DAVIDDLOUHY.COM

2009-04-02T23:26:00.000-07:00

Until I figure things out, please visit www.daviddlouhy.com to see my blog.

Blessings,
David

I'm back! I think....

2009-04-01T08:07:00.001-07:00

Well, it has been a really long time since I blogged anywhere, and even longer since I have been here. I am trying to make things more simple and am giving it a shot again. I leave for Mexico City on Saturday where I am leading a team of 30 God-loving revivalists into one of the largest cities in the world to see the Kingdom of Heaven come in power. Should be fun. I might try to do updates while I'm there. Who knows. God is good!

"India Will Never Be The Same"

2008-01-24T22:51:00.000-08:00

That is what we were told by leaders of the India Pentecostal Church (IPC) as we wrapped up our week of ministering at their 84th annual convention. On Saturday, the final night of the convention, the crowd had swelled to over 50,000 people. The grounds were packed and I knew we were in for a long night of ministering. The previous night was no different as myself and two others on our team prayed with a 75 year old man who was born blind (pictured above) who regained his sight until midnight. Considering that ministry time had started around 9, that is a lot of praying! The joy of the Lord was all over this man who travelled alone to the convention which was his 62nd consecutive time!

One of the first people that came to me on Saturday was a woman with several tumors on her stomach area, one very painful one near her heart, and also pain in her back. I was convinced going into the night that I was not going to stop praying for anyone until they were healed. There was some breakthrough but the tumors on her stomach would not dissolve. I kept praying though, not wanting to send her away without receiving her healing. It was particularly hard to keep praying for her because of the crowds pushing in on us wanting prayer. I actually had my translator begin to interview and pray for others while I was praying for this woman. I would then find out what was wrong with the other people and pray for them while the translator found out if the tumors were any smaller. After 15-20 minutes and numerous prayers we had breakthrough and the tumors completely dissolved! Praise God! The woman was so happy! Not only was her pain gone, but the tumors were gone as well!

That night I prayed for 5 people with diabetes, 3 people with some level of deafness (because of the number of people waiting and the difficulty of using a translator I didn’t found out how deaf they were), 2 people who were going blind, 1 woman who had an issue of bleeding, a baby with a paralyzed arm (everyone on our team prayed for this baby for 2 nights and tonight just after I felt released to leave the baby and return to praying for others, the baby squeezed the finger of another person still praying), and countless people with pain all over their bodies. I am happy to report that all were healed!

On Friday afternoon we had our second day of Healing Rooms. It was an amazing day that set the precedent for Saturday night in that everyone who came to me left healed! Most of the people on our team experienced the same success that day and all on the team had a very high percentage of people healed over the week.

It wasn’t always that easy, though. The first night we were there it seemed very difficult to minister as the people were very content to just receive prayer. “I believe I am healed,” they would say. “I believe that God will heal me soon.” We continued to press in individually and tell the people that we aren’t here to pray for God to heal them, we are here to see God heal them. Things began to break open as we persisted, prayed, and expected great miracles from God. In all, we estimate that our prayers resulted in 1,500-2,000 miracles. At the beginning of the trip we heard that they had not experience miracles at their convention in 15 years. A day or two later they told us that they hadn’t seen consistent miracles like this in 25 years. Then by the end of the week they told us that they had never seen miracles like this! And this was just from a group of 9 people who needed translators to communicate! Also, it doesn’t include possible healings that took place during times of corporate prayer where it is very possible for the number of miracles to radically increase. Miracles during the trip included dozens of cases of diabetes, deafness and tumors dissolved. Many blind, lame, crippled, mute, and other conditions were healed. Additionally, several cases of polio were healed!

In addition to seeing so many healed and their thoughts about God change, we also had a profound impact on the leadership of IPC. The worship leader at the convention was healed of diabetes one afternoon at lunch. He came back the next day having not taken any insulin and having testing his blood producing results confirming his healing. Several family members of senior leaders were healed as well as a few leaders themselves. As the week went on the leaders saw the need for God to move in power through their 14,000 churches. So not only were people healed, but they also had their minds renewed and were equipped to take revival back to their homes all over India. India will never be the same!

On the way home our flight took us to the beautiful nation of Singapore. While we were unable to shorten our layover, we were able to spend the day with the leaders of a church that will be starting a school of ministry modeled after the one I attend in California. While touring their offices, the leader of our trip asked if anyone in their office needing healing. An hour later after going in to their staff meeting we saw 7 of their staff get healed! We also prophesied over these pastors and released words of destiny to them. They expect nearly 1,000 students to be in their school when it starts later this year. Such a great connection was made that even after only a few hours we were invited back to Singapore just as we had been invited back to India.

Please consider partnering with me on future trips either financially or in prayer. How awesome our God is to set hearts on fire that can easily impact a country of over 1 billion people. Today I heard that over 1,200 people have already registered for the conference in Hawaii next month. I am getting so excited to see people not only receive God’s healing touch, but also to be equipped to influence their cities and churches. Australia is just two months away. The Kingdom of Heaven is truly at hand!

India - 5th day of the convention

2008-01-18T17:18:00.001-08:00

(I apologize for typos...the computer I am using is temperamental)

Hello everyone, here is what happened yesterday (which is today for everyone in the US). It seems as though we have general breakthrough to see most things healed now. However, it is now the big time miracles that we are really desiring to see breakthrough in. Chad, Bobby, and myself were praying for a 75 year old man who was born blind and has never seen in his life. Well, he started to see but even after praying for him for 3+ hours he was not completely healed. The cool thing was his eyelids have always been closed. At first he had to use his fingers to open them. But then he was able to open them without forcing them open. He still couldn't open them all the way though. It looks like his eyes might be damaged. God can take care of that though! The joy of the Lord is all over this man! He has come to the convention for 62 straight years and he comes by himself! 5 hour bus ride. When the bus driver asked he why he was going to it he replied that he was going to receive. Come on Jesus! He is a pastor as well. There was a boy that is competely deaf that didn't get any breakthrough. There was also a woman I prayed for that was completely blind in one eye that didn't get any breathrough. Also there was a baby who was paralyzed in the right arm. Everything else that I prayed for was healed, praise God! Thanks for your prayers! The crowd was huge last night and will be even bigger tonight. Today is our last day praying for people. Yesterday we easily saw a few hundred people healed. During our healing rooms time in the afternoon several people on our team saw 100% of the people they prayed for healed. Glory to God! One of the great testimonies has been that the worship leader that we prayed for the other day who had diabetes was able to check himself out and he is completely healed! He is so excited. Many of the leaders are getting very excited about seeing healing. One of the pastors who has been translating for our pastor is getting blasted by God. When he is translating the fire of God is all over him and the crowd just erupts in praise! Yesterday afternoon we did the first service in the 84 years of the convention that was just for Hindi speaking people. They were so hungry. The Lord sovereignly healed at least 20-25 people without anyone laying hands on them and then another 10-15 after we released the crowd to pray for each other. They haven't seen mass healings like this at the convention for at least 15 years! God is so good! Thank you again for your prayers! We want thousands of people here to know that God is in a good mood and that He wants to use them to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, and cast out demons!

Please be praying for me. I now havent been able to sleep for the past 3 nights. Fortunately I have had lots of energy during the day, but I just can't fall asleep at night. The history of India is being changed right now! The kingdom of Heaven is at hand! God, let your Kingdom come and your will be done in India as it is in Heaven!

India - 2 more days of miracles

2008-01-18T17:17:00.000-08:00

Hey all, the past two days have seen more breakthrough than the first. The blind are seeing, the deaf are hearing, the crippled are walking, and tumors are dissolving. Many people are being healed of diabetes, asthma, and arthritis. The worship leader has been healed of diabetes and was able to verify it! Yesterday afternoon we just walked around the back of the conference grounds and prayed for people seeing about 20 healed. While doing that a man came to me and offered to translate. He then also helped me last night (1/15/08). It is an answer to prayer to have a translator. I am still expecting more breakthrough though. A man who was told he would be crippled for the rest of his life walked last night. Thank you Jesus! He still needs to be completely healed though. We need the raw power of God. We need radical breakthrough and for the people to be ready to receive. They seem to be ready to get prayed for but not expecting to get healed. There is one man here that lays hands on people, but doesn't use a translator and never finds out if people are healed. The people then leave thinking they have received what God wants to give them. These people need an encounter with God, not a prayer. Please continue to pray for us. Several on our team have been feeling sick although I have been fine. We are also believing for greater breakthrough and for people to be completely and radically healed of all ailments so much so that they show emotion and get excited that God has healed them. Thanks for your prayers.

p.s. I don't hve much time to answer emails and such so don't feel bad if I don't respond, I will once I get back to the US.

India - 1/13/08

2008-01-18T17:14:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone, just a quick update from India. We got here (finally!) after almost 48 hours of traveling. We had a few stops along the way in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore. Sunday night was our first meeting. It was great. However, we really need breakthrough. The people don't know how to respond yet so last night despite having thousands of people there, less than 100 came forward for healing and of those, maybe half stayed to actually be prayed for. Only the women on our team had tranlators so it was very difficult for us to communicate and find out not only what they needed prayer for but also to find out if they were healed. One man seemed to be healed of numbness in his feet from diabetes as well as pain in his hip and leg. One woman was completely deaf in one ear and mostly deaf in the other ear, but Jesus totally restored her hearing.One of the India Pentacostal Church (IPC) leaders was healed of respiratory, back, and knee problems. Many other miracles happened as well, however we are really expected more. We have the expectation of seeing every person healed who comes to the meetings. The crowds will only get bigger over the next few days as those who are traveling far distances will arrive. We need supernatural help to do the things that we can't do. Thankfully Jesus is with us always and is in a good mood. Please be praying for us!

Legacy

2007-12-23T22:15:00.000-08:00

There have been men and women throughout history who have lived their lives in pursuit of fulfilling impossible dreams. These are the people who shake cultures, who invent things that are of vital importance, and who are remembered long after they have died. These men and women know that God has appointed them to be a catalyst that will change the world as we know it.

These men and women were not without opposition. They faced failure, scrutiny, threats, and attacks. However, what distinguishes them from the people that only the most studied historians would know about is that they were not satisfied by attempting to change the world. They were only satisfied when their mission was accomplished. Their dream of change would spur them on through defeat and their small victories gave them a taste of what they knew they must fully experience.

These were men and women of focus. They didn’t forget what they were born for when they faced opposition. They didn’t give up when faced with obstacles and they didn’t change the subject when others mocked them. They didn’t allow friends or family who opposed them to veer them off the path set before them. They would preach their message to anyone who would listen and even those who wouldn’t. They were never deterred by the odds they faced or how strong the opposition appeared to be. They sacrificed their own well being for the advancement of the cause.

These are men and women who prayed. They sought God to give them strength. They found peace in God through the fiercest storms. They understood that if God said it, He will do it. They realize that they are the Lord’s vessel and that they must follow the direction He leads them down to the most detailed coordinates. They abandon themselves to God’s grace because what they are trying to accomplish is impossible for man, but not for God.

These are men and women who left a legacy. They weren’t just legends while they lived, they were legends after they died. Their legacy lives on through the men and women who have come after them. They didn’t focus on serving themselves, but rather on serving others. Serving people they would never see, people who would never be able to give their appreciation. Jesus taught His disciples to do things in secret so as not to be rewarded (Matthew 6). He taught them to pray to God, “Your Kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.” Legends are made out of people who pray. Legends pray for Heaven to invade and occupy the earth. Mary Queen of Scots said, "I fear the prayers of John Knox more than all the assembled armies of Europe." Legends leave behind a legacy for generations to come. What will your legacy be?

Greater Measure

2007-12-13T20:15:00.000-08:00

If I were to go around asking people if the Bible contained promises, most Christians would agree that it is full of them. Unfortunately, if I were to ask the same people if God has fulfilled any of these promises in their lives, many would probably have a difficult time remembering what God has done. After praying for a man today who has been a Christian for 75 years I was asked a question as to how I can see so many others healed but did not see breakthrough with him. In the midst of crisis it is easy to forget the things that God has done in the past. The disciples struggled with this after they had seen Jesus multiply food not once, but twice. The Israelites certainly struggled with this as they fled Egypt on their way to the Promised Land. Bad theology comes when an insecure person gives an answer to a question that God has not yet answered. Why the man didn’t get healed today is as valid a question as why someone I prayed for in Nashville didn’t get healed.

Over the past several months there has been an incredible increase in the anointing of God not just in my own life, but as a corporate body. At the end of 2006 I had a goal of seeing someone healed every day of 2007. However, as the days passed by I knew that I had already missed the mark. Healings were not too much more than sporadic for the first half of the year so I really had no idea what was about to happen. While traveling several times in July I began to notice that people were getting healed more often when I prayed for them. By the time August rolled around I knew that when God showed me a problem that somebody had it would be healed 100% of the time. When school started in September I had now seen many more healings than there had been days so far in the year. Also in September I started to go after deafness like paparazzi go after celebrities. Since then I have seen dozens healed and have been acutely aware of people being around me with any measure of hearing loss.

Recently I have noticed a greater measure of God’s presence. I honestly don’t feel like I have done anything differently, although I know there have been some small differences. Ever since going to Nashville I have felt God’s presence more while praying for people than any time I can ever remember. Specifically I have also noticed that my awareness of angels has increased. No, I haven’t see them yet, but I sure do feel them. Many times I have felt the presence of angels as I have prayed for people and my faith has increased that God will heal them. It is amazing to look back on 2007 and see all that God has done. I have experienced tremendous increase as the Lord has poured out a greater measure of His presence and anointing. At the beginning of the year I was concerned that God had not yet given me a greater measure, but looking back now I see that what has happened was only made possible by Him pouring out an even greater measure than I had anticipated to begin with. He has gone beyond what I could even think of asking for! The glory of the latter house truly is greater than the glory of the former house!

I No Longer Call You Servants

2007-12-08T16:11:00.000-08:00

While talking with a coach recently about the vision I have for my life I began second-guessing myself. One of the things I had told him was something that had just within the past few weeks become highly important to me. While I mentioned spending more time creating this vision I thought for a moment and said that I need to make sure that this is what I am supposed to do. Immediately my coach stopped me and said, “You aren’t a servant, you are a friend. Friends have the option to do what they want.”

I suddenly realized that I was thinking the way I used to, always asking what God’s will for my life is. Jesus taught the disciples to pray in Matthew 6:10, “Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” When Jesus talked about the kingdom coming, or being at hand, he was always talking about the good news of God’s love being shared as well as the sick being healed, the dead being raised to life, and the oppressed being freed. So when my vision lines up with His kingdom coming on earth as it is in heaven, I shouldn’t be worried about the details. Why? Because God wants to be in relationship with us and will tell us what we need to know. Jesus says in John 15:15, “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.” Jesus tells us everything that the Father tells him. So when Jesus says in John 5:19 that he only does what he sees the Father doing, which was healing every person that came to him, we also have access to that same realm!

Although we know that we are God’s friends we often have tendencies that suggest we still feel like servants. And as long as we still feel like servants we will not fully access our heavenly bank accounts where we have waiting for us the full knowledge of what the Father is doing. As long as we have the mindset that we cannot possibly know what God is doing we create a theology that excuses us from knowing what God is doing. When we are convinced that something can’t happen we will live our lives to make sure that we are correct. It is only when we determine that something is possible that we will live our lives to search out a creative solution. What about Proverbs 25:2 which says, “It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, to search out a matter is the glory of kings.” There is truth to it, but Solomon isn’t the savior of the world, Jesus is. John 14:6-7 says, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him." If we want to know the Father, we need to know Jesus, as he is the ultimate truth.

Since we are friends with God and not servants we have a voice. When we ask God for things He hears us. John 14:14 says, “You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.” Jesus didn’t say to ask anything that is God’s will; He said to ask for anything. What is it that you are passionate about? What dreams has God given you? Don’t do nothing just because you don’t want to do what isn’t God’s will. If you are in relationship with God He will tell you all things and loves you whether you decide to be a pastor or a high school math teacher. Jesus taught us to pray that the kingdom would come on earth as it is in heaven and that can happen no matter what you are doing and no matter where you are. As a friend you have full access to God and the answer to every problem that the world will ever bring you.

Incredible Healing Wave In Nashville!

2007-12-05T01:36:00.001-08:00

As I type this I am on the plane flying back to California after spending the weekend in the Nashville, TN area ministering with Bill Johnson and also his son Eric. Saturday night after our team called out what God was wanting to do and Bill released the congregation to pray, over 125 miracles of healing happened! Sunday night Bill had everyone with some measure of deafness stand and within ten minutes 62 people had been healed! Then after the team again called out what God wanted to do, another 140 miracles were released to people!

All weekend I had been asking God to release healing of deafness in a greater measure. Although I had already personally prayed for nearly ten people who were healed of some measure of deafness I was asking God to release a wave that would heal every person in the building. I almost got what I prayed for! After sharing several testimonies Bill felt that God was moving in the area of deafness and boy was He ever!

One of the most exciting things to see this weekend, as has been the case recently, was how many people were touched as I was ministering to them and God showed me something specific that He wanted to heal, even though the person hadn’t told me about it. Several were brought to tears as they were healed of multiple ailments that they hadn’t even asked for prayer about. The majority of things I saw healed were in fact not things that people told me about, but rather things that God told me about. Not bad for someone who used to tell everyone that he never hears God speak!

Friday night was at a wonderful church, Grace Center, through whom I had initially heard about the ministry of Bill Johnson through a friend. The worship at Grace Center is amazing. The church is so passionate about the presence of God. They have prayer meetings before each service that are really just times of soaking in God’s presence! The place was packed as people hungry for more of God jammed into the building to find that all of the seats were already reserved more than an hour before the service started. The overflow room and hallways allowed space for everyone else. However, God is not limited by walls and people cheered loudly as testimony came forth that someone was healed of cancer in the overflow room!

God, aren't you going to do something?

2007-11-22T09:04:00.001-08:00

Recently I came to the realization that I cannot simply ask God to do everything for me while I sit back and do nothing. While you might think that is a bit extreme to ask God to do something while we do nothing, it actually isn't that far from the truth. Before I moved to Redding I was under the false assumption that I could not hear from God. There were many times when I asked God whether or not I should do something and I would never hear Him speak to me. What I didn't know at the time was that God can speak through other things than just an audible voice. Since I never heard His audible voice I thought that he never answered my prayers.

In the past several months I have been almost overwhelmed by God's love in how often He speaks to me. No, I don't hear His audible voice as though I am talking to my friends, but I have heard Him tell me hundreds of times that He is wanting to heal people and then as a result people have been healed. Hundreds of times God has given me prophetic words for other people that encouraged them with the things that God has been showing them. Hundreds of times God has given me dreams that confirm things or speak prophetically to me just as Joseph or Daniel in the Bible.

While praying for a friend recently I felt that God was wanting me to pray for them as though I had never prayed for them before. Dozens of times I have prayed for this friend without them being healed. There have been breakthroughs and answered prayers that I am very thankful for, but I felt as though I had gotten to the place of praying for them as a way of sympathizing instead of praying for them to be healed. So I repented to them and began to pray like I meant it. When nothing happened the first time I prayed again. I kept praying until we saw some breakthrough rather than stopping and just asking God to bless them.

Then, a few days later I was praying for another friend who I have also prayed for many times. I invited Holy Spirit to come more, as He was already there. Then it hit me. God was there. Every time I have prayed for this person He has been there. Sometimes His presence has been very thick and yet the person is still not healed. I was asking God to heal the person Himself. However, I realized that I have done that before and that God listens to me. I remembered that it is impossible for nothing to happen when I pray. Then it hit me; God wants me to do something about it!

Mark 4:38-40 says:

Jesus Himself was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke Him and said to Him, "Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?"

And He got up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, "Hush, be still." And the wind died down and it became perfectly calm.

And He said to them, "Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?"

The disciples asked the savior of the world, "do you not care that we are perishing?" however we often ask the Healer, "aren't you going to heal this person?" Jesus then essentially told them, "you wouldn't be scared if you had any faith." I think that God is now saying, "you would heal this person if you had faith."

Well hasn't God been healing people when we ask Him to come? Yes. Jesus didn't start His ministry by telling the disciples that they had no faith. He performed miracles. He taught by parables to the crowd and then explained them to the disciples. However Jesus knew that the disciples must be trained to partner with Heaven so that God's will would be done wherever they went. It is the difference between going to get food yourself and asking someone else to do it for you.

When children learn responsibility their parents can trust them with much greater things. However the child who always asks for help and never does anything themselves will never be given responsibility. I am not saying that we are the ones who heal people, but I remind you that Jesus did tell His disciples to heal the sick, raise the dead, cast out demons, and cleanse lepers. He is preparing us for promotion just as He prepared His disciples before Pentecost. To walk in a higher level of authority we must be willing to take steps of faith beyond what we currently know. God is doing something, it just might not be what we think.

God Magnet

2007-11-16T23:35:00.001-08:00

About seven or eight years ago I remember one of my high school classmates singing a song by one of his favorite bands, MxPx. The song was called "Chick Magnet" and the line he always sang was, "Well he's a chick magnet, if ya know what I mean. The way the girlies just go to him, well ya should've seen."

People often ask me how I get words of knowledge. Do I go around and constantly ask God to show me things? That’s a good idea, but I have only done that a few times. Do I seek the Lord for a few hours every morning to get a list of things to look for? Nope, but that isn’t a bad idea either. Most of the time I just feel something in my body that isn’t what my body would normally do. Then I ask people who around me if they have a problem with that part of their body. I really can’t take credit for getting the words of knowledge because frankly I didn’t do anything to get them. Well, maybe I did actually do something to get them.

This morning I spent a few minutes reflecting on the goodness of God. I remembered the day almost a year ago when God gave me a huge download of things He wanted to heal and I saw each one of them healed. I remember being at work and getting words of knowledge for my co-workers who weren’t Christians. Since I knew that it was God speaking to me, I was only slightly hesitant to ask them if they had that problem. For what seemed like weeks I was getting dozens of words for people every day. Actually it was only three or four days, but I could literally be writing an email and would get words of knowledge for the person. However, I then began to become afraid to give the words because of how people were reacting. Whereas I had been very accurate at first, I started to be much less accurate. Before I knew it, I wasn’t getting words of knowledge any more.

Now fast forward to June of this year. I was going on some ministry trips and was stepping out with what God was showing me. Then I went on more trips in July and even if I wasn’t sure about whether it was God or not, I would try it out. By the time August rolled around, it felt as though I had antennas sticking out from my body in every direction. I would pick up words of knowledge for people about problems they had forgotten they had because they had become accustomed to them. I started to realize what was happening just before going on a trip to Petoskey, Michigan at the beginning of September. I was no longer afraid of whether I was wrong or not; I was just going to give the word of knowledge regardless.

There are things that we can do to attract God. Some are obvious while others are less obvious. Some of those obvious things are reading our bibles, praying, spending time in worship and things like that. The things that are less obvious have to do with God’s character. God is good, so if we aren’t ready to obey what He is going to tell us, He isn’t going to tell us. In His goodness, He spares us the heartache of repeated failures that come simply because we aren’t ready for the responsibility that He gave us. No guy would ever be a chick magnet if he never talked to girls. In the same way, no person is going to be a God magnet if they never talk to God. Ask God questions, and make sure to answer the phone when He calls. He looks at our faithfulness and will give you the responsibility when He sees you are ready to handle it.

There is one more great way to become a God Magnet. How do you respond to a friend who asks, "Can you to do me a favor?" Do you immediately say yes or do you hesitantly say maybe? I had someone ask me two days ago if I could do a favor for them and I told them frankly, "it depends on what it is," because I knew that his priorities were not my priorities. When he told me what it was that he wanted me to do, I told him that I couldn’t do it because it conflicted with a higher priority. We have to know what our priorities are, and if you want to be a God Magnet, then God must be number one on your priority list. Regardless of my desire to help them, if I constantly turn down people who ask me to do favors for them, it won’t be long before they stop asking me for help. They will find someone who is not only wanting to help, but is also willing to make any sacrifice necessary to help. God loves that we desire for Him to use us, but He is attracted to the people who say yes before He even asks.

Got Love?

2007-11-10T23:35:00.001-08:00

I know I promised a blog on what has happened over the past few days, but the reality is that I can't put it to words. I tried, but I can't do it. Three hours of writing and I feel like I would need to write a book in order to finish it. My thoughts are too jumbled right now to put something together that would be comprehensible. So here is a quick thought on love:

"And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love."

So there you have it. Love is the greatest. Until we encounter the love of God we won't be able to share it with others because you can only give what you have. Got love?

The Kingdom of Heaven is upon you

2007-10-31T22:46:00.001-07:00

Wow, so much has happened since I last wrote. Within 48 hours I witnessed God open over a dozen people's ears, increase the vision of a person who is almost completely blind, dissolve three tumors near a woman's collarbone, heal a man's leg that had kept him from being able to work, and other miracles of healing. Aside from being amazed by God's love in healing all of these people, not to mention the hundreds of others that I didn't personally witness, is that most of the healings took place not when someone approached me for prayer, but rather when God spoke to me about what He was doing.

