selah

What do you think?

2009-03-14T20:39:00.001+11:00

This particular line- is something I have been saying for 'years'.....


Second, we charismatics still seem to have a habit of elevating 
gifting above character.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*



THE TRAGIC SCANDAL of GREASY GRACE
-by J. Lee Grady.

This week's announcement about evangelist Todd Bentley's hasty
remarriage and restoration is sending a confusing message to the church.

I groaned when I learned early this week that Canadian preacher
Todd Bentley, leader of the controversial Lakeland Revival, had
decided to divorce his wife, Shonnah, and marry his former
ministry intern, Jessa Hasbrook. The news surfaced after almost
nine months of silence and speculation, during which time the
board of Bentley's Fresh Fire Ministries in British Columbia
publicly scolded him for committing adultery.

In a statement released March 10 by Rick Joyner, the popular
author and minister who is overseeing Bentley's restoration
process, we were told that (1) Bentley married his new wife several
weeks ago and moved to Joyner's base in Fort Mill, S.C.; (2) Todd
and Jessa agree that their relationship was "wrong and premature"
and that it "should not have happened the way it did"; (3) Bentley
will remain out of public ministry while he seeks healing; and (4)
Joyner will oversee the healing process with input from Dallas
pastor Jack Deere and California pastor Bill Johnson.

"Many of us have rejected biblical discipline and adopted a sweet,
spineless love that cannot correct."

It was also announced that Bentley plans to relaunch his ministry,
called Fresh Fire USA, in Fort Mill, and that Joyner is now
collecting donations from supporters to help rebuild it. (The
Canadian ministry Bentley started has now been renamed
Transform International, and it has severed ties with the evangelist.)

In a few places in his statement Joyner expressed tough love,
especially when he said: "We know that trust has to be earned
and that Todd will have to earn the trust of the body of Christ for
future ministry, which will not be easy, nor should it be." He also
made it clear that true repentance and restoration "can only come
if we refuse to compromise the clear biblical standards for morality
and integrity."

But there were some glaring omissions in the statements released
this week that indicate a fundamental weakness in our freestyle
approach to "restoring" fallen leaders.

First of all, it is outrageous that Shonnah Bentley, Todd's first wife,
does not seem to be an issue in the current discussion. Her name
is never mentioned in Joyner's statement-while Todd is mentioned
18 times. We are never told how Shonnah is handling the divorce.
How will she manage to care for the three children she and Todd
share? She and the kids seem invisible in this process. Yet if
anyone needs healing and restoration, is it not the other half of
this broken family?

Second, we charismatics still seem to have a habit of elevating
gifting above character. It's almost as if the end justifies the means.
(So what if a preacher ruins one marriage and makes a hasty
decision to marry a younger woman - the important thing is that
we get him back in the pulpit to heal the sick!) That is a perversion
of biblical integrity. God can anoint any man or woman with the
Holy Spirit's power; what He is looking for are vessels of honor that
can carry that anointing with dignity, humility and purity.

What is most deplorable about this latest installment in the
Bentley scandal is the lack of true remorse. In his own statement,
Bentley apologizes for his actions and says he "takes full
responsibility for my part for the ending of the marriage." But how
can he be taking "full responsibility" if he willingly chose to have a
girlfriend on the side-and then married her immediately after his
divorce was final? Why did he hide for several months when he
should have been listening to counsel and seeking reconciliation
with his first wife?

Many Christians today have rejected biblical discipline and
adopted a sweet, spineless love that cannot correct. Our grace is
greasy. No matter what an offending brother does, we stroke him
and pet him and nurse his wounds while we ignore the people he
wounded. No matter how heinous his sin, we offer comforting
platitudes because, after all, who are we to judge?

When the apostle Paul learned that a member of the Corinthian
church was in an immoral relationship with his father's wife, he did
not rush to comfort the man. He told the Corinthians: "You have
become arrogant and have not mourned instead, so that the one
who had done this deed would be removed from your midst" (I Cor.
5:2). Sometimes we must draw a ruthless sword in order to bring
genuine healing. The "wounds of a friend" are faithful to bring
conviction and true repentance (see Prov. 27:6).

Paul actually delivered the unrepentant Corinthian man to Satan
"for the destruction of his flesh" (5:5) so that he could be saved.
That does not sound very nice. Many today would call Paul's tactic
harsh and legalistic. But that is because we have lost any true
sense of the fear of the Lord - and we don't realize that our laxness
about God's standards is a perversion of His mercy. When the sin
is severe, the public rebuke must be severe.

In all the discussion of Bentley and the demise of the Lakeland
Revival, I am waiting to hear the sound of sackcloth ripping into
shreds. We should be weeping. We should be rending our hearts -
as God commanded Israel when they fell into sin (see Joel 2:
13-14). To give guidance to a confused church, our leaders should
have publicly decried the Lakeland disaster while at the same time
helping both Todd and Shonnah to heal.

We have not mourned this travesty. We have not been shocked
and appalled that such sin has been named among us. We act as
if flippant divorce and remarriage are minor infractions - when in
actuality they are such serious moral failures that they can bring
disqualification.

If we truly love Todd Bentley, we will not clamor for his quick return
to the pulpit. While we certainly want him to be fully restored to
fellowship with God, we cannot rush the process of restoring a
man to ministry. Leaders must live up to a higher standard. We
must demand that those involved in Bentley's restoration not only
love him but also love the church by protecting us from the kind of
scandal we endured last year.

-J. Lee Grady is editor of Charisma.

~SOURCE: http://www.charismamag.com/index.php/fire-in-my-bones

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Dirty Laundry Day

2008-04-13T06:55:00.001+10:00

Currently Reading
When Bad Christians Happen to Good People: Where We Have Failed Each Other and How to Reverse the Damage
By Dave Burchett
see related

Welcome to my dirty laundry day. I thought today should be the day I take a theraputic look at some of the major mistakes I and the church at large have made while representing a loving God.

*Breathes deeply*

Okay, let's get on with it.

Turn or Burn

I have an ever growing disdain for the arm of Christianity that continues to represent Jesus in this light. I can not find ONE biblical example of where he used this type of evangelism with people. Yet over the years 'many' Christian groups have used this in order to frighten people into the kingdom of God.

I myself have been guilty of it as well.

I now understand a little bit of Why I did this.

Many of us Christians have been brought up hearing this kind of thing over and over again. Because those that have gone before us have not properly understood the love and grace of God, they too have not been able to represent Him in that light either.

It is a bit like the child of an alcoholic becoming an alcoholic. You become what you hate, and you become what you know.

Of course this is not not an excuse for it happening nor the misbehaviors or consequences that ensue, but it may explain a little of why it does.

It is only when you begin to KNOW God as grace and love and experience it, can you really begin to be His representative of it. Otherwise it just becomes another far off 'characteristic' of God that glimmers somewhere behind the legalism and religiosity.
If you had been brought up in the type of church that focused on rules, 'laws, appearances and behavior then you get the distorted view that this must be how God operates.

Unfortunately this point of view usually keeps people wrapped up in fear and not really able to experience true freedom in Christ Jesus.

Does this mean that you can just become a follower of Christ and just 'do' whatever you like?
Ahh we will deal with that another day.

The Marketing of God

After all aren't Christians His sale's reps on earth? Well yes in someways they are. When you look at a Christian we consciously or unconsciously start to measure them up, to see if they are worthy of the label, almost like suddenly God reached down from heaven and gave the job he had reserved for Jesus to us to do on his behalf.

We have all done it. Often we can make the decision to investigate Christianity on the behavior of the Christians that we know. Likewise we may decide to stay away for the same reasons.

But this is not really what I am talking about. Some churches have become mega corporations that 'sell' God very well. Unfortunately they don't always sell an accurate view of God or the Christian life. Often taking a soft sell approach to make and keep converts.

What happens usually in this scenario, is when your life does not turn out as perfectly as you are told it will, you become disenchanted with it. This may leave you feeling a couple of ways.

a. That God has failed you
b. Maybe you are just not good enough for God and therefore not worthy of the kind of blessing you have been promised.
c. You simply don't have enough faith.

God doesn't need His people to market Him, it wasn't what He asked them to do and He certainly never asked anyone to distort the truth of His message in order to do so.

If you want to know exactly what Jesus did ask us to do you can read it here...

Disciple making is very different, it requires mentoring, a deeper level of relationship and committing to journey with someone towards authenticity. It is NOT becoming the voice of conscience in someone's life. God already gave that job to the Holy Spirit. But it 'may be' offering advice and wisdom appropriate to the relationship.

Because becoming a true follower of Christ starts with a personal revelation of Jesus, and because it is a relationship, God really can't be marketed. People can explain to you how to enter into that relationship with God, but at the end of the day a relationship is just that- a relationship. Something YOU do with someone YOU love (or at least care about) and something YOU are responsible for. No church or other individual can do that for you.

The church is not some multi-million dollar marketing machine (or at least it shouldn't be) the Church = the Body of people that have a relationship with God through the son Jesus Christ.

I know I certainly have been guilty of treating God as a product to be marketed before, and for this I greatly apologize.

Emotional drive by shootings

You know the type I mean. Those sharp shooting accusations by well meaning people just 'speaking the truth' that end up being more like bullets in our heart and soul.

You may have heard, or experienced some of the following bullets:

'Look at those tattoo's and you call yourself a Christian'

'Well, I could have told him it would end that way, she was a bad seed to begin with. It's his own fault'.

'You're pregnant? We just can't have you here any more imagine the example you are setting for our daughters'

'Dear, you simply CAN NOT come in here dressed like that'

'Young man tuck your shirt in, don't you know you are in the house of God and where is your tie?'

'My son Johnny saw your Bruce smoking behind the sheds at school the other day. And you call your son a Christian? I have spoken to the pastor and he can't come back to Youth until he has quit that evil habit'

'AIDS? You do realize that is the judgement of God don't you?'

'You like to raise your hands in worship? I just don't think you are going to fit in here'.

'You never really had any hope did you, alcoholic father, loose mother, it's no wonder you turned out this way'.

And even worse, tragically there are those that found themselves mistreated by people in positions of authority and power within the church. Abused sexually, emotionally, mentally and spiritually by shepherds who are supposed to care gently and tenderly for those under their care.

These are the kind of emotional drive by shootings the world and the church can do without.

In fact if we are honest with ourselves we all have done it to someone else at some point in our lives in a similar way. And we have all had these happen to us at some pointing our lives. Christianity doesn't have a monopoly on these kind of behaviors but it certainly has it's fair share of participants.

Asssumptions, critical statements, or accusations without ever a shred of empathy, compassion or a deeper understanding of the whys behind behavior.

Jesus did not operate in this manner with people. In fact from what I have read of the gospels, the only people he ever did react too was the religious of his day who set themselves up as being judge and jury on people's behavior. Make no mistake, Jesus sees what goes on in the church in His name, and He will deal with it, in this life or the next. Thankfully though we have the ability to change our behaviors before it is all too late. That is the wonderful thing about Jesus and the power of the Cross.

I have certainly been guilty of participating in drive by shootings.
And again I sincerely apologize.

Before I go I just want to leave you with one of my favorite bible passages from the Message bible.

1 John 4

17-18God is love. When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. This way, love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature in us, so that we're free of worry on Judgment Day—our standing in the world is identical with Christ's. There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life—fear of death, fear of judgment—is one not yet fully formed in love.

19We, though, are going to love—love and be loved. First we were loved, now we love. He loved us first.

20-21If anyone boasts, "I love God," and goes right on hating his brother or sister, thinking nothing of it, he is a liar. If he won't love the person he can see, how can he love the God he can't see? The command we have from Christ is blunt: Loving God includes loving people. You've got to love both.

When Bad Christians Happen to Good People

2008-04-03T07:56:00.000+11:00

Quote from the above book':

Sinner-Sensitive Church

"The sinner-sensitive church (SSC) is my proposal for a new church movement toward making everyone feel welcomed and loved. The SSC would model nonjudgmental attitudes. Issues like having tattoos, body piercings, weird hair, or ugly shoes would not necessarily denote demon possession. The SSC would pledge not to gossip because we would realize that it is only by the grace of God that we are not the current targets. The SSC would value every spiritual, physical and financial gift, no matter how big or small. This church would appreciate but not elevate the person who built the new wing with the large financial endowment. The SSC would make it a practice to reach out, touch and care for one another sacrificially because we know that we all fall down in life and in our Christian walk. At the SSC we would have executives holding hands in prayer with laborers and not thinking twice about it. Blacks and white and Hispanics and others would break bread together because we are all sinners in the eyes of a color blind God.

The SSC would give freely out of profound gratitude to a God who some how saw fit to give us an undeserved chance. The SSC would practice the prodigal son ministry, running to welcome those returning from mistakes and bad decisions and sin. Ou members would get involved in other people's lives. We would hold our brothers and sisters accountable to godly standards. Marriage would be cherished. Families would have a community of support during problems and trials. The congregation of the SSC would not be self-centered that we would demand the undivided attention of the pastor at every little crisis. Other believers would help meet many of those needs that we now prefer to leave to the 'professional Christians' on staff. The people of this church would come with hearts ready to be fed but also realizing that God has provided resources beyond any available in history to meet our spiritual hunger. And should we walk out the church doors still needy, we would know we can draw from the marvelous resources of Christian books, music, radio, video, tapes, Internet and studies to meet our needs. Anyone of us could be filled to overflowing if that were our desire.

The SSC would also delight in the company of other spiritual travelers and make it a priority that no one ever felt alone. We would make each other feel valuable but on occasion a little uncomfortable. Being comfortable in church is not the primary goal. I am not always comfortable at the dentist's office. I often arrive home in pain because I have neglected to do what I should have done. The staff always make me feel welcome and even cared for. Then the dentist confronts me with the truth; "You have let this go too long, and I must hurt you (a little) in order to heal you. You will have to pay a financial price and spend time recovering before you feel completely well". Those are the facts of my dental hygiene sin. The sinner sensitive church would not back off the truth either. Decay in the enamel or soul must be addressed. We will tell one another the truth and explain that the process might be a little painful. We would participate in ongoing preventative maintenance and help one another deal with problems as soon as possible, before they become even more painful and expensive to fix.

The SSC would worship with enthusiasm, whether singing hymns or praise choruses because God is worthy of that praise. The SS fellowship would have a sense of profound reverence because we have received God's grace, the most amazing gift ever offered. The SSC would be so excited about this grace that the incredible news of the gospel would be as much a part of who we are as our jobs and our families.

SS was the ministry style of our Lord. He was always available to people who realized their need. Merely being a seeker did not merit his time. The wealthy young man came to Jesus seeking what he lacked to receive eternal life (Matthew 19:16-22). However, the jarring truth of Christ's answer to sell his possessions and give to the poor revealed to him that he was not ready to follow Christ. But when sinners came with a humble confession of need and a willingness to obey God, Jesus never turned them away. The church of Acts was SS and functioned much in the way I have described above (I am not sure about the praise choruses though).

Frankly, sometimes we try a little too hard to "attract" the unchurched. A church that functioned like the one descried above would be such a societal miracle that you couldn't keep people away if you barred the doors. And while the majority of my idealism has been beaten out of me, I still believe that such a church will be possible when we finally reach a point of actually wanting it. That will not come until we decide we are willing to pay the price for such a church. The harsh reality is that most of us are afraid to commit to this radical type of fellowship because we aren't sure what it requires of us. My own natural reaction is "Praise the Lord but keep the Lexus"! I'll hazard a guess that you are the same. When the young rich man in Matthew heard Jesus' words to him, "he went away sad, because he had great wealth."

"When Bad Christians happen to good People" Dave Burchett pgs 25-27

Thoughts?

Being off balance........

2008-03-31T03:30:00.004+11:00

I took my son Joey for his daily toddle up the lane this afternoon. He loves it, and has really begun to look forward to this part of his routine. Being in a colder climate I plan this little outing for him otherwise we would be housebound all day long.

Joey is 17 months old and being the youngest of 5 is head strong to say the least. He knows what he wants, when he wants it and how it is going to happen. I suppose it comes from being the youngest in the pecking order.

For me the daily toddle is a frustrating experience. I want Joey to walk to the end of the lane and home again, getting a nice bit of exercise and breathing in some fresh country air along the way. I don't mind if he stops to admire the flowers, the horses, to jump through the puddles if he so desires, chat to me (and our fellow toddlers) along the way or any other thing that takes his fancy on the way up the lane. But I would certainly prefer a walk where both of us walk forward one way and then forward the same way home.

Joey is more creative (read stubborn) in his style.

He likes to walk a couple of steps forward. Shake his head at me, turn and go the opposite direction. I pick him up, walk forward, put him down, watch him toddle forward a few more paces, then prepare myself for the dash in the opposite direction.

It was during our habitual walk this afternoon that I noticed a very interesting thing about Joey.

