After Three Days, I Failed to Rise Again

I’m sorry I haven’t written more lately. My church just had a three-day “Rendezvous” conference, which was actually a revival. I worked all three days, leaving early in the morning and returning late. Today I’m convalescing. I got up at 10:30.

Our speakers were Judah Smith, John Gray, Carl Lentz, and Harrison Conley. We also had our homegrown talent, headed up by Rich Wilkerson, Jr.

I have not recovered to the point where I have the energy to write about it.

John Gray nearly melted the church on the first day. People filled the aisles, trying to get to the front for the altar call. After that, I wondered how things could get any better. But they did. Each speaker built on the foundations laid by the ones who preceded him, without knowing their material in advance.

Judah Smith finished us off last night. His message was this: God sees all of time, from one end to the other, at every instant. When he saves you, he knows you’re going to stumble and sin. He saves you anyway, and he loves you all the time, and he is not angry with you.

I don’t know if I’d go so far as to say God doesn’t get angry with us, but I would say there is never a time when he will refuse to hear you when you come to him for help and admit your sins. And I don’t believe you can become unsaved, barring some extraordinary act of defiance.

Here is what Psalm 32 says:

Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.

When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long.

For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned into the drought of summer. Selah.

I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Selah.

For this shall every one that is godly pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found: surely in the floods of great waters they shall not come nigh unto him.

To me, this says we suffer internal condemnation, through the Holy Spirit, when we cherish and cling to and deny our chronic sins (iniquities). We block God’s earthly blessings during those times. The Holy Spirit continues warning us, taking away our rest. When we turn back to God and admit wrong, the blessings return. One such blessing is that the “flood” of curses released by the enemy will be turned back.

Robert Morris says “flood” often refers to slander. I would broaden that and say it applies to hostile words in general. After all, don’t curses begin when they are spoken? Aren’t they founded in words, somewhere back at the supernatural source?

I would also say that Jesus is utterly crazy about us. I know that because he came into my room and touched me twice, and his love could be felt physically, like the heat of a spotlight. It will sound silly, but when his presence touched my leg or my shoulder, those parts of my body felt loved and at peace, independently of the rest of me. I know that makes no sense, but it is completely true. And it’s not just mature, sober love. It’s not just God wanting what’s best for us. It’s also affection. Jesus LIKES us. Go figure.

John Gray talked about lightning. He talked about “leader” strikes, which begin the process. He compared God’s power to lightning hitting the earth, and he compared us to leader strikes, which connect lightning to its targets. I thought that was wonderful, because on one of the occasions when Jesus manifested himself to me, I felt lightning entering into my upraised palms. I don’t know what it meant.

I guess you could say God’s blessings are like lightning, and our chronic sins are like insulation.

Psalm 37 says:

The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord,
and he delighteth in his way.
Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down,
for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand.

We are like sculpted figures, slowly chiseled free from marble by God’s hand. Chronic sins are like the overlying marble between the hidden figure and the point of the chisel. I believe prayer in the Spirit is the chisel. Maybe that’s why God refers to his word as “sharper than any two-edge sword.” Prayer in the Spirit is a completely pure form of God’s word. The phrase “God’s word” doesn’t always mean “the Bible.” It means anything spoken by God. If you have lunch with Jesus, and he orders a cheeseburger, his order is God’s word. If the Holy Spirit speaks through you, it also has to be God’s word.

The people speaking at the church and running things didn’t have much time to talk to us. I wish I could have buttonholed a couple of them to tell them all the stuff the rest of us were seeing. God was working all over the place, among people lower on the food chain. I had some wonderful conversations with my friends, and we strengthened each other and helped each other with our needs. And the speakers said things that were like laser-guided bombs aimed at my personal issues, about which they could not have known anything.

I think you need to tell your authorities when God works through them, so they will be encouraged in what they do. And they need to make time to hear you, for their own good. It’s great to be so strong you’ll serve God without reward, but a little honor and encouragement can be very helpful.

When we were planning Rendezvous 2010, I didn’t realize it would be a revival. At first, I didn’t plan to go, because our regular Tuesday night Rendezvous is aimed at younger people. I used to think it was a singles thing for the young, which ruled me out.

After I had been at the event for a while, working security and helping the VIPs and witnessing the things that were happening to me and around me, I realized a revival was underway. And I came to realize what a revival does. We all know a revival attracts the lost and brings them into the fold. What I did not realize is that a revival touches those who are already on the path. I figured we would serve and have a good time and hear some great things, and that would be it. But we found ourselves promoted to higher levels of faith, knowledge, and power.

I prayed so much during Rendezvous 2010, I feel like my “faither” got sore. I really mean that. The part of my mind that exerts faith literally felt worn out at times. But I thought it was extremely important for people at the church to be praying for the speakers and authorities at all times. They don’t have the time to do it all themselves. Over and over, I found myself with convenient down time when I could be alone and pray.

During John Gray’s second talk, I got stuck in a hallway outside an empty conference room adjoining our green room. There was no reason to put me there. They could have just locked the door. It looked like a bad assignment. But I was old enough to know better. I knew God speaks through apparent adversity, and I also knew he expects us to serve at the bottom if we expect to be promoted. I knew that God was telling those above me what to do with me. I refused to be disappointed, because I knew I was getting a blessing. I used the time to listen and pray.

I found that by moving a bench, I could command a view of the entire backstage hallway I had to protect, while seated behind a curtain next to the stage. John Gray was maybe forty feet behind me. I didn’t miss a thing, and I wasn’t distracted by people who needed to be herded and managed. It was wonderful. When my relief came, I went to the sanctuary, but I made a quick trip back to the bench to let him know that he didn’t have a bad assignment, and that God would make something out of it.

Later that day, the guy who relieved me sat at my table at lunch, and I got to hear about his life. I learned about the attacks he’s facing, and I found out how driven he is to serve God and bring in the lost. He has lived on the streets, and he knows the people, and he goes to them and preaches and brings them in. He rebukes spirits during services to help people make it to altar calls. I told him what little I knew about being built up and fighting attacks, and we had a great time. I hope what I said was right and useful. Maybe it was his blessing for sitting on that bench.

Last night, I heard beautiful worship music in my mind as I tried to fall asleep. I wanted to get up and try to write it down, but it was just too late. Today I woke up full of the urge to praise God. It just poured inside me.

More than ever, I feel that I am walking by faith. I have become a very hard person to hurt. When you walk by faith, whatever is intended as evil toward you turns out to be a blessing. I don’t know where things are going, but I feel almost manic when I consider the changes in my life.

I think God is going to start speaking to us more directly than he used to. We’ve all been at emotional sermons where speakers talked sincerely and zealously about the power of God, without making it clear how we could put that power into action. We’ve been inspired and encouraged, but practical information about getting the required tools has been lacking. I think that time may be over. Some say the heavens are polarizing and heating up with conflict, just like the earth. If that is true, we need to be serious, and we have to become effective. Vague instructions like “pray a lot” and “quit sinning” aren’t going to get the job done. Those aren’t the tools the Apostles used. They healed the sick, cast out demons, and raised the dead. You can’t get the power to do those things by going to church a lot and trying to be good.

The age of real supernatural warfare is beginning. That’s what I think. We are going to come to a realization that prayer and fasting and worship are more important than anything we do with our physical or mental abilities. When we understand that, we will automatically start walking by faith. When that happens, God will be beside us all the time, so how will anyone stop us? We’ll be protected from all sorts of harm, and even when harm touches us, it will turn into blessings. It’s kind of unfair to the enemy, if you think about it. But I can live with that.