David Wilkerson, one of the great men of God in America over the last 80 years, died on Wednesday in a car crash.  To say that this is a great loss to the church is a massive understatement.  If you have never sat and listened to any of his teaching or read about his exploits of faith, you have truly missed out.  He is a rare man of a rare breed of great men who preach straight from the heart of God.  He did not walk in the fear of man nor preach to tickle men’s ears but instead preached a powerful gospel of salvation, a relationship with a holy God through Jesus Christ that brings true joy, true power, true victory.

I would recommend to every believer to get ahold of and listen to his sermon titled A Call to Anguish and listen to it at least twice a year.  It is prophetic and profound and is applicable with great urgency to the times we live in.  sermon index link

In my last post, I announced the birth of our son Malachi John and wrote about the desire that he walk in clear discernment and be a prophetic messenger to God’s people of repentance of a turning out of darkness and into light.  David Wilkerson was a man that walked in this understanding and this conviction.  My prayer for Malachi and all my boys is that they be this kind of man.

Below I am posting the contents of a sermon that Wilkerson preached in the 1990’s as a prophetic message to his denomination.  Is it not so clear the clarity of his understanding?  I think you will be sobered by this message. (BTW, I don’t wear a suit to church and I don’t particularly like choirs but that is not his point in this sermon, his point is that the message of the gospel has been changed to not offend people but to tickle their ears and that this message will keep people from finding true salvation)

The Dangers of The Gospel of Accommodation
A sermon given by David Wilkerson at an Assemblies of God headquarters chapel service.

By David Wilkerson

I am not coming to you as a pastor but with a prophetic word. God so shook me recently with this message that I should bring it somewhere, sometime in Springfield. This morning the Lord, by His Spirit, spoke to my heart that this is the time. He has called me to be one of His watchmen, and I have wept over this and prayed that He will help me deliver the message in a spirit of love. This is not a chastisement but a warning for the Assemblies of God.

A New Gospel

Accommodate means to adapt, to make suitable and acceptable, to make convenient. A gospel of accommodation is creeping into the United States. It’s an American cultural invention to appease the lifestyle of luxury and pleasure. Primarily a Caucasian, suburban gospel, it’s also in our major cities and is sweeping the nation, influencing ministers of every denomination, and giving birth to megachurches with thousands who come to hear a nonconfronting message. It’s an adaptable gospel that is spoon-fed through humorous skits, drama, and short, nonabrasive sermonettes on how to cope—called a seeker-friendly or sinner-friendly gospel.

To begin with, those terms are unscriptural. The gospel of Jesus Christ has always been confronting—there is no such thing as a friendly gospel but a friendly grace.

This new gospel is being propagated by bright, young, talented ministers. They have come upon a formula which states you can go into any town or city; and if you have the right formula, within a short time you can raise a megachurch.

If you are a young man and have certain skills, you find those skills and a part of the city that would best suit you. You move into that area, poll it, and find out what the nonchurchgoers want:

“You don’t like choirs. Well, would you go to a church that didn’t have a choir?” Yes.

“You don’t like to wear suits. Would you go where it’s informal?” Yes.

Then you go to your computer and design a gospel that will not confront but will shoot out the desires and the needs of the people. After you have gathered a handful of people, you keep interviewing them to find out what they want; then you design your message to help people cope with their needs. The program you design is intended to make the church comfortable and friendly for all sinners who wish to attend.

This gospel is fast becoming the most prosperous and flourishing of all religious movements. Thousands attend these churches. The pastor is the CEO, and it becomes a business. They make no bones about it: They are following Madison Avenue tactics and can make a success of it. Their formula for quick church growth is cleverly packaged and is being sold especially to young ministers—those who want to be a part of the big boys and what’s happening on a fast track. They want it to happen quickly.

Paul’s Warning

Paul warned of the coming of another gospel and another Jesus (2 Corinthians 11:4). He warned the church that it’s really not another gospel but a perversion of the true gospel of Jesus Christ. If you hear any other gospel, he said, let that preacher be accursed. In other words, no matter how pleasant, how pious, or how sincere, if the message is not the death of sin through the cross of Jesus Christ, let it be accursed.

I tremble when I read in the Scriptures that in the last days Satan is going to come right into the church posing as an angel of light. He’s going to take ministers who, at one time, had the touch of God, and he’s going to transform them into angels of light to become his tool of deception. That’s frightening. It causes me to fall on my face before God for such false, deceitful workers transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. No marvel, for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore, it’s no great thing if ministers also are transformed as the ministers of righteousness whose end shall be according to their works.

Paul said they are going to glory in the flesh, in their bigness, their numbers, their influence, and their contemporariness. They will boast they are contemporary, that there is a gospel that is out of style that doesn’t reach human need anymore. They will glory in the world’s acceptance. Jesus warned, “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves” (Matthew 7:15). The context of that warning was: “Straight is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth to life, and few there be that find it” (verse 14).

His warning was to beware of the wolves who are going to say it’s really not that narrow and straight—they are going to come posing as submissive sheep. Jesus put His finger on the cause: ambition—ambitious ravening wolves. In the Greek it means “starved for recognition and quick gratification, quick growth.”

Jesus left no doubt about His meaning. For example, He was addressing a struggling pastor who has worked for years and hasn’t seen the kind of growth he wants to see. A young man with an accommodating gospel moves into town and and within a very short time has a megachurch. People are flocking there because there is entertainment; it’s a gospel of fun. I’ve been in some of them. It’s the gospel of entertainment that has no conviction whatsoever. There is very little in their gospel that speaks to sinners of repentance, brokenness, and cross-bearing. A Christ is preached, Jesus’ name is mentioned, but Paul said their’s is another gospel, another Jesus.

Paul warned that if you are caught in this trap, if you want that hook of entertainment, that hook of sudden growth, this is the hook: The enemy will put in your path a teaching.

I have two preacher sons. One of them confessed to me, “Dad, I was that close to being sucked in because I fasted and prayed and didn’t see the growth I wanted to see, and I saw these others grow. That hook was there, and I almost bought it.”

That is something this Movement and every movement is going to have to look at and deal with: It is possible, through unholy ambition, to be transformed from a man of God, who has been seeking God and getting a word from heaven, to an unholy ambition and a tool of Satan. Let every pastor heed this warning: The moment you begin to consider the “competition,” seeds of accommodation will be planted in your heart. Suddenly, Satan will put in your path a wolf in sheep’s clothing—a man who will try to seduce you into ungodly ambition and achieving church growth at any cost. Yet the truth is, it could cost you your soul.

