Renewed thinking

Romans 6:5-8, "For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of his resurrection, 6knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; 7for he who has died is freed from sin.  8Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him."

This blog is all about one of the most freeing revelations available to the believer today.  It's a revelation that will radically change how you view yourself, how you view God, and how you understand the absolute effectiveness of the cross.  Here it is.  You, the believer are not a sinner anymore.  That part of you has died. You are now a saint having been adopted into the King's family.  Now, I'm guessing one of two things happened as you read that.  Either you got really excited, or some red flags went up inside your head.  

"Does that mean we can't sin?  What about when I do?  1 John 1:8 says..."  I'll get to all that.  I have a ton of scripture to throw in here and hopefully you'll see without a shadow of a doubt that you as a believer in Christ are truly a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17) and have received a new identity.  The title "sinner' doesn't belong to you anymore.  The cross did a better job than that.

Now let's go back to the the verse from Romans at the top.  Read it again if you like.  That's exciting news!  We have died with Christ and as a result our old self/ our old man is dead.  The word "self," in 6 is the word anthropos in the Greek.  In addition to meaning man, or human being, another part of the definition is "with the added notion of weakness, by which man is led into a mistake or prompted to sin."  It describes our tendency to do sinful acts.  Now insert that meaning into the context of the verse.  It looks something like this.  

"Knowing this, that our old tendency towards sin and unrighteousness was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin."  

Now the objection could be that the phrase "in order that..." could imply that this is yet to happen.  That our body of sin is yet to be done away with, and it'll be a while before we can no longer be slaves to sin.  Looking at other scripture quickly makes this impossible though.  In Romans 8:2, Paul says, "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death."  Romans 6:20 says, "For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness."  The prerequisite to no longer being a slave to sin is that our body of sin must be done away with.  We are no longer slaves to sin therefore our sin nature must have been done away with.  And it was, on the cross.

Anyway, enough with that verse.  Let's deal more directly with the title "sinner" vs, being a "saint."  There's a reason that in all of his letters (except his letter to Thesalonica), Paul is writing to "The saints at the church of Rome, Ephesus, etc..."  The reason was, He was encouraging them in their new identity.  They were no longer sinners but saints of the most High.  Look at Romans 5:8-10.  

"8But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.  9Much more then, having now been justified by his blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.  10For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life."

According to Paul a sinner is an enemy of God.  Now, what Christian is willing to call themselves an enemy of God?  Yet many Christians unknowingly do by still considering themselves sinners.  

Read on in Romans 5 to verse 19.  "For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous."  When will we be made righteous?  It already happened.  One of the benefits of justification is being made righteous, and verse 9 says that we have been justified.  Therefore we have been made righteous.  Are righteous people sinners?  Paul contrasts them in verse 19, so I think it's safe to say no they are not.  

Now what does it mean to be righteous.  This definition is according to, http://www.searchgodsword.org/lex/grk/view.cgi?number=1343

in a broad sense: state of him who is as he ought to be, righteousness, the condition acceptable to God

1. the doctrine concerning the way in which man may attain a state approved of God
2. integrity, virtue, purity of life, rightness, correctness of thinking feeling, and acting

The condition acceptable to God!  We as believers are unconditionally accepted by God!  How's that for a concept?  And here's the best part!  We didn't get there ourselves.  God did it for us!  We are in right standing with God!  Look at what Ephesians 2: 10-13 says.    "¹⁰ For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

 ¹¹ Therefore remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called “Uncircumcision” by the so-called “Circumcision,” which is performed in the flesh by human hands— ¹² remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, ^[a]excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope andwithout God in the world. ¹³ But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off ^[b]havebeen brought near ^[c]by the blood of Christ."

Where were we created?  In Christ.  And where are we now?  In Christ again!  Also see Romans 8:1.  We're back to the original glorious  person God created us to be.  He didn't create us with a sin nature and now we're back to that original status!  That's good news!

