"There can be no intimacy without painful passion." -Ken Helser.
For those of you who heard my testimony, you may remember me talking about the Fear of the Lord. It was a lecture topic that changed my life and flipped my world upside down. Of course, it wasn't the lecture that changed my world, it was the One whom the lecture was about, Jesus Christ.
This last week's topic was the Fear of the Lord taught just as last time by my mentor, Nathan McGill. I was expecting to see break though-- I was expecting to see things happen. I think all of us on the staff team were. I think it's because when conviction comes two choices-- obedience or disobedience. And we were just aching to see conviction come to our school and to ourselves so that we could go beyond what we knew of God and into higher places and more intimacy with Him.
Nathan had 3 days. He always gets shorted because he's not an 'out-of-town' speaker.. But 3 days is enough. It was enough for God to move and alter my life completely, so why shouldn't I expect Him to do a similar thing in the lives if my students?
The first day was hardly a lecture. We all came, knees bowed, worshipping, crying out to God. Some entered in and some didn't. But the focus wasn't on that-- it was on Him. He called us to worship, so we worshipped. I remember Nathan was leading out in prayer much of the time and at one point, in tears he screamed out, "Oh God! I've never started a class like this! But I want so badly to have your will done, I will lay my agenda aside!"
I kinda laughed at that actually.. He didn't realize he was saying that out loud. ha.. anyway.
The second day we spent more time in notes and in defining what fear of the Lord is: to be in awe of Him who holds everything together.. and as a result of a revelation of that power and everlastingness, we submit to hate what he hates and love what he loves.
The third day we came to the thing that keeps us from fearing God most of all other things-- fear of man. We didn't finish the notes because the Spirit of God began to move and we wanted to co-operate with it. We put a chair up their and a microphone and began to repent of being motivated out of fear of man rather than God in all the different areas of our lives.. A student would repent and then we would gather around them and pray, prophesy and speak out what God was saying and doing. Most of us staff went to the chair and repented of being motivated by the fear of man (including myself) as well as 3/4 of the students.. and we began to see SO much breakthrough individually and corporately as we continued to worship God even as we ministered to one another.
3 days. God can change and transform you in a minute if you allow Him to. But so often, we hold on to that which is most dear, that which is comfortable to us. That sinful life of living in fear of man (which is pride) rather than allowing the fear of God to be the purpose and motivation of everything we do in our lives.
Oh God, thank you for moving in the lives of these students! Continue this work in our hearts God. But more importantly, to all who read this, meet them in such a way that all fear and shame will be chased out by your love, for your perfect love casts out all fear. Move them to repentance Lord that they may find more intimacy and that they may know You for who You are, not for what You do. Praise you Lord.
"Now all has been heard;
here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the whole duty of man." (Ecc. 12:13)
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Monday, December 10, 2007
Prophetic Deal-yo.
So, for those of you who don't know, one of the foundational values of YWAM is 'Championing Young People into the Kingdom'-- which is a long phrase that means we release, encourage and help fuel the dreams of visions of young leaders who are with YWAM and to disciple those who come through our DTS.
What does that mean for me? I have leaders who believe in me. Not because they have to, but because they see something that God has placed in me that they want to fan the flame and help further me into advancing the kingdom of heaven in the lives of others. I have mentors who keep me accountable, base directors who dream dreams with me, and school leaders who back me in every decision I make-- and work through the good and bad consquences with me. How awesome is that?
I have been asked to teach and lead the first day of a Prophetic Workshop for this DTS. The first day is all about the basic understanding of the prophetic, and then second day is prophetic in the Arts.
This is something God has really stirred in me consistantly-- to prophesy-- to speak from God's heart so that people may be turned to their true identity in Jesus Christ.
The privilege!
But as I was walking home I humbly confessed to God... "Lord, I don't even know where to begin to teach the prophetic. But I surrender this to you. I know you have placed a prophetic voice within me, so I believe you really show me exactly what to show from scripture, and how to verbalize prophetic principles.
As I began to study the word God was downloading revelation and understanding of what I had been walking in for this past year and a half -- the prophetic. He showed me scriptures through Elijah which portrayed beautifully prophetic principles, understanding of Paul's instructions to the Corinthians and proper guidelines for we who are in Christ Jesus and choose to co-operate with him in this awesome gifting.
I prayed a lot over the students, and began to prophesy outloud in my time with the Lord over their lives and the prophetic voice he was abut to place inside of each of them.
When they came, I could feel in the presence of God.. He was waiting to crown His children with this wonderful birthright-- to hear the voice of their Father.
