Reading Games Online

Hey Reginda, Kanesha, and Don–maybe even, Kent, Terry, or Ed someday!

I put a list of links together below to give you some options when you come into the computer lab.  Happy hunting and I hope you enjoy!

Between the Lions. PBS Kids!
Great games for learning your alphabet and sounds.
http://pbskids.org/lions/games/

Clifford Interactive Storybook.
Read along books, games, and more.
http://teacher.scholastic.com/clifford1/

Starfall.com
4 Different levels of activities. Where people have fun learning to read!
http://www.starfall.com/

SoftSchools.com
Learning Phonics Games.
http://www.softschools.com/language_arts/phonics/

ToonUniversity.com
Play games, read stories or have them read to you, alphabetizing and more!
http://http://www.toonuniversity.com/free/elementary-education-1st-3rd_a.asp

Live and Learn
Play a game that will help you learn your colors.
http://www.liveandlearn.com/cgame/colors.html

Readauarium
Phonics, vocabulary, comprehension, site words, and book games!
http://www.gamequarium.com/readquarium/index.html

Kaboose
A variety of games involving letters and reading.
http://resources.kaboose.com/games/read2.html

Primary Games
Find any kind of game your looking for to help advance your reading skills.
http://www.primarygames.com/curriculum/language_arts.htm

Mansfield/Richland Public Library Reading Games
Just what I said above.
http://www.mrcpl.org/literacy/lessons/sight/index.html

Scholastic
Online Activities and Interactive Learning.
http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/learn.jsp

Woodlands Junior School.  http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/interactive/literacy/index.htm

Same as above but with games link.  http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/interactive/literacy.html

Kristy for the advanced word game click on the link above, click on the GAMES option then find the SPELLING GAMES AND ACITIVTIES and it’s called HOW MANY WORDS CAN YOU MAKE? Or here’s the link http://www.eastoftheweb.com/games/Eight1.html 

Hell

I live in a world formed by Truth.  Not by how everyone else does things or by what is normal on television or even from when I grew up.  I am eager and willing to lay down everything I’ve ever known and things that are comfortable and familiar to me as soon as I find out they’re not True.  Truth.  There are other people made like me.  They live in a world where things are either right or they’re wrong.  Before meeting Christ and understanding that he the holder of and is Truth, people like me consider themselves the carriers of truth.  Their way is the right way and why can’t the other people see that their way is wrong?  We’re not the easiest people to work with but regenerated by the Spirit of Christ there is yet hope and purpose for those of us who dwell in the army camp of Truth.

There is a small sword given to Frodo in the lord of the rings.  When orcs are near is glows blue.  When I come face to face with lies in the body of christ is like my spirit glows orange.  I haven’t quite figured out the best execution of a response in those moments yet.  But below is an outpouring of one of those interactions.

Lie:  I don’t know if I really think hell exists.  I don’t think hell is a real place.  I don’t think people stay in hell forever.  Hell isn’t all that bad.  I don’t like to think about Hell, it’s uncomfortable.  God is good, God is love he can’t create that bad of a place. Etc, Etc, Etc.

Truth:  Mind this, I’m not expounding on these things to scare people.  These arn’t opinions or reasonings.  These are simply the words of Jesus the Christ.  Truth.  Truth.  Truth.  The first commandment involves loving God with all of our minds…

It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.

Anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell.

Doom to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as you are.

How will you escape being condemned to hell?

But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after the killing of the body, has power to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him.

(By Peter the disciple) For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them into gloomy dungeonsto be held for judgment; if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, … if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly; … then the Lord knows how …to hold the unrighteous for the day of judgment, while continuing their punishment.

Hell is a place.  God sends people there.  He is just.  Those people choose it by their life here on earth.  He will sentence humans that follow the ways of the world to the same sentence of satan, the ruler of this world.  One must be born again of the spirit of God as a citizen and a follower of his kingdom in this life to stay a part of it for eternity.  Not everyone who says ‘Lord’ means it, that Jesus own their life and it is now submitted to his Lordship and direction. 

If you entertain anything but truth in regards to the idea of hell you are in bed with deception by friend and the truth will one day find you whether or not you denied it.

Chapter One

 

  

 

 

Chapter One

 

By Heather Amundsen

 

Summer of 2008

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 Hello family.  I have been compelled to say hi and invite you take a walk with me as I share a little of my life with you.  I so appreciate your company in this life, even if I’m not around you very much.  I see your love and endurance as I think about you here.  Your choice to live, your choice to love and hopefully your choices to forgive—both for yourself and others as they too live and grow around you. 

 

I’ve broken down this letter into some topic headings.  These topic headings by no means give light to my day-to-day reality, but they will to some of it and the inclusion of these headings indicates their importance to me.

 

 

 

 

 

Food

 

My first subject fortunately applies to everybody.  Everybody—everybody—has a relationship to food.  I am in a classroom with the Lord of this area of my life.  I thought in the initial stages it was just something I needed to address before him, get down, and move on.  How wrong was I.  Did you know the Lord wants to liberate us and walk us into health and wholeness in every area of our life that we’ll allow him to?   So I handed over the reigns here—or so I thought—about three years ago when I first moved to Cairo. 

 

All Christians are called to fast.  It’s an expectation of our walk with him that Jesus had.  It is a co-tool with prayer.  The two are joined at the hip all throughout the word and over and over again, God moves.  It’s all about voluntary humility and ultimate trust.  Sometime the voice of our flesh is so loud we can’t hear the voice of the Holy Spirit.  Or if we do, on a full stomach, sometimes we feel more inclined to ignore it. Although the title of the class may be the same: fasting; it truly looks unique for every individual, but isn’t that the way love always goes?  It’s so unique between every individual.  And so the Lord’s been good and I’m in places I didn’t know existed having been led step by step through obedience to what I felt the Holy Spirit was calling me to lay down.

 

I tell you this has transformed my outlook on food, my relationship to it, and ultimately my health.  Did you know that people in the bible all the time had to lay down the ways of their forefathers and the people around them even in their diet to follow the Lord?  I too am not leaning on my own understanding but His.  The Lord will always lead us to our good.  I know this because he loves me.  I know this because I desire the good of those I love…their best in fact. 

