A Greater Reality

When faced with adversities, it is often difficult to see how we can fulfill our dreams. The reality of what we can see in the natural attempts to block out the reality of what God has called us to. Much like an eclipse, we may only see a glimpse of what we know to be there whereas the lesser reality is what we see most.

My friend Daniel reminded me how we cannot let the lies of the enemy and our current circumstances dictate our future hope. If you dream of being an author, you cannot focus on the reality that you are a poor student, you must focus on becoming an accomplished writer!

The enemy would like nothing better than to keep you from fulfilling your destiny and having a big impact in the Kingdom of God. If he can convince you that you are incapable of accomplishing your dreams then he has gained a small victory. God gives us larger than life dreams so that if we believe His word the devil won't stand a chance at getting in our way.

I dream of being a revivalist. I dream about seeing people saved and healed every day not because I do outreach daily but because I make myself available. I dream about the biggest cities in the world being transformed by the gospel. I dream about massive healing and evangelistic crusades in the US and internationally. However, my current situation does not point to that destination. When I minister on the streets people aren't getting saved or healed at nearly the rate they should be. A few of my friends see people get healed and saved on a daily basis. Literally. One friend told me how she was shocked when she realized one day recently that nobody had gotten healed that day.

When God has called you to the impossible, it is imperative to keep your eyes on Him and not what you see in front of you. We must allow what is invisible to become more real than what is visible or else our circumstances will dictate our future. Our world would be significantly different if inventors gave up when they didn't immediately experience success and became satisfied with the status quo.

How many times have Christians given up on a dream because they thought it was impossible or too difficult? If I remember the story correctly, Reinhard Bonnke was not God's first choice to win millions of souls on the African continent, but he was the first to say yes to the call. How many others are called to change nations but have let a false reality get in their way?

One of the first prophetic words I ever received was so big that I didn't know what to do with it. I often would listen to it thinking, "how could I ever do that?" I didn't have a firm grasp on the reality that God can use anyone to do anything and that He might just want to use me for greater things than I could ever imagine. If we turn our focus to our present circumstances instead of to God we will never see the greater reality that He has called us to and walk in the fullness of our calling.

Defeat is not an option

Randy Clark has a sermon titled, "The Thrill of Victory and the Agony of Defeat." I tend to dislike this message because I am not content with living a lifestyle where defeat is normal. I understand why he preaches it though; many would become so disheartened by defeat that they would give up before ever tasting victory. Randy, like so many others, had prayed for the sick for years without seeing anyone get healed. They had to persevere through so much just to taste victory and experience the thrill of God healing someone through their prayers. Because of the groundwork that men and women like Randy, Bill Johnson, Heidi Baker and others have laid, we now get to experience breakthrough much more quickly.

One year after seeing my first healing, I have seen more people healed than I can count. At the beginning I wrote down each healing testimony, and although I still try to write them down it is difficult to keep track of everything God has done. However, I have seen more people walk away without healing than I have seen walk away praising God for healing them. Many of these defeats break my heart. I remember praying for a man with cerebral palsy back in February. I prayed so fervently and felt the Holy Spirit stronger than any other time I have prayed for someone yet nothing manifested that I could see.

Then of course there are friends of mine who are afflicted with disabilities. These are illegal! I have contended for their breakthrough but to no avail, both still are confined to their wheelchairs. I can't leave out that I prayed for one of them that the doctors would not have to put rods in her back because she was healed and while the doctors changed their minds and didn't put any rods in her back, she still isn't healed. But praise God, no new rods!

This past weekend I met a guy two years younger than me with a disabillity. Most people with his condition die at a very young age. Counting the whole weekend, I spent around 10 hours praying for him before he left town. He is an amazing young man whose freedom is being robbed by the enemy. Seeing him leave in the same condition as the first time I saw him crushed me. That evening I spent at least another hour praying for another man whose freedom and health is also being robbed by the enemy after I had already spent over an hour praying for him the day before. Still nothing.

Today I was called up to go to the hospital to pray for a man who was dying with two people from church who knew him. I felt the Holy Spirit flowing into him as I prayed. Heat was all over his chest as my hands were on him. Several times I felt the power of God rush through my hands and into his body. A few minutes after I stepped away from him he went to be with Jesus. After giving the family a few minutes to mourn I knelt down to quietly pray for him to be raised from the dead. After a few minutes, one of the people I was with tapped me on the shoulder to motion for us to leave. I am now 0 for 2 in seeing both the dying healed and the dead raised.

Tomorrow I should be meeting with a man who is paralyzed that I prayed for last week at the hospital for about an hour. Nothing happened last time but he is going to walk. I am not giving up and I am not giving in. God is good all the time. By His stripes we are healed. I will lay hands on the sick and they will recover. It is impossible to pray and have nothing happen. Jesus commanded us to heal the sick and to raise the dead. Nothing is impossible with God. Defeat is not an option.