The Right Formula

If you find the right formula, according to the accommodation gospel, you can succeed in any field of endeavor.

An editorial in the New York Times (March 1, 1998) was entitled, How To Manufacture a Best-Seller. It told the story of John Baldwin, a 53-year-old carpenter and a would-be writer, who had struggled for years to make a living from writing. He determined to become famous and rich overnight by writing a best-selling medical thriller. He studied five or six best thrillers. After 7 years’ research he found 10 steps to producing a best-selling medical novel. He honed it with some Hollywood writers and agents, and here is the 10-step formula he used:

The hero is an expert.
The villain is an expert.
You must watch all the villain’s activities over his shoulder.
The hero has a team of experts behind him, working in various fields.
Two or more on the team must fall in love.
Two or more on the team must die.
The villain must turn his attention from his initial goal to the team.
The villain and the hero must live to do battle again in the sequel.
All deaths must proceed from the individual to the group.
If the story bogs down, just kill somebody.
John Baldwin had the formula but no story, so he read of research by John Marr who was studying the epidemiological causes of the 10 plagues, hoping to explain their causes scientifically. The two men formed a partnership, and using Baldwin’s 10–step formula, together wrote a 640 page manuscript called The Eleventh Plague. Harper Collins bought it for almost $2 million.

Baldwin, who has no passion for writing, said, “If I get the formula, I’m going to be a multimillionaire and famous.” Well, he’s going to make another $3 million on the movie rights, and he’s laughing all the way to the bank. His philosophy: “If you have the right formula, you can be a success at anything.”

You see, this is the gospel of accommodation—the formula. You get the formula, you get what people want, and you can be a success. I am here to tell you that a formula-based, accommodating gospel is contrary to everything in the Scriptures.

God’s Method

Certain men of God met at Antioch to send out men to preach the gospel and establish churches (Acts 13). Here is God’s method:

1. They ministered to the Lord and fasted. This was their planning session—worshiping, fasting, waiting on the Lord, and calling for direction from the Holy Ghost. They did not move until the Holy Ghost spoke. There were no formulas, no surveys, no door-to-door asking people what they wanted and then serving it to them.

2. They prayed—no strategizing, no network, and not one step until the Holy Ghost spoke His mind. Then and only then did they lay hands upon them, anoint them, and send them out in the power and demonstration of the Holy Ghost.

Paul lived his whole religious life on religious formulas, and he said they didn’t work. He gave up on formulas and said, “I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2:2). Paul boasted unashamedly, “We preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness” (1 Corinthians 1:23). He was saying, “Gentlemen (he was talking to his peers), they want us to accommodate. The Jews are looking for signs in our gospel. The Greeks want the wisdom. They want to know how to cope, but I’m not compromising. There’s only one message. Our gospel has been and will be the Cross and its demands as well as its victories. As for me, I’m determined to preach nothing among you but Christ and Him crucified.”

What the Gospel of Accommodation Does (1)

I see three things in the gospel of accommodation:

1. It is the accommodation of man’s love for pleasure.

“This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers…of pleasures more than lovers of God” (2 Timothy 3:1–4). The Greek for pleasure is “sensuous, lustful, voluptuous, exciting, gratifying, sensual pleasure.” If you move toward this gospel of accommodation, you are going to have to accommodate the people’s lust because they are not going to give up their love for excitement. They’ve made gods of sports, pleasure, and lust. Unless that is confronted by the gospel of Jesus Christ, unless there is a truth that comes forth, you have to accommodate this lust that is in the American lifestyle.

I was shocked by an article in the New York Times.1 Philip Wogaman, President Clinton’s pastor, said, “Sexual misconduct does not automatically render a leader immoral. Morality should also be judged by indicators like courage, concern for the poor, fostering world peace, running the economy responsibly, and furthering racial equality. Heterosexuality and homosexuality are merely cultural expressions.” In other words, Mr. Clinton has been told that he has enough good indicators to overrule another that would be immoral in his life.

God said that men who preach doctrines like these resist the truth; they are men of corrupt minds counterfeiting the faith.

In disbelief I watched a televised Sunday night service of a seeker-friendly church—seeker-friendly by its own admission. To a packed church where thousands attend, the pastor said, “This is fun night, a David Letterman night.” The youth pastor came out and did his monologue as David Letterman. Then they showed 10 of the most boring things teenagers do during preaching. Three of the 10 were throwing spitballs, yawning, and picking their noses. The crowd went crazy. After the service, the pastor brazenly announced, “We’re not here to offend people, but to make church comfortable for everyone.” I wept.

I ask you, how long do you think that audience would stay in church if the pastor was gripped by the Holy Ghost, convicted for “entertaining” people toward hell, and suddenly preached a message entitled, “Be sure your sins will find you out”? How long would people keep coming back if a gospel of holy living and separation from the world was preached? Two things would happen: (1) Those who are misguided, hungry, and didn’t know any better would weep and run to the altar. (2) Those who are judiciously blinded by their pleasures in madness would flee from the church and never come again. The church doors would close.

I keep this foremost in my mind and before my eyes, because every minister of the gospel one day has to face it when he stands before the Lord. He will say, “Son of man, I made thee a watchman. You were to hear the words of My mouth and give them warnings from Me. You were to tell the wicked, ‘Thou shalt surely die.’ And you gave them no warning nor spoke to warn the wicked to turn from their wicked ways to save their lives. These same wicked men died in their sins, but their blood I’ll require at your hands.”

What the Gospel of Accommodation Does (2)

2. This gospel of accommodation accommodates all man’s aversion to self-denial.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is one of self-denial. Jesus said, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me” (Matthew 16:24). Self-denial is not something you give. It’s someone you give up—the giving up of yourself, giving up everything you are. It’s a living sacrifice to the Lord Jesus Christ to present your body a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. God has every right to say to His church, “If you expect to give Me your body, your resurrected body, all through eternity, I have every right—it’s only reasonable of Me and your reasonable service—to ask your body why you’re here on earth. I want every part of you. I want you to be spiritually minded. I want to possess you.”

The gospel we preach must bring people under the total possession of the Lord Jesus Christ. Otherwise, it’s a gospel of accommodation.

