waiting for a moment.

I just feel like maybe we start to loose passion when we stop expecting God to do something. I mean when we stop waiting on God, ok, what I really mean is when we stop doing things as a means to position ourselves so that God will do something. say for instance you had a service and someone asked what happened. You might say; we worshiped, we prayed, we heard the word. but....how often do we hear about what God did? I'm still waiting for a moment, I'm still waiting for an encounter, I'm still waiting to see what God will do. How sad is it when we just stop expecting God to how up. We just stop crying because we dont think anyone is going to come. Then we just begin to take solice in the amount of christian activity that took place instead of genuine encounter. Something about having an expectancy that changes everything, when we really expect something to happen. ...

A healing desert

Identity
I’m convinced there is nothing more dangerous in this world than an insecure man. This is doubly true in ministry. An insecure person will always seek to find his approval and acceptance from those around him, and in his own ability. Since his entire self security rests in the outlook of others he will contend with anyone and anything that threatens it, as if fighting for his own life. Such is the state of a world trying desperately to forge their own destiny apart from one already predestined by a loving God. Every sin and every dispute within or without the church stems largely from our having our personal identity rooted in anything but Christ. May it be looks, degrees, intelligence, family, success, etc. As much as we try to escape it much of our identity is completely wrapped up in our own sense of achievement and standards set by our society. There lies in the pressure to live up to a standard imposed upon by a culture, this is the pressure breaking the backs of the world and stealing the joy from the children of God. What a tragedy we carry these same ideals with us into the house of God. Where we again are evaluated by success in ministry and become obsessed with personal growth instead of relationship with God.
The call
Growing over several months of time was a gaping and haunting feeling of failure. It seemed to loom behind my every prayer. Failure in ministering to others, failure in displaying Christ like character, failure in fasting and prayers. All previous methods of advancements seemed only tiresome efforts in the flesh. I had only as it were a mirror in front of me at all times showing me the ugliness of my failure. I tried to encourage myself with prophecies over my life, past victories and much Christian busyness. I felt tired, and worst of all a sense of being used. What started as a whisper of a thought slowly turned into a scream. It was time to seek God, all else had failed. I began planning a trip out of town to be alone.

The wilderness

I began to study and meditate on the epistles in the New Testament. “I no longer live, but it is Christ who lives in Me.”, “for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God”, “You are a new creation”, “made in true righteousness and holiness”, and many such scriptures. I came out seeking my identity, who am I truly? What defines me? It came to a time in my walk with God where I could go no further with God or with my life in Him. I needed to be changed, I needed some revelation, yesterdays manna was gone, the iniquity that was at my heels had caught up with me; my failures had caught up with me. Something that is not often spoken of in Christianity is that call to loneliness. It is in solitude where we receive identity from God, being stripped of society and our perceived self image tied up in the way other people see us. It is in solitude that the mirror of others and the mirror of society are taken away and we begin to look only to God and begin to see who we truly are in Him. It is there we wrestle with strongholds in the human mind, demonic ideologies, principalities and powers.
It was the Spirit of God that led Jesus our lord into the wilderness. There he was alone facing the devil. What was the devils scheme? He attacked His identity, “If you are the son of God...” It is in the dessert the fathers of our faith were sent by God. Abram was told by God “You are Abraham” and called Abraham a father of many nations. It was in solitude in the wilderness that Jacob crossed the river leaving his family and belongings on the other side to wrestle with God all night. It was there in the place of desolation that Jacob was forced to face his own nature as Jacob, the supplanter and deceiver before God would give him his new name, Israel, prince of men. It was there Jacob had to face his past sin. There David instead of fighting for his calling as king trusted his life in the hand of God and learned to trust that God would lead him into his calling. Moses and the burning bush, Elijah on the mountain, Paul before meeting the apostles.

Leaning
“I cry out to God Most High,
To God who fulfills His purpose for me.” Psalm 57:2
When we hear from God who we are, we no longer have to create our own destiny of fight for our calling. We don’t have to step on others people, plot scheme and fight for our purpose and destiny in God. In solitude God alone shows us who we are, and we find ourselves in Him.
Jacob was leaning his whole life on His own ability, until he met with God. For the rest of his life he would lean, no longer on his flesh but now in the God who is able to perform that which He promises. In the dessert we learn to say good bye to our Jacob. In the wilderness we finally lose all our strengths we thought we had, all our self preservation methods, and fabricated self images, and we are left to lean on the Lord. It is in that leaning that we are closer than ever to Jesus...