I don't deserve this!

Most people think that God is waiting for them to mess up so He can punish them. People think He is like the Highway Patrol officer that stands outside his car with his radar pointed like a sniper rifle down the highway to catch speeders. Actually, that may be partially true. However, when God comes after you to pull you over, He does so in love, not to intimidate or threaten, but to warn that your actions could cause harm to yourself and others. God is so loving that He watches over us and takes us out of dangerous situations.

Recently I was talking with a teenager who has been doing drugs for half of his young life. His view of the police was that they were out to get him for no reason at all. People typically think that they don't deserve the punishment they receive for doing something that they don't even think is wrong. Their view of God is that He punishes them for their sin by giving them bad luck or by making them sick. If only they realized that sickness is from the devil and that God's mercies are new every day!

But it doesn't end there. God doesn't suspend our license when He catches us speeding. He might put us on probation, which is so we can learn to not make the same mistakes again. But most of the time it is just the opposite. Since His love for us is not based upon what we do or don't do, we can mess up and He will shower us with His favor and love.

Wondering why God would use us to see people get healed of conditions and pain they have battled for years, a friend asked me, "What did we do to deserve this?" Another friend answered that question today in a simple yet profound way, "We don't deserve it and we can't earn it. He just loves us." I was just showered with His favor after I did something stupid. What did I do to deserve it? Nothing. I think that God just wants me to know that He loves me regardless.

Bill Johnson says that God can win with any hand, even a pair of 2's. God is in the business of turning things around. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. He didn't die for us before we had sinned the first time. He died for us after we had betrayed Him time and time again. Yet He still considered us to be His friend and not His foe. When we didn't deserve mercy, Christ died for our sins.

Many people think that God is teaching them a lesson by giving them sickness or disease. When offered prayer their response screams that they are thinking, "I deserve this! God is dealing with me!" They think that because God caught them speeding, He took the tires off their car so they are slowed down. They think that he broke their air conditioning permanently so that they must live in torment for the rest of their lives. They think that He drained their oil so that their engine would fail prematurely. God doesn't do any of that. The devil has come to steal, kill, and destroy but Jesus has come so that we may have life and have it to the full!

God is handing us the keys to our dream car and most of the time we do all we can to turn it down. We think that in order to be spiritual we must be in a constant state of suffering and not accept any gifts. I've got news for you: Jesus suffered so we don't have to. He died for our sins so that we don't have to. He paid the full price for it so that we don't have to. We don't deserve the favor and blessings we have experienced in life because we didn't do anything to earn it. But we don't have to worry because our Father has given it to us with no conditions - He simply loves us. Yes, He loves us.

Walking On Water

I just returned home from a great ministry trip to Lake Tahoe. Almost immediately after seeing the lake I began to think about walking out onto the water. This is because I have a burning desire inside of me for the impossible. I have had dreams in which I am flying through the air, watching lightning come down from heaven when I prayed for someone, and walking into a room full of people in wheelchairs with every one of them being completely healed. We were born for the impossible!

Rather than becoming satisfied with what I have seen, with each impossible thing that God does, I become even hungrier to see more. On Saturday, a man who was completely blind in one eye due to a detached retina began to see the outline of his wife and other features of the restaurant that they were eating lunch at. The catch is that nobody was there to lay hands on him; he just took off his sunglasses and saw! A word of knowledge had been given at our meeting and the man’s daughter had the person use their cell phone to call and pray for him. Since he wasn’t home, the person left a message declaring that God is healing his eye. It was confirmed that the man’s sight was restored at the same time the phone call was made.

I am so thankful for that miracle, as well as the people that were healed of different ailments after we got back to Redding while I was just standing around talking with friends. God is so faithful with the aches, the pains, and the blind eyes, but He does not want us to become complacent because we have seen one miracle. The reality is that we were created to live a supernatural lifestyle and not just have a supernatural moment here and there.

After seeing more of the goodness of God this weekend, I can’t help but long to have even more of His goodness revealed to me. I have come to the realization that I must move beyond thinking that it would be nice to live supernaturally. Even just telling other people that you want to live supernaturally isn’t enough. We must actually go do something about it. Take this analogy about eating. Do you just think to yourself that you are hungry and want food, do you tell someone else that you are hungry and want food, do you go search for food until you find it, or do you find food and eat it? It is dangerous to have knowledge of the supernatural and then do nothing about it. If I know that God heals people and that He does it through me, then I am responsible to take that healing to the people who need it.

Bill Johnson says that God will not give us revelation that we are not ready to be held responsible for. When God shows you something it is because He thinks you are ready to handle it. If I had thought about walking on water or flying several years ago I would have thought that I was going crazy. However, this morning when God was increasing my passion to take revival into the streets of my city on a daily basis, it was because that is what He is moving me into.

