Pictures of His Love

Reading my old stories and the inspirations for my new ones I see a common thread—Christ’s love.  Christ’s unconditional love is inspiring.  Its what we base all our romantic movies on.  The uncontrollable love felt by a lover in a movie pales in comparison to the love God has for us.  God created marriage as a picture of his love (Eph. 5:32) thus it makes sense that all story for me should come out of a desire to copy that picture.

            I am writing two love stories, which I intend as allegories for Christ’s love.  One is based heavily upon my studies of Song of Solomon.  The other is based upon a dream I believe the Lord gave me this summer.  Each I think draws on different biblical models of Christ’s love as well as my experience of him.

            I spent a lot of time as a theatre arts major in college discussing the human condition and how as Christian artists we should make that our focus.  I think the human condition cannot be accurately represented without Christ’s love.  He who spoke us into existence is the very same God who died for us.  The gospel is so interwoven into who we are that it is futile to argue against Christian arts.  To shut Christ’s love out of our artwork is to shut out man’s spirit from his bones.

            Perhaps I have now hit a more theoretical or hyperbolical ground by speaking thus.  But I am stirred.  The gospel message is that there are two characters in history; not one.  Not only are there lowly human beings suffering the affects of sin, but there is a God who died for those sins who desperately seeks relationship with these humans he created.  In addition, the Bible calls the church his Bride (Rev. 22:17).  The motif of the bridegroom longing for his bride is found throughout the Bible (Matt 9:15, Matt 22:2, Hosea 2:16, Isa 62:4-5).  It is only fitting that we respond with that tension in our artwork and reveal the end of the story:

"Let us rejoice and exult and give him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready" (Rev 19:7).

"Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb" (Rev 19:9).

“And like the sun after all of the rain’s gone.  The morning without any cloud comes with a picture of your love.  And when I think of the stars so high over me, the moon and the darkness lets everyone see a picture of your love.”  --Luke Wood’s song Picture of Your Love

Sweetly Surrendered: Musings on the Call Detroit

At last I have free time as we are on Thanksgiving break here at IHOPU!  We arrived in Detriot on November 5 and proceeded with an intense schedule of pre-call rallies, intercession, and evangelism.  At one of the pre-call rallies Sam shared a passage out of Power Encounters by Carol Wimber.  He explained that the renewal movment was birthed out of prayer, longing, and repentance.

Side note: This post seem weird to those of you who do not believe in that God speaks to us today or that the Holy Spirit still does signs and wonders.  I welcome your questions and comments :)

I've been sharing stories since we got back but actually writing it out is another matter.  I thought I'd read my journal entries to inspire me.  I had completely forgotten about a word the Lord had given me on Monday.

I saw picture of TCI students (our group that went) getting into a metro train.  As soon as we were inside, it took off and started moving fast.  Over teh train was a huge blinking sign that said, "Vacancy."  Underneath that sign numbers appeared next to the word "passangers."  But the numbers kept increasing, as though people were getting off the train.  I felt like the train symbolized the move of God opening up in Detroit, but nobody was getting on board!  In fact, people were doing the opposite.

THE CALL DETROIT:
Why did I write that?  To write this.  The Call was good in that our team was obedient to what the Lord told us to do.  There was a lot of healing that took place, specifically between Canada and America and the native Americans and Detroit.  Of course, I am human and cannot judge.  God alone knows the heart of man.  However, it is obvious revival has not hit yet.  A black pastor actually glossed over issues that needed to be repented of.  People were not getting on board.  On the Other hand, I am so excited for Michigan  The Call was a huge step for her.  I have never seen so many churches uniting and praying.  One pastor solemnly and firmly exhorted his community, "Why do you keep moving out of Dearborne as Muslims move in?  Move back!"  He was calling the church to take her place as a light to the nations.  So much fear has gripped the heart of many Christians that they have actually retreated from Islam instead of standing against it.

Important to note: I was made aware that on my last post it sounded like I was attacking Muslims.  That is not my intent.  When I make these bold statements I am making them fully aware that our struggle is not against flesh and blood but "against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms" (Ephesians 6). The church is stand against darkness and Islam is a false religion, therefore is must be stood against!  We love Muslims.  We don't want them to go to Hell.  It is their religion that must be stopped.  Guys, there's an enemy out there who is so crafty he created a world religion that promises so many things but the one thing it cannot promise is eternal life.  If anyone would like to comment on this, feel free.

