Turmoil Amongst Believers in the USA

I have copied below an article from Charisma Magazine, reflecting insights into the election of Barack Obama, and the impct made on the US Church

Tuesday, November 11, 2008
A Divided Church—Beyond the Polls
Although last week’s historic election of Barack Obama as the United States’ next president obviously shattered racial barriers, many Christian leaders say it also highlighted a still-prevalent racial divide among churches and believers. Associated Press exit polls showed that 74 percent of white evangelical Christians voted for Republican candidate John McCain, while 94 percent of African-American believers voted for Obama. Yet according to many leaders, the underlying differences—and problems—emerged long before a single vote was cast.
“I think in the eagerness to protect the right to life issues, there were some things said … that were not always fair and that were insensitive that need to be rethought,” said T.D. Jakes, founding pastor of The Potter’s House in Dallas. “I would love to see black and white Christians find common ground, and a deeper understanding of each other’s needs.”
Other black leaders voiced a stronger objection to the pre-election rhetoric, particularly from the white-dominated Christian right: “What they did is insult our biblical understanding,” said Derrick W. Hutchins, a leader in the predominantly black Church of God in Christ. “The white religious right-wing determined that if you didn’t vote for McCain, you were not meeting a standard of the Bible.”
Taking a more historical viewpoint, Shirley Caesar-Williams, pastor of Mount Calvary Word of Faith Church in Raleigh, N.C., told her congregation that “God has vindicated the black folk. Too long we’ve been at the bottom of the totem pole, but He has vindicated us—hallelujah! I don’t know about you, but I don’t have nothing to put my head down for, praise God. Because when I look toward Washington, D.C., we got a new family coming in. … And you know what? They look like us.” [AP, 11/7/08, 11/10/08]

Living With Change

Change affects us all differently. some of us love it and others hate it vehemently!!

For the people of the USA things will never be the same following the election of Senator Obama to the place of leading the most influential nation on the face of the earth

Firstly, many Christians are going to have to account for the many false, misleading and straightforward lies they told in an effort to dissuade others from voting for the man that they have characterized as an "anti-christ" figure. There needs to be a serious holding people, especially Christian leaders and organizations accountable for the wild accusations that swirled around from those seeking to cause panic response to an unusual leader in the presidential race.

What has this to do with change? Fundamentally, everything! You see our Christian leaders who become embroiled in political activism catch the spirit of the secular organisation that they fight alongside. It will be a change of great magnitude if leaders, magazines and tv shows are actually called to account for their statements and called upon to repent as it becomes apparant that the accusations and innuendos are without foundation.

Change is also coming because some Christians have broken rank with tradition and with conservative leaders in an attempt to see that the Gospel has social as well as spiritual implications. For a long time independent organisations have gathered finance for such purposes as minsitering to the poor etc, and spent lavish sums on the money on themselves in the process. A new social conscience in Evangelical/Charismatic churches has been triggered by response to some of the truths Obama has promoted. This will put Christians in a place to challenge the idea that all those who are unemployed, sick, neglected and socially disconnected are simply "lazy bums who need to get a job". The words of Jesus concerning visiting the sick and those in prison are going to gain a new significance in the hermetically sealed world of evangelicals who spend so much time trying to change the nation through legislation, rather than through evangelism that leads to changed lives that will then change society.

Change is coming because the whole financial structure of life in the USA and the Nations is undergoing a massive shaking that will give a new sense of value to money and to the things people spend it on. Luxury living, never actually promoted by Jesus, and the "Great American Dream" have effectively turned into the Great American Nightmare. Christians who have bought into the prosperity message will need to study again the word and learn to live in the provision of God without expecting it to mean that they are in fact entitled to a high standard of prosperity as an obligation on Gods part.

The financial priorities of the Church in North America are going to change. A shift away from large expensive buildings to equally large but less ornate properties will see some organisations gaining a new credibility in their community as the buildings they have become harnessed to the needs of their community. Change also for young people as they express themselves as the church in brand new ways to meet the cynicism that has risen around "organized Christianity", an institution that many of them realise has become more political and financial than spiritual in its goals .

The Times they are a changing! This an echo from another generation but it is true.

Do I think Obama is some "saviour of America"? No not at all! I am conservative in my own politics, but could see little difference in the choice my American friends have just had to make between Obama or McCain... only the packaging and rhetoric were different!

Living through change is hard enough. Hopefully people wont identify the present world need for change to be simply a political program, but one where God is at work and we can co-operate to maximise its advantage for the Gospel. Like Joseph and Daniel and that wonderful woman Esther "we are come to the Kingdom for such a time as this"

Looking over the fence

In happier days when people communicated with each other more freely, it was not unusual to see your neighbor just look over the backyard fence to gain your attention of simply to say "Hi"

Not so popular in these days of fear and suspicion.