I taught. I taught a lot longer than I expected. But the Holy Spirit brought up stories, and brought up new points as I began to talk that were awesome. Really, I was in awe. The students ate it up. But really, it wasn't me. I don't have much to offer other than the willingness to serve God. And even that I can be pretty bad with at times. But the Spirit spoke through me (don't worry there were other staff their to keep me in check).. And then we did some exercises.. And we began to see God speak through each that was there!
Hearing God's voice is so easy! It's following it that is the difficult part.
After a good 30-45 minutes of prophetic exercises, we prayed and left encouraged, exhorted and comforted-- As we all should be.
How great is our God!
What does that mean for me? I have leaders who believe in me. Not because they have to, but because they see something that God has placed in me that they want to fan the flame and help further me into advancing the kingdom of heaven in the lives of others. I have mentors who keep me accountable, base directors who dream dreams with me, and school leaders who back me in every decision I make-- and work through the good and bad consquences with me. How awesome is that?
I have been asked to teach and lead the first day of a Prophetic Workshop for this DTS. The first day is all about the basic understanding of the prophetic, and then second day is prophetic in the Arts.
This is something God has really stirred in me consistantly-- to prophesy-- to speak from God's heart so that people may be turned to their true identity in Jesus Christ.
The privilege!
But as I was walking home I humbly confessed to God... "Lord, I don't even know where to begin to teach the prophetic. But I surrender this to you. I know you have placed a prophetic voice within me, so I believe you really show me exactly what to show from scripture, and how to verbalize prophetic principles.
As I began to study the word God was downloading revelation and understanding of what I had been walking in for this past year and a half -- the prophetic. He showed me scriptures through Elijah which portrayed beautifully prophetic principles, understanding of Paul's instructions to the Corinthians and proper guidelines for we who are in Christ Jesus and choose to co-operate with him in this awesome gifting.
I prayed a lot over the students, and began to prophesy outloud in my time with the Lord over their lives and the prophetic voice he was abut to place inside of each of them.
When they came, I could feel in the presence of God.. He was waiting to crown His children with this wonderful birthright-- to hear the voice of their Father.
I taught. I taught a lot longer than I expected. But the Holy Spirit brought up stories, and brought up new points as I began to talk that were awesome. Really, I was in awe. The students ate it up. But really, it wasn't me. I don't have much to offer other than the willingness to serve God. And even that I can be pretty bad with at times. But the Spirit spoke through me (don't worry there were other staff their to keep me in check).. And then we did some exercises.. And we began to see God speak through each that was there!
Hearing God's voice is so easy! It's following it that is the difficult part.
After a good 30-45 minutes of prophetic exercises, we prayed and left encouraged, exhorted and comforted-- As we all should be.
How great is our God!
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Holy Spirit.
It's been longer than I would've liked updating this blog, but responsibility sets in and takes my time and energy away.. But here's a new entry just for you! Woo!
I thought I'd share a few cool stories:
A few weeks ago we were covering the topic "Father Heart of God" and we had a speaker named Ken Helser. Thankfully, Ken had taken me under his wing in personal mentorship that week giving me the keys and secrets of his ministry and personal life. I was so blessed!
One day we were worshiping after class and had dismissed the students but allowed time for some to stay if they liked. Ken put on his son's worship CD (I highly reccomend it, buy it on iTunes: Jonathan Helser "The Awakening") and we were all seeking the Lord. It was a very powerful time of worship.. At one point as the Holy Spirit began to minister to us and the intensity of the song and worship began to pick up, a girl began to scream. At first it was a bit hard to distinguish whether this was a good scream or not. But something in my spirit didn't feel right about it, and I began to hear the fear behind her scream.
Immediately, I responded and Ken turned as well. Both of us walked to her and began speaking in tongues similtaneously as we laid hands on her. She screamed more and we prayed harder realizing this was a manifestion of something not of God. As we prayed her screams became quieter and quieter and Ken led her through a prayer of delieverance while I continued to pray over her. And it was done! She was freed! It had been a generational curse placed on her by others that had become a stronghold in her life.
How is amazing is our God!?
Another cool story:
Yesterdy in class we provided ministry time over the weeks topic which was the 'Holy Spirit'. During the worship, I felt led to offer baptizm of the Holy Spirit and prayer for gifts of the Spirit as well. I had given Caleb (one of my guys) a word earlier that day about the Lord's Spirit being poured out over Him.
He came forward as did another one of my guys, and as we began to pray over them there was such breakthrough! The both began to shake, and teared up.. Caleb said he felt something brushing across the other side of his face at one point, as if someone had blown wind at him. I prayed with another staff girl over one of the girls on my outreach team to recieve the gifting of healing and that was a powerful time as well.
