Enter the Heavenly Wine Cellar - Drunk on the Holy Spirit

So I spent a few days in Searcy, Arkansas and attended a John Crowder meeting and was thoroughly stunned by it.  First off, let me say that I first heard of John from a friend that recommended his books The New Mystics and The Ecstasy of Loving God.  These books are amazing!  They stretch our modern definition of what God is willing to do with someone that is simply in love with Him.  Now, the books do little to prepare you for what attending a "John Crowder meeting" entails.  Thankfully, I have watched the videos of John and Benjamin Dunn on YouTube for quite some time.  While it did take me a bit to dissect the content of their message from the drunken behavior displayed on those videos, the Truth always testifies with His Spirit (and I want both).  A lot of people find their type behavior offensive, but those same people usually A) Take themselves too seriously B) Assume God doesn't have fun and/or C) Assume that because they haven't experienced something it must not be real.

Here's some of the antics you can expect should you google these fellas:


So you might be asking, what happened at this meeting?  First, John is EXTREMELY intelligent.  When you hear him discussing multiple translations of the Bible, it's because he's read them... multiple translations... to get the depth of the verses.  Instead of parking in the King James Version parking lot, he's pursued wisdom by seeking the original author's meaning and attained it.  In the "Questions and Answers" portion of the meeting John eloquently defended his stance on the completed works of Christ.  So what about the drunkenness?

Well, I personally haven't experienced the glory in a manner that makes me feel intoxicated... yet.  Just because I don't have a frame of reference from my experience doesn't mean that theirs is negated.  In fact, it has given me a hunger for more of God's presence and that is NEVER a bad thing!  John gets "intoxicated" when he starts preaching as the love of God tangibly manifests upon him.  I personally have no problem with that because I have experienced God's amazing love (yep you guessed it... I'm saved).

So what about the message he was bringing?  It's simple: his message was the cross.  John's revelation on the completed works of Christ suggest that our modern "striving" mentality to try to complete sanctification, become holy, or be made righteous are all folly, because Jesus completed all of these on the cross.  Sanctification, holiness, and righteousness are not progressive processes which a believer can attain through his/her own efforts, but instead we were made holy (Romans 11:6) righteous (1 Cor 5:21) and are sanctified (1 Cor 6:11).  I'm not sure the verses I mentioned are the ones John used, but they do support the concept.  He attributes most of our religious toiling against sinfulness and pursuit to "better ourselves" as shadow boxing since we are struggling against a self that is no longer there.  We are not sinners any longer, but instead are the "new creations" Paul spoke of in 1 Cor 5:17.  Anyway, I was really encouraged by the whole thing.

One last mention: I know a lot of you are probably asking "how do I get drunk on the Holy Spirit?"  Short answer: by faith.  The "whack" as John calls it, is the presence of God.  In the The Ecstasy of Loving God John covers the different levels of prayer, which result in a tangible manifestation of His presence.  It is this meditation which is the "drinking" you see displayed, by faith believing that the love of Christ is consumable and drinking of it constantly leaves the individual feeling intoxicated by His love.  If you have more questions about that just leave them in the comment section.  Be blessed!

Testimonies!!!!

I used to keep a journal of miracles & supernatural events that occurred to me, but having gone through extreme seasons of seeing a lot of miracles it was getting inundating to recount all the Lord had done (what a wonderful problem to have... right?!).  In lieu of the upkeep of that journal, here are a few of the more recent miracles I have seen within the last couple months... I share these to encourage your faith and testify of what THE LORD has done.

• A man came to the prophetic booths and the Lord gave me an accurate word of knowledge for back pain  which this gentleman had suffered from for years.  After only a few seconds of prayer, he testified that his back was healed and the pain had left! 
• An elderly gentleman came in to the healing rooms as he was suffering from back pain, hip pain, and spinal problems.  The woman I was praying with received a word of knowledge that one leg was shorter than the other.  I held up his feet and his right leg was over an inch shorter than the left.  After about 10-20 seconds of commanding the right leg to grow... the heels were perfectly even!
• At Kroger a woman was walking with a cane and she was in her late twenties.  I asked her what happened and she said she had been in a car accident and had two herniated disks.  The back pain had caused her to lose her job too.  I prayed for her once... and there was no change.  I asked if I could pray again and reminded her that Jesus had to pray twice for the man that "saw people walking around like trees" and she agreed.  After the second time her back pain entirely left and tears streamed down her face as the Lord touched her!
• In the healing rooms, a woman came in with a headache, sore throat, chest pain, a cough, and vision problems in her right eye.  After we laid hands on her throat and had her take a few deep breaths all the chest pain, cough, and sore throat left.  We laid hands on her head and the headache left.  Then we prayed for the vision problem in her right eye and it too was totally healed!  She had a whole makeover!

