She also tackles her thoughts about Lakeland now that some of the dust has settled – GOOD stuff there.

Kelly, if you read this – thank you for being such an encourager to the Body of Christ!

What I feel is very hard to describe – it’s holy fear and awe but more, but over time and with consistency I’ve come to know it as my “God is about” feeling. What I feel is subtle and I suppose could go un-noticed if I wasn’t paying attention. I never rely on “just” the “feeling” (I think that would be dangerous) but couple that with what the Bible and the Spirit actually say. (I can’t say that I’ve ever had the feeling when Scripture contradictions)

I also have a particular physical sensation when exposed to certain non-Christian teachings – occult, new age, JW, Mormon, etc. It’s almost like a cloud descends and it feels like something is trying to bend my brain. It’s an odd feeling, disturbing. (Likewise I can’t say I’ve ever had the feeling about something that’s actually God)

I’ve noticed over the last few weeks that I get that same cloud/bend sensation when I’m reading heresy-hunter stuff. I just happened upon a forum I figured would be pro-revival by its name. Some folks are, and some folks are rabidly anti-revival (not just Lakeland). Same sensation as I get when I’m around evil.

Just wanted to note it as something interesting.

Found two things of interest to everyone who’s following the Lakeland Revival/Todd Bentley and the issues therein:

The first, from Pray the Revolution, discusses heresy hunters and bereans. Good take on it.

The second, from the Prayer Room blog, talks about Todd’s comments on his situation, through Rick Joyner. I’m copying the relevant portion here – but the rest of what Rick has to say is important, too.

”Todd Bentley asked me to convey his appreciation for all the prayers, expressions of love, and concern while he tries to navigate through this present situation. He is grieved by the trouble and confusion this has caused, especially to his friends, coworkers, and all who have trusted him. He wants to make a clear statement about it, acknowledging his responsibility in this and the mistakes he made, but he feels that he should first meet with Pastor Bill Johnson, who is out of the country and will not be available for a couple more weeks. He asks that you would continue to pray for him, and he thanks those who are willing to be patient. He wants to do this right and not hastily or superficially. ”

Given Fresh Fire Ministries’ announcements over the last few days regarding Todd and Shonnah Bentley’s separation and the subsequent announcement that Todd had developed an emotional bond with another woman that was inappropriate, a number of people are asking questions.

Perhaps the most common is, “How did all those leaders, pastors, and people who flocked to the revival lack discernment?”

My satirical response is, “Did YOU know it was going on?” (to which you’d reply, “no, but I knew SOMETHING was…”, and my further response would be, “Because millions and millions of Christians are poor, ignorant slobs who are dumber than a big bucket full of hair and who are incapable of hearing from the Lord and who should bow to your obviously superior connection to God” … except that the complainers generally have complained that many felt that Todd Bentley had a superior connection to God and I’m sure that said complainers don’t want THAT association. (not to mention that it’s rather ridiculous!)

The simple answer to “Why didn’t you know?” is, “He didn’t tell me.”

Contrary to popular opinion (mostly among non-prophetic folks), God does not tell His prophets everything. He doesn’t tell anyone everything. Paul argues in 1 Corinthians 13 that even if God DID tell us everything, but we lack love (KJV=”charity”), it’s all rather pointless.

My question is, “Where’s the love and charity for the Bentleys?”

Best ask God before you reply, “But we knew something was wrong from the beginning…”

Kathie Walters has a GREAT piece over on the Realms of Glory blog – talking about discernment and bitterness with regards to this whole situation. She even talks about Branham, Ron

Someone else (when I remember who/were, I’ll edit) said that perhaps God has reasons for not telling people – because He’s wanting to teach the church about how to respond in love and humility to this situation.

A counterpart to the above question/response is this: The revival is/was never about Todd Bentley. TB is a man. But Jesus is Jesus, and that’s Who the revival is about.

A second counterpart to the above question/response is this: God used a flawed man. Find me one that’s not. [self included there!]

There’s no “excuse” for sin – but when it happens, what is the one who sinned supposed to do? Perhaps the critics and heresy hunters would be happy if TB doused himself with gasoline and lit himself on fire? One would hope not (but I wouldn’t doubt it!)… all TB has to do is go to God with it and get right, and take steps to ensure it doesn’t happen again, and marvel at His grace and love (as the rest of us should, daily!)… and it sounds like he’s doing just that.

