This week we move the thought on, with our scripture reading: Romans 5

Colossians 2 says that “you also are complete through your union with Christ”. We are not complete by ourselves. We are not complete because we have a relationship with someone, like a marriage. You’re not complete because you have stuff either. It’s only through our union with Christ that we are complete.

We are complete positionally when we make peace with God by believing in Jesus. It’s an accomplished work -- it’s done.

Experientially, however, we are in the experience of walking into that completeness day by day. And as long as we’re on the way, that’s good. We’re not there yet but must be moving in the right direction.

It is access that brings us to the position of completeness. It is through submission that we truly find freedom.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=NprbvI1dOUw

What was the orignal sin? The act was disobedience, but the sin was idolatry. As a lawyer, you don’t look at the act so much as the motivation behind the act. Murder may be the act, for instance, but self-defence or planned murder are two different motives.

The motive inside of Adam and Eve was idolatry -- seeking meaning, security and personal identity in someone or something else other than God. Eve swapped God as the source for the tree as a source. They moved from truth to a lie.

When idolatry took place, there was a consequence. As we read in Romans 5, “by one man’s death, sin reigned.” Individual death, and from one man, society experienced chaos.

When God breathed into Adam, He imparted ten things to Adam which we participate in. One of these was God’s gregariousness -- His social capacity. God is social! When you understand this, you begin to understand things like honour, respect, submission, love -- all of these are social.

Being social, there are 5 areas of relationship:

1. With God
2. With Self
3. With People
4. With Things
5. With Places

God originally wanted us to have a health relationship with all of these things -- but because chaos entered the world, these are corrupted. We have a corrupt relationship with God, ourselves, with others, with things and with places.

We can seek to find meaning and identity in ourselves -- “I’m my own person” -- but this is idolatry. The serpents real lie to Eve was that she would become God -- it was making God in the image that we want Him to be, rather than us in the image of God!

The Word says Jesus came to seek and save the lost -- lost meaning those disconnected from their Creator, their God, Their Heavenly Father. Jesus came to seek and save -- this was His mission -- and His mission set His attitude in life toward everyone He came into contact with. When you read the Gospels you don’t see Jesus fasting and praying and striving for God to lead Him to the right people -- waiting for some weird mystical experience that would lead Him to ‘an intense God appointment’. Rather we see Him going through His daily life with an attitude of seeking and saving. This lead Him to people like Zacchaeus. And although the religious establishment wasn’t happy with Jesus associating and befriending Him -- with them Zacchaeus never featured and was written off / never stood a chance -- Jesus commentary on what He did was ‘I came to seek and save’.

A mission that set His attitude which set His thoughts and behaviour. It established the way He related to Himself, God and people. Relationally He became a winner -- not because He wanted to be known as Mr Nice Guy for some egotistical motive, but because His purpose was to show people the Father and further to introduce them to the Father -- He Himself being the Peace-Maker. Our impact and significance on others must not be motivated by the advancement of self or selfish gain but in our impact on others for our God! Everyone that came to Jesus He lead them to the Father. Our goal is be like Jesus.

John 3: 16-17 says [For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He even gave up His only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him shall not perish - come to destruction or be lost - but have eternal, everlasting life. For God did not send the Son into the world in order to judge - reject, condemn, or to pass sentence on the world, but that the world might find salvation and be made safe and sound through Him.]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFZAbkOp4o8

Small people keep people around them small thereby containing themselves to live in an ever smaller world. Negative, critical people have to always reduce everyone around them; they’re always fault-finding so that they can bring people down to their level so that they can feel good about themselves. Whenever people treat you badly all they are doing is  projecting their own unhappiness onto you.

The German Theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his book -- Cost Of Discipleship wrote: “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” Small people are too full of themselves to give themselves to anything beyond themselves.

Romans 12:18 [Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone.]

When hurting people come to Christ and get healed and know what it is to be healed then as healed people they can in turn inspire the hurting to get healed too! Inject Life into every situation, every meeting, every conversation you have -- let it frame your everyday world. Instead of defaulting to the atmosphere in the room or the pressure of your daily circumstances take responsibility for the atmosphere in your life -- your home -- church. You are an agent of change and you can change the atmosphere. Jesus did it so well that not even death could dominate the atmosphere when He entered it. Just His presence lifted the room.

People are electrifying- some light up a room when they enter it and others when they leave -- which one are you?

You will come into every person’s life no matter how brief for either a reason; a season; or a lifetime -- whichever it is make it a positive one. As a believer your goal should be to laugh often, to keep smiling, be warm-hearted, genuinely friendly, endearingly mischievous and free-spirited. The River’s overarching mission is the increase in our generation and culture of the love of God and neighbour.

Love God -- Love people!

Mark chapter 4 is a parable about hearing -- The soil that the parable talks about is a metaphor for our hearing. What you hear and how you receive it affects how you process the information you receive and what you do with it .

[Romans 10:17]says faith comes by hearing and hearing the Word of God! So the Word of God in the first instance imparts faith to us -- it is the source of our faith; it also communicates with our faith growing and strengthening it; and finally it is the perfecter of our faith -- causing those things God promised to us in His Word to manifest as our own.

God and as human beings necessitates the development of our hearing.

• Communication is the Basis of Life.
• Exchange is the Process of Life.
• Balance is the Key to Life.
• Agreement is the Power of Life.

John says: ”Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God.” [Jn 13:3]

John reveals three keys from the life of Jesus: What He had, Who He was and Where He was heading! Breaking this down for where live today it looks like this: Power. Position. Purpose.

You have to know your power – your talents, gifts, abilities and powers that lie within you. What power has God put in you and placed your hands?

You have to know your position – who you are in Christ which includes where you come from!

You have to know your purpose – where are you going – your visions and dreams – the reason for your existence.

Knowledge of your power, position and purpose allows you to do life with confidence. This is Godly security. People’s opinions no longer matter. No task too demeaning. Nothing can be stripped away from you. Nothing to distract you from your focus in life.

We’ve been ministering on greatness this year, and this is all centered around service. Jesus said, “the greatest among you is the one that serves.” The question we need to ask then is are we serving people? Do we love people?

Jesus said that we need power to be witnesses. Acts 1:8 tells us about this. Acts 10:38 also tells us that Jesus was anointed with the Holy Spirit and Power -- He needed power to minster to people!

Ephesians 6:10-13 tells us that we must “be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.” Most see this as some incredible, spectacular supernatural miracle, but the reality is that in everyday life, it is about us activating our faith for people on a daily basis in a simple way.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vD6dZYME2hE

Consider 1 Kings 18:1 “After a long time, in the third year, the word of the LORD came to Elijah: “Go and present yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain on the land.”

According to a couple NT passages, this “After a long time” was actually 3 ½ years. The famine was 3 ½ years long. For 3 ½ years, the people apparently continued to sin, Elijah continued to hold on by faith, but God said nothing. God was apparently inactive, not speaking, even to His great servant Elijah.

Have you ever been there? Has the silence of God in your life ever been eerily strong?

Imagine you had been faithfully serving…God is using you…you are in constant communication with Him…and then suddenly…everything is quiet.

The separation must have seemed unbearable. Elijah is un-liked and unpopular; he’s an outcast from the people and the One he trusted most was seemingly absent. God would soon do a miracle through Elijah, but during this period, all Elijah could do was wait.

If you have been believer for very long at all, you have had periods where it seems God is nowhere to be found. We often call them periods of spiritual dryness. Sometimes I refer to it as being in a spiritual funk.

What should we do during the times of silence, before the miracles of God come through for us?

If you are like me, you can figure out how to celebrate a miracle. You don’t need much help doing that. The tough part of life is figuring out what to do during the years of silence; during the years when miracles are nowhere to be found.

What do we do during the spiritual dry periods of life when we don’t hear clearly the voice of God?

Here are 7 actions I encourage you to consider:

Don’t ignore the silence…
Some of the biggest moves God has made in my life have come after a period of spiritual dryness; when it seemed like God was doing nothing in my life. Stay very close to God and watch for His power to be displayed.

Confront known sin in your life
This wasn’t the problem of silence for Elijah, but the problem for the Israelites was that they were chasing after other gods and living lives in total disobedience to God. Sin may not be the reason you don’t sense closeness to God right now, but if you have known sin in your life it will affect your intimacy with God.

Go back to what you know
Get back to the basics of the faith that saved you. You’ll do it 100’s of times in your life, but you must remind yourselves of the basis of faith. God is in control. He really is…even when it doesn’t seem that He is anywhere to be found.

Make a decision…Choose sides
You can’t adequately serve God and the world. Something happens in life, often sin, or busyness, or boredom, or a tragedy…but if we are normal, we have periods where we grow away from our close relationship with God. God hasn’t moved, but if you’ve shifted in your obedience, get back securely on the right side.

Trust More…Not less
Times of silence may be filled with fear, but these times will definitely require more faith. Times come in our spiritual life when our enthusiasm isn’t as real as when we began our walk with God. That’s not an indication to quit…it may be that God is using that time for something bigger than you could have imagined, but it will require a deeper level of trust.

Listen and Watch Closely
Some day God is going to make His plans known to you. Don’t miss them. He may come to your personally, through His Word, circumstances or another person. You’ll need to be in a position to know that God is moving.

Get ready to receive

God will break the silence some day…and when He does….it WILL be good. If you mope around in your sorrows, you’ll be less prepared to receive the good things to come. Not because of your circumstances, but because of your faith, clothe yourself in joy as you wait for God to bless you after the period of silence.

Are you in one of those periods of silence today? How do you handle these periods of time?

[By Ron Edmondson]

Our annual Beach, BBQ and Baptisms was last Sunday, with over 90 church members heading down to Budleigh Salterton where 10 members got baptised in the quite cold British channel!

You can also see the album and tag yourself on Facebook.

If you need wisdom—if you want to know what God wants you to do—ask him, and he will gladly tell you. He will not resent your asking. But when you ask him, be sure that you really expect him to answer, for a doubtful mind is as unsettled as a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. People like that should not expect to receive anything from the Lord.They can’t make up their minds. They waver back and forth in everything they do.

Is it not the worst thing when your prayers are not answered? “How do I ask, so that I get answers?”, says Pastor Michael.

1. Ask Intelligently

Intelligence is not the same as education. Often we pray educated prayers, but we don’t pray intelligbly!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPfBpZHoOv8

What does it mean to ask intelligently? It means I understand what I am asking for and the effects of it. In you pray “God use me”, are you ready for God to really use you? Because often people are upset when “people are using me” -- but we can’t be if we prayed for “God to use me”!

God many times saves us from our asking by not answering. Many times we are protected when God doesn’t give us what we are asking for, because we don’t know the effects of it!

2. Be Specific

As you mature in Chris you become more specific in your answering. Being specific is essential for faith to work, because faith can’t be vague! When you are general in your asking, you can’t be focussed in your faith.

“When you pray general prayers, God generally answers.”

Rather than saying “take everything in my life”, take one thing to Him and ask Him to deal with one thing. Be focussed and don’t loose the intensity. If you are asking for money, say how much. If you are asking for issues to be dealt with in your life, say which ones. If you need a car, specify what you need it for.

3. Ask In Faith

Faith is the willingness to take intelligent risk. Faith is not blind!

Also, a lot of people makes their faith walk about their own ego rather than about the glory of God. “Let’s raise the dead” -- but it’s more about their ego than the purposes and glory of God!

Jesus said that before you even get to asking, you should count the cost so that you can finish what you’ve started. Your faith has to be greater than the pain of the call!

Do I have the faith to see through what I’m starting? So we start out in faith and then finish what we started. The starting point should be faith and not money or anything else. Unless your faith can support what you are about to receive, it will create a crisis in your life.

Often, the time it takes from asking to receiving is when God is working on you to handle what you’re about to receive. During the waiting time, let patience have it’s perfect work.

Finally

What type of person do I need to become to receive what I’m asking? If you go to a bank and ask to be a banker, but you look like a Rock Star, you’ll unlikely to get the job.

I am asked dozens of questions about what we did or didn’t do as parents. I am amazed that God has allowed us to raise the two young men we have in our house, but there were a few principles we practiced consistently.

Here are three principles for parenting I think all parents should consider:

Be intentional – Parenting is hard work. Don’t try it without a plan. It’s amazing how we tend to plan for everything in life, but seldom for our parenting. I know men who have a plan to improve their golf game, but nothing to help them grow as a father. If you want to be a great parent, you must be intentional about that role. Have an overall plan for your parenting and an individual plan for each child, depending on their needs at the time.

Shape the heart – The Bible is clear that we should “Above all else guard the heart for it is the wellspring of life.” (Proverbs 4:23) I believe in firm discipline. I also believe in extending much grace. More than anything, however, the parent should learn to know, protect and shape their heart of their child. It is that heart, which will determine the decisions and directions the child eventually makes in life.

Enjoy the ride – Children are children for a very short time. Enjoy those days. Be a fun parent, balancing love with discipline. Laughing together with your children will help relieve the stress of your life and keep them wanting to be close to you well into the difficult teen and early adult years.

For my complete parenting philosophy see THIS POST or read other parenting posts HERE.

Which of these do you most need to improve upon as a parent?

If you need wisdom—if you want to know what God wants you to do—ask him, and he will gladly tell you. He will not resent your asking. But when you ask him, be sure that you really expect him to answer, for a doubtful mind is as unsettled as a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. People like that should not expect to receive anything from the Lord.They can’t make up their minds. They waver back and forth in everything they do.