A LITTLE OF MY STORY:
Since there are so many stories to share I will only share my personal journey on the trip as God expanded my heart.  I can't wait to see you all because all of these stories are literally spilling out of me and they are so much better in person anyway.  My story needs a little back story.  TCI does these little evangelism outreaches every Thursday after class.  We call them treasure hunts because we ask the Lord where he wants us to go, who he wants us to talk to, he tells us, and we go.  Well, the very first time I went I was thrown in a group with a guy on our team named Greg (just laughed inwardly because he may read this sometime).  As we went out, he got so filled with the spirit he actually looked drunk.  At the time, I was easily offended by the Spirit moving like this.  But the Lord, in his kindness, showed me how God filling him made him bold to declare his truth.  I wanted what he had.  Already, before I left, God was busy breaking down walls.  A lot of my offense came from the fear of man.

The first church we went to I was on my face in a huge move of the spirit some leaders in the faith have entitled "travail."  I was weeping and groaning as the Spirit moved.

However, that night I became offended in how God moved on one the members of our group.  I talked it over with a friend and he gave me some wisdom.  Still mulling over the experience in my head, I went up to the sanctuary to be alone with the Lord.  As I sat there, it became clear that I needed to fix my gaze on God because thinking just drew me further into frustration and the lies of the enemy.  So I finally gave up and said, "Jesus, I don't get you.  But I love you.  If this is you, than I want it."  I did not say it in those exact words but that was the gist of it.  My friend played the piano and I began to sing my prayers as the Lord revealed himself to me.

The very next day we had planned a time of intercession for the city all morning before we actually went to the city of Hamtramk to do evangelism.  Brooke said, "Dial down and wait on the Lord.  Ask him to give you his heart for the city."  I broke into a loud travail.  I have never experienced anything like it.  It seemed like the entire room was on their face weeping.  I know that if I had not surrendered to the Spirit the night before than he would not have moved on me so powerfully that day.

Because of these moves of the Spirit, our times of evangelism bore much fruit.  Again, I don't have the space to really go into that.  My point is that we must be surrendered to the Spirit.  The book of Acts alone testifies to what can happen when a people "receive power from on high."  God is a big God.  We need to let him do what he likes to do and not think our way out of it.

STEPPING OUT:
Faith is spelled R-I-S-K.  I would tack on the old addage love makes one do crazy things!  On the way home the Holy Spirit fell on our car and we started interceeding over the highway.  The highway we were on has been named the Red Light district of Missouri as it is lined with strip clubs and adult book stores.  This is an amazingly long story with so many repercussions but one thing I want to highlight is the divine appointment God set up.  We were so filled with the Spirit that we couldn't NOT share it with anyone else.  We stopped at a gas station and I just HAD to walk right up to the guy at the register, introduce myself, and ask if he needed prayer.  We ended up praying for his back and the Holy Spirit fell on him too!  When the love of the Lord fills you, you can't help giving it away.

The short of the intercession story is that Governor Nixon signed a bill last year severely restricting those strip clubs and adult bookstores.  The bill has been floating about from court to court since.  But on Tuesday it was finally decided on and the law went into affect.  However, the battle was already won in the heavenlies on sunday night in our car!

Joel calls sound the trumpets and the Lord roars from Zion--The Call Detroit

Why the Call?

            Honestly, I can tell you all before I came here that I had no idea why we do solemn assemblies.  I had been a to a number of these over the years.  The most impacting for me was the Call Sandiago.  It took place in a giant stadium.  I remember standing there and seeing thousands of other believers crying out in prayer against abortion and the gay agenda (specifically prop 8 at the time).  It made a mark in my spirit and I will never forget it.  However, I had no biblical foundation for this clearly divine experience so I just treasured it inside and did not speak much about it.

            In fact by the time the Call Sacramento came up again, my heart was so far removed I could not bring myself to want to go.  I had talked to people in my church about revival hoping that the stirring in my spirit was in fact biblical.  I thought “surely if this is biblical than other people that I respect will want it too.”  But no one seemed excited.  In fact, the people I talked to actually seemed against what I thought was revival.  During the phase between these two calls I had slowly hardened my heart toward solemn assemblies.  I regarded them as purely spiritual hype because I could not justify them in my mind and everyone around me seemed against them.  I thought, “That’s great for those people.  But I feel like I’m called to individual faith.”

            So my question still stands: why the call?  Why gather a bunch of people in a stadium and fast and pray for a couple hours?