The invitation is there. God is calling the plays out methodically just hoping that someone is listening to what He is saying. God is looking for people who are leaning into Him to hear what He is saying and act upon it. I used to tell people that God never speaks to me. However, what I didn't realize is that if I had been really hungry to hear God, I should have waited on Him until I heard Him speak. Two and a half years ago I went on a my first mission trip to South Africa. I went into the trip praying that I would see miracles while I was there. However, I was dissappointed to return home without seeing anyone healed. Unfortunately I didn't realize for over a year that I didn't pray for anyone to be healed while I was there.

Now I understand what God is doing and what He saying at least some of the time. I have asked God to show me what He is doing so that I would only do what I see Him doing. Jesus only did what He saw the Father doing. That is what words of knowledge are. Similarly, by leaning into God we can often get a grasp for what He is doing in this current season. For us in Redding, He is giving us authority over deafness. It is amazing. I had never seen anyone healed of deafness eight months ago, and nobody healed of it in the U.S. until July, but since then I have seen over 50 people have their hearing restored. Around 40 of those have been just in the past two months. Those aren't people that were in the same room as me, those are people that I have prayed for personally. The Kingdom of Heaven is here!

I feel like God is taking us on a bullet train. Right now it is leaving the station and is picking up speed, however, it is still there and if people will drop their luggage and run after it, they will make it on the train. This train is rapid acceleration. God is going to take us to our next destination so much more quickly than we reason is possible. However, this is what happens when the Kingdom is upon you. God is calling us to draw near to Him so that He can reveal His secrets to us. We don't hear because we don't listen. We don't see miracles because we don't pray.

The Kingdom of Heaven is now. God is pouring out His Spirit on all flesh, at least on those who want it. However, in order to want something you must know that it is available. My personal conviction in this season is to drop everything and run after God. That doesn't mean that I don't go to work or do my homework for school. I even got my oil changed in my car about two weeks ago. However, it does mean that I am looking closely at the activities I engage in to determine how committed I am to them. The Kingdom is here and it is accelerating at a rapid pace, I don't want to miss it because I am holding onto nonessential things.

Praying from an Open Heaven

2007-10-24T23:36:00.000-07:00

In recent weeks I have felt a significant shift while praying from the standpoint that I have authority from heaven to declare things into existence. Not that asking for things doesn't work, because it has, but when I declare things I find that my faith for them is significantly higher than if I was just asking for them. I have asked God for 100% breakthrough over deafness and I have received a measure of that, however my faith increases when I declare that deafness isn't allowed anywhere near me.

Tonight was the first night of Bethel Church's annual Open Heavens conference. As many of you may know, southern California has been ablaze with several wild fires that are fueled by very gusty winds. At the conference tonight we began to pray around 8:30 that the winds would cease and the fires would be put out. We did as Jesus did, we commanded the winds to stop and the fires to disappear. After arriving home I checked the news and saw a great headline that read, "Signs of Hope: Winds ease in California's fire zone." The article was updated about 10 minutes before 9:00. We have authority to command the winds to stop and they will obey us!

Along with me declaring that deafness is not allowed in Redding, I have been asking God to bring me people with hearing loss. Tonight at the conference I was praying for a man with cancer when God showed me that he had a hearing problem. We prayed very briefly and I asked him how it was. His response was, "It's louder. It's almost too loud." Then I asked him about a problem with the heel and he said that he shattered both of his heels in an accident 18 years ago. I quickly commanded the pain to leave and had him test it out. The pain in his left foot was completely gone, just like that.

In both of these cases I already knew that it was God's will to heal, because He wouldn't show me that the man had hearing loss or a problem with his heels if He didn't want to heal him. So rather than asking God to do what He has already said He wants to do, I simply executed the play that God called. God gave me the orders and I gave the deafness and the pain the order to leave. We live under an open heaven all the time and as long as we live under authority, God gives us His authority to command things into being. Those are the prayers that stop the winds!

A new kind of jet lag

2007-10-21T15:04:00.001-07:00

Now just about a week after returning from a 19 day trip to England I have spent several days being wide awake at 4:30 am and extremely tired from about noon until 5 pm. However by Friday I was doing well, sleeping in until 7 and getting to bed at a normal time. Then out of the blue, last night I was so tired that I went to bed at 7:30. Other than waking up at 2 am, I slept until nearly 6 this morning, ready to take on my first Sunday at Bethel in over a month.

Coming back from England I was excited to see what God had in store for the next month and a half before I would go on my next ministry trip. Over the summer I had a very busy month of travel in July and then only went on one trip in August. However, I saw more healings in August than I had in perhaps the rest of my life up to that point. Amazing things happened as I prayed for people in the healing rooms, at church, and out in the community. So my anticipation for this time frame is sky high as I am expecting amazing things from God.

One thing that I have seen a ton of breakthrough in over this past season of trravel is deafness. Since going on a Firestorm to Michigan the couple days before school started September 11, through the end of the England trip, I have prayed for 20 people whose hearing has been restored. Before the England trip I set a goal of seeing one person healed of deafness every day. I didn't get it, just 10 instead of 19. So naturally, when I got back, I wanted it to keep increasing. It took less than 48 hours to see the first person healed. I walked into a group of young people before youth group when God gave me the word of knowledge. I asked them who had a problem with the left ear and they each said no, until one spoke up saying that he has hearing loss in that ear.

Then Friday night at church God gave me a word as I sat in the front row that He wanted to heal someone of deafness. I was praying for a man with heart failure and could tell that his hearing wasn't great. I shifted to put one hand on his back and when he started to walk away I told him that I wasn't done yet. I prayed more and this time he could feel the fire of God. I asked if he had problems with his hearing and he told me that he did, but he left his hearing aids at home that night. So I prayed and his ears opened up. Praise God!

Fast forward to this morning. Pastor Bill was amazing. Make sure to download the podcast. While others were praying for a fresh and continual baptism of fire for intimacy with the Lord, I was ready to leave, to come home and pray on my own. I was going to look for people with hearing aids on my way out because God gave me a word for it as Bill preached. As I got up I saw a woman with a walker, but when I turned towards the door, I slowly turned back and walked over to her. I talked with her and prayed for her as she had suffered a stroke. I felt fire go into her as I prayed but she felt nothing. We talked some more and then I said goodbye. As I did, Pastor Bill asked people who needed healing to raise their hands and as I walked to leave, a young boy raised his hand. I asked him what he needed prayer for and he said his ears. He has hearing loss and pounding in his ears from an infection. Actually, I should say, he HAD hearing loss and pounding in his ears because Jesus healed him!

The thing that gets me is that I would have totally missed him, but because I have been crying out to God to give me more compassion for others I went over and prayed for that woman who had a stroke and listened to her talk for a while. It was just long enough to get me to be the first person to see the boy as he raised his hand. Had I not talked to the lady, I would have already been driving home. I am contending for a deafness free city and it is off to a good start. I am so thankful that the fruit of people being healed of deafness in England is hanging over and getting people healed in Redding too. That is one kind of jet lag that I will look forward to the rest of my life - the increased fruit that comes after returning home from ministering.

Some things never get old

2007-10-04T17:03:00.000-07:00

Well, I just got back from The Well, which was in the nearby town of Leamington, which was well worth the drive from Rugby. The meeting was in a massive cathedral and people came from all over to attend.

Banning lost his voice before he even began to preach. He was leading us in prayer for England and as soon as he started to talk after it, his voice was completely gone. I could barely hear him with the microphone, so he handed the mic off to me to take over - or just to share some of the healings that broke out when Chris Gore and myself went to Canada the weekend before I came to England.

After we shared testimonies Banning came up and just called out a couple words of knowledge and we scattered around the cathedral to pray for the 25 or so folks who stood. I prayed for a woman in the back who had a problem with her knee in which it clicked and was weak. She tested it out and no longer had any problems.

So then I began to slowly walk up and down the aisle a few times to see if God would show me anything. I picked up a few things and then went down the outside to be more out of the way. God gave me words of knowledge about healing a heart condition, problem with the brain, and then I moved more towards the front and stood next to a pillar. I felt a pretty strong word for the left ear, but rather than asking the crowd over Banning speaking, I just waited. Well, within 30 seconds a teenage boy came over to me and asked me to pray for his hearing. It turns out it was his left ear and so I explained what had just happened.

Now keep in mind that Banning is preaching at this point, but this kid just gets up out of his chair and asks me to pray for him! Nothing happened the first time I prayed. The second time he noticed a slight increase, and then after praying a third time he said that his bad ear was now better than his good year. Banning saw what was going on and so the kid and I got to share how God had just opened up his ear after he got up to ask me to pray just after God had given me a word of knowledge for the left ear. God is so good!

Just a few minutes after he sat down another man got out of his seat and asked for prayer. Poor Banning. First he loses his voice, then people are leaving their seats to receive prayer while he preaches! This man was the boy's father who had memory loss. Obviously it is hard to test how good your memory is right on the spot, but he felt the fire of God as I prayed.

Then a few minutes after that man sat down, another man came over to me for prayer. This man said that the people around him told him to come over and have me lay hands on him because he has an irregular heartbeat that comes every 2 weeks or so. This man also felt the fire of God as I prayed. Three words of knowledge and three men that came to me to receive their healing for the very things that God was doing. God is so good!

By this point Banning's voice was starting to sound much better. The more people I prayed for the better he got! He wrapped things up and we were told that we only had about 15 minutes to pray for the sick. He wanted us to be able to give words of knowledge so we squeezed that in really quick between myself, Chad, and Wes, and then we immediately started praying for them as soon as we gave our words.

The first guy I prayed for didn't get healed of deafness- yet. Argh. I wanted 100% tonight. The next lady did however. The ringing in her ears went and she regained the balance that she had been lacking for a while. Her friend was so happy that she came back over to me later on just to boast at the work God had done!

Next, a man that I had prayed for on Sunday that wasn't sure if he was healed came back to get the whole thing. He left with it!

Then came another man with a "shopping list" of things he needed healed. First I started by praying for his ear. His response to me asking if anything was different was, "I hear you much louder!" Then I prayed for a cyst on his throat. When I asked him to test it out he said that if I had told him that I couldn't see it anymore that he would believe me because he couldn't feel it anymore! Finally I prayed for his hand. It didn't hold out for long. I felt like it was done and all the joint pain left. Praise God!

Finally I prayed for a woman who had pain in her mouth. Most of it left but then I felt like she had pressure in her ears. She says that she was very congested and had sinus pressure. When I prayed for that her sinuses cleared up but then she got a sharp pain in the side of her head. I commanded that spirit to leave and it didn't want to at first. I kindly stepped on its head and took authority over it in Jesus name. All the pain left and the woman was shocked at how free she suddenly felt. Praise God!!!

What a great night! It was a breath of fresh air for me as this is one of my favorite things to do, possibly my favorite thing to do - heal the sick. Not that doing skits, or sketches, for kids is a bad thing, but healing the sick just doesn't get old to me. We did the same skit over and over in schools this week before today when we finally got to do the other skits. However, we still repeated one of them four times. In order to keep it fun we added some improvisation to them but even then it still gets kind of old. However, with the last man that I prayed for tonight, the fourth person who was healed of hearing problems, I was more excited when he was getting healed then I was with the others. There is just something that never gets old about seeing deaf ears open and people being set free. Seeing what the Father is doing and then doing it is so much fun! Hopefully there will be much more of this to come in the coming week!

England: Day 1

2007-09-30T15:20:00.001-07:00

Today was a good day in the Kingdom. Both the United Kingdom and the Kingdom of God. I woke up feeling pretty good and went to a combined church service of three congregations in town.

The worship was solid and then we did one of our "sketches" as they are called here. Then we shared some testimonies. Instead of preaching as had been the plan, the pastor decided to just move straight into ministry time. After we prayed for those who came forward and saw several of them get healed, I asked the pastor if we could give some words of knowledge so we did.

I must say that having an increased measure of faith to see deaf ears open makes it much easier when giving a word of knowledge. I used to be pretty scared to pray for people who were deaf, and now I love it. I said to the congregation, "God made it clear to me that He is going to heal people who are deaf, partially deaf, or have ringing in their ears, so please come forward if you have any of those."

Before the next person was finished giving their words a man had already came forward for healing. He took his hearing aids out and he didn't put them back in. Then after another word of knowledge his back was healed as well.

Another woman came forward for healing from deafness and thought that she could feel some heat and that they might have opened up some. Probably 30 minutes later she came back to me and said how ever since she recieved prayer everything has been much louder and that she keeps telling people how everything is louder. Praise God!

At least one other person with deafness was healed too through Wes, who is the only other current BSSM student on the trip. I was talking with another man and suddenly got a word of knowledge for him as well. However, with the noise in the room he didn't notice any difference although he wasn't aware of any hearing loss to begin with, but rather too much ear wax.

So we have a deaf count of at least 3 so far and I have 2 of them. I want to personally see at least 35 healed of deafness on the trip and at least 50 for the whole team. I can't wait to get into another meeting or just into a place where I am around a bunch of people. The people of Rugby are ready for Jesus to come and take over, whether they know it or not!

This afternoon we went to a big reservoir, or man-made lake, where sailing is quite popular. On the way there we drove by several buildings that were over 300 years old and even a few that were 400 years old. It was very beautiful with the countryside, the narrow roads, and partly sunny weather. It was still chilly though. Well, I am going to go to bed now as it is quarter past eleven, and we have a full day tomorrow starting out in the schools. Over and out from the expanding Kingdom of God in the United Kingdom.

Stumbling upon the Will of God

2007-09-26T22:21:00.000-07:00

There are times in life where things just don't seem to be happening the way you want them to. Why would God seem to keep you from doing something that is obviously good? Well, sometimes He just has something better in store for you if you are open to going where He is going. Tonight I had a great example of being where God wanted me to be even though I didn't think it made sense.

I had a meeting for those who work in the Healing Rooms that included a time of impartation from Beni Johnson. I was thinking that I should go to that instead of of Youth since it is only every other month. However, late Monday night I was informed that I had to be at Youth to perform the skits that we will be doing in England next week for Jesus Culture. Finally, I told one of the people in the skits to send me a text message when we were about to start and I went to the Healing Rooms meeting. Beni spoke for a little while and then prayed for us and I then went over to the sanctuary to the youth meeting.

I didn't know what was going on, but Linda was talking to the kids and all of the sudden she calls me out and tells me to come up on stage. She has me share some of the testimonies of what happened in Canada this past weekend. As I am sharing about getting a word of knowledge and someone getting healed, God shows me that He wants to heal someone's tailbone right then so I interrupt myself and call it out. All of the sudden I am leading a healing service, instructing the kids to go pray for each other. Some of the kids come up and give more words of knowledge.

It just broke open! There were at least 20 healings, including several tailbones, necks, backs, wrists, knees and sore throats. One kid shared how he felt electricity all over his body when the kids were praying for the hole in his heart. After I handed it back over to Linda we went into worship which all of the sudden seemed like worship! Why can't we always remember that God is so good? After worship I went to the back to get ready for my skit and asked one of the guys who has problems with his left ear if he got any breakthrough. He said something to the effect of, "I feel something going on, but it hasn't broken open yet." I laid my hands on him and commanded it to open. I started to feel some supernatural activity and then he says, "I think it just opened!"

I talked with Linda later and she said that she had been looking for me and thinking, "Why isn't David here? He needs to be here for some reason." Interesting how God moves. I didn't want to be there, yet God did, and because I came over right after Beni prayed for me instead of waiting for a text message, I didn't miss out on how God wanted to use me to release the youth to heal the sick.

Last night I went to the hospital to pray for someone from school. We were unable to go into her room to see her, yet as we were praying for the family member of some women in the waiting room, God showed me that someone had a problem with the front left side of the head. I asked if it was their mom, who was in the ICU, and they said no. I then asked if it was any of them. One of the women then said that her son-in-law has a very large cancerous tumor on his brain in that exact location. I was able to pray for him and hope to hear a report from them. Then I prayed for a man with hearing aids because hours earlier I had received a word of knowledge for deafness and had yet to find a person who was deaf.

Don't discount what seems to be an abnormal circumstance, it could be the Holy Spirit trying to see if you are paying attention to what is going on. In fact, be on the lookout for opportunities that will arise after unexpected detours. God will use any hand that is given to Him if we are open to followed His lead.

Quick update from Canada

2007-09-23T06:44:00.001-07:00

The woman we came to Calgary to pray for saw significant breakthrough yesterday. There is still one area that we are wanting to see breakthrough in, but she already had numbness leave her feet, pain leave her leg, arthritis leave her hand, the ability to breathe easily, and the ability to fully lift her arms in the air.

Last night I preached at the church that they go to. It was supposed to be the youth service but one of the worship leaders got married, causing most of the young people to be at the wedding. No worries, the average age at the meeting was probably 45-50 - I wonder what this morning will look like! It turns out that a lot of the people who were there were from other churches. Praise God! They heard about understanding the authority we have in Christ to heal the sick and the ones who stayed long enough received healing.

Since it is just Chris and myself I didn’t want to just call people forward, as they would be waiting in line for probably two hours, so I just had the people around them laying hands on them as I called out words of knowledge. A few people experienced a touch from God in that manner, but the real miracles started to happen after at least half of the people left.

Several people who were deaf quickly regained their hearing. A young woman with mild cerebral palsy no longer limped as she walked, which shocked the friend she was with. After one man’s ears opened up, I still felt that he had a problem that was caused by the inner ear and it turns out he has had a problem with his equilibrium for over 25 years. I prayed for him and he tested it out, now able to walk in a straight line with his eyes closed! Praise God! One woman had a problem with the tendons in her feet and she was now able to walk on her tip-toes without any pain. The same woman had cancer in the exact location of where I had a hand print on my upper chest when I woke up yesterday morning. As I prayed I felt it go and she is excited to go to the doctor to see the good report. Another woman has been troubled for years with pain which has manifested as a demon. The manifestations stopped after I rebuked them and commanded the spirit to leave and the pain left her back, neck and head.

God is in a good mood and the temperature is in the 30s!

Sign Language

2007-09-10T23:35:00.000-07:00

Jesus tells His disciples in John 14:11 that they should believe Him based on the miracles from His ministry. He didn't just come saying that He was the son of God and the Messiah, but He preached the Kingdom with demonstration of the King. When John the Baptist was having an internal struggle in prison he sent his own disciples to ask Jesus if He was the Messiah even though John himself had said that Jesus was the Lamb of God. The response Jesus gave in Matthew 11:5 was that "the blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor."

If that was the standard that Jesus carried then why shouldn't we do the same? In John 14:12 He tells the disciples that they will do greater works than He did. Jesus made it clear to the disciples that their mission was not to preach at people and get them saved but rather it was to preach that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand, heal the sick, raise the dead, cast out demons, and cleanse lepers (Matthew 10:7-8). Jesus never intended for us to argue with people and try to convince them with our words. We are simply to preach the gospel and do the stuff.

Jesus even said in Mark 16:17-18 that "these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well." Are the signs accompanying you? Since I am not about lowering standards so that I can pass them I will use the example of Matthew 11:5. Do the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk, the dead come back to life, and those with skin conditions healed?

While in Michigan I realized that the more breakthrough I get in healing, the more I become hungry for greater breakthrough. Many deaf people were getting healed but there were others that had not gotten healed. There was a blind woman at one of the meetings but I didn't get to pray for her and I don't believe she regained her sight. The lame did walk, but not all of them. I prayed for one man who hasn't had legs in many years and he did not receive a miracle. Do we really believe that these signs will accompany us if we believe? I think sometimes we forget to uphold the standard.

(Someone has a problem with their left ear. Open in the name of Jesus!)

Sometimes we struggle to speak the language the others need in order to receive the gospel - and I don't necessarily mean that they don't understand English. They may have arguements that we don't always have answers for but when signs follow you it is a language that all understand. When they experience the power of God it speaks their language and confronts them with the truth. I am becoming much more proficient in sign language so that in all circumstances signs follow me. I rejoice in the man who took out his hearing aids yesterday morning and said that he didn't need them any more, but I know that if I can't communicate every sign then the language of the Kingdom may not be expressed.

God is so good!

2007-09-08T04:36:00.000-07:00

I am in Petoskey, Michigan right now on a Firestorm. For those of you who don't know what that is, it is simply a ministry trip led by a pastor from Bethel where students from the school of ministry can get hands on experience. So far this has been an amazing trip! Leading up to this trip I began to contend for breakthrough that every person who comes to the meetings would get healed. With all the healings that have taken place over the past two evenings I believe we are well on our way to reaching that goal. I want to share with you just a few of the testimonies of what God has been doing.

A man with diabetes was prayed for on the first night. He walked up to the front carrying his cane to testify that God had healed him. He was there again last night without his cane sharing again how God had healed him. Towards the end of the meeting he brought me to another man saying that he really needed prayer. God showed me there was something wrong with his feet and he said they were numb. After praying once his feet were tingling and then after praying again all of the numbness was gone and all of the feeling had returned. The man then started to laugh and then cry - something that several people told me they had never seen him do (laugh or cry!). I then asked him if anything else was going on and he told me that his stomach can't digest food. I prayed once and he said that he was feeling less nauseous than before. As I prayed again I felt as though I was squeezing his body in the spirit. He started shaking a lot and after I said, "be healed in Jesus' name," I released the peace of Heaven over him and he immediately stopped shaking. I asked him how he felt now and he said that it was completely gone! God is so good!

On the first night I called out scoliosis as being something that God was going to heal. Last night a woman grabbed me and said that she got healed. She told me and then testified to the whole church of how she went to her chiropractor that morning and told him that she didn't need an adjustment because she got healed. The chiropractor then was amazed that he couldn't find the curve in her spine. He asked her, "what really happened to you?" to which she answered, "I went to church last night and God healed me!"

Last night Kevin shared a testimony from last Saturday in Turlock, CA when he called out a word of knowledge for Rhonda with Lupus. It turned out to be the wife of somebody in the church. Kevin talked to her on the cell phone during the service and God healed her! She then came to both services the next day to testify that all of her pain and fatigue was gone! Well, last night Kevin asked if there was a Rhonda who has Lupus and a woman raised her hand saying that it was her daughter. So as 200+ people watch on, Rhonda, who was in another state, got healed of Lupus over the cell phone! Over the next 10 minutes, two more people with Lupus were healed over the cell phone. Talk about the power of the testimony!

I gave a word of knowledge last night that not only was God going to heal deafness, but that somebody's ears were going to open right now. I was surprised when only two people stood up for that word. The first one didn't even have deafness, but ringing in his ears. Within a few minutes of giving the word I went to find the other person who stood up. She wasn't standing anymore because God had already healed her without anyone praying for her!

After hearing of her healing I started to pray for an 86 year old woman. As I had her test out her hip she said that while she was able to walk better, she was still in pain. I then asked her what was wrong with her feet and she said they were fine. I told her that I was feeling burning on the bottom and she said, "Oh, my feet do feel like they are burning on the bottom!" I told her that this was just a sign from God that He is going to heal her whole body (she told me she was skeptical that God would heal her) and sure enough within a minute the burning in her feet had stopped - Praise God!

Later I went to pray for an 89 year old woman who had a stroke and was constantly dizzy for four years. I prayed for her a few times and nothing happened. An hour or two later I came back to release the joy of the Lord over the woman and her son. I was pleased to see that she started to laugh. She is 76 years older than me! I have never made someone that old laugh! After a few minutes of laughing I asked her if she was still dizzy and she said that it completely went away. She was so happy because she has been constantly dizzy for four years until someone laughed on her! God is so good!

There were so many more healings both last night and the night before. One of the great things is that each night about half of the crowd has been from other churches in the city. I am praying that when we get to the last meeting we will fully exhaust the supply of sick people in the church! Yesterday we got to speak at a Christian school. We prophesied over students and teachers, gave words of knowledge, and healed the sick. That hour could have just changed the lives of those students. God is so good!

For God so loved the world

2007-08-29T17:43:00.001-07:00

"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son." - John 3:16-18

As I was praying and worshipping this morning I was struck by the lyrics to a song that was playing. It was "How He Loves" off of the "We Cry Out" CD. I started to think about how much God loves us.

Ephesians 3:17-19 says, "And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." His love surpasses knowledge. Paul is praying that the believes will be able to grasp just how much God loves us.

Then in my spirit I felt that if people knew how much God loves them, they would be instantly healed. John 3:16 came to mind and I realized that Jesus wasn't just talking about salvation. So often people think that God gives them sickness as a punishment for things they have done wrong or to teach them a lesson. That is not what my bible says. It says that whoever believes in Him is NOT condemened. Did you get that?

Well, wouldn't you get to Heaven and be with Jesus sooner if you died an early death due to sickness? I think that is just an excuse to to cover up the fact that you didn't want to be in relationship enough with Him while here on earth to ever seek His face until you had encounters with Him daily. Am I stepping on your toes yet? Back to John 3:16, Jesus says that those who believe will not perish, but have eternal life. Let me tell you that eternal life doesn't start when your body is six feet under the ground in a casket, it starts the moment you believe. If you believe in Jesus, and what He said, you will not perish. I am becoming more convinced every day that the mountains are not removed from the lives of Christians because they lack faith. Let me rephrase that. Breakthroughs don't come because people don't understand that God is good and that He loves them unconditionally.

