The following is a simple word, of which I am most excited! Being one who loves creative and unique music…

In the short years ahead, as it was in the 60’s, 70’s and early 80’s… a product of the Revival called the “Jesus Movement” of the late 60’s, so it will be in the days ahead.

In the form of anointing and “extra talent”, from the origination of the Kingdom of God, is about to come some of the most beautiful music we have ever heard. It will come from the church and from outside of the church. It will touch us right where we are at. It will speak to us the very heart of the Father in words and tunes that require revelation knowledge. Even the music alone will move our hearts.

From the pits of desperation to the joy of salvation on earth as it is in Heaven will come some of the most wonderful music! Souls will be saved because of it!

A great peace will come from such tunes of anointing that will help those who are walking thru the valley of the shadow of death. They will walk with Ipods on and laugh in the face of weak evil.

Here it comes! Now let’s pray it in and have ears to hear!

Even now it has begun. However, tomorrow it will be clear and shattering, extremely powerful though nameless… shifting, but not by any person… direct to those who are willing to accept the new thing of God.

There will be times when only the music will see certain people thru. For those who produce it, they need to know; their work is as valuable as those who step forth into the harvest fields.

Cases in point… Blue Merle, Jason Upton, and Pat Metheny, to name just a few…

Blessings!

Scott

I have found many times that what the Lord leads me to speak to is born from many years of wrestling with it in my own life. What I speak to here is indeed an issue I constantly go before the Lord with. He is always working on my prideful and cold heart! So as I write, know that I am speaking to myself as much as I am speaking to you. With that in mind… read on!

Whatever I think that is not in alignment with what the Spirit says to the churches combined with the revealed word of God (Bible) becomes the cause and substance of spiritual blindness.

Everything I have concluded outside of revelation knowledge is done so in independence rather than dependant revelation.

This is sin.

When I follow a theology that has not been given by the Holy Spirit, the devil gains a right against me to blind me to deeper Spirit given truths that God is trying to give me. A wall has been placed in my outer man (soul). I become unable to see deeper truth even if it stands right before me. What I am able to spiritually see becomes limited by what I think.

This is the primary tool and strategy of Satan, to dupe the world into false theologies by conclusion rather than revelation. Good sounding arguments born from the pride of what I think rather than revelation words that are born out of intimacy with the Heavenly Father thru Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

What is real in Heaven is absolute. In most cases it is absolutely contrary to what is “real” to the world. Heaven and Hell are absolute. Salvation and damnation are absolutes. The Bible is absolute in its literal “logos” written word. But to understand these absolutes in the fullest measure requires revelation knowledge born from a state of complete dependence. There is no other way to gain deep truth but by revelation knowledge that is expressly given by the Holy Spirit, “the Counselor who leads us into all truth.” (NIV)

Humility leads to a mind yoked in deep submission to the mind of Christ. Therefore the right way to use my mind is to first put on the yoke of the mind of Christ, and then to gain what he knows thru intimacy with him.

God gave me a mind to use. However the right way he intended for me to use it is to be in submission to him first! I must first die to my mind and then use it. The only way to be truly in submission is to start with a heart of humility. This is a lesson I am constantly learning!

Whatever I conclude must first be revealed to me. Not by voices in my head but by The Voice of The Word, namely the Holy Spirit who speaks the word into my being. There are NO other ways to truth.

Good sounding arguments are like an insidious disease. They come on subtly and hidden, and are almost unnoticed. Independent of the mind of Christ, they sound good but are devoid of any value as to the Kingdom of God. If I cling to what I know, before I recognize it such arguments become lethal and blinding.

Oh for the ongoing manifestation of the Holy Spirit in our churches that would shed light upon the lies of good sounding arguments! How great would the church become in manifest power and reaping if this were so! The only thing standing in the way of such power is the lack of willingness to die to self in manifest humility!

In the Kingdom of God, there is no way to gain revelation knowledge but thru the ones who are humble of heart. They are the ones who hear from the Lord. They are the ones who gain the deep most intimate things from the Throne Room of God. They are the ones who will move in mighty exploits here on earth!

There is something about the humble people of the Lord that draws the heart of the Father near. Humility is the means by which I gain entry into the inner courts of God. I am nothing so he can be everything to me and then thru me! This is plainly written in the Scriptures of the Bible.

Isa 66:2 Has not my hand made all these things, and so they came into being?” declares the LORD. “This is the one I esteem: he who is humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word.

Dan 10:12 Then he continued, “Do not be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to them.

Zeph 2:3 Seek the LORD, all you humble of the land, you who do what he commands. Seek righteousness, seek humility; perhaps you will be sheltered
on the day of the LORD’s anger.

Luke 1:52 He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble.

James 4:10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.

1 Peter 5:5b-7 All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.

The only road to truth and Kingdom knowledge is the road of selflessness and humility, in as much as we are able. The Lord says this again and again, “…lower and lower still.” We must become less and lower in humility so that He can be made known through us.

Ultimately, the road to salvation starts with humility. For it is true that one cannot see the need for a Savior unless one agrees to the need for him! Humility says I am a person in need. Then humility allows my heart to have faith. The result is a true love that is born from humility. True love is selfless. Therefore, true love requires true humility. If I am to love my Savior like I do, I must love him selflessly.

Even in marriage, success can be summed up in one word… selflessness. Those who have great marriages understand this truth.

The world hates this humility argument, because it sounds weak and helpless. It sounds like the way of slavery. But the truth is that humility leads to great liberty, not just for the ones who operate in it but also for the ones who receive love from it. True humility leads to an eternity in Heaven and a release to be used of on earth. And therefore, selflessness is the way to truth. Any other way is good sounding and deadly.

It is better to give than to receive. This starts with humility.

Humility leads to a selfless love that establishes a measure of intimacy by which we come to know our lover deeply. And so humility leads to love, which leads to intimacy that leads to revelation. Revelation leads to a desire to give to my lover my all. And so as to the Kingdom of God, love results in the reaping of a harvest of souls in manifesting power.

Therefore, humility leads us into power and great effectiveness. It is not weakness as the world would say, but humility is power that overcomes the lies of this world and that establishes the way by which the Kingdom of God manifests on earth.

Col 2:2-4 My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. I tell you this so that no one may deceive you by fine-sounding arguments.

Rom 1:16-28 I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.” The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities — his eternal power and divine nature — have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator — who is forever praised. Amen. Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion. Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done.

Since humility leads to the revelation of what is Kingdom truth, the lack of humility leads to a depravity of the mind. In whatever measure we lack humility is the measure we are unable to see and move in the deep things of God for his purposes. The Holy Spirit awaits the humble of heart to come and express supernatural Kingdom truth by supernatural Kingdom revelation.

John 16:13-14 But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you.

Gal 1:10-12 Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ. I want you to know, brothers, that the gospel I preached is not something that man made up. I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ.

To please people seeks to be seen and heard in order to gain something on earth for selfish purpose. But to please the Lord is selfless and rooted in love. It seeks to give rather than receive. It seeks the Kingdom of God over the Kingdom of this world to gain what is unseen over what is seen.

We must constantly revisit this need to go lower and lower of self with a heart of humility. In doing so, we will love the lost with a great love they can feel. In doing so we will gain a great harvest for Jesus Christ.

“Lord humble my heart, because I choose this lower way of self. I love you Father! I love you Jesus and I love you Holy Spirit! This day I choose to go even lower still so that you may be more greatly seen thru me. To you be all the glory and all the praise! Amen.”

My dear brother Paul has hit a milestone in his life-walk with his wife… 20 years of marriage. He emailed me a poem he wrote for his wife Melissa. Paul has such a big heart which you can plainly see in his words of love.

With Paul’s agreement, I thought is so wonderful to post this as a read for whoever might stumble upon this little site of ours.

Now Paul and I would love to invite you to add your own segment to this poem. Feel free to compose one or more additions to this little collection of life thoughts and send them to us as a post. I will add them to this blog for all to see.

Enjoy and much love to all whose hearts are moved in this selfless dance we call marriage!

Scott

Twenty years

In twenty years we’ve seen miracles
For twenty years weathered storms
In twenty years smelled roses
For twenty years you’ve adorn

In twenty years had tears
For twenty years of love
In twenty years seen sorrow
For twenty years faith above

In twenty years had fights
For twenty years taken risk
In twenty years eaten ice cream
For twenty years of bliss

In twenty years wrecked cars
For twenty years made a home
In twenty years mowed the lawn
For twenty years hugged hello

In twenty years lost loved ones
For twenty years made love
In twenty years had friends
For twenty years hand in glove

In twenty years had children
For twenty years they’ve grown
In twenty years of foundation
For twenty years of their own

In twenty years had fears
For twenty years waved goodbye
In twenty years seen the wonder
Twenty years of sunset sky

In twenty years what will be?
For twenty years on my mind
In twenty years and more…
I’ll love you all my life

For twenty years…

…and twenty more…
…and twenty more…

By Paul Daniel Morton

Ep 6:10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.

If this Ephesians scripture true, it references a power that we are supposed to be strong in. But what power does the world see in the church today? Why is there but little evident power in the church today?

In order to answer this question, we must first understand what and who this power is.

The power of the Christ, who also is the same power that is supposed to manifest in the church is he the Holy Spirit.

All power belongs to God and is given to us to use according to his desire and purpose. We can do nothing in our own power because right power is only his to give. The war we fight is spiritual and which then requires spiritual supernatural power to be successful in the fight. Therefore in order to succeed, we must appropriate the ability to do so. We must then understand that of our own we are unable. Of our own, we will lose the fight.

