Zach Joy on the 700 Club

www.cbn.com/700club/features/amazing/Zach_Joy121509.aspx

Ramon on the 700 Club

www.cbn.com/700club/features/amazing/Ramon_Luna120709.aspx

Dark Night

Who among you fears the Lord and obeys the voice of His servant? Let him who walks in darkness and has no light trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God. Isaiah 50:10

I've been in a strange place lately. I've been crying out to God for breakthrough in all the areas I feel stuck or see other people stuck, where I see glimmers of the Kingdom that are hugely encouraging and make me hungry for more - more of God's presence, more healing, more intimacy, more freedom. I believe there is more. What I have seen is already so much more than I used to believe or expect; it makes me believe it all. And I hear stories from around the world of the "more" that Jesus is up to. But we're not seeing it yet.

As I am waiting, I am finding myself in a darkness that feels, at times, like I have lost my way. While my conversations with God are as lively as ever, I don't sense His presence or hear from Him like I have been. Especially when I am in a place to pray for someone else, I have the deeply disorienting sense of having nothing to offer and not knowing how to pray AND not having faith that God is going to "show up" when I do. I realize that the ways I have learned to pray, which have been life-giving, have the potential (along with all prayer) of being formulaic or technique. I think God is stripping me of that, which is good because it gets me back to He is the Vine and I am a branch and apart from Him I can do nothing. We have been saying for some time that we want to walk in total reliance on Jesus, who did nothing of Himself but only what He saw the Father doing. How else to do that but to be in utter reliance?

The hard part is that whatever is going on doesn't feel very good. It is depressing and out of control. Is it time to press in or to simply receive the Kingdom like a little child?

Encountering the Father's Heart

It was a Kingdom come kind of day. 25 people gathered - mainstream white, Latino gangsters and Lummi Nation who are becoming sons and daughters, ex-offenders from prison, rappers and worship leaders - all seeking to connect more deeply to the Father heart of God.

People talked about their relationships with their own dads and how that has affected their relating to God as Father, then forgave their dads. We talked about how our experience of the reconciling work of Jesus begins in the places where we need to be reconciled with one another - when we forgive as our heavenly Father forgives we are becoming children of God. As we walk in this, we see our need to be reconciled with our heavenly Father.

At the end of our time one young man spoke up about feeling deeply and painfully alone. As he shared his pain, these gangsters and others admitted their own aloneness and came around him to pray with and for him. "No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us." (1 John 4:12) What seemed, initially, to take us back a step from all we had been talking about actually moved us out of our individual attempts to experience a deeper connection with the Father to experiencing a deeper sense of our adoption by connecting to our family through one expressing their need.

It was a beautiful moment. One said, "Healing is cool thing to see and other signs of the Kingdom breaking in, but this is the greatest sign when the children are loving one another."

Treasure Hunt

I was listening to Bill Johnson's podcast yesterday and was challenged that the Spirit of the Lord is upon me - for a purpose. As I was sitting in the parking lot outside the Bellingham REI I asked the Holy Spirit to give me a clue for someone the Father wanted to bless through me. I immediately had the impression of a red and black plaid shirt, so I went looking (somewhat fearfully, I admit) and was relieved not to see such shirt at REI.

I went home and was doing laundry in the common house, having put this whole thing out of my mind, when I looked out the window and saw Ed, one of our community members, walking by in a red and black plaid shirt. Jesus reminded me that He had things for me to do here and it was time to do one of them. I saw Ed disappear into the wood shop and made my way over there. Glad to find him by himself we got to talking about this and that. Then I said, "This might sound strange to you, Ed, but I was praying this morning and asking God who He wanted to bless and I got a picture in my mind of a red and black plaid shirt. I think God wants to bless you today. Would it be okay if I prayed a blessing for you?" He didn't hesitate and said yes; he straightened up from the workbench and closed his eyes. I put my hand on his shoulder and prayed a short prayer asking the Father to show His delight to Ed. When I finished he thanked me and we moved on to talk of other things.

Bless him again today, Father.

prophetic praying

We were praying with a friend the other day. As we did God gave one of us a couple pictures from this friend's life when he was a boy in Mexico. They were traumatic events. As he shared them we could see that he was touched deeply.

