Bonjou

I have been in Haiti for a week now. My amazement hasn't stopped. In some aspects it's surreal to be back. I didn't think I would really be able to come back here. Praise You God. In other ways, I am amazed how God is continually moving in this church. God has anointed Seige as a pastor and leader. Him, his team and everyone here are doing mighty mighty things. It is incredible. Last week was spent at their young adult retreat. We were able to integrate into the whole event in such a supernatural way. We had amazing small group time, even with the language barrier. We had testimonies a few of the nights. People giving up old lives, people getting saved. It was incredible. I am tearing up right now in joy just typing this. God is amazing, the gospel is powerful no matter what language, no matter what color. Jesus loves us...He really does. We can't ever forget that. All he wants, all he has ever wanted was to get back with His love. This next week we will be serving at the church and at a few orphanages. I know God has amazing things for us this upcoming week and I can't wait. On a personal note, I miss the heck out of my family :) Also, my creole is growing like crazy, I have been able to have meaningful conversations fully in creole, and if you know me, that's an INCREDIBLE blessing for me. Praise God. I am journaling each day the details and hope in the next few weeks to get parts here on the blog to share God's glory and power that is moving with force through Haiti from Calvary Chapel Port-au-prince. Orevwa, e Bondye benye ou.

Haiti - 2009

Good morning all, in a few hours I will be getting in a van with 11 others to head to Haiti for a 12 day mission trip. We will be going to work with Pastor Seige at Calvary Chapel Port-au-prince, Haiti. We will be involved with a young adult retreat, village churches, the local church, a few orphanages, and many "Spiritually Spontaneous" things. I email this to ask for your prayers. Our team has already (and is still going through) gone through spiritual attack upon spiritual attack and we need and covet your prayers. God has really grown a bond that I know Satan despises. Here is our prayer request:

- Please pray for: unity, open hearts, safety, joy, filling of the Holy Spirit, health, spiritual protection, effectiveness, wisdom and God's favor

Bondye benye ou

In the name of....

John 14:14 (New King James Version)
14 If you ask anything in My name, I will do it.

So many times we read this verse for what we want to see in it instead of what's actually in it. I don't want to talk about the context in detail. Just one note about it, this verse was explicitly spoken to a special group of men (the disciples) and a disciple is to have their life totally sold out to Christ. Hence, the reason why this verse was applicable to them. Ok, now onto the portion I wanted to discuss. This is Jesus talking to His disciples. If I ask anything He will do it. Oh wait, no...it says, if I ask anything IN HIS NAME, He will do it. So what, I end my prayer with "in Jesus name, AMEN" I am good right? Was the prayer answered? "No, not really, but that's normal, I just kinda pray because I feel better and I know I am supposed to" I struggle with this mentality myself. I pray out of duty and not out of a desire to talk with God or to genuinely place a need before Him. So when I pray I struggle with expecting it to be ignored or go unanswered. Totally my fault, I will admit that, but what am I doing wrong? Well, the beauty of God's word is that it always has an answer, we need only look. In the same chapter, a few verses previous, Jesus gave us the explanation of "asking in His name: John 14:6 "Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me" Ok, so we know that only by Jesus can we approach the father. We also know that the father is who we are praying to when Jesus taught us how to pray by what we call "The LORD's Prayer" He starts it out with "Our Father, who art in heaven" I think I have the overall concept down in my mind, practicing it in spirit is another thing entirely. So, here goes:
I heard a great analogy in a book titled "The power of prayer and the prayer of power" he went about it like this: To come to the Father we must come in Jesus' name. Because by our own name we were rejected, and will always be. If you wanted to talk to a very high up official in a corporation or in government, how do you get in to see them? The easiest name is to name-drop. "Hi, I want to talk to the president, I know so-and-so" Knowing this high-up official has now enabled you to come in their name. The same is true for our relationship with the Father. We come to Him, not because of who we are or what we have done, but because of what Jesus has done and who Jesus is. My attitude must be one of total humility in Jesus and what He has done for me. This attitude must carry on in prayer. When I approach my holy God, I come to Him THROUGH Jesus, not through myself.