Why would we not be able to walk on water? The Bible tells us that nothing is impossible for God (Luke 1:37) and that everything is possible for him who believes (Mark 9:23). If we believed what God says about Himself and about us as much as we believe what the media says about American Idol and the Presidential candidates then the Kingdom would be advancing so quickly that we wouldn’t be able to keep up. Hospitals would be cleared out in moments. Campuses would be completely transformed during lunch. Nations would be saved in a day. It’s time to walk on water; but let’s not just think about it or tell others about, let’s do it again and again and again.

Can I get your attention please?

Give it up for the King of Glory!

Well, did you?

Yesterday I said a silly remark to a friend about their future spouse. I only told them because I thought it when I had seen the person dancing during worship. Probably only a few hours later I was talking with other friends about people needing to be hungry for God and passionate about his glory manifesting I realized the mistake I had made. While it just seemed fitting to think what I had, in reality it is the worshippers that will usher in His glory.

Too often it seems like God can't get our attention. I know that He tried to get a hold of me a few times in the past week and the first few times when He left me a message I just took it for what I thought it meant rather than calling Him back to find out the real scoop. I have a habit of not calling people back who don't leave me a voice mail. I just tend to think that it wasn't important. When an important decision comes up and I know I missed God's phone call, I need to delay making that decision until I get ahold of Him. I can't just assume that I know what He is wanting.

Between two friends yesterday I asked a lot of questions. Although the wording was different, both made it clear to me that the answer was running after God like He is the only thing worth waking up for. When we pursue Him, when His glory falls, everything else will follow. When we praise, when we worship, when we press in, when we give all we have, His glory comes. It must be an acceptable sacrifice. The people who seem lost in Him during worship and do what looks foolish are the ones who are making the sacrifice while God is trying to get the attention of those who are distracted by them. Lord let your glory fall!

Taking back my seat

This morning I had some revelation that I believe is imperative for the body of Christ to understand. It isn’t something that you haven’t heard before, however, if we miss it, we miss out.

I realized how much the enemy has stolen from me. He has tried to hold me back from before I was born when I was an unplanned pregnancy. Even tonight he has tried to destroy me and keep me from plundering hell to populate heaven. As I sat in my car tonight I didn’t know how I could go on. I hesitated for several minutes before I hit my steering wheel and started my car, more determined than ever to take back what the enemy has stolen.

He has done it to me before, making me so introspective that all I can think about is myself and wondering what the heck is wrong with me. I almost walked out of a meeting tonight because of what he was doing to me. That was the first time tonight that I chose to put my foot down and not miss the opportunities that God is giving me.

Shortly after I decided to stay I was given a prophetic word that I was holding a football. The person asked if I was really into calling the plays and making sure that the correct strategy was implemented. I responded that although I have liked football for a long time, I have never closely been involved with a team as to actually be helping the coach as they had asked. As the meeting progressed Kris Vallotton talked about being on the offensive instead of the defensive and calling all the shots from heaven. The words he used were nearly identical to the flavor of the prophetic word I was just given.

We are seated, literally in heavenly places. That means that we get to call the shots. In football, the offensive coordinator sits in the press box so that he can see what is going on and call the plays. If he were down on the field he would not be able to tell what was going on and why some things were working while others weren’t.

I feel like I was born to be the offensive coordinator but the devil has been telling from the beginning that I don’t think of the right plays (I don’t hear God) and that the trick plays will never work (miracles won’t happen). Because of these lies I left behind my seat in the press box and just sat down on the bench on the sidelines wishing that I could get in on the action. We have to know that we hear God and that the impossible is an everyday experience.

I have learned so much about myself and about the Kingdom in the past week. So much that I need to take a break and unplug. So I am done here for a while. I don’t know when I’ll be back. Thank you for taking the time to read my thoughts, it means a lot to me. Signing off from Redding, CA.

David

When we ask, God answers

This morning as I was spending some time praying I was asking God to increase the number of healings that are manifesting while I am around. I have felt that recently there hasn't been much breakthrough in healing, or if there has been, then the people have just not told me.

Tonight I went to a Living in the Supernatural class taught by Bethel's outreach pastor Chris Overstreet with my friend Erica. I have been wanting to go to Chris' classes for the longest time but I have never been able to. Well, tonight was a good night to go. Within a few minutes of being there, God used me to bring healing to two people! As I was greeting two men I felt a muffling over my right ear so I asked them what was going on and found out that one was 50% deaf in the right ear and the other had blown out his ear drum.

The first man could not notice a difference in his hearing because there was so much noise in the room, but as I prayed for the second man God completely healed his ear drum! He said that he used to be able to get air through it and that he would experience a lot of pain when he would get water in it in the shower.