I asked him later how he felt about hearing of these images in his prayer time. He said he felt very hopeful and full of joy because it meant that God was real and that God knew about him, and that he was never alone.

There are times when we pray and our approach is to help people make the direct connection to hear from Jesus for themselves. This is important, especially so that they aren't dependent upon anyone else for their connection with Jesus. But this reminds me how important prophetic words are - the secrets of our hearts are revealed and we will worship God and declare that God is really among us (1 Corinthians 14:25).

Removing the Blame

We were praying with John (not his name). This was the third time. As we had some worship music on and quietly invited Jesus to come bring healing to him, I asked Jesus what He wanted to do or what He wanted to show us. An image came to my mind of a rough post with a metal ridge a little higher than head height. I dismissed it, thinking I was dozing off. The image came back so I asked Jesus what it was about. The image expanded to reveal what appeared to be the inside of a barn and a young boy (around ten) kneeling, saying, "It wasn't my fault; it wasn't my fault." I saw other kids sitting on boxes or hay bales above him, laughing.

I asked John if something bad had happened in a barn when he was ten. He told us about how he had been jumping out of the hay loft. He added more hay to the pile so it was softer to land on. Later in the day, his cousin joined him and hurt himself badly by landing on a hay fork that was hidden in the pile. John ran off for help.

John mentioned that he was often around when things happened and would help but people suspected he was to blame for them as the "coincidence" of his presence at these events become more frequent. I felt like Jesus wanted to remove the label of "blame-taker" and scapegoat from him, and also that he might need to forgive himself for what happened that day.

I asked him if he could picture himself with Jesus at the cross. (The cross is the place of exchange - our sin for His forgiveness, our burdens for His yoke, our death for His life...). He said yes, and saw himself kneeling with Jesus in front of the cross. I asked him what his burden of guilt and blame looked like and would he give it to Jesus. I led him to forgive himself.

As we sat there praying, I watched him having this encounter with Jesus with a smile on his face. I thought we should go back to the memory in the barn and see where Jesus was, so I asked him if he'd want to go there. He said that he and Jesus were already there - Jesus was walking him around the outside of the barn and showing him that some workers had left the hay fork in the pile between the time he had been jumping and when his cousin jumped.

I don't know why I am surprised by that, as though Jesus needs my leading to do anything. I just love how Jesus met with John, first leading me, then leading him.

Getting Ready to Move

We will be moving at the end of the month. We are moving into a co-housing set up - http://www.bellcoho.com/. As we've prayed about this, we have felt that Jesus wants us here. This also means that we will be in Bellingham for another year, at least.

Riley

Riley Neelley
May 22, 1994 - September 5, 2009

"Dogs are created as social creatures to be family members. Riley was a member of the family. (Our) grief runs as deep as the gift he was to us."

Riding the Riley Train

Last week was an emotional rollercoaster for us with our long time companion, Riley. At fifteen and a half, Riley has been with me through miles of trails, four churches, nine houses and in two marriages. Though he has been slowing down as an old boy, last week he took a dramatic turn for the worst and stopped eating and mostly moving.

The vet took x-rays and found that both lungs were half collapsed. The radiologist said he has a mass in his chest and pneumonia. We started him on antibiotics but by Wednesday it appeared he was done. Even as we prepared for this, he picked up his head and started drinking some water. Eventually we got his pills in him and on Thursday, after three days of no eating, we got scrambled egg down him, morning and evening.

Now, a week later, his appetite and strength have picked up, though he still requires assistance. He is laying here, panting quietly as I type this.

Setting Captives Free

We just finished a week long course on deliverance - setting the captives free. There are a lot of amazing stories to tell, so here is John (not his real name) from Taiwan. He thought he was just coming to learn and that he didn't have anything to deal with in himself, but the Lord showed him rooms full of judgment against white people for the prejudice he experienced growing up. As he confessed his judgments and forgave the people who hurt him he began to show signs that there was something in him that didn't like what he was doing and was fighting back. Some of our team prayed with him and after a while the fight subsided. He shared the story with the group that night and asked our forgiveness for his hatred and judgments against white people.