            I now believe corporate prayer and fasting is biblical.  When Solomon dedicated the temple he went through every curse that, in Deuteronomy, the Lord warned his people of sending and said basically, “even after this, if we repent and pray will you hear and forgive?” (2 Chron. 6:18-39; Deut. 28:15-44).  Then God gives his famous answer to Solomon that night when he says, “I have heard your prayer, and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice.  When I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among My people, if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land” (2 Chronicles 7:12-14).  This was God's rubric clearly seen throughout the Bible.  Another would be Joel.  But Samuel preceded them all.

            In 1 Samuel 7:9-14 God shows up and delivers the Israelites from the hand of the enemies.  In the same way, I believe along with many others that the Lord wants to deliver America out of the oppression she is in.  But a divine visitation is not something we just passively wait for.  It is something we must prepare for.  Perfect holiness and sin do not mix well!

            How do we prepare?  This is what happened: “ 3And Samuel said to all the house of Israel,"If you are returning to the LORD with all your heart, then put away the foreign gods and the Ashtaroth from among you and direct your heart to the LORD and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines." 4So the people of Israel put away the Baals and the Ashtaroth, and they served the LORD only.

 5Then Samuel said, "Gather all Israel at Mizpah, and I will pray to the LORD for you." 6So they gathered at Mizpah and drew water and poured it out before the LORD and fasted on that day and said there, "We have sinned against the LORD." And Samuel judged the people of Israel at Mizpah” (1 Samuel 7:3-6).

            The preparation required was to put away their idols and serve only God but also to fast and pray corporately at a gathering.  Why?  Why are they commanded to all gather at Mizpah?  Because this wasn’t just preparation for God to visit an individual, but an entire region.  A corporate visitation requires corporate preparation (2 Chr. 20:3-4; Joel 1:14; Acts 1:14).

Why Detroit?

God is highlighting Detroit for a number of strategic reasons.

Economic hub of America (side note: God's curse in Joel of locusts was supposed to cause a great economic upheaval.  Sound familiar?  Hm.  Maybe America should think about God's judgments for sin.)

Highest Muslim concentration in America.

Literally every Muslim nation is represented there.

Largest mosk in America is located right in Dearborne.  I visited their website.  They call themselves the “Islamic Center of America.”

Is ranked number 1 on the most dangerous cities out of 320 metropolitan areas (http://www.morganquitno.com/cit05pop.htm).

Motown and gospel were birthed there.

A hotbed of racism represented by the 8 mile wall and 8 mile road.  “Built in 1940 this wall presaged the racial divisions that have come to be symbolized by 8 Mile Road” (Detroit Chic) (I actually did not know anything about this wall before the Call so if anyone else is in the same position, I found this article very informative http://detroit1701.org/Black-WhiteWall.htm).

“Yet, rather than having a revolution and tearing down the wall, Detroit has kept this reminder intact. The wall, a sore spot of Detroit, is rarely mentioned and has now become a white wall painted with murals. Perhaps, this is to forever remain as a reminder, until the separation of Detroit is fully unified once again.” (Detroit Chic)

Henry Ford founded Ford Motor Company in 1903 in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit.  His fame is the ground that Michigan is built on.  In fact, we are going to be hosting the Call in their home stadium, Ford Field.  Ford was actually extremely anti-Semitic.  In addition, cars in our prophetic dreams have come to symbolize greed, so there’s definitely something there.

My heart:

Again, I came into this movement with not very much expectation.  I did not think that the Lord could move so powerfully over a group of people like he has done with us.  We meet each week in a class called “Dream Stream” where we share dreams the Lord has given us regarding the Call.  We actually spend a lot of time in the Scriptures and throw out ideas of interpretations.

            Personally the Lord has transplanted my heart into this movement.  I find myself weeping for America and all her perversions: abortion, sex trafficking, homosexuality, and now for the Muslims and the ending of Islam.

            I’m so excited to be a part of a team that is so grounded in the word and so close to the Lord that he reveals his heart to them.  I’m so excited for the word that Lou gave us the first day that the Lord said about the Call: that God will roar like a lion at Ford Field (Amos 1:2; Jeremiah 25:30).  Why is that exciting?  We didn’t even know Ford Field was home of the Lions!

Prayer requests:

·      The Fast—You can pray for us as we’ve been fasting for 40 days in preparation.  Pray that we do not grow weary. 

·      Pray for the team that is over there now (including Lou Engle).  Pray for protection as they stand on 8 Mile Road and in all that they do.  Pray for more divine appointments.  Muslims are getting led to the Lord already!

·      Practical things—Pray for finances for the Call and travel safety.

·      Pray for us to get even more fired up about doing evangelism in the week leading up to the call.  I know I just got a divine appointment in Wal Mart that not only humbled me but fired me up to go deeper in my Bible and prepare to witness.

