In Ephesians 4, Paul was describing a mature picture of the church, and gave advice and prophetic announcement about how to get to that position and condition of maturity. In verse 16, he wrote that Jesus is the source of the Life that enables and motivates the Body to growth – building itself up in love as each part does its part. Every believer has an important ministry. Some don’t […]
Monthly Archives: July 2017
Real Unity
As I listen to the few leaders who are making some noise about unity in the church, it seems that most are just calling for uniformity. Most cries for unity are “Come and be unified! (Under my “covering”) Unity is not just all the black and white pentecostal congregations being able to tolerate working together on a project. It is groups who have different cultures, different giftings, different assignments from […]
Guard Your Supply Lines
Imagine that you were in the rush to steal land from native Americans on April 22, 1889 in the area now called the state of Oklahoma. At noon on that day, thousands of people on foot, horseback, or in wagons were lined at the borders of the territory waiting on that moment to be released into the race to stake a claim on a square mile of land, given freely […]
Ministries of Miracles
Who should be doing miracles? Some other questions that could help answer that one, by finding a pattern: Who should be leading people to Christ? Who should be encouraging other believers? Who should be praying for their city or for the business they work for? Who should be teaching their children the ways of the Lord? Answers to all of those questions could at least be “anybody.” “Everybody” may even be appropriate, […]
Singing and Dancing
Whether we appreciate music or not is a cultural statement about what we like or what we value. It is further a cultural declaration when we vote for the kind of music we like. Dancing is expression of culture, too. Some believers are convinced that if they like something, it is certain that Yahweh likes it even more. Of course, the inverse is also true – if they don’t like […]
The Fellowship of Misery
But the things that used to be advantages for me, I have, because of the Messiah, come to consider a disadvantage. Not only that, but I consider everything a disadvantage in comparison with the supreme value of knowing the Messiah Yeshua as my Lord. It was because of him that I gave up everything and regard it all as garbage, in order to gain the Messiah and be found in […]
Increasing Faith
When His disciples asked Him to increase their faith one day, Jesus answered with 3 descriptions of the relationship of faith to authority and obedience to that authority (Luke 17:6-10). The answer was not a “7 Steps to Increased Faith” series, available for a one-time gift of $25 or more. It was a description of faith at work with authority. When a centurion asked Jesus to heal his servant one […]
Grace Works Faith
He was in the world, and the world was created through Him, yet the world did not recognize Him. He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him. But to all who did receive Him, He gave them the right to be children of God, to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood, or of the will of the flesh, or […]
Why and How we Change
Two conditions that promote or provoke change are vision and pain. Vision – the idea that something is happening that shouldn’t, or that something isn’t happening that should, awakens the person it can influence with a desire to pay the cost of changing themselves so that the vision can come to pass as other things change. Pain can force change even with no target for improvement – sometimes we just […]
The Word of the Lord
Recently, we looked at the impact the “word of the Lord” had on Samuel at various points of his life and work. The more he interacted with and submitted himself to the word of the Lord, the more he advanced in revelation, character, and power. You may not have much you could point to in terms of direct revelation about your identity or purpose that the Spirit of God has […]