Then the first man asked me to pray for his right shoulder because he could not lift his arm above the shoulder. God completely healed him as he started lifting his arm and explaining, "I couldn't do this before! I couldn't do this before!"

Meanwhile, Erica was praying for the second man again who then got healed of headaches through a word of knowledge, arthritis, and then even a problem with the lymph nodes which he could feel drain! All this happened before the meeting started!

When the meeting was about to dismiss Erica felt pain in her left knee and hesitated to give the word as oftentimes people just kind of roll their eyes when a random person gives a word of knowledge. However, I wasn't gonna let her pass it up, so I looked around, thought that I saw the woman who had the pain, and then asked if anyone had pain, and she responded. Erica prayed for her knee and God completely healed it!

Meanwhile I went to pray for a guy who fell off a ladder and has almost no movement in his arm due to swelling. He was able to relax his arm more and regained some of the movement.

Erica and another student named Anne began to pray for another woman. After praying for a while and seeing many things in the spirit for the woman, they were able to usher in God's complete healing of the woman's back. She was so excited because she has been in such tremendous pain. Through words of knowledge about scoliosis, problems with the shoulders, TMJ, and others, the woman was completely set free from the pain and healed of fibromyalgia.

It was incredible how God was giving us the tools to minister to people. God, you are so good! Afterwards we discussed why God uses us since we haven't done anything to deserve it. I didn't think of it at the time, but I feel like He moves through us because we ask to be used and we make ourselves available. If I hadn't acted on the word of knowledge that Erica had, none of that would have happened. When we ask, God answers!

Carrying my own weather system

Tonight I came across an interesting situation when I asked a man in a large grocery store about why he was limping very badly. I am sure that I have had similar situations in the past, but now I am paying more attention to what is happening. The man went into a somewhat hard to follow story as to how he got injured and showed his disgust at the circumstances which involved the church. I didn't understand what he was referring to so when he mentioned his theological differences after he turned down prayer I asked his affiliation and found out that he was Mormon.

This morning I was contending for an Acts-like anointing where not just my shadow, but anyone close to me would be healed. Not that I am looking for an easy way out, but rather wanting to release the Kingdom in a greater measure than physically praying for people. I still love the tetimony of a group of guys from Bethel that went to the Houston Astrodome to minister to the people who were evacuated after Hurricane Katrina who had a man get healed when he walked by the area where they were gathered. That is what I want as my lifestyle, not just in a moment. I know from Spiderman that with great power comes great responsibility, so I understand that some people might have a problem with me saying that without qualifying it. Well, I'm not going to do that, so please don't tell me how I am in error, but feel free to ask questions.

Anyway, back to the man, understanding that he shut the door on me to pray for him right there I asked him if I could pray for him in my own time to which he answered that it was my choice. I found out his name and shook his hand doing my best to purposely release the Presence onto him as I did so. I really don't want to take no for an answer from people, so I did my best with him to keep talking to him without arguing about the things he said that I disagree with or that I simply know that are untrue.

Earlier in the evening I went to the Sundial Bridge because I thought I would find all kinds of divine appointments there. Well, there weren't nearly as many legal targets as I thought there would be, but I did pray for a dog that was limping since in La Paz we had a dog get healed out on the streets. I was trying to increase my awareness of the Presence as I walked with my party so that when I would see people and make eye contact I could hopefully see something shift.

As we were on our way out I saw a man wearing a back brace and approached him. At first he explained that he didn't need prayer for his back, but again I was trying to release the Kingdom so I asked him if he had any other prayer needs for his health in a way that let him know that I cared. Then he shifted and quickly told me about how he had just had surgery to remove throat cancer that had affected his vocal chords. After I prayed for him he seemed to be different than he had been before. I carried my own weather system into the area and it kicked out the one that had been there.

Holy Ghost in the kitchen

So that is pretty much the view we were forced to cope with all weekend. Lake Tahoe is beautiful!

Amazing things happened to me the entire trip including the ride home. After a fairly long time of just being drunk in the Holy Ghost, we made a stop in Carson City, and then headed back to Redding. Business was as usual, as it had been on the trip at least, until we started to prophesy over each other. A little ways into it I started to manifest a lot. I don't really know what was happened, however one person said that I was receiving the prophetic words given to other people for myself.

Their was definitely something major happening. It is hard to describe. I'll just mark it down as a very significant day (weekend and season) in my life for a few reasons. More on that some other time. :)

Today was our moving day - again. So I am writing from my home for the next two months. I will have my own room for the first time since moving to Redding and will be sleeping on a regular bed for the first time as well. There is an office big enough for Jeremy and I and there is also a pool (feel free to come over!). It should be a fun and exciting summer as many new things are going to happen. God is on the move! He is only waiting for us!

