Bootstraps & Horns

    

    Ever heard the phrase "Pull yourself up by the bootstraps?".   Or, "Grab hold of the horns of the altar!"?     Who knows where those sayings came from but to me, there is a truth in them.  To me they express a need to reach down inside of yourself at a moment of trial, at a moment of warfare, or tempatation and make a determination, no matter the outcome, you are going to make it.  A lot of folks, I guess, go through life and never have one of those bootstrap moments.  Or, maybe, their moment hasn't come yet.  But, for most people I know, there comes a moment, or moments, when you have to reach down inside and determine in your spirit, that no matter the outcome, you are going to go on in life, go on in the worship of God, go on being the person God says you are.

   This reminds me of the Hebrew children in the furnace.  They went through the fire and come out the other side without the smell of smoke on them, unharmed.  But, you know what saved them and made them heroes was in how they faced that furnace.   They got hold of the bootstraps.  They grabbed the horns of the altar.  They gripped the bone like a bulldog.  They got hold of something down inside and they said, "no matter, if you throw us in, we will not bend nor bow, we will not worship another God".     I think that committment would have delivered them, or, taken them through.  As it was, it took them through and indeed, they came through without harm.

    The real foundation of overcoming faith is something like this.  Often when we are only concerned with relief from the trial, our faith is grounded solely on our human desires.  No matter how good the desire, it is not always a strong basis for standing in faith. A lot of it is motions and emotions can trip us up. A determination to walk with God, to go on in life, to not let the furnace put the smell of smoke on us, is a better basis. We don't really have a promise of "overcoming life'. We have a promise of "life" by which we overcome. Sometimes "life" takes us through, sometimes it takes us over.

    Do I know what I am talking about?  Well, more than once, I have had to reach down inside and say "God, no matter how this comes out, it is still you and me.  I won't be changed by the furnace. I am still yours Lord."  I have known and pastored others whose faith through the trial was so admirable.  One lady lost her  baby grandson to a brutal murder. We prayed and prayed with her and she walked through the toughest of painful agonizing times. Times that would have caused a lot of stronger looking people to crumble and become bitter by the smoke of the furnace. She came through with a song, with a devotion for God that has not faded over the years. And, she has joy. Wonderful joy.

    Facing a trial? Grab hold of your faith in God. You can and will make it. Focus on Him through every day and you will come through.

decent and in order

     Defenders of the modern, evolved gentlemanly church love to talk about things being done "decently and in order" 1st Cor. 14:40. Only they too often mis-quote the verse and say "decent" and in "order".  They mean by  the word "decent" that what is done should be done so as not to offend any all-important person.  (Religious correctness at work!)  No siree bob!  We wouldn't want to offend Bro. & Sister Doodad.  He is on the board, she is the church mother and they tithe BIG!  And, several of the little Doodads run the Sunday School.  Them thar Doodads like things quiet, reserved and dignified.  Well, unforturnately for the Doodads, the word is not "decent" which implies being done so as not to offend. It is "decently"  implying things done  things done well.  So, if we are to prophesy, do it well.  If we sing, praise, shout, dance,  talk in tongues, roll on the floor, get drunk on New Wine, do it well.  "Decently"

    And, then, there is that word "order".   Whose "order" are we truly concerned about?  Doodads?  Man's? The board of deacons?  Or, God's?  Often the word, as used, means things have to happen the Pastor's way or they are not going happen!  No siree!  Of course, sometimes it is the bored board that establishes the order, including hiring and firing the pastor if their order is not observed.  Yessiree!   For me, I really prefer God's order.  Haven't seen it as much as I would like, but I love it.   A friend of mine visited a powerful revival going in a church in another state.  He received a mighty touch of God that changed his life and he excitedly ran back to his pastor to report what had happened.  He told him, "Oh, we need this revival to come to our church. Couldn't we have that evangelist or someone from the revival come and hold a meeting here?".  The pastor answered "Oh no, we don't want that kind of revival. It is out of order.  It would split the church.".  And, of course, he misquoted the obligatory verse saying all things need to be done  "decent and in order".

    Who are we to tell God what kind of revival we will allow Him to give us?  Isn't that  just a  big wheelbarrow full of pride to even think that way?  Who are we to tell Him what order we will permit?  You know, in spite of the common sentiment to the contrary, He is God and does what He wants when He wants, the way He wants. That is what you get when you are God.  That is what you get when God shows up and manifests among us.  I am okay wih that.  I like God being God.  I like God showing up suddenly , disrupting the well laid plans of man.  I like God offending the senses of natural thinking deacons, forcing them to really examine where they are with God.    I like it when "humdrum" explodes under the mighty wind of God.  I like it when ordinary burns up under the flame of the Holy Ghost fire baptism.  I love it when God takes charge, does things real decently and has His own order.