Let me close with this:

- God wants to answer our prayers
- God can answer our prayers
- God will answer our prayers
- God the Father is who I am praying to
- God the Son is who I am praying through
- God the Spirit is who prompts and ministers to me in prayer
- To get to the Father (in prayer) I must go through Jesus (name drop my Savior)

Mirror of God

In my prayer time today God gave me a fresh sight of what He means by us being salt and light. I have used the analogy before that we are like the moon, but wasn't able to personalize it enough. I see us better now as mirrors. There are 2 things that have to happen for a mirror to be used properly. First, it needs to be at the right angle to reflect the light or image. If I am living my life at my own pace, at my own whims and according to my own desires, the angle of that mirror is off. I am not reflecting God to this world but a hideous distortion of Him and myself. So my first issue is to get the mirror off of myself and angle it or point it towards God. The second issue to deal with is the reflectivity of the mirror. In other words, how clean and clear is the glass so that the image or light being portrayed is clear and perceivable. Have I let the world come up and dirty up the glass? Have I myself begun to not keep it up. We are told to work out our salvation with fear and trembling in Philippians 2. I see keeping this mirror clean as one of those items we need to work at. Again, with the mirror not clean, as with the bad angle, what is seen is distorted and confusing. Is that not a picture of this world today? Do they not have a distorted and confused view of the Christian community as a whole? Do they not then pass that on to their interpretation of God? Brothers and sisters, what are we reflecting in our lives and claiming "it's Jesus!"????????

Foe or friend

In my previous post I talked about being a friend of God and what that means in relation to heaven admittance. I now address the "foe" portion. Many people ask the question "If God is so loving, how can he send a person to hell" This is a question that is so often asked but I'm sad to say it isn't always well answered by many. The statement is flawed in many ways, let me address a few. Number one, God doesn't send a person to hell. Here's the deal, no matter what anyone believes (belief doesn't change an absolute - i.e. - if I jump off a building believing I will fly, I still splat on the ground) we have two choices for our eternal resting place. One being spending it with our creator, friend and most of all LORD. The second is in hell with our tempter, destroyer and lord. We spend our time in eternity with who we chose to follow in this life. If we choose to follow satan then we get to be with him, it's that simple. You say though, "I didn't choose satan." You didn't? Sure you did, if you didn't choose God, you chose satan. "Well that's narrow minded", you say. Is it? It may be but it's true. There are many many roads to take to get to satan, but only one to get to God. "See, you're being narrow minded again" Am I? If I said "To get to the south pole from Florida you have to go south" you would agree right? Right. You narrow minded person!!! I don't want to go south, not in any way, I want to go east and east alone. "You can't" you say. That's what you think! I think I can get there going east. "But you can't!" Yes I can. "How can you say that?" I feel like it's the way for me, you can go south if that works for you but I am going east. (See how stupid this sounds?) Think of it in a spiritual sense........................how many ways are there to heaven?

Friend or foe

When I get to heaven, my "admittance" to the glorious place of tales, of dreams and of truth won't be because I was a good person. It won't be because I said a prayer, or that I went to church and actually enjoyed it too. It won't be because I had a favorite bible verse or talked about God to other people. While all those things are evidences of the "ticket" to get admitted, they are not the ticket at all. My "ticket" to heaven is Him (Jesus) knowing me personally and I, Him. See, when I get to heavens gates and stand there before the Father, my best friends (Jesus) will say "Father, he's ours, come on in Joe" If he doesn't know me, why should I be let in, if some random person comes to your front door you don't let them in, you will turn them away. But if you knew them (say a long time friend or family member) you would immediately identify with them and let them in. Think of it this way, if you didn't think enough of God to pursue Him for a few short years on this earth, why would you want to spend eternity with Him doing the things you avoided for years upon years? You never wanted to read the bible, in heaven that same word is proclaimed all day every day. You disliked church for the most part, in heaven it's 24/7 ultra church. You didn't like most Christians, in fact the ones who were all into the bible and God you thought were fanatics, heaven will be loaded with fanatics (mediocrity doesn't exist in heaven) If you are sitting there reading this and say you are fine, you don't have to be some fanatic person to get into heaven I ask you this: What does it take to get into heaven then?

Relationship with God façade…don't you think he knows?

This is something that is so crazy that really hit me a few months back.....How much do we live our lives focused on trying to keep up our appearances with others? Too much most likely. I ask another question, how much do we live our relationship with God that way? We try to keep up appearances with Him. We try to trick Him into thinking that we are ok with Him, that we are so close and so blessed and so....you know the drill. Why do we do that? How stupid is it for us to try to front with the Creator of our lives and knower of our every thought and desire?