The seeker-friendly gospel accommodates the body. The human body belongs to Him. What we see in America is a neognosticism where you take your physical body on one side and do as you please as long as your spirit is right with God. This is coming even out of the White House, this dividing of personality. No, we are one personality, and it all belongs to Jesus Christ. This neognosticism is destroying the faith of many throughout the nation.

What the Gospel of Accommodation Does (3)

3. There is an accommodation of man’s offense to the gospel.

The Scriptures state, “Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense.” Paul spoke of the offense of the Cross. This is the heart of God’s anger. We’re not called to the Cross but to go through the Cross—to experience the same thing Jesus did, not only coming to the Cross but dying and going into the grave with Jesus Christ and then being raised from the dead to a newness of life.

It’s cruel, pastor, to lead sinners to the Cross, tell them they are forgiven by faith, and then allow them to go back to their habits and lusts of the flesh, unchanged and still in the devil’s shackles. If the preaching of grace doesn’t have as its goal the producing of a walk of righteousness, then it’s another gospel, another Jesus.

I listened in horror to a man, who attended one of the largest seeker-friendly churches, being interviewed by CBS. He said, “I come to this church because I’m comfortable. I’m never made to feel uneasy. I bring my Jewish friends and my business friends, and I know nothing will ever be said that will offend them. The best part of it is, the whole thing only lasts an hour.”

Take it from me: You can get your big church and be one of the big boys, but it’s going to cost you your soul if you preach with a focus only on earthly things, rather than on the things of God.

I’ve lived in New York City 35 years. We have 103 nationalities from all walks of life—from the poorest to the richest. Probably 300 or more from the United Nations live there. But I look over a congregation (so does my dear friend, Jim Cymbala, in Brooklyn) and see men who have just walked in from the porno shops and are wild animals. I see a businessman friend who was CEO of a multimillion–dollar company, but he started snorting coke, lost everything, and is now a bum on the street. He sits in the congregation. A little 14-year-old girl with AIDS is up on 8th Avenue performing lewd acts before dirty old men. She comes to church and keeps saying, “Pastor Dave, I’ve got to get out. I’ve got to get help.”

I’m not about to put up a silly skit and preach a 15-minute message on how to cope to a multitude of people who are dying and going to hell. I tremble at the thought.

People don’t like to hear this, but we’re headed for perilous times—just a few years away from a collapse like the world has never known. When that happens, all who preached prosperity are going to disappear because the people will say, “Your gospel has failed me.” When that time comes, I want to grasp onto Jesus, and I want everyone I’ve preached to to have faith in the keeping power of Jesus Christ. I want them to know Him in His fullness. I want to know that I’ve done it in love, in grace, that they would know the difference between the holy and the profane.

May God, in Jesus’ name, spare the Assemblies of God forever. If I have ever given a prophetic message in my lifetime that God intended for a purpose, it is now.

Many are being deceived. If they are not awakened, what I warn you about will happen.

I pray that God will keep the Assemblies of God in its original purposes. In New York City, He has proved that the people come to hear a straight gospel, and thousands will come where the Word of God is being preached without compromise and yet with grace. May the young men who are discouraged in the Movement not try for a shortcut but be broken and on their faces before the Lord.

May we get our eyes off growth and onto a new revelation of who Jesus is.

Malachi John McDowell

The name Malachi means “My messenger”. The name John means “God is gracious”. The strongest desire of our heart regarding our Malachi is to raise him to be a bold and fearless messenger of the graciousness of God manifest in the gospel of Jesus Christ. That the whole of his heart would belong to God and that with his life and his voice he would wholly serve the Lord.

The prophet Malachi’s prophecies make up the final book of the Old Testament and are God’s final words to the His people before sending Jesus some 400 years later. In Malachi, God confronts the lovelessness of His people who are involved in the rituals and day to day business of religion but with hardened hearts, uncertain of His love and unconcerned by their sin.

God’s response is to confront his people’s indifference but also to declare the future arrival of “Elijah the prophet” who would “turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers”. This prophecy was fulfilled in the coming of John the Baptist, a messenger from God who prepared the way of the Lord Jesus, and preached a message of repentance of sins and a turning of hearts back to God.

For Suzanna and I, Malachi’s birth coincides with a period in our lives where we have been burdened for God’s people the Church. Our hearts are anguished by the lack of discernment in the Church and the lack of the fear of the Lord that hinders the revival fire that we and so many others cry out for. It is difficult to watch the simplicity and joy of the Gospel to be lost in a deluge of powerless religious activity, but we know that God longs to restore the joy of salvation to His people.

Our prayer for our son is that he will walk in the conviction and clarity of these men, the prophets Malachi and John the Baptist. That he will rightly divide good from evil. That he will walk in the fear of the Lord and teach others the same. That he will serve in the Church and in the world as a bright and shining light that helps bring clarity where there is confusion. That the testimony of his life will be a loud shout of JOY of the simple transformational power and victory found in Jesus Christ for those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.

Then those who feared the Lord spoke to one another, and the Lord listened and heard them; so a book of remembrance was written before Him for those who fear the Lord and who mediate on His name. “They shall be mine,” says the Lord of hosts, “On the day that I make them my jewels. And I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him. Then you shall again discern between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve Him. - from the book of Malachi

It always gives us such joy to remember the simplicity of receiving His word like a little child and the joy that is found in reading the Gospel and obeying it!  Oh to find one person in America that would receive His word this way….

The Kimyal People Receive the New Testament from UFM Worldwide on Vimeo.

Eight months ago, Suzanna and I started leading a small home group.  The goal was to train some couples on the power of the Gospel, freedom prayer, and discipleship.  After a few months, we realized that leading a small group into lasting transformation was much more fulfilling than constantly teaching larger groups the freedom class (which basically is an introduction to discipleship). For us, momentarily touching the tip of a giant iceberg with a group, seeing them temporarily engage, and then seeing them distracted again by the next conference, the next movement, the next big thing that seems better or more attractive than the Gospel was severely disappointing.   Our hearts have longed to see the people of God understand the Gospel as THE message, THE movement, THE answer for our generation and for this world.

The Lord has clearly shown us what the content and the message of the Gospel is.  We have understood and REJOICED in what a great power there is in Jesus to transform lives and to destroy the works of the devil in people’s lives.  But what we were lacking was an understanding of how to reproduce this on a large scale.

