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.
Showing posts with label evangelism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label evangelism. Show all posts
Friday, June 29, 2007
Friday, June 1, 2007
How will we respond to crisis?
I read an article last night that was talking about cancer as being a third wave disease from the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. What would happen if the 40,000 workers who were exposed to the toxins at ground zero came down with a cancer type that has no treatment? I can tell you what I would do, I would organize a team to go to New York City to see every last one of them healed!
After Hurricane Katrina ravaged the Gulf Coast almost two years ago, a team from Bethel went to minister to the evacuees that were living in the Astrodome in Houston, TX. God showed up in amazing ways as people were healed of things that had kept them in bed or in wheelchairs and God even healed a man who walked by the team as they were praying for someone else!
Not that I can't ever experience a normal life, but I believe we are already living in a crisis situation where many are dying without knowing Jesus. I have had the tendency to live my life as normal amidst the brokenness of the people surrounding me. Each day is an opportunity to save someone from their own crisis situation - there is no need to wait for a national disaster to jump into action.
The people that we see during our normal activities could be drowning inside and desperately in need of a touch from God. However, without the covering of a crisis, it is easy to dismiss their demise as one of a million problems that can't all be fixed by one person. It doesn't have to be one person, but unfortunately in the church today the majority of the EHRs (Emergency Healing Revivalists) are just a handful of people (and I am NOT one of them yet). They are the few that produce the vast majority of the testimonies. The saying that 20% of the people get 80% of the work done may be true, or the percentage could be even more lopsided in the scarcity of the revivalists that harvest most of the crop.
Revival comes when God moves, but it also requires radical obedience by His people. When Peter was threatened to never talk about Jesus again in Acts 4, his response was to ask God for more boldness. He didn't back down, but asked for God to do more of what had just gotten them in trouble (healing the sick!). Lord, grant your servants boldness to take risks when we face disasters on a personal level in our daily lives!
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!
Thursday, May 31, 2007
A step in the right direction
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.
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.
Saturday, April 14, 2007
prepare today for the great harvest tomorrow
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!
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!
Friday, April 6, 2007
Gettin' out of the box
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!
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!
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