We open every morning with worship and prayer before our core teaching session begins. First of all, this is not your typical singing worship songs and prayer. This is prophetic worship and ministry time. People get words of prophecy, healing and deliverance every time we go before the Lord in worship. This is the best part of the day.
Yesterday morning we were singing and praying and one of the directors had a word from the Lord about a woman in the internship who had a specific calling, she had dedicated her life to ministry at about the age of 13-14 at church camp...um yeah, that was me. I raised my hand and people sitting around me came to pray for me, and the director prayed over me. Two women praying over me heard from the Lord that there was a spirit of rejection on me. I agreed and we prayed through that and I was delivered from that bondage. It was the most amazing feeling of relief. The director had been praying over me as well, encouraging me that I had not missed it, that I had been faithful and God was still preparing me to fulfill that destiny.
After the core teaching time, we were asked to fill out some paperwork for a program calling Pure Heart. It is an inner healing and purity covenant course we will be starting in February. On the form there was a checklist of things we were to mark if we were (or ever had been) struggling with them. One of the issues was suicidal thoughts. I had struggled for a short time with suicidal thoughts when I was freshman in high school. It hit me that it was August before my freshman year that I was at campmeeting and consecrated my future to God and felt the call to missions, and it was that first semester in high school that I was struggling with depression and dealing with suicidal thoughts until about Christmas time. The enemy had an assignment against my life! I had never made this connection before that I can remember. God had specific plans for my life and the enemy was trying to destroy them.
This means several things to me. It first of all means that God delivered me out of this trap. Through a faithful friend who reached out for help for me by contacting my youth pastor, and through the ministry of the Holy Spirit directly to my heart, the Lord looked out for me and did not allow me to be overcome.
Next it means that I was not only worth fighting against, I was worth fighting for. The enemy felt that I was significant enough to bother trying to trap. But more importantly, this thing that God has called me to is important enough for Him to bring to completion. I have been hearing a lot from Him while I have been here about my worth, my place in the Kingdom, the importance of fulfilling my destiny in Christ...and going back to this place of discovery when I was only 14 years old has allowed me to see that I haven't missed it. He knitted me together in my mother's womb and has been molding me and shaping me to be a Forerunner ever since. This is the place where it all starts to come together, where I find the boldness and freedom and intimacy that I need to walk out my destiny in Jesus Christ. I am in awe because I am not worthy in my own rite, but only because of the blood of the Lamb. I am honored to have a part to play in His Kingdom. And I am grateful to have another insight into how He has been working all things together for my good.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Sunday, January 16, 2011
week one: it's new day, it's a new dawn, and I'm feelin'...good...
I want to chronicle my time in Kansas City so badly but I don't even know where to begin or how to process everthing that's already happened.... I haven't even been here a full week yet, but I was packing this time last Sunday. I had to say a LOT of goodbyes. All of my previous missionary training came in handy in that respect; I learned the importance of saying good-bye and taking the time to do it right. Leaving, even if its only for a little while, is hard enough to process without having unfinished business left behind. Little things have a tendency to blow up into major things in a new "culture" or setting. It was important to me to make sure that my friends and family knew how much I loved and appreciated them before I left. God has used so many people in my life to help shape me and make me who I am today. He used His faithful to speak into my life and help me overcome the obstacles along the way. For that I am grateful. I have an amazing support system at home and it is by Divine design.
I left Monday January 10 for Lee's Summit, Missouri. I drove about 8 hours before I hit the snow storm that was moving my direction. I stopped outside St Louis for the night to avoid the snow. About five inches fell that night while I was sleeping. When I got back on to I70 the roads had been cleared, but there were cars and trucks abandoned in the ditches and medians pretty much the entire way to Kansas City. Thank the Lord for his protection and for His Spirit who guided me to stop for the night.
Tuesday I made it to my cousin's home round 1:30 PM. Amy and her husband Stan live near KC in Lee's Summit. I have found that it is literally 12-15 minutes from everywhere I need to be. I am so thankful for their willingness to adopt me into their home and family. It is so nice to be with extended family since I am so far from home. I have been having fun getting to know her children TJ, Joella, and Garrett, and even their pets, Cash, Fanny and Pancake. Amy and I were able to spend a couple of days together shopping and running errands and having lunch together before the Internship officially started on Friday 1/14.
