If I could give you one key to a successful 2013, it would be this: Think practices, not products!

Everyone is making new years resolutions right now, and that is a good thing, not a bad thing. But make sure that your resolution takes the form of a practice, not a product. Let me explain the difference.

Here are some examples of product oriented new years resolutions:

In 2013 I will write and publish a book!

In 2013 I will lose 35 pounds!

In 2013 I will learn to speak a new language!

In 2013 I will save $20,000!

In 2013 I will memorize 100 verses of Scripture!

All of these are great goals, and if any one of them is on your list, you are definitely thinking in the right direction. In 2013 I believe God wants to move us forward in places where we feel stuck, where little or no progress has been made. We need to think big this year! In 2013 its go hard or go home!

But their are three distinct problems with product-oriented resolutions, and these problems are the reason why most people fail to accomplish their resolutions. If you understand these problems and shape your resolutions differently, I believe you cannot help but succeed in all you do!

Problem #1: Product-oriented resolutions are so daunting! We tend to set huge goals for ourselves, and every day we awaken to this huge task before us. Lose 35 pounds. Every morning I wake up to the scale, and I'm confronted by the fact that I still haven't lost 35 pounds! Product-oriented resolutions delay my sense of accomplishment for months into the year!

Problem #2: Product-oriented resolutions lead to discouragement and/or embarrassment. What if you don't lose 35 pounds? What if you only lose 25 pounds? 25 pounds is a clear win! You've changed your life in an incredibly powerful way, but it still feels like a loss because you fell short of your goal.

Problem #3: Product-oriented resolutions are short-term, and thus short-lived. To continue the weight-loss example, what happens after you lose the 35 pounds? Your only goal was to get it off. Now that you've accomplished that, are you going to go crazy with food again? People lose weight on diets all the time, but the weight doesn't stay off because the goal was to procure the product of a certain weight-loss number, rather than to establish a life-style that includes the practices that lead inexorably to weight-loss and long-term health.

Now let's look at the same group of resolutions from a practice-orientation, rather than a product-orientation:

In 2013 I will write for one hour every day!

In 2013 I will exercise at least four times a week!

In 2013 I will spend 30 minutes a day studying Spanish!

In 2013 I will save 15% of my gross income every single month!

In 2013 I will meditate on a verse of Scripture every day!

All of these practices lead to your desired products, but because the focus is on the practices, rather than the products, your heart and mind are protected from being overwhelmed by the immensity of the task of producing a product like a book, or learning a new language. Bettering your life is not about amassing more products, it is about developing the practices that make you feel good about yourself when you go to bed at night. So stop thinking about what you want to produce, and start thinking about what you will practice in 2013. Focus on those practices and get em right, and you'll produce more products than you ever thought you could possibly produce. Its called bearing fruit!

P.S. My new book, A Path Through Mighty Waters, will help you tremendously with the last resolution! :-) To buy it on Google Play, click here. To buy it on Amazon, click here.

In the 16th century Martin Luther emphasized the biblical theme of the priesthood of all believers as a critique of what he saw as an overemphasis upon the professional priesthood in the Roman Catholic Church. Luther contended that from a biblical perspective, every believer in Jesus Christ is a priest, not just the professional clergy. Inspired by Luther, William Tyndale set out to translate the Bible into English, having devoted his life to the prospect of making the Scriptures accessible to the common man. In a famous encounter with a group of priests whom Tyndale rebuked for placing the words of the pope above those of Scripture, Tyndale declared: "...if God spares my life, ere many years, I will cause the boy that driveth the plow to know more of the Scriptures than thou dost!" (see Foxes Book of Martyrs, chapter XII)

While nearly 500 years have passed since Luther tacked the 95 Theses to the door of the Wittenburg Cathedral, it is now time for a new reformation! Tyndale (and others in the tradition of Wycliff) sought to make the bible accessible to the masses by translating it into the language of the common man. That has proven to be a highly successful pursuit, as now bible translations abound, and anyone with internet access has access to as many free bible translations as their hearts desire! But my contention is that we have not gone far enough in providing the means for equipping the average believer with the weapons that comprise the arsenal of the average pastor.

Seminaries and bible colleges are for those who are called to full-time ministry, right? But see, there's the problem right there! We are all full-time ministers! Every believer in Jesus Christ is called to the ministry, not just pastors and teachers! Ministry is not just an event, not just something that happens within the four walls of the local church; ministry is everything that every believer does in the world as a representation of Christ. Just as we expect pastors to be serious about preparing themselves for the sacred task of declaring the gospel to the people of God and rightly dividing the word of truth, so we must begin to expect every member of the body of Christ to get serious about preparing themselves to bear witness to the resurrection and glory of Jesus Christ in the work place...in the realms of education, of politics and government, of arts and media, of family, of entertainment, of science and medicine, etc. Every believer is called with a holy calling, and that means that we must get serious about preparing every believer to fulfill that holy calling!

The problem is that the traditional routes take too much time and money. A seminary education can cost $60k or more, and typically requires three years of full-time study or more. We cannot expect every believer to drop everything and go to seminary, and in fact such a decision would not be wise. Seminary will continue to be a viable option for those who are called to professional/vocational ministry within the local church, and/or those called to be biblical scholars and theologians. Seminary is not the problem; the problem is that there is no viable alternative for those called to serve in non-church related realms. If such an alternative existed...a way of providing the core content of a seminary education to every believer in a digestible, understandable, and practically applicable package, it would spell the beginning of a new reformation...a 21st century reformation!

What if every Christian took their calling seriously? What if Christians in the secular workplace saw themselves as the pastors and teachers divinely appointed to serve there? I know, this type of rhetoric is already widely used in the body of Christ. But I still don't believe it is really taken seriously. Pastors are expected to pray fervently and study the Scriptures intensely as they prepare themselves to bring the word of God to bear upon the people of God. But how many marketplace Christians prepare themselves with the same intensity before going to work in the morning? Christians in the marketplace tend to say that they see themselves as full-time ministers, but they rarely take that calling seriously enough to take the time to arm themselves with the accoutrements of the task set before them. Workplace evangelism tends to take the form of simplistic spiritual platitudes and invitations to come to my church on Sunday! "Come hear my pastor preach," is not what Jesus meant when he commanded us to make disciples of all nations! What if every member of the church had just as much depth in the word as the pastor? Now that would constitute a real reformation that actualizes the priesthood of all believers!

We are a kingdom of priests! But we've got to get ourselves ready! We've got to take our calling seriously! Its not enough to sit under a pastor who knows the word intimately; you've got to know the word intimately yourself! And you've got to prepare yourself to give a reason for the hope that you have to anyone who asks! Its time for the church of the 21st century to wake up from its slumber, and when that day comes every member of every church will rise up and take their place! This is my passion in a nutshell: If the Lord spares my life, ere many years, I will cause the boy that driveth the plow to know more of the Scriptures than the average pastor!

