Fun in the Philippines: Part Two

Our first Sunday in the Philippines was one of the biggest hi-lights of the whole trip for me and one I will not soon forget. Our team of 42 was split up into 9 teams that dispersed to different churches all over the city of Manila. I was placed with our fearless leader and activator extraordinaire, Lindsay Coil. She is actually Filipino and is married to Matt Coil whom she met while he was serving as a missionary in the Philippines. They currently reside in Redding and Lindsay serves as Eric Johnson’s administrative assistant. Eric is Bill Johnson’s son and one of the senior leaders here at Bethel. Lindsay is a girl after my own heart when it comes to administration and being organized! I applaud her, and really all of our team leaders, for doing such a fabulous job of keeping our team informed regarding our schedule and various other details. Lindsay even created a binder with our team member’s information, team meeting notes, packing list, and schedule for our time in the Philippines. Call me crazy – but this binder made me very happy! If I ever had a question, my answer was often found in this delightful notebook.

Lindsay and Matt had been building a relationship with Hosea Praise Church over the last couple of years so it was a privilege and honor to be invited to minister to them again. The name of the church reflects them well! As our team of 5 (Lindsay, Mark, Sam, Christina, and I) were praying before church and asking God what He was wanting to do in the service, we all sensed we were about to enter a very big praise party – quite appropriate for Palm Sunday. And boy did we ever! If there’s one thing that encompasses the Church in the Philippines, it’s that they are true worshippers. I think God is so pleased with them because of their hearts of pure worship. In fact, Hosea Praise Church has had angel feathers and gemstones from heaven fall during their worship services. Honestly, I had been hoping to see these gemstones fall from heaven while I was there – who wouldn’t? We didn’t see that this time but I’m still hoping to experience that someday here on earth. Perhaps such a thing sounds crazy and unthinkable to you. I know – I’ve come to realize some things God does are a mystery though. As the father of Bethel Church, Bill Johnson, says, “it’s a sign that makes you wonder.” The first time I had seen anything like this was when I watched the documentary, Finger of God. The director of the film, Darren Wilson, travelled around the world capturing what God is miraculously doing – including gemstones falling from heaven, gold dust appearing during services (which has happened several times over the past year here at Bethel – we like to call it a glory cloud), and other amazing healing testimonies. He actually didn’t intend to make the film. He had no budget for it, didn’t have any connections, and had never made a feature film before. The documentary itself is a miracle considering all of this! God certainly paved the way for him to produce the film and capture phenomenal miracles on video thus revealing the heart of God for all of us. I highly recommend viewing this documentary if you haven’t seen it yet.

We met some very friendly members of the church upon our arrival at Hosea Praise Church whom we enjoyed chatting with for a bit before the service started. It didn’t take them long to nickname a couple of my team members. Sam was deemed to be Justin Bieber, and once they heard Christina sing and play the piano, they called her Kim Walker. I think Sam and Christina liked their new nicknames. J Soon after we arrived I asked God to hi-light a church member to me to help me doing a prophetic painting during the worship. Let me pause here lest you are wondering what prophesy means. Prophesy is a gift of the Holy Spirit and very simply put, it means I ask God what’s on his heart to say and then I release that through whatever means He’s leading me to release it whether it be through art, acts, dance, or words, etc. If you want to do a more in depth study on prophesy, a good place to start is with Kris Vallotton’s book, Basic Training for the Prophetic Ministry.  He leads you through several scripture verses that help unpack this wonderful gift of the Spirit. I have done prophetic paintings before – but never in front of a congregation and never in partnership with someone.  A young lady named Michelle stood out to me so I asked her if she would like to paint together. She was absolutely delighted to do so. Later she informed me she had never painted before but one would never know from her excited yes to my request.  Her willingness and excitement to do something new encompassed such childlike faith – absent of all fear – which allowed her to have so much fun as we painted together. Oh that I may respond in the same way whenever I receive an invitation to do something new for the Lord! I had actually dreamed about a painting a couple nights prior and in it, there was a field of purple flowers. So we painted that together and the main message I felt God was saying through it was simply that it’s a season of multiplication for Hosea Praise Church. The interesting thing is that they are in the process of getting a new and larger church building. It will be exciting to see how God multiplies their church and their kingdom work! Christina also did a prophetic art piece and found out after she was finished that someone in the congregation had actually had a dream with her painting in it! It’s interesting that both of our paintings were tied into dreams. I love how God speaks in so many different ways!