Last week we discussed Growing, Developing and Maturing. This week, we’re going to continue the thought in this message, The Power Of Asking.

Prov 4:7 says “Wisdom is the principal thing; Therefore get wisdom. And in all your getting, get understanding.” This is much like Pastor’s testimony.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=lf15f4yC4Vo

“When I found the truth of God’s Word -- not the religious does and don’ts -- but the truth that sets you free, it did indeed set me free, and this is what I bring every Sunday.” When you get understanding, when it finally clicks, no one can steal that from you!

God’s Ideal

Deut 4:5 says this:

Surely I have taught you statutes and judgments, just as the LORD my God commanded me, that you should act according to them in the land which you go to possess.

So this means that anything that we possess or gain in life comes from understanding God’s word. Verse 6 then says:

Therefore be careful to observe them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes, and say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.”

This means that when you have God’s word and wisdom, those around you will admire this wisdom. Then Verses 7 and 8 say:

“For what great nation is there that has God so near to it, as the LORD our God is to us, for whatever reason we may call upon Him? And what great nation is there that has such statutes and righteous judgments as are in all this law which I set before you this day?”

In other words, God’s idea was that a spiritually based social order that would become the envy of the world.

Today

It is a pity that the Church currently for the most part does not reflect that effectively and so the world does not envy us as God said they should. Our moral high ground gives us the authority to speak but because certain sections of the church have lost that moral authority, the world does not listen to us.

But we are a new generation and a new breed who are raising up a different standard!

Paul writes in Ephesians 3:10 that “through the church the manifold wisdom of God would be made manifest.”

We are not human beings trying to have a spiritual experience -- we are spiritual beings mastering the human experience. And based on that mastery we gain the attention of the world where they ask us how do we do the things that we do.

Everything we do in life should reflect a sense of mastery about it, because it has the touch of God in it!

As we learnt in the Parable of the Sower in Mark 4, some seed fell on the wayside and never produced any fruit -- because they lacked understanding. This is why Proverbs says that in all our getting we should get understanding!

Cause and Effect

We live in a universe of law governed by a system of order. The Bible reveals the author of those laws and that system of order and it teaches us those laws and how to co-operate with them.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=NU3CJ981BXw

One of these laws is cause and effect. For every cause there is an effect. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Whatever you will sow you will reap.

Your thoughts are the cause for the effects of your condition.

Why do people act the way they do? -- look at how they are thinking. The reason why the Bible says we will be transformed by the renewing of our mind is that the only way you can change the conditions in your life is by changing the thoughts in your head. Change your thoughts and you change your life. Changing your thoughts includes changing the way you at things -- including the Word.

Change your thoughts, change your life!

Mark 11:22-24:

So Jesus answered and said to them, “Have faith in God. For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, “Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says. Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them.

1 John 5:14-15 then says this:

And we can be confident that he will listen to us whenever we ask him for anything in line with his will. And if we know he is listening when we make our requests, we can be sure that he will give us what we ask for.

If we ask according to His will He will hear us.

So the real question is -- is it about asking or receiving? What do we focus on?

What is the condition paced on -- the asking or the receiving?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBz8AMwFGRk

The conditions are always placed on asking not receiving. If you ask right you will receive. Receiving will take care of itself. You do not have to focus on receiving -- so you can believe you receive all you want but if you asking is wrong you will not receive anything.

It’s like asking for finance for a car. If you don’t complete the application form correctly or don’t have the necessary credit rating, you won’t get the money. There’s not a problem with the finance, it’s a problem with asking!

James 1:5 therefore says

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; 8he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

This is all about how you ask -- you must believe and not doubt when you ask. Again the emphasis is not on the receiving but on the asking.

Whether it’s marriage, a CV, prayer, a proposal, meeting up -- life is all about asking.

Growth is a necessity for life!

Pastor Michael recalls how he has loved God all his life (he’s 47 now) and never really had a defining moment when he ‘started’ to love God. He first began to preach on his own when he was 17 -- which makes it 30 years of preaching for him.

Being a disciple of Christ means that you are a constant learner. You never stop being taught by Jesus -- the Teacher. And the more you get of Him, the more you want of Him!

Micah 6:8 summarises much of how Pastor feels right now -- “He has shown you O man, what is good, and what does the Lord require of you, but to do justly, to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”

John 10:10 says that the thief’s purpose is to steal, kill and destroy but Jesus’ purpose is to give a rich and satisfying life. This doesn’t mean making you a multi-millionaire! If your life isn’t rich and satisfying -- there is something wrong!

If you aren’t living this life, Pastor suggests you revisit your expectations and revisit these scriptures to understand what Jesus is saying!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-h7OC_qo_QY

When we worry and stress -- our worry is a down payment on the troubles of tomorrow!

God wants to bring stability into our lives -- “He leads me beside still waters” is what David said in Psalm 23. We’ve got to get off the roller coaster and settle into a mature and balanced Christian life. In this settledness, we grow, develop and mature.

Jeremiah 29:11 tells us that God has a plan for us -- a hope and a future. His plan isn’t for us to live on antidepressants! His plan isn’t for us to live at the bottom of the barrel or live with stress! His plan is for us to wake up in the morning and see everyday as a precious gift for us to enjoy!

In Mark 4, we looked at the power of the casual invitation. A university did a study to see how much a farmer contributed to the development of a seed -- and discovered it was only 5%! Hence Jesus says “the kingdom of God is like a farmer who planted and seed and didn’t know how it grew, but it did.”

Pastor says -- take my son Gregory when he was 10. If I gave him everything he needed at 10 that he would need up until he was 20, it would be too much! You don’t get all the nutrients that you need right away, and you don’t get there right away!

You can’t make your body grow faster. If you pump yourself full of junk, it’ll hurt you and make you unhealthy. You need a stable diet to grow. Three things about growth:

• Growth is a mystery
• Growth is a process (See Mark 4:28 -- first, then, finally)
• Jesus Himself grew! (See Luke 2:52 “He grew in wisdom, stature and favour with God and man.”

Over the last few weeks, we’ve looked at the casual invitation -- a seemingly obvious thing, but actually really grates against our culture because as Pastor said the other week, inviting people to church is weird in our culture! I really loved really getting into this parable. Jesus says that if you don’t understand this parable, you can’t understand the other parables. The ironic thing is that this is one of the most debated parables.

• Some people use this parable to say that we should only sow on good soil, because look what happens when we sow on bad soil.
• Some people measure -- quarter here, quarter there, then there’s 30/60/100 folder -- x times y =…
• One preacher even said that Jesus was telling a joke in this parable -- “A sower threw seed onto stoney ground? Pull the other one!”

Scatter

But as we’ve heard and understood this parable and the casual invitation, we’ve learned not only how the casual invitation works, but even more about how God works in our lives and how life works in general. You don’t even know which is good soil and which isn’t! In fact, when I generally think I’ve found good soil, it turns out to be the worst! In the parable, the sower just scattered. He didn’t choose to plant in good OR in bad soil, but he allowed it to fall on all soil.

How do we know that there is good soil? It bears fruit.

Once we understand this, we can now move on from scattering, to gathering.

Gather

I’m sure many of you have had fruit -- result -- in your life, but you didn’t keep it. We’ve had fruit in this church that we haven’t kept. As any Farmer will tell us, and as we see in the parables, once you’ve scattered, and the seeds bear fruit, it’s no longer the time to scatter, it’s the time to gather.

In the church context, gathering is about relationship. Building people into our family. Gathering together for greatness!

The same way we have the casual invitation and the intense invitation to church, we have the same thing with gathering -- some is intense, and some is casual. The intense gatherer says, whether you are gathering someone to you, or you yourself are gathering around church -- that it has to go in at this major height of spirituality!

But gathering, just like the scattering (the invitation) can be intense rather than casual. In the same way that the intense invitation locks off everyone else because you think it’s all about YOU and your invite, the intense gathering makes it all about YOU.

The casual gathering says, let’s grab a coffee, I’ll text you or Facebook you, I’ll keep in touch, sure let’s have dinner, my house is, well… you know! You have to gather your fruit to keep it. When you get some fruit in your life -- some result -- don’t become complacent. You have to gather to keep it.

Matter

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZD6KgOaOHRU

Mark 4:30 Jesus said, “How can I describe the Kingdom of God? What story should I use to illustrate it? It is like a mustard seed planted in the ground. It is the smallest of all seeds, but it becomes the largest of all garden plants; it grows long branches, and birds can make nests in its shade.”

We scatter, we gather and then we matter. As the song says, “Take this life and make it matter.”

Our wonderful senior Pastor, Michael Meyers, has been tracked down by Elim’s national magazine to answer some questions that their readers have submitted. The article will be out in a few weeks, but seeing as we had the scoop on this one, we thought we’d share it with you now!

Question 1: I’m diabetic, but I believe that God wants to heal me. My friends have had a release of faith and prayed over me. Should I stop taking my medication?

Answer: Jesus is certainly the Healer for the whole man! He is moved with compassion when He sees us in pain and discomfort and this is evident through the release of faith that your friends have sensed toward you. After all, God uses people to accomplish His work on the earth. Thank God for giving us godly friends that care for us and pray for us! Taking medication or not taking medication is not a sign of the presence of faith nor a sign of the lack of faith. Our faith is based in our relationship with God and the promises of God’s word, not in stopping our medication.

When Jesus healed people in the Gospels He commanded them to show themselves to the priests where they would inspect and verify that the healing had taken place. In like manner, I would suggest that you go to your doctor to verify whether the manifestation of your healing has taken place. Once verified and on his advice you can stop taking/decrease your medication. If however your condition remains unchanged then don’t be discouraged. Keep on believing God and taking your medication.

Question 2: Do you feel that in our Hillsong inspired push for excellence in Church we have favoured ‘programme over presence’?

Answer: Excellence in our lives as believers and as the church starts with us as individuals. It is a reflection of the God that indwells us and Whom we represent on the earth. 1Pet 2:9 (AMP) says, “But you are… God’s own purchased, special people, that you may set forth the wonderful deeds and display the virtues and perfections of Him…”. Like Old Testament Daniel we should have an excellent spirit which manifests through us as excellence of character, excellence of lifestyle and excellence of faith.

This excellence should also push us for excellence in church. In our nation it is culturally acceptable to push for excellence in business but it is anti-cultural for us to push for excellence in church because it is seen to be ‘American’, pretentious, unspiritual and not authentic. This attitude has contained and diminished our capacity to reach the world. Excellence is a means to an end rather than an end in itself. If a church is more concerned about excellence rather than the presence of God then it has lost it’s way. An excellence-driven church should not be prideful but keep on seeking ways in which they can connect to, serve and reach their communities.

Question 3: Why do people talk about the Holy Spirit ‘coming’ into a meeting? I thought he was there already?

Answer: Psalm 139:7, “Where could I go from Your Spirit? Or where could I flee from Your presence?” God’s omnipresence means He fills the universe in all it’s parts and is present everywhere at once so there is no place to go where God is not already there. So when we meet together God is already present, but He may not be manifestly present. For example there is always a certain level of moisture in the atmosphere around us even though we are unaware of it – like God’s omnipresence. Moisture however intensifies in certain areas and manifests as clouds or mist. To be in these clouds or mist would make it’s presence ‘felt’. This is likened to God’s ‘coming’ into a meeting where He makes His presence felt. The Holy Spirit does not come into a meeting for our sensual pleasure or some Charismatic frivolity. He comes into our meetings for purpose. How He is experienced varies according to the need of the people and His purposes for that meeting. So in Lk 5:17 the ‘power of the Lord was present to heal’. The more we can discern why He is present the more effective our meetings will be.

Question 4: My youth group are trying to stop me going out with a girl just because she’s not a Christian. Is that not the same kind of misguided ideological approach to humanity that led Hitler to attempt to ‘cleanse’ the world of Jews?

Answer: I don’t think you can liken your youth group’s motives to the ideology of an evil leader. Your youth group care for you and your prospective girl friend by giving you God’s counsel. 2 Cor 6:14 says we shouldn’t become emotionally connected with people who hold different belief and value systems to us. Although you may both have some commonality of values they may not have the same priority as each other. For example you may have a common interest: she may want to spend her Sundays with you while you will want to put God first by going to church. The tension caused by this difference in values means that either you will compromise and live ‘emotionally’ or follow Jesus and live ‘principally’ [based on His Word]. This becomes true of the places you go, the people you hang out with, how you spend your money, what music you listen to, how far you go physically etc. God calls this emotional connection being ‘yoked together’. Whatever you are yoked to you will carry the burden of. Before you become yoked to this relationship you need to consider how it will burden your life. No-one can stop you from doing anything but I counsel you to follow godly wisdom.

Question 5: I really want to help my church grow, but I’m convinced that any feedback I give will be perceived as unwanted negativity. Why do churches seem to want to hear only positive comments about their ongoing activities?

Answer: The simple answer is that your leaders are probably acutely aware of the gaps and shortcomings in the church’s activities and feel much more burdened by this than you do. They carry the vision of God in their hearts and are working it out to the best of their abilities with the limited human and financial resources they have available to them. They are probably doing the best they can. Church leaders are also used to being criticised for almost every reason under the sun including third world poverty, global warming and the deforestation of the Amazon jungle, with the critics offering no solutions and no help to ease the burden they carry. It’s easier to break down than build. I suggest that if you aren’t already, become involved in your church by giving of your time, talent, treasure and tongue. Get under the weight of glory that God has placed on your leaders and as a co-worker labour with them. Learn obedience! Once you carry the heart of your leaders then they will be more open to hearing what you have to say. This ‘right to speak’ may take years. Finally, when you do bring feedback to your leaders ALWAYS bring solutions with you. Best of all, be the solution by being a gap filler instead of a gap finder!