 Thank you Jesus for the privilege of ministering your love and healing to those You love and that may not have had a tangible encounter with that love yet.

The Perfect Gift

Did you know that the Same Spirit that Raised Jesus from the dead, Lives in you!

 “And if the spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, is living in you, He who raised Jesus from the dead will also give lie to your mortal bodies through His spirit who lives in you.” (Rom. 8:11)

 The SAME Spirit that enabled Jesus to drive out demons while HE was here on Earth lives in you!

“Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them, "If Satan drives out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then can his kingdom stand? But if I drive out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.” (Matt. 12:26 & 28) 

The SAME spirit that enabled Paul to preach with Miracles, signs and wonders through demonstrations of God’s power, Lives in You!

“My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit's power, so that your faith might not rest on men's wisdom, but on God's power.”(1 Cor. 2:4-5)

Question: If the SAME spirit that did all of these things lives in you- why are you not walking in more power (Miracles, Signs and Wonders), more Healing and more Liberty? Let me venture to say that it could be because you have not truly embraced the person and power of Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is more than just a nice deposit, a mystical force or spiritual after thought that God has gifted us with. He IS the Spirit Man of God.  HE is the POWER SOURCE of God and He is an individual “being” within the Trinity. He heals, delivers, guides, creates, instructs, teaches, gives life, testifies, anoints, reveals, wars, does miracles and this is only the beginning of His truly impressive resume!

You will never be able to truly grow close to God or in your spiritual giftings and anointing, without embracing and growing in intimacy with the “person” of the Holy Spirit All Christians need to get to know the Holy Spirit on a personal level. He is the one who releases the current word of Jesus to us for our lives and is the great communicator between God and us. 

“I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth” - John 16:12

The problem is that not every Christian personally knows Holy Spirit on the level that they should. I was recently reminded of this truth at one of my last ministry events. Upon arriving at this event to speak for the weekend, I was informed by the ministry staff that they had decided to take me up to the top of witch mountain where they would blow the shofar and then let me decree words out against the enemy in their region.  There was just one problem with their plan-the Holy Spirit had not told ME to do this.  I explained to my hosts that the Holy Spirit had not specifically told me to do this on their behalf and that I only did what the Holy Spirit told me to do, especially in regards to spiritual warfare issues. They were confused and disappointed by my response but they kindly relented and gave me the benefit of the doubt.  As it turned out, God had a much better plan he wanted to implement to deal with the enemy in their region. By the end of the weekend, the Holy Spirit had not only revealed a plan, he had also implemented it so that an immediate shift took place over their church and in their region.

Blindly taking on warlocks and demonic principalities over a region can be a dangerous and deadly activity. I shudder to think of what would have happened if I had not checked in with the Holy Spirit to get his word on the subject first. I have learned that Holy Spirit ALWAYS knows what is best and that He always has the fastest, easiest and best plan for the situation at hand.

The Holy Spirit desires to be our closest friend. He longs to share Jesus Christ in his fullness with us. As Christians, we need to develop a close and intimate relationship with the Holy Spirit. This relationship starts by PERSONALLY, inviting him into our daily lives. It grows by being mindful of his presence and including him in every decision and aspect of our lives. We must see and treat him like a trusted family member who loves us and is loved by us in return. 

Jesus promised us that through the Spirit we would never be alone and that we would always remain connected to Him. In short, he left us with the perfect gift as our deposit - a greater part of himself. 