We have traveled to many places in the world to teach this restored understanding of the Gospel to other believers.  We have taught multiple groups of very hungry believers who have been so excited to hear about freedom and the power of Christ within.  During these times it has been so encouraging to see them engage for a few days or a week with the incredible power available to us in Christ to break strongholds and to come into freedom and joy.   However, when we would leave a place after a trip there or in the conversations with the believers one month, six months, or a year later, we would see how little lasting impact we were able to have.  We began to realize that a week of teaching, a conference here or there, even a special school do not equip a believer to walk in power or understanding.  Even in a large, healthy church with consistently good biblical teaching, personal discipleship can be lacking.  The disconnect between what is true theoretically and what is actually true in a person’s life is very strong.  This disconnect in the church is implanted so deep, that even quality teaching and an earnest personal desire to “be on fire for God” are not enough for the reformation needed to produce a church that multiplies.

So as we wrestled to know how to see God’s power, His truths, multiplied across the earth, an answer came from God that was so different than what I had expected.  Smaller, not bigger. As we accidentally stumbled into leading this home group that has become a home church, we realized that we had entered into a way of worship, a way of life, a mode of discipleship much more biblical than anything we had experienced before.

We starting moving forward with leading a small home church with a goal towards training individuals and families to walk in the power of the Gospel in every area of their lives from marriage to children to their interactions daily with other believers and with unbelievers.  We preached multiplication as a lifestyle, not a program or a class or a movement.  In the midst of this, we were sort of shell-shocked.  Most of our thinking up to this time had been on trying to get larger and larger groups into some sort of school or conference or training atmosphere where they could get free, get trained, and get ready to GO.  Now we were realizing how impossible and unproductive this was for the church as a whole.

Most believers are called to GO exactly where they are.  They have children and wives and families and jobs and houses and responsibilities to the community God has called them.  How then do we help these believers in bringing the Gospel where they are?  The answer is in the Gospel.  The answer is in Jesus.  The answer is in discipleship.  The answer is in the Church that Jesus is building.  A church of LIVING STONES, real people filled with Christ himself, the hope of glory, living out the Gospel and multiplying themselves where they are.

A book I have been reading is called Houses that Change the World by Wolfgang Simson.  In the beginning he lays out 15 Theses for how to change the basic structure of how we do church.  While I don’t think these changes are powerful in and of themselves, I see that they are God’s plan for the best structure to multiply the powerful message of the Gospel.  The core of this book is understanding the most basic truth of discipleship. In order to change the world with the Gospel, we have to have quality transformation at the most basic level, the individual believer, before we can see mass transformation and proclamation.

Well, it’s time for our biannual apology for going offline!  We’re back, after many hours of shenanigans with our domain renewal.  Whew…thank goodness that the sharks who’ve been trying to buy “ojandsuz.com” for a few measly tens of thousands missed the chance to swoop in and steal it from under our noses.  :)

Oh, and after a LOOOONG hiatus from writing, my fingers are itching and my mind is whirling…and my belly is GROWING!  So while it could seem like I sure don’t have time for writing now, good sense tells me I’ve got loads of time compared to oh, say, the month of May…

So as long as I can reach the keyboard, I’m going to take the opportunity to get some things off my chest, while I have no such powers over the belly…which is not going anywhere…for another seven weeks.  :)

So…Sorry, hello again, and here we go!!!

One of the most compelling authors on the life of a prophet and on authentic Christian living is Art Katz.  He went to be with the Lord a few years back, but his teachings are still alive on his website.  http://artkatzministries.org/

His book Reality: The Hope of Glory is the most stirring book on life in the Spirit I have ever read.  It cuts through rhetoric and religiosity with precision and heat.  There is no Christian book I can compare it to (except his other great book Apostolic Foundations).  Here is an interesting quote from his book that had me thinking.

“For me to live is Christ” Phil 1:21.  For me to speak is Christ.  For me to carry on a conversation is Christ.  I was once a very engaging personality.  An hour with Art Katz over a cup of coffee would be filled with bright and witty conversation on almost any topic.  Now Katz is lousy company; I am gray, lifeless, inert, except that He is my life.  If there is any graciousness in me, it is His graciousness.  If there is any real wisdom, it is His wisdom.  When it pleases Him not to be engaging, speaking bright things, then neither am I:  “For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.  When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. (Col. 3:3,4)  We have no glory independent of His glory.  He is my life.

The theme of this quote is similar to the theme of Watchman Nee’s book, Release of the Spirit, which is this:  that God wants the soulish part of a man, his personality, his wit, his sense of humor to become increasingly broken and dead so that Christ by the Holy Spirit might use that man.  That a man’s soul would become a tool of the Spirit instead of the soul hindering the work of the Spirit in that man.

Of course there is a danger in this way of thinking in that a man might come to a place where he even hates or despises the gifts of God in himself and would think that dull and lifeless living was virtuous in some way.  I don’t believe that Nee or Katz intend this outcome nor is this God’s desire.

However, I have seen in God’s dealings with me that this part of me is dying that wants to “be liked” or to impress upon others my intelligence, my personality, even my wit.  I see that God still uses these parts of me at particular times in particular ways for His glory.  Yet increasingly, it is according to Christ in me that I live and move and have my being and less according to my own fleshly compulsions.

The outcome of this in day to day relationships and conversations is remarkable and very humbling.  In the company where in the flesh I most desire to be lively and filled with external manifestations of the Spirit to prove in some way my spiritual “greatness”, the Spirit compels me to silence and even a certain degree of deadness.  Its hard to tell why except that it seems God is dealing with my fleshly need to be somebody and to “show” how spiritually lively and wise I am.  Also, there is the element in which God will not be mocked.  The whole ‘no pearls before swine” principle.  God reserves the best things for the hungry and desperate and saves the deep things of the Spirit for where they can be received.

Its in the ordinary moments, where I am not desiring to be puffed up or “show off” my spiritual prowess that I find God moving through me in remarkable ways.  Sometimes in the most ordinary moments of life or ministry in which I am simply obeying God to be there and to say what He wants me to say, I listen as words of life pour out of my mouth, shocked internally that I hear my voice speaking and observing in wonder as streams of living water flow out.  Christ is doing His work through me, a dead man.  The dying (which is difficult, have no doubt) is now serving its purpose in that every trial, every rejection, every humiliation, every lifeless moment of waiting becomes beautifully exchanged for seeing His power and life manifest in me.