Ok, now it's time to look at some possible objections.  Let's look at the classic justification for using such terms as, "I'm a sinner saved by grace."  1 John 1:8 says, "If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us."  Or even better yet let's look at what Paul writes to Timothy in 1 Tim 1:15.   "It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all."  Other versions say "chief." 

Really quickly let me just point out that in 1 John, it says that, "if we say we have no sin..."  I'm not suggesting that we have no sin.  I'm just saying that we're not sinners.  I'll explain more in a little bit, but let's deal with 1 Timothy first.  

It would have been so much easier if Paul would have just said, "...of whom I was foremost of all."  He just had to make it tricky by saying "am."  And I'm not going to lie, I don't have the best explanation for it.  However look at what Paul says in Galatians 2:15 when He is rebuking Peter.  

"We are Jews by nature and not sinners from among the Gentiles."  In 1 Timothy, it looks like Paul views himself as a sinner, but we clearly see the opposite in Galatians.  Jews in general did not see themselves as sinners.  We see why in Psalm 50:5.  "Gather My saints together unto me; those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice." (KJV)  Jews didn't see themselves as sinners, but saints because they were in a covenant with God.  Likewise it says in Eccl 9:18, "Wisdom is better than weapons of war, but one sinner destroys much good."

So what can we take from these 2 examples of scripture?  Well, a saint according to Psalm 50, is one who is in a covenant relationship with God, and the means by which they obtained covenant is sacrifice.  We as believers are indeed in a covenant with God.  It's called the New Covenant (Matthew 26:26).  How is it possible for us to be in a covenant with God?  It's possible because of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.  Therefore we are in a covenant with God through sacrifice which qualifies us as saints.  

Going back to Paul, I really don't know why Paul decided to word 1 Timothy 1:15 like that.  However with the abundance of scripture that says the believer is no longer a sinner but righteous, I think it's safe to believe those instead of taking one scripture and using it to validate what we are experiencing.  

1 John 1:8.  As far as this verse goes, I want to point out the difference between being a sinner (having a sin nature) and having sin.  They are completely different.  A sin nature is not necessary to sin as so many suppose.  Adam and Eve didn't have a sin nature but they were able to pull it off.  It's important to understand that just because you sin as a Christian, it doesn't make you a sinner.  Look at what Hebrews 7:26-27 says.  

"For it was fitting for us to have such a high priest, holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners and exalted above the heavens; ²⁷ who does not need daily, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the sins of the people, because this He did once for all when He offered up Himself."  Priests in Israel would atone for their sins first, and then for the people.  Why is that important?  They recognized the presence of sin in their lives.  However despite that, the Jews didn't consider themselves as sinners (refer back to Psalm 50:5, and Galatians 2:15).  They knew that their sacrifices atoned for their sins, so they didn't identify with it.  

Now let me ask you a question.  How much more complete was Jesus' sacrifice on the cross?  Much more!  If the Jews didn't consider themselves sinners in an incomplete covenant then how can we think of ourselves as sinners in the better covenant?  

Romans 6:20 sums up this thought pretty well.  "For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness."  What is Paul saying?  He's saying that when you were a slave to sin you were free from righteousness; meaning you were free from the obligation to be righteous.  You were only obligated to sin because it was your nature and your tendency to do so.  Question.  Is it impossible for a sinner / a pre-Christian to do a righteous deed.  Of course not!  It doesn't make them righteous but it's still a righteous deed.  There are plenty of non-believers in the world who spend their lives doing what Jesus talks about in Matthew 25:35 (clothing the naked, feeding the hungry...).  It's not their nature to do these things, because according to Romans 6:20 they are free from righteousness, but they still do them.  They are just acting outside their nature.  