Whenever he shook his head at me, he became unbalanced. His steps forward became more stumbley than usual and he lost his sense of direction. More often than not he would end up on his bottom in the gravely lane.

As I watched him do that, I wondered if that is how we look to God.

God has a plan for our lives, a focus for us to keep our eyes fixed upon- His son Jesus.

Sometimes we don't like the direction being a follower of Christ leads us. Life often throws us curve balls that we neither expect nor want, and certainly don't deserve. It is part of living in a world where sin and hurt are still a regular part of our earthly existence.

These are the times we have choices to make.

We can stand or even run from God shaking our head. But this may leave us off balanced. Then being unbalanced we stumble and fall, landing on our proverbial backside often physically as well as spiritually.

Or we can run towards the arms of our savior. Our Father, who loves us and tenderly wants to carry us through those times of hurt and uncertainty.

As frustrating as it is taking Joey for these walks, we will continue. He needs the exercise and the fresh air. He needs the training these little walks provide as a bi product. He needs the time to hold my hand and have my undivided attention for that small portion of time in my day. He needs me to smile and tell him I love him, praise His successes and guide him along the way with a firm but gentle hand.

He needs me to model for him the love and grace of God.

And I need to watch him as he learns these things, to remind me of my own short comings.

Clothes....

2008-03-30T04:16:00.000+11:00

I know we Christians have a frustrating knack of spiritualizing everything. I know that it gets up the rest of the populations nose, and most likely many of our own noses as well. This one has certainly been up mine all week.

I found myself thinking very deeply about what my clothes say about me.

Do they represent any deeper side of my character, both good and bad?

Can you tell things about me by my clothing?

Can I tell things about my clothing?

This goes deeper than the 'modesty' debate that Christians normally get stuck on. This is, why do I make the choices I make about the clothes I wear, where I shop, how much I spend and even the fabrics I wear?

Jesus said in Matthew 15

16"Are you still so dull?" Jesus asked them. 17"Don't you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man 'unclean.' 19For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20These are what make a man 'unclean'; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him 'unclean.' "

It is what comes out of us that 'indicates' our heart conditions. Surely something as simple as clothing choices can also be governed by the condition of our heart? And if this is indeed the case then surely our clothing on a conscious or unconscious level represents something of the inner man both good and bad?

Things like the amount of money we spend on clothes, a desire for particular brands, or not for brands but a particular style, or fitting a mold, representing a cause, a team, people pleasing, fitting a group, a political part, the debt we may go into to afford our clothing or have we even developed a scrooge mentality that has come from something deeper within us that may not be God?

I am NOT talking here about rules, regulations or legalism in the sense of trying to tie anybody to any one particular choice or train of thought. I am trying to dig a little deeper into why we do the things we do!

I like comfortable clothes for instance. I go out of my way to find soft fabrics at an affordable price. I KNOW this is a reflection on the part of my character that likes comfort. This is a negative thing about me. I dislike it when I am uncomfortable in my clothes, in life, in a social situation, even in the weather. I lack particular traits that enable me to grin and bear it with style and grace and trust in God.

BUT over the last year the Lord has been showing me little niggly things like this in my character through the things that 'come out of me'. The every day things like preferences in clothing have shown me deep inconsistent, failings in my character that need to come under the power of the cross.

Please don't get me wrong. I am not at all suggesting a life of introspective naval gazing where we constantly examine everything we do, becoming so caught up with it that we are no good to anyone. What I am challenging is from time to time, examining some of the more robotic choices we make to see if there are hypocrisies that can be picked up in these choices that do not measure up with the character of God and the 'renewal of mind' we are supposed to be coming under.

I like this quote about being a hypocrite.

Hypocrite: 'one who ceases to perceive his deception, the one who lies with sincerity'- Andre' Gide (in When Bad Christians happen to Good People by Dave Burchett)

Something as simple as the clothes we wear, may very well reveal a flaw (or good trait) in our character that may be silently speaking volumes in the 'spiritual' realm as well as the physical.

We may be under a deception and blissfully lying beautifully to the world around us.

Why did he refuse the Myrrh?

2008-03-27T19:01:00.000+11:00

This Easter I was struck with the question of why did Jesus refuse the Myrrh laced wine they offered him in Mark chapter 15:

22They brought Jesus to the place called Golgotha (which means The Place of the Skull). 23Then they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. 24And they crucified him. Dividing up his clothes, they cast lots to see what each would get.

The analgesic effects of Myrrh have been known throughout history and Myrrh has been used to help deal with pain and infection.
So why did Jesus refuse it?

Was it so that the could feel the true effects of what was about to take place, not numb in anyway to the pain that he would suffer for us?

Was it so He could truly identify with our pain as it talks about in Hebrews 4?

14Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens,[e] Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. 15For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. 16Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

One commentator draws attention to the fact that Jesus tasted the wine laced with Myrrh which would have been a bitter taste to His mouth, and while He tasted the bitterness of the he would not partake in the benefit of the drink.

Is it to set the example that God is exceedingly able to comfort us through any pain we face even unto death and we do not need to 'numb' our pain through other means, for us to draw comfort from sources other than Christ?

I am still not sure on why it was He refused that drink in the place of the skull, but I do know He did it for me.

A Bossy Attitude

2008-03-07T01:47:00.000+11:00

WORD FOR THE WEEK 2 March 2008
Christian Fellowship Church, Bangalore, India.
http://www.cfcindia.com
------------------------------------------------------------

A Bossy Attitude

Zac Poonen

Our Lord was a servant, but alas, Christian leaders and
missionaries today are often masters-bosses and Sahibs.
We may not be able to prevent others from calling us "Sahibs"
perhaps, but the question is whether we desire to be Sahibs
in our hearts.

We need to re-learn the lesson that Jesus sought so
patiently to teach His disciples. To them He said, after
washing their feet, "In this world the kings and great men
order their slaves around...but among you the one who serves
you best will be your leader. Out in the world the master
sits at the table and is served by his servants. But not
here! For I am your servant" (Lk. 22:25-27-Living N.T.).
Oh, how these words should convict us of our bossy attitude to
those under us. How we should be humbled by the example of
our Lord. May the Lord remove from us all false, worldly
ideas of self-respect and dignity and race-superiority that
we may yet be having. May He teach us afresh that the real
mark of greatness in the kingdom of God is to be a servant,
a pourer of water, as Jesus was.

May God help us to take the low place not only now but right
through till the end of our lives. Let us never seek for
honour and respect and obedience from our fellow-brethren at
any time, not even when we feel we are senior workers in the
Lord's vineyard. In our attitude to others, may we always
recognise that they are the masters and we are the servants-
even if our official position in the administrative set-up
of our church is higher than theirs and even if we are
senior in age and in experience. The higher we go, the more
it becomes our responsibility to serve others.

2 Corinthians 4:5 is a very challenging verse in this
connection. Paul says there (paraphrasing his words).
"We preach two things: By our lips we proclaim Christ Jesus as
Lord. By our life we proclaim ourselves as your servants for
Jesus' sake."

Brothers and sisters, this is our twofold message;
and what God has joined together, let no man put asunder.
This is the full gospel. May we never be guilty of proclaiming
only half of it, for only when this message is proclaimed in
its entirety will the heathen begin to see Christ sanctified in us.
It is the lack of this that hinders so much of the Lord's
work in our land today.

If we are to be servants, we have to be genuinely humble.
We shouldn't mistake condescension for humility. It is easy to
have condescension. Even selfish politicians have that.
We can have a conceited opinion of ourselves in our hearts that
we are big people and then condescend to fellowship with
lesser folk and mistake that for humility. No, that's not
humility at all.

Genuine humility involves my recognising that in God's eyes
there is no difference whatever between me and anyone else.
All the natural distinctions that exist between me and others
are caused by circumstances and environmental factors etc.,
and have all been eradicated at the cross. The cross of
Jesus reduces us all to zero. If that has not happened in my life,
it only indicates that I have not yet begun to esteem others
as more important than myself, as Philippians 2:3 commands us to.
Once we have been reduced to zero, it becomes easy to
take the low place, willingly and joyfully. And it becomes easy
then for God to accomplish His full purpose through us as well.

As long as Moses (at the age of 40) felt that he was to be
the leader of God's people, God couldn't use him
(Acts 7:25). God had to take him out into the wilderness for
another 40 years and break him. Finally, Moses came to the
place where he said, "Lord, I'm not the man for this job.
I'm unfit. I can't even speak" (and he really meant it;
it wasn't just false humility as it often is with some folk who
say similar things!). It was only then that God could use him,
for Moses had now come to an end of himself. At the age
of 40, in his own strength, all Moses could do was bury one
Egyptian under the sand. After God had broken him, he buried
the whole Egyptian army under the Red Sea. Such is the
result of brokenness.

It is not enough that the Lord take the five loaves and
bless them. They must be broken before the multitude can be fed.
This is a process that has to be repeated in our lives
constantly. God takes us, blesses us, breaks us and uses us.
Then we tend to get exalted because we have been used to
feed so many. So He has to take us and break us again. And
this process goes on all through life.

How we need to covet this brokenness. When a small atom is
broken, what power is released! Then what power could be
released if only the leaders in our churches and then the
congregations were broken by God.
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Mummy did God punish us?

2008-02-08T15:15:00.000+11:00

It was early November 2007 and we had finally manged to squeeze in a weeks holiday after 3 years. When you are married to a Consultant, holidays can be hard to come by. If you don't work you don't get paid, and when you work in the area of Risk Management there is always SOME pressing crisis that needs your attention. A fraud, a system that needs overhauled or some other squeaky wheel demanding your attention.

This time however, I must have squeaked loudest because we managed a week away.

We had just left our church of almost 5 years, and were settling into a new one when we decided to take the break away.

Subsequently we didn't get to church a couple of weeks in a row.

But wouldn't you know it, after weeks of gorgeous Australian spring weather it began to rain, and rain and rain. The children were very disappointed. We had rented a house at the beach and were looking forward to some good salty swimming, boogie boarding and hanging out with mum and dad on the white sands.

My husband and I while mildly disappointed at the weather, breathed a secret sigh of relief. While it meant 5 children cooped up inside a house, it also meant much less running around. We were exhausted. He from work and me emotionally, physically and spiritually burnt out from 'leaving church'.

We spent time watching dvd's, playing games, doing puzzles and the children took much delight in wrestling with daddy in the large garage down stairs.

My 9 year old daughter caught me over Sunday morning coffee. She looked a little disappointed at the time and I wondered what was wrong. I asked her and she came and stood next too me, and asked me in the way a 9 year old does, if God had punished us for not going to church by sending the rain and spoiling our holiday?

Oh my, I felt sick!

Where had that come from?

Is this an attitude that I had exhibited?

Was there something theologically wrong with the way I had been bringing up my children?

Had I REALLY given them a Santa Claus view of God where He was making a list, checking it twice, going to find out whose naughty and nice?

What does this say about God the Father who I know wants nothing more than to sit with that little girl, rain hail or shine and just love on her!

We had the necessary chat, as I sat her on my lap and explained that God simply did not work that way. God probably had ALL kinds of reasons for the rain that week, but NONE of them had to do with us not attending church. It was all I could manage at the time. The rippling affect on my psyche had already started and I was off in the land of mother guilt trying to figure out where I had gone wrong.

Today I sit here on this drizzly Sydney summer morning, surrounded by packing boxes and general chaos, and beside me is another book that I have been reading.

The book is called Healing Spiritual Abuse- How to Break Free from Bad Church Experiences by Ken Blue.

Somewhere in the past month the Lord has been dredging up a heap of crap, He obviously doesn't want packed to go OS. A hard time to be having such a moment, but I am very thankful that the Lord cares about me enough to not let me believe certain things any longer.

I realize I had modeled that type of behavior for my children. I hadn't meant too and I certainly don't hold that believe to be theologically correct of God. But in the way I have conducted my Christian walk in the past little while, I was silently saying to them, that being a good Christian is the way that you behave on the outside, the meetings you attend, the involvement you have in ministry, the hours 'serving' you do and the general conformity to a set of structures that are largely leader (not God) based to suit leaders and what they want to achieve.

Reading Blue has been a both freeing, and frightening experience. It is always hard to grasp that there are fundamental flaws in our character and theology that leave us wide open to the lies and deceptions of the enemy in whatever realm we find them.

I am by nature a people pleaser. Whether it is comes from being the first born or because it is something inherently there with my nature, doesn't matter, it is a fact.

Falling pregnant at 21 in my third year of university, marrying an obsessive compulsive gambler who was not a Christian has reaped consequences further and wider than just those directly related to those three facts alone.

I realize I have spent most of the time since those decisions, in the church trying to 'make up for it' with God. I would attend countless meetings alone, run ministries, write programs, run small groups, envision new groups, run bible studies, and generally be 'open' to be used of the Lord in whatever way I was needed.

This in itself is not a bad thing, but unlike the Psalmist who has developed an awareness of God needing truth in the inward parts, I was blissfully unaware of WHY I was doing those things.

Blue talks about in one chapter of his book, the three types of religious loads that we come under.

The first is God's load- 'that is, the law keeping and the disciplines he supposedly demands of us in exchange for his approval and acceptance. Second is our load- This is the idea that spiritual success is a do-it-yourself project. We must take care of our own sin and produce our own holiness. The third is "their load", the spiritual leaders load. This is when the burden of making our leaders look or feel good falls on our shoulders. Their load is the work we must do for their sake to meet their needs'.

These loads are two fold in that the potential to be prone to them has always existed within us for whatever reason, but they may also be 'played' on either knowingly or unknowingly by those who are pastorally responsible for us. Meaning, while these may start out as our 'own issues' they can soon be issues that are made worse by bad shepherds.

What makes this even more tragic is that these shepherds are not always aware that they are even doing it. They may sincerely believe they are on the right track, have heard a word from the Lord or are doing the Lords work. They are for the most part not acting out of a malicious spirit with the intent to wound, abuse and burden their flocks. They are so narcissistic in their commitment to the path they are on that almost any kind of behavior becomes justifiable because they are about 'God's business. They expect that the flock serves them, their dreams, their hopes, their visions their 'word of the Lord' rather than, them serving the flock as an intimate shepherd would. The sheep become porns in what the shepherd wants to achieve, rather than being shepherded by a shepherd who is there for the care and protection of the sheep.

While it certainly makes it more tragic, it does not make it justifiable or even acceptable in the sight of the Lord.

Let me leave you with Ezekiel 34 this morning, I have posted it from the message bible, because it paints such a visual verbal picture for me.

Let me know what you think!

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Ezekiel 34

When the Sheep Get Scattered

1-6 God's Message came to me: "Son of man, prophesy against the shepherd-leaders of Israel. Yes, prophesy! Tell those shepherds, 'God, the Master, says: Doom to you shepherds of Israel, feeding your own mouths! Aren't shepherds supposed to feed sheep? You drink the milk, you make clothes from the wool, you roast the lambs, but you don't feed the sheep. You don't build up the weak ones, don't heal the sick, don't doctor the injured, don't go after the strays, don't look for the lost. You bully and badger them. And now they're scattered every which way because there was no shepherd—scattered and easy pickings for wolves and coyotes. Scattered—my sheep!—exposed and vulnerable across mountains and hills. My sheep scattered all over the world, and no one out looking for them!

7-9 "'Therefore, shepherds, listen to the Message of God: As sure as I am the living God—Decree of God, the Master—because my sheep have been turned into mere prey, into easy meals for wolves because you shepherds ignored them and only fed yourselves, listen to what God has to say:

10 "'Watch out! I'm coming down on the shepherds and taking my sheep back. They're fired as shepherds of my sheep. No more shepherds who just feed themselves! I'll rescue my sheep from their greed. They're not going to feed off my sheep any longer!

11-16 "'God, the Master, says: From now on, I myself am the shepherd. I'm going looking for them. As shepherds go after their flocks when they get scattered, I'm going after my sheep. I'll rescue them from all the places they've been scattered to in the storms. I'll bring them back from foreign peoples, gather them from foreign countries, and bring them back to their home country. I'll feed them on the mountains of Israel, along the streams, among their own people. I'll lead them into lush pasture so they can roam the mountain pastures of Israel, graze at leisure, feed in the rich pastures on the mountains of Israel. And I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep. I myself will make sure they get plenty of rest. I'll go after the lost, I'll collect the strays, I'll doctor the injured, I'll build up the weak ones and oversee the strong ones so they're not exploited.

17-19 "'And as for you, my dear flock, I'm stepping in and judging between one sheep and another, between rams and goats. Aren't you satisfied to feed in good pasture without taking over the whole place? Can't you be satisfied to drink from the clear stream without muddying the water with your feet? Why do the rest of my sheep have to make do with grass that's trampled down and water that's been muddied?