 

And so through fasts for certain periods from different things I am walking in more and more liberty and freedom from things I was bound by before.  As I write this now, it sounds real comprehensive and abrupt but this has been over the course of three to five years; some lessons taking a lot longer than others.  And I also want to highlight that all of these started merely with the holy spirit highlighting some area of my health—fatigue, headaches, digestive things, swelling—then I would be lead to an understanding of what was causing it.  There were addictions, imbalances, and unhealthy patterns involved that I will never have to feel or suffer again because of this journey. 

 

And I’m telling you now I’m not done.  Understand these things may not be for a life time but they are for my LIFE right now and have ultimately—I know—have redirected my health for the rest of my life.  The voice of ‘normal’ in the eyes of the world will never lead you to true freedom.  My freedom has been found in the Lord.

 

So here are some communicable landmarks in the subject of food for me. I have been fully relieved of any addiction to caffeine and no longer intake it in any form I know of.  I had been drinking it daily from a young age and not only that but as I became an adult it developed even into higher content through coffees, mochas, and more.  These were things I took comfort in, that I took rest in, that I took peace in, that I enjoyed but I can honestly say things are temporary in gratification and do more harm than good.  I had huge energy swings and lapses. I had overwhelming symptoms of withdrawal without it.  Caffeine in these ways have never been a benefit to my body or my health but I continued to drink it apart from this knowledge and the dent on my finances it was making. I’ve

learned to identify harm, despite how it might be wrapped in a pretty bow of taste, feel, or sound.

 

I also know its actually destructive to different systems and parts of your body in ways that over a lifetime take its toll.  In the Lord’s mercy that response was sped up and I was having terrible impact from these drinks over a period of time and still I would turn to them.  Long story long, through selective periods of fasting from this I would once again return to it and after doing that over the course of years I now no longer even have the desire.  Celebrate with me friends.  I no longer have the desire.  That’s awesome to me.  No coffee, chocolates, teas, etc.  The rest of the following were a similar process but I am also fully free of any addiction to processed sugars.  Corn syrup, sweets, desserts, artificial sugar based anything, all of it.  No desire.  That’s still a kicker to me.  No desire. 

 

I enjoy putting healthy things in my body!  I enjoy natural things.  Who knew there was a place where there is guilt-free eating and enjoyment too.  I am also currently taking a break from eating all meats.  Anything that died to feed me.  And guess what?  I still feel no lack.  God’s mercy and grace through all this has been amazing.  I used to exercise more regularly until one day I just knew I wasn’t supposed to anymore.  I couldn’t even run on the treadmill and ignore the Holy Spirit anymore.  Now a common response might be, “exercising is healthy for you!”  Although that is true, God knows what he’s doing for our good, whether we understand it or not.  That’s why he calls us to unconditional obedience through trust, not obedience according to our understanding. 

 

In his goodness I did come to understand his wisdom as time played out.  I would go and exercise the day after I overate or I would overeat knowing I could exercise.  It was another way for me to cope and be comfortable with unhealthy eating habits.  I still am not exercising as of right now, but like I said I am not finished yet.  This is still an area where I know I need work, where I know I make mistakes, where I know there is more freedom but I tell you it’s the journey I’m in for—not the destination.  It’s the walking with him that’s my reward, not the destination.

 

The most recent and last one is salts.  Did you know you can be addicted to salts!  Who knew!?  I didn’t.  But I am in the midst of this one right now.  No processed foods, canned foods, things high in sodium.  It’s not for my good!!  I’m not going to choose a diet that reaps diseases and death just because its normal!  I see around me through things I have the power and freedom to change.  Again the power is not within me, it’s the mercy of Jesus, his grace, his patience in my slow and often resistant learning, but he can do so much with just a little yes, even if it’s a whimper.  He will only move in our lives where we ask and invite him to.  Yeah, Lord I want you here in my life too.

 

Whoa!  That was a long first category.  These are things going on in my life that are important to me.  Now that I’ve written the above, it reminds me of my mother who often says your health is a very important thing, if that goes, what else matters?  I believe we can eat in a way that doesn’t reap sickness and disease. It’s worth it to me and I believe it’s honoring to Him.  And honestly I fall on my face and fail repeatedly but there’s a proverb that says the righteous man falls but gets back up again. And in his steadfast love towards me and his constant goodness I do. Don’t listen to condemnation, don’t listen to guilt.  Get back up again.  You will succeed and no lie of discouragement will steal from you the freedom that’s rightfully yours.  I’m not just talking about food anymore either.  That truth applies to so much more.  If you’re up for more…let’s move on.

 

 

 

Disaster

 

The word says do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.  Another area the Lord has renewed my mind in the last few years is HIS overwhelming love for people.  Not just for people serving him or following his ways, but for everybody.  Everybody.  The word says he desires no one to perish.  Not one.  But we do perish; we parish apart from his ways.  We parish in our selfishness, pride, arrogance, stubbornness, rebellion, bitterness, offense, in our unforgiveness, and our despair.  We perish apart from Him.  Apart from Life.  Apart from His encouragement.  Apart from His Word.  Apart from the man Christ Jesus who delivered us from all things that cause us to parish. 

 

It’s not just something to cash-in on after we die, its my deliverance from the sin of my heart now that as long as it dwells within me is bringing death even to my mortal body.  God is continually trying to wake up his bride.  Wake up his love.  Wake us up.  In his mercy he is relentless to show us his kindness and his goodness.  And apart from he we are left to die in our sin; our woundedness, our selfishness, our hurts and our pain.  God, in your mercy, wake me up.  Shake me from my slumber.  Awaken my spirit to the reality of your goodness and your gifts towards men. 

 

In your mercy wake up America.  Wake up a nation lost in our busi-ness and our labor to reap that which does not satisfy; numbed by our comforts and lulled to sleep in our American dream.  Wake up a church that’s lost a vision of the beauty of Your face.  And has become distracted by her own image in the mirror.  In your mercy God, do whatever you need to do to allow the highest number of people to humble themselves and come into fellowship with you.  Whatever you need to do Lord, interrupt what which we’ve settled for as life on this earth.  Don’t let us miss out on the fullness of what you’ve offered us.

The Lord is gentle, it’s true.  The Lord is long suffering, it’s true.  And in his mercy I pray he shakes us awake.  In his mercy I pray he would roar so loud we no longer hit the snooze button again and roll over back to our old ways.  I agree with the Lord; that things that wake us up from spiritual slumber are his mercy to a nation when we have strayed from him.  His heart is to wake up a slumbering church into her destiny so that love, life, freedom, humility, and a fear of the Lord are restored to their rightful place within her.  That we might no longer slander his name by the way we live our lives with self-focus and lack of love; in bondage as slaves to sin, despite the complete work of the cross.