I do wonder what God thinks of all the curses that have been leveled at Todd and Shonnah. The Bible says that life and death are in the power of the tongue. That’s not some magickal formula, but it is a practical spiritual principle. If it’s true that out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks – and the mouth is speaking vile words against a Christian – what is in the heart? Jesus says that we’ll give an account for our words, you know! (NOTE: again, I’m not referring to people who disagree. I’m sure if I attended my local Baptist church I’d find a lot to disagree with, and I might say so – but I’m not going to call their doctrines demonic and denounce the pastor and warn people about them! *)

(I’m going to talk about me for a second, because to talk about Todd with my next statement would be speculative and that would be wrong to do. Could it be part of what happened? Yes. Is it? Time, and God, will tell.) I’ve been the recipient of loving, constructive criticism. It can be hard to take sometimes, but when God is in something, even when two people disagree, all grow more in Him. I’ve also been the recipient of hateful, spiteful, cursing, venomous words – most often from people claiming to be Christians.  Some of it’s current, but most of it’s in the past from my involvement at EW. Hopefully I’ve learned some lessons from that time, that I can apply to now. But I can say that discouraging words do tend to do just that – discourage. When it seems that not only is every demon on the planet out to get you, but friends, neighbors, brothers, sisters, and complete strangers are out to get you also – it’s hard to maintain focus. It’s hard to escape the bitter soap opera (it just occurred to me, lots of the Psalms are about this very subject…).

I speak of the revival in the present tense, and will continue to do so. To the best of my knowledge, services are still going on at Ignited Church, but even if they were to cease, the impartation I received and revival I experienced still live in my heart. There is a holy passion for Jesus and a level of intimacy with Him that I have now that’s qualitatively and quantitatively DIFFERENT from what I had pre-revival (and I had no small measure before).

Someone (Anita or Alycin, I think) said that we should not take “pride” in our relationship with Christ. I think I’m going to have to write another post, about intimacy and relationship. To an extent I agree – if we start thinking that because we’re in tight with God, nothing bad can happen to us, and we can do no wrong, then things are likely to unravel. But we also must rest secure in Jesus and strive to grow in that relationship every minute of every day! I’ll say more in another post, maybe later today – we’ll see.

Again, I’ve written a much longer post than I intended to! I just get wordy in my old age and general sleepiness (it’s been an odd day – had to have Kayt to the RDU airport 90 minutes away, at 4:30 this morning for her flight to Florida. That means we got up at 2 and left here around 3. Came home, took a nap, but still zzzzzzzzzzz!! She just called a bit ago, arrived safely and is headed to Southeastern to get settled in! Thank You, Lord, for her safe travel!!)

* Clarification – since I’ve mentioned them before – There are two Baptist churches in our town that I DO warn people about – not because they’re Baptist, but because they routinely throw people out of church for not giving enough money and not dressing “appropriately” (One church asked Mother Louise not to ever come back, because she attended an evening service wearing a pantsuit). However, these two are exceptions to the rule and most of the other churches are quite nice.

Tears and hysterics. She’d had a car wreck up in Maryland (where her summer job was), and was pretty sure the car wasn’t driveable.

She’d been driving back to her room with 3 of her friends and a guy ran the red light. She’s pretty sure that he had no headlights on, because all she saw was shadow. She knew the shadow would hit the side of her car, so she swerved to protect her passenger. It’s a good thing she did, because the girl might well have died. She took the impact on the front left bumper of the car. They spun around a few times and ended up banging into a big light pole.

The kids were jolted around a little bit, and pretty shook up – but none of them were injured.

The guy who hit them parked his car and took off on foot. The cops busted him later and he was in jail last I knew. They towed her car off, and a friend came to give them a ride home (THANKS GAVIN!)

About a week before, God showed me that Kayti would be a car accident before she left Maryland. I didn’t tell anyone – I just started praying. After she called, I told Ken and he said, “God showed me the same thing! I’ve been praying for her safety all week!!”

God answered those prayers. The tow truck guy was amazed the kids had escaped injury.

