About two months ago I became very disillusioned and disappointed in the response of the church to prayer, and basically stepped back from almost all ministry activity.  In some ways this was a midlife crisis, and in other ways it was a need to get away from the “echo chamber” I was seeing in the Christian community.  I really didn’t want to know what another leader was saying, I wanted to know what God was saying.  I also needed to review what God has said to me in the past.

To my surprise, I have been encountering others feeling the same way I have–a need to step back, listen to God, unplug the ministry “machine,” and get into the scripture.  God is waking a number of people up to a simple truth–the secret is Christ in you the hope of glory (Colossians 1:27).

About 4 years ago God showed me a vision of waves that took many forms.  The core of the vision is under the Prophetic Words tab on this page.  The last wave I saw was one that was named “TSUNAMI.”  That wave comprised several things–first it was a wall of water that moved from East to West.  It was formed out of ancient wells opening up, and it was powerful.  The Tsunami could destroy anything in its path, and it would change the landscape everywhere it went.  Along with this, there was a sense that those who rode this wave would experience a rebirth of freedom. 

I believe this wave is starting to rise, and that it is going come in unexpected ways.  If the church embraced the truth that is being revealed to a few leaders right now, the impact could be much larger than the impact that the Protestant Reformation had in the 16th Century.

For a long time I believed that part of reopening the Ancient Wells meant tapping into the revivals of the past that happened in New York and New England.  I have spent a lot of time, energy, and money traveling to remote places to pray in old churches, at grave sites, and on location in significant spots.  Although there was a lot of value in this to focus and reignite passion, I don’t believe God is going to repeat the events of the past.   I think our Ancient well is the well of truth in the core of the New Covenant–God wants to live in and through you.  For several weeks now I have been meditating on this truth.  Jesus is in you, and if Jesus is in you, then all that Jesus says he is is in you.   At first I made a list of a few promises.  Now I am starting to see the New Testament through a completely new lens.  It’s as if I am looking at a beautiful painting after centuries of grime has been removed.  I didn’t know how good the Good News was.   This truth–the reality of an inside out gospel, is on almost every page.

Both Ezekiel and Jeremiah foretold a day when the law of God would be written in our heart, and Jesus promised there was a place we could dwell in him.  I have struggled for years to appropriate these realities in my life, but I have had seasons of success and seasons of failure.   The issue is not just “how do I get saved?”  The issue is “how can I be the person I was made to be?”  How can I be in Him?  And the most powerful thing of all– ”how can I experience the stuff Jesus says I already have?”

There’s the rub.  We aren’t looking for a sin based revival where people publicly repent for a few days and then go back to “normal.”  We are looking for a body of people to rise up and say “Jesus says this is who I am.”  I am choosing to surrender to Christ in me, and he will live in and through me.  I am going to wake up to the reality that I am an heir, that the Law of God is written on my heart, that I am defined by who I am and not what I do, and that the reality of the life of God–eternal resurrection life–is in my physical body transforming me from the inside out.  And if God in me is transforming me, then God in me can touch you, and God in me can touch the world.  Maybe this is what Paul meant when he said that all of creation is longing for the revealing of the sons of God.  All creation is groaning for us to wake up, walk into who we are, and begin to redeem all creation.  What an earth shaking idea.

What would happen if a body of people embraced this?  There are little glimmers of healing, miracles, and outpourings here and there.  What if there was a body who embraced this as a whole?  It would shake a number of areas in society, and I know it would have a drastic impact on the religious system in many churches.  Maybe this awakening would be nothing short of a Tsunami.

If you have found value in this post, I encourage you to subscribe to belonginghouse.org in the sidebar on the right.

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.

Last year Massachusetts began issuing Choose Life License plates.   If we can get 3000 plates on the road, a coalition of Pro-Life organizations in Massachusetts will receive a substantial amount of the proceeds from each plate, and each plate renewal.  We are only 400 plates away from the goal–but we need 400 more people to register and pick up their plates.  This is a VERY worthwhile cause, and a goal that is easy to reach.  Click on the license plate and go to the Massachusetts Choose Life website today!

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.

• You will do the works that Jesus did (John 14:12)
• You will do greater works than Jesus did (John 14:12)
• What ever you ask God for in Jesus’ name he will do (John 14:13)
• The Spirit of Truth lives in you (John14:17)
• You are not abandoned (John 14:18)
• You live because Jesus lives in you (John 14:19)
• Jesus will love you, and manifest himself to you (John 14:21)
• Jesus (and the Father) makes his home in you (John 14:23)
• You will hear the Father’s voice (John 14:23)
• The Holy Spirit will teach you all things (John 14:26)
• The Holy Spirit will remind you of all that Jesus said (John 14:26)
• Jesus will give you his peace (John 14:27)

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.