We own or possess no power. But we operate in God’s power as a willfully submitted conduit according to his will and timing. Therefore any release of power from the Father into us by the Holy Spirit occurs in those who are furthering his Kingdom purpose only when he chooses to anoint or endue us with power. The key then to right release of power within me is to know his will and be in submission to every authority that he has given me. The basis behind this authority and the essence of which this authority resides is love. Love is the very fullness of everything in the Kingdom. The revelation and manifestation of love then is the root of all power in heaven and on earth.

Holy Spirit

Rev 19:1b Salvation and glory and power belong to our God…

1Co 12:11 All these (supernatural gifts) are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines.

The power of the Holy Spirit is the power that was clearly evident in the first church. He is the power of Pentecost, the power of the cross. In him is the power by which we are supposed to be able to:

Mt 10:7-8 As you go, preach this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven is near.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.

When the Holy Spirit shows up in power, the Kingdom of heaven has come near. When the Holy Spirit shows up, the mind of Christ is made known. When the mind of Christ has been made known, the will of Father God has been revealed. They are each God and they are all as one. This is the ultimate demonstration of the authority of the Kingdom, that three parts of God can be one in unity and submission. The fullness of the Kingdom of God is dependant on this chain of authority between Father, Son and Spirit.

Interestingly though, because they each prefer each other, that authority is not vertical, it is lateral. Even more, one might see that this authority can be seen as vertical in the reverse! Since the Spirit does nothing but what the Son says, the Spirit has lowered himself below Christ in humility. Since the Son does nothing but what the Father says, so it is that he has lowered himself for the same purpose. In reality, there is no one of the three above the other. They are the perfect personification of love that prefers the other over themselves. The end result is a moving wheel of love that is not lopsided at any part. None of the three take a greater position than the other.

True love operates in this way. And so is it that true authority should. We prefer each other above self. Therefore true authority looks up to those we serve, unlike the world that condescends. The result is the power of perfect love. The result is a manifestation of the heart that releases anointing to do what no person can do of their own.

True power absolutely requires the power of perfect love.

So it is with us. When we are under this kind of authority, the Kingdom comes near, power is released, and love is made known. And again, love is the start and finish of it all.

I am convinced; this is the hour that Father God is renewing the mind of the church by the Holy Spirit. He is restoring us by instilling in leadership a consciousness of need for this power to be restored back into the church. He is causing church leadership to be curious, hungry and thirsty for deeper intimacy with the Lord. He is doing this because he wants his church to know of his love the way he meant for us to know him since the first church. This restoration of the revelation of the Father’s heart of love leads to a byproduct of power. In such a way, power is not the focus, Jesus becomes the focus. Why? In a word, love. He loves us. The power of love has the ultimate result of revealing this great love in revelation form.

Love leads to anointing and power. Power produces revelation knowledge. The revelation leads to love. So the fullness of love is manifested and revealed in power. Without the power, it must stand to reason then that there is a great measure of loving missing.

Talent or Anointing?

There is such an evident fear that manipulates the church away from these radical spiritual miraculous things.

However, perfect love casts out all fear.

I Jn 4:18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

All power is released by the Holy Spirit. But because the church is all but devoid of the Holy Spirit, there is little or no power in the church. In such a place, fear runs rampant.

In such places, what remains is only the best man can do by talent alone. There is little or no anointing to empower the call. Our love becomes the love of man, which is at best flawed.

Paul told the Roman Gentiles:

Ro 15:18-19 I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me in leading the Gentiles to obey God by what I have said and done— by the power of signs and miracles, through the power of the Spirit.

How could Paul have convinced anyone about anything spiritual without the power of the Holy Spirit to make him able? And we’re not talking about just the revealed word here; we are talking about signs and miracles!

Again Paul says:

1Co 1:17 For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel—not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.

And Paul again says:

1Co 2:4-5 My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.

The church is strongly exhorted in the following words:

1Co 4:20 For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power.

Why is Power Missing?

So why then is power all but missing from the church? One very important issue is a lack of faith that is based in fear. We tend to fear failure. We tend to fear what people think of us. We tend to fear that we are in error by moving into a former unknown thing. We fear change. We fear the devil. We fear the Lord even in unrighteous ways.

There is a great balance to fear. We are not to fear a thing in the world. But we are to fear the Lord. There is a point of balance between gripping fear and godly fear. We are not to have any gripping fear, but we are to be in fear of the Lord.

But perfect love casts out all fear. What fear? Gripping fear. Perfect love also makes way for the righteous fear of the Lord. For it is true that the basis for “the fear of the Lord” is not found in a cowering fear, but in an intimate love relationship that causes me to so love the Father and the Son that I fear him in love. So perfect love casts out all fear and sets me up in the fear of the Lord, which is love! Perfect love brings into balance the issue of fear in line with Kingdom truth.

Kingdom Balance

Perfect love manifests in the church a restoration of “balance” in all ministry works within the Body.

Now I understand that the term “balance” is a four-letter word to some spiritual leaders, but read carefully how I define Kingdom balance below before you shut down on this point?

Perfect love reveals Kingdom truth. Kingdom truth has nothing to do with the world and its physical laws. Therefore it has nothing to do with worldly reason. This revelation of Kingdom truth sheds light on God’s points of truth in whatever areas the Lord wills to show it. We come to a place of understanding any point of Kingdom truth and how radically different it is from the ways of the world. Therefore, the definition the Lord establishes for any point of truth is radically different from the world’s point of truth. The world calls it’s point of truth balance. The Lord calls his point of truth “truth”. The Lord’s truth is always different from the point of balance that the world has defined. So as the world defines a point of balance, that point rarely if ever is identical to God’s point of truth on the same issue.

In the world, balance is compromise. It is Yin and Yang. It is a half way between two extremes. It accepts the good with the bad. It is ungodly. But God’s balance is like a pinpointed lightning strike! It is always radical and Kingdom spiritual, and which can only be revealed, not concluded. Kingdom truth has no connection to worldly truths. In fact the worldly mind cannot comprehend Godly truth. The worldly mind is incapable of understanding Kingdom truth. It must first be yoked to the Spirit and dead to self before revelation can be made. Independence causes blindness to Kingdom truth. Dependence opens the door to Kingdom truth.

Why is this discussion so important? Because in order to be restored to the power moves of God in the church, we must first be revealed to how important it is for us to succeed by way of new and fresh revelation. We must be revealed to God’s point of truth regarding this power of which I speak. We must have a paradigm shift in the knowledge of God’s points of truth as they relate to the manifestation and purpose of the Holy Spirit in the church!

We must come to an understanding that this love is far more powerful that the world thinks or even can comprehend. We must come to the understanding that this love is the root of all deeper wisdom, knowledge and power; the very Kingdom of God manifesting in and upon us in the church and which is available for us here and now.

Faith

In the revelation of this great love, each person is revealed to his or her place. Manifested perfect love, as revealed into the church by the Holy Spirit reveals the fact that no one is disqualified to either give or receive out of the abundance of it. Therefore the one and two talent people in the church should not be held back, but encouraged to express their anointing as revealed by the Spirit in the church.

However the reality in today’s church is that perfect love is not yet fully manifested. And so we deal with the flesh in our members and in the church Body. The result is that we all struggle with measures of fear both in our lives and in the church.

As a child, there was a covering over me. I loved easily and without a fear of man. The days were endless and there was no anxiety. But as an adult, I came out from under my generational coverage and into a place of responsibility to accept Christ of my own volition. It became incumbent upon me to have faith in all things. The depths of my spiritual understanding became a matter of my own right choices. As well, the measure of my error manifested by my wrong choices.

I needed to find the Holy Spirit just as I needed to find Christ. As with my necessity for faith in Christ, the Holy Spirit required also my faith in him to reap from him. I came under the effects of my flesh and unbelief that we all deal with. I was faced with the choice to accept the supernatural or not.

John 14:16-17 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever– the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.

As an adult, I not only needed Christ, I needed the Spirit both in me and with me for both salvation and effectiveness in the here and now. Jesus became my all in all. But the Spirit became my power and revelator for the here and now. As it was in the first church, so it is today. As if Jesus was standing before us in the flesh, he asks each of us today, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you first believed?”

Acts 19:1-6 While Apollos was at Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at Ephesus. There he found some disciples and asked them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” They answered, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” So Paul asked, “Then what baptism did you receive?” “John’s baptism,” they replied. Paul said, “John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. He told the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus.” On hearing this, they were baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus. When Paul placed his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied.

When they heard of the need for baptism into the Holy Spirit, they believed and then were baptized. Faith for the Spirit was born in them. Only after did they receive the Holy Spirit through the laying on of hands.

Rom 10:17 Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.

So therefore, all thing overcoming and all things regarding my growth in the here and now require me to accept in faith, to receive and then to flow in the River of the Holy Spirit. He brings to me the manifestation of the Kingdom of God on earth.

John 16:13-15 But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you.

Without him, I am unable to move into spiritual maturity. Without him I am unable to overcome the flesh within me. Without him, I am unable to enter into a state of effectiveness in this world. Without him, I am left with the far inferior mind of man within me to decide what is right and true. Without him, I can never hit the benchmark of spiritual truth in any Kingdom understanding. Without him, I am like a dart thrower who has been blindfolded. Imagine the mess I make when I start to throw the darts towards what I think is the center point of truth!

Mercy and Grace

God is not asking for perfection in us regarding this way of independence. Even with the Holy Spirit, I cannot enter into perfection in these things while in this world. For still, while in this world, we will be dealing with troubles of every kind. As the word says, there is no one who has not sinned, no not one. And we have all fallen short of the glory of God. Praise God for the sacrifice Christ made for me! Oh how I need him daily!

The gap between perfection and our individual way of life is called “mercy.” The power of repentance and restoration for our imperfections that was born on the cross for us is called “grace.” And so as in Nahum Chapter 2, we the warriors of God stumble along the way. That is OK with God. He just wants us to get up, dust off and in repentance move on.