Are you ready to take your place? Let Abba University start you on your journey! We can provide you with the core content of a seminary education without the complexity of technical research papers and obscure academic reading! We equip our online classrooms with high quality HD video lectures that are deep enough to challenge you, yet simple enough to engage you, and our courses require as little as one hour per week! And here's the best part: the cost to you is only $95 per course! 

Don't wait another day: register today and let Abba U empower you to take your place in the 21st century reformation!

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In my previous entry I discussed the secular dimensions of what I see as the next great revolution of our generation and how it is reshaping our definition of locality. My argument was that technological advancements in the realms of communication and transportation have affectively made the world a smaller place...and since locality is primarily about accessibility, as our accessibility increases our local spheres of influence and relationship also increase!

In this post I'd like to discuss a primary spiritual dimension of this next great revolution. My argument is simple: church is about to change! In fact, the transition has already begun, and if we are to catch the wave of the next great move of God we must shift our hearts and minds into alignment with what God is doing in the body of Christ!

So what is God up to, and how will it change the way we do church? From my perspective the answer to that question is found in Malachi 4:5-6.

Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.

We have entered into the season in which God is releasing the spirit of Elijah within the body of Christ, and the role of the spirit of Elijah is to return the spirit of fatherhood and sonship to the body of Christ. God is removing the curse of fatherless from the earth by causing there to be a turning of the hearts of fathers toward their children, and the hearts of children towards their fathers. Where this does not take place, a curse remains on the land.

To state this clearly, God is reviving the role of the spiritual father in the body of Christ, and in doing so he is teaching us how to become his children, and how to become mature sons and daughters of God! This is the great revolution that is just now beginning to break forth in the body of Christ that corresponds to the social revolution that is happening in the world. Together, these two great movements will completely transform the way we see church, the way we see our role in the kingdom of God, and the way we grow in our relationships with each other and with God.

However, when I say this this movement is just now beginning I do not mean that people are just now beginning to speak of the realities of spiritual fatherhood and sonship. In fact, the concepts are as old as the body of Christ itself. Paul referred to Timothy as his true son in the faith, and in Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy the concept of the spiritual father has always remained strong. However, Luther and the reformers threw it out because Jesus said that we should call no man father. The result has been an overly individualized form of Christian spirituality that has pervaded the Protestant world, manifesting itself most prominently in the tens of thousands of denominational entities that have cropped up since the reformation.

Yet, even in the past 100 years talk of spiritual fatherhood has begun to creep up in Protestant circles as many evangelicals (especially pentecostal-charismatics) have begun to sense the presence of this reality and have sought to trace its contours.

But the nature of spiritual fatherhood and sonship -- what it really means -- has yet to be adequately articulated and understood within these circles. We've known about it for a long time, but we're just now beginning to understand it. The next step is that we actually begin to practice it!

In the next move of God pastors will begin to see themselves as the spiritual fathers of their congregations and church members will begin to see themselves as the sons and daughters of their respective houses. The result will be an increase in the authority of the set man to bring freedom to the hearts and minds of the sons and daughters of the house and an ability to pass down the things that God reveals from one generation to the next (see Deuteronomy 29:29).

This will change the way we see and do church because what we will look for will be completely different from what we have looked for. The concept of the local church is a spacial concept and it is dependent upon transportational and communicational restrictions. But what will happen as those restrictions are being alleviated by technological advancement is that people will no longer look for a church in their region to join, but will join themselves to the man or woman of God who gives birth to them through their teaching. Sons and daughters are born through teaching, just as we are all born again through the incorruptible seed of the word of God which lives and endures forever (1 Peter 1:23).

This shift in my thinking has taken place gradually over the past few years, but has hit its tipping in just the past 6 months, and it was my experience with the Bermudez family in Oklahoma that brought my thinking on this subject to its present place of clarity. Rene and Naomi Bermudez live in Oklahoma just outside of Tulsa. Through a series of events, Rene discovered a couple of my sermons on youtube and was blessed by them. He them shared them with his wife, who was also blessed. Then he discovered Living Hope's website (one of the two churches that I pastor) and my podcast there and began listening to sermon after sermon with his wife. Then he discovered my blog and facebook fanpage and began digesting everything I communicated there. Finally, he discovered that Living Hope live-streams all of its services and began gathering his family around their computer to participate in our services from Oklahoma.

At the time Rene contacted me he and his family had already been following our ministry for three months. They listened to every sermon, read every blog post and every facebook status update, participated in every service. The only thing they were missing was a connection to the community. Rene finally contacted me with a request that confronted me with a hole in my paradigm: "Can we become members of Living Hope from Oklahoma?" I didn't know what to say; that request didn't fit into my paradigm...so I told him I'd have to pray about it and get back to him.

But how could I turn him and his family away? I had this sense that they had been born into my house through the teaching they had received! I was now responsible for this family just as I am responsible for the teaching. But how could I receive them? They are in Oklahoma, for God's sake! How could they be a part of the community from Oklahoma?!?

Then I realized that the technological advancements in the realm of communication had already begun to answer that question. One of the most powerful community builders that Living Hope has is a facebook members group. As soon as we receive people into membership we add them to that online community, and the interactions that happen there are nothing short of amazing! When someone feels down, they let the group know and the members encourage one another right there on the wall! So much love, so much care, so much encouragement is communicated there, it causes me to marvel!

So we accepted the Bermudez family and livestreamed them into the next membership course. We gave them a Barnabas Partner (I ministry we created to help integrate people into the life of the house) and introduced them to the body. We welcomed them into membership along with the others who went through the process, and then added them to the facebook group. The result is that they are more connected to the life of the house than some people who live around the corner! The community loves them and they love the community! In fact, they are so interactive in the facebook group that someone invited them to their home for dinner, thinking they lived nearby!

How is it that a family in Oklahoma watching a computer screen can be more connected to the life of a church than people who live around the corner from it? Because the life of a church is not regional life, it is spiritual life, and the Spirit transcends space and time. Where the life of the Spirit is imparted between a spiritual father and a spiritual son, there we have a manifestation of "church" that is more family oriented than regionally oriented. The idea behind the local church is that family and community can only happen within a particular locale. This is not true even in the natural! When I moved from the Bay Area to Pasadena to go to Fuller Seminary my parents did not say, "Its been great having you as a Robinson, but now your first priority in Pasadena is to find a new family to be a part of." No, I was always a son of Peter and Diane Robinson, and that sonship has never been a spacial phenomenon. So why do we send off church members to new cities and instruct them to find a new spiritual family? Because our concept of the local church is communal, but not familial. When you are a son, you are a son, and that transcends location.  And how do I know who my sons are? My sons are those who receive my teaching! And my spiritual father is the one whose teaching I receive as a son. Wherever this occurs in the world, we've just begun to experience church the way God intends it in the days to come. Locality, from this perspective, is a spiritual phenomenon, not a regional phenomenon.