The internship...I have never in my life been so overwhelmed by the presence of God. The clarity of Him drawing me to this place is staggering. I am so full up right now with praise and adoration for the work of His hand that I can hardly bear it. In three short days I have already learned so much about my identity in Christ...all I want is more. More of Him, more of His Word, more of His presence and power in my life...THIS is what I was created for. Everything this world has to offer pales in comparison to true intimacy with Him. I have only yet had a taste of what He wants to do in my life when I look at how He worked to bring me here. I can not wait to see what I will look like in 12 weeks. And speaking of 12 weeks, there is a track 2 in this internship that is another 12 weeks. I am already praying that God will make it possible for me to stay the full 6 months. I have no doubt that if it's His will that He will make it happen. The financial miracles I have seen and have been hearing about from my fellow interns have been astounding.
This is just the tip of the iceberg...I promise to post more later as I process through the things I have been hearing from the Lord and as we dive in on Tuesday into our full schedule.
I left Monday January 10 for Lee's Summit, Missouri. I drove about 8 hours before I hit the snow storm that was moving my direction. I stopped outside St Louis for the night to avoid the snow. About five inches fell that night while I was sleeping. When I got back on to I70 the roads had been cleared, but there were cars and trucks abandoned in the ditches and medians pretty much the entire way to Kansas City. Thank the Lord for his protection and for His Spirit who guided me to stop for the night.
Tuesday I made it to my cousin's home round 1:30 PM. Amy and her husband Stan live near KC in Lee's Summit. I have found that it is literally 12-15 minutes from everywhere I need to be. I am so thankful for their willingness to adopt me into their home and family. It is so nice to be with extended family since I am so far from home. I have been having fun getting to know her children TJ, Joella, and Garrett, and even their pets, Cash, Fanny and Pancake. Amy and I were able to spend a couple of days together shopping and running errands and having lunch together before the Internship officially started on Friday 1/14.
The internship...I have never in my life been so overwhelmed by the presence of God. The clarity of Him drawing me to this place is staggering. I am so full up right now with praise and adoration for the work of His hand that I can hardly bear it. In three short days I have already learned so much about my identity in Christ...all I want is more. More of Him, more of His Word, more of His presence and power in my life...THIS is what I was created for. Everything this world has to offer pales in comparison to true intimacy with Him. I have only yet had a taste of what He wants to do in my life when I look at how He worked to bring me here. I can not wait to see what I will look like in 12 weeks. And speaking of 12 weeks, there is a track 2 in this internship that is another 12 weeks. I am already praying that God will make it possible for me to stay the full 6 months. I have no doubt that if it's His will that He will make it happen. The financial miracles I have seen and have been hearing about from my fellow interns have been astounding.
This is just the tip of the iceberg...I promise to post more later as I process through the things I have been hearing from the Lord and as we dive in on Tuesday into our full schedule.
Friday, June 26, 2009
Considering current events...
The past couple weeks have been tough in the entertainment world, losing 4 big names at once. Doesn't it usually happen in 3's? Anyway, with the loss of Kung Fu Master David Carradine, Jester Ed McMann, Angel Farrah Fawcett, and now the King of Pop, Michael Jackson, there is a lot of buzz out there. Every person's reactions are based on their opinion of the person who died, and the opinions are many! Of course the free thought is what makes this Country great, but I can't help but be saddened by some of them.
My personal opinion about MJ is that he was psychologically ill, but a genius in music. The world worshipped him, which is not OK with me, but his talent and impact on the music industry is something that cannot be denied. I loved his music. I remember listening to Thriller and Beat It on the playground on a friend's little cassette player and loving it. I still love it and have a lot of his #1's on my Crackberry. As far as the pedophile accusations, I lean towards not believing he was the monster he is accused of being. The accusers walked away with money instead of justice, that tells me that something was false. In my opinion, his childhood was destroyed by fame and the greed of his father, like SO many child actors and performers of that era. His family says that he was just child-like, loved children, and was trying to re-gain the childhood he never had. That coming from an adult man with psychological issues is often considered creepy. We will never know what truly happened, and now it's between him and God. It really only ever was.
Which leads to my sadness. I was at a Christian function when all of this with MJ was going down, and actually had someone say to me, referring to all the recent deaths, that "the gates of hell were busy this week". They were laughing, and I was in shock because it was coming out of the mouth of someone I have deep respect for and have known forever. How can it be funny? How can we know or judge where they are right now? I believe in hell. I believe we can choose to not live in relationship with God and that it has consequences in Eternity. I cannot however, know the heart of someone else at the moment of their death and say in jest or otherwise that they went to hell! We look at the celebrities today and the absolute mess that is plastered all over the media and assume there is no hope for them, that they are out of God's reach. (Which is a lie!) And then somehow we are not saddened or moved at the thought of someone spending an Eternity without the Presence of God. As a follower I have experienced times in my life where I have not felt His Presence because of the hardening of my heart; because of the path I had chosen. We all experience dry times and it is not pleasant. That is only a taste of what a world completely void of Him would be like. A world with no God filter? We cannot imagine this. The very thought makes me shudder! And yet we are ready to toss anyone who is not like us into such a place without batting an eye. I am thankful that He is the final Judge and knows the heart of each individual in life at the point of death. I am thankful that my Eternity does not rest in fickle human hands but in the Omniscient Creator.