·      Pray for the 24 hour period of the call itself.  It’s the first 24 hour call so pray that all those volunteering for the event the whole time would have strength to make it through.  Pray the Lord release the spirit of adoption on a fatherless generation (note: Allah is not a father.  Only our God is).

We leave on Saturday, November 5 and the Call Detroit is 11/11/11.  I write this not just to be informative but so that you pray.  Please join me and pray for America.

http://www.thecall.com/Groups/1000080537/TheCall/Events/Detroit/Detroit.aspx

Xmen and Ihopu

I tend to love analogies so here's some random thought that has popped into my a head a number of times.  In asking the question of, who are ihopu students?  The only thing I find them analogous to is xmen.

The first thing I would like to say is this is not to put ihopu kids, myself inculded, onto some kind of pedastal above the rest of the church.  In fact, in one of my following points you will see that we are just as screwed up as the rest of the church.  My point is to (hopefully) comically categorize the breed (myself included) that comes here.

Xmen and ihopu students are both gifted.  Corey Russel, one of our professors likes to joke about this.  One day he said, "I can't even walk into some restaurants.  One time I did and said to my wife, 'honey, we got to go.  Why?  I don't know why?  Maybe there's some demon chef!"  Of course you can't really got the full effect of this quote on a blog because Corey's pretty hilarious in real life.  However, the point was that, what he said, he was a "feeler."  He discerns spirits through feeling.  Afterwards he had us all raise our hands asking, "are you a seer?  Are you a feeler?  Are you a hearer?"  He then joked about our giftings and how in real life we can't seem to make sense of them to our friends.  But they are real and true giftings!  Just incredibly unique sometimes.

Xmen have been taken out of regular life by Xavier to delve deeper into their giftings through training.  They are accepted in this environment.  Similarly ihopu students can't settle for normal church life.  They are awakened with dreams.  They fast.  They pray.  They are so burdened that "church" just isn't enough.  They have to embrace their calling.

Part of this is their callling as forerunners.  We are called in this generation to tell the world of Jesus' second coming.  This will save a generation.  In the same way, Xmen are not noticed until they save a generation.  When all else fails, they come on the scene.

Xmen training (as we have seen in the movies) is marked by nontraditional methods.  Xavier has to push a student off of a high point in order to get him to fly.  Ihopu is the same way.  We stand and sing in tongues.  Its a Bible school but most of the classes are spent in the presecne of the Lord, on our faces weeping.  Its very strange but God is definitely doing something.

Lastly, xmen are shunned by the world.  Ihopu has been called a cult.  They have been marginilized by the church who does not understand why we give ourselves to night and day prayer.

Finally, the xmen are in training.  That is, they're not superheroes yet.  They still have a lot to learn.  This is poignantly seen in teh last film when they're all using their super powers in silly ways, joking around.  They didn't take the call seriously.  I came here looking for superheroes and found a whole lot of broken people like myself "in training."  It was a comfort as well as a challenge.

Conclusion?  Heroes are not dead.  In fact the Lord made us to be heroes.  He made us to do great thigns for his kingdom.  We may feel small and somewhat insignificant but we are impacting the world.  We are the weird, dorky church kids, shunned by our own kind but pulled out of our regular circumstances by one guy (Jesus) to a higher calling.

As I write I am sitting on my wood floor leaning up against one of the French doors to my back porch.  The other door is propped open to let the nice, cool breeze in.  Its a wonderful blustery day and it just rained a little bit.  I just finished a bit of my home work and decided I would take a break and say a few words.

First of all, I apologize for not keeping this thing updated.  But I have an excuse!  It has been a busy week. This weekend we had guest speakers come from an organization called i squared to speak to us on Islam and Chrisitanity.  I learned so much!  All you Biola people, one of the speakers was named Jeff Morton.  I mention him because he said he teaches at Biola.  Funny guy.  Loved him.

I also started working at Panera on Thursday (my birthday, ha ha).  On the note of my birthday, everyone keeps talking about how old I am.  One of my guy friends thought I was married and so, apparently all my new young-in friends (of 18 and 19) think I should be married.  I think they're cute.  I'm not THAT old!  Come on people.

The last major thing on my to-do list is to get a couch.  Things are getting a bit more difficult to squeeze into my schedule now that I have a job.  But nothing is impossible with God.  I have faith that he will still bring us a couch.