It was so cool to see God breakthrough the lives of these students and begin to equip them for their life of ministry ahead of them!
Thank you so much for your support in prayers and in finances!
God Bless,
Kels.
I thought I'd share a few cool stories:
A few weeks ago we were covering the topic "Father Heart of God" and we had a speaker named Ken Helser. Thankfully, Ken had taken me under his wing in personal mentorship that week giving me the keys and secrets of his ministry and personal life. I was so blessed!
One day we were worshiping after class and had dismissed the students but allowed time for some to stay if they liked. Ken put on his son's worship CD (I highly reccomend it, buy it on iTunes: Jonathan Helser "The Awakening") and we were all seeking the Lord. It was a very powerful time of worship.. At one point as the Holy Spirit began to minister to us and the intensity of the song and worship began to pick up, a girl began to scream. At first it was a bit hard to distinguish whether this was a good scream or not. But something in my spirit didn't feel right about it, and I began to hear the fear behind her scream.
Immediately, I responded and Ken turned as well. Both of us walked to her and began speaking in tongues similtaneously as we laid hands on her. She screamed more and we prayed harder realizing this was a manifestion of something not of God. As we prayed her screams became quieter and quieter and Ken led her through a prayer of delieverance while I continued to pray over her. And it was done! She was freed! It had been a generational curse placed on her by others that had become a stronghold in her life.
How is amazing is our God!?
Another cool story:
Yesterdy in class we provided ministry time over the weeks topic which was the 'Holy Spirit'. During the worship, I felt led to offer baptizm of the Holy Spirit and prayer for gifts of the Spirit as well. I had given Caleb (one of my guys) a word earlier that day about the Lord's Spirit being poured out over Him.
He came forward as did another one of my guys, and as we began to pray over them there was such breakthrough! The both began to shake, and teared up.. Caleb said he felt something brushing across the other side of his face at one point, as if someone had blown wind at him. I prayed with another staff girl over one of the girls on my outreach team to recieve the gifting of healing and that was a powerful time as well.
It was so cool to see God breakthrough the lives of these students and begin to equip them for their life of ministry ahead of them!
Thank you so much for your support in prayers and in finances!
God Bless,
Kels.
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Preparing the Preacher?
Man. I can tell that I'm going to have fun coming up with titles for these little blog-a-trons. Ha. Blog-a-trons.
Anyway, thought I'd share a story.
For those of you (I don't actually know who reads this thing) who know Mr. Thomas Mohn, I remember him telling me once, "A long time ago God told me He didn't want to prepare the sermons with me, he wanted to prepare the preacher." I think that's a wise perception. As soon as I started leading worship again in YWAM (almost a year ago) that was a principle I applied to my daily life. I didn't want to be one of those worshipers who spends all his time preparing the music, and making sure everything is perfect while leaving the heart untended. I prayed that God would teach me how to prepare my heart to lead worship and out of that my worship would flow.
He's been faithful to do that so far. Most times I lead worship these days I pick maybe one song in my head that I've felt the Lord speak to me in my time with Him, and the rest of the worship time will turn into prophetic singing, intercession, stillness or more songs that He brings to my mind. And still, I've only scracthed the surface of the depth of power that comes surrendering to God and acting in submission to Him.
Recently, we were doing a locacl outreach in Roma (a rural bush town in Australia, about 6 hour drive south west from Brisbane) and Leah (my leader) asked me to teach at a church in Chinchilla which is a town that we would be passing through on our way home. I agreed but let's face it: I had no clue where to begin. I think it can be so humorous how God will teach something in one area of your life, and then continue to teach it to you until you get it in ALL areas of your life. As I was talking to her and a few other leaders, the message came across, "Only teach what you have to give." Which is true to an extent, but then again I don't think we should limit God to that.
So I went through my journal and through some things that I thought I could teach on-- conviction namely.
The week goes by and I have notes, scriptures and a lot of great stories talking about conviction.. I feel like a bonified teacher at this point. And then I realize something. I'm not really a teacher. I'm not really a preacher either. I'm a helper. Ben Pasley puts it like this, “Helpers, on the other hand, come to us with personal concern and a belief that we have inside of us the tools to excel, but we simply need encouragement and maybe a working model to follow.”
And then another awful realization set in as I was reading a book by Larry Lea.
I hadn't asked God what he wanted to say to the church I was teaching at. I was prepared to speak a message completely from my flesh without even thinkning of what God wanted to do. Conviction set in hard at that point (I know, ironic.) on Saturday afternoon the day before I was to teach.
