Powerhouse Ministry Blog

Trump SCREAMS Every Word He Knows At Reporter

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Thu, 30 Jan 2020 21:24:00 +0000

These People Failed Martin Luther King Jr. Day | The Daily Show

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Wed, 22 Jan 2020 20:07:00 +0000

KingFace On the Trump Effect In Black Communities

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Fri, 13 Dec 2019 01:55:00 +0000

The Things that God Hates

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Tue, 10 Apr 2018 20:50:00 +0000

Wait... God actually hates something?

Yes! There are a number of things that our Heavenly Father hates. You can learn about them in this video:

What is the BEST Type of Prayer?

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Fri, 15 Dec 2017 20:19:00 +0000

There are all kinds of prayer. Supplication, intercession, praise... but what is the most important type of prayer? The key is provided in this video:

Don’t Believe the Hype

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 19:28:00 +0000

Don’t listen to the lies of satan, your enemy. The enemy may try to make it sound as if his way is the most exciting and that church is boring.

But, even if you go to the most boring church in the world, the Gospel of Jesus Christ will send you to an exciting eternity, as opposed to...

Don’t believe the hype!

Gather Together By Yourselves

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 22 Jan 2017 21:02:00 +0000

Making Voting Choices Based on the Abortion Issue?

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 06 Nov 2016 19:09:00 +0000

Interesting that people want to make Abortion the justification for voting choice. But, what would Jesus do?

Schisms: A Rainbow of Deception

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 20 Mar 2016 18:46:00 +0000

Get Out of the Boat

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 13 Oct 2013 14:41:00 +0000

You Can’t Walk On Water If You Are Sitting in the Boat (via http://link2power.org)

You ever hear someone say about a person that they walk on water? It typically means that this individual is the best at what they do. Well Jesus is the ultimate at what He did. He is asking us to do those works that He did. The etymology behind the…

The Right Path

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 18:19:00 +0000

This week... Judy Ann provides meditations guaranteed to help you stay on the right path during this upcoming week, and beyond...

The Right Path by Judy Ann

Father, show me the path You want me to take and point out the right road on which I should walk. Today I deny myself and take up my cross and follow You wherever You may lead. Lead me beside the quiet waters; restore my soul. You are guiding me in paths of righteousness for Your name’s sake. You are my God and I will praise You in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Show me Your ways, O Lord; teach me Your paths.

Psalm 25:4 [AMP]

³⁴And Jesus called [to Him] the throng with His disciples and said to them, If anyone intends to come after Me, let him deny himself [forget, ignore, disown, and lose sight of himself and his own interests] and take up his cross, and [joining Me as a disciple and siding with My party] follow with Me [continually, cleaving steadfastly to Me]. ³⁵For whoever wants to save his [higher, spiritual, eternal] life, will lose it [the lower, natural, temporal life which is lived only on earth]; and whoever gives up his life [which is lived only on earth] for My sake and the Gospel's will save it [his higher, spiritual life in the eternal kingdom of God]. ³⁶For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and forfeit his life [in the eternal kingdom of God]? ³⁷For what can a man give as an exchange (a compensation, a ransom, in return) for his [blessed] life [in the eternal kingdom of God]? ³⁸For whoever is ashamed [here and now] of Me and My words in this adulterous (unfaithful) and [preeminently] sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when He comes in the glory (splendor and majesty) of His Father with the holy angels.

Mark 8:34-38 [AMP]

A Psalm of David. ¹THE LORD is my Shepherd [to feed, guide, and shield me], I shall not lack. ²He makes me lie down in [fresh, tender] green pastures; He leads me beside the still and restful waters. ³He refreshes and restores my life (my self); He leads me in the paths of righteousness [uprightness and right standing with Him--not for my earning it, but] for His name's sake. ⁴Yes, though I walk through the [deep, sunless] valley of the shadow of death, I will fear or dread no evil, for You are with me; Your rod [to protect] and Your staff [to guide], they comfort me. ⁵You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my [brimming] cup runs over. ⁶Surely or only goodness, mercy, and unfailing love shall follow me all the days of my life, and through the length of my days the house of the Lord [and His presence] shall be my dwelling place.

Psalm 23 [AMP]

Father, may I always listen for Your gentle whisper. Thank You for sending the Holy Spirit to take me by the hand and guide me into all the truth. He speaks only what He hears, and He will tell me what is yet to come. In all m y ways I acknowledge You, and You shall direct my path. In the name of Jesus, I thank You for Your great love for me. Amen.

And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire [a sound of gentle stillness and] a still, small voice.

1 Kings 19:12 [AMP]

But when He, the Spirit of Truth (the Truth-giving Spirit) comes, He will guide you into all the Truth (the whole, full Truth). For He will not speak His own message [on His own authority]; but He will tell whatever He hears [from the Father; He will give the message that has been given to Him], and He will announce and declare to you the things that are to come [that will happen in the future].

John 16:13 [AMP]

In all your ways know, recognize, and acknowledge Him, and He will direct and make straight and plain your paths.

Proverbs 3:6 [AMP]

Power and Love Our God is so full of power and love for us there’s nothing He cannot do or will not do for our benefit! God doesn’t want you to be fearful and anxious. He wants you to rest in Him and pray. For when we pray and allow the Holy Spirit to direct our steps, He will always lead us out of bondage, sickness or depression and into victory! "...you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit come upon you..." - Acts 1:8 "Grace does not grant any of us permission to live in the flesh, but it will supply the power to live it the spirit!" “And this is the promise that he hath promised us, even eternal life” - 1 John 2:25 Eternal life is God’s gift to everyone who accepts Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. “Keep yourselves in the love of God ” - Jude 1:21 Remaining grounded in God’s love protects you from Satan. When you walk in love, you are hidden in God’s light, and the devil can’t touch you! "Grace does not grant any of us permission to live in the flesh, but it will supply the power to live it the spirit!" Father, thank You for the Holy Spirit who helps me pray when I don’t know how or what to pray for. I affectionately and gratefully praise Your name, thanking You for answered prayer. The Holy Spirit helps me love without hypocrisy. I abhor what is evil, and cling to what is good. I will be kindly affectionate to others with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to others, not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord. I rejoice in hope, patient in tribulation, and will continue steadfast in prayer; distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality. Thank You for sending the Holy Spirit who takes hold together with me against my weaknesses. Amen.

^9-10Love from the center of who you are; don't fake it. Run for dear life from evil; hold on for dear life to good. Be good friends who love deeply; practice playing second fiddle. ^11-13Don't burn out; keep yourselves fueled and aflame. Be alert servants of the Master, cheerfully expectant. Don't quit in hard times; pray all the harder. Help needy Christians; be inventive in hospitality.

Romans 12:9-13 [AMP]

"Grace does not grant any of us permission to live in the flesh, but it will supply the power to live it the spirit!" Father, I thank You that You simply write Your will for me on my heart. And I thank You that You not only give me the desire or willingness to do what You want me to do, but You also give me the strength and ability to do it! Thank You for leading me from the inside in all that I need to do today. In Jesus name I pray. Amen

Just Wait ‘Till I Tell Them What You Did...

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 06:12:00 +0000

The predisposition to Tell or Tattle Tale on other people seems an indigenous part of human nature.

Nobody goes to school to learn how to tell tales on others. It comes naturally... and at a young age!

How often do you hear this coming from a group of young children: “Oooh! I’m TELLING!”

Comedians like Eddie Murphy have made millions mimicking that very behavior that seems to form the foundation of our human psyche.

And yet, this type of behavior goes contrary to the perfect will of God.

Or, to put it bluntly, it is sin.

Or, to just get plain real with it... GOD HATES THIS (see Proverbs 6:16-19) !

And you don’t want to do something that God hates, do you?

One of the reasons that God hates type of behavior is that it can kill you.

A man's [moral] self shall be filled with the fruit of his mouth; and with the consequence of his words he must be satisfied [whether good or evil]. Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and they who indulge in it shall eat the fruit of it [for death or life].

Proverbs 18:20-21 [AMP]

Years ago, when somebody pulled a gun on me after I had mouthed off... I realized that I needed to listen more, speak less, and pray always.

Not very long ago , I was working with a group of people, a couple of who considered themselves very devout Christians.

One of these individuals had a number of outward expressions of his religious faith. His style of clothing... his grooming... all he believed to be taken from the Bible and presumably would make him closer to God. Apparently he did not seem to want to get closer to other people... but that is another story.

The other individual expressed very conservative beliefs. No socializing. No fraternizing. Just keep your nose down and do your job.

Both of these individuals worked with a group of drunken, cursing, blaspheming, fornicating heathens... yet their judgmental wrath seemed reserved for yours truly. Granted, I believe that the true motivation for their attacks was a classic case of cronyism with a religious frosting (yum, religious frosting!).

The reality, however, is that I have seen more such attacks from people who profess a strong Christian background than from those who say they worship the devil or some other religion. One Christian brother spent so much time trying to find something about my work to criticize that he was four days behind in his own work. And the person who strove to shield me from his attacks happened to be perhaps the biggest heathen in the organization. Weird.

In another situation, a manager who allowed employees to decorate their workspaces with profane, vile and pornographic materials wanted to fire me for having my Bible on my desk. And he, I was told, was a stalwart member of his congregation.

Really?

Some of you can begin to understand why the Lord directed me to write the book, Please Don’t Feed the Atheists. Not that I am so concerned about Christians picking on me. But what does concern me is the atheists’ reaction to behavior that goes in the extreme opposite direction of Jesus’s greatest commandment:

I give you a new commandment: that you should love one another. Just as I have loved you, so you too should love one another. By this shall all [men] know that you are My disciples, if you love one another [if you keep on showing love among yourselves].

John 13:34-35 [AMP]

Getting back to the topic of doing things that God is pleased with and not doing things that God hates; the scriptures make it clear that there are behaviors that please the Lord. For example:

But without faith it is impossible to please and be satisfactory to Him. For whoever would come near to God must [necessarily] believe that God exists and that He is the rewarder of those who earnestly and diligently seek Him [out].

Hebrews 11:6 [AMP]

So, faith (which, according to Galatians 5:6 [AMP], is activated and energized and expressed and works by way of love) is something that pleases God. So then, if there are things that please God, then conversely, there are things that God hates. Specifically:

These six things the Lord hates, indeed, seven are an abomination to Him: A proud look [the spirit that makes one overestimate himself and underestimate others], a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, A heart that manufactures wicked thoughts and plans, feet that are swift in running to evil, A false witness who breathes out lies [even under oath], and he who sows discord among his brethren.

Proverbs 6:16-19 [AMP]

Proverbs 6:16-19 delineates seven things that God hates. You can listen to a full study of these things by listening to our free audio teaching entitled, The Things That God Hates. But our specific focus is on the parts highlighted in red above:

A proud look
A lying tongue
A false witness who breathes lies
He who sows discord among his brothers in Christ

Let’s be honest... cutting others down is an act of pride.

If you are threatened by how good Sally Ann looks in her new dress, you might say words to tear her down in the eyes of the other ladies in your fellowship.

The proud look overestimates our own value while underestimating the value of others.

It is what causes people to say, “How can you call yourself a Christian... the way that you (fill in the blank).”

The concept of a Christian being a forgiven sinner who is living on a constant supply of God’s mercy is often rejected (except, naturally, during those times when we need to apply that concept to our personal lives.

The lying tongue and false witness who breathes lies come from the same Hebrew word, “sheqer” which is:

an untruth; by implication a sham. It is deceitful, false, and a vain thing that has no justification or cause.

Sowing discord, strife, or contentions between people is what drama is all about. Not just real-life drama, but also fictional drama. A movie or television program that does not have conflict will not have viewers.

Think about it. You don’t watch a procedural to see police officers sitting around the station house eating doughnuts and drinking coffee, do you? No... you watch to see a bad guy do some heinous thing and then have the detectives find that guy, beat him (or her) down, and then incarcerate them.

Hey... you think that is what God will do to those who cause this level of drama in the lives of their Christian brothers and sisters? Stand them before His judgement seat and... hmm...

Thoraf Gilbrant and his team wrote the following about this sort of person:

This sort of person not only damages human relationships, but thereby reveals his hatred of God and His covenant, especially of the basic covenantal obligation to love one’s neighbor (Leviticus 19:18, 33f) that underlies more than half of the basic commandments (cf. Deuteronomy 5:16-21). Those who seek to destroy others are therefore not only condemned by those whose lives they attack, but by God himself (v.16), Who hates their way of life (vv. 17ff) and the attitudes that underlie it (v. 14).

After describing the arrogance that leads them to use any means, even violence, Solomon warns that the real problem is not behavior (damaging as that is), but the attitude of the heart. Their hatred grows out of self-centered arrogance that sees others as tools to be used or discarded, and cannot bear to see happiness or love in those whom it despises. A heart that seeks the misery of others will do anything at all to accomplish its ends, as those poems show.

Granted, all seven of those things that God hates (as indicated above) overlap to a degree... considering that they are the fruit of a person who is not walking in love but, rather, hates his brother (and also God). Still, our primary emphasis this week is on taming our tongues.

When I recounted those earlier experiences of mine, you might have wondered to yourself, “Now what exactly did Brotha DC do?”

Well, I did avoid the temptation to retaliate. A little. But when the pressure persisted... I eventually caved. :-(

However, I did make the effort to remain in a position of forgiveness towards those who had hurt me.

And, of course, when I got to the point where I was ready to cuss someone out... we went to 1 John 1:9 and repented, turning around from that path and continuing to walk along the path architected for us by Christ.

But why do people judge others... even to the point of making up lies? Perhaps it could be if one doesn’t express their faith in the exact same way that they do.

I recall being attacked by a Christian who didn’t believe in handing out tracts... he felt that soul winning should be strictly personal, not printed. Well, I respected his belief... but it was difficult convincing him I did not want to argue about it. Our time would be better spent winning souls and not arguing.

Another colleague wanted to argue with me that we should use the Hebrew name Yeshua to refer to our Lord and not the English derivation of Jesus. Again, not something I want to waste time fighting over. From my perspective, if you call upon Him sincerely, regardless of what language you speak... you shall be saved.

In the situation where I received the proud look... the lying tongue... false witness about my job performance and personal ethics... and the end result was discord that resulted in my losing an awesome job. Granted, the most awesome job I have is loving the Lord with all my heart, soul, strength and mind. And NOBODY can get me fired from God’s employ. God don’t listen to your gossip. He knows all anyway... not just the conjecture but the intricate details.Still... I found it rather confusing when those who should have been brothers in Christ came across as my enemies.

Of course, God has his hand in every situation. And, when opportunities came to throw my misbehaving colleagues under the bus, I followed the instructions of the Holy Spirit to keep my mouth shut (well, maybe I didn’t keep it 100% shut) and to pray for those who persecuted me, in accordance with Matthew 5:44 and Luke 6:28. And, yes, I did repent when my lips failed to stay completely sealed.

But that incident is also a reminder for all of us to keep in mind what our religion is truly about. Is it about spending a requisite amount of time with our butts touching a church pew? Is it about dressing a certain way? Is it about pronouncing your words while dipping your diphthongs? Is it about fasting a certain number of meals, or reading a certain number of chapters of the Bible or not watching movies or not chewing gum or not dancing or...

What is religion truly about?

If anyone thinks himself to be religious (piously observant of the external duties of his faith) and does not bridle his tongue but deludes his own heart, this person's religious service is worthless (futile, barren). External religious worship [religion as it is expressed in outward acts] that is pure and unblemished in the sight of God the Father is this: to visit and help and care for the orphans and widows in their affliction and need, and to keep oneself unspotted and uncontaminated from the world.

James 1:26-27 [AMP]

True religion is the practice of doing those things that Jesus did: visiting, helping and caring for those who are afflicted and in need. AND, to stay away from the filth of this world (ref. those things that God hates). AND, to bridle your tongue!

I was thinking about an incident that happened to me many ears ago. I was a teenager, attending university. In the town where I matriculated, there were liquor stores on just about every corner. And those stores sold more than just beer, wine and distilled spirits. They sold milk, snacks, and newspapers. It was a common thing for people to go in and out of those establishments for anything from a pack of cigarettes to a pack of chewing gum.

I was confronted by a young lady at the church I was attending at the time. She accused me of being a backslider... or worse. She saw me go into the, gasp, liquor store!

OH THE HUMANITY!

She also saw me exit that same store. And she admitted that I was not carrying any bottles, cans or containers... just a copy of that day’s newspaper.

When she realized that she had not caught me in some type of sin, she walked away sorrowful...

What that young lady forgot... and what most of us often seem to forget... is that what we perceive is not always what we are seeing.

AND, even more importantly, whether it is or whether it ain’t someone sinning... our obligation is to make prayers and supplications with intercession for them... not to spread gossip to tear down their character.

Quite often, what people see or hear is filtered by what some social researchers call paradigms. For example:

An employee may be deep in thought about an innovation that could make the company billions. But, all the boss sees is somebody sleeping or daydreaming at their desk. Women in the church may see a young hussy trying to steal their husbands while in reality a young woman brought herself a new outfit trying to raise her downcast or depressed spirit... not for the purpose of catching anyone's eye.

