The Holy Spirit has been all over the map this week at camp, but if you connect the places that He has landed it all makes for a well thought out journey that is going somewhere!
Not once have I preached a message that I initially thought I was going to preach on that specific day. There were switches, new revelation, multiple shifts in services...and all of it headed towards Friday to finish off a week that really began yesterday when camp ended.
On Thursday night I preached on "Do you know God, or just know about Him?" I told them that a generation who doesn't know their God will not stay committed to Him. I told them that in my opinion, the greatest passage of Scripture for evangelism is found in Song of Solomon chapter five. I explained why. Ask me about it if you are intrigued as to why.
That night ended in worship and just drawing close to God. We ministered to the Lord that night!
Friday morning PK and I tagged team and talked about word and generational curses, and we all broke them off of our lives. With especially the stronghold of broken families so prevalent in Aurora, this was extremely important and a new spiritual generation was born that would not repeat the mistakes or engage in the sin of generations prior.
Friday night was a prayer and prophetic night, and it was awesome! We worshipped, flowed in the prophetic, prayed over eachother...and at the end the teenagers gave testimony as to what God did in their lives. A beautiful ending!
I can honestly say this was one of the most stretching and memorable experiences of my life. Never have I spoken so many times in such a short timespan. The Holy Spirit provided the grace and the strength to do so. The testimonies of the teenagers were so impactful, freedom from all kinds of chains and an ignition of the Holy Spirit in their lives. I'm excited for COTRA and all that God has for their church.
I asked their lead pastor before I left what his vision for Aurora was. He simply said "To own it".
And 45 young people who are in love with God and moving in the power of the Holy Spirit are ready to come alongside.
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Thursday, July 8, 2010
"Fire and Love" Pt. 3
Hello everyone!
I havent blogged in a couple days but two evening services have passed. Wow! God is rocking us to the core.
Tuesday night I spoke on the mantle of Elijah and how that mantle has floated throughout history, waiting for a generation to pick it up -- a generation that will honor their parents and leaders that would give healthy succession of revival. I instructed the students to form into a fire tunnel and one by one, the pastors of the house took a teenager aside. Each would take the mantle and hold it close to their heart while receiving prayer and blessing from their pastor, and then the pastor would symbolically place a red mantle over them and send them into a fire tunnel of radical young people! It was incredible.
Yesterday morning I taught a session on the prophetic, and it was so beautiful! They were amazed to realize that God can and wants to speak to them. By the end of the session, many had given their first prophetic word as we had lined people up and asked Holy Spirit to speak about them!
Last night was a shift from the fiery services we've had to my favorite thing to speak about: the Love of God. I talked about love vs. fear and how God desires to draw us close to Him, but the fear of the devil tells us we need to stay at a distance. But the fear of the Lord draws as close, not keeps us far! We had an altar call for salvation, and then we prayed for 4 specific areas over the course of about and hour: healing from broken families, seeking fulfillment in relationships, depression, and insecurity. Each call I had young people raise their hands and become surrounded with people who would pray for the love of God to invade and heal. Seeking God's face continued even after the band stopped playing!
It's been quite an amazing week! This has been personally stretching for me as I've never spoken this often in this short amount of time, but there is a grace for it. I'm feeling really tired today but my spirit is anticipating God yet again kissing us with His presence. I really feel like I'm coming back to Ohio a different person!
Love each of you and miss you terribly. MO is wonderful but there is no place like home where YOU are!
I havent blogged in a couple days but two evening services have passed. Wow! God is rocking us to the core.
Tuesday night I spoke on the mantle of Elijah and how that mantle has floated throughout history, waiting for a generation to pick it up -- a generation that will honor their parents and leaders that would give healthy succession of revival. I instructed the students to form into a fire tunnel and one by one, the pastors of the house took a teenager aside. Each would take the mantle and hold it close to their heart while receiving prayer and blessing from their pastor, and then the pastor would symbolically place a red mantle over them and send them into a fire tunnel of radical young people! It was incredible.
Yesterday morning I taught a session on the prophetic, and it was so beautiful! They were amazed to realize that God can and wants to speak to them. By the end of the session, many had given their first prophetic word as we had lined people up and asked Holy Spirit to speak about them!
