Change is Here

I went to a carnal church that was under the influence of greedy megachurch preachers. I left because they were hostile to scripture-based correction offered in humility, and because they treated people like slaves and milked them like cattle.

I ended up at a church where the Holy Spirit was welcomed. The pastor and his wife were enlightened through the gifts of the Spirit. At the old church, when I brought up revelations I had received, or good teachings I had heard, I got this: “That’s great, Steve.” And then I got blown off. At the new church, usually, the pastors already knew about the things I brought to them, and when they didn’t, they listened and thanked me sincerely, and with the Spirit’s help, they added to them.

I’m not a big wheel at the new church. I’m not in charge of the volunteers. I don’t run a ministry. I have never been asked to teach, except for a couple of minutes. I’m not pleased because I finally found a place that exalted me and kissed my rear end. That hasn’t happened. I’m pleased because God led me to a place where I was not treated the way a white corpuscle treats bacteria. My old church was under the control of Satan, and his servants kept me and other sincere Christians sealed off from acceptance and authority.

A while back, my pastor started teaching the same things I tried to teach at my old church. Prayer in tongues, mostly. It’s a secret language, through which you speak directly to God. You prophesy your future. You build yourself up in the fruit and gifts of the Spirit. You fire weapons at Satan, and because he can’t understand you, he can’t defend. You pray God’s perfect will, with faith provided by the Holy Spirit, in Jesus’s name. As we know, those prayers are always answered. Jesus promised it.

Because I’m middle-aged and not totally stupid, I predicted that a few people would take this seriously, and that it would be enough to bring change to the church. That is now happening.

On Sunday, the pastor called up a friend of mine. Unbeknownst to me, she had listened to the sermons. She stood up and said she was praying in tongues at least an hour a day. She said she was doing it at work, and she was trying to keep it quiet, because she worked in a library. She began teaching and prophesying. It was amazing. I’m sorry I don’t recall all the things she said. I was too busy thanking God to pay close attention.

A year or two back, at the old church, I attended a Friday prayer service. They have since cancelled these; apparently, prayer services aren’t “dope” or “slammin’.” At the service, I found myself saying, “Unleash the flood. Unleash the flood.” I had no idea what it meant. Soon I realized I was talking about the Holy Spirit flood.

Water, floods, rain, mist…these things represent speech. Prayer in tongues is a flood that comes from the Holy Spirit. More accurately, it’s like the mist that used to come up from the ground every day, before rain existed. It comes up inside us; it doesn’t just fall on us from outside.

Genesis 1 says God created heaven and earth, but the next verse says, “The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.” Many believe something happened between the verses. Creation was performed, but something screwed it up, and then the earth was without form and empty, and it was covered with waters.

Satan works through voices. He’s a tiny man who talks loud. He’s like the moon, which looks big when it comes between us and the sun, which is 444 times as wide. He and his fallen spirits speak and yammer constantly. They slander God. They curse his work. They curse and corrupt human beings and turn them against him. I believe this is the water that covered the earth. Through salvation and the baptism with the Holy Spirit, we receive faith and knowledge that lift us above the flood, into the space where God works miracles.

In Matthew 14, we see this illustrated symbolically. The Disciples see Jesus walking on water; Jesus is above the words of the enemy and his people and spirits. Jesus asked Peter to come to him, and Peter walked on the flood, which would have drowned him but for God’s help. When Peter focused on the storm, he sank.

We are so immersed in Satan’s lies, we can’t get to the place where God works. We are conditioned to think he doesn’t care, or that he doesn’t exist, or that he can’t help. As a result, we don’t get help from God, and he doesn’t improve us, as he wants to. If you pray in tongues every day, you will eventually be lifted up for air. Your faith in the deadly waters will be overcome and destroyed by your faith in God, through the living water.

I believe that’s what the Holy Spirit was trying to tell me through those words. God is unleashing a flood of living water on the earth. A generation of people are rising up, and through God, they will have tremendous power. In the hearts of many, Satan’s lies will be wiped out and proven wrong, and through us, God will finally do the “greater works” he promised.

My church is focusing more on prayer and worship. We’re also doing some things which are probably pointless, involving social media and so on. But we’re doing what matters. The prayer and worship we go through before and during services are ramping up tremendously, and God is manifesting himself. This Friday, we’re having a special night just for prayer and worship.

My own prayer life gets better and better. Sometimes it seems as if there is no room for improvement, but you know God (I hope). He doesn’t fill the cup. He makes it overflow. There is no end to his help and his goodness. I can’t even guess how much better things will get, with his help.

Carnal people will doubt this. That’s how it has always worked. This stuff is only understood and accepted with the help of the Holy Spirit. Your mind alone will never get you anywhere. Hell is full of brilliant people, and heaven is full of the simple. It’s frustrating to know that it’s pointless to say these things to most people, but I’m glad there are people who will hear, understand, and take advantage.

If you haven’t received the gift of tongues, keep trying. Find people to lay hands on you. Ask people to pray for you. Fast, if you have to. Look up the promises of the baptism with the Holy Spirit, and stand on them in prayer. I can’t tell you why it takes some people longer than others, but I know God loves you, and he will give you what he wants you to have. He hit me with it while I was alone in a room with a television set.

The faith of the Holy Spirit is the rock Jesus referred to at Caesarea Philippi. People think he referred to Peter, but that was a play on words. Peter had a revelation through the Holy Spirit. This is what Jesus referred to. Through the Holy Spirit, we understand and believe, and once that happens, we stand on the Spirit as we would stand on a rock in a turbulent sea. God says he has lifted us up out of the miry clay and set us on a rock and established our goings. He didn’t mean Peter was going to hold us up.

God will also transform the floods of your enemies into rock you can stand on. He will turn your enemies’ lies and curses into blessings, so you will walk on the flood. Your enemies will be your footstool. In this way, he will make your enemies your slaves, as he brought honey out of the lion he killed for Samson.

Why did Samson kill the lion and touch its dead body? He shouldn’t have been handling torn, rotten flesh. He was a Nazirite. He did it because it showed that when the Holy Spirit was with him, he was above the written and spoken law.

God IS the law. What he tells you in real time is what you should do. The Bible is great, but because it doesn’t change, Satan can use it to trap you. He can cause you to go against God by obeying the LETTER of the law. Look what happened to Jephthah. When you hear from God minute by minute, you obey the SPIRIT, who has the liberty to tailor his orders to the situation. This is why Jesus let the disciples pick grain on the sabbath. It’s why Jesus made a habit of healing on the sabbath. The book is good, but it’s inferior to the one who wrote it.

What’s happening in my church is exciting, but I’ve already seen the danger. When the Holy Spirit falls on a gathering, kooks show up. People who love attention come, and the first thing you know, they’re howling like monkeys and hitting people and rolling on the floor. They’ll come to the microphone and say stupid things. It happened in Pensacola. I warned my pastor about it. I think God gave me that insight. Satan hates the power of the Holy Spirit, so he will send idiots to make it look like heresy and ignorance. Don’t be fooled by the chaff. This is real. Satan may put on a sideshow to distract you, but a hundred fools don’t disprove the righteousness of one true witness.

I get quibbles from people who sit around reading things like St. Augustine and Tertullian. I hear nonsense about how the books of the Bible were chosen arbitrarily, or how they’ve been altered. People love to pump themselves up with intellectual pride, as if a little being with a 3-pound brain and a 70-year lifespan could dissect the Almighty.

You can read about God, or you can cut out the middleman and get to know him personally. That’s where real authority comes from. God and those who believe him will be here long after the conceited have been sent to a place where bloviation brings them no recognition and no relief. Don’t let your pride ruin your future.