When God reveals to you more of His love you will know it. You won't be the same until He does it again. It isn't about just words. You can memorize the entire Bible and miss the heart behind everything that is said. That is why people can have enough faith to go to Heaven but not enough faith to bring Heaven to Earth. They believe that Jesus died for their sins but miss the rest. On the other hand you can dive into the Word until you grasp it and know it in your entire being. That is when you become a Heavenly atmosphere ready to change the world at any moment in any location.

I pray that today you will have an encounter with this love that surpasses knowledge so that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Pressing in for breakthrough

2007-08-28T19:17:00.001-07:00

I just got back from a six mile run with three guys from church. With the exception of being forced to run about a mile one day in May, I haven't run at all since June of last year. I am happy to say that I ran the first 2.5 miles without walking. However, after that point I walked most of the way back around the loop. However, when I could see the end I went for it again, running faster than I had run at any other point. I could see my goal and wanted to finish strong. I could have just kept walking, I mean it was 105 degrees outside, but there is something in me that won't just throw in the towel and give up. It is possible that I won't go running again anytime soon since it is a very low priority for me, but if I do, I know that I will need to challenge myself to run more and walk less. Don't worry, there is a point to this.

Two times in the past week I have had friends come over for a "Glory night." The goal of these nights is to seek the face of God by giving Him the glory through praise and worship. The idea is that we must go beyond what is convenient and comfortable and actually give a sacrifice of praise to God. My friend Zach said it well, "the higher our praise goes, the deeper our worship will be." I found that to be true during the second night when I had trouble breaking through with my praise and then found that my worship was much shallower than it had been the first time around. Zach read us a quote by Ruth Heflin who said, "When you discover things that seem to contribute to the glory, do those things more; and when you find things that seem to diminish the glory, stop doing them. It's as simple as that." Run more and walk less.

I have found that even with all the hunger for God there is still the element of time and convenience. I set aside an hour to pray in tongues. I soak for an hour. I might read my bible for an hour. Occassionally I might block of more time for one of these, but typically it is set in stone. I thought of that this morning as I prayed. I abruptly stopped at one hour just because it was an hour, even though I was gaining momentum.

It would have been pointless for me to stop running after one mile because I was still feeling great. When you can meet your goal and still have energy you shouldn't stop, but rather go for greater Glory! If you are wanting to go to another level, you can't continue to do the same things that you are already doing, you must press in for breakthrough! I will not be able to run 6 miles if I always stop once I reach the 2.5 mile marker. We won't see the Glory of God in our meetings if we stop short of His Glory. We have to praise higher and worship deeper.

Last night was an experiment. We had no instruments and we didn't put on any CDs. We didn't have a worship leader. After we went for maybe two hours we stopped and began talking. I knew that we should press in again, but my flesh didn't want to. We shared some great things and had very meaningful conversation for another few hours, however I knew that next time we meet together there would be no excuse for not pressing in again. After walking at least a mile and a half I knew that I had no excuse to not press in and run the last mile or so. You don't get breakthrough when you give up, you get it when you press in, running more and walking less - doing the things that contribute to the glory more and doing things that detract from the glory less.

Hunger-Producing Victory

2007-08-27T19:05:00.000-07:00

A week ago Bill Johnson had a “family talk” at the Sunday evening service. I would say that the main theme of his talk was pressing in for more. There have been so many people who have gotten healed over the years, yet there are still many who have gone on to be with Jesus or are still stuck with their disease or disability. The challenge is to not get satisfied with some victory and become complacent so that future battles are lost. Like him or not, when Lance Armstrong won the first of his seven consecutive Tour de France races he picked up his training regiment to further distance himself from the competition. How much more should we prepare ourselves for something that has eternal significance?

I have been reading sermons by John G. Lake extensively over the past week and have been amazed by his faith. It truly seems as though every person who came to him was healed because he wasn’t afraid of any condition. That is how I want to be. I want cancer to be afraid of me, not the other way around. After reading several stories about how when he placed his hand on cancers and tumors they were literally burned by the power of God I became convinced that this should be how we always approach disease. When you know you have the answer, you will use it.

Last night I was praying for a man who was given no hope by the doctors. There is nothing that can treat the form of cancer that he has and his insurance has refused to pay drug companies to just do experimental research on him in hopes of finding a cure. After listening to him talk for quite some time I felt like my faith was about ready to explode all over the man and his wife. Romans 4:18-21 says, “Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, ‘So shall your offspring be.’ Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.”

I don’t know about this man, but I know that I was not about to waver in unbelief regarding the promises of God. I am fully persuaded that God has the power to do what he has promised. I told the man that it was time for his miracle and I began to pray. I felt God lead me to he area where the cancer is so we laid hands on it and I imagined that thing shrinking under my hand, being burned away by the fire of Almighty God. After a minute or two I asked him what was happening and he responded that the pain was leaving and that he felt it was shrinking. So we continued to pray and that continued to happen.

I haven’t seen hundreds of cancer cases healed like John G. Lake, but bless God it is starting to happen. I have been pressing in for more and God has been answering. I have been praying that every person would be healed and a much greater percentage of people are being healed. Those who are truly hungry only get hungrier when they taste victory.

God doesn't lie!

2007-08-14T21:43:00.000-07:00

In Mark 8:17-18 Jesus askes His disciples, "Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes but fail to see, and ears but fail to hear? And don't you remember?" He was asking this because He had fed the 5,000 and He had just fed the 4,000 and yet the disciples were still worried about whether they would have enough to eat. We have their example of what not to do, however often when God miraculously provides we do the exact same thing.

When I was first seeing miracles in Brazil last summer I faced doubt only a few days later. I was preaching in a church and on the third and final night I began to worry about whether people would get healed when I prayed for them. Just a week earlier, the first service that I was at to pray for people I prayed for seven or eight people without a translator and each one of them was healed! Even though I had seen many healings take place through my own prayers and even greater miracles through the prayers of the rest of the team, I began to wonder if God would do it again. That last night was tough as my doubt overcame my faith for most of the people I prayed for.

God wants us to look at what He has done and what He is doing to have faith for circumstances that we face. In the past ten days I have witnessed upwards of 50 things healed ranging from hearing loss to carpel tunnel to arthritis to dizziness and all sorts of pain. In March I was very hesitant to pray for people with hearing loss even though I did see some people get healed and was the only person to pray for one woman whose hearing was restored. In Boise, Idaho last month God showed me that He was wanting to heal a man's ears and he did just that. Since then my fear of praying for the deaf has gone away and I have seen probably 10-12 people regain their hearing. In fact, I believe that someone reading this is going to have their ears healed. Particularly the left ear. Be healed in the name of Jesus! The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.

My faith is increasing that when God releases a word of knowledge to me that the person will in fact be healed. I believe that they will be healed as much as I believe that the sun is going to rise tomorrow morning. I used to think of a word of knowledge as though it was a check from a friend that is without a job and may not have the money in the bank when in reality a word of knowledge is as good cash - it has no chance of bouncing. My faith has increased so that Numbers 23:19 has become a reality. When God speaks, it happens, because He doesn't lie. While in Oregon last week I asked God for a word of knowledge for the gas station attendant who was limping. I felt a sensation on the right side of my head. It turns out the man had cerebral palsy. It wasn't that his leg was injured, it was that there was a brain injury at birth that affected his leg. God doesn't lie!

But wait, there's more!

2007-08-04T16:20:00.000-07:00

Today Alex Rodriguez became the youngest player to reach 500 home runs in baseball history. However, the once spectacular feat is now overshadowed by the question of whether he will be able to match Hank Aaron's 755 home runs and the amount that Barry Bonds ends up with (he is currently at 754). Even for Bonds, the quest to pass Aaron's record and get to 756 will then be how many more can he hit.

The past three days was the Jesus Culture conference here in Redding. On Wednesday night Lou Engle talked about how The Call is like John the Baptist who prepared the way with prayer and fasting. Then he went on to say that filling stadiums with people to pray and fast isn't enough, we must move on to the ministry of Jesus, with mass healing and deliverance. It was great to have 70,000 people gather in Nashville for The Call on 07/07/07, but can we fill stadiums with people who will be saved, healed and delivered? We are to the point where we must move past praying for revival and go out and have revival!

On Thursday I was leading one of many outreach sites in our city to equip the conference goers in signs and wonders. The first person that I talked to during the 30 minutes we had got healed. For many of the people in my group they had never even ministered on the streets before, let alone see someone get healed. The man was walking with a cane and was wearing knee braces. He was in a lot of pain because of his sciatic nerve. A few minutes after we had prayed for him we saw him again and he told us that when he walked away he realized that his back felt better. I realized that "better" isn't good enough and asked God for more while he was still 40 feet away. Then as he continued to walk he realized that all of the pain was gone and that he no longer needed his cane to walk. Carrying his cane in his right hand, he continued to walk down the street thanking us for our prayers and praising God for healing him.

Last night Chris Hill spoke about how it isn't enough to simply have a profound experience at a conference but then leave thinking that you will have to wait until next year to experience God in the same way. For David it wasn't enough to be King, he had to have God's presence in his city. We can't be satisfied with having access to the presence of God once a year or just at certain locations or events. There is so much more of God that we can tap into!

This morning at the healing rooms I saw God open the ears of three different people. With each one I could feel when the healing was done and then would tell them to check the improvement. I recently heard Todd Bentley say that when a word of knowledge is given it isn't his anointing that heals people, but it is God because Todd is just calling out what the Father is doing. I expereinced that in a measure this morning as every correct word of knowledge I gave (between 7 and 10; I did give a few that were not correct or undetected) got healed. I asked one man if he had problems with his left ear and he said no, only to have his wife say that he has ringing in his ears. As I prayed I felt like my ears were draining out and declared that his ears were opened and asked him how it feels. Well, his ears popped, and then he couldn't stop smiling, laughing, and praising God as the ringing stopped and his hearing increased!

The more people I prayed for, the more words of knowledge I got, and the more my faith increased that God was going to heal every last infirmity a person had. For some of the first people I didn't get as many words of knowledge. Some of them experienced healing while a few didn't notice a difference. I prayed before we started that God would heal every person that came in. Out of the people I prayed for, only one didn't notice any change, others felt God do something and left encouraged that they were healed but had no way to test it, and the rest got mostly or completely healed. There is more though. As great as it was to have those 3 people have their hearing restored before I ate anything today, not every person who came in was healed. As much as God did I won't be satisfied until every person gets healed. Once that level is reached I will have to think of something else because there is always more!

Are you hungry?

2007-07-25T07:50:00.000-07:00

Ever go through a season of life where it feels like all you are doing is preparing for a deadline? In school it seemed like I would study for tests, take them, and then forget all of the information I studied. There have been times when I geared up for a ministry trip only to get lazy after it passes. This isn't the way it should be.

We should pursue God for relationship with Him, not for Him to show up at our meetings. Many trips that I have been on have left me tired, wanting to do nothing else than sleep. Why not spend time worshipping in His presence before going to bed? We spend time praying for God to show up but after He does, we often forget about Him until the next time we need Him to show up.

I used to get up early to pray in the Spirit before going to work, even if that meant that I didn't go to bed because of needing to be at work at midnight. I haven't been doing that as much recently. I used to spend all of my free time over at the prayer chapel soaking even though I didn't necessarily feel anything or sense that something was happening. It is a shame that I have to think about how it used to be. I realize that not everyone is going to be in full-time vocational ministry, but regardless, why shouldn't we spend hours a day with God? It is all about priorities and yes, I could do a better job managing my time. Working in a secular industry shouldn't be an excuse for an inconsistent or nonexistent relationship with God.

Think about it. Those in the secular industry need to be just as hungry as those in ministry because they have to compete against non-Christians that are probably more willing to make sacrifices for their career. Unfortunately we don't hear of too many great products that are made by Christians, but rather we constantly are bombarded by filthy movies because no Christian can make a decent movie that isn't in Aramaic about a guy from Nazareth. The attitude seems to be, "let the forerunners be hungry and we will just follow them." Basically, that translates to, let the radical people be weird and catch all the flack from mainstream Christians and we will try to ride on their coattails if it doesn't inconvenience us.

God reveals His secrets to those who are completely in love with Him. Last time I checked, if I was completely in love with someone then I would be sure to find time for them every day. Last time I checked the average Christian could sure use some tips from an all-knowing God. Don't forget the dreams God has put on your heart. Will you remain hungry enough to chase after God until He gives them to you?

Pressing in for breakthrough

2007-07-23T19:21:00.000-07:00

Through my travels this summer is has become evident to me how much the devil likes to try to distract us from what we are supposed to do. At the beginning of this month, poison oak on my leg caused swelling that led to stiffness and serious pain whenever I stood up. This of course was while I was on a Firestorm. I didn't want to do a thing other than rest, but I pressed in through the pain and wound up experiencing healing on the trip after I stepped out in ministry in words of knowledge and healing while I needed healing myself.

This weekend I was on another Firestorm and felt very weak due to pain in my stomach. Determined to not let the devil keep me from ministering, I went out on outreach and prayed for a woman who was paralyzed due to a stroke, her husband who was mostly deaf, and another man with no feeling below his knees. Then, that evening I led worship at the service, something I have never done before. After worship started I no longer noticed the pain or any weakness in my body. One person on our team commented that the worship was highly anointed and that she had never been that drunk in the Spirit during worship.

Oftentimes our breakthrough is just on the other side of the hurdles that stand in front of us. After experiencing somewhat of a spiritual low point during parts of February and March, I pressed in hard for the last two months of school. Right after graduation, my sensitivity to the Spirit increased dramatically. Starting with a trip to a Todd Bentley conference I noticed an increase in people getting healed and my accuracy in words of knowledge. With each successive trip, there has been an increase.

In the past I had been quick to become content with the measure of breakthrough that I received. This summer I have realized that being content is foolish. I am extremely thankful for the measure God has given me, but there are people who are still being oppressed by the devil and need to be healed. That is why I am continuing to go after more. I am taking the opportunities that God is bringing me and not allowing myself to become complacent like I did back in February when I had ramped myself up to a big trip and then came back mildly discouraged at the outcome. When we see results that we don't like, that is the time to press in for more, not the time to give up and just hope that things turn out different next time.

When a baseball player who is very serious about his game returns to the dugout after an at-bat he will talk to the hitting coach regardless of whether he struck out or hit a homerun. Why? He could have done something wrong on the homerun and just gotten lucky or he could have done the right thing when he struck out but just missed. Likewise, if we really want to grow in our ability to co-labor with God and minister to others it is imperative that we ask the Holy Spirit for advice whether the person we prayed for died of cancer or was raised from the dead. I think God is pleased with us when we ask Him questions even after victories. It shows our hunger for more and it shows that we know who the Healer is. God has a good track-record of exalting those who humble themselves and ask for help even when things are going well.

Your time has come

2007-07-18T23:48:00.000-07:00

John 2:1-11

"On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus' mother was there, and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine was gone, Jesus' mother said to him, "They have no more wine."

"Dear woman, why do you involve me?" Jesus replied, "My time has not yet come."

His mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you."

Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons. Jesus said to the servants, "Fill the jars with water"; so they filled them to the brim. Then he told them, "Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet."

They did so, and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside and said, "Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now."

This, the first of his miraculous signs, Jesus performed in Cana of Galilee. He thus revealed his glory, and his disciples put their faith in him."

What will you do when the wine runs out and your mother comes to you wanting you to do something about it? Will your response be to do what the Father wants or will it be to act out of fear? How will you respond when a demand is put on you that is out of your reach? Will you be ready?

Jesus prayed and fasted as a lifestyle and not just when he found out that there was a boy who had a demon that didn't want to leave at the disciples' commands. Will you be ready when someone comes to you and needs a breakthrough in an impossible circumstance? Be ready for the opportunities that God gives you. Be ready to release the Kingdom anytime, anywhere. Your time has come! The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand, will you seize the opportunity?

Keep the fire going!

2007-07-11T06:40:00.000-07:00

About two weeks ago the Thermocouple on the water heater decided that it didn't want to work anymore. This caused the pilot to go out and stopped the gas from heating the water. The result was very cold showers and no hot water at all. I decided that enough was enough and I went to Home Depot to buy this $7 part. After installing it I re-lit the pilot light and turned the water heater back on. It wasn't too difficult, but it probably still took me an hour, plus the time to go buy the part. Unfortunately, I couldn't immediately enjoy a hot shower as it still takes time for the water to heat up. Then it occured to me how many Christians continuously allow their pilot light to go out, making it difficult each time they want to have hot water. Allow me to explain.

Our pilot light is our relationship with the Holy Spirit. It is being in a constant state of prayer. It is staying in His presence. It is being constantly connected with Him. I have had this happen to me before, where I allowed myself to not spend time seeking God every day, and then finding how difficult it was to get the fire back to pray, soak, and literally walk with Him. It got to the point where the water was so cold that I couldn't stand it anymore and I had to get back with God. Likewise, I got to the point where I was tired of cold showers and I had to have hot water.

It may cost more to constantly remain connected to the Holy Spirit because in order to do so you may have to eliminate some things that you do and likewise it costs more to have the water heater going every day so that the water is hot. However, the cost is worth it. I am reminded of a dream that one of the interns had in which he was turning on the lights in this huge house and a woman, who represented the Holy Spirit, kept turning them off. After arguing with her about keeping the lights on to let people know she was there, she ran throughout the house and turned on every last light, coming back to tell him, "Power costs!"

It is costly to walk in power. Many people, myself included have tried to just turn on the heat when they are in the moment, but that doesn't usually work. To see the best results, the heater needs to be on all the time. We must constantly stay connected to the Holy Spirit, not just when we want to see the results. No coach would let someone from the crowd join his team during a game and give him the ball. The coach gives the ball to those who are there day in and day out and have proven their faithfulness with whatever opportunities they are given.

Don't turn off your heater and let your pilot light go out. It might not seem like a big deal to turn it off and it might seem like you are saving yourself some money, but when the time comes to bring the heat you will be like the virgins who didn't prepare oil for their lamps. You will miss out on opportunities to see Heaven invade Earth. Pay the price to keep your fire going. It is worth the cost.

Preparation for Acceleration

2007-07-09T14:21:00.000-07:00

This past weekend I was afforded the privaledge of attending The Call in Nashville, TN. I came to The Call expecting to go to a new level in many ways. I feel as though because I prepared my heart and was expecting God to move, He did.

On my flight to Nashville I recognized that as we boarded the plane, the person in front of me in line was going to be sittting next to me. Although it was a short flight, I prepared myself to talk with her before we ever got on the plane because I know that there will be times when revival will break out while I am on an airplane. I was able to share with her the journey of moving to Redding and seeing God move in the supernatural. She had an encounter with God because I was able to convey how I went from not believing in miracles to being apart of them on a regular basis.

During The Call I was informed that I would be going with a small group of people from Bethel up on stage to pray for healing revivalists to be released throughout the country. I was also told to get words of knowledge to release for healing to the people who were gathered (and I suppose also who were watching on TV). As we waited backstage I remembered that I have received several prophetic words about preaching at stadiums full of people. I thought, "Lord, I never knew it would be this soon!" In the end, they ran out of time to do that segment, so we didn't end up on stage at all to pray or give words of knowledge. However, I did find a woman who had an injury very close to the word of knowledge that I was going to give (I was going to say broken right foot that didn't heal correctly and she had a broken right ankle that didn't heal correctly).

I have asked God numerous times in my life for an acceleration to take place. I don't want God to move mightily when I am 85 years, I want Him to move mightily now and for it to continue to increase for the rest of my life. What would happen though if I am suddenly thrusted into doing what would only seem possible 10 or 20 years from now? Would I step up as though I was made for that moment or would I shrink back in fear giving the excuse that I am not ready?

Many Christians claim to not be ready when faced with things that are beyond comfort for them. If something causes them fear they claim that God has not prepared them for it yet. Could it be that God is wanting to bring an acceleration to His people who are willing to take Him by the hand and walk into uncharted territory? Having opportunities that are stretching for us now, but are things we desire to do in the future are gifts from God. He is giving us the ability to bring tomorrow into today.

If God has told you that you will preach to thousands, get ready to be handed the microphone. If God has told you that every crippled person you lay hands on will walk, start laying hands on them now. If God has told you that you will start orphanages all over the world, start taking care of kids now. Don't wait for a plate of food to show up in front of you, go prepare it. Too often we wait until God gives us the thing we long for when the reality is that He already gave it to us and we don't even realize it. We wait to be clothed in power before we will pray for the sick but the truth is that they won't be healed until you pray for them.

As my friend aptly stated on a firestorm a few weeks ago, if you don't do anything then nothing is going to happen. If you want to continue experiencing the results you are now, keep not doing what you aren't doing. Did you get that? But if you are wanting an increase in results, take a risk. John Wimber says faith is spelled R-I-S-K. Do something you wouldn't normally do, pray for something that scares you to pray for, and pray for every person that you want to see healed (which should be everyone!). How can God use you to see limbs grow back if you never pray for anyone who has a missing limb? Take a risk and prepare to be accelerated.

A Greater Reality

2007-06-29T08:50:00.000-07:00

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

2007-06-25T20:33:00.000-07:00

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!

2007-06-19T21:09:00.000-07:00

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

2007-06-18T18:06:00.000-07:00

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?

2007-06-17T12:47:00.000-07:00

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

2007-06-14T23:33:00.000-07:00

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

2007-06-13T23:40:00.001-07:00

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

2007-06-12T21:04:00.000-07:00

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

2007-06-11T22:39:00.000-07:00

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...

2007-06-10T01:45:00.000-07:00

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!

2007-06-08T23:58:00.000-07:00

(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

2007-06-07T22:58:00.000-07:00

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!

2007-06-04T19:02:00.000-07:00

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...

2007-06-03T12:31:00.000-07:00

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?

2007-06-01T09:10:00.000-07:00

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!

A step in the right direction

2007-05-31T17:35:00.000-07:00

So after a ridiculously productive morning in which I had everything I wanted to do for the day done by 8:15, I feel like I somewhat squandered the rest of the day. That might be the problem with waking up early is that if you run out of things to do you feel as though you are wasting time.

God has really been putting it on my heart recently that it is time to step out in faith and see Heaven invade earth. Time to get back to the passion that I had back in November and December when I wanted to see people get healed every day. That means that every day I need to be out giving God the opportunity to give people a life-changing encounter. So with that being on my heart, my faith has been increasing and my prayers times have gotten more passionate. Well, during my prayer time two days ago I felt that I was getting a word of knowledge for a man who was in there. I didn't talk to him that morning, but this morning I felt the same impression so I approached him. It turns out that he didn't have pain or deafness in either ear, but if he had and he had gotten healed, I think it would have been one of the more obscure times that people have gotten healed - at 5:30 in the morning!

After turning in the keys to our old apartment, Jeremy and I went to Winco so he could get some groceries. I was on the phone most of the time with a guy who I was hoping to work for. It is possible that things could still work out, but I am not so sure. Thankfully, I have other contacts that I can look to from people that I have talked to in the past week. While I was on the phone we passed at least a dozen legal targets (wow, I haven't said that in a while! A legal target is someone in a wheelchair, wearing a cast, with hearing aids, etc...). Finally, after I got off the phone, Jeremy realized that he forgot to get oatmeal, so we headed over in that direction. Right before we got there I saw a legal target (I almost feel bad for saying that, but it is the truth that God is setting us up when we don't have to get a word of knowledge to know where someone is in pain). So after following Jeremy for just a moment to the next aisle, I immediately turned around to talk to the guy.

I'll admit I noticed a sticker on his wheelchair that tipped me off that he was a Christian so I knew that I at least had that open door. I talked with him for a few minutes and found out a little bit about him before finally praying for him. I discovered something that I have never realized before in approaching people - I didn't pray for healing how I normally would have because of what I knew about him. Well, lucky for me, God can still do whatever He wants, regardless of the words used in my prayer.

It is a step in the right direction for me. I know this may come as a shocker, but that is the first time that I have prayed for someone when not on a planned outreach in quite a few months. As a friend told me last week, "the worst thing that could happen is that they say no." She was right. It is possible that I will inadvertantly offend people along the way, but better to plant a seed and give God an opportunity to change their life forever than to allow the fear of offending people to cripple me into being scared of approaching anyone and keep me from walking into the fullness of my calling.

He's always speaking

2007-05-30T21:57:00.000-07:00

"I thought to myself, 'What would happen if the washing machine flooded?'"

Not much later we received a phone call and rushed out the door to respond to a flooded garage. After helping clean up some of the mess and putting the drainage hose back where it belongs, our flooded friend realized that the Holy Spirit had warned her of what was going to happen, but she hadn't recognized it. My roommate then responded that He is always speaking and that it is up to us to listen.

Yesterday I was rushing to our old apartment to get my clothes so that I could go to where we are now living to take a shower and get to the church for a meeting. On my way there I saw two cars on the side of the road. Seeing that there was an officer on the scene and that all the people were standing outside their vehicles, I felt a sensation in the big toe of my right foot. Having never stopped at an accident before I wasn't quite sure how to approach the people since the officer was writing up what happened. It could have just been me feeling the Holy Spirit, or it could have been a word of knowledge for one of the people (I think it was a word of knowledge). I have been so used to not getting words of knowledge "on-the-go" that I doubted the validity of it until I had already talked myself out of stopping.