I am guilty of joking about "going to hell" for things done by people. It's usually with a friend and I don't really believe they are going to hell. It's a lot less funny after the person has actually died, however. It's easy to think, oh they got what they deserved, but if that were true... if we all got what we deserved, we would all be screwed.
I am not in denial. From the outside it doesn't look like these people had any connection to God at all. But the bottom line is that I hope that God will give us a heart that sees people from His perspective, and gives the capacity to grieve when one of His children is lost. I do not want to be callous to the fate of immortal souls that are created in God's image. That judgemental superiority is one of the most effective barriers between followers and unbelievers. And by the grace of God, I refuse to add any bricks.
My personal opinion about MJ is that he was psychologically ill, but a genius in music. The world worshipped him, which is not OK with me, but his talent and impact on the music industry is something that cannot be denied. I loved his music. I remember listening to Thriller and Beat It on the playground on a friend's little cassette player and loving it. I still love it and have a lot of his #1's on my Crackberry. As far as the pedophile accusations, I lean towards not believing he was the monster he is accused of being. The accusers walked away with money instead of justice, that tells me that something was false. In my opinion, his childhood was destroyed by fame and the greed of his father, like SO many child actors and performers of that era. His family says that he was just child-like, loved children, and was trying to re-gain the childhood he never had. That coming from an adult man with psychological issues is often considered creepy. We will never know what truly happened, and now it's between him and God. It really only ever was.
Which leads to my sadness. I was at a Christian function when all of this with MJ was going down, and actually had someone say to me, referring to all the recent deaths, that "the gates of hell were busy this week". They were laughing, and I was in shock because it was coming out of the mouth of someone I have deep respect for and have known forever. How can it be funny? How can we know or judge where they are right now? I believe in hell. I believe we can choose to not live in relationship with God and that it has consequences in Eternity. I cannot however, know the heart of someone else at the moment of their death and say in jest or otherwise that they went to hell! We look at the celebrities today and the absolute mess that is plastered all over the media and assume there is no hope for them, that they are out of God's reach. (Which is a lie!) And then somehow we are not saddened or moved at the thought of someone spending an Eternity without the Presence of God. As a follower I have experienced times in my life where I have not felt His Presence because of the hardening of my heart; because of the path I had chosen. We all experience dry times and it is not pleasant. That is only a taste of what a world completely void of Him would be like. A world with no God filter? We cannot imagine this. The very thought makes me shudder! And yet we are ready to toss anyone who is not like us into such a place without batting an eye. I am thankful that He is the final Judge and knows the heart of each individual in life at the point of death. I am thankful that my Eternity does not rest in fickle human hands but in the Omniscient Creator.
I am guilty of joking about "going to hell" for things done by people. It's usually with a friend and I don't really believe they are going to hell. It's a lot less funny after the person has actually died, however. It's easy to think, oh they got what they deserved, but if that were true... if we all got what we deserved, we would all be screwed.
I am not in denial. From the outside it doesn't look like these people had any connection to God at all. But the bottom line is that I hope that God will give us a heart that sees people from His perspective, and gives the capacity to grieve when one of His children is lost. I do not want to be callous to the fate of immortal souls that are created in God's image. That judgemental superiority is one of the most effective barriers between followers and unbelievers. And by the grace of God, I refuse to add any bricks.
Monday, February 02, 2009
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
cs lewis: on infection and the Trinity
"And that, by the way, is perhaps the most important difference between Christianity and all other religions: that in Christianity God is not a static thing-not even a person-but a dynamic, pulsating activity, a life almost a kind of drama. Almost, if you will not think me irreverent, a kind of dance."
"And now, what does it all matter? It matters more than anything in the world. The whole dance, or drama, or pattern of this three Personal life is to be played out in each one of us: or (putting it the other way around) each one of us has got to enter that pattern, take his place in that dance. There is no other way to the happiness for which we were made. Good things as well as bad, you know, are caught by a kind of infection. If you want to get warm you must stand near the fire: if you want to be wet you get into the water. If you want joy, power, peace, eternal life, you must get close to, or even into, the thing that has them. They are not a sort of prize which God could, if He chose, just hand out to anyone. They are a great fountain of energy and beauty spurting up at the very centre of reality. If you are close to it, the spray will wet you: if you are not, you will remain dry. Once a man is united to God how could he not live forever? Once a man is separated from God, what can he do but wither and die?" CS LEWIS, Mere Christianity
The past year or so I have felt like I have been withering. And all of my own accord, I have to admit. It is I who needs to walk into the spray of the fountain. I found a letter I wrote to myself several years ago, 6 things to never forget. It reminded me of time when I was so close to the Heat source I was on FIRE. And yet close to the Fountain I was dripping wet. I guess Amy Grant knew what she was talking about when she sang about not always being able to be on the mountain top. I used to sit in my room with my 8 track player and sing along with her at the top of my lungs not having a clue really what she was saying.