Since her car wasn’t driveable, we headed up to MD to get her and all her stuff and bring her home. She was supposed to have left Saturday afternoon to drive home ANYWAY!! At that point we were figuring that the car might be fixable. Kayt went that afternoon to get her stuff out of it (AGAIN – THANKS GAVIN!) and sent us a picture:

I, of course, burst into tears. Ken was pretty close. We got to see the car for ourselves the next morning – it looks far worse in person. The front bumper’s gone, the radiator’s smashed right into the engine, pieces of the top of the motor, like the emissions canister, are mangled or gone. The airbag deployed and Kayti says at the accident scene there was oil everwhere – so we think the engine block’s cracked too.

The tow truck guy told us that the insurance company will likely total it. It makes us mad because although it’s an older car, it was in pristine condition. Kayt had just put new tires on it and had some other work done to it. It even got great gas mileage!!

He also told us that by the look of things, the guy had to be travelling a lot faster than the speed limit.

We’re still waiting to hear from the policeman who responded to the scene. The cops say we have to wait 10 days for a police report – which includes finding out the guy’s name and insurance info. WHAT? She’s got to be at school Saturday morning. How’s she going to get there??

So, we’re praying for God to make a way for a speedy resolution to the whole matter.

We could have gotten a midnight call that our baby had been killed. God heard our prayers and protected her!!

So, we drove from Charlotte Sat AM to Greensboro, and rented a car because we weren’t sure the van would make that long of a trip. Drove up to the far side of DC through hours (weeks? years?) of bumper to bumper traffic, and got there so exhausted we decided to get a hotel rather than risk driving home sleepy. So we stayed at the Sleep In in Laurel, MD. If you’re ever in the DC area that’s the place to say. Nice room, nice indoor pool, nice breakfast, nice people for far less money than any of the other hotels in the area!!!

We drove back Sunday afternoon, after seeing the car (and crying some more). Got in lateish last night and went zzzzzzzzzzz. Still feeling tired and achy from so much riding, but so glad to be home with our daughter safe and sound!!

If you want to read something REALLY cool, scroll down to the heading, “A Visit From Jesus”.

ARRIVAL

Thursday morning we packed up and headed down to Charlotte. Our hotel (Best Western Carowinds) was quite nice. They let us check in early. We got a bite to eat and headed over to Morningstar fairly early. We’d never been there before, so we drove around and saw the big field where Friday’s meeting would be, and sort of self-toured their campus.

I’d heard that Morningstar had bought the old PTL (Jim Bakker) campus, but since the whole PTL thing blew up years before I cared about what Christians did, I didn’t know about it. They sunk bazillions of dollars into the place, and apparently even though it was opulent, some of the workmanship was shoddy – especially on the high-rise apartment building that’s going in right next to the church (which meets in the former lobby of the big hotel). Opulent doesn’t even describe the hotel/indoor mall/church… it looks like something out of a fairy tale (and yes, there IS a castle on the premises too – but it seems to be boarded up for now.) Morningstar bought it for 1.6 million in terrible disrepair, and they’ve been fixing it up ever since. It seemed to us that where they were able to preserve the beauty of the place inexpensively, they’ve done so – but where that would cost too much they’ve opted for plainer and more practical.

PARTNER’S MEETING

After we registered for the partner’s meeting, we ate a nice and inexpensive lunch in the church’s Missions Cafe, then wandered through the bookstore and such. While we were eating, we got to say a quick hello to Rick Joyner. I gained a lot of respect for him over the two days we were there. Many senior pastors of important ministries expect everyone else to do the work, and the pastor expects to sit in the air conditioning and get the glory for it. Rick was out there talking with team members, making sure they had what they needed… and on Friday he was out driving a golf cart around working!!

Eventually we bought a book and got in the book-signing line. I highly recommend that everyone read Todd’s latest book – The Reality of the Supernatural World. He signed it for us, and chit-chatted, and shook our hands. I do admit that it’s nice to know that it’s possible to be touched by Todd Bentley and NOT end up on the floor!!

The partner’s meeting was nice. We weren’t sure what to expect. They talked a lot about the work in Uganda, especially with the child soldiers (made me cry!) and they took up an offering, of which 100% of it goes to that work.

