Day 9 Bethel School of Worship

Today in the worship I stepped outside to encourage one of the ladies who was painting on the stage.  She was nervous about it, so I thought I would tell her how amazing her picture was.  But a lady followed me out and gave me the most encouraging word.  She said I had the most amazing voice (which was really nice as I am still trying to soak these compliments in), but as she left to go back in the hall the lady I was encouraging said “Do you know who she is?  I said no.  She said ‘she is an amazing opera singer’.  I cannot remember the name she gave me, but I still feel like God is saying “see you can do this.  Now go home and step into what I have prepared for you”.

Ray Hughes was the main speaker again today.  He has the most enormous moustache which I find very disconcerting.  I am not big on facial hair, and this moustache is big enough for a bird to nest in..

His main points were:

• What we believe and say about us becomes our new song.  When we believe in what the liar says about us, that is our song.  When we come into agreement with what God says about us, our sound changes and our song changes. 
• Sound waves can move the earth.  Sound changes the atmosphere.  When we put on a worship CD it can change the atmosphere in the house. 
• When you get a song stuck in your head, that goes round and round, the only thing you can do is sing a new song: because new song will break repeating cycles. 
• Loads of the psalms start with “sing new song to the Lord” then David got them to sing it.
• Each revival has a fresh new expression a new sound.   
• 1904, in Newquay UK a pastor Joseph Jenkins decided it was time for people to see what the young girls in his church had seen.  As they were dancing the holy spirit descended on the girls with blue light and flames of fire.  For 10 years people thought he was a bit bonkers but….
• Welsh revival: In 1914 on Feb 14 Florrie Evans  said ‘I love Jesus with all my heart.  He died for me’.  The tears in her eyes became an outpouring to all people.  This started a new song which was the beginning of a revival that went around the world. “Here is love”.  She led it all around Wales.
• The power of the testimony is your song.  What ever you value, write songs about it.  It will happen. 
• Let’s live our lives bigger than church.  When the passion for God rises higher then an any resistance we may have. 
• Evan Roberts was the preacher in the revival.  But he would often just lie on his front and just pray for hours.  Not even preach, but just pray for God to move.  They would sometimes sing, sometimes be silent.  The whole land sang the song. 
• Whatever your song is for this generation, we pray that it will not be snubbed out by religious ideas, or church structure, or criticism from others.  Let it rise.

Next I went to probably my most favourite class yet.  It was more than awesome.  It was a class on bible meditation with Will Matthews.  I have tried meditating on the bible before and to be very honest I have become distracted and lost momentum.  In this class (a 2 hour class) I was so upset when it ended – I could have done this all day.  I so so so so very much want to bring this back home, to do on my own and teach others to do it. 

So first here are his main points and then after I will describe how we did it:

• In the old testament they meditated on the word of God all the time
• In this culture with social media we live in a time where people think that just commenting on your status on facebook, that you are good friends.  But good friends spend time together, they eat together and commune together.  Just as Jesus did with his deciples.  It is the same with God: we need to spend time with him, sharing the word together. 
• Purpose of Meditation
• To reflect on, contemplate on and imagine (thinking on)
• To plant in the mind and intend in your mind (planning)
• To engage in devotional contemplation, especially in prayer (engaging)
• To think on something deeply, to reflect deeply on spiritual matters, to mull over, to muse, to ponder and chew, to speculate and contemplate.
• Meditation is not about empying our minds but about filling it with the truth of who God is.
• In Ephesians 5 v 26 it talks about washing ourselves clean with the word of God.  Meditation is like taking a bath in the word.
• Where your mind is determines where your life will be.  If you think about junk, your life will be like trash.  But when you think about God his word will renew our minds.
• Colossians 3 talks about setting your mind on things above and on the mind of Christ.
• When you meditate on and speak out a verse, first we just say it.  After a while we feel it, and then we see it.  A bit like sitting at a door, then knocking on and having it opened for us.
• The greatest thing in life you can do is to sit at His feet feeding on His word.  More than a missionary position, or a leadership position.  When we spend time with Him, these things will flow out.

Ok so how did we do it?  First we had to choose a scripture.  We were all given Psalm 27 v1. 

The Lord is my light and my salvation

Whom shall I fear?

The Lord is the Stronghold of my life

Of whom shall I be afraid?