About Michael

Michael is Senior Pastor of The River Church, Exeter together with his wife Beloved who is on the Aspire Team. Missionaries from the South African Veld where they frolicked with lions, elephants and bugs their teaching ministry has taken them to 30 nations. In addition they have pioneered churches, a leadership school, tv ministry, authored books and a blog that are all significantly more interesting than you might initially think.

The jobs range from Specialists to back of house stock controllers. If you want to apply, you need to go to this page, register an Apple account and then apply online.

Happy hunting!

Photo used courtesy of nechbi.

Marriage Matters

If you are married to a normal, healthy man, his greatest need in life is honor and esteem.

Men and women are equals-the Bible says we should serve one another-but one way a wife can serve her husband is by living out Ephesians 5:22. It says “Wives submit to your husbands as to the Lord.”

Submitting to your husband means honoring him. Honor and respect are like oxygen to a man. He gravitates toward it. He is invigorated by it.

Likewise, he’ll move away from a place where he doesn’t receive honor. Too many of the failing marriages I’ve seen have been rooted in a wife’s inability to honor her husband. That’s not the only reason marriages fail, of course, but it’s a common thread.

Honor is the key to a man’s heart. By requiring wives to serve their husbands, God is giving them the keys to their husband’s hearts.

One important way to honor your husband is by focusing on his strengths and not his faults.

I’ve heard it said before that the devil is the “accuser of the brethren.” There are five ways Satan accuses us. He is always accusing me to God, God to me, me to myself, me to you, and you to me.

Why? Because he hates relationships, and he wants to destroy those five important human relationships.

Any relationship you have with anyone will find itself under accusation from the devil for the purpose of dividing that relationship. This is especially the case with marriage.

To be happily married, both the husband and the wife have to learn to take their thoughts captive because the devil is always accusing you to each other.

Psalm 149:6-7 is an interesting scripture. It says “May the praise of God be in their mouths and a double-edged sword in their hands” to inflict vengeance upon the enemy. Praise is a weapon against the devil.

As Christians, we know the importance of praising God. But do we also realize the power that praise has in our earthly relationships? I defy you to praise your spouse all day long and still have angry or annoyed feelings about him.

Praise is a discipline that reminds us of what is right with each other and why we fell in love with each other.

Praise also leads to a positive outcome. As a husband, if you call your wife “gorgeous” multiple times a day, there will be a payoff. As a wife, if you tell your husband how handsome he is and that you’re proud of him, he’ll respond to it.

In other words, he may be doing ten things wrong and only two or three things right. But if you focus on the few things he’s doing right, you’ll be surprised at the result.

Submit to your husband “as to the Lord” by showing him honor. Honor him by focusing on what he’s doing right. By doing so, you’ll be meeting his number-one need.

Blessings,
Jimmy Evans

Photo courtesy of alicepopkorn

Marriage Matters

What are strong marriages built on? There are few better foundations for a marriage more than a sacrificial spirit – a spirit that enables a husband or wife to look at their spouse and say, “You are more important than me.” Want to protect your marriage against divorce? Put your spouse’s needs ahead of your own.

Every great relationship is a sacrificial relationship. Sacrifice is an ancient concept, going all the way back to the ancient Israelites and their relationship with God. He made a covenant with them – sacrifice for remission of sins – and then Jesus gave us a new covenant through his blood. He became the ultimate sacrifice.

Paul describes that covenant in Philippians 2, which starts off with two verses that married couples should have underlined and highlighted in their Bibles, and written on Post-It note reminders all over the house.

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.” (Phil. 2:3-4)

I can’t come up with any better tip for married couples. If you want a strong marriage, live your life according to Philippians 2:3-4. Love your husband or wife like Christ loves us.

Couples who live together before marriage often struggle because they never learn to sacrifice for each other. Co-habitation is totally self-centered. It’s a tryout, a chance to get the benefits of a relationship without putting down tent stakes. Maybe she wants to know how good he is at taking care of her. Maybe he wants to know how good she is in bed. The whole relationship is performance-oriented - if you please me enough, I’ll marry you.

But a covenant marriage is built on the sacrificial example of Jesus Christ, who “made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant,” as Paul wrote in Philippians 2:7. A sacrificial marriage says, ”This is not about me and getting my needs met.This is about me giving my life for you.”
That’s the difference between a co-habiting marriage and a covenant marriage. That’s the difference between a marriage headed toward trouble and a strong, successful marriage. A good marriage – like a faithful follower of Christ – is never self-centered.

Blessings!
Jimmy Evans

Read more from Jimmy Edwards at www.marriagetoday.org.

Photo courtesy of sharaff

Thursday Night

Friday Morning and Night

Saturday Morning and Afternoon

Saturday Night

Mark 12:28-34

It’s great to say that we are going to serve our city, but another thing to do it. We’ve tried to break it down into clear tasks.

First of all, the task requires purpose.

We serve our community by adding value to it and making a positive contribution to people’s lives. We need to know what the heart is for this -- the why -- because if we don’t, we won’t last at the casual invitation to church.

Our purpose is the increase of the love of God and neighbour in our culture and our generation.

The second thing our task requires is aim.

Aim arrives when our purposes becomes focussed. Our purpose also cannot live in a vacuum -- love does not live in a vacuum!

The power of the casual invitation is this: we don’t care where the seed ends up! We don’t know the condition of people’s hearts -- that is why He is the Lord of the Harvest!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=udPLpxsLFNU

The third thing our task has is objectives.

Many times, church becomes very mystical. But the New Testament has very quantifiable language; from the parable of the talents, to the counting of people on pentecost, to the addressing of specific issues.

After all is said and done, a lot more is too often said than done -- but we must have objectives that are concrete, definite and time bound!

Vision is the mental picture that we have of our church.

We see ourselves as a church:

• Gathered -- filled 5 times on a Sunday with people in our community
• Scattered -- a contemporary people that engage our society where the people are!

For the rest of days we are going to build the power of the casual invitation into our Church!

See the photos below, or directly on Flickr.

A brochure for He Saved The Day 2010 has been spotted at the Touch 10 Conference this evening!

For any husband whose wife has been at The River Dream Centre for Touch 10 this weekend, you’ll be getting one of these when she arrives home. The rest of you – stay tuned – we’ll have He Saved The Day information in your hand soon!

Registration for He Saved The Day 2010 opens on Friday 15th July. This years conference is on Friday 15th and Saturday 16th October.

You can look at the photos below or view them directly on Flickr.

See the photos below, or check them out on Flickr.

Check out the photos here, or view them directly on Flickr.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=5M37HBWxkRM

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHQlXxoEmqY

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zUOpBuGIBE

www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaut3xr03J8

Mark 4:13-32

We have said that inviting people to church in the United Kingdom is anti-cultural. For other nations, it might be cultural, but for us Brits, it’s weird! It’s weird to invite people, and weird to be invited. It’s also weird to invite people to our church because we are also, in many ways, an anti-cultural church -- in the sense that we are not a culturally typical church.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIT_4WgmVMM

We are not going to limit who can and can’t come to church!

We need to sort out this antagonistic thinking that wants to divide people up. When we as the body won’t go, then we neutralise God’s hands and feet through our prejudice! We can’t sing “all things are possible” and then not practice it!

The power of a casual invitation is that I don’t care where it ends up. It’s like the seed that is scattered -- we don’t know how it grows.

We have prayed in our church for it to grow for 13 years. We’ve done every type of prayer you know how -- yet we haven’t seen the growth that we want. Jesus also debunked the “not yet” theology when He said to His disciple “you say ‘Not yet -- 4 months’ -- but the harvest is now!”

Church in the UK for now is an invitation only business!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=onaex7s67o0

Thank God for friendship evangelism, however it is too limited -- it is an intense invitation. In Luke 14, Jesus says “go the periphery of your life and invite those people -- and then go even further and invite people you don’t know.”

True love - according to what Jesus says -- is not about “I love you, therefore I love you”, but it is about inviting those from who we can receive nothing back. It is not about reciprocity!

Many of us are first generation believers! We were right on the edges -- probably in a galaxy, far, far away!

In 2 cor 10:4-5, it says “We use God’s mighty weapons, not mere worldly weapons, to knock down the Devil’s strongholds. With these weapons we break down every proud argument that keeps people from knowing God. With these weapons we conquer their rebellious ideas, and we teach them to obey Christ.”

These strongholds are like a fence that looks out, but doesn’t let you get out!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7P4mKX924s

Change is the essence of growth. To not change -- that is truly destructive.

Luke 14:12-14

Jesus says to not only invite your family and friends into your life but enlarge your circle of invitation. This gives ‘friendship evangelism’ a place in our lives -- where we invite our family and friends to church, but it should not be the only tool we have in our box to meet and befriend unchurched people. We should be befriending and influencing, not just the exclusive people called “family and friends”, but everyone. Lets think about this -- most times those in our family who do not attend church are the most unresponsive to us and we are missing so many other people coming into our life who are much more responsive than our unchurched friends and family.

Just as Jesus stopped trying to reach those who were His family, so I have given up trying to reach my friends and family who every time I tried to speak to them became emotional, argumentative, confrontational, disrespectful. Remember, you are not the only person on the planet that God can is limited to use to speak into your friends and family’s lives.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2A61AuShAqI

Your family is my stranger, who I may be speaking to next week and they may respond favourably to the power of the casual invitation and be here next Sunday! Sometimes we are the worst people to invite our friends and family to church because of the baggage we carry between us relationally that makes them unwilling to respond favourably to anything you have to say. On the other hand when we befriend people that live on the periphery of our lives we have no baggage and therefore they would be more open to respond to me because they have less to overcome with me than with you.

This doesn’t mean we stop praying for them but we should release them to God. Most times our well intentioned conversations with friends and family end up so confrontational that we end up polarising them totally against us, Christianity and God. Don’t let church ruin your relationship with them. If God found you then He can and will find our friends and family.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCSkZ_wEjYc

If you have used the power of the casual invitation this week or the previous week then please let me know your story. Email me whether you failed, succeeded, were beaten up on or were kissed!

The power of the casual invitation is so that our city and county and nation will know that God has a house, a family and that they are welcome to be a part of it no matter who they are, no matter what they’ve done, no matter where they’ve been, no matter what they’ve done! Let’s contract with each other today that we will do away with the church mafia who will vet who is and who is not acceptable to be a part of the family -- and love everyone who walks through our doors!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA8CA634bn8

www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJbcEvbif8A

Marion Meyers Speaks with Celia Bowring about CARE.

The CARE campaign focuses on human trafficking for sexual exploitation – tackling the demand for prostitution, ensuring that trafficking survivors are given adequate care and protection, and raising awareness of the issue.

Just under 2 weeks ago we had a short AV team meeting where I went through “The Perfect Sunday”, a picture of how we wants things to look from a media perspective on a Sunday.

I did this to communicate HOW things will look on a Sunday, but really what is more important is that we know WHY things should look like this. This is something that Pastor Michael wrote about recently, and it’s made a big change to the way that I am thinking.

Today as I watching the Worship Team, I remembered how 80% of communication is non-verbal. Edgar Dale many years ago drew up “The Cone of Learning” (pictured above) which says we remember 20% of what we read, but 50% of what we see and hear, and up to 90% of what we do.

The reason WHY we should have media so deeply involved in our church services is because they communicate beyond the sense of hearing that most of the service operates on, and move towards engaging the other senses to communicate the Gospel.

In actual fact, this is what Jesus Himself did. John 1:14 says “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us”, which meant it no longer was the Word which was read, it became the Word which was seen. The Bible itself is of course full of mixed media. Sometimes God is visual (the cloud, the pillar of fire, the burning bush), other times He is audible (“Abraham, Abraham” or the “still small voice”), or kinesthetic (Christ laying hands) and so on.

Seeing what you are singing helps people learn, helps people worship, and helps communicate the gospel. Pure and simple. There’s a reason why there were objects in the Tabernacle – each one was a visual and practical picture of entering the presence of God – so must learn from this and do the same in Praise and Worship.

However this is more to mixed media that just passively engaging the senses. Dale famously said that “We tend to remember our level of involvement.” Active engagement will create a far more memorable and transforming worship experience.

On the most basic level, this is simply asking people to raise their hands. Even today at The River, when the exhortation came for people to raise hands, up to 60% of people would then go ahead and lift up their hands. Then, when perhaps the most climactic points of worship came, I saw that up to 90% of people would have their hand raised. It’s actively engaging in the experience.

At a deeper level, this active engagement comes through activities like confessing the word, or having the congregation even lead each other in praise and worship, or sharing testimonies with one another. Like the saying goes, “you remember what you teach” – and of course, our friend Edgar Dale here proved it.

It’s important to read here that “some will not believe the Good News”, and that when we explained the Parable of the Sower, there will always be those who don’t believe. This isn’t a downer -- it’s to be expected.

We said that we are increasing the love of God and neighbour in our culture and generation. There is a mantra today “if you make others people’s dreams happen, then yours will too”, but this didn’t come from the world -- it came from the Word. This is greatness. It is living beyond yourself and knowing that the greatest among you is the one that serves.

