Category Archives: Prophetic

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Mushrooming and hearing God

And other ramblings and stories

The other day I discovered a book about how God does not speak with us.  The author (a pastor) firmly believes that Christians cannot hear from God directly.  I didn’t read it.  The title itself, and advance knowledge of the general thesis was nauseating enough for me.  Publishing a book like that is kind of like popping a high-five with the devil, celebrating keeping people spiritually deaf.  It’s like a relationship where you get to read The Letter of God all you want, but by no means are you allowed to ever have the audacity to pickup the phone and call Him.  Jesus said “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Matthew 4:4  It’s important to point out what Jesus did not say.  He did not say “…but by every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God.”  He used the word proceedeth which is ongoing.  By no means am I saying that in any way, shape, or form something should be added to the holy canon of scripture.  But the heavenly manna that we all need is the ongoing, continued, every-day word of God proceeding from His mouth!

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4 DANGERS OF THE ROCKSTAR CULTURE IN MINISTRY TODAY

A PROPHETIC VISION

This was a vision I saw as I was praying. In the vision I saw Jesus in my church, standing in front of the stage at a table, with a large ladle in His hands. He was serving our church hot soup. It was warming, and really hit the spot, like hot soup on a cold winter day. People were walking around enjoying the soup with smiles on their faces, content with the warmth in thier bellies.  Then all the sudden, in a blur, Jesus was drawn up and disappeared, like he ascended to heaven suddenly. Now there was a steaming pot of soup with a left-behind ladle still rocking back and forth from when Jesus dropped it. In a few moments, it became apparent, that there was nobody to serve the soup. Eventually people in the church started complaining that they weren’t getting any soup (because no one was being served).  In the vision, not being in the situation, but seeing it from above, I was thinking “Oh, will someone should just pick up the ladle and start serving the soup. No big deal.”  However, to my surprise, people would walk by the abandoned ladle and say things like “Oh, I’m not going to do that!” It was somehow too low for them. “That’s not a job I want to do.”  When I saw that in the vision I started to weep bitterly.  I was deeply grieved at what I saw.  As I wept, what came to mind was what the apostle John experienced when he started to weep as he realized that nobody was worthy to open the seals of the scroll described in the book of Revelation. That very accurately reflects what I was experiencing in the vision.

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Preaching the Gospel is Preaching the Gospel

Not drilling wells

Jesus didn’t send his disciples into cities, and say   “When you go, be nice, trendy, hard-working, law-abiding citizens, start successful businesses, be super culturally relevant, and pray…   And wait…   Wait for that moment.  That moment someone asks you why you’re such a great person and why you’re so successful. Then, and only then, preach the gospel to them.” Actually he told them to preach the gospel, heal the sick, cleanse lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Matthew 10:8   It’s dumb for us to do everything that helps us spread the gospel, but never actually preach the gospel. That’s just dumb. I understand that there are many “covert ministries”, and spheres where much wisdom is required, and I’m thankful for Christians who God has positioned to bring influence in the various mountains of culture. And I understand that in most cases, it would not be a good idea to jump up onto the table and start proclaiming a blistering bible message. However, I’m afraid that we’ve become kind of like hunters sitting in our hunting blinds, and we’re so preoccupied with the process of sitting in waiting and perfecting our animal calls, that we never take the shot. We just watch the game stroll by and we pat each other on the back, and pride ourselves in how close they got to us without getting spooked.

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Don’t let your heart get crusty

A prophetic word

“Don’t let your heart get crusty.   You need to soak.   Stop trying to run a marathon.”  Those were the exact words I heard from the Lord in prayer.  Perhaps this word is for you too.  My heart was growing crusty.  It’s not that I was losing my edge.  The opposite would be closer to the truth.  It was that in the place where my heart used to be full of compassion and tenderness, it was becoming edgy.

Soaking.  

Perhaps the term “soak” doesn’t make a lot of sense to some.  “Soaking” is when I spend time in Gods presence without necessarily doing anything.  “Soaking in His presence.”  Not tomato juice.  I’m not reading my bible, I’m not praying for anything.  It’s when I’m just resting in His presence, and practicing being loved by Him. Sometimes life turns into a marathon.  And in my attempt to catch up with life, I forget how to rest.  How to disengage.  How to pause.  I believe it was never intended to be that way.  All of nature is more like a series of sprints than a dragged-out marathon. It’s even the natural way our bodies function.  Our muscles slide into atrophy if we do nothing.  But if we over-work them, they are traumatized.  They need stress, and then sufficient recovery to grow and be healthy.