Drawn in Church this morning with a Tombow marker, brush end. Inspired by Malachi 4:2.

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.

• You are not condemned (Romans 8:1).
• You are free from sin and death (Romans 8:2).
• Your spirit is alive because of His righteousness (Romans 8:10).
• The same power that raised Jesus from the dead is in you (Romans 8:11).
• And He who raised Jesus from the dead will give life to your body (Romans 8:11).
• You are God’s son (Romans 8:14).
• You are free from the spirit of slavery (Romans 8:15).
• You do not have to live in fear (v.15)
• You will receive an inheritance from God (Romans 8:17).
• You will be glorified (Romans 8:18).
• You will experience glorious liberty (Romans 8:21).
• Your body will be redeemed (Romans 8:23).
• The Holy Spirit will give you help when you are weak (Romans 8:26).
• The Holy Spirit prays to God on your behalf (Romans 8:27).
• Everything will work out for good in your life (Romans 8:28).
• You will begin to take on the shape of the image of Jesus (Romans 8:29).
• God has called you (Romans 8:30).
• God has justified you (v.30).
• God has give you His glory (v.30).
• God is for you, not against you (Romans 8:31).
• God will give you all things (Romans 8:32).
• You are more than a conqueror (Romans 8:37).
• NOTHING can separate you from God’s love (Romans 8:38-39).

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.

Invariably, I respond in my best gravelly New Yawk accent “TRY HARDER.”  That usually breaks the flow of my intensity, and we have a good laugh.

Sadly though, many good Christian people are advocates of the grumpy gospel.  And it isn’t a joke.  They have traded the inside out gospel of Jesus Christ for something else, a form of godliness that denies the power.  Many times these dear ones are forced to live lives of “quiet desperation” to quote Thoreau.

The other day I was walking to my train and I passed the long row of free newspapers that you see in larger cities.  One of them was the Bay Windows, the local paper of the gay community.  As I looked, I recognized the man on the front page, the leader of a well-known “ex-gay” ministry.

“Another one bites the dust,” I thought to myself.  The leader had recently left the ministry, said that he was always gay, and that he had never experienced the victory that he claimed in public.  Sadly, this double life of outward sanctity and inward misery was forced on others as well as a method of healing.  I am not saying that all ministries dealing with same-sex issues are fraudulent–because I can recommend several.  What I am saying is this man came to a place, with all the spiritual disciplines, all of the “accountability,”  all of the the pressure to look a certain way to the Christian community, where he finally cracked up and got real.  It wasn’t working, it was hurting him, and hurting others, and I bet he was pretty grumpy.

I know for myself, in my own struggles with sexual sin, that outward efforts often made my situation worse.  You can’t make a broken heart better with an hour long accountability group.  It’s like trying to stop a massive wound where the patient is losing blood with a little band-aid.  It isn’t going to happen.

I remember when my life really hit bottom, I had someone hand me a book and tell me all I needed to do was memorize more scripture.  Ironically, I had spent eight years in seminary, and already earned two degrees in Bible.  Not only had I memorized scripture, I had memorized it in the original languages.  Big deal.

Another well meaning person said all I needed was more accountability.  Fortunately, people are starting to come clean about accountability groups.  Most of the time they fail because they are driven by fear.  I take that back, they work for people who really are fairly healthy, and “have it all together.”  But for the rest of us, they only make our problems worse.  Accountability is often another masquerade for the grumpy gospel–just try harder this week and bring us a good report next time around. (That is not to say that open transparent relationships with others aren’t important, they are very important, and you need other people in your life.)

It took me years of this cycle of failure before someone explained to me the real gospel.  You know that one, the one Paul says he’s not ashamed of because it is the power of God for salvation (Romans 1:16).  Someone sent me to Romans 8, and I read these words:

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, for the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus has set me free from the law of sin and death.

The grumpy gospel is the law of sin and death.  Paul describes it in Romans 7.  I am still amazed how many people preach and teach Romans 7 as if Romans 8 doesn’t exist.  But Romans 8 does exist:

For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received the spirit of sonship.  When we cry “Abba, Father!” it is the Spirit himself bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God. (Romans 8:15-16)

The real gospel is a gospel where God, through the Holy Spirit, puts himself, Jesus Christ inside you.  And then, if we let him, Jesus begins to live in and through us to transform us from the inside out, and we begin to look like Jesus.  In another place Paul puts it this way,  “the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, goodness, and self control, against these there is no law.”