1 Cor 4:20  “For the kingdom of God is not in word but in power.”

(Letter to the Lost)

You matter.

You matter because there is a case pending against you that all of history hinges on.  You, God’s masterpiece, knit together out of a secret DNA code that only He could write and science is still beginning to try to decipher.  Too much beauty is contained in that code to describe.  A thousand pictures could not capture how it makes those who love you feel when you laugh.  Too much wisdom is written in those helices for our most brilliant minds to comprehend.  Like the wisdom that teaches the feet of the illiterate to balance their weight perfectly on symmetrical legs.  Too much joy is written into those strands to be expressed; even your parents didn’t come close on the day of your birth.  The only appropriate celebration for your grandeur is of heavenly proportions…but that does hang in the balance.

Because your DNA was hijacked and your beauty marred and the wisdom despised and the joy stifled.  Because you and I have participated in the greatest treachery of all time.  The One who designed, crafted, and rejoiced over you for Love has been denied His heart’s desire:  full fellowship with you.  Your soul’s DNA no longer reads, “Lover of God with all heart, soul, mind and strength.”  It’s been changed to read, “Seeker of self for pleasure, glorification, identity, and source.”  The design is so grossly perverted that you have to be told…TO BE TOLD IN WORDS…to love the most beautiful, perfect Lover conceivable.  To love Love Himself.  You and I, we must be commanded to love Love (for which we were made).  To see Light (for which our eyes were formed).  To do Justice (which is HIs only possible course).  To cherish Mercy, by which we continue to breathe from moment to moment.

So because He must, He commands it.  And still, after the command, written long form in 66 books over hundreds of years, shouted by prophets who were thrown in jail and sawn in half, and then embodied in His own Son made flesh, still after all…still the Word is neglected and disbelieved, the prophets despised, and the Love, Light, the Son of God, made into a pendant.  Crucified by religion daily, His righteousness undesired.  And here you are in the now of history, with thousands of years of defiance of men before you and the return of the King to come, and everything is hinging on how you will respond.

You matter.  The case against you is unchangeable, insurmountable, terrifying.  You were made for greatness, one way or the other.  And you have been pursued in the sea of humanity for rescue by the Son of Man and the Son of God.  One and the same, Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.  Have you heard His name?  Then you have been pursued eternally and offered the world’s only hope.  Have you seen His book?  Then He has cried out to you in a loud voice.  Have you been told of His death?  Then you have been confronted with the most astounding injustice the greatest imagination could ever conceive of, the greatest story ever told, and the greatest act of Love any man or spirit could attempt.  The immortal God dying slowly at the hands of the rebels, the underlings, the traitors.  The created killing Creator.  The Omnipotent nailed up by weaklings.  Voluntarily.

And YOU are the one at the center of the story.  The ONE for whom Christ died.  You matter.  You matter.  You could not matter more.  There is no more certain guarantee of your worth than this, Jesus Christ hanging on the cross outside the camp, bloody beyond recognition.  You matter.  If there is one question on which you dare not waste another moment it is the question of whether you are loved and important.  Do you see Him there on the Cross?  You matter.

No, the question is not whether you are loved, or whether you are significant.  You must disbelieve the Cross and reject history to remain asking what has been so resoundingly answered for all time.  No, the question is if you esteem Him.  Whether you see Him as worthwhile and significant.  Him, the King of Glory.  All Creation is groaning for His return, but He holds off, offering you another day and another breath to engage all the angels of heaven in celebration.  Will you repent?  Will you turn?  Will you bow and surrender to love, or defy not only the Righteous Judge, but your own Advocate and Redeemer, in the end standing only in agreement with your accuser and abuser, who calls you worthless and tutors you how to be so?  For a few moments the world will stand with you as you stand with them, but it is a vapor.  And so you will face the One before whose face all of heaven and earth flees away on your own.  And He will open the Lamb’s Book of Life, to see if your name is in it.

All the universities in the world, temples of idolatry, and drunken stupors of men will never change the eternal truth:  There’s a book.  He died to put your name in it.  You matter.  Will you believe, confess, and repent?  He will pay all debts, allowing you to die and be reborn.  To be a new creation, to have new life, eternal life in full fellowship with Him.  He will save you not only from the eternal penalty of sin, but from the life of slavery to sin you now live.  Sin will no longer be your master; if only you will submit to Him, the kindest and most preferred of all Masters, Lord of all!  Bowing to His Lordship will make you free!

When you do, friend and brother, finally the celebration of your worth is released in the heavenlies, all the angels rejoicing at the redemption of the Precious Prodigal.  What joy, on earth and in heaven, the Father’s will done.  Restored relationship with you.  You matter.

⁸ But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart”^[a](that is, the word of faith which we preach): ⁹ that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. ¹⁰ For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.  Rom. 10:8-10

And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.’ ¹⁰In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”  Luke 15:9-10

All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: ¹⁹that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. ²⁰We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. ²¹God made him who had no sin to be sin^[a] for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.  2 Cor. 5:18-21

This is a very powerful sermon.  I know you would be blessed by this sermon if you have ever thought about being a pastor, missionary, Sunday school teacher, small group leader, home group leader, Christian counselor, or having any sort of impactful ministry.

Allright, first on the list of things believers generally don’t believe in is Salvation.  (meaning that people don’t seem to think that salvation means actually being saved from anything)

Go ahead, throw a fit.  But if you can put up with me for a minute, I think I can prove this to you.  And I’ll try to make you laugh.

Here’s a typical conversation one might have with a Christian.

“So, are your parents saved?”

“Well, I don’t have a relationship with my dad.  But my mom and my step-dad, Fred, are.  They go to First United blah, blah, blah…”

“Oh.  Your step-dad?  The one your mom left your dad for?  Wait a minute, didn’t you tell me that Fred is an alcoholic?”

“Yeah, but he believes in Jesus.”  Believes IN Jesus?  What does this mean?  At this point, I’m picturing Fred giving Jesus a big high-five… “Way to go, Jesus.  I knew you had it in you.  I always believed in you. ”

“So…he believes that Jesus…is cool?  Likes church?  Gave him a free hall pass on adultery and drunkenness?  What?”

