“Speaking at the Chinese Missions Convention in Ontario, Canada, on Wednesday, Chan lamented the fact that churches do not understand the power that God has given each believer, and instead keep them in “cages” where the only way they can survive is if someone feeds them.These cages include the children’s ministry cage, youth ministry cage, singles cage, and married couples cage, he noted. “Let’s just put everyone in their cages and let’s just feed them every week and our whole job is to just keep feeding you, feeding you, and feeding you when the reality is you were made for something more,” Chan emphasized.”
Francis Chan has identified the very essence and elemental weakness of what we call our church system. Perhaps it is why he felt the need to leave his own well established church that had thousands in the pews every week and was successful in every measurable way, at least by the way our system of church is measured. Yet surely he was dying spiritually while most pastors are striving for what he had and what he has now given up? It is like the illusion of wealth and the American dream. No matter how many voices speak out about the fact that money does not bring you happiness and contentment, still the vast majority seek it out. Suicides, for the most part, are undertaken by the wealthy not the poor. The poor has the illusion to work towards yet the rich man now knows how empty his life was and still is, for no amount of money can fill a whole in your spirit. And so pastors all over the world strive to have what Chan had, not understanding the fundamental truth of their calling. Their calling is not to contain the Body of Christ in cages as alluded to by Chan, but their calling is to enable them and to empower them and edify them so as they may operate to the fullness in their own gifting.
Now how can we open those cages and let the Christian loose? We have to allow the gifts of the Spirit to operate in our midst just as they did in 1st Cor 14. Read that chapter and ask yourself why your church does not operate in such a way? What has changed? Does not the Word of God remain unchanged in an ever-changing world? Will not all the world pass away and the heavens above but still the Word of God shall remain. Did not Jesus Himself say that the Word is never broken? If it is never broken then why do we not worship as they did in 1 Cor 14? Why is there not two or three tongues? Why is there not two or three songs and spiritual songs? Why no interpretation of those tongues? Why is there not two or three prophecies or words of exhortation? You see saints, this is the cage that we have put most of the Royal priests in. You can clean the toilets and volunteer to look after the children but God forbid that He should speak through you from the front or, horror of horrors, from the platform.
Will God be contained? Will He continue forever to allow His Word to be chained and caged by the power structures of men? The power structures of men take solace in the fact that their system has been in place for centuries. We Protestants scoff at Catholic tradition and say how dare they put as much emphasis on tradition as they do on Scripture? They cry “Sola Scriptura,” while all the while worshiping their own traditions as much as any Catholic ever did. How do we remove the chains from a people who cannot see their chains? How can we speak of true freedom while most of our brothers and sisters are caged and fed and have grown to like it that way? How can we restore the preeminence of Jesus in our gatherings?
Jesus wept over Jerusalem because He could see that in just a few short decades everything they knew, all of their traditions and means of worship would be torn down, stone by stone and nothing would be left. Nothing but Jesus. We will never know how much Jesus means to us until Jesus is all that we have, then we will know. The times are at hand brothers and sisters when God will allow every stone to be torn down of the structures we call the Church. The Church will remain for not even the gates of Hell can destroy us, but our system of worship shall be swept away by the storms of persecution. A tsunami of enormous proportions is headed towards us. When the waters begin to recede, know that destruction is at the door. This persecution will not destroy us, it shall refine us. And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness (Mal 3:3)
Eze 18:2 “The parents eat sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.”
Politics is a poison to the soul. It is why i do not vote. Don’t get me wrong, I have opinions, plenty of them and I am not afraid to express what I believe. Yet since I don’t vote I don’t have to choose between the lesser of two evils, I just call evil wherever I see it whether it has a left leaning or a right leaning. The partisan spirit to me, is one of the great evils of the day and helps to corrupt the minds and souls of children as they listen to the sour grapes of their parents, whether it was bitter complaints about President Clinton or bitter complaints and rejection of President Bush, President Obama and now President Trump. With every passing generation for the last few decades we have seen hatred and bitterness and partisanship passed down like an ever heavier weight for our children to carry. The legacy that we pass to our children should be a legacy of faith and of joy and of peace in God. We should be equipping our children to find the living God and serving Him all the days of their lives, not caught up in a slough of despondency. This current hatred of President Trump will eat into the children, that are being raised with it, like a cancer and draw us ever further apart as a society. Once we teach our children to reject authority then hell follows in its path and society is drawn down into the abyss. The children’s teeth are on edge, God, help the children.