20-22 "'Therefore, God, the Master, says: I myself am stepping in and making things right between the plump sheep and the skinny sheep. Because you forced your way with shoulder and rump and butted at all the weaker animals with your horns till you scattered them all over the hills, I'll come in and save my dear flock, no longer let them be pushed around. I'll step in and set things right between one sheep and another.

23-24 "'I'll appoint one shepherd over them all: my servant David. He'll feed them. He'll be their shepherd. And I, God, will be their God. My servant David will be their prince. I, God, have spoken.

25-27 "'I'll make a covenant of peace with them. I'll banish fierce animals from the country so the sheep can live safely in the wilderness and sleep in the forest. I'll make them and everything around my hill a blessing. I'll send down plenty of rain in season—showers of blessing! The trees in the orchards will bear fruit, the ground will produce, they'll feel content and safe on their land, and they'll realize that I am God when I break them out of their slavery and rescue them from their slave masters.

28-29 "'No longer will they be exploited by outsiders and ravaged by fierce beasts. They'll live safe and sound, fearless and free. I'll give them rich gardens, lavish in vegetables—no more living half-starved, no longer taunted by outsiders.

30-31 "'They'll know, beyond doubting, that I, God, am their God, that I'm with them and that they, the people Israel, are my people. Decree of God, the Master:

    You are my dear flock, the flock of my pasture, my human flock,
   And I am your God.
         Decree of God, the Master.'"

Why did the woman cross the world?

2008-02-06T07:56:00.000+11:00

To get to the other side!

I was struck last night by the story of Jesus and the disciples beside Galilee.

After a full days ministering to the needy, Jesus asked the disciples to jump into boats and cross to the other side of Galilee. Jesus then fell asleep on the voyage. I can imagine my Jesus tuckered out from the people who needed his help but in no way resentful of the time spent ministering to Him. Lulled to sleep by the lapping of the water on the hull and the chatter of his inner circle reflecting on the days events he slept soundly in the boat.

Only to be woken by the shaking and pleading yells of his disciples questioning his ability to sleep at a time like this...

[quote]As Jamie Buckingham tells it in his book Where Eagles Soar he states; "He spoke to the sea: Peace be still." Immediately the wind ceased to blow, the huge waves subsided and the storm was over. Then turning to His followers, Jesus rebuked them. "Why all this fear? Have you no faith?"

That remark used to bother me, for it seemed to be an unjust rebuke. Who wouldn't be afraid in a situation like that? But you cannot understand Mark unless you remember Mark. Before they embarked, Jesus had affirmed: "We're going to the other side."

Faith is believing God will do what He says, regardless of the height of the waves. Fear causes us to look at the circumstances. Faith causes us to look at God. It is the gift that which enables us to go go to sleep in the middle of the storm., knowing God has promised we will cross over."[/quote]

Where did God tell you He was taking you?

Where has He promised that the journey will take you?

Then trust that He will get you there, trust that this year that His word is true to you 'still' despite the howling winds and stormy seas of life around you. Trust even when it seems like Jesus is asleep on the job.

In doing good.... do no harm!

2008-02-03T13:47:00.000+11:00

I am on a bit of a journey right now. Actually is more than a bit of a journey it is one absolutely HUMONGOUS eye opening journey. Not really what I need 3 weeks before leaving the country, but I do get the sense that the timing here is crucial and I am being put through a purging time that has a specific purpose.... most likely being that I don't repeat the same mistakes again in some far off place like the UK.

I have been meeting with a counselor type person on an semi regular basis. She has been there mostly to listen but also to pull me back to reality when I head of into my own little land of unreality. She has been a real blessing to me as I journey through some of these things.

She has had a hard time working out why I have trouble with identifying issues of control particularly from within the church. Until this week. This week we both had a moment of epiphany. I had been making a comment about intimacy in marriage and how with women this is tied in very strongly with trust issues. We need to trust and feel very safe and secure in order for intimacy to happen effectively. I also said that every time I explore this idea mentally I have bible verses from Corinthians hammer down on me internally.

She wondered where this came from... and straight away I knew.

I knew where it came from and I knew where my control issues stemmed from.

So here are a few of my revelatory thoughts to date;

1. Scripture CAN be used to control peoples thoughts and behaviors- it can also be used to exhort, rebuke and encourage people too. MOTIVE is crucial here!

2. There is a differences between submission (true biblical submission) and blind obedience that cause you NOT to question the status quo.

3. Questioning is not necessarily a sign of rebellion- but can be the healthy workings of someone examining things before Christ.

4. The concept of submission can be used to control and manipulate.

5. It is ok ask questions. Discouragement to do so can be used to control and manipulate.

6. Leaving a church is not the same as leaving God- even when your decision hurts people.

7. People can use their emotions about people leaving to control and manipulate others.

8. It is especially dangerous when leaders do this- particularly where the relationship is discarded and all that is left is the 'emotion' of the situation. TRUE hurt at someone leaving would be followed up with an attempt at maintaining authentic relationship.

9. Boundaries are ok and healthy.

10. That people who control and manipulate sometimes GENUINELY don't know that they do it and they may think they are doing something TRULY for the good of another- but that does not mean that it is justified at the end of the day.... in doing good... do no harm!

Here are a few links that I am working my way through. I happened to just stumble on these this morning while reading something totally unrelated.

http://jamesfive19.com/Spiritual_Abuse_Links_Resources.html#Abusive

http://www.micsem.org/pubs/counselor/frames/spiritabuse.htm?http&&&www.micsem.org/pubs/counselor/spiritabuse.htm

http://www.youthspecialties.com/articles/topics/spirituality/abuser.php

What are you hear for?

2008-02-02T16:33:00.001+11:00

Another quote that impacted me this week.... (have you noticed I am bored of packing already? Call this procrastination blogging).

Here is a quote from a book I will paraphrase it as it is quite long but it is relevant to this topic;

Quote:

'My friend, Peter Lord... is one of the few men I know who has designed his life so his first priority is to abide with God. As a result he is constantly probing those of us around him to realign our priorities.

...One afternoon Peter and I sat under an oak tree... (Peter) began his spiritual probing.

"Don't give me your answers", Peter said, " Just think about them as I ask you five questions".

Why did God make you? I knew what he was driving at. He wanted me to define why I was here. What was the reason for my creation? ... I made a mental note- true to the Westminster confession: "I am here to glorify God and enjoy Him for ever".

Second: What is the thing you love more than anything else? I was tempted to give a religious answer, but I knew better. One of the best ways to test your greatest love is to determine what you can't do without... Inwardly I answered; "My greatest love is my family".

Peter's third question: What is your greatest fear? Again, I was tempted to give a religious answer about being delivered from fear- but that's just not so. In fact everyone is afraid of something. My greatest fear I thought was losing my family and being left without their love.

Fourth: What is your greatest ambition? Deeply spiritual people are always ambitious people. Not worldly or egotistical ambition but and ambition sanctified and restored to its proper dimension. Peter was asking me about my goal in life... I yearned to write a book that would touch the world for Jesus Christ.

Finally Peter asked: Why do you want God? That took more thinking than the rest. He was asking in essence what I expected to gain by being a Christian. That was easy: I wanted God so He could help me accomplish my goal for Him- for without Him I was nothing.

... All my answers seemed sound. At least I seemed to have my spiritual pyramid down pat: God first, family next, career last.

"If your answer to question number one is not the same as your answer to question number four, you are a mixed up person," Peter said matter of factly.

..."But I said that my reason for being on earth was to glorify God and enjoy him forever," I said.

"That's fine," Peter answered. "Then your greatest ambition better be to glorify God and enjoy Him forever."

But I had not said that. I had said my ambition was to do something for Him, rather than abide in Him- to have fellowship with Him. Slowly it dawned on me. I am here on this earth for no other reason but to have communion with Him and to renew that wonderful relationship that took place in the garden of Eden when Adam walked alone with God in the cool of the evening.

If I have any other ambition than that, I am missing God's purpose for my life. If I have been placed on this earth to abide in God, then my greatest ambition should be to have fellowship with Him.

Peter continued: "Your answer to question num ber two ougth to be the same as your answer to question number three."

Again I was trapped. I had the right sequence, but the wrong answers. If my purpose for being on earth is to abie in God, then my greatest love should be the person of the Father- not my wife, children or my ministry. Likewise my greatest fear should be the fear of losing that prceious fellowship with God...

..."I will not ask you how you answered number five," Peter said. "But if you said you wanted God for any other reason than the fact He is God, then you are a materialist and an idolater."

He needed to say no more. I was cut to the bone. I had said I had wanted God to help me accomplish something I wanted to do for Him-notably to write a book for which He would get the glory and I would get the money.

Where Eagles Soar- Jamie Buckingham pages 120-122

Interesting quote.....

2008-02-02T11:00:00.002+11:00

"I know of a few individuals with powerful gifts of discernment and a wide-open spiritual awareness who many think are prophetic, but there is a taint in the anointing- a kind of under taste that builds up over time as you absorb more and more of their ministry.

Gradually under the ministry of one of these you feel invaded, defiled and controlled.

A sense of revulsion develops until you want to cut that one off completely. Underneath the apparently gifted exterior is a dominant unbroken need for power- a yearning to be seen and recognized as important, wise and gifted. Such a waste of good raw material! Character is everything. The prophet must be dead to self and alive to God. Make certain you are not one of those whose inner self is so invested in denying your rejection issues that to admit to the depth and extent of your depravity would be too much to absorb. Jezebel finds such people an easy mark.

I wish we could crucify ourselves. It might be easier to absorb the pain if this were possible. That would however, be control. The essence of our training must be loss of control and surrender to the hand of God, even in suffering. So do you still want to be prophetic?

When all is stripped away what remains? What value is there in standing naked and broken before God?Publish Post

The answer is the inestimable value of knowing to the core of myself that I am a son, that I am loved and that He is my Father. This is my whole identity. Am I a prophet, a healer, a leader? Recognized or ignored? Well-known or laboring in obscurity? These things no longer matter. What remains is that I am His, secure in His arms. Nothing more. And should that not be enough?

I must reinstate that a new generation of leadership is soon to emerge. Prophetic people will be forerunners. This leadership will both understand and ministre from a base in the Sabbath rest of the people of God;

9So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.10For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His. 11Therefore let us be diligent to enter that rest, so that no one will fall, through following the same example of disobedience. 12For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Hebrews 4: 9-12

The key in this ministry will be that we will have rested from our own works because we have suffered exposure of every thought and intention of the heart that does not resonate that rest. The flesh avails nothing.

The new leadership is being refined in the crucible of brokenness, the wilderness and the dark night of the soul.

They labor in hiddeness under limitation, learning the sweet simplicity of being nothing more that sons and daughters, but they must soon be revealed and released. In brokenness and humility, walking in the depth of His love, this new generation will be safe to wield the power of God because those elements of the flesh that would have abused the flock or usurp the glory of God for self will have been crucified with Christ. This must be our goal, not building great ministries or expanding our influence."

From the book 'Understanding Prophetic People- Blessings and problems with the prophetic gift' R. Loren Sandford, pages 215-218

Any thoughts?

Lay your head down.....

2008-01-12T08:38:00.001+11:00

Well in between sorting through the piles of junk we seem to have accumulated, and cleaning children's rooms, washing linen, and trying to work the logistics out of our move to the UK in Feb, as well as caring for the 7 kids we have here at the moment (2 nieces), I managed last night to squeeze in a couple of pages of Where Eagles Sore (by Jamie Buckingham).

My friend Rae was right, this little read is exactly for me right now. It certainly sums up a lot of what has been happening in my life the past year and will continue to happen this year as we move.

May I share a quote with you?

... "Bit by bit these things need to be taken away until we become like Jesus, with no place to lay our heads. Foxes have holes, birds have nests, but the man true man of God has no place to lay his head but on the bosom of the Father. Places- geographical places- are necessary for service. But not for security."...

Where is your head at rest today?

Is it in your dreams? Your expectations? Do you feel crushed under the weight of the reality of your life? Maybe for you right now life is a bit cushy and comfortable or maybe you can deeply identify with David who cried out to the Lord from the very depths of brokenness and heartache. Or like me you are learning to soar like an eagle when I really want to run around like a chook with it's head cut off in the chaos that has suddenly become my life.

Then take a moment to lay your head down on your Father's chest. Feel Him breath and let the warm of his exhalation breathe over you. Listen to the beat of His heart, and stay there until your heart has matched His pace and you are beating in unison. Let Him soothe you, cry His tears over you, chuckle at your stories, dry your tears, rub balm into the cuts and lesions of your life. Let Him speak the 'Olam' wisdom over you, the wisdom of the ancient paths, soak in His words to you, His promises, heed His warnings and discipline as He speaks tenderly to you.

And let today be the day He becomes your security.... your strong tower, the place where you lay down your head.

The Great Need for Shepherds After God’s Own Heart

2008-01-12T08:08:00.000+11:00

The Great Need for Shepherds After God’s Own Heart

Zac Poonen

"Lord! Help! Godly men are fast disappearing. Where in all
the world can dependable men be found? Everyone deceives and
flatters and lies. There is no sincerity left" (Psalm 12:1 - Living).
The state of affairs described in this verse is an apt
description of Christendom today. We find nowadays that
even believers who were once pursuing after godliness have
started indulging in deception, flattery and lies - to serve
their own ends. Sincerity is what God seeks from all of us
first of all. We may have a thousand and one faults and make
an equal number of mistakes. But if we are sincere, God can
do miracles with our lives.

In Matthew 16:3, Jesus rebuked the Pharisees by asking them
a question: "Do you know how to discern the appearance of
the sky, but cannot discern the signs of the times?" If we
do not read the signs of the times in which we are living
now, Jesus will have to rebuke us exactly as He did the
Pharisees. When people know the Bible but don't know God
Himself, they can easily be deceived - for every cult in the
world uses the Bible as its textbook and have their proof
texts to promote their peculiar doctrines. This is why so
many cults have mushroomed around the world in this century
and become fashionable and acceptable to many people. Even
believers are being led astray and are losing their
salvation. Under the new covenant, God wants every child of
His to know Him personally (Heb.8:11), unlike as in old
covenant times, when only the prophet (who rarely appeared)
could know God personally. In fact, the new-covenant child
of God can know God better and in a more personal way than
the greatest prophet under the old covenant. Jesus said so,
very specifically (Matt.11:11). There are very few
believers who have a passion to know God Himself. Most of
them seem to be keen only on increasing in Bible-knowledge
and on having spectacular emotional experiences.

All this is an indication that we have come to the very last
minutes of the last hour of the last days in which Paul said
it would be "difficult to be a Christian" (2 Tim.3:1 - Living).
It will be difficult to be a Christian in the last days,
not because of persecution or opposition, but because
many people would "have a form of godliness without its
inner power" (2 Tim.3:5). In other words they would major on
correctness of New Testament pattern and doctrine but would
not be interested in personal devotion to Christ or in
practical godliness.

Most of us who left dead denominations in the past, left
them because we were searching for spiritual reality. We may
have begun our search in earnest. But Satan is very smart to
sidetrack believers into something cultistic, like the cult
of the Pharisees in Jesus' time.

The history of Israel has been given us at such length in
the Old Testament to teach us some important lessons. A wise
man will learn from that history the way men pleased God and
the way many displeased Him.

In Jeremiah 3:14,15, the Lord promises saying, "I will take
you one from a city and two from a family and I will bring
you to Zion. Then I will give you shepherds after My own
heart, who will feed you on knowledge and understanding."
"Zion" represents the true church of the living God. God
brings one from a city and two from a family into His
"Zion". And when we have come to this Zion - the church that
the Lord is building - He promises to give us there
"shepherds after His own heart", who will feed us on a
knowledge of Himself (and not just a knowledge of the Bible)
and on understanding of His ways (and not just an
understanding of doctrine). One primary identifying mark of
the true church of God is this: It has shepherds after God's
own heart. God is love - and the primary characteristic of
love is that it does not seek its own. So, shepherds after
God's own heart are those who do not seek their own. Such
shepherds will not seek for anyone's money or honour. They
will seek neither to please men nor to impress them. Instead
they will seek to build up the believers in order "to
present them perfect in Christ" (Col.1:28). Wherever God can
find a man with such a longing - in any town or village of
the world - He will build His church.

On the other hand, we have seen many cases of believers who
leave the mainline denominations and who seek to follow
"the New Testament pattern", who have their doctrines all
correct, but who love money and seek their own, and who yet
imagine that they are building the Body of Christ. Confusion
and chaos are always the result of their labours and what is
finally built through their labours is always Babylon.

Only where God can find a man who does not seek his own,
can the Lord build His true church. One man like that, who
shares the concern of God's heart for people, is far more
valuable to God than a thousand believers who seek their
own. To be a shepherd after God's own heart will involve
sacrifice, inconvenience, and suffering. It will mean being
willing to suffer misunderstanding, opposition, ridicule and
slander joyfully. And if such a shepherd is blessed enough
to have a wife who also does not seek her own, so that their
home is open for the Lord to do whatever He wants, then
there will be no limit to what God can do through their lives.

