It's been a while

Holy cow has this month gone by fast!
seems like it was just yesterday that I was journaling about my fantastic travels with Al to Kansas City.
After that I was back in Edmonton for a week, which was taken up by the Leadership Summit, and then it was off for 2 weeks of holidays, which were very good.
So now it's back to normal life here in the city.

It's been interesting to see the rise in popularity of facebook and it makes me wonder about whether the 'fad' of personal blogs is fading? It seems that more and more people are interested in the brief time it takes to connect through facebook. Perhaps it's because it's more interactive and visual than most blogs. It also has neat applications, although many of those are just plain irritating.

It's taking some time to get back into the swing of things and I don't think we'll have much of a routine until school starts.

I've been thinking SO much about paradigm shifts in my own life, that God is stirring. Much of the rest of life is currently is a bit in the background right now, while God wrestles with me over these paradigm changes. I'm sure I'll be blogging about it eventually, in some form.

All this leads to life feeling like it's flying by at an unusual speed, and days and weeks go by and I'm not having as much time to write and reflect as I'd like.

Last night I felt God clearly stir in me this phrase: "Behold I make all things new" In a time of worship I found myself quietly singing that phrase over and over and over again. I knew that God was giving it to me but I wasn't sure where it was. Turns out it is Revelation 22:5 in the King James and NKJV and the RSV versions.

I felt it was God's promise to me. If you have the faith to believe that, it's very powerful. Huge actually.

These are days when God is moving in some significant ways and I feel the need to position myself in faith before Him.

"I make all things new."

Jim & Al's Excellent Adventure: The Conclusion

We arrived home tonight (Monday) at about 6 p.m. Both Al and I were very tired and sensing that it had been a very powerful trip. So what is some of the fruit of it all?

I'd begin by looking at the hours I spent with Jesus each day; the amount of worship and the heart connect that was made wide in my life. The time in the Scriptures, praying them; especially 1 Timothy. (the concept of Christ's 'unlimited patience' being poured out touched me very deeply). There was peace and joy in my heart a great deal of the time I was in Kansas City, which is always evidence of the Holy Spirt's work; there was inner healing of wounds and disappointments with myself.

My heart for prayer and worship is larger and stronger; my own passion for Jesus has grown. So how was the trip? Judging by the fruit I'm experiencing in my life, it was fantastic!

As I said in an earlier post, I also am coming back to Edmonton, with an excitement to see what and participate in, what God has in store for our city!

Jim & Al's Excellent Adventure Pt. VIII

It’s Monday morning and Al and I have been driving now for 14 hours! We just left Minot, ND, and we’re about an hour from the border. It’s been a fun time down here in the excited States! They sure do have some funny road signs and store fronts in the U.S., such as the ‘Micro-Incision Vasectomy Reversal’, with a ‘money-back guarantee’! or the ‘Rusty Chandelier Antiques’ or the ‘Shelton Fireworks’ sign with a slightly smaller ‘No Smoking’ sign underneath! Our personal favorite for the trip was the construction sign reading, “Hit Roadside Worker: Fine: $10,000”! Simply classic! We laughed for a long time about that one.

The night of driving was tiring, but quite awesome at the same time. At about 3 a.m. while Al was asleep, I was listening to some music from IHOP and the Lord met me powerfully as I drove down the interstate.
Here are some of the lyrics:

“Bring restoration
Bring restoration
You taken my pain
You’ve called me by a new name
You’ve taken my shame
And in it’s place, you give me joy.
You take my mourning and turn it into dancing
You take my sadness and turn it into joy
You take my weeping and turn into laughter

Chorus:
You bring restoration
You bring restoration to my soul

Bridge:
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
You’ve make all things new

As I drove down that dark interstate with that song playing, the Lord came and reached into me and brought a 2 month journey of healing to a new level of completion. It was incredibly powerful.

From about 4 -5 a.m. as we drove along, it was as if the Lord treated us to our own personal lightshow: all around in the distance we watched lightening strikes for nearly an hour, but we never drove through any of the storm!

At around 5:30 a.m. we cranked up the volume on this incredible live chorus from the cd, and we welcomed the dawn of a new day, joining in with 10,000 voices:
“I believe that you will come, like the rain”!!

It’s beyond amazing what the Holy Spirit can do with such a simple declaration!
Amen Lord! Let it be.

