Yesterday was a fasting day. I was in the prayer room during the 4-6 set, taking in all the sights and sounds of a few hundred Jesus lovers gathered to cry out for mercy and pour their hearts out at His feet. I took note of my posture as I was observing the Lord moving on various people in the room. Standing up, I had one hand in my pocket and another grasping an Ozarka water bottle. For a brief moment I had a flashback of myself in this same physical posture at a show in perhaps Dallas or Little Rock, a Bud Lite or a Heineken in hand enjoying the idolization and glorification of the talent of human beings… not to mention the seduction of rampant immorality in these bars and clubs.
Now, I do have to mention that I don’t think there’s anything wrong with having fun and enjoying an art form. I have been to shows that have actually inspired me to love God more (though these were performances by Christian bands) and it wasn’t just words but music that awakened something in me.
I think of King Herod in Acts 12 “On the appointed day Herod, wearing his royal robes, sat on his throne and delivered a public address to the people. They shouted, “This is the voice of a god, not of a mere mortal.” Immediately , because Herod did not give praise to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died.”
Not that audiences in most concerts are shouting at the muscians “You MUST be a god!” (though I have to mention that some of them do scream things similar to this), but the majority of bands are completely idolized for their talent. If you think about the hundreds of women (whom most of the musicians take advantage of) that follow them from town to town, this might conclude some of your questions. What about the posters plastered all over the walls of teenage bedrooms? These kinds of things don’t happen to normal folks.
What I love about IHOP is that when outside people visit, more often than not, most of the people don’t have any idea who is playing on stage. They haven’t come to oooh and ahhhh over the musicians (though they might respect the gift God has given them), they have come to seek the living God.
Sometimes I wonder if I should be like Lou and just chill at IHOP 24/7. During fasts I sort of feel like I live here. I never get to see my apartment. Today Dale thought I was moving in. I had 3 bags containing my laptop, two kinds of juices and an exorbitant amount of books including two different Bible translations.
I’ve noticed in the last week or so that people seem to be smiling much more in the prayer room. In fact, in the prayer room last night, a total of four people, out of nowhere, volantarily and SINCERELY smiled at me as if they actually were glad to see me.
I was stunned.
I was so stunned I didn’t know what to do with myself. How do I react? Is it okay to smile back at someone in the prayer room? Is that kosher?
I think we need to make this a new precedent in the prayer room. I think we should smile at eachother more often. We are the body of Christ, you know. We should like eachother.
And trust me, I know. I’m the choir that I’m preaching to. I don’t smile often while I’m in the prayer room. In fact, people have told me that they have been scared of me when I get in my whole pacing routine. But that’s gonna change, baby.
I’m going to be a smiler. One of these days it’s going to become easy to make people feel appreciated, loved and welcome at IHOP.
Filed under: Art, Fear of the Lord, House of Prayer, Prophecy, Purity, Sin, Spirit of the Age, The Arts
It has been a somber yet clear and beautiful day after Mike’s exhortation yesterday during the staff meeting. Actually, I don’t know if exhortation is the right word… but I’m very grateful for Mike’s leadership and I’m grateful for the leadership of the Holy Spirit who prompted Mike to give this word of correction. There is nothing more destructive to the body of Christ than sexual immorality. It not only affects our own hearts but it affects the hearts of those we love. Trust me on this when I say that it can absolutely DESTROY the hearts of those that you have made vows with.
One thing, specifically, that I felt the Lord highlighting in my heart was the secular media. I have felt the pang of guilt as I watched a show on TV or watched a movie that was not particularly pure. Why am I watching something that Jesus would clearly frown on? We can make all the excuses we want by saying that we can’t seclude ourselves from the world and “we are in the world but not of it” but the truth of the matter is Jesus might go to a movie if it were today but He definitely wouldn’t sit through a bed scene or laugh at the raunchy humor of an effeminate charector. He wouldn’t consider a promiscuous couple to be “cute”. He wouldn’t embrace wickedness like we do when we let ourselves be entertained by it.