IMPARTATION

Afterward, we had a healing/impartation prayer line. This time when Todd touched me I went out on the floor (most folks did) and I had an experience with God that was just incredible. I could feel the heavy weighty kabod glory of God, and peace and warmth and love flowing through me. I just lay there for a long time, just drinking in His presence. After it was over, no one wanted to leave!!

FRIDAY’S REVIVAL SERVICE

On Friday, we got up and found the Starbucks We eventually made our way over to Morningstar. It was a big open field, but fortunately the main building was open and air conditioned, so before the service started at 5, we were able to go in and rest a bit. We sure got sunburned! But interestingly the sunburn doesn’t hurt…

CARNIVAL?

I’m sure a lot of people who see it on GodTV or youtube will say, “It had a festival (or carnival) atmosphere”. Well, sure. If you get a coupla thousand people together in a big open field, and make sure their needs are met, it’s going look like the county fair minus the rides. People need to potty – and so there were portapotties everywhere. People need to eat, and drink, and so there were food vendors (most of which were reasonably priced!). People also brought in coolers with dinner and bottled water. Since it was in a field, most people brought lawn chairs or blankets to sit on. People want to buy stuff, so the bookstore had a tent with books and t-shirts and such. Music or video was playing. Was it a festival? Yes!

One neat thing is that it was 08-08-08 and it was 88 degrees (the temp dropped 10 degrees between Thursday and Friday — THANK GOD!!). Still hot but not enough to really cause trouble.

The worship was great, but it was a little difficult for us to get into because we didn’t know ANY of the songs. The musicians were fabulous, and we did pick up on the choruses of a few songs along the way. So, we just had to determine to worship the Lord despite that. It was good dancin’ music!!

A VISIT FROM JESUS

The first highlight of my evening was when Todd announced that they were going to have a special commissioning for ministry prayer for people ages 25-40. Bob Jones had given a prophetic word prior to the meeting about a “new breed” of Christians – which I took to mean the younger generation rising up and really believing in, and acting upon, God’s Word.

So I stood up along with hundreds and hundreds of others, and Todd prayed over us all. Mid-prayer I suddenly couldn’t really hear him any more. It’s not like I went deaf – it’s more that my focus changed and his voice became part of the background noise.

I had my eyes closed and my hands raised and I was praying to receive everything that God wanted to give me.

Suddenly my eyes were filled with light, and out of that light I saw Jesus coming toward me. I was filled with awe and holy fear and anticipation all at once. I started crying, because I could feel His love for me. He stretched out His hand (I saw the scars!!) and He touched each of my hands, and my forehead. I very nearly fell out on the ground!! Then He was gone from my vision…

I’m not sure how to describe what I felt in those moments, except that after He had gone from my vision I could sense His presence in a greater way than I ever could before. For me, that’s really saying something, because the instant I was saved I could feel Him there with me, and that sense of Him has been growing ever since. And yet Friday that grew so much more that… wow.

I also had a literal sense of commissioning, and a confidence in God and in His ability to use me, to strategically position me, to speak through me.

I’m sure the heresy hunters will have a field day with my vision of Jesus… oh well. I think I’m going to make a heresy-hunter-hunter’s site this afternoon They need to get over themselves and read the book of Acts. They might even get saved…

RAIN

At one point, Todd brought up a young man from the Morningstar school (they’ve got a K-12 school there apparently). He and several friends had been to Lakeland, got some, brought it back and kicked off revival services there – they’ve got meetings 6 nights a week! That was one on-fire kid!! During the offering, they played a video of revival services there… WOW. People giving glory to God and burning with passion for Him – healings and miracles – and twice, rain… you could see on the video that literally drops of liquid were forming out of thin air and falling from above. It was WILD!!

HEALING

Todd started to call out words of knowledge. One was for a pain in the side, which Ken’s had for months. He reports that it’s gone. There were several dramatic healings that night.

MINISTRY

When we sat down, a mom and daughter sat next to us. It was obvious that both had health problems, and that the daughter had some muscle problems. She didn’t move right, speak right, etc. God spoke to me, “crack cocaine”, torment, and the name Ashley, and several other things. We planned on praying for both of them during the healing ministry, but late in the evening the daughter took off. The mom told us she was laying down in the car, feeling really awful. So we prayed with the mom (who’s on dialysis), and went out to the car. We prayed with the daughter, confirmed the accuracy of those words of knowledge, counseled her about unforgiveness and a few other things, and ended up going out for a late-night dinner with them. Lovely people. It’s hard for me, when I do God-encounter ministry like that, because it’s rare that I find out what happened afterward. They’ve got our phone number, maybe they’ll call us one day.