Now think of that verse in reverse.  Flip it around.  You'll end up in our current position as believers.  Instead of being slaves to sin, we are slaves to Christ and instead of being free from righteousness we are free in regards to sin.  Does that mean we can't sin?  No.  If an unrighteous person can do a righteous deed when it's not their nature, then a believer can sin when it's not their nature.  It doesn't make us a sinner, just as doing a righteous deed doesn't make an unbeliever righteous.  You are not defined by what you do outside your nature!  You are defined by who God says you are.  That settles it.  He calls you a royal priesthood in 1 Peter 2:9.  He calls you a holy one (saint).  He calls you righteous!  In fact you are HIS righteousness!  (2 Corinthians 5:21)  Just accept it!  You're awesome!  He made you that way when He made you "in Christ!"  Now you're in Christ again.  Accept the new identity your Heavenly Daddy has for you.  You'll never be the same!  Literally!

So why is all this important?  It's important because every believer has an assignment.  It's the same assignment Jesus had.  Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil and to preach the Kingdom (1 John 3:8, Luke 4:43 respectively).  Jesus said in John 20;21, as the Father sent Him, He sends us!  We can't accomplish this assignment to the fullest of our potential if we have an unrenewed way of thinking of ourselves.  It just won't happen.  Sinners saved by grace won't change the world but Saints walking in the fullness of power and authority available to them will bring nations to the one they desire! (Haggai 2:7).  Jesus did it all on the cross.  Now we're dead to sin and alive to Christ!  We were sinners before the cross, but now we're saints!  Glorious saints of God!  Let's live like it!

Heaven minded vs. Earthly minded

Habakkuk 2:14 says, "For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea."  Now, the earth is already filled with God's glory according to Isaiah 6:3.  It's just that not everyone knows it yet.  That's a no brainer statement considering we all can probably think of several people we know personally who are unaware of what God is doing on the earth.  
That is what makes Habakkuk 2:14 so profound though.  The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord.  Meaning, everybody's going to know about it!  Everybody is going to be aware of God's glory being manifested on the planet.  Not just the church, and not just a select few, but the whole earth!  How do the waters cover the sea?  Completely!  The world in its entirety will know that God's glory is present on the earth!  


Now here's the thing.  I refuse to believe that this is meant to be reserved for the millennium.  One key reason being that Habakkuk doesn't say that the world will be filled with the acknowledgement of the glory of the Lord.  It simply says knowledge.  At the end of this age, like Romans describes in chapter 14 verse 11, "It is written: “‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord, ‘every knee will bow before me;every tongue will acknowledge God.’”


So what's the difference?  Let's use an example.  Say your ex boyfriend/girlfriend who you had a rough breakup with a week earlier walks into the same room as you.  Chances are that within a split second of you recognizing their presence, your back is turned to avoid eye contact.  What happened?  You realized they entered the room (knowledge), but you avoided acknowledging their presence.  


At the end of this age, the glory of the Lord on the earth will drive everyone to acknowledge who He is (every knee will bow, and every tongue will confess).  No such action is described in Habakkuk as a result of knowing of the glory of God on the earth.  Which leads me to think that even though all will be aware of it, there will be those who are drawn to relationship with Him, but also those who refuse to acknowledge His presence.  Those who turn to greet Him as he enters the room, and those who turn their back refusing to acknowledge He walked in.  


Now with that understanding, read Habakkuk 2:14 again through a lens of faith.  Something should be stirring up inside of you.  The earth is filled with the glory of God, but the world doesn't know it?  Wait a minute.  There are those in the world who are yet to know how good God is?  There are people who haven't encountered the glory and the perfect goodness of the Lord?  Something must be done!


That's where we, the believers come in, and that's where being heavenly minded becomes absolutely crucial.  