2 Cor 6:4 Rather, as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance; in troubles, hardships and distresses…

Phil 4:13-14 I can do everything through him who gives me strength. Yet it was good of you to share in my troubles.

So as to fear, we will never be perfect in the overcoming of it. Yet in all things, I can do anything in Christ who strengthens me. We are perfectly loved and perfectly saved, and perfectly covered… in an imperfect body that is in an imperfect world. The result will be troubles. Though momentary and meaningless, we deal with them. How? By perfect love.

Included in this perfect love is mercy for mistakes and powerful grace to overcome.

Oh how great is the need to the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in all we do today! Now not only do we need the Spirit to manifest revelation knowledge of Christ, but also to overcome our momentary troubles to remain free and in joy!

When I surrender my all in faith to Jesus and in the Holy Spirit, these things are revealed to me. But the flesh curse I deal with that came to me from Adam, the knowledge of good and evil, that thing that works in my members and wars against me, constantly attempts to minister fear into my soul. It is by this that I fear in an ungodly way. But praise the Lord for the manifestation of the River of God! In the Spirit, I am constantly renewed day by day in my mind by the revelation of joy and love and the mind of Christ given me by the Holy Spirit.

2 Cor 4:16-18 Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Fears have to flee in the River of God! Perfect love is manifested in his Presence! Perfect love casts out all fear.

In the River I am shifted and aligned. In the River I am healed and restored. In the River all things are made new. In the River I am given unto the power of perfect love upon me. In the River the Kingdom of God comes near me.

It’s like a wheel. I go round and round. I go into the Presence, then into the world. I get knocked around a bit by the world, certain ungodly things stick to me. Then I come in again, as an act of my will, back into His Presence. I get cleaned up, re-revealed to his love, and anointed anew. Then I go back into the world, back into the Presence, back into the world, then into his Presence and then back into the world once again. Round and round I go in the great circle of life as a man of God. I move from freedom to freedom, from love to love, from glory to glory, in the ever increasing revelation of Father God upon me and within me that sets me up to overcome and reap! Faith, hunger, love, power, then ability. Then it starts all over again. Surrounding all of this is love.

In the River of God comes the revelation of love. The revelation of love casts out all fear. In such a way of going, in all things I am able in Christ, who by the Holy Spirit just then made me able in all things. If I don’t go in again and again, I will miss the new release I need desperately.

So then all things of the Holy Spirit are first a revelation of love. Everything of the Kingdom manifests from this benchmark of revelation truth. This is why the greatest commandment is to love. If I am ever to understand anything of the economy of the Kingdom of God in this lifetime, it first requires a healthy revelation of perfect love. Now I know that contrary to the voice of the world that say either “you can’t” or “you can but in your own power”, I can! And that not of my own, but based upon a dependence upon the Holy Spirit of God, that River to which I must return again and again.

Faith without works is dead. Works without Kingdom power is meaningless. Kingdom power without love is unavailable. As such, we are called to do the work. But the road to supernatural Kingdom success can only be seen or known through one’s eyes of love.

Self Death (Dependence)

In speaking of the end times, the Lord warns us about residences of faith without power:

2Ti 3:5 …having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them.

We are told of the Spirit by whom we have the following:

2Ti 1:7 For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.

Like the author of Philemon, I want to know Jesus and the power of his resurrection!

Phl 3:10 I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death…

I want to be so dead to self that Christ can be alive in me in power. Power then manifests from a place of submission. Submission manifests from a heart that is faithful and a mind yoked first under the authority of the Father and Son, second to the church and then to those in the world to whom the person serves. All these things require selflessness. They require that I be emptied of my will.

Kingdom revealed authority releases power (not authority as man defines it). The willingness to submit to authority is found in a heart of love and then obedience to Father God. The fullness of such submission is found in selflessness.

1Jn 2:1-5 My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world. We know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. The man who says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But if anyone obeys his word, God’s love is truly made complete in him. This is how we know we are in him…

Perfect love is a supernatural supply of “life essence” from heaven. There is no natural perfect love. The only place perfect love is made, established and released from is in the Presence of the Lord. It comes to us from the Kingdom of God. This is quit possibly the very reason God asks us to pray this in the first sentence of the Lord’s Prayer. God takes measures of it from up there and gives it down here into the world through his church.

Ep 3:17b-18…And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ…

Love is revealed in the power of the Spirit.

Col 1:8 and who also told us of your love in the Spirit.

Paul is complimenting the love of the Colossians by stating that their excellence in love as having come “in the Spirit”.

Why did Paul say, “your love in the Spirit?” Why did he not simply commend them on their “love”? Why did he add the words “in the Spirit?” Could it be that the primary place to remain in right love is in the presence of the Spirit? Could it be that for love to be rightly expressed, the Spirit is the key? I am certain this is true.

Any form of “love” outside of the presence of the Holy Spirit can only be lacking at very best. In fact the world really does not know love outside the revelation of the Father’s heart for mankind. The farther away from godliness it goes, perversion sets in. In reality, any form of love that is not in perfect love is perverted to one extent or another.

Perversion is defined in Webster’s like this:

1a: to cause to turn aside or away from what is good or true or morally right : CORRUPT
b: to cause to turn aside or away from what is generally done or accepted : MISDIRECT
2a: to divert to a wrong end or purpose : MISUSE
b: to twist the meaning or sense of : MISINTERPRET

This is the very language of the enemy of God. It is the very purpose of the devil to take what is so important to the Father and to falsify it so as to disqualify it. We have an enemy that wants to cause us and the world to be lost in false truth. How does he do this? He works to cause the church to take what is so important to God and cause the church to believe that it is not important, even worse, not right.

If perfect love casts out all fear, then the enemy is going to do everything he can to cause perfect love to be misunderstood. If where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom, then the enemy of God will do whatever he can to put the fire of the Spirit out in the church to establish bondage.

It is for this reason that the revelation of perfect love is so come against in the world and in the minds of people. Perfect love releases the power of the Lord. The release of Kingdom love into the world brings the fullness of God’s Kingdom power into the world. The devil gets forcibly displaced when perfect love manifests into the world! Manifestations of evil is directly come against. The result is a step closer for the enemy towards the lake of eternal fire.

Kingdom wisdom starts with revelation love. By this wisdom the enemy will be defeated every time. Though we deal with troubles of every kind, in reality, the enemy is forced out of the way or backwards as we supernaturally reap a harvest for Jesus Christ!

As such, perfect love is our sacrifice for him!

Conclusion

The closer we move towards perfect love in these last days, the closer we come to literally touching the face and heart of the Father. In such a place, the power of the Kingdom begins to manifest on earth. This whole thing is all about intimacy! In such a place, no fear may reside!

This is what the Lord wants of us. This is the progression. Be thirsty and faithful that there is more. Seek the Presence, and wait for him to come. Become filled with his Spirit. In that place of wonderful joy, become revealed to the fact that he first loved you with an unfailing love. Be made known to what he thinks of you even in your flawed state. Be made known to the revelation of grace. Love him in return with the sacrifice of you flesh and soul. Die to self. Submit to the authority of the Father and then of the church. Then start it all over again by returning to the River again and again.

If it is true that “of the increase of the government (Kingdom) of God there is no end” (Isaiah 9:7), then enough is never enough! There will always be more to be had.

Certainly it can also be said that no man has seen all there is of God. If the greatest a person has ever attained is a grain of sand, then the greatness of God through us is like a beach full of sand, the grains of which cannot be counted.

Who then is any person to think that he or she has attained to the fullness of all knowledge? The point is that there will always be something to be revealed to. We will always need to go back into the River to gain the new thing, the next thing. This is so very important.

If it is true that the body requires regular hydration, then so it also is that the soul and the church Body requires regular spiritual hydration found only in the River of living water. Lest I go spiritually bone dry, I must come back to the River again and again to drink.

Wait for him by worshiping in love until the presence falls? Soak in him until he is thru? Don’t look at your watch as you seek the Father? Then move out in power, under the authority of the call and under the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Reap your harvest.

If perfect love casts out all fear, then no worldly thing can possibly stand against a Kingdom warrior such as this!

Ep 6:10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.

The power of perfect love…

“Why did you not believe?”

John 3:1-12 Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you are doing if God were not with him.”
In reply Jesus declared, “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.”
“How can a man be born when he is old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb to be born!”
Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.
You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”
“How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.
“You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things?
I tell you the truth, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things?

Here was a man, this Nicodemus, who was trying to figure it out. He was thinking. He was seriously trying to grasp in his own thinking and in his own mind the answers to who Jesus was and how one can be saved.

Consider the difference between conclusion and revelation.

This Nicodemus was incapable of hearing as God defined hearing. Hearing and seeing the Kingdom of God is a supernatural ability. To see and understand the things of the Kingdom of God requires Kingdom knowledge. Kingdom knowledge comes only by way of Kingdom revelation.

Kingdom revelation comes only by the manifest Presence of the Holy Spirit who comes and brings such knowledge. Only those “born of the Spirit” can understand it. Only those who move in the manifest Presence can comprehend Kingdom stuff. This is why Jesus speaks of the Spirit before making this statement. Everyone born of the Spirit moves in the Spirit. They understand what Jesus meant when He spoke of the Spirit’s goings and comings.

The only way to gain spiritual Kingdom truth is to be revealed to it by the Holy Spirit. I cannot conclude Kingdom knowledge by my reason, I must be revealed to it.

John 16:13-15 But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you.

The definition of “all” is all! All Kingdom truth comes by way of revelation knowledge. We can’t figure it out. Therefore we must cease trying to figure God out in our own thinking and let the Revealer of mysteries bring us the truth that He wants us to understand.

If the Holy Spirit is the one who brings all truth, then there is no Heavenly Kingdom truth that is any truth at all that has not first been revealed.