Every promise that God has, there is an offence attached to it that we must overcome.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkySAB1eGz4

We must understand that whether we do the intense invitation or the casual invitation, both will have an offence attached to it because even the casual invitation is anti-cultural. We are against what the Bible calls a stronghold:

• Jesus, for instance, in John 4 spoke to a Samaritan woman -- which was anti cultural
• Jesus went into a Samartian village as a Rabbi -- which was anti cultural
• Jesus touched a coffin -- which was anti cultural
• Jesus allowed children to come around Him, which as a Rabbi, was anti cultural
• Jesus empowered women to minister, which was exceptionally anti cultural
• Jesus washed people’s feet, as Rabbi, which was anti cultural
• Jesus didn’t fast during the religious fasts but ate -- that was anti cultural
• Jesus ate food from the fields on the sabbath and even healed on the sabbath -- both were anti cultural!

As a Church, we have challenged the challenge -- both within the church and without the church.

• We were told that the South West was the graveyard of evangelists and evangelism, but every week we have seen people give their lives to Jesus.
• The British Christian mindset is that church should be done “on the cheap and nasty”, but we have bucked the trend and done things with a high level of excellence.
• The British mindset is that our faith is private, but after each service at The River Dream Centre, the average time that we spend talking together is an hour.

In Africa or India, the casual inviation is not anti cultural, but in Britain, it is very anti cultural and not everyday. But then again, all the things that we have achieved in our church were anti cultural 16 years ago when Pastors Michael and Marion arrived -- but churches throughout the United Kingdom have challenged the challenge.

There are still, a few assumptions to challenge:

1. We assume people aren’t ready for church -- but thats the ‘intense invitation’ talking!
2. We assume people aren’t calling out for God -- but they are!
3. We assume people aren’t God conscious -- but 3 summers ago we sae 3014 people lead to Christ on the streets of Exeter!
4. We assume people aren’t praying -- but many of the unsaved people that we know do pray!
5. We assume people have been invited to church -- but most haven’t, and would say yes if they were!

How will they believe unless someone tell them? And how will someone tell them, unless someone god? We are the hands of God that extends the casual invitation.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8WtR4eEFy8

Marion Meyers talks with Rachel Davies about what CARE does.

The CARE campaign focuses on human trafficking for sexual exploitation – tackling the demand for prostitution, ensuring that trafficking survivors are given adequate care and protection, and raising awareness of the issue.

Luke 14:16-24

Greatness means that God has never let himself to be contained to a small circle of relationship or cliques of people that refuse to expand and grow.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUQUL75dWVw

We see in this story that Jesus first of all issues an RSVP. This is like us when we first get saved. There is nothing as intense as a newly born again Christian!

And it works! There is zeal and we see some fruit, but we mustn’t stay hooked on this intense invitation, whereby those that respond become a clique, and those who don’t are polarised and we push into outsiders.

We don’t mind people being polarised -- because everyone will at one point or another -- but the intense invitation polarises people unnecessarily.

When people don’t respond to the invitation, Jesus doesn’t stay hooked up to those people -- He creates new invitations, saying “go into the highways and the byways.” He goes into the work place, the coffee house, the bar, the school, and issues casual inviations whereever He goes.

The result? The casual invitation returned more result than the intense invitaiton did.

Jesus doesn’t cancel the event

www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8OOTkbibMQ

True Christianity is seen when we act well towards people who can do nothing back for us.

Often we don’t issue the casual invitation, and cancel the event, because of fear. Plato said that “We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark. The real tragedy is the men who are afraid of the light.”

The characteristics of a casual invitation

The Word is sown by scattering seeds. God has enough seed to scatter. If some lands on the rock, it doesn’t matter -- God has more than enough seed to scatter elsewhere. No seed can grow unless it has time to germinate. The intense invitation keeps on interfeering with the seed -- poking and provoking it -and the seed doesn’t grow.

The casual invitation releases me from the divine appointment theology. You’ll find the more casual invitations you extend to people, the more ‘divine appointments’ you actually get!

Here are some testimonies of people are part of The River, just because of a casual invitation to church:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvxZWMeJh6o

Last week we said that:

• The only thing Jesus ever said He would build is His Church!
• And the only commendation Jesus will ever recognise is service in His church!

The truth is that greatness means that God has never allowed Himself to be contained or confined to a small circle of relationships or cliques. When there are cliques, Jesus begins to leave. In this parable from Luke 14 we see this happening. We see it again with the letters to the churches in the book of revelation.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zA-fdo1gj8o

The question is, given that Jesus crossed the universe to connect with mankind, will cross the room and meet new people?

Are you prepared to cross the room -- go to the watering holes -- and start entering into banter, friendship, and relationship, than can leed someone to Chris?

Greatness means we are continuing to break relational containment.

The problem is that we have so elevated ‘The Invitation’ to a level of near-perfection that we have inhibited people from doing it.

You can watch Pastor Michael preach on the difference between the ‘intense’ invitation and the ‘casual’ invitation here:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yui0aTN5aZg

www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDPdEaW5ugI

The only thing Jesus ever said He would build is His Church! And the only commendation Jesus will ever recognise is service in His church!

The story we read last week records Abraham’s instruction to His servant, Eliezer, to find a wife, Rebekah, for his son Isaac. The story records the finding of this wife.

Servanthood is the key to three things in our lives: Promotion, Authority, and Destiny

In one day Rebekah opened the door to her destiny through servanthood, and she became God’s choice to mother God’s chosen people. This biblical matriarch was the wife of Isaac and the mother of Jacob. 39 generations later that people bring forth the messiah – Jesus. To us she is the picture of a believer the Spirit searches for, with which He adds to and Jesus build’s His church with. True greatness is found in servanthood!

Every resource you will ever need lies in the hand of another person.

That other person is a key to open the door into the room you are desperate to get into. And many times they come in the form of a stranger – and perhaps not a nicely packaged stranger but a difficult stranger. People will train you to become a great servant!

Rebekah sensed God in Eliezer coming across her path. She was no spiritual giant. No Bible in her hands. No complex theological understanding. At best, she was a member of a semi-pagan, heathen, non-believing family. But that small seed of faith she had she used and look what greatness came to her.

Rebekah’s experience at the well in Genesis draws a fitting parallel with that of the Samaritan women in John 4. The progression between the two stories are fabulous. Both ask for water. Both are searching for someone. Jesus said that He came to seek and save the lost.

The truth is that God has never allowed Himself to be contained or confined to a small circle of relationships – cliques. If you only interact with people that think like you, act like you, look like you, feel like you, you will always be small and limited because the world is much bigger than that. God blesses people other than you and your buddies. There really are people who think that they have franchised God and that he fits within the circumference of their ideology and theology.

The question is are you prepared to step out of your circle of relationships that has contained God? Are you prepared to cross the room? Are you prepared to make new friends because friendship always precedes evangelism? Do you know where the watering holes are – where the wells are in our city where it’s people collect? These are not just places where people get together but these are places where people come to quench the thirsts of their famished souls. Let’s be inclusive and outward focused, just like Jesus.

Sooner or later everyone asks WHY?

And the reason we ask WHY? is because spiritual emptiness is a universal condition. There has to be more to life than this we tell ourselves – and there is!

As Senior Pastor of The River in Exeter, we have a congregation that lives out their lives on four different levels: Survival, Stable, Success and Significance.

Each one is a level up from the previous with the lowest level being Survival and the highest level of life being Significance. This is a reflection of our community as a whole whether they are Christians or go to church or not. Each of these levels basically ask one question [even though they come in many different forms and do life in many different contexts].

Those living on the Survival level ask, “Why can’t I work out my problems?”
Those living on the Stable level ask, “Why can’t I get ahead in life?”
Those living on the Success level ask, “Why don’t I feel more fulfilled?”
Those living on the Significance level ask, “Why am I here?”

At The River we help people on each level to ask these questions that they are many times feeling yet cannot understand neither articulate. The Kingdom of God defines these levels differently [‘the what’] to the current post-modern worldview. It’s not that God doesn’t want His people to live great lives. He does! Jesus espoused and upheld the value of greatness; it’s just the path of ‘how’ to get there is different. God’s Word empowers us to move through the levels of every stage and become significant people of influence and/or affluence.

So when we ask WHY? Our question is ‘why church’? What is our purpose, our cause, our belief? Why do we bother? Why should you care? And our answer is laid out in answering the above. Our highest level of significance is presenting Jesus Christ as the answer to humanity’s universal condition of emptiness.

Through The River, Jesus Christ brings forgiveness and eternal life to those who receive Him into their lives. Through this decision every person’s purpose is developed, appropriated and discovered individually and corporately as a church by allowing the various gifts, talents, abilities and powers to be expressed in all types of service to the churched and unchurched. Our significance is not found in just attending church to ‘get’ something but in coming to church to contribute together to the world we do life in.

The Search of the Spirit for a Church! The only thing that Jesus only said He would build is His church. Ultimately no matter where we are, everything we do should be for the glory of God. This is realised by our working with Jesus! We need to get along side where He is working.

Everything we should do should be alongside Jesus and the building of His Church -- and for us, this should be at The River.

The only thing you will then hear from Jesus when you meet Him, for the stewardship that you have had while on earth, will be “well done, good and faithful servant.” There are no prizes for sport, or business, or position, or profit. The only prize is “well done, good and faithful servant” -- servanthood.

The greatest among you is the one that serves.

Gen 24 records the story of Abraham’s servant finding a wife (Rebekah), for his son, Isaac. The servant travels 450 miles to find Rebekah. This story of is a shadow: God is Abraham and the Holy Spirit is the servant who is finding a bride for the Father’s Son, Jesus. The servant went with criteria to find a bride -- not just anyone!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdbRp6htvsw

So What Are The Qualifications?

Rebekah was beautiful, which verse 16 tells us. God is looking for a beautiful believer. A beautiful believer is one who is looking to increase in their culture and generation the love of God and neighbour. Someone who is beautiful takes it seriously when called to be a carrier of the Glory of God.

Rebekah was a servant. Rebekah also wasn’t proud or arrogant. She came from a statured and influential family but was a servant. She was the servant of all. Servanthood does not begin in the hands, it starts in the heart. What we can we learn from her heart?

1. Rebekah had a willingness. She had a ‘can-do’ attitude. 7 times it records that Rebekah was willing. Willingness creates energy.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Asg9uMYr2SA

2. Rebekah had excellence. What she started, she finished.

3. Rebekah had enthusiasm. Verse 18 tells us “then she quickly”, and again in verse 20 “then she quickly”. Enthusiasm is noted by the speed on your performance and execution. An enthusiastic waiter will get the food served quickly to you!

4. It was an inconvenience -- but Rebekah didn’t mind and she didn’t ignore the servant. She didn’t excuse herself to not help -- she got down and served at her inconvenience, not begrudgingly.

5. Honour. Rebekah was honouring to a stranger -- even to a servant! She laid aside the social norms, whereby she was a first-class citizen, and was humble.

6. She was a hard worker. She served the camels, which was no mean feat. Each Camel would’ve drunken about 5 buckets worth, which means she would’ve done up and down the stairs to the well about 50 fifty times!

7. Rebekah was caring. Statistics for most churches are that only 1 in 4 serve in Church -- and only 10% of them touch the lives of strangers.

The Holy Spirit is looking for someone with dirty hands -- someone who is in the arena.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfoF-ik9fw8

Marion Meyers Speaks with Abigail at the Poppy Project.

The Poppy project to provide accommodation and support to women who have been trafficked into prostitution or domestic servitude.

The Poppy Outreach Service works to improve the safety and wellbeing of women from all over the UK who have been trafficked and who are in need of short-term support and advocacy.

‘And the winner is…’

‘Till the day I die I shall never forget that July afternoon at The River Dream Centre in Exeter, the Women’s Conference to which my daughter Sally had invited me was drawing gently to a close. We had reached the stage of drawing the prize to see who had won the car; someone’s name was drawn out of ‘the hat’. Then to all our surprises, the winner declined her prize because, she said, she had just bought herself a new car so back to ‘the hat’! When Sally’s name was drawn out I was absolutely delighted and joined with everyone else in delighted applause. Imagine my astonishment when, as she made her way up to the podium I heard her say:

‘My Mum drives a rubbish car; can I give her this one?’

I must have told that story many, many times. But every time, the reaction it produces is the same: delight, wonder and a sharing in my joy at such a generous and unexpected present. It is a lovely little red car, as boisterous and full of life as I hope I am. Anyone who has a car like that is as quick to spot a fellow driver and enthusiast, so in the year since I have had my little car, I have made many friends and shared a million friendly exchanges.

Quite apart from the blessing the car itself has brought, it has surrounded me with enormous joy. I am so grateful to the Women In Touch team who dared to believe God to fund and buy a car and organise a raffle for their very special women’s conference; thank you also to Sally for passing on the blessing and most of all thank you to my most generous and faithful God for this wonderful blessing.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMf_mpnA3Ps

More Testimonies

Dear Pastors Michael and Marion

Thank you for what you spoke about last night about getting into the flow and going to the secret place with no agenda. I asked Jesus into my life when I was 11 and had a few very real, tangible experiences of the Holy Spirit much like Pastor Marion was speaking about when I was a child but nothing to speak of since my teens, which, for the most part, has made me feel very insecure. Therefore, what Pastor Marion said last night was very enlightening, encouraging and reassuring.

