Welcome to my blog, I'll be updating this when I have time, it's going to be about whatever is on my mind. Could be stories, revelations, words of wisdom or just whatever. I hope it inspires, blesses and informs you.
I've been really busy lately. Doing what you may ask? Well, working and seeing friends, but I've also been working hard at gaining back some lost personal space. I've really been enjoying not being around people a whole lot. It's been nice to go for a walk alone, go out for coffee to read alone and do just about anything, alone. I am definitely looking forward to seeing everyone again, but, while I have this opportunity, I'm taking advantage of it! I also recently got the privilege to meet up with Luke(alberta) for coffee one night while he was down in my area visiting family. That was really nice, it was fun to talk about things that only we would care about. Things from school, etc, that kind of thing. I also just got back from a friends concert, Simon Hoskyn, which was really good, I went with Jake and Marg and we had a de-lightful time.
That about does it for my update, I don't really have alot I feel like saying, so before I move on to more trivial matters, I'll give you a quote I like to think about regarding contemplative prayer.
“This method of prayer is a movement beyond conversation with Christ to communion with Him.” -Thomas Keating
Lately I've been looking at some of the stats for my webpage, and I've been noticing that when I include a famous persons name in the midst of an entry, I get people searching for that and stumbling across my page. So, in order to fully exploit that, I composed the following short story using top search keywords compiled from various search engines. I hope you enjoy this, and if you don't, well, it's boosting my traffic soooo...
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After a long day at the Golden Globe Awards, Britney Spears sat on the couch, turned on the T.V. and flipped past the NFL game, a WWE match, briefly settled on the Miss Universe competition but then sighed, shut of the T.V. and said to Paris Hilton, "You want to play some Nintendo Wii?" "What?" Paris Hilton asked, "Sorry, I was listening to Beyonce Knowles belt out a tune on my Apple Ipod."
"Whatever," Britney flippantly remarked, "you and your Christmas music. You'd probably rather play XBox or PS2 anyways."
"Well let's do something, like throw around the baseball, play a round of golf, try out for the NBA, anything!" Paris cried, "I'm so bored I'd even watch a YouTube video of Tupac and Eminem teaching Lindsey Lohan how to play "PokemonPoker"!"
Britney laughed, "I'm not quite that desperate yet, why don't you go on your Apple computer and see if Clay Aiken is online on MySpace, he always has good ideas!"
Paris Hilton squinted at the laptop that Hilary Duff gave her. "Something is not right," she declared, "My spyware detector is blocking all sites except, NeoPets, Wikipedia and a Barbie fansite. How could this happen? I only ever use this computer to look up prom hairstyles that are endorsed by Jessica Simpson!"
Frustrated, Britney put down her wine accessories and came over to have a look. "I know what the problem is, when you let Harry Potter borrow your laptop over Halloween and Easter, he installed LimeWire and KaZaA so he could download all his favourite Shakira songs."
Paris Hilton sighed, checked the time on her Nokia N80 and suggested, "You know, why don't we just invite Jennifer Lopez over and write ourselves the best darn High School Musical since SpongeBob SquarePants!"
Britney Spears jumped up, dropped her PSP and said, "You know, that's even better than Oprah Winfrey's suggestion! Let's go!"
The weekend is over. It was good, some fun was had, but it's gone now. Now it's back to work for me. I thought I'd throw up a few pictures of my trip to Seattle on Saturday with a few friends, we went to a Death Cab for Cutie concert. It was a pretty good show, I didn't know it was a stadium show, I'd never been to one that big before, as much as I did enjoy it, I think I much prefer smaller shows and little venues where you can hear them clearly and see them even better. Regardless it was a nice little roadtrip. We were right beside the space needle and the Experience Music Project building, so that was pretty neat, they have some nifty buildings in downtown Seattle I must say.
Well for lack of anything else to say, this is it.
It's been a while. I thought I should at least post something, anything, so I don't lose my devoted audience!
Well it's been a nice change for me. Currently I'm working full time, painting up a storm, and that's about it. Sometimes I see people in the evenings, sometimes I don't. Sometimes I do things, sometimes I don't. Sometimes I drive, sometimes I don't. That kind of freedom and whimsy is something I'm really enjoying while I'm here. I've really enjoyed just hanging out with myself, going to read or whatever. It's been really great to have a vehicle again, I'm definitely liking that! Let's see, what're some highlights so far... Well I had a great day with Jake and Marg, we went to watch his brother race in the Canadian Championships, an 8k race in the snow. Definitely not something I think I'll be doing, the winner did it in like 26 minutes, it takes me 26 minutes to do 1/2 a kilometer, let alone 8! Then we hung around Vancouver for a while, went to Chapters, and that night went to a play called Caribou Magi, it was a really good play, all in all, a pretty excellent day.
I also had an amazing movie night with Adam, we watched two old movies that were so bad they were pretty good. Not too many people like watching those old B-movies, so it's good to have someone to do that with.
This weekend I'm going to a Death Cab for Cutie concert in Seattle with another friend, that should be most excellent as well.
So really, now that I saw those things, it sounds like I've been pretty busy, but it's been relaxing. I've found it kind of relaxing getting back to work, it's a good feeling getting back to work, doing something productive with your hands. That said, I'm sure I won't mind a 6 month break from painting in January!