One can read the Bible all day long and get nothing out of it. One can ask questions all day long, get good worldly answers, and never gain God’s key point of value. In such a case is what Jesus means when He says:

Mark 8:18a “Do you have eyes but fail to see, and ears but fail to hear?”

Only by the Holy Spirit of God thru a humble heart will we gain spiritual truth expressed in spiritual terms!

Dan 2:26-29 The king asked Daniel (also called Belteshazzar), “Are you able to tell me what I saw in my dream and interpret it?” Daniel replied, “No wise man, enchanter, magician or diviner can explain to the king the mystery he has asked about, but there is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries. He has shown King Nebuchadnezzar what will happen in days to come. Your dream and the visions that passed through your mind as you lay on your bed are these: “As you were lying there, O king, your mind turned to things to come, and the revealer of mysteries showed you what is going to happen.

The Kingdom of God is a mystery. Who can understand it by the mind of man alone? It’s up there and we’re down here. What is real up there is so vastly in excess and so greatly superior to what we know down here. But Christ died on the cross so that we would be given the Holy Spirit, the Councilor who would lead us into all truth.

We cannot understand by what we think. We understand by dependence. We can only understand by what we are revealed to by faith. Understanding does not bring faith. Faith brings understanding.

I can read the word of God all day long and still completely miss what God is trying to say to me. Even the devil knows the word of God. Rather, it is by a dependent faith that I can understand what the Lord wants me to know. It is by faith I can heal the sick, cast out demons and raise the dead. It is by faith that we can see thousands of souls saved in a day. It is by faith that we gain revelation of the Kingdom of God and then move in it.

It is by faith that we give God control of our meetings. It is by faith that we let Him lead without fear of the enemy or the flesh and without fear of loosing control. It is by faith that we fall to the floor in His Presence and receive. It is by faith that the joy of the Spirit is released in a place.

But now I hear the Lord saying it again and again, “Why do you not believe?” Today, He speaks this same question to church leadership. Is it not true that the church can only go as far as a leadership has faith?

Faith in works is a dead faith. Faith without works is a dead faith. Right faith in alignment with God’s radical ways and supernatural truths is the only way to reap a supernatural reward. These are the radical men and woman of God that are being forged in this hour. It is a leadership like this that will lead their people into Biblical exploits. Stories that will be told throughout the ages will come from people such as this!

How then will we answer the question that is even now being asked, “Do you believe?” Will we believe for the radical harvest? Will we believe for the sick made well, that demons will flee, and that dead people will come to life? Will we believe that we need the Presence to do these things? Or, will we continue in our own thinking and own dead religious meaningless ways? Will we interpret the sign of the time with our own independent thinking or by dependent revelation?

God says, “Will it be you alone, or us together? Do you believe?”

For many who are in Heaven and all who are in hell, the answer to this very question will most likely be answered as follows:

“I didn’t know. No one told me.”

God’s answer would most likely be, “No, you were told. You just did not have ears to hear.”

By faith, we have ears to hear. But like Nicodemus, those that try to figure it out in the mind, cannot hear. Understanding follows faith.

For those in hell, how tragic is this error. But for those in Heaven who did not have ears to hear beyond their salvation, how great is the loss as well! Yes, they had a faith that gained them a home with the Father. But they had no ears to hear the deeper things of God. They never graduated off the baby’s bottle. They did not understand that they could have reaped a great harvest! How great is the loss when God wanted them to go deep into the radical things of the Holy Spirit but they had no ears to hear!

Regarding the church, and this is the heart of what I am hoping to write:

Miracles are coming, healings are coming, and joy is coming. The dead will be raised, and for those who believe, they will see thousands of souls saved in a day and millions of souls in a month.

But what does that all look like? What does the Kingdom of God look like with our natural eyes? No one can see the Holy Spirit. No one can see a cancer or a demon come out of a person. No one can see the inner workings of the Spirit in a dead body that causes it to come back to life. All we see are a people drunk on the new wine of the Holy Spirit! HA!

How quick we are to criticize what we do not understand. But who can understand the Kingdom of God with natural eyes?

But when the Spirit falls, we will be confronted and tested with this question: “Do you believe this? Do you believe I am doing a radical work or do you just see the offensiveness of one who is drunk on the new wine of God?”

We have a fleshly brain in our natural body, given to us as a part of our soul. God gave it to us to be used for His purpose. We have been given a freedom to think as we see fit and choose as we see fit. Oh how critical are our choices in this life!

But God has asked us to yoke our minds to the mind of Christ. He has called us into a forever state of dependence upon his Holy Spirit. In this way, we connect our natural minds to the supernatural mind of Christ. It is only then that we can see supernatural things. It is a complete dependence. Independence is a deadly lifeless way!

Mark 8:22-25 They came to Bethsaida, and some people brought a blind man and begged Jesus to touch him. He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man’s eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, “Do you see anything?” He looked up and said, “I see people; they look like trees walking around.” Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’s eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.

There is such wisdom in this scripture! Jesus saw fit to open this man’s spiritual vision before healing him of natural blindness. How much more important is it for us to be revealed to supernatural Kingdom things rather than to base what we know upon what we see in the natural!

God has called us into a state of complete dependency. Independence is what got Lucifer kicked out of heaven. For the very root of independence is pride. There is no humility in independence.

Why then do we have to figure it out? If I have the answers, I have put God into the little tiny box of my religious mind. I have based my conclusions on earthly experiences of what I see, taste, touch, hear and smell… or in the vain imagination of what I might presume.

We are supposed to be supernatural beings. When we give our minds over to Christ, He starts to show us wonderful things supernaturally. We then gain supernatural experiences. We then have testimonies that we can speak before the spiritually hungry and thirsty. They receive it in the same way I got it… namely revelation knowledge by the Spirit.

We start to overcome the world so that Jesus can have the harvest, the reward for His sufferings! We start to see miracles, healings and radical understanding that so far exceed the smallness of what we think!

God is the revealer of all mysteries. So how then will we respond when the Father asks us, “Why did you not believe?”

Today, there stands before us an “eternal” choice. What stands before us is a harvest of one or a harvest of a thousand. What stands before us today is a hospital of dieing people or an empty hospital. What stands before us are spirits of death going around making a mockery of God, or these same demonic spirits fleeing from our cities in seven directions under the power of God’s Presence.

What stands before us today is despair or joy… division or peace… anger or love… fear or hope. We have a choice today to live in the poverty of the intellect of this world, or the riches of the knowledge of the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in Heaven.

Stands before us today is our choice. Will we believe in faith for these radical ways or question in doubt and judgment?

How great is the loss when we in the church silence the supernaturally radical for form of worldly order and fear based protectionism.

How great is the loss when our disbelief results in little Kingdom understanding and little earthly fruit. How great is the loss when our failure to listen and trust in the supernatural results in a tiny harvest.

How great is the loss when our failure as a church to hear the deep things of God means that many who might have been saved languish in hell as a result.

Consider the story of Lazarus.

When Jesus was crying at the tomb of Lazarus, I am convinced he was not crying for Lazarus. Jesus was about to restore Lazarus back to life. So for Jesus, there was no loss regarding this Lazarus whom He was about to restore. No, Jesus was crying for a different, far more serious reason. I believe Jesus was crying because this dead Lazarus was symbolic of the dead lifeless church all down through the ages.

John 11:38-40 Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. “Take away the stone,” he said. “But, Lord,” said Martha, the sister of the dead man, “by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.” Then Jesus said, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?”

Jesus restored Lazarus because many wanted him to be alive, not the least of whom was Jesus Himself. They grieved over their loss. But Jesus grieved over the far greater loss that He foreknew.

I believe that Jesus was crying for all the lost souls all through the years that could have been saved that were not because of generations of dead, Spiritless, lifeless, religious and ineffective church.

I wonder how many church leaders today are crying out right now that Jesus would come and restore their dead churches? How I hope for this brokenness of self so that Father can have the church he desires!

How recognizable is the smell of death to those who hunger for life!

This is a heavy word. But now is the time to die to everything we hold dear… to all that holds us back. Now is the time to wipe the slate clean and start afresh. It is never too late.

Now is the time to do away with the age old religious chains whose name is engraved on every link…. “OUR YESTERDAYS.” Now is the time to be made hungry again and thirsty again for the fresh waters of life that satisfy our thirst and then their thirst.

You know we must be filled first before others can be filled.

Now today the choice is ours. We have nothing to fear if the Holy Spirit is leading our meetings. Then we will know where to steer the church God has given us. Then we will be made known to where the attacks are coming from. Then we will gain the anointing power to be used of by God to do great exploits.

There will be thousands of arguments against letting go. The devil is fast at work against the Spirit filled church because he knows that these are God’s greatest weapons against him. Every good sounding argument will be leveled against the radical ways of the Spirit.

But just how big is the devil anyway against the power and fierce zeal of our God? If God is really in control of our meetings, by what power can the devil override God? (Likewise if we are in control of our meetings and God is not, what scenario is the devil more likely to be in control of… God’s meetings or ours?) If God created satan, then what of anything he might try to do should we fear? Perfect love casts out fear, and perfect love is supernatural. And if Perfect Love is manifesting in the room, what devil can stand in that place?

Now then, we all will be asked this question, “Will you believe?” Should we not reconcile ourselves to this now rather that in Heaven when it will be too late?

2 Cor 10:3-5 For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

How then will we choose? Will it be in selfless dependent heartfelt faith or by the independent intellectual arguments of a worldly mind?

5/12/08

Hell has been shaken! This move of the Lord has so shaken the pits of hell that the enemies of God are in great fear and in a great rage.

Never before in my entire life have I felt this kind of urgency to pray and intercede. I have a simple word. Every ministry, every church, every family, every person that is moving in the Holy Spirit, now is the time to pray.