Regardless of how much we recognize the voice of God, we must awaken ourselves to what He is doing and what He is saying. Jesus only did what He saw the Father doing. That has been my prayer in recent months - that I would know what God is doing so that I could do it and nothing more. Had I been waiting for God to speak like the sick people at the pool of Bethesda were waiting for the angel to stir the waters I would have jumped at the opportunity. Now that I think about it, that is how I want to start living - eagerly awaiting an assignment from the Lord whether it is to give someone an encouraging word, or to pray for someone to be healed of an incurable disease.

Eagerly await the voice of God, the Language of the Holy Spirit. When you hear your spiritual phone ringing, don't hesitate to answer because you may miss the call.

Purposeful Planning

2007-05-29T23:11:00.000-07:00

At one point this morning it seemed as though nothing could go right. It is partially my fault for checking my email and seeing that there was something for me to update on Jesusculture.org, but regardless, it set me off to a bad start almost 5 hours after I had woken up (and yes, 5 hours after I woke up was still the morning, and it was probably before a few of you woke up).

Interestingly enough, this isn’t the first time in the past week that making an update on the Jesus Culture website has gotten me rather mad. I would not think twice about it other than the fact that I do not get angry with people. Fortunately I am getting angry at the internet or the website not working properly instead of getting angry at another person, and double fortunately I am not getting angry at it when anyone is around, however, I don’t want to get mad at anything except for a holy anger at the devil.

I was running a little bit late to help my friends because of trying to squeeze in more than I had allowed time for. Then I went to the post office to finally put in my change of address form but I couldn’t remember the new address. Then I noticed that I could have done this online. So I drove to the old house to find that nobody was there giving me the opportunity to go back to the apartment to get my mail forwarded online. Then I check my email and see that the website was needing a pretty important update. The internet worked long enough for me to see that somehow the link to the page I was updating got messed up. Then when I knew it needed to be fixed, the internet would not work. After getting a phone call back from my friend asking if I was still coming I tried one more time and this time it worked! Thank you Jesus! So after 15 more minutes of fixing the problems and updating the site I was on my way.

I lacked planning and didn’t have my priorities straight to follow through on the commitment I had made to help my friends. Soon after arriving to help them I realized another important lesson: If you don’t know your purpose then you are almost completely useless and ineffective. I felt very out of place as I stood around wondering how I could help. I didn’t know my purpose and because of that simple bit of knowledge, I didn’t get much accomplished.

It is my goal this summer to have a purpose, some of which I have already laid out, so that I know what I want to do and what I need to do in order to accomplish it.

Some like it hot...

2007-05-28T20:54:00.000-07:00

It's heating up! yes, that is the forecast over the next few days for Redding.

I am starting to believe that it is imperative for me to live a life of radical faith in which every day I am doing something that streches myself. For instance today I heard the story of some students (not at Bethel) who for a few hours read and prayed scripture about Jesus and Peter walking on water and then for several hours attempted to do it until one walked across the pool that they were at! Think about it. How can we expect to do the impossible if we are too worried about trying in the first place. It is time to turn up the heat!

I am getting back to that place of desperation and I am actually feeling the heat on a situation when I would need a jolt of faith. I am so thankful that the desperation for more has returned because it honestly was not fun to be in the place of not even wanting to pray for people. I would rather be sweating because I know that I should approach them than just walk away without hardly giving it a thought. It is time to turn up the heat on the devil!

I am starting to see why the devil seems to have so much authority on the earth (notice how I said "seems", because in reality he doesn't!). It is because we don't do anything to keep him from prowling around and doing as he pleases. If we would be on the offensive then he would have no option other than to retreat. Come on! How many of you know that you could stand in a fire pit as long as you wanted as long as there was no fire. In the same way, if we put no pressure on the devil then he isn't going to give up quickly. Of course in the end, he has no option because he has already been defeated, but what is our purpose if we refuse our right to co-labor with God? Let's turn up the heat on the devil and go out and help God to kick him out of here!

Somebody get happy!

2007-05-27T23:46:00.000-07:00

So I finally got smart last night and put my laptop in its normal spot next to my bed so that I could write down my dreams when I wake up in the middle of the night. Sure enough, I had a dream, woke up, and wrote it down. One person that was in this dream had never been in any of my dreams until the past two nights. Anyway, I woke up early to get some time in with the Lord. It was fitting that Pastor Kris talked about how something only has value when it costs us something. Well, I have loved my time with God in the mornings and this morning was no different. I think it was probably my favorite time of praying in the Spirit ever. Of my goals that I wrote about a few days ago I have been doing very well on the praying, soaking, and reading the bible, all of which I do in the morning. I have not been as consistent in spending an hour reading other books, but have been reading a few pages each day.

Church was super cool. I was digging worship as I have learned again how to enter in when it isn't my choice of music. Eric Johnson, Pastor Bill's son, shared this amazing story about an 8-year-old that learned not to be afraid of snakes (the devil). I am not doing the illustration justice right now, but he made several great points about how we need to put the devil in his proper place of being small and only having the authority that we hand over to him. Pastor Kris told a story that I have heard many times, but after he told and just began to talk was amazing! When I went up to pray for people I felt an impression on my right knee, so I turned to Banning and asked him if it was hurting, which it wasn't. Ten seconds later he went to go pray for a man. Fifteen seconds after that he tells me to get over there and explains how not only did this man ask for me to pray for him, but also that it was his right knee that he came up to get healing for! So Banning and I just declared healing in a second over him, without praying, and told him to go walk and test it out. He reported very much the same as I did with my knee problem from a month ago in that, it didn't feel nearly as weak when he was walking and that he felt more stable. Praise God!

Fast forward to the evening and I showed up to pre-service prayer a few minutes early. Since I have been having such a good time praying in tongues the past few days, I didn't hesitate to start walking around the room even though there was no music on yet and I was the only one doing it. Sure enough I could feel God's presence almost immediately and was then getting touched by some angels and the Holy Spirit. Later I was with several other people and was starting to get a little bit drunk in the Holy Spirit. I was laughing so much that now my throat is just a tiny bit sore from it. I kept falling over and laughing. Ah, being happy is so much fun! I now have the feeling that the summer is going to be a blast!

So, I don't think that I have ever had quite the experience that I had during worship tonight. It was amazing. I have had other experiences that were incredible, but I think this one tops them all. I thought I felt that something special was happening (which normally does not happen) and after just the third song Pastor Kris gets up to share that he feels such a special anointing in the room that he hasn't felt anything that strong since the Jesus Movement 40 years ago! WOAH! I was already going crazy, but that just kicked it up another notch. It was fantastic. On top of that, a good friend of mine that I have been constantly praying for was finally back from her surgery a month ago. I didn't realize just how special this is until now, but I had been praying that she wouldn't need any more rods put in her back because she would be healed, and guess what, she didn't need any rods! She still needs to be completely healed though. While praying for her I got a couple words of knowledge, one for pain in the left ear, which left completely, and another for headaches which lessened. Also, pain in her knee went away while I was praying for her feet. God is so awesome!!!! I can't believe how faithful He is! Oh and while I was praying for my friend, she was praying with one or two other people for a woman with a large tumor. After the second time of prayer the woman had an astonished look on her face and could not find the tumor!!!! JESUS!!!!!

I almost forget to mention what got released during this time of worship before I prayed for my friend. In addition to the healing anointing, Pastor Kris also said that there was an anointing to break cycles, not only including bad addictions, but also including bad thought patterns of fear or loss of hope. He explained how many lose hope when things they are praying for don't get answered. I totally felt that I had lost hope and it was also fitting that Kim Walker sang prophetically about dreams that were forgotten due to lost hope or bad memory would be restored. Well, I have dreams of people getting out of wheelchairs among other things that I have definitely lost hope on in a very general sense. Actually, I think it would be more accurate to say that I don't carry those dreams with the same level of faith that I once did.

Nearly two hours into the service Danny Silk finally got up to preach. I sat with some friends who were susceptible to getting drunk in the Holy Spirit on purpose just because I know God is giving me some freedom and joy. I was not dissappointed. After Josephs and Marys were called forward to be released we ended with a big fire tunnel. Much later I got to pray with an awesome guy, Scott, for a woman with cancer. You can tell that Scott has been around Pastor Bill by the authority that he prays with. Not a gift of faith, loud authority, but rather a soft-spoken, rock-solid healing theology authority. He got a clear word about her not being able to sleep and the whole time we were praying I could feel the fire coming off of my fingertips. She is gonna be healed.

Somebody get happy! God is good!

You may want to write this down...AGAIN!

2007-05-26T19:15:00.000-07:00

God is really good!

Seriously. After my experience at the prayer chapel yesterday morning I thought that I should have a little party in there this morning before reporting at 8 am for the healing rooms. So, I had a cool time from 5-8 hanging out with Jesus and some angels and then headed over to the church. This was not my normal team, but there were a few familiar faces there from school and then also the intercessors that pray in the room with us and pray for us as we pray for the people. They are so awesome. It is like having four Grandmothers in the room cheering you on.

I learned something very valuable last night as we were sharing testimonies before going out into the city for outreach when one of the leaders made a comment about how my friend shares her testimonies. He made the comment that she always is thankful for the little things such as headaches and pain and treats them as a normal person might treat someone getting out of a wheelchair. He then said that people like her who are so thankful for the little things are the ones that then see the people getting healed of cancer and deaf ears opening. Anyway, when our leader at the healing rooms told us to ask God for what we want to see, I said, "God, I want to see headaches healed." I realized how quick I have been to write off less impressive healings as insignificant and to only really value the healing of cancer, deaf ears, blind eyes, etc... The angelic was pretty thick in the room at the time and I was probably manifesting more than I have since February especially when someone called out autism. So, I quickly followed with "Ceeeerebral Palsy! Down's Syyyndrome!" as I was shaking.

Did I mention that God is really good? Well, in case you didn't realize that yet, He is! I believe that for each of the people we prayed for I had at least one word of knowledge. For many of them I had several. I don't say this to boast, because God is giving them to me, but several weeks ago it seemed like I couldn't get a word of knowledge if I waited for one all day. God is really doing something in my life in creating a balance between doing what I am called to do, but doing it for the right reasons. It has been a long time coming, but better to go through what I did and be doing it right then to still be performing for the testimonies and praise of others as I had started to do. Anyway, on to what God was doing...

One woman no longer got dizzy when she danced and spun.

A man who is now one day past how long the doctors said he had to live felt fire in his chest. He had lung cancer that spread to his brain. Through words of knowledge he also got healed of numbness in his fingertips and lack of feeling in both of his feet. On his fingertips we prayed many times with there being improvement each time. We had to press in for his feet several times before they started to get better. We had already prayed I think three times (and were going to move on) when I then felt the Holy Spirit touch the bottom of my right foot, and so I told him, released another testimony and then prayed again, this time with breakthrough! Praise God!!!!

A girl with all kinds of stuff wrong had an outbreak of laughter (we did too!) when we prayed for God to release joy on her. She had chronic headaches (come on!), so I gladly prayed that they would never come back and that she would no longer have insomnia (both problems I had several weeks ago that I didn't have at the end of the week). Then, even though we had already been told to move on to the next person, I felt led to share a testimony from one of my classmates about how she got healed of lactose intolerance and then prayed for several friends and family members who got healed as well. Then the girl tells me that she has that too but thought it was unimportant compared to the rest of the things. Apparently God thought it was very important! She experienced indescribable feelings throughout her body as we prayed for her complete healing of many illnesses.

A woman wrote that she wanted prayer for "whatever the Lord wills". Well, after reading this, I think you will see that it is God's will to heal! We could barely touch her because the Holy Spirit was touching her so much. My prayer partner had a great word of knowledge that allowed us to find out that she had deafness so bad that hearing aids don't help. As we were praying for that I got words of knowledge for her feet and for her knees. We prayed that the numbness would go from her feet and that her knees would be fully strengthened and she had breakthrough. Then we also prayed for her back which I believe is fully healed as she quickly bent completely over at least a half dozen times without any sign of pain.

This is good!

When praying for a man with shoulder problems I felt heat in the exact area that I later found out was the location of the problem. He couldn't do anything to test it out, but he knew that swimming would test it and so he is going to give the report to one of the intercessors who is in his family.

A woman was receiving some inner healing when I felt that she also had feet problems. Guess what? She did! We got to pray for her feet and her knees as well and when we were about to wrap that up I felt that God was wanting to do something on the balls of her feet. It turns out that she has a fairly serious problem there in which she is prone to getting cut with possible dangerous consequences. We began pressing in for that and were feeling that God was doing a great work.

Another woman came for prayer for her colon. After praying in the spirit for a minute I felt that there was something wrong in the lower right side of her back. She said that she was having problems there so we prayed. A few minutes later there was a great shift that she felt, after which the pain was gone. Later as we were praying I felt that God was touching the colon so we prayed for that and she ended up feeling her colon pull back towards her back. Praise God!!!!

To top it off we prayed for a student who has had problems with her knees, hips, and back. After prayer she could bend her knees to get close to the ground without pain. Praise you Lord!!!!

God is good!

I went to the wedding of two of my classmates this afternoon and just watched the webcast for The Call on God.tv and just happened to catch the segment that we filmed here at Bethel. I could feel the anointing on it and was so thankful that I get to be a part of what is going on here. Later they showed the Ramp in Alabama which was rocking and had a very strong anointing too! How cool is God? I am getting rocked while watching a webcast, some of which wasn't even live! :)

You may want to write this down again.... God is good!

drum roll please...

2007-05-26T17:44:00.000-07:00

I just changed my layout! I hope you like it, because I do. Your feedback is welcome here, I won't do anything to you if you don't like it! :)

You may want to write this down...

2007-05-26T17:19:00.000-07:00

God is good.

Oh wow, what a day I had yesterday. I woke up at 4 am to take a classmate to the Greyhound Bus terminal and after I dropped her off I thought it would be fun to go to the prayer chapel. Good choice. As I prayed I was more aware of His presence and also angels than I have been in a while. After that I had some good soaking time and then went home. I read my bible and made some breakfast. Lol, the only thing I "made" was the bagel that I cut in half to put in the toaster.

Later, when I was reading "The Reality of the Supernatural World" by Todd Bentley, I was hit with some pretty good revelation about the need to maintain spiritual disciplines. I don't want anyone to start debating with me, so I won't touch any specifics, but it was easy to relate what he wrote to my own personal experiences of having trouble doing something when we haven't been doing it regularly. For instance he gave the example of having a hard time getting back into doing meetings after having a week or even just a few days off. However, if he has been doing meetings every day then it is no problem for him to get going the next day. Likewise, revelation from reading the bible comes best when we actively read it every day. If I make a habit of ministering to people in public it becomes easier to do, but if I don't do it for a while, it is very difficult.

Something really seems to be happening in the spirit for me. Maybe it is because I am spending more time in prayer (it isn't because of performance, but rather familiarity!) and in God's presence. Last night at pre-service prayer I was really getting touched and started to laugh a lot, which I haven't done in a while. I went on outreach and was on a team with two of my favorite people. These people would blow you away. We had a blast and ministered to a lot of people. It all started with one of them following arrows they saw in the spirit and then passing it off to the other who felt that we should go to IHOP (Pancakes, not Prayer). So I pull in and before we even get inside the building we immediately found people that matched several words of knowledge. One man's knee got healed and another one's vision improved.

While talking with our waitress and telling her how great she is, I start to think that we should bless her with a large tip and immediately after I think that my friend gives a word of knowledge that we were supposed to bless a Native American and she happened to be one (I wouldn't have guessed it and we actually ran into more Native Americans before we left that did look like it). So we end up leaving her a large tip and after ministering to many other people we headed back.

We didn't make it far before I noticed a man walking on crutches, so we did a U-turn and pulled over to talk to him. We prayed for him and my friends both prophecied over him. While we were praying I could feel heat transfering from my fingers to his knee. He was really touched. It was awesome. So we went to a street that our group leader had written down that has nothing on it except for one intersection. Well, there was a car stopped at that intersection. Turns out one of the girls was teaching the other to drive. We were able to pray for them and just let them know that God thinks they are awesome. After that we finally went back to the church.

OK, so that was kinda long, I will save you by making a new post for what happened Saturday morning at the Healing Rooms...

To Be Continued...

It's summertime and the weather is hot!

2007-05-23T23:09:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year again. I can't believe that I am in the beginning of another summer "vacation" from school after I knew that when I graduated from college two years ago, that I would never go back to school. Summer can be great or it can be horrible. It can be a time of burning with passion for God or a time of wondering how you wasted that much time and never did anything productive. I am determined that this summer will be one of setting goals and reaching them rather than having the problem of wondering what happened during the three month break from school.

I know it is going to sound like I have a lot of goals, but reality is that there are a lot of things that I still need to work on and the summer is a great time to do it. So here you will have a list of my goals in no particular order, because they are mostly things that I want to have part of my daily routine.

1. Find a full-time job as fast as I can. I want to be able to save at least $1,000 (minimum!) this summer to go towards either Jesus Culture England or towards school next year. I would really be happy if I could save $2,000 or do I hear $3,000 over the summer.

2. Read the Bible for an hour every day. There is so much that I have been missing out on because I don't know the word well enough. I already know more than I did a year ago, so that is good, but alas, I need to get in the word more.

3. Spend a few hours a day at the Prayer Chapel. I would actually rather say "spend a few hours soaking and praying at home" but since I don't know what that will look like yet, I will for now say at the prayer chapel.

(How many hours does David think there are in a day? He is crazy!)

4. Read other books on revival or related topics for an hour each day. I would like to spend additional time on weekends reading as well. There are quite a few books that have been on my "to read" list for a while now.

5. Get my body in shape. At first this will just be doing some stuff at home that I will not mention because I don't want to embarass others by my supernatural strength and it might morph into working out at a gym three times a week if I feel that I am making significant enough contributions to the summer savings fund (see #1). We'll see.

6. Meet at least once a week with my crazy revivalist friends. I desperately need to be around them so that I can glean from their strengths and grow fully into who I am called to be. This is beyond just hanging out, this is to strategize, to challenge each other, to experiment (Bethel/Redding is just a big laboratory), and to spread revival. I gotta get myself around people that are getting out of the box and out of the house out into the community!

What are your plans for the summer?

Time with my significant other

2007-05-22T20:41:00.000-07:00

When you fall in love it is easy to put things off in order to spend time with the one you love. Sacrifices of sleep, time and money are more joy than they are hardship. When you are really in love the shortest message, a quick hello, and simply being together doing nothing are infinitely valuable.

I see too many relationships where the love seems to have left. When one calls the other, it is more of a hassle than a joy. Instead of excitement when they call, an annoyed, "What?" is the greeting given when answering the phone. My loved one is calling me right now and I couldn't be more thrilled about it. You aren't going to find me getting annoyed. When my loved one is wanting my attention, I am going to give it. And since I am going to give my full attention, this blog entry is as good as done.

It is finished!

2007-05-21T02:21:00.000-07:00

Tonight was the graduation for School of Ministry. So my first year of school is officially over. However, before getting into what happened tonight, I'll back up to to Friday. I had volunteered myself to help out at a formal dinner hosted by a family at church for all the second-year women. So Friday at 10 am I showed up to learn what would be going on that night and to help set up for it. The hosts are absolutely awesome. Apparently they do stuff like this all the time. It just amazes me. I ended up rolling into school a minute or two late because of it though and had a seat way in the back. I mean like so far back that there was no row until people started putting chairs there. We had worship, which by the way, we have been blessed with some super musicians all year that are better than almost any worship team at any church, and they are just our band for school. Thanks God. Then we heard from Pastor Bill and Pastor Kris. After them they announced the winners of the M. Earl Johnson Award. That award was named after Bill's dad, who went to heaven a few years ago, with the intent on being given to the person who most signifies a revivalist. The problem is, it is way too hard for them to pick people. Seriously. I wouldn't want the job at all. Since earlier in the year I had people telling me I would win it. Not knowing what it was, they did nothing more than confuse me and make me wonder why I should win some award. Honestly, that would have been the single greatest honor that I have ever received considering who I'm up against and the integrity of the people choosing it (it isn't some popularity contest like in high school). Anyway, I didn't win it, but when they announced who won it, I was so happy because of knowing the sacrifice this man has made. Yeah. It is incredible. He is a great guy as well. Someone who I can proudly say that I would endorse to anyone. He has been a constant encouragement to me from the beginning of the year and is always telling me that he believes in me. Great guy. I'm so happy for him. (They had a male and female from 1st, 2nd and 3rd year that were picked for the award, so six total, and they all shared briefly at graduation as well as getting free rides for their next year of school, except that the 3rd years don't have a next year, so I don't know what they get.)

Then they had this ceremony of the award winners praying for the students as they did a prophetic act of walking through a door into their destiny to then go and be knighted by Pastor Bill and Pastor Kris who both had long swords. Then we got went through a fire tunnel. I was wearing a new shirt that one of the interns made that shows a guy in a wheelchair getting healed. I'll have to put up a picture sometime. Anyway, so the first year winner, Chris, is praying for me as I go through and he says in his New Zealand accent, "That is you! You are going to be pulling people out of wheelchairs the rest of your life! Feel free to start with my daughter!" It was something like that. Actually, a little bit longer, but man was it powerful. Then as I went through the fire tunnel, I heard, "That is you!" or "That is perfect for you!" several times as people hit me on the chest pointing to the man praying for the guy in the wheelchair. Knowing that I just got impartation from a whole lot of people, I lay down for about 15 minutes to just soak it in. I would have stayed a lot longer, but they were needing me back at the party, so as most of my class had yet to go through this process, I was leaving my last day of first year. Kinda sad to be honest. It was a great year.

Oh boy. The party. Incredible. Tough again in that I had to have had people offer me food at least 20 or 30 times. Makes me want to go hide just so that people can't ask me. It was a six course meal with all the bells and whistles. We were to treat them as princesses and make everything perfect. I got there around 5 and the guests started to arrive at maybe 6:30 for (I'm not even gonna try to spell it, but it sounds like...)"or derves". :) Haha. I know it starts hors, but I forget all the other stuff. Yeah, then the appetizer, then the salad, then sorbet, then the main course, and finally desert. It was an incredible time and I got to spend time with a lot of really great people who I will surely be spending more time with this summer. I left a little while after 11 pm and headed over to the prayer chapel to prayer through the night, after soaking for a while I realized I would be dead tired if I stayed up all night, so I went home and went straight to bed. Time, approxiamately 1 am.

The next morning I woke up at 5:30 or so and went straight to the prayer house. I figured if I have made it to the 40th day of a fast I might as well go out with a bang and pray it up. So I went and prayed in tongues for 4 hours. Then I went and hung out with one of the more recent friends I have made, Derek, for coffee, except neither of us got anything. After that I went back and spent a little time soaking and then more time praying. After having gone over 4 hours again I was starting to feel like I should stop and leave. However, since I had wanted to stay for 6 hours I was trying to get to that. However, the urge won out when I realized I didn't feel into it any more. So I left after 4.5 hours. Finding a note from another friend that I had made it to the end of the faston the sign in sheet, I called her to see what was up, and ended up going with a group to see Shrek 3. Eh, ok. It wasn't my favorite, but it wasn't bad. I was happy that there wasn't the random, unnecessary bad language. After that we went out to eat and I came to the official end of my fast! Woohoo!

I honestly didn't think I'd finish it, but I got the burger that I love at the restaurant and ended up finishing my whole meal! LOL. I ate much more slowly than I ever would normally. Man was it good! Haha. Boy did I miss eating. The rolls were great, the fries were even better, and the burger, magnificent. Even the water was so refreshing (I fasted everything that day). After another person joined us and ate, all 6 of us went to the Sacramento River Trail to go for a walk. I had never been before so it was a new experience for me. I was full, like I would be any time that I eat out , and so I was walking slower than I normally would be able to. Not to mention I was still really sore from playing softball on Thursday. Then after a little while Derek joined us too. After that ended I went home to relax after a long day.

Today, I woke up on my own, before my alarm was to go off at 5 am. Haha. People think I'm crazy, but I just love spending time with God early in the morning. I got much more dressed up then is normal hear, wearing dress pants and a dress shirt tucked in. I ate breakfast for the first time in what seems like forever! Haha, 40 days serriously makes you forget what it is like to eat! I got to the chapel around 6 and started praying, and then later began to soak. Well, as I was soaking I became super aware of His presence and my hands were getting super hot. Wow. I honestly can't remember exactly what I was asking, but it was something to do with what I need to do to walk in the breakthrough, and then I heard a small inner voice say "faith." It was so tiny that I could have missed it completely, but it hit me like a ton of bricks. Faith is the key. I immediatly started thinking about Smith Wigglesworth and how he seemed to have faith for anything and everything. I truly believe that small voice was from God. I think faith is the key. It is all we need. We need mountain moving faith, but sometimes it seems like we don't even have faith that the grass will grow even though it still needs to be mowed every week. The great thing is that we can learn all about faith in the bible and don't need some book or something else to help us get it.