Living only sixty miles from the US border gives us a neighbors opportunity to look over the fence to their backyard.

I have looked carefully over the fence at my dear friends and neighbors at this time of crucial election choices that have to be made.

My first reaction is that I am amazed at the rhetoric of US politics and the vehemence with which positions are taken and held. Plain lies and exagerrations being used, even by Christians, to justify their opposition to this or that candidate.

Secondly, I am disturbed at the way that the political parties involved exploit and use the weapon of fear especially amongst Christians, and sadly that Christians participate and co-operate in the spreading of such fear.

There is always much talk amongst my American brothers and sisters, whom I love dearly, of theories of conspiracy and of "secret agendas" something by the way that the Liberals in Canada are also prone to do! Unfortunately they are all so "secret" that no one can really prove them anyway! When these things are ultimately revealed as being false, the very folk we want to impress are again justified in saying that "the church is out of touch an irrelevant"

Most of you know that this is an unusual subject for me to even comment on publicly as I dont really hold much hope of changing nations by politics and conformity to ideals that are politcally imposed,but much more by changing the hearts and lives in the way that Charles Wesley did in the UK in the past.

I believe there is a Kingdom Culture which should over ride the National Culture of any great nation for Christians to apply to their lives. The means are not justified by the end. Honesty is a Christian virtue and should not be sacrificed for strategic reasons. Stealing a persons reputation and lying about them is actually called LYING and is not high on Christ's list of virtues. "Dirty tricks" do not decorate the gospel of Christ and Christians should not be sucked into the secular agenda of either party.

The Bible says "everyone should be fully persuaded in his own mind"and I encourage all my wonderful American friends to vote tomorrow on the grounds of what God speaks to them personally.

God has made strange choices like Pharaoh to lead Egypt in byegone days. He knows which of these two men is most susceptible to hearing his voice, even if they dont and have never heard it in the past! Remembering His Sovereignty may be the greatest encouragement that US Christians have tomorrow.

Having said the foregoing. Tomorrow we will witness a "sea change" in American politics. Many who have never been gripped by social issues will fight their own consciences as they seek to know how to vote in such a polarized environment. Many young christians will "break ranks" with their older brothers and sisters and be captured by the vision of a changed America, and I hope desparately that they register a vote for one or other of the candidates.

Whoever wins tomorrow there is coming a radical change to America. Senator McCain is not a traditional Republican, and should he win there will be a "whole lot of shaking going on" in the "old boy" networks in Washington, that ironically will have worked hard to elect him. Conservative Christians have little to encourage them in their pursuit of a candidate who stands strongly on their important issues, and he will likely not promote their ideals any more than his opponent

Senator Obama, has campaigned on the basis of change being needed and change coming in the basic ways Americans think of themselves at home and abroad. He has waged a campaign to deliberately initiate change , and if elected may well do so! Since he has not identified strongly with the traditional values of the Church, he will not be expected to promote those values either.

So looking over the fence I see the garden of the USA with different configurations to the old garden! The days of easy choices are past! Issues like economics, social justice, and international role in the nations are all about to be challenged and many changed.

This is a time when the Church in the USA needs our support in prayer and a willingness to co-operate with God in the choice He makes tomorrow!

Confusing Times?

Lost Gift of Discernment
Posted: Wed Sep 03, 2008 12:01 pm
The Lost Gift of DiscernmentBy J. Lee Grady