Now is the time to release the intercessors to do what they were made to do, namely to cry out under the unction and power of the Holy Spirit, to intercede and to prophesy.

There are attacks coming. The Cyclone of Myanmar and the earthquake today in China are two examples on the grand scale. But I see attempted attacks coming from all sides from a position of hiddenness. Now the Holy Spirit will shed light on this darkness if we will take the time to hear and then pray. We do not fear. We are not involved in man-made works. But we must pray, now.

In as much as we allow the enemy of God to traffic in darkness is how much we stand the chance of being blindsided by it.

All the spiritual bells and whistles are going off in my spirit. Now is the time to intercede!

Please send this out! I could care less about being heard! Send it out to whoever has ears to hear!

Be blessed,

Scott Morton

5/7/08

Well now I am totally wrecked once again! HA! It’s a good thing to be wrecked! It is so good this wonderful feeling of “nothingness”! I have once again come to the end of myself! HA!! I have once again come to the end of what I think, simply because what I have just experienced is outside my capacity to think! And I realize again that I cannot figure out or define what God does among those who believe for the radical. I am just wrecked! All I am left to say is, “Come Lord Jesus, come!”

As I write, it is Wednesday, May 7th, 2008. My wife, daughter and I have just returned from Lakeland, Florida and the Todd Bentley/Fresh Fire Revival. We spent four days on the road and the weekend in place just hungry for more of the Lord. We knew this Revival was a wonderful outpouring from the Lord. When we got there, we dove right in. The Spirit met us in power. We saw wonderful healings and radical miracles like body parts growing back, the dead being raised (2 by that date) and gold teeth being installed supernaturally. Even my dear mother-in-law was deeply touched by the Holy Spirit. She had gold dust manifest on her body as she was being prayed for. It was just awesome! We were rendered wasted on the ground time and time again in a state of drunkenness in the Holy Spirit. We met people from revivals all around the world.

We had divine appointments again and again on each of the three days we were there. We received and gave out as the Lord lead.

David Vaughn from Wales, England was with us. My old revivalist friend, Jim Samuelson from Fargo, North Dakota was with us. Many revivalists from around America and around the world were in attendance this last weekend. We were prophesied over by some of the most anointed prophets in the world. Every single word was a confirmation and an increase of former words we have received. The Spirit was moving so strongly in the place that we were on the floor as much as we were in our seats!

David Vaughn regularly tested my level of offendability in the flesh! Indeed David carries a mantle of the Welsh Revival upon him. As he laid hands on us, as did so many people in each meeting, we went deeper and deeper in the Holy Spirit and in the love of the Father. Jesus was magnified to great heights! Meanwhile we fell lower and lower of self under the weighty revelation that God is God and we are not.

Now the Spirit of the Lord has been moving in power around the world for many years. Since the end of World War II, there have been certain outpourings of the Holy Spirit that have been preparatory for these end times. Though there have been great revivals before then, there seems to have been a shift to end time purpose since the end of WW II. World War II was the war of the ages and which was a manifestation of the natural that came forth because of the great spiritual battle that was going on in the Heavenlies. Somehow I think that the enemy was being served notice back then that the end times were close at hand.

I have been in this outpouring of the Spirit since 1997. But this particular release of God’s Spirit in Lakeland has come with a purpose far greater than just a few Godly people getting healed, delivered and blasted in God’s manifesting love! No, we were getting set up to be sent out! This manifestation is the great outpouring that has been prophesied for years that would reap a great end time harvest.

A Vision

One night (The Saturday night meeting 5.3.08), I saw in the Spirit a great wave of waters. Like a great tidal wave cresting, it was just hovering just behind the stage. It went from the north horizon to the south horizon. I knew that it was about to just brake down over us. I was waiting for it to come, but it just stood there, many hundreds of feet high and but just a few miles away.

Then I saw in the Spirit three lightning bolts strike the center field of the baseball park. In a moment of holiness and weighty presence, I saw each lightning bolt strike the same exact spot on the ground. Each one came slowly and with a pause in time between bolts. BOOM… (everyone just froze in position in terror)…………… BOOM… (everyone was shocked that it came again)……………BOOM… (now everyone just fell to their faces under the weight of the knowledge that God had just come). Then I heard the Lord say, “Lightning might strike the ground twice in the same place. But, three times is impossible. THIS IS GOD!”

Now I knew that what was happening in Lakeland was the very hand of God doing his plan in his timing.

End vision.

Indeed we do not know the day or hour of Christ second coming, but we can and should know the season of it. Without a doubt, we are in the season of the end times.

Now it stands to reason that if by the power of the Holy Spirit a great harvest will be reaped, we must know that every accusation, effort, strategy, tactic and plan of satan will come against such outpourings to prevent them from coming to pass. For it is true that by the power of the cross we can see thousands of souls won in a day, so it is that this power is what the enemy of God would come against the most.

Now even at these Lakeland meetings, I saw people who were clearly offended at the manifestations of the Holy Spirit that were happening before their very eyes. I was shocked to see how most received, but some rejected what they were seeing as a work of man’s flesh. This greatly saddened me.

Lord! Let it never be said of me that I got in the way of God to stop others from pressing in to deep relationship and fullness with the Father!

Now this must be spoken of, and in a word of knowledge and prophetic sort of way!

A Prophetic Word

There will be people who will scoff and mock this outpouring. There are many who would say, “This is not of God.” Even now there are some who would say, “This is nothing special and unique.”

It will come more from the religious “church” than from the world. Though there will be persecution from the world, it is the Spiritless church that will mock this the greatest. It will come most from those who have something to loose. They will crusade against these moves with publications and accusations of impropriety and error. Do not be surprised. Do not respond to offenses with an offense.

If the Spirit filled church will love the spiritless church then many will be saved. In such a way, many dry places will be filled. But if the Spirit filled church responds in anger, the divide will become great.

God will forever be checking the condition of our hearts to see if we will become less so that God can be great among us. And so we who are going deep in the Lord must know and be willing to take the slap and respond in love. Do not be surprised by judgments, accusations and offenses taken up by those who call themselves people of God. We must remember, it is not the mind that makes us people of God, it is our hearts. By our hearts, we know what is true. So it is that by our hearts, do we respond.

Rom 12:17-21 Repay no one evil for evil. Have regard for good things in the sight of all men. If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. Therefore

“If your enemy is hungry, feed him;
If he is thirsty, give him a drink;
For in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head.”

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Let no one steal your joy because they accuse you of error. Let no one pull you down because of condescending judgment. Be submitted to your church leadership who are themselves submitted to the Holy Spirit of God. But do not allow the spoken or written words of those who pass judgment against Revival hold you back from the radical stuff God is now calling you into.

End Word

Taking Ungodly Offense

In John 6, Jesus was speaking to the disciples regarding the eating of his flesh and drinking of his blood. They did not understand the teaching because they needed the revelation of what this radical teaching meant. When revelation is missing, the mind takes over. When the mind takes over, interpretation error is sure to follow.

John 6:60-64 On hearing it, many of his disciples said, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?” Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them, “Does this offend you? What if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before! The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life. Yet there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe and who would betray him.

Revelation does not require the mind, it requires the heart. God shoots right past the mind to check the condition of the heart. Then and only then does God bring revelation knowledge. The results are mental judgments against anything that one does not believe.

Where the spiritless church is concerned, these mental judgments arise from man’s interpretation of the literal “logos” written word.

Man has fallen into the trap of taking on the responsibilities of God to judge the church.

These are the people who are quick to quote:

1 Thess 5:21-22 Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid every kind of evil.

They neglect the revelation of the scripture that precedes it:

1 Thess 5:19-22 Do not put out the Spirit’s fire; do not treat prophecies with contempt. Test everything . Hold on to the good. Avoid every kind of evil.

Today’s church has so divorced itself of the manifestation of the supernatural that it rejects the restoration of, or any manifestation of the supernatural.

We should know that there is power in passing judgment. But that power only applies to the world. In the Kingdom of God, the only one with the power to pass judgment is God Almighty. Whatever judgments man might pass against the church is powerless against the church so long as the church remains in the Spirit of the Kingdom of God. Therefore, we must not make any judgment, lest we gain the punishment due the world. But we must love, allowing the Father to judge.

Woe be it to those who pass judgment against the real moves of God! Here are many scriptures that directly speak to this issue:

James 4:11-12 Do not speak evil of one another, brethren. He who speaks evil of a brother and judges his brother, speaks evil of the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. Who are you to judge another?

Rom 14:10-13 But why do you judge your brother? Or why do you show contempt for your brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. For it is written:

“As I live, says the LORD,
Every knee shall bow to Me,
And every tongue shall confess to God.”

So then each of us shall give account of himself to God. Therefore let us not judge one another anymore, but rather resolve this, not to put a stumbling block or a cause to fall in our brother’s way.

Oh my goodness, let it never be said of me that I have placed a stumbling block at the feet of those who are doing the radical stuff of God! And Father forgive me for ever speaking a word of presumptive judgment against anyone who has moved in the radical of the Lord!

A Warning

Those who are passing judgments against what is a real and true move of God must be warned. If the Spirit of the Lord manifests in power to bring healing, wonders and strange manifestations of drunkenness and seeming disorder to the people of God, who is it that one comes against if one passes judgments against such things? The answer is the Holy Spirit. The result of such a judgment is to accuse the Holy Spirit of bringing a false manifestation, or, to accuse that which actually is of the Holy Spirit as not being of the Holy Spirit. That is a form of blasphemy. One definition of blasphemy is this: “The act of insulting or showing contempt for God.” Merriam-Webster

People who publicly pass judgment against a true move of the Lord are showing a form of contempt. Contempt is defined as: “A willful disobedience to or open disrespect of a… judge.” Merriam-Webster

Jesus spoke a fearful and powerful word of warning in the following:

Matt 12:30-32 “He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters. And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.