 

We are his people and yet because we have not fellowship with him—mere allegiance—we don’t look like him anymore, we don’t freely give what we’ve received from him.  I say ‘we’ because the church of this nation is my family.  Whether they honor the Lord or not, whether I agree with them or not.  Whether they stand on the word or not, those who have given their to Jesus Christ are my brothers and sisters no matter how well we’ve all surrendered our lives to obedience to Him and whether or not they want it, they have a praying sister and I know a God that’s all about redemption, restoration, and taking our weakness and showing himself strong. 

 

And so I pray even for the region in which I live that God would take away all the props.  Take away all the things we trust and lean upon and place our hope in apart from him.  It’s in His mercy that he would do it something now rather than allow us continue in our ways and stand before him on the day when the books are opened and our actions and words have been recorded and taken to account with such regret of what we chose in this life in comparison to all that he had freely offered us. 

 

Yes, my friends, my family and my loved ones, this subject heading is called disaster.  There is a time coming when all created things will be

shaken and only the Rock that is Christ Jesus will remain.  I honestly feel like I am being prepared more and more for that day.  God is progressively raising the trust and faith in the midst of our team down here as we continue to say yes to him.  Mental and physical preparation are good but honestly it’s our ability to hear the voice of the Lord, to follow his leading, to know the voice of the shepherd and to walk nearer and nearer to him that is the true preparation needed for the days to come. 

 

Seek the Lord while he may be found.  In His word, in prayer, in obedience to what he’s asking of you, knowing you’ll lose nothing and be blessed by it.  Our fellowship with the Father is real. He isn’t kidding when he says he’s our Refuge, our Strong Tower, our Deliverer, our Strength, our Shield, our Fortress, our Bread, our Living Water, and our Good Father.  Trust in the Lord with ALL your heart and lean not on your own understanding.  God looked death in the face and took the keys from its hands and he wills that even death would not cause our hearts to tremble.  He is good all the time.

 

Our team has been moved to act in additional ways to be prepared for things we believe will happen to our region and nation.  We are going through the Disaster Preparedness Training through the Red Cross.  There is one volunteer for all three of the Southernmost counties of Illinois.  You cannot volunteer with Red Cross in a disaster if you have not received their training before hand.  If you have, you have access to the disaster.  Access to the shaken, the hurting, the broken, and even the helping.  Lord I pray the church would be useful not only in truth but also in deed.  We’re setting up training and getting the word out to others in our region and area that they too might be equipped to respond and to give unto others, not just wait to receive.  The rep that came to our site says 96% of Red Cross volunteers in America are church affiliated.  Loose Your compassion through Your Church Lord, loose your mercy, and your nearness and your comfort. 

 

You’ve heard my heart on disaster.  That’s been a growing and unfolding understanding for me and more and more I see mercy and judgment as synonyms.  Just like it was mercy for to me have consequences to my eating habits so that I don’t destroy myself by them, it’s mercy when there’s consequences to our spiritual apathy and stubbornness that our separation from him too might not destroy us.

 

Gardening

 

Over the past three years a number of my teammates have had a longing for or a desire for a plot of land to tend their own gardens.  There was a community garden in town switching hands but our leadership didn’t feel up to task of any one of us organizing or maintaining it. 

 

In the meantime a young man started to hang out with our staff and invited out to his place 40 minutes north of Cairo and his father is an organic farmer.  I spent a number of days interacting with the earth, lots of new things, and a land that produced life.  It was through this relationship that I was first exposed to seasonal eating.  As the harvest would be brought in, it also would end up on our kitchen table. 

 

Time passed, then it happened.  The community garden overgrew.  There is a 78-year old pastor that was overseeing it and this year it was just too much.  With the garden three feet tall but bearing no fruit, one of my teammates stepped up to the plate.  She had already been growing things on her porch and in a new bed in the front yard. She was enjoying it so much that she was entirely prepared when the need for the community garden arose. 

 

The keys to the community garden were officially handed over on the 16^th of June, 2008.  For those of you that don’t know, this is the sixth summer that an organization called YouthWorks has been sending

volunteers to Cairo.  There is usually about 60 to 70 high-schoolers and their adult leaders every week and they run a kid’s program, paint houses, go on prayer walks and volunteer at a couple different places in town.  A couple times a week one crew would work at this community garden and help to quickly restore it.

 

 The week that I’m writing this has been a week of harvest.  The tomatoes aren’t quite done but we have peppers, greens, cucumbers, eggplant, squash, herbs, and more.  These will be handed out to the community as they continue to come in. 

 

My roommates little plot of land out front has been the same; zucchini the size of your forearm, squash, peppers, cantaloupe and more.  I also joined this planting and gardening extravaganza.  I have two rows of sweet potatoes growing beautifully and two rows of corn fighting against bugs right now.  I just repotted a dying strawberry vine today and am preparing pots to start a number of new seeds.  We have begun to recycle all natural kitchen scrap into compost as well.

 

I volunteer with a psychosocial rehabilitation program that is a day care facility for mentally ill adults or those who just got out of prison or post/current addicts.  There is greenhouse run by them as well.  They do mostly plants but they also have a string of vegetables and edible foods.  This afternoon came the first tomato, purple pepper, and yellow peppers.

 

It feels like something ancient has been tapped into within me as I think, feel, and enjoy reaping things from the earth, natural, healthy, nutrient-filled and great tasting.  We rarely know food that exists free of chemicals, pesticides, exhausted, hormones, dyes, and other things that damage our bodies rather than help them.  This has been and interesting development in relation to my personal lessons about diet and food. It’s like I’ve been presented with this complete cycle that’s been a part of us are since the first garden was created.  It’s something I honestly desire to equip this town with.  Many ideas have passed through my mind and with the Lord going before me there’s a possibility of expanding what the Lord’s already investing in us right now.

 

It not just a nice little idea of eating healthy but when you live a community that’s largely an island with no major grocer for 45 mins and a majority without licenses or cars and literally without money to buy food, it moves beyond a cute idea to feasible sustainability for families.  The ideas are endless but I don’t want to open a door until the time is ripe, that the timing is the Lord’s.  I could honestly exhaust myself in a lot of good ideas but I can assure you my greatest investment is in listening to the Lord and his direction.  He knows what coming, what’s best, and will set you up to be in the center of what His business in this hour.