CAR WRECK

We were just about to pay and leave the restaurant when my cell phone rang. Why would Kayti be calling after midnight? I answered and she burst into tears. She’d just had a car wreck… and I’ll continue about that in my next post.

 And when I found out that if she hadn’t swerved to miss the guy, it’s likely that her passenger would have been killed. It turns out that she didn’t avoid him completely – just changed the impact location – and so her car is almost certainly totalled. It filled with black smoke, the air bag deployed, and the windshield’s busted on the driver’s side.  The tow truck guy says there’s no way the ins co will consider it worth fixing, so that’s what we’re going on. (If we thought they’d fix it quickly on Monday we might stay up here. But even if it were fixable it’d be no quick fix, that’s for sure.

The guy who caused the accident shot through a red light – she thinks with no headlights on, she says all that she saw was a shadow and she swerved to avoid that (it was very late Fri night when this happened). The guy left his car and took off running. The cops caught up to him at the 7-11 and arrested him. We still don’t know anything about him – name, whether he’s got insurance, whether he was drunk – but we’ve started praying that he does have insurance and that he gets to know Jesus.

The KICKER is that about a week ago I got notice from the Lord that Kayt would be in a car wreck before she left MD. So I have been praying all week, tho tempted to chalk it up to a momma worrying too much!! I didn’t even tell Ken about it!!  When she called, hysterical, to tell us what happened, I knew that God had answered my prayers. I told Ken and his jaw dropped – God had told him the same thing, and he’d also been praying all week!!! What a wonderful God we serve!!!

The trip to Charlotte was lovely – and the ministry was absolutely incredible. I had an experience with Jesus that just rocks my socks off, and I’ll say more about that later too.  We got to minister to a mom and her adult daughter after it was all over, and God gave me several incredibly accurate words of knowledge for them – things that not only could I not have known, but things that the daughter didn’t want to admit but finally did. The presence of the Lord in that big field was so incredible I don’t know how to describe it.

PLEASE join us in praying that the insurance companies will settle this quickly because Kayti’s GOT to be in Lakeland, FL early Sat morning for college!! If she doesn’t have a replacement car by then, we very well might need to rent a car and drive her down, or possibly put her on the Amtrak (which she despises, but it’s cheaper!!) I guess if we did that, we’d have to fedex all her stuff to her too. But God’s got a solution!

Gotta run!

I’ve been watching the Lakeland revival for a long time now. Long enough that when it’s not on, it seems strange to watch “other” shows that were normal for us prior to revival. The revival’s been happening now for something like 112 days, and we’ve probably watched 90-95 of them. We’ve missed a few nights due to travel, and some due to church or family events. One thing that I like about it is that it’s really not about Todd Bentley. Nights he’s not there are just as good as when he’s there. We’ve been introduced to a number of preachers we’d never heard of. I’ve greatly enjoyed the preaching of Roy Fields (yes, the worship leader), Bobby Conner, and Steven Strader, and quite a few of the other Fresh Fire affiliates.

As an aside…Another thing I like is that the music is not always that great (to my ear, anyway) but that the focus is never on the musicians, not on the worship leader, it’s on Jesus and that profound sense of worship, and the anointing, are present regardless of who’s at the keyboard and whether that last note was in key (no one seems to care because their focus is above )

Anyways… our current favorite preacher is the guy who’s ministered the last two nights – Ryan Wyatt of Abiding Glory Ministries in Knoxville, TN. He’s very bright and biblically spot-on, but also funny. He’s not afraid to dish it back to the heresy hunters either . He’s made some comments about the occult that I’m not so sure about – but I’ll tell you something that I’ve not said before. I’m learning not to say, “That’s not so”… and instead say, “That’s not been my experience, nor the experience of those I’ve ministered to.” More on that later.