While talking on my cell phone tonight at a birthday party in the kitchen I started to get drunk. I figured that I shouldn't keep it all for myself so I distributed some to a few others. I was talking with a revivalist in Miami, FL who just connected with one of my old pastors. I am so excited to hear the revival reports that are going to come from them out of South Beach!

The Normal Christian Life...

Today was another good day in the Kingdom. People got saved, people got healed, and people received prophetic words that will catapult them into their destiny.

In the morning I did prophetic art during worship. I have never done it before and haven't painted since elementary school. I'll admit, other than not knowing the basics about painting like drying off the brush, it was a lot of fun and not hard at all. During the rest of the meeting our row was just getting whacked some more. Man, has it been fun. I can't wait to go on more Firestorms in the future.

We gave words of knowledge and a bunch of people were getting healed. God is so good! After changing a flat tire and then taking it to get fixed we arrived for our afternoon outreach to hear an amazing testimony from the pastor's wife. One girl who just graduated from BSSM called up the pastor's wife's father to pray for him for healing of his detached retina that left him completely blind in that eye. She prayed over the voicemail as they weren't home. Meanwhile, at lunch, the man takes of his sunglass type things, covers his good eye, and tells his wife that he can see her and the outlines of some other things as well! God is so good!

There were some awesome testimonies from our outreach time. In addition to the seven people who got saved, many others got prophetic words. One boy, who I made a balloon sword for, told me that he has been to many nations already (like 10!) after I prophesied that he would go to many nations. Other children were taught to prophecy and learned to hear God's voice with training from our team. Yea God!

The evening meeting was amazing. We prophesied over every person there. It was great. I think our whole team was drunk. The people were experiencing new things and had things spoken over them that created a grace for them to walk into. I even received an amazing word from one of the mothers on our team. I feel funny saying mother since it was perfectly delivered like Cindy Jacobs! It was so powerful! Definitely the most impacting word I have gotten.

People got healed of stuff. One girl on our team asked a lady if she had problems with her right knee which led to finding out she had all sorts of problems. The report when we left was that all the pain was gone! Woohoo!

Enjoying some new wine!

(Ok, so if I say today/tonight in this blog I am referring to Friday, June 8 since that was when I thought about it. And if you don't want to read the whole thing, then I think you should read the very end where I talk about eating pizza, it will rock your paradigm if you aren't familiar with it)

So today, well yesterday now that I am writing it, I finished work early up in the mountains to leave Redding for a ministry trip to Lake Tahoe. I have mentioned that pretty much since school ended I have had an increased awareness of the Holy Spirit and angels. Today (er, yesterday) was no exception. From the time we met to pray before we left until the time I lay down in bed to go to sleep I was getting royaly whacked. Can I just say that I was drunk for about 13 hours? (Is everyone ok with the term, "drunk?" I come from a background that is less free than Bethel and so I don't want to offend people just because of word choice. No, I didn't backslide and get drunk on alcohol. Yes, I did get plastered in the Holy Spirit and was being immersed in His love!).

So the whole car ride there I was pretty much drunk. On the way there we drove towards Mt. Lassen, the 10,000 foot volcano that I hiked up back in September and then headed towards Reno. Then we drove towards Lake Tahoe and drove up over 8,000 feet in the mountains before headed back down towards the Lake (for my Florida friends, a football field is 300 feet long not including the endzones, so that means we drove up about 27 football fields high!). The mountains and the Lake are beautiful. God is so good. I work on top of a mountain with incredible views, then I drive through the mountains and end up at a service which overlooks a huge lake with beautiful mountians around it!

Tonight, the speaker at the meeting was the man who imparted the Father's Heart to both the late Jack Frost and John Wimber (of the Vineyard movement). I tried to pay attention as much as I could but I was getting blasted the whole time. Since school has been out I have been manifesting a lot more than I had earlier in the school year. It feels as the my discernment is definitely increasing as I am starting to take notice of things. Praise God!

After the meeting, he had everyone under 30 come up for impartation of the Father's heart and sure enough when Kevin Dedmon (our fearless leader) came by and prayed for me I got wasted. A little bit later I went to go join others from our group in praying for people. I only prayed for two people but I didn't hear any reports of God not healing someone! Come on Jesus!

I went and prophesied over a couple with another guy, we were later joined by probably 5 others, and at one point Theresa Dedmon and I got slammed at exactly the same time (Woah! It is starting again! HAHAHAHA!) I am talking about getting blitzed and I am getting myself hammered in the process! Talk about power in the testimony!

Through an exchange with one of the people on our team, I am learning that even when we look like we are manifesting similarly, we can still feel things completely different. For instance they felt like liquid pouring down their head onto their body whereas I didn't feel it at all when they put their hand on my head, but instead I felt heat on my hands. When the prayed a second time the heat came back and then increased.