I have so many blog entry topics lined up you have no idea!  Actually, they are really just short essays.  You know, thought bubbles that people would normally post in a blog.  However, I am not sharing them as of yet because I have not updated the world in a while about myself so I thought I'd share a bit more about what's happening with me.  As soon as I get into a rhythm of updating my blog I will start to tackle some fun subjects that have been on my heart.

I am so incredibly grateful to the Lord for how he is taking care of me out here.  He has exceeded all my expectations.  I am so blessed with the friends I've made and the classes that I get to take.

On Monday was the twelfth anniversary of the prayer room so we had a big celebration.  Mike Bickle shared some of the prophetic history and had some other people get up and share.  There was even a video of Bob Jones telling us the visions he had seen about IHOP.  Also, random tangent, just throwing this out to all you Vineyard old folks who would remember, Bob Jones was at the Vineyard in 1989?  Sam randomly mentioned that in class one day.  I think thats cool just because that was the year I was born.  Anyway, it was a really cool to hear the stories in their entirity and recommit ourselves to night and day prayer.

I will try my very best to update tomorrow if not in the next week. :) Blessings.

So I moved into my bedroom on Saturday!  That was exciting.  Man, I've just learned so much about spiritual warfare in the last week that I was just not aware of.  I mean its like as soon as the Lord shows you his goodness Satan tries to take it away.  I'm very aware of it now, which is good.  I was so sick last week though.  I didn't have a bed and so on Friday I slept for a while on Sam and Brooke's couch.

Saturday: we did a treasure hunt at some festival thing in Independence.  It was fun!  I got a word that someone's ankle was going to get healed and we did pray for an ankle, but a skeptical and hurried father ushered the kid who prayed for away from us.  But before he left I made it clear to the kid that the Lord loved him because I showed him the paper and said that I believed his ankle was going to get healed.  I really believe that it did.  Also, I had a seen a picture of a kid in a basketball jersey and, sure enough, when I went to go buy something from a stand the kid was wearing one.  I struck up a conversation with him and his band members (they were raising money for their school's band) and I showed him the piece of paper I had written his shirt down on.  He didn't want prayer.  But me and my friend Elizabeth kept pressing in.  The group said, "Oh, you can just pray for our band."  Then a girl was like, "Yeah, we've had a lot of injuries."  It turned out her and her friend sitting right there had injuries.  So we prayed for them.  No, we didn't see miraculous healings but the Lord started downloading words into my friend Elizabeth for these girls and she just spoke God's truth over them.  They were really touched.  It was pouring rain on and off during this whole thing so we all rain under this tent to wait for the bus that would take us back to the parking lot we were parked at.  All of the crazy ones were running and jumping in the rain.  It was unforgettable.

Things God is doing in me: causing me to give up everything (things I didn't even realize I was holding onto), and fortifying walls of persistence and endurance. This week was my first time doing early morning prayer but God gave me so much grace.  Consistently this week he has reitorated the importance of being persistant in prayer and really being obedient to the Lord, even when you don't feel anything.  This guy shared at the EGS service that we have here on Friday nights that one month he really wanted to pray for deaf ears so he decided to make that month "pray for deaf ear month."  So basically stalked people who needed healing in their ears the whole month and was obedient to pray for them.  All month he did this and didn't see one healing.  Instead of giving up on prayer, he persisted.  Since that time he has seen increasing healings in of the ears.  It made me think of how one summer I had committed to praying alone with the Lord every day.  So, even when I didn't feel like it, I did it.  I mean, as an intercessor, I get burdened a lot, but not everyday.  But once I postured myself in a place of prayer, growth happened.  I may not have seen fruit at the time but months down the Lord God was doing crazy things in me.

In TCI Sam's word for us is "endurance."  This is interesting because it is a byward in Revelation, which we are studying in our class during the week.  He had been talking to us about endurance but he didn't explain until last night at our first TCI dinner at his house that the Lord had spoken that word to him for us out of a verse from Timothy about being soldiers.  I thought that was cool because before I left the Lord told me he was going to make me into a fighter.  Anyway, so last night Sam had us all cram into his tiny family room and watch this movie called Endurance, which is about this team of adventurers from Europe who decided to take the longest boat journey through this one icy sea (somewhere in the arctic).  Their ship got stuck in the ice and the movie told the story of how they spent 2 years trying to get out and succeeded!  It was a really prophetic word for our group who have to combat a lot of spiritual forces in prayer as we come up on our solemn assembly (the Call) 11/11/11 in Detroit.