 

The two last little addendums I’ll add to this section is one—that we also have chickens.  Yes chickens—in town.  This is also new for us this year, my same gardening roommate stepped out in this area.  They lay eggs on a regular basis and are providing for our household.  She built them a coup from scrap material.  We will probably get more to provide not only for our staff but also to barter with locally.  We’ve joked about goats…

 

And lastly self-sufficiency has been stirring on some of our team’s hearts. Rain collection, alternative sources of energy, foods, grains, earth-based construction, it’s been eye-opening and exhilarating all at the time.  It’s crazy how much our society has been manipulated to be reproduction-less.  There’s also a form of construction called cob houses and I was already thinking of the artistic and engineering possibilities of that material.  I hear they also are unaffected by earthquakes, because they move with the earth…maybe this belongs in the previous section…moving on…

 

Discipleship

 

The longer and longer I stay in Cairo, the more and more I realize God’s looking for a people to invest our lifetime into His kingdom.  The more and more my eyes adjust to this, the more and more I see that His kingdom lives in dwells in the hearts of men and our love for Him.  It’s not about buildings, programs, or denominations.  It’s about coming alongside the Holy Spirit in His loving men into wholeness, healing, freedom, and the fullness of life.  This is the blood of Jesus at work.  God desires to heal our wounds and reconcile us complete to Him. 

 

There are a lot of wounded people walking around with pain and are wounding others because they either can’t see it, don’t want address it, or don’t know that it can be healed.  There are a lot of people bound by fears, anxieties, insecurities, worries, offense, pride, doubts, and discouragements.  Jesus Christ died so people don’t have to be bound by the chains darkness has managed to establish around their hearts.  And I’m not talking about unbelievers!

 

God intends for His people to use word as a guide and a foundation for this in our own lives and the lives of others.  In a recent newspaper article wrote I God has not saved me from hell, like a ticket I’m cashing in when I die or others for that matter, but God has liberated me from the hell that dwells in my heart in mind now that I might walk in freedom, in liberty, in peace and joy in this life now.  God has been faithful to continue to show me areas in my life that he is gently and kindly teaching me a better way; bringing light into the dark places of my thought patterns, my choices, my heart, and my perception of Him. There is a better way, a way of love, of worship, and power through Christ.

 

I get to simply be transparent with some individuals in Cairo.  How God’s been faithful to me, how I used to live or act, what he’s teaching me and showing me, who he’s revealing himself to be to me.  This is partnered with me pointing them to the word and prayer—my  sources of life—and we get to do those things together. 

 

God has been faithful even in the young ones he’s brought around me.  The youth I’ve worked with Cairo are amazingly beautiful.  I love God more as I get to know them more.  He’s awesome.  There is a little band of us that meet together on a weekly basis.  We meet all over, in the park, on a porch, in the prayer room, on the levee, where ever works for that week.  Equipped with drinks and snack and the word we meet together.  God’s been teaching me how to walk alongside these ones.  Over and over again the Lord reminds me that my one desire in meeting with them is to love them.   Lord, let me love them well this week.  Let me listen, let me train them as overcomers, let me be led by you, Lord, even in my words.  I just ask him week to week what we’ll be doing.  He shows me exactly where I need to prepare or just be ready to respond to what will come up that week.  Sometimes the best meetings are when I come empty-handed.  You are a good leader when Jesus leads through you. 

 

One thing that has been created through this is a safe place.  My one rule when this bible study began a year ago was that there is a no tolerance level to name-calling, teasing, laughing at, picking-on, or putting down, or rejecting one another.  This is a rare environment among the youth’s lives in Cairo.  It’s like I can see hands pushing back darkness in the air and you create a pocket of light and these kids step in it and they don’t see or know what’s changed but they just know they can breathe better.

 

I meet with a group of about 8 youth. Schedules and transportation and getting connected with them week to week isn’t always simple.  Not all the families have cars, phones or consistent addresses.  I just found out last night that one of the girls moved again for the fourth time since I’ve started working with her. 

There are a core group that are there the most often; two guys and two sisters.  The two boys were given a great opportunity this summer.  They are too old to participate in the YouthWorks Kid’s Club program but the leading staff took the two of them under his wing and they did an amazing job being servant leaders. They walked in understanding and authority and were not only helpful but also a delight to those they worked with.  Both mothers have shared with our staff that they have seen change in their sons in the course of the past year and especially this summer. 

 

The two boys also played on a rotary baseball team this summer.  The team was made up mostly of kids that that hang around the center where we work.  The first time I checked out a practice, I introduced myself to the coach.  He said I’m doing this because the Lord told Him to.  “I’m a perfectionist and this is very challenging for me,” he said, “but I know I’m supposed to be doing it.  And not only that the Lord told me to employ one of the players for the summer.”  I got to pray with him and I walked away being totally encouraged.  I ended holding some practices in the park with some of the team and attending most of their home games.  I was delighted to attend their end of season celebration party. 

 

There’s a derivative of discipleship we’ve been doing this summer; the encouragement of churches.  It started with an invitation by a church.  A church four and a half hours away that’s over a hundred years old had never been on a missions trip.  Their youth came to Cairo.  Their adults came a year later.  Then they invited us to come and just be who we are before their church and share with them the testimony of our ministry and our walks with the Lord.  And so we went. We all stayed in different houses of members of the church. We led a Saturday night service and spoke during the morning service. 

 

One of their members drives down four hours once a month to fellowship with us.  He says we’ve become more of a family to him than his own.  We were created to love and be loved.  Love never runs out.  When you spend it, it multiplies.

 

Since then we’ve been involved with a small number of different churches in our city and region.  These look slightly different as day-long prayer journeys.  Just like people, churches have a life  to them or a lack thereof.  There are strengths and callings upon the churches and at the same time wounds and hurts.  We go and listen.  Listen to the Lord.  What does he have to say about these groups of people walking out community in the context of a church.  What needs to be addressed?  What needs to be strengthened? Leadership have prayed with us, congregants prayed, people have wept, people have been encouraged, the Lord has been worshipped and his presence shown up.  These journeys remind me of the churches the Lord addresses in the beginning of the book of Revelation.  It’s been awesome and a privilege to walk alongside churches; to pray with them, encourage them, and worship with them.