A prime example of this is the typical automobile accident. Two cars collide... and two drivers tell differing (and, often, diametrically opposed) versions of what happened. As Philadelphian TV personality Wally Kennedy used to say, you ask fifty people what happened and you will get fifty answers. However... those vehicles did not back up and crash into each other fifty times in fifty different ways. The danger, then, is taking one’s incomplete picture and making it into an absolute truth (when, in fact, it is not).

The Pharisees accused Jesus and His disciples of being unlawful for doing something (in their opinion) on the wrong day of the week. Check this out:

AT THAT particular time Jesus went through the fields of standing grain on the Sabbath; and His disciples were hungry, and they began to pick off the spikes of grain and to eat. And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to Him, See there! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful and not permitted on the Sabbath. He said to them, Have you not even read what David did when he was hungry, and those who accompanied him-- How he went into the house of God and ate the loaves of the showbread--which was not lawful for him to eat, nor for the men who accompanied him, but for the priests only? Or have you never read in the Law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple violate the sanctity of the Sabbath [breaking it] and yet are guiltless? But I tell you, Something greater and more exalted and more majestic than the temple is here! And if you had only known what this saying means, I desire mercy [readiness to help, to spare, to forgive] rather than sacrifice and sacrificial victims, you would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of Man is Lord [even] of the Sabbath.

Matthew 12:1-8 [AMP]

God does not want us being Judge Mental... 50% judge and 50% mental. And if someone is judging you, check this final scripture out from the Apostle Paul:

Let not him who eats look down on or despise him who abstains, and let not him who abstains criticize and pass judgment on him who eats; for God has accepted and welcomed him. Who are you to pass judgment on and censure another's household servant? It is before his own master that he stands or falls. And he shall stand and be upheld, for the Master (the Lord) is mighty to support him and make him stand. One man esteems one day as better than another, while another man esteems all days alike [sacred]. Let everyone be fully convinced (satisfied) in his own mind. He who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. He also who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God; while he who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God. None of us lives to himself [but to the Lord], and none of us dies to himself [but to the Lord, for] If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or we die, we belong to the Lord. For Christ died and lived again for this very purpose, that He might be Lord both of the dead and of the living. Why do you criticize and pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you look down upon or despise your brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of God. For it is written, As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to Me, and every tongue shall confess to God [acknowledge Him to His honor and to His praise]. And so each of us shall give an account of himself [give an answer in reference to judgment] to God. Then let us no more criticize and blame and pass judgment on one another, but rather decide and endeavor never to put a stumbling block or an obstacle or a hindrance in the way of a brother.

Romans 14:3-13 [AMP]

This Weeks Homework

Let us watch our mouths...
Let us exercise the process of watching our mouths...
And, as God reveals things that you may of done that He hates... or things you failed to do that would please Him... REPENT!

Want to go Deeper?

Our long-form audio teaching The Things That God Hates is available for on-line listening... free of charge.

For immediate access, click The Things That God Hates and enjoy!

Emotional Healing Meditations from Judypie

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 06:09:00 +0000

Quite often, we read Isaiah 53:4-5 and think of healing of our physical bodies. But Jesus also provided emotional healing when He died on the cross.

Many of us experienced situations in our youths that turn into time bombs that go off in our adult lives. Whatever your issue... Jesus can heal it. He is willing to heal it. Why not let go and let God heal your deepest emotional issues. Like the woman with the issue of blood... you are on the verge of being loosed from the emotional issues in your life.

Think on These Things

Father, Your Word is my Handbook for renewing my mind to think and speak as You think and speak. By the grace of God I will think on things that are true, honest, just, pure, lovely and of good report. Your Word will renew my mind with Your thoughts, Lord, driving out thoughts of fear, doubt, bad feelings toward others, self-hatred, depression and unbelief in the name of Jesus. Amen.

For the rest, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is worthy of reverence and is honorable and seemly, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely and lovable, whatever is kind and winsome and gracious, if there is any virtue and excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think on and weigh and take account of these things [fix your minds on them].

Philippians 4:8 [AMP]

Letting Go

Father, I glory in what Christ Jesus has done for me. I let go—put aside all past sources of my confidence—counting them worthless, in order that I may experience Christ and become one with Him. I unfold my past and put into proper perspective those things that are behind. I trust in You, LORD, with all my heart and lean not on my own understanding. In all my ways I acknowledge You, and You will make my paths straight. Thank You, in the Name of Jesus. Amen.

⁷ I once thought these things were valuable, but now I consider them worthless because of what Christ has done. ⁸ Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ ⁹and become one with him. I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ. For God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith.

Philippians 3:7-9 [NLT]

I acknowledged my sin to You, and my iniquity I did not hide. I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord [continually unfolding the past till all is told]--then You [instantly] forgave me the guilt and iniquity of my sin. Selah [pause, and calmly think of that]!

Psalm 32:5 [AMP]

I do not consider, brethren, that I have captured and made it my own [yet]; but one thing I do [it is my one aspiration]: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead

Philippians 3:13 [AMP]

Lean on, trust in, and be confident in the Lord with all your heart and mind and do not rely on your own insight or understanding. In all your ways know, recognize, and acknowledge Him, and He will direct and make straight and plain your paths.

Proverbs 3:5-6 [AMP]

Direction

Father, thank You for instructing me and teaching me in the way I should go and for guiding me with Your eye. Thank You for Your guidance and leadership concerning Your will, Your plan and Your purpose for my life. I hear the voice of the Good Shepherd, for I know You and follow You. You lead me in paths of righteousness of Your name’s sake. In Jesus Name, Amen.

I [the Lord] will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with My eye upon you.

Psalm 32:8 [AMP]

The watchman opens the door for this man, and the sheep listen to his voice and heed it; and he calls his own sheep by name and brings (leads) them out. When he has brought his own sheep outside, he walks on before them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice.

John 10:3-4 [AMP]

He refreshes and restores my life (my self); He leads me in the paths of righteousness [uprightness and right standing with Him--not for my earning it, but] for His name's sake.

Psalm 23:3 [AMP]

Change

Father, direct my steps by Your word and let no iniquity have dominion over me. Uphold my steps in Your paths that my footsteps may not slip. Thank You that I am ever learning, ever growing and ever achieving. Things change because I'm changing; I am wonderfully and fearfully made. You give me the freedom and courage to be my creative self, which You made unique unto me. In the name of Jesus I pray. Amen.

Establish my steps and direct them by [means of] Your word; let not any iniquity have dominion over me.

Psalm 119:133 [AMP]

My steps have held closely to Your paths [to the tracks of the One Who has gone on before]; my feet have not slipped.

Psalm 17:5 [AMP]

I will confess and praise You for You are fearful and wonderful and for the awful wonder of my birth! Wonderful are Your works, and that my inner self knows right well.

Psalm 139:14 [AMP]

Emotional Healing

Heavenly Father, you saw my heartache and pain when I was brokenhearted. You sent your Word and healed me, and you delivered me from all my destructions. It didn't all happen in one day, but layer-by-layer you healed the emotional wounds [curing my pains and sorrows). Thank you for the anointing of Jesus that is at work binding up and healing my broken heart. In Jesus name. Amen.

He sends forth His word and heals them and rescues them from the pit and destruction.

Psalm 107:20 [AMP]

The Lord is close to those who are of a broken heart and saves such as are crushed with sorrow for sin and are humbly and thoroughly penitent.

Psalm 34:18 [AMP]

The Spirit of the Lord [is] upon Me, because He has anointed Me [the Anointed One, the Messiah] to preach the good news (the Gospel) to the poor; He has sent Me to announce release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to send forth as delivered those who are oppressed [who are downtrodden, bruised, crushed, and broken down by calamity],

Luke 4:18 [AMP]

The Offensive End (Part 1 of 5)

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 02:55:00 +0000

On a snowy day, an altrusitic act is appreciated. On a sunny day, a simple greeting is ignored. The temptation comes to get offended. We must not give in to that temptation!

²¹ Then Peter came up to Him and said, Lord, how many times may my brother sin against me and I forgive him and let it go? [As many as] up to seven times?
²² Jesus answered him, I tell you, not up to seven times, but seventy times seven!
²³ Therefore the kingdom of heaven is like a human king who wished to settle accounts with his attendants.
²⁴ When he began the accounting, one was brought to him who owed him 10,000 talents [probably about $10,000,000],
²⁵ And because he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold, with his wife and his children and everything that he possessed, and payment to be made.
²⁶ So the attendant fell on his knees, begging him, Have patience with me and I will pay you everything.
²⁷ And his master's heart was moved with compassion, and he released him and forgave him [cancelling] the debt.
²⁸ But that same attendant, as he went out, found one of his fellow attendants who owed him a hundred denarii [about twenty dollars]; and he caught him by the throat and said, Pay what you owe!
²⁹ So his fellow attendant fell down and begged him earnestly, Give me time, and I will pay you all !
³⁰ But he was unwilling, and he went out and had him put in prison till he should pay the debt.
³¹ When his fellow attendants saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed, and they went and told everything that had taken place to their master.
³² Then his master called him and said to him, You contemptible and wicked attendant! I forgave and cancelled all that [great] debt of yours because you begged me to.
³³ And should you not have had pity and mercy on your fellow attendant, as I had pity and mercy on you?
³⁴ And in wrath his master turned him over to the torturers (the jailers), till he should pay all that he owed.
³⁵ So also My heavenly Father will deal with every one of you if you do not freely forgive your brother from your heart his offenses.

Matthew 18:21-35 [AMP]

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noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 04 Sep 2011 08:55:00 +0000

What does it mean to be a Christian?
I like what Keith Green said:

Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than going to McDonalds makes you a hamburger...

In other words... a person who has no spiritual fruits and is just a religious nut.

This week’s blog features wisdom from Judypie and Pastor Jake... and a song by Keith Green.

A Morning Prayer
by Judy Ann

Father, in the name of Jesus, I come boldly unto the throne of grace, that I may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in my time of need. Father, I thank You for a good night’s rest. I laid down in peace, and slept; You made me dwell in safety. Grant me the grace to walk through this day in true godliness with contentment. I bind mercy and truth around my neck, and write them on the table of my heart, and I will find favor in the sight of God and man. With Your grace I will serve my employer and everything I do today I do in singleness of heart as unto the Lord. Amen.

At day's end I'm ready for sound sleep,
For you, God, have put my life back together.

Psalm 4:8 [MSG]

Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let's not let it slip through our fingers. We don't have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He's been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let's walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help.

Hebrews 4:14-16 [MSG]

Don't lose your grip on Love and Loyalty.
Tie them around your neck; carve their initials on your heart.
Earn a reputation for living well
in God's eyes and the eyes of the people.

Proverbs 3:3-4 [MSG]

Servants, do what you're told by your earthly masters. And don't just do the minimum that will get you by. Do your best. Work from the heart for your real Master, for God, confident that you'll get paid in full when you come into your inheritance. Keep in mind always that the ultimate Master you're serving is Christ. The sullen servant who does shoddy work will be held responsible. Being a follower of Jesus doesn't cover up bad work.

Colossians 3:22-25 [MSG]

Christ Likeness
by Pastor Jake

It is impossible for man to rationalize and understand by his own intellect the things of God. Man cannot determine for himself what Christ is like and then imitate Him. His carnal efforts to be like his Savior results in man becoming an imitator of himself. He measures himself by himself. The results are he becomes a wolf in sheep's clothing; he has the appearance of his own estimation of righteousness but inside his cloak of self righteousness and religiosity is a raving wolf working against the will of God. He becomes as a “noisy gong and a clanging symbol;” just another noisy, ritualistic, and empty religious person.

Then you may ask; how are we to be like Jesus? Or you may ask; what is the key to Christ likeness? Of all the wonderful attributes of our Lord the most outstanding was his humbleness. The Apostle Paul sets our Lord's attitude before us as an example; he writes,

Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Phiipians 2:5-8 [NASU]

Our Lord saw the need of mankind and humbled Himself that he might fill that need. In the Garden of Gethsemane He totally submitted His will to our Heavenly Father as He prayed, saying,

“My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will.”

Through the total submission of our Lord the Father brought forth a Savior for all mankind. He is the “only begotten” the unique Son of God; in this manner there is and never will no other like Him for there is no other where-by man can be saved.

Each of the original apostles were unique as individuals but yet they had these in common with their Lord----they saw the need, thus, like their Savior before them they humbled themselves before the Father; a humbleness that lead to total submission to the will of the Father. Then the Father created them to be unique vessels of His Spirit and word. If we as true believers will also see the need and become totally submitted to our Creator then He will create us in a uniqueness that serves His purpose.

It is only when man totally surrenders his own will and summits to the will of God that the soul of man is swallowed up by the Soul of God and the Spirit of God performs the word of God in his total being and brings forth a son of God whose thoughts and deeds are like those of his Lord and Savior; he does nothing unless he sees the Father do it and he says nothing unless he hears the Father say it. It is then and only then that he has become like Jesus. It is the work of the Spirit and not by the rationalizing and understanding of the human intellect.

The Apostle Paul writes,

For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

Ephesians 2:10 [NASB]

God is the Creator, the Potter; we are the clay; the one being created in His image. We are to believe, be humble, pray, have faith, be obedient, prayerfully study His Scripture and trust Him to do His will in our lives.

The Apostle John tells us,

“In Him was life, and the life was the light of men (John 1:4).”

Our Lord teaches;

A pupil is not above his teacher; but everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher.

Luke 6:40 [NASB]

Our Lord also tells his pupil,

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden;”

Matthew 5:14 [NASB]

In each true believer there is the life and the word (or light) of God that is the message or the gospel that is the “power of God for salvation (Romans 1:16);” the hope for mankind.

Submit to God and He will create you a vessel of His word; a manifestation of the invisible Father; you will be in His image; you will be like Jesus.

James C Sanford

I Want to Be More Like Jesus
by Keith Green

For more, read “Spiritual Nuts or Religious Nuts”

Love

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 21 Aug 2011 11:00:00 +0000

As we are continuing our series of podcasts on Meditations on Love, we have some powerful blog posts by Jolan and Judypie that further enforce the edict of Jesus’ greatest command. May this week’s blog post inspire you throughout the coming week… month… year…

If You Have Love For One Another
by Jolan

By this shall all [men] know that you are My disciples, if you love one another [if you keep on showing love among yourselves].

John 13:35 [AMP]

Often I think of the blood that you shed

The blood that you shed so that I may live

The love that you showed me that day on the cross

The love that continues to grow in my heart

Why me I wonder?

What did I do?

Me, who is so far from perfect

The idea is skewed

It's like that for all of us

We come to him broken

Ashamed of our past

And yet His arms are wide open.

That kind of love

Is the love we should have

The love we should always show our fellow man

So the question is this?

How do we love?

Others as Jesus continues to love us?

The answer is simple

The answer is this:

Love one another as Jesus loves us!

Simply put. If God can forgive you who are we to hold a grudge?

If God can open His arms wide after all that we have done. What prevents us from doing the same?

We are human and yet we are blessed beyond all measure with the spirit of God

Walking in Love
by Judy Ann

Father, the love you define in 1 Corinthians 13 is my greatest aim, and I ask also for the special abilities the Holy Spirit gives. I believe on the name of your Son Jesus Christ, and I am able to love others just as I love myself because you first loved me. God, you are love, and when I live in love, I am living with you and you live in me. As I live with Christ, my love grows more perfect and complete. Thank you for loving me, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Go after a life of love as if your life depended on it—because it does. Give yourselves to the gifts God gives you. Most of all, try to proclaim his truth. If you praise him in the private language of tongues, God understands you but no one else does, for you are sharing intimacies just between you and him. But when you proclaim his truth in everyday speech, you're letting others in on the truth so that they can grow and be strong and experience his presence with you.

1 Corinthians 14:1-3 [MSG]

And friends, once that's taken care of and we're no longer accusing or condemning ourselves, we're bold and free before God! We're able to stretch our hands out and receive what we asked for because we're doing what he said, doing what pleases him. Again, this is God's command: to believe in his personally named Son, Jesus Christ. He told us to love each other, in line with the original command. As we keep his commands, we live deeply and surely in him, and he lives in us. And this is how we experience his deep and abiding presence in us: by the Spirit he gave us.

1 John 3:21-24 [MSG]

^13-16This is how we know we're living steadily and deeply in him, and he in us: He's given us life from his life, from his very own Spirit. Also, we've seen for ourselves and continue to state openly that the Father sent his Son as Savior of the world. Everyone who confesses that Jesus is God's Son participates continuously in an intimate relationship with God. We know it so well, we've embraced it heart and soul, this love that comes from God.To Love, to Be Loved

^17-18God is love. When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. This way, love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature in us, so that we're free of worry on Judgment Day—our standing in the world is identical with Christ's. There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life—fear of death, fear of judgment—is one not yet fully formed in love.

¹⁹We, though, are going to love—love and be loved. First we were loved, now we love. He loved us first.