I am not talking now about gathering many people. Numbers
are not a mark of God's blessing. Many of the well-known
cults gather more numbers of people than anyone else. That
does not prove anything. I am talking now of quality - the
building of the Body of Christ, where every individual
member comes into a personal knowledge of God. Without such
a development, any group will only be a place where one
blind man has led a whole lot of other blind people into the
ditch. All their prayer meetings will be in the ditch, their
Bible-studies will be in the ditch and their conferences
will be in the ditch too!!

In Jesus' time, He looked around and saw that people were
like sheep without a shepherd. It is the same today. The
great need everywhere is for shepherds after God's own
heart. I am not talking here about just being an elder in a
church. No. A large church needs many shepherds - those who
have a heart that cares for God's people. Such people may
not be elders at all. But they will feed and encourage the
sheep - serving them gladly.
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Where Eagles Soar

2008-01-12T08:02:00.000+11:00

A dear friend of mine left a book on my kitchen table the other day. The cover is starting to tater at the corners, it has crease prints throughout and the pages are well and truly and orange shade of brown. The price sticker on the front nearly faded, but not quite enough to stop me from knowing it was purchased a good while ago.

She had told my son it was one of those out of print books, but she thought I might like to read it.

Where Eagles Soar by Jamie Buckingham.

Let me encourage you with a quote from this aging book....
..."you must recognize you are an eagle, not a grasshopper. Then you must be willing to cooperate with God, to put yourself in takeoff position for God to fill-and send you soaring. To remain on your nest when the storm blows is disastrous. Your only hope is to launch out in faith against all insurmountable obstacles, lock your wings and let God do the rest".

What does God in store for you in 2008?

How will you choose to respond?

The eagle doesn't sit on his nest in the storm waiting for his rescue. He mounts the wind and rises above the storm.... literally. He soars over it!

His wings locked together in glorious flight, right under the nose of God.

Will you allow the winds of God to send you soaring this year, no matter where life finds you?

Let's encourage each other to keep above the storms of life, flying high with all our troubles and cares below.

I know I am certainly going to need reminding.....

Counterfeit Community

2007-10-04T22:11:00.000+10:00

I have been really challenged by this article.....

Counterfeit Community by Charles Crismier

Is your frustration building?

Pursuit of Christian unity is hitting a wall. Programs, gospel gimmicks and compromise... even prayer are failing to yield true community. Here’s why.

Cries for Christian unity have defined much of the public expression of the church over the last two decades. Calls, conferences and commitments to racial reconciliation have played a significant role in the current yearning for unity. A plethora of exhortations that “they may be one” have made Jesus’ “high priestly prayer” of John 17 a centerpiece of the Christian unity movement. Yet genuine unity eludes us.

Pastors and Parishioners at RiskGeorge Barna, in his book Virtual America, revealed statistics that should break your heart.

• Fifty-five percent of non-Christian Americans believe it is getting harder and harder to make lasting friendships.

• Sixty-two percent of “born-again” Christians claim it is getting hard to make lasting friendships.

• Seventy-three percent of “evangelical” Christians are finding it difficult to make real friends.

It seems the stronger the alleged commitment to scriptural authority, the more severe the problem of our relationships. Conclusion: the more RELIGION, the less RELATIONSHIP. Something is desperately wrong! Divided and in a state of dissolution, we stand. Individualism reigns supreme.On my daily broadcast, VIEWPOINT, I interviewed H.B. London, head of pastoral ministries for Focus on the Family. Our focus was “Pastors at Risk.” He disclosed that at least 70 percent of pastors in America claim they have NO friends.Whatever happened to Christian community?

Whatever happened to the “covenant community” in America”? Are we destined to be strangers in the “Commonwealth of Faith?” Can we truly have unity without genuine community?The fracture of community is also revealed in the widening chasm that divides our families. The divorce rate among professing Christians exceeds that of the nation at large. The divorce rate among pastors equals that of their congregations (Hartford Seminary Study), the second highest of all professions, and divorce in the “Bible Belt” exceeds the nation at large by 50 percent (Rutgers University Study - “The State of Our Unions”).

Christ may be our Savior, but SELF is king. Could it be that the Church has taken the lead even in estranging the family? Counterfeit community is devastating us and destroying our witness.William Hendricks, author of Exit Interviews, also appeared on VIEWPOINT. He revealed that 53,000 people per week who remain committed to Christ are leaving through the “backdoor” of America’s churches. He concluded that many parishioners do not believe they are being told the whole “gospel truth,” that their unique giftedness and purpose as part of a body is not recognized, and that the church does not provide true Christian fellowship and community but has become a “gospel country club” of Sunday back-slappers who care little about one another after the worship service. Add to that the new “mall” methods of mass ministry and you have a pretense of community utterly void of natural commitment to one another.Organizational “unity” programs multiply, rhetorical unity abounds, but genuine relational substance is scarce. Why? What is it that frustrates experiencing the fruit of true unity? Could it be that in our increasing pursuit of unity we have missed the community out of which unity is born?

The Real and the CounterfeitIt is said that the best way to identify counterfeit currency is to study the real thing. The sin nature is pervasive, and we humans have a distinct propensity to counterfeit the real in every area of life. This is true also of such prized commodities as unity and community. American pragmatism only fuels the counterfeiting fires, enabling us to stamp “UNITY” or “COMMUNITY” on relational coinage that lacks the spiritual or relational “metal” of true unity and community.Genuine unity is forged in community. It cannot be carved out of the cold rock of American hyper-individualism. Rather, it is hammered out in the intense heat of relationships being welded together “in Christ.” The very godhead is an eternal display and declaration of community... Father, Son and Holy Spirit – distinct persons, yet one – united in truth and spirit. Even so, we who are born of the Spirit and saved through the sacrifice of the Son who declared himself “The TRUTH” become “one” with the Father.

This was Jesus’ vision in his “high priestly prayer” of John 17. Jesus said true worshipers must worship Him both in spirit and truth.Truth coupled with the warm wind of relationship in the Spirit is essential to Christian community that produces the fruit of biblical unity. That relationship is not just with the Father but revealed in our communion – common union – with one another. Just as truth and relationship are indispensable to our union in Christ, they are indispensable in common union with one another.Without the fulness of both truth and relationship born of the spirit, our faith becomes either a cold set of creeds or an orgy of conjured feelings. Compromised truth in pursuit of unity yields nothing but a cheap counterfeit – sentimentality.

Similarly, conjured feelings of unity without genuine common union in real relationships mocks the costly currency of true unity expressed in community.So how did we come to so readily accept such tinny counterfeits? Is there an essential “metal” that has eluded us in producing the coinage of genuine comm-unity that gives rise to the glorious unity we so desire? There is, and it is called HOSPITALITY.

Whatever Happened to Hospitality?There was a time when hospitality was at the heart of the American home. There was a time when hearts and homes that practiced hospitality welded families into community with an invisible glue that let people know they belonged and were welcome and accepted. And there was a time twenty centuries ago when one of the hallmarks of the Church was “behold how they love one another.” They broke bread together “from house to house with gladness and singleness of heart,” and the Church exploded (Acts 2:41-47). Hospitality was the earthly expression of the eternal hope of believers.Something dramatic has happened, however, since those times, causing Christianity Today (May 22, 2000) to ask the headline question, “Whatever Happened to Hospitality?”

There is a pervasive sense throughout our land that hospitality is becoming discouragingly scarce as an art and as an expression of the heart. So let me ask you, Whatever happened to hospitality?Many experience “crowded loneliness” – surrounded by people but lost in the crowd. The spirit of the mall has become the consumer model for the Master’s church. There is a growing absence of heart connectedness, a deep feeling that no one knows my name, or even cares. The collective effect is the collapse of community, a conclusion validated by both secular and spiritual observers. Even our church buildings are increasingly designed like malls, breeding grounds for artificial relationships.

We belong to the club of strangers yearning desperately for fellowship. Often even our small group or cell group efforts become more methodologies for organizational growth than for genuine biblical and Kingdom relationships. Artificiality is becoming normative. And we are becoming virtually strangers... in the crowd, yet lonely.Crowded loneliness is frightening. God well understood the implications of lack of relationship rooted in genuine community. He warned Israel from the moment of their deliverance from the bondage of Egypt to reach to the stranger. But the insidious roots of strangerhood have assaulted the American heart, threatening the very faith that bred our freedom.

Alexis de Tocqueville first diagnosed the danger of selfish isolationism that threatened the nation. In Habits of the Heart, sociologists discuss the gravity of de Tocqueville’s 1830's observations for our time, noting it was he who coined the term “individualism.” Individualism has mutated now into hyper-individualism, a virulent disease of the soul now threatening to destroy even Christian community and the God-ordained heart of hospitality that undergirds all genuine community.

The Divine Antidote“Hospitality is as close as we will ever get to the face of God,” declared a rabbi. Hospitality is at the heart of the Gospel. God was not willing that we, who were estranged from Him by sin, should remain strangers. The Father sent forth His Son to extend an invitation to His home, welcoming those who would receive His invitation into a holy comm-unity called the Church. His desire was that we be one in community with Him even as Christ was, that the world would be convinced of Christ and His mission.Hospitality is to reach to strangers. In a very real and growing sense, we are all strangers here. We must grasp the God-breathed need for Christ-infused hospitality to reach the virtual strangers around us, beginning with those virtual strangers right in our midst in the household of faith.Hospitality is glorious, but not glamorous. It is not an artificial marketing tool but the Master’s authentic method for birthing and maintaining relational community. Therefore, the Apostle Paul stated that anyone in a position of leadership in the Church must first be “given to” hospitality and be a “lover” of hospitality. In describing the functional essence of Christian relationships, Paul made clear that all who follow Christ must be “given to” hospitality.

Contrary to popular thinking and teaching, hospitality is not a gift I have, but a gift I must give. It is the practical handle God has given to implement agape love. It is the attitude of the heart which, when expressed collectively among members of the Body, produces the authentic relational womb that births a community in which a people linked in truth are described as being in “unity.” Unity is not the goal but rather the fruit that issues from the root. When either truth or community relationship fostered by hospitality are missing in whole or in part, we seek gospel gimmicks to replace them. The result is not true unity but a counterfeit, requiring constant catering to fleshly interests demanding a conformity of compromise rather than to Christ.As we see the day of our Lord’s return rapidly approaching, the Holy Spirit bringing re-birth to the holy heart of hospitality that graced the life of the early Church, causing outsiders to desire becoming insiders as they observed the unity of truth displayed in holy community. We yearn again for the world to inescapably conclude, “Behold, how they love one another.” But first it will be necessary to restore the Hebraic roots of the church.

Restoring Our Hebraic Roots

How could Christian leadership since the early Church have largely lost the profound simplicity of hospitality? The viewpoint of the Church and its leaders changed dramatically.The Church was born in Jerusalem on the Day of Pentecost, a Jewish feast celebrated fifty days after the Feast of Passover, the Feast of Unleavened Bread and the Feast of First Fruits. Pentecost was followed by the Feast of Trumpets and the Feast of Tabernacles, celebrated by Jesus, His apostles and the Apostle Paul, all of which were Jewish, to display God’s covenantal community before the nations. The “Feasts of the Lord” were open to all who embraced the “God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel,” whether Jew or Gentile.Into such a spiritual environment Yeshua (Christ) was presented as the “Word made flesh,” “Tabernacled among us,” welcoming all who would receive Him to His Father’s eternal home. It was in this same Hebraic environment that the Church was born.As the Church spread, invading Gentile realms, Gentile thinking and ways invaded the Church. Predominant were Greek thinking and Roman organization. For the Greek, the mind mattered most, and relationship was of remote relevancy. Hellenistic influence rapidly replaced the Hebraic heart. God’s Truth became not a faith to be practiced but facts to be pondered.For gentile Christians, it became more “kosher” to think like a Greek than like a Jew. This eroded Hebraic practice.

As Christianity spread throughout the Roman Empire, so did the Roman Empire spread its ways and practices among Christians. Roman structures and organizational ways replaced Hebraic synagogues and relational patterns of worship.With radical changes of thought and practice among Christians came radical rejection of Hebraic practices and persecution of the Jews, severing our Hebraic roots while laying the foundation for seventeen centuries of abandonment of the very heart and soul of first-century Christianity. The Spirit of God is grieved. He is bringing course correction. It is part of the Holy Spirit’s “preparing the way” for our Lord’s return. Much is at stake. Our future success will depend significantly on the degree to which we restore the Hebraic roots that open our hearts hospitably to others.

Nowhere is the substitution of the Greek mind for the Hebraic heart more prevalent in practice than among pastors. We who pastor have become the primary perpetrators and propagators of a purely cognitive approach to the practice of Christian faith. While what we believe is truly important, how we live is of equal or greater importance. The great gap between what we say we believe and how we really live opens us and our flocks to self deception.In few places is this gap more apparent than in the practice of hospitality. While statistics do not always tell the whole truth, the fact that 70 percent of pastors admit they have no friends reveals a significant disconnect between our sincere desire to practice agape love and our failure to practice hospitality.

When hospitality begins to invade and issue from a pastor’s heart, new hope and healing flows from his ministry. His home becomes a revitalized haven for his family, the faithful, and those who would enter the family of God. The spirit of true community comes alive. Genuine unity emerges naturally from the vibrancy of community.

The Pastoral Connection

If we truly want unity, we must restore community. Genuine community will flower with a fresh pursuit of truth and a rebirth of hospitality. To preach hospitality, I must practice hospitality. And if I would practice hospitality, I will soon preach hospitality. Hospitality must again become an essential of Christian discipleship.If we would be touched with hospitality, we must teach hospitality. Hospitality gives us a “handle” on agape love. It requires not only teaching but also training, enveloping every aspect of our Christian walk. Once one gains a vision for The POWER of Hospitality, forgiveness, reconciliation, fellowship, reaching the lost, and virtually every other aspect of ministry and relationship take on new significance and meaning, including unity.The heart of our faith is revealed in a heart of hospitality. Let’s get serious about discipling the saints in this essential expression of God’s grace to us. May no Christian magazine ever again need to ask, “Whatever Happened to Hospitality?”

And may The POWER of Hospitality give rebirth to genuine Christian comm-unity causing a skeptical world to again declare, “Behold how they love one another,” thus extending a welcoming hand to those in a fractured and hyper-individualistic society who will embrace “the WAY, the TRUTH and the LIFE.”

Charles Crismier, founder of Save America Ministries, is host of VIEWPOINT, a national radio broadcast “Confronting the Issues of America’s Heart and Home.” This article is partially taken from a new release, The POWER of Hospitality (2005, Elijah Books) by Chuck and Kathie Crismier.

SAVE AMERICA Ministries P.O. Box 70879 Richmond, VA 23255
1-804- 754-1822 1-800-SAVE USA 1-804-754-1823 (FAX)
Email: crismier@saveus.org

Intimate Friendship with God

2007-09-03T16:00:00.000+10:00

Quote from the book Intimate Friendship with God by Joy Dawson pp. 67 & 68

Satan can come at any point in time and tempt us with any kind of sin. It does not matter what it is, unbelief, lust, pride, criticisim, disobedience to God, or anything. We will find there is no attraction to that temptation to sin to the degree that we have been asking for the fear of God and receiving it by faith. We will have Jesus' attitude toward sin, and instantly we will say to Satan, "Nothing doing! I happen to hate your suggestion and I am not about to do what I hate. I resist you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is written in James 4:7, 'Resist the devil and he will flee from you".

God tells us to replace the evil thought with pure ones. "whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things". (phil 4:8) The amplified bible says ' Fix your mind on them'. That is a deliberate, determined, disciplined act of your will.

Think of the face of the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at a beatiful flower or scenery and worship the creator. Quote or read the word of God aloud.........

... How do we know when evil thoughts come into our minds if they are satanic in origin or from our own hearts? The answer is very simple- by our immediate reaction to these thoughts. If we have an immediate reaction of hatred for them we know they never came from our hearts. The thoughts, came, therefore from satanic activity upon our minds. If we have not had an immediate reaction of hatred to some critical, evil, unforgiving, lustful, or unbelieving thought, then we know there is still a love for that sin in our hearts. We know we have some homework to do in that area. We need to ask for the fear of the Lord to come upon us to relpace the love for that sin.

Revelations w2

2007-09-03T15:52:00.001+10:00

Revelation Week 2

Hmmm... I didn't take a lot of notes last week because the children were with me, but here are some thoughts about the session anyway.

I disagree with Hilton Sutton. I have discovered I am not a Premillennialist

"Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this."

Hilton Sutton used this verse from Revelations 4 as part of his argument for Christians being raptured pretribulation. He drew a parallel between the words come up here, being needed, because that is what would be happening during the rapture.

I am afraid that this interpretation isn't enough to convince me of his position.