The Holy Spirit has provided a way for us to sort truth from error. But in this season of spiritual compromise, discernment is not popular. When I began making regular ministry trips to Nigeria a few years ago I learned that a peculiar Nigerian minister named T.B. Joshua was causing quite a stir in that country. Often referred to as “the Man of God” or “the Man in the Synagogue” by his followers, this African preacher founded a massive religious compound in Lagos called The Synagogue, Church of All Nations. He began attracting big crowds because of his healing powers. I was initially excited to hear about a new healing ministry on the international scene, but when I talked to pastors in Lagos I learned that no mainstream Christian church or denomination in Nigeria embraced Joshua as authentic. In fact, Pentecostal leaders had denounced him publicly because of his occult background and because he mixed Christian terminology with pagan healing methods. I finally sat down with Joshua in 2003 to confront him about his story (including his claim that his mother carried him in the womb for 15 months because he was “special”). After being in his offices, talking with his zombielike followers, interviewing ex-members of his cult and watching videos of his bizarre methods (which include a form of magic writing), my own gut feelings confirmed what I had already been told by countless pastors in Lagos, Port Harcourt, Abuja and other cities: This man was not operating by the Holy Spirit’s power. What was even more shocking was seeing planeloads of Christians from South Africa, Europe and North America arrive in Nigeria to attend this man’s meetings. The excited pilgrims came to receive a touch from God. They wanted a spiritual impartation. Some left claiming they had been healed.It was through this experience that I realized how desperately devoid of discernment the American church has become. When the charismatic movement was at its zenith 30 years ago, Christians rediscovered the gifts of the Holy Spirit listed in the apostle Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. We embraced healing, prophecy, speaking in tongues and miracles—gifts that had been ignored by the mainstream church for centuries. We also learned that discernment is one of these nine supernatural gifts (see 1 Cor. 12:8-10). We were taught that since the devil has the ability to counterfeit, and since Satan’s activity includes “all power and signs and false wonders” (2 Thess. 2:9, NASB), God’s people must be equipped with the supernatural power to tell the difference between the true and the false.God gave us spiritual gifts in a package, and discernment is part of the set. It is not optional. Yet today it seems we’ve set discernment aside—perhaps because we’re suspicious of any gift that requires us to exercise clear judgment.We live in a confusing season marked by spiritual compromise, moral relativism and deceptive imitations. In our culture today up is down and right is wrong. Oprah tells us that Jesus is not the only way to God. Spirituality is up for grabs, and you can define it however you want. The broad way to destruction is celebrated while the narrow way to salvation is criticized. And in some charismatic churches, hunger for the supernatural is encouraged while leaders seem reluctant to put boundaries around it for fear of seeming intolerant. We stopped teaching discernment because it forces us to draw lines. We desperately need to return to what the Bible teaches us about this important subject:1. We are commanded to discern. The apostle John instructed us to “test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). The word “test” means to “examine as metal”—the process a jeweler would use to prove authenticity. Metals may look the same; only when you apply heat will you find which ones are fake or of low quality. All that glitters, in such cases, is not gold.We don’t like to test because it seems harsh. We don’t like confrontation. We want to be nice to everybody. But it is the Lord who tells us to test the spirits. Will we please people, or fear God?2. Discernment is a sign of spiritual maturity. The author of Hebrews told his readers that they were immature babies who couldn’t handle eating spiritual meat. “Solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil” (Heb. 5:14). The implication here is that those who don’t learn to discern are spiritually stunted.Is it possible that we in the American church have been so focused on satisfying our own material or emotional needs that we have gotten stuck in perpetual infancy? The Bible offers a remedy: Grow up! We will never come to full adulthood in a spiritual sense if we don’t develop discernment.3. Discernment is damaged when leaders compromise. The prophet Ezekiel denounced the priests and governors of Israel because they didn’t teach the people to discern. “They have made no distinction between the holy and the profane, and they have not taught the difference between the unclean and the clean” (Ezek. 22:26). Discernment, according to this passage, is shaped by the choices leaders make.When shepherds don’t build fences, sheep wander into wolves’ territory. That’s why God holds leaders to a stricter standard. In some cases today, leaders have brought their flocks to feed near toxic streams. The gospel has been polluted by false prophecies and poisonous doctrines and, in some tragic cases, by the direct impartation of immorality and greed from the pulpit. Do you want discernment? It will probably not make you popular. But I pray we will be willing to risk our popularity in order to become mature disciples of Jesus—and to guard the American church from deception.

J. Lee Grady is editor of Charisma.

Real Revival part 1

A few weeks ago I published an article about Julio Ruibal and this one should have preceded it but I could not find it. Now its turned up so here it is



The Marks of Genuine Revival, Part 1


Julio Ruibal, who was martyred for his faith in 1995, left us a legacy of revival. His widow, Ruth, shares in this interview how the gospel transformed Bolivia in the 1970s.

Most American Christians today are unfamiliar with Julio Ruibal, the humble Bolivian preacher who was known in South America as “the apostle of the Andes.” He was martyred in 1995 in Cali, Colombia, where he and his wife, Ruth, planted a church and were mobilizing unity among churches in order to stop the violent drug cartels that controlled that city. Years before criminals shot Julio in the streets of Cali, he was used by God to ignite a spiritual awakening that shook his native Bolivia to its foundations. In the early 1970s, after his conversion in Los Angeles, Julio returned to the city of La Paz, Bolivia and began to share Christ. After a core group of young people came to the Lord, conversions began to multiply exponentially until there were more than 5,000 new Christians. After word of this spiritual outbreak spread in the predominantly Catholic country, Ruibal found himself in a meeting with Bolivia’s president, Hugo Bánzer Suárez. The president and his wife prayed with Julio and then gave him an open door to evangelize the entire country—giving him the use of stadiums and asking mayors to declare a holiday when the young evangelist arrived in their cities to preach.

“Churches sprang up everywhere and poverty was diminished, especially among Christian families when they learned to tithe.”
During the next several years, hundreds of thousands of people were converted to Christ. Those who study the history of missions there draw a clear line between the days “before Ruibal” and “after Ruibal.” Today the evangelical population of Bolivia has grown to more than 11 percent.
Ruth Ruibal carries her husband’s torch today. Besides leading their ministry in Colombia, she speaks all over the world about the need for genuine revival and its transforming power. In this two-part interview, she shares with Charisma about what she believes we should expect when we pray for revival to sweep our own country.