“Who is that coming up from the wilderness, leaning on her beloved?”
Song of Solomon 8:5

In every generation the the greatest challenge is to be awake to the state of the social society of the day, to see the condition of the culture we are born and steeped in from birth. The great challenge is to see the conditions and atrocities of our generation as it will be seen for generations to come. But as a man once said "All that evil has to do to perpetuate is for good people to do nothing." This is what heroes are made of. Those men and women we hail as heroic of our history were not those who simply lifted up there heads from the crowd to see the issues in there day, they were those who gave legs to their convictions and took a stand.
it is a drunkenness, a delusion, its when we are so caught up in our interests and the issues of our lives we do not see the dark cloud that is over us and our generation. Like the fish doesn't know it is in water so we being born into our generation have the idea of normality with our state. Is there a moral plumb line that stretches through every generation by which we can lay hold and judge our current condition or are we simply prey to ever changing morals handed to us by whatever the current trend in our society deems fitting? There is an everlasting kingdom reigning above the kingdoms of men that finds its evidences in our hearts as we dream of a utopia of peace of unity, this dream is the evidence of things not seen it is the clarion call of our origin and history, it is 'The Kingdom of God'. "On earth as it is in heaven' Jesus instructed His followers to pray.
From the God who wrote destiny in the human heart there is in each of us a word from heaven, a summons to the hills of our world.

This present darkness. As real and true as the Kingdom of God there is established in our world a kingdom of darkness. A host of principles and ideologies propagated to billions beneath its sway to keep the minds of the people dark and their understanding from grasping the truth of God and our destiny in Him.

to be continued in part 2.....

so many people
so many cars
so many voices jumping out at me
and I took it all in
I internalized it all
I let it go down deep
till fish hooks grabbed me from the inside
til the voices of the masses followed me home
and wouldnt let me lie down
and would let me sleep
and wouldnt let me rest
I listened to every one of you i gave you my time
when Im with Him im on fire when Im with you im burnt out
so many long nights
so many long drives
Im longing just to know how long this goes on
Im running through this valley just dying to rest
spinning places
spinning faces
long stares and nightmares
and Im coming to the door
moved in such a way i could never imagine
I fought for the life thats inside of my soul
I fought day and night
fighting in the darkness I was never alone
tortured and broken may back on the ground
and eternity came flooding in, in the agony of beauty
in a rocky heart
in terrifying gentleness in a jagged soul
He poured in like a wind burning and shattering
something took ahold of me I cant control
theres something in his presence theres something in His power
ripping into time, i cant control whats inside
lifted up onto my feet I opened my eyes
to see the shattered peices of this dark reality come crashing around me

the cross, a faithful companion

We must never speak for ourselves to be faithful witness' (the greek word for witness is martyr). But to speak for God and all ourSELF to be offered up as sheep to the slaughter. Being found not in our own righetousness, defending ourself but instead seeking only the glory of God. Considering ourself of no reputation and worthy of nothing greater than to die for Jesus, sharing in His suffering, becoming like Him in His death on the cross as he said "forgive them Father they know not what they do." Like the chinese Christians when asked how they felt towards their persecution they joyously answered "Why should I be upset? This is the way of the cross." count it all joy when you fall into vaious trials. There is no place in following Jesus for discouragement. Through this light momentary affliction God is working an eternal weight of glory. So let us trust our spirit, soul and body to the care of the one who ordered the galaxies, thate HE will perfect what concerns us and all the sooner if we take our hands off. So to Him be the glory and the honor who in His grace has allowed us to be treasure chests carrying the life of Christ within us. Though they beat the and attack the vessel it only causes the life of Christ to pour out of us all the more.
So in my death I see life. He is an expert shepard who expertly drives His nails (Ecc12:11). A stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. Do not dispise the discipline of the Lord. Do not dispise the cross. In the cross, in the cross be my glory forever. It bekons you again. Why wait another day? Get on the cross, share it with Jesus and today you can be with Him in paradise. let me be found upon the cross when my saviour returns. And may my resistance to self, my resistance to self governance be unto the death and may it be as wheat falling to the ground. Every lost dream, every lost ambition, every forfeited pleasure of sin be a seed. let it be a sweet smelling aroma to God. True love is the giving up of your life for another.
May my shame be to your glory Jesus, as yours has been to mine. "You are my freinds because you have been with me in my trials." how deep the riches of the glory of the wisdom of God.