So I prayed. I sought God with my whole heart and allowed Him to take away my sin and to speak to me.
As I surrendered to God, verses started popping up in my head. I looked them up, read them allowed and started preaching. I started to speaking out the revelation God was giving me and after about 15 minutes I had a whole sermon. Amazed, I took a second to reflect. "Where did that come from?"
I jotted down some notes and praised God.
The next morning, I woke up early and went through the process all over again. By the time, I went up to in front of the church to share, I felt the Spirit dripping all over me. It was heavy. I began to share, and as I did I noticed something: The anointing was there. People were on the edge of their seats listening. They were eager to listen to what I was saying.. It was incredible! And as I allowed God to speak through me, the Spirit was moving on the hearts of the church.
We had a time of prayer afterward for all who wanted it, and that was such a powerful time. One lady fell over as I prayed for her.. So praise God!
Once again, I see fulfillment of that scripture in Samuel: "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."
Thank you Lord, for being a God who is all about the heart.
Anyway, thought I'd share a story.
For those of you (I don't actually know who reads this thing) who know Mr. Thomas Mohn, I remember him telling me once, "A long time ago God told me He didn't want to prepare the sermons with me, he wanted to prepare the preacher." I think that's a wise perception. As soon as I started leading worship again in YWAM (almost a year ago) that was a principle I applied to my daily life. I didn't want to be one of those worshipers who spends all his time preparing the music, and making sure everything is perfect while leaving the heart untended. I prayed that God would teach me how to prepare my heart to lead worship and out of that my worship would flow.
He's been faithful to do that so far. Most times I lead worship these days I pick maybe one song in my head that I've felt the Lord speak to me in my time with Him, and the rest of the worship time will turn into prophetic singing, intercession, stillness or more songs that He brings to my mind. And still, I've only scracthed the surface of the depth of power that comes surrendering to God and acting in submission to Him.
Recently, we were doing a locacl outreach in Roma (a rural bush town in Australia, about 6 hour drive south west from Brisbane) and Leah (my leader) asked me to teach at a church in Chinchilla which is a town that we would be passing through on our way home. I agreed but let's face it: I had no clue where to begin. I think it can be so humorous how God will teach something in one area of your life, and then continue to teach it to you until you get it in ALL areas of your life. As I was talking to her and a few other leaders, the message came across, "Only teach what you have to give." Which is true to an extent, but then again I don't think we should limit God to that.
So I went through my journal and through some things that I thought I could teach on-- conviction namely.
The week goes by and I have notes, scriptures and a lot of great stories talking about conviction.. I feel like a bonified teacher at this point. And then I realize something. I'm not really a teacher. I'm not really a preacher either. I'm a helper. Ben Pasley puts it like this, “Helpers, on the other hand, come to us with personal concern and a belief that we have inside of us the tools to excel, but we simply need encouragement and maybe a working model to follow.”
And then another awful realization set in as I was reading a book by Larry Lea.
I hadn't asked God what he wanted to say to the church I was teaching at. I was prepared to speak a message completely from my flesh without even thinkning of what God wanted to do. Conviction set in hard at that point (I know, ironic.) on Saturday afternoon the day before I was to teach.
So I prayed. I sought God with my whole heart and allowed Him to take away my sin and to speak to me.
As I surrendered to God, verses started popping up in my head. I looked them up, read them allowed and started preaching. I started to speaking out the revelation God was giving me and after about 15 minutes I had a whole sermon. Amazed, I took a second to reflect. "Where did that come from?"
I jotted down some notes and praised God.
The next morning, I woke up early and went through the process all over again. By the time, I went up to in front of the church to share, I felt the Spirit dripping all over me. It was heavy. I began to share, and as I did I noticed something: The anointing was there. People were on the edge of their seats listening. They were eager to listen to what I was saying.. It was incredible! And as I allowed God to speak through me, the Spirit was moving on the hearts of the church.
We had a time of prayer afterward for all who wanted it, and that was such a powerful time. One lady fell over as I prayed for her.. So praise God!
Once again, I see fulfillment of that scripture in Samuel: "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."
Thank you Lord, for being a God who is all about the heart.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Prophetic Workshop
Hello whoever reads this blog and thank you for reading. I hope these stories are inspiring you to draw closer to God from whever you are at in life, so that you may experience the power of God in a such a real way.
About a month ago, I shared a story of how 2 leaders and a fellow staff person and I did some prophetic evangelism in a hippie town and how we say God move in such marvelous ways. Well, the prophetic movement in evangelism is something as a base we all have really wanted to delve in to. Leah (a leader on the base) has been doing workshops with her church and a few with YWAM here for these past few months and we thought it was time to introduce this new MAD DTS to the prophetic, so that when we go out into the city to do evangelism, there will be much more purpose in our thinking.