In the next post I want to flesh out spiritual fatherhood and sonship with greater detail in order to reach for greater clarity on this all-important reality! Thanks for sticking with me. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

We are living in the midst of what I consider to be the third great revolution of the modern world. The first was the Industrial Revolution, the second was the Technological Revolution, and these two have given birth to a third: the Social Revolution. The result of the first two revolutions was to make available to the masses what was once available only to the few. The result of this third revolution is to make the masses available to the masses. Not only do we now have access to creative innovations that can enhance the quality of our lives; we now have access to each other!

The two primary contributors to this revolution have been advancements in the realms of transportation and communication. Advancements in transportation have given us greater physical access to each other and advancements in communication have given us greater virtual access to each other, and the way in which the tension between these two areas of advancement is resolved will determine the shape of the future of the modern world.

I say ‘tension’ because it seems that transportation and communication are rivals at heart; the more you have of one, the less you need of the other. Traveling to visit a friend is unnecessary if you can communicate with that friend just as effectively in the privacy of your own home, and communicating with your friend remotely is not so attractively if you find that you can travel to their location without inconvenience. We are finding that moderns highly value both efficiency and intimacy and the realms of transportation and communication are advancing as transportation becomes more efficient and communication becomes more intimate. Because both of these values are entrenched in human nature, we can be sure that both realms will continue to advance and neither will ultimately overshadow the other. There will always be contexts in which we prefer the efficiency of virtual presence over physical presence and there will always be contexts in which we prefer the intimacy of physical presence over virtual presence and for each of us the balance between the two will be at a slightly different place.

While these two areas of advancement seem to be working against one another, in actuality they are working together in a powerful way. (To put it in Hegelian terms, the thesis of transportational advancement and the antithesis of communicational advancement has produced the synthesis of Social Revolution.) The result of the Social Revolution has been the radical redefinition of the term ‘local’. Remember when ‘local’ calls were restricted to your area code and calling even just a few cities away was considered ‘long distance’? Now nationwide calling plans are the standard! That means that – as far as calling plans are concerned – California and New York are ‘local’ entities. What is more, Skype, iChat, Facetime and the like have given us the capacity to have communicate with people in other nations just as easily as we communicate with someone across town. This means that, from a communications standpoint, the concept of ‘local’ is relative to the availability of technology. The ‘local’ and the ‘global’ are becoming less and less antonymous and more and more synonymous. The local and the global are coming together, and this is where the idea of ‘glocality’ is coming from.

So what does this mean for the church?

What the concept of glocality is doing is expanding our understanding of the nature and meaning of the local church. Every other sector of society has transcended a regional concept of locality except the church. Companies are outsourcing and offering remote employment opportunities and communicating through telepresence, etc. Clubs are providing international memberships. Schools are offering satellite programs and online degrees, and the list goes on! What all of these entities are discovering is that locality is about accessibility, and if we can utilize communication technologies to supplement the lag in the development of transportational technologies to make local resources accessible at a global level, we have effectively localized the globe!

The next wave of revival will be sustained by the glocalization of the church. The future of church in the 21^st century is glocality, and this applies not only to the mission of the church to reach the nations for Christ, but to the membership of local churches as well. This element of glocality will come into being not simply as more religious resources (like podcasts, live streams, books, etc) are made more readily available at the global level, but as the element of commitment/covenant is added. We already have access to a surplus of information, but what we are starving for a corresponding surplus of intimacy. What we are finding is that information without intimacy is ultimately empty!

The availability of information, goods and services was the product of the technological revolution, but the availability of community is the promise of the social revolution. The social revolution gives us access to relationships that we otherwise would have no access to because of physical distance. The church of the 21st century must learn to harness this power of connectivity and exploit it for the purposes of the kingdom of God! We must go beyond the dissemination of religious goods and services and actually bring the people of God into covenant relationships. When this happens we will exchange the pervasive consumerism that plagues contemporary Christianity for a robust sense of global presence facilitated through covenantal relationships. Satellite memberships: its the next wave for the church of the 21st century, and in my humble opinion, the future looks bright! 

In the next several posts I’d like to explore this idea further in order to reflect upon the biblical, theological and practical implications of it. I hope you join me for the journey, and I'd love to hear your thoughts and responses!

Parenthood, childhood, friendship, courtship, engagement, marriage... All of these are forms of relationships. They are not mere titles or roles, but they are forms that relationships may take. Neither are they arbitrary, or easily changeable! There is no such thing as pure relationship...relationship that does not take a specific form. Every relationship is specific, and the ability to identify and cultivate the specific form of a relationship will determine the power of it either to heal or to destroy. Happiness happens when relationships are properly stewarded, grief is the result of a failure to properly steward relationships, and the failure to properly steward a relationship begins with the failure to properly define it.

The task of defining the relationship is the task of determining its purpose and therefore the responsibility of each party. For instance, if you are a parent, the purpose of your relationship with your child(ren) is relatively obvious. If you hesitate to correct/instruct/encourage/discipline/engage them because you're worried about overstepping your boundaries, you've misunderstood your responsibility in the relationship. But if you understand that you bear the responsibility to raise them properly and to shape their character, then you will rebuke them when they need to be rebuked, encourage them when they need to be encouraged, instruct them when they need to be encouraged, and you won't feel any angst about it because you're clear on your role and responsibility.

However, defining the relationship can also be a difficult thing to do. For instance, if you are a member of a local church your relationship with your pastor is not primarily a friendship. Your pastor has a responsibility toward you and you have a responsibility toward him/her. If you try to transform that relationship into a mere friendship you will miss out on the resources that that relationship is supposed to procure for you. The failure to properly define that relationship will ultimately lead to grief!

The most poignant context for misdefining relationships is within the complex of possible relationships between members of the opposite sex. It is essential for your present and future happiness that you properly define your relationships with members of the opposite sex so that you can be intentional about stewarding those relationships correctly! The failure to do so will lead to grief...to much grief...too much grief!!! So for God's sake, listen to what I'm about to say!

The most common mistake that single friends of the opposite sex make is allowing for long-term ambiguity in regard to the nature of the relationship. Have you ever been confused about how to define your relationship with a member of the opposite sex? Have you ever found yourself having coffee and thinking, "We're just friends, right?" Ambiguity happens when a male and a female develop a friendship that is more intimate than their other friendships with members of the opposite sex, yet not quite intimate enough to be called a "relationship." So what is it? Its not a friendship, its not a relationship...it can only be defined as a train-wreck waiting to happen!


Why is this the case? Because a relationship that cannot be defined cannot fulfill any specific purpose! Non-purposive relationships are also non-directional, and therefore aimless. If you are confused about the nature of your relationship with someone, confusion becomes the definition of that relationship...and a relationship characterized by confusion can only create confusion. The primary principle for the health of any relationship is the principle of clarity! If you are friends, be friends. If you are boyfriend and girlfriend, be boyfriend and girlfriend. If you are only friends but are acting like boyfriend and girlfriend, you are deceiving yourselves! But before you move into the dating/courtship stages too quickly consider what I have to say next.