 

Over the course of a year I interact with hundreds of individuals at prayer meetings, regional gatherings, other churches, people in Cairo, hundreds of volunteers that come through during the summer, people that come visit from all over.  It’s like I’ve been able to zoom out in really connecting with so many people.  It’s like hearts were created the same, even if they have different personalities and strengths, but either the wounds or the chains are the same and the Lord’s truth is always victorious, powerful, and faithful in restoring people to fullness of life.  In some ways it has just left me hungrier and hungrier for him.  Hungry for his nearness, his fullness, his power, and his goodness to be more and more consuming.  I love his heart, his desires, his faithfulness, his plans, and his sovereignty. He really is a good king and I long for the day the nations are shown his goodness, his beauty, and the wisdom of his ways.

 

Reading

 

I have a selective taste in reading and I won’t do it at all unless it’s something that I desire to feast on.  This is apart from the word of course.  I can literally feel my spirit dimming and my pride growing if I’m not in the word on a regular basis.  I have this fascination with factual books having to do with World War II, particularly treatment of Jews and German resistance.  People who looked organized death in the face and still did not waver, did not compromise, did not relent in love of their neighbors.

 

One book was in the form of a novel of a small town in France and their experience with German occupation.  Another was a factual compilation of direct evidence of the life of someone who joined the German SS initially to investigate the mysterious death of his sister and he climbed the ranks and at the same time partnering with people on the outside to tell the world what was happening.  People didn’t believe him or they felt helpless or didn’t care.  He lived through the war and died while being imprisoned after it ended.  The documents he published are some of the only documents that we have that share an eyewitness as to what went on inside Auschwitz. 

 

The one I’m currently in is Schindler’s list.  I watched the movie several times when I was younger but I’m not sure if it ever registered to me that it was a book.  This book too is entirely based on first hand interviews and statements of the people involved in the book.  It’s like watching the evil of men’s hearts manifest on this earth.  I think this was just a peak of what’s to come.  At the same time I know so will God’s kingdom advance in power in the days to come.  As I write this I realize I have the expectation that situations like what arose with Nazi German will come again in my day.

 

 

 

Team

 

This last section is almost like the unstated obvious in my day to day reality.  The team I operate in has become such a way of life to me that it’s like I don’t even remember what it’s like to be living life apart from them.  Well actually I do and I like it on this side much better.  I say that not because its more fun or easier with more people.  I say that because I see God’s power, strength and wisdom of us operating in communities.  I think we were supposed to be fully known by other and yet still be fully accepted.

 

I think the 10 of us are the most unique and different individuals I have ever met; how we communicate, our personalities, our strengths and weaknesses, so many things.  But with all of these, I know that each one on my team loves the Lord more than themselves.  Or we wouldn’t be here.  These relationships have been tried and tested in every way and I tell you they are not going to dissolve.  Nothing that we do or say that is hurtful or selfish will sever these relationships.  They are here to stay in all of our weakness.  For better or for worse.

 

I understand why Jesus said we are called not to forgive seven times but seventy times seven times.  Forgiveness is the basis upon which relationships stand and endure.  Without it they will only be temporary.  I have received such grace through these people.  I also am hearing loud and clear that I shouldn’t take this grace for granted and act without care.  I have been surrounded by a people that display the Lord to me on a daily basis.  It never ends.  You never get relationships down and then they are always fine.  It’s like they grow and change and shift and are tried and tested and if they survive, are stronger.  It feels like I’ve married 9 other people.  And to be honest with you I feel the Lord is establishing relationships that will equip us in ministry for a lifetime.  Not that we will always be together but that we will always be there to pick one another up and help one another stand, in whatever nation we’re doing ministry in. 

Love is always the standard.  If was doing everything I was supposed to down here but not loving my team, I would be failing.  And sometimes it feels like I am but we are called first and foremost to love those God’s placed around us.  That’s why it sometimes feels like the area most attacked and therefore a place I covet your prayers.  I can’t be okay with anything less then being watchful in my heart in this area. 

 

I think our team as a whole is also not done.  There are deeper places  in our daily love towards one another in giving and selflessness and service and joy.  I’ve already been told that our team’s interaction with one another has impacted the heart’s of people just watching us, but I think there’s more to be laid a hold of here.  God said the world would know we are Christians by our love.  The church as a whole has a long way to go.  God has not given up on his people and in his mercy and by his grace we will be transformed into his pure and spotless bride that he’s coming back for.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today is a new day.  God’s mercy is new everyday.  He loves to make everything new.  The past never has to bind us today.  I praise the Lord that he is a God of healing and restoration power.  May his name alone be exalted among the nations.  May all people see the light of his glory that truly does fill the earth.

 

 

 

 

 

HR 194

 

H. Res. 194

 

In the House of Representatives, U. S.,

 

July 29, 2008.

 

Whereas millions of Africans and their descendants were enslaved in the United States and the 13 American colonies from 1619 through 1865;

 

Whereas slavery in America resembled no other form of involuntary servitude known in history, as Africans were captured and sold at auction like inanimate objects or animals;

 

Whereas Africans forced into slavery were brutalized, humiliated, dehumanized, and subjected to the indignity of being stripped of their names and heritage;

 

Whereas enslaved families were torn apart after having been sold separately from one another;

 

Whereas the system of slavery and the visceral racism against persons of African descent upon which it depended became entrenched in the Nation’s social fabric;

 

Whereas slavery was not officially abolished until the passage of the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1865 after the end of the Civil War;

 

Whereas after emancipation from 246 years of slavery, African-Americans soon saw the fleeting political, social, and economic gains they made during Reconstruction eviscerated by virulent racism, lynchings, disenfranchisement, Black Codes, and racial segregation laws that imposed a rigid system of officially sanctioned racial segregation in virtually all areas of life;

 

Whereas the system of de jure racial segregation known as `Jim Crow,’ which arose in certain parts of the Nation following the Civil War to create separate and unequal societies for whites and African-Americans, was a direct result of the racism against persons of African descent engendered by slavery;

 

Whereas a century after the official end of slavery in America, Federal action was required during the 1960s to eliminate the dejure and defacto system of Jim Crow throughout parts of the Nation, though its vestiges still linger to this day;

 

Whereas African-Americans continue to suffer from the complex interplay between slavery and Jim Crow–long after both systems were formally abolished–through enormous damage and loss, both tangible and intangible, including the loss of human dignity, the frustration of careers and professional lives, and the long-term loss of income and opportunity;

 