Charisma: Repentance seems to be a hallmark of true revival. What level of repentance did you see in the Bolivian revival?

Ruibal: Julio’s conversion was dramatic and his repentance was deep. He would lie on the living room floor saying, “Jesus I have found You; I have found everything.” Up until then, Julio was supporting himself by running a yoga academy. He told all his students about his conversion—and half the students were saved while half left. He closed down the academy and from that day, for the rest of his life, he lived by faith.

Most people would have tried to save the academy or wait until they had something else to do. But Julio was drastic in obeying. I saw the fruit of repentance in Bolivia. People were getting right with others, making restoration for prior wrongs and dramatically stepping out from sin. Since repentance was part of Julio’s life, the people saved under his ministry saw that as well. Repentance was his lifestyle.

Charisma: How did the Bolivian revival affect the nation and the culture?

Ruibal: This was a sovereign move of God over a nation, not just one church being revived. Up until that time, Bolivia had had more presidents than years of independence. There had been so many coups. At one point there were four presidents in one day.

However, when President Bánzer opened the country to the gospel, he stayed in power for eight years. That was a first for Bolivia. Bolivia experienced its first economic boom. Churches sprang up everywhere and poverty was diminished, especially among Christian families when they learned to tithe.

Charisma: Many believe that supernatural signs and wonders must accompany a true revival. What kind of miracles took place in the Bolivian revival?

Ruibal: The miracles were so remarkable and abundant that it is hard to adequately describe. One of the outstanding miracles involved a woman who was dying of bone cancer. She was bedridden and her upper leg could not be moved for lack of bone. Her sons asked Julio to pray for her.

He led her to the Lord and then prayed for healing. Then Julio felt the Lord telling him to lift the lady to her feet. He helped pull her up and she stood. God had replaced the bone eaten away by cancer!

Another type of miracle took place in Santa Cruz, a city with a warm climate. On this particular day the multitudes were waiting for the meeting to begin, but it was a very hot day and some began to faint and ambulances would carry them away. Seeing this, Julio was moved with compassion for the people and prayed that the Lord would change the weather.

The Lord sent clouds from the north to confirm that it was the Lord bringing relief. (Normally that area would get cool winds from Antarctica in the south, but not from the north.) Also the Lord sent a light mist that proved to be a type of air conditioning. This was so outstanding that the secular newspapers showed pictures of the clouds and reported the miracle.

We saw clubbed feet made straight. The lame walked, a hunchbacked man’s back was straightened, people who were brought in blankets or sheets got up and walked out healthy, the blind were given sight, the deaf were able to hear, diseases were healed with medical certification, the mute spoke, legs grew out and people were delivered from demons. At one point people were healed even when Julio’s shadow passed over them.

There were other types of miracles, too. Food was multiplied supernaturally. At a dinner, fish appeared on a plate in front of several elders. Once, money multiplied so that we could feed some leaders who had come to minister.

Charisma: There is much emphasis among charismatics today on seeing angels and communicating with them. Was this a factor in the Bolivian revival?

Ruibal: I believe we all experience angelic ministry more than we are aware of. How many times have we been saved from an almost certain car accident—and then we realize it was a miracle. Probably angels were sent to help us. Julio told me of someone who offered him some free wood for a building project that he was working on. When he and his friends went to the establishment to pick up the wood, they found it at the very bottom of a pile that reached almost to the ceiling of the shop. Julio and the young men discussed what they should do and prayed. It seemed impossible to get to the wood without days of moving all the wood on top of the pieces they needed.

When they went back to re-evaluate the situation, they found their wood was now on top of all the other wood! They could only assume an angel had moved it there. However, they never saw angels, never talked to them and never acknowledged their presence—other than to comment, as in this case, that it would have had to be an angel that moved the wood. All the praise and thanks went to Jesus. He was the One they loved and acknowledged.

Charisma: There is also an emphasis today on exotic manifestations such as gold dust, feathers, oil appearing on Bibles, or gem stones appearing on church floors. Did this happen in Bolivia?

Ruibal: There were all sorts of miracles from the beginning and that continued throughout Julio’s ministry to the very end. They were mainly signs, wonders and different kinds of healings. Sometimes people fell when we prayed for them, but this was not something we looked for or particularly wanted. We did not have gold dust, feathers, gems, orbs, oil oozing from hands or any other such thing, nor did we seek it. We sought Jesus and His will.

J. Lee Grady is editor of Charisma Magazine.

What shall we do?