The dating and courtship levels of relationship must fulfill a specific purpose as well, and that purpose is not simply to do away with your loneliness! Many people date just so they can have someone to date...so they don't have to be left out on Valentines night. Dating and courtship are not simply for the sake of the thrill of companionship. That mentality leads to debauchery. The purpose of dating/courtship is to move toward marriage. If you are not interested in getting married, you shouldn't be dating. If you know in your heart that a particular person is not marriage material, you have no business dating them!

Keeping this principle in mind will create boundaries in your thinking that will protect you from much grief. Pursue clarity, reject confusion, embrace responsibility. Do this and you'll find happiness!

The Genesis narrative teaches us that desire and need occur only by means of revelation, either demonic or divine. The human soul exists between two revelatory options when it comes to desire; the devil seeks to reveal to us that we desire the things of this world, and the Spirit of God seeks to reveal to us that we desire the things of God. Each time we embrace a particular desire we come to faith in one teaching or the other.

Adam was alone, but not lonely. To be lonely is to consciously grieve the absence of others. Adam did not yet know grief, and so he did not yet know loneliness. He was not conscious of any personal needs...in fact he was conscious only of the fact that God was the provider of all his needs. God had to tell him that he was alone and that it was not good for him to be alone. Adam's need for a woman was a revelation from God. Because God was responsible for revealing Adam's need, he also took responsibility for meeting it, and this is paradigmatic for the life of faith. Whenever God reveals a need he does so because he fully intends to meet it. So he put Adam into a deep sleep and brought out of him the answer to his need. The whole process was instigated by God, executed by God, and completed by God. Adam was passive on all accounts. All that was left for him to do was to yield to the sleep that God brought over him and then rejoice in the woman God brought to him when he awoke.

This is what our lives are supposed to look like. We are so busy trying to figure out what we want from God that we don't stop to listen for what God wants for us. At the end of the day we really don't believe that God wants anything good for us. We think he wants us to be broke, sick, lonely, hurt, and discouraged, and this way of thinking is so unworthy of a God who gives us all things freely to enjoy!

Eve, on the other hand did not desire the fruit of the knowledge of the tree of good and evil. All she knew was that God had commanded them not to eat of it, and that was enough for her! She did not naturally desire to disobey God. In fact, she wanted to obey him! She was content with what he had given her and was completely fulfilled. Just as God had to tell Adam that he was alone and needed a wife, so the devil had to tell Eve that she was incomplete without that particular fruit. Temptation always begins with deception! In fact, temptation is a form of satanic revelation. Satan is constantly trying to reveal a lie to God's people! The lie is that you want sin!

This is where the rubber meets the road, and this will set you free if you truly get it! Most believers who struggle with sin issues think they are struggling because of their evil desires! This is the greatest deception that the enemy has sent to the people of God, and I'm exposing it right now! Hear this and hear it well: If you are a believer in Jesus Christ, you have been regenerated by the power of the Spirit and your flesh (sinful nature) has been put to death. The new nature of righteousness has been born in its place and you have been completely cleansed of your sin. You do not desire sin anymore! Now you desire God and his Spirit and his kingdom and his righteousness and his power and his love and his blessing and his favor and his will and his ways! In order to get you to sin, Satan has to convince you that you still want it! But that's a lie!


Then why, you might ask, do I still feel the desire for sin? You still feel the desire for sin because you still believe that you want it. You are no longer under the power of the devil, but you still think you are. You are no longer in your sins, but you still think you are. Once you unmask the power of the deception of sinful desire, you have virtually conquered sin because you are now established in the truth that your soul thirsts for God, for the living God!

How do we do this? Easy! Its called repentance. But most believers repent for the wrong thing! Don't just repent for committing the sin and walk away believing that you still desire to commit the sin. Real repentance is a change of mind (that's what the word metanoia means, after all), not saying sorry for an action. To change your mind you need to repent for believing that you desire to do what you have done. Sin requires faith. Repentance is the rejection of faith in the demonic teaching on desire. Jesus commands us to repent and believe the gospel. Stop believing the demonic lie that tells you that you are still bound by the desire to sin and begin to believe the truth that Jesus has set you free...and not only has he set you free from the act of sin, but from the desire for it! The Spirit of God is ready to release that revelation into your life, and if you receive it you will not only conquer sin, but you will find that your desire for God and for the things of God will jump off the charts! But the truth is (and I speak by revelation) your heart's desire is for God and God alone.

Love and lust are realities that are drastically different, yet often confused. What they have in common is the component of desire; desire can either take the form of love or lust. The distinction is in the outcome: lust perverts the purpose of its object by using it as a means of self-gratification. Love perfects the purpose of its object by restoring its dignity and recognizing its sanctity.

All things were created by God for his sheer enjoyment. This is why God takes a break on the 7th day; not out of exhaustion, but out of enjoyment! God looks upon all that his hands have made and declares it to be good, very good. God desires to enjoy his creation through the enjoyment of man, therefore he blesses people with good things, which he gives them freely to enjoy (1 Timothy 6:17). In man's free enjoyment of God's good creation, God himself rejoices in his creation. This is why we should never be afraid to enjoy what God has given us. He blesses us to be blessed and to be a blessing. But too many believers feel guilty receiving God's blessings, or try to limit God's blessings over their lives out of a desire to make sacrifices for the kingdom of God. Making sacrifices for the kingdom of God is a good thing when those sacrifices have been mandated by the kingdom of God. In other words, when you are sacrificing what God has given you to enjoy it is not godly at all! Likewise, it is not godly for you to enjoy what God has given you to sacrifice! Discernment is required to know the difference, and that discernment comes through the spirit of sonship and submission so that we may learn to offer right sacrifices, and not religious sacrifices, to God through Jesus Christ.

The Bible tells us that lust causes corruption and decay (2 Peter 1.4). Lust breaks things down by separating them from their created purpose. Ultimately all things were created for God's enjoyment and God has determined to use the enjoyment of man as a vehicle for his own enjoyment. Lust perverts the purpose of things by cutting them off from God's enjoyment. When a man engages in a form of enjoyment that God will have no part of that man is engaging in lust. Lust robs its object of God's enjoyment, and therefore lust is idolatrous! It replaces divine enjoyment with self-gratification, and in the absence of divine enjoyment things begin to break down and decay. Thus, lust is the vehicle through which Satan perverts God's good creation by cutting it off from God's enjoyment. Satan wants to destroy God's creation, and he wants to use you and me as his vehicles! If we harbor lust we join his program of destruction!

Love, on the other hand, restores things to their created purpose by covering sin, casting out fear, and cultivating faith. Love comes from God, it is his gift and the central attribute of his being. Love is patient and kind, it does not boast, it is not easily provoked, it keeps no record of wrongs, it does not rejoice in evil but rejoices in the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, and always perseveres. This is why love never fails! Its no wonder John said the one who loves is born of God and knows God! Love never takes an object as a source of personal enjoyment in isolation from God, but love seeks to reconnect people and things to God's enjoyment. When you are being truly loved you will feel it coming from two sources simultaneously: from the person giving it to you, and from God. When you are truly loving you will feel like a channel of God's love, as if his love were just flowing through you and you had no love of your own. If we keep these truths in mind we will intentionally partner with God in restoring people to their created purpose by bringing them into the flow of God's supernatural, eternal and unconditional love!