Though many things in my life have shaped me, outside of Christ nothing has defined me. I am not that boy who grew up in an alcoholic home, we are not that couple who were pregnant as teenagers. We are not that couple who were homeless or that couple who lost their child. Nor are we the couple that’s son was 60% burned when he was two or whose other son was born with Down Syndrome. I am not that guy who struggled with drink and pot. I am not that guy who quit drink and pot. I am not that guy who laid bricks nor am that guy who sells houses. While all of these things had a hand in shaping my wife and I, it is only Jesus that has defined us. Jesus has defined us so much that probably no one could tell where we came from or even guess what our childhood was like. We are so rooted and defined by God because He is so much bigger than any one of those events or even all of those events combined. Do not let yourself become defined by the events that happened in your life whether good or bad. Don’t be that guy who is very wealthy, don’t be that woman who was abused, don’t be that person who has a handicap, be defined in Christ and you will be renewed no matter what your circumstances were or the combination of all of your circumstances are. Be known as that couple who are kind and loving. Be known as that woman who is virtuous. Be known as that man who walks with integrity. Be known as the couple who others can turn to for help. No single event or series of them must be allowed to define us, not even our salvation, for salvation is not a one time event, it is a living thing. Let the lives that we live define us and let those lives be in Christ and then when the world looks at us they will see Jesus. And if He be lifted up…………………….Glory to God in the highest , Glory to our God on high who can take someone who has been shattered into ten thousand pieces and put it all back together. Glory to the one who transforms and renews and makes all things whole.
The man who has passed on into the divine Presence in actual inner experience will not find many who understand him. A certain amount of social fellowship will of course be his as he mingles with religious persons in regular activities of the church, but true spiritual fellowship will be hard to find. “The Saint Must Walk Alone” A.W. Tozer
Tozer is speaking of true spiritual fellowship. That seems to be something that is very rare. I guess the very nature of being a pilgrim denotes loneliness to a certain extent. When we think of pilgrims and pilgrimage we think of long journeys , the definition of pilgrimage is ” a religious expedition.” The word expedition means a voyage or journey, typically that of exploration. Let me ask you saints, does it seem to you that you are on voyage or a journey? Have you left the world behind and struck out into unknown lands and crossed uncharted seas? Or, have you stuck with what you know?
The Christian walk is a voyage of discovery. It crosses uncharted oceans and climbs un-climbed mountains. It leaves the world behind as it journeys towards the celestial city. We are citizens of a land unknown to men. The only map that we have is to be found deep within our hearts. In order to reach this city all must be forsaken. Have you left the world behind you? Are you a mere sojourner on this earth? Does this world seem foreign to you? The saints heart will never be at ease in Babylon. It will long to be in the New Jerusalem. We shall follow the light within us as the wise men followed the star. It will take us home.
I have grown to dislike this season more with every passing year. When I was a child my poor mother would go into debt every year, not on extravagant presents but just so her children could have something. Maybe that is one of the reasons I dont have a lot of time for it. Maybe it is because every year there is less and less focus on Jesus. Around my house I am known as the grinch because I dont care much for all the present buying, in fact I tell them, with a smile on my face, that if it was up to me I would ban all present buying, but I a deadly serious, I would. My heart is pained at what this season represents to the world. I will be pleasant enough to everyone, but my heart is not in it at all. If I could just sit with a company of saints and sing Oh Holy Night and consider the day, whatever day it was, that the Lord was born and rejoice in that, that would be better than anything. I don’t want to rain on anyone’s parade, it is simply how I feel.
Tozer writes ” God saves a criminal not so he might tell about it once a year for the next 40 years but so that He might become a saint. God takes him out of his bondage that He might lead that person into the promised land. And the farther in the man goes, the less he will have to say about what he used to be. It is not the mark of spirituality when I talk at length about what I used to be.” I could not agree more with what Tozer says.
I have found this to be true in my own life. It is not so much what the Lord delivered me out of, but more so what the Lord delivered me into. He delivered me into a royal priesthood. The focus of my life is not where I came from but where I am now and where I am going. When I speak too much of where I came from I am speaking about myself and the devil. When I speak about who delivered me and what He delivered me into my focus is on Jesus and if He be lifted up, then all men shall be drawn unto Him and glorify Him.
