In light of the healings that have been happening in Lakeland, I've started reading Leonard Ravenhill's "Revival God's Way" once again and it's been provoking my heart in a profound way. I'm collecting my thoughts for a small series of posts on the topic of revival.

I'm convinced that revival is what the church so desperately needs. But I'm also convinced that it is not going to come in the way we are expecting it to, nor will it be nicely packaged, predictable, or containable, and will certainly not come without offending the hearts and minds of the church. The revival to come is one of the ways God will shake everything that can be shaken before His return. (Hebrews 12:26-29) I'll develop these concepts further in upcoming posts. But today I'll just start with this provoking quote by Ravenhill:

Any true revival can be proven by the fact that it has changed the moral climate of an area or nation. Perhaps the offense of true revival is that:

It cannot be organized. (The wind bloweth where it listeth.)
It cannot be subsidized. (It does not need financial backing.)
It cannot be advertised. (There is nothing more self-advertising than a fire, and revival is fire from heaven.)
It cannot be computerized. (God alone knows the extent of His power.)
It cannot be regulated. (We cannot lay a theological track for it to operate on.)
It cannot be rationalized. (It is a divine mystery beyond finite minds.)
It cannot be denominationalized. (It leaps over doctrinal barriers.)
It cannot be nationalized. (Preachers by the hundreds have been flying to Korea to see what God has done in that country. Most have gasped at the packed churches and returned sad that our mechanical services are so sterile.)

Many people express an interest in revival. There are not so many deeply concerned about it, and fewer still burdened for it, still fewer heartbroken for it. Yet, spiritual revival is not an alternative for the nations right now. It is imperative.

-Leonard Ravenhill, "Revival God's Way", p. 64

The “buzz” in the evangelical world about the “Lakeland Outpouring” or “Lakeland Revival” is widespread across the internet. If you haven’t heard about it, here’s a quick summary – about 35 days ago, a Canadian evangelist named Todd Bentley was holding meetings at a 700 seat building in Lakeland, Florida. The power of God began to break out at these meetings and doctor-confirmed miracles began happening. Since then, nightly meetings have been going on, the venue has changed to a 10,000-seat convention center, and healings are happening night after night.

This healing power has even touched us in a powerful way here at IHOP. A young teenager who is a part of the Children’s Equipping Center here at IHOP named Kelsey had been diagnosed with serious autoimmune diseases several years ago. She was in constant pain and needed an IV drip to live. We had been praying for her healing often. In faith, her family took her down to Lakeland despite her constant pain. The folks there prayed for her, and she was completely healed! She came back with an amazing testimony, and just yesterday she went to the doctor and her blood work came back completely normal. That’s the power of God… See this link for more of Kelsey’s story.

I’m so grateful for what the Lord is doing down in Lakeland and I’m excited for the Lord to pour out His promise of supernatural healing even here in Kansas City. But at the same time that I’m desperate for such a move of God here, I’m trembling on the inside at the prospect of it actually coming.  read more »

The idea of regret is a powerful motivator.

Mike Bickle stirred me up again when he spoke this Sunday about the issue of regret in the hearts of believers when they stand before the Lord at His return. Paul makes this massive statement that I think many believers (still including myself) have not sufficiently wrestled with (my explanations in brackets added):

“Now if anyone builds on this foundation [Jesus and the gift of righteousness] with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one’s work will become clear; for the Day [when Jesus returns] will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire [among other things, the fire in His eyes]; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is. If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss [experience pain and regret]; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.”
(1 Cor 3:12-15 NKJV)

We've traditionally thought of things differently but Paul makes a statement that should trouble us. There will be real pain and loss for believers at the second coming of Christ.  read more »

End-times junkie alert!

I was going through some old email and found this humorous forwarded image from Mike Bickle... You can see the corridor of glory and everything.

In all seriousness, if it looks like that, well, Abraham was a pretty silly guy.

Well, Sam Brownback dropped out of the '08 presidential race.

I normally don't speak up a ton about politics but my roommate has been telling me to take a look at Mike Huckabee for the next president. He is a former governor of Arkansas with lots of good convictions about righteousness and truth and the ways of Jesus. He does not support the murder of babies in the womb and firmly believes in the covenant of marriage is for a man and a woman only. While I do believe the economy, the war in Iraq, terrorism, and border control are important issues to consider, I believe our nation has a bigger problem on our hands - it's God Himself. If we don't turn and repent and walk in righteousness, we'll end up under the judgement of God. We need a righteous leader that understands that God is our greatest problem and leads our nation from that perspective.