On my way home today I heard a piece on pbs about how the practice of technological inclusion is working to transform lives and communities in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. Technological Inclusion, I discovered, is the process of making technological advancements accessible to those for whom such advancements are beyond reach. This process entails making technology understandable and affordable. Older people, for instance, often do not understand new technologies and prefer archaic and outdated (which usually means that they are more labor-intensive, less effective and more time consuming) methods that they are used to. Lower income communities, on the other hand, often do not have the financial ability to procure newer technologies and are often excluded for economic reasons. The process of technological inclusion then consists of educating older people who have yet to understand the benefits of newer technologies and subsidizing financially underprivileged people who desire such technologies but do not have the means of acquiring them.

The people who benefit from technological inclusion learn how to utilize technological resources as a means of understanding and transforming the realities of their experiences. For instance, a group of ten jr. high school aged boys who were given cell phones with internet access and video cameras used their phones to 1) video rats rummaging through loose garbage on the streets of Rio, 2) make people aware of the problem by posting the videos on youtube, and 3) get the word out through text messages and emails. The result was that the garbage problem was brought to the attention of the city authorities and measures were taken to deal with the rampant garbage problem. Making these boys recipients of the benefits of technological inclusion empowered them to understand and transform their environment!

As I listened to this story it dawned on me that the primary activity of the church could be described as Supernatural Inclusion. Supernatural Inclusion is the process of making supernatural resources accessible to those who are excluded from the benefit of such resources. Like technological inclusion, supernatural inclusion also entails making the supernatural understandable and affordable. The educative aspects of this process are directed toward those who are so accustomed to living by natural means that they do not yet see the benefit of the supernatural, or do not even believe that it exists. This archaic way of living is referred to in Scripture as the flesh. The first aspect of supernatural inclusion is educating people about the fact that living by the flesh is far more labor-intensive, less effective and more time consuming than living by the Spirit and participating in the supernatural resources of the Spirit-filled life. And the worst part of it is that even with all that extra work you still don't get the results from the flesh that you get from the Spirit. Just as people die all the time because of a technological deficit, so people die all the time because of a supernatural deficit. If we can succeed in educating people about the power of supernatural living, we can not only change lives, but empower people to change lives!

The affordability component is directed toward those who understand the benefit of the supernatural and may even desire to participate in the resources of the supernatural, but are not willing/able to pay the price. Like the latest technology, supernatural living is costly. It requires the relinquishment of the claim to personal sovereignty and abandonment to the lordship of Christ. Many people cannot afford this because they are spiritually impoverished having been enslaved by the dictatorial powers of sin and the demonic. Making the supernatural resources of heaven available to this group of people requires the payment of their debts (by the blood of Christ) and the release of supernatural life (through faith, the preaching of the gospel, the prophetic, prayer, etc). In other words, these individuals know that Jesus can help them, but are unable to seek him or believe him for themselves. They need friends who can tear a whole in the roof to lower them down to Jesus.

Supernatural inclusion is not religious inclusion: our goal is not to make the religion of Christianity accessible to those who are outside of its boundaries, but to make the supernatural resources of heaven accessible! The goal is not to lead people into Christian practices, but into supernatural experiences. Empowered with the resources of heaven, people will emerge from their encounters with believers with the ability to change their lives and their communities with the power of God!

If our churches began to understand their role in the world as being characterized by supernatural inclusion, the result will be a Christianity that is not only full of charismatic expression, but characterized by the process of educated openness. I am a charismatic-Pentecostal, but I want more than the ability to have charismatic experiences; I want to help others have charismatic experiences. I want more than the power to lay hands on the sick and heal them; I want to empower others to lay hands on the sick and heal them. I want more than the ability to hear and speak powerful words from God; I want to empower others to hear and speak powerful words from God. I want more than a powerful Christianity; I want an empowering Christianity! This, I believe, is God's heart for the church of the 21st century!

Spiritual renewal is a dangerous thing if it is not coupled with a renewed understanding of order and authority. Spiritual experience and hierarchical authority are often considered antithetical realities. We tend to think that we can have one or the other, either spiritually arid order and government, or highly experiential chaos and disorder. I believe this division between order and experience is the primary reason why historical revivals have not had the type of lasting and dramatic impact they were designed to have in the world. From a biblical perspective, this is the primary reason Paul writes the letter of First Corinthians. The Corinthian believers had very powerful services in which multiple miraculous and prophetic spiritual gifts were in operation. But there was no order there. Paul's intention was not to quell the currents of revival that were washing over that church, but to add order to it so that all things would be done with decency and order. "For God is not a God of disorder but of peace" (1 Corinthians 14:33). Experience without order is like a drug-induced high. It feels good but it is not productive, and at the end of the day it destroys relationships! So in this blog entry I'd like to discuss the relationship between order and disorder, and in the process clearly define what proper authority in the church should look like.

Let's begin by charting the difference between order and disorder. The following charts should help you understand what the two look like.

Disorder always begins with fear...of not getting your way, of being misunderstood, of being mistreated, of being controlled and of being manipulated. Fear clouds the mind, damages the understanding, and skews the power of the will. 

This is why fear always leads to confusion. Confusion is lack of clarity, lack of certainty and lack of security. Confusion is a state of bewilderment. The confused person knows there's a problem, but can't pinpoint it and therefore can't fix it. Yet, he knows it needs to be fixed, so he frantically tries to fix it, but because he is confused he has misdiagnosed the problem and has therefore prescribed the wrong medicine and the wrong treatment.

Confusion is always coupled with anxiety. Anxiety is a state of worry, nervousness or unease. It manifests as an overwhelming sense of impending trouble; something is about to go wrong! In this sense, anxiety is prophetic because it declares what will happen 'tomorrow at about this time', but it is a hated prophet because it never has anything good to say!

Because confusion and anxiety lead to the attempt to fix the wrong problems, they always lead to division and conflict. When the wrong medicine is prescribed it makes the patient more sick! Conflict is a sense of irreconcilable incompatibility. It is only possible in the presence of unbelief, because conflict is a failure to believe in the reality of oneness. Division polarizes communities into two or more camps; it is a form of civil war. It is 'the act or process of being separated'. Division takes that which is rightfully one and makes it effectively two.

The result of the progression is rebellion, and this is the irony of it all. Once rebellion has set in confusion leaves, anxiety and fear dissipate, and clarity comes! The rebellious man is absolutely sure of the rightness of his position, and so he is bold in the proclamation of his gospel! The only problem is that his gospel contradicts the clear gospel of the house. Now the house will certainly be divided or destroyed, because two different gospels are being preached and the people are torn between one loyalty or another.