1 John 4:13-19 [MSG]

Prayers for Presidential Wisdom by Judy Ann

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 11:00:00 +0000

Father, in Jesus’ name, we thank you for the United States and its government. We pray for the men and women who are in positions of authority – the president, representatives, senators, judges, police personnel, as well as the governors and mayors and all others who are in authority over us in any way. We pray that the Spirit of God will rest upon them. Amen.

FIRST OF all, then, I admonish and urge that petitions, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be offered on behalf of all men, For kings and all who are in positions of authority or high responsibility, that [outwardly] we may pass a quiet and undisturbed life [and inwardly] a peaceable one in all godliness and reverence and seriousness in every way. For such [praying] is good and right, and [it is] pleasing and acceptable to God our Savior

1 Timothy 2:1-3 [AMP]

Father, by your Spirit send forth skillful and godly wisdom into the heart of our president and impart to him necessary, supernatural knowledge and discretion. Discretion will watch over him; understanding will keep him and deliver him from the way of evil and from evil men. We ask this in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.

So now you can pick out what's true and fair,
find all the good trails!
Lady Wisdom will be your close friend,
and Brother Knowledge your pleasant companion.
Good Sense will scout ahead for danger,
Insight will keep an eye out for you.
They'll keep you from making wrong turns,
or following the bad directions
Of those who are lost themselves
and can't tell a trail from a tumbleweed,
These losers who make a game of evil
and throw parties to celebrate perversity,
Traveling paths that go nowhere,
wandering in a maze of detours and dead ends.

Proverbs 2:10-12 [MSG]

Father, your Word declares that blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord. We declare that Jesus is Lord over these United States of America. We receive your blessing. You are our Refuge and Stronghold in times of trouble (high cost, destitution and desperation). We pray that we shall dwell safely in this land, in the name of Jesus our Lord. Amen.

God takes the wind out of Babel pretense,
he shoots down the world's power-schemes.
God's plan for the world stands up,
all his designs are made to last.
Blessed is the country with God for God;
blessed are the people he's put in his will.

Psalm 33:10-12 [MSG]

The Lord also will be a refuge and a high tower for the oppressed, a refuge and a stronghold in times of trouble (high cost, destitution, and desperation).

Psalm 9:9 [AMP]

Father, we ask that you compass the president about with men and women who make their heats and ears attentive to godly counsel and do that which is right in your sight. We pray that the upright shall dwell in our government – men and women blameless and complete in your sight Father. We ask that the wicked be cut off and the treacherous rooted out of our government. In the name of Jesus, we thank you for answering our prayer. Amen

So—join the company of good men and women,
keep your feet on the tried-and-true paths.
It's the men who walk straight who will settle this land,
the women with integrity who will last here.
The corrupt will lose their lives;
the dishonest will be gone for good.

Proverbs 2:20-22 [AMP]

Freedom From Religion

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 11:00:00 +0000

Holier Than Thou?

It is amazing that there are people who can actually feel such an emotion.

Is the Brightness Still in Me?
by Brotha DC

There was a time in my life when I fell into the category of a holier than thou mentality. I walked around with a Bible in my hand, sneering at the sinners as they went about their lives ignoring what I perceived to be righteousness. Then, one day... I decided to accost a young man sitting in the park with a can of beer in his hand. To my surprise, he (between sips) completely deconstructed my phony religious constructs and had me feeling like a complete idiot. He simply spoke on the commandments pertaining to the love of God, not to judge a person’s quality of life by setting one’s focus on relatively trival things such as a can of alcoholic beverage.

Over the years, I came to realize that while I may not be one to routinely imbibe in a libation of hops and barley... that doesn’t make me a better person than anyone else. The late great Dr. David Durham said it this way:

If all you do regarding your salvation is to give up drinking alcohol... all that means is that you will go to hell sober.

Have you ever had one of those moments when you look at yourself in the mirror and realize just how flawed and imperfect you are? I have. And when I contemplate the limnitations and weaknesses of my humanity, I wonder how could God even stand the sight of me?

Then... I remember...

This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn't go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person's failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.

John 3:16-18 [MSG]

⁴ But God--so rich is He in His mercy! Because of and in order to satisfy the great and wonderful and intense love with which He loved us,

⁵ Even when we were dead (slain) by [our own] shortcomings and trespasses, He made us alive together in fellowship and in union with Christ; [He gave us the very life of Christ Himself, the same new life with which He quickened Him, for] it is by grace (His favor and mercy which you did not deserve) that you are saved (delivered from judgment and made partakers of Christ's salvation).

Ephesians 2:4-5 [AMP]

It is not hinged on how good I can be... or how perfectly I can live my life. It is set by the matchless love that God has for us. Now that is not an excuse to live a selfish, wreckless, sinful life. It is, however, freedom in knowing that despite my imperfections, God’s love is perfect.

Religious people don’t seem to have those existential dilemmas. They look at the (often self-imposed) rules and regulations that they manage to meet and declare themselves perfect. Even more perfect than others.

^41-42 "It's easy to see a smudge on your neighbor's face and be oblivious to the ugly sneer on your own. Do you have the nerve to say, 'Let me wash your face for you,' when your own face is distorted by contempt? It's this I-know-better-than-you mentality again, playing a holier-than-thou part instead of just living your own part. Wipe that ugly sneer off your own face and you might be fit to offer a washcloth to your neighbor.

Work the Words into Your Life

^43-45 "You don't get wormy apples off a healthy tree, nor good apples off a diseased tree. The health of the apple tells the health of the tree. You must begin with your own life-giving lives. It's who you are, not what you say and do, that counts. Your true being brims over into true words and deeds.

Luke 6:41-45 [MSG]

Some of the worst problems I have faced in life stemmed from religious people. For example, I worked with one woman who had religious paraphernalia all over her desk at the office. She would sit there and sing hymns to herself... and then get up, go into the senior boss’ office... and tell the most heinous lies about me. Lies that eventually cost me that job.

I could go on and on about such people... perhaps until my fingers ached from typing it all out. The point is, there are people who truly typefy the title of Christian (a person who is a true follower of Jesus the Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One) -- following His example and living in accordance with His lifestyle. In other words, someone whose life is the definition of “What Would Jesus Do?”

It is impossible to feel holier than thou when staring in the mirror of God’s word. Yet, in that mirror is where I will stay planted until I can confirm, as my pal Charlie Peacock wondered, is the brightness still in me?

Examine Yourself
by Judy Ann

Father, in the name of Jesus, I humble myself and submit to Your Word that speaks...exposes, sifts, analyzes, and judges the very thoughts and purposes of my heart. I test my own actions, so that I might have appropriate self-esteem, without comparing myself to anyone else. The security of Your guidance will allow me to carry my own load with energy and confidence. Amen.

For the Word that God speaks is alive and full of power [making it active, operative, energizing, and effective]; it is sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating to the dividing line of the breath of life (soul) and [the immortal] spirit, and of joints and marrow [of the deepest parts of our nature], exposing and sifting and analyzing and judging the very thoughts and purposes of the heart.

Hebrews 4:12 [AMP]

⁴ But let every person carefully scrutinize and examine and test his own conduct and his own work. He can then have the personal satisfaction and joy of doing something commendable [in itself alone] without [resorting to] boastful comparison with his neighbor.

⁵ For every person will have to bear (be equal to understanding and calmly receive) his own [little] load [of oppressive faults].

Galatians 6:4-5 [AMP]

My desire Lord is for people to see You in me..may I reflect your love and grace and mercy..may I be more like You Lord everyday with a heart of compassion ..You are the reason I live and breathe..

Fruit of the Spirit
by Judy Ann

Father, your Spirit lives in me, and I am swift to hear. I have learned it’s more important to listen than to be heard. I purpose to be slow to speak, and choose the words I speak with grace. I am slow to become angry. May my recreated human spirit, under the control of the Holy Spirit bear fruit -- joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness and temperance, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

¹⁹ Understand [this], my beloved brethren. Let every man be quick to hear [a ready listener], slow to speak, slow to take offense and to get angry.

²⁰ For man's anger does not promote the righteousness God [wishes and requires].

James 1:19-20 [AMP]

But the fruit of the [Holy] Spirit [the work which His presence within accomplishes] is love, joy (gladness), peace, patience (an even temper, forbearance), kindness, goodness (benevolence), faithfulness, Gentleness (meekness, humility), self-control (self-restraint, continence). Against such things there is no law [that can bring a charge].

Galatians 5:22-23 [AMP]

Growing Up
by Judy Ann

Father, I affirm the Lordship of Jesus over my relationships. When I was a child, I talked, thought and reasoned like a child. I am done with childish ways and have put them aside. The blood of Christ, Who offered Himself without spot to You, Father, purges my conscience from dead works of selfishness, agitating passions and moral conflicts. Holy Spirit, help me grow up in every way, speaking truly, dealing truly and living truly. Jesus is Lord over my spirit, soul and body. Amen

When I was an infant at my mother's breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.

1 Corinthians 13:11 [MSG]

May God himself, the God who makes everything holy and whole, make you holy and whole, put you together—spirit, soul, and body—and keep you fit for the coming of our Master, Jesus Christ. The One who called you is completely dependable. If he said it, he'll do it!

I Thessalonians 5:23-24 [AMP]

Renewing Our Thoughts
by Judy Ann

It is written, "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways," declares the Lord. "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” I no longer desire to conform to the pattern of this world, but may I be transformed by the renewing of my mind. Then my thoughts and my ways will be changed to Your thoughts and Your ways, in the name of Jesus. Amen

⁸ For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, says the Lord.

⁹ For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.

¹⁰ For as the rain and snow come down from the heavens, and return not there again, but water the earth and make it bring forth and sprout, that it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater,

¹¹ So shall My word be that goes forth out of My mouth: it shall not return to Me void [without producing any effect, useless], but it shall accomplish that which I please and purpose, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

Isaiah 55:8-11 [AMP]

Do not be conformed to this world (this age), [fashioned after and adapted to its external, superficial customs], but be transformed (changed) by the [entire] renewal of your mind [by its new ideals and its new attitude], so that you may prove [for yourselves] what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God, even the thing which is good and acceptable and perfect [in His sight for you].

Romans 12:2 [AMP]

"Do all things without complaining and disputing, that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world.." Philippians 2:14-15

Who’s Afraid of Death?

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 19:02:00 +0000

Who’s Afraid of Mister Death?
by Brotha DC

A few years ago I was in an office with a bunch of people that liked to get into some deep conversations during slow periods. Often we discussed the vicissitudes of life... love... etceterra. But on one occasion, the conversation turned to the concept of death. “How would you like to go,” the question was asked.
Most wanted to go in some quick and dramatic way... like a skydiving mishap. Or maybe a quick automobile collision. The discussion also covered those who were to be executed for a capital crime. Would a firing squad be preferable to the slow burn of the electric chair?

One colleague finally chimed in. With a panicked voice, she begged us to please change the subject! She couldn’t bear the thought of her own demise. The great unknown of death was terrifying to her... as it seems to be for a lot of people. Many just try to push the idea aside. When they do discuss it, the conversation can be like two colleagues I overheard just the other day. One was concerned that they would be trapped in a paralyzed body with their brain crying out... but nobody hearing.

I am so happy that I don’t have any such worries or concerns.

Why?

Because I have a great and precious promise... and you can to. What promise? The promise in 2 Corinthians 5:8 that the moment that I am absent from this physical body, I will be in the presence of the Lord. Check it out:

⁷ For we walk by faith [we regulate our lives and conduct ourselves by our conviction or belief respecting man's relationship to God and divine things, with trust and holy fervor; thus we walk] not by sight or appearance.
⁸ [Yes] we have confident and hopeful courage and are pleased rather to be away from home out of the body and be at home with the Lord.
⁹ Therefore, whether we are at home [on earth away from Him] or away from home [and with Him], we are constantly ambitious and strive earnestly to be pleasing to Him.

2 Corinthians 5:7-9 [AMP]

For those who who by fath make the quality decision to cling to, trust in, and rely upon God’s free gift of love, death is no longer a threat. So what is this gift? How can you get it?

¹⁶ For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only begotten (unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts in, clings to, relies on) Him shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal (everlasting) life.
¹⁷ For God did not send the Son into the world in order to judge (to reject, to condemn, to pass sentence on) the world, but that the world might find salvation and be made safe and sound through Him.
¹⁸ He who believes in Him [who clings to, trusts in, relies on Him] is not judged [he who trusts in Him never comes up for judgment; for him there is no rejection, no condemnation--he incurs no damnation]; but he who does not believe (cleave to, rely on, trust in Him) is judged already [he has already been convicted and has already received his sentence] because he has not believed in and trusted in the name of the only begotten Son of God. [He is condemned for refusing to let his trust rest in Christ's name.]
¹⁹ The [basis of the] judgment (indictment, the test by which men are judged, the ground for the sentence) lies in this: the Light has come into the world, and people have loved the darkness rather than and more than the Light, for their works (deeds) were evil.

John 3:16-19 [AMP]

The great unknown is now revealed. The mystery of what happens after we die is solved. And for those worried that they might not have lived a good enough life to escape hellfire... the good news is that we don’t have to. Jesus lived the good life that we could never live. And when we cling to, trust in, and rely upon what Jesus did... then we can receive the eternal life that we could never earn. And since Jesus told us in John 3:16 that we shall not perish (will never come to destruction... will never be lost) then we can embrace the promise of eternal (everlasting) life.

But wait a minute. People who believe and receive Jesus have been put into a pine box and buried six feet under. How does that work? Again, remember the Apostle Paul’s words in 2 Corinthians 5:8 that when we are absent from our physical body, we will be in the presence of the Lord. So then, what is there to say about Mister Death?

But let me tell you something wonderful, a mystery I'll probably never fully understand. We're not all going to die—but we are all going to be changed. You hear a blast to end all blasts from a trumpet, and in the time that you look up and blink your eyes—it's over. On signal from that trumpet from heaven, the dead will be up and out of their graves, beyond the reach of death, never to die again. At the same moment and in the same way, we'll all be changed. In the resurrection scheme of things, this has to happen: everything perishable taken off the shelves and replaced by the imperishable, this mortal replaced by the immortal. Then the saying will come true:

   Death swallowed by triumphant Life!
   Who got the last word, oh, Death?
   Oh, Death, who's afraid of you now?

It was sin that made death so frightening and law-code guilt that gave sin its leverage, its destructive power. But now in a single victorious stroke of Life, all three—sin, guilt, death—are gone, the gift of our Master, Jesus Christ. Thank God!

1 Corinthians 15:51-57 [MSG]

Wow! When the world has reached the end of its lifespan and the celestial trumpet sounds, those who died in Christ will rise first (after all, they have six feet farther to travel). Then, those who are alive will rise up with them to meet the Lord in the air.

Okay, but what happens before the end of the world... before the trumpet blast?

Well, Saint Paul explains in 1 Corinthians 15:54 that death is swallowed up (utterly vanquished forever) in and unto victory. He goes on in the next verse to ask, “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” The answer for those in Christ is that death has no victory. For those who have eternal security through Christ, the sting of death has been rendered impotent.

Delivered From the Power of Darkness
by Judy Ann

Father, we thank You for Christ, our Passover lamb, Who has been sacrificed to clear us of sin. You have delivered us from the power of darkness and translated us into the Kingdom of the Son of Your Love. Therefore we will keep the Festival, not with the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with the bread of sincerity and truth. Amen.

Purge (clean out) the old leaven that you may be fresh (new) dough, still uncontaminated [as you are], for Christ, our Passover [Lamb], has been sacrificed.

1 Corinthians 5:7 [AMP]

God sacrificed Jesus on the altar of the world to clear that world of sin. Having faith in him sets us in the clear. God decided on this course of action in full view of the public—to set the world in the clear with himself through the sacrifice of Jesus, finally taking care of the sins he had so patiently endured. This is not only clear, but it's now—this is current history! God sets things right. He also makes it possible for us to live in his rightness.

Romans 3:25-26 [MSG]

[The Father] has delivered and drawn us to Himself out of the control and the dominion of darkness and has transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of His love

Colossians 1:13 [AMP]

Life in the Spirit
by Judy Ann

Father, I thank You for strengthening those whose hearts are fully committed to You. You prove Yourself mighty on their behalf. LORD, You have done great things for Your people, and we are filled with joy! We are a happy people, replacing the lower life for the higher life of the Spirit. Thank You for the great things You have done and are doing for us in the name of Jesus, amen.

For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him. You have done foolishly in this, for from now on you will have wars."

2 Chronicles 16:9 [ESV]

It seemed like a dream, too good to be true, when God returned Zion's exiles.
   We laughed, we sang,
      we couldn't believe our good fortune.
   We were the talk of the nations—
      "God was wonderful to them!"
   God was wonderful to us;
      we are one happy people.

Psalm 126:1-3 [MSG]

Whoever finds his [lower] life will lose it [the higher life], and whoever loses his [lower] life on My account will find it [the higher life].