Whereas the story of the enslavement and de jure segregation of African-Americans and the dehumanizing atrocities committed against them should not be purged from or minimized in the telling of American history;

 

Whereas on July 8, 2003, during a trip to Goree Island, Senegal, a former slave port, President George W. Bush acknowledged slavery’s continuing legacy in American life and the need to confront that legacy when he stated that slavery `was . . . one of the greatest crimes of history . . . The racial bigotry fed by slavery did not end with slavery or with segregation. And many of the issues that still trouble America have roots in the bitter experience of other times. But however long the journey, our destiny is set: liberty and justice for all.’;

 

Whereas President Bill Clinton also acknowledged the deep-seated problems caused by the continuing legacy of racism against African-Americans that began with slavery when he initiated a national dialogue about race;

 

Whereas a genuine apology is an important and necessary first step in the process of racial reconciliation;

 

Whereas an apology for centuries of brutal dehumanization and injustices cannot erase the past, but confession of the wrongs committed can speed racial healing and reconciliation and help Americans confront the ghosts of their past;

 

Whereas the legislature of the Commonwealth of Virginia has recently taken the lead in adopting a resolution officially expressing appropriate remorse for slavery and other State legislatures have adopted or are considering similar resolutions; and

 

Whereas it is important for this country, which legally recognized slavery through its Constitution and its laws, to make a formal apology for slavery and for its successor, Jim Crow, so that it can move forward and seek reconciliation, justice, and harmony for all of its citizens: Now, therefore, be it

 

 

Resolved, That the House of Representatives–

 

(1) acknowledges that slavery is incompatible with the basic founding principles recognized in the Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal;

 

(2) acknowledges the fundamental injustice, cruelty, brutality, and inhumanity of slavery and Jim Crow;

 

(3) apologizes to African Americans on behalf of the people of the United States, for the wrongs committed against them and their ancestors who suffered under slavery and Jim Crow; and

 

(4) expresses its commitment to rectify the lingering consequences of the misdeeds committed against African Americans under slavery and Jim Crow and to stop the occurrence of human rights violations in the future.

hello again

thanks for those of you who pull me out of my little corner of the world and ask how I’m doing. 

I am blessed.  Here’s some stories.  My life is now composed of a shared reality that is seen through the lens of 7 other people as well.  Their story is mine and vice versa.  community truly is beautiful.  It feels good to be known.  I also like living in a small town.  enough of that, on to the stories…

The life of a christian is a life of fasting.  Our will is no longer our own. It belongs to another and he is good.  I have no rights or justifications before an almighty God.  I have been bought.  I am enraptured with my owner whose ways are always better than my own and who never fails to show me and lead me for my own good into his ways.

Oh yeah, story… Kristy likes meat, she’s like lord, my roomies don’t really eat it and its getting expensive.  I’m handing this over to you.  My roommate Sara, whose stepping out on faith for her support, has a dream about the verse where God says he owns a cattle on a thousand hills (storehouses of wealth).  We also corporately are doing our first declaredly all food fast.  me likey this and have been praying for it.  This started Monday. 

Monday.  A man from near chicago gave us a cow…in the form of 9 cooler and 4 boxes.  like 500 lbs of meat if not more.  We had freezer space.  Same man commits to fund Sara for an entire year and attaches 100 on per month to other staff.  My roommate gets documented word of being recommended for being hired back for teaching again next year.  This was her first year ever.

Tuesday.  Honestly there’s been some spiritual warfare going on for me and this was a day where I had a really good convo with a teammate who prays (go figure) and God’s totally being faithful to bring me out of a low place of agreeing with the accuser.  He gave me a dream this night “The one who defames himself defames that which is holy.”  I’m not going to agree with the accuser about myself anymore than I would agree with him about Christ.  Spiritual warfare is not something you get down.  Everyone has a relationship with the accuser its just whether to let him hang out with you or you don’t.  It needs to be maintained with truth my friends!  I was given $50 as a gift from one of the places I volunteer at.  What?  that doesn’t happen…

Wednesday.  A pastor in town says Gary’s an encouragement and wants to meet not just on a one time only basis.  This, for those who know what we’ve been doing here, is miraculous.  As Heather C’s ministering on the street a former addict walks up, clean for like 6 months (also miraculous), and HC’s like your supposed to minister to these two.  He drops Psalm One don’t hang out in the counsel of the wicked.  They like drop their jaws and this guy totally has the Word in him, its just been buried by slavery to addiction.  Praise God.  We got a fridge after not having one for like a month.  Also having to do with food… funny.  Finally released to apply my educational stipend to the loans I’m paying off.  Praise the lord.  Also confirmed that I was payed the $50 that another paster north of us had felt led to give me.

the journey continues my friends.  i will not quit.  I will not settle for my will.  I will not agree that death and sin reign, they no longer have authority.  Only to the level a christian or the corporate church is ignorant to the enemies way and allows it to happen.  We have been given life in every area.  We have a right to joy.  That’s another thing we prayed for this morning and just that fact that we prayed for it was supernatural. 

I continually covet your prayers and desire Christ to be manifest in flesh in you and through you.  His word is power and transforms us.  His spirit is ever willing to take us deeper as our actions dictate.  mercy in this hour.  let our flesh not rule over us.  Give us dominion in EVERY area of our lives Jesus.  please grant me the mind of the messiah.  let us starve for your righteousness and your kingdom to come.  I pray God you would send fire on this reader.  Light em up!  the flames are unquenchable.  dreams, visions, and revelation of your word and their callings jesus.  release destinies. reveal identities. deliver us from our own understanding.  let us dance in the freedom of your all-encompassing love.  Give us that freedom we only dream about but never really have faith enough to obtain.  Believe it.  Let us believe.  you are able.  you want it for us.  it really is for us.  yes lord. no lowered expectations.  never again.  our faith is what needs to persevere, only then will we surely lay ahold of what you’ve freely promised us.

We have no idea

I feel like I’m making some of the most difficult decisions of my life right now. I am at a critical point where the kingdom life I’m living can still kind of be understood as normal. I am making critical decisions in my life to extend that normalcy or go into all out abandonment to the Lord. Unfortunately, but necessary, this doesn’t always involve just me.

I recently sent an email to some people saying about how I don’t see other people other than my team much and I occasionally see my family. This isn’t a default or a that’s just the way its turned out to be. This is a mandate for me. Is this the desert or not? Is this a battlefield or not? This is what he’s calling me to. But for his sake and my sake, what is he calling YOU to?