Order, on the other hand, begins with obedience. Obedience has nothing to do with faith, understanding, or agreement. Obedience is simply the decision to comply with the desires of another. Obedience says, I'll do it even though I don't necessarily like it, understand it, or agree with it. Obedience primarily involves the actions, rather than the heart or thoughts. The thoughts and heart are involved, but only at the basic level, for the one who obeys simply knows and feels that it is the right thing to do and the best thing for the community.

In submission and trust, the heart is more deeply engaged. Submission is the action of shifting the heart and mind around that which was formerly obeyed. Submission receives instruction not merely as command but as truth. It requires trust because it does not yet necessarily engage the understanding. This is what the disciples were getting at in John 6 when they said, "Lord where would we go? You have the words of eternal life." In other words, we have no understanding of what you are saying, and because we don't yet understand we cannot agree. Yet, we refuse to disagree because we know you and trust you to be one who speaks truth. 

The next level is agreement. Agreement is mental and emotional harmony; it is a shared perspective. Agreement says not only do I submit and trust, but I understand and perceive at the same level. This manifests itself as a sense of connection, of intimacy and of communion. 

All of this leads to what the bible calls 'unity'. We can also refer to this state as 'oneness'. When we are one, or united, we are completely submitted to one another out of reverence for Christ (Ephesians 5:21). We now share all things common and none of us claim that anything is his own. In unity all hierarchy and becomes invisible. It is always there, but it becomes virtually unnecessary because it is fully subordinated to love. In this state we are united in action, thought, emotion, desire, and spirit.

Can you imagine what would happen if a powerful revival were coupled with complete order? It would be powerful beyond measure! It would have the power to transform whole cities! It would change both the church and the world! I believe that the Spirit of God is bringing the two together in these last days so that the fruit of revival is no longer lost in the fallout of disorder.

Conventional wisdom teaches that trouble comes when you begin to live beyond your means. You end up spending money you don't have to buy things you don't need and end up in a place you don't like: back-breaking debt and hopelessness about your financial future. Your best bet is to live within your means, spending only what you make, being content with what you have and committing yourself only to that which you can faithfully steward. This is a balanced approach to life, and its benefits are many!

Yet, without disagreeing with the conventional wisdom, I would like to suggest that there is a sense in which God calls us to live beyond our means and that striving to live within our means in this regard restricts the work of the Spirit of God in increasing our territory and expanding our boundaries. The call of God always pushes us beyond the boundaries of the practical and requires us to embrace the faith that commands the practical to submit to the spiritual. This means that if you are doing only what you can do with the resources you have, you have not yet fully discerned the call of God upon your life or adequately responded to it. Until you stand before a hungry multitude with nothing in your hands and hear the Lord say, "You give them something to eat," you have not heard God call you! This is what I have been learning in this new season that God has taken us into, and this is what I want to share with you in this post.

First, let me catch you up on what has happened over the past couple months. On the last Friday in May my wife called me to inform me that a three-day notice had been placed on the door of our 1,000 square foot condo in Dublin, CA. We purchased that condo four years ago and were happy living there; though the place was small and greatly restrictive, we were thankful for it as it was the first home we could call our own. But within a few months of closing escrow we began to hear the reports of the crash of the real estate market and became concerned. By year 3 the home had lost nearly 40% of its value and we were facing the prospects of foreclosure as we were fighting to continue paying an interest only loan that was about to fully amortize and go through the roof!

During that season my wife spent her Friday nights in prayer at the church with a few members of her missions team. They began praying at 10pm and finished at 5am. During one of those sessions the Lord spoke to my wife and said, "Let your condo go, go home and start packing and I'll give you a five-bedroom house." She came home and told me what the Lord said and so we let it go, fully expecting that at any moment God would drop that 5-bedroom home in our laps! What we discovered was that God almost never drops blessings out of the heavens. Instead, he requires us to learn how to inherit them through faith and patience. In other words, your blessing will not happen to you, you've got to happen to your blessing!

Ten months later we received notice that the bank had sold our condo at auction for less than 50% of what we paid for it. We were given 30 days to vacate and $2,000 for our trouble. Not bad!

Meanwhile, in early May we received word that the building that our church has occupied for the past two years had sold to a school. The plan of that school was to use our sanctuary space for classrooms space and put us back upstairs in the smaller space that we had occupied for a year before moving downstairs. At first I was adamantly opposed to the whole scenario. I declared boldly to my congregation, "It is not possible that we should be put out of the Lord's inheritance! This is the sanctuary of God and this building is ours!" There were two major prophetic confirmations of this word, so we simply expected something to happen that would prevent the school from occupying the building.

But low and behold, their permit was approved, their loan funded, and they came and took possession of the building, moving us upstairs immediately. It was a difficult time, but the Lord forbad me to grieve over it. Instead, I kept hearing the Spirit of the Lord command me to rejoice! So as we were breaking down the sanctuary, pulling up the carpet, etc., I just kept thanking the Lord: "Lord, thank you that you saw that this place was far too small for your vision for us and so you have delivered us from it and into a greater space." I kept hearing the Lord say that this was not loss and that we could not be diminished! So I boldly proclaimed that to the congregation.

Then June 1st came and my wife and I had to surrender the keys to our condo. We had been frantically searching for a new home for a few weeks already, and our search kept coming up empty. I kept thinking that the problem was that the rental market was flooded with people like us who had recently been foreclosed on. In hindsight I realize that tthe blockage was actually in our faith, rather than in the market. Our search had two criteria: it had to be in alignment with the word we had received from the Lord (five bedrooms) and we had to be able to afford it! What we found is that it was impossible to meet both those criteria!

We came close though! At one point we stumbled upon a 3,200 square foot home in Concord that was renting for $2,800 per month! That's a great value in this market, and even so it was beyond our budget. My wife was uncomfortable with the amount, but because of the word of the Lord, she opened her heart and agreed to reach for it. My mouth was wide open as we toured this property! I frantically filled out the application and submitted it. It took them several days to get back to us, and finally, on the day we were moving out of our place and the night before we had to surrender the keys, we drove to the office of the real estate company that represented the owner. I walked in and said to the property manager, "Look, I need to know if we got the place or not. We have to move out of our old place tonight!" The manager very kindly informed me that they had decided to give the place to another applicant.

At this point I could feel my heart rate increase. I went down to the car where my wife and baby were patiently awaiting the good news and as I climbed into the driver's seat I felt my fear intensify and my faith flee. I felt like our only chance had just slipped away. I felt like I had failed my family, like I had lost everything, like a failure of a father and husband. I felt physically sick as I shared the news with my wife. As we began the drive back to Dublin to begin the move, I began to develop a headache, and then I felt nauseous, and then dizzy and I knew that my blood pressure was up. When we got back to the house I took a blood pressure pill and then laid down for a few moments. The headache intensified, the nausea increased, and the dizziness and light headedness escalated. I drove myself to Safeway and took my blood pressure twice: 165/106. I sat in the car and cried. I even thought I would die of a heart attack right there and leave my wife and baby without a husband and father.