Last night was a shift from the fiery services we've had to my favorite thing to speak about: the Love of God. I talked about love vs. fear and how God desires to draw us close to Him, but the fear of the devil tells us we need to stay at a distance. But the fear of the Lord draws as close, not keeps us far! We had an altar call for salvation, and then we prayed for 4 specific areas over the course of about and hour: healing from broken families, seeking fulfillment in relationships, depression, and insecurity. Each call I had young people raise their hands and become surrounded with people who would pray for the love of God to invade and heal. Seeking God's face continued even after the band stopped playing!
It's been quite an amazing week! This has been personally stretching for me as I've never spoken this often in this short amount of time, but there is a grace for it. I'm feeling really tired today but my spirit is anticipating God yet again kissing us with His presence. I really feel like I'm coming back to Ohio a different person!
Love each of you and miss you terribly. MO is wonderful but there is no place like home where YOU are!
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
"Monday, July 9th" MO Trip Pt. 2
In case you were especially observant and noticed the title of this blog, yes I do know that yesterday was in actuality July 5th and not the 9th. But it might as well of been because last night at the camp service, it was like something you'd expect on the last day of camp: everyone (and I do mean everyone) engaged in radical worship, teenagers praying and prophesying over each other, bondages falling off...it was pretty intense!
Things started off with a prayer session. I could tell that there were some hungry kids as they went after it and prayer, but some seemed to have let the heat and business of the day slow them down a little. Worship began and the first three songs was good, but once we got into "Healer", things began to get crazy.
Something in the atmosphere shifted and intense worship broke forth, and Ken whispered over to me "Why not now"? I went up there and began to exhort on how we need to stop just thinking that God can and believe that God will! So we began to pray over the sick and hurting.
The band, named Fuller's Field, played Revelation Song and How He Loves back to back, which was amazing! I sat everyone down after that and preached for 10 on Elijah at Mt. Carmel and the falling of fire. I told them to bring whatever plagues them to the altar, and let the God who answers by (fire) change be God and destroy every work of the devil! So we began to pray over the students.
Pastor Ken got up soon after and began to exhort about how the violent take it by force and that should be demonstrated in our worship.
So we continued in radical, violent, free worship.
Later I released them to pray love and joy over eachother, to prophesy and build up eachother! There was just such a radical sense of His joy in the place!
I wasn't planning to preach for only 10 minutes, but who cares? I stated in my first blog that I just want to see what Holy Spirit is doing and run with that. As a minister I want to be a steward of God's presence, not a preacher with an agenda. To be used less is actually to be used more! When you let God work outside of your help, things can really get crazy.
The hunger in their eyes as I told them we have 4 more days to pursue God was amazing to behold.I'm looking forward to what God will continue to do over these next four days! So I know that it wasn't July 9th, but I'm glad that God made what we thought would be the ceiling the floor of all that is to come!
Things started off with a prayer session. I could tell that there were some hungry kids as they went after it and prayer, but some seemed to have let the heat and business of the day slow them down a little. Worship began and the first three songs was good, but once we got into "Healer", things began to get crazy.
Something in the atmosphere shifted and intense worship broke forth, and Ken whispered over to me "Why not now"? I went up there and began to exhort on how we need to stop just thinking that God can and believe that God will! So we began to pray over the sick and hurting.
The band, named Fuller's Field, played Revelation Song and How He Loves back to back, which was amazing! I sat everyone down after that and preached for 10 on Elijah at Mt. Carmel and the falling of fire. I told them to bring whatever plagues them to the altar, and let the God who answers by (fire) change be God and destroy every work of the devil! So we began to pray over the students.
Pastor Ken got up soon after and began to exhort about how the violent take it by force and that should be demonstrated in our worship.
So we continued in radical, violent, free worship.
Later I released them to pray love and joy over eachother, to prophesy and build up eachother! There was just such a radical sense of His joy in the place!
I wasn't planning to preach for only 10 minutes, but who cares? I stated in my first blog that I just want to see what Holy Spirit is doing and run with that. As a minister I want to be a steward of God's presence, not a preacher with an agenda. To be used less is actually to be used more! When you let God work outside of your help, things can really get crazy.
The hunger in their eyes as I told them we have 4 more days to pursue God was amazing to behold.I'm looking forward to what God will continue to do over these next four days! So I know that it wasn't July 9th, but I'm glad that God made what we thought would be the ceiling the floor of all that is to come!