Acts 2:377 When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, "Brothers, what shall we do? (from New International Version)

The present crisis that has erupted over the Florida Revival is much bigger than simply one weak man who’s life did not match up to his message. In June in a quote of a conversation with a reporter Todd said “."We're preaching and teaching the gospel and praying and healing the sick," he said in an interview just before the recent service began. "Jesus said a tree is known by its fruit. What's the fruit we've produced? One suggestion here is that the product has been “Civil War in the Body of Christ”
So this is a really good place to start when we ask ourselves the question “What shall we do ?” In the scripture above quoted the verse is followed by these words repent and be baptized every one of you and you will receive”
This speaks clearly that where there is a heartfelt repentance there is also a heart changing impartation . None of us who believe in Grace, believe that Todd has irreversibly damaged his relationship with God. Like all of us he is a weak man and has succumbed to his already known and recognized weaknesses. However the scripture tells us “To whom much is given much is also required” The need for acknowledgement after repentance (baptism) caused such a release. Repentance is more than an acknowledgement that I have been found out .in wrongdoing. It is a willing recognition of the impact that my failure has had on others , as well as on God Himself..
Repentance means changing our mind and going in an opposite direction. We all need to repent, Todd for his lack of wisdom , and for his deception in holding back information from those who were supposed to give him covering. One of those men said this week “Todd kept me out of the loop about a third party involved in the marriage problem”. The reason Todd gave was that he wanted to protect his fellow minister. In fact “being kept out of the loop” is an unsophisticated way of saying he lied or misled someone, whom he knew had the power to shut him down. A little like Hilary Clintons comment that she “misspoke”
Repent to, for the teachings he gave that distorted the word of God led people into dangerous spiritual territory, and the unwise people he surrounded himself with many of whom were marked as immoral , or had marriage troubles themselves. If repentance means turning around then he certainly needs to set off in a new direction with new companions…the Bible clearly tells us that “bad company breeds bad morals” if you have a problem with shoplifting its insane to visit Wal Mart with a group of people with a similar problem
We as church leaders and avid Christians need to repent for many things in this whole situation. Turn round change our direction and ensure we don’t find ourselves once more in the place of being the laughing stock of the press and communications world, and bringing shame to the Good News we are here to present. and exemplify.
1. We need to repent of a mindset that says that the Great Commission is no longer effective. Instead of going out and reaching the world with the message of salvation we have formed a mindset that says “super stars” are going to gather the last time harvest whilst ordinary believers sit in the bleachers and cheer on their favorite evangelist . This is a little akin to the “big bang theory”. The places where the Gospel is growing fastest with the greatest impact are the places where individuals are burdened for and feel responsible for telling people about Jesus. Our North American attempt at this always includes massive and instant “revival” that releases us all from personal responsibility to be obedient to Jesus, and allows us to finance a Hollywood style leader to do it for us.
2. We all need to repent concerning our failure to believe the Bible to be the Word of God., and the standard for life and Ministry. The moving of the Holy Spirit is to be in connection with the preaching of the unadulterated Word of God. The North American Charismatic is a biblically illiterate person desperately wanting to see the moving of the Holy Spirit and will surrender to any manifestation that comes along, and believe it must be from God because its supernatural. Thus we have mixed a New Age thrust with the moving of the Holy Spirit .. In this connection we have allowed ourselves to be convinced that miracles demonstrated are in fact an endorsement of a mans teaching , no matter how far away he is from an orthodox belief system. and the revealed word of God
3. We need to repent of our own foolishness and naivety which leads us to believe that somehow God is more concerned with demonstration than He is with Character. Jesus, Paul, Peter and the church through the ages, have pointed to the need of Character in those who preach the Gospel. None of us are perfect but God does not endorse our lifestyle because he uses us. Paul warned against laying hands too suddenly on people. In writing to Timothy he called for the highest standards to be expected of those in ministry at the fundamental level.
4. We need to repent about ineffective and inoperative accountability set ups for ministries. The scripture when talking of leaders says they must be “known to be full of the Holy Spirit” The accent here is on being known. How can accountability exist when the persons involved have no overlapping life and knowledge of one another’s life style. Did no responsible ministers know about Todd’s marital problems. I fear even those in his own office were party to the information. Where there is no true team ministry there can be no true accountability . We are told to “know those who labour amongst us” God has a wonderful accountability system its called the Local Church. Here a man or woman’s life can be open to the knowledge of fellow leaders and elders, and correction and help can easily be obtained, or offered
5. We need to repent of thinking too highly and expecting too much of men we place on a pedestal and then promote to the place where they believe their own publicity. Turning our gifted men and women into eternal jet setters, leaves them with a wrong view of themselves and their value in the Kingdom , and sets them up for spiritual, moral and financial failure. Making them so elite that no one can challenge them or call them to account since we have declared them to be the” Lords anointed”.. We need to repent.for being worldly when it comes to our view of ministry. In the real world people like Billy Graham carry such a punch because of their clear holiness springing from a wholesome relationship with God and their family
6. We need to repent to for our attempts to sanitize the Holy Spirit in our meetings in such a way that no offence might be felt by those who need conviction of sin and who are crying out for real people to introduce them to a real God. We have become the arm chair critics of all those who hunger for manifestation and are more in favour of suppression than expression of the life of God in our regular meetings
7. We need to repent because we have been guilty of finding fault with a person based on the outward appearance. Millions of young adults have tattoos and love Jesus more than their fathers and grandfathers who lead ineffective churches that fail miserably to connect with the current generation.. God looks on the heart ( ours included) and is less concerned with body decoration than we think He is.
8. Many of the “Fathers” of the charismatic movement need to repent for withholding their wisdom, and maybe their private knowledge, of Todd’s personal problems, because they were afraid of losing face with their stream or group and not supporting what others saw as God moving. Some need to repent for not speaking out clearly, others because they were more interested in getting on the bandwagon and gaining publicity for their own ministry than sharing the truth in the light of the written word of God
9. We need to repent because there are a group of “ministries” who are more interested in their own financial success, and personal fame in ministry than they are in the truth of the Word and the standards of the book. These people will now capitalize on their presence in Florida as though its a qualification for ministry and a reason for people to have them come and minister. They will tell how they sat on the platform, were personal friends with Todd and some will even say that God has shown them “that Todd’s mantle has passed to me” We need repentance to see that this is not the style or methodology of the Carpenter from Galilee.
So what shall we do ? We shall all repent ! Not just Todd but the whole Charismatic Movement that allowed itself to be deluded into the Western Dream that the “Great Revival is upon us” and all we need to do is to turn up and capture the blessing that someone else has created