The real gospel makes slaves and servants into friends and sons.  The real gospel is not based on what you do, but who and Whose you are.   It is not based on trying harder or performing more successfully, it is based on being in relationship with someone who loves you and wants to make you the truest version of yourself.  Anything else is a pretty cheap imitation.

Trust me, you can try harder to be loving and patient, and you will become the most hateful, impatient jerk around.   And sadly, I have met many Christians who, although they have an outward smile and pleasant demeanor, are just angry impatient grumps.

So to sum up, if you are driven by your outward performance, driven by fear, caught in a cycle of failure, and keep secrets from people, you are probably subscribing to the grumpy gospel.  I bet if you ask those around you they will probably say you are pretty grumpy too.

The good news is, you can be set free.  All you need to do is ask the Holy Spirit to begin to take over–surrender to God being in control in your life.  The really cool part is, you can keep going back and keep getting set free!

Jesus, you living in me is the secret to life.  I want you, the Word made flesh, to be law of my life.  Write the law of the Spirit of Life in my heart and set me free from the law of sin and death that says I have to try harder.  Today I want all that you have for me, more than I could ever ask or imagine.  Amen.

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.

The only way you can burn is if the Holy Spirit burns within you.  I guess it is no coincidence that Wesley also said that the moment his faith came alive his heart was “strangely warmed.”

We have to continually stir up the gift of God in us, as Paul instructed Timothy. I have found a very simple practical way to do this.

I put my hand on my heart, and I take a moment to quiet myself, and then I pray this prayer:

Jesus,
I believe that You are in me,
and I am in You.
If I am in You, then I am in my Father,
and my Father is in Me,
Just as You are in the Father.
Thank you that I abide in You,
and Your word abides in me.
Because of this I can ask anything in Your Name,
I can do greater things than You did,
I can love others as You have loved me,
and by this Your Father is glorified.

Then take a few moments and rest in His Presence.

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.

If Jesus really lives in you, then . . .

• the Word of God incarnate flows inside you.
• the Prince of Peace is in you to bring peace.
• the fountain of Living Water flows in you.
• the Bread of Life is feeding you.
• the Resurrection and the Life is in you to give you life healing and wholeness.
• you are blessed because the Father said “this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
• you have all authority to do what God has given you to do, because the King of Kings lives in you.
• you are able to cast out the devil because the name of Jesus is above every other name.
• you can be free from sin because Jesus is free from sin, and he lives in you.
• you can love others, because God is love, and God lives in you.
• you do not have to be beaten about by life, because greater is He that is IN you than he that is in the world.
• everything Jesus did by becoming a man, by living a sinless life, by suffering and dying, and by rising again is available to you right now.  Paul said that the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead is in you, giving life to your mortal bodies.

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.

RENUNCIATION OF SEXUAL SINS

Heavenly Father, I come to you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

He is the Son of God who takes away the sin of  all those who repent and confess him as Lord.

The blood of Jesus cleanses me from all sin.  I claim freedom from all sin of a sexual nature that came through my eyes, ears, mind, or through sexual activity.

In particular, I confess all preoccupation with sensual desires and appetites, all longing for that which is forbidden, and all unnatural affections, all unrestrained passions and lusts, and all activities that produce lewd emotions or foster sexual sin.  I further confess all filthy communication, obscene and filthy language, course conversations and jokes, lewd and obscene music, poetry, literature, and art; all forms of pornography,  all acts of sodomy, adultery, immorality, fornication, masturbation, gender confusion, or homosexuality.

I also confess all affection for and attachment to philosophies, religions, and lifestyles which glorify, promote, and condone sexual conduct contrary to the clear reading of Scripture.

I further renounce the promotion of non-Biblical sexual attitudes and lifestyles in art, literature, mass-media, and public attitudes and practices.  Lord, I ask that your Holy Spirit reveal to me the other areas where I have allowed demonic torment through sexual sin.

In the name of Jesus Christ, I command all unclean spirits to come out of me now.  I break all unholy soul ties and ask you Lord to return to me all that was lost through sexual activity.

Jesus Christ became a curse for me on the cross (Gal. 3:13).  I declare all curses over my life, through my sin, or the sin of my ancestors to be broken in Jesus’ name.  I hereby rededicate my body, mind, soul, and spirit to you Lord Jesus Christ, to be used for your glory alone.  I also give you my will, emotions, and affections, to be controlled by your Holy Spirit.  I choose to avoid the near occasion of sin, and to live an upright life.  Amen.

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.

based on the painting done at "Revival Then and Now." Painted in Shiva Paintstik on paper.

©2012 Belonging House. All Rights Reserved.