Filed under: Family, Healing, Prophetic Dreams, Spiritual Warfare, The Church
So I’m going through an inner healing program right now. It’s absolutely one of the most brutal experiences of my life. It’s funny how things are popping up that haven’t happened in literal years. People popping back into my life (briefly) who had previously caused a lot of pain, apologizing for the mistakes they’ve made. Family secrets that have been hidden for years being exposed and generational strongholds being revealed. It has been a lot to take in. In essence, I’ve been handling it by hiding. Finally, this weekend I decided to actually lean into Jesus rather than avoid Him. I’d been frustrated about not hearing from Him during this difficult time, but it was really mostly because I was too scared to let Him into certain aspects of my heart. So I spent much of the evening in the prayer room yesterday. This resulted in me finally having some dreams.
The first dream, I was at my childhood home in northern Wisconsin. My boss, Kristen Anderson was there and someone had stolen the security system out of her car. She called the “car company” to see if they could replace it but they wouldn’t so they had to tow her car away.
At first I thought the dream was about Kristen and was going to tell her I thought I might have had a prophetic dream about her but when I told the dream to my OTHER boss, Dale, she mentioned that the place that the dream was taking place in was very significant and the scene was the home of my childhood.
So I pieced the symbols together. Kristen, is my boss, so this speaks of authority. The car speaks of ministry, and my parents were both pastors. The security system was stolen from them. It all started to make sense. When I was around 11 or 12 there were some serious issues in our church. It’s sort of a long story but one of the major major disruptions was when my dad was accused of stealing $10,000 from our church. A huge split happened and there were rumors spread all over my small town about my family. In the end, the truth was found out and it involved a mistake of someone else in the church. My parents ended up staying at this church for another five years but that year caused a lot of insecurity issues with my parents. At the time of this happening, I was really tough about the whole situation. I don’t remember feeling a lot pain, but definitely felt a lot of anger towards the people that were treating my family in this manner. I’ve always felt, for some reason, that I needed to be strong for my mom. I think my mom suffered more than anyone else in the situation. My dad handled the situation as well but I think that I internalized a lot of the pain I felt and covered it with an appearance of resolve and indignation at the injustice. Without knowing it, I believe that this scenario caused a deep level of insecurity in me because of the shattering of outward security in my parent’s lives. I will write more at another time.
edit:
I will add another dream (or what I can remember of it). This one I really have no clue what it is talking about but I’m hoping that someone else gets it.
I had moved back in with my grandmother in Little Rock. In my dream, I had a room there ready for me. It was a room from my childhood and I had a lot of other things from my childhood in the room. However, when I went to move into the room a girl I hardly know, named Joelle was in my room playing guitar. Like I said, I barely know Joelle, but I looked up the meaning of her name and it means “be willing”. Anyway, I saw her and I went into another room next door to this room. It was like I was talking to her through the wall of the two rooms and I was saying that I should have brought my keyboard so that we could worship together.
So I kind of think it is the Lord calling me out to be willing to see the painful things from my childhood but to worship Him in the midst of it. Yikes! If anyone else gets more interpretation from it, let me know. I’m curious to hear your thoughts.
Filed under: Faith, Finances, Intimacy with God, Life in General, Prophecy, Spiritual Warfare, Trust
I have been really feeling great about my supposed move to a new apartment next week. I felt that this transition was really key to the journey Jesus was on with me. It would give me plenty of time alone with the Lord and a quiet place that I could let everything hang out with him. I had a roommate that was lined up that is very quiet and sweet so I thought for sure it was going to work out. I am suppose to move on the 24th… a week from today.
This past week I went to the prophecy rooms sort of on accident. I wasn’t really planning on it and then they happened to need people. During my time in there, Esther Min began affirming me on some things that were taking place in my life right now. That I was making wise decisions and also affirming the deep things the Lord was doing in my life. But immediately she caught my attention when she said: “I feel like Jesus is going to come into your house. Yeah. I feel like he is going to wake you up in your house in the middle of the night and you are goin got have encounters with Him.”
This was confirmation for me that this move was really strategic from the Lord.
However, I’m a little bit concerned as to the status of my roommate situation at the moment. She might have bailed on me. She is currently MIA when we have literally a week before our move and I have nowhere to go after that.