Last night Leah and Andy asked Amber and I (we were the four that did the prophetic stuff in Byron) to help with this prophetic workshop for the MAD DTS. So we got together about a half hour before we were to meet with the school and talked about what we were going to do, how we were going to make the prophetic a practical thing rather than some gifting that seems to high to attain, and also to pray. During our prayers, we felt God moving inside of us in really overwhelming ways. The four of us has been feeling the burdens of the school over the course of the day, feeling heavy, feeling fearful, and feeling disconnect from God (these are all issues that the students were dealing with). And after feeling God break through these feelings we felt Him promise a real move. We were stoked, but kinda scared, not ganna lie.
I started the workshop off telling the stories of Byron Bay, which were so inspiring and powerful. And then Andy balanced those stories with some stories of how many times her and Leah have been rejected or have gotten it wrong or the timing wasn't right. We did that simply to give the students a very real view of what operating in the prophetic looks like. Sometimes, we think that a person who is prophetic, we could never be like them because they are so gifted, but God has given that gift to all of us. It says in the Book of Revelation, 'the spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus'-- so all who are claim Jesus as Lord and are surrendered to him have the ability to prophecy.
Then Leah had the four of us get up in front of the school and prophecy over the students. We just went for it. Every impression, every picture, every word that God gave us was right on. We must have prophesied over 10-15 students or so. It was incredible to see God move in that way. Not matter how small the impression was it was always right on.
Leah then interviewed us on HOW we recieved the prophetic word, once again to just show how simple it is to operate in the prophetic. After that we had 5 students come up and we had the rest of the school prophesy over them. We let that go on for a fair bit and we ended with worship.
I led worship, and I felt like we needed to turn the lights off so that people could be free to express themselves however. It was an optional thing, people didn't HAVE to stay for worship, but everyone did. They were all so hungry to encounter God. I led a few songs and just felt the prompting to ask if there was anyone who wanted to give their life to God--- I barely finished the question before 2 or 3 people start screaming out "I give my life to you God!" and "Everything I have is yours!"
We kept on worshiping God, His presence seemingly tangible.
At one point I stopped playing guitar and we all just sang the song of our heart. \
After that I felt another prompting to confront that fear that I had felt earlier on. I spoke out, "I feel that the Lord wants to say to you all, that His perfect love casts out fear. And if you have fear in you, raise your hands, because God wants to bring His love into your life so that you won't have anymore fear inside of you."
Most of the school raise their hands and we prayed together and as we did there was a release of freedom over the group.. People started crying out, giving their fears to God, girls were dancing, we were all singing.. asking for His love to come in a greater way.
It was an incredible move of God.
After a bit more singing, we finished worship. And they just wanted more. One of the students asked, "Is there anyone with a hurt ankle? I feel God wants to heal you." A girl raised her hand and we all came around her and prayed for healing to come to her ankle.
It was such an incredible night to see all these students come on fire for God, to be hungry for His presence and His word, and to be set free from fear.
Isn't our God great?
About a month ago, I shared a story of how 2 leaders and a fellow staff person and I did some prophetic evangelism in a hippie town and how we say God move in such marvelous ways. Well, the prophetic movement in evangelism is something as a base we all have really wanted to delve in to. Leah (a leader on the base) has been doing workshops with her church and a few with YWAM here for these past few months and we thought it was time to introduce this new MAD DTS to the prophetic, so that when we go out into the city to do evangelism, there will be much more purpose in our thinking.
Last night Leah and Andy asked Amber and I (we were the four that did the prophetic stuff in Byron) to help with this prophetic workshop for the MAD DTS. So we got together about a half hour before we were to meet with the school and talked about what we were going to do, how we were going to make the prophetic a practical thing rather than some gifting that seems to high to attain, and also to pray. During our prayers, we felt God moving inside of us in really overwhelming ways. The four of us has been feeling the burdens of the school over the course of the day, feeling heavy, feeling fearful, and feeling disconnect from God (these are all issues that the students were dealing with). And after feeling God break through these feelings we felt Him promise a real move. We were stoked, but kinda scared, not ganna lie.
I started the workshop off telling the stories of Byron Bay, which were so inspiring and powerful. And then Andy balanced those stories with some stories of how many times her and Leah have been rejected or have gotten it wrong or the timing wasn't right. We did that simply to give the students a very real view of what operating in the prophetic looks like. Sometimes, we think that a person who is prophetic, we could never be like them because they are so gifted, but God has given that gift to all of us. It says in the Book of Revelation, 'the spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus'-- so all who are claim Jesus as Lord and are surrendered to him have the ability to prophecy.