As I was walking and praying yesterday, I thought about an incident my wife and I witnessed last year. We were sitting at a traffic light of one of the busiest intersections in the city where we live. Out of the corner of my eye I saw something moving. It was a baby bunny rabbit. Somehow it had managed to cross this street which was an absolute miracle. Now it was stuck at the curb which was only about six inches high. It kept jumping up and almost getting it and then falling back down. I thought about jumping out of the car and running over and helping it but I knew the light was going to change any second.
As my wife and I watched, engrossed and rooting for the bunny, with one big effort it somehow managed to get up and we were cheering as we watched it run across the sidewalk to the grass on the other side. Just as it approached the grass, from out of absolutely nowhere, a large hawk swooped down and snatched that little bunny and carried it away. For a moment there was stunned silence in our car. Then we looked at each other and just said wow, who could have ever saw that coming. This morning a brother from a church which I attended for many years died of a heart attack. He was about my age. No one ever saw it coming and I can only imagine the profound shock for the family.
This life often makes no sense at all. It can be profoundly beautiful and it can be intensely brutal and everything in between. Live your life today. Love and be kind. Consider the fact, not in a morbid way, but in a deep way, that tomorrow is not guaranteed for any of us. Live your life today with the understanding that life is precious, our relationships are precious and our walk with the Lord is paramount. Grab hold of life and live it with a ferocity, live it with the fierce urgency of now. Be bold and do great things, be loving and do little things. We have this one life to live.
I’ve seen rainbows in the waterfall
As a child I heard my mother call
He lifts me up every time I fall
It all belongs to Him
I’ve seen dolphins dance upon the waves
I’ve watched squirrels as they misbehave
I’ve seen my Lord and how He truly saves
It all belongs to Him
I’ve seen starlings playing in the sky
I’ve seen the eagles teach their young to fly
I saw my Lord, He came to bleed and die
It all belongs to Him
I have seen a little baby crawl
Then I’ve seen him standing oh so tall
When I cry my Lord He hears my call
It all belongs to Him
So when you see the setting sun go down
And all the kings have finally lost their crown
And tongues confess and every knee bows down
It all belongs to Him
The victory for the saint comes in the depths of the dungeons. Those who will prevail are those who shall endure and overcome. If we love God more than life then we shall endure until the end and not just endure but cry glory even in the midst of gross darkness. The enemy shall never silence the praises of His people even though he would try to kill every one of us to shut the mouth of Jesus. The enemy killed every child of a certain age in a great slaughter and laments were heard all over the land, but, hark the Herald angels sing, glory to the new-born King, above the weeping of grieving mothers the cries of our deliverer was heard. The enemy failed and Christ prevailed and as it was then so it ever shall be until that day dawns and the morning star rises in your heart.
Hundreds of years ago, brave men would go down to the sea and embark on voyages from which there was no guarantee of returning. They would encounter monsters of the sea, savage storms that would threaten to tear them apart, windless days, ever diminishing supplies and in those days worrying about falling off the end of the world. Yet, they embarked and because they embarked we discovered brand new worlds. Few were the men who would dare to do such things and few are the men that change the world. Yet saints, genuine saints who embark upon the journey of faith, who throw caution to the wind and go all in, these saints change the world as we know it. They lead the way for others to follow. I believe there is an especially large mansion for those saints on earth who endure great hardships. The foundation that they are currently hewing out of solid rock will prove to be the foundation for their eternal home to come.
In the early years of the Church, wild accusations were used as a weapon against Christians. Because some had heard them speak of the Lord’s supper where they ” ate His Body and drank His Blood,” symbolically of course, they were wildly accused of cannibalism among other things. Severe persecution followed. In the last 10 years many things have been weaponized. Race, gender, information, and now sexual abuse. Mere accusation can ruin people’s lives. This wild hysterical atmosphere, which itself has been weaponized, therefore multiplying its power exponentially, is tearing away at the fabric of society. The day is coming, soon, when the wild mob, no longer held at bay by the rule of law, will turn on Christianity. Today the cry is sexual abuse where people are presumed guilty and then ruined, tomorrow the cry will be “hate speech,” and it’s target will be genuine Christians who hold to a Biblical worldview. To stand upon the truth, in the coming days, will be to lose everything.
Young people with families will be especially tested I believe because of the pressure to put food on the table. In order to put food on the table in the time soon to come one will have to deny fundamental tenets of Biblical truth just to be able to work. If not and once labeled as one who is guilty of hate speech, that one will be fired right away without any due process and will be unlikely to get a job anywhere else. I am not writing to this to suggest this can be changed, I do not believe it can be changed, it is coming. I do advice all the saints to be prepared for this in any way the Lord leads you to.