Anyway, this is huge for me. I just need to walk in the realization of faith. Anyway, between services I prayed for a man with diabetes. God touched him so much that even though the guy had just gotten there for the second service, he was tempted to go home so he could test himself to see whether or not he got healed. This guy had faith! I believe his faith healed him, and hopefully he will report back to me in a week that Jesus healed him completely. Amen! After church I went immediatley to Costco to pick up some FOOD! Woohoo! I have never spent that much money on things that weren't a bunch of clothes or some big ticket items. Granted it included protein powder that will last me several months as well as other things that will last me a month or at least several weeks. Got home and enjoyed eating. It was great. Again. Thank you Jesus! After spending some time cleaning up, I watched a movie with Jeremy and we enjoyed some vanilla ice cream with hot fudge, well it tasted cold, but it was still good! Then it was off to the civic auditorium for graduation. I made myself a sandwich with some lunch meats I bought! So proud of myself for eating something that isn't what I would normally eat! Lots of people were really dressed up as were Jeremy and myself. It was fun. We all went outside for a group shot which hopefully turned out OK as we were all looking into the sun and who knows how we fit into it as it was a mess. Anyway, back in for worship. I felt the presence roll in so I ended up sitting down after pressing in for a few more minutes. Fire on the hands! After that the graduation began with the third years, then the second years, and finally the first years. The M. Earl Johnson award winners all spoke and probably my favorite line of the night was from the female second year receipient who was diagnosed with cancer and then a few weeks later found out she was pregnant (the doctors have told her to abort the baby, but she has refused) said that we must remove the word impossible from our vocabulary. That is faith. Come on! My camera batteries, which I had charged on Wednesday didn't work at all, not even to turn on my camera, so I was only able to take some of the pictures that I would have liked to. Hopefully I still got some good ones.

I was talking with a friend afterwards about how they at times feel like even in this environment that they aren't challenged. This person is passionate about revival and wants to be trained up to become a revivalist that will change the course of history, but feels like they are being held up by people who are less passionate. They talked about wishing that the people who are going after "the stuff" as Pastor Bill would say could be hanging out and building with each other and really start to grow. I mentioned how there had been some people that would just meet together and do that kind of stuff. Unfortunately, I don't know how you grow in leading a crusade unless you are being trained by someone who has lead a crusade. You can't give what you don't have. Anyway, I feel like I need it as well, so I think we are going to try to get something like that started. This is going to be for crazy people that want to be radical evangelists (I would say revivalists, but in this culture that is too general and inculdes everyone). If you are interested let me know. Jeremy and I headed over to In-n-Out where probably 100 other students had gone as well and boy did I enjoy it. Grilled onions are definitely much better than the regular and vanilla milkshakes are the best. Ok, glass of water and I am going to bed! Even though I have no school tomorrow, I do not want to start going to bed at 2:15 in the morning! Heck, I could call my sister in Hungary right now and it would be after 11 in the morning for them! Good morning to those on the east coast! Good night to everyone in Redding who is probably still up after their graduation parties! Congrats and thanks for a great year! :)

Big League Dreams

2007-05-17T19:22:00.000-07:00

I'll admit that I was a bit skeptical when our leaders at school announced that the next to last day would be at a park in town called Big League Dreams. I had never been to it, but I know that it is one of the main attractions that is promoted by the city. In the morning I had to take care of my car, so as I started walking towards the church I called AAA. They gave me a time frame from 8 to 8:30. I looked at my watch and saw that it was already 8. Well, once I got to a bike trail near the freeway I started to run, knowing that he would probably be there soon. I had planned on needed to do this so I had stretched before I left. It actually wasn't too bad. They called on my way to let me know that he didn't see me, so I let them know that I was running and would be there in a few minutes. After he got my car jumped I headed over to get it checked out and found that I needed a new battery, so I got that taken care of and went home to get some more Gatorade. Luckily I took some with me thinking that I would need to run. I don't recommend running on the 38th day of a fast just in case you ever think of fasting for 38 days and then think you should go running. Anyway, I am doing fine.

I spent some time checking out some great links that my Tallahassee buddy Clayton put in his blog. After gathering my first base glove, bat, disc golf discs (that I never used!), and a gallon of gatorade that would have to sit in my car (no food or drinks allowed) I headed out to the park in my car (Yea, it works!). Well, I arrived about 11:30 got my sunscreen on and went to the batting cages. Thankfully everything was paid for so we could do it as much as we wanted. It had been away since I have swung a bat, so I started out in the slow pitch softball cage. Hah! I swung and missed on the first three pitches! After that I started to improve and got out so really good hits before moving onto the slowest of the baseball machines. After a few times in there I moved up again and then repeated that once more to get up to the fastest cage which had looked quite intimidating when I had first arrived. While I was far from amazing, I surprised myself a little bit and got off some really good hits.

Wanting to see what else was going on I walked around to find some people inside playing dodgeball and others playing basketball. Not wanting to kill myself I moved on to see what else there was. I found a game of softball going on, but having just spent a lot of time in the batting cages I went inside the clubhouse restaurant. I didn't eat, but it was sweet. Tons of seats and tons of TVs, almost all on sports. Ah, it has been a little over a year since I have enjoyed that kind of experience watching the first round of March Madness in Tallahassee with a bunch of friends and some great appetizers. Best of all, it had great views of the game, so I could watch, drink some water, and cool off for a little bit. After a few minutes I went out to get closer to the action and sat right near the dugout. Seeing that sitting nearby wasn't getting me in the game I entered the dugout and immediately got put on a team.

After getting to play first base a few innings I was finally gonna get to bat when they decided to start a new game and change teams. Several innings later I got my first chance to bat, 2 swings and I was out. Yes, they decided to make it just 2 strikes for that inning, which they later changed. No worries though, I got on base every at-bat after that and scored several times. One tiem I was on first with two outs and so I was running on every pitch (we couldn't steal if the ball wasn't hit, but we could still run) and for three straight pitches the hitter lined the ball foul, with me getting to third base each time. Finally he got the ball in play and I scored from first on his single! That's what I'm talking about!

After a few errors at first, I made some much better plays like the good ole days. A few hours had passed by now and we were still going strong, rotating in new players for those who wanted to do other things. In what ended up being my team's last time hitting I hit a sharp grounder towards short. I slipped and fell in the batter's box (which I had done once already and others had done many times as well) but got up and sprinted to first barely beating the throw that was a bit wide. So I decided to go for second, barely beating the tag (I knew I could make it...hah!). After an out I was looking to score. So with two outs (I think, lol, I think I batted 6 or 7 times and got only got out in my first at-bat) I ran on a grounder to short. Rounding third determined to make it home, I scored just a second after the first baseman dropped the ball! As I walked toward the dugout I could feel something was wrong. My left shoe was hurt bad and I lost yet another shock (Maybe these guys should make a Junky Shoes Club). Oh well, I scored from second on a ground ball!

It was so much fun. I forgot to mention that we were playing on a field that was replicated to the Chicago Cubs' Wrigley Field. There also was a replica of Yankee Stadium in New York and Fenway Park in Boston. How cool! The game got cut short as it was time to go when the visiting team was up. My run had been the go-ahead run, but they ended up scoring 3 or 4 runs before we had to stop the game. Oh well. Hopefully someone out there has understood my baseball lingo. I was explaining the rules to one student who is from Europe. They were having trouble understanding balls and strikes (hey, it was their first time!) and the other team had first baseman that would just stand on the bag, creating more than one collision. As I hit one ball that ended up being a double I was yelling, "Get off the base! Get off the base!" as I ran towards first. Haha. Big thanks to our leaders for making the big league dreams for many people come true.

The end is near

2007-05-16T23:56:00.000-07:00

School is almost over. I can't believe it. Today was amazing. The leaders called out students to come up and share what was on their hearts and it was unbelievable. So good. It was also a nice reminder to me that other people go through struggles too. Stupid devil tries to make me think that I am the only person who goes through identity struggles and can't get the mind transformed to think like the Kingdom. It totally reinforced in me the need to declare daily over myself the promises of God and what He thinks about me. I can't afford to think one thing about myself that God doesn't think.

Pastor Kris talked to us about generosity. It was amazing. I tithe and give offerings but it still hit me pretty good as I am sure it hit many people. I am now fully perplexed by anyone who argues that they shouldn't have to give money to the church. It really is an issue of the heart. If you want to argue against tithing and you give more than 10% to the church then fine, but if won't give because you think it is wrong then you have some issues that need to be worked out.

After school I went to my car to get on home to pick up all the DVDs for our La Paz team party tonight. Well, my car wouldn't start. We tried to jump it and it still wouldn't start. I think the end is near for my battery. I am gonna go get one tomorrow and change it out. I think it finally kicked the bucket after getting drained when my alternator failed during the winter. Oh well. The party was a lot of fun and it was great just to hang out and laugh at all the memories that were caught on film. Ok, I gotta get to bed, I got a long day tomorrow.

How to Move Mountains

2007-05-15T18:16:00.000-07:00

These days there is a "How to" book on just about every subject imaginable. Come to think of it, if someone finds a subject that doesn't have one, they will probably write it or sell the idea to a publisher. Well, since there are already books on how to cook Salmon, how to use an egg several hundred ways, and how to play video games, I thought that I would devote this blog on how to move mountains.

First you need to expect the miraculous from God. Bill Johnson says that we need to pray for things that are probable, improbable, and impossible so that by the success of the probable we are building strength for the improbable and impossible. Similarly, you should anticipate what God is going to do because by doing so you are abiding in faith. Oftentimes when we anticipate what God will do He will equip us with a gift of faith for the situation. This jolt of faith gives us the spiritual strength to beat the odds. However, we must not neglect developing a life of faith, which sets our attitude, that will sustain us between times when God equips us with that burst of radical faith. Each gift of faith should raise our measure of faith that we live with on a daily basis. Although you might not use it to the same extent in your normal activities, strength training will increase your strength so that when needed, you are up to the task.

Link your heart to what God is already doing. If God is sending rain, pray for rain. If a contract looks to be won, pray for the contract. By praying for what God is already doing, you are co-laboring with Him and building up a history of success. Then it is very important to celebrate those answered prayers. Give thanks to God for answering your prayers and remind yourself of how faithful He is. When less probably circumstances come your way, you will have greater faith because you have experienced the smaller victories. If I went to the gym today (I have not been in a year), it would be foolish for me to try to bench press 250 pounds on my first try. I need to work my way up, starting with what is easier. Why is it that sometimes we think that a headache is nothing and that the only people worth praying for are those who are dying or haven't walked in 40 years (I am shouting at myself)? Sure I could try to lift 250 pounds once with someone spotting me to make sure I don't seriously hurt myself, but meanwhile I should work most on what is probable and improbable.

Have the mindset that you have a 100% rate of success. If I were to play tennis right now it would be easy for me to have the mindset that my first serve would be a fault. Why? Because most of the time my first serves have been faults. However, if I go into my serve expecting to get an ace I found that oftentimes I would get one! However, I can't remember ever getting an ace when I had the mentality that I was just going to mess up on my first serve. Likewise, when praying for someone we must have the mindset that every person we pray for gets healed, or in this case, every mountain that has ever been in my way has gotten out of my way. Plus, we serve a God who does the impossible so why not believe that every person will be healed?

I will undoubtedly talk about this again because I absolutely love it. However, if you are slightly bored, feel free to check out a sweet Mountain Moving picture that I put on my new website. It beats myspace by a longshot and is much more customizable than any other site I've seen thus far. So feel free to join and add me as a friend!

Dream Language

2007-05-14T19:43:00.000-07:00

God is so good! Today has been a wonderful day of using my free time to get things done and also spend lots of time with God. I came to the realization this morning that as long as I am at home and my roommate isn't, I have no excuse to not pray in the Holy Spirit and soak to the extent of my heart's desire. Some days I just don't feel like going to the prayer chapel since it can often be crowded and I realized that I need to learn how to pray in tongues and soak elsewhere!

God has been giving me a lot of dreams recently. They have varied greatly but have all spoke to me in some way. Many times I am having two or three dreams each night. Today in addition to two during the night, I went into a dream while I was soaking this afternoon. (There was a slight pause in my blogging train of thought as I could not type in anything in my browser for the past 20 minutes or so. Now back to your regularly scheduled blog.) I have been reading a book by Todd Bentley called "The Reality of the Supernatural World." It seems like it has been a key of sorts to open up new experiences for me, which have manifested most frequently as dreams. Addtionally, my friend Jeremy has been speaking very highly of James Goll's "Dream Language." I read the forward of it recently before going to bed and sure enough I had several dreams that night.

Ironically, the dream I had this afternoon had James Goll in it, even though he didn't look like any of the pictures I have seen of him. However, he looked fairly close to the real thing and I knew in the dream that it was him. In it there was something to do with his book "The Seer" which I own, but have not started reading yet (I think I will read it next after dreaming about it!). Interestingly enough one of the pictures that I saw on the book in the dream is not the actual picture that is on the book. However, in the dream the picture revealed the secret to a mystery that opened a huge door and led to a dramatic encounter with God! I believe that this is the first time that I have ever had a dream about having an encounter with God. I have had dreams about cripples and paralytics getting healed, but never about getting blasted by the Holy Spirit.

I feel kind of funny saying it, but I feel like I need to hire a dream interpreter. Perhaps I should just start to meditate on my dreams so that I can get the interpretation myself. That sounds like a better idea. However, the idea of seeking help isn't totally wrong either. Jeremy pointed out to me the other day how dreams are just as valuable as a prophetic word and understanding what God is saying is just important in a dream as it is through prophecy.

That was a good night

2007-05-11T07:26:00.000-07:00

That is what I said to a friend and his mom as I left a friend's house last night after probably one of the craziest nights (in a good way) that I have experienced in my life. It all started when I was at home group and happened to be in the middle of a game of Uno when a friend called me to invite me to come hang out with the Westerfields. While on the phone it became my turn and not fully paying attention I put down my next to last card and forgot to call out "Uno" thus keeping me from probably winning that game. Oh well...the price I paid to get some breakthrough and and an encounter with God.

I really could have said that it was a good day because that morning I had an amazing time in the prayer chapel. Rather than making myself only lay down, I spent some time just soaking in a chair. Boy was it good. There were a few times where God's presence was so heavy on me that it felt like someone was sitting on me. Actually I guess it would be more accurate to describe it as a really heavy blanket covering my entire body. Then while reading my Bible I felt like I was getting more revelation than I have been getting recently. Maybe I should be reading more...

School was great as well. Danny Silk spoke to us for the last time and was great as always. One of the interns, Israel, talked to us for a while and was stinking awesome! It was amazing. He told the Power Costs and the Healing Anointing dreams which get me every time I hear them. Lastly, Mark Brookes spoke. He can preach. Yeah, I can't even remember what he talked about after what happened last night.

So I went over to the house where we were meeting and saw how few people were there. After a few minutes and a few more people got there Jason asked if we were ready to start. Ready to start? I thought that we were just hanging out. Well, it turned out much better than just hanging out. He asked everyone what they came expecting and pretty much everyone mentioned intimacy. I also mentioned that I was wanting and understanding of how the Spirit is moving so I can work with Him, just as I have talked about only doing what I see the Father doing. Well, that was probably what Jason talked about most of the time. It was phenomenal. I wish I had it recorded because he was talking so fast that my mind could catch very little.

The thing that was scary (in a good way) about it was how similar it was to an experience I had when Todd Bentley was speaking at the Encounter conference back in February. The presence of God was so heavy that I couldn't handle it and felt like I needed to leave. Before I could leave though Todd told everyone that they could lay down on the floor or do whatever, which I took him up on and that helped a lot. Well, this went on last night for who knows how long until I broke out in a pretty good sweat, had shortness of breath, and felt too weak to get up out of my chair. Often all I could do was drop my head in front of me or drop it into the back of the chair behind me. Finally, I got up to go to the restroom and barely felt like I would make it there (it was only 10 steps away). I sat down again because I felt weak like I do when I am about to throw up (even though I didn't think I was going to) and got some cold water on my face. I went back out drank some water before going back out to the room. Stuff was starting to break in the room and I was starting to feel better. Then Jason described pretty much what had just happened to me was going to start happening to some people in the room.

Within a minute or two I felt completely normal again. We started to pray more and again stuff began to break. I didn't understand most of what was going on, but I believe that I am starting to get a grasp on the reality of the spiritual realm. I did catch from Jason that so much of the struggle is in our minds. We forget that we have the mind of Christ and that the Kingdom of God is within us. One of the things that hit me the most that he said had to do with fear. He mentioned that the fear and shaking that happens when we are looking for eggs at the grocery store but then see someone in a wheelchair, our compassion for the person starts kicking at the demonic (that isn't exactly what he said, because I can't remember, so I will try to explain it). When the two Kingdoms collide it produces fear in us. Why? We are feeling the fear that the kingdom of darkness is feeling. He then said that the greater fear that we face, the greater breakthrough will come after it is broken. That is encouraging to me because I am normally very scared!

Although he didn't pray for me for impartation like he did for almost everyone else, I still feel like I got a ton out of those few hours. I can see why the name of his ministry is Kingdom Realities, because it really is a reality of the Kingdom that changes everything. As the Kingdom becomes real to us and continues to become more real we begin to walk in more and more. It is all about understanding the Kingdom. I am so thankful for that opportunity to connect with the Spirit of God because it confirmed to me that my search for understanding is exactly the thing that I need.

Overdue for an update

2007-05-08T15:20:00.000-07:00

Since my last post a lot has been going on. I went out of town Friday after school for a ministry trip in a small town called Clear Lake. We were facilitating 24 hours of prayer and also planning on going out into the city to do some outreach. But before that, we had some awesome stuff at school.

On Thursday Joaquin spoke and we just had a good ole time. I sat on the floor around the podium with about 40 other students as God came increasingly into the room and started getting many people drunk in the Spirit. I honestly can't remember what he talked about now, but I know that it was good. Haha. Following that, we had our last outreach of the year. We were outside for a little while and since it was pretty cold, I put on my jacket in addition to my sweatshirt. I couldn't believe that I was wearing that much clothing in May. Then I had home group and had fun hanging out at our leader's new apartment.

Then at school on Friday we were privaledged to have Jason Westerfield speak to us. Jason is a graduate of the School of Supernatural Ministry and is one of the main people behind a lot of the testimonies that Pastor Bill has shared over the years. Additionally, he was one of the main speakers on the Global Awakening trip I took to Brazil last July and was the preacher for my team until he got sick, at which time I took over the preaching duties for the rest of the trip. It was much like Thursday with Joaquin but even more just because of Jason's personality. It was great.

So fast forward to Saturday. I hadn't been feeling too well after not sleeping well in a sleeping bag on the floor of a house with no heat. Yes it was still cold. My pillow was cold all night long. It was like sleeping on an ice pack. That would be great when it is 85 degrees in the apartment like it was when I got home last night, but not great when the temperature in the house is below 60. I stayed at the church and tried to pray while a few guys went out to do outreach around noon. They went to the hospital and got to pray for a man in the emergency room who hadn't been responding at all. When they started praying for him, his eyes began to move and he began to respond!

That night we walked down the road to the grocery store. I was looking for some sort of energy/protein drink and another group was looking for some food. While walking down the back aisle I could hear something going on on the last aisle (don't worry, I was just around the corner). Jeremy, Daniel, and Samuel stopped to pray for a woman in an electric wheelchairs that the store provides. She had messed up 5 vertebrae in her back. After they prayed for her, they prompted for her to do something that she couldn’t do before, so she gets up out of the wheelchair and starts running. Jeremy follows her running down the aisle and runs past me yelling Jesus as the woman runs past me. She got completely healed and ran to her friends who were several aisles down and says to her friend who was in a wheelchair that she needs to let us pray for them. So she goes back to her electric cart and drives it back to the front of the store to get a normal shopping cart.

Meanwhile we begin to talk to her two friends. We pray for the daughter of the woman in the wheelchair and as we are praying I feel a sensation in my left elbow so I ask them if they have any pain there and the woman in the wheelchair said that she has had problems in that elbow for a long time and her friend just claimed it for herself even though her pain was in her right elbow. So I prayed for them both at the same time and the woman’s right elbow got instantly healed. She began moving it around and said that there was absolutely no pain. Her friend who was in the wheelchair said that there was still pain so Samuel began to pray for her again. Jeremy then asked her if she was feeling anything and she said that Samuel’s hand was very hot. After a minute or two her elbow was also healed! Samuel then laid hands on the other woman and she said that she felt like she was on a rollercoaster ride. God really whacked them both. Praise God!

Thankfully that evening we had a portable heater for the house and so I was able to sleep a little bit better. At church Sunday morning God continued to move. He healed the eyes of a guitar player after the first service so that he didn't need to wear his glasses in the second service. Another woman said that she could see me clearly after I prayed for her without her glasses. God also healed a woman's neck and shoulders that were causing her hands to go numb. Then we came across an interesting situation where a person was needing some inner healing and deliverance. I wasn't wanting to get involved since I don't have much experience with it and I hadn't been there from the start, but our trip leader called me over since I have been fasting. Well, while standing there I got a word of knowledge for something she had been doing but she ended up saying it within a minute anyway. Although I didn't really need to use it, it was reassuring to me that God was showing me more in the form of words of knowledge that I am feeling and that I am sure are from Him.

After that the pastor took us out to lunch, and I got to watch people eat again. Haha. Luckily I won't have to do that too many more times. We drove home and made it in time to get to pre-service prayer where I got to see Clay, Bart, Ross, and Lance from my church in Florida. The service was great. It was nice having our worship team back after a few services with less experienced musicians and a much different style of music in Clear Lake. There was a guest speaker, Paul Goulet, who is from the International Church of Las Vegas. He was great and it was awesome to get to hear what God is doing in "sin city".

Yesterday I was up early to work for the conference. After some serious miscommunication I showed up to work at 6:30 am and worked until noon. Then I worked again from 2-4 and again from 5:30-7:00. Needless to say I was pretty tired so I went to the prayer house to soak and then went home and soaked some more.

Today I was working in the kitchen which was actually a lot of fun. The people were great and it was fun to get to serve all the pastor's by being one of just a few people who were making their breakfast and bringing it to them. At one point I put out 240 bottles of water in just a few minutes to replenish the supply that was being decimated by the pastors. Haha. They were all super thankful though so it was a pleasure doing it. I spent a couple hours at the prayer chapel and now I am waiting to a little bit before a impartation meeting for the healing rooms with Cal Pierce and his team. Cal had been on the board at Bethel but God called him to reopen the Healing Rooms in Spokane, WA that John G. Lake had run many years ago. So he has been doing that now for many years and their reputation has grown to the point that even a hospital has asked them to set up a healing room! Praise God!

Well, I'll let you know how that meeting goes! I can't believe that there are only 6 days of first year left. God has been so good!

La Paz, Mexico - Highlight video

2007-05-02T22:34:00.000-07:00

Here it is. Now that I am done with it I wish I had done more with it, but oh well, not bad for the first video I've ever made.

In other news, I am finding that I am getting back into really enjoying soaking again after several months where it has been difficult. It sounds dumb, but I used to just do it every spare moment I had. I am getting back to that again. Before school, after school, after youth. Watch out world, I'm about to be full of Jesus!

Learning the little things

2007-05-02T00:34:00.000-07:00

You know when things just seem to click? Well, that seemed to be happening for me a lot today. I was working on the DVD for my mission trip to La Paz, Mexico and I finally finished it, so look for it in the next few weeks! Then at school I found myself hearing what seemed to be the most important things for me to hear from a staff member who was substituting for the normal teacher of our AMT. Then tonight at home group stuff just seemed to click for me and I realized that I was noticing things without having ever realized that I was noticing them.

Rewind to AMT. Banning Liebscher was our guest speaker. Banning is awesome. He is the youth pastor, but in reality he is more of the visionary for the youth movement and is taking it across the nation and even across the world. He shared about his experience in ministry and how he ended up taking a route that looked nothing like what he had planned. He shared about how we must not abandon things that don't seem to line up with where we are going but we must go through the open doors that God provides for us. Often times we must serve another man's vision for years before God gives us our own ministry that goes towards our vision. Similarly, sometimes we need to do the things that we don't want to do so that we grow in areas that we would not typically grow in. We need to be willing to do the things that are needed and not just the things that we want to do. I cannot tell you how much of what he said I needed to hear and how much it will help me over the next 10+ years! Best AMT of the entire year! It was amazing!

Fast forward to homegroup. People were just chatting about what has been going on recently when one of the leaders starts to talk about how sometimes worship seems dead and other days it is amazing. It just hit me something that I heard probably five years ago at a conference session for worship leaders. As worship leaders we should lead the congregation whether we are on stage or in the audience. We need to be the ones shouting, singing, dancing, clapping, and worshipping! We need to set the atmosphere so that if nothing else, we have entered in for worship, and hopefully others have joined us in the process. I realized that I have been frustrated with people all year for not getting into worship. I felt like sharing that they always seem to need someone to pump up the crowd and tell them to get excited for them to show any emotion. Well, I can be that spark of energy by worshipping! It just hit me that I need to start leading. I don't know why I haven't thought of this earlier, but it finally dawned on me that I need to start leading at school. I may already be leading in some ways, but it hit me that I need to intentionally be a leader.