Too many Christians are focused on the things pertaining to the first heaven (earth).  For example, so many Christians still believe that despite what Jesus accomplished on the cross, they are still sinners; when in reality we are saints.  One can't be a saint and a sinner at the same time.  Psalm 50:5 defines saints as those who made a covenant with God through sacrifice.  Because of Jesus' sacrifice that established the new covenant, that is every believer.  It is perfectly legal for a believer to no longer consider him/herself a sinner because God calls us saints.  We are in a covenant with Him and Jesus provided the sacrifice.  (I'll write another blog dedicated to describing this better sometime in the future)


Why is this important?  After all, isn't it humbling to acknowledge the frailty of our humanity?  It might appear to be humbling, but it won't make you a world changer.  Habakkuk 2:14 is talking about the entire world knowing about what God is doing on the earth.  Bringing this about will require the saints on the earth to focus on things that are above, and not below.  I'm sorry, but if you are constantly mindful of your sin, you are limiting what you can experience , to what is possible in the natural realm.  And the only way to bring the entire world into encountering God's glory is through supernatural intervention.  It's only through Heaven invading earth through the partnership we have with God the Father in ministering to the world, that they will know of his goodness.  Everyone on this planet is only one God encounter away from coming to acknowledge Him for who He is.  How can we ascribe to bring the Kingdom of Heaven with us to encounter people if we're still wrapped up in our sins, problems, and imperfections.  That's why Paul says in Romans chapter 6 to consider yourselves dead to sin.  Think higher!  


The bottom line is that Habakkuk 2:14 should be a goal for every believer.  A Christian should read that and say, "I will give my life to see this come to pass."  And the only way we can assist in this glorious assignment is to abandon all other ways of thinking that are not from heaven.  It starts with realizing who God says we as individuals are.  Sinners saved by grace won't change the world, but saints walking in the full power and authority they were destined to walk in will draw nations to the One they desire (Haggai 2:7). That's heavenly minded thinking.  Agreeing with what God says.  He says "On earth as it is in Heaven," we say, "I purpose to live to see Heaven invade earth in my life."  He says, " As the Father sent me, now I send you," we say, "Lord I accept the assignment you gave me; to destroy the works of the devil." 


It's not that complicated.  Faith actualizes what it realizes.  Faith sees the heavenly realm and forces it into manifestation on earth.  The only way to accomplish this is to know what the Kingdom of Heaven is like.  Only then can we accurately bring it to earth and as a result, see the world marvel as we present them with the goodness of God.  The whole world is dying to know how good God is.  Jesus is the desire of nations.  Everybody wants a King like King Jesus.  Let's not let them down.

Missions Trip!

So one of Bethel's requirements to graduate is to go on a missions trip.  But not just any missions trip.  A Bethel missions trip!  What that means is... well, I'll just let you read the description of the trip I'm going on;

Tijuana Leader: Mark Brookes  Dates: March 27 - Apr 3

Tijuana has been a life changing experience for every student that has gone. We will be based out of a

camp that Bethel has been coming to every year for 10 years. There is Revival breaking out among the

local pastors who have set up a network of churches including the Ensenada area. Teams of BSSM

students will minister as worship leaders, children’s ministers and have opportunity to preach, teach

and give words of knowledge in local church meetings. Open Heavens are over the area and there is

an expectancy for the supernatural in the community. We will also minister on the streets with prophetic

art, treasure hunts, drama and many other forms of outreach. We will visit the legendary Revolution

Street for a large evening crusade using various local churches to assist us in reaching out to the lost.

This is a time of experiencing community on a team, personal freedom and God breaking out. Come

and experience being used by God to love the poor, love on tons of children, heal the sick, the blind,

the lame, and encourage Pastors as we partner with them to see Revival change a nation. We will end

the trip with a blow up service at a sister church in southern California, hang out on the beach and

enjoy how good our God is. You will be forever changed!!!

Tijuana, Mexico.  It's going down!

Tijuana was actually one of over 40 trips to choose from.  Some of the other trips were to crazy places like Russia, Central Asia, Japan and New Zealand.  Of those 40+, we had to pick 5 just in case they couldn't fit everyone in their top pick.  Fortunately for me Tijuana was my top pick which made me super psyched!  I cannot wait to see what God does while our team is there!  One thing's for sure; He is going to blow up my expectations and show me how good He really is, and how much He loves people.