Canadian Soldiers in Afghanistan

I am posting a poem I wrote today in response to the death of the 90th member of Canadian forces in that country. Such heroic young men and women involved in such an impossible task!

In Afghan Fields

In Afghan fields the poppies blow,
Our soldiers die, and we don’t know
The reasons for their sacrifice
The outstretched hands of a needy child?
Backward peoples living wild,
Are looking for a word of hope
A deed of kindness and a word of cheer
For this they put aside their fear

In Afghan fields they reap their crops
Unhindered by the local cops
A steady stream of trade goes out
To touch the world without a doubt
The lives of brave Canucks laid down,
Why don’t we question ? Why don’t we frown?
The thirst for powder white and pure
Is this the reason they are here?

In Afghans fields their blood is shed
Brave valiant ones and now they’re dead
For these brave men , what could it mean ?
Their death for such a prize as this
Leaves anguish, pain and deep distress,
O Canada your sons are brave,
But gone too quickly to their grave.

Keith Hazell August 2008

Dates 08-08-08 !

All day today many very dedicated Christians as well as a lot of superstitious Chinese people will be pondering over the date and its significance.

Frankly, I can overlook the Chinese who have quite and obsession with numbers, but Christians???? Come on!

Why is it that Christians seize every opportunity to panic over imagined significance in everything from particular dates to when then planets line up, or someone sees the Virgin Mary"s face reflected in a pool of oil in Saudi Arabia.

Basically, so many Christians have absolutely nothing to do with their time, and so many spend what time they have digging into bizarre theories.

For instance, take the matter of dates. Any student of history knows how many times the calendar we use has been changed. Roman and other Emperors and Kings changed the calendar to reflect their own particular whims. "The Church" changed the calendar over many centuries to suit a particular doctrine or teaching.

If God has a calendar, I doubt much if His says 08.08.08 today! Therefore to try and draw a conclusion or teaching from this is absurd and beyond reason!

Strange how we are pre-occupied with little "weird and bizarre " teachings whilst the world "goes to hell in a bucket" with the complicity of a sleeping church, who tries to show its spirituality in strange and wonderful things drawn at random from the air.

Ah so! Keith we have to keep the troops occupied till the Second Coming

A Wake Up Call?

Hi There
My friend Lee Grady at Charisma has scored another "home run" with the following article and I thought it worth while to make his thoughts available to you also.


Are You Headed to Nineveh … or Tarshish?
Jonah fled from God’s presence because he didn’t want to be a prophet to a lost world. Which way are you sailing?

In the 8th century B.C. Jonah participated in one of the most unusual prayer meetings in history. It happened at the bottom of the sea from inside a giant fish. With damp seaweed wrapped around his head and his skin bleached by digestive juices, the renegade prophet sat on the slimy stomach membrane and gasped for breath amidst the foul odor of eels, crabs and barnacles.

In total darkness Jonah prayed from the salty depths: “Those who regard vain idols forsake their faithfulness, but I will sacrifice to You with the voice of thanksgiving. That which I have vowed I will pay. Salvation is from the Lord” (Jon. 2:8-9, NASB).