Ryan’s done a lot of preaching the last two nights. The man’s a whirlwind. Some of his points sum up to this – we’re not living up to our potential in the Kingdom. I know that’s probably not news to anybody – but I’d like to examine some Scripture and address some core beliefs in the church, and then invite readers to comment. Some of what is below is straight from Ryan, and some of it’s my own ruminations. Since I’ve spent much of the last two days and nights pondering what he said, it’ll be awfully difficult to sort out what’s “his” and what’s “mine” – we can just assign it all to the Lord, for His glory, and not worry about human inspirations. Also note that I’m not trying in any way to summarize all that he said, because he made a lot of other great points.

Here’s a good snippet on youtube of Ryan preaching, and what I’m about to talk about…

Point # 1 – Jesus didn’t preach a gospel of salvation. He preached the gospel of the Kingdom.

That one just comes and smacks you upside the head. “The gospel of the Kingdom” is a direct quote from Matthew 9:35 (I just found it – not sure if Ryan referenced it or not).

Jesus began His ministry by saying, “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.” (Matthew 4:17) and as He went, He preached salvation… and healing, and cleansing, and deliverance, and resurrection from the dead, and provision, and and and…

Why have we utterly lost track of, “Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons.” (Matthew 10:8).

Salvation is necessary and what I’m about to say should not be taken to diminish that grace and gift of God in any way… but the Bible is clear that salvation is not the sum total of our inheritance from God.

Point #2 – Jesus came so that we could become sons of God.

Romans 8:14 says, “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are SONS OF GOD.” (emphasis in caps is mine) and then in verse 16 and following, the indisputable word of God says, “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs – heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ…”

Woah. What’s that mean? But wait – there’s more. Galatians 4 says that in the fullness of time, God sent Jesus to redeem us, “that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, “Abba, Father!” Therefore you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.” (emphasis mine)

Point #3 – If Jesus inherited the Kingdom of God (Hebrews 1:4), and we are heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, then WE ALSO inherit the Kingdom. Right along with Him.

The Holy Ghost lives within us. Our bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit. That means we carry the literal presence of God within us everywhere that we go. We carry our inheritance with us everywhere we go. No matter what situation we find ourselves in, we’re the heirs of God and He’s right there with us.

So why do we have such little effect on the world around us?

Point #4 – Salvation is only the beginning of what God wants to give us.

This hearkens back to point #1, but I wanted to bring out the other points first. If the gospel of salvation is the only good news preached (and it is indeed good news), it becomes rather like going to Disney and entering into the kingdom through the gates… but never getting on any of the rides, never hanging out with Mickey Mouse, never eating the funnel cakes… just sitting within the gates, doing nothing.

Point #5 – If the Gospel is, indeed, more than salvation, why isn’t the church living in that reality?

I’ve had conversations back and forth for a couple of years with a friend (who can comment and tell her story if she likes – I don’t have her permission to) who was very hurt when God did not heal someone important to her. The central question is, “If healing really is part of the atonement, then why doesn’t God always heal?” – which ultimately has led my friend to question the validity of the Bible and trustworthiness of God.

My answers over the years have ranged from speaking of the natural (since not everyone’s healed, since sin introduced sickness and death into the world) to sovereignty (since God is not our puppet, and since everyone dies a physical death).

I’m currently questioning that thinking – even with my own illness (see my last post).

The Bible says, “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not His benefits: Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases, Who redeems your life from destruction, Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies, Who satisfies your mouth with good things, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” (Psalm 103) Why is it that Christians are willing to accept the reality of forgiveness (He doesn’t pick and choose which sins He forgives, does He? No! He forgives ALL.) and willing to accept redemption, lovingkindness and tender mercies… but don’t accept that the Bible really does say that God HEALS ALL OUR DISEASES?

I do see in the Bible that there’s a couple of examples of people not being healed… Paul, from whatever his thorn in the side was – but God communicated that to him. Trophimus was left in Miletus, sick. Was he, perhaps, our forerunner?

Perhaps it’s because the church has preached the gospel of salvation ONLY for so long that we don’t lay claim to our inheritance.

The Bible also says, “But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our inquities, The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed.” Again – we’re willing to accept His wounding and bruising for our sins – why not His whipping for our healing?