Note:  if you take the conversation this far, you will be getting a very blank look from your friend.  Or he might be getting a little angry.  So you might try this instead.  ”Have you ever talked with Fred about his relationship with Jesus?  Have you asked him about his testimony of salvation?”

“No, people in our family are pretty private about religion.  I love my parents.  I’m not trying to ’start something’ with them.”

At this point, you are wondering if this person has started to realize that they just claimed to “love” someone who may be headed for hell with their approval.  But typically they are not realizing.  Instead they probably think that you are weird.

But here is the Scripture:  ”Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.” 1 Cor 6:9-10

You probably wouldn’t share that scripture. Because who believes that scripture?  WHO BELIEVES THAT SCRIPTURE?

I had a fear of God moment one when I was struck by how many programs churches present to those in sexual sin that enables them to sit in their bondage, tormented out of their minds, destroying themselves and their families and headed for hell because no one believes the Scripture enough to tell them the urgent truth straightforwardly.

FLEE SEXUAL IMMORALITY!  YOU WILL NOT INHERIT THE KINGDOM!  The Bible says that ungodly sorrow leads to death but godly sorrow leads to repentance.  So it doesn’t matter if you cry over your addiction every day in church for ten years!  You will stay addicted because you have not repented!

If you’ve never had a conversation like this and seen the light dawn on someone’s face, I need to tell you how sweet and glorious it is when a sinner repents.  The angels in heaven REJOICE!!  And seeing sinners repent and come to God more than makes up for the sadness you feel at how people can be in church all their lives and never once hear the simple, beautiful message of the power of repentance.  Also if one person receives the truth, it more than makes up for ten who reject it and you.

If you believe the Scripture, you have fear of God over the souls of your friends.  You speak with force, and you do not let people sit in the deception that “I’m saved, you just can’t see it.  It’s the invisible kind that doesn’t bear fruit.”

The church simply has unbelief that salvation actually saves anybody.  Think about it.  When we come across someone who’s “really broken” with the drug addiction and the prison background, do we shrink back?  Do we calculate if they will fit in to our church body?  If there’s anybody equipped to handle their issues?  If we could afford the “Christian counselor” they need?  Or do we get in their face with the confidence of eternity in our eyes and our hearts filled with love and say “THAT is why He went to the cross.  YOU are the one He’s looking for. It was for YOUR ADDICTION, YOUR PAIN, YOUR SHAME.  IT’S ALREADY DONE. Will you BELIEVE on the Lord Jesus Christ, CALL on His name, and REPENT?  HE WILL SAVE YOU AND SET YOU FREE!!!  How many stories of how Jesus set ME free do you need to hear right now?”

Obviously, if we don’t have those stories about how Jesus set us free then we have quickly gotten to the core of our unbelief.  Of course, salvation is not just for the point of conversion.  Jesus always SAVES!  It’s who He is! Either we’ve been too prideful to see our need, or have not believed for the miraculous salvation of Jesus over and over and over as we daily encounter our stuff:  our depression, our anger, our confusion, our self-focus.  Do we call on the name of the Lord?  Or do we “handle” life with worry, analysis, and fleshly solutions?  Because normal Christian life is to have another story of how Jesus saved us with every passing day.

If I had to guess how most believers think of salvation, I’d say we tend to think of it more as a club membership attained by assent to certain doctrines.  We don’t tell people to be saved so much as to agree that He is a Savior.  You know, doctrinally.  Why is this?  What is it that we don’t believe about the world, ourselves, and Jesus that stunts our confidence in salvation?  Next time…sin.

At last week’s Bible study with the High School girls, a young lady gave her life to Jesus. She’d been hearing the Gospel at Bible study for a few months, but she got saved because someone appeared to her on her bed while she was listening to her rap music. He had asked her if she wanted to take “the oath.” Her response was, “I’m gonna have to get back to you on that.” She got on her computer to research the “oath” and learned that one of her favorite rap artists has written about “the oath” he took when he sold his soul to the devil. And another of her favorites. And another, and another.

We found all this out when she confessed in the group that she knew her music was sinful and she needed to get rid of it. I asked, “How did you know your music was sinful?” wondering where she got this revelation. Then she told us “the story” above.

So…we had preached the Gospel to this young lady, and eventually the devil showed his hand by showing up on her bed. This young lady knew there was a way out. She had been pondering if she would be able to give up her life to Jesus, but this pushed her over the edge. She gave it all to Jesus. The enemy lost this battle.

A few months ago, OJ and I came across a DVD of a black preacher who was testifying of what the Lord had shown him years ago about the then-emerging hip-hop movement. In the wake of the phenomenon of satanic heavy metal, the Lord told this man that the enemy was releasing a power to prepare a generation for total anarchy and resistance to order.

There are lots of freaky people out there with scare tactics and conspiracy theories. But this guy didn’t have any theories. All he did was tell the self-published stories of the most popular hip-hop artists of the day. He showed their lyrics, album covers, books, and video clips. There was nothing hidden. All the occult references were glorified and emblazoned, bold. I was paying attention, very close attention, because I had already witnessed the music addiction of the young people. I had experienced the feeling of trying to preach the Gospel while opposed by a spirit of witchcraft, but I couldn’t explain why, because the young people were not involved in the occult.

This is how I’ve heard the young ladies talk about their music repeatedly before they come to the point of being willing to give it up to Jesus:

“It’s my heart.”
“It’s who I am, it’s my identity.”
“I can’t live without my music.”
“I love it more than anything. I need it.”
“It’s the only way I can get my feelings out.”

I don’t know how many times a year a demon offers a lonely child “the oath” in exchange for fame and money, and they accept it. I don’t really care. No oath is bigger than the blood of Jesus, so it’s a hoax anyway. How can you sell a soul that’s already bought by Jesus on the cross? The answer’s still the same…it’s the Gospel. So why am I telling this story?

I’m telling it because I’m burning inside with a consuming fire. The phrase “the valley of the shadow of death” has been going through my mind today, but not just because of rap music.   There has never been a land or a country more saturated with Christianity, more churched, and more familiar with the name of Jesus than ours. But demons are visiting kids on their beds, thousands of young people are primed for riots and rebellion in our inner cities, millions are being launched into perversion by media and public education, and overall the situation is so much more dire than anyone will admit.  I feel like the “valley of the shadow of death” describes our nation. A religious graveyard that is saturated with a powerless gospel.