When I read the scriptures, specifically Matthew 24, Thessalonians and Revelations I don't believe Christians will be raptured before the tribulation. I believe that they will have to go through it, and persevere until the end. I believe this is why there are so many references to the ones who will over come to the end.

While I have come to this conclusion, I have really liked hearing this teaching and have felt that it has been very worth while. I am really glad I have at least made the first two.

What are your thoughts?

Revelations w1

2007-09-03T15:50:00.000+10:00

Josh, I went to the Revelation's sessions last night, and I was pleasantly surprised.

Once I got over the shock of thinking that Hilton Sutton was Tim Allen from The Santa Clause 2 in disguise. I settled down nicely into what he had to say to us.

I have tried to read Revelations a couple of times now and must say have never really been able to overcome the mental barrier of all the symbolisim. So I feel I am able to breath a spiritual sigh of relief at having some of that explained to me.

So what did I learn?

Revelation is a book of blessing.

Revelation is 'not' a book of symbolism

Revelation DOES contain symbols but only 21 and that is less than 1 per chapter- and these are easily interpreted. This gives me great hope.

Revelation is a book of obedience.

The Cross turns bitter to sweet

2007-08-08T09:43:00.000+10:00

Disclaimer- I don't agree with everything this guy says. Specifically about their being a myrrh anointing. But I think the gist of this message is pretty good about the bitter seasons of our life.

From the book ~The Decree of Esther Aaron Fruh

The Cross turns bitter to sweet

I want to discuss further the message of myrrh as it relates to the cross, because one of the last lessons Jesus taught us during His life here on earth involved myrrh.

In fact I used to feel confused by it because scripture seems to offer contradictory information. Mark 15:23 says, “they gave him wine mingled with myrrh to drink, but he did not take it.” Matthew gives a similar account adding, “When he tasted it, he would not drink.” Matthew 27:34 Yet John’s gospel says this;

Who is right? Mark says that Jesus would not drink the myrrh but John says that he did. On closer examination we see that both are right. There were two different times that Christ was offered bitter myrrh to drink at Golgotha the place of the skull.

The first time recorded in Mark 15:23 and Matthew 27:34 was before he was crucified. It was Roman custom to offer the victim of crucifixion myrrh mingled with wine before they pierced the hands and feet with the nails. You see myrrh and wine mixed together act as a simulant and pain reliever. Jesus rejected the medication so that he would experience the inferno of pain for us. Soon all the shame anguish and bitter seasons of our lives would be cast upon Him, and he chose to take the full force of them.

The book of Exodus, gives us a beautify foreshadowing of Christ rejecting the numbing myrrh. The children of Israel have crossed the Red Sea triumphantly and have seen their enemies perish before them as the sea walls cascaded down upon the Egyptian horses and chariots. The Israelites sang the song of Moses and Miriam led a joyful procession of praise with timbrels and dancing. The very next stop in their journey was the wilderness of Shur where for three days they found no water.

Exodus 15: 23 When they came to Marah, they could not drink its water because it was bitter. (That is why the place is called Marah. [a] ) 24 So the people grumbled against Moses, saying, "What are we to drink?"

25 Then Moses cried out to the LORD, and the LORD showed him a piece of wood. He threw it into the water, and the water became sweet.
There the LORD made a decree and a law for them, and there he tested them.

Remember the Hebrew root word for myrrh is marrah, which means “bitter.” When the Israelites tasted the bitter water they spat it out, just as Jesus would reject the bitter myrrh after he had tasted it.

Here is the lesson he was teaching us. When we come to the “bitter water’ seasons of our lives we can begin to put the pieces of the puzzle together. First of all we concluded that we are in the beginning of a myrrh season. Next, we realize that we are thirsty. And finally, we conclude that the water is bitter. Thus we refuse to drink. We mistakenly reject the discomfort of the myrrh in hopes that we can make it to a place where the water is sweet. The Israelites too, were pressing on to a better place; Elim, where there were twelve wells of fresh water and seventy palm tress for shade. We choose to spit out the bitter myrrh of Shur in order to taste the cool waters of Elim.

Do not think however there is anyway around those bitter waters without the cross of Christ. Like the tree Moses threw into the water, the tree of Calvary, where Jesus bore our sorrows, is the only way to end our wilderness experience. It is only through the work of the cross that our bitter waters will be made sweet. Without the cross we are forever stranded in the wilderness. We can never get to Elim and rest … and beauty.

God has designed and organised your beauty preparation schedule. Every person’s path is different. There are times when, like Esther you come to a season of life in which all you see, taste and smell seems painfully bitter. How will you endure it? Not by longing for the sweet wells and shade of another season. You simply need to find the one ‘tree; in your puzzling wilderness that will make your life complete. One that tree Jesus took all of our pain and bitterness. He spat out the myrrh so that He would endure it every aspect of our desperate moments. He spat out the myrrh so that when we face our own myrrh anointing we can be transformed into His image- a church without blot or blemish.

You see, the tree of Calvary when applied to my bitter wilderness experience makes it sweet. Jesus has taken away the bitterness of life’s suffering. Paul tells us that on the cross Jesus brought us a glorious victory so now we can proclaim, “Death is swallowed up in victory?” (1 Corinthians 15:54-55).

Jesus swallowed the bitterness of death for us and made life sweet. Even your pain is bearable because of the tree of Calvary.

Mark’s gospel records that even before the nails pierced Jesus’ body, He spat out the myrrh mixed with wine because it acted as a pain reliever and He desired to experience all of our pain. In John’s gospel, and also is Matthew 27:48 as we read earlier, Jesus drank the wine mixed with myrrh just before He gave up His spirit. So the last thing Jesus did before He died was to drink the the cup of bitterness on our behalf. This was done to fulfil the Scripture; “They also gave me gall for my food, and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink” (Psalm 69:21).

Jesus is returning for a glorious church without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish. And every time we allow the Lord Jesus to anoint us with myrrh to cause us to be more attractive to Him, we are fulfilling the scriptures.

In the old Covenant law in Leviticus 14 a procedure is given for cleansing lepers. The priest was to take hyssop (a long reed) and dip it into the blood of an animal and then sprinkle the blood on the hyssop over the leper. David says in Psalm 51:7, “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean, wash me, and I shall be clean; wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.”

Unknowingly, that Roman solider at Golgotha was fulfilling the Levitical law. He took hyssop and put a sponge filled with myrrh on the tip of it and gave it to Christ to drink. Before Jesus committed His spirit into the hands of His father, He was purged with hyssop and anointed with myrrh. We remember of course that when Christ came into the world as a baby He was anointed with the gift of myrrh given by the wise men. It was used as a balm for the skin care of a new child. Before he gave up His spirit on the cross, Jesus was again anointed with myrrh…

…First the suffering then the glory. First the bitter, then the sweet. All of the authority that Esther will later receive is a direct result of her willingness to be anointed with myrrh. Beloved it is time to start walking in the divine authority. It is time to get the putrid odour out of our anointing.

The writer of Hebrews says of Jesus.

Hebrews 5: 7During the days of Jesus' life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. 8Although he was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered

If Jesus learned obedience to God through the things he suffered then our life journeys will also have moments of myrrh. IF Jesus came into the world anointed with myrrh and went out of the world anointed with myrrh, then I say, “Bathe me Jesus in myrrh anointing. I desire to be beautiful and carry with me your sweet smelling fragrance”.

Picture of a Prophet

2007-08-06T18:21:00.000+10:00

Picture of a Prophet
By Leonard Ravenhill

The prophet in his day is fully accepted of God and totally rejected by men.

Years back, Dr. Gregory Mantle was right when he said, "No man can be fully accepted until he is totally rejected." The prophet of the Lord is aware of both these experiences. They are his "brand name."

The group, challenged by the prophet because they are smug and comfortably insulated from a perishing world in their warm but untested theology, is not likely to vote him "Man of the year" when he refers to them as habituates of the synagogue of Satan!

The prophet comes to set up that which is upset. His work is to call into line those who are out of line! He is unpopular because he opposes the popular in morality and spirituality. In a day of faceless politicians and voiceless preachers, there is not a more urgent national need than that we cry to God for a prophet! The function of the prophet, as Austin-Sparks once said, "has almost always been that of recovery."

The prophet is God's detective seeking for a lost treasure. The degree of his effectiveness is determined by his measure of unpopularity. Compromise is not known to him.
He has no price tags.
He is totally "otherworldly."
He is unquestionably controversial and unpardonably hostile.
He marches to another drummer!
He breathes the rarefied air of inspiration.
He is a "seer" who comes to lead the blind.
He lives in the heights of God and comes into the valley with a "thus saith
the Lord."
He shares some of the foreknowledge of God and so is aware of
impending judgment.
He lives in "splendid isolation."
He is forthright and outright, but he claims no birthright.
His message is "repent, be reconciled to God or else...!"
His prophecies are parried.
His truth brings torment, but his voice is never void.
He is the villain of today and the hero of tomorrow.
He is excommunicated while alive and exalted when dead!
He is dishonored with epithets when breathing and honored with
epitaphs when dead.
He is a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, but few "make the grade" in his class.
He is friendless while living and famous when dead.
He is against the establishment in ministry; then he is established as a saint
by posterity.
He eats daily the bread of affliction while he ministers, but he feeds the Bread of
Life to those who listen.
He walks before men for days but has walked before God for years.
He is a scourge to the nation before he is scourged by the nation.
He announces, pronounces, and denounces!
He has a heart like a volcano and his words are as fire.
He talks to men about God.
He carries the lamp of truth amongst heretics while he is lampooned by men.
He faces God before he faces men, but he is self-effacing.
He hides with God in the secret place, but he has nothing to hide in
the marketplace.
He is naturally sensitive but supernaturally spiritual.
He has passion, purpose and pugnacity.
He is ordained of God but disdained by men.

Our national need at this hour is not that the dollar recover its strength, or that we save face over the Watergate affair, or that we find the answer to the ecology problem. We need a God-sent prophet!

I am bombarded with talk or letters about the coming shortages in our national life: bread, fuel, energy. I read between the lines from people not practiced in scaring folk. They feel that the "seven years of plenty" are over for us. The "seven years of famine" are ahead. But the greatest famine of all in this nation at this given moment is a FAMINE OF THE HEARING OF THE WORDS OF GOD (Amos 8:11).

Millions have been spent on evangelism in the last twenty-five years. Hundreds of gospel messages streak through the air over the nation every day. Crusades have been held; healing meetings have made a vital contribution. "Come-outers" have "come out" and settled, too, without a nation-shaking revival. Organizers we have. Skilled preachers abound. Multi-million dollar Christian organizations straddle the nation. BUT where, oh where, is the prophet? Where are the incandescent men fresh from the holy place? Where is the Moses to plead in fasting before the holiness of the Lord for our moldy morality, our political perfidy, and sour and sick spirituality?

GOD'S MEN ARE IN HIDING UNTIL THE DAY OF THEIR SHOWING FORTH. They will come. The prophet is violated during his ministry, but he is vindicated by history.

There is a terrible vacuum in evangelical Christianity today. The missing person in our ranks is the prophet. The man with a terrible earnestness. The man totally otherworldly. The man rejected by other men, even other good men, because they consider him too austere, too severely committed, too negative and unsociable.

Let him be as plain as John the Baptist.
Let him for a season be a voice crying in the wilderness of modern theology and
stagnant "churchianity."
Let him be as selfless as Paul the apostle.
Let him, too, say and live, "This ONE thing I do."
Let him reject ecclesiastical favors.
Let him be self-abasing, nonself-seeking, nonself-projecting, nonself- righteous,
nonself-glorying, nonself-promoting.
Let him say nothing that will draw men to himself but only that which will move
men to God.
Let him come daily from the throne room of a holy God, the place where he has
received the order of the day.
Let him, under God, unstop the ears of the millions who are deaf through the
clatter of shekels milked from this hour of material mesmerism.
Let him cry with a voice this century has not heard because he has seen a vision
no man in this century has seen. God send us this Moses to lead us from the
wilderness of crass materialism, where the rattlesnakes of lust bite us and where
enlightened men, totally blind spiritually, lead us to an ever-nearing Armageddon.

God have mercy! Send us PROPHETS!

STOP PRESS

2007-08-05T22:16:00.000+10:00

It was officially announced at church this morning that as of the 2nd of September Church of the Good Shepherd will no longer meet in 'cells' every Sunday. We are returning to the traditional weekly Sunday Celebration service with the eventual implementation of mid week home groups.

This is a strengthening phase of the church.

Cleansing, Healing, Words

2007-07-31T14:25:00.000+10:00

'The Power of the Blood' by HA Maxwell Whyte

Cleansing, Healing, Words pg 114-116

Wise King Solomon wrote, "There is that speaketh like the piercings of a sword; but the tongue of the wise is health" proverbs 12:1. The words that proceed from our tongues will give clear evidence of the state of our health. Dr William Standish Reed MD of the Christian Medical Foundation Medford Oregon informed us that such terribly destructive things as criticisim, grumbling, self pity, hatred, cursing and bearing grudges are the cause of much physical sickness, and all these things are manifest through the tongue.

Solomon again wrote, "Thou art snared with the words of thy mouth, thou are taken with the words of thy mouth" Proverbs 6:2. It is we ourselves who destroy ourselves. Satan puts into our heart all these evil thoughts, wich find their almost inevitable expression as words in our mouths. As we speak them, we ensnare ourselves so that Satan has perfect right to come along and tell s there is no hope for us, for He is the angel of death, and the wages of sin is death.

No wonder Solomon warned that negative words, sush as those of hate, envy and criticisim, are as "piercings of a sword". There is always a positive for a negative, a day for night, light for darkness. Thank God, there is another sword than that of Satan- the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

The same tongue that spewed out vile, evil things that corrupted and destroyed us can be tamed, not by ourselves, but only by a true work of the Spirit of God in transforming our spirits. Our whole nature is changed and now the heart that was a cesspool of every foul thought becomes cleansed by the blood of Jesus.

Instead of unclean water spilling out of our mouths, now the Holy Spirit will give us words of truth, of life and of health. "The tongue of the wise is health".

Harry Potter Revisited

2007-07-29T19:41:00.000+10:00

I have been thinking a bit more about this whole Harry Potter thing and I had a momentary flash of brilliance. I thought that rather than just stick up the regurgitated thoughts of other people (as I have done previously) I might try to dig deep and write down some of the thoughts down.

Genius (as young Annabelle would say).

I am a person who tends to think in point form so I might set out my thoughts here like that if that is ok.

The war that is in disguise:

10Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

These verses tell us that our war is not against flesh and blood, but against powers and principalities in the spiritual realm. It is against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

For there to be a war going on in the spiritual realm there needs to be 'sides' or 'teams'. Simply put you are either for God or you are against Him, and all that is not for Him is against Him.

This applies in the natural and is mirrored in the spiritual.

Some would argue that my stance is some what simplistic, and perhaps it is, but I am a simple kind of gal. You are either for God or you are against Him, you are either going to heaven or going to hell.

Harry Potter, whether fictional witchcraft or modelled from the real thing still focus's on a 'spiritual battle', but now it becomes a war between the 'good witches and the bad witches'. I do not believe this is a true reflection of the Spiritual warfare that Ephesians 6 is talking about. The battle in the heavenlies isn't about two divisions of witchcraft fighting it out, it is between the agents of hell and the agents of heaven and it involves US. We know this because we are asked to take an active stand in the ongoing verses of Ephesians 6.

I really dislike the personification of witchcraft as being 'good'- even if it is only in a fairy tale or within fantasy literature. I have the same dilemna with that old classic movie 'The Wizard of Oz'. The fact that we now have the Wicked Witch of the West, warring the White Witch is spiritually subtle to say the least.

I 'personally' don't have the same feelings towards CS Lewis Chronicles of Narnia as I do towards Harry Potter. The reason for this being that there are obviously two sides in Narnia. The Witch who represents evil, and Aslan who is considered the 'Christ' figure. For me it does not hold the spiritual ambiguity I see in Potter.

The Coat Hanger

Many people secular and Christian alike, talk about the virtues, values, character and issues of life that the young boy Potter deals with on his way to becoming a man.

While I have no doubt that many deep issues are explored within the pages of these novels, I don't personally 'feel' I need to learn those lessons myself clothed in the garments of witchcraft whether it be 'real or fantasy' in content.

I believe there is enough other literature around that would be values, virtues or moral character based without glorifying wizardry, that may 'even' glorify God!

To debate or not to debate?

While I believe that there are many Christians around who have legitimate minstries to those in the occult, paganisim, satanism and yes even the New Age, who believe they need to read the Rowlings books in order to be well informed. I do not really 'buy' the argument that as Christians we need to read the books or watch the movies in order to be able to engage people or debate about it.