Each day, as we worshipped and invited people into places of repentance and forgiveness, John would experience more of this powerful resistance in himself. The last day of the conference I was praying with him and got to watch the Holy Spirit reveal things to him that needed to be addressed and got to see the beautiful, powerful name of Jesus conquer all opposing forces. When we were done praying, he told me that he had so much love for us now. He said when he first saw me, he knew we were going to be tight because he had hateful thoughts toward me (from the Enemy). I told him that was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to me...

Wedding by God

We weren't sure it was going to happen - Nicholas and Holly, both recovering meth users, having been together for years, wanted to get married. We talked about it and even set a tentative date of July 3, but then I didn't hear from them until the end of June. So the day before the wedding date, we hang out in the garden and make our plans.

Friday morning I sat in the garden and read Psalm 23, which they had picked for their wedding. I asked Jesus what the Father's heart was for them and began to write. I've done this in different situations but never before for a wedding. I felt Jesus told me things He wanted to bless them with, things they needed to ask for and things He wanted to break off of them.

As we neared the ceremony, I mentioned to Chris (playing piano) that after the vows and rings we would have a time for everyone who wanted to come up and lay hands on them to pray. Chris suggested that he play some music and we invite people to sit and ask Jesus what He wants them to give to Holly and Nicholas, and then we would all pray. So, when the time came I invited people to do this but what happened was better than our plan. Throughout the music, couples and individuals came forward when they were ready to speak blessing over Nicholas and Holly and to pray with them. This went on for 15 minutes and was so beautiful to see. It was intimate, personal and powerful.

Soul Making

Thoughts from Alan Jones that have made me hungry and introspective:

Conversion is about soul making. It is not material for the ten o'clock news. It takes a long time to make a human being and conversion is that continual process of being made and re-made (and being un-made at times, I would add. some things in us need to come down before we are built anew).

Our conversion of saying Yes to God is a real thing, but it is unfinished and incomplete... no one has an experience of Jesus without it being filtered through another person... we also encounter Jesus in a particular form or tradition, through a historically conditioned community. Sometimes that tradition is mediated through a form of worship or a body of writings. Then we have our own unique and idiosyncratic way - our neuroses push us into a particular style of believing... and all my prejudices are undermined when I meet and like people from different traditions I had rejected as bigotted or false.

So, I've been thinking about conversion as another way of talking about baptism or dying to self. We must be converted again and again. So much of what we encounter in the church appears to be simply what is outside the church with a thin veneer of Jesus. We have forgiveness and eternal life, but apart from that much is business as usual. What does it mean for me to be converted again in how I see Jesus, how I see myself, in how I view money and power and sex, in how I really love my neighbor, in how I work, in how I love the poor?

Some people are converted by reading an article or watching a movie. These are people of deep compassion and passion. I am not one of these people. For me, maybe especially as a teacher, to be converted to the scandal of the gospel (when is the last time Jesus offended you?), I have to be uprooted from my safe, distant, I've got it figured out because it works for me context and be put among people for whom my theology and beliefs don't work so easily. Then I must wrestle in order to be blessed. I must be converted again. That only happens for me where what I am regularly encountering doesn't fit with my nice, neat categories. And its not enough to be in it by myself; the load of understanding, trying to make sense of it is too much for me. Or of trying to do anything about it; the overwhelming nature of it would paralyze me. It takes a community, flawed in its own blind spots, but present in the questions and witnesses to the saving work of Jesus as we wrestle together.

Year in Review

So it is a year now since we arrived at Tierra Nueva (New Earth) and its been rich. It is like we were a potted plant that has been transplanted into a bigger space, so our roots are spreading out, we are absorbing new nutrients and new and more fruit is coming.