So I'll cherish the old rugged cross,
till my trophies at last I lay down;
I will cling to the old rugged cross,
and exchange it some day for a crown.

burning bridges

Im still digging through my purpose and digging through my past
trying to find the meaning inside my past
trying to find something like a railing in the mist
something to guide me back to all the love that I missed
was it inside me all this time
this yearning at last
its wonderful in its mystery its following me all the time
how much longer can I wait in a thursday night
Im listening for the starts when im walking in the light
drove down these roads so many times before what am I looking for?
like a little kid sitting in the lost and found
in a land before time where it all began
Im laying down all I was to see up higher
trying to understand the meaning of these scribbling words
like God just creeps in under every verb
I got pushed over the fence like a shooting star
now im crawling up hills just to hold your hand

the glory

A new veiw

I'm sitting on the plane looking out the window and I glance over at my open bible. Psalm 33; "The Lord looks down from heaven,
He sees all the children of men.
From where He sits enthroned He looks out
on all the inhabitants of the earth.
He who fashioned the hearts of them all and observes their deeds."

I stare out the window at tiny squares of land, highways as thin as hair, and tiny specks of houses so small they fade into the tapestry of the landscape and fade off into the horizon. I think of how small, how tiny they are and the tiny little lives they contain and the tiny little problems in those lives. how small and insignificant they look from up here.
As tears roll down my cheeks I hear in my heart the words; "God so loved the world...."
this world? this tiny world I see out my window? more tears....
"that He gave..." I pause on that thought, He loved the world so much that He gave, but what did He give? a handout? A quick fix? a few dollars like we toss to a beggar without a second glace to ease our own guilt?
"God so loved the world He gave..." then it drops into my heart like a thud; "He gave His only begotten son". I taste the salt now from my tears and it makes me wonder if all the oceans in the world are nothing more than the tears of God crying out for this world, a world that for the most part ignores Him...and yet "He gave..."

Why did God whisper to an elderly lady :" I will never leave you"
Why did God supernaturally put fillings in my landladies teeth?
Why did God help a struggling teenage girl stay clean for a month as I heard her proudly pronounce at church?
Its these little drops, these messages that come down to us from The Lord and Hes saying
"I see you and I care"

What is glory anyway, i hear that word allot lately. Well i have a definition for it: God showing his character.

God loves, God gives

"For God so loved the world, he gave His only begotten son that whomever believes in Him may not die but have everlasting life." John 3:16

freedom

You sick and dead world look what you did to me. you promise me freedom but you gave me a cage. You painted a smile on my face and stuck a knife in my back. You promise me freedom and you promised me fun, you dead world your steeling the children and you eat them alive. You dead world how could you? When I was young and volnurable you raped my mind with vulgur language pornography and violence.You made me hate my body and hate my face until I changed my image and ran after your styles so I could finally look at myself in the mirror.you told me I would find some releif when I smoked your drugs and drank from your drinks, but you used it to drain every bit of childish joy from my heart until I couldnt feel anything but numbness without a drink or a smoke.You made me feel so worthless, you told me God didnt care, you told me He was far away or hiding in a church or that He didnt even exist.


But then I saw this man on a cross. Who was he dying for my heart asked. Could it be me that he was suffering for? That broken cowardly insecure me I spend my whole life trying to hide away deep inside of me, that broken me I never let anyone see? He looked at me from that cross and as our eyes met I knew it. This God I spent my entire life hating and ignoring was dying for me...and all this pain and insecurity, all the sin and pain this world had caused me died with Him. And then like a flood in one moment of time all my innocence I had lost came pouring back into me. Like waking up from a bad dream it was all gone I was pure again from the inside out and all my baggage was gone. Then I looked up to see this man, He was no longer on the cross but was standing right in front of me. I saw Him for the first time this God I had never known. He put His arms around me and finally I felt the love and acceptance I always longed for and I never want to leave His arms again.

Who the son sets free is free indeed. No going back to Babylon now. Children of promise turn your eyes to Zion and keep on walking, your salvation draweth near.

to the faith of our fathers

I feel the waves crashing about me
I look up and see the stillness of the stars
Is it true that the light Im seeing is from the past
that it was pushed out by violent storms and heat?