Art and film are beautiful things. I LOVE a well-made, well-written film. That’s why when the Lord started speaking to me last night during the meeting, things began to click in my head. Consider this a prophetic word… blog-style. Once we take the position of severing our connection with wickedness and embracing righteousness… God will honor it. How will he honor it? By filling the void that we think we have with divinely-inspired creativity… which can only be the best kind of creativity. I don’t think the believing community has done a great job with asking the Holy Spirit for ideas for higher-level artistic expression. It’s already inside of us, we just need to tap into it. IHOP has been prophesied over that we will be producing films… so let’s start believing God’s promises about this and not use the world for inspiration. Let’s use Him!
Filed under: Biblical love, Communing with the Holy Spirit, Grace, Healing, House of Prayer, Intimacy with God, Jesus Loves Me
It feels like the week of freedom. As I’m waiting to hear back from my Aunt who is in Redding California right now getting healed of cancer, I can hardly manage to contain myself with thoughts on how tender, merciful and compassionate Jesus is. I’ve been learning a lot about the freedom we have through the blood of Jesus and through the truth of the message of the Gospel. God has been giving me a lot of revelation… some through the Holy Spirit and some through others… about how to destroy the works of darkness that have held us in bondage since childhood. It is actually very simple. Through intimacy with the Maker of Heaven.
The unsettling truth is, many of us have strongholds that have held us down since childhood. It all started in a moment when words of rejection were spoken, we were touched in a wrong way… it could have really been a number of things… and since we were children we didn’t understand our innocence in the situation… we just believed a lie about ourselves and about God. This is when the enemy decided to take advantage of us and create a stronghold in our lives that would last until adulthood. As I’ve had moments of breakthrough in this area this week, nothing has been really formulated enough to actually articulate.
Today in the prayer room (during Misty’s 2-4, of course) I suddenly caught a stream of thoughts running through my head. A wave of rejection came over me and suddenly I heard clear voice in the midst of the chaos of lies. It said to me “that’s not true, Brooke.” Suddenly, I had a flash-back to a couple of moments in my childhood that I had filed back somewhere in my brain and sort of left alone. I remember at the time these words were spoken I really believed that I was a bad person but as an adult remembering the situation, it was an absolutely terrible thing to say to a pre-teen girl and had really no truth in it what-so-ever. The Holy Spirit began speaking truth to the lies I had believed and internalized all of these years. Lies telling me that I was a fraud, that I only worshiped God and spoke about Him constantly to get attention from others. These lies pushed me into a pattern of striving to earn God’s love all through-out my life and if I didn’t live perfectly than I would become consumed with shame. I was in the prayer room today actually concerned that as I was softly weeping in the presence God, others might think that I was conjuring something up, that the love I had wasn’t real. I had all kinds of accusation coming at me but the Holy Spirit broke in and spoke truth to me and I believe a lot of freedom was experienced today.
Praise God that we can be confident that no one knows our true motives and the thoughts and intentions of heart but Jesus, Himself. I don’t have anything to prove to anyone else, including Him.
Filed under: House of Prayer, Humility, Intimacy with God, Music, Prayer, Prophecy, Worship
Yesterday I was singing for a team at the JPR and we had what I thought was a fantastic set, though I tend to feel deeply insecure every time I walk off stage… I’m hoping that this will change over time. Anyway, I was all concerned that I had botched some things up but one of the guitar players started in on a very profound speech. He is also a guitar player for a popular team at the GPR so he’s pretty experienced, of course. He began to discuss the importance of being able to submit to what the Spirit of God is doing in the room during a set… to not just spout out scriptures because you think you have something good to say but to connect your heart with God and flow together in the Spirit with the rest of the team.