My housemates are going to some crazy places too.  My roommate Ethan is going to England.  Adam is going to Alabama.  Connor is going to Croatia.  Justin is going to the Philippines.  John is going to Tijuana with me, and Sam still doesn't know where he's going yet.  I am so looking forward to coming back from our trips and sharing with each other stories of what God did.  March 27 can't come soon enough!  

Just gold dust...

So I've been thinking a lot lately about physical manifestations of the presence of God.  Manifestations like gold dust, angel feathers, perfect jewels, manna etc...  It's actually hard to ignore here at Bethel because so many people have seen gold dust appear, glory clouds, gold dust falling from glory clouds, and things of that sort.  Shoot, I've seen gold dust appear in my hands during times of worship.  It's fun for sure, but different.  I naturally wondered, why God would do that.  After all, the Bible doesn't mention gold dust falling to the ground when the presence of God came. 

So came the question.  Is God limited to His Bible? 

I quickly realized after a few minutes of exercising my common sense that God is not limited to what He's done in the Bible.  He can't be.  It doesnt't make sense.  First of all, we serve a limitless all powerfull God who can do whatever He wants. 

Then I started thinking, "What about all the people in the world with HIV/ AIDS?"  If God is limited to scripture, then there's no hope for these people because Jesus never healed anyone with AIDS in scripture. 

We do know that it is still God's will to heal AIDS patients though, despite it not being in scripture.  Why?  Because His nature doesn't change.  His acts do, and must for Him to be God, but His nature remains the same.  That is the reason we can pray for those with new strains of viruses and believe that we have the will of God backing our prayers.  That's the reason we can ask Papa to provide for us things that may not have been in the Bible.  We can do these things because we know that who He is (the God who heals, and the God who provides) will always remain the same. 

When  people look at things like angel feathers and gold dust, most of the time they will process these occurances like so.  In fact, I myself had to get used to NOT doing this.  They will look for it in scripture.  If they dont find it, they then say "Well God doesn't change according to Malachi 3, so it must not be from God." 

Our job isn't to judge what God is doing based on what He has already done.  Rather we must determine what lines up with His nature revealed to us in the scriptures.  The Bible among other things shows us 2 things.  It shows us what God has done, and what God is like.  If we cling to what God has done, we are stopping short of knowing what Father God is like because seeing what He's done is supposed to bring us into a revelation of His nature.  And that is where our discernment has to lie.  That's the standard.  His nature, not His track record. 

AIDS?  That's a sickness.  We know how Jesus dealt with sickness, and God never changes.

The presence of God?  It is very real.  In fact the Bible tells us that the unseen is more real than what is seen.  It manifested physically in the Bible, and God never changes.

So, all that to say just because it isn't in the Bible, doesn't mean it's not from God. 

Now what about the why question?  Why gold dust?  Why do feathers fall on people sitting in their cars, or on airplanes?  Why do some places see manifestations of jewels to perfect to be worth anything in this world. 

I have no idea. 

Why a pillar of fire?  Why a cloud?  Why a bush?  Why not a talking sheep on fire?  Now THAT would have been symbolic!

What we can know is that if we understood why God did everything, we would end up with a God that looked very similar to us.  And that's just no fun.

Side note... I was going to mention laughter as a manifestation, but there are so many verses on joy being a part of the Kingdom that it would've been too repetitive.  Bottom line make room for "new," in your understanding of God.  He never changes, but what He does is a whole other story.  He's like Domino's Pizza.  The pizza is the same wherever you go (thank God), but the specials might be different.  Yep.  That's right.  God is like Domino's Pizza. 

I am so behind.

I desperately need to maintain some sense of regularity with my blog posts.  Otherwise I'm not going to be able to keep up with everything that happens.  Lord help me. 

So last night was absolutely incredible.  Heidi Baker, an amazing missionary who founded Iris ministries spoke at Bethel's Sunday evening service and the word she spoke just wrecked me.  First of all, when you  look at Heidi, you see pure love and joy oozing out of her eyes.  She has truly captured the heart of Father God and moves to the rhythm of His heartbeat.  Her ministry watches over 10,000 orphans, and they've planted over 7,000 churches in the past decade.   Impressive numbers, but even if you had no knowledge of the incredible statistics of her ministry, you could know the love in her heart just by looking at her.  It's incredible. 

