"I'm a mess I'm a mess I'm a mess right now,
Don't fix me up, just lay me down
You fill me up to pour me out
And I am undone"
It doesn't matter where we are with God... It doesn't matter if we are a mess, or in a mess. When we come to God and just lay before Him he fills us up... but not to just to a where we can function again, but to overflowing. God brings order in chaos, He breathes life into dry bones, He rescues the lost, He heals the sick.....
If you are in a mess, if you are a mess just ask God to lay you down and fill you up. When we are undone by God we will never be the same.
Today the worship was loud and we danced a lot. It was great.
Jeremy Riddle was praying that we would be stubborn and have faces set
like flint to God. I am so pleased I got a picture of him saying this:
Then Steffany Frizzell prayed that we would lose our own minds
and take on the mind of Christ.
After this Christa Black Gifford came and talked about ‘Perfection
V’s Excellence’. It was one of the most
amazing talks I have ever listened to.
In fact I went to the book shop and bought her book. I tried to upload the talk on here but is not working so I will have to try tomorrow.
Her main points were:
Perfection is the fruit of performance but excellence is the
fruit of sonship.
If you only think you are loved when you do well, you will
be a perfectionist.
Adam and Eve were in the garden in the beginning, before the
fall they walked with no shame. Even in
their nakedness they had no self awareness, they were outward looking and had
intimacy with God.
When the fall happened they then became aware of their
nakedness. They became self aware and inward
focussed.
Some of us are wearing a cloak of shame too.
But, in the garden of Eden God walked with them. Now, he lives in us. So why are we still wearning the cloak of
shame?
Why are we not living like God is inside of us?
Shame makes us focus on what we don’t have and not on what
we have been given.
When we judge ourselves we also judge others.
1 cor 4 v3-5 says that we are not allowed to judge ourselves
or others before Jesus comes back because we are in a supernatural period of
grace. Even when we reach judgement day we
will receive praise from our God.
John 16 v7-11 Christ
lives in me. My sin is dead because
Christ lives in me. Because my sin is
dead, I cannot receive judgment for it.
The Holy spirit is here to convict you of your righteousness
not your sin. When God points to an area
of your life – He is not pointing at your sin, He is pointing you towards the
truth about Him you have not realised.
For example instead of pointing at you in your food binge saying ‘you
disgust me’ he is pointing at His love saying ‘You just don’t know yet how much
I love you. Bask in my love’
Again she told the story about the man who was dwelling in
his misery of years ago. Jesus said “I
want my stuff back. I paid for
that. I want it back. It is not yours anymore!”
She gave a testimony of how one day she needed a binge
fix. So she snuck into the kitchen and
started to devour food. Suddenly she
heard a pop behind her: It was her new husband opening a packet of crisps. She stood full of shame at being caught. He said to her, ‘oh honey. If you need to binge I am just gonna sit here
and binge with you. I don’t want you to
be alone in this’. She said this is what
God does in our sin. He comes to the darkest
place, shines his light and loves into wellness.
I have to say I just sat after and cried. Not in sadness but in relief … as condemnation
left me.
After lunch I went to a Spoken word class. I went to this one for my friend Rachael… I
have recorded it for you lovely friend. This
is mike last year at Bethel School of Worship:
He gave the history of the spoken word and then performed
some of his spoken word stuff. It is
basically dramatic poetry. He is very
good. I would love to see some of this
in our church: another creative expression.
I would also love to see dance and art incorporated into our services
too. I watched a lady paint a picture in
the service a few days ago and it spoke so clearly to me prophetically.
Also he endorsed getting an iPhone to record lyrics and to
record poem and song ideas. I am going
to have to save up for one of these.
Might take me a while.
Next I went to another class with Christina Black
Gifford. She was talking about leading
in rest.
God does not expect Christains to give every minute to ‘the
cause’ at the expense of their families.
God wants us to rest in Him and love our families.
God will not ask you to give and give at the expense of your
health – we do not need to strive in the Kingdom.
We get the wrong idea about work and striving though our culture
(you must be the 1st in and the last out to be successful), our
families (you have to get good grades, you have to be the best), and the
structure of religion and Church (all about the Sunday service and
meetings). But God modelled rest to us
in Genesis 2 v 1-2. God rested on the 7th
day.
Jewish people have a day off one a week – always. But they are very productive.
When you rest in God He will give you all you need for the
rest of the day. You will be more productive.
2 Cron v20 We don’t
need to fight the enemy – he has a third of the angels, we have 2 thirds and
Jesus, and God and the Holy spirit. We
are on the winning side… When we rest
and praise God defeats our enemies for us.
Soak and still yourself in the Lord and He will bless you
and keep you.
After one more main session we went out to celebrate July 4th. I will post about that later. It was awesome!!!!