I've really enjoyed being back, and the solitude and rest I've been able to find in God since. Never have I felt so connected to my creator and the supernatural in my daily life as right now. It's totally unique to me, I find that instead of striving for godliness, righteousness, spirituality, gifts, character, whatever it is that we try to attain, I am starting to understand that I just am. As I begin to accept who I am in Christ, the promises He's made, the person He said I am, I just am. I can rest in Him and he lets me be who I truly am.
It's easy to feel close to God when you are surrounded by 30 or so other like minded people who are all relentless in their search for intimacy with their Creator, but it's been an interesting and encouraging season for me here at home, as I go about my daily routine, doing sometimes something, sometimes nothing, and the whole while feeling perhaps the closest to God I've ever felt. Even in my good and bad times, the reality of Him is so much more apparent. I don't understand it, and I don't expect to feel this way forever as I understand there are always highs and lows in every relationship, sometimes it flows very naturally, other times it seems like much more work getting to know someone.
It's kind of hard to describe what this time is like, I haven't even really thought about it until now, when I decided to write something out, it's been good for me to just reflect on what God has been doing in my life, then and even now. He has a way of constantly encouraging that I truly admire.
Well I'm not sure I have more to write at the moment. I'll try to post a few more times, but come on, give me a break, this is my holiday for goodness sake.
Finally, after about a week of resting and procrastination, I decided to sit down and write about the Real Estate Expo.
So we got to New York, went straight to Sharayah's Church where the guys were staying over night, then dropped the girls stuff off at her house. Then we went to New York, to the Jacob Javitz Center where the Learning Annex was hosting the New York Real Estate Expo. We got there a little late due to lack of time and some traffic issues, including a not so successful U-Turn on one of the busiest streets downtown, but it all worked out, we had our training session which was interesting, but at least for me, not that helpful. We were split up into our different areas of service, I was in Product, which meant I moved boxes of the speakers product to different classrooms and to the product tables in the main room. It was a pretty simple job, pick this up, move it over there.
It was definately nicer than some other people jobs, like the girls who did sales and had to deal with cranky people, credit cards and answering questions they barely knew about product they just got. So compared to some of the girls, I had a cushy, low-pressure job. Which was fine with me.
The next day when we actually started working, it took us 2 hours to drive 30 miles because traffic was bad, we got there at almost 11 am and worked till 10-10:30 pm. So it was a late night, we got home and had dinner at almost 12 am. Then the next day we were up at 4:30 am so we could get there to start at 6:30 am, that day we worked till 10:30ish as well, so it was a really long day for all of us.
Besides the other guys working product with me, I didn't get to see anybody that often, so it was always really exciting when we got to deliver boxes to a table where people we knew were working, that made it fun.
Overall, it was a very interesting experience. I've been to many christian conferences where they have speakers and people worship God and get all excited about Him, but this was like the complete opposite. This conference was all about getting rich quick. It was so, over-the-top selfish, it was really a strange feeling, to see 15,000 jumping up and down, giving each other hugs, hooting and hollering, all for the sake of self and riches.
At one point, during Marshall Sylvers(a hypnotist) session, I felt the overwhelming grief of the Holy Spirit as Sylver presented a counterfeit move of the the Spirit and talked about the power of self and doing whatever it takes to be rich, successful or whatever. It was all about manipulation and control of self and others, it was really so, so sad.
There were some half-decent speakers, most of them were so humanistic it was hard to get alot out of what they spoke, but some were at elast fun to watch, like Tony Robbins, he got everybody so pumped up, it was funny to watch 15,000 peole run around and hug each other. I also learned a few good tips on real estate and investing, although I'm not sure how much of it translates to Canada and the laws and regulations we have, oh well.
As much as it was humanistic and all about self, I did get some really great things out of it. For example, it was awesome just to be there and serve, the managers could really tell that we were there to work, it was a blessing to the people around us. I learned about the weakness of man, how these people were so desperate for wealth, success and fame, that they would put their trust in man and in themselves. In a kind of weird way, it was almost exciting as I saw the hunger of these people for something true, I knew that God offered so much more, that He could fulfill them way beyond their expectations. It was also good going to learn how to put on a seminar as I believe we are going to be doing that next semester, you learn some good tips that will help streamline your own event after watching things at this one, so it was actually really good going. The best part of it is, even if I didn't learn anything, if I had nothing positive to say, we knew that that was where God wanted us, that He arranged for us to be there, so it was awesome to just be able to be obedient and do what he wanted. That's what it's all about anyways, whether or not we see any fruit at the moment, who knows what seeds were planted in people, who knows what he was preparing us for. Maybe someday some of us students will be speaking at a conference at the very same building and we were just there to begin to prepare the place for that event. Who knows, with God it's limitless.
Sorry it's taken so long to write, unfortunately this isn't going to be an amazing entry, instead, it's a short and sweet post to appease my demanding public.
It's been a long last week, with the Trump conference and traveling home, but I finally got back to Abbotsford, B.C. Canada last night at about 8:00 pm PST. It was definately a long haul, especially with two stopovers, it tends to lengthen one's trip.
Anyways, I'm still real tired, so I'm heading to bed but I wanted to let you all know I am still going to update you on the Trump conference, but after that, I likely won't write much if any until I go back to school.
If any of you are reading this and from my area, give me a call, talk to my secretary, we'll see if we can work something out.
So, eagerly await whatever is next. If you feel like it.