I think it’s because it’s become so ingrained in our minds – even in the minds of people who KNOW and ACCEPT that healing is part of the atonement – that this inheritance is not really ours. We own it, we possess it… but we never DO anything with it. We enter into the gates of the Kingdom, but we never access any of the Kingdom’s benefits.

It’s all right for Jesus to have healed the sick and raised the dead. After all, He’s Jesus. It’s all right for the apostles to have done those things – after all, they were directly commissioned by Jesus. (But weren’t we all? Matthew 28:18-20, Mark 16:15-20)

But the Bible says that God’s no respecter of persons. The Bible says we’re joint heirs with Christ. The Bible says that we’re sons of God. Jesus Himself commissioned us to do the work of the Kingdom.

So why, exactly, are we powerless when we should be powerful?

Is it because God’s word is untrue? Is it because there really is no power? (NO!)

I think it’s because even though we’re supposed to be the children of the Most High (with all the attendant privilege and responsibility thereof), we still live like we’re homeless people.

I know that a lot of people will have a hard time relating to what I’m about to say (and so I’ll say it another way, in a moment)… I use “homeless” for a reason. I was homeless once. I lived on the streets of Bangor, Maine for a season. It wasn’t a long time – just a few months – but I was young, and it made an impression on me that I occasionally still find myself face to face with.

Some terrible things happened to me… I went hungry. I was cold. I was sick. I was raped out there. I literally had the clothes on my back and nothing else.

As a result of the experience, once I began living in a normal place again, I had a very hard time. There was a bathroom with a toilet and shower in it. I didn’t need to worry about danger there. I could pee in that toilet any time I liked. I could take an hour long shower if I wanted to. It was mine. But what did I do? For about a year after I had a place to stay, I was in and out of that bathroom in ten seconds flat. Even though it was mine – it really wasn’t mine. Somewhere deep inside, it took me a long time to accept ownership of that thing.

Another way to look at it – most of my readers can likely relate to this. I haven’t had the impression that anyone who reads this blog is filthy rich – we’re mostly lower to middle class working folks. What would happen if we were suddenly transported out of our lifestyle where we have to pinch pennies and we were dropped into a mansion, complete with servants, polished silver and china to eat from, sparkling chandeliers and enough money to do anything we wanted, any time we wanted? I’m betting that most of us would take a long time to get used to it. Sure, we could settle into some things – but how comfortable would we be in that role? I know I sure wouldn’t be comfortable for a long time. For starters, I’m just more comfortable in jeans and a t-shirt drinking coffee out of a chipped ceramic mug than I am in manicured nails drinking tea from porcelain. If my entire outfit, head to toe, counting shoes, costs more than $20 I’m not comfortable. While I’m sure that if I suddenly became wealthy that I might choose to buy new clothes, there ain’t no way I’m buying Prada. Know what I mean? Secondly, I’m sure that for a very long time I would have a fear of what I had suddenly disappearing (the same thing happened after I got a home, after being out on the streets). I was terrified to use what I had, lest I come to depend on it, and it disappear.

Is this the way the church views the Gospel? Has salvation-only become so ingrained in our psyche (like homelessness) that we aren’t ABLE to enjoy our full inheritance? And we’re even so wobbly about salvation itself that it’s easy to go to extremes – to take it for granted or as a license to sin, or to condemn ourselves for past wrongs that God’s forgotten about.

So what if my sickness has nothing to do with God’s sovereignty? What if God really wants to heal me, just like He promised (and God cannot lie)? Maybe we’re not seeing mass healings and resurrections from the dead and deliverances because even though we give intellectual assent to the possibility, we really don’t believe? Maybe it’s because we, as a body of believers and as individuals, have so fixated on what we can “prove” that the only “unprovable” thing we’ll believe is salvation? (Just ask yer average Christian about the supernatural – they’ll either tell you that it’s heresy or that it doesn’t exist)

What do we need to do, to break loose from this unbelief (Lord, I believe – help my unbelief!)… what do we need to do, to truly live out the reality of being sons and heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ, carriers of His manifest presence everywhere we go…. ?

More on that, I guess, in my next post.

This week’s services have been particularly GREAT – Todd preached the other night on Romans 8:11 (And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.), Steven Strader the night before last, and Roy Fields ministered last night. Among excellent preaching and faithfulness to the Word, he also does the funniest impressions

Anyways, some thoughts have occurred to me over time.