Lindsay shared an encouraging word and called all the teachers to the front so that we could pray and prophesy over them since they are the ones leading the leaders of the next generation. She felt strongly that we should pour into them – so we blessed them and watched God love them through our prayers. Sam shared some prophetic art with one of the pastors and you could tell the pastor was really moved by it. In fact he was so touched by it; he ended up on up kneeling on the ground. Mark released and encouraging word about thankfulness and then sang a song over the congregation. It was evident that what Mark was sharing what was on God’s heart for the morning. Christina played the keys and sang a powerful prophetic song over the church. I’ve found that when Christina sings, the Presence of God falls in the room. It certainly did during this service! God has given her a huge destiny with her voice, and I’m so excited to see where He takes her! She also sang Let It Rain for me while I prophetically danced for a young woman in the congregation. That was a first for me! I had danced before the Lord in the privacy of my own home – but definitely not in front of a church congregation. Thankfully, the Lord honored my willingness to step out in this new area of ministry for me and really blessed this young lady. Praise God! I shared Isaiah 35 with her as I felt that was the Scripture God was giving her and simply hi-lighted a few things in the chapter that were for her. It was a truly beautiful moment.

We also had an opportunity to share words of knowledge about what God was healing. The beautiful thing about Hosea Praise Church is that they have taken what Lindsay and Matt have taught them about healing in the last few years and have run with it! So much so that the church didn’t have that many sick people. Why? Because they’ve taught their congregation how to pray for each other when they’re ill! They see God heal them on a regular basis because of that. There were a few words of knowledge we received though, and I received the clearest word of knowledge I’ve ever had before. I was scanning the image of a body in my mind’s eye and as I did, I saw a bright light – almost like and explosion of light on the left shoulder. So I asked if there was anyone there with pain in their left shoulder. And sure enough – the pastor’s Mom came forward for prayer! She was only able to raise her arm half way before we prayed. Then after we prayed she was able to raise her arm all the way up above her head! God is so good! After that I prayed for an older lady who was suffering from leukemia. While I was praying for her she fell back under the power of God (don’t worry someone caught her and helped her into a chair). I asked her what was going on and with tears streaming down her face she said that she couldn’t explain it but that her knees felt week and she couldn’t stand any longer. I told her it was OK because she was just being touched by God because He loves her so much.

And then the worship team started playing again and we concluded the entire morning praising God for all He had done. I thought that we had an amazing time of worship earlier in the morning, but the worship at the end of the service went to an entirely new level – it was indeed the praise party we had anticipated and the perfect way to end our time there.

Stay tuned…more to come in the days ahead! J

Fun in the Philippines: Part One

My heart is overflowing with the events of the last several weeks. I recently returned from a mission’s trip with around 40 other radical revivalists to the Philippines. I fell in love with both the Filipino people and the ministry team I had the honor and privilege of traveling and ministering with. One of the first things I noticed about the Filipino people is that they are full of warmth and love. In fact, they are so generous with their hospitality that I found myself feeling like I was being treated like royalty! The Filipino’s captured the heart of honor and love in their hospitality and for that I’m so grateful.

I must also tell you how wonderful the ministry team I served with is! They are all filled with so much joy that the entire trip felt like a big party – even when we were so tired be it from jet lag or long ministry days.  It didn’t matter what was going on, our days were filled with laughter. In fact, whenever something went completely different than we planned, we chose to laugh at it. That’s what happens when you get a group of people together who are crazy in love with Jesus and filled with His presence. And since God is in a good mood and He resides in us, it seems fitting that laughter be our first instinct don’t you think? The unity among our team was extraordinary and such a blessing!