I have no doubt that it would help to engage or debate people about it if we read it. But my deeper question is 'SHOULD' we engage or debate people about 'spiritual things' without giving them them the gospel to hang it on, or before they are ready to receive them?

1 Corinthians 2 says;

The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 11For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man's spirit within him? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. 13This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words.[c] 14The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. 15The spiritual man makes judgments about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man's judgment: 16"For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him?"[d] But we have the mind of Christ.

Without having the Holy Spirit impart wisdom, we are told in the above passage that the man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the spirit of God for they are FOOLISHNESS to him.. he simply can not understand them, because they are spiritual discerned.

This is not to say that I believe we should never talk to the unsaved about Spiritual matters, I just believe we need to be listening very closely to the heartbeat of God for how we should address those we are engaging.

Jesus when talking to the woman at the well started in the natural and moved on to the spiritual. The same as when he was brought the woman caught in adultery. Each time he discerned the Father's heart for these women and how to go about 'unlocking' the door to their hearts to the gospel.

He didnt need to engage them about the latest fad or trend in their world. He went straight for the issues of the heart, he showed them their need for a saviour and then opened the door for them to receieve Him.

We may have many enjoyable conversations with people, or spiritual debates, but do we really need to fill up on every new fad or fettish that comes along in order to do it?

OR should we be so full of the word of God, full of His presence, renewed and transformed in our mind that when we meet the unsaved along the way, we can easily discern the beat of the Father's heart at that minute like Jesus did and get to the very crux of what it is that we are meant to be doing... leading people to Jesus for their salvation, eternal security and an intimate ongoing relationship with their Father- God... as they were created to have.

Do we need things like Harry Potter, the DaVinci Code or whatever the flash in the pan trend seems to be at the moment to hang the gospel on? Or does the gospel stand alone?

I suppose that is the deeper question I am asking here!

In finishing for now... I am aware that Jesus spoke in parable's from life, and perhaps as our modern day existence seems to take on more and more fantasy than ever before, literature such as Potter could be legitimate forms of parable telling, I just think I am going to need a lot more convincing about the need to use wizardy/witchcraft to expound the gospel of Christ Jesus.

~ S E L A H ~

Another grasshopper stops by...

2007-07-28T09:27:00.000+10:00

Did you read the post about my grasshopper visitors?

It was posted on Sunday, June 24, 2007 if you want to go back and have a look. Anyway... to be honest I thought I had seen the end of my grasshopper visitors. But alas that was not to be the case.

Yesterday I was having a look for various things that would help us when we got to the UK. I was looking up property sites, furniture stores, reseaching the history of the various townships around Manchester and looking at church websites trying to get a feel for the area.

Then out of the corner of my left eye I saw something moving across my lounge room floor. It was too small to be Joey (our 9 month old) and it wasn't a cockroach (as would be the normal creature I might see scurrying here in Sydney). And it certainly wouldn't have been a mouse, because we have Eastwood's BEST mouser in residence here (a handy thing living near a park).

Instead it was another 'little' grasshopper'.

I laughed!

Then I checked myself to see if I had been thinking small. While I had been looking at sites, I didn't feel worried, or stressed or negative about any of these things. So I was very surpised to see my little friend because I didn't feel like I had grasshopper thinking at all!

This morning I feel the Lord is telling me that He really 'does' have it all in His hands and to stop trying to do it all in the natural, because He has done it ALL already in the spiritual!

~ S E L A H ~

Harry Potter

2007-07-22T17:51:00.000+10:00

Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows"

Spiritual Warfare of the Highest Degree

Cutting Edge Harry Potter Section

I. Over 300 million people worldwide breathlessly awaited their copy of the seventh and supposedly final Harry Potter novel, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows".

NEWS BRIEF: "For Harry Potter, Good Old-Fashioned Closure", New York Times, July 18, 2007

"So, here it is at last: the final confrontation between Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, the Chosen One, the “symbol of hope” for both the Wizard and Muggle worlds, and Lord Voldemort, He Who Must Not Be Named, the nefarious leader of the Death Eaters and would-be ruler of all. Good versus Evil. Love versus Hate. The Seeker versus the Dark Lord."

"With each installment, the Potter series has grown increasingly dark, and this volume .... is no exception. While Ms. Rowling’s astonishingly limber voice still moves effortlessly between Ron’s adolescent sarcasm and Harry’s growing solemnity, from youthful exuberance to more philosophical gravity, 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows' is, for the most part, a somber book that marks Harry’s final initiation into the complexities and sadnesses of adulthood."
Cutting Edge noted, in our book review of the sixth book, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince: Is The Final Secret of the Seventh Book Revealed?", that it is highly possible that Harry will be named the Messiah of the World of Wizardry at the end of the seventh book. We can only wait to see how this plot works out, but I believe that this is a distinct possibility.

If Harry is declared the Messiah, wouldn't that be a kicker, as the world seems poised on the edge of the World War III which will produce the real Antichrist? For this reason, I am anxious to get my copy and begin reading. We shall have a Book Review for you on Monday morning.
Interestingly, this next news article asks the question, "Is Harry Potter a Christ figure?"
NEWS BRIEF: "Christian elements lurk in Potter books: "Is Harry Potter a Christ figure?", by Manya A. Brachear, Chicago Tribune, July 20, 2007

"Is Harry Potter a Christ figure? ... As Potter fans await the release of the seventh and final installment at 12:01 a.m. Saturday, it's a question worth considering."

"Do you think Harry Potter has an agenda?"

Yes, I think Harry Potter has an agenda. From the beginning, when kids were so encouraged to draw a lightening bolt in the middle of their foreheads, I believed Potter was conditioning children and adults to accept the final mark of Antichrist.

As far as whether Christians should read Potter, the answer is Biblical. God forbids His people from having anything to do with witches and familiar spirits and the "peeping and muttering" that witches go through to stage their rituals.

Furthermore, Potter novels describe real witchcraft in great detail. No Christian should allow himself to be so completely subjected to such powers of Satan. God's Word admonishes His people to avoid even watching evil. Listen:

"He who walks righteously and speaks uprightly, who despises gain from fraud and from oppression, who shakes his hand free from the taking of bribes, who stops his ears from hearing of bloodshed and shuts his eyes to avoid looking upon evil." (Isaiah 33:15, Parallel Bible, KJV/Amplified Bible Commentary)

Did you catch that last phrase? "... shuts his eyes to avoid looking upon evil."

A Christian simply cannot fill his mind with words and images of witches, wizards, familiar spirits, shape-shifting witches, and REAL witchcraft descriptions and still think he or she is in right standing with Jesus Christ!

Do not be deceived on this point! Jesus' warnings in Matthew 24 against being spiritually deceived at the End of the Age are so strong and are repeated three times, you must understand that unprecedented deception -- both spiritually and politically -- is one of THE End of the Age characteristics. Listen:

* Verse 4 -- "Jesus answered them, Be careful that no one misleads you, deceiving you and leading you into error."

* Verse 11 -- "And many false prophets will rise up and deceive and lead many into error."

* Verse 24 -- "For false Christs and false prophets will arise ... so as to deceive and lead astray, if possible, even the elect (God's chosen ones)."

Parallel Bible, KJV/Amplified Bible Commentary)

Since the Christian Church has fallen into such spiritual apostasy over the past 50 years, I should not be surprised when I hear of a known apostate leader espouse the ridiculous notion that J.K. Rowling has woven the Gospel of Jesus Christ through her novels.
But, I must confess, I was shocked when I read these very sad remarks, thinking of the millions of trusting Anglican people who will believe these lying words.

NEWS BRIEF: "Anglican Bishop praises ‘Gospel according to Potter’ ", by Sally Williams, Western Mail, I.C. Wales, July 20, 2007

"THE Anglican communion should learn lessons from Harry Potter ... The Bishop of St Davids, Carl Cooper, said the Christian virtues of humility, respect and love portrayed in the stories about the teenage wizard should be replicated within the church."
"JK Rowling’s books are no strangers to controversy among the religious establishment, with previous installments being burned by Christian groups, and one Catholic Church official last year denouncing Harry Potter as the 'devil. But the Anglican church has shown an increasing willingness to embrace the popularity of the Hogwarts pupil. Bishop Cooper said that although the story is cloaked in magic and wizardry, it has strong Christian messages and themes are at its heart. He said, 'The reader is in no doubt that love and friendship need to be acts of the will as well as acts of the heart'."

When I read the Harry Potter novels, I was repeatedly almost overwhelmed by the intense hatred and occultism which simply covers the entire series like a heavy blanket. Only the bond between Harry, Ron, and Hermione can be thought of as having "love and friendship", and even that bond was extremely mild compared to the love Jesus showed for His disciples.
At best, Harry Potter is a mixture of intense hatred and evil, and the mild bonds of friendship between Harry, Ron, and Hermione. In other words, Christians will be subjected to the hatred of Belial and a mild love. Do you remember what the Apostle Paul said, "...what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial?" (2 Cor 6:14-15)

CFR member, Rick Warren, of the Purpose Driven Church, loves Harry Potter and encourages his members to read the novels. (Read Warren bragging about his Council of Foreign Relations membership, Paragraph VI, November 25, 2006, Newsletter)

"Though the seventh and final installment is yet to be released (July 21, to be exact), when it does, it will be well-worth reading. Though some would disagree, I am one to put Rowling's work in the camp of fantasy literature, along with Lewis and Tolkien, with her use of magic more mechanical than occultic. I found her earlier six volumes instant classics of the genre, and the final book will undoubtedly cement this series as among the best written." (Rick Warren's "Ministry Toolbox")

This kind of nonsense from church leaders is so very deplorable, and will not go unnoticed by the One Who will sit on the White Throne Judgment.

This next news story illustrates how deeply Harry Potter has penetrated into the hearts and minds of his legions of followers. Read it and weep.

NEWS BRIEF: "Kids' Grief Counselors Wait By Phones in Case Harry Potter Dies", By Mark Herlihy, Bloomberg News, July 20, 2007

"A U.K. children's charity has brought in extra staff to man its phone lines in expectation of a deluge of calls from distraught youngsters if Harry Potter dies ... 'For many children, Harry Potter and his friends have become a major part of their childhood', said Kate Trench, a spokeswoman for ChildLine, based in London, which provides telephone support services for children. 'Excitement could give way to sadness for those caught up in the huge build-up to the seventh and final book'.''

How sad, for so many children to be this devoted to this Satanic character, Harry Potter! This kind of devotion is exactly the kind of devotion Jesus Christ demands of His people. Listen:
"He who loves and takes more pleasure in father or mother more than in Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves and takes more pleasure in son or daughter more than in Me is not worthy of Me." (Matthew 10:37, Parallel Bible, KJV/Amplified Bible Commentary)

Can you just hear the application of this verse to Harry Potter?

"He who loves and takes more pleasure in Harry Potter is not worthy of Me." This last statement might be the bottom line in this entire Harry Potter controversy.

What do you think?

Leave a comment................

Giving birth in the jungle......

2007-07-14T11:25:00.001+10:00

This is a portion of an update from missionaries I grew up praying for. The Jennings have worked long term (27 years) with the Higaunon people translating the bible, establishing a church and training and discipling converts/teachers to work with their own people. They serve with New Tribes Mission.

Read more about the Higaunon people

Dear Friends in Christ,

... We had an interesting night a few nights ago. We were woken up around 2am with someone outside calling us. This hasn't happened in a long while and the first thing we both thought was, "Oh no, a possible political problem" because we had heard that there had been some problems in an area about 10km from here with some killings. I think the guy outside must have realized that was our first thought, because once he knew Ron was on the other side of the door and hesitating to open it, he proceeded to tell us that his wife was having her baby (her 8th!) and there was a problem with the birth.

So Ron opened up and he told us what was going on. It seemed like although the head was present the baby just wouldn't deliver. The midwife helping with the delivery has delivered a number of babies here, so I guess what she was experiencing concerned her and thought we might have some advice.

Now childbirth is something I usually don't get involved in having only delivered one baby since we have been here. The midwives here seem to do a pretty good job considering their circumstances. We have been here 27 years and only know of one death of the mother during childbirth and very few babies dying at the time of birth. I really didn't know what help I could be other than moral support but we went over anyway. Thankfully they live close by so getting there wasn't a problem.

After talking to the midwife, it was clear that she was really concerned that things were not progressing as they should be. For the past two hours or more she had been trying to deliver the baby to no avail. She had physically tried to get the baby out but it seemed stuck fast. I felt like I was somewhat thrown in the deep end and needed to try and help too. So for the next 2 hours, with each contraction we both tried to get the baby out. There definitely seemed something wrong and an obstruction preventing the head from coming out. Eventually we encouraged them to consider taking her out to the hospital on the coast. Calling in the plane did not seem a good option as it would still be a number of hours before it was light enough to call in the plane and plus there was also the possibility that it wouldn't make it in here anyway due to a current typhoon off of the coast that had been getting worse. So rather than wait, they organized some guys to help carry her out in hammock and sent someone on ahead to try and organize a vehicle once they got her to the top of the mountain.

I was reminded once again after that experience how much we have to be thankful for with the medical help we have in Aussie. Here I was in a small wooden hut with no light other than our spotlight and their tribal lamp which is just some diesel in a bottle with some cardboard as a wick, so every few minutes it needed to be turned upside down to re-wet the cardboard which rejuvenates the flame after initially giving off black bellowing smoke. At one point I nearly got burned by the oil lamp. I only realized that I was standing right over it when I felt the heat.
The mother, Yom-pot, was laying on the grubby wooden floor on a sheet of plastic with her husband Bah-lat, at her head trying to encourage her. All they had to use was a bowl of warm water and some old rags. The whole situation was as far from sterile as you could possibly imagine and basically I had nothing to add to their conclusions about the problem. Behind us were their other 7 children all huddled together on a sleeping mat, half a dozen people were hanging in the open window and different ones were coming in and out seeing what was going on. The Lord gave strength though, especially to Yom-pot who amazed me how well she was doing in spite of the pain she was in and the pain I am sure we were inflicting on her as well in our trying to help.

It was also encouraging to hear the discussion that went back and forth about the Lord being in control and the exhortations from the elderly folks to not be afraid but trust the Lord. Before the Gospel came here they would have been pushing on the mothers stomach to try and push the baby out and sacrificing chickens to their ancestral spirits and wiping the blood on the woman’s stomach, but now they are depending on the Lord and eager to follow His leading.

By 4.30am they had everything organized and ready to hike her out up the mountain. When they left I felt so helpless, wishing we could have done more, but realizing that there really wasn't anything more we could do. My prayer was that she would have the baby on the way so that she wouldn't have to make that horrible trip for hours over the unbelievably bumpy mountain roads out to the coast.

Four hours later I heard that that is indeed what happened. When they reached the closest village along the road to here, there was a trained government midwife there who apparently was able to help her deliver the baby. Thank you Lord!!

The following day I felt like I had been run over by a truck. Every muscle in my body ached, due to the fact that I had to get into positions that I haven't been in for a long time and with the problem I have with my back, it was just made worse. Oh well, at least I know this will wear off in a few days.

I guess that even though we were unable to help physically, we were able to observe something far more important than our physical help and that was their faith in Christ in the midst of a real life trial. That is something we can rejoice in having had a part in delivering to them that which will carry them through every trial no matter how much we lack the ability to help them physically.

As you know we are looking forward to a translation check beginning on the 17th July. Ron is finishing up a 'guest room' that we have put together so that Ginny (our checker) can have a bit of privacy whilst here. We used to have a small spare room next to our bedroom but decided a little while ago to just pull down the dividing wall to make our bedroom a bit bigger to fit in our exercise bike.

This left us with no where to put any visitors other than just setting up a mattress in our living area. The 'guest room' is just outside of the main house but shares the same roof area. It is something we have been wanting to do for ages but just never got around to it. I guess the need pushed us to get on with it. So if you come visit us, you can stay in the white house. Were calling it that because we painted it white inside and it is the only place in our house that is actually painted. Additional features are 24/7 WiFi and bug proofing. No gaps and holes for the bugs to get through.

Well, this is getting long so will close for now. Once again we want to thank you for your partnership with us in prayer. What an encouragement it is to us to know that so many are praying for us and the work. We trust that as we keep you updated, you too are encouraged to hear what the Lord is doing amongst your Higaunon brothers and sisters.

With Christian love
Ron and Michelle

2007-07-10T10:33:00.000+10:00

One of the learning curves I am on at the moment is not doing things to please man, which is very different to doing things to 'edify' man or glorify the Lord. This is not so easy to discern all the time and comes down to being aware of the motives of my heart.

Often we use words like laying down your life, sacrifice, pouring yourself out and having a servant heart, but these things can become just as legalistic if we do them for the wrong reasons as any religious dogma we may find elsewhere.

Jesus certainly WANTS those thing from us, but as an act of love and perfect sacrifice to HIM and under HIS anointing and HIS equipping and HIS empowering... it is all about HIM!