Then Leah had the four of us get up in front of the school and prophecy over the students. We just went for it. Every impression, every picture, every word that God gave us was right on. We must have prophesied over 10-15 students or so. It was incredible to see God move in that way. Not matter how small the impression was it was always right on.
Leah then interviewed us on HOW we recieved the prophetic word, once again to just show how simple it is to operate in the prophetic. After that we had 5 students come up and we had the rest of the school prophesy over them. We let that go on for a fair bit and we ended with worship.
I led worship, and I felt like we needed to turn the lights off so that people could be free to express themselves however. It was an optional thing, people didn't HAVE to stay for worship, but everyone did. They were all so hungry to encounter God. I led a few songs and just felt the prompting to ask if there was anyone who wanted to give their life to God--- I barely finished the question before 2 or 3 people start screaming out "I give my life to you God!" and "Everything I have is yours!"
We kept on worshiping God, His presence seemingly tangible.
At one point I stopped playing guitar and we all just sang the song of our heart. \
After that I felt another prompting to confront that fear that I had felt earlier on. I spoke out, "I feel that the Lord wants to say to you all, that His perfect love casts out fear. And if you have fear in you, raise your hands, because God wants to bring His love into your life so that you won't have anymore fear inside of you."
Most of the school raise their hands and we prayed together and as we did there was a release of freedom over the group.. People started crying out, giving their fears to God, girls were dancing, we were all singing.. asking for His love to come in a greater way.
It was an incredible move of God.
After a bit more singing, we finished worship. And they just wanted more. One of the students asked, "Is there anyone with a hurt ankle? I feel God wants to heal you." A girl raised her hand and we all came around her and prayed for healing to come to her ankle.
It was such an incredible night to see all these students come on fire for God, to be hungry for His presence and His word, and to be set free from fear.
Isn't our God great?
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Some MAD Worship.
Hello world.
Today would be the first official week of lectures on the MAD DTS, which is awesome. The new bunch of students (25 girls, 7 guys) are from all sorts of backgrounds and countries--From broken homes with christianity as the Sunday things to some as Pastor's Kids who've seen it all and are just plain skeptical. It's an interesting mix to be sure.
So we kicked off yesterday with some lectures and some community worship which was good, but frankly not very free. It felt stiff. Gunnliek (MAD school leader) led worship with a bunch of us MAD Staff backing up (I did some keys and crazy lead guitar). It was a good time but not that deep. But it's okay, it was only the first day.
Today being the second day, and being the day that I was designated to lead worship for the MAD school, I was ready to get past the stiffness, the shallow worship. Of course Ingvild (fellow Staff leader) and I searched God's heart on what was to happen to day and we felt very strongly there was going to be freedom. We felt God was going to touch these guys in a way that they had never been touched before, showing the reality of His being, of His presence. Naturally, we were stoked. The past two mornings I woke up insanely early (the only alone time possible, pretty much) and this morning I felt in my spirit excitement and praise start to build inside of me in such an overwhelming feeling. I knew something good was going to happen.
I felt God lead me to speak release to this kiddos. So we gathered at our usual meeting time and I gave a bit of a talk about expression. I felt it important to greet them all in this manner:
"Good morning, Creators. Who here is a creator? Raise your hand! All of you raise your hand, because you are all creators. We were created to create."
I spoke to them simply of the expression of worship from our heart in the gifts (art, music, poetry, dancing, photography, cinematography, ect..) that God has given us. To bring our most excellent talents before the throne room of God as an offering of praise to God the Creator, the Father. I told them they had freedom to do and express whatever they wanted. They could sing whatever, draw whatever, dance whatever as long as it was worship to God. After a short 5 minute talk we were off.
I felt the words flow out of me as naturally as they always do when I begin to worship God. We sang maybe one song and then dove into the prophetic-- as God impressed feelings, thoughts and guiding of where He was taking this whole sha-bang, I led the rest of them into it. After a while this eruption of praise was coming from Ingvild and I:
"Your unfailing love casts out fear!
It casts out fear in me!"
And I felt the Lord give me the nudge. I spoke it out, "Does anyone here feel like there is some sort of fear, or hinderance that is keeping them from God?"
A few hands go up and the staff flock to them, and as they do some one named Maureen falls down in tears weeping.. The presence of God is heavy now.. And as my fellow staff are ministering to these girls in this worship time, the girls are crying out to God in tears. It was beautiful..