“But the Comforter (Counselor, Helper, Intercessor, Advocate, Strengthener, Standby), the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father will send in My name [in My place, to represent Me and act on My behalf], He will teach you all things. And He will cause you to recall (will remind you of, bring to your remembrance) everything I have told you.”  John 14:26 amp

Mignon Murrell

Glory Reign Ministries

www.gloryreign.org

The best way to grow in relationship with Holy Spirit is to spend time with Him.  However, if you want more resources on the person of the Holy Spirit, I highly recommend Benny Hinn's  Good Morning, Holy Spirit.

 

Activating Spiritual Gifts - Exercises - Part 2

This is the second part in the series of Spiritual Gift exercises, you can see the first part here.  This will eventually become a permanent page.


6.  Treasure Hunts - Practices the prophetic gifts (words of wisdom and words of knowledge) as well as the gift of healing and the gift of evangelism
          This wonderful activity has swept the nation as Christians have become dissatisfied with the monotonous ineffective way-of-life that the traditional American church has been raised in.  This began with Kevin Dedmon and you can read more about it in his book Treasure Hunts. So here's how you do it: get a group of people together if possible (it's not required, I started doing these on-my-own before I ever practiced this with a group), wait on the Lord for prophetic revelation for clues for who to pray for and where to go, then go out and find the people God points you to!  
          The way that you can be sure to practice the gift of healing as well, is to ask the Lord for people to pray for that need healing and He will point them out to you.  This is the beginning of walking as true witnesses that we were called to be.  I wrote another article on how essential this practice is to the growth of the believer/Church as a guest post for The Prophetic Life and you can view that article here.

 7.  Hospital Run - Practices the gift of healing
           Okay so this one is just what it sounds like, go to a hospital and pray for the sick.  There are a few things to pay attention to when you go to hospitals.  The first is that security doesn't always like it when you do this.  I have never been personally kicked out of a hospital for praying for people, but I do personally know people that have been (you'd be surprised how many hospitals are branded with the name of a denomination of Christianity that disallow praying for the sick).  There is a tension between submitting yourselves to authority and going through and obeying the mandate from Christ to pray for the sick.  While I have called the clergy at multiple hospitals seeking permission to pray for people there, I have yet to be given that approval.  So how do you get in?  There are two ways that I (and others) do this.
          First, if you can let your pastor or healing team leader know that you want to pray for the sick, oftentimes they will notify you when a congregation member is in the hospital.  This gives you the excuse to be at the hospital.  When a member is in the hospital, not only should you pray for that individual, but visit as many other people as possible!  Just peek your head in and say "Hi, my name is ____ from ____ church, would you mind if I pray for you?"
          The other method can be done more often, but it is a bit more risky: simply go up to the hospital/ER and start praying for people.  We won't see the sick healed if we don't pray for them... and we don't build our faith on what we never do.  Just be aware that people are there for a reason and that Jesus wants to heal every single one of them!


 8.  Spiritual Reading Booth - Practices words of wisdom and words of knowledge
          As seen in Furious Love, this entails setting up a booth or table with a sign Free Spiritual Readings and giving people prophetic words.  This creates excellent opportunities for evangelism as well.  As the Lord reveals things about people's lives, call forth the destiny of their calling.  Sow promise and prosperity over all that you minister to with the love of Christ.  Do not be afraid to use the name of Jesus!  However, it's important to remember when doing this that you are not brow-beating people to Christ.  Nor does a prophetic word necessarily require the salvation of an unsaved person you are ministering to (let the Holy Spirit do His work, so that every time that person thinks about the word you give... he/she will be contemplating the reality of Christ).
         A word of caution for this one, I do NOT recommend starting off in a New Age or Witchcraft festival like you see Jason Westerfield do.  This is a great thing to do for people that are accustomed to walking in the power of God, but especially for people that have experience in battling the demonic.  Those settings can be dangerous for someone that has not quite learned to walk in the authority Christ has given them yet... so just pray about it before you determine to do that in an occult atmosphere.