So firstly we need to make sure we HEAR from HIM and arent just doing things which are 'good ideas'.

While in one sense we do forget ourselves, because it is all about Him, we actually do need some awareness of self because without it we can not really be honest about WHERE we need his help. It is really great when we can use our gifts and talents to serve the Lord, but if we are doing it without the Lord we may as well be doing it out in the work place and getting payed for it because the spiritual significance may be totally lost without intimacy and relationship with Jesus.

Romans 12 says;

1Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual[a] act of worship.

It then goes on to tell us about using our spiritual gifts to edify the 'body'. But our first port of call is to offer ourselves to GOD! So often we get this the wrong way around. We use our spiritual gifts/talents to 'serve' the body (or is self really disguised as such?), and hope that God is ok with that.

It's a bit like that verse in James that talks about the man who looks at himself in the mirror and then goes away forgetting what he looks like. We NEED to know where we are at spiritually, we need to look in the mirror of the word of God and ourselves in Jesus reflection, so we can get a true sense of where we need repentance, forgiveness, reconcillation, redemption and rebuilding.

If we don't take the time to examine the motives our hearts and why we do what we do, then we could spend weeks, months and years doing 'good' things that He never really called us to do, nor equipped us for, or worse still had no anointing for but was a work of our very talented flesh!

~selah~

Let us...

2007-07-06T17:24:00.000+10:00

... throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.

Hebrews 12:1

I am always struck when I read the scripture with how many 'verbs' there are. True christianity is not just some passive religious experience that we let happen to us. Instead it is intentional, directional and requires us to be accountable to each other and the wider Body of Christ.

I was reading this scripture today and the Lord impressed a few things upon me.

In order to 'throw off' something, first we must have an awareness that it is there in the first place. I think of myself running with a coat on and getting hot (lol funny thought really given how unfit I am). In order for me to throw off that coat, I need to know it is there. I may even need to spend some time unbuttoning (undoing it) before I cast it off to the ground.

So it is with our sin. We first need an awareness of the things that keep us hindered and entangled. The Lord is ever faithful in showing us what these things are, when we take the time to seek Him.

We need to spend time asking the Lord to show us the things that hold us back. Then we may need to spend time 'undoing' those things in our live. Sometimes we can manage them on our own (with Jesus), and sometimes we may need the help of a fellow sister or brother in the Lord to pray with us.

Repentance, renouncing and breaking off is paramount to this disentaglement.

The second thing that strikes me about this verse is that we are told to RUN! Now those of you who know me, know that unfortunately running to me is like flying to a pig. In the natural, I don't do it often and I don't do it well! But here in relation to our spiritual walk we are told to RUN! Running requires strength, perseverence, fitness, direction, preperation, training and focus. Do we have those qualities about us everyday, or are we merely taking a meandering stroll in our Christian walk?

The third thing that I see in this verse, is that we are told to run the race set before US! Now that US I believe has a few different dimensions.

There is the corporate us- that is the Body of Christ US. We have clear mandates in scripture about the types of things we should be doing. Things like making disciplies, loving one another, living our lives as acts of worship to God etc.

But there is also the US that has to do with our own life. What is your mandate in life, the vision God has for you? Do you know or are you too busy looking over the spiritual shoulder of someone else, judging, assessing or even envying the the calling of others. I know there are times I have been guilty of this.

Seek God and find out what the race is you are required to run, and then under the anointing of the Holy Spirit and the empowering of our Lord Jesus Christ let's run it with all our might!

~selah~

Burden Bearing

2007-07-06T17:14:00.000+10:00

Psalm 68: 19

Praise be to the Lord, to God our Savior, who daily bears our burdens.

I was reading this Psalm on the 5th July '07 and it just struck me at how remarkable God is (yet again). Not only does He promise to bear our Burden's but the scripture tells us He does it daily.

I just want to encourage you to once again cast your daily burden's upon Jesus, because He cares for you.

Oh what a mighty God we serve!

~selah~

House on Fire

2007-06-27T14:11:00.000+10:00

It has been the Lord's way in my life to parallel an issue in my heart with the house that we live in. I don't know why He does that with me, but He does. Regardless of why, I am very appreciative of this as I am a very visual person.

Over several nights Christmas 2006 the Lord gave me a series of dreams about the house we currently rent, burning down.

Having seen what happened the week I dreamt of floods in September, Anthony was very keen to check that our house insurance was up to date, in case it really did burn down. I however sought the Lord for what it was He was trying to say to me.

The revelation came a little while later.

We live in a beautiful wooden house. Pretty well everything is wooden other than the tiles in the bathrooms and hearths. It is nicely decorated, light and airy. It has a wonderful 'feel' to it. People walk in and often comment on the loveliness of it.

The Lord told me that I was that house.

The Lord also told me that this was how I have often been viewed as well.

Yet He promised that a new day was coming.

See after living a little while in this lovely little house, Anthony and I noticed that some things had been renovated really quickly. Glass sheets would fall out of cupboards. Floorboards would scratch at the slightest thing (because they had not been varnished hard enough), light switches would cease to work, sealing around sinks and baths slowly started to pull away. Niggly little things started to happen that made the house not as attractive to us as it first was to us.

The Lord told me that just like this house there were things that were like that in my life. Not so niggly little things that needed to come under the refining fire of the Lord. We all know that old adage, that a stitch in time saves nine. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that if these character flaws are NOT burnt out now that I am in for big trouble later on.

At first this left me bewildered, hurt and feeling very alone. But the Lord has used this time to mirror many of my character flaws, insecurities and fears.

Praise be to God though that this is not my first such wilderness experience. The Lord has often taken me through refiners fire. Showing me my true nature and character, my unsurrended heart, my uncrucified flesh, my unsubmissive will. And each time He crushes and breaks and hones out the changes that He wants wrought.

The Lord revealed that I was in for a spiritual house fire. He was going to burn away the dross, the wood and chaff and rebuild me a new.

It has not been an easy road. I have not always responded the way that He would have me respond, but I am starting to see His victories in my life. I have begun to notice the redemptive work of the cross, I can see resurrection life starting to shoot forth.

Part of the way the Lord has done this in my life is through Cleansing Stream Ministries. It has been a time of laying foundational truths in such a way that this time, I can't help but know them, and God in a new intimate way.

I know this time is not over, but I can see an end in sight. I am looking forward to the retreat this weekend and seeing what the Lord does. I am ever thankful that He chose now to make these changes, as we plan to move to the UK.

But most of all I am especially thankful that the Lord never just leaves us alone, but sanctifies us so that we can truly reflect His glory and enjoy Him forever.

~selah~

Siftings

2007-06-25T21:42:00.000+10:00

Ever been sifted?

I made a commitment to follow Christ when I was 6 years old. I can remember it so very clearly as it was the result of a very real and vivid dream that I had. But I haven't always walked a righteous walk before my God.
For every person that succeeds in walking righteously before our God in their teenage years, there are many more that won't. I am one of the many that didn't. Consequently at 21 and in my third year of University I found myself pregnant to a non-Christian compulsive gambler.

Praise be to God that while my husband is still not a Christian, God has healed him of his gambling and we have gone on to have a great marriage relationship despite our tumultuous start.

That is a whole other story to be told perhaps one day about the perils and disobedience involved in marrying an non-Christian, but today I'll share with you a little of where I feel I went wrong.

Luke 22 say's

31"Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you[a] as wheat. 32But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers."

Who gave the permission to Satan ??? GOD gave the permission to Satan. A pretty mind blowing concept isn't it? It's not the first time it's happened and neither will it be the last. Job was another example of Satan trying to break the will of a righteous man to worship God.

I can remember as a self-righteous 17-year-old vowing off so many things, alcohol, smoking, sex before marriage, going out with a non-Christian even marrying a non-Christian. Not bad things to steer clear of are they.

Recently a lesson dawned on me. Just like Peter I was vowing these things in a spirit of pride. Just as he felt that he was a special disciple who deserved to be regarded highly I was looking for recognition from my God for an attitude that was born out of a spirit of pride. Oh she's a good Christian girl isn't she saying all these things let's give her a pat on the back..... WRONG!

I look back on my life now and I know and truly believe that God gave Satan permission to sift me and guys I failed dismally not just once either. Just like Peter when push came to shove I denied my Lord over and over and over again in lots of areas in my life.

So what does this mean for us today, should we never set out to live a righteous and godly life. Of course we should. My problem was I promised God all these things and I told him over and over again that I would never deny him. But each time I did, I had that sinking feeling like Peter must have had when he heard that cock crow.

My trouble as I bet Peter's was, was that I rested upon my prideful promises rather than in humbly submitting myself to God. Admitting our weakness is not a character flaw, it opens you up to God's nurture and protection in your life. Satan will try to condemn you for your weakness but the bible tells us that there is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. You already have victory in Christ- you just need to walk in it.

Never say Never has become a catch phrase of the movies, but I believe it is applicable to the Christian life. As soon as we say we never will or make a never statement based on pride rather than humility, we are opening ourselves up for a good sifting. Rather we should be each day humbly asking God for the strength to resist ANY temptation that comes our way, to stand firm.

James 4:7 say's"Submit yourselves then, to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you"

Action is required here on the part of the Christian, in order to resist Satan. We are not to passively sit back and let him attack us. This is warfare.!!!!

However it is still necessary to understand that it is only through the power of Christ in us when we choose to abide in him that allows us victory. There is no power in our prideful attitudes or flesh, but when we humbly acknowledge our faults and seek God's face he will meet us where we are at, and give us the strength by his grace and his mercy to resist the devil.

I have been reading a book lately that talks about the 3 enemy's of a Christian;

• Satan

• The world

• Our flesh.

Ephesians 6:12 tells us that our war is not against people (flesh and blood) but against the rulers, the powers and the principalities in heavenly realms. I am not telling you this to scare you, or out of some kind of demon fixation you may think I have, I am telling you this that if you are not aware of the tricks that Satan plays you will fail dismally.

Dress yourselves in your armor daily. Cover your thought life, your deeds, and your behavior with the armor of God. This isn't a daunting task pray it is straight from your bibles.

The world is a place that a Christians daily has trouble being. Movies, music, clothes, television, books etc ... are so anti-Christ that it's no wonder we are told to be in the world not off the world. The world will try to sell you so many lies. You're not whole unless you're in a relationship. Your not fulfilled unless it's a sexual relationship, look out for number one, beauty is essential, only the beautiful people succeed, times have changed, so therefore the biblical rules have changed. WRONG! The world is not so very different from the days of Sodom and Gomorrah.

God's principles are just as valid today as ever before. Know them, learn them and write them on your heart. Stand strong in the Lord, but do it humbly knowing that you can do nothing except through Christ's who strengthens you. It may be okay now in the loving shelter of your families, but the day will come when you will have to leave it for one reason or another, and you will want to make sure you can stand firm in Christ by yourself.

Even if you were to remain with your family until the day you were married, temptation doesn't stop because you have a ring on your finger, a husband and a home. Be strong ladies, and learn soon.

Thirdly our flesh is our other enemy. Galatians 5: 19-21 talks about the sins of the flesh. Some of them may be hard to understand and I encourage you to talk about them with someone who can help you further investigate and explain.

These ones come from a book called 'The Adversary" by Mark Bubeck;

• Adultery - thoughts or acts of immorality after marriage.

• Fornication - thoughts or acts or immorality before marriage.

• Uncleanness - evil or impure thoughts, dirty stories, lustful desires, dirty movies, pornography.

• Lasciviousness - the practice of stirring up sinful desires outside the limit of God's approval- dress, speech, smile, eyes, physical gestures, modesty.

• Idolatry - the sin of the flesh rebelling against worshiping God. When we either physically or mentally put a 'thing' before God.

• Witchcraft- this is a desire to contact or relate to the spiritual world that is outside of the realm of God's spiritual domain.

• Hatred - dark thoughts towards something/someone, bitterness, contempt, loathing, anger.

• Variance/Quarreling - expresses itself as we become a part of strife or discord. Usually springs from the need for attention or to prove ourselves right.

• Emulation's/Jealousy - inner feelings of resentment that someone else is or has something that we want. Comes from desiring our own interests above others, also manifests itself as a lack of self acceptance or thankfulness for the way in which God has made us, or the life he has given us.

• Wrath - bad temper, violent anger, rage or sentiment, coming from things/people threatening our self interest.. Anger is an attempt of the flesh to step in and take situations (vengeance especially) out of God's hands.

• Strife - self-seeking rivalry, pulls others that threaten us in anyway down.

• Sedition's - to divide, split in two parts. This is trying to identify with a group that will my selfish interests. It's what causes church splits and quarreling amongst believers.

• Heresies - like the above, including being party to a spirit of non-essentials. This is trying to identify with a group that will support our conduct with doctrinal argument. Especially harmful in the body of Christ.

• Envying - an inner discontent with our life or ourselves. Look at others success or superiority with a desire for his/her place. Comes from our own insecurity and trust in God's enabling, and a refusal to be happy with God's will for us, and his grace.

• Murders - the rebellious desire of the flesh or the action of taking a life.

• Drunkenness - reliance upon a substance (intoxicants) that provide an artificial means of escape from our sins and responsibilities, providing an artificial feeling of well being.

• Reveling and such alike- this is were sensual appetites rule and dictate behavior. It is the desire and act of meeting and gratifying the body's appetites without moral responsibility.

I know that is a long list of flesh sins, and some will not apply to you, but if you are honest with yourself you will struggle with some of these at some time.

So how do we avoid sins of the flesh?

By acknowledging them before our God. We need to at all time walk honestly, seeing our faults and allowing and cultivating the Holy Spirits prompting in our lives.

Galatians 5:24-26 says;

"Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking or envying each other"

Even though we may feel like good for nothing sinners, the truth of the matter is that God has already taken our sin for us, and made it possible for us to walk in the Spirit. We need to learn to walk not by what we feel but by the truth of God's word. The verse above says that our sinful nature was crucified with Christ. It doesn't mean that we won't sin, it means that we don't have to be a slave to our sin. You can have victory in your life.

Always give God his due glory for the care, protection and victory in your life. Keep your minds focused on him, not on your own self. Don't become proud of your Christian walk unless your proud of how much the Lord has done for you. Then be careful not to think he's poured out an extra dose of grace on you cause your such a worthy recipient, but rather boast only in the Lord.

The reason that I am telling you this is because I did become proud and conceited. And I didn't get told any of the above information until just recently when the Lord revealed to me. I wish I had of understood it better when I was your age, I may have saved myself, my family and my Lord a lot of unnecessary heart ache.

ThankfullyRomans 8:28 says;

"And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose"

There is an old chorus that says;

"Something beautiful, something good, all my confusion, he understood. All I had to offer him was brokenness and strife, but he made something beautiful of my life".

That's how I feel about my Lord. It's taken me many years and quite a journey to be able to say that. God has brought me to the place I am in today, and he sustains me daily. I have learnt to say, that without my God I am nothing, but in my Lord I am a conqueror, victorious, whole and forgiven.

(written in 1998 for a home school mail out to young teenage girls)

White washed walls.

2007-06-25T21:25:00.000+10:00

Acts 23

1 "Then Paul, looking earnestly at the council, said, “Men and brethren, I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day.” 2 And the high priest Ananias commanded those who stood by him to strike him on the mouth. 3 Then Paul said to him, “God will strike you, you whitewashed wall! For you sit to judge me according to the law, and do you command me to be struck contrary to the law?” 4 And those who stood by said, “Do you revile God’s high priest?” 5 Then Paul said, “I did not know, brethren, that he was the high priest; for it is written, ‘You shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people.’"

I was reading this passage about Paul and was reminded of the many 'people' that may be around us that we may consider to be 'whitewashed walls'. Is it a government leader, that pastor of that mega church, that prophet, those people from church in authority over you? Do we not realise that people ONLY stand in places of authority because the Lord you God keeps them there?

You may not respect the person, but we are certainly called to respect the positions of authority that God places, and keeps men and women in. Paul when he realised his mistake was greatly humbled and realised that he had made a grave mistake..... not so much against the man he offended, but the position of authority this man held.

Again I say, men and women only hold places of authority because the Lord keeps them there, for whatever reason.Either He is God or He is not? Either way do not limit your view to the key hole of life that you look through, but rather submit yourself to the 'eagle-eye' God view and allow God to be God, praying all the while that HIS will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Floods- Make of it what you will!

2007-06-25T12:38:00.000+10:00

I posted this on a public Forum last September.

Posted: Mon Sep 04, 2006 3:42 pm Post subject: Floods

Link here for verification-

Revival School Forum

I just feel the need to write this down...
Over the past week I have had several dreams about floods. They are non-specific but the theme is the same... floods. I woke up this morning and I said to my husband (who is not saved), I keep having these dreams about floods. He said, "Wow I had one last night as well' and went on to tell me about it....