Non-Gentleman God

    Some folks believe God is the perfect gentleman, that he would never do anything to offend.  (They might be the same folks that think the fruit of the Spirit is to just be a nice person.)  What Christian television show would allow Jesus to make a spitball out of mud and rub it into a man's eyes? Hear the critcs?  "We don't believe in spitballs here", "This is TV, not the time and place for spitballs"  "No spitballs, it might offend". No matter that the man was healed - just stop them spitballs.  God is not always a gentleman. Ask Zechariah about it. God struck him dumb for a while. Or, Saul, riding along minding his own business killing those pesky Christians and the Holy Ghost knocked him off his horse or whatever he was riding, and changed his name.  Ask the ruined farmer whose pigs who Jesus gave a good dose of demons and it sent them screaming over a cliff. Or, imagine a great convocation of fundamental preachers from around the world and their water gets turned into wine.  Oh, I would love to be at that meeting, just to watching the wilting of spiritual pride.   Would water turning into wine be acceptable in most churches?

     I was in the Army with a scrawny little fellow who wore big black goggle-like glasses. He was a first class Nerd!  But, when he spoke he had a bass voice that rumbled when he spoke.  He was a DJ in real life and I often wondered what his fans thought he really looked like. Certainly not like he sounded.  People are that way with God. They shocked when God turns out to be different than they supposed.  Eventually, only accepting God as you have predetermined Him to be, or as you have previously seen Him, is going to cause you to miss God.  He comes as He chooses.

     How about you? Can you accept God the wine maker?  Or the water walker?  He appeared to Moses as a burning bush, a snake on a pole, a rock, a cloud, a fire and a staff in hand. Any problem with those forms?  Mary, at the tomb, thought he was a gardner. In Acts He came like tongues of fire and then as New Wine.  To Joshua He came as captain of the host.  John saw Him and said His eyes were like a flame of fire.  How many  of these manifestations would you accept?

  God has promised manifestations of Himself.   I think we have slowed down the rate of occurance of His manifestations because we insist on telling God how He ought to behave.  If He doesn't come like a gentleman, as we have so determined, we tune out.  It is time, I think, for the Holy Ghost to start interrupting sermons, religious plans and mannerisms and theological boxes and preconceived notions of how He ought to manifest.  What if He manifests in an unfamiliar way?  Will we go with the flow or fight the tide?  Over the years I have seen and heard many confess their hunger for God, only to see them pass up manifestation after manifestation, since it wasn't what they had in mind.  Having met this God who at times chooses not to observe the order of man, I am ready for more.  I want to "see thy power and glory as I have seen it in the sanctuary", Ps. 63:1-4. Come on Holy Ghost, come as you choose!

    

The Falling Holy Ghost

    Don't you love it when the Holy Ghost falls?  "while Peter yet spoke these words,the Holy Ghost fell on all of them which heard the word", Acts 10:44.  Why is that not every believer's dream?  Oh, what church we would have if the Holy Ghost would fall, right in the middle of the sermon!  Why not?  Maybe because our dream is about people showing up, not the Holy Ghost showing up.  Maybe, because we are too big for God to manifest.  Very much God would be disruptive, out of order for today's mega-church.  You see, success  in church today is measured by counting heads, census taking.  It is not measured, any longer, by whether or not the Holy Ghost fell.   Sad, huh?  

    Watching some of the more "successful", big, people friendly churches on television, I often find myself wondering, with amusement, what would happen if we had a Holy Ghost falling moment.  Right as the Reverend. Starchy was at his most sobering, intellectual point in his well prepared sermon, just as He did with Peter that time, BOOM!  The Holy Ghost falls and makes a spectacle - people start shouting, laughing, singing, talking in tongues, looking drunk and prophesying to one another.  And, all Reverend Starchy can do is just stand there.  Of course, the TV cameras would shut off immediately, but, wouldn't you just love to see the camera pan out across the huge audience and focus right in on a spot where the Holy Ghost was manifesting?  Right there in the middle of the 20,000 member church, about  120 folks just get plastered with the presence of God and just lose it!  Holy Ghost chaos strikes and just ruins the well-planned service order.  Having a Holy Ghost falling moment, they got so intoxicated they forget where they are and just had church!    Wouldn't you love to hear Reverend Starchy try to explain what just happened when the cameras did come back to him?