Finally, we left for our host home. Talk about awesome. I have a queen bed (fit for a king though...haha) that has nicer bedding than any other bed I have ever slept on. Hands down the greatest pillow ever. The towels are definitely 6 feet long and the shower head was glorious (maybe it is just that I have been using bad shower heads since I moved to Redding, but boy was it nice!). OK, this next part is great!

As we ate some late night pizza one of our guys was talking about his joy angel being next to him. Since I have been able to feel angels recently I figured I would go over to where he was standing (the angel that is) and immediately when I got to where he was I could feel him and had to back up. It gets better. After a few times of me asking Shandy what he saw the angel doing when he felt him, I had gotten up to get another slice of pizza. When I got back to my seat I felt something on my neck that made me manifest pretty good and I try to quickly put down my plate to keep from dropping it. When I asked him about it, Shandy said that he took a feather off the angel and put it on my neck when I walked by! No joke, that feather, that I didn't know about, and I didn't even know that he put anything on me, even in the spiritual realm, rocked me!

God is so good! More fire Lord!

Right where God wants me

Sorry for the absence of blogs, I have become super busy with a job (Praise God!) and other random things coupled with fatigue and now even a bit of a cold (I can't believe the devil has the nerve to try to make me sick! I haven't been sick since December, which just happened to be the last time I made a push towards going after God more than what is humanly possible). Now, back to the blog...

On Sunday at church my roommate asked me if I wanted to go on a Firestorm this weekend. I responded by saying that I should check my calendar but that I should be good to go. Less than 30 seconds later, as I was getting out my laptop to check iCal another friend came over and asked me if I was going on the Firestorm this weekend. I couldn't help but smile. Long story short, I am going on the Firestorm which starts tomorrow and I will be one of the drivers, so please pray for me and the team that I feel better (and AM better), that God whacks us, and that God whacks everyone in the region of Lake Tahoe!

The man who I have been working for seems like a very familiar person. He is an ultra nice guy (I felt so special at how excited he got when he discovered that I was able to get one particular food item that he wasn't sure the grocery store would have) but even then, I had never heard of him nor met him until last Friday. Yet I feel like I have known him for years other than the fact that I really don't know him very well. In the meantime, it is a joy to work for him not only because of the spectacular views which I will hopefully have pictures of in the near future, but also because he is just a great guy!

Today while at work I had a bit of deja vu. Well, I want to think of a better name for it than that, because in reality, God has just showed that to us before, most likely in a dream that we couldn't remember when we woke up (or it could be a dream that we remember). Anyway, I was there at another house doing some work outside while there was a specific guy who will remain annonymous inside the house playing the guitar and singing (I am not concealing his identity because it was bad, it actually was quite good, I just don't want to say who it was here). I have been there before, but I had never been to that house, and I had never been around that guy in a setting like that. I must have had that in a dream and God was showing me that he has me right where He wants me.

Tonight, after a few things that were planned and several things that were not planned I found myself leaving the apartment to get some cold medicine. My nose feels sunburned from all the papertowels I have used in trying to keep my nose from dripping at work (and at other places). Target was closed, so I decided to go to Wal-Mart so that I could also get some white T-shirts. After spending a few minutes finding the right medicine and a few minutes finding the right shirt I head over to check out and get in a line that just will not move. Some people behind me left to go to another register but I stuck it out. Right before it was my turn a man came up who was hobbling drastically. After finding out it happened as a youth when he was involved in "the wrong activities" I asked if I could pray for him. He declined, saying that he had just received prayer, but he thanked me and said that he was a minister. I asked him where and we made short small talk. After I left I realized what God was thinking about him, in that He is proud of him. I then also realized that I should have told him that God forgave him of doing the wrong activities so that his leg could be healed just as much as He forgave the sins that paid his way into Heaven.

Don't miss the prayer meeting!

Ah, God is good.

It has been a long day of hard work, but there is a satisfaction of being able to relax after working hard. My back is a little stiff after 9 hours of working, but the first thing I did as I got in my car to drive home was to thank God for giving me that job. Being able to admire God's creation while I work and on the drive to and from work doesn't hurt either.

Well, I'll back up to last night. I went to soak before pre-service prayer and God's presence was thick! When I went over to the church I was one of the first ones there and started to get whacked a little bit before anyone else was really there. Did I mention that God is good and that I am having so much fun? Pretty soon more people arrived and God kept coming as well. At one point I was about to fall backwards when a guy that I normally walk around with came out of nowhere (which is funny because he walks really slowly like I do while there) and caught me. The rest of prayer kept getting better as our group of 3-5 people with arms around eachother's shoulders started, stopped, spun around completely (I'm still not sure how we pulled that one off!), almost fell over a few times, laughed a lot, and fell over a few times. Then we had a bonfire at the end and sure enough me and my "dancing partner" (lol, that guy I just mentioned) fell over and almost took a few people with us.