Last night we stopped in Hopkinton, Massachusetts at a Vineyard Church where they fed us an amazing dinner which included some homemade lasagne, definately a crowd pleaser. That night Ken talked a bit about prophetic evangelism, did some dream interpretations from up front and then we broke up into teams and gave people words, kind of like a Salem format. It was really good, it was super easy, very refreshing. I think it was so good for us to start doing this kind of thing at Claremont and at Salem, where the spiritual climate was very different, it was alot harder to get words when we were there. But here at the church, where people want it, and are already seeking after God, where we don't have to set the atmosphere with intercession, it's already there, it's so much easier to receive revelation and to just pray through it all when you are in that kind of an enviroment which is so open to whatever the Holy Spirit wants to do.
Today we got to New York, we went straight to Sharayah's church, "The Lighthouse", from there we dropped the girls stuff off at Sharayah's then we rushed as fast as our little vans could take us to New York City for our training session. We arrived a fashionable 45 minutes late due to traffic and due to simply not having enough time.
You know all the things they say about New York? Well it's true, I even saw steaming manhole covers, I'll be honest, I always wanted to see steaming manhole covers, I mean, I seen them on TV and all, but steaming manhole covers is not something common to the thriving metropolis of Abbotsford. Anyways, moving on.
I never realized how big of a deal this conference was, untilI saw some of the big names coming, like Tony Robbinson, that guy you always see on TV, with his book "Natural cures the governement doesn't want you to know." Also there will be the obvious highlight, the Mad Money guy, yeah that's right, Jim Cramer himself, I sure hope he brought along his sound effects... Well I won't bore you with any more details, mostly because I don't know them.
But you can go to www.learningannex.com there is probably info and pictures of the conference there. I don't have my computer here so I'll put up pictures later if all goes well.
I got to go to bed now, tonight is probably the most sleep I'm going to get before I go home, so I think I'm going to take advantage of it. If you have any questions feel free to e-mail me, I don't think I'll answer them though because I won't have time or feel like it. However, I would take the time to read and maybe respond to any comments you leave, you oughtto know by now how much I appreciate them.
If all goes well, I've got a few ideas to sell to Donald Trump, I'm fairly convinced I can double his profits with an invention I have, I won't say what until the patent comes, but let's just say it will dramatically affect the amount of trash and mice in New York City, we'll see though...
It's been hitting me recently how little time I have left. You'd think I'd have clued in by now, seeing how by this time next week, my flight will just be arriving home in Abbotsford. We are officially done classes, we had this morning off to sleep in and to start cleaning up our rooms. Tomorrow we have the morning off to pack up as well. We are leaving for New York tomorrow early afternoon so pretty much I'm packing a bag to take to New York, then I'll pack the rest to be ready for when I come home to go again. I've also been cleaning up all my stuff, and just making my room generally even more amazing.
Not only that, adding to the reality of the shortness of this semester is the number of student impartations we had the last week or so. We had a lot and it was really awesome to hear everybody's heart on all this different things. It was cool had God spoke to everyone so differently in what to share. It was always so perfect, what everyone had to say was so unique and refreshing.
I've really felt so humble in the last few days with all these people sharing. Some people have these amazing passions for different things, others have had some really hard times that God has brought them through. But in all of those, I just feel so honoured to live with and grow with these people. Makes me so much more grateful that I am where God has placed me, it reminds me of what Ali said "How is it, that all these amazing people are all here at this time." Sometimes we take God's order for granted, but every move is orchestrated carefully and perfectly. There's no way we could improve on God's order, as much as we might know that in our head, sometimes in a given moment, it's almost overwhelming to think that everything you've ever done in your life has led up to this particular moment. Shouldn't that make every moment all the more significant? If we start to truly realize how divinely our steps are ordered, we should be thanking God for every step and moment because He has us there for whatever reason we don't always know.
In this last week I'm really trying to suck everything up, trying to get all that I can before I go. I'll be home for a month and a half, and then I'm coming back for another six months. I'm really looking forward to going home and visiting people, but I'm pretty sure I'll be looking forward to coming back and seeing everybody as well. Especially after sleeping in my own room by myself for 6 weeks, who knows, I could get lonely after 3 months of sharing a room with 3 other guys. (But I don't think it's likely...lol)
This is likely the last time I'll write for a bit, I don't know if I'll have any internet access when I'm gone, so we'll see. But I'll do my best to update you at least after I get back, I'll be sleepy eyed and maybe not even coherent, but hey, it's an update at least right? I thought I'd throw in some pictures of a few projects I was given to work on recently. One is a newspaper article poster I made for Pastor Phil from the Gathering in Salem. The other is a graphic for our Salem Testimonies which we'll be bringing home. Please keep us all in your prayers as we are off on our last trip of the semester. I put a basic schedule below so you can track us with your prayers.
Thurs, Nov. 16 Depart from girls house, arrive in Hopkinton MA Minister at church in the evening.
Fri, Nov. 17 Get to New York 2 pm. Training session for conference 5-6 pm
Sat & Sun, Nov. 18-19 Very long days expected at conference
Mon, Nov. 20 Sleep in. Little bit of sight seeing Minister at Lighthouse Church in New York Leave for home at 11 pm
Tues, Nov. 21 Get home early early morning Sleep. Pack-up Commencement Dinner
Wedns, Nov 22 I'm getting up to leave by around 5-5:30 am get back to Abbotsford around 8 pm.
Oh and before I go, here's a link to all my movies on YouTube It may be hard to appreciate them fully, not having been here and knowing all the people, but feel free to check 'em out anyways.
How about a recap of the last few days, alrighty then, well let's start with a lesson I learned on Sunday.