I watched each team member daily love extravagantly whether it be loving fellow team members or loving the Filipino people. I realized this pure love that was flowing out of them wasn’t from a place of strife. Rather it is the essence of who they are because God resides in each of them. It came easily and from hearts filled with purity and overflowing with love. One of my biggest takeaways from this trip is simply this: love never fails. My own heart actually received inner healing as I received love from my team members.  And as a result of their love, God’s grace, and perfect timing, I believe I blossomed and the full fragrance within me was able to be released as I ministered.  When the atmosphere is charged with honor, love, respect, freedom, kindness, and patience, one can’t help but have the best drawn out of them. It’s an atmosphere I want to carry with me wherever I go. I am forever marked by the love I experienced from my team members whom I now call dear friends. I believe it’s safe to say so were the Filipino’s we had the privilege of ministering to.

There are so many testimonies I can share with you from this trip it’s hard to know where to begin! Or yestimonies as we call them in my weekly outreach Sidewalk Sunday School.  A yestimony is something good God does that we say yes to so He can do it again! So as I share these stories with you, know that they can all be repeated in your own life if you’re in need of a similar miracle. Nothing is impossible with God!

One of the first opportunities we had to minister was at a Church So Blessed Conference. Our team leaders had asked us to ask God for some words of knowledge about what He wanted to heal during the service and then to draw a picture of the body part that we received a word of knowledge about. I hadn’t really received many words of knowledge before this trip as it was a rather new gift of the Spirit for me.  But it’s really simple. You just ask God about what He’s healing and He shows you. Sometimes you see a picture of it, other times it’s an impression, and some people actually sense pain or even heat in their body that wasn’t there before so they know it’s a word of knowledge for someone else. Another way is to simply scan the body in your mind’s eye and see what God hi-lights as you scan.

So I saw a picture of a jaw in my mind and drew that. After we drew our pictures, we announced them to the congregation and had anyone who needed healing for that particular problem come forward. But we didn’t pray for them the way you would typically think of praying. That is something I love about prayer language – it just doesn’t fit into a little box! Believe it or not, English isn’t God’s first language. :) So instead of praying in English, we placed our artwork on the body part that needed healing (if appropriate) and then laughed over it for about thirty seconds or so.  And we saw many people be healed from various ailments! There were too many to count. I had a line of people come up for prayer for their jaws and I saw God heal several of them simply by putting the artwork on their jaw and laughing!

One of my favorite memories of this day was when I had the impression that someone had a problem with their chin. I however discredited this word of knowledge and quickly thought I was simply making it up. In my mind it sounded ridiculous so I talked myself out of it. Boy was I wrong! God was setting me up for a lesson though. I was shocked when I heard my teammate Anna call out that her word of knowledge -  that someone had something wrong with their chin. No one responded right away. Kevin Dedmon who was leading the service received more words of knowledge about this person. He began to say that the chin injury was accident related. It took a while for the young woman to come forward. It turns out she had a scar on her chin and when she was a little girl she had been abused and thrown around. Often times her hair would be pulled so hard that her head was very sensitive and she was unable to pull her hair back in any way. After she received prayer, God healed the sensitivity in her head and she was able to pull her hair back into a pony tail! It didn’t stop there though. She also had physical repercussions on the top of her head from being thrown around. I’m not sure if it was an indentation or if it was a bump on the top of her head, but after prayer, her head shape was back to normal! She then said she wanted to be taller. It’s common for us at Bethel to pray for someone who has one leg longer than the other one and we’ll see their back come into alignment and their one leg grow to the length of the other. This young woman didn’t have any problem with one leg being longer than the other…she just wanted to be taller. So a few people on our team prayed for her and a few days later one of our team members received a text saying that she had grown two inches since we had prayed for her! I love how God cares for the desires of our hearts! This whole situation taught me that I do hear clearly from God, and to not second guess things – even when it sounds crazy in my own mind. To think – God did all of these things for this young woman and it all began with a simple word of knowledge about a chin!