But I knew there was something more. So we kept worshipping, singing out exactly what God was doing in me or what He was wanting to do in others.. Another prompt:
"Has anyone here never been touched by God before or felt His presence?"
One hand from Mick (one of my guys) and I spoke it out:
"Mick, God wants to touch you."
His hands go out in a cry and he falls to his knees as two leaders come to minister to him.. It was such a joy to see God move in the way that He said He would.. Bringing freedom and life to those that were captive to death..
Worship ended in the chorus of one of Brad Kilman's songs:
"I want to be close to you, I want to be found in you.." over and over and over again.
The cry of our hearts is to find identity in Jesus Christ.
And Jesus is on the move.
Today would be the first official week of lectures on the MAD DTS, which is awesome. The new bunch of students (25 girls, 7 guys) are from all sorts of backgrounds and countries--From broken homes with christianity as the Sunday things to some as Pastor's Kids who've seen it all and are just plain skeptical. It's an interesting mix to be sure.
So we kicked off yesterday with some lectures and some community worship which was good, but frankly not very free. It felt stiff. Gunnliek (MAD school leader) led worship with a bunch of us MAD Staff backing up (I did some keys and crazy lead guitar). It was a good time but not that deep. But it's okay, it was only the first day.
Today being the second day, and being the day that I was designated to lead worship for the MAD school, I was ready to get past the stiffness, the shallow worship. Of course Ingvild (fellow Staff leader) and I searched God's heart on what was to happen to day and we felt very strongly there was going to be freedom. We felt God was going to touch these guys in a way that they had never been touched before, showing the reality of His being, of His presence. Naturally, we were stoked. The past two mornings I woke up insanely early (the only alone time possible, pretty much) and this morning I felt in my spirit excitement and praise start to build inside of me in such an overwhelming feeling. I knew something good was going to happen.
I felt God lead me to speak release to this kiddos. So we gathered at our usual meeting time and I gave a bit of a talk about expression. I felt it important to greet them all in this manner:
"Good morning, Creators. Who here is a creator? Raise your hand! All of you raise your hand, because you are all creators. We were created to create."
I spoke to them simply of the expression of worship from our heart in the gifts (art, music, poetry, dancing, photography, cinematography, ect..) that God has given us. To bring our most excellent talents before the throne room of God as an offering of praise to God the Creator, the Father. I told them they had freedom to do and express whatever they wanted. They could sing whatever, draw whatever, dance whatever as long as it was worship to God. After a short 5 minute talk we were off.
I felt the words flow out of me as naturally as they always do when I begin to worship God. We sang maybe one song and then dove into the prophetic-- as God impressed feelings, thoughts and guiding of where He was taking this whole sha-bang, I led the rest of them into it. After a while this eruption of praise was coming from Ingvild and I:
"Your unfailing love casts out fear!
It casts out fear in me!"
And I felt the Lord give me the nudge. I spoke it out, "Does anyone here feel like there is some sort of fear, or hinderance that is keeping them from God?"
A few hands go up and the staff flock to them, and as they do some one named Maureen falls down in tears weeping.. The presence of God is heavy now.. And as my fellow staff are ministering to these girls in this worship time, the girls are crying out to God in tears. It was beautiful..
But I knew there was something more. So we kept worshipping, singing out exactly what God was doing in me or what He was wanting to do in others.. Another prompt:
"Has anyone here never been touched by God before or felt His presence?"
One hand from Mick (one of my guys) and I spoke it out:
"Mick, God wants to touch you."
His hands go out in a cry and he falls to his knees as two leaders come to minister to him.. It was such a joy to see God move in the way that He said He would.. Bringing freedom and life to those that were captive to death..
Worship ended in the chorus of one of Brad Kilman's songs:
"I want to be close to you, I want to be found in you.." over and over and over again.
The cry of our hearts is to find identity in Jesus Christ.
And Jesus is on the move.
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Byron Bay
Upon my arrival to the YWAM Brisbane base (my new home).. I found out I was to leave on local outreach to a New-Age-Hippie-Beach-City called Byron Bay for a week. But hey, I'm just going with the flow and this is all apart of God's plan anyway. So I packed up quickly and jumped in the car jet lagging like no one's business.
The week was awesome. We had lectures, we worshiped together, we were able to be apart of a girl's inner healing session with our leaders, and we were able to spend time on the beach.
But of course, the whole week's purpose was really to get us more grounded and capable in street evangelism, as we are missionaries and we are to be discipling others in this new lifestyle of spreading the kingdom.