Matthew 10:39 [AMP]

Complete in Christ
by Judy Ann

My life is complete in You, Lord Jesus. Every answer, every need, every solution I have need of is available to me. You are Jehovah-Rapha, my Healer, Jehovah-Nissi, my Victory, Jehovah-Jireh, my Provider. You are Jehovah M’Kaddesh, my Sanctifier, Jehovah-Shalom, my Peace and Security. My Shepherd, you’re Jehovah-Rohi, Jehovah-Tsidkenu, my Righteousness, and Jehovah-Shammah, my ever-present Friend. Because I am complete in You, Lord Jesus I can overcome my insecurities and bring maturity and wisdom to every relationship for the good and benefit of others. Amen

And you are in Him, made full and having come to fullness of life [in Christ you too are filled with the Godhead--Father, Son and Holy Spirit--and reach full spiritual stature]. And He is the Head of all rule and authority [of every angelic principality and power].

Colossians 2:10 [AMP]

God Is Love. Are We?

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 26 Jun 2011 05:49:00 +0000

A Love Letter from God
by David River

My Dearest Child,

When I created the heavens and the earth, I spoke them into being. When I created man, I formed him from the dust of the ground and breathed life into his nostrils. But you, woman I did not create from the dirt. I made you from man as a symbol that you are “within” man, just as my bride is “within” me.

I fashioned you after I breathed the breath of life into man because you are too delicate. I allowed a deep sleep to come over him so I could patiently and perfectly form you. As a surgeon would put a patient under anesthesia, man was put to sleep so that he could not interfere with my creativity. From man’s one bone, I fashioned you. I chose the bone that protects his very life. I chose the rib; that which protects his heart and lungs and supports him as you are meant to do. Around this one bone I shaped you... I molded you. I created you tenderly, beautifully, and perfectly.

Your characteristics are as the rib; strong yet delicate and fragile. You provide protection for the most delicate organ within man, his heart. His heart is the center of his being; his lungs hold the breath of life. The rib cage will allow itself to be broken before it will allow damage to the heart. I created you to support man as the rib cage supports the body. You were not taken from his feet, to be under him, nor were you taken from his head, to be above him. You were taken from his side closest to his heart, to stand beside him and be held close to his side and dear to his heart.

You woman are my perfect creation. You are my beautiful little girl. You have grown to be a splendid woman of excellence, and my eyes fill when I see the virtues in your heart. Your eyes are as beautiful as a golden sunset. Your lips; how lovely when they part in prayer. Your nose; so perfect in form. Your hands so gentle to touch. I’ve caressed your face in your deepest sleep. I’ve whispered tender words of love in your ear. I hold your heart here within mine. Of all that lives and breathes, you are most like me. Your pure heart is most like mine. You my precious angel are the climax of my creation. You are a representation of my pure and spotless bride. When man loves you, he loves me, and the more deeply he loves you, the more deeply he loves me.
Adam walked with me in the cool of the day, yet he was lonely. So everything I wanted Adam to share and experience with me, I fashioned in you as a physical representation of myself upon the earth. You possess my holiness, my strength, my purity, my beauty, my love, my protection and my support.

So man... treat woman well. Love her extravagantly; treasure her royally, for she is fragile. In hurting her, you only hurt me. What you do to her, you do to me. In crushing her, you only damage your own heart; her heart, and also my heart.

Woman, support man. In humility, show him the power of emotion I have given you. In gentle quietness, show your strength. In love, show him that you are the rib that protects his very life; that you the bone that shelters his very heart.

Signed,
The One Who Created and Loves You

Be Children of Love
by Brotha DC

³⁴I give you a new commandment: that you should love one another. Just as I have loved you, so you too should love one another.
³⁵By this shall all [men] know that you are My disciples, if you love one another [if you keep on showing love among yourselves].
³⁶Simon Peter said to Him, Lord, where are You going? Jesus answered, You are not able to follow Me now where I am going, but you shall follow Me afterwards.

John 13:34-36 [AMP]

I find it interesting that, in the world, people rarely argue about what Christians would refer to as their sin. What do I mean by that?

Well, for example, you dont find beer drinkers battling over whether to get drunk off of stout, a pilsner, or ale. Regardless of what type of beer they prefer... they will raise their glasses together and, as the song says, “Drink! Drink! Drink!”

For that matter... you don’t see winos fighting over whether it is better to get drunk off of red wine versus white wine. Neither will sneer over those who prefer to drink a wine cooler. And you will never hear drinkers of clear liquor battling with those who use brown liquor.

Do heroin addicts protest in front of crack houses?

The point that I am making is... people in the world just enjoy their lives. Those who go to disco nightclubs dont fight those who go to rave clubs. They just want to party... and if someone wants to party differently... then no biggie, right?

So then, why is it Christians will cut each others’ throats over doctrinal differences while ignoring the weightier matters?

We have fights over doctrine and dogma... over musical styles and “acceptable” instruments... whether the church supper should include potatoes or Stove Top stuffing...

Look at those who fight against a woman being in ministry, rather asking themselves if she is being used by God? Is she bringing souls into the kingdom?

I hope we can take the above scripture to heart and truly love one another... rather than to be so quick to tear one another down. If a brother or sister is caught in a sin, a fault, or an error... pray for them... and then make sure you aren’t walking around with a beam in your eye while criticising the splinter in their eye.
Jesus died so that we might have and enjoy life (John 10:10).

Don’t be a curmudgeonly sourpuss, only interested in finding fault. But seek and even believe for good in the lives of your fellow believers.

A Lifetime Filled With the Father’s Love
by Judy Ann

Father, I thank You for the great love You have bestowed upon me, that I should be called a child of God! I submit to Your Word that is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of my heart. In the name of Jesus I repent and renounce anger, bitterness and depression. In the name of Jesus, I look inside that I might experience Your love that is imparted to me. Amen.

¹What marvelous love the Father has extended to us! Just look at it—we're called children of God! That's who we really are. But that's also why the world doesn't recognize us or take us seriously, because it has no idea who he is or what he's up to.
^2-3But friends, that's exactly who we are: children of God. And that's only the beginning. Who knows how we'll end up! What we know is that when Christ is openly revealed, we'll see him—and in seeing him, become like him. All of us who look forward to his Coming stay ready, with the glistening purity of Jesus' life as a model for our own.

1 John 1-3 [MSG]

Hebrews 4:12 [AMP]

Father, I pray that I may be filled with the love of God. You are able to do immeasurably more than all I ask or imagine, according to Your power that is at work within me. To you goes all the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

^14-19My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit—not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength—that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you'll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ's love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.
^20-21God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.

   Glory to God in the church!
   Glory to God in the Messiah, in Jesus!
   Glory down all the generations!
   Glory through all millennia! Oh, yes!

Ephesians 3:14-21 [MSG]

“Do all things without complaining and disputing, that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world..” Philippians 2:14-15

Father, thank You for the Holy Spirit who helps me pray when I don’t know how or what to pray for. I affectionately and gratefully praise your name, thanking you for answered prayer. The Holy Spirit helps me love without hypocrisy. I abhor what is evil, and cling to what is good. I will be kindly affectionate to others with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to others, not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord. I rejoice in hope, patient in tribulation, and will continue steadfast in prayer; distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality. Thank You for sending the Holy Spirit Who takes hold together with me against my weaknesses. In Jesus name. Amen.

^9-10Love from the center of who you are; don't fake it. Run for dear life from evil; hold on for dear life to good. Be good friends who love deeply; practice playing second fiddle.
^11-13Don't burn out; keep yourselves fueled and aflame. Be alert servants of the Master, cheerfully expectant. Don't quit in hard times; pray all the harder. Help needy Christians; be inventive in hospitality.

Romans 12:9-13 [MSG]

The 2nd Chapter of Acts

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 04:07:00 +0000

The 2nd Chapter of Acts was one of my favorite “Classic” Contemporary Christian bands. Their story, thanks to Judypie, was a great inspiration to us.

THE FRAME NEVER OUT DID THE PICTURE

The 2^nd Chapter of Acts Story

Part 1

SIMPLE WORDS

The blinding North Dakota blizzard blasted against Elizabeth Irmen as the young schoolteacher and her troupe of students trudged through the knee-deep snow. The lane that led from their rural North Dakota schoolhouse to the main road was already obscured. They must move quickly before the whirling winds heaped the snow into mountainous drifts. Otherwise, it could be disastrous.

From behind her, came the drone of a truck engine and turning her facing into the whipping wind, she saw the welcome sight of headlights approaching. Hastily, she huddled her students off the highway and watched as the huge truck slid to a stop near the spot where the children had been walking only a few moments earlier. The door flew open, and the driver, Walter Ward, called to them through the storm. “Come on, kids! Pile in. I’ll get you home.”

Gratefully, with teeth chattering, the children clambered aboard the warm vehicle. As Walter assisted the children, he asked the teacher “And where do you live, honey?” It was an innocent question. She was so young he’d mistaken her as one of the students.

”Well, honey-” she replied with a twinkle in her eye, ”-I just live around the corner. I’m the teacher.” It didn’t escape her attention that this thoughtful “rescuer” was strong and good-looking.

An awkward introduction, but it was a beginning. Walter and Elizabeth fell in love and married. Soon their lives revolved almost entirely around children. They had nine of their own. Three of those children - Annie, Nelly, and Matthew - grew up to become the “2nd Chapter of Acts,” one of the pioneering groups in contemporary Christian music. Much of what they set in motion continues to influence Christian music today.

To understand the impact of the 2nd Chapter of Acts’ music and ministry, it helps to reflect upon how God called them into relationship with Himself, how He filled them with His presence, and how He has worked in and through the lives of three shy, unassuming kids from North Dakota and a big guy named Buck Herring. Where did they come from? How did they get to where they are today? What was God saying through them in the ’70s and ’80s, and what is He saying through them today? Let’s go back to the beginning.

The Early Days

In the 1950s, Walter Ward worked hard as an itinerant farmer to provide a sparse living for his sprawling family. He was a happy man who loved to dance, sing, and play the harmonica. Though poor, the Wards were rich in love, fun and music. “There were many things we did not have,” Annie recalls. “Things such as indoor plumbing and other ’luxuries.’ But the one thing we did have was love. No matter what, we always knew Mom and Dad loved us.”

”I never heard my parents argue,” recalls Annie. ”They were always very kind to each other, and to us.”

Music was a major part of the Wards’ life. Annie began singing publicly at five years of age, with her older sister, Kathryn and Stephanie. They performed favorites like, “How Much Is That Doggie in the Window,” while their mom accompanied them on piano. “The Ward Sisters” sang for all sorts of rural festivities: farm co-op meetings, the dedication of a new train engine, school openings, and country church picnics.

The Catholic Church also had a great impact on Annie. It was there when says she first encountered the majesty of God. “I loved the Church,” says Annie. ”I loved to sing in the choir and to sing those Latin masses. It filled me with a tremendous sense of awe. I didn’t understand much about God, but I loved the liturgy. I loved taking communion. The only thing I didn’t love about the church was going to confession. That was a scary thing. I didn’t always tell the truth in confession, because I was too embarrassed.”

By the tenth grade, Annie knew she wanted to be a nun. A wise “sister” explained to her that to serve the Lord in that capacity required a special calling. ”Annie, unless Jesus tells you to be a nun, don’t go into the convent. In fact, you shouldn’t do anything unless the Lord tells you to do it.” Annie couldn’t fully comprehend her mentor’s words. But the message seemed important.

It was late in 1950 that Elizabeth began to complain of chronic headaches and constant physical weakness. Doctors diagnosed her as having epilepsy. Despite their best efforts, Elizabeth’s condition grew worse year after year. The family moved to California to be closer to relatives who could help in the face of Elizabeth’s deteriorating health.

In 1968, Elizabeth Ward died of a brain tumor. She had been misdiagnosed for more than a decade.

Annie was left reeling at her mother’s death. She was dabbling in drugs, searching for the meaning to life in Eastern mysticism and in New Age type religions. Nothing satisfied the inner longings of her heart. The loss of her mother intensified Annie’s sense of loneliness and meaninglessness-and it forced her to face the fleeting, fragile, nature of life.

About this time, Annie’s boyfriend, Buck Herring, committed his life to Jesus Christ. His new faith was about to make Annie face another confrontation.

A “New” Boyfriend

Buck Herring had hopes of steering a rock band into the big-time. One day, while working as a deejay at a Top-40 station, Buck received a frantic phone call from one of his band members. In a panic-stricken voice, he informed Buck that their drug supplier had “gotten religion” and was refusing to deal drugs any more! Buck was intrigued.

The deal told Buck that he’d been “filled with the Spirit,” and it was true, there was an undeniable change. To his own amazement, Buck asked if they could go to church together some time. The moment Buck walked into the church, he realized that these people were Spirit-filled, with a capital “S”. The worshippers were raising their hands to the Lord singing and speaking praise to him…out loud!

Oh! No! Buck thought. These people are nuts!

As he stood there, fighting an urge to leave, Buck also experienced a powerful stirring in his heart. The searching question came to him: Are you willing to be foolish in your own eyes-for My sake?

He pondered the implications of this query for less than a minute. Then by a simple act of his will, Buck raised his hands in the air and began to speak words of praise to Jesus.

Shortly after surrendering his life to the Lord, Buck began to sense a conflict between his faith in Christ and the lyrics of the songs that he played as a Top-40 deejay. He resigned his position at the radio station, even though he had no idea where he’d find work.

He also parted company with the rock band. He’d purchased some used recording equipment two years before, in hopes of producing demo tapes of the band. Following his commitment to Christ, he packed up the equipment and donated it all- microphones, tape deck, control board, everything- to the church where he’d given his life to Jesus.

As he was packing the equipment, Buck found himself saying out loud: “Father, I would love to produce records for Your kingdom.”

In the years to follow, God would honor Buck’s obedience by allowing him to produce all of the “2nd Chapter of Acts” albums, as well as recordings by Barry McGuire, Phil Keaggy, Matthew Ward, Annie Herring, Terry Talbot, Mike Deasy and Michael and Stormie Omartian. He also served as concert sound engineer, manager and primary spokesperson for 2nd Chapter throughout their ministry.

One of the first people Buck wanted to tell about his new commitment to Jesus was Annie Ward. They have been involved with each other previously, but the relationship had soured. By now, Annie was living in Los Angeles, working with a singing group and on the verge of breaking into a successful pop music career. Although she considered herself a “seeker of truth,” she really wasn’t interested in “Jesus stuff”. But since the death of her mom, Annie had continued searching for something to take away the haunting pain and emptiness.

For two weeks following his spiritual rebirth, Buck prayed for Annie regularly-not about a potential relationship, but out of concern for the fact that she was lost without Christ. One day, he sensed the Lord saying, “Go find her.” He drove to LA and eventually, found Annie living with the members of her singing group at the home of a famous songwriter, who was hoping to launch the group onto the charts.

Buck zealously shared his newfound faith with Annie. He briefly told her that she needed to be “born again.” Although Annie didn’t understand what he meant, she was willing to listen. He also thrust into her hands a copy of the Modern English New Testament, Good News for Modern Man. “Read this,” he said. And after praying, he left her stunned.

For more than a week, the book remained untouched. But there was something about Buck’s prayer…Annie felt as if something profound was happening deep within. Nothing in her life seemed worthwhile-not the drugs, not even the promise of fame.

Several days after Buck’s visit, Annie finally picked up the book he’d left and decided to read it-from the back! The Book of Revelation, amazingly, made sense to her. Perhaps it was the sense of majesty she’d felt as a little girl, but she saw Jesus for who He is-King of Kings and Lord of Lords!

Still pondering this Jesus of Revelation, Annie sat down at the piano and started fooling with the keys. She didn’t really know how to play, but as a child she’d learned a few basics by watching her mother play. To her surprise, she began playing and the words to a song rushed in.

Puzzled, Annie stared at the keyboard. Okay, she thought. This song did not come from me. Where did this song come from? In her mind’s eye, she pictured Jesus. He was walking toward her, and Annie had the conviction that the song had come from Him. What did this mean? Then Jesus spoke to Annie and His words seared into her heart: The only thing I am asking of you is to give your life to Me and let Me live through you.

From this unusual event, Annie was convinced of two things Jesus had given her the song, and He wanted to live through her. Meanwhile, Buck continued to pray for Annie. During the next two weeks, he also hungered for a deeper relationship with Christ. When he sought counsel from his pastor, he was told to come for prayer on Sunday morning. That Sunday, Buck experienced a deeper touch from the Holy Spirit.

The Wild Weekend

The next time Annie saw Buck, something was different about him. She was fascinated when he explained that he’d been filled with the Holy Spirit. What kind of spiritual power could change a guy like Buck? She wondered.

That night, Buck asked if he could pray for her. When she consented, he took her hand, and prayed a simple prayer.

The next morning, when Annie got up, she knew she had two items of business to take care of: She quit the singing group, and committed her life to Jesus Christ.

Annie’s commitment to Christ was total, even though it meant losing all that she had ever wanted in the music business. “Nobody told me that I had to quit everything in order to become a Christian,” Annie recalls, “but once I had made a decision to follow Christ, it seemed like the only logical choice. It was so clear: I could choose everything that I thought I ever wanted…or I could choose Jesus.”