• May 1, 2008 - Bob, what are we doing here? We spent several months trying on different roles and by the end of the summer we felt that it was too much for Susan to try to do ministry at Tierra Nueva, have a counseling practice in Seattle and live in Bellingham. It was a hard process of discerning that continued into the Fall. May 1, 2009, Susan got office space above Tony's coffee in Bellingham to start her counseling practice 6 blocks from home!
• Receiving extraordinary teaching - we have had international visitors from France (teaching on deliverance ministry - Gilles Boucomont), South Africa (teaching on dialogical reading of the Bible - Gerald West) and Abbotsford, Canada (on hearing God's voice - Brad Jersak). We have hosted classes for Regent College from Vancouver, Canada on Reading the Bible with the Damned (reading with the poor for mutual liberation) and Lift Up Your Voice: Combining the Charismatic Prophetic with the Social Prophetic. In these classes we have both learned and been able to have amazing ministry sessions praying for people. We have also been able to receive regularly from the great minds and hearts of our staff in Bob Ekblad, Chris Hoke, Amy Muia, Nick Bryant. We had our summer course on Going Deeper in Word, Spirit and Street where all that teaching and ministry got to be combined for a full week in July.
• One of the core values in practice here is that of forgiving enemies and blessing them. I am learning this from ex-convicts who have discovered that when they do this they are set free from bitterness and anger. It is remarkable to me that I haven't heard this teaching in the church. I know that we have done this sort of thing in healing prayer, but to find it here and a regular practice (a spiritual discipline) that gangsters and felons move into so readily is humbling.
• I have wrestled regularly with my theology finding myself in a place that has challenged what I have simply swallowed, often uncritically. This has been a dismantling and stretching that has created crisis and a new expansiveness in my encounters with God. I have seen that when I said that Christianity is about relationship with Jesus, my deeper assumptions have been exposed - that being a "good Christian" is about right behavior and right belief. With the people we work with on the margins and the challenge to my theology both of those stones in my foundation have been knocked loose as I have recognized that the Pharisees were about those things.
• We have seen more of the power of God to do more than we can ask or imagine as we see people healed physically and spiritually, we see miraculous provision come in, we see demons obey at the name of Jesus and we experience the beautiful presence of God in worship more and more. And still we are praying for more - for breakthrough in healing, for debt being cancelled, for people to be delivered completely of their addictions. All that we have seen has increased our faith that there is even more.
• I have been experiencing more of the presence of Jesus daily as I am hearing His voice more and inviting others into that place. This has taken the idea of a relationship with God to a whole new dynamic level of interaction - being led by the Spirit, hearing the voice of the Good Shepherd.

Everywhere I turn, the invitation from God is to ask, seek, and knock and to keep doing it. This year has felt like a graduate program where all the studies are worked out daily in lab. It has been the most amazing year!

Setting Captives Free

Last week I had the opportunity to team up with two others from our ministry to pray for a woman for inner healing. As we were praying, one of my team members was asking the woman about some family patterns with her dad. As I listened, I asked Jesus what was going on here. I imagined a dam with a lot of water behind it and only a little coming down the trough. I thought, "That's predictable." I was feeling skeptical of my hearing from Jesus. I asked Him, "Jesus, what is the dam?" I thought I heard, "It's a lie that she has been told." I thought, "That's predictable, too." I thought that because often in prayer we have found that there are things God wants to release to a person but they can't receive it because they have come to believe something that keeps them back for one reason or another.

Still I asked Him, "What's the lie?" I won't say what it was (for confidentiality) but the next thing I heard sounded so much like my own thoughts that I immediately dismissed it. Then I realized that it was so unlike anything I would have thought of that I asked what I should do with it. He said, "Tell her," but I was afraid to, in case I was wrong. So I asked all sorts of questions around it that might give me some idea if what I was hearing was right. Her answers didn't help me sort it. Finally they all looked at me and asked me where I was going with all that and what I heard. Even at this point I hesitated and finally said, "Okay, this is what I think I saw and think I heard," and she looked at me with eyes wide and said, "That is exactly right!" This led us down a line of praying that brought increasing freedom for her.

Jesus is so beautiful to give a prophetic word (1 Corinthians 14:25) in order to set a captive free. It is such an honor and great encouragement to my faith to get to be part of things like that! Praise Him!

One of the ways Jesus is scandalizing me

As I've been praying with people lately and inviting Jesus to show up, He has been offending me at times...