Room mates: I have two lovely room mates now named Sonnet and Megan.  They are my age and older so I have a great balacne between all of my young 19 year old friends and them (I also have a friend who's 29 which has been good for my sanity).  You can be praying that we continue to grow closer.  This is a crazy time for Megan because she's a fourth year.  Sonnet and I have a spent a lot of time together.  I'm hoping to grow closer to both of them though.  And pray we get another room mate soon that is who needs to be here because we have one more empty room to fill.

Along with that I've met some pretty wonderful people.  Saturday night I "hung" with a fun gang of youngsters and also have been frolicking in parks in this amazing weather we've been having.  Sunday we have a picnic!

Other short but sweet news: I bought a bed.  This is good because sleeping on the floor wasn't going to work for me longterm :) (although I may need the practice for the Call).  I got a job.  I work at Panera.  The stars are amazing at my house when I walk out to my car at 5:40 every morning.  I love it!

Here at last!

            After years of praying and hours of driving, I am finally in Kansas City.  As I write, I am gleeful because it has been an amazing adventure living and going to school in Kansas City.  Within just two short weeks the Lord has really revealed himself to me in new and amazing ways.

            I started this blog because there’s just so much stuff going on and I really feel called to share my journey and not just summarize it in a quick e-mail.

            First of all, let me just comment on the things that first caught my attention here.  When my mom and I were driving to my new home I heard this loud, roaring sound and I thought man that is a loud lawn mower.  Come to find out that is no lawn mower but actual bugs called cicadas.  I am still not used to them.  Then there were thunder storms that lit up my room at night.  Another interesting experience was not just seeing a sign for umpteenth time that says “deer crossing’ but actually seeing a deer crossing the road in front of my car.  The look on his face unmistakably meant, “What are you doing here?”

Orientation

            Day one, morning one I am standing in line to pay for the semester and I meet Tia and Sarah.  A couple minutes later I met Danae (pronounced “Deny”) and her room mate Angel.  Since that meeting, these girls have been my buddies.  I know it’s been a short time but we held fast to each other and have really gone deep with each other already.  Tia and I are in TCI, which means that automatically spend more time together.  The other girls are in other programs.  But even when we’re separated we find ways to hang out and share life together.  I’m so glad we came across each other!

            This has been the most Spirit filled orientation ever!  What I mean by that is that the teachers didn’t just give information, but after they spoke (sometimes even before) they would ask the Holy Spirit to come and make those truths a reality to our hearts.  That first night was called “Consecration Charge” but really should have been called “deal with your sin night.”  There was so much repentance and the Holy Spirit’s manifest presence filled the room.  I felt like the Lord personally broke some strongholds in my life and set me free to worship him.

            At the end of the night they had us spread across the room and the prophetic team came and shared words they had gotten for us.  The first lady said that the Lord told her I have songs in my heart.  She specifically said I’m a singer and a songwriter.  Instantly after she left the Lord started speaking to me, affirming me in who I am.  He revealed to me a pattern of comparison I had had in my heart.  Then he just spoke identity over me.

            Maybe this is a good time clear up confusion about Ihop, Ihopu, and fcf.  There’s a church called Forerunner Christian Fellowship, which Mike Bickle pastors.  Ihop is the prayer room (called here GPR, which stands for global prayer room), which the Lord prophesied to him would exist in the 80s when he was pastoring another church.  Ihopu came out of the prayer room in order to train up night and day worshippers who would proclaim God’s kingdom to the world. 

            Anyway, if you have any questions about Ihop, please don’t hesitate to ask.  Now that I’m here I have language for the heart of ihop, which is also my heart for the nations.

            That Saturday the SGA set up a fun scavenger hunt for us to get to know the area better.  Before this I really prayed that God would allow me to meet people and form more friendships.  All orientation I had been hanging out with the same group of girls that I met in the morning but not really making any new friends.  When I got there they asked if I was a driver or not and I said yes.  So by the grace of God I ended up sitting by myself, away from my friends in the driver section and a group of students was assigned to me.

            Side note: it was actually both amusing and nerve wracking as the girl next to me was talking to girls standing up behind me about “rigging it” so that they could all be together.  I was nervous because I really didn’t want these girls to feel like they were stuck in my group.  But those girls (thankfully) were not in my group.

            I was so excited when I got to meet Lauren, Eric, Taylor, and Micah.   We had more of a blast (I think) getting to know each other than doing the actual game, although, that certainly didn’t fall on the wayside.  Taylor already lives here so we had that covered.  I discovered that Lauren is a graduate of APU and Micah is sisters with my friend Sue who goes to APU and lead my Mexico team this last spring.  Also, Lauren, Micah, and Eric are on the higher end of the age scale, which I find awesome because everyone I have met is either 18 or 19.