Later in the day, during this same conference, we all had an opportunity to teach a workshop on our chosen topic. I helped teach the SOZO workshop. SOZO means saved, healed, and delivered and the purpose of SOZO is to connect you with God the Father, God the Son and the Holy Spirit. There are several tools to help this process along and that was what we were teaching. Often times forgiveness is one of the key tools used during SOZO. While the focus on SOZO is inner healing, it’s not uncommon to see physical healings take place simply because of forgiveness and emotional healing taking place. After the session was over, I was approached by a young woman who wanted me to pray for her. After talking with her for a bit, I learned that she felt like her relationship with God was disconnected because she had given herself to her boyfriend, and she was feeling ashamed and guilty. So I led her through a prayer to receive forgiveness from God and also a prayer of forgiving herself. As we prayed, shame and guilt could stay no longer because Jesus paid for that on the cross! In fact, she mentioned that when we were praying she saw a picture in her mind of the cross and then she saw God come and embrace her. Their connection had been restored! Praise God! That’s what SOZO is all about. I also remembered that God loves to restore his children’s virginity so we asked God to do that so that when the day comes for her to celebrate unity with her husband; all will be redeemed and restored. There have been many testimonies of how God has done that for others – I’m trusting He’ll do the same for this precious young woman.

Another hi-light from this day was getting to hang out with the kids and paint their faces! They were precious and it was wonderful to get to love on them and tell them so! One little girl stole my heart. She sat down for me to paint a flower on her face and before I knew it she was speaking encouraging words over me! I thought – wait a minute – I’m the one who’s here to speak encouraging words over you! But that’s how the body of Christ works, right? We get to encourage one another – it’s a two way street of giving and receiving. What a beautiful gift! We talked for quite a while and exchanged drawings with each other.  I told her I would treasure her drawing always and she responded that her heart would be broken if she ever lost my drawing. What a precious girl!

There are more stories to come! But for now, I’ll let you ponder these. God did so much it’s hard to capture it all. But I’m going to do my best to share as many hi-lights as I can. To be continued…

My Year of Reading in Redding

3,167 – That’s the number of pages I’ve been assigned to read over the course of this school year! And that doesn’t include what I’ve been reading on my own. I find it quite funny that as a child I didn’t really enjoy reading. But thankfully, my Mom gave me mandatory reading time during one of my summer breaks. Out of that (and being introduced to some Grace Livingston Hill novels) my love for reading grew. I think it’s at an all time high this year, and I’m quite thankful to have the time to soak in such amazing information. Yes – this picture is a good representation of how I’m spending my time these days!

So, I thought I’d share with you a glimpse of what’s on my bookshelves in case you’re looking for a good read or are particularly curious about a specific topic I’m studying at school. I’ve listed books below that I’ve been reading for school, books I’m currently reading or soon will be reading for school, and books I’ve read for fun. I’ll give you some brief info about each book as well since the title of a book isn’t always enough to capture the contents.

Books I’ve Read for School

When Heaven Invades Earth by Bill Johnson – This book captures the heartbeat of Bethel Church and is written by the Senior Leader of both the church and school. In short, Bill presents a foundation of why it’s in our spiritual DNA to have an appetite for God to show up in the impossibilities that surround us and how we can stand in our God–given authority to release the power we’ve been given from on high into the circumstances of life. 

The World Aflame by Rick Joyner - This was a fascinating read about the Welsh Revival in the early 1900s. It contains great examples to follow in future revivals and also great lessons to learn from for the future. It’s an important reminder of and a call to being prepared for revival and building our foundation on Jesus Christ alone.

30 Days to Understanding Your Bible by Max Anders – This is a great interactive book that gives you a wonderful overview of the Bible including key Bible characters, places, and events in chronological order. It only takes about 15 minutes of your time each day to read a chapter and participate in the fill-in-the-blank activities that are designed to help you retain the information you’re learning. The author has a great sense of humor which is always a bonus.