Praying with one man, I asked Jesus where He was in the room and I saw Him kneeling at the feet, "submitting" Himself to this man. I thought, "No, thats not right. We submit to You, Jesus." Then the thought came to me, "The Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve."

Even as I write that I still feel the resistance in me. We are to serve Him - right? Not my will, but His - right?

Praying with another man, I again saw Jesus kneeling before him and told Him, "No." He said He wanted to wash his feet. I still resisted what I was hearing/thinking and He said, "Unless I wash you, you have no part of Me."

The other night in worship we recognized that the resurrected Jesus was among us to visit us even as He visited the disciples in the upper room. So we asked Jesus to show us how He wanted to visit us. After sitting to see what He would say to us, several people said they saw Him dancing and worshipping over us, celebrating us, telling us how glad He was that we had come. We were there to worship Him and He was there to receive our worship but also to bless and lavish His love and affection on us.

I am continually amazed at how Jesus breaks the box of my understanding which is way too small for the risen Jesus.

Asking Jesus

A friend called me the other day about a decision he was trying to make. He had talked with his small group about it and was getting conflicting advice. He called me and presented all the options he was considering and the pros and cons, and asked me what I thought. I said, "This may be an obvious question and you've probably already done this, but have you asked Jesus?"

He said, "No, I asked my small group and I'm asking you."

"I think it is better to start by asking Jesus and if you have questions about what you are hearing, then ask your small group for confirmation. But we need to start with Jesus."

He said he hadn't done that and agreed that we should. His question was around some money stuff, so I prayed, "Jesus, You've heard our conversation and You know all our baggage around money - guilt, stewardship questions, self-justifications. Would You please move that aside and tell us what You want us to do with this question?" Immediately my friend said, "I heard Him say..."

It was a beautiful moment that I realize doesn't happen often. Our thought is always to ask others before we ask Jesus. Why is that? I think it is because:

• we don't believe Jesus speaks to us in real time, only in the bible. But the bible says (John 10) "My sheep hear My voice" - not "My pastors, My teachers, My super-spiritual friends." My sheep -thats all of us.
• we are afraid we already know what Jesus will say to us and we want to do what we want. This is largely the case. If you boil down Christian faith to two words, they are trust Jesus. Mostly I think that we still live out of the first lie in the Garden which is, "God is holding out on you, He is not for you but against you, so you need to grasp for and hold on to whatever you are going to get." The good news is that God is for you and not against you - He is a good Father who gives us good gifts. We need to replace the lie with the truth. That is not to say that if we ask for something He won't have an answer different than the one we are looking for. He is not a rubber stamp, He is God. That is where the trust Jesus part comes in, when He is saying something that requires faith on our parts, whether to step out or to wait.
• we don't trust ourselves to hear clearly. Good. We are to test every spirit. The minute we realize that Jesus does speak to us, we soon discover that His is not the only voice out there. This requires us to discern (throw out the bad, hold on to the good) and to submit what we are hearing to others that we trust and ask them to ask Jesus and hear what they are hearing. But we can have fun, too. As we step out with what we are hearing, we will find that Jesus is calling us co-workers and friends.

The most helpful book I've read on this is Brad Jersak's Can You Hear Me? Tuning In To The God Who Speaks. This book has done more to transform my daily interaction with Jesus from basic Christian obedience to a dynamic interaction.

Jesus and gangsters

The other day a couple Latino gangsters came by to hang out - Juan and Jesse (not their names). My co-worker, Chris, walked in on Jesse chilling in our Family Support Center. Jesse said he always feels at peace there, but whenever he thinks of coming by he always gets distracted by something coming up or by dark thoughts and ends up not coming. So Chris starts praying for him, just blessing the good stuff he is feeling there and has an image of a banqueting table covered with glorious food and the invitation from God for Jesse to eat, eat.

Jesse pictures this but quickly the plate in front of him is pushed away and replaced with a plate with a five-pointed star in the center - this is a satanic symbol. Chris invites me to join in praying and the more Chris prays, the more Jesse gets distracted and agitated. He talks about thoughts of murder and feels like he wants to jump up and hit people and run out of the room.