I went back to the house and laid down for a few minutes, then got up and tried to help with the move. I just couldn't leave the whole thing on my wife! I carried a few boxes, then practically collapsed onto the ground. My sister in law saw me, took me inside and made me lay down on the floor. She said I was ice cold. She covered me with coats and then laid hands on me and went into intense prayer and intercession. Then the Spirit of prophecy fell on her and she spoke this word from the Lord: "Bring glory to me my son for I am with you and I will be glorified in all that you do! Keep your eyes upon me, for I am about to bring you abundant blessings!" As I received that word I just wept before the Lord and began to say, "Father I bring you glory!" After a while my parents came and my mom took me to their house while my father stayed and helped finish the move.

The next day I processed the experience with my spiritual father. After explaining the whole situation to him he said, "Benjamin this whole thing happened because you left your place in the Spirit. You keep thinking you have to provide a home for your family with your own resources, but God is calling you to move beyond that. You've got to stop thinking about what you can afford and begin to trust the word of the Lord. God said he would give you a 5-bedroom home, he didn't say you had to go rent one yourself!" In other words, the problem was that I was trying to believe God's promise and rely on my own resources at the same time. This is enough to kill anyone! Can you imagine Moses thinking he was supposed to part the Red Sea with his own resources? The disciples thinking they had to feed the five thousand with their own resources? The miracle is always in the hand of the disciple, but the power that works it is always in the hand of God! In order to access that power, you must learn to live beyond your means.

On the first of June we moved in with my brother and sister in law. The day we moved in the Lord gave me this word: "Tell the congregation to watch what happens to your family; to the extent that I bless you over and above what you lost, to that degree I will bless my house and my people." That next Sunday I stood up before the people and explained what had happened to me when I left my place of faith, and then I made the announcement: "We are a sign and a wonder that God has placed in your midst. Now watch us! Watch what God gives us! To the degree that God blesses us over and beyond what we lost, to that same degree you can expect him to bless this house and this people!"

The next four weeks were stretching weeks; our minds had not yet arrived at the place they needed to be in order for God to open the door that he wanted to open. We were still in the old season in our thinking. God had much more. When our minds finally began to move in that direction we started looking in outlandish directions. We looked at homes that were far out of price range and in the 3,000 - 5,000 sq ft range. Every time we stumbled upon a house that we could afford and were tempted to settle, I would hear the Lord say, "Don't limit me! Watch what I am about to do!" We were looking, but only out of obedience. We had no plan and no understanding of how it would work.

Finally, my spiritual father shared this with me: "I sense the Lord is moving your wife into a new season: give up your salary and live by faith. Let the church provide a home for you, but nothing more than a home. Instruct the people of the house to give you a love offering every month. In that way they will learn how to sow directly into their inheritance, and you and your family will lack nothing." We shared this with our financial presbytery and they agreed. We turned over the housing search to them after a month of fruitless searching.

Two days later a member of our financial presbytery stumbled upon an ad for a house in the Hayward hills. 4,300 sq ft, fully furnished, in a gated community and on a country club. The presbytery scheduled an appointment to look at the house, and we all went up together. There was an instant witness in the Spirit that this was indeed the place! The owner liked us immediately and very easily approved us. Yesterday we moved in!

Our New Home

Last night I had to drive to Oakland at 11:30pm to pick up my daughter's medicine from my brother in law's place. On the way home I was overtaken by gratitude to God. I said, "Lord, I can't believe how lavishly you have blessed me! This is too much!" The Lord immediately replied, "This is not because of your righteousness but because of the generations that have gone on before you. I have desired to show honor to those who have served me in your lineage and have waited generations to show you favor on their behalf."

I thought of my grandmother, National Evangelist Williette Means, who served God so faithfully, leading revivals, planting churches traveling around the nation ministering in the power of God. She was never financially affluent, but she didn't care as long as she could serve give the love of Jesus to the least of humanity.

National Evangelist Williette Means

I thought of stories I had heard of my grandfather, Elder William H. Means, who planted churches that are still reaching people for Christ to this day.

Elder William H. Means

I thought of my grandmother, Elizabeth Robinson, the great woman of prayer she was and the great legacy of faith I have received from her.

Elizabeth Robinson

And I thought of my parents, who have made many sacrifices to pave the way for me to stand where I now stand.

Pastors Peter and Diane Robinson

I was overcome with thankfulness and wept before the Lord out of sheer joy. The Lord has not only fulfilled his promise, but he has exceeded his promise! He has enlarged our territory in every way; but the enlarging of our territory first required the enlarging of our hearts and of our minds. The struggle was custom tailored by God for this purpose, and now we are very peacefully living beyond our means!

I am so overwhelmed by what God did over the past several days in Ethiopia. I just wanted to take a few minutes to share some of the highlights.

By way of summary, we partnered with Joshua Campaign to run a mass evangelistic outreach in the city of Daye, Sidamo in Ethiopia. The crusade began on Wednesday night and ended on Sunday afternoon. Over the course of those five days we ministered to more than 300,000 people with crowds of up to 200,000 at a time. It was by far the most exhilarating and impacting ministry event of our lives!

In each of the crusade services there was some local worship and then we proclaimed the word (either Karl Hargestam, the founder and CEO of Joshua Campaign, Per Akvist, the director for Ethiopia, or myself) with power and authority! It was absolutely amazing!

First, I wasn't fully aware of the difference between preaching to 200 people and preaching to 200,000 people who don't speak your language or understand your culture. It was a major shift for me and I had to become a learner again. All of my years of experience and all of my competence as a preacher went out the window in the face of this task. To complicate things, many of the people in attendance had very little education and many had never even seen a bible before! I could not preach as I usually do before this crowd! This was humbling for me as I was required to submit myself to being instructed again. I felt like a child, like a novice; I was a beginner all over again.

Friday night's meeting was very discouraging for me. Per had preached a powerful message on Wednesday night to launch the crusade, and when he prayed for miracles a long line of people came to testify of what God had done for them! The blind saw, the lame walked, the deaf heard... It was tremendous! Then on Thursday night Karl preached a powerful message and had even more powerful results! The line of miracle testimonies was endless! Not to mention the thousands of hands that went up in each service as the invitation to receive Christ was given!

Friday night was my first meeting (the first of three). I preached with all my might, and with all my heart! But I felt like a fish out of water. I know I had a powerful word, but it didn't feel like the people were fully connecting with me. I almost felt like the people were disappointed that Karl wasn't preaching!

At the end of my message I began to pray for miracles. I stormed the heavens with all my might and beseeched the Father to break out in power amongst the people. Then I invited people who had been healed to come to the platform and testify, as was the protocol. Then I asked for a song and waited. The song went on for about five minutes, and not one person came to testify of being healed or delivered. I was planning on sharing the miracles and then inviting people to receive Christ. But before the song ended, the rain came pouring down, and the crowd turned and left the premises with the quickness!