Jim & Al's Excellent Adventure Pt. VII

So what does all of this mean for Edmonton? I could be dreaming of moving here to Kansas City! After all, I could sell my house in Edmonton, buy one here, pay it off fully and have a nice pile of money to spare! (houses here are super cheap compared to Edmonton!) If IHOP is so great, why not? Well, because my heart is in Edmonton! Because of what I believe God is wanting and preparing to do and release in Edmonton. I don’t know fully what it is, but I know that it involves night and day worship and intercession. What will that look like and when will it happen? I don’t know that either.

I will leave here tomorrow, refreshed and inspired again. Not toward a model, but toward a person! We HAVE to pursue the glory of God being released and manifest in Edmonton. We have to!

Please O God bring together the company of people in the city who hunger for this! I know they are there Lord; you have already stirred people. It’s time Lord. I come before you Father right now. I stand before your very throne and I come in the name of Jesus, through the power of the Spirit and I ask for you to bring together the people in Edmonton who hunger and thirst for you glory to be released in our city. Let you glory fall O God. Call others. Stir still more! According to 1 Timothy 1:14, I ask for the abundance of grace to be pour out upon these ones who you have stirred. I ask for you to pour out love and faith upon us and gather us together. And may we see your glory released in the city. Not just at a meeting Lord, but a release of glory that abides in our city and causes your Kingdom to come and your will to be done in Edmonton. The Spirit and the Bride say COME! Amen.

Jim & Al's Excellent Adventure Pt. VI

How do I describe what it’s like to be here in the midst of a night and day prayer room? To be in a room on a Saturday afternoon with so many people sitting and reading their Bibles and praying to Jesus, and worshiping Him and expressing their voluntary love and devotion to Him moves me more than I can describe. It wasn’t in the midst of a big corporate meeting or conference; it was an average Saturday afternoon, with nothing out of the ordinary going on. No big worship leader or speaker or anything like that; the musicians weren’t all that extraordinary. That’s what is so great about IHOP! It’s not an event; it’s a way of life!

Right now, it’s 11 p.m. on Saturday night and there are about 100 people giving themselves to the Lord; some raising their hands; others standing, some reading their Bibles, others walking around praying.

What is drawing me in all this is the heart that I see and feel here. It’s not so much the form or the structure that touches me, but the reality of there being a community of people of such devotion. Not perfect devotion for sure; not by any means! (IHOP has lots of weaknesses) But there is a very deep expression of worship and love for Jesus, and it’s expressed continually, all night and all day, without end.

Okay, it happened again! It’s now 11:49 and just when things has kind of mellowed out a bit, another wave of the Spirit just rolled across the room. All across the room, people are now singing out “Jesus you’re alive and coming soon, coming soon!” That’s happens all the time: just when you think you can get ready to leave, another wave washes over you and you realize, “NO, I can’t leave now!” (now they’ve moved onto another spontaneous chorus “No matter what this world may say, the promise of your coming is near!” People standing all over the room!

This is like having your spirit marinating in the Presence of God. Simply amazing!

Jim & Al's Excellent Adventure Pt. V

It’s 10:40 p.m. here on Saturday night and I’m in the newly refurbished prayer room at IHOP. Basically all the renovations were to facilitate the new partnership between IHOP and GOD TV. They have installed whole bunch of high-tech TV cameras as part of the new 24/7 broadcast of the IHOP prayer room. In some ways it feels quite different because of the production requirements related to such a broadcast.

Tonight Al and I were at the Encounter God service here at the Missions base. The worship was really good; I didn’t have the same level of personal experience as last night, but that’s fine. The preaching however, was OUT OF THIS WORLD! (am I holding back?) O MY! That’s all I can say. Allan Hood was speaking, having just returned from an 18-day trip all over Asia, strengthening the churches there, and meeting with various church leaders. He had fire on him tonight. Clearly inspired by the devotion and dedication of the believers in Korea and China, he shared of what he saw and the intensity and commitment of the thousands of Christians he was with.

We simply have so little idea of the significance of what we are doing when we gather to worship and pray! The power that is released and the response in the spiritual realm! He spoke with authority of the current shift that is happening in the church around the world.