So basically, liquid love in a person was preaching.  To sum up, her message was about stopping for the one.  Recognizing the needs of those who are starving not only physically, but spiritually.  4.4 billion people on the Earth are starving spiritually because they have not heard the good news of the Gospel of Jesus.  That's our mission.  Not to necessarily make it our goal to reach all 4.4 billion of them, but to simply stop for the one in our everyday lives. 

At the end of her message she had everyone kneel down on the floor and invite Holy Spirit to come.  She shared a vision she had, which I can't remember in its entirety ( a side effect of waiting to blog about it).  Basically she saw chariots of fire going around the world.  Two people (believers) were in each chariot and God was holding the reigns of each chariot.  He was holding the reigns, as opposed to the riders because each person needed both hands to hold a sword that they possessed.  The sword stood for mercy and justice. 

As a prophetic act, she asked everyone to kneel, hold up with both hands their sword, and ask that God would show them people He wanted them to reach.  She declared over us that God was showing us faces, places, nations, people that we were called to reach.  For a while now, I've had this desire to go to China because the greatest revival in history is happening there right now.  So I immediately felt a drawing to China.  I felt God say that, "Too long has China been associated with dragons."  God apparently has big plans for China.

Pretty cool, but when I arrived home, it got better. 

Last week, my house dad Daniel went around asking if anyone wanted this plastic sword that he had.  Now for whatever reason I just like swords, and he was going to throw it out otherwise.  So I said that I would take it.  I had a feeling that it would have some sort of prophetic meaning eventually and I turned out to be right.  So anyway I kept it in my room by my bedside, not really getting any super divine revelation from it.  In fact, most of the time when I left the house I would just completely forget about it. When I came home from the Sunday night service though, I saw my housemate John playing with my sword.  He decided to point out something obvious to me that I, up untill that moment never realized.  There's a dragon on the hilt of my sword!  The word God spoke to me instantly came to memory.  What God spoke to me prophetically as I held up my sword on Sunday night, He confirmed with my physical sword which I received a week earlier.  Needless to say, my mind was blown.  

God really does speak.  He's always speaking.  Listening is the key.  Listening and expecting to hear His voice.  One of the pastors here said something so true one Sunday morning before worship.  "Expectations are the only things that can kill faith."  By lowering our expectations of what God is going to do, we automatically lower our faith level.  Now it's hard for the one who has never heard the voice of God before, because they have no experience to draw faith from.  Hard, but not impossible.  And even if it was "impossible," that word is not in God's vocabulary.  It has no meaning in the realm where He is, and it certainly has no power.  God will speak to those who wait and listen.  And He will do it in ways that you would never imagine.  Case in point, my 2 dollar plastic sword, no doubt from either Party City or Wal-Mart.  Just listen.  He loves to speak to His children! 

So God's put it on my heart to go to China.  How that's going to happen, your guess is as good as mine.  But God gives you the desires of your heart for a reason.  There's a reason I feel so attracted to China.  It might be years before I can act on that, but whenever it happens, I am for sure bringing my dragon sword with me!

Adoration

So this is what I've decided to do.  I have decided to use this blog to write about all the spiritual experiences I have while I'm at Bethel, and I'll use my tumblr to write about everything else.  I may have to adjust that line somewhere down the road because as I become more aware of the spiritual realm, that world is going to grow and the occurances of the "natural world" are going to seem less "natural" and more spiritual.  Anyway, I'm sure you'll see what I mean simply by reading the two and recognizing how different they are. 