   I remember a Mennonite preacher telling how, in the 60's, the Holy Ghost fell on his congregation.  I don't remember the whole story and may have some of the details wrong but as I remember it, somehow he had come in contact with the Holy Ghost but his congregation had not. It was all new to him, but  one day he began sharing what he knew with his folks.  One by one his congregation began to fall under the power.  Frightened, he got his deacons and men to haul them out to other rooms until there was no room and then they stacked them against the walls of the sanctuary.  He had everyone still upright plead the blood of Jesus over them and rebuke the devil.  They were scared witless and pleading the blood for fear of their life. They thought the devil had envaded.  Then one by one, the congregation began to slowly awaken and did so speaking in tongues and worshipping God. And, from that, their came a mighty revival in that community and a mighty ministry for that pastor.  Can we even dream of this?

    Where are we today?  Do we dream of this?   Can we?  In churches today, even those who bill themselves as "Spirit filled", if the Holy Ghost shows up in any way other than a seemingly silent force, it is too divisive. The church splits and the pastor is fired for letting it happen.  That has actually happened to me.  Been there, done that. The cost was high, but, it was worth it and you know, the dream is still in me.  I am still dreaming, still thirsting, still hunger for more of God.   I dream of Holy Ghost falling moments.

The Shout of A King!

    Remember when Jesus came riding into the city on a donkey and people began to shout?  Of course there were those there who wanted to stop the shout, to whom Jesus said, "if these should hold their peace the stones would immediately cry out", Lk. 19:40.  God will have a shouting people because His plan does not call for shouting rocks.  And, there is more to this shouting business than just noise and emotions.  Once the king of Moab tried to get old prophet Balaam to curse Israel.  Balaam said he couldn't do it for the "shout of a king was among them", Nu. 23:21.  That is peculiar for Israel at the time had no earthly king.  I think old Balaam saw something in the spiritual realm about shouting that the modern church might be missing.  Jericho fell when God's people shouted.  The people of Israel once rebuilt the temple walls and did so with great shouting, so much so that people were unable to discern weeping shouts from joyful shouts (Ezra 3).  Have you ever been in a church service like that?  Love it, love it!    When David brought the Ark home it was done so with shouting.

    Of course, shouting is only for the undignified, some will say.  Yet, the Bible says those that trust in God "shout for joy", Ps. 5:11.  Upright of the heart "shout for joy", Ps. 32:11.  Those God blesses "shall shout aloud for joy", Ps. 132:16.  Sometimes I get so full of joy there just ain't no way to let-r out but shout!  We are to shout for joy for the Lord has taken away judgments that were against us, (Zep. 3:14-15.)   Oh my, when that sinks in - you just gotta shout!   Undignified?  Okay, I'll accept the title and love the title - and keep shouting. Why?  Because I trust, because I am upright of heart,  because God has taken away judgments against me!  G-L-O-R-Y!!!!!! (shouted).

       When Jesus came riding on that little donkey, He was fulfilling this prophecy,  "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion, shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold they King cometh unto thee: he is just, and having salavtion; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a cold the foal of an ass", Zech. 9:9.    Those people in Jerusalem, seeing Him coming on a little donkey, started shouting because deep down inside the shout of a king rose up.  Maybe they did not understand it all, maybe they did not even know a prophecy was being fulfilled before there very eyes, but the shout of a king rose up in them and they let the shouts fly!  My friend....when you know the King...it happens!  Can't help it....gotta shout!

      We are to clap our hands and "shout unto God with a voice of triumpth" Ps. 47:1.  Why, oh why oh why should we behave so radical, so undignified?   Because "God is gone up with a shout", Ps. 47:5.  God rises with the shouting of His people!  Over the years I have found things begin to happen when people begin to shout for joy. Demons get nervous and flee and revival may even break out when "the shout of a king" arises in the hearts and mouths of the redeemed of the Lord.  It has happened for us before.  Oh,  tell you, when the Holy Ghost suddenly chooses to magnify the King to you  it is really hard not have a shout come out.  If I could somehow type with volume, I would say, Halelujah, the King is here and He has taken away judgments that were against us!!!!!!!!  (shouted)

Sound Of Heaven

    

     "and suddenly there came a sound from heaven", Acts 2:2.  Do you know heaven's sound?  The word "sound" in this verse actually is the word "echo".   That day on Pentecost, it was a sound as of a mighty rushing wind, but what could have made that sound?  What was that echo that reverberated from heaven to earth?  What do you think a sound from heaven, coming right on the heels of the ascension of Jesus might be?  Joy, Joy, Unspeakable Joy!   "Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound: they shall walk, O Lord, in the light of thy countenance", Ps. 89:15.   The word "heaven" in that verse is, by implication, means "happiness".