1. READ  First we read it.
2. WRITE  Next we wrote it down
3. SAY  We said it, over and over, lingering on one word and saying it over or just saying it all.
4. SING  Then we sang it.  Everyone had a different song.  We had some great guys from IHOP just playing in the background.  They sang out bits too.  In fact we started by singing the words we had written and then just spun into other things that the Lord revealed from the scripture.  It was awesome.   Some sang and some spoke it out at the same time (like at IHOP).  It was an awesome sound.  Then we started to write down what God was saying to us through it.  I certainly got enough stuff that I could easily turn it into a song.
5. DANCE  Some of us felt really moved to dance it too.  Will was so encouraging as he said he often looks out when he leads worship to see what the dancers do as they are often the 1^st ones to receive the prophetic.  He said that he asks God to interpret their dance.
6. PRAY  Then we were praying it over our lives.  It was the most powerful prayer.  After an hour you really know the scripture and believe it to be true. 

We then shared what God had been saying to us.  Many of us had visions that were amazing.   When I was singing out and dancing I closed my eyes and saw angels.  I had seen these while I have been here when we worship (only when I close my eyes though).  When I danced I saw these angels again…  but this time they were dancing with me.  They were copying me exactly.  When we worship Him the angels join with us….. and now I know that angels dance!  How cool is that!  Other people shared what had said to them and I found it so encouraging.  We all heard differently from the same scripture but it was awesome to hear what everyone else saw.

Next I went to a main session with Jeremy Riddle.  He was talking about hosting the presence.  He said we cannot release the presence unless we first learn to host the presence. He said as leaders we must not pursue the power of God, but we peruse the presence of God.  He said unless we know what God’s presence looks like in our own private worship we will not be able to know when it comes corporately.  Many worship leaders completely miss the presence of God when it comes in worship because they do not know His presence in their own devotions.  He said a leader should step back and assess the room and the spirit rather than ploughing through their song list.  I hope this is something I do.  I try to see where God is moving.  He said that God is omnipresent (all the time), but also sometimes comes as a manifest presence (like the glory cloud or as a tangible presence in the room).  The things he thought were vital in hosting the presence were:

• RISK  He said that obedience requires some risk.  If you feel that God wants you to sing out, or have a period of stillness it can be a risk to do it.  But it is when risk happens that God’s presence comes.
• FAMILY  A beautiful family takes time to cultivate.  Church is not a business venture.  Church will feel like home when it feels like a family.  Families have intimacy and this is alluring to the world.
• CULTURE OF HONOUR  Don’t criticize other worship movements.  Ask God to show you what is beautiful in them and ask God what to make that beautiful in you.  Don’t imitate others…  their sound is good because it is their sound.  Take good elements by all means, but don’t try and be them.  You are you and your sound is what God wants to hear.
• SPIRITUAL EXCELLENCE  Not performance excellence.  Seek God.
• PERSONAL EXCELLECE Be very careful.  The enemy most wants to derail those who hear God.  The easiest way for him to do this is though a lack of sexual purity.
• AUTHENTICITY  Being yourself will release your anointing.
• SPIRITUAL AUTHORITY  Don’t stand in the authority of your giftings… Stand in the authority of God.  Your amazing guitar playing and sweet voice might move hearts, but when you have spiritual authority you will move not only hearts, but heaven itself.

He ended the session by praying for us.  Then we just waited on the Lord.  It was awesome.  To sit in silence with others all seeking God’s face is electric.  After about 10 minutes the spirit started to move people.  Some were crying and some were laughing hysterically.  We then sang several worship songs – just voices.   The presence of God was so thick and I ended up dancing on my chair.  Others did too and we rocked the joint.

After dinner I decided to sit in the 24 hour prayer room and soak while catching up with my notes and blog.  An hour passed so quickly.  I must try and go in there just to soak and pray before I go.

Next I went to the loo (I know this information is too much for some of you), and I could hear this amazing beat of a drum through the wall.  I then went to find out where this noise was coming from.  It was a dance Jam.  Like a music jam with all the instruments – but people were dancing to it.  It was the most amazing dancing vibe I have ever witnessed.  They danced to Mexican music (complete with a trumpet), African music (with loads of different drums), in fact every kind of music.  People were just dancing completely free and uninhibited.  I watched from the window and then some girls came out and got me and dragged me in.  They had already been dancing for an hour but there was still an hour and a half to go.  I danced and danced.  I watched loads of men come in and they danced too.  There were people breakdancing and leapfrogging everywhere.  It was so very very cool.  I am still on a high.  I managed to dance (not just bobbing up and down but skipping, leaping and running) for an hour and a half.  And my hips do not hurt at all.  My back is stiff but my hips are good.  That in itself is a miracle.