9.  The Quickdraw - Practices words of wisdom and words of knowledge
          One moderator gets two individuals to be back-to-back, the moderator then counts out 10 paces, after the 10th step the two turn and whoever gives the accurate prophetic word first wins!  Obviously the paces can be increased or decreased to permit more time to receive revelation.  This exercise removes the "logical" human reasoning from the process, since the immediacy of the prophetic word disallows much contemplation on the revelation.  It's important that the winner must also have a correct interpretation if the revelation is abstract.  In other words, you can't turn around and say "I see you looking in a mirror that's shattered into a thousand pieces and then it becomes a solid pane" (the only way that word wins is if that is something that has recently happened to the recipient, because it has no interpretation).  The interpretation has to come with the abstract revelation.  In the example it could be something like, "I feel like the Lord is saying that you see yourself as have a shattered/disconnected life and that the parts don't seem to make a whole, but He is saying that He is making you whole."

10.  Concentric Rings - Practices words of wisdom and words of knowledge
          This one requires at least 6 people.  There is an "inner circle" and an "outer circle".  Every person faces another person.  Those on the "outer circle" give a prophetic word to the person he/she faces.  A moderator allocates a period of time to receive the words and then give them.  After the prophetic words are delivered, the circles rotate and new words are given to the new partners.
          To mix this one up, the moderator can have the group receive the revelation... and then rotate the circles (this prevents the bias of foreknowledge from interfering with the accuracy of the words).  A good starter time limit is a minute.  As the group progresses, the time to receive revelation can be decreased.

Soak in the Spirit

The term "soaking" was birthed out of the Toronto Blessing revival that took place at the Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship.  While even in charismatic churches this practice can seem New Age, I assure it is both Biblical and essential to our spiritual growth.  This is not something I practice on a daily basis (although it probably should be), but as often as it is feasible.  Soaking brings rest, peace, revelation, vision, and oftentimes divine encounter.  So what is it?

Soaking is when we still ourselves before the Lord in His presence and wait upon Him to work on our spirits.  We get saturated by His Spirit and His presence.  Most of the time, when people soak they listen to soft spiritual music (a couple sites that have free soaking music are Soaking with a Purpose and Soaking.net).  If you want to purchase music I highly recommend Glory Reign's Soaking CDs and Joshua Mills soaking music.  I liken this practice to much of what you see David do in Psalms and here's a few verses for it:

• Psalms 131:2 “But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me.” 
• Psalms 37:7 "Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him” 
• Psalms 27:14 "Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD."
• Psalms 40:1 " I waited patiently for the LORD; he turned to me and heard my cry."
• Isaiah 40:31 "Yet those who wait for the LORD will gain new strength; they will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary.

That's just a few starters.  If you have ever experienced a solemn assembly, then the idea of waiting on the Lord should be familiar to you.  Some of the other terms that you'll hear that generally mean the same thing are "waiting" and "tarrying".

There are some things that you can expect when you begin this practice.  First, is that sitting still for 10 minutes (with or without music) is likely to seem like a long time.  Most of us are accustomed to darting from one thought to another in the busyness of life, so the concept of letting your thoughts be still before the Lord seems foreign.  One thing that has really helped me with this is worship.  Before I soak, I worship for a while.  It fixates my mind and spirit upon the Lord.  Soaking is a practice that initially requires discipline.  When most of us started reading the Bible we first had to discipline ourselves to do it, but later grew to love encountering the Lord through the Word.  It's the same way with soaking.  You can expect to see visions, feel Holy Spirit's presence significantly increase upon you in your daily life, and receive divine revelation.

So how is it done?  It's simple and I'll give you my steps for soaking:

1. Worship the Lord until your thoughts stay fixed on Him
2. Turn on some instrumental worship or soaking worship music
3. Get in a seated or lying position that is comfortable
4. Focus your thoughts on the Lord and holding your mind still before Him
5. Wait for Holy Spirit to takeover

When I feel His presence it comes like a very light blanket being laid over me, but it gets heavier and heavier the longer I soak.  Hold your mind still before Him and look with your spiritual eyes (similar to your imagination, except you are the one causing what you see/hear).  The more you look the more you'll see.  You may feel like nothing is happening, but as you wait on the Lord He works on your spirit and that doesn't include your mind.  Benny Hinn also has a fantastic teaching on this that makes me jealous (in a good way) every time I hear it.  So I encourage you to take up this practice and pursue God from the place of rest (and please share your experiences with it in the comments to this post)!

Activating Spiritual Gifts - Exercises - Part 1

Here's just a few exercises that I've come across for growing in the gifts.