I tell him, "We can pray for you and you might feel some measure of relief from that, but you need to pray and ask Jesus to come in to you and to help you." So he does and things get worse for him. I have this thought about a "deliverance" type prayer that leads you in claiming Jesus as Lord, to confess and repent of your sins, to receive washing through the blood of Jesus and to break off all demonic assignments.

I bring it into the room and hand it to Chris. He reads it quietly and agrees that we should lead Jesse through it. He reads it out loud so Jesse would know what he was agreeing to. At that moment, Juan says, "Hey man, I gotta bounce (go). I'm late to see my girl." (Juan has left his girl hanging for hours in the past...) Jesse says the same, that he has somewhere he suddenly has to go. He says he could come back another day and we can spend the whole day praying. We ask him if he'd be willing to take five minutes and he relunctantly agrees with Juan scowling at us. Jesse repeats after Chris with a few breaks to explain terminology. At the end they are ready to go. Chris asks Jesse if he feels any different and he says, No. Then Chris asks him if he is still having evil thoughts in his mind and he says, "Hey, I haven't thought of those in a little while."

There is still more work to do with these guys, but it was beautiful to see Jesus moving to bring His shalom into gangsters.

Journaling, Soaking and Hearing from Jesus

When I was in Toronto in January some people were praying over me and one said that Jesus was going to answer my prayer for greater intimacy and that I would experience it primarily through journaling. Since I returned I have found that it has been true! In my journaling I have been asking Jesus questions and just starting to write. In one case, I had an image of me sitting with Him by a slow moving river near a foot bridge. I asked Him what He wanted to say to me. He said that He really loved being with me. I asked Him, "Why?"

He smiled and said that my question was about measurement and that His love didn't measure. His love isn't based on worth and my question was about worth. He said, "I AM Love, and My love is what gives worth, it is not based on worth. Receive My love and abide in it."

There have been many other encounters, too, around theological questions and wrestling, asking about certain people I am praying for, and asking Him to teach me about the scriptures I am reading. It has been really beautiful, dynamic and full of life.

Legal Issues

Last Wednesday I went with my friend Zach to meet with a retired judge. Zach has done his share of time and has been out and clean for four years. He is now our head roaster of our Underground Coffee project - tattooed men with dark pasts are now artisan coffee roasters...

In the process doing time, a person can accumulate a lot of court fines which in turn accumulate interest to the point where it is next to impossible to pay them off with the kinds of jobs ex-offenders get hired for, if at all. The coffee project is helping with that. One way is by giving guys like Zach a job and helping to pay their bills. Another way is to advocate for them in the court system. Thats what we were doing last week when we met with the judge to get advice about getting some of the fines dismissed so that Zach wouldn't live under such oppressive debt. At the end of the time we prayed together and the judge blessed Zach and Zach blessed the judge! When we were leaving the judge went to shake Zach's hand but Zach asked if he could give him a hug. When he did, Zach looked over at me with a big grin and said, "I've never hugged a judge before!"

Then Zach invited me to lunch with his wife and then asked the judge if he'd like to come - and he did. What a beautiful picture of the Kingdom - the lion and the lamb, the convict and the judge, eating lunch together and blessing each other!

A Meeting in Heaven

It was a pretty amazing weekend at Tierra Nueva. We were into our second of three weekends learning about the combining of the social prophetic (speaking out against injustice) and the charismatic prophetic (learning to hear God's voice to speak words of comfort, encouragement and building up). The class is called "Lift Up Your Voice."

Today we got to hear from Brad Jersak, a pastor from Abbotsford, BC and the author of "Can You Hear Me? Tuning in to the God Who Speaks." I have bought this book for and recommended it to more people than any other book. It is the most accessible book on learning to tune in and hear God. It has powerfully transformed my prayer life and the way I read the bible and talk to others about Jesus because it invites us into a dynamic interaction with Jesus instead of leaving messages on some divine answering machine in the sky. Throughout the book Brad has "tuning in" exercises and he led us through several today. I want to share one with you and then I will share how I met Jesus in that same exercise.