Once upon a time in place far far away from his home land... Well maybe I won't be quite so dramatic. On Sunday, I was listed as a substitue for prophetic teams at the Bridge Church here in New London. I was quite relieved to just be a substitute because I really wasn't feeling the whole, being on a ministry team deal, especially not that day. Just before I left for church, Jon Bohy, who was supposed to be one of the team leaders asked if I could replace him, he wasn't going to church. So all of a sudden I went from not being on a team, to being the team leader! I had thought that I could handle being on a team, but to be the team leader was totally unexpected and quite frankly, not appreciated. So I complained a little, mostly to myself, then during worship, I got convicted for having such a poor attitude towards what I supposed to do that day. I realized that God had set me up. He knew that I didn't feel like being on a team, I didn't feel particularily holy that day and I didn't feel confident to lead a team. So I decided to bite the bullet and figured well, it must be God because I really don't feel like it, so He's going to have to do it all.
So after the service, when we broke up into our teams I was able to come with at least a good attitude, I still certainly didn't feel holy or very prophetic that morning. I was on a team with Danielle (South Carolina) and Matt (New Jersey) and it was just perfect. We had such a good team, everything flowed really easily. I found it so much different doing a team like this rather than in Salem. The words came so much easier, we didn't have to fight for it and interceed at the same time like we did in Salem. We had 5 people that day and it was just really good. God has a way of surprising you and pulling you through when you really really don't feel like it.
God really convicted me that day on my attitude towards doing what He wants. I thought I knew how to maintain a fairly decent attitude regardless of what I was doing, but I'm realizing more and more that our attitude is so often affected because we feel like God wants us to do things. But not really so, all he really wants is us to show up, He wants to do things through us. All God wanted me to do was to show up to what was asked of me, and then He would take me through the rest, I didn't have to worry, but if we are not going to have a good attitude or let Him do it, we can't expect it to go well.
This semester is drawing to a close, but the Lord is still doing big things, I can really feel an anticipation in my spirit for what's going to come next. I have no idea what's coming or what God wants to do in this last week, but I'm even really looking forward to when I go home, there's no reason for me to believe that God doesn't move just as much at home. It's easy to get caught up into a mindset that God moves more powerfully in an enviroment like this where there are so many prophetic people and people who are really going after God passionatly, but He wants to move just as powerfully right in your home.
Sorry I have to cut this short, I made a mistake on when we are going to leave this morning and I have to go make me a lunch in 5 minutes.
It's been a while, maybe a little too long, I was thinking about it, wondering why I didn't feel like posting, and I realized I don't feel like anything interesting has been happening. Then I realized, that interesting things are happening, but when I compare them to events like Salem or something where I have too much to write about, well, it's just not the same. So here is a non-exciting but still interesting entry.
Let me get into this by first saying how disapointed I am in the good 'ole Vancouver Canucks. Luke (Alberta), Jamie (Alberta), Micah (Here) and myself went over to the Coopers house to watch my home team, and kind of Luke's go at it with Jamie's. Even after a 2-0 lead for the Canucks, they couldn't hold it and lost 3-2. So now, no thanks to the Canucks, I owe Jamie lunch. Serves me right, I suppose, for betting. But it seemed so right at the time...
In the last week, we have been having a lot of student impartations as we kind of rush to get them all in before this semester is up. We missed quite a few of them earlier because of different things we had going on, so now we are making up for lost time. So it's kinda nice, I've really been enjoying hearing what the students all have to share, it's awesome hearing their passions, what's on their hearts and what they've been learning. I think tonight we have Jody (Michigan), David (Scotland) and Anthony (Virginia) so it ought to be a real treat!
It's going to be a good week, I'm sure it's going to pass very quickly, especially with us going to New York, thursday after classes, we get home from New York on tuesday afternoon and I'm leaving at like 5:30 am on wednsday to go back to my home on the west coast. So I'm sure I'll be pretty beat after this trip, maybe I can catch soe sleep on the plane, but with two stopovers on a 6 hour flight, I doubt I'll be able to do much sleeping. But that's what you get when you search online for the cheapest flights. Two stopovers.
I have to head off to church pretty quick, so I better go make myself presentable, I'll do my best to keep updating you all on the maybe not impressive but most certainly news worthy things that will happen this week.
Not a lot to write about today. It's tuesday, we are just getting back into the swing of things. We had an awesome 4 day break which was so needed, but I was sure ready to get back into a routine!
We found out about an outreach we are going to be doing in the end of this trimester, which is getting closer and closer, something like, two weeks left. We are going to be heading to New York City, we are going to be working at a Donald Trump conference. It sounds like we are going to be really busy there, not much time to see any sights, but it'll be a cool thing to be involved with for sure! Who knows, maybe we can set-up a dream tent for the business men! I don't really know what to expect, and will Donny even be coming? I hope so, just so I can get fired by him. If all goes well...
I felt like I hadn't written an update in a while, which is true, but I probably shouldn't have chosen now to do it as I got very little sleep last night. I had a terrible ear-infection which kept me up past 4, so I'm sorry if this isn't up to my strict quality standards.
What else can I say? I gotta give props to Jamie for making all them videos, without a fellow canadian like him, well, none of that would be possible. So, thanks Jamie. Well that's finally out of the way, so I attatched a video to the bottom here of Good 'Ole Chad cooking up a delicious treat. Did he share any? No. But it's OK, I'm not bitter or anything...