Tonight after Allan’s message, we sang ONE song; for 45 minutes, and yet I was SO disappointed when we stopped! The Presence of God was very strong there and both Al and I were both pouring out our hearts in worship! (and I mean visibly!)

Jim & Al's Excellent Adventure Pt. IV

Today is Saturday and sadly it's our last full day here :( However the trip has been entirely worth while, simply for what happened last night. Al and I went to the 'Encountering God' service and it was simply out of this world! I have to say that my reasons for saying that were quite specific to me; what God did for me in that time was amazing.

First off, the worship was quite something. The band started playing and to be honest it didn't seem like very many people were super engaged with the music; they played one song for about 5-6 minutes, which is quite a while for most churches (that I have been connected with!), but then rather than moving on because it seemed most people were not engaged, suddenly the room changed and virtually everybody was highly engaged! I mean something shifted, or so it seemed! Most places I'm used to would have moved on, but not here!

I think there were about 1000 people there, on a Friday night of all nights!

Al just made a good point: we've seen worship like that at conferences, where there is a high level of anticipation for the worship time, but we didn't experience that here. But what stood out for us was that unlike at a conference, there is worship happening here at IHOP NON-STOP! It's amazing that the people were SO into it in a place where there is SO much worship all the time! I feel like some people will relate to that sentence, but others won't. Just keep in mind that I come from a tradition where the older people complain about the repetition of worship songs and the average worship set on a Sunday morning was about 20 - 30 min. I've long since ditched that paradigm for worship, but it's still what I came out of!

Al and I were lost in the worship. It seemed like we'd only be there for 20 minutes and a full hour had gone by. When they brought up the pulpit in the middle of the last song, I wanted to cry out, "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" (and that's saying something, cause I'm a preacher!)

On a more personal note, in the midst of the worship, God began to show me some very powerful things. It actually started before the service started, at the moment I got there and started to journal. Suddenly I began to see elements of my life over the past 2 months begin to come together. Discussions I've had, streams of thought and specific events, began to come together in my mind like pieces of jigsaw puzzle. It started out as some thoughts I was journaling about, but then in the midst of the worship I began to see things in my mind (again, elements of my life over the past 2 months) and I understood how God was fitting them together and what the ramifications were for the future. I recalled conversations and events and instantly knew why God was causing them to happen and what He wanted to teach me. I'd have one stream of thought in my mind, like a video in my mind, and then as I was reeling from it, another whole stream would start and I'd be overwhelmed by that as well. All this happening in the midst of a truly incredible worship set.

I could say way more, especially about the young man who came up to dance with some friends and was clearly lame in one leg! Unbelievably powerful.

Even the message was bizarre for me. It wasn't an overwhelming message at all, but as I watched and listend, Misty Edwards was a picture of a LOT of things that God was saying to me. It's like her delivery of the sermon was a living example in front of me of what God was saying to me.

Al was SO classic on the drive home. He couldn't complete a sentence! It would be like, "Okay, so.... yah...I don't know..." and then we'd laugh, and he'd try again, but it would be "Okay, well, remember when.....wow."
There was lots of conversation, but we both knew and appreciated how hard it was to put it all into language.

God had met with us. Ruined us yet again for ordinary Christianity, and captured us with a vision for more!

Jim & Al's Excellent Adventure Pt. III

Day 2 (part II)

A funny thing happened when we arrived today.

As Al and I were driving into Kansas City, Al asked me a question about what I felt the 'best case scenario' would be for our time at IHOP. We talked about it and I basically said that I wasn't going with any big expectations or hopes or questions that I needed answers to. It was interesting to talk about whether it was good or bad to go on a trip like this without particular expectations. On the one hand, it sounds good to 'not have expectations', but on the other hand, it sounds problematic to not have any particular hopes.

Anyway, I then said to Al that pretty much the only way this trip could be bad was if we arrived to find that they had closed the prayer room (which obviously couldn't happen because it's a 24/7 prayer room that hasn't ever closed in 8 years!)

So today we arrive at the IHOP missions base and as we gathered our stuff together from the trunk, I expressed my surprise to Al at how few cars there were in the parking lot. There were about 40-50 cars. As we walked to the building, it appeared that they were doing some work to the main doors, and there were a couple of people who went in side door, so we followed suit.

We open the door to walk in and the entire place was a construction zone!! Dry wall all over; chairs everywhere....