A Practical Guide to Evangelism – Supernaturally by Chris Overstreet – I really enjoyed reading this book. The author serves as the outreach pastor at Bethel and joins us once a week during school to empower, motivate, and teach us prior to our weekly outreach events.  If you’re looking for an easy, fast, and practical read on supernatural evangelism – this book is for you!

Supernatural Ways of Royalty by Kris Vallotton – One of the key takeaways from this year at Bethel is stepping into my true identity as a child of the King of Kings – a royal heir to the eternal Kingdom of God – and living out of that. This book helps reveal your royal identity and inheritance as a child of the King. I recommend everyone reads this, ponders the contents, and embraces their God given royalty. The end of the book includes a Prince and Pauper test so you can see better how you view yourself. We took the test at the beginning of the year and will take it again at the end to see how much has changed. Kris also has the test available on his website: www.kvministries.com

Basic Training for the Supernatural Ways of Royalty Workbook by Kris Vallotton – It’s well worth the investment to purchase this companion workbook should you choose to read Supernatural Ways of Royalty. It allows you to take your processing a step further with thought provoking questions that will lead you into deeper revelations of the truth.

Basic Training for the Prophetic Ministry by Kris Vallotton – I must say it is a complete joy, honor and privilege to have the authors of these books teach us the contents in person! Kris and his wife Kathy are the senior associate leaders at Bethel. Kris teaches us once a week as long as he’s not out of town (he travels a lot speaking around the world). I loved this workbook because it helped demystify the prophetic ministry for me. Between this book and Kris’s teaching, I have a much better understanding of the prophetic ministry that is for the comfort and encouragement and exhortation of the body. If you’ve had burning questions about prophecy, this is a good place to start learning more.

Experiencing the Father’s Embrace by Jack Frost - Jack’s heart in this book was to partner with God in His plan for restoration of the family. He shares how God’s desire is to see the hearts of fathers and mothers to turn back to their children and for love and intimacy to flourish between husbands and wives. A key part to this coming to fruition is through each of us personally experiencing a more intimate relationship with Father God. So Jack does a good job of revealing the love of God for each of us and pinpoints areas that may be hindering us from experiencing the Father’s loving and comforting embrace. If you’re still struggling from any kind of father wound or family wound for that matter, this is a great book to help you process through that pain and receive healing and reconciliation.

Happy Intercessor by Beni Johnson – I think this book might be my favorite of all of the books we’ve been assigned to read. Perhaps that’s because I have a heart for Intercession and it’s also a very friendly read. I found the contents to bring about freedom for me with the discovery at a new heart level that joy and intercession go hand in hand. This book has been helpful in so many ways – but one particular thing that stands out to me is that when I finish praying for someone, I can release the burden of that concern to Jesus because He already carried it to the cross. So good! Beni Johnson is Bill Johnson’s wife. She is an amazing spiritual mother of this house (Bethel Church), and I always enjoy sitting under her teaching.

Moral Revolution: The Naked Truth About Sexual Purity by Kris Vallotton and Jason Vallotton – One of the amazing qualities of Kris Vallotton is his ability to directly address hard topics as a father who cares deeply enough to tell you the truth – even when it’s difficult to do so. In this book, Kris and Jason manage to give everyone the freedom to celebrate virginity as well as restore covenant love. It’s a much needed message in our sex driven culture. Whatever your relational status (married, single, divorced, etc.)  – it’s worth your time in reading because chances are you can utilize the contents of the book to positively impact the lives around you if nothing else. In fact, one of my fellow students stood up during class this week and thanked Kris for writing it because this student actually lead someone to Christ simply by sharing the contents of this book over Christmas break!

Books I’m Currently Reading or will be Reading Soon for School

The Hayford Bible Handbook by Jack Hayford – This book is massive! We are using it as a resource and companion to our daily Bible reading so I won’t completely read it by the end of this year – but it will certainly serve as a great resource for years to come.