Last night as I sat in my room worrying about things the Lord spoke to me and said: Don’t you remember planning things before and they never worked out exactly how you thought they would but I always, always come through for you? Things aren’t always as you imagine them to be.
It’s true. The unexpected always seems to happen to me. Jesus loves to keep me on my toes.
I am still praying that this roomie will come around. I know the Lord wants her here and the enemy is cunning and sneaky and there is always warfare surrounding big steps of obedience.
Filed under: Communing with the Holy Spirit, Friendship, Intimacy with God, Life in General, Maturity, Spiritual Warfare, Wisdom
My friend Aaron is heading back to Canada today due to some visa issues. So far his paperwork looks good enough for him to be back in a couple of months but it is sad that part of my “friend family” is gone for awhile. To see him off a bunch of us went to Legends (a massive outdoor mall about 40 minutes from my house) and went to Dave and Buster’s. I’ve been to Dave and Buster’s in Dallas but haven’t been to the one here. It is sort of like an adult Chucky Cheese but I felt a little like I was in a Las Vegas Casino. Flashing, neon lights, a few video-game obsessed, competitive, drunk men and… skee-ball. Nothing better than a game of skee-ball.
Legends has amazing shopping, by the way. Rebecca and I are planning another Saturday dedicated entirely to sales at Legends. Banana Republic, Forever 21, TJ Maxx. Though they don’t have an urban outfitters or anthropologie… you can’t get much better than those bad-boys. Sometimes I think I love shopping a little too much. Why am I writing about shopping in a blog?
on a completely different note: I’m learning that loving God is all about the choices we make. Choosing to spend time with Him even when we aren’t feeling His presence. Choosing to trust Him even when we can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. Choosing to believe that there is an eternal weight of glory to the pain we are in at the moment. Choosing to know that He has jealous love for us, is committed to us more than we are to Him, is patient and merciful and kind. We can make choices to believe the lies the enemy tells us about ourselves or we can choose to abide in the love and acceptance of Jesus. We can make choices to sin deliberately or to walk away from sin before it stings us with death. We can make choices to love unconditionally even when we are rejected. We can make choices to bless rather than curse. We can make choices to smile instead of put up walls of hostility. Some of these choices take a little bit longer to get there but I see the Lord chipping away at my own understanding… or lack there of. In my mind, I’m getting a picture of this massive block of marble. Somewhere in the center is something really beautiful but no one can see it because I haven’t allowed the Lord to chip away the fear that has held me back for so long. Let’s just say this is one of the most excruciating yet invigorating seasons of my life.
Filed under: Communing with the Holy Spirit, Grace, Intimacy with God, Missions, Prophecy, Spiritual Warfare
Okay. I really need some major prayer coverage right now.
As all of you know, I’m traveling to England in a little over a week. I will be ministering in London and in Cornwall… teaching and preaching for the first time in my life, actually. It was a very clear word from the Lord that I was suppose to go there.
Today I had a pretty overt attack from the enemy. I came pretty close to being attacked outside of my apartment. I felt immediately demonic oppression as soon as the incident began. The Lord protected me though and instead of being frozen in fear, I got away and took off running the opposite direction. Needless to say I was a little shaken up about it. Later in the afternoon when I was in my kitchen making lunch I kept seeing a cat lurking inside my kitchen. It was strange because we don’t actually have a cat… I felt like the Lord was showing me some things in the Spirit and was warning me about some dangerous assignments that the enemy has put out against me.
I’m not really scared about it because I know that they have no power over me and in a second, they have to flee at the mention of the name of Jesus but I know it couldn’t hurt to have a few people out there covering me in prayer. I’ve noticed this week that my prayer times have been full grace and there has been an extra anointing on my heart. A few nights, the Lord has not allowed me to sleep for hours because He wanted me to stay up to talk to Him and hear from Him. The more we open ourselves up to the heavenly realms like this, the more the enemy likes to poke his ugly head in and try to intimidate us. It makes me so angry!
So please please please cover me in prayer before and during my trip!!!