Love you both loads and Nigel and I are so blessed and privileged that God has led us to The River and to be a part of the family there.

- Elaine

Dear Pastor Michael,

For quite a while now I had been struggling with doubt in that, was I really hearing the Holy Spirits voice. I was blessed in that it could never touch the plans God has laid in me for the future but it really took a hold in the more superficial things, the main one being when I was walking somewhere and then being told to take a different route. There was one point when I walked up and down the same street at least 6 times such was the “go this way”, “no this way” in my head. I felt it lift a number of times but it came back again and again.

However, at Spring revival on Tuesday I felt the Lord say I would be free from it and this time I really felt it lift, but could sense it was still lingering around, but on Friday after the laying on of Pastor Marion’s and Liana’s hands it went. The difference this time is I have no fear of it coming back as I had the previous times, I have full confidence. And I truly am free in Jesus.

Thank you all so very much,

- Hannah

Dear Pastors,

I’ve had a fantastic week in the presence of God! He has revealed himself to me and moved in me a different way every night. I’ve had Joy, Peace, and Rest in the Lord. It’s also been a lot of fun, especially when I’ve just sat back and observed the move of God. The Joy lasted the whole week, and at one point my Christian housemate had to explain to everyone else in the house why I was curled up in a ball laughing when I got home. God’s also been dealing with some issues in my life that aren’t serious but I just didn’t want them to grow and eventually make me a slave to sin. One of them was ego.

As a performer I’ve sometimes been encouraged to develop an ego to give me the confidence I need to do what I do. After a while I started listening to this and let the ego come, which made me start living in the flesh in some areas of my life. I decided this week that if I wanted to step into what God had for me, I had to get myself out of the way (interestingly enough Drew was saying to the worship team that this week God was telling him that we need to get ourselves out of the way of what God wants to do) -- it’s not about me, it’s about glorying God, and serving others. By faith, I have claimed the victory over my ego this week.

God’s also been working in me by giving me, through Michael’s fantastic messages, a deeper understanding of what it means to be living in the spirit of God and his presence. I can’t wait to get these messages into my head and heart and start walking in his presence on a whole new level.

Thank you for this conference, it changed my life forever last year and this year it has equipped me to step into new territory. I love my River family so much!

- Chris

Hey Pastor Michael,

It’s Geri, I just wanted to email you about today. That was the first time, anything like that has happened to me in church. When You had your hand on my head you said you’d seen it, and the bit about the cross roads! I think that’s something that’s happening in my life now.

In all it was a great night as usual. Thank you and Pastor Marion so much for the wise words!

- Geri

Dear Pastors,

God has really used this last week to move me forward in my walk with Him. I have been filled and challenged in many different ways, and have learned to respong to His presence. I have had breakthrough in a lot of areas, and particularly in the area of fear.

On Frday Pastor Michael called for people who had felt a reaction on Wednesday to come forward for prayer, and God prompted me to go forward. When I was prayed for I felt instantly that God had set me free. He showed me quite clearly how small my fear was in comparisson with Him, and that it no longer had any power over me. The revelation of His power was enough to release me from fear permanently, and I know it will never bother me again.

I thank God daily for the amazing church family He has placed me in, and I look forward to putting into practice everything He has taught me and growing closer to Him.

- Beth

Matt 11:25-30:

Then Jesus prayed this prayer: “O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, thank you for hiding the truth from those who think themselves so wise and clever, and for revealing it to the childlike. 26Yes, Father, it pleased you to do it this way!
27″My Father has given me authority over everything. No one really knows the Son except the Father, and no one really knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”
28Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle, and you will find rest for your souls. 30For my yoke fits perfectly, and the burden I give you is light.”

Be careful what you yoke yourself to! Where you are over burdened, it will take your joy, it will spill over into your body and you will age before you time. Stress is over yoking and over burdening yourself.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZ594f7Drz0

Jesus says in Matthew 6:44 that today’s troubles are enough for today! The idea is that by the end of the day we cast our cares onto Him -- His yoke fits perfectly and His burden is light. He didn’t come to burden us with something that we couldn’t bear.

In our relationships, when we are yoked to someone’s presence and character, then we are yoked to their glory. This is why the wife is the glory of her husband. This means that she is a product of the husband’s character and presence -- you can what the husband is like by looking at the wife.

So what Jesus does is link us to the Father’s presence and character, which has transformation power about it!

Lessons from Turning the Water into Wine

In John 2:1-11, we learn some lessons about this:

1. Jesus doesn’t refer to His mother has his ‘mum’ but as ‘woman’ -- He is not letting a close family tie confuse His relationship with God. When God draws you to Him, you mustn’t do it through your family or friends -- it must between you and God! Jesus is saying that He doesn’t do stuff to impress people, which is in contradistinction to so many ministers who will boast about their “special relationship” with God.

2. Mary doesn’t get insecure by this either -- because she knows His compassion.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXqy-MJomo8

3. The water pots are dirty. People have walked to be here and they clean their hands and feet using these water pots. Once the miracle has happened, the master of the feast says “you have saved the best for last.” This represents Christ’s ministry to today!

What Jesus does here is unyoke us from the sinful nature, and yokes us to the Father’s glory. This is why 2 Cor 5 says that once He gives us His character and presence, we are so transformed that we are “a new creation”.

The Principle

Your presence comes out of your character.

This is why the Word says when we spend time with people’s presence, it will affect our character -- either for positive or negative. This is why we have Spring Revival Conference, because the more time you spend with God’s presence, it transforms your character.

If you can’t see the photos above, you can view them on Flickr here.

We had an incredible time at Spring Revival Conference this week – the power of God showed up, set people free and broke things off of people. If you were unable to come, or want to go through the notes, then you can read the live blog for each night here:

• Night 1: Monday Night
• Night 2: Tuesday Night
• Night 3: Wednesday Night
• Night 4: Thursday Night
• NIght 5: Friday Night

Do you have a testimony?

If God touched you in a power way and you hace a testimony to share, then we’d love to hear it. You can add it in the comment section below.

Eph 5:18 “And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,”

You shouldn’t be ‘drunk’ with anything that alters your state of being. When something become an addiction that alters you, it has power over you. A glass of wine in itself is nothing, but it can have power when you become addicted to it. You should be controlled by the Spirit, not the flesh!

So how do you live filled with the Spirit?

Three things that you are if you’re living in the Spirit:

1. You have a song in your heart

Ephesisans says “singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord.” If you have a song in your heart, you can come through anything.

What happens if you don’t have a song in your heart, then you’ve leaked! Ecclesiastes 10:1 says “Dead flies putrefy the perfumer’s ointment” – don’t let dead flys get into your ointment! When you have a song in your heart. you can overcome anything. This is why Paul and Silas could sing praises to God after being beten and thrown in jail (Acts 16:25.)

2. You are agreeable

The Bible says to be kind and tenderhearted and submit one to another. Sprit filled people are agreeable, not hard hearted and difficult.

The place where you really find out how agreeable you are is at home! This is why God says husbands and wives should submit to one another! If you are not agreeable at home, then everything else is a facade. We need to be agreeable on the interior – in the core – not just on the shell that others see.

3. You have a boldness of faith

When you become ashamed of the gospel and ashamed of Jesus, you have lost your spirit-filled living. This doesn’t mean standing on the street corner and shouting at people – but it means standing up for the gospel and having a word in season for your colleagues, friends and family. It means sharing the gospel and not shying away from it when people need encouragement.

Psalm 140:13 “Surely the righteous shall give thanks to Your name; The upright shall dwell in Your presence.”

Heb 9:23-24 “Therefore it was necessary that the copies of the things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us;”

Heb 10:19-22 “Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water”

The Tabernacle

The tabernacle of Moses was a copy of the Heavenly way of things. We can look at that tabernacle to understand how to access the presence of God, and dwell there. That’s why in Heb 10, the Bible says that we have enter by Christ’s blood – and stay there!

The tabernacle of Moses consisted of three compartments – the Outer Court, the Holy Place, and the Holy of Holies. Throughout each of stages there were various elements and parts that are a pattern to us today. In fact, Jesus calls Himself “The Way, the Truth and the Life”, He was referring to the names of two doors and curtains that separate each of the compartments.

The Outer Court was about the body. The Way to God is about being a living sacrifice.

The Holy Place is about the mind and the soul. The Truth is being renewed in the spirit of your mind.

The Holy of Holies is about the spirit. The Life is the very presence of God – “I have come that you might have life”

So to finish what Jesus said, “no one comes to the Father but by Me.” What Jesus was saying is that He is the tabernacle of Moses in flesh. He is the way to the Father.

The Elements in the Temple

The Brazen Altar and Laver of Water were in the Outer Court, where sacrifice was made. We have to submit ourselves to the fire of God (which consumed what was on the altar) – which is why the Bible says that no flesh can glory in His presence.

This is why Romans 12 says that we are to be a “living sacrifice.” Our body and its lusts and appetites have to be subdued and dealt with. You can’t live anyway that you want to, and then live in the presence of God!

The problem with asking for forgiveness then leaving is that you only get a sense of forgiveness – but you don’t subdue your flesh. You appetites only really get subdued in the Holy of Holies, which is where you become more spiritually aware than bodily aware. The nature of the lusts of the flesh are that they want more, more, more but are never satisfied! If you don’t realise this, you’ll constantly be a consumer.

There is a cost involved to carrying the presence, and this is the cost: saying no to your flesh. What keeps you a living sacrifice? Loving God more than you love (or lust) other things.

Here’s an important point: don’t drag it out when you make a mistake with God.

In the Holy Place there are the Golden Lamp Stand and the Table of Shrew-bread. This is a place of revelation – where the scriptures that you already know take new meaning and you have revelation of things that you already ‘knew’ in your mind. This is where you begin to live on the Word of God: “Give us this day our daily bread.”

You can’t get someone else’s daily bread. You have to get your own food from God – the Word becoming real to you.

Then there comes silence:

Zeph 1:7 “Be silent in the presence of the Lord GOD;  For the day of the LORD is at hand”

Psalm 62:1 “Truly my soul silently waits for God;”

Psalm 46:10 “Be still, and know that I am God;”

Then He anoints you – covers you with His presence.

Firstly what an awesome night. The message preached was powerful and on point again! For me there was a real mind change as we were taught that God should lead our personal meetings with Him, not us – we are to work together and flow with His Spirit and to allow His Spirit to flow through us. One of the best ways to enter to a point where we can do this is to pray in tongues, for by doing so we are already allowing the Spirit to pray through us. As we do so we should be seeking what God’s plan and will is for this meeting.

2 Cor 13:14 “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.”

Psalm 140:13 “Surely the righteous shall give thanks to Your name; The upright shall dwell in Your presence.”

Eph 3:19 “That you may really come] to know [practically, through experience for yourselves] the love of Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge [without experience]; that you may be filled [through all your being] unto all the fullness of God [may have the richest measure of the divine Presence, and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God Himself]!”

“To become” means we are not there yet. We have to grow into this. It’s not going to happen overnight – the same way that you don’t become an adult overnight.

In 1 Cor 2:4-5, Paul says “And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.” In other words, I don’t want your faith to rest in man, but in the power of God.

Flowing With Him

John 7:37-38 “On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.”

Mark 16:20 “And they went out and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word through the accompanying signs. Amen.^“

If you work with God, He will work with you!

When Jesus talks about living water, this is water that is flowing. When you are in your secret place, you need to learn how to flow with God. We often forget that HE is God – so we being praying and then we set the agenda as if WE are God! If HE is God (which He is!) then He should in control on the secret place – HE should set the agenda!

When you go to the secret place in your prayer – just go wanting to meet with Him!

We sing the songs about “have your way”, but then we don’t give Him time to have His way. This is why in prayer we must flow with Him and allow Him to have time and set the agenda.

A husband and wife learn how to flow with one another. You learn, through spending more time together, how to flow better with each other.

Whenever Pastor Michael begins with his prayer time, he begins by praying in the Spirit – in order to get him out of the natural and onto the heavenly agenda.

The Power

Acts 4:29-31 Now, Lord, look on their threats, and grant to Your servants that with all boldness they may speak Your word, 30by stretching out Your hand to heal, and that signs and wonders may be done through the name of Your holy Servant Jesus.” 31And when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spoke the word of God with boldness.

Answer to this prayer: Acts 5: Ananias and Saphira drop dead over an offering; Then Peter’s shadow healed people; vs 12 – through the hands of the apostles many signs and wonders were done among the people.

Zech was struck dumb for 9 months – couldn’t speak

Falling over:

• Acts 26:14 And when we all had fallen to the ground
• Jn 18:6 “I am he,” they all fell backward to the ground!
• 2Chron 5:14 / Matt 17 But even as he spoke, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy. Listen to him.” 6 The disciples were terrified and fell face down on the ground.
• Matt 8:24 – the guard at Jesus tomb / Rev 1:17 John on seeing Jesus.

Blindness:

• Acts 22:11 – I was blinded by the intense light and had to be led into Damascus by my companions. Saul was blinded, by a bright light and fell to the ground.
• Acts 13:11 Elymas the sorceror – mist and darkness fell upon him

Mist / Cloud:

• Is 6:4 Their voices shook the Temple to its foundations, and the entire building was filled with smoke.

Trances:

• Peter fell over bodily and went into a trance
• Balaam fell into a trance – fell down with eyes open.

Drunk:

• Acts 2 These are not drunk as you suppose!