Brad called the exercise "The Pearly Gates" (unfortunate name). He was teaching on Revelation 3:20 where Jesus says, "Behold (look intently), I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with them and they with me." He connected this directly to two verses later in Revelation 4:1 where John says, "After this I looked and there before me was a door standing open in heaven. And the voice I had first heard speaking to me like a trumpet said, Come up here and I will show you..." So, right after Jesus has made a statement, John steps into it. That is our invitation, so here we go.

Use your imagination to start. Our imagination serves all sorts of things for us, so let it serve your faith. Imagine the door in heaven and as the command of Jesus goes, "Come up here" -

• Go up to the door in your mind and what do you see?
• What do the gates of heaven look like? It could be anything.
• Jesus is waiting there. How does He greet you?
• What did Jesus' face look like? What was His expression? His eyes?
• What does He want to show you?
• Now, see His wounded hand. He wants to put His wounded hand on a wounded place in you. What happens?
• What promise is Jesus speaking to you in this place?

As Brad led us through this, even before I got to the door in my mind I saw a huge book lying open. When he asked what the gates looked like I tried to push the book image away, but let it come back when he said it could be anything. The book was enormous.

I pictured Jesus standing looking into the book - it was bigger than Him and He seemed to be peering down into it like a well. He turned and looked at me and smiled big and said, "Oh good, you're here! I've been waiting for you. I have so much to show you!" His smile was open and His eyes were fulled of unfeigned affection and delight, both in me and what He wanted to show me.

The next thing I knew, He took me by the hand and we climbed up onto the book. It was bigger now and it seemed alive and like we were going to sink down into it.

My neighbor sitting next to me in class kept exclaiming and crying and laughing. His meeting with Jesus was very powerful and real. Mine was cool, no doubt, but still seemed to be something I might manufacture.

About this time Brad asked us to see Jesus' wounded hand being placed on a wounded place in ourselves. I imagined the hand but before I knew it Jesus had placed it over my heart and waves of something I wasn't manufacturing starting coming out of me - it didn't hurt but it seemed that He was taking pain or grief or hurt away. The waves were so powerful that I was gasping for air between them and tears were running down my face.

Too soon Brad asked the next question. I wasn't ready to be done with whatever was happening, but I felt Jesus say, "I am always with you. Really! Not just in your imagination as wonderful as it is. I am right here. Now."

Thin Spaces

Many people have argued against going to specific places where God appears to be pouring out and healing and setting people free on the solid ground of saying that God is at work everywhere so why would I need to go somewhere else to "experience" God in these ways. I don't. I know that.

But there is something about getting away - first- to a place where I give God all my time and attention and I get to worship a lot and receive a lot of prayer. And - second - getting away to a place where other people are pressing in to worship and know God more for extended periods of time. But it is the third one that is unsettling - for whatever reason or for many reasons, God seems to pick places. We want to throw that out because the Temple is gone - we are the temple of God now; His dwelling place.

The Celts had an understanding of thin spaces; spaces where two things intersect - the sea and the land, the forest and the field, a burial mound; this world and the Otherworld. These were places where the unexpected happened, where the Otherworld and Eternity was bound to break through because it was a thin space. It makes me wonder about people and places that focus themselves on desiring God to visit, to show up, for revival; where worship and prayer and fasting desire more than anything to come into the Presence of God. Maybe God visits those places in particular ways because the first and the second thing are happening regularly there. Maybe its something else completely and isn't meant to be analyzed. I think we are meant to be thin spaces where other people encounter God.

Whatever the case, I've found some places like that. A prayer room in a church basement on Capitol Hill in Seattle. A church where people are getting healed in Redding, California. A church in Toronto where people are experiencing deeply the love of the Father that heals. If you want to hear an amazing testimony of that, go to www.fpcbellevue.org and click on Sunday, Feb. 1 sermon by pastor Scott Dudley, my long time friend. I got to be with Scott in Toronto a few weeks ago and prayed with him last Tuesday and I must say that he is a different man - the old has passed away and, behold, the New! It is a beautiful work of the Father, the Son and the Spirit that is beyond my description. Some other time I'll write about how God met me there.