1.  Look at Jesus - Practices the prophetic gifts (words of wisdom and words of knowledge), the seer/visionary gift, and discerning God's voice
          This one comes from the previously mentioned How to Hear God's Voice book by Mark Virkler, with my adaptation.  First, plead the blood of Jesus over your mind, thoughts and imagination; bind any spirits that would interrupt, distract, or hinder your time with the Lord. Get in front of your computer or use a pen and paper (if you want to go old school).  Then picture yourself sitting with Jesus.  Mark suggests using a Gospel setting for the imagery, my recommendation is that you can start with that and slowly adapt to picturing Him where you are.  Remember the reality is that Christ is always with us (Matthew 28:20) so picturing this is actually activating our faith in the Truth.  Then ask Holy Spirit to breath on what you are picturing and journal your conversation with the Lord.  After you've written it all down, be sure to take the conversation to either a spiritual adviser or ask the Lord to confirm it with His word.

2.  Prophecy Line - Practices the prophetic gifts (words of wisdom & words of knowledge)
          This exercise requires a minimum of 3 people but is best done with 5 or more.  One person faces the wall and an administrator organizes the others in a single-file line behind the prophesying person.  The person at the front of the line has 10 seconds to get a word for the person behind him/her before another person moves up to the front of the line (this is monitored by the administrator).  Instead of keeping a normal rotation, it's good to mix up the line frequently.  Prophetic words can be for the individual in the front of the line, but a lot of times we've found that Holy Spirit reveals who is receiving the prophetic words (which is a fun confirmation).  The objective is to remove the analytical side of prophetic words and just use what Holy Spirit gives you.  This is essential for moving in the prophetic in public settings, you don't always have 10 minutes to get the interpretation for the revelation, so you go with what you have and 9 times out of 10 Holy Spirit gives all you need.

3.  Small Group Healing - Practices the gift of healing
          The gift of healing is pretty simple to practice, you pray for the sick.  Kevin Dedmon said, "I used to have see 100% of the people I prayed for getting healed, because I wasn't praying for anyone."  Remember the prophetic gifts and healing are promises for everyone, while there are those with aptitudes and callings that show particular gifts in these arenas, they are both promised to the body of Christ as a whole!  (That means you). The easiest way to learn to pray for the sick is with a group of like-minded friends in a small group or just hanging out.  Find some sickness among you, lay your hands on it, and command it to go.  It's that easy.  Don't despise the day of small beginnings, I still celebrate when headaches are healed through my hands... because it's something I can't heal on my own and God is choosing to do it through me and that's worth celebration!  I didn't actually start praying for the sick this way, I joined a healing team and was visiting malls and hospitals on my own praying for the sick regularly.  One thing that helps to stay encouraged is to read testimonies and record all the ones you see (until they start multiplying beyond your journaling ability).  Bethel, Andrew Womack, Todd White, this blog, Joel2Generation blog, etc.  All of these have great testimonies to encourage you.  But I digress, back to praying for your friends.  Just use simple phrases like "In Jesus name sickness go!" and if you run out of things to say just say the name of Jesus over and over (every knee must bow to His name).

4.  Facebook Prophetic - Practices words of wisdom and words of knowledge
          While the social networking outlet you choose is irrelevant to how this is done, Facebook has shown to be the best for this sort of arena in my experience.  The objective is to join a community of people pursuing the prophetic gifts like yourself, and engage in prophesying over/with them.  (Warning: incoming shameless plug)  I have facebook group called Prophetic Practice where people that are interested in the prophetic go and are encouraged to message other members with prophetic words.  I used to hold weekly/monthly activities but consistent participation was hard to find.  Anyway, all the members of that group are accustomed to prophecy and you can join and give prophetic words to any one of them.  If you are new to the gift of prophecy, I encourage you to start by giving your words to an administrator first because they can offer some valuable feedback to your words.

5.  Specifics - Practices words of wisdom and words of knowledge
          This is simply having fun with the prophetic (who said God had to be boring?!)  Get a group of friends, a small group, or online friends that are familiar with the prophetic gifts and ask a series of questions of each other.  The following is an example we did with my men's group:

• What did the person eat for breakfast? 
• What is a circumstance the person is currently going through or dealing with? 
• What is something the person can expect to see in the next week?