Monday, July 5, 2010
"Spirit of Adventure" MO Trip Pt. 1
Why have some big adventures in my life come through the state of Missouri? This is a state where my spirit of adventure was revived back in November when I took a spontaneous trip to IHOP. When I was in highschool I was an adventurer, traveling all over the place presenting the Gospel. From driving a vanload of kids down to Dayton at the age of 17 (why again did parents let me do that?) to the many secular venues I infiltrated with the life of the gospel, I adventured.
Somewhere along the line, that part of me took a backseat. I don’t think that it was a bad thing because my character needed desperate attention. My rebellious and pride-infected self was in danger of uprooted everything I had become, and threatened my future.
YMC helped destroy that rebellion and pride in me and build me up in ways I never could have dreamed. But something felt so dead in me in the fall of last year, and I was desperate for a personal revival. So I pursued an Awakening in Kansas City, where God turned me from friend to bride and renewed my sense of adventure – the very thing that birthed Firestorm in its beginning days.
Now I’ve been invited to Aurora, Missouri by my long-time friend Pastor Ken Hogue, and I’m excited! Ken and I have had many adventures together with Firestorm. I can remember extraordinary times with God, including one time when a couple of our members were singing in the sanctuary on a non-service night and one of them went out in the Spirit. We were drawn there one by one, and the presence of God manifested in a super-intense way. I’ll never forget that.
I’ll be speaking at a summer camp this week all 5 nights, and this will be one of the more stretching adventures yet. Young people will be gathered in that room who want an encounter with God, and I’m a minister who wants to find out what Holy Spirit wants to do and grab ahold of it. I’m looking forward to great things.
The vision of Firestorm, which is now 8 years old and has just seen its final original member graduate, still burns inside of me, and will continue to drive me with evangelistic and prophetic fervor. A youth pastor of mine once said that I have the gift of an evangelist and pastor, which is a rare combination. And let me tell you, I feel the tension of those gifts in me often. I have an intense desire to stay and disciple people, and an intense desire to go out and evangelize with the full Gospel. The best way that I can describe a call that I know is on my life is this: I am to pastor young people and take them evangelizing with me, teaching them how to do so. And while these past few years the pastor in me has been the focus, once again I feel the evangelistic fire rising once again; this vision of Firestorm will always burn in my heart.
I speak tonight on "The Answer of Fire". Let fire fall!
Somewhere along the line, that part of me took a backseat. I don’t think that it was a bad thing because my character needed desperate attention. My rebellious and pride-infected self was in danger of uprooted everything I had become, and threatened my future.
YMC helped destroy that rebellion and pride in me and build me up in ways I never could have dreamed. But something felt so dead in me in the fall of last year, and I was desperate for a personal revival. So I pursued an Awakening in Kansas City, where God turned me from friend to bride and renewed my sense of adventure – the very thing that birthed Firestorm in its beginning days.
Now I’ve been invited to Aurora, Missouri by my long-time friend Pastor Ken Hogue, and I’m excited! Ken and I have had many adventures together with Firestorm. I can remember extraordinary times with God, including one time when a couple of our members were singing in the sanctuary on a non-service night and one of them went out in the Spirit. We were drawn there one by one, and the presence of God manifested in a super-intense way. I’ll never forget that.
I’ll be speaking at a summer camp this week all 5 nights, and this will be one of the more stretching adventures yet. Young people will be gathered in that room who want an encounter with God, and I’m a minister who wants to find out what Holy Spirit wants to do and grab ahold of it. I’m looking forward to great things.
The vision of Firestorm, which is now 8 years old and has just seen its final original member graduate, still burns inside of me, and will continue to drive me with evangelistic and prophetic fervor. A youth pastor of mine once said that I have the gift of an evangelist and pastor, which is a rare combination. And let me tell you, I feel the tension of those gifts in me often. I have an intense desire to stay and disciple people, and an intense desire to go out and evangelize with the full Gospel. The best way that I can describe a call that I know is on my life is this: I am to pastor young people and take them evangelizing with me, teaching them how to do so. And while these past few years the pastor in me has been the focus, once again I feel the evangelistic fire rising once again; this vision of Firestorm will always burn in my heart.
I speak tonight on "The Answer of Fire". Let fire fall!
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