Al and I stood there in stunned silence. It was amazing because of our conversation in the car, not because we were worried that they had closed the prayer room. Obviously they had moved it to another temporary location.

It's just so good to be here and great to be here with Al. He's loving it so much; Al is one of the funniest people I know and he's had so many great lines that made me laugh really hard, but just don't translate in a blog because the voice and facial expressions are missing, not to mention the specific context! He was great in the book store... like a kid on Christmas; he didn't know what to look at next! Classic!

Jim & Al's Excellent Adventure Pt. II

Day 2

We arrived in Kansas City at about 9:30 p.m. last night. It may have been anticipation and adrenalin but for about the last 500 km, I was TOTALLY awake and alert. It was amazing.

Even our arrival in Kansas City as amazing because I took a wrong turn off the interstate but then we ended up taking a different road and going virtually directly to the hotel!

Today we woke up at 10 a.m. local time, so we both slept like the dead for about 9 hours. We got up and went directly to IHOP. When we arrived we discovered that the prayer room on the missions base had been moved, due to extensive construction that they are doing right now. So the prayer room has been temporarily moved to another building, which is where I am right now. I'm excited that they are supposed to finish the renovations while Al and I are here, so we will be able to see it when it's done!

Right now we're in the temporary location of the prayer room. I find it takes me a few hours to 'orient' myself to being here and for me to get to a place in my spirit where I can fully engage. It's like I have to get used to my surroundings or something; I can't quite explain it.

That's it for right now. I'll probably post more a bit later today.

Jim & Al's Excellent Adventure Pt. I

Day 1

Well we got away from Edmonton several hours later than originally planned, leaving the city at about 3 p.m. Shortly into our epic journey we both knew we would be in trouble, as fatigue quickly set it. The crazy thing is that both of us, for completely separate reasons, only got 3 hours of sleep the night before; so off we go for a 28 hr. drive, on only 3 hours of sleep! Coca-Cola classic and Red Bull all the way baby!

At about 1:45 a.m. we successfully crossed the border. Given my level of exhaustion I struggled to successfully answer the border guards question about how long we would be staying in the States, and needed to ask Al for clarity! I was slightly concerned that my expired passport and AB drivers license would not have been sufficient, but all went smoothly.

It’s currently 3:46 a.m. and Al and I are hurtling down highway 85 in Montana. As we enter a small town called Alexander, Al lurches the car to the right to avoid the extremely large dead animal on the road. As we come into town we pass a motel called ‘The Ragged Butt Inn’! How classic is that! We decided from now on to stop and take pictures of these places because you simply can’t beat the ‘Ragged Butt Inn’

Al and I have been talking about issues of faith, spiritual authority and territorial spirits. Looking at the story of Jesus calming the storm, was the storm an attempt by the devil to prevent Jesus from going somewhere, or was it simply an act of nature? Is there far more going on spiritually around us, expressing itself in natural means, than we are consciously aware of? What does it mean for us to walk in the same authority that Jesus walked in? In Matt. 10, Christ gave the disciples the same authority as He had. Many of us would agree that according to the Scriptures we have the same authority, but practically speaking we don’t really know how to walk in that authority. And how does faith intersect with our ability/inability to walk in spiritual authority?

It’s now 5 a.m. and the sun is beginning to rise. We are looking forward to getting to the interstate where we can make up some time!

This morning I decided that extreme measures were needed: I would try to have one of those fancy coffees at Starbucks; one that has some much other stuff in it you hopefully couldn't really taste the coffee. I needed the caffine! WOW was it gross!! I gagged several times. It was awful! I have no idea how people can drink it... Luckily, Al liked it, so he finished it.

Is it a different day yet? I can’t tell. It’s 1:24 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon. Al and I are in South Dakota, about an hour from Sioux Falls. We’ve each had about 6 hours of sleep in the past two nights combined and we’ve been on the road for about 22 hours. We have been playing the cow game. (that’s when you see cows and be the first to say ‘those are my cows’ and then count them, keep track and the one with the most cows at the end of the trip wins) I’m at 220 cows and Al has 174. It’s a tight race. We’re at a rest stop now and I nearly fell asleep on the lawn. Wonderfully humid weather here. Zzzzzz…..

3:30 p.m. We just finished having lunch in Sioux Falls. We have about 5 - 5.5 hours to go to Kansas City.