I’ve heard various singers say things like “singing is just like any other thing I do. It has the same emotional significance to me as doing the laundrey.” That just sounds really sad because to me, singing is prayer. At the same time, however, since I am a fairly new singer to IHOP and haven’t quite gotten accustomed to singing for reasons other than to pump my ego up, I struggle with not allowing my insecurities to overshadow what God is doing in my heart and in the hearts of the others in the room. I know this is a very easy reaction to have as a singer or musician.
Well, I have thought a lot about this speech since last night. The remedy? More soaking prayer. More prayer in general. More prayer room. And not only that but to remember that the reason I’m singing in the first place is to be more in love with Jesus and assist people, globally to be drawn away into a spiritual atmosphere where they can be more in love with Jesus as well.
It’s the same remedy we have when we are struggling with general prophecy. Prophetic singing obviously needs the prophetic spirit behind it. Prophetic singing isn’t just singing whatever comes to mind and having no heart connection to it at all. Prophetic singing is declaring, through music, what is on the heart of Jesus.
Last night I was in the prayer room for six hours on my night off. Since I’ve been part-time for awhile now, I thought that after six hours would seem longer than I could bear. I sang for four hours of the six and this of course helped, but I can’t say that I ever got tired of it.
I love prayer. I love the prayer movement. I love the prayer room.
I am starting to remember why I came here in the first place.
However, nothing comes close to prayer in my own bedroom alone, saying the things I can’t say to the Lord in a publicly broadcast room surrounded by hundreds of people. The prayer room is about offerings. The prayer closet is about intimacy and discerning the voice of God. It’s important that we have a life of prayer inside the prayer room but we can’t forget our prayer life OUTSIDE the prayer room, either.
Anyway, lately I’ve contemplating coming back full-time which would virtually eliminate any time to myself. I would have maybe 2 and half hours on the week days and one of the those hours would be spent cooking and eating. As I was about to make the decision to switch-over again, I decided to take that class at FSM which won’t allow me to go back full-time yet. I have a feeling that I’m not quite ready. That there are still some more things that God wants to do in this season. I need time to figure out my heart and what God wants to say to me and do in me. I need to finish this season of healing.
Filed under: Biblical love, House of Prayer, Intercession, Intimacy with God, Life in General, Maturity, Missions, Worship
As I am conisidering stepping out to have hot cocoa at my friend Lisa’s (though this week has just about knocked the wind out of me), I thought I might write one of those New Year’s blogs. A sort of… New Years letter detailing my many activities from 2007.
January. Spent the first week in Little Rock with my family and the second week with friends in Dallas before moving to Kansas City. Somehow I made it to KC after a 12 hour drive in an ice storm with no heater and a Volkswagon that was barely staying alive. I spent the next few weeks working at IHOP’s apartment complex, Herrnhut but this didn’t last long as the Lord clearly showed me that I was here to be an Intercessory Missionary… not an apartment complex secretary.
February, I became an official staff member at the International House of Prayer. Very exciting indeed. But as the month came to a close I felt the Lord begin sharpening me in some areas. I knew that I needed to get my act together and that something exciting was about to take place. As I began changing my schedule around, prioritizing some important areas of my life, God began to speak to me very clearly about my destiny, not just as an Intercessory Missionary but as a messenger. One afternoon, walking home from the prayer room I heard a very clear voice tell me I was going to the nations. The voice became more specific and I’m pretty sure I trembled the rest of the way home. That night I had one of the most powerful encounters with God that I have ever experienced. The next night followed with a surprise prophetic encounter with some people from Toronto that confirmed everything the Lord had told me the day before. Seven months later, in September, I found myself in England getting a vision, speaking to Houses of Prayer about my favorite thing in the world (talking to Jesus), sharing my journey… asking God a lot of questions and getting only one answer.