I feel you in my trouble Jacob
Iv wrestled with you before
my father we're children marked from birth by our calling
travailing everyday to be born
is it true we're not so different me and you?
Im reaching up at the stars for you
Its the generations that keep me steady
When I look to the upward calling
I look up to the stars
and I see the past
Im a posterity
a child of your light
I look up and see your faces
now shinning in the firmament
every step I take is a prayer you prayed
out of joy, pain, death, and sorrow

Its the whisper of eternity that keeps drawing us to Him

Everything I needed to learn about Jesus I learned in kindergarden

I was just thinking about the book of acts and how the disciples and apostles ate bread together in simplicity and went from house to house and gathered at the synagogue. Its a beautiful picture. If theirs one thing Iv noticed since Iv been saved, at least Iv noticed this in Canada is; this searching for the real thing. What is real Christianity? what does it really look like? Its like everyone is asking this question and running back and forth.
I think if anything we need Fathers right now. Definitely we don't need anymore preachers or teachings, its like the writer of Hebrews said " by now you should be teachers" with all our information and resources by now we should be examples to the world. If Christianity were a complex math problem or a formula I'm telling you we would have this thing figured out! but the problem is....it's not. Its not something we just need to figure out like an engine. Because its about people, God's building a temple out of people and what holds us together is love. How can you do a teaching on love? We have so much info and books, heres my question :
When does it become real?
I think a huge part of our problem in this part of the world is that we have had community and friendship and family stolen from us. We dont even know what it means anymore. To be a Friend even when they offend you to stick it out with someone even if they hurt you soo bad. Faithful are the wounds of a Friend Solomon once wrote.
I have only seen a few, maybe three, people in my life who just exuded love I mean they were the real deal you could tell they care.
coming back to the father issue, I was dreaming today of men who preached but weren't preachers. What I mean is I have seen this hunger especially in young people for someone who preaches but then gets down off the pulpit and comes into there world and doesn't just run out the back door.
I think of these fathers in the natural who have given up there lives and had it ruff so they could provide a better life for there children. I think of our fathers in the faith from Hebrews 11, how they gave up there lives to provide "something better for us"(vs 40). I think that's the difference between a father and a preacher, a preacher is doing it for himself and a father is doing it for the children. "You have many teachers in the faith, but not many fathers".
Family, community, breaking bread in simplicity.

Anyway let me know what you think or if you have anything to add I would like some feedback on this one.

whoever does the word of the Lord shall live by it.
I was questioned recently by someone about why I would paint a room in someones house for free. I asked "why wouldn't I?" they responded "you need to make a living." I simply said " I don't live by the work of my hands."
From there lost point of view this makes no sense. But the fact is I now live by faith and I dont rely on the work of my own hands to provide for myself. Like the two sons of adam: Cain and Abel, one brought the work of his hands and the other brought a sacrifice of faith.
This clearly is a picture of two kinds of people in the earth, one who trusts in himself and his abilities to provide for Himself and the other who trusts in the lord for his daily bread. Basically put: I don't receive my living from working, I receive my living from obeying the voice of God. This is not to say I don't work, I do, I work a full time job yet that is not the source of my provision. If all the jobs would be gone tomorrow I know as long as I obey the voice of my God I will always have my daily bread, this is the difference.
Oh Mr. Trump you got nothin' on a simple sparrow lol. That little sparrow has more faith than He does!! lol. So once again we have the tree of life(faith) vrs the tree of knowledge(works).

Just a few examples:
I gave away my van to a family who needed it and a short time later a pastor who didnt know my situation called me and said the Lord told Him in prayer to give His pathhfinder to me....
I have cheaper rent and cheaper insurance than I think anyone I know and Im under 25 (usually insc is quite high before 25)!
All the glory to God! how did this happen? I didnt even try to make these things happen all I did was seek the kingdom.
O yea one other thing the van I gave away was an answer to prayer the next day after my truck had broken down, again the person who gave had no knowledge of my need.

So I just wanted to share the goodness of the Lordwith you. Dont just trust Him with salvation, trust Him with everything!

is your mother the slave or the free woman?

This was a word I had for a freind but now that i think of it it....it's for all of us.


the orphan spirit of suburbia wants you to be obsessed with your progress because it makes you feel like thats where your value is.
But the adoption Spirit of God wants you to stand out because your blessed in who you are.
A child isnt any better at 2 years old than 5 even if he knows how to do a few more things.
Hes blessed and loved because he's a child.
thats whats going to make you stand out.
You being blessed in your being, even in your failures.
your identity is not in how much you progress or how much you succeed.
your identity is in your Father your identity is in being His child.

I call you out of the yoke of the orphan spirit, I call you out of the heavy yoke of having your identity wrapped up in your progress, I call you out into the freedom to show the world what it means to be a child.
I call you into the freedom of the adoption Spirit.

remember; the first thing Jesus taught his disciples to say when they asked Him how to pray was "Father".


The vain tradition of our Fathers is not Judaism and the law but its striving to find value and identity in our own effort and ability to succeed, and the heavy load of having our whole identity wrapped up in how people around us see us.