That started me wondering if there was more to in that a week of flood dreams. This is what took place afterwards. A sister in the Lord replied on the same forum;

Maria, this was a portion of a word that was spoken for Australia while we were there.
"The Spirit of the Lord is pouring out on Australia. Rivers are released, flood gates are opened. The rivers are flowing, cutting and revealing. Revealing treasures, revealing the heart of God to Australia. The harvest released, and you will reap bountifully and joyfully. Job speaks that the Lord cuts rivers among the rocks, and he sees the precious things that were hidden. He keeps the floods from overflowing, and brings those precious things to light. In that chapter he begins to speak of wisdom, the fear of the Lord. JOb 28

My husband saw the harvest released in Australia and laborers reaping bountifully and joyfully. He saw grown men weeping and kneeling in the streets. Often the natural does represent the spiritual.
However, the Spirit of the Lord knows what He is releasing for Australia, and I fully believe in this, He is releasing revival for the harvest. There is wisdom among this for many in Australia. The wisdom that will enable those to reach not only home, but other nations in this end time. Many will be blessed because of Australia. I pray, “Let the Rivers flow”.

A response a few days later from myself;

Posted: Thu Sep 07, 2006 8:44 am Post subject:

Woke up this morning to this....

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/gale-force-winds-to-follow-storms/2006/09/07/1157222228299.html

Keep praying people!

Kindly Maria

********************

Friday 8th September

We flew into Launceston in Tasmania.

You would not believe our surprise when walking along the waterfront of the Tamar river in Launceston when we come across a sign marking Launceston as the city of Floods!

I can't believe I did not take a photo of that!!!!!!!

********************
Later that month at our night Celebration service on the 17th of September the Lord gave me Isaiah 41:17-20

Which after sharing the above stories, I proclaimed aloud in the congregation these verses.

17 "Those who are poor and needy search for water.

But there isn't any.

Their tongues are dry because they are thirsty.

But I will help them. I am the Lord.

I will not desert them.

I am Israel's God.

18 I will make streams flow on the bare hilltops.

I will make springs come up in the valleys.

I will turn the desert into pools of water.

I will turn the dry and cracked ground into flowing springs.

19 I will make trees grow in the desert.

I will plant cedar and acacia trees there.

I will plant myrtle and olive trees there.

I will make pine trees grow in the dry and empty desert.

I will plant fir and cypress trees there.

20 Then people will see and know

that my powerful hand has done it.

They will consider and understand

that I have created it.

I am the Holy One of Israel."

******************************************

Last week the following thread was sent to me in email format;

Catch the Fire Ministries Link

******************************************

This morning the Lord gave me;

Isaiah 43: 18-20

18 "Forget the things that happened in the past.

Do not keep on thinking about them.

19 I am about to do something new.

It is beginning to happen even now.

Don't you see it coming?

I am going to make a way for you to go through the desert.

I will make streams of water in the dry and empty land.

20 Even wild dogs and owls honor me.

That is because I provide water in the desert

for my people to drink.

I cause streams to flow in the dry and empty land

for my chosen ones. 21 I do it for the people I made for myself.

I want them to sing praise to me.

******************************************

~Selah~

Grasshoppers

2007-06-25T10:43:00.001+10:00

Late 2005 we had a visiting speaker come to address our congregation. He had been invited by our eldership because he believed he had a 'message' for our church.

This pastor spent a few weeks preaching on various topics to do with Grasshopper mentality and facing our Giants. This was definitely a message for me as it had been a personal struggle of mine for many years.

During this series of teachings the Lord was convicting me about one area of my own 'Grasshopper' thinking. It had to do with my small minded thinking, particularly in my marriage relationship. We often fall into traps with those close to us of nit picking, and not having a big picture view of things- well at least I do!

One day I remember having an argument with my husband about something obviously trivial and unimportant because I can't remember the topic. I could feel the Holy Spirit begin to convict me of my nit picking, nagging, grasshopper mentality.

As this happened out the corner of my eye I saw something small on a bench in our living room. I walked over to it and found a grasshopper sitting on top of some books. I chuckled to myself about coincidence. Wondering how the little fellow got inside and marvelling about a grasshopper showing up in the big city. I quickly tried to recall when the last time I had even seen a grasshopper, but couldn't accurately recall.

The second time a grasshopper payed me a visit, our family was driving in a car to a local shopping centre. Again I was arguing with my husband about something as equally unimportant as the first time. I was getting quite upset by whatever it was and my own failure to win this argument! As I reached for a tissue I again saw something that caught my attention.

A grasshopper (bigger than the first), slowly started to call across from the middle of the windscreen to my passenger side of the car. It stopped right in front of my line of sight and then preceded to walk to the left hand corner.

This time my sense of humor had vanished and I was not at all happy about such a visual reminder of my sin and struggle! I was not at all interested that day in the Holy Spirit convicting me as I was wallowing in my hurt and sin like a pig in mud.

Over the next couple of days the Lord began to gently deal with me again, and I repented of my bad attitude and sinfulness. Many times over the next couple of months the Lord would bring those two grasshoppers to mind any time I began to battle with the giant in my life.

August 2006 saw us move house and it has 'ALWAYS' been my experience with every new house we inhabit that the Lord deals with me about some issue in my life. Not all of them negative, some very positive things as well.

About a month after moving here Anthony and I had been discussing something. I hadn't even gotten out of bed before the 'grasshopper' thinking started. However this time I had, had enough. I renounced those thoughts bringing them captive to the obedience of Christ. I told myself (and any 'evil spirit') listening that I was NOT going to think that way any more by God's power. I was finished with grasshopper thoughts and I wanted to think big, remembering that God is a VERY big God and was able to help me overcome ANYTHING through the power of His Holy Spirit, through the death and resurrection of Christ my Lord. I covered my mind with the helmet of salvation and covered my thoughts with the blood of the Lamb.

With that I got out of bed and walked into my kitchen to have breakfast. As I reached to open the cupboard to find a bowl I saw the biggest, greenest grasshopper I have EVER seen in my whole life, sitting contentedly on my cupboard door. After calling my son to relocate the 'giant' grasshopper to our garden, I praised God for His work in my life. I praised God that we no longer have to be captive to our mind. I praised God that there was victory for those who choose to overcome by the power of the Holy Spirit.

A small battle was won that day in the 'spiritual realm' and in the fertile ground of my mind!

A door had been unlocked and freedom was nigh!

The use of scripture in prophecy

2007-06-20T12:43:00.000+10:00

All spelling/typing mistakes my own and I apologise to the author. The below quote is taken from pages 60 and 61 of "Understanding Prophetic People- Blessings and Problems with the Prophetic Gift" by R. Loren Sandford.

I am currently reading this book and came across this quote and would like to share it with you. It is about the use of scripture. I think it is a timely reminder to the body of Christ;

In the same way that the contemporary prophetic
ministry cannot add to or substitute for Scripture, neither can it be made into a key for interpreting the Bible. The Bible must be interpreted and understood in it's own context and on its own terms according to the intended meaning of the author.

Four different contexts reveal its meaning.

First, every word of Scripture has a linguistic context that demands we study the original languages. Words have specific definitions that can be
discovered.

Second, every verse has a historical context. Its meaning should be viewed in the light of the events of the day, or historical backdrop, in which it was written.

Third, every passage of Scripture speaks form a cultural context. This context determines meaning in the same way that culture informs the meaning of words we use today.

And fourth, we must understand the passage in the context of the verses surrounding it. Context informs meaning. When we lift a verse from its context, we not only miss parts of its meaning, but we also often distort or even lose its true meaning entirely.

Careful study of each element of context therefore reveals the intended meaning of the author. That intended meaning is the only infallible revelation of God. We have no right to change it, spiritualize it or
make it say anything orther than it was originally intended to say. No level of supposed Holy Spirit inspiration can be allowed to supersede these considerations, or else we have granted ourselves the right to make the Bible say whatever we want it to say. Doing so takes God off the throne and presumptuously seats us in His place.

Scripture gives us an objective revelation that cannot be altered, not subjective ones that varies with the inner perception or personal inspiration of the reader. No revelation, prophetic word, dream or
vision can change the intended meaning of any verse of scripture.

Personal revelation, prophetic words, dreams and visions can expand our understanding at the level of the heart, but they cannot be
allowed to alter or even add to the message......

....We think emotionally (prophetic people) and must struggle to achieve a balance between the discipline of reason and the depth of wisdom that intuitive understanding can bring when such a balance exists. We
need objective revelation, and Scripture provides this as we learn to study it properly.

And the wind blew.....

2007-06-18T08:34:00.000+10:00

I have been enjoying this bi-monthly edition of Everyday with Jesus. Selwyn Hughes has been looking at the various emblems of the Holy Spirit used throughout Scripture.

As I was reading over some of the devotional material, my mind hearkened back to the Children's Prayer Network event I attended last year with a team from the Church of the Good Shepherd. It was one of those 'desire of my heart' type trips where the Lord took me somewhere I had yearned to go, and He allowed me to share it with my daughter Kiyana as well as dear sisters/friends in the Lord.

Despite being 16 weeks pregnant (and historically very ill) with baby number 5, the weekend was just pure testimony of God's grace to me. He showed up both personally in being my strength throughout the trip, in our team, in the way He worked in individuals lives, and corporately, as we all took part in praying for this great nation, Australia.

The Lord took me through a season last year where I seemed to experience 'signs' in a new way in 2006. I hadn't really had this kind of experience before and to begin with I wasn't really convinced it was 'really happening'. Don't get me wrong, I have had signs of God's very real presence in my life in areas of answered prayer, protection etc but this was a different season for me.

Before we left for Uluru in one of our Saturday morning preparation/prayer meetings I happen to be the person leading the devotional that morning.

The Lord had given me the following passage to exhort the group from 1 Kings 19;

11 The LORD said, "Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by." Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. 12 After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper.

I remember standing standing in the line that the we had made surrounding the whole of Uluru, praying for specific things in our nation. We had just finished praying for the Holy Spirit to come upon our nation, and I know I personally had been praying for Him to 'whoosh' through like in the book of Acts upon the believers in that upper room.

All of a sudden I looked down the line, and the wind seemed to be bunny hopping trees that lined up almost parallel to the prayer warriors there. The gentlest breeze jumped from tree to tree right up the prayer line. I shook my head to make sure I wasn't imagining it, and took a look up and down the line. As I did this Pastor Robyn Peebles who was to my right called out, 'did you see that"? I then knew I hadn't imagined it. I looked up to my left where the rest of our team had lined up and were now worshipping. Almost directly in front of them the wind formed a Willy-Willy, tunneling upwards towards the heavens. It was quite remarkable to watch.

Soon after we were told it was time to put on our yellow t-shirts to reflect the glory of God upon our nation, and her being readied to reflecting His glory through revival repentance. We put on our shirts and began to pray. Out of no where, the June sun that had been quite pleasant up until that point, began to brighten and beat down upon us, it was as if God as conductor was focusing the sun's rays right back upon us as we sought to lift Him up and see Him glorified in our nation. It felt like fire on my face, but I felt that strangely I would not be burnt by the sun's rays at that time.

Again I thought, perhaps I am just imagining this. But when we returned to our groups, others too had experienced the same thing.

This was my first 'real' intercessory prayer event. Don't get me wrong I have been in a lot of prayer meetings over the years, and certainly ones where we were there to intercede for a particular thing, but this was the first of this kind I have attended.

The hardest thing I found coming home from this kind of trip, is trying to explain to people what we did. When Josh and I went to Fiji in 2005 I could come home and say, we taught here, did a kids club there, danced in that church, did a school out reach in this school... tangible things. But with an intercessory prayer event it is hard to put a finger on what happened in the 'spiritual' realm as a result of prayer.

Whatever happened at the end of the day is the Lord's concern. I do know however that the Lord was there with us that weekend. I also believe He showed His presence to us in tangible ways as well, in that still small voice that I hope we never fail to recognise!

~Hallelujah~

Encouragement from 2 Timothy

2007-06-16T19:58:00.000+10:00

I was reading 2 Timothy 1 this morning as part of my course work for Cleansing Stream (link below), and I read some verses within that first chapter which took on a whole new meaning to me.

Actually as I stopped to think about it, I have spent most of my adult life taking these verses out of it's 'true context'.

2 Timothy 1:6-9

6For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. 7 For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline. 8 So do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord, or ashamed of me his prisoner. But join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God, 9who has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace.

Now it could just be that I am slower than the average bear, but I had TRULY never really thought of it this way before, so humor me if I am lagging behind a little here.

Paul here is exhorting Timothy to use the gifts that he received when Paul layed hands on him. We can receive God's gifts with the laying on of hands, but we learn to utilize them (fan them into flames) only by using them.

However the thing that stood out for me this morning was that Timothy was also exhorted here not to be timid about the use of his gifts, when testifying. Not to be ashamed when testifying about the Lord, because he was not given a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.

I have often quote that verse in lots of places in my life when I have been afraid, but not ever really in the use of my gifts or testifying about the Lord.

As I read the commentary in my bible it suggested that Timothy may have had a confidence problem. Timothy was being exhorted by Paul in the use of his gifts because his confidence may be lacking. There have been many times in my Christian life that I have been timid in the use of my gifts, timid in testifying about the Lord just like Timothy! I pray though, that today is a new day and from this moment on I will remember the Rhema word to me this morning.... God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline!

~Hallelujah~

http://www.csm-australia.org/

Sincere and Unswerving Heart!

2007-06-13T16:39:00.000+10:00

Hebrews 10: 19

Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, 20by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, 21and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.

I came across this verse again during a course I have been doing and it struck me 'again' to be one of those that's gold verses in the bible! Not only does it sum up a whole heap of theology in a couple of lines, it also provides for us some really great tips for our Christian walk.

So often we wait for God to seem real to us but one of the keys I have found within this little verse is that we are told to draw near to God. I know this is expressed in other places in the bible, but this one really struck me. Not only are we told that we are to draw near, but how we are to do it. Firstly we are to draw near to God with a 'sincere heart'.

In the NIV version above the word sincere, replaced the word true. The original word;

a)lhqino/v or Alethinos means; that which has not only the name and resemblance, but the real nature corresponding to the name, in every respect corresponding to the idea signified by the name, real, true genuine opposite to what is fictitious, counterfeit, imaginary, simulated or pretended it contrasts realities with their semblances opposite to what is imperfect defective, frail, uncertain true, veracious, sincere

This is really quite amazing. The God of the universe, the one who created the heaven's and the earth, who hung the stars in the sky and splashed oceans and rivers across the land wants you to come just as you are, in your true state to Him.

I love how David does this in the Psalms. It has always been of great comfort to me to see the raw reality of David's heart's cries to the Lord. Many years ago I endevoured to learn from David and pour out my heart to God in a similar fashion. And usually in the same vein as David, my time of exposing my sincere and true heart, yes even the ugly side of it, usually ends up with me praising the Lord for His might and power or repenting for the sin the Lord has lit upon in His mercy and grace.

The second key here is that God want's us to approach Him in 'full assurance of

faith'. Where as above He wants us to be real about who WE are, here He requires us to be real about who HE is, and that means putting aside our worldly doubt and disbelief and approach Him in faith. This is much easier to do once we stop measuring God by our own standards. When we take stock of His character and understand the very nature of who he is, in the light of His word (not in the light of our 'true hearts') we start to cast down our own idols of who we THINK God is and start believing in who He REALLY is!

I don't know about you, but sometimes I find it very hard to remember to do this, but it is something that I am relearning how to do. If God say's He will take care of our needs, then He means it, if He say's that He knows the desire's of your heart, then you can trust that. If God tells you that your sins are forgiven and covered under His spilt blood then walk like they have been.

Sometimes though it is far easier to live in our own created images of who God is than to take that leap of faith and actually trust who the word say's He is. God's memory is not short that He forgets the things he tells us, His hands are not too busy that He can not hold us in them and His heart is not too small that He hasn't got you beating with in.

The third key I learn't his morning is that if we are truly children of God, we are told to also hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. Christianity is not a passive faith at all. Reading through the pages of scripture we are often told to do things that require action on our part, and this scripture is no different. Here we are told to hold undswervingly to our hope in Christ who is faithful.

http://www.dictionary.com/ list's unswervingly with the following definitions;

un·swerv·ing (ŭn-swûr'vĭng) adj.

Not veering or turning aside: "a path . . . so straight and unswerving" (Mary Wilkins Freeman).
constant; steady: unswerving allegiance; unswerving devotion.

We are to remain constant in our hope, devoted, steady, never losing hope, not turning aside but looking into the eyes of Jesus we are to are not to give up, give in, or give out. Why? Because He PROMISES to be FAITHFUL!!!

So next time we begin to look away and we start to veer off the path that God has for us, let us hark back to this verse and encourage each other to hold fast to God, be sincere in heart and trust, and live with full assurance that God promises to be faithful to us, and that is some promise!

Hallelujah!!!