Dancing in the Spirit / Joy of the Lord – are expressions of joy!:

• Acts 13:52 And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.
• Ps 126 We were filled with laughter, and we sang for joy.
• Is 12:3 With joy you will drink deeply from the fountain of salvation! / with joy will you draw water from the wells of salvation –
• Jn 4:14 But whoever takes a drink of the water that I will give him shall never, no never, be thirsty any more. But the water that I will give him shall become a spring of water welling up (flowing, bubbling) [continually] within him unto (into, for) eternal life.

Yesterday, Ben Hare wrote on his blog about his experience so far of Spring Revival Conference 2010. Ben writes,

“Yesterday was the first day of the conference and the Lord began to minister to me, releasing His joy afresh in me – I could not stop laughing. When I arrived on Monday evening my face was displaying all of life’s troubles, I left with a huge grin and a face glowing with Him!!!”

Ben continues on the message that Pastor Michael brought on “Private presence means public power“. He says that

“I spoke to God and said I do not want to be a public success, but fail at home! And He began to minister in me! I couldnt contain it, after a few minutes i was laughing in joy, and then suddenly He released me in such a way that I began to dance in a rather wild manner – not out of control in the way that i was forced, rather free to be released from the constraints of pride and self image and to dance free in the delight of Him. Then I began to shout aloud – I couldnt help it I had to praise Him for touching my life and meeting me!!!”

You can read everything Ben has to say on his blog post, “Thank You God For Knowing Me“.

2 Cor 13:14 “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.”

Psalm 140:13 “Surely the righteous shall give thanks to Your name; The upright shall dwell in Your presence.”

Eph 3:19 “That you may really come] to know [practically, through experience for yourselves] the love of Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge [without experience]; that you may be filled [through all your being] unto all the fullness of God [may have the richest measure of the divine Presence, and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God Himself]!”

Being a People of His Presence

It has been said that private presence means public power. In Acts 1:8 tells us that the disciples would receive the Holy Sprit privately, and have public power as a result. We shouldn’t have to try and hype church up – too many people have to hype up the power because they lack the private presence. Someone said that “A lot of kneeling will keep you in good standing.”

Psalm 91:1-2 says:

He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High
Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the LORD, “He is my refuge and my fortress;
My God, in Him I will trust.”

This is a dwelling – not a visiting.

The Wisdom That Comes From Above

James 3:17 says that “But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy.”

“The wisdom that comes from below“, Pastor Michael says, “is full of argument.”

You can mess things up by having presence, and then being bullish about it. There is a difference between having tenacity and pride. When you want to be in the secret place you must understand how like in Psalm 631:1, you have to be hungry and thirsty for it. Jesus said that when you prayer, you will have what you desire.

David found his secret place through harsh times. His hungry and thirst for God came from heartfelt need and desire – not a reasoned head desire.

Right now there is a big debat about prayer in school. A teacher then made the statement, “as long as there are tests, there’ll always be prayer in school!” The point is that when there are harsh times, prayer comes. The Psalms that we read, like Psalm 63 or 91, were written in times of distress and trial.

Prayer is Union and Communion with God

Pastor Michael says “Prayer is ultimately about getting into union and communion with God. To be a Christian without a secret place in God is like being alive but having no heart.”

When you begin to magnify God, He becomes magnified beyond the size of your problems! Righteous, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit is not the absence of hardship but the presence of communion with God.

James 4:1-5 says:

Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”?

What is James saying here? That God is a God of hearts.

God looks at the heart – the internal. If you internal is in it, your exterior is in it. For many people, there exterior is in something, but their interior isn’t. They are in Church, but they aren’t present in Church. This what God meant when He said that people were near him in their words, but distant in their hearts.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLdu2ugyxQc

This week we will be centering around three core scriptures:

2 Cor 13:14 “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.”

Psalm 140:13 “Surely the righteous shall give thanks to Your name; The upright shall dwell in Your presence.”

Eph 3:19 “That you may really come] to know [practically, through experience for yourselves] the love of Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge [without experience]; that you may be filled [through all your being] unto all the fullness of God [may have the richest measure of the divine Presence, and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God Himself]!”

In John 17 Jesus prayed that we as a body of believers “would be one, as even as we [Father, Son and Holy Spirit] may be one… And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one.” We have God’s glory. What makes up God’s glory? His Presence and His Character.

You can’t have God’s presence show up and everything stay the same. God’s presence is impregnated with His power. When you have God’s presence, it can change things without you doing anything, this is why the presence of God causes such changes in people. We must retain this presence and not let it fade away from us.

We call ourselves Pentecostals because of Acts 2 and the events that happened on the day of Pentecost. Here there is an infilling. Then again in Acts 4 there is another infilling.

They leaked!

Over two chapters, they leaked. That’s why we need to stay in the presence of God! There is one baptism but many infillings. Acts 2 was a baptism, Acts 4 and numerous other examples in Acts are further infillings.

A clear definition creates a clear understanding. We need to understand what it means to be ‘Pentecostal’, and what it means to be people of His presence.

Being Pentecostal means we are a people that have a direct, personal relationship with God experienced through the infilling of the Holy Spirit and by the power of the Holy Spirit. We don’t have a priest or intercessor -- we boldly enter the throne room of God in time of need (Hebrews 4) and have direct access to God -- which is known by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

When we speak about living in His presence, we don’t mean in His omnipresence but His manifest presence. This is the difference between God being everywhere because He is God, and God being tangibly present in a room. A doctor can be present in a room and no one knows, but the moment there is an emergency, the doctor steps forward and becomes manifestly present.

John Wesley said “I entertain and practice the presence of God.” AW Tozer said that “I want the presence of God Himself, or I don’t want anything at all to do with religion. I want all that God has or I don’t want any.” John G Lake said that, “Salvation is not something God gives you that is going to bless you after you die. It is having the presence of God now.”

In Judges 16, the story of Samson and Delilah is told. Samson gives her his heart and reveals everything to her -- including what his hair stood for. In verse 20 it recalls that Samson “didn’t realise that the Lord had left him.” He was playing with the things of God.

Pastor Michael says that as a young man he’d preach the message of “shape up or ship out” -- because the presence of God was on him and he mistook that power for his own dedication. One day he woke up, and God said He was taking him through a time where the presence would not be so heavy on him. Over years like this, Pastor Michael learnt what it was like to not have God’s presence heavily upon you every day and a lot of the arrogance that he had was dealt with.

There is a difference between talking to God, and embracing the truth that we are with Him. In God’s presence we learn His ways and His character. We said last Sunday that whatever you are yoked to in life you carry. Your look and presence comes out of your character, which creates an attitude.

When you are some people’s presence you feel warmth, and in others, the lights go out and it becomes cold! Just based on someone’s look, or presence, you’ve already anticipated how things are going to go.

The Word says that we shouldn’t therefore spend time in some people’s presence, because if we do, we’ll take on their character. Proverbs says “don’t spend time in the presence of angry man lest you learn his ways”, and Corinthians says that “bad company corrupts good character.”

Proverbs 27:17 then says that “as iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend.” The presence principle works both ways -- it can corrupt you or build you up. This is why Pastor always says to surround yourself with people who are more on fire than you are.

Acts 4:13 tells us that Peter and John were recognised as people who had “been with Jesus” -- it was clear by their character that they had been in the presence of Jesus. The conclusion was that the only way they could be like they were was because they had been with Jesus. It was the only explanation.

We are stewards of the Glory of God -- the character and presence of God!

Last week we talked about Revealing a Great God, but this week we are talking about Revealing a Great Believer.

The greatest commandment to each one of us here today above all is to love God and love our neighbour. The highest overarching mission of the church, and which every one of us must embrace, is the increase in our culture and generation of the love of God and neighbour. It is a single commandment in two parts -- like a coin with two faces.

When the man at the gate called Beautiful in Acts 3 asked Peter and John for help, they said “Look at us.” We are what Christ looks like to the world -- we are the revelation of Jesus to the unchurched!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Dft4npHPQk

If we are to reveal God’s glory and be His revelation -- then we need to understand what God’s glory is!

Two things make up God’s glory: His presence and His character! The essence of God’s character is goodness.

We should be good. Not worldy good, but Godly good. The Greek word for righteousness literally means equity of character which is to possess all of Christ’s character in perfection and perfect balance.

The World’s Good and God’s Good

The world’s idea of good is that a mother has a bill of rights, which includes the right to choose abortion. But God’s idea of good is sanctity of life, which includes not murdering, and not murdering a fetus. So you can say that life is greater is choice.

Or the world’s idea is that “do what you want as long as your don’t hurt anybody else” -- but God says that the absence of hurting someone isn’t good -- you must help people -- that is good. You have a responsibility to serve others.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjxXc_e_qpI

God’s righteousness is expresses in the ten commandments and then summarised by Jesus in  the double commandment of loving God and loving our neighbour! The first commandment [Ex 20] is, You shall have no other gods before me -- equating to loving God and then commandments 2 -- 10 are about loving your neighbour.

This law is written on our hearts. As believers in Christ by faith this work is represented as already been accomplished. The Holy Spirit then undertakes the work of accomplishing Christ’s character in perfection and balance a practical reality in our life. By His Spirit God communicates to us the spirit of that same law which is defined in the Old Testament.

Look at what Peter says in 2Pet 1:

2 May God give you more and more grace and peace as you grow in your knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord. 3 By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvellous glory and excellence. 4 And because of his glory and excellence, he has given us great and precious promises. These are the promises that enable you to share his divine nature and escape the world’s corruption caused by human desires.  5 In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises. Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, 6 and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness, 7 and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone.  8 The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 But those who fail to develop in this way are shortsighted or blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their old sins. 10 So, dear brothers and sisters, work hard to prove that you really are among those God has called and chosen. Do these things, and you will never fall away. 11 Then God will give you a grand entrance into the eternal Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

This is a step by step process -- adding one thing on another.

It truth that whatever you are yoked to in life you carry the burden of. So when Paul says do not be unequally yoked -- he means you need to know the character of what you are yoked to because it will become your burden that you will carry. And whatever you are not designed to carry will spill over into your mind, emotions and body -- it will age you / cause you mental pain of worry and anxiety / depress you / make you sick and diseased.

So Jesus says take my yoke upon you because my yoke is easy and my burden is light because Jesus knew that whatever you are yoked to in life you are burdened with and He didn’t come to burden us with what we could not bear.

We had an incredible evening last night at the Vision Carrier Awards. Above are just some of the photos of our teams at The River.

If you’re on Facebook, you can see this album here.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xf8QIEmDbkE

Marion Meyers Speaks with Celia Bowring about CARE.

The CARE campaign focuses on human trafficking for sexual exploitation – tackling the demand for prostitution, ensuring that trafficking survivors are given adequate care and protection, and raising awareness of the issue.

“We have to be continually reminded of what we believe. Neither this belief nor any other will automatically remain alive in the mind. It must be fed. And as a matter of fact, if you examined a hundred people who had lost their faith in Christianity, I wonder how many of them would turn out to have reasoned out of it by honest argument? Do not most people simply drift away?” – C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

In the light of C.S. Lewis’ thought as a pastor I’ve been examining the reason why people leave our churches and why ministers walk out of the ministry. The vast majority don’t leave because they have been reasoned to. They leave because of something that happens with more subtlety in their lives and yet is very effective in the hands of an enemy that delights in isolating us from our spiritual family and Godly community.

I’ve outlined 4 things that I see:

Temptations

This is the easiest one of all because the enemy uses our own lusts of the flesh to pull us away from the life of God. So we drift away…

Tests and Trials

Sometimes we go through tests and trials that simply overwhelm us to the point of despondency and despair. The nature of tests and trials is that it isolates us and makes us think that we are the only ones going through this. We believe lies that no-one else really cares. So we drift away to medicate our wounds at an ‘old’ watering hole that used to feed us before we came to Christ, to help refresh us from burnout ad depression.

Tragedy

Tragedy comes in many different forms – from sickness and disease, accidents, financial ruin to divorce or death. Unless we are schooled in the Word that says God is good – all the time – we are left with too many questions  about His love, faithfulness, presence and power, and no answers. Because He did not step in and save the day. So we drift away…

Triumph

The opposite of tragedy yet just as effective. Our victories, triumphs and prosperity feed self with an illusion that we are now free from what was vexing us and we now alright. We forget that freedom always comes with responsibility. This ‘comfort zone’ medicates self-sufficiency to the point of not needing the arm and hand of God in our lives and as pride creeps in we drift away…

Interesting to note that both the Lover and enemy of our souls both use the same thing but with different objectives. God desires to strengthen us while satan wants to weaken and destroy us.

Next time you or some-one in your church is confronted by one of these think about how you can help them through to stand firm.

The second in our 2010 Leadership Training Curriculum, on the subject of being a 360° leader

He was asked to teach at a large worship training seminar in Ghana, and seeing the incredible passion and exuberance that worshippers exuded in Ghana, he went to the Lord to ask what he could actually even teach them. The level of worship seemed to be greater than in the West, where people were much more reserved and tended to spectate rather than participate. God led him to study some Old Testament examples of worship, and as a result, he learnt about the “pageantry of worship”.

Yes, the Ghanaian worship teams that would hear him speak were passionate. But there was an area on which he could teach and impart. They had poor instruments, poor sound equipment, and adopted an unrehearsed approach.

Yes, worship is about the heart.

