Our church is in a series on the book of Acts. I have personally enjoyed diving into this book of the Bible as it has been putting a lot of faith in my heart for what God can do. I know I haven’t blogged in a while as I have been unbelievably busy, but hope to get back to regular updates soon. Anyways, A couple of weeks ago  had the opportunity to preach on the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. It is key to the book of Acts and it is key to seeing Acts like happenings in our church today. I am A charismatic. I have had a few supernatural God-encounters that have been key to where I am in my walk with God and ministry today. As much as I have an unshakable belief in supernatural Christianity, I still believe in godly-wisdom. Today, J Lee Grady published and article asking questions in the aftermath of the Lakeland meetings. Check it out here. Before I go any further, please know that this is not a slam on any ministry nor the Lakeland meetings, it is simply a call of accountability and questions for those who were closely involved with this movement. And specifically those who endorsed and should have known better. Each question in Grady’s article should be answered honestly by all those who were involved. The Apostles and the early church would have expected nothing less from the leadership of the early church. I have only caught a few article by Grady but as he has tried to bring clarity in these situation I cant help but think of Paul’s statement to the highly “charismatic” Corinthian church when adjusting them in their methodology in 1 Corinthians 14…

1Cor. 14:37-38 If you claim to be a prophet or think you are very spiritual, you should recognize that what I am saying is a command from the Lord himself.  But if you do not recognize this, you will not be recognized.

When I hear the news, I prayed a quick prayer for Todd and Lakeland, but I have been praying even harder for men of God who will not be afraid to ask questions like J. Lee Grady asks, who wont be scared of the truth, and most of all the God would bring lost people into our churches by whatever means the Holy Spirit chooses to use. On a side note, I have been radically transformed by reading Charles Finney. His book Lectures on Revival of Religion is a must read for anyone who is serious about God bringing Revival to our cities. More later…

Today our church begins 58 days of prayer with each of those days being taken by groups of people who are committing to not only pray but fast as well. We are actually posting a blog that will post information and testimonies during this exciting time. You can participate in the blog by going here . If you haven’t signed up to take a day and cover it in prayer we encourage you to do so. You can find large calendars set up at all three campuses where you can sign your name to let us know you’ll be participating with us. We really feel that this season of prayer is going to yield breakthrough in families and reaching people. I look forward to the many testimonies of God’s faithfulness and power during this time! Be Blessed!

Another highlight for me from this year was the intensity of the worship. I think this year we went to another level. I was just chatting with some people from another church who attended the Genconference and they were telling me about how 15 of their mediocre kids from their youth group ran to the front of the church this sunday to worship. Kids who would never do this sort of thing- All because of what they had just got swept away in at Gencon. Even as I am writing this blog, my words do not do justice to what happened. For example, our thursday night service went from 7:00-11:20 with 95% of the young people totally engaged. That speaks for itself. Their was an electricity in the air that was almost tangible. On Friday night the same thing -7:00-11:00. We would have gone longer but the Aud wanted us out. I think the majority of kids were disappointed when we had to wrap it up. I think this year was so special because of two things. First, the worship team itself spent weeks preparing themselves spiritually and musically. Many of them fasting food and all of them fasting regular activities like movies and such. The second, was the youth group at mount zion. They spent a week coming to the church every night the week before the conference fasting and praying for God to move significantly at the conference. And he did. Boy, did he ever. I think anybody who came to the conference this year will tell you there was just something special that God did that you cant quite put into words.

Here’s something I’ll never forget from this year: the offerings. I had a mentor tell me one time that one of the greatest indications of spiritual revival is generosity. We broke all the records this year. Chico did the offering the first night and I did it the next two nights. The offerings were very important this year because they were a fleece before the Lord for us as an indication of whether we should return to the Aud or not. Check this out. The first night approximately $5,000 came in. The next night- approximately $6,000. Let me throw a curve ball in here. After Benny got done preaching I felt led to take an offering for him for a house he is opening in Las Vegas that will help get teenage prostitutes off the street. This was done knowing we were still in need of money to continue the Genconference at the Aud. Approximately $10,000 came in for that. Well, that’s 21,000 big ones already. Any youth conference of our size would be blown away by that amount any day of the week. Before the last nights meeting Steve came up to me and said that given the numbers we needed about $6000 to go back to the Aud. Honestly, I have faith for $6000. I just didnt have faith for $6000 from those kids out there. They had already given SO much. I literally saw two girls walk up to the baskets the night before and open their wallets and dump out everything in them - change, and dollars. Before I approached the stage to receive the offering, I just prayed silently to the Lord. I said” God, I know you can supply 6,000 dollars but If you’re in this let there be a miracle tonight. Im being honest. I prayed that but I had little to no faith that it would happen. So you could imagine my shock when Steve came up at the end of the night and told me that close to$13,000 was given. WOW! I’ll remember that for the rest of my life. $34,000 in free will offerings from teenagers and young adults. WOW! I just want to give everybody some perspective on this- our conference attendance this year was similar to what we have had at our most filled regular weekend services at all campuses (including Albany). The total amount collected at the conference was just as much as the tithes and offerings at our weekend services! I hope you catch how amazing that is! Before this conference as we were considering what are next move should be we prayed, God if you want us to keep doing this show us by providing what we need. I think God overwhelmingly answered.