Friday night we all split up in pairs after some worshiping near the beach, to do some prayer walking. I was with a girl named Amber. We sang the song "Let It Rain" in a particular parking lot we were led to, asking for God's conviction to come gently, in love and mercy for the people of Byron Bay. We crossed the street and ran into our leaders, Leah and Andy. After talking to them briefly, we all talked about how we really wanted to step more into the prophetic as we evangelized and as we were talking Andy turned around and asked 3 girls who were passing by if we could prophesy over them.
We were caught off guard, but secretly excited to see what was going to happen. All four of us prophsied over this girl named Sarah all the while her friends saying things like, "Wow, how did you know that?" or "That is totally Sarah!" as Sarah herself was tearing up.
When they asked us how we did that, Leah explained in a short bit of what Jesus accomplished on the cross and how it has enabled us to come into relationship with God, thus being able to hear His voice. As she finished explaining, Sarah started fully crying and turned away walking off.. Her friends were confused as all that we had said to her was encouraging and uplifting and we immediately recognized the conviction settling inside of her. Her friend went off after her thanking us repeatedly.. We rejoiced that God was faithful to us and that He heard our prayers! How awesome..
We kept on walking and Andy had a word for a policeman, which she gave to his partner and it turned out to be right on.. Fully encouraged we started heading to the park where we had all met..
We saw 3 guys walking by and we agreed ask them if we could give them prophetic words. Andy stopped them again and I gave a word to a guy named Peter about his life and work situation and as I finished his friend responded saying, "Don't tell them they're right!" (They were a bit intoxicated.. didn't realize we could hear..) And the other girls gave their prophetic words as well which at the time didn't really make sense, but as we walked away from our encounter with the boys God exlpained to us more fully what it meant so that we could pray for them..
How awesome is our God! That He would speak through us to His lost children and confide in us..
God is doing some awesome things here in Australia. I feel priviledged to be apart of this mission..
To sum up, this week has felt like a reawakening of the prophetic in my life. A man named Don Webber (mentor of Clay Staires) actually prophsied that this would happen to me. That the prophetic ministry and greater portion of discernment was going to become a large part of my life this next 20 months for me. So, thank you God for fulfilling your promises!
I'll keep you updated to more stories as they come,
Kelly.
The week was awesome. We had lectures, we worshiped together, we were able to be apart of a girl's inner healing session with our leaders, and we were able to spend time on the beach.
But of course, the whole week's purpose was really to get us more grounded and capable in street evangelism, as we are missionaries and we are to be discipling others in this new lifestyle of spreading the kingdom.
Friday night we all split up in pairs after some worshiping near the beach, to do some prayer walking. I was with a girl named Amber. We sang the song "Let It Rain" in a particular parking lot we were led to, asking for God's conviction to come gently, in love and mercy for the people of Byron Bay. We crossed the street and ran into our leaders, Leah and Andy. After talking to them briefly, we all talked about how we really wanted to step more into the prophetic as we evangelized and as we were talking Andy turned around and asked 3 girls who were passing by if we could prophesy over them.
We were caught off guard, but secretly excited to see what was going to happen. All four of us prophsied over this girl named Sarah all the while her friends saying things like, "Wow, how did you know that?" or "That is totally Sarah!" as Sarah herself was tearing up.
When they asked us how we did that, Leah explained in a short bit of what Jesus accomplished on the cross and how it has enabled us to come into relationship with God, thus being able to hear His voice. As she finished explaining, Sarah started fully crying and turned away walking off.. Her friends were confused as all that we had said to her was encouraging and uplifting and we immediately recognized the conviction settling inside of her. Her friend went off after her thanking us repeatedly.. We rejoiced that God was faithful to us and that He heard our prayers! How awesome..
We kept on walking and Andy had a word for a policeman, which she gave to his partner and it turned out to be right on.. Fully encouraged we started heading to the park where we had all met..
We saw 3 guys walking by and we agreed ask them if we could give them prophetic words. Andy stopped them again and I gave a word to a guy named Peter about his life and work situation and as I finished his friend responded saying, "Don't tell them they're right!" (They were a bit intoxicated.. didn't realize we could hear..) And the other girls gave their prophetic words as well which at the time didn't really make sense, but as we walked away from our encounter with the boys God exlpained to us more fully what it meant so that we could pray for them..
How awesome is our God! That He would speak through us to His lost children and confide in us..
God is doing some awesome things here in Australia. I feel priviledged to be apart of this mission..
To sum up, this week has felt like a reawakening of the prophetic in my life. A man named Don Webber (mentor of Clay Staires) actually prophsied that this would happen to me. That the prophetic ministry and greater portion of discernment was going to become a large part of my life this next 20 months for me. So, thank you God for fulfilling your promises!
I'll keep you updated to more stories as they come,
Kelly.
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