Before you start fuming at me, yes, worship is about the heart. And their hearts were right. If the heart isn’t right, it doesn’t matter if you are playing a heavily orchestrated arrangement through stadium speakers. The heart attitude is fundamental. But moving on from that, God is creative, detailed, and highly accomplished. And we should be displaying the excellencies of Christ (1 Peter 2:9).
Ron Kenoly’s teaching revolves around the progression of worship in the Old Testament. It goes like this:

1. There was no praise whilst the Hebrews were slaves in Egypt, just complaining.
2. As Moses led them into freedom, he also led them in song. Singers and dancers with tambourines joined in. (Exodus 15)
3. When they faced Jericho, God gave specific plans for how they should play and shout. And they upgraded to the use of more complex instruments – trumpets. (Joshua 6)
4. King David and the priests learned that the presence of God must never be treated casually. God gave specific instructions for how the praise team (Levites) would be built and structured, and the music arranged with multiple instruments: lyres, harps and cymbals. Costumes, music and dance were all a part of praise. (1 Chronicles 15)
5. King David then appointed skilled musicians to minister regularly in the tabernacle. Now praise was turned into a constant lifestyle, not an event. David also encouraged song writing and challenged the people to lift up their hands. (1 Chronicles 16)
6. As the new temple was completed, King Solomon commissioned the best singers and musicians to deliver the greatest processional the nation had ever seen. One hundred and twenty trumpeters, with many singers, all dressed in priestly attire, singing and playing as one. Any musician will tell you that playing as one requires a) musicians and singers of great skill, and b) LOTS of rehearsals. (2 Chronicles 5)

So, of course the first step is getting the heart right. But after that, where are you going to go? Just like everything else with God, what’s on the inside manifests on the outside. How is your excellent heart going to produce an excellent experience for others? Production, scripting, performance-technique, dress-codes and dress rehearsals are not dirty words. Use them.

UPDATE: As Scott points out below, the rehearsed method might be relevant for large church services, but it isn’t always in smaller, less formal gatherings. Also, just to clarify that our Ghanaian team members absolutely rock. It just happened to be the example he used.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZGkgSERtkg

Jesus is the revelation of God to us. When we want to know what God is like, we can just look at Jesus!

John 1:14 So the Word became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father’s one and only Son.

We see many people shout “glory” or “God you’re glorious”, but what is the Glory of God? What is God like? Who is he? This verse 14 tells us that there are two elements that make up God’s glory:

His presence = So the Word became human and made His home among us.
His character = He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness.

What is God’s character?

the inherent (built in) group of attributes that determines a person’s ethical and moral actions and reactions.

In other words, the decisions that we make on a daily basis are are not made up in the moment of time, but made according to our character. Sometimes, we make decisions that are our of our character -- this isn’t necessarily good or bad -- but it is when we do something that we wouldn’t normally to. Perhaps

Sometimes we make decisions that are out of character and surprise us. Not consistent with who I am or who I think I am -- bc sometimes our choices and decisions reveal a part of our character that we did not know was there.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuLoKzkAEhs

God however, never makes any decisions out of character because He never changes, He is always the same. James 1:17 says:

Whatever is good and perfect comes down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow!

So: God is good -- all the time. Good God is! God is not good today and then not good tomorrow! He is good all the time. We can’t judge God on a give and get basis like we judge other humans on our human plane!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXXUHwHuDtk

Romans 8:28 says that all things work together for the good of those who love God. How times have we had to experience things in life that we didn’t like but were good for us?

God’s goodness is expressed in two ways:

1) His holiness, and
2) His love.

These two attributes balance and assist God from ever being in a moral dilemma.

God’s holiness is His separateness from all that is evil. God’s holiness is His separation from anything that is conspiratorial, seditious, oppressive, dominating, (domination is self-serving and oppressive). So God’s holiness is an expression of His goodness in His separation from all that is bad, wicked, evil. He is holy.

But God’s goodness is also expressed through His love. It is through God’s love that He can be sacrificial because love is the desire to benefit the one loved at the expense of self. So love -- God’s love -- is self-sacrificing. God is not only good but God is also love. Love is an expression of God’s goodness. His love comes out of His goodness and that is why He cannot ever have evil intention toward us.

God’s love is not lust. Love gives at one’s own expense. Lust gets at others expense.

Because God is holy and separate from sin he cannot have a relationship with anyone or anything that is sinful. It’s not that He wont -- it’s that He cannot! So sin separates us from God because God is holy. When Adam sinned that sin separates from God. Because of God’s holiness He cannot be identified with evil, sin. Is 59: It’s your sins that have cut you off from God. Because of your sins, he has turned away and will not listen anymore. So sin separated Adam from holiness.

But although it separated him from God’s holiness because God’s goodness is also expressed in love it did not separate him from God’s goodness. Because although God could not relate to man out of His holiness He could relate to sinful man though His love. So what man lost through sin God could counter-balance that through loving that man and sacrificing Jesus Christ for that man’s sin so that man could be restored to God’s holiness and also His full goodness.

So holiness put me out, but love brought me back!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjA3ruVy0Xc

• Some evangelists mission statements revolve around winning the lost, proclaiming the gospel and reaching the unchurched
• Other ministries believe our mission to bring society back to God’s original order and design for their lives

But when we listen to the words of Jesus, as in Matt 22:35-40:

A lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, 36″Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?” 37Jesus said to him, “”You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38This is the first and great commandment. 39And the second is like it: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ 40On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

What is the goal of church? The the increase in our culture in the love of God and the love of our neighbour.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ykigmj9zN4A

If you want to see a great life in action, this is it -- a life living for the love of God and their neighbour. Any other life is inferior to this -- the pursuit of fame, the pursuit of wealth and material possessions, the desire for emotional fulfillment, or even a purpose driven life.

This goal runs throughout the whole Bible

The first commandment was “you will love the Lord your God”, and then the next 9 laws were all about the love of your neighbour. God’s idea with Israel was not for them to a nation that would help other nations and strangers -- not an arrogant and proud nation. The idea was people would look at Israel, see how they helped and loved on the world, and say “hey, I want that!”

It’s impossible to think about God and not think about His love for mankind. John 3:16 is that well known scripture that says “For God so loved the world.” We understand that the value and meaning of life hangs entirely on a relationship with God.

A society that does away with God does away with the value and meaning of life. Long ago, life in a mother’s womb lost all legal right and meaning. Euthanasia is being passed as law as life decreases in value.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOBfuHEaRFU

The love of God and neighbour may start with just a smile and the sharing of bread, but it goes to the core of our nation.

Capital Punishment is abhorrent to a Christian because it is saying that the blood of Christ as a limit and can’t help some people.

1 John says that if we do not love our neighbour, whom we can see, how can we love God, whom we haven’t see? Mother Teresa famously said that in every unloveable person, she saw God.

The reason why we find this hard is because we are often waiting for the emotion before we act. Rather, we must act, and then the emotion will follow. If we don’t act, then we fail in fulfilling the commandment of God.

I certainly think that we need to understand the media and technology we are using and think them through. Doing an internet campus just because everyone else is doing is foolishness – but then again, so is doing anything just because others are doing it.

The contradiction I find around this area from those who oppose interweaving the Christian message with modern technology and media is that the Church’s history has always been one of using technology.

The epistles were letters, written letters being a technology, and one that grated against the oral tradition of the Jews.) How about the musical instruments used to praise and worship God throughout the bible (all technology), the building of altars (technology) and the tools used to build them (technology) upon which sacrifices were made to God, or even the incredible skill and technology we see that goes into both the Tabernacle (Exodus 31) and the Temple (1 Kings 6)?

Even in Revelation 21, there is a new Jerusalem. Heaven records instruments, bowls, seals, clothing, buildings. The message is clear: God is not adverse to technology. Even He himself is a craftsman who made the things that are seen from the things that are not seen.

In fact, right from Genesis we see technology when God makes Adam and Eve garments of skin. From Wikipedia:

Technology is the usage and knowledge of tools, techniques, and crafts, or is systems or methods of organization, or is a material product (such as clothing) of these things. The word technology comes from the Greek technología (τεχνολογία) — téchnē (τέχνη), ‘craft’ and -logía (-λογία)

In The Last TV Evangelist, Phil Cooke recalls how Hollywood was actually pioneered by the church. Much of the TV we enjoy today was pioneered in the 30s and 40s by the church. In my work around the world I continually find innovators in Social Media are Christians. Why is this? Because as Christians we are the ones with the creativity of God to build things that have not been seen before.

When I look at the incredible power that TV and films now have, and how they shape thought and teach morality in the place that the Church used to hold in society, I realise that each innovation in technology must be sized by the church. If not, we fail.

Pastor Marion says that recently she attended a number of funerals after having none to attend for many years. Being at each of these she realised how important life is, and how you have greater clarity of this when you face the transition from death to eternal life. In John 17, Jesus prays his last recorded prayer, and His focus in this moment of clarity runs to relationship. It runs to achieving greatness through people, for people.

We need to have greater relationships -- in both quality and quantity. We should have, as Pastor Michael says, “ever increase circles of love.” We are not called to be an exclusive group of people!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=u25MK67840I

When we look at each of the people with the talents -- we see that greatness is internal before it’s external. The person with the 5 and the two 2 talents, the scripture records as “immediately” going to invest and trade with their abilities. But the person with the 1 talent was diminished, and rather than immediately going, they had a small view of themselves.

What are the mindsets of greatness?

1. Your mindset prejudges. Before the person with the 1 talent even starts, they’ve decided to hide their talent.

When we hear about the wind of the Spirit being behind The River Church and pushing us forward, Mr 5 Talent and Mr 2 Talent get behind the vision. They are already seeing how they get involved and go with the wind. But Mr 1 Talent gets an attitude and begins to hide behind excuses -- without even understanding that their abilities!

2. Our mindset determines our attitude. With some people, we can see their attitude a mile off and know they won’t get involved.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=eORCX3d2qlM

Mr 1 Talent was even going to try and do what he’d been asked to do. He’d failed before he started because of his mindset. These people are the same victims that, without sowing, expect to reap all the benefits. They say “why doesn’t anyone want to spend time with me”, the reality is that you have to sow relationship in the first place to reap relationship!

What gives these people away is the phrase, “Yes, but.” They have a big but for everything and it gives them away. This attitude sabotages our greatness and the greatness that we can achieve for others!

Mr 1 Talent was fearful. This fear keeps us from even geting out of the starting block.

3. Our mindset sets our exceptions. If you expect nothing, you’ll get nothing! Pastor Marion always says “turn your expectors on!”

God does not work in an environment of fear but in an environment of faith and expectation. Hebrews 11:1 says that “Faith is the substance of all things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen.”

4. Our mindset governs our behaviour. Pastor Marion says that “Words do not define reality -- behaviour does.”

www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZLDMYZvCPY

If someone tells you they love you, but they are being mean, nasty and manipulative, you must realise that their words are not defining reality -- their behaviour is!

It’s not good enough to say we love God but then not invite anyone to Church! What we say and what we do are contradictory!

We are thrilled to show you the front cover of Pastor Marion’s follow up book to the ABCs of Emotions. Being released at Touch 10, The ABCs Of Relationships is full of wisdom, insight and truth to help you have fruitful and whole relationships!

The ABCs of Relationships will be £9.99 and available for pre-order soon!

These words in his final prayer are still powerful today! These words are all about relationships -- about the ones that had been given to Him, that His disciples would stay close, and for the further relationships that the disciples will have.

What we’ve discussed so far

Last week, we spoke about the shift from Excellence into Greatness. We are not forsaking excellence, but building greatness on top of it.

We said last week that, among other things, Excellence can lead to pride but Greatness should lead to humility. Excellence is internal, but Greatness is external.

This week I want to continue and bring a new point:

• Excellence is an end in itself => Greatness has no end and sees excellence as a means to keep on serving

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dn9_y14PwyI

Excellence is an event -- an end in itself. Once we’ve achieved it, that’s it! But Greatness is a process -- it keeps on going -- it has no end. It sees every event as part of the process.

Take marriage as an example. Just because you spent lots of money on the wedding day doesn’t mean that that’s it and you’re marriage is going to go well. You must have process -- greatness!

And this is the point -- you have never finished with greatness in your marriage -- your always pursuing and moving towards it.

In fact, you can have an awesome wedding day but a terrible marriage! It’s the same with bringing a friend to church. Just because they liked the service doesn’t mean that’s it! You need to follow them up and keep in touch with them!

Excellence is only an event. Process is before, during and after

One of the four timeless fundamentals of greatness is a relentless pursuit for growth and progress.

If at the end of the year we haven’t grown our church then the same chairs that are empty will show us that we’ve not relentlessly pursued growth!

Another point on this, when we think about events as opposed to process, is that excellence can be very rude, but greatness always puts people first.

When ‘excellence gets broken’, we reveal our bad attitudes. It doesn’t matter how good things are, if someone breaks what we’ve done, we still need to put that person first.

Pastor tells a story of his mother who kept the house so clean that him and his three brothers couldn’t play in that home:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=bonB6wJm4ps

Have you ever been to a museum? Excellence can be cold, removed, uncaring, and non-involved. Two of our fundamentals are that we need strength beyond one person, and to make it all about people.

It is all about people. Making people a core value means we place them at the centre of everything we do. That’s greatness!

We used to say that when people come to our church and they see how excellently we do things, they’ll stay. The fact that we have empty chairs shows that this thinking is wrong. Now we understand that people will come where they are valued and served.