Since we had less than 5 people there we answered these questions for every group member, if you have a larger group... obviously it's best to pick one person to be the "subject" and everyone else can get the words for that person.

These are just a few great little starter exercises for practicing spiritual gifts.  Obviously if your church has a healing and prophetic ministry, I recommend joining that as well.  The most important thing to remember is that we grow by being consistent (doing this once a week rarely yields the results most of us desire).  The more we are willing to steward what God has given us, the more He gives!  Be blessed in Jesus name!

Growing in God Exercises

The Lord has been giving me a couple exercises to help me grow in intimacy with Him as well as growing in love.  The first exercise is to grow in discernment of His voice.  Hearing God's voice is something that must be practiced regularly.  If the concept seems foreign to you, I highly recommend How to Hear God's Voice by Mark Virkler.  His book accustoms you to one method of hearing God (He speaks to us in a plethora of ways).  The exercise I have been doing is as I wait upon the Lord, I journal everything He says to me.  I ask open ended questions about my life/circumstances and note His responses as they light upon my spirit.  Then after I've written down the conversation, I ask the Lord to confirm it through His word.  This practice has actually changed the way I study the Word, it is a much more dynamic relationship since the Lord continues a conversation with me through the Scriptures.  Sometimes I'll ask Him where I should study, but most of the time I wade through the various bookmarked chapters I am going through (I usually read several chapters and have bookmarks in the Torah, the Prophets, SoS, Psalms, a Gospel, an epistle, and Revelations).  If I heard His voice correctly, He always confirms it with His Word!  Doing this validates what we hear and gives us confidence in what we hear Him say.

The next exercise is one the Lord suggested to me this morning, but I have yet to practice.  He said, "This is my 5 step plan: go to a public place and every 5 steps talk to a stranger."  Before I proceed, a major part of my calling is to publicly minister in power and love (I believe this is the calling of every Christian, but some have more of an aptitude for it than others).  Myself and a few others will regularly go to malls, hospitals, supermarkets, flea markets, etc. to find the sick and pray for them or just give prophetic words to strangers.  The Lord's 5 step plan is a new challenge for me, since I have historically waited until I had a complete revelation & interpretation from the Lord before approaching an individual.  Alternatively, I would approach people with visible illness/injuries.  This exercise will propel me out of that comfort zone, away from relying on the gifts, and into moving more in love.  Not everyone needs healed.  Not everyone will receive a prophetic word.  Everyone needs Jesus and the love of Christ is what we have that others do not, if we don't share it... the salt is losing it's saltiness. 

Mall Miracles

Saturday I took out our Power Evangelism team to the mall. Prior to our departure we waited on the Lord for revelation on where to go and who to minister to. Some of the words were: mall, right hand in a cast, a group of hispanic youth, someone smoking that would be delivered as we prayed for the baptism of the Holy Spirit, a woman that looked like Sarah Palin, and a few others. So we went to the mall and the fun began!

Before I continue recounting the supernatural things the Lord did in just an everyday mall, I want to emphasize what made this outing different than my usual outings. Most of the time, when I am ministering publicly in the power of the Spirit, I have a tendency to practice the gift I am most comfortable with (healing). That usually entails finding visible injuries/illnesses and asking to pray for only those individuals (wheelchairs, splints, canes, etc.). Even on the occasions when I was practicing the prophetic, I would generally be asking the Lord for words of knowledge to identify people with physical conditions that may not be visible. On this excursion, I made no delineation between what way Holy Spirit chose to manifest and who He chose to minster to. The objective was simply love.

When we minister from a place of love, we will never fail (1 Cor 13:8). There were an unusual amount of refusals to receive prayer for physical healing at first, so we started asking the Lord for prophetic words for the people working in the kiosks. The first one was for a woman at a jewelry kiosk, my two cohorts approached her with the word that she was like a spiritual mother and although she was not a mother in the natural, she was talking care of her two nephews. So quick confirmation number 1. While they delivered that word I was inquiring about Rosetta Stone and asked the Lord for a word for the guy working at that kiosk. I felt like the Lord said that he was a goal oriented person and that he was a writer. When I asked him if he was a writer, his reply was "Yes. How did you know that? Do I just look like a writer?" The smart-alic in me wanted to ask what a writer looks like. Anyway, I shared that the Lord had revealed it to me and he continued to confirm the word by telling me how he and his wife prayed for God to reveal His will for them every night before they went to sleep! I felt like the Lord was encouraging him that the desire to write was from Him. So we prayed for revelation and inspiration on what to write about.