#1 – A great many of the people on stage claiming healing have back and/or joint trouble. Todd tells them to do something they couldn’t do before and invariably they bend over to touch their toes.

Has anyone noticed that well over two thirds of them can not only touch their toes, they can actually put their hands on the floor? Only a couple of them look like they might have been in a gym or physical therapy in the last decade or so.

#2 – I’ve seen the following charges levied by the heresy hunters:

• “When Billy Graham went into an area, he always had a team for follow-up” They got the people into local churches.
• “There’s too little/no documentation of the healings at Lakeland.”
• “Todd Bentley rakes in the cash every night!”

Okay.

As an aside, the same people hooting that Billy Graham did it right are awfully quick to condemn him, too, for alleged sins. Don’t be fooled.

But back onto topic: Firstly, when Billy Graham went into an area, it was generally for a one-time meeting or short-term set of meetings for local believers. Sure, people might’ve travelled within the state/geographic region to hear him… but I’m not thinking anybody from Korea heard he’d be preaching in Kentucky and showed up, got saved, and needed somebody to find them a local church in Korea!

Could it be done at Lakeland? Sure. (and who knows, maybe they ARE finding churches for people – the ones making the charge haven’t been there. I was already saved when I was there, so I didn’t get to go off with the ones just prayed for to meet with the pastor… :::cough cough cough:::)

But if it was done at Lakeland, it would take a dedicated  base of staff to do.

Just like the medical. Todd’s said that he’s got a team he’s called in to evaluate the medical reports.

These two things you don’t put in the hands of volunteers (Unless they’ve been with you for a season and you know them well – and even then the lawyers would say no to the medical). In any case volunteers Todd’s known a while would come from Canada… they’d still need their expenses paid, to move to Florida…

So – let’s assume [these are my estimates and have zero bearing on reality] that Todd’s got ten people working 40 hours a week on medical reports, and another ten people working forty hours a week on finding churches for new believers (it’s actually harder than you think to do this…). Let’s assume he pays each of them ten bucks an hour. So, that’s eight grand a week that he needs JUST for these  two functions. (Don’t forget, somebody’s got to pay for those big lights – pay for the tent – pay for maintenance and cleanup at two locations – pay the salaries of the speakers and musicians (even Todd, BTW).

Oh, but I hear a roar. Todd says his salary’s set by his board of directors and he gets paid by the ministry.

Where do you suppose the ministry’s funds come from? Trees? or out of chicken eggs?

No, when Todd goes from place to place, he gets paid by the sponsoring church either via honorarium or love offering. That $ goes into the ministry’s budget, out of which he gets paid, the office staff gets paid, the office light bill gets paid… Todd’s not been many places, now has he? So it stands to reason that he’s getting that same old-same old paycheck from money he’s bringing in nightly in Lakeland.

Anyone want to dispute the fairness of that? I sure hope not.

And I was going to say more, but I’ll save it for a future post.

She makes the basic point that if God tells you prophetically, “I see Bolivia for you”, that you shouldn’t pack your bags and head to Bolivia as a missionary. That word could mean many things.

That reminds me of back a few years ago now. I was still a fairly new believer at the time, and God spoke directly to me a word I’d never heard before: Azerbaijan.

I had NO idea what it was, had never heard of it before, and didn’t know how to spell it so I wasn’t sure I could figure it out on Google. But I started to pray about it.

A few days later, we got a map from somewhere – Voice of the Martyrs, I think – that listed assorted hotspots and dangerous areas around the world. Guess what I found? The country Azerbaijan (it’s bordered by Iran, Turkey, and Armenia). It was listed as an area dangerous for Christians, and I began to pray in earnest, for some months, for the country, it’s people, the church there, and for missionaries to the region.

Some months later, a missionary couple came to our church and shared about their ministry (Guess where? Azerbaijan!) I’d been praying for them, without even knowing who they were or that they existed, all that time! What a privilege! And it’s been a privilege to continue to pray for them over the years.

Now, I suppose if I’d assumed something about that word, as soon as I knew where Azerbaijan was, I’d have headed off there. But I don’t like to assume. I want to do what God wants me to do. So I just kept praying, and God unfolded His wishes over time.