But how can the gospel be powerless?  Romans 1:16 says that the Gospel IS the power of God unto salvation.  Here’s how:  we preach a powerless gospel even if it is doctrinally accurate when we don’t ourselves fully believe it.  For OJ and me, the hunt for the power of God has led us through a lot of grand ideas right back to the simple gospel, only to discover that this most glorious and beautiful of all that could ever be said, thought, or imagined, had for us been shrouded in unbelief.

As we dove in through repentance addressing our own unbelief, we began to see this pandemic of unbelieving believers.  Unbelief leaves us essentially disabled in preaching an effective Gospel and seeing souls saved, lives transformed, and people set free.  I’m not talking about getting people to say a sinner’s prayer from a speech on a stage, but personally leading lost people into salvation, or a bound person into freedom.  You know, normal Christian life.

We did not know how much unbelief was in our lives, we seemed to be filled with faith.  But what an awesome and powerful revelation it has been to have our eyes opened!  I’m excited to take a few blogs to talk about some areas of unbelief that are so normal to believers, we often don’t even believe you CAN believe them.  :)  First up, Salvation.  Check back in.

If you have never had your eyes opened to the demonic powers at work today in hiphop music, then let me introduce you to G. Craige Lewis.  This man has more insight into the modern day music scene and its ties to mainstream pop culture and secular humanism than anyone I have ever heard.  And you know he’s the real deal because he always preaches the gospel while he’s opening up Christians’ eyes to the devil’s work.   Really, really love this guy.  His videos on youtube are hilarious and pointed.  Very powerful.

http://gcraige.blogspot.com/

I made that phrase up.  But we were married seven years ago today!  OJ and I wrote vows to each other, said the traditional vows, and wrote a vow to the community…I know, long wedding!  Anyway, we cannot believe how faithful God has been to allow us to live these dreams! Literally, we looked at the words the other day and just were struck.  This is exactly what the Lord has done.

OJ and I were talking about there can be an illusion that “grace” or “anointing” ever substitutes for really hard work.  When we wrote these words, we had very little idea of what we were really getting ourselves into!  Much of these first seven years of marriage were spent in really hard work submitting ourselves to God in our marriage, breaking through in Biblical parenting, and laying a foundation.  There were many moments of…shall we say…REALLY HARD  work.  But the payoff…wow, the payoff.  Jubilee!!    God is so faithful!!!  Thank you, Jesus!!!

Commitment to the Community as One

“Suzanna and I could each give you a testimony of coming to Jesus and finding in Him the treasure that is worth everything.  We have been saved, set free, accepted as the Beloved of the Most High.  Most of you know the commitments we’ve made as individuals to, in the words of Paul, ‘offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable…’  But today, out of two God forges a new thing:  one flesh, individuals no longer.  And so we bring to you the renewed commitment verbalized and declared, personal testimonies become also the testimony of a marriage–from two, one voice.

“This marriage we offer to God as a living sacrifice.  This marriage we commit to Jesus for His use and pleasure.  In unity, we ask for the ministry of Jesus to flow through us, to bind up the wounded, nourish the impoverished, set the captives free.  as one flesh we choose to reject the idols of culture and comfort in favor of the kingdom of God.  We ask of Jesus that He take possession of our home, our marriage, and our children, just as He took possession of our broken souls.

“We commit to you, His beloved church, to live for Him, to seek Him on your behalf, to lean on you for support and love, rejecting independence.  We pray that when you come into our home, instead of finding us in pursuit of vain ambitions, you’ll encounter Jesus with arms open, saying, ‘All who are thirsty, come and drink…’

“We see our frailty, but we rest in the promise of Christ, the guarantee of the Spirit, and the trust that you will offer grace when we fail.”

7 years. 3 kids. 5 moves. Lots of Joy.

This is worth your time to watch and listen.  Hope you enjoy!  OJM

I’m taking a break from the Love of Money series for one post because I am so burdened.  This is a little different, a plea from my heart to yours, so please bear with me.

OJ and I don’t watch TV really; we are pretty out of touch.  But last night, OJ was doing his discipleship meeting and I had a ton of folding and dishes to do, so I thought I’d find something.  I looked on a free website that hosts shows and movies and found a show that I’ve heard so many friends celebrate, so I thought I’d check it out.  I read that it was a family show, and the premise sure sounded super fun.

I opened the first one which started with the name “Madonna,” and skipped on to the next one.  The entire plot line surrounded a homosexual high school male who was yearning to draw a (straight) male into his amorous feelings for him.  Within the first five minutes, there had been numerous sexual references, including straightforward propositioning of a married man, an invitation to grab a same-sex partner for a dance, “if that’s the way the good Lord made ya,” and much more.  In FIVE minutes.

FRIENDS, PLEASE, PLEASE PLEASE…this is not an angry letter from a political group or a holier-than-thou sermonette, but please…my heart is breaking…please…what are you doing????  What are you doing???  What are you watching?  Where are you, that you could watch this stuff, and broadcast it as a pleasure, endorsing it publicly???  Do you not know?  Have you not seen?  Are you blind?

When my generation was in high school, the church was battling that we would make it through our teens with our virginity intact.  For most of the church, that battle was lost.  Do you know that for the generation that is now in high school, there is no difference between homo- and heterosexual sex, and it is all available and normal and practiced, often not even in the context of a dating relationship?  Do you understand that the utter destruction of a generation is taking place before our very noses?

The other day a young girl dressed like a man and almost in the j.d. system for violence heard me talking and asked, “What is righteousness?”  PLEASE can you HEAR them???  Asking….”What is righteousness?”  Can there be a greater injustice than to have no concept even that such a thing as righteousness exists?  Can you imagine, not being able to remember having an undefiled mind?  Being innocent?  Can you IMAGINE?  Perhaps you are too numb, because your mind is now so defiled!

Do you not know how such strides of destruction were made against these little ones in such a short amount of time?  The box in your living room!

Friend, please do not mistake my intent!  I am weeping, not superior, in any way!  If you can watch homosexuality among youth celebrated and invited on a screen, if you can welcome it into your home without flinching, if you don’t notice any more when women are half naked and casual sex and adultery and mockery of righteousness are PLOT LINES then I have to tell you, because the world won’t THAT YOU ARE SLEEPING!!!  You may think whatever you like of your spiritual life, but I tell you that the HOLY Spirit is grieved and whether you know it or not, you are hungry, so very, very hungry for His presence, not understanding that you are staving Him off and sending Him away.

Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”?  Jas. 4:5

I am astonished.  The world doesn’t astonish me, but friends with whom I have prayed, worshipped, and sought God…this astonishes me.  Please take a moment to be honest about whether you enjoy the Lord’s fellowship throughout your day, about whether when you speak, it carries authority, about whether your prayers are heard.  Please…you do not need to beg God to come near.  He already has but you have sent Him away!

Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, and that he may send the Christ, who has been appointed for you—even Jesus.  Acts 3:19-20

Please, I beg of you, give your Spirit CPR…take a one month fast from media and replace it with Scripture and see if you can go back.  See if you don’t come alive.  See if you can swallow what is now normal to you without vomiting.  I challenge you to this!!  I don’t know who you are, I don’t keep tabs, or remember names…I just BEG OF YOU to WAKE UP!  I beg of you.

This will encourage you:

A few verses on compromise:

Rom 12: 1-2

1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. 2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

Romans 13:12-14 (New King James Version)

12 The night is far spent, the day is at hand. Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. 13 Let us walk properly, as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lust, not in strife and envy. 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts.

1 Peter 4:1-5

1 Therefore, since Christ suffered for us^[a^] in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same mind, for he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, 2 that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh for the lusts of men, but for the will of God. 3 For we have spent enough of our past lifetime^[b^] in doing the will of the Gentiles—when we walked in lewdness, lusts, drunkenness, revelries, drinking parties, and abominable idolatries. 4 In regard to these, they think it strange that you do not run with them in the same flood of dissipation, speaking evil of you. 5 They will give an account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.

Gal 5:19-20

19 Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery,^[c^] fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, 21 envy, murders,^[d^] drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

James 4:4-6

4 Adulterers and^[a^] adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. 5 Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”?
6 But He gives more grace. Therefore He says:

“ God resists the proud,
But gives grace to the humble.”^[b^]

JOhn 7:6-8

Then Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always ready. 7 The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify of it that its works are evil. 8 You go up to this feast. I am not yet^[a^] going up to this feast, for My time has not yet fully come.”

Matthew 5:13

“You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.”

We have been talking about doing an update for so long that the stakes for a really, really good one just kept getting higher and higher. I am going to leave it to Suz to come on in the next few days with one of her brilliant posts. I will just put some of the main things down here.

1. After leaving KC, we visited family and did some ministry in South Carolina.   The Lord opened some doors in new relationships and some future opportunities to bring the restored gospel to my parents church and friends.
2. After about a week in Walterboro, the Lord provided for us to do a short family vacation in Palm Coast, FL! Absolutely wonderful, the kids loved it.

Kids play in sand

3.  After the trip to Florida, we went back to SC, and got to spend some time with my brother’s family.  This was totally GREAT!  The kids had not seen these cousins for 2 years.

Kids and Cousins with Grandpa and Grandma

4.  We left South Carolina and went to Chicago for 10 days.  We helped Suzanna’s parents do multiple projects to help get their house ready to sell and on the market.  It was hard work, but we accomplished a lot.  After the house sells, Suz’s parents are moving down here to KC! HOORAY!!! While in Chicago, we also got chances to see a lot of old friends and minister freedom to them.

5.  We came back here to KC and stayed with Dr. Wendy and Suzy’s sister Amy for over a week before we found a new place to live.  We only planned on staying a few days but it took a while to find the right place and Amy and Wendy were very gracious in allowing us to stay extra long.  The children tried multiple times to wreck everything in the home (not a home well-prepared for 3 McDowell men), but only I actually succeeded in breaking something.  (Wendy, I still owe you a new top for that sauce pan. Sorry!)

6. The Lord led us to a great town home right on the border of Kansas and Missouri.  We live off of State Line Road.  It is a very strategic place to be for us.  We are closer to our church. We are closer to Center High School where Suzanna continues to lead a girl’s discipleship group which has now grown to 6 girls every Friday afternoon. I am still only a few miles away from the men’s discipleship and outreach group that I am leading on Wed nights on the Missouri side.

So we are still not completely moved in and out of boxes yet.  From the time we hit the ground here, we have picked up right where we left off in the lives God has given us to invest in.  Multiple discipleship meetings every week, strategy and prayer meetings over the way forward for Center High School, and we just did a Marriage Freedom Course this past weekend for 12 couples who had attended our prior freedom classes.  The time with these 12 amazing couples was absolutely spectacular.   We are seeing amazing marriage teams raised up in our midst to bring the power of the gospel and of freedom in Christ to the areas of influence that God has given them.

It is such a joy to see reproduction so quickly.  We hear new reports every week of people who have received freedom and ministry doing the same things in their homes.  Taking a friend or group of friends through the freedom book.  Couples sitting down and praying for their friends and relatives and hearing from the Lord powerfully to bring freedom.  Our next freedom course begins on the 23rd and we already have friends of friends of friends registering to come to our next class.

The trip to SC and Chicago was supposed to be a fundraising trip, but for the most part, it ended up being more of a ministry and family trip.  We know that God knows the right people who will be partnered with us long-term and will lead us to come together at the right time.  In the meantime, God has provided for us every step of the way in this journey and transition as many people in the family of God have been led to give us one-time gifts.  We have even had a few people commit to regular giving to this ministry.  Currently, we are at 25% of what would be considered “fully funded” as far as commitments for partnering.  So we do need prayer that God would continue to lead us to the right relationships for those who see the need for freedom, discipleship, and the restored gospel in the church and want to partner with this ministry.

We are so encouraged to be back in Kansas City, doing what we were made to do and actively encouraging the church in being who we all are called to be.  God’s masterpiece, filled up with the hope of glory, Christ himself, our all in all, in whom we live and move and have our being!  A church set apart for the purposes of God, a light set on a hill, boldly living and proclaiming the glorious message of the cross and continuing daily to glory in what Christ has done and accomplished.  Unashamed and filled with joy, living not with our eyes dimmed by the cares and worries of this life, but eyes and hearts set heavenward, gazing on our beautiful, majestic Creator, fully engaged in bringing the kingdom of God to a broken and sinful world.  Not asleep, but awake to the reality that all of eternity stretches out before us and God has given us this vapor of a life to cooperate with His eternal purposes.  What a joy!  What an honor!  Words can not describe the greatness of the God we serve and of the message that we carry inside.