Filed under: Friendship, Life in General, Spirit of the Age, Spiritual Warfare, Worship
It sometimes feels like my life has had musical milestones or signposts. Music has always been such a big part of my life. My dad was tone deaf but was a passionate music lover and my mom, on the other hand, led worship at our church so she had plenty of musical ability.
I’ve been putting my CD collection on my itunes the last few days… some of the CD’s I haven’t listened to in years and so when I put them in my CD Rom and play them I feel like I’m back in some weird time portal. It’s amazing how easily some music can put you into a certain mood and can conjure up all sorts of memories.
When I lived in Little Rock, from about the ages of 18-22, we had a local pop-punk band there called The Kicks (formerly Ashtray Babyhead). I use to LOVE this band and would go to a show of theirs at least once a month. I still have their CD’s one of which I had to peel the sticker off the front because the band thought it would be funny to put a pentagram on the cover. But it wasn’t just the band that brought back memories it was the people I would go to the shows with, the relationships I was in and how I related each song, at that time to different aspects of our relationship. Memories of us driving down the road singing at the top of our lungs, making funny gestures at eachother…. even, I have to admit, “air drums” in which friends would mimic the beats, thinking they might actually look cool and know what they were doing. I have to admit this music also brought painful memories, moments that I haven’t thought of in a long, long time from past romantic relationships. When I listened to this CD I was surprised at the places it took me. It was almost like this blackness would come over me
Music is a powerful thing. It exposes what’s inside the soul of the individual and draws them into even the emotional aspects of their lives. Music invites vulnerability and sometimes vulnerability coming from a darker place is not always very healthy and dare I say… evil? When a person is writing music and their soul is full of darkness then they are inviting you to enter into that darkness with them. When a person is writing music and their soul is connected to Jesus and their spirit and soul are full of light, they are inviting you to be connected with Jesus as well.
We had a briefing for the STI leaders yesterday. Because this is a public blog, in this case I don’t want to be controversial but I will say that we were given a talk about “deliverence”. Calling it by another term might freak people out. You all know how the internet can be. Anyway, we were talking about how an “incident” might possibly come up. The presence of the Holy Spirit is very prevalent at IHOP. I mean it’s a place of prayer so that’s sort of a given. When there are a lot of teenagers coming from all types of backgrounds and they enter into the presence of God, we should be aware that the enemy does not like being there… things happen.
So how does the enemy get involved anyway? Because we allow an open door in our lives to let him in. Usually it is unforgiveness but sometimes it can be bitterness, a unrestrained tongue *shudder*. It kinda scared me a little bit.
I’m not really scared of demons. Not that it’s really a big deal but I’ve had two literal attacks from demons before. Of course it was frightening at the time. One tried to kill me by suffocating me after I was called to be an intercessory missionary, the other one just showed up in my bed one night and laughed at me (that’s a whole other story). The point is that because of those incidents I don’t really have a fear of them because I know that Jesus took care of them for me just because I called out to Him. What concerned me is that I have to be clean to deal with these types of situations in kids. If my heart (soul) is not clean, if I have an open door, there could be a problem.
So I’ve been asking Jesus is there anything in there that I need to get rid of before STI? Meaning unforgiveness, mostly. God’s been pulling out a lot of raw things in my heart lately but I want to be prepared and strengthened when these type of situations come up. There is a situation from my past, about 4 years ago, that I thought I would never be able to forgive but God has allowed me to go through a real healing process with that. And what do I do? I pray for that person and their family. It’s really weird. I NEVER thought I would EVER be able to pray blessings on that person and ESPECIALLY on their family… but it’s the little things that I’m worried about. The little petty, hurtful things that I refuse to let go of. So here we go. Forgiveness is a choice. Let’s do it.
Filed under: Faith, Healing, House of Prayer, Intercession, Spiritual Warfare
I’m currently reading Bill Johnson’s When Heaven Invades Earth. The STI leaders were given it as an assignment to read and I am so glad they assigned it! It is so full of wisdom. We can’t compare it to the Bible, of course, but it is one of the best books I have read on faith and moving in signs and wonders. It has already radically shifted some of my paradigms on prayer. For example:
“Travailing in prayer is not always a sign of true intercession. Many are not able to distinguish between the burden of their own unbelief and the burden of the Lord. I now pray until I come into a place of faith for that situation. When that happens, my perspective on the problem changes. I begin to see it from heavens view.”