            I discovered possibly one of the worst ways to find out your new friend is prophetic.  The story goes as follows: I attended a game night that SGA put on for the new students where there were various organized sports to play.  I had played a little volleyball in the hot Kansas City sun and I decided to go inside the gym to watch a game of dodge ball, which was already in progress.  Anyway, I watched for a while and Micah asked, “Why aren’t you playing?” My response was, “I don’t want to get pelted with balls!”  He said, “That happens in every sport.”  Of course it could happen I agreed.  But the likelihood was a lot less.

            A while later, I proceeded along with a couple others to play volleyball.  We were about to start a new game but we hadn’t started yet.  We were just trying to figure out teams and such, when I turned around I got slammed straight in the face with a volleyball.

            While everyone else panicked and came around me I just stood there.  I was perfectly calm and collected.  Not even embarrassed (which is extremely unusual).  Instead, my first thought (and I think I said it) was, “Am I blind?”  Then I realized that I had just lost my contact.  Someone retrieved it for me.  There was this weird greyish blur that didn’t go away the entire day from the corner of my eye.  No worries!  I am not blind.

            I am, however, now known as the girl who got hit in the head with the volleyball.  It’s like every other day that someone asks me, “How’s your eye?”  It’s pretty funny.

Classes

            Monday through Wednesday we have a class called Forerunner Curriculum, which is basically a big picture spread of theology and biblical truths.  On the second day of class Wes Hall, our teacher, in the middle of his teaching starts to slur his words.  There’s a moment where he started to laugh.  Then he just tells us that the Holy Spirit is on him in a powerful way.  He tries to continue and keeps slurring his words and then laughing.   At one point he suddenly stops and kind of bends over, he gets up laughing.  He tries to resume his notes but then looks out on all of us and asks, “Is the Holy Spirit resting on any of you in a powerful way.”  A bunch of hands go in the air.  Some people are doubled over laughing at this point and others shouting in the spirit.

            So then, he has us all stand and he prays over us as the Lord downloads words of knowledge into him about the situation.  If I remember correctly, he tries after this to get back to his notes and then gets slammed with another wave of the Holy Spirit.  He says, “I want to get through my notes.”  He of course says that this exactly what he was just talking about “the suddenly’s of God.”  A huge ministry time ensues.  It was incredible!  So incredible that even after a class was way over, Wes Hall was wandering around the halls laying his hands on people.

            At the end of class Wes explains (he does things very Vineyardy) that it wasn’t about the experience of God’s presence—falling, laughing, shaking, groaning, or getting flung around (he calls those tokens of his presence)--but God was after something deeper.  He was after real heart transformation.

            The next day he took the first 30 minutes of class to allow people to share testimonies about the day before.  Sure enough, real heart transformation happened.  One girl had gotten raped everyday for 7 years and she got up and shared how the Lord had set her free from bitterness and depression. That’s just one of a bunch of testimonies of breakthroughs that day!  As you looked at her she was literally beaming.  There were some physical healings too.  A back and a thyroid problem were completely healed.

            Then we have Life of Prayer with Corey Russel on Thursdays.  We were an hour into the class and he had gotten to page 2 on the syllabus.  He had shared his radical testimony about how he was saved and he just felt like giving us the “secrets” he had learned in life.  There was just so much wisdom spilling out of him I couldn’t stop writing.  Then at the end of class he had us pray for those who hadn’t received their prayer language yet.  Again the presence of the Lord was so thick in the room and I didn’t want to leave.  I was almost late for my next class because of this!

            TCI practicum….oh man.  I don’t even know how to explain it.  Lou Engle is this incredible, prophetic man.  He came and spoke about the Call.  Basically, if you don’t know what the Call is, the Lord visited Lou in 1999 and told him to call the nation back to God.  Through walking with the Lord he has led these solemn assemblies and God has highlighted in each of them areas that he is pinpointing (basically idols in America) that need to be repented of and destroyed through prayer and fasting.  One of these areas (still a big one) is abortion, which is why every Friday we are required to stand outside Planned Parenthood (ooo and God has been moving on these prayers…more to come!!!).

            You can start by partnering in prayer with me now for the Call in Detroit.  Its going to be on 11/11/11.  I’ll explain more about that in a later post.  Suffice to say, the Lord is moving in our midst and I’m so excited to be under this prophetic mantle.  As Lou put it (about soaking up annointings), “I was in Dick Eastman’s living room.  You are now in my living room.”