That night, Buck and Annie went to the home of some folks Buck knew, “Jesus people” who claimed to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Annie wanted the same Spirit that had changed Buck to fill her life. A group of “Jesus people” gathered around Annie as she sat on a chair in the center of the group. They began praying for her and singing in the Spirit. Suddenly, Annie experienced a vision of heaven. She describes it like this:

”There was a myriad of people around the throne of God. The dimension was different than anything I had ever seen in this world. I saw myself in front of the twenty-four elders-though I didn’t know who or what they were then. I smelled the incense around the altar. I sensed incredible power… .

Suddenly, I saw Jesus. I loved Him so much! I started toward Him, to kiss Him, but I stopped short. Every sin I’d ever committed seemed so real. I just stood there. I could not touch Him. I couldn’t touch Him because of my dirt, my filth, my sin. Instantly-without ever being taught this-I knew that there was no way that I could ever earn His good favor. There was nothing I could do on my own in order to be acceptable in His sight. I was covered with sin and I kept thinking, How could He love me?”

To everyone’s surprise, Annie bolted from the room. Outside, she ran into an open field, where she sat down and wept. “I felt God could never love me,” she recalls, “because I had disobeyed Him and hurt Him so deeply.” At home that night, she fell asleep still asking, “How could He love me? How could He love me?” Somehow, during the night, something changed inside. ”The Lord ministered to me so beautifully and gently, that I woke up asking, ’How could He love me so much?’”

The next night, Buck and Annie attended a Bible study and prayer meeting where the leader asked them to stand and give a testimony. Buck shared a few facts about his and Annie’s spiritual journey. “All I know,” said Annie, when it was her turn, “is that I love Jesus. And Jesus loves me.” It was her first public testimony. Simple words of a new faith.

Dying to Past Loves

The Monday morning following Annie’s spiritual renaissance, she met with one of the top movers and shakers in LA’s music industry. His offer was a stunner-everything that Annie had ever wanted as a performer: a package-deal contract, and the promise that he would groom her to be a star in the entertainment industry. Annie saw her choices clearly: ”Inside I heard the Lord say, ’He’s right. You can have everything you’ve ever wanted-or, you can have Me.’

”But, because I had ’seen’ the Lord, what choice did I have? In my heart I said, Lord, I’ll take you.”

When Annie refused the offer, the man was confused. ”Let me know if you ever change your mind,” he said as he rose to leave. “I won’t,”: Annie replied, “but thanks just the same.”

Two days later, she found herself reading the psalmist’s words: “I have been young, and now I am old: Yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, or his descendants begging bread” (Psalm 37:25). A short time later, she got a call from the president of one of the largest secular record companies in the world. “Annie, we’d really like to do an album with you,” he said. ”Thank you,” Annie replied sweetly, “but I’m not going to be singing that kind of music any more. I’ve given my life to the Lord. I’m going to be singing for Jesus.”

The man was incredulous. “Oh, sure. I’ve heard that before. You’ll come running back. And when you do, I will not even mention this to you. You just come back.” ”No,” Annie said politely, “I just read today that the Lord will provide for those who trust in Him, and I believe it. But thank you.” When Annie hung up, she was only vaguely aware of what she had begun. Through a series of deliberate choices, Annie Ward was dying to herself and was beginning to live for Jesus.

SIMPLE FAITH

It was a simple wedding, held in a backyard with only a few people attending. Buck and Annie married in February of 1969. Annie made her own Irish-linen wedding gown, with white embroidered crosses on the sleeves. Annie’s sister Kathryn was the Maid of honor, and Buck’s friend Noel Paul Stookey was the Best man.

The newlyweds became part of an informal prayer group that met regularly on Tuesday nights. They had no pastor or teacher to lead them, so the group shared a meal, sang, discussed scripture and prayed for each other. It was a fresh, free, spontaneous and energetic form of worship.

Soon they were running out of space. Buck and Annie found an old Hollywood mansion in need of repair. The rent was $500 a month. The place was huge-with an enormous living room, six bedrooms, and four-and-a-half baths. The Herrings furnished the house with discount furniture that Buck remembers as “seriously ugly, but comfortable.”

Buck had purchased an old upright piano for fifty dollars and had given it to Annie as a present in the first few months of their marriage. Although the keys were yellowed and nearly half the ivories were missing, when the Herrings moved into the Hollywood house, “Brother Bear,” as they later dubbed the piano, came along. “Buck and Annie’s place” became the gathering spot for the prayer group. Dozens of people came to know Jesus at those home meetings, launching the ministries of many musicians, pastors and missionaries.

Although they were living on a shoestring budget, the Herrings never asked for money to help support the meetings in their home. Nor did they ever inform anyone of their financial need. And somehow God always supplied. Frequently, just as the rent came due, they would unexpectedly find cash on the fireplace mantle following a Tuesday night fellowship.

Trouble At Home

In the summer of 1970, Buck and Annie’s lives suffered a serious blow. Two years earlier, as the grieving family stood around Elizabeth Ward’s gravesite, Annie’s dad had told her, “n two years time, I’ll be right beside her.” Nearly two years to the day, he died of leukemia.

Annie had visited him prior to his death, and as he sat up in bed, racked with pain, Walter Ward prayed to receive Jesus Christ as his Savior. Then in his first act as a newborn Christian, he prayed for the salvation of his family. He could not have imagined how his prayer would be answered.

Following their father’s funeral, the family agreed that the four youngest children should move in with their older brothers and sisters. Two went to live with Annie’s oldest brother. Nelly and Matthew, who were 14 and 12 at the time, moved in with Buck and Annie. The Herring’s had been married for less than a year-and-a-half.

The trauma of losing both their parents, combined with the pressures of being thrust into an “instant” family, took its toll on both the Wards and the Herrings.

From Nelly and Matthew’s perspective, Annie had moved away from home while they were small children. Their new “mother” was a 23-year old sister they hardly knew. Their father figure was a big, brusque, bear of a man whom they’d only just met. “I think we were both numb,” says Matthew of the decision to live with the Herrings. ”We had just buried Dad and it really didn’t matter after that… It didn’t make any difference where we moved.”¹

Buck and Annie, however, had been praying for Matthew and Nelly long before their father’s death. Their welcome was a foregone conclusion. Although they had little money to provide for Nelly and Matthew the Herrings were excited. “I just knew that they would have a future, says Annie, “and I knew that Buck would be good for them.”

At first, Buck and Matthew weren’t so certain. Buck was a strict disciplinarian, “verging on legalism.” Matthew possessed an incredibly quick wit, and Buck too-often mistook his comments for insubordination. Actually, Matthew was merely relating in the only manner he knew. Buck and Matthew’s conflicting personalities made for a volatile mix. Buck’s sternness with Matthew negatively affected Nelly, as well. After all, Matt was her brother; she barely knew the brute who was badgering him. Her compassionate spirit caused her to rise up in sympathy for Matthew, while she inwardly bristled at Buck for being so overbearing.

Nelly and Matthew, as well as Annie and Buck, are quick to credit “the grace of God and the lubricating oil of the Holy Spirit” as their secret to surviving these family frictions. Moreover, the tensions began to ease after both Nelly and Matthew came into a personal relationship with Christ. Still, Buck was often baffled in his attempts to discipline Matthew. “I made innumerable mistakes in my early dealings with Matthew,” recalls Buck. “Finally, I told the Lord this was obviously not working and He gave me some wisdom in what to do.” The turning point in their relationship came when Matthew brought home a series of pink slips from school, indicating the he’d disrupted the class.

Spanking failed, and Buck felt at wit’s end. “How am I ever going to get through to this kid?” he lamented. He needed a new approach, and he prayed for wisdom.

After praying, he took Matthew outside the house and drew a three-foot by six-foot rectangle on the ground. ”I want you to dig a hole here,” he pointed to the rectangle, “six feet deep.” Matthew was shocked, but dutifully he began digging. Years later, Matthew recalled, “I thought of running away, but where would I go? I didn’t have anywhere to go, and I didn’t have any money. So I stayed there and dug.”

As Matthew was digging, the Lord revealed to Buck that the hole was to be a grave. Finally, Matthew finished. Buck inspected the plot and said, “You’ve done a good job. Now to into your room and write on a piece of paper all the things you want to ’die’ to. I don’t want to see the paper. I don’t need to know what’s on it. It’s between you and the Lord. Then bring it out and I’ll help you bury it.”

Matthew retreated to his room to write his “spiritual obituary”. Half an hour later, he and Buck shoveled dirt back into the hole, burying the paper. It was the beginning a healing process in their relationship.

The Gift of Music

One day, Annie sat on the piano stool in from of “Brother Bear,” wishing she could have learned to play when she was a child. With nine siblings, lessons were a luxury the family could ill afford. The best she could manage was to fool with the keys. And then, to her amazement Annie found herself playing a melody. But how? The chords and notes flowed out, as if the Lord was literally giving her a gift of music. “At first,” says Annie, “I’d get these beautiful melodies and I’d ask Buck to write the lyrics to go with them.” One day, Buck replied, “Annie don’t think about writing a song-just sing whatever’s in your heart.”

It was this encouragement that opened the way to Annie’s simple, and deeply intimate songs of praise and adoration. To this day, she continues to write in much the same way. “I’m not a songwriter,” she protests modestly. “I’m a song receiver. I start playing, and the music comes.”

When Nelly and Matthew came to live with Buck and Annie, they discovered a comfort and closeness in joining Annie around the piano after school. Their voices blended together in spontaneous, smooth harmonies, so tight, so natural. Was it just that the Ward kids had similar genes-or was there another explanation?

Matthew offers: “I used to listen to a lot of AM radio when I was a kid and I learned to do harmony by singing a different note than the guy on the radio. I’d sing with everything. I’d even sing with Mom’s vacuum cleaner as it whirred back and forth across the carpet, changing its pitch. I’d harmonize with anything that oscillated-washing machines, or whatever. You could say I learned to sing harmony from household appliances!”

In addition to Annie’s special gift and Matthew’s offbeat vocalizing, Nelly possessed an amazing ability to find the missing notes between her brother and sister. When this trio sang together, their sound was almost angelic.

The Wards and Herrings never intended to become a professional singing group. “We were just singing to the Lord,” says Matthew, “and it was a way of releasing our pain. We had gone through something tragic but we knew there was a light at the end of the tunnel.”²

Annie agrees. “When we started singing together, there was such a healing, such a joy in our hearts, that we didn’t want to take it outside of our own living room. It was a healing balm to us. Precious. Personal. Something that was ours.” It would seem however, that the Lord had other plans.

A Fresh Start

One day as Annie, Nelly and Matthew were singing around the piano, they stopped to pray, which was a regular practice. As they prayed that day, they sensed that they were getting a personal message from the Lord.

As Annie remembers: “He said we were three small streams, but when we came together to sing we would be a mighty river. That river would uproot things in people’s hearts that had been buried—the way that rushing water uproots things-and cleans things out, and opens things up. He promised that we would sing as one voice.”

Yet, the trio remained shy about performing in public. They sang in church when called upon, and in local Christian coffeehouses at the insistence of friends. But that was the limit. “The last thing we wanted to do was to sing in front of people,” explains Annie. “We never thought ’Oh, boy! Let’s get out there and do concerts!’ It was always, ’Oh no! We’ve got to go out there’.’ We felt that way throughout our years of ministry together. We were scared, shy, and very aware of our inadequacies. The good part was that it forced us to rely upon the Lord.”

About this time, Eddie Overstreet, the Herring’s former housemate, wanted to record a song he’d written. Buck arranged for some excellent studio musicians, most of who were friends, and they went into the studio to record the music track for a song titled, “Jesus Is.” The track turned out so well that Eddie felt it was beyond his own vocal ability, and he agreed with Buck that they should find someone else to sing the song-but who?

Buck played the track for a number of their friends and all agreed that it was a “fun, happening” song. But who could they get to sing it? Then one day as Buck and Annie were driving along in their car, they looked at each other and said almost simultaneously, “Why don’t we have Matthew sing it!”

On Matthew’s 13th birthday, Matthew recorded the lead vocal. Annie and Nelly sang background vocals along with many of their friends. It was a “fun” song, and eventually it caught the attention of Pat Boone, who arranged a contract with MGM Records for the release of ”Jesus Is.” In 1972, the family’s recording career was officially born.

What Kind of Name Is That?

While working in the recording studio, editing a secular commercial, Buck heard a phrase go through his mind: The 2nd Chapter of Acts. Later, he described it as “the nearest I’ve ever come to hearing God speak in an audible voice. “It wasn’t like I should go read this chapter,” says Buck. “It was clearly to be the group’s name.” “I had read that passage of Scripture before, but I didn’t have a good idea of what it was about. I didn’t want to forget it, so I took a studio grease pencil and wrote ’The 2nd Chapter of Acts’ on the front of the tape machine.”

Buck couldn’t wait to get home from work that night to share the name with the family. Their reaction, however, was somewhat less than enthusiastic. “What?” they chorused. “What kind of a name is that?”

”That’s an awful name,” Annie lamented. ”It doesn’t even let anyone know we’re a family.” Matthew objected, ”People will think we are a play!”

But Buck was imperious. He knew he had heard from God. “Okay, go get your Bibles,” he suggested, ”and go to your rooms and let’s all read Acts, chapter two. Ask God about it. Then come back and let’s meet together in fifteen or twenty minutes.”

The family spread throughout the big house and began to study the passage. When they reappeared, their response was one of resignation rather than overwhelming enthusiasm. They reluctantly agreed, “Okay, if that’s what we’re supposed to be, that’s it. We’ll be the 2nd Chapter of Acts.”

Over the years, the name proved to be both a blessing and an obstacle. True, it had a fresh, contemporary sound. But it also barred them from singing for some of the largest, mainline denominations in America. “People were afraid we’d come in and start speaking in tongues or something,” laughs Buck.

”From our viewpoint, being called ’The 2nd Chapter of Acts’ didn’t have anything to do with speaking in tongues, or being filled with the Holy Spirit, or any other phenomena commonly perceived as ’Charismatic,’” Buck explains. “But it occurred to us, that if you were cast adrift and you had only Acts 2, you’d have it all. The prophecy of Jesus’ coming, the fulfillment of the prophecy, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, the birth of the Church, the activity of the early Church as it began to function-it’s all there in one chapter. It’s the ’Reader’s Digest’ version of the Bible. “It was never a banner we were waving, concerning the baptism of the Holy Spirit. It was meant to portray the whole life and ministry of the Church. And that’s what we felt we were about.”

If their new identity felt awkward to Annie, Nelly and Matthew, it was soon to become a household name to millions of Christian music lovers.

SEEDS OF MINISTRY

By the time Barry McGuire met “The 2nd Chapter of Acts,” he had tasted the best and the worst of the music business. His music had taken his group, “The New Christy Minstrels,” and their idyllic ballad “Green Green” to the top of the charts. And then his career skyrocketed with the 1965 solo hit, “Eve of Destruction.”

Unfortunately, Barry’s personal life was also on the precipice of destruction during this time. He later described his life as a “triple-X-rated horror story,” filled with alcohol and drugs.³

McGuire dropped out of the music scene, and spent the next two years with the Agape Force, a group of Jesus People who helped him become established in the Lord. Soon, with new songs to sing Barry began looking for a producer to help record the best, Christ-honoring album possible. His search boiled down to two individuals: one, a highly successful secular producer; the other Buck Herring. Though he’d become a respected studio engineer, Buck had yet to produce an album. Barry prayed, then called him.

Buck invited Barry to bring some songs over to the big house in Hollywood. After a few brief formalities, Barry explained how he felt that God had led him to seek Buck’s help in producing his next album. Buck asked Barry if he could hear some of the songs and Barry gladly got out his guitar and began singing.

Laughing, Buck recollects, “When Barry started singing, the house shook! He was banging his guitar and thumping out the beat with his foot as he sang, ’I don’t know what you come to do, but I come to praise the Lord!’. It was great.”

Before long, two pairs of eyes peeked around the corner of the stairway. Buck motioned for Nelly and Matthew to come down, as Barry sang several more songs. When Barry finished, Buck suggested, “Now that Matthew and Nelly are awake, why don’t you guys sing a song for Barry?”

Barry later confessed that he expected the worst. What have I gotten into? he thought. Now this little family is going to sing. Another can-we-have-our-kids-sing-for-you? How many times have I heard that line before? But as he looked at the skinny, bashful kids gathering around the beat-up piano, he though, ”Well, praise the Lord anyway.” He settled into a chair and attempted to appear as interested as possible.

Annie, Nelly and Matthew began to sing. Barry was stunned. He’d listened to thousands of singers, but he’d never heard anything like this before! Crystal clear harmonies. Lyrics that sounded inspired in heaven. When the trio finished, tears were streaming down his face.

That night, Barry invited them to sing background vocals on his new album. Seeds, was one of the groundbreaking recordings in contemporary Christian music.

Besides working together on the album, 2nd Chapter of Acts and Barry McGuire committed themselves to do a series of concerts. The logical place to start was Sacramento, where Buck had been a popular radio personality. It was also there the “Acts” achieved moderate success, as their second MGM single; “I’m So Happy” soared into the top five on the local charts. And of course, Barry was still well known because of his secular hits. The concert was sure to succeed. In fact, they lost money. Nevertheless, it was the start of something big.