Worship was so much fun! There has not been a worship set during a meeting in the past 3 weeks that I haven't loved. That is good! It isn't because the music was always the greatest, although it usually was, but rather because I have decided to worship whether I felt like it or not.

Eric Johnson spoke, which doesn't happen often on a Sunday. This is the first time I have heard him other than at school or one time at a Friday night service. He was great. He talked a lot about what I have been thinking about recently, just in a slightly different context. He talked about our spiritual inheritance and not trying to pay for what we have been given for free. I found myself realizing that I am still trying to pave my own way instead of building upon those who have gone before me. If they already have breakthrough in it and it is my inheritance then why am I still trying to get it on my own? After having a good ole time in the fire tunnel I went to the grocery store to pick up some lunch making supplies for work. While there I prayed for a few people. It was quite refreshing after many awkward attempts while down in Sacramento of Saturday. Nothing happened that the people noticed which I happily say to show that I am not just trying to share healings. It is a growing process for me right now as earlier yesterday I went to Costco and didn't pray for the people whose paths I crossed who could use a healing or two.

Finally, on a very random note, I wanted to share about something that just happened. I bought a pair of shoes less than two weeks ago since the pair I had been wearing were really falling apart. Really! So as soon as I bought them I started to wear them sinc my old shoes were now in such bad condition. Since the only way to return shoes is if you don't wear them outside your house I didn't see any value in keeping my receipt. Especially since I got them right before I moved I was trying to get rid of things I didn't need. I think the thought went through my mind about something happening to my shoes so I decided to keep the receipt and I put it in my checkbook. Today when I got home from work I was taking off my shoes right before going into the apartment when the loop that holds the shoelace in place broke. So I called up the store where I bought them and explained what happened and they are going to let me replace them because I have the receipt and the box (I can't remember the last shoe box I got rid of unless it was really old). It could just be an unusual coincidence, but I think it was the Holy Spirit telling me to keep the receipt!

While I was out...

So I missed yesterday, but I'm back again today! On Friday, I got a call to do some construction type work for a guy who lives just north of Redding up on a mountain. So I went up there and worked for a few hours after taking in the breathtaking views and then rushed home to take a shower before driving down to Sacramento to hear Todd Bentley. God is so good!

It was well worth the trip. Although we missed almost all of worship due to me getting off of work after we had planned on leaving, the meeting was still great! I have never seen Todd Bentley so drunk in my life! Drunk in the Holy Spirit for those who are wondering what kind of conference I was at. So we had a blast laughing and after the meeting we went out to Denny's with a bunch of friends.

After just 4 hours of sleep I got up the next morning to have my time with God. It was so good. It has been so good since school got out and I got myself to plan on spending time with God rather than just hoping that it fits into my day. Speaking of which, had I not planned it into my morning yesterday I would have never gotten a chance as we were busy the rest of the day.

One of Todd's associates, Jerame (not Jeremy) Nelson, spoke about dreams in the morning session. It was incrredible. I felt like I no longer had any need to worry about not remembering my dreams as the Lord will seal them in your Spirit and sometimes never intends for you to remember them. While waiting to leave after the meeting I prayed for a woman in a wheelchair who uses it because it is hard for her to walk. After prayer she started walking around and didn't feel the pain in her leg!

After grabbing some lunch we headed to the mall to go pray for people to be healed. Again I learned some valueable outreach lessons of how to deal with ministering with people. God still moved, but at times there were awkward situations that came up when neither person knew what the other was thinking or going to say. As we were leaving, the Lord was just touching me when one of the other Bethel students called me to find out where we were. Well, she answered the phone praying in tongues which did not help when I was already jerking around a bit. :)

We showed up to the meeting early to get seats and I saw the women that Jeremy and I had met when we came to see Todd in February after we just flew in to San Francisco from Atlanta. One of them was on crutches and started to walk without them after prayer. I believe she may have had a little pain left over, but by that point I noticed the woman in the wheelchair that I had prayed for that morning. She was sitting in a regular chair with the wheelchair empty next to her! She said that she walked in pushing the wheelchair up the hill! Praise God!

I went back and started to pray for the women and we all started to laugh and get rocked a little bit more. After a few minutes I went to talk with another woman in a wheelchair and her husband. They were an amazing couple and I prayed for all sorts of things for them. He has had cataracts since birth and then God gave me a word about his hearing so I prayed for his ears as well. She has been paralyzed for 37 years and was getting rocked when I prayed for her. The words of knowledge kept coming as God showed me that she had pain in her neck (which she had broken as well) and in her shoulders, as well as deafness in her ears.

Then I went to go back to my seat when several people asked me about my shirt, which was made by one of our interns in first year. I ended up going over to pray for them and we all started to get drunk. Several of us. Then more people came over and the drunkenness increased! Yay God! Some people were just staring at us, but oh well, I had fun!