Another thing that clicked was when another leader started to talk about taking care of your relationship with God. He talked about people in the past who have operated in all kinds of supernatural gifts while at the school but that after they left, they didn't really know the Father and know who they were. They got the gifts for free, but didn't take the time to work on the things that are expensive. I realized that for me earlier in the year I was so concerned with seeing miracles that I was asking for a lot and was seeing it. However, I realized that while I was paying the price to develop a relationship with the Father, I wasn't yet ready for all that would come with ministry. So I have experienced a season of digging a bigger foundation. During this season I have spent very little time pursuing the healings and miracles compared to what I had been during the first few months of school. It clicked with me without even realizing it, that I need to get my relationship with God more solid before I started to see radical healings.

There were other things that clicked as well, but those are the only ones I will bother you with. Hopefully tomorrow I will have the video uploaded onto the web for your viewing pleasure!

Could it be?

2007-04-30T10:59:00.000-07:00

If you read my blog from yesterday, you know that I was talking about flowing with the Holy Spirit and doing what the Father is doing. This morning I picked up Bill Johnson’s latest book, Strengthen Yourself in the Lord, and began to read some more of it. Just a few pages into it I became aware that the section I was in was talking about having solitude and how Jesus would only do what the Father did!

A year ago when my only way to hear Bill was through podcasts and downloaded sermons I heard him speak about unusual coincidences being the language of the spirit. This can come in all sorts of ways whether it is really bad traffic or waking up at the same time each night. Well, I find this as no unusual coincidence as I am wanting to only do what I see the Father doing to then read in just four pages about Jesus doing that same thing.

What does it mean? God is just confirming it to me. Why is it important? Because more will be accomplished on accident when I am focused on His presence than on purpose when I am focused on performance. Waiting two hours in a meeting for the Spirit of God to show up in power will create far more miracles than by just praying for people from the start.

I think that is another thing that God is trying to teach me: to co-labor with Him. He doesn’t want to do all the work and He doesn’t want me to do all the work. He wants me to partner with what He is doing. We co-labor with God. We co-labor next to God with what He is doing. He doesn’t co-labor with what we are doing. We are to co-labor with what He is doing. Yet we rest because we only do what we see the Father doing. Amen to that!

Language of the Spirit

2007-04-29T12:32:00.000-07:00

God has really been drawing me in recently to seek His voice. With the events of this week there have been a lot of questions that I have been asking. Most of the time my question has been about trying to understand what He is doing, such as, “God, what are you doing in this?”

As the school year nears its end, I can’t help but realize that I need some new goals for the summer. Right at the top of that list is to understand the language of the Spirit. While I might have maturity, character, and other things down solidly, I feel that I am definitely lacking in the area of understanding the Holy Spirit and even what my own spirit is feeling in any given circumstance.

Growing up one of my biggest frustrations was never feeling like I could hear God. I would ask God about things and never hear his answers. It was like a person who is only five feet tall trying to dunk (yes, Muggsy Bogues dunked a few times, but he was 5’3”). After so many times of trying and never getting an answer I began to expect that I would not hear God’s voice. I would even tell people that I don’t hear God or worse yet, that I can’t hear Him.

Since then I have learned that it is not a good thing to say things like that about yourself because they become true. They also create an escape route out of any circumstance that would require that ability (some even call it an excuse!).

Without going into the details of what I was asking in one of the situations, I basically said, “God, I know you are good, but I don’t like this and you gotta make it stop by a certain day or I’m gonna make changes so that it has to stop.” Well, I said that Friday night and on Saturday it was fixed. My deadline was tomorrow night, so I am pretty happy that God worked ahead of schedule.

With what God has put on my heart to do, I understand the importance of being in step with Him and with what He is doing. Jesus healed everyone who came to Him, but not everyone in the world got healed while He was in ministry. He went where the Father sent Him. While I love the idea of praying for every person I ever come across that has a healing need, the reality is that it is not practical for one person to try to bring healing to the entire world. There must be an army of believers who are mobilized, not just one who takes on the task of praying for each person they come across who sneezes or wears glasses.

I want to walk into a store and understand that the Holy Spirit wants to do something, not spend every free moment out in the city looking for the next person with a limp. I know that my schedule will become such that I will be traveling enough that I will be trying to get the most out of my time at home so it wouldn’t be practical if I returned home just to spend hours at the store because I kept seeing people needing physical healing. Many of the great Healing Revivalists of the 1950s got burned out because they would minister constantly and people would line up for prayer at their homes. The majority of them were only in effective ministry for a few years. I don’t believe that God would want us to do something that we can’t keep up for very long. Jesus would even go away to be with God. He would just go hide up in the mountains so that He couldn’t be bothered. We should probably do something like that. Minister and then rest. Jesus knew what the Father was doing. I want to follow His lead.

Don't ever give up!

2007-04-27T07:36:00.000-07:00

I have heard Bill Johnson say several times that you never know when it might be the time that God heals somebody. Similarly he says that it is ok for us to live in mystery, not knowing why things happen the way they do, but knowing that God is ALWAYS good regardless. Just think of how hopeless a situation could be for someone who has been seeking healing for years. It would probably get to the point of not wanting to waste their time in prayer because nothing ever seemed to happen.

On Wednesday right after school was over with I was slowly walking my way to my car when some students stopped me for prayer. I had just come from revival group where my leader and other individuals prayed for me when we ended and the entire group prayed for me when I showed up. On my way there, the Junior High Pastor prayed for me and before that another 10 students or so had been praying for me in the lobby. Even though my body and mind werre exhausted I told them they could pray for me. Another one of our first year pastors joined them and I decided to test it out by walking. For the first time since Sunday I was able to walk without feeling like my knees were going to collapse!

The funny thing is that I almost turned them down because I just wanted to get home and sleep, which is really funny since it has been almost impossible for me to sleep even though I am spending 10+ hours in bed. And foolishly the thought ran through my mind that their prayers wouldn't do anything. WRONG! I am glad I said yes to them and whether it was just from my obedience to receiving prayer or maybe that act of physical obedience caused a spiritual release of some tiny amount of faith on my part to get God to supernaturally strengthen my knees in an instant.

This can apply to other things as well. I want to see people who are paralyzed get healed. I have not seen that happen yet, but if I pray for 1,000 people who don't get healed I am not going to stop! Also, when I moved out to Redding I made a point of spending time soaking so that I could feel the presence of God. I would go to the prayer chapel day after day for hours at a time not settling for nothing. Those months of pressing in led me into an incredible January and February of experiencing God on a whole new level!

So here is my charge to you: If you are seeking healing, do not turn down prayer even when you would rather just go on your way; If you are seeking God, do not stop seeking Him when you don't seem to be getting anywhere; If you are seeking breakthrough in healing for others do not stop praying for them in faith no matter how many aren't getting healed; Don't ever give up!

Is God the Biggest?

2007-04-25T19:35:00.000-07:00

Bill Johnson often says that we must keep our awareness of God's presence at the forefront of our minds. We cannot allow for other things to become bigger than our awareness of His presence. Until Monday night I thought I had that figured out pretty well and that no matter what the circumstances, my awareness of God's presence was the biggest thing in my mind. Let me explain.

Late Sunday night I noticed that my knees were starting to hurt. I didn't think too much of it because I had spent a longer time kneeling during worship on Sunday night than I normally would, so I figured it would go away soon. Well, on Monday my knees were hurting worse so I decided to just lay down in bed and rest. For several hours I was aware of God's presence as a lay there. Well, by that evening I was having trouble sleeping and my knees were hurting really bad. In the middle of the night there were several times in which I audibly grunted due to the extreme pain that I was in.

When I woke up Tuesday morning I was in horrible pain. By now my back was also sore from being in bed for so long. Additionally I could hardly walk because of the pain and my knees also felt like they were going to buckle underneath me. I quickly became aware of how often I use my knees, from the slight bend to wash my hands in the bathroom sink to getting out of bed, rolling over in bed, and going up and down stairs. I ended up going to the prayer chapel hoping that being in His presence would heal me, but I was so miserably in pain that I could not even become aware of His presence. At this point I also had a terrible headache and so I ended up making my way over to the main building to just take it easy before school.

On my way there I almost fell over a few times. It felt like someone took a baseball bat to my knees and that they were going to buckle from underneath me. This isn't just soreness, I know what that feels like. My back is sore, as is my neck and collarbone, my knees just downright hurt. I was miserable the whole day at school. I couldn't concentrate because of the pain and the headache. I ended up just going home after school and skipping my Tuesday night homegroup.

Being able to lay down helped some and several hours later I noticed that my knees weren't hurting when I wasn't moving. A few times in the night I got up to use the rest room and quickly discovered that they were still hurting and still wanted to buckle under my weight (and I am not heavy!). However, I didn't have the killer pain at any time like I had the previous night or during the day so I woke up thanking God for the improvement. However I hardly slept all night due to my back and neck hurting and woke up with my collarbone also hurting.

My headache was so bad that I felt like I was in slow motion, so when I was getting very far trying to do homework, I decided to lay down and try to get some sleep. That didn't work for the sleeping part, but I did manage to have my headache go away temporarily while I put my pillow on top of my face. I managed to finish it (thank you God that I had already finished Dann's homework on the weekend!) and went off to school still in a lot of pain. My headache kept getting worse so I ended up just laying down in the back as Kris Vallotton spoke. After a while I couldn't handle that either so I went out to the lobby.

More and more people prayed for me but I was still hurting the same after school ended. I ran into Joaquin in the hallway and he and two other students started to pray for me. I tested it out by walking and found that my knees weren't getting weak as I walked. They prayed again and I walked even more, with less pain, but more importantly, without feeling like my knees were going to buckle.

I mention all this to say that with all the pain I was in I kept that as my focus instead of God's presence. Let me just say that God did not cause me to be in this pain to teach me a lesson, but He sure did use it to show me that I let this circumstance come between me and Him. How quick I was to allow my circumstances to take my focus away from God. Thank you God for your presence and for being bigger than the most excruciating pain I have ever been in!

Dreaming with God

2007-04-21T11:36:00.000-07:00

I have been dreaming a lot recently. Last night was the first night in probably the past two weeks that I woke up and couldn't remember having a dream. The thing about my dreams is that they have always seemed to be very short. I could write them out in four or five sentences on my computer. On Wednesday at youth group, Linda read some dreams that some of the youth were having. Some of them were really long and when I found myself asking God to give me longer dreams I remembered to be thankful for the dreams I have been getting.

Well, that night I had a longer dream. It had many sections to it which is very unusual for me. The next night I had an even longer dream which took up almost two pages typed out. So on my way to the church that morning I was asking God why I wasn't having dreams that were of real life events that I would see unfold. Again I remembered to be thankful for what God had just given me, realizing that I have seen an increase in dreams over the past few weeks.

After spending some time praying and soaking I had the unique opportunity to minister to the Pastor on Call team at church. Joaquin, who is one of the first year pastors and also the director of the healing rooms (he also led the mission trip I was on), led the meeting. He began talking about Benny Hinn learning about the Holy Spirit through watching Kathryn Kuhlman. She would wait for the presence of God before she would ever go out in front of a crowd. Then she would preach for hours until she recognized a shift in the spirit, at which time she would begin calling out words of knowledge and point to different areas of the crowd and people would get healed without anyone ever praying for them.

He also talked about how when the apostles prayed in the book of Acts they were so engulfed with the Spirit that when they went out the Spirit would just leak off of them to heal people. Men like Charles Finney would walk into a room and without saying anything people would fall to their knees crying out to God, repenting of their sins. There is something huge about moving with the Spirit of God. I am just beginning to realize how important this is.

At school we got to hear from Pastor Bill. We watched a clip of him on TBN Thursday night. God, help me to honor people as much as he does! I have never heard him say anything negative about a person before. It blows my mind. The last question that someone asked him was about a subject he had talked about maybe two weeks ago. I mentioned it here as well because I thought that it was so important. He stressed to us that a radical encounter with God does not make us anything better than someone who has never had such an encounter.

He again stressed how we must give honor to the small things that God gives us. The presence of God being in our midst is as big of a deal as a big encounter that could change our lives forever. The problem is that we put a measure on it, deeming it unimportant. He also told us to engage God's presence and not just enjoy it. I believe that is what great revivalists have done. They recognized the presence of God coming into the meeting and then engaged it. Sure some may have worked out of their anointing, but when they wait on the Lord, they aren't waiting so that they can fall asleep, they are waiting to set up an ambush, so that like Kathryn Kuhlman, when the Presence comes, the miracles immediately follow.

Holy!

2007-04-19T22:13:00.000-07:00

Just two hours after I wrote my blog yesterday I was encountering God in a way that hasn't really happened in a while. It didn't hurt that the night before I had just heard Heidi Baker repeat "Holy, Holy, Holy" over and over again. It also didn't hurt that the worship leader was singing, "You are Holy, oh so Holy, you are Holy, Lord". God is so holy. I have messed up so much, yet He welcomes me into His arms as though I have never done anything wrong. In fact, He pursues meto wrap me in His arms.

Today at school during worship I had to sit down. I started to cry again and was hit with the fact that I was sitting in the presence of a Holy God. The manifest presence of a Holy God was in my midst. My hands were on fire. How do I know they were on fire? My body was cold yet my hands were very hot. Words cannot express the impact it had on me to realize that God Almighty was right there with me. Did I mention yet that He is Holy? He is Holy! HE IS HOLY! God you are HOLY!

Here I go again. Yes, I am crying yet again. Every time I think about God since Tuesday I have begun to cry. Get yourself together David. Actually, don't get yourself together, get wrecked by God and never be the same. He is Holy! I got prophetic words today that really hit me. One was at school and the others were at a home group. The one at school was great because it confirmed what is going to happen because of what God is doing in me right now. He is Holy! The words I got tonight are great because they dealt with many of the leadership questions that I have been facing the past few days. God successfully covered everything that I needed.

There have now been several times in the past couple days where God has rocked me. His love is becoming more real every day. His holiness is becoming greater the more I think about Him. Oh God just to be with you! You let me be with you! Do you realize how amazing this is? This is like getting to hang out with the coolest person in the world, anyone you would like, but better, and you can hang out with God as much as you like! I remember thinking how cool it seemed to be hanging out with Bill Johnson, Randy Clark, and the other awesome leaders of the Power Invasion in Brazil last July. I still catch myself thinking that I am special because I got to hang out with cool people. That does not even compare to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ! Thank you Lord for all the people who help mold me, but let me never forget that you are the source and that I must know you above all! You are Holy! God is so good. He is Holy. He is Holy. He is Holy!

Leading Lower

2007-04-18T18:33:00.000-07:00

So it has been a few days. I am still alive, but there has been enough things going on that have kept me from sitting down and thinking about what I would write about. Well, I just had a revelation as I was reading The New Mystics here in the Lobby at church while I wait for youth to start. I realized that I am not comfortable leading people who I feel are at least as strong a leader as I am.

I was just thinking about how I don't really like leading small group here at school because I don't feel like I am the clear cut leader of the group. I realized that although I wouldn't want to be leading a small group I am going to need to learn how to lead in situations where I am appointed as the leader but it is not because I am the only leader.

I think a major key for me in life will be my ability to lead in situations where I am surrounded by leaders. I am not trying to say that I need to let everyone know that I am the leader in an arrogant way, but rather that I need to learn how to lead leaders as though it was very natural for me to do. Right now I feel like a fish out of water, but I need to learn to soar like an eagle in the sky.

Last night at home group we watched a video of Heidi Baker preaching her "Lower Still" message at the Brownsville Revival in Pensacola, FL. To be more accurate, I listened to it as I lay on the floor with my face in the ground. Since there is no way for me to capture what she said in this blog, I won't even try. However, I was completely shaken by her humility and the revelation that she walks in due to constantly being in the Presence of God.

Her message wasn't flashy and the average person at the meeting could write her off as a lunatic; however, it is hard to argue with someone who has planted 8,000 churches in a decade, feeds thousands of children every day, sees every deaf ear opened, sees most blind eyes opened, and who has raised the dead. You might not agree with her, but what fruit has been produced in your life?

The message gave me a clear picture of what my life, and the leadership principles I mentioned above, will look like in the years to come. Here is someone with a PhD who preaches often from the floor. For those who have not seen her I mean that she is lying on the floor. It looks like she is a mess, but the truth is that she is a mess for Jesus. Do I have it all together? Nope. Can God still use me? You bet. He moves in the biggest ways through those He has formed deep relationships with and the only way those can be formed are through time and trial.

It was a clear message to me that I must understand who I am and who God is. I must have a deeper understanding of Christ, to really know Him, to be His best friend.

This doesn't make sense to me as I write it, but as I watched and listened I realized that appearing to have it all together is not a requirement in the Kingdom. I probably don't get it now because I need to learn something else about it, but there is something amazing about having one of the biggest leaders in all of Christianity to preach while lying on the floor. She wasn't trying to impress the crowd with a polished message. Instead she spontaneously went where the Spirit led and poured her heart out to God.

This is too big for me to comprehend right now. I am back at the roadblock of a mind that can't produce thoughts that I had last night. However, in that place I felt like I could do more for Christ than when my mind is bogged down with the thoughts of daily life. When Jesus and Him crucified is all that matters you have reached the starting place where God can begin to use you to change the world.

prepare today for the great harvest tomorrow

2007-04-14T01:52:00.000-07:00

So tonight I went out on our Friday night outreach at church. I will preface what I say with being glad that I went, so don't take this the wrong way. It started out as our group split into the specific outreach that we would be going on, followed by breaking our Treasure Hunt group into smaller teams. Soon after several of the students began barking at each other talking about who was more anointed and would see more people get saved tonight. Although I know they weren't being completely serious about their arguing, it still annoyed me that this was even happening. We should be encouraging one another, not tearing each other down! Other than asking them to get along I stayed out of it because I did not want to be included in it.

As one group left someone stated to me that while my group is still "stuggling" to fill out our treasure maps with what God was showing us, they were going to be out winning souls. Then repeatedly as they left they shouted back to me that they were going to see more people get saved than my group. Now I know that this person has a sarcastic sense of humor, but do we really need to throw competition into the church as though it is a rivarly game in college football? I think not.

Anyway, it was a much different dynamic this week. One guy I didn't know at all and two other guys could have been leading groups. We went to Safeway and couldn't seem to find anyone on our lists. After a stop at Walgreens in which two of our guys prayed for a missionary from Sudan we headed off to get gas and then go downtown. As we got near, the guys wanted to stop at the Safeway that we were passing so I pulled in. After walking around for a minute some of the guys spot some people. One guy starts to pray for a lady and as he does I feel something in my right ear that had caused me to write down "deafness - right ear" on my paper when we were at the church. So after he is done I ask her if she has any problems with her ear and she does! She had gotten punched in the ear and it damaged her ear drum. C'mon God! Her hair was covering up her ear and she wasn't wearing a hearing aid so I never would have known!

I was getting really tired and so I was definitely ready to go but so when we got back to the church I decided to go soak and then read some at the prayer house. I am glad I did. I read some out of a book called "The New Mystics" by John Crowder. It was just really inspiring me to go after God and change the world through the gospel of power with demonstration of signs and wonders. Then on the way home I got to thinking about one of the dreams I have which is to see complete transformation of our country's biggest cities. I just began seeing myself doing power evangelism in Manhattan as the beginning work of seeing New York City won for the Kingdom. Oh was it beautiful! We were feeding the poor and homeless as well as seeing multitudes saved, healed, and delivered. I couldn't help but get excited to read that John Alexander Dowie saw the city of Chicago get transformed completely! And I can go beyond what he did! I can't wait!

Only believe

2007-04-13T10:19:00.000-07:00

"If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer." - Matthew 21:22

Recently I have been on a journey of asking God for wisdom. Some of it was evident in my last post about raising the dead, but even more so I have really been seeking the Lord in the area of healing. I don't really know why it came up, actually now that I say that I know exactly why it came up, I am praying fervently for a friend of mine who has been a quadrapalegic for 36 years to be healed.

This next part could be "That ain't right: Part 2" which I will probably not get around to because I hate saying things that sound like I am complaining. Anyway, I was talking to him the other day and found out that his insurance is saying that some of the medical supplies that he needs are not necessary. Now if you know me, you know that I am not all for the government just handing away money to people who don't want to work. Additionally I support President Bush and will not slander him for any decisions he has made. My friend however does not mind voicing his opinion about the President and saying how instead of throwing billions of dollars into the war, the government should instead be helping the poor in its own country. While I totally understnad that it isn't the job of the government to fix every problem, I couldn't help but understand that taking the money that has been spent on the war in Iraq and putting it towards helping the poor and elderly would have great benefits for those people.

Anyway, I say all that to get to my point that I want to have a better understanding of God and anything else that would help bring healing to people that will otherwise continue to suffer. I don't know how much longer my friend will live. He is getting old and I am sure that his health isn't getting better due to the condition of his body. It made me think of the revivalists who have moved in healing in the past such as John G. Lake. Oftentimes, it was a struggle for healing with someone they were close to that propelled them into a greater healing anointing.

I see this current struggle as that for me. I can visualize the future and multitudes of people getting healed. I know that it is coming so when I pray it is easy to believe for it. And since I know that it is for me, I know that like Mary the mother of Jesus, I can ask for it now. I can ask God to get me ready for it now. I can ask God to teach me how to pray. By dreaming with God I am no longer bound by my worries of life but rather have my sights set on what God is doing. It is easier to embrace the process when you have a vision of the finish line. Grab hold of what God has shown you and don't let go. Train yourself so that you can do the best that you can and then run your race with your eye on the prize.

Thoughts to ponder: Raising the dead

2007-04-11T08:18:00.001-07:00

So I have been thinking about raising the dead more than normal and came across a question on an assignment for school where the topic came up. Here is my response:

"Jesus didn't command us to prophesy, yet we all can, but we are not all prophets. Jesus commanded us to heal the sick, but some will have a gift of healing, perhaps like John G. Lake, who saw hundreds of thousands of people get healed. I'm not sure how that works when you consider that we were also commanded to raise the dead. Would the person with the gift of healing just raise the dead more often?"

Just a thought.

David Hogan's ministry in Mexico has raised 300 people (approx.) from the dead. However, they have tried to raise approxiamately 2,300 people from the dead. That is a 13% success rate. For each person they raise from the dead it takes on average between 6-8 hours of prayer. So assuming that they don't spend any more time praying for the peope that don't get raised from the dead than the people that do (which I am sure they probably keep praying for the people), they spend 40-54 hours praying for people that don't get raised from the dead between times when they are successful in raising the dead. Don't like the 13% success rate? In baseball you wouldn't even make a minor league team if you batted .130 unless you are a pitcher. However when you think that they have raised 300 people from the dead and I have never done it, their 13% success rate looks pretty good.

We were commanded to raise the dead.

When you are raising someone from the dead do they have the choice of whether to come back or not?

Just to clarify, Jesus said to raise the dead, not to pray for the dead.

I am now 0 for 1 in raising the dead.

I realized that if I did raise the dead I would think that I have somehow arrived in that I have reached some cool spiritual level with God that He allowed me to raise the dead. WRONG!

We would probably see more people raised from the dead if people like myself stopped thinking that we are at a high level of spiritual maturity because it happened through us. This is probably also true when applied to creative miracles and other "great" miracles that many people would not have faith for.

That Ain't Right (Part 1)

2007-04-07T17:55:00.000-07:00

As I talked with my paralyzed friend the other day I realized how my fight to see the disabled healed carries so much more weight than I realized. I don’t really know how many people there are in the world who are significantly suffering due to health problems but it has to be hundreds of millions if not billions. It is so easy when faced with such a big problem to just throw ones hands up in the air in disgust not even knowing where to start.

Earlier this week I decided that I needed to start over in my quest to right what the devil has made wrong. I am tired of offering sympathy to those who are suffering. Although I have been told that I am full of compassion for others, the difference between it and sympathy is doing something about it. So I am gonna do something about the suffering that is going on in the world.

I don’t know what it will look like, but I know that I can no longer sit back and wait, merely hoping that it will happen. What is it? God’s spirit being poured out on me in such a way that the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk and the gospel is preached to the poor. In the past I would have just thought that it would look like crusades in as many countries as was feasible, but today I realized that I can’t afford to end up like any past revivalist who died without passing the baton to the next generation of leaders, equipping the body of Christ to do the same, and making sure that people realized that the power was from God and not from them.

Prayer is the backbone of ministry and yet that seems to be one of the first things to go when life becomes busy. I am determined to make sure that my bank account is full so that when I need to make a big withdrawal, I have enough in my account to cover it time and time again. As I prayed I believed that God was going to release his healing anointing to heal my friend as well as the countless others that I will come across in my time on earth.

Remember how Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness? Then I am sure you also remember that the prayers of the righteous man are powerful and effective.