Grasping God’s Word by J. Scott Duvall and J. Daniel Hays – This book is actually our text book for our Bible class (in addition to the Bible of course).  It’s a great resource for understanding how the Bible was compiled, how to make observations and ask questions while studying the Bible and how to utilize all that information to bring about interpretation and application for our lives.

Culture of Honor by Danny Silk – One of the main things that marks Bethel as a Kingdom culture is it’s culture of honor. For that very reason, it’s a place many people receive healing from past leadership wounds. And it’s also a place that attracts God’s Presence and His supernatural power because of the culture of honor that is stewarded there. So far, this book has helped me understand the fivefold ministry (pastor, teacher, evangelist, prophet, and apostle) and how they are meant to operate together. Danny Silk has a background in counseling and currently serves as a Family Life and Leadership Pastor. The principles he shares in this book regarding restoring relationships are phenomenal!

God’s Generals by Roberts Liardon – I just received this book and look forward to reading about the history of revivalist who have paved the way for revival today.

Church History Made Easy by Timothy Jones – I’ve not received this title yet – but according to Amazon, it’s a fantastic book that summarizes the most important events in Christian history from the time of Jesus to today in 12 easy chapters. J

Strengthen Yourself in the Lord by Bill Johnson – This book was actually the first book I read by Bill Johnson. I remember having amazing content on how to encourage yourself when things are looking down through thanksgiving. There’s also great wisdom for how to stay connected to your God given destiny. I’m looking forward to reading it again after having sat under Bill’s teaching for a year.

Books I Read for Fun Recently

Hinds’ Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard - What a great book that captures Romans 5:3-5 so beautifully - "but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us." I could easily relate to this allegory and the lessons Hannah Hurnard presented so well throughout her book. It's a story that speaks hope and life into anyone battling with fear.

His Advent Still His Greatest Gift by Rebekah Freelan - This book was written by my dear friend, Bekah . I've had the joy of reading her daily blog postings so when Advent began this year I was so excited to read her delightful book. It captures the essence of Advent - focusing on and delighting in God's Presence - the greatest gift of all time! I love how she got into Biblical character's minds and imagined what they might be thinking as they encountered Jesus. It's a thought provoking devotional that can be read any time of the year and one that easily makes the Bible come alive!

Blessed Child and A Man Called Blessed by Ted Dekker and Bill Bright - This was the second time reading these two novels and the books were better than I remembered! They are well written, have an important message about the Kingdom of God and His power woven into a beautiful story that includes love, adventure, and God's goodness. I believe these novels are my favorite novels to date.

The Ultimate Treasure Hunt by Kevin Dedmon – This is a great tool for believers who are hungry to witness to others about the goodness and power of God through supernatural means and demonstration, through supernatural encounters. The book gives you an outline on how to create your own treasure map and then how to present the good message and the goodness of God to those your encounter – the treasure. It’s about sharing the Good News of the Kingdom to every kind of person – people who are just waiting to be discovered. Those who desperately need a real encounter with God in order to meet the overwhelming needs of their lives.  Kevin Dedmon is one of the leaders on my Philippines missions trip so I’m sure this is one of the many ways we’ll be ministering.

Strengths Finder 2.0 by Tom Rath – I first learned about StrengthsFinder through my housemate, Sarah Wind. All second year Bethel students are required to read it and take the online test (an access code to take the test is included in the book) to determine what you’re top five strengths are. The idea is to capitalize and invest in your strengths – to focus on what’s right with yourself rather than what’s wrong. It’s more of a resource book that will be used many times over your lifetime providing insights on what to act on given your strengths and how to work with others given their unique strength make up. I just took the test and these are my top five: responsibility, learner, discipline, empathy, and relator. What a great thing to know since I’ll be heading into a job searching season probably within the next six months or so.

So there you have it – a glimpse of what I’ve been reading, am reading currently, and will be reading soon! How about you? Do you have any recommendations of books based on what you’ve been reading lately?