            Oh!  And on Friday I got to hear Dick Eastman share on his journey to starting 24/7 intercessory worship.  I really encourage you to read his book that just came out called Intercessory Worship.  I don’t want to share everything he shared here as I’m already sharing so much but this stuff is so good!  Suffice to say he is one of the forerunners of what Ihop does now.  No one had ever heard of intercessory worship and when the Lord revealed to him that they was how he was going to call the nations to himself.  Powerful stuff.  Anyway, I’ll be talking more about that in coming posts.

            Built into TCI is a “class” specifically devoted to the sharing of prophetic dreams and the interpretation of those dreams.  Sam Cerny leads this.  Its called Dream Stream.  It comes out of both a biblical understanding of prayer and experience in the Call.  The basic premise is that God does not want to hide information from us (Gen. 18:17).  You receive the things you ask for.  Again, there’s a whole teaching in this.  I could literally take pages but I won’t.

Treasure Hunt

            After TCI practicum on Saturday the strike students (Sam’s second year students who are basically intercessory missionaries) lead a treasure hunt.  Now I don’t know if you’re familiar with these but we do them at the Vineyard (or did) all the time.  The basic format is you sit and ask the Lord who you’re to minister to and then you go and do it.  I was so stoked about this because I had been praying since I got here about doing a treasure hunt!  The Lord has really burdened my heart for the city.  When I found out they do it I was ecstatic!

            Their format is on a piece of paper everyone writes the categories: places, names, miscellaneous, and description.  After that (and I’ll talk about this next post) we sang in the Spirit for 5 minutes.  So we did this and then she just said, “now write whatever comes to mind.”  In my mind I was super skeptical.  Of course this is all going to be me!  I thought.  Oh me of little faith.  One for the first things I got was “brick wall” for a place, then “Richard.”

            There were a lot of encounters before this but I’ll just share the awesomeness that resulted from my word.  We had been out for a while and someone in our group had had the place “bank” so we saw one and all felt like we were supposed to go there (which is interesting since there was a bank we saw earlier that we didn’t go to).  When we got there a guy was walking out of the bank and my fellow TCIer Greg, filled with the spirit (I’m not kidding.  He was bold and correct), asked, “Is your name Brandon by any chance?” because that was a name that was on his list.  The guy goes, “No.   My name’s Richard.”

            Right then and there I almost died I was so shocked.  I should have showed him but I was shocked I couldn’t.  Anyway, I just kept nodding as the group explained that his name was on the list.  We told him about bank, his name, and I mentioned “brick wall” because the bank was brick.  He was pretty much the same smiling person the whole time.  But then we asked him if he needed prayer for anything.  He didn’t think so.  We prodded further “work?  Healing?  Family?”  He said his sister and aunt have diabetes and that he is pretty happy at work.  We prayed for him.  Then Greg asked if he knew Jesus.  The short story was that the guy wasn’t ready yet to receive Jesus but God had clearly set him up.  We told him this and that God would continue to pursue him because he loves him so much.  Richard received all of this.  It was wonderful!

Last Night

            Best ever!  Autumn cleaning out her clothes closet while Daniel cleans the garage as I sit in my room basement bedroom right across from them.  Apparently Daniel has a thing for shoes and buys her like these really fashionable shoes.  So he was arguing with her about how unfashionable a pair was that she was showing him.  It was absolutely hysterical. 

            In the meantime Autumn is throwing me all these clothes that she doesn’t want, including this beautiful prom dress.  Of course, I have nothing to wear it to.  But as soon as I see it my first thought (like any other girl who loves to play dress up) is to try it on.  And what do you know?  It fits!  Again, I have no idea where I am going to wear it but as soon as I put it on I felt like a princess and I just couldn’t part with it.  Ah!  You should never hang out with people when they are getting ready to move.

            For real though, last night the Lord encountered me in his presence.  Dick Eastman had just spoken basically the same message as before but the Spirit was really stirring in the room.  This time he had us all get out our prayer maps that his organization had made and had us break into groups and strategically pray for the countries so that every nation was covered.  On the map its split up by dates so that you can pray for like 5 or something countries a day.  Well, he had each person pray for the day that the birthday is in the month.  Anyway, as we’re praying and crying out for the nations I just start weeping uncontrollably.  I’ve been learning a lot about a particular type of prayer called travail (which is where you are birthing souls into salvation) and was in the midst of wondering if that’s what this is when one of the Ihop leaders gets on the mic and says that we need to pray for the unsaved in our own families.  There it was!  The rest of the night (even after my friends left) I just sat there, and Misty prophesied as she sang over me (unbeknownst to her) on the mic.