There comes a time when an injustice goes too far. That time is now. What would you do if your home was completely destroyed by a natural disaster and you had no shelter, only the clothes on your back (if you were lucky), you have no source of food and you haven’t eaten in weeks? In Mozambique, severe flooding has displaced hundreds of thousands of people and without government aid as we are fortunate to have in the United States, many people are suffering and facing horrible conditions.

The above picture is of a refugee camp where the shelters are sticks with grass over them. That camp was visited by Iris Ministries and was brought food for its 6,000 refugees. Iris Ministries is actually a great example of equipping the body of Christ, raising up leaders, and preaching the Gospel to the poor. And I shouldn’t neglect mentioning that through their ministry the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk, and the dead are raised!

Gettin' out of the box

2007-04-06T23:20:00.000-07:00

So today I got out a little bit. It all started this morning when I decided that the crowded prayer chapel was not the place for me to pray in tongues. While I was outside I felt that God impressing upon me that I should get back to doing outreach. It then occurred to me that when I had been getting words of knowledge frequently back at the beginning of winter I had been doing outreach a lot. Recently I haven't been going out to pray for people and haven't been getting many words in other times either. Not to say that God took them away, but there is definitely something about stewarding what you have properly so that you keep it.

So I went to go on our Friday night outreach instead of staying in the service where Lance Wallnau was apparently awesome. Anyway, other than the outreach pastor I was the only person from the church that had done outreach before. So I led a team of 2 young ladies and after soaking in the prayer house - God's presence is so awesome - we headed over to the Sundial Bridge where I saw a picture of a woman in a wheelchair.

As we were walking I spotted a woman wearing a neck brace so I stopped and started conversation. After they asked us a few questions about how we would be praying and whether we believed she would be healed, they allowed us to pray for her. She was somewhat surprised that some of the pain in her neck and leg left, but when I asked if we could pray again she said that one time was enough. One of the men actually said how he was so happy to see us out there praying for people. We ended up talking with them for a few minutes and they all thanked us as we parted ways, much different from their skeptical questioning of us when we met just a few minutes earlier.

We walked a little bit further and saw a woman in a wheelchair. They were much more receptive and immediately said that it would be ok for us to pray for her foot. I totally forgot to ask her if it felt different as we got to talking about other things, which is easy to do when people notice my Brasil shirt, the accent of our Australian teenager, and find out our other person is from Virginia. Again, we talked for several minutes and they showed their gratefulness for us praying for them.

As we were walking back towards the car I stopped to pray for a rougher looking man who had a cane. He too was very open for prayer and seemed as though it was quite normal for a stranger to offer prayer in public for healing. Although he didn't notice any difference he too was encouraged and as we parted ways his wife, who was probably 40 feet away at this point, turned around to thank us for praying. After we got off the bridge the girl from Australia (only 16 years old!) thought that we should go to In-n-Out. So off we went. As we drove off I noticed that the other team had just arrived but I decided to just keep driving.

As soon as we got to In-n-Out a man and woman were approaching their car to leave. The man was limping so I asked him what was going on. He said that he was sore from shopping all day but then eventually said that he has been struggling with it for years and can only take certain construction jobs because of it since he can't stay on his feet. He also said how eager he was for God to heal him and how he is praying constantly for it. Although he didn't feel anything the Australian girl (I know her name, I'm just not saying it) said that she felt God saying that he will be completely healed in the next week. Then he mentioned how the woman had things she needed prayer for as well. So we prayed for her and she began to cry. She didn't notice any difference but I believe that they both have the faith to be healed, and they certainly were encouraged by God. Praise the Lord that He put us exactly where we needed to be to bring encouragement to people who needed it!

On Tuesday night as I had been praying I felt that I should start really going after the healing for people that I have been praying for. It was time for something to happen and as Smith Wigglesworth would say, "if God isn't moving, I'll move Him." I felt that I should call a friend who is quadriplegic every day and pray for him. So the next day when I started praying for him I just got his voicemail. Yesterday he called me to say he had been in either the hospital or with doctors all day concerning problems that had come from surgery after the accident that left him paralyzed. These complications forced him to retire from working about 20 years ago. Needless to say, now is the time!

All the Tools

2007-04-03T11:06:00.000-07:00

So I am eating my Nature Valley crunchy granola bar and I notice a few logos on the wrapper. This is the official energy bar of the PGA Tour and also of the US Ski Team.

I can’t believe that I have the same exact resources as Olympic Skiers and Golfing greats such as Tiger Woods. I couldn’t help but wonder why I don’t hit a golf ball as far as Tiger or why I can’t ski nearly as well as Johnny Mosley.

Then it occurred to me that I must steward the resources that I have and put them to work. Similarly, it is not enough to have really good golf clubs, you need to use them the right way. I could use the clubs of any person on the PGA tour and I would not suddenly become that person.

In the same way we have all the tools in the kingdom but if we don’t steward them, then they won’t produce the same fruit as the “professionals”. We must steward the resources and put them to practice until they produce the desired fruit.

Why am I not good at golf or at skiing? I don’t do it very often. Last summer I played more holes than I have in my entire life, and that was still under three full rounds (rained out one time). I didn’t expect to be good after my few golfing days, yet sometimes we expect to be working in consistent signs and wonders with little experience.

My encouragement is this: we have all the tools we need to succeed, but we must put those tools to work and steward the gift. We must experiment with what works and what doesn’t and become “students of the game”.

Keep going after it and remember that Tiger Woods wasn’t the outstanding player he is now the first time he stepped on a golf course.

REWARD!

2007-04-02T11:25:00.001-07:00

This morning when I went downstairs to enjoy a delicious Nature Valley bar for breakfast I noticed through the drapes covering our kitchen window that my car had something written on it. Upon further inspection I found that it had a lot written on it.

The crime scene:

If you have information regarding this crime please comment and if your information is accurate you may be eligible for a reward of one (1) packet of Ramen Noodles. That's right. Ramen Noodles. Good stuff. :)

So fun, you won't want to leave

2007-03-29T18:28:00.000-07:00

Today has been a great day. God is in a good mood and He is still calls all the shots. Well, apparently Matt decided that after spending a few hours in heaven that he might as well just stick around and chill with Jesus. As much as I would have loved for him to come back, I don't blame him for choosing a place that doesn't have the blazing hot summers that Redding does. It is 80 degrees out right now, which feels hot since a few days ago the high was just below 60, but by July that high will be up around 110-115.

Anyway, even with hot weather God is still amazing! I even pulled out my sunglasses and rolled down my window as I drove from the church to my outreach. Boy do I have a lot to be thankful for. God's timing is perfect too. Twenty four hours before I would be praying for someone who just died God brought me out of a rather pitiful state of depression. Having just dealt with that and coming to the realization that God's presence is more important than anything, praying for the dead to be raised seemed like praying for someone who sneezed.

Yes, I will never be the same since that was the first time I have ever tried to raise the dead, but at the same time I could have easily let the situation discourage me. He died as soon as my shift began. He didn't just die after I prayed for him, he died when I showed up. Rather than entertaining the lie that I killed him by showing up, I prayed and believed that he would rise up!

Think about it. Yeah, I was coming to pray for a guy's healing and he died on my shift. That doesn't sound too good. But that isn't the truth. As Pastor Bill says regarding his father's death, I don't understand it, but I know that God is good and He will redeem the situation. One student, whose father just died a few weeks ago stood up at the funeral and invited people to come forward to receive prayer for healing after saying that he doesn't know why his father died but that he knows that God is good. Come on!

On outreach today we had the kids ask God to show them a picture and then draw it. It was amazing. I wish I had pictures of what these kids drew. One of our guys then led one kid to the Lord after the pictures he drew brought up questions about salvation. Oh Jesus, you are good! I can't wait for the creative miracles to start happening in abundance, the dying to be healed, and the dead to be raised.

Can't say I didn't try

2007-03-29T03:27:00.000-07:00

Well, today at school we signed up to pray for one of our fellow students who is dying of cancer. He is around my age, so obviously this cancer isn't right. Well, I felt like I should sign up for the 11 pm shift that would last until 2 am. I then had a feeling in my spirit that he would die while I was there so that we would have to raise him from the dead.

Initially, I also signed up for an 8 am shift that I thought would be a back up in case he hadn't been raised from the dead yet. I ended up giving that shift to someone else who really wanted it.

Well, we get to the house 5 minutes before 11 pm and the previous team tells us what is going on and then packs up to leave. The father also came downstairs to tell us just to pray down there and that he would call us if he needed us. Just a few minutes later we hear the mother yelling for us to come pray, Matt died.

We were trying to give the family space so we just stayed in the area praying in the spirit. After a while of that we left them and went back downstairs to pray. Not too long after that Chris O. showed up and went upstairs with the family. At 1 am Zachary and I went back upstairs to pray for Matt.

I kneeled beside his bed and grabbed his hand like I was giving him a "brother" hand shake and began to pray. I spoke life into his body, prophesied over him, declared promises of God, and commanded him to wake up in Jesus name. An hour and 15 minutes later I got up to let the next team begin to pray for him.

You can't raise the dead if you never pray for any dead people. Well, now I can't say that I haven't tried. God is so good. Not to sound insensitive or rude, but I would have never expected to be smiling and laughing when praying for someone to be raised from the dead. God has given me such a firm reality of his goodness that not even death can stop me from knowing He is good!

Teams will still be praying until the family tells them to stop. So please be praying for Matt to come back to life. I will give updates when I hear the good news.

Running to win!

2007-03-28T01:40:00.001-07:00

Although I have never seen the whole movie, there is a scene in Chariots of Fire where there is a race. The character falls down at the beginning and instead of giving up, he gets up and busts his butt running as fast as he can and ends up winning the race. It is crazy because it seems like he was down way to long to be able to make up the difference, but he ran with such determination that it didn't matter. That is what I feel like now.

The past month feels like I have been flat on my face breathing in dust from ground in Mexico. Then tonight after 3 hours of discouragement and me feeling that I was totally wrong in going to homegroup an amazing God-lover found that I had not left and came to chat with me.

Over the course of the next hour she talked me through what I was experiencing and finally said that I need to press in and run hard even though it hurts. That clicked for me. I am used to saying, "only one more mile" or "just one more set" but for whatever reason I had lost sight of that in this season in which God's presence has been lifted from me.

Then I remembered a dream I had back in December about running a marathon. While resting halfway through the race a friend told me that I was on pace to break the world record. My thought was to then run the second half of the race faster than the first half. So when this awesome reminded me that I was doing great and just to keep pressing in, I lit up and said, "yeah, I'm gonna run even harder than before!"

Coincidentally, Pastor Bill told us in the past week that although it isn't really halfway, he considers post-mission week to be the second half of the school year. So I am getting up off the ground and my eyes have the look of a lion about to devour its prey.

Thank you God for sending someone to pick me up and to remind me that this is an answer to my own prayers of, "God take me deeper no matter what it looks like." Thank you Katie for sharing with me your experiences and for reminding me why I'm here.

Fuel for the Furnace

2007-03-24T09:22:00.000-07:00

I will attempt to do the impossible this morning. I will attempt to be brief and amazing. I am still wanting to get updates from the La Paz trip, but those will have to wait a little bit.

I just finished reading an article from the Tallahassee newspaper that said that the Easter Seals closed down. They were unable to pay their mortgage, payroll, and other expenses. They had applied for but didn't receive a grant that would have given them $100,000 each year for the next five years.

The first time I went their to work with a client I was scared out of my mind. People were coming up to me, grabbing me, yelling at me and the conditions were just not good. However, it did provide a place for probably 50 adults with disabilities to go 5 days a week to be away from their families.

Unless the two other facilities in Tallahassee somehow decide to drastically expand their enrollment it means that those families will all be faced with the task of caring for their loved one full-time. The other facilities already have a long waiting list to get into them, so the outlook is bleak. God, stretch out your hand to heal developmental disabilities!

Speaking of that, Pastor Bill was crazy good in school yesterday. His main focus was Acts 4:29-30 which says:

"Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus."

His translation read ALL boldness. Yeah, we could use that. I was just thinking recently how nice it would be if I would approach people without having to try to be bold. It would be nice if it was just instinct and that boldness would kick in for the difficult situations.

Speaking of difficult situations, I had a dream yesterday as I was soaking. Essentially it was me watching a bunch of friends in groups of 3 or 4 floating around a safe little harbor in these small wooden boats. I was on land and was weary of them going out even though it seemed harmless. They were packed in them pretty tight because they were small. Then a huge Disney cruise ship came into the harbor for some reason. However rather than getting out of the way they all just stayed.

I was getting nervous at how close they were getting to the cruise ship. One group was literally touching the ship with their hands as it passed by. Then the ship turned and sideswiped another group. Their boat started to get pushed under water and the wood started to break. All I could think was "Emergency tongues!" So I just started to pray in the spirit, but was also thinking that I had to do something and that praying by itself wasn't enough, I would need to go save them.

This is all in a matter of seconds that I think that how can I go in after them when it is a cruise ship. The cruise ship could kill me too! Then, while still on the shore praying in tongues, I woke up.

Last night at Awakening Cry I realized that while it is super important to praying for the lost and dying, we have to actually do something about it. We need the radical boldness to go into the situations that seem impossible. It isn't enough to stand on the shore and pray "God save them, they are drowning!" We must also pray, "God, I'm going in after them and I need your help! Stretch out your hand to do a miracle!"

Yeah. Amen.

Laugh a little

2007-03-21T22:38:00.000-07:00

I don't know what has been the problem with me for the past week. Honestly, it has been the most difficult week that I can remember in a few years. It wasn't that travelling to Mexico was tough on me, well maybe it was, but I don't think so. Rather it was tough on me spiritually between me and God. It had already been a tough few weeks and this was easily the worst, which stunk since I was doing ministry in another country.

How can it be bad when I saw so many people get healed? I don't know how to describe it other than just saying that to me it is more important to feel the Father's love than to see His works. I was not feeling His love and therefore anything else that was good didn't seem to matter to me.

It probably didn't hurt that in the midst of me going through this, everyone around me was seeming to have a blast and going to new levels in God while I felt that I had hit rock bottom. I became increasingly frustrated each time someone asked me if I was feeling (discerning) anything as I prayed for someone or went into a situation. I suppose that I was getting frustrated at God, because after our second evening meeting I was so fed up that all I could do on the ride back to our base was cry.

I struggled with so many negative thoughts that I don't have anything to offer that I really didn't even want to minister. I also got stuck playing drums (like real drums, not the djembe), which I have realized that I don't want to do again. Basically I felt inadequate, unwanted, unloved, and like the person that had to do everything that nobody else wanted to do.

Yuck, I don't even want to talk about it. I hate being in a situation where I just want to be alone but I have no place where I can go and be alone. Even the bus ride back to Redding. Even today at school. I didn't really want to be there. I didn't want to hear how other people's trips went, because mine was hard. I didn't want to go up with my team to share testimonies so I just sat behind the group as they tried to stand and got drunk in the process. I was pretty annoyed when I got called up to share a testimony. I just wanted to hide.

Even up to tonight. I nearly just left church to go home and sleep because I was feeling so horrible. As I had unsuccessfully tried to soak I knew that if I could just manage to laugh and really mean it that I would feel better. But I could not just force myself to laugh for some reason. For whatever reason I made myself stay and I ended up reading some in the Bible to get caught up.

It didn't seem like anything that would really encourage me, but the more I read the better I felt. By the time I went to the prayer meeting before youth I was feeling so much better. Still not my normal self, but I felt like I had been raised from the dead. Right before youth started I found my way to the Burning Ones. The youth with the fire that you can feel. They started to laugh, I started to laugh, I felt more like myself again. And now, oh so abruptly, I will go to bed.

The deaf hear, the mute speak, the blind see, and the lame walk!

2007-03-18T14:05:00.000-07:00

So I wound up being put on the team that was all people from the worship team for Sunday morning, er afternoon church. So while everyone else loaded up in our vans, we waiting to get picked up by the pastor. We drove into town down some dirt roads, which was odd since the street would look the same as the one next to it minus the pavement, and picked up 3 men. Now there were 10 of us in the van.

We drove some more and stopped on the side of a street. A few got out to go pray for someone and I was told to stay with the van. So four spanish speakers and two english speakers were left in the van with not much to say to each other. So one of the guys pulls out his guitar and starts to play some worship songs. Luckily my fellow english speaker had learned that song in Spanish and so I played the djembe. We then sang it in English, switching back and forth between the languages. It was great.

After probably 30 minutes of worship we were all getting very hot as there was no breeze where we were. Soon after that the rest of our group came back reporting that the son of one of the men we had picked up was healed of asthma in the waiting room of the hospital! From there we went to the gas station and when the pastor said the attendant had pain in her foot we got out to pray and God healed her!

The drive to the church was an hour outside of La Paz. They told us that the people were migrant farm workers. Knowing this I think we all had very low expectations of what the church would be like. I think these expectations were lowered even more based on the dirt road that we drove on for miles. It is one thing to drive on a dirt road in a city. It is a whole different thing to drive on a dirt road in the middle of the desert where you can see no buildings at all.

I was starting to wonder if they would have any power at the church and I didn't even think that the church would be in a town, but rather just on a plot of land somewhere. Well, eventually we start approaching the farm land and it wasn't anything like what I had expected. Other than the desert backdrop, it looked just like anything I had seen back in Florida. Then we approached the town.

It reminded me of hearing stories of people that live on remote islands where groceries and other supplies are shipped in once a week. Even though it was just an hour outside of La Paz, it was remote enough that it probably does face some of the same difficulties as a small island.

They drove us around the town which took just a minute or two but described to us the slave-like conditions of this massive warehouse that provided a garage type home for some 3,000 people. We returned to the church and after quickly setting up their speakers and microphones the service started just after 12:30.

They had me play djembe which was interesting since I didn't know any of the songs and the worship leader didn't speak english. It was an interesting experience to be worshipping God with no fewer than 10-15 mosquitoes flying around you.

After worship they brought up a young boy who has been deaf and mute since birth. We began to pray for him and within a few minutes he responded to us snapping behind his head. So while our group leader preaches and our lone spanish speaker translates, the two girls and I take the boy out of the service to continue praying for him. Over the next half hour or so he begins responding with great frequency to snaps and then begins to speak what the boy who had been healed of asthma says to him.

The smile on the boy's face was priceless. Since it was such a special moment I kept switching between praying for him and getting the miracle on video. Praise God I had a video camera with me! Our greatest moment with him was probably when the young helper sat behind him out of view, spoke and then he spoke what he heard! When we went back to the service we showed the congregation the boy's progress and then went into praying for the people for healing.

I prayed for one of the young men that rode with us and God healed his shoulder. Then I told him to pray for his mother's ankle and God healed it too! Since there were only 2 people other than our team member that knew any english I just went around laying hands on everyone without knowing what was wrong. Others did the same. Our two girls prayed for a woman whose ear opened up. At the end of the service 20 people lined up to share the testimony of what God completely healed. Not bad considering there were probably between 30 and 40 adults there (plus another 40-50 kids).

I did pray extensively for a young girl with club feet who was in a wheelchair. I forget if she had any other problems, but even though I felt an anointing there as I prayed, we saw no improvement. Around 4 in the afternoon church was over and we left to go meet up with the rest of the team that had been at our missionaries' base (different from the base where we stayed). Exhausted, we slept most of the ride back, well, most of the ride after we got back on paved roads.

Once we got back we quickly grabbed some of the left over lunch which was now essentially the time when we normally had dinner. Then we left to go the boardwalk for our evening outreach. They had a worship band that was made up of some of the best worshippers in the city. They were amazing! After a few songs, the local church did a drama, then two people on our team shared testimonies, followed by our team doing the drama. They had no way of playing their music for it so they had me play the djembe and the keyboardist from the band play as well. It actually turned out better than with the CD because I could go with what they were doing and the keyboardist followed me!

Immediately after the drama was over I was introduced to preach. Although there was a crowd gathered I must say that probably all but a few were from the church and most of the ones that weren't were probably being talked to by people on our team. Nevertheless, one man raised his hand saying that he needed healing when I asked but he had been at our meetings all week.

A little while after I was done I went to get back my video camera from one of our guys and on my way I was grabbed by a woman from the church to pray for someone. The woman had partial deafness in both ears and had rhumatory arthritis in her left foot. I prayed for her foot first for maybe 30 seconds and all the pain left! Then I prayed for her ears once and in under a minute she had complete hearing! Glory to God! I tried to ask how deaf she was but they couldn't quite figure it out but just answered that it was pretty bad.

As a group that night our team lead 20 or 22 people to Christ including a police officer and another man who had said that Jesus was bogus. That man apparently had refused a prophetic picture and then after I preached went back to the guy who made it for him and our guy led him to Christ and got him filled with the Holy Spirit!

One of our leaders prayed for a few siblings who had all been cursed by witchdoctors and went blind at age 18. Yo, don't mess around with witchcraft. She started breaking things off of them and leading them through repentance and at least one of them (I forget the whole story now) regained partial sight!

When we were leaving after getting some more ice cream one of our guys stopped to pray for a man on crutches. He had been walking with crutches for the past 6 years due to a knee injury caused from a car accident. After praying for him the man started to walk around so I got out my video camera and got it on tape! Then our guy was asked to pray for a woman with a brain tumor. They were touched and as they left the man gave his crutches to his wife to hold as they walked away!

Women and children

2007-03-17T10:10:00.000-07:00

This morning we woke up early again. After a short breakfast we headed out to the church of a man who had done first year the same year as our trip leader Joaquin. We spent some time just playing with the kids for a while and then it was time for lunch even though it was still in the morning. After our team did the drama they took the children outside and left the mother's in the church building (it's roof was palm branches and the walls were tarps).

Eventually it got so hot in there that they took off one of the walls to let a little bit of a breeze in. After the first of our three speakers they saw 5 people get healed with nobody laying hands on them! Then after the final speaker 5 of the women gave their lives to Christ! Our gals then felt that they should wash the feet of the women. So they lined up and all had their feet washed by the girls on our team.

Our Children's ministry did much of the same activities that they had done at the orphanage and had their own healing service as well. When it was time for us to go all of the women and children got together with our team for a photo. It was amazing to see how God had knit our hearts together when we came to serve them in love.

After going to our host church to change we headed out to the beach. Although there are some beaches that are very close to where we were, our hosts took us a little further away to go to a very nice beach that had a view of Holy Spirit Island (yes, you read that correctly, many cities there have religious names as they were founded by Christians and never conquered by foreign militaries...La Paz means "The Peace" and we had stopped for ice cream in Todos Santos, or "All Saints").

The beach was gorgeous. Rather than wearing myself out in the water and out in the sun I just stayed in the shade under one of the little things they had. I have no idea what they are called but are like having a big umbrella but the shade is created again by palm branches. I just sat there and soaked for most of time only stopping to eat some snacks and take a few photos.

We went out to dinner with all of our hosts and afterwards went to get ice cream down by the boardwalk. I must say that their strawberry ice cream is the greatest ice cream of all time! Then before we left the translator who had just given his life to Christ the night before shared with us how moved he was by how we treated the women this morning. He never would have expected us to not only love them how we did, but to also treat them like royalty. The love of God did the trick.

Blowing up the Methodist church

2007-03-16T09:38:00.000-07:00

This morning we got to sleep in (relatively) and it was my friend LeAnn's birthday. We had the morning off and team time in the afternoon. I was trying to find some place to be alone and after our pavillion no longer fit that description I hung my towel over my bed from the top bunk to give myself some privacy. I was trying to soak but was just not in a good mood.

When it was time to go to lunch one of the guys came into the room to see what was up. We talked for a while and he was able to explain to me some of what was going on and the reasons why. It was good. I was so thankful that he had come in, since he was actually in the other room. I still wasn't really wanting to be around other people though. You know that feeling when something has happened and then you walk into a crowd and they are all looking at you. Yeah, didn't want to do that.

But I went to lunch anyway as late as we were. After lunch was more team time. Geez. I said I didn't want to be around anyone! :) Luckily my beat up hands did not effect me playing the djembe which I still had to do. Talk about not being in the mood to try to lead others into worship. We went into team soaking time led by one of the gals on our team. That was good. Finally I had some peace. I hadn't had my iPod on the trip because I left my earphones in Atlanta and so I had no way to listen to any music, so getting some soaking music helped ease my nerves.

We went to another taco stand for dinner. This one had beef and chicken, at least until they ran out of chicken. Spending some time talking with LeAnn helped cheer me up and got my focus off of myself. We went to the meeting and I was starting to feel good. I was gonna be on the ministry team (finally) and so I was really getting excited as we prayed as a team. I actually wrote down probably 6 words of knowledge and was ready to see God move!

After worship we moved straight into a healing service. I went to pray for a blind man who had been receiving prayer for a while from another guy on our team. Then I noticed a woman in a wheelchair so I went over to her. Finding someone that could get the interpreting job done I found out that she had polio and that she was pregnant. She had a miscarriage a previous time and so although she can walk, she was in the wheelchair as a precaution.

I began to pray for her and specifically that she would regain strength in her legs. At one point she did report that her legs were feeling stronger but she did not want to get out of the wheelchair. Another time I asked her if she was feeling anything on the outside of her right ankle, pointing to mine and then also to hers, although hers I couldn't touch because of the wheelchair. She reported that she was feeling a sensation on it.