It is a conscious decision to move closer. A crisis point that seems to come repeatedly in our lives as we forget sometimes what it takes to maintain a relationship with Him, or what it feels like to be moved by Him. Or what it's like when things are done in His power instead of our own. We read about the Israelites in the Wilderness and see and how quickly they forget. I saw Prince Caspian and saw how quickly the children dismissed their history with Aslan. We see such things and have a tendency to say what are they THINKING?? And yet I do the same thing over and over in my life. I couldn't even love Him if He didn't love me first. I couldn't even desire to know Him unless he placed it in my heart. The desire is definitely there, but is the discipline? There has to be a willingness to turn off the TV or the radio and listen for Him, communicate with Him. I have been trying to take advantage of those moments again, attempting to get close enough to the Source of everything I long to know and desire to be. I can feel Him blessing my efforts when I take those steps, when I willingly move into the dance...
"And now, what does it all matter? It matters more than anything in the world. The whole dance, or drama, or pattern of this three Personal life is to be played out in each one of us: or (putting it the other way around) each one of us has got to enter that pattern, take his place in that dance. There is no other way to the happiness for which we were made. Good things as well as bad, you know, are caught by a kind of infection. If you want to get warm you must stand near the fire: if you want to be wet you get into the water. If you want joy, power, peace, eternal life, you must get close to, or even into, the thing that has them. They are not a sort of prize which God could, if He chose, just hand out to anyone. They are a great fountain of energy and beauty spurting up at the very centre of reality. If you are close to it, the spray will wet you: if you are not, you will remain dry. Once a man is united to God how could he not live forever? Once a man is separated from God, what can he do but wither and die?" CS LEWIS, Mere Christianity
The past year or so I have felt like I have been withering. And all of my own accord, I have to admit. It is I who needs to walk into the spray of the fountain. I found a letter I wrote to myself several years ago, 6 things to never forget. It reminded me of time when I was so close to the Heat source I was on FIRE. And yet close to the Fountain I was dripping wet. I guess Amy Grant knew what she was talking about when she sang about not always being able to be on the mountain top. I used to sit in my room with my 8 track player and sing along with her at the top of my lungs not having a clue really what she was saying.
It is a conscious decision to move closer. A crisis point that seems to come repeatedly in our lives as we forget sometimes what it takes to maintain a relationship with Him, or what it feels like to be moved by Him. Or what it's like when things are done in His power instead of our own. We read about the Israelites in the Wilderness and see and how quickly they forget. I saw Prince Caspian and saw how quickly the children dismissed their history with Aslan. We see such things and have a tendency to say what are they THINKING?? And yet I do the same thing over and over in my life. I couldn't even love Him if He didn't love me first. I couldn't even desire to know Him unless he placed it in my heart. The desire is definitely there, but is the discipline? There has to be a willingness to turn off the TV or the radio and listen for Him, communicate with Him. I have been trying to take advantage of those moments again, attempting to get close enough to the Source of everything I long to know and desire to be. I can feel Him blessing my efforts when I take those steps, when I willingly move into the dance...
Thursday, December 06, 2007
Journey-Don't Stop Believing (ZOO BAND)
Ok, Journey has hired a new lead singer. Who knew a guy from the Philipines could channel Steve Perry?
Friday, November 09, 2007
mere christianity
Let's just start by saying CS Lewis was a genius. That being said, I have been reading his Mere Christianity. It should have been a requirement in college for any of my basic christian beliefs classes. Except it wasn't. Don't even get me started on that.
Here is one thing I have been chewing on this past week or so:
Here is one thing I have been chewing on this past week or so:
"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: 'I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic--on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg--or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God; or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."
That's deep. Thoughts?
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
PC?
Last Sunday Pastor Steve started a sermon series on the Tough Questions of Life and Faith. He made a comment that cracked me up, but no one else seemed to catch it. He was talking about Faith and being "politically correct" in America and he said "Today it isn't kosher to ask somebody about their religion".
Can anybody tell me what's wrong with that statement?? :)
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