Please express my appreciation to the WIT leading ladies and especially
Pastor Marion for your love and hospitality.  Thank you for affording me the
opportunity to minister at the conference, I was blessed as much as the ladies
present.

May all of you (The Beloved of God) continue to grow in the grace and the knowledge
of Jesus our only Lord and Master.

God bless
Roji

Anyway, can I say a great big thank you to you and your team for making the Drive Conference a wonderful and memorable experience.  Our ladies thoroughly enjoyed the time we spent with you all and came away blessed and changed by the ministry which we all received.

The teaching given was excellent and life changing.  The worship was such a wonderful gateway into His presence.  The Joy was palpable.  And the car !  We all had a really great time in the presence of the Lord and learnt and experienced soooo much.

To follow through with the saga of the car.  Kay felt that is was right that she give the car away.  She said she was sowing this blessing into the lives of her children.  When she came back her daughter, who lives in Sheffield,  came to her and asked for prayer as she had not been sleeping  and getting her life together was a struggle.  Kay prayed for her and she had been sleeping well since.  As Kay and her husband were Christians whne the divorce happened this had confused the children and they have become astranged from the Lord.  Kay, with her newfound confidence and joy in the Lord,  is a great witness to her children because they saw just how hurt she was.  We continue to pray into the situation with Kay.  Just the very fact that she had been CHOSEN (not only to win the car), had made her feel so special and loved.  Thank you providing the platform from which this blessing has sprung.

I pray that the blessing you have given to those at the conference will return to you and your ministry with an abundance that only can come from God.  I give no limit for our God is limitless.

Once again, thank you on behalf of all our ladies who, by the way, were planning next year’s conference trip on the way home.

Give our love to all the girls, you are all beautiful  Daughters of  the King.

With much love and many blessings

Annie

Once again thank you. Love and blessings to you and Olav

Rose

With Love

Pam x

Kind regards, God bless you and your family

Louise

Here are the photos from our second Singles’s Day!

For many years, we’ve built our church on excellent. We’ve not built it on mediocrity because we don’t have a mediocre God! Our God is an excellent God!

But in understanding more about excellent, pastor says he realised that “Excellence wasn’t a core value of Jesus -- He was excellent”

The thing was excellence is that we can get very proud about it. Excellence is a tool to achieve greatness -- if not, excellence goes to pride, but greatness goes to humility and service.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkrrdwhBFno

When someone asks you to help them, but someone asks “can you help me?”, pride will respond with “but I was going to…” Humility and greatness, however, doesn’t think about self as much as it thinks about you!

Here’s some points about Excellence from Greatness:

• Excellence goes to pride => Greatness goes to humility/serving/relationship
• Excellence is Internal => Greatness is External -- it reaches others and is embracing
• Excellence is an end in itself => Greatness has no end and sees excellence as a means to keep on serving
• Excellence is short term => Greatness is long term
• Excellence is only in the event or occasion => Greatness is in the process before, during and after
• Excellence can be rude to people => Greatness puts people first
• Excellence is Exclusive => Greatness is inclusive
• Excellence says you cant do this because I can do it better => Greatness gives you a go.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBsUrkMuJkY

We are moving on from excellence. We are not leaving excellence, but we are building upon it.

You might think I’m talking about the world, but I’m not. There are bullies in the church.

As in the marketplace, these ‘church’ bullies, whether they are ministers or support staff, are lauded because they ‘get results’. As the late Jamie Buckingham noted, no-one cares or chooses to mention the spent trail of human carcasses that are left strewn in the wake of these ego-maniacs in Christian organizations. On whose backs these kingdoms are built!Bullies in the church are often more subtle and insidious in their approach than the brutish playground bully, but their mental and emotional punches are no less belittling and demeaning. These sociopaths that hold positions of power in church offices are supposed to be adults that display some baseline Christ-like character and meet some minimum biblical requirements to fill that office. They are supposed to be mature adults-Christians, not sanctified mafiosa!

It seems to me today that just as in Jesus time there is little difference between the world and the religious church.

The bullying, conniving, insidious reasoning, legal loophole jumping was veiled behind a religious facade that murdered Christ with ‘clean hands’. So they do today in the church world to further corporate aims and ambitions. At least the world has an integrity to their fallen nature where-as the bullies in church are the genuine hypocrites rather than their fake worldly counterparts. Jesus called them vipers because the forked tongue will pray, praise and posture godliness while the other side of the tongue will destroy you like the cold-blooded serpent it really is.

An Infection In The Church

The ambitious spirit of the world that has infected the church is the kingmaker attitude that has more care and concern for results, numbers and the bottom line than for people. While we are supposed to see Christ in every person and treat them accordingly, the bullies will think nothing of sacrificing you on the altar under the cross for a bigger church, more money or a bigger and better facility – and sincerely believe that they are doing Christ a favour. These bullies couldn’t care less about the human carnage they leave in their wake because they see the stream of ambitious fodder lining up and waiting to be fed off to further their aims. This is the reason the bully is hired in the first place.

And the Christian employers who employ worldly business practices together with church business bullies appease the appointment of such men because every organisation needs a rabid dog or two to keep everyone in line! Right? Ephesians 2:2 in The Message tells us:

“You let the world, which doesn’t know the first thing about living, tell you how to live.”

We cannot get information about life from darkness! The ambition-driven console themselves in the fact that many organisations in the world completely bereft of the Spirit of God need a ‘whip’ to ensure party discipline and so adopt the same ungodly methodology in the church world. Copying the world does not grow the church!

Excuses for Bad Behaviour

I’ve seen these church bullies use this detestable, borderline psychopathic, behaviour to further their own aims and objectives ‘for the kingdom’ and then excuse and deflect with some higher moral ground justification.

Recently our prime-minister has tried to spin his alleged bullying of some No. 10 staff as the behaviour of a mature man who is ‘strong willed’ and ‘very determined’. Bullies in the church are master craftsmen of this type of spin. Spin from the power-drunk like (and I know you’ve heard them before, as I have):

• “being focused on the building the church/kingdom”,
• “just really passionate”,
• “must do my job”,
• “God wants me to bear fruit”,
• “I care too much”
• and my all-time best – “I really do love people”.

Note to bullies: the only one you’re kidding is yourself. Everyone else knows you’re a jackass – even if you’re furthering their or their organizations aims. Most of all, God sees!

One thing is certain, while you are going the same way as these bullies they will seem to be ‘the nicest, most godly and spiritual’ people you know. You may even get some warm feelings. While you may catch glimpses of the trail of human carnage in the wake of their power wielding you will choose to be blind to it because you are the benefactor of their grace and favour – for now. But cross them and woe to you. Your chosen blindness to overlook and excuse and minimise will have been to your own detriment.

Stunted

Bullies in the church lack emotional and spiritual intelligence. They may ‘get results’ and win but in doing so they have lost. No-one really respects them because they break people instead of the issue at hand. Emotionally intelligent leaders and administrators respond with care and maturity to other’s emotions which is better for church business, spiritual life and long term productivity.

Leader’s who display higher EQ’s prove to be better team players, better at serving people [and church is all about serving people], better at leadership and more trusted to take people through change [the church is certainly a change agent].

The best way to deal with a bully is to stand up to them. I took my mother’s advice at school and dealt with the bully. When you are no longer intimidated by them or fear them or what they can do then your freedom makes you uncontrollable. And bullies will do anything to control. Let’s declare war on the church bullies by just not caring any more about their threats of what they can/cannot do to us. Be free!

Thanks for reading. Perhaps you’ve met some bullies that you can share some wisdom on too?
Michael

P.S. This post does not detract from good leaders having to take forceful action and being supported by a skilled team. We all know that sometimes discipline must come!

If you can’t see these photos, click here.

Africa Nite again raised the RDC roof!

Our third annual Africa Nite last Saturday was an incredible success as 250 high profile members from our community joined us at the River for a night of celebration around Africa.

The fundraising efforts for our supported cause – the Kondanani Orphanage – were supported by Unicef, and together we raised over £670 to aid them in their work with AIDS orphans in Malawi.

Thank you to all who were involved, and every worker in the house who helped us achieve an evening of greatness!

Greatness goes to servanthood. It is directly correlated to people. This is what Jesus mean when he said “he who desires to be great among you must be the servant of all.”

Jesus was great. He served people. Religion wants to say ‘you must be a doormat’ -- but it doesn’t say we must be servile, we must be servants.

How you serve determines your greatness. Greatness goes beyond excellence!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1pZ81_XUBA

The first thing to you need to fulfil greatness is:

1. A Core Set Of Values

Values are those things that you stand for, are willing to die for, and unwilling to negotiate on.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=mumS-a2PDdc

What you appreciate will increase in value.

There is a difference between values and a value system. Values are what you prize and stand for. A values system is how you order them. People might share your values, but have them in a different place in their value system.

2. A Core Purpose

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Es4W0igX8ZM

Why are you here? What is there that you are here to do?

3. You Must Have A Relentless Drive For Progress And Growth

Paul said “Where Sin abounds, Grace abounds all the more” -- there is an abundance, abounding amounts, growth, progress, increase. Paul also said “God gives the increase.”

When you begin to pursue growth -- when you have an insatiable appetite for God -- then people will try to detract it from you. You fire convicts them and makes them uncomfortable.

Pastor Michael recalls how after a Sunday service, he doesn’t go home and switch off. He’s listening to his friends service in America. He’s reading up on Bible notes. He’s thinking about the church and growth. A relelentless drive!

What is excellent on one level is mediocre on another.

• You must have the attitude: This isn’t enough.
• You must have the attitude: There is more.
• You must not have plateaus -- just rest!
• You can’t grow in isolation - you grow in community.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFcGmjOvbv8

Every person has three basic needs: intimacy with God, intimacy with each other, and self-worth. If you don’t find these things in the right place, you end up looking for them elsewhere, outside of God and church.

To grow:

1. Time (intentionally sitting, waiting on and listening to Him)
2. Transparency (saying, “Here I am, as I am”)
3. Submission (yielding, surrendering and cooperating with God)
4. Consistency (a day by day effort)

Pastor Michael says, “Our first steps are to acknowledge the need to grow, realise that you want to grow, and decide that you will grow”

4. Strength Beyond Any One Person

One is too small a number to achieve greatness. Longevity requires perpetuation.

• If you want a great family, you need a spouse.
• If you want a great church, you need members and helpers.
• If you want a great business, you need partners and employees.

Now in those days, when the number of the disciples was multiplying, there arose a complaint against the Hebrews by the Hellenists, because their widows were neglected in the daily distribution. Then the twelve summoned the multitude of the disciples and said, “It is not desirable that we should leave the word of God and serve tables. Therefore, brethren, seek out from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business; but we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word.”
And the saying pleased the whole multitude. And they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit, and Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas, a proselyte from Antioch, whom they set before the apostles; and when they had prayed, they laid hands on them.
Then the word of God spread, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests were obedient to the faith.

Jesus said something about the Holy Spirit -- He said that when the wind blows, you don’t know where it’s from or where it’s going, but you can see and feel it’s effect. When you say “look at the wind”, what you are seeing is the effect of the wind, not the actual wind.

When we talk about fake and real, the difference is that if we shake a tree, we can’t say it’s the wind. But if the wind is truly blowing the tree, it will shake. When people try to ‘create’ the effect of the Holy Spirit it is fake.

This passage from Acts ends in verse 7 with what is the effect of the Holy Spirit -- the effect of the wind blowing. What I want to discuss is, where is the wind in this passage?

We Are Talking About Greatness

www.youtube.com/watch?v=0--l29ow4uE

Three gospels record Jesus saying “the greatest among you is the one that serves.” We talked in Vision 2010 about what are the components of greatness.

A lot of people are trying to be great -- but they are doing it a vacuum. Their claims to greatness don’t line up with their actions. They say they want to be great, but they are rude. They’ll try to excuse it by saying “I’m just really focussed”, but Jesus accomplished true greatness by serving all. He didn’t choose who to serve -- he served all -- even to the point of serving those who murdered him!

God wants us to build greatness -- but it doesn’t happen if we are the ones shaking the tree!

Do We Want To Be Great?

Jesus lifted up greatness as a value, hence he said “the greatest among you is the one that serves.” Too many Christians are hiding in false humility that says we shouldn’t have a great effect, but Jesus said we should.

Right now the world is crazy over reality TV programmes. Who is the best singer, the best dancer, the best opera singer, the best housemate? This is just the world reflecting what is a human instinct -- to be great -- to excel.

It is the way that we accomplish greatness as Christians that differs from the world. We must accomplish greatness with humility and service, not pride and boasting.

How To Be Great

These are the two conditions of greatness: service and humility.

God wants to break down our walls of preference and prejudice that keep us from serving all. Pastor Michael recalls a story of going to Germany and being invited to visit old prison camps from World War II. Pastor Michael’s response was that he didn’t want to go there and feel the anger and hatred that he might feel towards those involved -- he wanted to guard his heart.

When the believers began to break down their preference and prejudice:

• the Word of God began to spread,
• the number of disciples multiplied greatly,
• a great many believed.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7G7hvAar_c

We’re really excited about our third annual Africa Nite on Saturday 20th March. Check out the video above to see what it’s all about!

We’ve got a whole mini-site dedicated to Africa Nite, with all the details you need, as well as some info about Kodanani Orphanage that we are supporting and photos from last year’s Africa Nite. You can see it all here.