Divine Appointments

In order to have enough material to do their part of the concert, “Acts” had to hire some musicians and rehearse a few songs. Annie had written several new songs, that she had received from the Lord, and afterwards some members of the band suggested to Buck that they record them. Buck shrugged, “I don’t have any money.”

When the band insisted, the whole troupe went into a studio. This recording session gave us some of the ”2nd Chapter’s” first classics-including “Love, Peace, Joy,” ”I Fall In Love,” and “Going Home.” One song from this session seemed to have a special quality. Annie had titled it, “Easter Song.” “Easter Song” was one of those that “just came out,” Annie recalls. “At first, I didn’t think it was much of a song. I loved it, but I didn’t think it was a song for us. I thought it was a choir song. I even said to the Lord, ’Oh Father, that sounds like a song that a lot of people should sing.’

”I was talking with our friends Jimmy and Carol Owens one day. We had been on tour with them in ’Come Together,’ a musical they’d written. I thought Jimmy might be interested and I said, ’I have this little song. You might not even like it,”

When Annie played “Easter Song,” Jimmy Owens was jubilant. “You don’t want to give that song to anybody. You need to record it!” Teeming with confidence, Annie took the song to the band members who, at first, did not share Jimmy’s enthusiasm. Drummer, David Kemper whined wistfully, “I don’t hear any drums on that song. I just can’t hear it.” “David!” Buck’s voice boomed. “You don’t hear any drums on it? Just play! Play something. Do it!” David did. He sat down and put a different drum pattern to the song, taking it out of the choir realm where Annie had first heard it and pulling it into a lilting rhythm that no only 2nd Chapter could sing, but the whole world could sing.

The song was to undergo a transformation from the way Annie first heard it. Drummer David Kemper added a rhythm and eventually Michael Omartian, another friend of the family, added the lively keyboard track that made the song unforgettable.

Omartian’s involvement on “Easter Song” began a long-term relationship. Throughout the early years of ”Acts” ministry, Annie roughed out the songs, and Michael wrote the charts for the musicians before going into the studio. Buck once said, “When the Lord gives Annie a song, it’s like a rough-hewn diamond, dug out of the ground. We give it to Michael, and he cuts it and polishes it and puts it in the right piece of jewelry.”

In Annie’s estimation, “Michael is such a musical genius. He has perfect pitch, and the ability to play almost any instrument. He’s really a virtuoso, and compared to him I could hardly play at all. Back then he’d get so tickled at me. He’d say, ’This song is wrong. You’re not supposed to be able to do these chords. But I love it! It’s wrong, but it’s great.’ He’d also say, ’You play the piano wrong, too. It’s wrong-but it’s fine…how do you do that?’”

Another person who was impressed by “Easter Song” was record executive, Billy Ray Hearn. Hearn had begun Myrrh, a new contemporary Christian record label owned by Word. When he first heard “Easter Song’” he said, ”Now that’s what Christian music is supposed to sound like!”

Growing Pains

When Buck sent a copy of the newly recorded Seeds album to Billy Ray Hearn, he immediately recognized the record’s enormous potential. When Billy Ray came out to the Herring home to discuss the deal, Buck played him some of the songs that 2nd Chapter had been working on. One of those songs was “Easter Song.”

Because of the difficulties “Acts” had experienced in doing Christian music for a secular record company, Buck had obtained their release from MGM. Within a few months, Hearn had signed them to do their first album for Myrrh. ”The 2nd Chapter of Acts” and Barry McGuire continued touring together, which was both exhilarating and frightening for the inexperienced trio. At first, the group merely stood on-stage and sang, rarely sharing anything from their hearts. Buck believed that in order to be “spiritual,” the music needed to be spontaneous. Consequently, he wanted to change the order of songs every night;, which kept them feeling even more unsure of themselves.

McGuire attempted to intercede, “But Buck, last night everything just felt so good .” “Sure,” Buck responded, ”but God may want to do something different tonight.”

Another factor that contributed to “Acts” early inhibitions was audience response. During Barry’s set, the audience sang along, clapped and cheered. When ”2nd Chapter” began singing-”Going Home” was their opener-the audience grew strangely silent. “We thought everybody had gone home!” Annie jokes. “That would really have shaken our confidence-if we’d had any.”

Several concerts into the tour, somebody approached Annie and said, “We’re really sorry we didn’t applaud-but we’ve never heard music like that before!” Many others expressed that they had never before experienced worship so keenly.

As Nelly reflects: “One of the reasons people didn’t applaud was because we weren’t singing songs about Jesus, we were singing to Him. When people recognized that, they sensed His Spirit. They could see Jesus, and they fell in love with Him.”

Despite the awkward beginnings, “Acts” and Barry McGuire continued to tour together intermittently for three years. Through his example, Barry taught the group how to communicate with an audience. “Just be yourselves,” he’d encourage them. “Be who God has called you to be.” Barry’s words fell upon fertile soil. “He taught us so much,” says Annie. ”He’s the best communicator I’ve ever known.”

Besides the spiritual power of their music, other factors catapulted “Acts” into the public spotlight. First, touring with Barry exposed them to a built-in audience each concert. Second, “Easter Song” was getting airplay on secular radio stations as well as the few contemporary Christian programs that existed them. Too, their album, With Footnotes had taken off. By 1973, they entered the music ministry full-time. For the next twenty years, they would travel across America, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and Western Europe singing about Jesus.

Today, aspiring Christian musicians often ask them how they too can “make it” in Christian music. Buck says, “I ask them, ’Do you feel you are to have a music ministry?’ If they say ’Yes,” I ask, ’Are you willing to have music ministry even if you never leave your own church, or your own home town?’ If they hedge here, I’ll ask, ’Are you looking for a music ministry or are you just looking for a career in music?’

”If you really want to have a music ministry, stay on your face before the Lord, and let God raise you up to use you the way He wants to.”

Bringing the Band Together

Early on, “Acts” felt the need to have their own band. Nelly’s close friend, Jamie Owens told them about a group of musicians at Church on the Way in Van Nuys. ”They practice a lot,” said Jamie, “but sometimes they don’t even play-they just pray.” That was good enough for Buck. He approached the band and asked them to pray about working with 2nd Chapter. “We already have,” they responded, “and the answer is ’Yes!’”

Since the members of 2nd Chapter also worshipped at the same church, the result was a spiritual unity between the singers and the band members. Later the Lord revealed to them a principle from the life of Abraham. Buck explains, “When Abraham went to rescue his nephew Lot from the enemy, he took members of his own household with him to help. Similarly, the Lord showed us that we were to go out against the enemy with a band called David.”

The result was a spiritual joining of forces between ”Acts” and “A Band Called David.” Perhaps the one person who influenced the “Acts” more profoundly than anyone else was the unassuming pastor of Church on the Way, Jack Hayford. The group began attending Church on the Way when the congregation was less than one hundred strong. (Today, the congregation numbers in the thousands.) “He helped us understand who we are, how to minister, and how to order our priorities,” says Buck. ”Jack Hayford taught us principles of spiritual integrity, and how to avoid the snares of the enemy.”

Indirectly, Jack Hayford also inspired one of 2nd Chapter’s most adventurous albums, The Roar of Love, based on C. S. Lewis’s classic stories, The Chronicles of Narnia. As Buck and Annie were driving to a camp where they were to minister together, Hayford suddenly said, “Annie, you need to read about Narnia!” Annie had read other works of C. S. Lewis, but was unfamiliar with the Chronicles. When she returned home, she immediately purchased a set and devoured all seven books in one sitting!

Over several years she collected enough songs for an album, centering around Lewis’s story, “The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. It would be some time, however, before the album ever was released. But change was in the wind.

Stop, Look and Listen

In 1976, “The 2nd Chapter of Acts” arrived at a crossroads: “Should we or should we not continue?” was the question. Prior to this, the ministry of “Acts” had grown out of the Herring-Ward family relationships. Nelly and Matthew had been drawn into the ministry primarily because of those relationships, and they’d been happy to comply. They’d faithfully helped Annie and Buck pursue the vision God had given to them. Now, however, as they approached adulthood, Nelly and Matt felt it was time to discern what God’s will and call involved for themselves.

Furthermore, the family sensed that the “group” had in many ways become an entity of its own. They were no longer the Herrings and the Wards; they had become ”The 2nd Chapter of Acts.” As Nelly explains, ”It got to the point where we didn’t know if we were ’The 2nd Chapter of Acts,’ or if ’Acts’ was us. We were almost becoming a machine-the ministry was taking over the family, instead of being an extension of the family. It was like the tail wagging the dog.”³

Annie sensed the subtle shift, as well. “I felt I was becoming more of a part of a group, rather than Buck’s wife. Buck had been doing his best to be fair by treating each of us the same. But I said, ’Wait a minute! I’m not the drummer. I’m not Matthew or Nelly. I’m your wife, and you are damaging our relationship by trying to treat us all the same.’

Consequently, “Acts” took time off to seek God, to grow in their relationships with each other and to clarify the call upon their lives. This did not mean sitting idle, though. For several weeks, Annie, Buck, Nelly and Matthew toured as part of Jimmy and Carol Owens’s popular, bicentennial musical, “If My People.” After three weeks on the road, Buck returned home to produce Phil Keaggy’s album, Love Broke Through. A few weeks later, Annie and Matthew came home. Nelly decided to stay. While on the tour she met and got to know a young singer named Steve Greisen. They would marry in 1978.

It was during the ’76 sabbatical that “Acts” met another singer-songwriter who would profoundly influence their lives. Keith Green and “Acts” met while working together on a Terry Talbot album. Their friendship blossomed when Keith came to Matthew’s birthday party at the Herring’s new home in Burbank.

Buck recalls, “We had a rented harpsichord in the living room, and an antique, grand piano in the bedroom. Keith sat down at the harpsichord and began praising the Lord with some of his high-energy music. Before long, the whole party started doing a sort of spiritual ’bunny-hop,’ winding around the room. The line danced out the sliding doors of our living room, across the patio, then in through the sliding doors of our bedroom, down the hallway and back into the living room. Keith was playing in the living room, but as soon as the group would go through the sliding doors, he’d jump off the stool, race to the bedroom, and start pounding on the antique piano, just as the group came bouncing through the bedroom doors. He barely missed a measure. “That was Keith - high energy. He could just roll right over you…in love, of course.”

Later, Keith wanted Buck to produce his albums, but Buck declined. “Keith, if you and I went into the studio together, it would be a war.” “Hey, that’s alright,” said Keith. “There’s a lot of creative energy that comes out of that. You don’t have to agree all the time.” “No, Keith. I don’t want to do that. If I go into the studio, I want it to be a pleasant experience.”

Buck prayed about Keith’s album, though, and felt that he should recommend a producer to him. “Look, Keith, I know a guy named Bill Maxwell. He worked with Andraé Crouch. I’ll call him and introduce you to him. He’ll do a good job for you.” Buck’s introduction turned out to be a fantastic musical match. Bill produced all of Keith’s Christian albums, which became classics.

Back to Work

By the end of the 1976 break, “Acts” had redefined their ministry. Both questions, “Should we continue?” and “Do you feel that God has called you to this work?” were answered in the affirmative by everyone. Furthermore, by taking the year off from touring as a group, they’d learned a number of personal lessons: how to better appreciate each other, and how to allow each person freedom to be himself. Consequently, 1976 marked a major turning point in their ministry.

Following their recommitment, “Acts” went back into the studio to record The Roar of Love. Says Annie, “For the first time we had fun in the studio, and that came from a new sense of freedom and release.” Part of the fun could be attributed to the fact that the studio in which they recorded the vocals did not have a window through which Buck could see the singers. Normally, while recording, Matthew loved to ”cut up,” laughing and goofing off until the second the ”Record” mode was triggered. Yet because of his incredible vocal ability, he could still hit his notes. Meanwhile, Annie and Nelly would be convulsing in laughter, and Buck would be fuming in the control room. On The Roar of Love, since Buck couldn’t see the singers, he never knew what was going on behind the partition.

Although the album was completed, the release date of The Roar of Love would be long delayed by contractual and copyright problems. Yet, the detours proved to be providential.

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The 2^nd Chapter of Acts Story

Part 2

Birds of a Feather

About that time, Billy Ray Hearn left Myrrh to begin building a new record company, intent upon ministry. He phoned Buck one day to ask him if he had any ideas for a name for this new company. “We’re thinking of ’Chalice Records,’” said Billy Ray. ”What do you think?”

Buck thought for a while before suggesting “Sparrow.” Why Sparrow? ”It’s a bird that can fly high, but there’s a humility in the sparrow, and simplicity,” Buck explains. ”The Bible says the Lord’s eye is on the sparrow.”

When Sparrow began, “Acts” was among the first of many artists to sign-on. The albums Through a Child’s Eyes (Annie’s first solo album), Mansion Builder, and The Roar of Love (which they were finally free to release) quickly followed.

Matthew also recorded his first solo album for Sparrow. The album was intended to be titled Matthew 18, a humorous “take-off” from the name, “2nd Chapter of Acts,” and referring to the fact that Matthew was then eighteen years old. A series of delays held up the album’s release, and it was finally re-titled, Toward Eternity.

Despite the delays, Matthew’s first solo project produced some powerful music, including songs like ”Hold On,” “It’s Alright,” ”Noah’s Song,” “Angels Unaware,” and ”Summer Snow.” Several songs on the album were written especially for Matthew by renowned songwriters such as Michael Omartian and Keith Green. Beyond that, the album was the first project on which Matthew enjoyed freedom to experiment with his wide-ranging vocal styles. “Some people say I sound like two different people between the “Acts” albums and my own solo work,” says Matthew. “In a sense, that’s true. In the “Acts” arrangements, I was always singing the third. And, I wrote very little of the material, especially in the early days. On my own projects, I do a lot of different things.”

Their relationship with the founders of Sparrow Records was one of the most influential factors in the “Acts” ministry. Annie and Buck readily acknowledged the impact of Billy Ray Hearn and his wife, Joan, both upon the group and in their personal lives. They’re one of the most sensitive couples we’ve ever met,” says Annie. “Our whole purpose was to minister, and the Hearns understood that. Billy Ray desired to start a record company of music ministries, not just Christian recording artists.”

Buck credits Bill Ray with teaching him the record business. ”The wonderful thing I quickly learned about Billy Ray was that I could trust him. When we first signed with him at Myrrh, I knew nothing about the record business, so I asked a lot of questions. And Billy Ray always gave me an honest answer. Even if the answer was not in his best interests, he always told me the truth.”

Radical Stands

Because they refused to “go with the flow,” “Acts” was often perceived as a “radical” group. Actually, much of their “stance” just ran counter to the direction they perceived Christian music to be heading, toward commercialism and to a focus on “Christian super-stars.” ”We created real problems for Sparrow in the early days, “Buck recalls, “because we didn’t want to be interviewed by certain magazines, or be on the cover. We didn’t want to do anything that smacked of self-promotion. We didn’t think it was right to use superlatives, because those drew comparisons. All we wanted our record company to do was to put out the information: ’The 2nd Chapter of Acts has a new album.’ That doesn’t make it easy for a company to promote a product. ”I would much prefer the days of our beginnings to what we have now,” Buck continues. “There wasn’t anybody clamoring to do what we did, or what ’Love Song’ or any of the other early ’Jesus Music’ groups did. There were no ’charts’ for us to be number one on. Contemporary Christian music charts didn’t exist. I think it’s sad that, today, Christian music has become an industry rather than a ministry. I don’t really know the answer to this—We used to fight against it continually, and we got ourselves into a lot of hot water. We tried to avoid those things that, in our view, were not edifying to the Body of Christ. “Now, we have so many magazines, music charts, and popularity contests, it all has the potential to put ministries in competition with each other, rather than coming alongside and working together for Jesus.”

For a similar reason, throughout their ministry, “Acts” usually shunned most of the major Christian music festivals. Besides being a sound-technician’s nightmare, the outdoor concerts did not lend themselves to their concept of their ministry. “We always felt that we were the strolling violinists walking by the table where the two lovers-Jesus and His Bride-were seated,” Buck reveals. “Our role was to encourage the romance. But it’s tough to be romantic with Frisbees whizzing by your head. Consequently, we felt our ministry was more effective indoors.”

An “Acts” concert was designed to usher the audience into a worship experience. Annie notes, “We believed God had called us to be a wooer of the Body of Christ, so they could come and be loved by Jesus and be healed.”

In the early years, the emphasis was primarily upon evangelism, but then the Lord led “Acts” into a broader ministry, building up believers. Buck contends, “One of the greatest revelations we received from the Lord was that we were not primarily called to preach people into the Kingdom-although we almost always provided some sort of opportunity to meet Him. In most every concert, people did. Bunt we felt He was telling us simply to let people see Him, and let them enjoy His love, and new believers would be born into the Kingdom of God.”