I woke up today to a good inch of snow on the ground. Kind of a nice welcome sight, a surprise for sure after the warm day we had yesterday. But it's pretty much all gone by now anyways. I cleaned up my room. Did some laundry, helped facilitate a roommate change. Matt (North Carolina) my now former roommate, switched with Brandon (Alberta) because Brandon has a tough time going up and down the stairs since he broke his foot in Salem this weekend. But that's a whole other story in itself. So, I thought I should get writing while it's still all fresh, we'll see how much I do at this sitting, I tend to get carried away when I'm writing, I write too much too fast and pretty soon I just get sick of writing and cut it off. This time, I'm hoping I can pace myself a little better...
Salem was amazing, I am so changed. I never considered myself a christian who was caught up in religiousness, but after these last two trips to Salem, I discovered I am now far-less religious than ever! I'll try to break it down for you, we were all scheduled to be at different places at different times, but the whole schedule thing was highly organic. As much as we tried to follow it, often we'd get called to help in other areas. It worked out really well as long as you were prepared to be flexible.
For those four days my schedule was: 2-4 pm - Working the Free Hot Cocoa booth 4-6 pm - On a team at the fountain location 6-8 pm - Watchman/Intercessor at the fountain 8-10 pm - Host at the fountain
Often when I was a watchman I'd be pulled onto a team and sometimes I ended up hosting at the bank instead, you know, everyone just pitches in when needed. Sometimes the lines would all of sudden die at the fountain and they would be really long at the bank. So we'd have to always be forming new teams and cutting down. You know, just being all organic like.
It was a very busy weekend with us starting our schedule at 2 pm, but before that we'd be setting up the tents and hot dog stand, etc...
My goodness, I'm having a brain fart, too much to write, I don't know where to go from here...
Hmmm...Well, lessee...
How about some of my highlights...
Highlight #1
I was on a team with Kelly and Jamie one night and we had young guy, Tony, come sit down, he had a dream of king made out of stone and fire with a sword of fire in his hand hovering above his bed. He woke up into another dream where he was in a church, and he had a cross burned on his chest. There were other people wtih crosses on their chests as well and they were all preparing for battle. The metaphors in this dream were so obvious it was hard for us to contain ourselves. Tony already had the basic idea that this King wanted him to join him and fight with him. So we explained who that king was, that it was Jesus and we made an opportunity for him. After he invited the King to be a part of his life, we explained basically that the Holy Spirit was given to us to dwell with us. And did he want that? Then we told him how he doesn't have to live with the darkness that he said he had, that God wanted to deliver him from that. So basically that night Tony got saved, filled with the spirit and delivered from oppressions.
I've never seen someone just get it so fast, I was talking to him later and he was saying, "yup, I'm a son of God now!" He had such a grasp of sonship so immediately! We didn't have to barely tell him anything, he just wanted God, he said he was going to stop hanging around with bad influences, we introduced him to Pastor Phil from the Gathering and Tony was just all around excited about what just happened. He said he felt way better, and lighter... It was really amazing and encouraging.
Highlight #2
Right after we had Tony, we had two witch friends and their young daughter and grand daughter. We just loved on them and gave them the encouraging words God gave us for them. At the end they were totally blown away, they kept telling us how accurate we were and all the things that were going on in their lives that corresponded with what we said. They were really blessed and encouraged by our words. Jamie even got to give all the glory to God, saying it wasn't us who was giving these words.
These two witches did this kind of thing as well, but it was really encouraging for us to have them so blessed, feel so loved and for them to tell us how accurate we were.
Highlight #3
On our last day there, I got my first chance to lead a team with Caleb (Alberta) and Claire (England). The first couple we had were so open to what we had to say, we were right on with our words to the lady. The guy had some spiritual experiences he was wondering about, for example he would feel his hands vibrating sometimes, he didn't know what it meant, he didn't know if he should be worried or not. He said when he was sitting there that it was happening just then too. So we explained to him how that was God trying to get his attention, how sometimes the body has a physical reaction to the spiritual presence of God.
This guy was so ready. He even said to us "I just feel like I need to be where you guys are at." This guy and his girlfriend both got saved and filled with the spirit, and he said he felt better, like different and better.
It was so amazing, I've never had opportunities like this in my life to lead people to the Lord like the testimonies I just shared, so encouraging! The lady just kept telling us that she just felt so much peace around us, and we were explaining to her that one of God's names is the prince of Peace and that it was now a promise for her to take hold of.
It was awesome to have people comment on how much they felt at peace and felt love when they were around us. Such a testimony of the presence of God there.
Highlight #4 This doesn't start out as a highlight, but there were a bunch of other Christians who go out to these types of events and basically preach at people and tell them to repent and be saved or they are going to hell. They were there walking around with their signs and loudspeakers, handing out tracts, pretty much the whole time we were there. Needless to say at this type of event, it tended to often cause conflict. We witnessed many a shouting match and arguments over whether or not people were sinning etc.
I'll be honest, it was really really hard for me to keep my heart right towards these fellow Christians who were trying to tell people about God without much love.
One of the nights there was quite a conflict they had with Shawn, a black witch who heads up the psychic fair with another witch called Christian. The Christians tried to forcibly exorcise Lila, who Shawn says is the best psychic at the fair. What's cool is that Shawn's response was to call pastor Phil and get the monks to come. Pastor Phil has spent alot of time developing relationships with the witches, neo-pagans, wiccans, whoever down there. And they know his heart for them. The monks are some of the people who were working the confessional booth, and they got in there and helped calm everyone down and escorted them to the Gathering. It was a healing time for Shawn especially, he was a former christian, but basically felt that in his times of trouble he was left out to dry by Jesus. He, Christian and Lila stayed for a while at the gathering, Christian eventually left with Lila, but Shawn ended up staying till 1:30 am with the guys at the church just talking to us. One of the most profound comments he made to us is "You guys here, you guys are Jesus." He said that we were true Christians. He just really enjoyed talking to us and being with us. He said never in his life did he ever expect to be in church with 30 christian guys on Halloween Eve at midnight.