This has caused me to second-guess how I view prayer. As he speaks about our authority in Christ and God’s own desire to see heavenly things on earth, I can’t help but be filled with faith. When we were praying for Iraq today (which by the way excited me so much because one of my best friends is a missionary there), I couldn’t help but know that Jesus was working. Like Johnson says, we have to move from a place of knowing He can to knowing He will.
Filed under: Fasting, Purity, Revival, Sin, Spirit of the Age, Spiritual Warfare, The Church
In the book The Prophetic Whisper, Richard Gazowsky shares the significance of a 40-day fast that the Lord gave him:
My wife and I had gone to Carmel, California for a time of extended prayer. On the third day, while we were praying at the beach, a swarm of flies ascended from the ocean surface as if orchestrated by an invisible conductor and swept like a blanket across the water and onto the beach. I ran over to the place where Sandy was praying to see if she was alright.
“Richard it is so strange,” she said. “While I was praying, I brought up the name of a pastor’s wife whom I knew had been tempted to commit adultery, intending to intercede for her. As soon as I mentioned her name, these flies rose up off the ocean.”
No sooner had she finished, then the Lord quickened my spirit and said, “I am going to show you a secret vulnerability in Satan’s kingdom.” His weakness is in the flies. Later that day, we went to the Carmel public library and looked up the word fly. I discovered the meaning of Beelzebub, and found one of the names of Satan is “Lord of the Flies.” Scientists have discovered that flies have a reproductive period from 4 hours to 40 days depending upon the species. When pest controllers go to eradicate flies in a certain area, they spray pesticides everyday for a 40-day period. If they destroy the reproductive cycles of presently existing flies, they can kill off a whole generation of future flies. I then saw what God was trying to show me. Satan can’t fight for long periods. If a Christian will pray consistently for a 40-day period, he will be able to conquer most satanic strongholds in his life.
On this 40th anniversary of the 1967 landmark of the sexual revolution called the “Summer of Love,” we are calling for a 40-day fast beginning on the evening of May 28 through TheCall Nashville on 7-7-07. Our purpose is to call two generations to a 40-day season of fasting from food (the more intense the better) and from the media to cleanse ourselves of the affects of the spirit that seduces our nation into sexual immorality, greed, entertainment, dependency and spiritual malaise. Let us cry out, “God, break the pornographic plague off of the church and the homosexuality that is invading a young generation!” Let us cry out for deliverance from the spell of Jezebel, witchcraft, suicidal thoughts, drug addictions and eating disorders. Let parents pray daily for their children’s freedom. Pray for 40 days that the prodigals come home. Let a generation cry, “No toleration of Jezebel! No toleration!” And watch Christ break the power of Beelzebub, the lord of the flies, and once again the shout will be heard, “Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty I am free at last!” (Martin Luther King, Jr.)
Lou Engle
Filed under: House of Prayer, Intercession, Missions, Prophecy, Revival, Spiritual Warfare
Obviously, God has been giving me a greater burden for England because of recent events and it is interesting that I’ve been reading a book called “Developing Your Prophetic Gifting” by Graham Cooke, a prophetic church-planter in Great Britain. Of course I did not know he was from the UK when I bought the book and in fact I purchased it when I was in FITN. In it, he writes a detailed prophecy for the church in England, “There will be a network of deliverance and intercessory ministries spreading right across the nation. This will provide a strategy for warfare and inter-church/inter-city prayer links that will crisscross the nation. These networks will share information, training and equipping programs, and a common warfare strategy for the nation.” He then goes on to explain that greater unity is coming to the church of England. There will be an end to competition among churches, denominations, and ministries as well as cities and counties (evidently there is a lot strife amongst specific regions in the UK). I know that the Farnham’s have already experienced some hostility from other ministries in the area who seem to think they will be in competition with the House of Prayer. But, don’t you see how Houses of Prayer could be a direct fulfillment of this prophecy??? How amazing it will be to have people crying out to the Lord in intercession and worship while transforming the spiritual atmosphere and the church in England. I believe that revival is long-overdue in Europe and I’m so excited to see how God is going to use Houses of Prayer to radically change the hearts of young people all over that nation.
