Messiah Culture

Protection from Danger

When your scared or stressed where do you go for protection? If you feel panic do you have a place to go for shelter and protection? Some ancient writings of a King tell us of a place we can turn, no matter what is coming against us.

In you, O Lord, do I take refuge; let me never be put to shame; in your righteousness deliver me! Psalm 31.1 

Refuge means:

1.shelter or protection from danger, trouble, etc.: to takerefuge from a storm.

2.a place of shelter, protection, or safety.

3.anything to which one has recourse for aid, relief, or escape.

So King David says, in you, Oh Lord, I take refuge... He has himself disciplined to take refuge in the Lord. He doesn't just say a quick prayer and goes on trying to figure it out in his own strength. When the storm hits, he does more than whisper a quick prayer, he takes refuge in the Lord.

He spends as much time as it takes in the Lord's presence. Keeping his mind focused on the reality of our Father in heaven. Keeping his perspective based in righteous truth. 

No matter where we are at in our day we can take refuge in the Lord. Even in the busiest circumstance, the craziest storm, we can take refuge in the Lord. 

Live Inside Out

This changes everything for our lives. Living from the inside out. No one can make you sin if you live from the inside out. Listen to what Jesus says about living from the inside...

 Peter said to him, "Explain the parable to us."And he said, "Are you also still without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth passes into the stomach and is expelled? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person. But to eat with unwashed hands does not defile anyone." Matthew 15.15-20

Nothing out there can make me do anything. My anger, my sin, my lust comes from within my heart. So if I focus on my heart being in deep relationship with Christ and allowing him to clean and reveal issues of my heart I will live free. So in a sexual perverse culture, I can be sexually whole. Lust comes from the heart but so does hunger for Christ! As our hearts are cleaned up and we have a passion to love Christ and draw near to our Father we will not see sin as an option!

Same goes with anything, anger? No one can make me angry, anger come from within me. Now if you mess with my kids, look out! But you know what I am saying. Living from the inside out puts the focus on my own heart issues. When my heart is pursuing him and him alone nothing can stop me. So live from the inside out...

His Desires for the Midwest

I just returned from IHOP (International House of Prayer) located in Kansas City. Pastor Philip Anderson along with Ryan Hansen and I set out on our 500 mile journey at 6:00am last Tuesday. Our heart in going was to simply pray and seek God. I personally went to pray about strategy but I discovered in KC that prayer is the strategy.

Live worship and prayer has been going non stop 24/7 since 1999. It was life changing to experience. I experienced a culture that had been developed over all these years. Things were done with great excellence which would lead to powerful times of being led by the Spirit in prayer and worship. I appreciated how well The Global Prayer Room was governed. So much passion goes into the detail of seeking God. One of the scriptures they had on the wall has been burning in me since I left. Leviticus chapter 6 says the fire on the altar must be kept burning, it must not go out. It must burn continuously. This culture of prayer and worship really impacted my life. The focus is on HIM 24/7 and it is hard to find words to describe.

During our many hours in prayer God was speaking to me concerning The Grove and the Midwest Region. I believe that God wants to establish His kingdom in a mighty way among us. This work of God will be visible to the region, even the nations. He is mighty to save and his love will be experienced as this work is established. God wants a people here that are desperately depending on Him. Seeking him like Christ did with his life. Prayer and seeking after the Lord's heart is a foundation. King David was know to be a man after God's own heart. It was his intimacy with God that gave him the boldness to fight and kill Goliath. God has been speaking to us prophetically about many of these things in the recent years. The key for us to move forward is to seek him and be men and women after His own heart.

God invites you to participate in raising up a movement that depends on Him and makes disciples. He is asking you to be part of creating a culture of excellence in prayer and a heart after Him. I believe that God is going to unite local churches in this region to pursue him as one church! We will be part of making history together to see his church unite.

Be encouraged and press into God like you never have before. If there is warfare against you right now I believe it is connected to what He desires to do in this Midwest Region. What he wants to do in your life is bigger than our Sunday gatherings. But our gatherings are crucial for unity and depending on Him. God is mighty to save and we will see many souls come into the kingdom in this region. 

As the Lord gives us strategy we will develop it together. Kinda puts a whole new meaning to our Conquer the Land Strategy Meetings starting March 7th.

Please devote yourself to keeping the fire of God burning in your heart, the grove and this region.

New Inspiration

As we have started a new year I find my hope for all that God desires to be increased.

Things that have been renewing me and I want to write about in the coming days are simple. Rest, more solitude, prayer, allowing my imagination to put life to my faith, many simple things combined have been renewing and increasing my inspiration!

I look forward to writing and discussing them here in the coming days.

Happy New Year

A Glimpse of Promise

I was filling my truck up with gas just about an hour ago. The wind was blowing strong on my back as it carried the rain right to me. Getting pelted with rain I was facing north and praying as my truck filled.

My heart cried out, "Lord you are great. I thank you for covenant relationship. I am thankful that you provide and supply our every need in life. The finances of The Grove are getting stronger and I am grateful. Thank you for suppling our needs this month." I went on to ask specific amounts for our monthly needs as a church. About then my head tilted upward...

I saw this beautiful rainbow just north of me. It looked like it stopped over my property. It was an interesting rainbow, not very defined, just hanging in the thick gray clouds with no sun shinning at all. 