It was an amazing time. Pastor Phil has spent so much time and sacrificed to so much to be with the people he's called to. And we got to witness some of the fruits of it. Like Shawn, for instance, a guy who travels all around the world training people in witchcraft and makes a ton of money, that night especially he had a visible perspective shift, that not all Christians were the same. It was such an honour for all of us to be able to come and help Phil pull in the harvest. He's been so faithful working out there, I constantly felt like I wasn't worthy to be there. I kept telling people, "Who gets to do this stuff? Who gets to give prophetic words to people, lead them to the Lord, love them like they've never received before, get to chill with and have a witch king open up his heart to you?"
That just doesn't happen to Christians. I'm totally wrecked for having a normal christian life. I feel like I've finally started to find out what normal Christianity should be. There are so many stories of salvations, of people who received emotional healing, and countless people who were just encouraged and loved.
I wish I could step back and see the big picture of what happened at Salem this year. So many lives were changed, so many people have a new hunger to find truth. So many people will never be the same. None of us interns will ever be the same. It was such an eye opener for all us. It's hard to know if the greater work was done by God through each of us, or in each of us. I need a writing break. Please please please, As much as I have been practicing the prophetic lately, I can't read your minds. So please leave a comment below, let me know what you think, if you have any questions, or want to know more about something. I will try to write more later and maybe throw up some more pictures. But until then...
Some Videos
Some of the crowd near our tent by the fountain.
Jamie and Anthony performing a live song to attract people
A little tour of Salem before it got busy
A guy who stood in front of the store and scared people all weekend.
Hey all, well I'm sure you are all curious as to how the last 4ish days went for us down in Salem. I just got back today, wednsday afternoon and I don't feel much like writing. So I thought I'd just let you all know it was amazing, God did so many awesome things in peoples lives, and it was pretty much the best weekend ever.
So I guess this is really just a teaser until probably tomorrow which is when I may feel like writing again. Only problem is, so many things happened, it's a daunting task to try to cover most of it. So we'll see.
I threw in a few pictures to pique your curiousity while you wait for my next entries.
Here's Jamie with a few of your friendly neighbourhood ghost-busters...
A big 'ole bat
A picture of myself hanging out with two of the most prominent witches in Salem.
And last but not least here's a video of a bit of the approx. 60-100,000 person crowd we encountered Halloween night.
It's the calm before the storm. Not that we really have anything to worry about cause we be bringing it. Tomorrow morning we leave for Salem, round two. This time we will be gone from Saturday till tuesday, but possibly coming back wednsday. We're going to be nice and busy, working from 2pm - 10pm those 4 days, so we could definately use your prayers in those times.
Yesterday, we had 3 student impartations in the morning and a teaching on the tabernacle by Ali. I don't really have time to write much about each of the impartations, they were all so amazing and different.
Sharayah Quinn (New York) talked about love and fave some testamonies of how God has loved through her by her just giving a hug to someone and it breaking them down because of God's love. It was a really powerful testamony of God's love, even if we don't feel like we are doing anything, just being available to let God's love work through us.
Chad Seymour (Michigan) didn't do much talking, that's not his style. Instead he shared a bit and then dove right in and prayed for each one of us, giving us an impartation of his seer gifting.
Kulbir Raju (England) shared a bit about her testamony, coming from a religious background that was kind of a mix of hinduism and sikhism. Then she explained about a festival called a Rakhi, (Say Rook-he) which is all about family and community, where the sisters honour the brothers by giving them a bracelet and give them a chocolate to symbolize the sweetness of the relationship. The brothers would tradtitionally give the girls money or clothes symbolizing their protection as a brother, but we skipped that part. I don't know if many of the guys could afford giving money or clothes to each of the sisters here... It was a very meaningful time and really encouraging especially for the guys as the girls went around and prayed for the guys. It really seemed to knit us together as a covenant. Yeah. It was just awesome, kind of hard to describe if you weren't there...
So I hope you all have an amazing weekend and that you are blessed beyond your wildest dreams, and hey, remember us in your prayers, especially as we are down in Salem. I threw in a picture of Danielle (South Carolina), Luke (Alberta) and Myself(British Columbia) praying up a storm on our watchmen duty shift.
Yesterday was another milestone. Well, kind of, maybe not really, we finished our second ISD (Institute for Spiritiual Development) class, we are now finished 102 Advanced Prophetic Ministry.
So that's cool. I'm not sure what's going to be taking place of that in our mornings, but I'm sure I'll find out soon enough.
Last night Recie Saunders came and imparted to us and tonight is Greg or Patty Mapes, I think they are each doing a week, Greg is the president of Streams Ministries and Patty is the Chancellor, I'm not really sure what that is, I may or may not get back to you on that...
Having Recie speak was really good, he travels with Scott Evelyn a lot, they do a lot of ministry together. They go to Burning Man all the time and other new age events. He talked more about different events and gave us a bunch of amazing testamonies from different events they go to. They have high level witches and psychics getting saved all the time, it's really really neat.