Next up was the "smoker in the mall", it was the guy working at the electric cigarette kiosk! He was a believer and had been suffering with PTSD since being in Iraq. Nightmares were common for this young man. He had already received the baptism of the Holy Spirit, but when we prayed for him, he got a second dose! His eyes watered and he received noticeable emotional healing. The Lord obviously wanted to get a hold of this guy, and you could see that he had an aptitude for communicating with strangers and the light of Christ was all over him. The Lord started to set him free from the bondage of his past!

We did see three people with casts or splints on their right wrists. Two of them allowed us to pray. The most encouraging was a middle aged hispanic gentleman and his wife, his right wrist was wrapped in bandages and he had an arm sling. When we prayed all four of us (the three of us ministering and the man receiving prayer) felt heat. He said he felt heat and energy shooting into his hand! He was able to turn his wrist and said it felt a whole lot better. He also said he was going to check with the doctor to confirm the healing. When we prayed for him, the man started swaying under the power of the Spirit (I thought we might need a catcher) and after we stopped his eyes were filled with tears as God touched him!

There were many more interactions like this in just a couple hours (several other accurate prophetic words, witnessing about what Jesus did, and more). This is the Christian life. This is how Jesus and the disciples ministered, through public displays of His affection through the power of the Spirit. It is His kindness that leads us to repentance and His miracles are a wonderful kindness. Jesus didn't evangelize like we do: creating friendships with ulterior motives of sharing the Gospel, He loved people where they were at. His love is all it takes to lead someone to salvation. He never said to someone "believe in Me or you won't be healed" nor did He say "if you don't believe in Me you will go to hell" (regardless of whether it's true). He just healed them and loved people. By receiving His love, we receive Him. You don't have to know certain facts to get into heaven (i.e. - the Four spiritual laws), just know Christ and believe in Him. I'm not suggesting that knowing those things aren't good and as we grow in the Lord our knowledge of Him should absolutely include those things. But Jesus didn't make them requirements to enter Heaven... who are we to make it more difficult for others to enter in? It is through simply turning from our lives of sin to Him and trusting Him to do what He said that we enter in. It's all about posture of the heart and His love changes our posture.

New Creation

The Word truly astounds me sometimes. I had memorized and thought upon 2 Cor 5:17 dozens of times... and yesterday a dimension of this scripture was enlightened that had not previously struck my heart. I certainly am not the first to have received this revelation (I've heard it from Ben Dunn and Brandon Barthrop previously), but it just landed on me in a way that renewed my mind. "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!" A new creation is not the same species... a new creation is something entirely different. Calling ourselves human is no longer a sufficient description of who we are.

We no longer spiritually resemble our old selves: we used to look from a worldly perspective and now see people as He sees them (2 Cor 5:16), we used to think in futility and now have the mind of Christ (Ro 1:21 & 1 Cor 2:16), we once walked in the hopelessness of the flesh and now walk in the Spirit (Gal 5:16), and we were once powerless and now are filled with His power (Ro 5:6 & 1 Cor 4:19-20). This comparison is not between a person that "turns His life around" but between two completely different beings. While the flesh is the vessel for our spiritual entities and remains unchanged, in the Spirit we are entirely different. An adequate comparison would be to change from a fallen angel into one of the four "living creatures" (see Ezekiel 1 and Revelations 4). We have been translated from a cursed being into an entirely new species which has been created to behold the glory of the Lord (it's the ultimate underdog story). We are now "spiritual beings", though we are still men & women (1 Cor 2:15)... yet... no longer cursed but blessed.

Now we are being built into the very house of God. He dwells within us! (Col 1:27) He is coming to stay in us! (John 14:23) We are able to live in the supernatural reality of heaven, because His kingdom is within us! (Luke 17:21) As we grow and mature into our new spiritual selves and the revelation of Jesus manifests in us all, we truly begin to become all we were called to be!