I was so devastated! I felt like such a failure! But at the same time I was struggling to remain in the Spirit, as I had been instructing our team in every one of our team meetings (every morning and every night). My soul was turning violently within me. At once it would move into the flesh and I'd be overcome by grief and discouragement and I would feel tears welling up in my eyes. Then, suddenly it would move into the Spirit and I would feel joy and encouragement! "This is your qualifying round," the Spirit kept assuring me. I finally prayed, "Lord, if you have to break me like this 1,000 more times to qualify me to walk in your power the way I desire, I'm willing and ready to go through it!" I ended the evening with joy.

On Saturday morning I woke up excited and terrified at the same time. I was still fighting embarrassment from the previous evening's fiasco, and half believed that Saturday morning's meeting would bring about the same result. God, are you going to heal anybody? Are you gonna let me look stupid again? I felt so much pressure and nervousness that I was on the verge of tears all morning, and I was fighting the urge to cancel the meeting and go home early! This lasted all the way up until the moment I took the microphone. There were more than 100,000 people on the field that morning, and the atmosphere was different than the night before! I realized then that even though I didn't see the breakthrough of miracles the night before, we had broken through the atmosphere, and now they were ready to receive the word through me. I proclaimed the word with power and authority, and I could feel the Spirit of God moving through the crowd as the word went out. I can't tell you what it feels like to see the Spirit of God move on 100,000 people. There were pockets here and there throughout the crowd where God was moving, as people were receiving and responding to the word.


Then came the miracle prayers! As I did the night before, I cried out to God to break out in miracles. The need was astounding! These people didn't have medical coverage, pharmacies, drug stores, or even first aid! This people had nothing to hope for but Jesus and Jesus alone! My only fear was that my lack of faith would prevent God from breaking out in mighty works to meet the needs of this great gathering!


After I prayed for miracles, two people came up to testify. One of them was deaf in one ear, and that ear opened during the miracle prayer. The second person had a large goiter on her neck that had caused her tremendous pain. It disappeared. While I was encouraged by the miracles, I was also reaching for more. There were thousands upon thousands of needs there. I needed faith for more than two miracles!


On Saturday night Karl was scheduled to preach. But just before we left for the crusade grounds the rain began to pour down in heavy sheets! We sat on the field just off the platform in the bust waiting for the rain to stop. But it was not to be stopped! Most of the people hed left the field, but there was still a good 5,000 - 10,000 people that were so desperate for something from God that they would not be deterred by rain! After a good 45 minutes of waiting, one of the Mission 1:11 team members jumped up and began preaching and praying for the sick. We all joined in and the platform was flooded with people desperate for miracles. We laid hands on each individual sick person, and the results were astounding! So many deaf/mutes were healed and heard and spoke for the first time! There were probably 30-40 notable miracles that night!


Then came Sunday morning, the last day of the crusade. Karl was scheduled to preach in the morning, and I was scheduled to preach in the evening. When we arrived at the crusade I was informed that I would preach right after Karl finished his service so that we could be finished before the rain arrived in the afternoon. I was a little worried that the attention span of the people would be gone by then and their capacity to reach for God would have been spent, but I was excited for the opportunity, nonetheless.


While Karl preached I was so stirred in my spirit! I looked out at this crowd and thought, "Wow, this is the fruit of Karl's ministry! He pioneered here 15 years ago, and now look what God has done!" I began to envision doing crusades like this in places like Banda, Acheh in Indonesia and in East Timur. I've been dreaming of preaching to uncountable multitudes in foreign countries since I was a little boy, but what dawned on me as Karl was preaching was that I always dreamed of holding these crusades in safe places. I turned to my wife and said, "We've got to get out of the box. God doesn't just want this in safe places. God wants this in dark places! We've got to go to places that seem impossible to penetrate and believe God to open the gates of righteousness for us!"


Then, suddenly, as I stood there listening to Karl preach, the Spirit of the Lord came upon me and I knew that God was going to speak to me. I was suddenly reminded of the last scene of the first Lord of the Rings movie, The Fellowship of the Ring. I remembered how Froto realized that it was his destiny to take the ring to Mt Morodor. Then Aragon stood up and said, "Then you'll have my sword, and I'll protect you with my life!" It hit me that Jesus is Froto and the ring is the gospel. I'm Aragon and my sword is my voice. Then the Lord said, The gospel is my gospel, and I'm taking it to the world. The question is do I have your voice? Do I have your sword? Will you serve and defend the gospel with your life? I'm not taking the gospel only to nice places. I'm taking it to the very gates of hell, to the place where Satan has his throne. Will you go with me? Will you give me your voice and put your life in the way of the gospel? I was broken before the Lord. I wept like I had not wept in a very long time. There on that platform I surrendered my life, my voice, my all to Jesus as if for the very first time! I felt like I had just gotten saved!

Suddenly I realized that all this time I was trying to use the gospel to reach people, instead of letting the gospel use me. I thought the gospel was the vehicle that I would use to share God's love with the world. Suddenly I saw that I was the vehicle that God wanted to use to share the gospel with the world. Suddenly, I became a servant of the gospel, rather than making the gospel the servant of my ministry. It was a profound paradigm shift! I cried out, "Lord, you have my sword, and I will defend your gospel with my life! I will go wherever you are going with the gospel! I surrender my all!"

When I got up to preach more than an hour later, I felt something completely different than I did the previous days. I felt peace. I felt power. I felt joy. I felt devoid of self and full of God. I stood before this massive crowd and was unmoved by the fact that they were completely distracted by the transition from one service to the next. They didn't seem very convinced that they needed to hear another word from God right after Karl's word. But I knew that I had the word that they needed to hear! I preached with such power, such authority, and such freedom! Within ten minutes the crowd was completely focused upon every word that I was speaking. They began to rejoice, cry out, clap, shake, and weep as I ministered the word. It was the most powerful preaching experience of my life!

Then I began to pray for miracles. I had a new sense of authority and power now. As the team surrounded the platform and stretched out their hands toward the people, I prayed for God to open the ears of the deaf, the eyes of the blind, and the minds and hearts of those who were bound. And God did more than I could have imagined! The miracles just kept coming and coming and coming. Deaf people began to suddenly hear again. Goiters and growths disappeared. There were miracles of many kinds! But to me the most powerful miracle was the deliverance of a demon possessed man who was so violent that they brought him to the crusade in chains! God set him completely free and they unchained him and brought him to the platform where he took the microphone and proclaimed that Jesus had set him free! His wife also testified of what God had done! I was so excited about that miracle because God had not only healed a broken body, but restored a marriage, a family, a household!

Overall, the trip was life-changing! I can't say enough about the powerful team that travelled with us! The team was so submitted, so unified, so focused, and each one had such a beautifully servants heart! And my wife...my wife Sunhee is the greatest missions team builder and trainer in the world! So much honor that came to me was actually the direct result of her ministry! All I could do was recognize, affirm, and submit to it! It was powerful!

Please keep praying because my wife and 6 others are still in Ethiopia for another week ministering in a region called Showa. I know that God is going to use them in powerful ways!