Alot of what I got out of what he was saying was about being religious. How so often we christians feel compelled to, if we get an inch, we take a mile. So if someone seems vaguely interested in spiritual things, we blurt out their need for Jesus. but that's not even how Jesus did it. Thinking specifically of the woman at the well in the gospels, Jesus let here pursue him, he'd answer her questions, but he never pushed her or gave her more than she asked. Finally, she asked him for the life giving water. He didn't blurt out when he met her, "Man you've had a lot of divorces, you sure need me with that kind of track record."
We need to let God do what He wants to do. We can't approach people with an agenda. People can see your agenda from a mile away. Thinking that we need to say "You need Jesus Christ!", to every person who we talk to is pushing our religious agenda. If we are going out to get people saved, that's an agenda, it's assuming we know what God wants to do better than he does. Instead, we need to just go out there and love people. Let the spirit does what he wants. Maybe, just maybe, all an encounter with someone is meant to be, is just to plant some seeds, to create a deficit in them for everyday life.
Just being here and listening to all these amazing people and going out on these outreaches has drastically changed my view on evangelism. I never used to really like evangelism because I hate convincing people. I'm not good at arguing people to the Lord like it seems other people are. But, this just takes the pressure off. I'm learning to approach it only with God's agenda, just let him do what he wants, just love them people and see what happens. If I feel like I have to convince someone, that's me getting in again, God doesn't need me to defend Him. I'm learning to talk to someone, just as long as He wants me to, not to keep going and going. Like Jesus said, I only do what I see my Father doing, that's what I want evangelism to be for me.
While hosting at Salem, I was talking to a group of four people from isreal, they were my age and lived in the states, but they had just gotten back from a trip to Isreal, they said that at http://www.birthrightisrael.com/ they give free trips to Isreal to people who are between 18 - 26 and have any jewish blood in them. So I thought I'd pass this on because hey, if you are part jewish, you could get a free 10 day tour of Isreal.
Well I'm back. We went this weekend to Salem, left Saturday morning and got back late sunday night. We had, an amazingt time, I can hardly wait to go back next weekend!
Let's see, so what did we do. Well we got everything set up so we could start at 2 pm, so we got there, set up our tents and anything else we needed to do. It's really cool because our tent is set-up right in the middle of everything, there is a fountain and a square kind of thing right in the middle of the main street, and the church we are with, The Gathering, has a stage set up on the drained fountain, we have our tent off to the left, they have a free hot chocolate booth to the right of the stage and a confessional (I'll tell you more about that later!) behind us. So we really take over that little area, it's awesome!
I'll give a rundown of the different things that were going on with us and the Gathering. 1. We had our Spiritual Reading and Dream Interpretation tent
2. We did a skit and live dream interpretations at the bank twice a day.
3. The Gathering had their stage from which there was lots of worship music and christian artists, along with other people from the area, we also did a few live dream interpretations. 4. There was a free Hot Chocolate booth, pretty self-explanatory
5. The Gathering was running a confessional booth.
6. There was a hot-dog stand to help raise funds to cover the expenses of all of this.
Well I'll start with the Confessional booth, I never got to sit in or help with this one, but basically, people come in, expecting to confess their sins or something, and instead, the people that are running it, are dressed like monks, and they confess to the people the sins of the church. For example they apologize for the hypocrisy in the church, for things the church has done in the past, etc. Maybe next weekend I can help with this, I didn't hear alot about how it went so far this year but they have alot of cool testimonies from the past years.
I was mostly working at the fountain location, I was some teams in the tent, but I also did alot of hosting and interceeding. I really enjoying hosting actually, hosting is basically standing at the front of the line and watching the teams in the tent so that after they finish, they get some time to recap and when they nod, I'll bring them in some more people. I really enjoyed it, it's cool just to talk to people and answer their questions, I really learned alot about how to answer their questions in a non-religious way. Probably some of the most common questions were:
Q:What's a spiritual reading? A: Basically we'll look at you and tell you the things we percieve about you. We're only going to tell you encouraging edifying thngs, don't worry, we're not going to criticize you or condemn you in any way.
Q:Are you guys psychics? A: No, we are not psychics, we actually get our information from the Creator(or God, or the One Light, etc., we just use the names that God calls himself but don't sound really religious.), whereas psychics usually get their information from spirit guides or lesser lights, etc, while we go right to the source.
Q:Why is this free? A: We are all students with the Institue for Spiritual Development, based out of New London, and we are basically here to practice what we've been learning.
Those are some of the usual questions I got asked, I would basically just give them an overview if they even asked before they went into the tent. Most people didn't have any questions at all, I just desperatly tried to remember their name, it didn't ususally work.
Now, the times I was in the tent, were pretty much amazing. We were always in groups of three, two interns with a staff/second-year-intern and always at least one guy or girl. When the people came, we'd ask whether they wanted a dream interpretation or a spiritual reading, then we'd just dive right in.
What really struck me, was how open everybody was. One question we'd usually ask when we started was, "What does spirituality/religion mean to you?" From that question it helped establish any base belief in God, or just gave us a general idea of where they were at.
It was awesome how, as we spoke with them, gave them words, gained credibility, and just loved on them, we gained their favour. The whole process was often like peeling layers upon layers back to reveal the truth to them. Throughout the weekend, we had quite a few salvations, it was really, really cool.
There was a few different levels that this affected people. 1. They would leave feeling encouraged or just loved.
2. They would have an increased desire to pursure truth and to not follow "lesser lights".
3. There was often healing for past issues and hurts in people.
4. Some people even got saved!
5. Other people, we basically just wrecked them for the psychics and the false things.
We had a particular husband/wife come in and the husband was saying, "We just payed $30 to get a reading from the psychics, and I've already gotten so much more out of this and you haven't even done me yet!"