Annual Check-up

”Acts” sensitivity to the Spirit’s leading was not accidental or peripheral. Throughout their ministry, they would gather each January to pray and seek God’s priorities for that year’s ministry. Annie recalls: “Some years, He’d tell us, ’You are going to be planting. You will be harvesting in three years, but this year you are going to plant.’ Another year He’d say, ’This year you are going to be ushering people into the presence of the Holy Spirit,’ or “This year is going to be a year of deliverance.’”

One such “word” came to the family during a time of prayer in 1977. They sensed the Lord telling them that, starting in 1978, they should no longer depend upon ticket sales for support of the ministry, but that they were to return to doing “offering only” concerts. God promised that He would meet all of their needs if they would trust Him. This was no small step of faith, considering the enormous expense of putting twelve people and equipment on the road from city to city, plus supporting the groups members and families. In addition, ”Acts” determined that the offerings should be divided equally between the local concert sponsors and themselves. If a sponsor did not receive enough to pay expenses, 2nd Chapter would take money from their portion of the offering to reimburse the promoter.

That year, every need was met. ”Acts” ministered to more people than ever before-their audiences nearly doubled in number, and more people came to know Jesus than in any previous year of their ministry.

Spiritual Battles

Prayer was an important key to “Acts” success. Each morning while on tour, the group gathered in one of their hotel rooms to read a brief passage from the Bible, to share from their hearts, and to pray together. “One of the reasons we did this in the morning,” says Annie, “was because by the time we got to the concert hall, there was so much to do, too many distractions.”

Still, when the 2nd Chapter of Acts bus and truck arrived at the auditorium, prayer took priority over unloading. “We’d gather in a circle on stage and pray again. We’d asked for protection, so nobody would get hurt. We’d pray over the auditorium, too, to establish the Kingdom of God there,” Annie recounts. “Then right before the concert, we’d have one more short time of prayer-a ’flare prayer’ we called it. We’d always invite the stagehands to join us, and many of them did. Some of them came to know Jesus.”

Because of their emphasis upon worship and exalting the Name of Jesus, “Acts” often found themselves thrust into spiritual warfare, even before the concert began. Again, there were no “how-tos.” ”There were no pat formulas,” says Annie. ”We just attempted to stay sensitive to the Holy Spirit. When we encountered evil, we dealt with it by pleading the blood of Jesus.”

On one occasion, “Acts” was scheduled to minister in a movie theater. The same complex housed several other theaters, in which the owners where showing raunchy films. As Buck recalls, “As was our custom, we took time to seek the Lord before the concert. But as we prayed, we just felt slimy. Then the Lord spoke to us and told us to proclaim the blood of Jesus. “We began to pray-loudly, in the name of Jesus, against any evil principalities and powers in that place. As we did, a horrible odor permeated the auditorium. It had not been there before we began praying. But as we continued praying, the odor went away. That night, the largest number of people to date came to Jesus during the concert.”

Texas Transition

In 1981, “Acts” moved from California to Texas. The group had been seeking some space where they could build homes, as well as a central headquarters for their ministry. Also, they wanted a more central location, so they could redesign their touring schedule, hoping to cover the country in shorter tours. It would also enable Nelly and Steve Greisen, married three years now, to spend more time with their son, Andrew.

During the summer of 1980, the group visited their friends, Keith and Melody Green at the new headquarters of Last Days Ministries in Lindale, Texas. A piece of property next to Last Days was for sale, and before long the 2nd Chapter of Acts and Last Days were neighbors.

The group had been living in Texas slightly more than a year when tragedy struck. Their good friend, Keith Green, was killed in a plane crash, along with two of the Green’s children and nine others. “Acts” was in New York, ministering at a street crusade with evangelist, David Wilkerson, when they heard the news. “Keith’s death rocked us,” says Annie. “We all felt our vulnerability like we never had before. We just wanted to wrap our arms around Melody and the others at Last Days, to let them know how much we cared.”

Looking back, Buck believes a high standard for all of Christian music was lost at Keith’s death. ”I think Christian music would certainly be different,” Buck says, slowly and quietly. His love for his friend is obvious. “And probably it would be better had Keith not been killed. The music ministers would be better because Keith held up such a high standard. It required everyone else to raise their level of integrity, to measure up.”

Annie remembers a softer side of their friend. “In 1981, Buck and I lost a baby because of a tubal pregnancy. It was one of the toughest times of our lives. We had to fly home empty-handed, with heavy hearts. When we deplaned at the airport in Dallas, there were Keith and Melody and another friend. Winkey Pratney. They’d brought Keith’s bus to pick us up at the airport. When we arrived at our home, there were flowers all over the house, and a huge sign that said Welcome Home!”

Restorative Surgery

In 1983, “Acts” took a full year off from touring, to seek new strength, new direction. This break was far different from the one they’d taken years before. They had no question about continuing as a group; it was a matter of stopping the hectic travel pace long enough for the Lord to do some restorative work.

As Buck recalls, “God told us, ’I have some surgery I want to do on you and you need to hold still.’ Holding still meant not running all over the country, but to be at home where He could communicate with us on a more personal level.”

Although they spent the time at home, 1983 was still a busy year. They built their own recording studio that year. The same morning the studio was finished, “Acts” began cutting tracts for the album Singer-Sower, which contained songs such as “Takin The Easy Way,” ”Spin Your Light,” and “Room Noise.”

For Matthew, 1983 was a very important year; he and Deanne Paul were married in September. For the Greisens, the rest allowed them time to enjoy parenting. As Nelly recalls, her family came to the forefront of her priority list. ”The Lord was showing me that He cares about every detail of my life. My ministry to God is not just standing in front of people singing. My ministry to Him is simply to have a heart filled with love and gratitude to Him, expressed in whatever task I’m doing. “God is far more concerned about who we are-our character-than what we’re doing. Far more concerned with our attitudes than our actions. ”I think wives and mothers especially need to understand this, because we deal so much with the mundane. Being a mother is very important to God and is a high position in His eyes. We are the hand of Jesus to our children. They learn about God by seeing our commitment to Him, lived out in our homes. We can be pillars of strength to our husbands as we help release the gifts God has placed in them. And we do this by being consistent and available with our love.”

Motivating Messages

When “Acts” returned to the road in 1984, they felt revived in every sense. “When we went back out in 1984, we were amazed that the arena of Christian music had changed so much since 1982,” says Annie.

Buck felt strongly that part of the explanation for the downward slide was Keith Green’s absence. ”It seemed as though once this incredibly powerful standard had been removed, the flood dikes were opened to all sorts of things. For whatever reason, Christian music began to be highly diluted from a spiritual standpoint.”

And it seemed that the Lord had a distinct message waiting for them. While ministering at an international missions conference in Lausanne, Switzerland, the Lord spoke to the group through the leaders of the gathering. His instructions were clear, and encouraging:

God will give you prophetic words to restore the foundations of holiness and purity in the church and in the world.

Make your plans large - God is your partner!

As you sing, I will bring new life into existence.

Move as one. Keep ’short accounts’ with God and with each other.

God will use the group to encourage Christian musicians and to release other musicians in ethics, love, and guidelines.

Keep your eyes open to the ’small people,’ stage hands, helpers, and others. Some of your most significant work will be done in these areas.

Pray that God would show you how to give the ’family unit’ time. He will provide time for the families.

Each one of these messages had a deeply personal impact upon the members of the 2nd Chapter of Acts. Interestingly, as their ministry moved into its final stages, every word that was revealed proved to be true.

Ending Up

”Acts” might never have recorded their best-selling album, had they not been sensitive to the Holy Spirit’s direction. During one of their last tours, three separate individuals approached them in three separate cities. Yet all three had the same message: “I believe God has a word for you-that you should do a hymns album.” “If one person had something such as this,” Buck said later, “we may have missed it. But when all three brought the exact message….”

Besides instructing them to produce one of their most inspiring albums, God was providing a financial resource for them in advance. When the last concert was sung, Hymns, Volumes One, and Two, would continue to sell briskly. “Acts was not the first contemporary group to do an album of great hymns from the past. Nevertheless, everyone involved with the project sensed a special anointing upon the Hymns albums. The arrangements were so fresh, so vital, so filled with life, love, praise, worship-and yes, majesty.

Buck sensed the Lord speaking to him as he and the family listened to the first rough vocal mix of “Holy, Holy, Holy.” As Annie, Nelly and Matthew sat in the studio listening to their voices, Buck heard another. “The Lord spoke to my heart and said, ’I have chosen you to breathe life back into these songs for your generation.’”

All of the songs that “Acts” recorded had that “special touch,” or else they never made it onto an album. “Other than the Narnia album, in which the songs came over a period of five years, we’ve never written songs specifically for an album, says Annie. “We never said, ’We’ve got to do an album. Let’s write some songs!’ To me, that concept is backwards. That’s not why you do an album. Only when you have something to say, only if God has provided the music-then do an album.”

Nelly agrees, “Recording an album isn’t a goal, it is an end result. When I have something I feel that God wants me to say, I’ll say it, but not until.”

One example of the way such inspiration works is the song, “Fight the Fight,” an inspiring anthem that became a rallying cry for the pro-life movement in America. How did it happen? “Melody Green called and asked if we’d sing in Los Angeles for the kick-off of the Walk Across America Campaign in the effort to save unborn babies,” says Annie. “We were praying about whether we could attend. Our schedule was already packed full. One day I was sitting at the piano and “Fight the Fight” just came to me. We felt that was a clear indication from the Lord that we should go. Then we got the idea that we should get other concerned Christian artists to help. Steve [Greisen] coordinated the effort, and the artists donated their time to do the record.”

Calling It Quits

When “Acts” came together in January 1988, to seek the Lord’s direction for that year, they were stunned but not surprised by the Lord’s instructions to them. The guidance they received was this: ”Complete what you have committed to, but don’t take anything new. I have other things I want to do with all of you.” “We’d all felt for a while that a change was coming,” says Annie. “There’s always a stirring when the Lord is about to do something.”

Part of that stirring came several months prior to 1988, in the form of a message from the Lord through a friend. The words were simple: “I am going to do something new. Do not be afraid.”

At first, the members of “Acts” kept the news of their disbanding within the family. Then slowly, they began to share the information with their closest friends. “Once we understood what we were to do,” recalls Buck, “I presented it to Jack Hayford, our pastor and spiritual counselor. Jack confirmed what we were feeling. He said that he’d been feeling the same thing in his heart for some time, as well.” Hayford told Buck, “I was excited when you guys were honored with a Dove Award for the Hymns album, because I felt that you would be winding down soon.”

When “Acts” met in January, they had concerts booked through the middle of August 1988. They realized that each concert would be their last in that city. To prevent anyone from thinking that they were attempting to exploit or play upon their public’s emotions, they decided to avoid telling their audiences the news until the final tour was close to completion.

Pastor Jack didn’t agree. “If you came to my town and I didn’t get out to the concert, then later discovered that it was your last concert in my area and I had missed it, I would be extremely disappointed. You owe it to your audience to let them know. Otherwise, it’s not fair to all the people who’ve loved and supported you through the years.”

Once the “Acts” announced their final tour schedule, the response from friends was overwhelming. In every city, they sang to packed auditoriums, and the Spirit of God moved mightily in each concert. “That last time around was unbelievable,” says Buck. ”Such an incredible amount of love and support was poured out upon us by the Body.”

”It was heartbreaking, too,” adds Annie, “because we realized that we’d been a part of so many people’s lives.” While Pastor Jack’s reaction to the new of “Acts” break-up was positive, many others remained unconvinced. “Believe it or not, some people were angry that we were quitting,” says Annie demurely. “They’d say, ’This cannot be of God, because when we sang they could still sense the anointing. So they assumed that we should continue. But we knew. Most people who came, though, said, ’Hey, we just want to tell you how much your ministry has meant to us.’”

Nevertheless, knowing that they were doing what God had told them to do did not make the final concert-in Houston, Texas, on August 12-any easier.

As Matthew remembers it: “We finished the concert and the 7500 people attending rose to their feet, and clapped and clapped. Nelly and Annie were crying and I was losing it. I think it had finally dawned on us: This is our last concert. This is it!… We weren’t tired of ministering to people or anything. It was just God’s time for something new.”

Where Are They Now?

All of the members of “Acts” continue to be actively involved in ministry. They still live near to each other and remain in close contact.

Annie has done solo albums, and doors have opened for her to have a solo ministry in numerous churches. ”It’s a much more simply ministry,” says Annie. “In some ways, it is more intimate. It’s just me out there.” Is it difficult to sing without her brother and sister? “Sometimes it is,” Annie admits. ”I’m so used to them being there. I can hear what they would be singing. Nelly and Matthew sing with me on my albums, though. So in that sense, I still have them out there with me, but I really don’t think we’ll be doing any more tours together-not unless the Lord tells us to do something.”

Ironically, after 20 years of concert ministry, many people do not realize that Annie, Nelly and Matthew are family. People often ask Annie, “Do you know Matthew Ward?” or “Do you know Nelly Greisen?” ”Yes,” quips Annie, “I changed their diapers.” Changing diapers is something Nelly is quite experienced at herself. She is fully, happily involved in one of the most challenging ministries of all-raising a family. One of the Greisen’s deepest anxieties while on the road was having to leave their two boys, Andrew and Jesse, so frequently. Now they’re able to work at home, and they love it! Steve has developed Reel Productions, LLC, a video production company that produces powerful stories which they sell online at Explorationfilms.com, and Nelly is a full-time mom, who “just happens” to have a great voice for singing.

Matthew has also recorded solo albums since “Acts” retirement, has faced and overcome a bout with cancer and also continues to be involved in full time touring and speaking.

Over the years, Matthew has received several offers for a secular music career, all of which he has refused. “I don’t want to sing dead music,” he says. ”Singing in front of people of the last things that I’ve ever wanted to do,” says Matt. “I was always scared to death, nervous and insecure. But that’s probably one of the things that has kept me honest with what I do and not allowed me to get puffed up. Because I realize where I’ve come from. All the while, I’ve known that God was calling me to use my gift for Him. I look at it as an honor.

Matthew and his wife, Deanne, are also busy parents. They have three delightful daughters: Megin, Morgan, and Mattie.

Simple Words

What was the enduring message that God gave to the “Acts” to share with the world? “Sometimes we feel like an old record being played over and over again,” says Annie. ”The message is the same: To see the Body of Christ healed, and to see people’s needs met. There is hope in Jesus. There is no situation too great that He cannot take care of.”

What does God want to say through music today? Buck and Annie answer almost in unison, “Jesus is Lord!” Jesus was never popular. We can’t make Him ’more palatable’ to our generation. He was despised and rejected. We cannot put him in 20th century trappings and expect that everybody is going to love Him. He is King of kings and He calls you to die to yourself-that will never be popular.”

”All we ever wanted,” Buck concludes, “was for people to see Jesus. If anything made us different, it was our fervent desire to please the Lord and to be obedient to Him, regardless of the costs. We only wanted to hear Him say, “Well done, good and faithful servants.’”

When asked what burning words God has placed upon their hearts today, Annie and Buck are quick to respond simultaneously: “It’s gonna rain!”

Buck elaborates: “The Word of God says that we are to wait for the former and the latter rain, that in the last days God is going to pour out His Spirit. There is coming an outpouring of His Spirit and an ingathering that will make the ’Jesus Movement’ of the early ’70s pale by comparison. We can see that beginning already. It’s gonna rain!”

Some years ago, at the Christian Bookseller’s convention, “The 2nd Chapter of Acts” sang three songs and sat down. Their songs brought a sense of worship, holiness-a sense that, in the vehicle of three human voices, Jesus was exalted. To hear Annie, Nelly and Matthew sing of Him, their Risen Lord, was almost to see Him…almost to feel His touch.

Afterwards, a well-known and respected man of God approached them and said of their ministry, “The frame never out-did the picture.” ”That was our earnest desire in all we did,” Buck finishes. “That the frame would never out-do the picture. And the picture always had to be Jesus.”

http://2ndchapterofacts.com/

Dig One Ditch, You Better Dig Two. The Trap You Set, It’s For You...

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 04:47:00 +0000

Reviewing our audio teaching, “Defender” reveals powerful forces available to those who are children of the Most High.

^1-2 So the king and Haman went to dinner with Queen Esther. At this second dinner, while they were drinking wine the king again asked, “Queen Esther, what would you like? Half of my kingdom! Just ask and it’s yours.”
³ Queen Esther answered, “If I have found favor in your eyes, O King, and if it please the king, give me my life, and give my people their lives.
⁴ “We’ve been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed—sold to be massacred, eliminated. If we had just been sold off into slavery, I wouldn’t even have brought it up; our troubles wouldn’t have been worth bothering the king over.”
⁵ King Xerxes exploded, “Who? Where is he? This is monstrous!”
⁶ “An enemy. An adversary. This evil Haman,” said Esther.
    Haman was terror-stricken before the king and queen.
^7-8 The king, raging, left his wine and stalked out into the palace garden.
    Haman stood there pleading with Queen Esther for his life—he could see that the king was finished with him and that he was doomed. As the king came back from the palace garden into the banquet hall, Haman was groveling at the couch on which Esther reclined. The king roared out, “Will he even molest the queen while I’m just around the corner?”
    When that word left the king’s mouth, all the blood drained from Haman’s face.
⁹ Harbona, one of the eunuchs attending the king, spoke up: “Look over there! There’s the gallows that Haman had built for Mordecai, who saved the king’s life. It’s right next to Haman’s house—seventy-five feet high!”
    The king said, “Hang him on it!”
¹⁰ So Haman was hanged on the very gallows that he had built for Mordecai. And the king’s hot anger cooled.