It might be argued that a person is acting in what he or she thinks is right, not knowing the truth. Thus in not knowing, they are not responsible for their own actions. But I say to you that people who persecute do so in the pride of the flesh. Those that persecute, in most cases, do so from a place of inner woundedness. They judge from a place of presumption. If they knew God, they would never do such a thing. If they knew God, they would know the truth. See John 16:1-4 below…

These are the people who warn us about the “strange teachings” talked about in Hebrew 13. But they do not include the context and revelation of the scripture that speaks only to false teachings of the full and basic Gospel of Christ.

Heb 13:7-10 Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings. It is good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace, not by ceremonial foods, which are of no value to those who eat them. We have an altar from which those who minister at the tabernacle have no right to eat.

If we are to imitate the faith of those who went before us, are we not to do what Jesus did? Are we not to be like the twelve Apostles? Are we not to manifest the same things that came to these Apostles at Pentecost? Are we not to heal the sick, cast out demons and raise the dead? Are we not supposed to be seeing 3000 souls save in a day, as was the product of Pentecost? I tell you this; I will imitate the faith of Todd Bentley way before I imitate the faith of the religious.

We must remember the words of Jesus Christ, as written in John 16. These will be the people we are warned about:

John 16:1-4 “All this I have told you so that you will not go astray. They will put you out of the synagogue; in fact, a time is coming when anyone who kills you will think he is offering a service to God. They will do such things because they have not known the Father or me. I have told you this, so that when the time comes you will remember that I warned you. I did not tell you this at first because I was with you.

That’s how far an offense will take a person. It starts with disbelief. It then manifests into a judgment. The judgment manifests into hatred. Hatred manifests into murder. This is how the Saints become martyred.

Of these things, the Body of Christ should have no part. We must know that the hatred leveled against us must be answered with love, lest we fall into the snare of the trap of strife and division. The devil is always in the business of tempting the Body of Christ to fall into this trap.

If I am nothing and He is everything, whenever an offense comes my way, it is not my offense. It’s not my offense to be offended about. It deflects off of me to the One who is everything. If God truly owns all of me, it is He that has the right to be offended, not me. True humility means that all I am is his. Therefore I have no right to carry an offense. It’s not my offense.

As such, when we commit an act of offense to someone of the Kingdom of God, in reality, we commit it against God. The Lord says that all the vengeance is his.

Todd Bentley and many other apostolic leaders who are moving in the radical of the Lord are stewards of the mysteries of God. It is of these people that God writes:

1 Cor 4:1-5 Let a man so consider us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover it is required in stewards that one be found faithful. But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by a human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself. For I know of nothing against myself, yet I am not justified by this; but He who judges me is the Lord. Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the counsels of the hearts. Then each one’s praise will come from God.

These men, women and yes children will be people who do not deny the power of Jesus Cross. It is the revelation and manifestation of this very power that the religious come against the most. But look at how God considers those who deny the power of Christ’s Cross:

2 Tim 3:1-5 But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them.

The denial of the power of the Cross is lumped in here with a large list of great sins! The scripture is clear… have nothing to do with them.

If we deny the power of the Cross, we deny the Chief Cornerstone of the Church. We deny Christ directly.

Isa 28:16-18 and 20-22 So this is what the Sovereign LORD says:

“See, I lay a stone in Zion,
a tested stone,
a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation;
the one who trusts will never be dismayed.
I will make justice the measuring line
and righteousness the plumb line;
hail will sweep away your refuge, the lie,
and water will overflow your hiding place.
Your covenant with death will be annulled;
your agreement with the grave will not stand…

…The LORD will rise up as he did at Mount Perazim,
he will rouse himself as in the Valley of Gibeon —
to do his work, his strange work,
and perform his task, his alien task.
Now stop your mocking,
or your chains will become heavier…

So now all that is left for us to do is to get wrecked and stay wrecked! In as much as we become less, God will show us great things and move us into great exploits. But as much as we operate in the flesh of our being, we will not see it. And the result will be the pride of our self-defined certainty. What manifests then is judgment. May we never fall into that trap.

1 Cor 3:18-23 Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you seems to be wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, “He catches the wise in their own craftiness”; and again, “The LORD knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile.” Therefore let no one boast in men. For all things are yours: whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas, or the world or life or death, or things present or things to come — all are yours. And you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.

Zech 4:6 So he said to me, “This is the word of the LORD to Zerubbabel: ‘Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit ,’ says the LORD Almighty.

This, therefore, is the strategy of the devil. He desires that we get tripped up by others accusations and enter into strife with them.

James 3:13-18 Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, demonic. For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there. But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

1 Cor 3:3 For where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal and behaving like mere men?

Have nothing to do with the Spiritless false accusations that are sure to come in the days ahead. Love those who bring them, but do not receive such strife. And above all, do not come into agreement with man made cranial arguments that cheapen the Cross that usually end with, “I don’t see that in my Bible.”

I know this is a lengthy word. But please take the time to read this. If you are limited in time, please go to the last paragraph for the current word.

We are on the edge of a long ago promised outpouring of the Spirit and I sense the Lord saying, “Here it comes… are you ready.”

It’s April 23rd, 2008. I am up in Anchorage, Alaska on business and again the Lord is giving me a word regarding Revival in America from this place. Today and for the last few days the weather has been clear but hazy. The news this morning said that the cause of this period of haze is a series of fires and dust clouds to our west in Russia and China. As the smoke of many fires are reaching Alaska and having a visible effect, so it is that the fires of Revival in America that are just about to happen are about to circle the globe and have an unmistakable effect. Before I speak what the Lord is setting in my heart we must revisit a word the Lord gave me years ago…

The following is an excerpt of a word I gave to a key national apostolic leader in February of 2002. Included in this word is a series of words I got from 1998 until 2002. I know this is lengthy (about 2 pages) but it all is very important to this word today. Here is that word cut and pasted below:

About two years prior to this last Presidential election (early 1998), in a prayer group meeting at Shady Grove Church in the DFW area, and in the presence of many witnesses, the Lord gave me a clear word. He said, “George W. Bush will be the next President of the United States. But you will need to pray for him unceasingly.” (This was about a year and a half prior to the date he announced that he would run.)

God said, that we needed to pray very hard about this until it would come to pass. Little did I know of the spiritual battles that were to come regarding his election! It would become obvious why God said to pray.

I took this to heart and prayed for him nearly every day during this period of time. But I remember asking the Lord, “Why George Bush? What, Lord, is so important about this man?” I knew that he was a man of God, but sensed that there was more to this man’s call than just that he was a man of faith… much more. I just didn’t get an answer until the summer prior to his election, over a year later.

Two prophetic visions happened that summer (2000) of great importance. I spoke these visions as often as I could to anyone that would hear.

1) An all time record drought hit the central part of America in the summer of 2000 just prior to the Presidential election. The Lord was speaking to us through that event though I sensed that few people heard what He was trying to say.

As an airline pilot, I use satellite images to know where bad weather is. When you “loop” these images together on a computer, you can see the motion of the clouds across the nation. The Lord showed me a vision in my sleep of what seemed to be a presentation of these satellite images looped together. It would replay again and again. Then I saw the hand of the Lord with His pointing finger pointed drawing a circle around this drought region of the United States. It market out the central middle States in a large oval circle. His hand went around and around, and He was saying, “Pray for the rain, pray for the rain, pray for the spiritual rain.” The area that was affected by this drought included mainly Texas, the north west corner of Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, the lower western half of Missouri, Kansas and then upward into the Dakota’s. This was the area that the Lord was circling in my vision. Though it seemed that the upper most segment went up into Canada.

I sensed the Lord saying that this is an important strategic area for revival to be nurtured and birthed. I believe this still stands today (2002).

2) Then a wonderful event happened in August of that election year. I was flying from Salt Lake City to Boise Idaho. It was a late evening flight, to arrive around 9 pm. I was a passenger. The Lord put a strong call on my heart to pray for George Bush. I interceded the entire flight. My head was in my hands almost all of the flight as I was praying.

In that time (late summer 2000), you might remember that there were many wild fires burning out of control in the northwest United States. That too was a prophetic vision in the Lord.

As we were descending into Boise, I took my head out of my hands and looked out my window into the pitch black into an incredible sight! There before my eyes was a forest fire only 10,000 or so feet below. It was magnificent! Flames were leaping hundreds of feet into the air. Thousands of acres of forest were on fire. As a pilot for 20 years, I had seen hundreds of fires from the air, but not that was so magnificent as this one.

Then the Lord spoke into my spirit as clearly as I had ever heard, and in so doing, He answered my long-term question, “Why George Bush”?

This is what He said, “This is why I want this godly man in the office of President. Because I am going to bring the fires of revival to this nation such as what has never been seen before. No work of man or the devil will be able to put this fire out!”

Now I knew, this would be a battle that must be won in intercession and by only a few.

The election debacle was over (beginning of 2001). But the Lord spoke to my heart the power and importance of intercession in the days ahead. He said, “See, the minority has voted this President into office. Likewise it will be the minority of the church Body that will be enough to stir Me into action. I will give you a new effectiveness in a new season”

My wife and I spent New Years Eve 2000/2001 in our home. We could easily notice that all the hype of the previous years millennial changeover was nonexistent this New Year. Somehow this New Years Eve seemed very subdued. It was true that 1999/2000 was a hyped change of the millennium. But that was a false change of seasons. The true change of millennium, the true change of season occurred 2000/2001, as it is true that this millennium actually began New Years Day 2001.