Sometimes we must sink to the lowest point before we turn to God. That’s what Jonah did. From what could have been a watery grave he got a second chance to obey.
“Are you running from God’s call on your life? Have you hired a luxury ship to take you to a comfort zone where you don’t have to think about the needs of your Nineveh?”
The fish swam hundreds of miles eastward, back toward the Phoenician shore, and vomited the repentant prophet onto dry land. Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: “Arise, go to Nineveh the great city” (3:2).

It had not been an easy process, but Jonah now understood his priorities.

When he finally arrived in Nineveh he heralded his message and caused a citywide commotion. Within hours everyone was talking about the Jewish prophet who spoke of divine judgment. All the inhabitants of the Assyrian capital, including the king, put on sackcloth and called on the name of the God of Israel because of Jonah’s dire warning.

God touched an entire city with His amazing forgiveness because one reluctant man finally fulfilled his divine assignment.

All of us can relate to this story. We are called to minister to the faithless Ninevehs of our generation—our workplaces, campuses, neighborhoods, cities and beyond. Each of us is called to be a missionary with a specific assignment. But often we run in the opposite direction because of fear of failure, insecurity about our weaknesses, disappointment about a past ministry experience or just plain selfishness.

Jonah hired a boat to take him to Tarshish, which was about as far as you could go from Nineveh in those days. (Bible scholars say it was in Spain, possibly a mining outpost near Gibraltar.) But he never reached his Mediterranean hideaway. God found him asleep in the hold of the ship and sent a storm to rouse him. Within a few hours he was thrown overboard and ended up as fish food.

Can you find yourself in Jonah’s story? Are you running from God’s call on your life? Have you tried to drown out the cries of lost people? Have you hired a luxury ship to take you to a comfort zone where you don’t have to think about the needs of your Nineveh?

Many American Christians today are in Jonah’s boat. We don’t like to hear sermons about evangelism. We’re not interested in the crucified life. We’ve shunned sacrifice. Instead of making the Great Commission our priority, we’ve fallen asleep with our iPods playing perky messages about success and prosperity.

But I hear the sound of wind and waves. God has sent a storm to rouse a distracted, disobedient church out of its slumber. We must take the same steps Jonah did:

1. Wake up. Jonah’s disobedience put the sailors on his ship in peril. Did you realize that when we shirk our responsibility to share the gospel of Christ, others perish? We must get out of our beds of spiritual lethargy and stop ignoring the cries of the unbelieving.

The charismatic church today has ignored the call to evangelism. In many churches we are more interested in getting personal prophecies, having heavenly visitations, interpreting our dreams or seeing gold dust than we are in winning souls. We’ve lost our first love. We’ve become ingrown and self-absorbed. But an alarm has sounded!

2. Look up. Sometimes God allows difficult circumstances to bring His church to repentance. Could this be one reason our economy is squeezing us to a breaking point? Has God sent a storm to blow away the materialism that has made us fat and proud?

Jonah was stripped to the bare essentials by the time he landed in the fish’s belly. He went through a scary digestive process, yet a loving God watched over him. Many of us may face some darkness and discomfort before we emerge empowered for a coming season of revival.

3. Embrace your call. When Jonah repented, he declared: “Salvation is from the Lord” (2:9). How desperately the American church today must embrace again the message of salvation. We must stop running. God wants to use all of us to reach people for Christ. The Lord has given all of us the message of reconciliation, and we must reclaim it anew.

The Christian life is not about you and your needs—it is a call to deny yourself and share the forgiveness of Jesus with everyone around you. If you are a fugitive from the call of God, please turn yourself in today.
J. Lee Grady is editor of Charisma.

Flexibility

How flexible are we?

Most of us like some routine in our lives and because of this we are able to keep track of our time and make best use of it! When I was first a Christian I learned a couplet that ran"Only one life and that soon past . Only whats done for Jesus will last"

One of the most inflexible thing in most of our lives is "church"! We have a tendency to "have church" rather than to "be church' So thinking of the passing nature of our lives, can we in the church be inflexible?

I mentioned in one of my other blogs that I attended church every Sunday, sometimes twice or three times, ever since I was 16! Then of course there was "mid week meeting" which was another time we always "had ' church..

In the last year since joining with others to begin Mosaic in Lethbridge, I have learned something about flexibility in Church life. In the last few weeks we have had to skip our usual Saturday gathering, because of events that we were involved in , a birthday party (mine) , an outreach event that had no songs and very few prayers, and a wedding This week we had to stretch a bit further and actually have our gathering on Sunday morning. This was hard for us because it interrupted our usual pattern! But, it was great ! We had a great meeting and having lunch afterwards and fellowship into the afternoon was not a chore!