Then she said that she would only like us to pray for her baby, so we did that, declaring life over it and I shared a prophetic word with her from a man in my small group who said I would pray for a pregnant woman. Several hours later, after the meeting was over I found out from another guy on our team that her right leg was wooden from above the knee down. I asked the translator (someone who is from Bethel but is now a missionary there) to verify and she confirmed it. So, I don't know how to explain it, but she was feeling a sensation on her right ankle even though her leg was wooden from above the knee down. Creative miracle? I hope so!

I never got to go up for ministry time after all but did have fun mostly video taping the rest of our team get drunk. One of the translators who was not yet a Christian got saved, baptized in the Holy Spirit and delivered at the meeting! Many miracles happened at this service and the people stayed until almost midnight when we finally left. As we rode back to the base, I started to pray for the people sitting around me and when they started getting whacked I wasn't left out this time! Praise God! I was so thankful to be included this time as just the night before I just watched as everyone else got blasted and had incredible encounters.

Moving dirt from here to there

2007-03-15T09:08:00.000-07:00

By today I was really starting to feel horrible. Between seeing others go to new levels and myself not seeming to have any encounters at all, I was getting very frustrated. We woke up early and headed out to the "orphanage" which is the easiest way to describe it even though it was not one.

I worked at digging a hole that would be used to burn trash. Other groups chopped down cactus, painted, picked up trash, or dug a hole for a new outhouse. Starting from scratch we were able to dig an 8 foot by 8 foot hole that was about 3-4 feet deep. It certainly didn't seem like much, but when you consider how fast we tackled it, it would have taken them possibly weeks to dig. They had been constructing a new building that looks far from completion but has been under construction for 2 years. I hope to get the trip video up online sometime soon after I finish editing it and there is some hilarious footage from our work.

After lunch and a much needed rest period in the shade (the temperature was up to just over 100 degrees) we put on a big program for all of the kids. This included a drama, teaching on how to hear from God, soaking, worship, and then at the end some crazy balloons. It was great. I was lucky to escape the several hours of shoveling with only 3 blisters, 1 of which was very painful for a few days but was no longer hurting by the time we came back to Redding.

We went back to our base to shower up and get ready for the evening service. We were going to be doing a worship workshop which I was totally not looking forward to at this point. I did not want to speak at it because frankly I didn't think I should. When I had been on a worship team in the past, my heart in doing it was not right at all. So I felt that I shouldn't be there sharing. So, when the group went to go hold the workshop I stayed seated in the back videotaping the service.

I realized an important lesson (writing this on March 26th) that for someone who is called to ministry the worst thing you can do when you don't feel you have anything to offer in ministry is to go do something else that keeps you from ministering to others. Had I just gone with the group I would have had a great time, but instead I sat in the back of the service holding a video camera thinking of how I have nothing to offer and am stuck as the camera man. The same thing happened for me in doing worship. Not that there is anything wrong with working behind the scenes or being a musician. I just realized that it should be the people who are called to do it and not people who are hiding or being hidden from ministry.

That night I was truly miserable. In praying for people I couldn't discern a thing and it seemed like I didn't have an answer for anyone. A few ladies did get healed of a fallen bladder. I have never even heard of it before and there were two in the same meeting. This was where I was not really caring that people were getting healed, I just wanted to be with God. On the ride back to the base I just sat in the back of the van crying out to God (silently).

Hospitals and worship

2007-03-14T08:41:00.000-07:00

Today was pretty busy. After we ate breakfast the worship team met to go over the music we would do that night. As much fun as I think it is to play drums sometimes, I don't know what I was thinking when I volunteered myself to play them on the trip. From that meeting we went straight into a team meeting and from there went out to lunch at a sweet taco stand.

The thing I have noticed about tacos in mexico is that they are nothing like tacos in the states. I never saw a hard taco (tortilla shell) and the soft tacos are much smaller than what we have here. This place had a bunch of different kinds of seafood as the meat for the tacos. I had the shrimp tacos which were great. From there we went to the church where luckily we got to rest for a little bit. It was really hot so I found myself a place on the concrete floor which was a little bit cooler to lay down.

Soon most of us left to go to hospitals while another group went to a Juvenile Hall. One of our translators kept leaving the group so we ended up spending probably 30 minutes just waiting for her to come back. Once we finally got in we went to pray for one of the people they told us to, who happened to be asleep. So we prayed for her while she slept. Then we went to another bed in the room where there was a very old woman who was not doing well at all. We prayed for her and the family members that were with her and then went on.

They had asked guys to only pray for the guys and the women only to pray for the women, so I was eager to find a guy so that I could lay hands on him. We saw a guy with a neck brace on so we went into his room. His mother said that some people had already prayed for him, but we asked if we could pray for him again. So I laid my hands on him and after I was done praying he said that he felt fire on his neck and on his hands. He said that most of the pain was gone, but there was still a little left. So I prayed again and this time his feet also got hot and all the pain left.

We spent more time talking with them and prophecying over them. Then I got a word of knowledge for left ankle pain and it was his mother. After we prayed a few times all the pain left! During this time, our group leader for the hospital was talking with a doctor in the hallway about healing. Haha. He said that we should pray for his patient who was right next to the guy who just got healed. Although his patient only had a few weeks to live, he declined prayer saying that he wanted to sleep. The mother of the guy with the neck injury starts talking to him from across the room telling him that he will get healed, but the guy still wouldn't let us. As we waited to leave, the young man kept looking out into the hallway where we were smiling and giving me a thumbs up! He was ready to leave!

I got back to the church with enough time to eat dinner for about 5 minutes before going in to start practicing before the service. Oh boy. It sure does help when people have played together before. Lol. It went off fine though other than two times when the wrong signal was given so that I didn't know where we were going (and neither did anyone else for that matter).

My buddy Nolan shared a few minutes about yielding to the presence of God. It was amazing. God is all over that guy. After the preaching was over we got back up to play some more as the rest of the team did a fire tunnel. We did a song that we hadn't done earlier which was tough. Luckily we switched over to one we had done that was easier. Praise God that I survived hopefully my last time playing drums during worship.

Does she know there is an angel next to her?

2007-03-13T19:25:00.000-07:00

Thankfully after the previous two days of traveling, Joaquin, our trip leader, made it so that we had the morning and afternoon off. It was nice to just be able to rest and relax. I spent a few hours just soaking and thankfully when I went to lunch I no longer was feeling the symptoms of a cold that I had been feeling since I woke up yesterday morning.

We had some team time and did more worship. I now realize again why I was so thankful to not be on the worship team. It is really distracting to me to have to focus on playing an instrument. I think I will again retire from playing during corporate worship times. We did some more drumming like we did last night including a time of declaring freedom from fears. It was hilarious to hear Joaquin ask people as they came forward, “Who are you? Oh, you are an overcomer? I thought I recognized you!”

Tonight was the first night that we went to Pastor Angel’s (pronounced On-hell) church. Little did I know that some pretty cool stuff would break out when there were only maybe a dozen people there when the meeting started. After worship was over and many more people had arrived Joaquin had our other leader Andrea tell a testimony. After stating that it released an anointing for the prophetic, he called me up to share a testimony. I shared the one from back in November when I started to get a lot of words of knowledge and a woman with spina bifida had some significant healing.

Joaquin then stated how a healing anointing was released with that testimony and asked if I had any words of knowledge. I gave one for the left ear. After other words were given we went to pray for people and two members of our team prayed for a woman whose left ear opened up!

When she went up to testify, Joaquin started getting rocked and asked if she knew there was an angel standing next to her. She testified that she had just been declared clinically deaf a week ago but that now she was totally healed! Our host later shared with us that she and her family had been with their church when they first started but had moved away to a very legalistic church until just 3 weeks ago when they heard God tell them to go back. So when they came back they said, “We don’t know why we are here. We were happy where we were at, but God told us to come back.” Obviously God knew what He was doing!

Do you have anything besides Mexican food?

2007-03-12T18:51:00.000-07:00

We left the hotel at 5:15 am to go to the airport. Once we boarded the plane a few people started to get toasted by the Holy Ghost. We were sitting together as a group, all in the back of the plane. Even the flight attendants got in on it, commenting over the intercom, “we have a snorter on the plane,” to which we all started laughing even more. After a couple of minutes they made us stop though.

Once we arrived and got through immigration we all piled into two, 15-passenger vans. Luckily our team was only 28 so that with the two drivers we could all squeeze in. We stopped for lunch in a beach town called Cabo San Lucas which was about 30 minutes from the airport in Los Cabos. A little bit later we stopped for ice cream in a town called Todos Santos. Just before getting to our base in La Paz we were pulled over for not stopping at a police barricade. Our driver hadn’t seen the police officer trying to get us to stop and then he didn’t see him on his motorcycle trying to pull us over. Luckily, since the officer didn’t speak English and our driver didn’t speak Spanish we were able to get away without anything happening.

After dinner we had an orientation meeting with our hosts to know how we need to adapt so that we honor their culture. Following that meeting we broke out into some drumming in which people played on the tables and chairs while I led from the Djembe. One of our team members said when we were done that the beat was breaking through and opening up the heavens for people.

On the way to San Jose

2007-03-11T23:02:00.000-07:00

After some team worship and drinking time I have finally made it back to the hotel room. We leave six hours from now to go to the airport. The bus ride to San Jose was fun. It was a really old bus with no air conditioning and just a few working windows, so with the temperature around 80 degrees, it was pretty hot. I spent some time soaking and then some time praying with my buddy Nolan. We got whacked pretty good and soon our leaders and then the whole bus was in on it.

We ate dinner at Applebee’s and had to wait 45 minutes outside because they messed up our reservation. No worries though because I got to catch up with my friend LeAnn. She is so encouraging - very much like an older sister even though she is three years younger than me. The food was great except for that our waiter left me with nothing to drink for most of the time we were there. I suppose I should have warned him that I am a heavy drinker.

The worship time was amazing. The team was getting rocked. Afterwards we just laid down on the floor in this room that was part living room and part breakfast area, conveniently located right in view of the elevator. So as we laid there and prayed for each other it was quite amusing to see or hear people’s reactions to us laughing on the ground.

Why revival tarries

2007-03-10T23:26:00.000-08:00

"If we were as scared to miss fire baptism as we are to miss water baptism, we would have a flaming Church and another Pentacost."

- Leonard Ravenhill

"Oh! for a heart that is burdened!
Infused with a passion to pray;
Oh! for a stirring within me;
Oh! for His power every day.
Oh! for a heart like my Saviour,
Who, being in an agony, prayed.
Such caring for OTHERS, Lord, give me;
On my heart let burdens be laid.
My Father, I long for this passion,
To pour myself out for the lost-
To lay down my life to save others-
"To pray," whatever the cost.
Lord, teach me, Oh teach me this secret,
I'm hungry this lesson to learn,
This passionate passion for others,
For this, blessed Jesus, I yearn.
Father, this lesson I long for from Thee-
Oh, let Thy Spirit reveal this to me."

- Mary Warburton Booth

Today I read Leonard Ravenhill's book "Why Revival Tarries." If you want to see revival, you should read this book. If it doesn't grip you then you should check your pulse and call a friend to have them raise you from the dead.

A friend from school loaned it to me saying that she thought I should read it. I believe that I got out of it what she was hoping: an increased burning passion to pray and preach the gospel. I am just glad that I decide that I would read it today instead of after missions week.

In a way, the book scared me. I am scared that I could lose the intense passion that so gripped me as I read. It scares me to think that I could forget about something that moved me that much. It scares me to think that I could get too busy to have time to pray and think that I am being more effective in helping people.

Well, here we go, off to Mexico. Many updates will come when I get back. It's revival time!

Testimony: No Work, No Problem!

2007-03-09T18:34:00.000-08:00

I met a man in San Diego at the West Coast Prayer Rumble back at the beginning of January. He lives in New York but was in California for surgery. I prayed for him at the Rumble and gave him my contact info. Well, tonight he called me to ask for prayer because he has had severe pain in his head that has kept him out of work since mid January. He said that if he tried to go in he would feel like he was going to pass out after just an hour or two. He has gone to the doctors and they couldn’t figure out what was wrong with him.

After sharing a testimony with him of a man who couldn’t work but then got healed, I commanded the pain to be gone. After I had finished just praying for him in general he reported that his head felt better right when I started. The first thing I did was command the pain to leave in the name of Jesus. When I asked him how much better it felt he said that all of the pain was gone! Hah! Praise God! He heals over the cell phone across time zones!

From the boiler room

2007-03-09T07:41:00.000-08:00

"Do you want some rock?"

I could barely make out what the young woman said and I probably wouldn't have known what she was talking about had I not been informed by my hosts of their encounters with people trying to sell them drugs. Her voice was so faint that only the most attentive person would have heard her cry for help. She was desperate - probably needing food.

About four hours earlier I went to meet with our group for lunch even though they were about to leave and I didn't end up eating. As I returned to my car exhausted from the morning I realized that I had parked outside a gay bar. Soon four men would be standing just a few feet from my car smoking cigarettes. They were just trying to fit in - looking for someone who would love them.

I both of these situations I become so aware of the situation that is at hand in San Francisco. I became aware of the utter importance of what our friends and hosts at Justice House of Prayer (JHOP) are doing. They are praying for a city to be transformed. On the street right below their flat on Haight Street you could minister to the homeless, drug dealers, club goers, and homosexuals.

Almost coincidentally, over the next few days I read, "Red Moon Rising" and saw what seemed to be the same situation played out in countries across Europe. I read story after story of radical lovers of Jesus who would pray and then go out among the lowest of society to minister the gospel.

To me, this book felt more like my own story than an assignment. I love just going to pray in the "Boiler Room" just as much as I like getting out on the streets and seeing people get touched by God. It also didn't hurt that I have been given a prophetic word about being like the Moravians.

Now more than ever I see the importance of prayer and loving people. If only my prayer tanks had not just been emptied when I crossed paths with the men outside the gay bar or the woman who wanted to sell me drugs. When the intercessor also becomes an evangelist and the evangelist also becomes an intercessor some amazing fruit truly will be reaped. Now is the time for us to shine, the red moon is rising.

Out of Momentum

2007-03-07T02:39:00.001-08:00

Tonight at homegroup I finally had an epiphany of the past week. Everyone was talking about how great things have been since last Thursday when Beni spoke in class. They were saying how they all felt there was a huge shift and things have been much easier since then. Maybe I have my radio tuned into the wrong frequency because although I agree that Beni was great, the days leading up to her speaking and the days following have all been rough for me.

Looking back, it seems as though my peak was the second day of the Eyes and Wings Conference. The last day of the conference I was already trying to feed off of what had happened the previous day. To be honest I wasn't really sure what to make of it.

Looking back even further, it has now been a month since I quit my job at Target, went to Atlanta, and unfortunately have not been praying and soaking much at all. Something in me had said, "you better not stop praying," but at the same time it seemed so much harder to get it into my schedule even though I had an extra 25-30 hours in my week freed up due to not having a job.

Part of my excuse was that I was gone so much. For Atlanta I was gone for 5 days. Then after 4 days back I left for 4 days for the youth Winter Camp. Then I had a day and a half to recooperate before the Eyes and Wings Conference started, which for me lasted 2 extra days since I had friends in town. After 4 days of being mostly normal, I went to our Berkeley outreach in San Francisco for 3 days. I took yesterday to rest, and now was back at school today.

In a way, I can view this experience as valuable training in that I realize the importance of rest, but more importantly my relationship with God is in the midst of ministry. I am trying now to get back into that place of rest with God, spending time soaking and praying, trying to redig the wells that I abandoned for the past month.

Probably the most discouraging thing for me, other than the fact that I felt like I have lost the level of manifestation of His presence that I had been at, was that everyone around me seems like they are on a whole different level than I am in the spirit. I was amazed as I listened to them speak tonight that I didn't have a clue what any of them were talking about and that I had no idea how God was talking to me.

That also was happening a lot in San Francisco this weekend. It seemed like everyone was wearing 3-D glasses except for me. They were all talking about the things they were seeing in the spirit, which were amazing, and I might as well have never known that God speaks to us and can show us things. I wasn't picking up a signal at all while everyone else seemed to be picking up multiple stations at once.

One of the leaders brought up a very interesting point that did at least encourage me some, I think. He said that we already have the authority over things but we just don't understand that we have it. The reason why I don't walk in the breakthrough is because I don't have the faith that I have it. So, it seems to me that in order to see that breakthrough come, I must simply believe that I have it, rather than needing to pray for the next 20 years for God to give it to me.

Another thing that stuck with me is what one of the other leaders said. She mentioned an analogy of seeking after a freshly baked batch of chocolate chip cookies instead of just eating the one chocolate chip cookie that you already have. It is like seeking after a new encounter with God instead of just continually returning to the same encounter that you have been having.

I have found that it is true that the encounter will sustain you for a little while, but after some time, you do need a fresh encounter. Right now, that one encounter that I had been reusing for a week or so has run dry and I am in need of something new. Shoot, right now I would be happy just to have it back again. I feel like I took multiple steps back after only stepping forward for the past several months.

It is kinda like running on a treadmill. When school started I was just barely walking. But slowly the speed started to increase so that in November I was starting to jog, by December I was running and now was quickening the pace just about every day, if not every day. Then, one month ago, when I stopped praying, the treadmill was unplugged and so I was only running off of the momentum that had already been created. When a treadmill is stopped it doesn't take long for the running surface to become an immovable force.

Like a car coasting up a hill, if you have enough speed you can go for a little while, but soon your momentum will stop. Yup, lesson learned. Prayer and soaking was totally sustaining me through my long days and little sleep. Now is a great time to start asking for gifts and to start walking in the authority that God has already given me! Prayer and soaking will be my vehicles of choice for climbing the higher mountain that is next on the horizon.

Indescribable

2007-03-05T13:47:00.001-08:00

Disclaimer: This was started on Sunday, March 4 and finished the following day.

So this morning I woke up early to get some time in the word before everyone else woke up. As I was reading I started to imagine driving home this afternoon and talking with my friend Ron who I had met back in December. I was talking to him about forgiving anyone and then I prayed for him. I was driving my car, talking on the phone with him when he starts yelling, "I'm healed! I'm healed! I'm healed!" to which I responded, "Are you kidding me?!" He wasn't. I got so excited that I moved across several lanes of interstate to pull over and get out of my car. I started jumping up and down shouting and praising God.

As those events unfolded I couldn't help but cry. The thought of him being completely healed brought so much joy to my heart. Renewing a life that has been hidden mostly out of view for so long would be one of the most memorable experiences of my life.

While we were breakfast about 15 minutes before we needed to leave for church Ron gave me a call. He sounded worried and told me that his attendant didn't show up so he was stuck in bed. He asked if I would be willing to come help him so after dropping off our people at church, Nolan and I headed out to Berkeley to see him. We got there around 10:20 and found him just where he said he would be, in bed.

After praying for him briefly we started to take care of his daily needs. This is the most personal care I had done ever. Even more than I ever was required to do when I worked with developmentally disabled adults after college. This is also the first time I have done it since God touched me a year ago and opened my eyes to His power and His presence. I was nervous as I have been in a long time as I tried to find all of his medications. The last thing I would want to do is mess up his meds and have something bad happen as a result.

I will spare many of the details for the sake of keeping this readable for anyone, but let's just say we took care of ALL his needs. We missed the entire church service and when our group called to tell us that they were at lunch we knew that we should probably start to get ready to leave.

So we prayed for him again. It was much more powerful this time. Nolan spoke some amazing prophetic words over Ron. I am so thankful that he came with me. He had so much to offer that I would never have gotten or would have been too hesitant to give.

There was an incredible release of God's presence in Ron's apartment. Nolan had Ron say, "I am worth it in Jesus' name." It was obvious when it was difficult for Ron to say it that it struck a chord in his heart. He expressed how he was taught just the opposite - that he wasn't worth it. Even just the revelation of "God is in a good mood and He loves you," really touched his heart.

Nolan also shared what he shared with me as we drove to meet Ron. This was how imagination turns into powerful intercession as we partner with God instead of having intellectual offense. Then I shared with Ron what I had been thinking this morning as I read my Bible and it brought tears to his eyes.

I felt God wanting me to tell Ron to ask for anything that he desires, including complete healing in his body. Again, he expressed how he had been thinking that it wasn't ok for him to ask God for things like that. Such a shift happened during that time. It was so powerful.

We left with Ron going to sleep. As we were taking care of him he talked about how he had worked for the federal government in getting civil rights for people with disabilities. In the late 1980s he had to retire due to his health. Now he is in need of a live-in attendant so that he can stay out of an institution.

Seeing how he has to live gives me even a deeper passion to see people with disabilities healed. It was a fresh reminder of how difficult disabilities can make life be. He is just one of millions that are forgotten or ignored by most of society. God, heal the disabled!

In the big city again

2007-03-03T23:44:00.000-08:00

Tonight is our second night staying on Haight Street in San Francisco. It seems like San Francisco is becoming my second home to Redding. I was here three weeks ago, then two weeks before that, and I will also be here next weekend. Thankfully the streets are starting to become familiar and I am starting to learn my way around. Unfortunately, there have been three times today that I have spent at least 30 minutes looking for a parking spot.

Anyway, it has been an amazing trip. The prayer meeting last night was incredible. My hands have never felt quite like they did last night. They were on fire for so long that when we were leaving they felt weird. Weird in a good way. Perhaps I could say they felt like they were dripping with anointing. Maybe not.

This morning we had another meeting with the different campus leaders. In the afternoon we broke up into teams at Berkeley for outreach. I led a treasure hunt team. We only had about an hour because it took me so long to find a parking spot, but God still did some radical things.

Here are some of the things God showed us: Telegraph Ave., "First", problems with the feet, blank piece of paper, communist t-shirt...

So we started off on Telegraph Ave. and at the first street corner one of our guys saw "First" spray painted onto a newspaper stand so we stood over by it. Within a minute I spotted an older woman who was walking slowly. I approached her with one of our girls and then we look at her feet and see them wrapped in bandages. It turns out that she has had 7 surgeries on her feet and the last one the doctors really messed up. She was a Christian and let us pray for her and tell her that God loves her and then she continued on with what she was doing.

We walked down the street and I stopped to pray for a few individuals. At one point I noticed that two of our girls had stopped up the road. So we went back and found them standing next to a blank piece of paper. Soon after we got there one of the guys noticed a man wearing the communist shirt he saw and so he went after him into a restaurant and let him know that God loved him and then prayed for him. Also, a man with a cane stopped right next to us so I prayed for him.

Then a guy came up behind us to try to get us to buy his CD. One of our girls did and then he said, "God bless you." So I started to talk to him more and he ends up asking us to pray for him and so I did. That was a lot of fun.

I had noticed a girl with a cast on her leg earlier and when I saw that she was just at the street corner we went to pray for her. She let us pray and just as I started one of the girls she was with turned her back to me to express her disapproval. Oh well. I should have asked her if she felt anything because I did as I said my 15 second prayer, but I let them go back to their conversation since I had interrupted them.

Next we walked down the street and got into several more conversations with a few street vendors and other pedestrians. We were all having a good time and really getting into it when it was time for us to leave.

When we got back to the JHOP I couldn't find a parking spot for a long time. So I kept driving around until I finally got the best spot right out in front of the building.

Tonight we went to an Indian/Pakistani restaurant for dinner in downtown. We had even more problems trying to find parking. There had been a parade and so there were a ton of people and the restaurant was diagonally across from the Hilton and other major locations. Well, we end up getting a parking spot right across from the Hilton only a few spots down from the restaurant! Talk about favor!

On the way back we drove by a pretty big group of homeless african americans. It really tore me up. To think that they might be living in the very spot that I saw them broke my heart. I can't imagine living like that. The type of evangelism that is on my heart for sweeping through major cities would have to incorporate something special for the homeless. I don't know how, but something has to be done.

Running until your shoes fall apart

2007-03-01T10:01:00.000-08:00

A few days ago I felt challenged by a quote that a friend posted in a blog to believe for impossible things each morning when I wake up. The quote is by Lewis Carroll and says, “Sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” Although I understand the importance of being in a corporate setting, I began to realize again that I must be willing to go after breakthrough as if I am the only one doing it. I must be willing to run until my shoes fall apart (which they did yesterday!).

So this morning I took it upon myself to believe six impossible things before breakfast. It was a good exercise. A few years ago when I was in a song writing group we wrote down our thoughts each morning when we would wake up as a way of getting the creative juices flowing. It just occurred to me how believing for impossible things is a good way to start dreaming with God! That’s a good word right there!

It is vital that we cut all stinking thinking out of our mind and start thinking what God thinks. How are we going to do the impossible when we quit running the moment conditions aren’t perfect? When I was really into working out, which seems like so long ago, I would run every morning to the gym and work out. It didn’t matter if it was bitterly cold or if it was raining, I would still do it. I realized around this time last year that if I was committed as much to God as I was to keeping my body in top physical shape then I could change the world.

It is time for distractions to get out of the way and to run the race in order to win. If I are running a marathon I am not going to stop running because I am worried about the stock market. Yet I am distracted away from God so easily! Time to lace up the running shoes and get to work!