The Lord caused something very unique to happen that night for me. My wife and I decided to stay up and watch a pay per view movie off of our Satellite system. We had no control of the time the movie showed. We decided to see the movie “The Patriot”. It’s the first time I had seen it. But I noticed that this movie was scheduled to end 6 minutes after midnight. I told my wife that I had a good “time hack” on my watch, I would watch for midnight and inform her of midnight when it occurred.

Now as we were watching this movie, I was enthralled by it! The movie progressed from one patriot’s defeat to the next at the hand of the enemy British Red Coats. It was one step forward two steps back all through the movie, that is until the end. All through the movie I got the sense of how impossible it was going to be for these patriots to defeat the tyranny of the Red Coats. Then came the final battle between the key characters, Mel Gibson and the Red Coat leader. The battle scene was intense.

Meanwhile I was looking at my watch, only seconds to midnight. I informed my wife of the countdown. But then, just as Mel Gibson thrust the final victorious blow into the enemy in slow motion cinematography, my watch struck exact midnight! This was, to the second, the very turning point of this movie.

Now from this exact point in the movie, until the end six minutes later, the patriots were now victorious, the battle won, the Nation was now officially unshackled from evil, and they became a nation. There battles were won easily from that point forward.

As the movie closed, the Spirit was all over me! The Lord said, “I have released a new season of effectiveness into the intercessors of the church from this moment. I am turning up the heat. You will do much more with much less in much less time, and in power in the spiritual realms. The intercessors will be much more effective because the season has just changed.”

Then the Lord led me to scriptures. Among many I read that night, this was the most important. My bible just fell open to it when I first opened my bible!

Nahum 2:3-6 The shields of his soldiers are red; the warriors are clad in scarlet. The metal on the chariots flashes on the day they are made ready; the spears of pine are brandished. The chariots storm through the streets, rushing back and forth through the squares. They look like flaming torches; they dart about like lightning. He summons his picked troops, yet they stumble on their way. They dash to the city wall; the protective shield is put in place. The river gates are thrown open and the palace collapses.

The river gate is about to be thrown open! We are these soldiers clad in scarlet red! We are His picked troops! We are the ones that stumble along the way (which is the flesh and which is O.K.)! The palace represents the strongholds of the enemy during this season of revival! It is going to come down.

End word of 2002

So there it was in a long word given a key leader in February of 2002. Today, April 23, 2008. I remember that word and know full well that the Revival I heard about has yet to come to pass. Until now.

We have just a few months before this President must leave office. Is it not just like the Lord to wait the fullness of his timing to bring to pass what he has promised? Is it not like the Lord to cause us to wait until the last second to see a thing come to pass? Is it not like the Father to examine our hearts before he sees a thing through? Are we not tested in these times so that when the fires come we do not burn out?

Now I sense it as strong as ever. The Spirit of the Lord is hovering over America to bring this thing to pass just as he said it would back in the summer of 2000. Revival is coming to America, just as the Lord had said it would. Only it will not come in the way that we would expect. The Lord said to me that the doors that open this year are not where we expect them to be and not what we expect them to be. We must be fully dependant on the Holy Spirit to even understand what the Father is about to do.

Here it comes! We are only days away from the fullness of it. Either I heard in error or the Lord is about to complete what he has started.

There are fires that have already started. But these fires are small and which are “starter fires.” But the Lord is saying that there will burn from America many fires of Revival that will affect the whole world. The smoke of many fires will be very visible and very obvious. The unbelieving world will be confronted with a mighty Jesus as he walked this earth, in signs miracles and wonders. The unbelieving world will have a great opportunity to see real Christianity. They will be forced to make a choice. No work of the enemy will be able to put these fires out. Every provision to see this thing come to pass will happen supernaturally. We will go for want for nothing in these days of joy. Though unbelieving America will deal with measures of suffering economically, the church that is filled with the Holy Spirit will not. Everything needed to take these fires to the nations will be provided for supernaturally. There will be many very wealthy Spirit filled Christians in the short days ahead. Here we go! Are you ready?

Isa 55:1&6 “Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost… Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near.

My dear mother and her husband live in a wonderful and remote area of America, a small town in Oregon named Medford. Though a rapidly growing city, Medford remains fairly remote in terms of visitation. It’s kind of like Vermont. It’s just hard to get there and not normally a place one would visit.

Every time I step off the airplane in Medford though, I feel such a blessing of God’s presence. I sense God’s supernatural blessing up and down the I-5 corridor of Oregon, even as far south as Redding, California, three hours to the south. I hope to retire in Medford some day.

My family and I do our best to visit mom and my stepfather at least once per year. During one visit in 2005, we decided to drive to the Pacific Coast of Oregon. From Medford, that drive is about two and a half hours.

It’s a magnificent drive! Winding curvy country roads that follow rapid mountain rivers, giving way to vistas of gorgeous small farms, rolling hills, horses, crops, vineyards and mountain scenes that will take your breath away. We turn and wind our way across the Oregon state boarder into the northwest corner of California where Highway 199 meets the coastal Highway 101.

Sometimes there is ocean fog as you approach the coast. Other times it’s cloudy and rainy. Rarely is it absolutely clear on the coast of Oregon and California. This day, the crisp clear and hot summer morning gave way to a twenty-five degree temperature drop and low-level fog.

Very soon the drive came to a California State Park named The Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park. Just before the 199 meets the 101 is this unique state park that is filled with ancient redwood trees.

We planned to stop here for a few hours to visit these magnificent trees. As it was, we were right on the edge of heat and chill, between crystal clear sun and cold low-level fog. It was gorgeous. Just a few miles from the Pacific coastline, the contrast was very visible, very physical. This midday, there were few people there.

The park consisted of the Smith River, a winding mountain to ocean flow that emanates from the western California/Oregon hills. There is a lengthy walkway bridge spanning across this slow flowing segment of the river. And of coarse, the huge redwood trees on the south side of the river. I stood absolutely amazed at the sight.

From the north bank of the river looking towards the south bank of redwoods, I could see these trees climb hundreds of feet into the air. As I walked across the river’s bridge, looking down into the waters I saw millions of rocks clearly visible on the bottom. All were perfectly smooth and uniformly rounded, tumbled by years of flowing and sometimes furious motion. Here, in the slow flow of this river’s end, the rocks were resting motionless. These rocks were perfect and individually unique. Not one rock was the same that was moving with the flow of this river. I imagined myself as one of these rocks.

As I looked from my stand on the bridge at the middle of the Smith River, I looked up at these magnificent trees. These trees had been there for hundreds and some for thousands of years. I read on the park placard that there were some trees there and still alive for well over 2000 years. These trees had been drinking from the waters of this unchanging unshifting river for hundreds, even thousands of years! Some of these trees were there since before Christ’s work on the Cross.

That afternoon, my dear stepfather spoke to me a personal story, an event that happened to him one day at this very same park many years ago. I have his permission to share this with you. Dave is a great man of God and a dear beloved friend and father.

He said that many years ago as he stood within this very same grove of redwoods, suddenly he felt the unmistakable presence of the Lord come upon him. For but a short few minutes, he was overwhelmed with love. He had never felt this before. He says it was very intimate. He never again felt such a presence of joy in this same way. But it greatly impacted his life.

Having experienced the manifest presence of the Lord in my life, I know generally what he was feeling, though his experience was very personal and uniquely profound to him. I do not presume to know what he specifically personally felt. All I know is this, he was made known, by manifest revelation, to the Father heart of God for him that day. And he was changed for a lifetime in that experience. He knew that he knew, he was loved by God.

As I thought of his experience later, it is no wonder to me that this happened in this park.

It was time to leave this Holy place. Now I was standing on the north bank of the Smith River. I looked one last time at these magnificent trees before departing for the ocean. Then Lord spoke something deep into my heart. “There are some rivers that never change.”

As I though about that day in the weeks ahead, the Lord began to reveal many things to me about rivers.

The Unchanging River

In Oregon, as it is in much of the Pacific Northwest, geographically there are mountains and hills that press up against the Pacific Ocean. Historically and for thousands of years, these mountains would fill with winter snows and then empty through a series of rivers into the Pacific Ocean.

The Rogue River is the classic example. The Rogue runs through Medford and eventually winds it’s way to the Pacific. This river is mighty and which is where American athletes train in whitewater activities to prepare for the Olympics. It rushes through mountain valleys in paths that have not changed for thousands of years. It channels the flow of fresh winter melt waters to the sea.

The key point is, these rivers have not changed their coarse in thousands of years. Some rivers are unchanging. They never geographically shift position. They represent the River of God that does not change. They represent the very word of God which when spoken does not change and which cannot change.

Heb 6:17 Because God wanted to make the unchanging nature of his purpose very clear to the heirs of what was promised, he confirmed it with an oath.

Heb 6:18 God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged.

Nu 23:19 God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?

1Sa 15:29 He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a man, that he should change his mind.”

Mal 3:6 “I the LORD do not change. So you, O descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed.

Jas 1:17 Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.

When the Lord speaks a thing, it cannot change lest the Lord be a liar. We who drink of these Rivers are shaped by these Rivers, we are nourished by them. They produce the substance of life by which everything of the Kingdom of God is formed. The Word. Jesus! Love!

It’s no wonder that my stepfather felt the presence of God in that very place of the redwoods! For the very word of God is the very dwelling place of God. The Father wills the word, Jesus speaks the word, and the Holy Spirit manifests the word. These words emanate from the throne room of the Kingdom of God. What a Holy place, that place of the unchanging River of God, where the spires have grown for thousands of years!

But the word only defines God. It establishes the principles of God. It establishes the laws of God. It tells of what is true and what is false. It speaks of who God is. It defines The Way. It makes a way. It is The Way.

However, the word alone is incomplete as to the whole of God’s plan. The word does not define what God is actually doing now. It defines who God is.

As I read the Bible, I find words that define who and what God is. I also find prophetic words that speak to the future of what God is doing and will do in the days ahead.