    When you get around where the Spirit is flowing, you can hear this sound.  You can hear it in the celebrating believers.  You can hear it in your spirit.   Echoes from heaven!   In Ezra, when the temple was rebuilt, they were shouting for joy and weeping at the same time and it could be heard from far away.  It was a precursor of the heavenly sound.   People who have connected with the sound of heaven begin to alter their approach to God. They come into God's presence with a "joyful noise", Ps. 95:1-2.   They have placed their trust in God and without inhibition "shout for joy", Ps. 5:11.   In heaven, the sound of ten thousand times ten thousand times a thousand praising God, sounds like thunder, rushing water and mighty winds.

    Those early disciples were in the temple waiting for Holy Ghost baptism, an event that meant to them (and us) that Jesus has been crowned Lord of Lords.  They were praising God with great joy and then "suddenly",  the Holy Ghost entered the room.  His first act?   Take the praise of men, anoint it and combine it with the heavenly sound, the echo from above.  Suddenly, they were as drunken, laughing, rejoicing and praising God in languages only God understood.  Suddenly they were in the manifested presence of God where there is fulness of joy!  The sound of heaven!  What a sound!  The sound of home!  It still echoes right down to those who thirst after the Holy Ghost.

Holy Ghost Tongues

      "Have you received the Holy Ghost since you believed?"  That was the question asked of the Ephesians,  (Acts 19:2).  Have you?  You may already have, if you are a Christian, you just haven't yielded yourself to His presence.  That yielding always starts with the tongue.  When you got saved, it required a yielded tongue.  You had to confess unto salvation.  Holy Ghost baptism has a similar requirement.  He comes upon you and gives you an "utterance" (odd, unknown syllables).   That requires you to speak that utterance.  It isn't your native tongue.  In fact, it may not sound like a language at all, at least not one you have heard.  But,  yield your tongue and for the first time, your spirit (not your soul  or  physical person) begins to speak.  And, it begins to speak to God.  Isn't that awesome!  You can now talk God's language.  Spirit to spirit.  No man understands that language, including you, but God does (1st Cor. 14:2).

    Some always ask "do I have to speak in tongues?".  The answer is "no", but you get to and why not?  You can talk to God in His language. When you do, it builds up, strengthens your spirit. When you do, it builds you up on your most holy faith (Jude 20).  When you do, it is a rest and refreshing for your spirit.  So, why not?  And, then there is the usual question "Should there be an interpretation?".  The answer is as simple as God could possibly make it, though natural men struggle to understand.  If you are talking to man, in any language he does not understand, then interpretation is required.  If you are not talking to man, and you are praising God, talking to God in tongues, it is none of man's business what you are saying.  Oh, and by the way, speaking in tongues is a sign God specifically says unbelievers are supposed to see us doing (1st Cor. 14:22).  So, it shouldn't be hid in a closet somewhere.  It is crazy for people to say "tongues" are for real, but only for private use.  Really?  How will unbelievers see us speaking in tongues?  Some will say tongues are only for home use only, but not for in the church.  Really?  Are you going to believe you have a language with which you can speak to God, but you can't use it in His church?  Come on now, wise up a bit. That is crazy!

    Want to receive?  Search the Scriptures and see if the promise is there.  (Try Matt. 3:11, Lk. 24:49, Acts 1:4, Acts 2, Acts 10:44-45, and Acts 19:6 for example).  Start praying about it and begin to tell God you want to receive this gift Jesus died to give you.  Then, if you are alone, get before God  in praise and prayer.  Ask Him for the gift of the Holy Ghost and speaking in tongues.  If you ask, He promised to give you exactly what you asked for, (Lk. 11:13). Begin to thank Him for the gift and praise Him .  Do it out loud, yielding your voice and tongue.  If you don't open your mouth and yield your tongue, you will have a much more difficult time coming into this than you should.   After a time of this, pause a moment believing the power of the Holy Ghost is coming upon you.  Take a deep breath, then let it out and when you do, speak the syllables that come to your mind. Don't speak your natural language. There will be strange syllables that will pop up.  Speak them, whethere they be a few or many.  And, by the way, chances are you have already heard them in your head.  Like so many others, you might think you are making it up or copying someone.  But, have faith.  You asked God for this, now trust that He has given what you asked.    Now, speak out in praise  those syllables just the way you were doing a few minutes before in your native tongue.  What happens after that may vary from person to person. It can be sudden and dramatic change, elation and joy or it may be quiet stillness.  No matter.  In the days to come you will begin to notice significant differences.  Keep praising God with those syllables and as well your natural speech.  Do it every time you think about it.

    If you are in a believing church and want to receive, do what I just told you, during praise tor altar time. Or, get to the altar and if your church does this, have them lay hands on you and pray over you.  The method of receiving will still be much the same as I described above.  One last bit of advice: if tongues do not come right away, don't be discouraged.  Keep thanking God for the gift and listen to for those syllables to pop up in your mind.  They will,  maybe later, when you are relaxed and not worrying over it, and when they do, speak them boldly.