God has trained me specifically for the work he’s called me to. Am I going to lay down my sword on the field and trot off to go and entertain something menial? I know there’s a simple answer and I know there’s an eternal one. (I love you Stacy). The eternal one is that nothing in this life matters but the work God’s called us to. I know that sounds dramatic but for me this has proven true.

God has been preparing a work for us, his people, to be a part of. He is looking for ones that are sold out to his causes, his heart, and our relationship with him. I never knew how much until now. I am sure and hope that he calls me to more. I am chained in to the ground here and my chain gets shorter and shorter and my cry is getting louder and louder, “YOU ARE WHAT I WANT LORD!” “THIS IS WHERE I WANT TO BE!” meaning the very center and no where else of what He’s calling of me DAY to DAY. Everyday. There is no weekend in his kingdom. Again I might be sounding unhealthy, but I trust his word. These paths lead to life. If we really want to be about what we say we’re about. If we really want to walk like Jesus walked, more of ourselves have to die. Did the John the Baptist take weekends? Did Elijah put God on hold with the Baal worshippers so he could tend to his house or person or family? Do we even HEAR about Elijah’s family? Could he not have loved them till the day he died? Well actually HE DIDN’T DIE, HE WAS TAKEN INTO HEAVEN BY THE HAND OF GOD.

Where are the Enoch’s of my generation Lord? Where are the Elijah’s? Raise up a generation that would move your heart to show up! Raise our expectations in this hour! God part the heavens and COME DOWN. Nothing less God. You’ve been preparing for this hour since the beginning. ABRAHAM HAS NOT YET LAID A HOLD OF HIS PROMISES! God all of creation is groaning and waiting for the sons and daughters of God to be revealed! God GIVE US A HIGHER VISION! GIVE US A HIGHER VISION!

Is it worth to you? God’s asking his people right now. Is it worth it? Am I worth it? Is what I’m offering you worth it to you? Would I ask you to give all this up if I was not giving you multitudes more? Have I not told you that in my word? Do you know how much I love you and that I’ve parted hell so that you can fellowship with me eternally and co-reign in my kingdom? Hell is not the rightful place for my kings. Do you know what I created you for? And that its not the stuff going on around you right now? I have always had a plan for you to be with me. Oh, if only you could see what I see, He says. You would run. You would run to me like I run to you. If only you knew what I have planned for those who love me. Trust in my heart. Dare to follow me and trust in my heart. Even the depths of it which you have not yet seen, but only dimly.

Mercy in this hour for your body Lord. Grace in this hour for your body God. We want to walk in heaven today. I am declaring and asking to walk in heaven today. That means more than Holy Spirit benefits, that means eternal perspective and the death that comes with it. Jesus! We have no idea what it means to be whole hearted! Not a clue! Mercy in this hour Lord that we would not compromise on the very riches you hold out to us; not for the meal laid before us; for the ‘okay things’ temporary things that our senses perceive now. Let us not be Esau before you God and throw away that which is our inheritance in Christ because of the normal comfort of what we want in this life. Help me Lord. Help me hear the urgency of your heart in this hour. Redeem this hour for the days are evil. Ephesians 5:16 Redeem time through me Lord. Redeem the time. Redeem the time.

He is forming a holy bride and has beheld her glory for Christ. The fullness of the intimacy of your heart and the only priority of your life rightfully belong to him if you represent his name his on earth. My question is, does he own those two things in your life? Are they mostly yours and some his or do they belong WHOLLY to him and not at all to you?

Time

Ephesians 6:14

Redeem the time.  Redeem the time.  Redeem the time.

There are mountains in your personal life.  Whomever or whatever controls those mountains affects every area of your life and its direction.

We often walk through life believe our ideal priorities are actually our priorities.   We often walk through life looking at an ideal road when in actuality we find ourselves upon a very different course.  Often it may feels like we’re not the one driving.

The way you pay time to your priorities reveals the order they’re in.  Examine the order of your heart. 

The mountain of time has been stolen blindly from the church, and when I say that, sometimes it is the establishment of the church itself that pulls us away from God.

If you are a christian.  Your time is not yours.  Its the Lords.  Trust him with this.  He is a better manager than you or I will ever be. 

A lack of time is the number one excuse for not approaching your throne and yet you keep giving it to us God.  Lord Help us wake up!  You’ve put us here for us, you and me.  Not the world and me.  The more I get on your page the more my life will match yours.

The body very openly often speaks to the responsibility of how we spend the resource of our money but we rarely wave a banner of time stolen by things from the Lord.

Trust the Lord that when you speak to him, he hears.  That you approaching his throne and him moving is 10x more effective than the unannointed labor of your flesh. 

God tells us for a reason that apart from him we can do nothing.  It’s true.  Not by might, not by power, but by my spirit says the Lord.

The enemy will get us to trust that our identity is found in anything else other than the words of the Father.  He will use whatever we will listen to.  Our identity is often fictiously formed by the labor of our hands.  This is a sandy foundation and I pray its shaken in your life.

Our identity is in the father’s love.  What are you really laboring for?  Who are you really laboring for?  All he wants is you and I pray that accompanying you is the revelation that you have nothing to give. 

God LET US BE BRAVE ENOUGH TO BE STILL AND KNOW YOU ARE GOD.

Father take back what is rightful yours.  God I pray that, like a vile, our time would be yours first, our spouses’ second, and our families third.  Not the illusion’s of the activities into which we thrust ourselves; isolated while together.

God restore in your church the preciousness of raw fellowship and communication and relationship with the people you’ve placed in our lives.  I pray that everything that we bow our knees to in regards to time that does not bear fruit for your kingdom would be asphyxiated from our lives in Jesus name.

Jesus, teach me what is means to redeem the time.

works/words addendum

John 14:10-12 “Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in Me? What I am telling you I do not say on My own authority and of My own accord; but the Father Who lives continually in Me does the works.Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me; or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves. I assure you, most solemnly I tell you, if anyone steadfastly believes in Me, he will himself be able to do the things that I do; and he will do even greater things than these, because I go to the Father. “

The creative word.  An utterance from the belly of God changes created reality.  Are you speaking from your throat or His belly?  From which do you desire?  Is your mind set with that being your destination?  God I desire to speak from the fire in your belly.  God I desire to speak knowing the plans and purposes of your will by divine revelation of Your Spirit living, and being active, and dwelling, and moving within me.