But really though, I won't be fully satisfied until Jesus is president of the whole earth from Jerusalem and His glory covers the entire planet.

I’ve been helping facilitate David Sliker’s FSM class “Biblical Foundations of Eschatology” this week. It’s like the 4th or 5th semester I’ve helped him with it, and I always end up provoked to pursue the Lord even more. Yesterday he was talking about the forerunner ministry and what the Lord is raising up on the earth today, and it really stirred me so I figured I’d get some of my thoughts down.

The Lord is going to produce an expression of Christianity on the earth that will silence all of the accusers of the name of our God.

There will not even be a contest on the earth as to which religion or system is truly authentic. Jesus promised that the world would know with certainty that He is God and that the Father loves us in the same way that He loves the Son (John 17:21, 23).

What the Bible reveals about the nature and expression of the church in the days to come before Christ’s return is very clear. She will be pure and white, mature in holiness, blameless, full of meekness and humility, and she will not love her life, even to the point of death. She will exhibit Christlike character in everything she does, eagerly waiting for Jesus’ return to the earth. (Rev. 12:10, Rev. 19:7-8, Rev. 22:17)

All of the other options the world has for fulfillment will be shattered one by one. There will only be two choices before all is said and done.  read more »

My theology geek hat is on and the theology geek goo is oozing out of this post.

I've got a poll running on this topic but the quiz I found deserved a full post.

Take this quiz if you want to know what your end-time millennial theology is. If you have any idea what I am talking about, then you already probably know what you believe.

Some of the questions are pretty funny, although certainly valid :)

Of course, I am a die hard premillennial. What are you?

I've been super busy with my kitchen renovation the past couple of days - painting, painting, and more painting. It's amazing what some fresh paint and new cabinet hardware (courtesy of IKEA) will do to a kitchen! I'll post some before and after pics on my photo gallery when I've completed everything.

Well, this coming Monday starts a 3-week-long change in my schedule. I'm helping David Sliker as a teaching assistant for his "Biblical Foundations of Eschatology" class at FSM. This semester we have almost two hundred students taking the class. David lectures Monday through Wednesday, but my favorite part of the class happens on Thursdays when we split up all of the students into small groups for discussion. It's amazing to see how even over three weeks the students are stirred to greater hunger to understand the leadership of Jesus at the end of the age.

I'm a big end-times guy, but not for the reasons you might expect. I am not interested in a bunch of facts, figures, and charts about when Jesus is coming back or how intense the sixth seal will be. But I am interested in understanding the Man behind the facts and the sixth seal. The study of the end-times can't be diminished to charts, timing, and who goes where, when. The book of Revelation is not the revelation of the antichrist or the revelation of the judgments of God. Revelation 1:1 tells us exactly what the whole book is about. "The Revelation of Jesus Christ". The study of the end-times is not just for the scholarly or learned. It's for every believer, because the knowledge of Jesus is for every believer. Studying it should give us zeal to pursue the first commandment - it should propel us into deeper love and devotion to Jesus.  read more »

With an utterly underwhelming lack of response to my last post on "what action hero are you", I've decided to go back to my prophetic music series. If you haven’t read the first two posts in this series, read here and here first.

Satan has a far greater understanding of the power of music than we do. It’s why he is giving so much time and effort into making sure all sorts of music that directs men away from Jesus gets thrust into the ears and hearts of men today. According to the Psychology Press, “music is a complex acoustic and temporal structure that induces a large variety of emotional responses in listeners.” Scientists and psychologists have debated much over the issue of music and its affect on human emotions. Practical investigations have demonstrated that basic emotions, such as happiness, anger, fear, and sadness, can be recognized in and created by musical stimuli. Some hospitals are even using “music therapy” to make people feel better and heal faster . The simple question which continues to baffle scientists is simply “how can vibrating air and sound waves affect human emotions?”  read more »

At the IHOP spiritual warfare and intercession conference here this weekend, Stuart Greaves talked about the emerging global prayer movement as God's chosen way to birth the second coming of Jesus and usher in the "speedy justice" that Jesus spoke about in Luke 18. Put simply, justice is making the wrong things right. My post on environmentalism a few days ago is only the tip of the iceberg in some of the social issues affecting our world today. As a very brief follow-up to that post, Stuart made some good points that I wanted to make again here.  read more »