Since returning from this beautiful country I have felt that wrestling with God that Jacob knew. I’ve never felt more warfare in life than I have in the last four months. Things have been rough. I find myself becoming increasingly sensitive and fighting anger much more than I am use to. I’m tired of pettiness and elitism and snobbery and controversy. I just want to sit in silence for once and put walls around myself and never let a single person in. I don’t want to deal with the things God wants me to deal with because they are just too hard to face.
But there have been “ups” in these last few months that I am grateful for. I’m surrounded by a great community in the evening section and at the bookstore. My PR team is like family to me and we have a lot of fun together. Also, a couple of months ago I was approved to sing for the house which I am grateful for because the more I sing to my God, the more my heart expands and tenderizes. Singing is my favorite form of prayer… it’s intimate and sweet and it makes me come alive.
I’m very unsure of what the next step in my life is. I feel a little like I am on a seesaw. Should I do this? Should I do that? But the Lord isn’t telling me anything. Why? He likes me to squirm a little. He likes me to fight for my time with Him. He likes wrestling with me. He likes to see the effects of the work He is doing on my heart.
Well, not really. I mean it’s my birthday and honestly I have no weird feelings at the moment about turning 28 though it is slightly unnerving that I am getting close to 30. 30 is very scary to me.
Anyway, enough about that. Sunday I was suppose to sing on John Thurlow’s team but he missed his flight so Ryan Kondo led worship. This worked out to my advantage because the only other time that I have sung before was at the JPR with Ryan and so he put me smack in the front, which by the way is super scary if it’s your first time at the GPR. I kept seeing myself in that television screen and couldn’t help but complain in my head about how weird my hair looked. We sang one of my favorite Psalms, Psalm 91 which is all about the protection of the Lord.
My apartment is going to be pretty crowded during Onething while I’m staying in a cushy hotel room downtown. It’s a little scary leaving people in my house when I’m not there. My friend Nathan’s sister and her husband are staying there along with my friend Autumn who was one of my roommates in Dallas and possibly a few other folks who I hope don’t mind if they have to sleep on the floor. By the way, if you are going to Onething… be sure to register! Yes, I know it’s free but we need to know what to expect! After Onething, I plan on taking the week off and hanging out with Autumn who is one of my most favorite people. I can’t wait to show off this place.
I’m going to Little Rock again on Friday. I really don’t want to. I really just want to stay here but it would be incredibly depressing on Christmas without my family. I attempted to coerce them to come up here and stay for Onething but was not successful in my attempts.
I’m contemplating making a very big decision right now. I really really need to hear from the Lord about it. I have to keep reminding myself that it’s not going to kill me if I choose rightly.
Filed under: Bible Study, Faith, House of Prayer, Intimacy with God, Jesus Loves Me, Purity, Worship
And he said: “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.(Matthew 18:3)
Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 18:4)
And whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me.(Matthew 18:5)
When those who were carrying the ark of the LORD had taken six steps, he sacrificed a bull and a fattened calf. David, wearing a linen ephod, danced before the LORD with all his might, while he and the entire house of Israel brought up the ark of the LORD with shouts and the sound of trumpets.(2 Samuel 6:13-15)
I never want to be weird for the sake of being “weird”. I don’t even want to be weird for the sake of being different. But as I’ve sat in the prayer room and watched what seemed like strange people flailing their arms about in the dance area and scoffed at them a bit, I am beginning to see something I’ve never seen before in the expressions on their faces. Most of them are completley and totally in love. They may not be fantastic dancers but they’re not dancing for our entertainment, anyway. They’re dancing because they know they are a child of God and they know God is smiling upon them and His heart is being blessed by their offering. The Bible says that “knowledge is puffed up”. The truth is we can have all kinds of knowledge about the Word but if we aren’t coming to Him like a child, if we aren’t loving others, if we aren’t approaching the people around us in love, kindness, and forgiveness than it is (in the words of my British friends)… “rubbish”. I don’t want to push away the importance of knowing the Word, however. The Word is suppose to awaken love in our hearts but knowledge should never over-ride wholly abandoned love for God. Never.