A few nights ago I was at Bethel's prayer house which is open 24/7.  Eventually I will take pictures of it because pictures really are worth a thousand words.  Especially when it comes to a place as beautiful as the prayer house.  However, I do have to explain that outside,  in the back of the house there are gardens surrounding a pool.  They aptly named the pool, the pool of Bethesda- the pool in the Bible that would be stirred daily by an angel.  Flowing into the pool from a stack of natural rocks is a miniature waterfall which creates the incredibly peaceful sound of flowing water.  It's awesome.  Leading to the garden in the back of the house there is a path that runs from the entrance of the prayer house, and around the side of it to the back. 

That night I was walking along that side pathway with an unbelievably clear sky above me.  As I walked past this one spot I was hit with an unusually tangible presence of God.  It felt as if I stepped into a circle where angels were worshipping and adoring Jesus.  There was such a sense of adoration for the person of Jesus that it literally took my breath away.  What was unusual for me was that I was able to discern exactly what was going on in the spirit.  Literally, Jesus was being adored.  That's what the angels had on their minds.  I paused for a second just to be in that place and continued walking.  The sensation left.  So I walked back to that spot and BAM.  Tears started forming in my eyes because there was so much love being poured out onto Jesus in that one area it was overwhelming. 

I stayed there in that spot and did the only thing I could do- kneel down and join the angels that were so obviously present, in adoring and loving Jesus.  Ever since that moment, my ability to connect with God in worship has increaced so much!  It's like I just turn my thoughts on Him, and that same sensation comes over me- as if those same angels join with me whenever and wherever I begin to worship. 

Today God told me why that was.  He told me that angels of adoration are attracted to me.  When I worship, they like to join me and adore with me.  And it feels strange but awesome.  I'll be worshipping by myself but I won't feel like I'm alone.  It's like whenever I start singing, praying or even just thinking about the goodness of Father God, these angels of adoration are just attracted to that like a magnet and immediately join in with me.  Sometimes I hear them when I stop, saying "Don't stop, don't stop!  Just keep going!  Go deeper go deeper!"  It's incredible.

A rude awakening!

Today was a fun day.  I was feeling adventerous so I decided to do something really extravegant.  Something I would remember for years to come and be able to tell my children about.  Can you guess?  I'll give you a hint.  It involved me traveling to a local pizza joint, purchasing a regular cheese slice, and ingesting it for the sole purpose of comparing it to New York's pizza.  Need another hint?  Hopefully not.  I mean if you need another hint to understand that I went rattlesnake hunting then you need some serious help. 

Anyway, I did try the pizza.  Or should I say, "pizza."  Now as expected, I do have a few (12 to be exact) complaints.  However instead of just writing them down in a boring list I think it would be much more fun to write down a series of  highly dramatic idioms that describe my "pizza" experience here in Redding.  I may even throw in some sarcasm.  You know what?  It was that bad, I have to throw in some sarcasm.  Let's begin shall we. 

So what exactly IS it like to eat "pizza" outside of New York state?
It was like diving into a pool of low expectations and coming out more dissapointed than expected. 
It was like wandering through a desert hoping to arrive at an oasis only to find more desert. 
It was like being mauled by a bear and coming out of it with no limbs and only half your organs still inside your body.  You expect it to be bad, but THAT bad? 
It was like watching The Room.  For those of you who have seen The Room, enough said...
It was like swimming in a lake of crushed dreams and hopeless futures. 
It filled my mind with thoughts of pain and torment.  And then I realized that these thoughts were only an extension of the pain and torment my taste buds were experiencing. 
It was so bad, immediately after I finished I drowned out the taste with massive amounts of peanut butter... I hate peanut butter. 

I could go on and on but I'm actually out of ideas.  Figure that one out...  The point is, it was bad.  It wasn't terrible ( I was just having fun with the colorful descriptions), but it definitely wasn't as good as I would have liked.  It tasted like cheap microwave pizza that was just heated up in the oven instead.  BUT!  They did have the courtesy to conveniently cut my slice in half thus eliminating the daunting and agonizingly tumultuous task of folding it in half.  How kind.  Now I'm not going to name the name of this particular pizza shop (Luigi's)  but it doesn't matter because it's not their fault.  Who's fault is it?  Canada's.  And that settles that.