It was such an encouraging time for all of us, God changed so many people's lives in so many different ways.
I don't even know where to go from here, but if you have any questions, I'd love to answer them, because, I don't know what you want to hear about. So, if you want me to elaborate on anything, leave a comment, or e-mail me at dustinzupancic (at) hotmail (dot) com
I'll try to get some more pictures, I was pretty busy most of the time so I didn't take that many... But there sure was a lot of bizarre costumed people walking aournd, lots of strange stuff to see. We'll be going back next weekend for saturday, sunday, monday and tuesday, so I'm sure I'll have alot more great stuff to tell you.
I wasn't going to post tonight because I'm really tired, but I got this picture and I thought ya'll might like to see who all the students are...
While I'm at it I might as well throw in 3 good quotes from John Paul Jackson this morning...
--> Never focus on a lesser power. --> What you focus on, you make room for. --> What you fear, you empower.
Tonight we had an impartation from Scott Evelyn, mostly in preperation for Salem this weekend, it was really good, he has so much experience with the new age and occult. He goes to burning man every year, which is pretty crazy... It was really good what he had to say, it will definately be handy.
Well I'm headed off to bed, hope you all are having the best day ever...
I'll try and update you one what's been new lately. I find as I settle into the routine of here. That I don't feel like I have as much to write, which probably isn't true, but well, what can I say?
Lately we've been working on the ISD class (Institute for Spiritual Development) 102, which is called Adnvanced Prophetic Ministry. The ISD classes are all made by Streams, it's just kind of it's own branch.
The course is basically laying a foundation for prophetic ministry, what did it look like in the bible, and how does it operate in the church, as well as it includes some prophetic excercises.
What I really enjoy about the ISD classes, is that we often have different people teaching it from Streams. It's cool because everybody who teaches it has a different style and it's just really cool.
The lady who taught us the last few sections, Dawn Dube, liked to make sure we got our prophetic excercises. I'll list a few of the different excercies we've done to give you an idea.
-*-4 people will go up to the front and as people get a word for them, they stand up and give it to them.
-*-8 people in a circle facing outward to 8 other people who are facing inward. The people in the circle on the outside have 30 seconds to give a word to the person they are facing, then the person on the inside has 10 seconds to tell if they are on, and why it's significant. Then they rotate. After you've gone around the whole circle, the inside circle switches with the outside. I really enjoyed this one, it was cool as you went around, sometime I'd give someone a word, and they'd vbe like, wow, three other people gave me a word really similar to that, or it'd be right on, so it was really good.
-*-Another one, we made two long lines of people. The people on one sidw would keep their eyes closed while the poeple on the other side would mix up and go, stand in front of someone, and tap them on the shoulder. With your eyes closed, and no idea who was in front of you, you had to give that person a word. This was cool because it took out the element of using any previous knowledge of the person, you had to just go for it.
-*-The last one we did, I was one of the volunteers, and 4 of us stood in front of the class and practiced giving words to a crowd, so instead of a particular person, we'd give a word over whoever the Lord pointed out to us, or a corporate word.
So you can see, we've been pretty busy. What's really faith building and encouraging is doing all these different types of prophetic ministry, not just one form, but in all these different ways.
Probably the best thing about these excercises for me is that they have really helped me differentiate between what is myself, and what is God. It's really helped me distinguish the voice of God. It's super encouraging because God's really been showing me how easy it is to hear from Him, that He is always speaking, it's just a matter of whether I want to listen of not.
Besides the ISD courses, we've also been hearing about the Tabernacle from various second year interns, we've been getting amazing teachings from Ken Nelson, they've been recording them, because he wants to make a series of his Spiritual Linguistics that he's been talking to us, but us Interns get it free, so I'm going to be able to keep them which is such a blessing, because there is no chance that I could get half of what he's saying at the time, it's soooo good. So now I'll be able to go over them whenever I want, I am way too excited about that...
Let's see, we've already read "Prophecy, Dreams and Evangelism" by Doug Addison, and now we are reading "Needless Casualties of War" by John Paul Jackson, it's really good, it's all about spiritual warfare, not being stupid about it, knowing your boundries and authority.
We still have our impartation nights wednsday night when different couples from Streams mostly, come and share/impart with us. Last wednsday Ron and Cherry, an older couple from New Zealand who now work with Streams came and talked on the Power of God, well, they talked for about 15 minutes, then Ron and Cherry got tired of talking and just prayed for the power of God to come. And, simply put. It did. Most of us got rocked.
We were supposed to be working on Pinnacle Mountain today, a work day, but there is a conference this weeked that Streams is helping put on, so instead most of the students went, and we helped set-up, most of them are there today, I however, am going fishing. I caught a pike yesterday and am hoping for a big 'ole bass today.
Last night, most of the canadians, Luke, Caleb, Jamie and myself went to Eric Coopers to watch the Canucks game with Josiah Cooper, unfortunately, their pay-per-view was having issues, so instead we watched a movie. But we'll probably be over ther in the future for other games, so that will be just dandy. I heard the canucks lost anyways...It was game I could miss.
Well I'm getting pretty geared-up for Salem, it's coming up next weekend... It's going to be amazing!
What else to say? I don't know, but you can all check out www.streamsacademy.com it's the new internship pages, I must say, way better then when I applied...I think I got short-changed webpage wise...
