Welcome to Dawlish Christian Fellowship!
More People, More Like Jesus
Dawlish Christian Fellowship (DCF) is a growing church seeking to be more people, more like Jesus.
DCF includes people of all ages and backgrounds whose lives have been touched and transformed through their personal encounters with Jesus Christ.
We are a relational church, with lots going on throughout the week. Check out the site for more details!!
We would love to welcome you and look forward to seeing you!
Mark’s Blog
Have you ever wondered why you get out of bed each morning? I know I have, at times. If only you could discover the reason you had been made, the very point of your life, then you might be more motivated to get up and go.
Well, you can.
You can, because you can discover your God-given spiritual vocation. And what I mean by your spiritual vocation is not your current or even your ideal job, be that paid or voluntary. Neither am I talking about your personal gifting, your love language, or the ‘sacred pathway’ through which you best hear from God, or connect with Him. It is none of these good things. Your spiritual vocation is something else altogether. And you can only ever receive it as a revelation from the Holy Spirit.
What am I talking about? Let me explain. Your spiritual vocation is the very meaning to your life, your secret purpose, or put less cryptically, why God made you, well, you. It’s what you would still be if you quit your current job. It’s what you will always be an advocate for, what you cannot help praising God for. It’s why you love Him, what you most admire about Him, which of His limitless attributes you find the most unspeakably wonderful. Here is a list of just a few of God’s attributes to get you thinking: Wise, Infinite, Sovereign, Holy, Joyful, All-Knowing, Faithful, Loving, Awe-Inspiring, Limitless in Power, Self-Existent, Self-Sufficient, Self-Controlled, Just, Truthful, Gentle, Unchanging, Merciful, Eternal, Good, Gracious, Patient, Kind, Peaceful, Present Everywhere.
That’s all well and good, but how do you discover this remarkable knowledge about yourself? To start with, don’t look to what you do, or to who you think you are – a grandparent, a manager, a cleaner, a student, or even a Christian. Instead, consider why you do it? What drives you? Reflect on this, by all means, but prayer is the only way you will ever really come to know this, because, through prayer, you need God to tell you, through His Spirit, what only He knows about you. What is the secret ‘name’ that He has for you, and by which He calls you in person, and only you? (Even if others profess to have a very similar spiritual vocation, it will feel truly unique and personal to each person through God’s love). Pray deeply, and over time, and share what you hear with a ‘soul friend’ who can honestly test what you have heard, and confirm it for you. They will probably be better placed to see in you what you cannot see in yourself.
Once you have a handle on what it is that you most love about God, it will bring change. Firstly, it will help you to personalise your faith; you will discover something of ‘My Jesus’, rather than everyone else’s Jesus. A glorious foretaste of what is to come ‘…then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. 1 Corinthians 13:12 (NIV). Secondly, it will help you to make good decisions. We are all inundated with a multitude of choices every day, but knowing your true purpose will help you to say ‘Yes’, and say ‘No’. You can use this knowledge as a decision-making tool to help you stay in God’s will for you. Thirdly, it will change the way you feel about mission, in the broadest sense of the word. Someone once said that ‘availability for mission’ is a key marker of spiritual maturity. Pursuing the very thing God that made you for will be irresistible to you, once it has been revealed to you, so ask, seek, knock (Matthew 7:7; Luke 11:9). There is no other path to complete personal fulfilment. God’s mission will become your mission. Fourthly, and finally, knowing your spiritual vocation will help you to find God in ‘all things’, not just in some things, which is what Fruitfulness on the Frontline is all about. Discover this and you will enter into a more expansive experience of the reality of God’s sovereignty over all things, and you will find your true place in God’s wonderful universe.
Mark Jones, Church Leader, June 2018