WOW! What a year. I hate to compare years but if last year we thought it was great (despite the transitional elements of moving to a bigger venue), this year was Unbelievable! Craig Groeschel preached a life changing message on getting a burden that rocked me to my core. I looked down and one of our keynote speakers was still on the floor when we were wrapping things up at the end of the night. Steve Furtick tore it up. Watch out! If you haven’t heard this guy yet, you are missing something special. Anyone who attended the conference would tell you there is the mark of God on this guy. I look forward to hearing of the amazing things God will be doing through him in the future. It was great to make the connection. Benny Perez was vintage, moving in the power and preaching a great message. Jude wrapped it all up on the last night with a great message on serving the church. I want to blog tomorrow about some of the awesome things that happened. For now I’ll leave you with this. We were praying about moving the conference back to the church and just having two sold out weekends…but God overwhelmingly made it clear to us that he DOES NOT want us to do that. More on that later. If you were at the Generation Conference thanks for coming. We appreciate all those who participate every year!

The day has arrived. I could hardly sleep last night. My heart is expectant and anxious to see what God is going to do. The reason why I am so excited is I see the rumblings of an incredible three days. First off, There has been more prayer than EVER that has gone into this year with many of the youth in the church fasting and praying AND even coming to the church every night for the last week to pray together! Im telling you Prayer like this only leads to one place - BIG BREAKTHROUGH. Also, the creative element of the conference is on a whole nother level for us. It should be fun! If your coming today we’ll see you in a few hours!

I did this once but somehow I deleted it.

The last post has been extremely popular. I think there are a lot of people who can relate to what Grady says in that article- Pastors in particular. Grady’s article was a personal challenge to me. If you havent seen it you can see it here. I am a charismatic. I believe in the gifts of the Spirit. I want all of what God wants for his church today. I want healing, deliverance, tongues, prophecy, and miracles. And not just because I want them, I believe we NEED them. I don’t believe there has to be a “blue coat” “grey coat” division in the body. And if that does happen, guess what? Nobody wins. I believe with all my heart the next move of God is not going to be led exclusively by Toronto, or the Assembly of God, or Lakeland, or Willow Creek, or Ed Young Jr. but by a collaboration and a working together of every movement in the body of Christ. I hate when people say this “movement” is the best or this person is the best. “Best” often comes down to a style preference. In my realm of Influence as I look at the leadership landscape in the Body of Christ, I see we need input from Power ministries but we also need input from people with the gift of leadership. Believe me. Im not super experienced but it would not be good if either “coat” was the main figurehead in the body. The point: Lets be more open. When I say open, I don’t mean take everything. I mean we take what’s good and leave what is unnecessary. We have something to learn from Todd as well as Bill Hybels, something to learn from Oral Roberts as well as Rick Warren, etc etc. One Perspective alone will severely handicap us. As I have taken this perspective, I have come under some criticism from those who believe if you are not 100% in a certain movement you are banished to the other side. This has caused me pain, and quite frankly was getting into my spirit causing me to be critical and defensive, but J Lee Grady’s article has given me new perspective. I want to be humble and loving and be a promoter of peace instead of division, love and not hate. Thank you J Lee Grady!

Its funny the things that stay with you through life. Memories that is. I have been thinking a lot about prayer lately and I thank God for my father and all the people that have been such great models of Prayer in my life. One such memory I have is from my childhood. The great apostle Reg Layzell would come and stay with us on occasion. He would stay in the guest room right next door to mine and my brothers room. I remember getting up in the wee hours of the morning to use the bathroom and sure enough his light would be on every morning at the crack of dawn and he would be praying. As I recall, sometimes it was still dark when he’d be up. He would pray and Worship for hours. The guy was intense. Although I never witnessed it myself, my father told me part of his daily 4 hour spend time with God discipline he also had a daily workout routine. He would workout his arms, not so much so he could be in shape, but so he could keep his arms in the air longer while he worshiped. Amazing. I thank God for the quality of men of God my father had around us while I was a boy and for the example they were to me even when they didn’t even know they were influencing me.

J Lee Grady just wrote an article that struck a cord with me because it clearly captures the way I feel in so many ways. In seems in the last couple of years I have been caught in J. Lee Grady’s spot once too often and have been perplexed as to why. You can check it out here. He uses the whole Lakeland meetings to make a larger point- I hope we don’t miss it because I think his point in this article could be the clearest direction for us as spirit filled christians in a while. The article also points out in a subtle way what Jesus’ desire is based on scripture rather than just a view of what we may sense may take place in the future. In light of this article, I think it is somewhat puzzling as to how much we ignore the clear teachings of scripture sometimes. Civil War amongst Christians? Are you for real? Isn’t love the defining mark of our faith?

I am excited for this years conference. There is already an expectancy in the air that’s hard to describe. Apostle C will be speaking at our weekend service and I am excited to hear the word he is going to bring. He always seems to have a pinpoint prophetic insight into our church. Our 2nd year in the Aud should be a great one.