The greatest revelation of God in my life has come in the midst of my needs. It has not come in my wants or desires or accomplishments it has come in my needs. The greater the need the greater the revelation. The second time of greatest revelation of God in my life has come when I have sinned against Him. There is no deeper humiliation for a saint than to have failed his Lord badly. Yet, when I approached the throne of grace with my head hung low and with a spirit within that was crying out ” woe is me for I am undone,” then suddenly I am encountered with love and forgiveness even although I myself had desired punishment and penance to atone somehow for my sin. Now I am undone not because of my unworthiness but because of the realization of the depths of His love and faithfulness to me. It is His holiness that saves, it is his grace that is sufficient and it is His faithfulness that will never fail. He increases in my heart and I decrease as I realize the very source of all that I am in Him and in Him alone
And so, the revelation of the depths of God have come to me and changed me and shaped me because of my needs and my need to repent of my failure and my sin. Contrast all of that to the fundamental aspects of the faith and hyper grace movement if you will. One is that God would have you have all your wants and desires and would be glorified in you accomplishments. The other is that there is no need to humble yourself and be broken and contrite over your sin because He has already forgiven your sins, past , present and future. Now if the greatest revelations of God to us are found in the midst of our needs then would not the enemy of our souls strive to get us to such a place where there is no need?
If our sins lead to humility and repentance and brokenness before the throne where we receive a greater and deeper revelation of who God is then would not the enemy of our soul try to keep us from this place by convincing us that there is no need to come here because all sins, past and present and future are already taken care of? Do not be fooled saints, God is glorified and revealed to us in the depths of our needs, our infirmities and our failures. Should we then seek to be in need or to be infirm or to sin so that God may be glorified? Not at all. I can guarantee that you wont have to seek out needs or infirmities or sin. They will find you because you are finite and corruptible. But an infinite God will one day raise you up in in-corruption. And until that day comes His grace will be sufficient for you. He will meet you in the depths of your needs. He will be faithful to forgive all of your sins when you come before Him and confess and in all of that you are drawn ever deeper into the heart of the Father.
God is not the answer to all of your problems, He is, quite simply, The Answer. When we worship “The Answer,” then every dark problem is brought forth from the shadows as His light breaks through the darkest clouds and lights up the hearts of those who love Him. And from the deepest darkest valleys we begin to hear His praises rise. Darkness is set to flight and light is brought into every situation. We have not been called to live problem free lives, we have been called to use our problems as platforms that lifts us up from the valley floor to the heights of heaven.
It is always dangerous write about end times. There has to be a lot of humility even when you broach the subject and a willingness to agree to disagree. Anyone who tells you that “this is the way it is going to happen,” you can take with a pinch of salt. The reason I am writing this short piece ( I try to keep everything short these days, could take 1000 words just to introduce the subject) is because a few people have asked me if I think there is any significance for the end times in regards to the USA recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Short answer, yes, just because I think everything that happens to Israel and more specifically Jerusalem is significant. I think it actually might lead to a major peace deal, the one spoken of in Scriptures, a seven-year comprehensive peace deal and all the world will celebrate, but when they say “peace,peace,” there will be no peace and half way though that deal it will all fall to pieces. Let me give you the relevant Scripture from where we get the notion that there will be a seven-year comprehensive peace deal.
Dan 9:27 And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.
Mat 24:15 When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)
Mat 24:21-22 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.
1Th 5:2-3 For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.
Rev 13:7-8 And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations. And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
So, the typical understanding of the abomination of desolation is that it takes place in the Temple, a Temple. Of course at this moment we do not have a Jewish temple in Jerusalem so most suppose a third temple has to be erected in order for this prophecy to take place. I disagree, for a couple of reasons. First I believe the saints themselves to be the third temple with God dwelling inside each of them, each of them being a living stone. Secondly in Matthew 24 Jesus refers to the “Holy Place.” Now, the ground upon which the Temple was built was a holy place. If you do the research you will see that the site of the Temple itself had a long rich history and so was not built on a random site. So what is there now? Right now we have the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa Mosque. The Dome was completed in 692 and this makes it one of the oldest Muslim holy places in the world.
So that is some of the history and Scriptures that allude to this topic, now back to the USA recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Many if not most scoff at the notion that someone like Trump could be part of a final comprehensive peace deal in the Middle East. I want to remind everyone that there was another President that people openly mocked and scoffed as a buffoon, President Regan. Yet he was the one that brought down the mighty Soviet empire and the Berlin wall, the symbol of separation of east and west. Now we know that God raises up the foolish things of this world to confound the wise. The recognizing of Jerusalem as the capital city is the first step towards the peace deal that we know has been foretold.