Esther 7 [MSG]

Esther was a Jewish young woman who became the wife of the King of Persia. No one knew her ethnic heritage or lineage. So, when Haman (who thought himself to be in tight with the king) decided he wanted to kill all of the Jews, he came face to face with the reality that he had declared war against the King’s beloved bride. Not only that... Haman wanted to kill Esther’s cousin, Mordecai. He even built a 75-foot tall gallows to hang Mordecai on. But Mordecai was not only the closest living relative to the Queen, he had previously saved the King from an assassination plot. Haman built a gallows to hang Mordecai... but wound up being hung on his own gallows.

This is another indicator that the scriptures are true that say:

He who digs a pit [for others] will fall into it, and whoever breaks through a fence or a [stone] wall, a serpent will bite him.

Ecclesiastes 10:8 [AMP]

Whoever digs a pit [for another man's feet] shall fall into it himself, and he who rolls a stone [up a height to do mischief], it will return upon him.

Proverbs 26:27 [AMP]

God has promised to protect His children. God is your Defender. Don’t worry about people who try to persecute you. Keep an attitude of gratitude. Remember that the joy of the Lord is your strength. You don’t need to fight your battles. God is your defender. Thanks to Pastor Lon Solomon for his great teachings that inspire our work.

If you need reassurance of God as your defense, listen to our audio teaching, “Defender”.

Are You an Undercover Christian?

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 04:05:00 +0000

Back in the 1970’s, comedy troupe IIsaac Air Freight did a sketch about the “Undercover Christian,” someone who hides their light under a bushel. Many of us (myself included) are tempted to be undercover Christians because we don’t want to encounter ridicule from unbelievers, or from churchgoers who may not believe the same way as we believe.

I recall offering a friend in the church I attended some gospel tracts. He had unsaved relatives and colleagues... and while a tract will not necessarily cause someone to fall on the ground, repent of their sins, and ask Jesus to come into their life... it can. It was a tract that someone left on the seat of the Greyhound Bus I was riding on that caused me to ask Jesus to be the Lord of my life. And so I do recognize the power of the printed word.

Unfortunately, my friend seemed intimidated by the possibility of handing out one of those leaflets. I can understand. Some people have taken tracts and ripped them to shreds... or simply tossed them into the waste bin. One person figured they would respond to a tract I left in a common area of our apartment complex by putting a satanic tract on my doorstep. Yep... those who follow the devil have tracts too!
But while there may be some discomfort or embarrassment about handing out tracts... in our society there is little opportunity to be executed for following Jesus’ commandment:

Jesus, undeterred, went right ahead and gave his charge: “God authorized and commanded me to commission you: Go out and train everyone you meet, far and near, in this way of life, marking them by baptism in the threefold name: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Then instruct them in the practice of all I have commanded you. I’ll be with you as you do this, day after day after day, right up to the end of the age.”

Matthew 28:18-20 [MSG]

Pastor Lon Solomon reminded me of five young men who paid the ultimate price to share the gospel of Jesus Christ to a group of indigenous Ecuadoreans. Nate Saint, Jim Elliot, and three other young men traveled to Ecuador to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the native people. This tribe had a history of hostility to outsiders. Oil workers looking to drill near their tribal land were summarily executed. One young woman from that tribe warned of their murderous ways.

Those warnings notwithstanding, these five young men went down into the jungles of Ecuador to bring the good news of salvation through Jesus Christ. Those young men were found murdered; their bodies pierced with spears that had their gospel tracts attached. The natives who attacked and murdered these young men eventually realized they had committed a grave error (see biographical sketch) and when the wives of the slain men arrived offering love and forgiveness, the tribe was converted.

Such commitment to the gospel makes me ashamed of keeping silent to avoid ridicule. It makes me want to be more bold in sharing the love of God to the world. How does it affect you?

A motion picture entitled The End of the Spear dramatizes this story... showing how the sacrifice of five lives, and the love and compassion shown by their surviving spouses... lead to the complete evangelization of this tribe of people. We have embedded this 2006 motion picture below for your enjoyment:

Purpose for the Pain

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 29 May 2011 06:31:00 +0000

I recall having a coach in high school whom I thought to be a certifiable maniac. It seemed that he inflicted pain upon us just for his personal enjoyment.

One day, while enduring a painful session, I just flat out refused to do any more. The coach responded to my rebellion by asking a question.

“If your house was on fire and you needed to climb down from the second story window to escape, could you do it? Would you have sufficient upper body strength?”

I knew the answer to that. I was a fat, overweight slob whose favorite exercise was lifting a fork up to my mouth. I then had an epiphany. The coach was not some brain-damaged masochist. He was, in fact, trying to save my life. And so I came to realize that there was a purpose for the pain.

Just like a good coach looking out for his athletes, God will often direct us into situations where the pain may not make sense to our finite minds. Pastor Lon Solomon pointed us to the pain that Esther suffered en route to becoming the most powerful woman in the then known world:

Now there was a Jew who lived in the palace complex in Susa. His name was Mordecai the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish—a Benjaminite. His ancestors had been taken from Jerusalem with the exiles and carried off with King Jehoiachin of Judah by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon into exile. Mordecai had reared his cousin Hadassah, otherwise known as Esther, since she had no father or mother. The girl had a good figure and a beautiful face. After her parents died, Mordecai had adopted her.

Esther 2:5-7 [MSG]

Esther was a young girl whose mother and father had died as a result of some unmentioned circumstances. To lose one’s parents is a traumatic thing. Even more so for a young girl. And, to add insult to injury, this young girl was sent to live with a middle-aged bachelor. Perhaps this was the inspiration for the television series Family Affair?

No... I didn’t think so either.

Moving right along...

Esther probably didn’t know at the time that the death of her parents... followed by the paradigm shift of moving in with cousin Mordecai and turning his world upside down... would lead to her occupying the powerful position that ultimately would lead to her singlehandedly saving all of the Jewish people who resided in ancient Persia.

Nobody knows where their circumstances, which may be difficult if not downright painful, will lead them. There was a young boy whose mother dragged him to a foreign country where he would be ridiculed and mistreated. Later, his mother dumped the young boy on his grandparents’ doorstep and then went off thousands of miles away to live with her new husband and new baby daughter. That had to be a painful experience. Yet... it was part of what made Barack Obama the man he would become. And who knew during those early years where he would wind up.

Many of you have heard Joyce Meyer’s story. Years of abuse by her father is difficult to imagine. Yet, Joyce acknowledges that it was all a part of God’s plan to make her the internationally known evangelist that she is today.

The bottom line...

[But what of that?] For I consider that the sufferings of this present time (this present life) are not worth being compared with the glory that is about to be revealed to us and in us and for us and conferred on us!

Romans 8:18 [AMP]

The Apostle Paul reminds us that whatever we suffer in this life is nothing compared with the joys of eternity in God’s kingdom. However, there is another perspective to consider. God has good plans for us. Consider Joseph in the Old Testament. His brothers wanted to murder him... but as a compromise they sold him into slavery. Joseph spent time as an innocent man in prison. He was subjected to great indignities. Yet, Joseph rose to become the second in command to the mightiest nation at that time, Egypt. Joseph’s take on his path from the pit to the prison to the palace:

Joseph replied, “Don’t be afraid. Do I act for God? Don’t you see, you planned evil against me but God used those same plans for my good, as you see all around you right now—life for many people. Easy now, you have nothing to fear; I’ll take care of you and your children.” He reassured them, speaking with them heart-to-heart.

Genesis 50:19-21 [MSG]

God is Soverign. God is also good. Although the plans He has for you may seem difficult to understand, they do have a good purpose. Many people shake their fists toward heaven and curse God. They just don’t understand the promise that the prophet Jeremiah relayed from our Creator:

For I know the thoughts and plans that I have for you, says the Lord, thoughts and plans for welfare and peace and not for evil, to give you hope in your final outcome.

Jeremiah 29:11 [AMP]

Although the path may seem difficult, there is a purpose. And it is a good purpose. But it requires us to trust in God... to cooperate with God... to allow our faith in Him to be a constant. Jesus is the ultimate example of this principle.

At once, this same Spirit pushed Jesus out into the wild. For forty wilderness days and nights he was tested by Satan. Wild animals were his companions, and angels took care of him.

Mark 1:12-13 [MSG]

Jesus left the comforts of friends of family. He left the comforts of the city. He went out into the wilderness where satan pounded Him relentlessly. Yet, we all know that His pain was for our gain.
My good friend and mentor Pastor Mike Macintosh wrote the following, regarding the above scripture:

The Holy Spirit sent Jesus out into the wilderness where He would be tempted in all areas of His life. The Book of Matthew gives us a fuller account of Jesus' temptation, and there we see that the devil was pounding Jesus. Do you ever feel that way? That the enemy is just pounding you? The pain hurts. But the good thing is this: the pain points us to Jesus Christ.

Stop and think about that; you don't really grow up until you've felt pain in your life. Our society tells us to hide the pain, to mask it. They tell us that using drugs or alcohol or having affairs will dull the pain, making us feel good. But all it does is drive us to an even greater, excruciating and senseless agony in our lives and in our marriages.

Maybe you have been thrust or driven into a situation. The natural human reaction in the flesh is to run away. But to be mature, many times we have to face the music and stay where we are. One of the great sins of our nation is the divorce rate. You can get a divorce for any reason you want these days; sort of like trading in an older car for a newer one. Well, a marriage isn't like a car! And we forget the vows we take are serious things. The devil wants to ruin your marriage. He will tempt you in every way to break up your family. There are times when God puts you into situations that don't always make you feel comfortable. Maybe it's with people who rub you the wrong way, or maybe it's a job that causes you stress. But God wants you to be in these situations to strengthen your faith and to rely on Him more.

The pain of obedience and patience will be rewarded to you. Pain reminds us that we are alive; people that are in the grave feel no pain. When things get hard and painful for you, just realize that God is using that to remind you that you are alive and that you are dependent on Him to get you through. Look to Jesus for your answers to life's pains, not the bottle or the pills. Look to the Holy Spirit's guidance in your life to keep you from the enemy's lies. Go to the Father in prayer, asking Him for the supernatural strength to endure. Only then in your pain will you find true happiness and joy.

Judy Ann provides us with the following prayer based upon Psalm 42 & 43 and Psalm 4. This may be a prayer you may wish to offer up to the Lord when you find yourself going through those painful periods of life.

As the deer pants for water, so I long for you, O God. I thirst for you, the living God. In the name of Jesus, I resist discouragement because I expect you to act! For I know that I shall again have plenty of reason to praise you for all that you will do. You are my help! You are my God! I place my trust in you, and I shall again praise you for your wondrous help; you make me smile again, for you are my God. Amen and Amen.

When I call, give me answers. God, take my side! Once, in a tight place, You gave me room; now I'm in trouble again: grace me! Hear me! In my anger I will not sin; when I’m on my bed, I will search my heart and be silent. My trust is in You, Jehovah, my LORD. Let the light of Your face shine upon me. Thank You for filling my heart with great joy. I will lie down and sleep in peace, for You alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety. In Jesus name. Amen.

A Full Course Meal for Atheists

noreply@blogger.com (The Powerhouse Ministry) — Sun, 22 May 2011 05:20:00 +0000

DEAD FLIES cause the ointment of the perfumer to putrefy [and] send forth a vile odor; so does a little folly [in him who is valued for wisdom] outweigh wisdom and honor.

Ecclesiastes 10:1 [AMP]

Some of you may remember how the Watergate scandal brought down the presidency of Richard Nixon. He should have gone down in history as the man who ended the Vietnam war. The man who initiated detenté with the former Soviet Union. The man who crossed the Bamboo Curtain and opened to the door to diplomatic and economic relations with China. But when you say the name Richard Nixon, the first thing that comes to the mind of many is Watergate. Thus, the words of the writer of Ecclesiastes (commonly thought to be King Solomon) are proven to be absolutely correct.

All it takes is a little foolishness to bring much wisdom and honor to nought.

Most of you know that broadcaster Harold Camping predicted that the rapture would occur on May 22, 2001 -- accompanied by a myriad of catastrophic events. Pundits, comedians and naysayers caught hold of this and responded with a barrage of comments, basically riduculing any belief in God. This has dangerous consequences... as King David found the hard way.

Nevertheless, because by this deed you have utterly scorned the Lord and given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme

2 Samuel 12:14a [AMP]

What makes false prophecies even more dangerous is if the cause you to do something contrary to the will of God for your life. There was a huge controversy over a pastor who taught a relatively famous parishioner of his that God approves of people living homosexual lifestyles. Not to open a can or worms (whoops, too late!) but anyone who questions what God has clearly said is doing the same thing that the serpent did to Eve in the Garden of Eden. There was a prophet in the Old Testament who was led astray by a false prophet and that act of disobedience came with a heavy price.

⁷ Then the king invited the holy man, "Join me for a meal; I have a gift for you."
^8-10 The holy man told the king, "Not on your life! You couldn't pay me enough to get me to sit down with you at a meal in this place. I'm here under God's orders, and he commanded, 'Don't eat a crumb, don't drink a drop, and don't go back the way you came.'" Then he left by a different road than the one on which he had walked to Bethel.
¹¹ There was an old prophet who lived in Bethel. His sons came and told him the story of what the holy man had done that day in Bethel, told him everything that had happened and what the holy man had said to the king.
¹² Their father said, "Which way did he go?" His sons pointed out the road that the holy man from Judah had taken.
^13-14 He told his sons, "Saddle my donkey." When they had saddled it, he got on and rode after the holy man. He found him sitting under an oak tree.

He asked him, "Are you the holy man who came from Judah?"

"Yes, I am," he said.
¹⁵ "Well, come home with me and have a meal."
^16-17 "Sorry, I can't do that," the holy man said. "I can neither go back with you nor eat with you in this country. I'm under strict orders from God: 'Don't eat a crumb; don't drink a drop; and don't come back the way you came.'"
^18-19 But he said, "I am also a prophet, just like you. And an angel came to me with a message from God: 'Bring him home with you, and give him a good meal!'" But the man was lying. So the holy man went home with him and they had a meal together.
^20-22 There they were, sitting at the table together, when the word of God came to the prophet who had brought him back. He confronted the holy man who had come from Judah: "God's word to you: You disobeyed God's command; you didn't keep the strict orders your God gave you; you came back and sat down to a good meal in the very place God told you, 'Don't eat a crumb; don't drink a drop.' For that you're going to die far from home and not be buried in your ancestral tomb."
^23-25 When the meal was over, the prophet who had brought him back saddled his donkey for him. Down the road a way, a lion met him and killed him. His corpse lay crumpled on the road, the lion on one side and the donkey on the other. Some passersby saw the corpse in a heap on the road, with the lion standing guard beside it. They went to the village where the old prophet lived and told what they had seen.

1 Kings 13:7-25 [MSG]

Following the false prophecy caused the holy man to meet an untimely demise. You can read more about the holy man, the false prophet, and the full set of events in Chapter Three of our book, Five Men Who Faced the Roaring Lion.

But getting back to Camping’s obviously false prophecy, many people are using this false prediction as an occasion to blaspheme. We read in Hearst Seattle Media’s Seattle P-I web site that atheists are having rapture parties to ridicule religious belief. Adding additional fuel to the fire are other journalistic reports, including an article in The Los Angeles Times regarding seemingly foolish behavior by those who followed Camping’s false prophecy.

Too bad Camping never read our book, Please Don’t Feed the Atheists.

Unfortunately, antics such as Campings false prophecy are giving the atheists a full-course feast. Last year, comedian Ricky Gervais published a piece in the Wall Street Journal speakeasy section in which he explained why he was an atheist. We have seen similar thoughts from Bill Maher and other pundits... and like Gervais’ article, there are the streams of comments by fellow atheists blasting Christianity (primarily the target of such diatribes). Funny how atheists rarely spew hateful venom at Ba’Hai, Hinduism, Buddhism, or other belief systems). For that matter, they never use figures of those religions as curse words.

What can we do about this absolute mess? The only solution is to show the world what real Christianty is.

He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, and to love kindness and mercy, and to humble yourself and walk humbly with your God?

Micah 6:8 [AMP]

²⁶I anyone thinks himself to be religious (piously observant of the external duties of his faith) and does not bridle his tongue but deludes his own heart, this person's religious service is worthless (futile, barren).
²⁷External [a]religious worship [[b]religion as it is expressed in outward acts] that is pure and unblemished in the sight of God the Father is this: to visit and help and care for the orphans and widows in their affliction and need, and to keep oneself unspotted and uncontaminated from the world.