What the world doesnt understand is a child.

God loved us before the foundation of the world, before we did any right or wrong.....before the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

the voice

The word of the Lord is more than words, it's substance. We need to follow the word. It needs to overpower you . It needs to be in you to direct you, it needs to be the strongest force and the loudest sound in you. It's an overcoming fire. You need to give it such precedence over your own life where you are no longer in control, where the power of the word literally overpowers you and masters you. Until you are the voice, you are what God is saying in the earth, until there is no part of you that has not been conquered by the word. Every desire is layed down, every thought is layed down and you are the carrier of the word of God and you are a fire and a hammer wielded by the hand of God Himself. And you will bear the stripes of the word and you will be brought through the valley of the shadow of death with the word and you will be hated with the word. You gotta hear it. You gotta hear the word. He who has ears to hear let him hear what the Spirit is saying to the churches. The word has gone out and God is directing his army and some heads are going to hear it and bow but those who do not hear it will not bow and they will be destroyed. There is a call that's gone out and the word of God has been sent. Either you will bow and let the word overtake you and rule you or the word will consume you. That still small voice has to made louder than the world around you, has to influence you more than anything around you, has to drive you and push you forward. It'll make you burn with life "I have come to cast fire on the earth and how I wish that it were already kindled." You keep it a whisper in your life so you can push it away. I pray it becomes louder and louder until you cant sleep, until you cant rest in anything but Him, until His word shakes us until everything that can be shaken; all the compromise, all the false comforts break off us and we are brought to nothing before Him and His power is released in us.
The voice...can you hear it

I heard it said that God doesnt exalt His voice. Everyone in the world was waiting for an exalted voice. The stars dont make a sound but night after night the bible sais they sing. Creation sings of this great God. But He doesnt exalt His voice, He doesnt have to, He knows He's God. He knoews who He is. As the youngest of four I was always lifting up my voice because I was insecure wanted to be heard just like this fallen world exalts its voice to hide whats inside.
when the word of God came into the earth He came in a manger in the back country somewhere, a still small voice. The People were waiting for an exalted voice and they asked "Is this not Jesus, the carpenters son?", and many didnt hear Him. But the sound of The Lord has gone out over the earth and the humble and meek will hear it and rejoice and lift up there heads.
Are you still waiting for an exalted voice?
The Lord declares His love over His children every morning and rejoices over them with singing. A still small voice finds its home in a gentle heart.

Psalm 131

To him who has ears to hear, let him hear.

people for sale

this has really been on my heart recently, this issue about being for sale. I was day dreaming the other day about what God's plans may be for some people and I was day dreaming about some certain young people and what God may want for there lives. I dreamt of things like taking care of orphanes and things like this. Then I started to think about these people and wondered if they would be bought, what I mean is; what if the right man or woman comes along or they get involved in being popular and the desire to be accepted and they never find out what God's plan for there life was? It just breaks my heart to think of. I mean how cheap.
Can the world purchase you? How about if it offers you the right carreer? the one youv always wanted? What about for the American dream?

In the process of coming to Jesus I was given 2 dreams in one night, they are in the order as follows:

The first dream started with me laying in bed and I had just woke up. I looked at myself and my body was almost in perfect shape. I also had brand new really nice tattoos. I got out of bed and I had lots of freinds in this very nice house and people were calling me and they were inviting me to parties. Then the dream ended.
This dream represented all i wanted in life before getting saved: tattoos, physically fit, freinds, popularity etc.

Then I had this second dream: In this dream i was being escorted around an orphanage that was also a home for sick kids by a middle aged woman who took me room to room. Finally we came to a closed door and before she opened it the lady turned to me and said "be careful how you act, in this room is a young girl who is dying." When the door opened I saw a small girl with straight brown hair, maybe 7 or 8 sitting on her bed. When she saw us come in I could tell by the look on her face that she was constantly treated by people as a dying person and she was nervous of visitors. I said to myself in my heart "Im going to show her Jesus", so I gave her the biggest smile and when I did she looked suprised for a minute but i felt the love of God enter the room.
Then I woke up
That night my heart made a choice. Behold two dreams; mine..........and God's.

Can you be bought?

Lord Jesus I pray right now for every heart that is struggling to lay down there old life, I pray for every person wondering why they are here that you would visit them with your dreams O God and invade this generation with your plans. God I pray right now for a sold out people, a people so desperatley after your heart that all the fleeting pleasures of this world are seen as garbage compared to knowing you Jesus.