So I believe that when you see all three religious leaders of the world come together in the “Holy Place,” to combine the religions of the world then this is the abomination, the birth of the great whore church. What disaster or disasters that bring this about I cannot tell you but it will come to pass. The world will be so sickened by terrorism, perhaps after the largest atrocity the world has ever seen, that the people of the world will demand a coming together. The leaders of the religious world will meet, at the demands of the political leaders of the world, at the holy site, the holy place, the Dome as it is now. They will tell the world that each of them believe Abraham to be their mutual father of faith and that Abraham’s God is their God whether they are Christian, Jewish or Muslim. It will be a day that the world will celebrate and exchange gifts to commemorate true world peace. And the cry will be “peace and safety.”
The only people of the world who will resist this will be the saints and they will incur the wrath of the whole world. They will be seen as a cancer in society that has to ripped out. The religious and political leaders will point to them and tell the world that these so-called Christians are the source of all the worlds problems. And so war shall be made upon the saints and they shall be overcome for a time as every tribe and tongue and nation worship the one world government and the one world religion. In fact it will be so severe that if God Himself does not shorten those days then there would be no saints left on the earth.
I believe that all these things are shortly to come upon us. It is a good thing to be prepared just as Jesus prepared in the garden before the crucifixion. We are called to endure to the end saints. We are called to overcome and stand in the evil day. Our God will be with us and He will pour out His Spirit upon us so that we may have the strength to endure. He is God that keeps His promises and He shall never leave us no forsake us.
I love the fact that no matter how ungodly the world becomes, some people still maintain their devotion to God and one another. No matter how much betrayal and debauchery we see on every side, some people still believe in duty, love, and honor. God is faithful to bless those whose hearts are attuned to him. They may not be in the majority; in fact, they usually are not. But they don’t mind; they keep on doing the right thing.
Many times today, those who love the Lord with all their heart and are sincere about following him feel bereft and alone. They look around at the corruption both outside and, unfortunately, inside the church, and they say, “How can people act that way? Don’t they know any better?” The enemy often tries to get us to give up and compromise ourselves.
In such a moment, we need to hear God’s voice reminding us of what he told Elijah at a low point of discouragement: there were still 7,000 others who had not bowed the knee to the idol of Baal. Elijah was not the only one after all.
Jesus said, “Wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it” (Matthew 7:13-14). God is looking for people in every age who choose his small gate and narrow road. They want to please him regardless of how opposite the cultural tide is running. They will be his holy remnant. On these God will pour out his abundance in surprising measure. (Jim Cymbala)
“[Elijah] replied, ‘I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.’” (1 Kings 19:10 NIV).
If you were to watch my dog Jack go for a ball you would be pretty impressed. I have a little ball throwing gizmo that helps me launch it much further than I could ever possibly thrown it. While it’s still behind my back, half way through the swing, Jack has already figured out the trajectory of the ball and is off and running without ever looking back. The ball will bounce once in front of him and while never missing a beat he leaps up and just at the very apex of the bounce trajectory he snatches it out of mid-air and lands perfectly, it is poetry in motion. Now he will do this action 100% of the time and 99% of the time he gets the ball. Yet, even when he misses it is still poetry in motion because every single time he is 100% committed, he will catch it spectacularly or he will miss it spectacularly.
There is something about the way Jack goes for this ball that speaks to me. His passion, his commitment, his expectations are all really impressive. The most impressive thing about Jack is that it does not matter that the last time he went for it he missed, he just goes for it every single time. God is always looking for a passionate people. Yes you might miss the ball sometimes but do you have the passion, the commitment and the expectations when you hear God speak? Are you off and running in the direction that God sends you knowing that there is going to be a ball dropping right in front of you? The Scriptures tell us that without faith (trust) it is impossible to please God. When He sends you off in a certain direction do you go for it, do you believe that God is in it and He knows what He is doing? Or are you always looking back and second guessing him? It is not the catching of the ball that God loves, it is the passionate pursuit of Him and His ways. You are gonna drop the ball, you’re gonna miss the mark, but that is just you, that is just natural. What is supernatural is to trust in God with all of your heart and keep pursuing Him over and over again. God loves diligence. He is not a rewarder of the guy with the biggest ministry, He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. This is what gets Gods attention.
A Call To The Remnant 