We have a smaller church , around 25 , and we are all on Facebook. This helps us to be flexible and to change meeting times and places with minimum difficulty. There is something good about this because we don't have to be tied to a time or place to express our membership and life in the Body of Christ., and our particular expression of the Body.

Its important to "not forsake the assembling of ourselves together" but at the same time in the New Testament the Church met "daily" and "from house to house" so they were also very flexible in their way of doing the work of the ministry. The variety of places they met, the day of the week they met, were all subject to their ongoing pursuit of preaching the gospel wherever and whenever they could . They seemed to manage it without Facebook to help !

Its great to have a place or a centre to work out of and I know its in our future , but its so easy to become a slave to a time and place and location, and to believe that having church can only happen at those specific times in that specific place.

Being the church is so important that when we find ourselves with one another, or in an evangelistic situation with those who are not Christians, there are opportunities for prayer and ministry to them and to our brothers and sisters. So often healing does not happen on Saturday Night at our regular gathering or on Tuesday at our Training Night... its there we actually hear what has happened as we have been out in our world "being the church"

Flexibility was a mark of the lifestyle and ministry of the New Testament... lets keep as flexible as we can!

Changing Times

We live in changing times!

When man first walked on the moon I had a conversation with my Dad. He told me in his lifetime he had witnessed the advent of Flight, by seeing a zepplin, or as we would call it a blimp. Now he said "Man is walking on the moon...I have seen great change in my lifetime"

I am approximately the same age as my Dad was then. I see now all or most of the things that I watched on "Star Trek" in its early days being a reality in my own lifetime.

We now have "space stations" "mobile telephones" "virtual reality" the ability to project holographic images of preachers and teachers and to give them multi-location ministries. We have massive TV screens, and ability to see each other as we communicate on the Internet or on our mobile phone.

How does God cope with all this change? "I am the Lord I change not" is His response to a changing world "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever" The same Jesus that saved my Great grandfather , a Primitive Methodist, my Grandfather, a member of the Peculiar People, my Father and myself , still goes on saving people today.

The unchanging Truth of the ability for men to find the forgiveness of sins, by trusting in the finished work of Jesus at Calvary, continues in an age of innovation and technical revolution.

Times may change, and our methods of presenting the Gospel may become more sophisticated but the message is an unchanging message in changing times!

Missed "Church" again

I have lived now for 70 years and for 54 of them have been used to faithful church attendance on a Sunday am.
Around a year ago Nova and I moved to Lethbridge again! Since we have been here we have been attending a unique church plant Mosaic whose leader is our son Jeremy.
Mosaic is different for "old-timers " like Nova and I!
Firstly, we don't meet on Sunday we meet on Saturday Nights in Jeremy's home .
Secondly, we have as many people at our Tuesday Night Training Night as we do on Saturdays.. and when its prayer time they all want to pray !
Everyone in our Church is on Face book and most of them are young adults. We are all nosey and know what is going on in the church and with each other on a daily basis. They like to drop into our homes and spend time with us in between meetings , and sometimes when they do this with each other they land up praying and seeking God together!
People "get saved" we are not always sure how they did it but we are not into "collecting" existing Christians and "maintaining them" Lots of our newer believers seem to be able to maintain themselves and show great insight into things it took me years to understand!
Having said that, for the last two Saturdays we "missed Church" Last weekend was my 70th Birthday so friends and family gathered on our "church night" at Jeremy's house and we worshipped and they prayed for us... then we had cake and talked lots. At the end of the evening we had conversation with a couple and found out that the husband had a potentially serious problem with his eye, a torn retina, that could turn into a disease that would limit his vision. We laid hands on him and prayed in a quiet corner of the room that Jesus would heal him. Just this week came a note on Facebook saying" we visited the specialist who said whatever it was seemed to healed itself because there is no longer a problem" Our friends commented "but we know different!" Jesus is the healer!
This Saturday we "missed church" again and instead went to the first showing of a video produced by three young men in Mosaic. Truth/Life video depicted their search for truth and included trips to Africa and Asia in the process. Two of the young men and another since the trips found Christ in the process of their search. On this special Night one of the guys Moms, who is not a Christian surprised us all and came and visited the event. At the end of the evening the last of the speakers shared some Gospel insights... so the crowd of mostly Christian young folk from other churches , shared with us in hearing the Gospel proclaimed in an entirely new way. During the presentation I sat next to the"mum" and she was quietly weeping through many of the scenes.
At the end of the evening we prayed for another of our young ladies , who was going on a ministry trip. We didn't do it in the spotlight, just in the corner, and sent her on her way under authority and with the Blessing of her local church.
So for two weeks now I have "missed church" so am wondering about next week since we have a wedding on Saturday and most of the church will be there... we have to meet on Sunday am. I am wondering a little if Jesus might just turn up again like he did at the wedding in Cana of Galilee?