Then came along a man and a woman. The man had Parkinson's and the woman had MS. As I was praying for the man he stopped shaking and only had a faint tremble. I asked him if he had hearing loss and he did, so I prayed and he responded that he was hearing things that he couldn't hear before. Praise God! At this point the meeting was starting so I prayed quickly for the woman with MS after sharing with her the testimony of a woman getting healed of MS and ME at Bethel a few weeks ago. Praise you Lord!

Worship was fantastic. After having been drunk in the Holy Spirit and having prayed for so many people I was just ready to enter in. It was so nice having Brian and Jenn Johnson and a band from Bethel leading worship. It also helped that I knew all the songs! I honestly can't remember much about what Todd talked about because God was really birthing something in my spirit. I do recall him talking about building your spirit man by praying in the spirit, soaking, and reading the bible. Not that it is some formula, but we can't expect to get closer to God and the Holy Spirit if we don't spend any time with them.

Then it was impartation time as Todd was going to pray for everyone. I was glad that he explained how we should prepare ourselves just to remind me that I should stir myself up (which I already had been doing) and that regardless of what we feel, we should receive by faith. Just because we don't feel a jolt of power doesn't mean that God didn't deposit something in us. I know that God gave me something even though I didn't feel like something major happened. So we got back on the road to head back to Redding.

We were still drunk all the way home, don't worry, we weren't so drunk that it was unsafe to drive, and got back at 1:45 am at which time the neighbors came out and introduced themsleves and we talked for about 5 minutes. Boy was that random. God is gonna get them! After two hours of sleep I was back at it and going for more in the prayer chapel. There really has been an increase as I have pursued God, received impartation, and then given it away. By doing these every day I have been growing a ton in a short period of time.

Just after I got to the prayer chapel one of the security guards came in. He was a student and so I prayed to give him what I had just received. he got rocked pretty good, as did I, and then he told me that he felt someone touch his left shoulder as I touched his right. That had never happened to him before!

I was good and drunk at church before we even started. Thank you Jesus! I fell into my seat at one point just as it was getting started. Worship was fantastic again. It felt like something broke as I went forward and began to dance. Some of the pastors were right behind me and I felt that they broke through what I had been poking at. Anyway, it went from feeling dead, to very alive in a matter of moments. A song or two in I had to prop myself up using the handrail for the stairs going up to the stage. It didn't help for long as I fell down onto the stairs laughing.

At one point I stood up only to fall back down within 10 seconds. I then remained on the ground for the rest of worship. God is so good! Danny Silk continued his message on the role of women in the church. It was great, you should definitely listen to the podcast. During ministry time I approached a man who came forward needing healing from cancer. Come on God! Cancer is one of things I pray into every morning that every person who comes onto the property would be healed. He felt some heat and I released the joy of the Lord onto him, although I think God got me better than He got him. Haha. I fell to the floor and the guy I was praying for kept standing. Oh Jesus, I can't wait for tonight!!!!!

How will we respond to crisis?

I read an article last night that was talking about cancer as being a third wave disease from the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. What would happen if the 40,000 workers who were exposed to the toxins at ground zero came down with a cancer type that has no treatment? I can tell you what I would do, I would organize a team to go to New York City to see every last one of them healed!

After Hurricane Katrina ravaged the Gulf Coast almost two years ago, a team from Bethel went to minister to the evacuees that were living in the Astrodome in Houston, TX. God showed up in amazing ways as people were healed of things that had kept them in bed or in wheelchairs and God even healed a man who walked by the team as they were praying for someone else!

Not that I can't ever experience a normal life, but I believe we are already living in a crisis situation where many are dying without knowing Jesus. I have had the tendency to live my life as normal amidst the brokenness of the people surrounding me. Each day is an opportunity to save someone from their own crisis situation - there is no need to wait for a national disaster to jump into action.

The people that we see during our normal activities could be drowning inside and desperately in need of a touch from God. However, without the covering of a crisis, it is easy to dismiss their demise as one of a million problems that can't all be fixed by one person. It doesn't have to be one person, but unfortunately in the church today the majority of the EHRs (Emergency Healing Revivalists) are just a handful of people (and I am NOT one of them yet). They are the few that produce the vast majority of the testimonies. The saying that 20% of the people get 80% of the work done may be true, or the percentage could be even more lopsided in the scarcity of the revivalists that harvest most of the crop.

Revival comes when God moves, but it also requires radical obedience by His people. When Peter was threatened to never talk about Jesus again in Acts 4, his response was to ask God for more boldness. He didn't back down, but asked for God to do more of what had just gotten them in trouble (healing the sick!). Lord, grant your servants boldness to take risks when we face disasters on a personal level in our daily lives!