I have been watching the events of the last few months with great interest. Several years ago a good friend of mine, Vivian Hibbert, encouraged me to pay attention to what God was doing outside the church, particularly in the arts. And maybe with artists, so lets take notice of a few things.
First, Whitney Houston has stepped forward telling how God delivered her from a long abusive situation. Second, I am intrigued with McKenzie Phillips new book telling about her long-time abusive relationship. And finally, Kaycee Dungard, is found after 18 years of being held captive in an abusive situation.
I remember how the Lord spoke to me over a year ago these words:
Breakthrough - May 11, 2008
“My perception is that spiritual authority is going to increase in the next 6-12 weeks. The thing that I am seeing is that you are going to be given the power and authority to break and destroy the limitations and strongholds that you have been dealing with in your lives for years. You are going to go free from those limitations in areas of your life that you have been merely coping with because you couldn’t get rid of it. There is going be such an experience of freedom in the lives of individuals and families that strongholds will be broken off of people’s lives. Listen to me, it is happening to you. You need to exercise it. The authority is coming up into your life, but you need to be the one who exercises it and says, “I am going free of that.” And when you go free of it, you’ve got to hate that thing. Those things that were strongholds in my life before, I hate them now. You cannot go back and play with them…. If you have strongholds, thought patterns, limitations, habits, particularly low self-esteem; particularly you don’t think you are worthy, you’re insecure…that is going to be destroyed, because low self-esteem is the Enemy robbing you of the potential in your life. If the Enemy can keep you thinking you don’t matter, you don’t count, nobody loves you or likes you, if He can keep you there he can keep your gifts from coming out. Those strongholds are coming down, that is coming off, and you’re going to come out of that thing and go, yes go into the freedom that He has purchased for you.”
I truly believe that God is releasing people from strongholds that have been extreme. Now is the time for the Church to arise and to set people free. Jesus defeated the enemy and He has entrusted the Church with the authority to set people free in His name. Unfortunately the church has been lulled asleep. It is time for her to wake up and to operate in the authority that she has been given.
It is time for many to realize that they can go free right now. A few days ago I ran across this: "We remain captives within a mental framework that has actually been broken. We are like prisoners who could walk out of a prison because all that would enclose us has been burst open, but we remain inside because we are asleep...it is time to wake up.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Thursday, September 24, 2009
RE-VISION THE CHURCH
Failing to understand the nature of the church can lead to a number of problems. Defining the church functionally -- in terms of what it does -- can shift our perspective away from understanding the church as a unique community of God's people. In place of this, the church tends to become a series of ministry functions such as worship, education, service, children, youth, etc. Defining the church organizationally -- in terms of its structures -- shifts our mind away from the spiritual reality of the church as a community, a family, the body of the Christ, the very presence of God on earth.
In most cases the church has become something to be structured and managed. Thus ministry is to be administrated and managed to maintain effectiveness, in order to accomplish certain goals. This seduces leaders into placing too much confidence in their managerial skills or in their us of organizational techniques. Thus church leaders are always looking for the "next" key to success.
It is my conviction that we need to move beyond trying to find the "next" church "thing" that will help us be successful one more time. We truly need to rediscover what is more basic about what it means to be the "church." It is critical that we recover the nature of the church before we understand what the church is do be doing.
We must face the very way we think about "Church." The critical question is what is the church?
The church is more than what meets the eye. It is more than a set of well-managed ministry functions. It is more than another human organization! The church lives in the world as a human enterprise, but it is also the called and redeemed people of God. It the people of God who are created by the Holy Spirit to live as a missionary community here on the earth.
The church is God's personal presence in the world through the Spirit! This makes the church a unique spiritual community. The very family of God who by it's presence give witness to the origin and future of God's people.
The Church's true character is its embodiment of Christ’s mission by its very existence in the world, it witnesses to the mission of God, to overthrow evil and to the ultimate reign of God over the entire created order. This is the eschatological nature of the church. It is the presence of a Good God now revealed, it is the very future of God’s Kingdom; in a world hostile to its message and values.
The early Christians saw themselves as participants in a grand drama, …..those gathered from all nations to testify to the resurrected Lord. Without the church the world literally had no HOPE OF SALVATION since the church is necessary for the world to know it is part of a story that it cannot know without the Church.
The Church is the adopted people bought by His blood, united to Him and to each other …. Whose lives have been changed and communities that have been transformed by God’s presence among them.
The church is an inviting and compelling community of people who attract unchurched because they embody a new life under the reign of Christ and informed by their eschatological (prophetic) vision.
Our personal journey into Christ therefore is nourished by the community called “church” which God has been sent and set as a divine presence to proclaim the unltimate destiny of the world…
Without the church the world would have no idea of it’s destiny!
To come to Christ and His Church is to come into a new way of seeing!
The church is the nurturing and caring community of the Father: “when we encounter the church we move into spiritual territory that occupies earthly terrain. We encounter the living God in the midst of our humanity. We encounter the Spirit of God dwelling in the midst of a people who are created and formed into a unique community. In and through this community the converting person is nurtured, discipled, and equipped.
In most cases the church has become something to be structured and managed. Thus ministry is to be administrated and managed to maintain effectiveness, in order to accomplish certain goals. This seduces leaders into placing too much confidence in their managerial skills or in their us of organizational techniques. Thus church leaders are always looking for the "next" key to success.
It is my conviction that we need to move beyond trying to find the "next" church "thing" that will help us be successful one more time. We truly need to rediscover what is more basic about what it means to be the "church." It is critical that we recover the nature of the church before we understand what the church is do be doing.
We must face the very way we think about "Church." The critical question is what is the church?
The church is more than what meets the eye. It is more than a set of well-managed ministry functions. It is more than another human organization! The church lives in the world as a human enterprise, but it is also the called and redeemed people of God. It the people of God who are created by the Holy Spirit to live as a missionary community here on the earth.
The church is God's personal presence in the world through the Spirit! This makes the church a unique spiritual community. The very family of God who by it's presence give witness to the origin and future of God's people.
The Church's true character is its embodiment of Christ’s mission by its very existence in the world, it witnesses to the mission of God, to overthrow evil and to the ultimate reign of God over the entire created order. This is the eschatological nature of the church. It is the presence of a Good God now revealed, it is the very future of God’s Kingdom; in a world hostile to its message and values.
The early Christians saw themselves as participants in a grand drama, …..those gathered from all nations to testify to the resurrected Lord. Without the church the world literally had no HOPE OF SALVATION since the church is necessary for the world to know it is part of a story that it cannot know without the Church.
The Church is the adopted people bought by His blood, united to Him and to each other …. Whose lives have been changed and communities that have been transformed by God’s presence among them.
The church is an inviting and compelling community of people who attract unchurched because they embody a new life under the reign of Christ and informed by their eschatological (prophetic) vision.
Our personal journey into Christ therefore is nourished by the community called “church” which God has been sent and set as a divine presence to proclaim the unltimate destiny of the world…
Without the church the world would have no idea of it’s destiny!
To come to Christ and His Church is to come into a new way of seeing!
The church is the nurturing and caring community of the Father: “when we encounter the church we move into spiritual territory that occupies earthly terrain. We encounter the living God in the midst of our humanity. We encounter the Spirit of God dwelling in the midst of a people who are created and formed into a unique community. In and through this community the converting person is nurtured, discipled, and equipped.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
