Archive for February, 2010
One Thing
We are fast approaching the end of month one and it has been the most amazing, challenging, God focused month of my life…ever! Prayer is becoming really fun, I’m starting to feel like I can ask God to move and He will, not only because He promised but because He likes me enough to do it but one of the best things so far has been seeing all that God is doing in the kids. As part of their class they are learning the apostolic prayers and so we find them singing and reciting scripture all day long! And they understand it too, maybe not all of it but Clara-Lily definitely has a grasp on what she is saying. And it seems they are enjoying praying more too, it’s not a case of us asking them to pray at bed time but they ask us!
I did want to scribble down a few thoughts from one of our classes this week that was taught by a lady called Jessica Willard (here’s a short video of her talking about something) she spoke out of testimony of what God has done in her life and she shared some really great stuff.
Jessica spent a good few years as part of the Onething team at IHOP and she shared about being intimate with God and living a devotional life. We can live good lives, serve the poor, love our neighbours and our enemies but unless we KNOW Jesus, not about Him but know Him it is all pointless. We are created to be lovers, first and foremost, to love God with all our hearts, minds and souls. If everything we do, all the “good stuff” is flowing out of requirement, to fulfil the law or the commandments even out of a sense of duty to serve God then we might as well not even bother because it is pointless. Everything we do should come out of the overflow of loving Jesus and getting to know Him better. As we spend more time with Him we become more like Him and we receive His compassion. It is out of that place of loving God that we become effective in truly loving others.
The story of Mary and Martha is a good example. Mary sat at Jesus’ feet and spent time with Him and Jesus said of her that she chose the “one thing that is needed”. We alway play down what Mary did here, like she picked the easy option. Culturally, she would have been expected to help her sister and prepare everything but Jesus says she chose what is best, the one thing that was needed, everything else was good but not needed. It made me think about in my life, I very rarely chose the one thing and often chose to do stuff. It is so hard to stay in that place of being in God’s presence when life is going on around us yet it is needed. We need to learn to say no and learn how to commit to spending daily time with God, in His word and in His presence.
Anyway, I just wanted to get that all off my chest!!
If you could keep praying for us, Becci slipped on some ice on Sunday and has been in a lot of pain since. She has a condition called SPD which she gets when she is pregnant which loosens the tenderns in her pelvis and the fall has made that a lot worse and she has struggled to walk much this week because of the pain. This means that she is not getting along to class much and is not getting much time at the prayer room. Please do pray for her. And generally please keep us in your prayers, that God would keep speaking to us and imparting new wisdom from His word. Seriously, I keep finding scriptures and saying “has that been there the whole time!” it’s really eye opening.
Love you all.
So much to blog…
…I just don’t know where to start!!
We’ve now had a full weeks worth of teaching about the Bride of Christ and God has been doing so much in our hearts as He reveals Himself in new ways through the scriptures. I think we find it very easy to view scripture and God with a kingdom perspective, that God is King and we have gained access to His kingdom through Jesus and His death on the cross, and that is all true and very good. But God wants to unlock our eyes to see even more. What our kingdom perspective calls “entering the kingdom” our bridal perspective calls “taking His name”, like a bride takes her husbands name. It’s not that one view is more important than the other, it’s just that if we can have both then our intimacy with Jesus is so much greater, our time waiting on the Lord is so much sweeter. For example in 2 Corinthians 5 Paul talks about us becoming the righteousness of God, he talks about imputed righteousness. Our minds view it like a courtroom scene, where God as the judge grants us the defendant His righteousness which we don’t deserve. If you switch your mind to the bridal perspective, rather than a courtroom scene we see the wedding feast where the bride is presented to the bridegroom and everything that is His becomes hers. Both speak of the legal aspect of what is happening, but how much sweeter and intimate is it to look at imputed righteousness as an act of love between a bridegroom and his bride than a judge and a defendant.
The teaching has been absolutely mindbottling, both Dale and Ian who have been teaching us move so effortlessly from teaching and preaching to ministry time and receiving from the Lord in the quite place. Dale went through the book of Esther and then the book of Ruth in one 3 hour session each and unlocked so much of God’s heart for us. Ian unlocked some “tricks” for praying the word today which I wanted to really quickly share with you. This works really well with prophetic words for your life as well, for the times when you want to do more than just say “thats a cool word over my life” when you actually want to press into it. Here it is:
- Declare the particular truth, the verse or the word.
- Thank Him for it.
- Ask for more.
Here’s an example from 2 Corinthians 5:17
17Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!
- Jesus, I declare that I am a new creation because I am in You. I declare that all my old ways are gone and I receive a new heart and new perspectives from You.
- Thank you Jesus that You have made me a new creation. I thank you that I can dwell in You and You in me. Thank you so much that you have given me newness and life where there was darkness and death.
- Jesus I ask that you would reveal more to me of the newness you have put in me. Jesus, would you show me what it is to dwell in You and You in me. Lord, show me more of how you have made me a new creation, because of Your love for me.
I guarantee that if you try this the next time you are praying and reading the bible that you will encounter Jesus in the scriptures.
Anyway, there is so much more to tell you but maybe another time.
Be blessed and I pray that Jesus, in His vast love for us, would reveal Himself more to each of you as you read this blog.
One Week In
So we’re are finally here in Kansas City, MO and it is cold! Yesterday it snowed for half the day and dropped about 2 foot! We are all still adjusting to the time zone, going to bed too soon and getting up too soon but we are slowly getting there.
I wanted to tell you a little bit about the course so far as it’s been really good. We are looking at a really key topic for IHOP, the Bride of Christ, or the Bridal Paradigm. It’s been really interesting to consider all of scripture the from view point of Jesus as the bridegroom and the church, us, as the bride. It’s a stretch at first, particularly for the guys(!) to think of yourself as the bride of Christ but in doing so it unlocks how God feels about us. He doesn’t just love us, He likes us!! He didn’t just die on the cross to save us, He bothered to come down in the first place. Understanding How God feels about us and the importance in this time to consider the church the bride of Christ reveals the importance of night and day prayer. God’s love for the lost is so strong that it should compel us get before Him and pray for salvation.
The kids are having a good time too. They are in their class when we are in our class. They are getting to play with some other kids, learn the apostolic prayers and a lot of the stuff we are learning but at a level that they can understand. It’s been really cool to see how excited they have been at class and I’m excited to see how they grow in thier knowledge and relationship with Jesus as a result of our time here. This three months will have been worth it if all we get out of it is kids that love Jesus more.
I also wanted to tell you that we have received some support from IHOP itself to cover some of our cost for the course! I have been given a full scholarship and Becci has been given $400 off her course fees. Praise God! He has been so faithful to us and has provided for us, just like He said He would. Us being here is a living testimony of God’s goodness and provision.
That’s all I had to tell you for now I think, I’m just going to go a clear the driveway of the snow. Please keep praying for us, we really appreciate it. You can pray for my health, I’ve been a bit cold and fluy this week. I’m much better but still a little way to go before I’m well.
Bless you all. See you soon!!
Michael
