Archive for March, 2010
Fasting time!!
Hi everyone. Well the fast is upon us. We are really excited about what the Lord has planned for England. He is pouring out His love here at IHOP and in other places around the states and I truly believe that we are on the cusp of a move of God that will travel around the globe, not based around one persons ministry but around the revelation of who God is and how He feels about us! Last night at the awakening, Wes Hall prayed for the UK, speaking with power and prophesying a great move of God and as he spoke it really resonated with what the Lord has been speaking to us about. We are genuinely so excited!
We mentioned a few weeks ago about reading through the New Testament over the course of the fast and a coupe of people have asked if we have some sort of plan so we figured here would be a good place to put it. The plan is as follows:
Day 1: Matthew 1-7
Day 2: Matthew 8-12
Day 3: Matthew 13-18
Day 4: Matthew 19-24
Day 5: Matthew 25-28
Day 6: Mark 1-6
Day 7: Mark 7-11
Day 8: Mark 12-16
Day 9: Luke 1-4
Day 10: Luke 5-9
Day 11: Luke 10-13
Day 12: Luke 14-19
Day 13: Luke 20-24
Day 14: John 1-5
Day 15: John 6-9
Day 16: John 10-14
Day 17: John 15-19
Day 18: John 20-Acts 4
Day 19: Acts 5-9
Day 20: Acts 10-15
Day 21: Acts 16-20
Day 22: Acts 21-26
Day 23: Acts 27-Romans 4
Day 24: Romans 5-10
Day 25: Romans 11-1 Corinthians 1
Day 26: 1 Corinthians 2-9
Day 27: 1 Corinthians 10-15
Day 28: 1 Corinthians 16-2 Corinthians 9
Day 29: 2 Corinthians 10-Galatians 4
Day 30: Galatians 5-Philippians 1
Day 31: Philippians 2-1Thessalonians 2
Day 32: 1 Thessalonians 3-1 Timothy 5
Day 33: 1 Timothy 6-Hebrews 1
Day 34: Hebrews 2-10
Day 35: Hebrews 11-James 5
Day 36: 1 Peter 1-1 John1
Day 37: 1 John 2-Jude
Day 38: Revelation 1-7
Day 39: Revelation 8-15
Day 40: Revelation 16-22
Hope you find that helpful.
We’ve been pretty quiet these last few weeks and it’s not been for any good reason. God has been touching and challenging us both in class and out of class and we are starting to put together some semblance of plans for when we return to Manchester. The journey we have started seems long and difficult but we have faith that God has put us on this road and His heart is for us.
Be blessed!
How important is the word of God?
As you know we’ve been challenged to fast and contend for leadership of our nation. We’re really excited about what God is going to do in our nation. I was also challenged this last week about how much, or how little, I actually know the word of God. When I say know I don’t mean have an idea about the narrative, I mean actually know intimately. I can quote endless lines from movies and TV but I want to be able to bring to mind countless lines of scripture. It’s not that we can’t take this stuff in, it’s that we’re not spending enough time studying it. How easily we let or priorities be skewed.
The thing that challenged me was when Jesus was in the wilderness and being tempted by the devil (Matthew 4 and Luke 4). Every time satan tempted Jesus, Jesus’ reply was always straight out of scripture. If scripture was Jesus’ first line of defence against the tempting of the evil one then how is it ok for us to just have a vague idea of it. If we want to live effective lives, lives that are not infulenced by the world or it’s current ruler then we need to be in the word often and we need to know it to know what to do with it.
For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
Hebrews 4:12
How cool is that!! God has given us this living and powerful weapon against the enemy for both defence and attack but not only that it can help us understand ourselves better. I also really like John 5:39
You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me.
Knowing scripture is more than just good to know more about God and to know how to counteract the enemy but the more we know the word of God, the more we can know God. All of scripture is about a man, the man Jesus. If you look through out the whole book you will find Him there.
One prayer we hear a lot here at IHOP is from 2 Thessalonians 3:1
pray for us, that the word of the Lord may run swiftly and be glorified
and I truly want for that to happen, I pray that for the city of Manchester daily but there are some serious consequences to asking God for this. I believe that God hears our prayer and that He answers them so I believe that we will see the word of God being spoken and proclaimed in the market place, in local government, on street corners as well as in the church. And I want to be a part of seeing that happen. But if I don’t know the word of God then how can I expect to be used to see it spread through our city?
So along with the challenge to fast we;ve been challenged to take seriously the reading of His word. We will be reading through the New Testament in the 40 day fast and with about 30 minutes of study a day we can get through the whole New Testament. If you have been considering joining with us in fasting for our nation then consider joining with us on our journey of knowing His word better so that we could be a part in allowing the word of the Lord to run swiftly throughout our lives, cities and nation. If you want a copy of the reading plan we’ll be following then fire us an email and we’ll probably be putting it up on here at some point.
We’ve been really encouraged by the numbers of people who have expressed an interested and committed to the fast. If you are considering the fast then please get in touch with us.