The River that never changes speaks to the unchanging nature of God, of who and what he is. But there is a River that is forever changing that prophetically speaks to what God is doing and will do in the days ahead.

The Ever-Changing River

My work has me flying over these United States almost daily. I see rivers from the air as I fly. One obvious river I see from the air is the Mississippi River. This river is unlike the Rogue River. From the air, one can clearly see, the Mississippi River is constantly changing, constantly moving and shifting geographic position. It winds and turns through soft and pliable lands that willingly give way! Though slowly and sometimes unnoticeable, this river always shifts. Those who live by this river understand what I am talking about!

When the river has made a change, and you can see this from the air very well, an area of swamp is left behind. This area where the river used to be has become a swamp of stagnant mostly lifeless waters. Though life is there, it is devoid of the fresh waters of the edge of the river. The waters edge has moved to a new place. The old place of where the river used to be is where you will find these stagnant waters.

This ever-changing River represents the manifesting presence of God that defines what God is doing right now and in the days to come. This is “The River of God.” This is the Holy Spirit. It winds and turns through lands, and is always shifting. One day the edge of the River is here, next it is there. Where this River changes to is the new thing of God. Where the River changes from is the old thing of God that is no more!

Where the River is today is what the Lord is doing today. Where the River used to be is what the Lord did yesterday. Where it will be tomorrow is what the Lord is doing tomorrow, and which is always a greater thing, an increasing thing!

Though God does not change when he verbalizes a thing, he is always increasing and doing a new thing that has never been done before. This is a critical understanding for us who are doing God’s business in this world!

The River that is ever changing is God moving from glory to glory. The people who move in these new things are moving from faith to faith!

Those who live on the edge of this ever-changing River are a people filled with the Holy Spirit constantly shifting from the old thing into the new. This River represents the increase of God’s government, the new thing, and change. It is the River that forms in the wasteland and which wells up in the desert. It is very supernatural.

Comparing Two Rivers

In the River that never changes I am like the rock tumbled and perfected in the word of God until I am formed into the likeness of Christ, God’s desire for my life. I go from rushing waters to sudden still waters. And the waters of this River are full of life-giving truth.

As the waters become still like the Smith River that morning, like the motionless rock in the unchanging River, I wait quietly and patiently for the next word that deepens my knowledge of Father God, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.

Under the weight of the knowledge of who my God is, I find myself hungry and thirsty for the knowledge of what God is doing. I want to be a part of it. I want to be on the edge of it. I want to be like the tree planted by the edge of the River drinking the fresh renewing waters of what God is doing now and tomorrow.

I have drunk deep of the waters of the River that never changes. Now I want to drink of the waters of the River that brings supernatural life to my members! When I drink of the waters of the ever-changing River, my tree is made able to produce fruit that brings healing to the nations.

We must be drinkers of both Rivers! The River that never changes speaks to my Salvation and my home in Heaven. But the River that always changes speaks to my life here on earth. These shifting waters make me able to do great exploits for my Father and my King in the here and now! You cannot have one without the other. Both are necessary to be effective in the fullest measure.

The waters of the unchanging River set my foundation. The waters of the ever-changing River set my feet in motion to reap a harvest.

Unchanging waters reveal and establish the base. Ever-changing waters reveal and then activate!

What we have experienced of God yesterday is never meant to be the basis for how we do things today. We build upon our yesterdays, we do not make our yesterdays our limit.

We cling to the unchanging word of God that defines him. Then we add to it the good of what God did yesterday as a basis to add upon for our tomorrows. We always seek the new thing of God in faith and with a willingness to be once again surprised with something that has never happened before. We couple our new experiences to the unchanging word and the inheritance of past revivals and build upon them. Only in this way will we succeed in the fullness of God’s call for his church.

There is a time to wait on the Lord in the unchanging River. But that is not to be mistaken for our call to forever be uprooting our tree and moving to the edge of where the ever-changing River has moved to. There is a vast and total difference between stagnant waters and still waters; one brings life, the other is lifeless.

I sense the clear direction of the Lord from time to time to uproot my tree and move from where the edge used to be to the new place of the new edge of this River. I know that if I stay where the banks used to be, I have lost the fresh waters of the new thing of God. I have become comfortable in the old thing. I have lost faith for the new thing.

But the shift of this River is subtle and which is discernable only over time and by the revelation of the Holy Spirit. It doesn’t look like it until you suddenly notice that the banks of the River have moved.

Isa 43:19 See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.

Isa 9:7 Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end.

How valuable is the knowledge of the Kingdom of God! By the Holy Spirit we are made known of the new things of God. The Holy Spirit is “the Helper who leads us into all truth.” The NIV Bible calls him the “Counselor” who leads us into all truth.

A Vision

One night, I had a vision. This is what I saw:

I saw a large grove of oak trees. They were all dieing. These trees were all standing in an area of swampy bog. They were drinking stagnant waters. The River had changed position but these trees did not perceive it. They stayed put. They would not move.

Now there were young trees and old trees. They were all dieing. The Lord told me, “These trees are drinking from the waters of their yesterdays.”

Next thing I knew, there was a man standing tall on the top of a hill. He was yelling. “The River is not there any more! The River has changed! It’s over here! Come over here so that you may live!”

Sadly only a few trees uprooted and moved. End vision.

I will not be like the oak tree that is dieing in the stagnant still swamp waters of where the ever-changing River used to be. Such a way is the basis for religious theological man made thinking. Whenever we define God by what he did yesterday we limit God to yesterdays ways. It causes us to disbelieve for the new thing. The results are religious shackles that limit our walk.

After contemplating this vision, the Lord brought to my mind this scripture:

Mark 8:22-25 They came to Bethsaida, and some people brought a blind man and begged Jesus to touch him. He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man’s eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, “Do you see anything?” He looked up and said, “I see people; they look like trees walking around.” Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’s eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.

Jesus knew that it was more important to first heal this man of spiritual blindness before healing him of his natural blindness. So, he was given this vision of walking trees. How great was this vision! Are we not like these trees that must uproot ourselves from time to time and move to the new place of the ever-changing River of God? Would that not look like people who are trees walking around?

We are all like trees who need the nourishment of these fresh waters to live. We need the fresh waters of the Holy Spirit to know and to do what the Father wants of us, within the context of what He is doing now and tomorrow. Therefore we must be living on the edge of this ever-changing River of God. This is an ongoing act we must make. We must uproot and move to the new place of the ever-changing River that we might drink the fresh new waters of revelation and supernatural power.

Ezek 47:1-12 The man brought me back to the entrance of the temple, and I saw water coming out from under the threshold of the temple toward the east (for the temple faced east). The water was coming down from under the south side of the temple, south of the altar. He then brought me out through the north gate and led me around the outside to the outer gate facing east, and the water was flowing from the south side. As the man went eastward with a measuring line in his hand, he measured off a thousand cubits and then led me through water that was ankle-deep. He measured off another thousand cubits and led me through water that was knee-deep. He measured off another thousand and led me through water that was up to the waist. He measured off another thousand, but now it was a river that I could not cross, because the water had risen and was deep enough to swim in– a river that no one could cross. He asked me, “Son of man, do you see this?” Then he led me back to the bank of the river. When I arrived there, I saw a great number of trees on each side of the river. He said to me, “This water flows toward the eastern region and goes down into the Arabah, where it enters the Sea. When it empties into the Sea, the water there becomes fresh. Swarms of living creatures will live wherever the river flows. There will be large numbers of fish, because this water flows there and makes the salt water fresh; so where the river flows everything will live. Fishermen will stand along the shore; from En Gedi to En Eglaim there will be places for spreading nets. The fish will be of many kinds– like the fish of the Great Sea. But the swamps and marshes will not become fresh; they will be left for salt. Fruit trees of all kinds will grow on both banks of the river. Their leaves will not wither, nor will their fruit fail. Every month they will bear, because the water from the sanctuary flows to them. Their fruit will serve for food and their leaves for healing.”

Unmistakably there is reference to both spiritual Rivers I speak of in this Ezekiel passage. We are the trees, the Body of Christ. We must be living on the edge of these fresh waters lest we die of thirst!

Matt 13:52 He said to them, “Therefore every teacher of the law who has been instructed about the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old.”

Simply said, the old treasures are found in the River that never changes, and which are invaluable. The new treasures are found in the ever-changing River and which are also invaluable. We need both!

To drink of the ever-changing River requires a leap of faith. For it is true that whatever is new has never happened before. It requires revelation. It requires intimacy and humility. Brothers and sisters, we need both Rivers to succeed in our Kingdom call.

Lastly, consider these applicable scriptures:

Zech 9:10 I will take away the chariots from Ephraim and the war-horses from Jerusalem, and the battle bow will be broken. He will proclaim peace to the nations. His rule will extend from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth.

Ps 72:8 He will rule from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth.

(Notice that the word “River” is capitalized in the above two scriptures in the New King James and NIV versions…)

Gen 2:9-10 And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground– trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A river watering the garden flowed from Eden…

Rev 22:1-2 Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.

Even in Heaven we will be living by the River of God! How important is the understanding of it for us today, here on earth! From the beginning of creation to the end of time and beyond, there will always be the River of God bringing life to wherever it flows.

Even in this life, a few days without water bring death. How much more then should we who are born of the Spirit be filled with the spiritual waters of God that bring life to places of death on this earth? All around the world, people who do not know the love of God are dying of thirst! Shouldn’t we be the ones who bring them the waters of life that change? Were we not commissioned from Jesus Christ before he returned to Heaven to do this very thing?

Acts 1:8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

May we all be heavy drinkers of the waters of life from both Rivers so that we might reap a great harvest, a reward to Jesus for his sufferings.

Rev 22:17 The Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” And let him who hears say, “Come!” Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.