My spirit was reminded of God's promise in the rainbow. It was like he was saying, I hear your heart and I got your back. Fear nothing! 

As I finished at the pump I looked up again and the rainbow was gone. It lasted a mere twenty seconds or so. A glimpse of His divine promise!

Thanks Father!

Faulty Defaults

It is very challenging to devote yourself to advancing the kingdom. It is upside down. It is difficult, it is offensive to many. You will be persecuted and when you are rejoice! I heard a great Rabbi say that once. Rejoice.

So I have been challenged alot when it comes to my own defaults and the Spirt of God is creating new defaults within me. Our humanistic response and defaults can led to great pitfalls.

Now I was raised to think that faith without works is dead. The book of James teaches us so. So my default thinking in my human nature was always to take action. That is the goal of faith, without action or works it is simply dead.

Most of the time my default has been my human instincts. Which can blur the line of God's true desire. In the movie Prince Caspian Peter went into battle like he did in the first movie but this time he got his tail kicked. Later when he finally caught up to Aslan he learned that things do not happen the same way twice in the kingdom. It was not Aslan's will for him to go to battle but his default thinking was trumping the very will of God.

So I am learning new defaults which requires a great relationship with my Father. Faith without works is dead. So the new default is to seek the Lord and ask him what his will is concerning any circumstance. So if God says wait in a particular situation that is the work, waiting. If he says to pray, that is the work. To many times the pressure even in the Christians realms can work against this. We have so many programs and formulas to go by, who needs to seek the Lord. We even have church in a box, order this kit, open it and boom you will have it. I really am not a fan of this kind of approach. It takes the authentic out of it. I want to hear from God and do what he says to do, even if it works against most Christians default thinking. 

Unless the Lord builds the house we labor in vain. So it is not that we do not labor but its more about who is building. We must be in tune with the builder and then our labor will matter and advance the will of the Father.

One of the problems is that in a culture that is enslaved to production. The hustle and bustle of life. Waiting on the Lord seems weak, prayer seems weak. So many of us are slaves to the grind that we have default thinking that is faulty. Working in our own strength like Peter and getting our tails kicked in battle.

So may we be in tune with the Father's will. May we seek after Him. As we come to know His will may we simply obey it, no matter what.

Peace.

 

Messiah Culture

Is a vision I have had for a few years now. As I continue to walk after our Messiah as one of his disciples a dream has been born within me called Messiah Culture. To impact culture, to bring kingdom influence into the earth. Raising up many disciples equipped to bring Heaven's peace here now among us. So how can we impact our culture with the culture of our Messiah is the quest!

We are working to develop Messiah Culture into more than just a blog site. More to come soon.

Sons & Daughters

I thoroughly enjoyed speaking yesterday at The Grove. Sons & Daughters of glory was not only one of my favorite messages to deliver, it is a high hope for the kind of life and relationship I have with our Father in heaven.

If you have time please check it out!

Sons & Daughters - Brian Phillips

Limping

So the prophet calls a particular community of people into check by asking them if they are limping between two opposing forces.

This community was Israel, the people of God. They had reached a point when the foreign god of Baal was more attractive than the "One True God" as known in Deuteronomy 6.4. 

Baal had 450 prophets, the God of israel had one at this time. With so much Baal influence seeping into the community it was easier and easier to accept this idolatry. You know the key to boiling a frog is not to drop it in boiling water it will jump out, rather put it on simmer and you will have a cooked frog. So the influence of Baal had Israel on simmer.

But the Prophet Elijah summons the people and with clarity calls them to awareness. "How long will you go on limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him."

If we are not fully convinced of God's power we end up shrinking him to the size of this world.

Doubt is good cause it means we are still searching. But these ancient words dealt with me recently. Am I limping between different opinions? Opinions about my identity and call or even the economy vs God's provision.

Anything that over rules the power of God becomes an idol in our life. 

So today I remember who our Father is and I am fully convinced in his mighty power. May I limb no more.

Tension

Navigating tension is a very mysterious part of our journey in life. I love tension but it also frustrates me as well. I believe that tension is healthy and it can not be resolved. To journey without tension is to be out of touch with reality.

Something ancient has caused a lot of tension in my modern day life. Christ. He defeated the enemy aka satan but he did not fully destroy him. He (satan) still rules this world of darkness. His day of total destruction is coming but it has not happened yet. Tension.

To walk in covenant relationship with the living God is very mysterious but the longer you walk the more you learn and the more natural it becomes. So as I walk with my Father in heaven I learn all kinds of promises concerning my own identity and responsibility in this world.

This clash between darkness and light creates tension. I have promises. I have purpose. I have a new identity that comes with new responsibility and awareness. Sometimes I wonder why it takes a promise so long to actually happen. But then in the process of waiting and continuing to believe that my Father is good, I learn deep lessons that transform me even more.

I'm probably not even doing that great of a job describing tension and maybe that's not the point of this blog. I'm just expressing that tension is good and to many times we try to resolve it. We try to defer back to a more secure route, when we were destined for wild untamed adventures. Tension has taught me much, it has opened my eyes to wonder and awe, it has grounded me more firm in my faith, it has made me a better man.

So I embrace the mystery and my aim is to journey within tension, not resolve it.