Gathered Around the Fire

Remember the account of Jesus at a Wedding in Cana when they ran out of wine. He performs His first sign there. This is perhaps the greatest of all His miracles. In that it unveils the purpose of His earthly ministry as the bridge between the Old and New Covenants. Ephesians 2:14-22  Water Turned to Wine  On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there.  2  Now both Jesus and His disciples were invited to the wedding.  3  And when they ran out of wine, the mother of Jesus said to Him,   “They have no wine.” 4  Jesus said to her,  “Woman, what does your concern have to do with Me? My hour has not yet come.” John 2    H as that last line ever bothered you?  It has bothered me, plenty! In fact it made me believe that somehow this miracle was not that significant: if Jesus did it only by compulsion... can you hear your teenager responding when you suggest that they display a talen...

THE DAYS OF AWE During the seventh month of Elul there are three fall feasts established by the Lord the God of Israel in Leviticus 23:23-43 right now as of 7:12 pm in Minnesota it is Elul 11 the day after the Day of Atonement.  THE KING IS IN THE FIELD  Rabbi  Schneur Zalman of Liadi  explains the paradox of Elul with the following metaphor:  The king's usual place is in the capital city, in the royal palace. Anyone wishing to approach the king must go through the appropriate channels in the palace bureaucracy and gain the approval of a succession of secretaries and ministers. He must journey to the capital and pass through the many gates, corridors and antechambers that lead to the throne room. His presentation must be meticulously prepared, and he must adhere to an exacting code of dress, speech and mannerism upon entering into the royal presence. However, there are times when the king comes out to the fields outside the city. At such times, anyo...

THE SIXTH KINGDOM IS sometimes called the Stone Kingdom In the second chapter of Daniel this transition is described as the stone cut out of the mountain without hands. 34  You watched while  a stone was cut out without hands , which struck the image on its feet of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces.  35  Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold were crushed together, and became like chaff from the summer threshing floors; the wind carried them away so that no trace of them was found.  And the stone that struck the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth. This depiction of Jesus (the Word of God) being cut out of the mountain, is very similar to the two tablets of stone that were cut out of Mount Horeb without hands so that the 10 commandments (the word of God) could be written on them back in the wilderness. What mountain is mentioned in Daniel Chapter 2? One that fills the whole earth. To me, this sounds...

I was in a conversation the other night and an analogy of the life of religious performance came to mind and I wanted to expand on it here. Here is the picture… I said, “your life is like a person who pulls up to a parking meter.  To feel good about yourself you must put in a quarter but the meter. The meter only gives you 15 minutes of peace and security, your 15 minutes in the sun, fifteen minutes of approval. Fifteen short minutes later it demands another quarter for you to stay there, in your happy place.  Without your performance (another quarter) the flag will come back up declaring in big RED letters “Violation!” Many religious people live right there, PARKED!  They want God’s love but have missed the entire message of the good news! Plugging money into the offering basket to “park in His presence” on Sunday morning, was not what God had in mind when he started the church. The good news is NOT that you can earn God’s love it is that long before yo...

I was half awake lying in my bed, musing on the words given at the Prayer Summit in our city and region, I was praying for the move of God in the Church and in me personally. I want to be vessel of honor in His house, as I am sure you do. I was lying there and asking God to fill me, to use me, to speak His word to me, to make me a vessel of honor.  This afternoon, I will be going into the prophecy rooms to prophesy over people who are coming for encouragement, edification, and comfort. I was asking the Lord to begin to fill me even now, for the individuals who will be coming in this afternoon. I began to get prophetic words, while I was still lying in bed, I heard them as though they were being spoken by me over this one or that one. It reminded me of a night many years ago, that I saw a friend being filled with precious gemstones from her feet to the top of her head. And I was praying for Father to fill me in that same way again today; to fill me with words (precious gems) ...

THE MIXED UP KINGDOM IS HERE Incredible as it may sound in the dream of Nebuchadnezzar roughly 600 BC God laid out for the King all the world empires that would ever rule, from his time until the final world empire just before the return of Jesus Christ on the earth. If you take the figure seen in that dream in Daniel chapter 2 and lay it down with the head facing left, then it becomes a prophetic timeline of the history of the earth from Babylon until the fall of Mystery Babylon. This period covers the entire dispersion of Israel as a Nation scattered throughout the earth. Here is the description of the figure taken from Daniel chapter 2, starting at the Gold head and working down to the mixed feet Gold Head - 'BABYLONIAN' EMPIRE Silver Chest and Arms- MEDES/PERSIANS Bronze Belly and thighs - 'GREEK' EMPIRE Iron Legs - 'ROMAN' EMPIRE Iron/Clay Feet - 'MIXED' EMPIRE (melting pot) 34  You watched while a stone was cut out without hand...

40 years ago 3 Leaders of the Christian world discovered a common perspective on culture.  There are 7 Mountains of Influence in Culture... In 1975, Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade, and Loren Cunningham, founder of Youth With a Mission, had lunch together in Colorado. God simultaneously gave each of these change agents a message to give to the other.  During that same time frame a modern day Theologian, Francis Schaeffer, was given a similar message .   That message was that if we are to impact any nation for Jesus Christ, then we would have to affect the seven spheres, or mountains of society that are the pillars of any society.  There are many subgroups under these main categories. These seven mountains are:  business,  government,  media,  arts & entertainment,  education,  the  family   religion.   In essence, God was telling these three change agents where the battlefield was....