Category Archives: Stories

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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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Man trapped behind bars rescued from starving to death

A personal true story

At the moment, I’m still processing some strong aftermath emotions as a result of something that happened the week following the Feast of Love.  This was the third such event we did.  It’s one of the greatest things we’ve ever done with homeless people.  You can watch some highlights of the last one we did here. For several months we had started to feed the poor at two different recycle centers where needy people bring bottles, paper, metal and other materials they can get money for.  We were building relationship with them, and inviting them to our upcoming Feast of Love event.  A celebration where the poor are treated like kings and queens.  On this particular Saturday, I wasn’t going to go to the second recycle center, because I had to go prepare for preaching the following Sunday.  Tanya and the team had just left, and I was making my way to our church office, which is located in a way that we have to go through the back courtyard of our building to get to our office. As I climbed the stairway to the landing where our office entrance is, I glanced over to where we had found a homeless guy and gave him some food, hoping to get him to come to the Feast of Love a couple weeks prior. Near where we had found him, there was an open manhole that was an access point to a basement in the high-rise apartment building not far from our building.  When we met him, he told us he was living in that basement.  I stopped as I looked over at the manhole, half expecting to see that homeless guy.  It was about 50 yards from me.  Here I realized that the manhole had been closed off with a metal grate welded out of rebar. “They must have closed it off, so homeless people don’t live in that basement”, I thought.  I wasn’t surprised.  Not that long ago, there was a horrible stench around the entrance to our office, and it turned out that in the basement of the adjacent building close to our office, a corpse was discovered.  The body had had been there so long, that there was a strong stench all around the area.  It was likely a homeless person who died down there, who nobody knew about. I was about to open the office door, and go about my business, but I noticed something.   Fingers.

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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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The text only my wife was supposed to read

Vulnerability… It’s easy to talk about, however few of us have the guts to actually do it. Letting someone else have a glimpse into some of the rickety parts of my being has never been something I look forward to. My wife and I were attending a marriage workshop where we were part of a core group of couples for the course of the workshop that lasted several months. By joining this workshop, we were all metaphorically pushed off the cliff of vulnerability. Sharing things we perhaps never shared with anyone in our lives, including our spouses. You just fall. And you keep falling. And there’s nothing to grab onto. All you can do is hope. Hope that your spouse, and the people in your group will catch you graciously.  After a while getting together with the same group, I can’t say it was easy for me to open up even though that was a huge part of the workshop. What happened next perhaps pushed me along in this process, but… I pray this never happens to you.

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4 keys for Bouncing back in the face of failure

The dreadful sandal scandal

I bought my wife a gift. It didn’t go so well. Here are a few things I learned in the process.
Much of what we aspire to requires courage. Recently I realized that you can not grow in courage if you don’t grow in failure. To the degree you learn to be o.k. with failure, you will grow in courage and creativity. Courage and creativity go hand in hand.