Breach the walls of my common sense and the 5 senses, so restricted, by which I operate.  God resurrect yourself within me this day.  This hour.  Even silently and noticeably resurrect your heart within me that I may fellowship in some way with you.

It is the Words of the Father in us that move and shift and change created reality.  You must believe Christ has imparted that ability in your life.  Whoever you are, wherever you are, Christ desires to recreate reality with you. 

God bring your kingdom to this Earth!  GOD!  You told me to pray that your will would be done and not mine!  This day Jesus, resurrect your will in place of the death of mine!  God make us a people whose one desire is to become transparent that the Father might be known amongst men.  God let me believe.  Raise it up Jesus.  Come in me.

Words.  Works.  God mesh the two in our renewed minds.  Meld the two to be indelibly one. 

Greater Works.  If Jesus’ words are true; if going to the Father was better; if you would do greater works presuming you believe in the Christ, let us consider.  Jesus sends His spirit to dwell in men.  Jesus, through our voluntary process of repentance, changes all men and women who believe in him into a greater and greater likeness of the Father…

In these last days God is going to pour out His Spirit more and more, on all men and women, young and old.  God is raising up an army that walks, lives, breathes, and moves in the likeness of God.  Christ in flesh was with us, but what if the Father brings glory to the Son by moving a mass of people seeking first Christ’s righteousness and His reign, to literally move in the Father’s authority -as Christ did, through Christ, and by Him - here on earth.  A collaborative network moving with the orchestration of the Father’s hand in the face of the darkest time this earth has ever seen.  What could be revealed among men in that hour?

They will be called the Holy People…the Redeemed of the Lord…      Isaiah 62:12

works/words

Jesus just gets done telling his disciples that he is the way and they have seen and know the Father through him.  Philip replies, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough.”  Jesus responds, “Who do you think I’m?  You still have no idea who I am?” (paraphrased) and goes on to say, (word for word from the way cool bible my mom got me for Christmas.  Thanks mom)

“Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me?  The words that I speak to you I do not speak from Myself. But the Father who stays in Me does His works.”

“Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, the works that I do he shall do also.  And greater than these he shall do, because I do to My Father.”  John 14:10-11

I might need to cleanse your ears of the translation of the word ‘works’ to ‘miracles’.  Please do not restrict your mind when you read this passage to the common modern understanding of a miracle.  What was Jesus talking about right before he says this?

He says the “words I speak” he does not speak from Himself but from his Father staying inside of Him.  He says he’s also staying in the Father. 

This understanding affects what Christ was saying to us.  When we (sons of Adam)inquired about seeing the Father, Jesus’ response was of the Father dwelling in Him AND the Father dwelling in us.

In John 14:12 Jesus goes on to say, “THIS IS TRUTH AND I’M SHARING IT WITH YOU SO LISTEN TO IT!” (paraphrased) “Anyone who believes in Me, the works that I do he shall do also.”

If you believe in the fullness of Christ’s identity that he reveals here, he says what he is and what he’s doing to fully available to us.

Jesus isn’t just a sideshow confirming the gospel.  He’s in the flesh, living and walking in the ways of the Father here on earth.  This had never been done from the inside out like this before.  Jesus was the first indwelling of the Holy spirit because he was the first clean temple in the form of man that God could enter.  He was the firstfruit of not only our shared resurrection but the firstfruit of God’s temple in Adams on this earth.

The miracle, the glory, of this is the ways and words of God manifest in the formerly fallen man.  We truly die in order to live with him.  We must die in order for this resurrection.  My body may follow but my spirit has already been resurrected.  The Father lives and breathes and has his way in me.

Let us listen to him brothers and sisters.  Quit fighting the process of life, for I know it feels like a road of death.  It is the Father speaking through us, his will embodied within our increasing hearts, his spirit moving on behalf of the glory of the Son to the delight of the Father. 

You will never gain power through this.  IT BELONGS TO HIM.  You will never have power.  Get that settled in your heart.  But God’s power has been asking to dwell in your in obedience to whatever the Father wants to exercise it for.

Your destiny is to let God dwell and move and have his way and have his words here on earth through you.  Make room for my God please.  I want to see him.  He desires to share that glory with you.  I expect to see him in you.  Don’t expect anything less for yourself.

The more we become an empty vessel with no strings attached, with the Holy Spirit dwelling within us, the more we look like Jesus.  Let Him love you to death today.  Jesus I believe that is was better for me that you went to the Father.

the conditions of our unconditional God

After a brief blurry season of confusion and blindness I return to writing.  Please pray for spiritual warfare around something so simple as this.  Of course after reading this, that’s no small request.

-

I believe answer to intercession is conditional. ’If’s in the Word are never casual.  God is lighting a fire under me to understand these conditions, walk in them, and watch him move.  I’m still on the first step.  John 15:7  If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given to you.

To access the limitless trenches of God’s heart and economy I need only to understand what it means to abide in Christ and his word in me.  My desire and motives must funnel down to one: to abide in Him. 

This alone is not for any motive of mine but His plans in me.

John 15:8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

For the glory of the King of glory.  The confirmation of following the true Christ.  That the spirit would give birth to spirit through me.

John 15:10 If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love.

John 15:12 My command is this: Love as I love.

John 15:13 Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.

John 15:15 I have called you friends [and shown it to be true].

My life, my will in this body, is the only thing the Lord will ever ask of me.  The sooner you can reconcile this death, the sooner you will know true freedom.

Intercession is conditional.  I must abide. 

 John 15:5  Apart from me, you can do nothing [that has any value to Me or My kingdom].

The Lord does not abide secondary to the will of man.  The only way he exists is as King. 

Yes Lord I agree with your calling on my Life,  that you might find a place to dwell among men.  Awaken my spirit to your presence and your absence.  More Lord.  More Lord.  Let me discern your will.  I know you know I hear you and pretend I don’t.  I know Lord you know I hear you and resist.  I know too Lord this means nothing without a resolved change in my heart and thought regarding my daily processes.

Holy Spirit; the Spirit of God in person dwelling in fullness within me…  this day, this hour, this moment.  I submit to your requests.  Speak to me.  Take it, take it all.  

There is no Loss to fear in anything you ask of me.  It is only gain for You and for me. You will ask of me nothing that you did not already ask of the Son.  Follow.  Follow.  Follow.  This is the way.  Walk in it.

Righteous acts are rags but obedience is love.