Intimacy and work.  You need both. 
If you work too hard, you lose intimacy, and you forget how to rest and soak.
In my case, I have to be careful to not let my identity of being a son, who the Father trusts, not to let that give me an excuse to not seek the the Holy Spirit for His lead.
Either extremes are unhealthy.
In one extreme people supposedly rely so much on God leading them, that they simply don’t really do much, because they’re waiting on His lead.  In my case, as I learn to be a son, and realize the light is green by default, and pursue releasing the Kingdom on the earth, I can start to neglect allowing Holy Spirit to lead me.
The third group is the people who don’t really believe God could lead us supernaturally, and rely entirely on just serving the Lord faithfully.  Those are the ones who have a younger prodigal brother, who they despise.
We’re all learning what it looks like to live as sons and daughters, and no longer slaves.
Sometimes we learn one piece, but neglect the other piece.
Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices,
    as in obeying the voice of the Lord?
Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice,
    and to listen than the fat of rams.  1 Samuel 15:22
It’s important that we live with the realization that He first loved us, and continues to love us, before we loved him.
If we get that mixed around, then it really screws us up, because then we start
working for love,
working for healing,
working for favor,
working for blessing.
Instead of being sons and daughters and inheriting what belongs to us.
God wants to install sonship sensors, that give us an alert warning when we start to slip out of sonship, and back into slavery and orphanhood.  
When I come to the Train Station in our city, where I minister to the homeless, I can either rest in Gods goodness and in my identity as a son.
Or I can feel the pressure of making something happen.
You see, often people get healed and we see phenomenal miracles.
However, when my hope is in my ability to make something happen, I end up disappointed and discouraged, because I can never live up to the standards I set for myself.
But He is strong in my weakness.  That’s where the real “magic” lies.
Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.” Luke 15:31
What is it like to be hugged by Father God?
Did you get many hugs as a child?  Or very few?
Our loving Heavenly Father wants to hug you, and speak words of pride and joy over you, and let you know how proud He is with you.  That’s the heart of God.
Here’s the challenge.  
Practicing being loved by the Father tends to be a more difficult task for us humans as opposed to us loving the Father.
That’s where we get everything messed up, and slip into a performance, orphan mentality.
The problem is that we tend to be more concerned about how well we’re loving Him than keeping a close watch on how well we’re allowing Him to love us.
He’s the One pursuing us.  If you’re not experiencing that reality, then you’re missing out.


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Image courtesy of: ReflectedSerendipity on Flickr

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A list of declarations that changed my life

Exposing a subtle lie I used to believe about the power of the tongue

There was a time when I was a bit skeptical about making “declarations of faith” as some do in certain Christian circles.  When I would run into Christians who believed in this kind of practice, I often felt like it wasn’t sincere and authentic.  I believe God wants us to be real.  I mean read the Psalms.  David didn’t polish his words with God.  That all changed when I was in BSSM taking the Church Leadership Track led by Steve Backlund, the crazy guy who is always trying to get people to laugh at lies.  I realized there were probably a few lies I had been believing, and my attitude toward making those audacious un-authentic declarations of faith started to change dramatically.  It was a combination of scriptural teaching, and empirical evidence from my own life that slowly converted me to one of those crazies. The problem with deception is you don’t know you’re deceived until it is somehow exposed. I am fully aware that many aspects of this idea of making declarations and proclamations has been abused in many ways.  But unfortunately we, the church, have a great reputation of throwing the baby out with the bath water.  I don’t know how someone could throw a baby out with the bath water.  I prefer not visualizing that.  

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The Prophet Of Love

Who went to meet the lover of his soul on Valentines Day

Three years ago, on Valentines Day, a great man, who many came to call “The Prophet of Love” went home to meet the lover of his soul.
I had the honor to know Bob. He was a dear friend of our family. I never met anyone who knew scripture like he did.
And he truly lived to please the Lord.  Many who heard him for the first time, might think he was just some corky, mystical hill billy, but he was a great prophet, and he was the real deal.  He could also interpret dreams like nobody I’ve ever heard of.  He blessed my parents, and our extended family tremendously through interpreting dreams, which he would do using scripture he knew so well.  My earliest memory as a kid being exposed to the prophetic, was hearing how Bob predicted with precision to the day, a horrible earth quake that struck San Francisco, when the bridge was damaged.  As a kid, that really impacted me, that God could use someone to actually predict something like that with such accuracy.

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The conversation with a liberal, Jewish, atheist businessman that flipped his world upside down

This was a conversation I transcribed from a podcast with Kris Vallotton. Kris was exhausted, and not interested in talking with anyone. However this liberal, Jewish, atheist businessman just wouldn’t leave him alone.
Kris Vallotton is a prophet with a unique calling that often involves ministering to leaders of nations, and people from various walks of life, outside the church.
He has prophesied to individuals about becoming presidents of nations, and these prophecies have been fulfilled.
God opens many doors for him to influence, and minister to people in very high positions of government from both sides of the aisle, politically speaking.  He has a very unique Joseph/Daniel anointing to prophetically speak into people’s lives in ways that literally transform them.
He also is the co-founder and leader of the Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry (BSSM) in Redding, CA where I completed the BSSM program in 2011-2014. It was three of the best years of my life, and I highly recommend everything Kris has written.

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4 Examples of how unlocked identity reveals your destiny

The revelation of your true identity leads to the revelation of God’s true identity.  This leads to the revelation of your true destiny.  Whether you are a follower of Jesus or not, you’re probably like me and have spent most of your life trying to answer this million dollar question. “Who in the world am I?”  When we find out that someone has not been born again, our first reaction is to tell them about Jesus.  Perhaps in some cases the first step should not be to tell them about who Jesus is.  Perhaps we would be more effective in sharing our faith if we followed Jesus’ example and made our first step to tell them about who they really are.  I am fully aware that this might come off as some sort of humanistic false idea.  Easy… Allow me to explain.

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The scientifically proven way to hear God’s voice

I was 15 years old.  My heart was on fire and my brain was almost boiling.  As the pressure increased, tears started to run down my cheeks. It was a stuffy summer night and I was pacing the dusty streets of Kharkov, Ukraine.  I was frustrated with people.  Not just any people.  It was the people who would say “God told me this…” and “God told me that…”
“Do they really hear God?” I thought. Or are people just audaciously faking it?

I was desperate to hear God’s voice.  I wanted it more than anything else in the world!

Have you ever had thoughts like that?

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A simple hack for effectively stewarding prophetic words

It will make you feel RICH

So, you have promises and prophetic words from God for you life?   Good.  The prickly truth however is this.  Just because you have prophecies and promises stored away in your little treasure box, this doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re getting all the juice.Here I share one little practical approach that was a real game changer for me personally.