Giving Up, Letting Go, and Hanging On

I've had a wonderful opportunity lately to work in a nursery on a consistent basis with a pretty large group of kids under the age of four. I've really grown to love them... but when they start to get fussy or throw fits over things, and then refuse my advice or comfort... it can be kind of frustrating. It's the simple lessons of giving up, letting go, and hanging on that they just can't seem to get: "In order to get a cool, new toy you want to play with, you may have to let go of the one you're playing with now; I know you want to start the TV, but why don't you let go of the remote you don't know how to use, and let me do it for you; if you really want to make a basket in the goal, you have to try more than twice..."
Obviously, these are just a few examples... but you get the gist of it. But a funny thing happened the other night while I was thinking about these kids: God told me that I'm one of them! I had this dream:

I was playing nerf-gun wars with a few friends of mine in this city-like area. The rules were simple: If you get hit three times, you're out. So we started playing, running around and shooting at each other. Before I knew it, I had two hits on me. Someone began chasing me trying to get my one last hit in order to eliminate me from play. So I took off running - through streets, over cars, in and out of buildings... until I reached this green pasture area and tripped, rolling down a hill. My buddy was coming down after me ready to get the last hit on me, so I quickly turned and started shooting just as they began to shoot at me. But suddenly, we weren't shooting darts anymore - our guns had turned into water guns! We continued firing at one another and soaking each other until a voice said, "It's no longer about winning or losing, it's about who gives up first."

Now, from a glance... this just sounds like a silly dream. But I woke up knowing there was some substance to it, and this is what God has been pressing on my heart for a while. Take a look at this passage of scripture with me:

"Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you." -Philippians 3:13-15

Paul wrote this letter with the intent of getting the believer's mindset right. For Paul, it wasn't about a physical achievement, it was about their heart attitude. He encourages them in this passage to "be thus minded" - not to act this way... to "be thus minded."

So how does all this tie together?

Well, there's three things:
1. It's not about winning or losing, it's about who gives up first.
2. We, as Christians, are little kids. We don't know what to give up, let go, or hang on to.
3. This is a mindset change that pushes us towards our destiny.

So let's start with number one! What on earth does that dream mean?

Well, at the beginning of my dream, success was measured in a very attainable way. Basically, three strikes and your out! Sadly, many Christians live their spiritual lives in a similar way. We so often use our carnal minds to try to discern spiritual things that we try to use worldly goals to reach heavenly prizes, and it just doesn't work like that! We often have this "checklist" mentality that enables us to make spiritual growth a series of achievements. The big problem with this, is that it erases grace, enables men to reach perfection, and disallows the work of the Spirit! And that's a BIG PROBLEM!

If loving my neighbor becomes a task, it means that I can somehow either succeed or fail at doing that task. However, the Bible tells us that we are saved, not by our works of righteousness, but by his grace! I think its safe to say that our "heavenly calling," also mentioned in Ephesians three, takes more emphasis on God's grace completing us than our "righteous acts" fulfilling our destiny. And if our  own righteous acts can get us to maturity, what's the need for the Spirit? The bottom line is this: "Spiritual Maturity" really isn't something we obtain, it's something we pursue.

Another part of my dream I didn't mention had me set in a foreign mission field trying to use carnal tactics to reach the lost for Christ. It wasn't working. God then used this seemingly silly analogy to teach me about what Spiritual Maturity and Spiritual Success is really defined by:
"It's not about winning or losing, it's about who gives up first."
Or the amplified version:
"It's not about obtaining or falling short, it's about giving up, letting go, and hanging on to the right things."

So what's with giving up, letting go, and hanging on? How do they relate to Spiritual Maturity and Success?

Well, Paul talks about these three very important concepts in the passage in Philippians 3: He does not count himself to have apprehended; he forgets the things behind him; and he presses forward to things in front of him. Paul tells us that this is the mindset of a mature, success-driven believer!

But the problem is, we don't know how to give up, let go, or hang on.
You see,

I don't want to give up my past life, my sins, my struggles, my pride, my "achievements." I don't want to really lose my life in order to gain whatever Christ wants to give me. I don't want to give up this toy for the cooler toy Jesus is offering me! Can't I have both?

And I really don't want to let go of my ministry, my life. God, you don't understand. I know you created me and all, but I think I should be holding the remote.

And why should I keep trying something that's so hard? Why should I keep pressing towards a life of holiness? Of godliness? I tried that. I missed my shots. I'll go back to my old games now.


But this isn't the mindset the Bible teaches us at all! Paul was a very "successful" Christian. He could say the he "achieved" spiritual knowledge, he could have basked in the fact that he had started so many churches, and he could have talked himself out of pursuing more ministry since he had so much on his plate already! But instead, Paul called himself the chief of sinners and was constantly pursuing fresh revelation; he didn't focus on what was done, but what needed to be done; and he fixed his eyes on God's will and not his own plans.

Brothers and Sisters, this is such an important concept. If we don't learn how to do this properly, we stunt our growth, hurt the body, and lose heavenly rewards. It's not worth that to hold onto our pride! We need to learn to give up our ideas of perfection, let go of our life plans, and press forward in faith for what God has in store! This is the path to Spiritual Maturity - realizing it doesn't end. Realizing we don't attain it. Realizing that following God is a life-long journey that isn't about winning or losing, it's about giving up!

So let's all give up our worldly pursuits in favor of heavenly rewards! Let's give up, let go, and hang on to the things God would have us to, and let's experience the growth and success of living a life according to the Spirit.

And Lord, enable me with your grace to discern if there is "anything in which I am otherwise minded" that you may mold me according to your Will in the name of Jesus!

Judgement and Shaking

After spending some time in prayer about this, I feel like it's time that I share something God has been showing me over the past few months. The message is simple: judgement is coming. However, I've had some fairly specific ways that God has shown me these things, and I wouldn't necessarily be one to jump and down to get attention and share it - but the things have been coming to pass, and I feel like it's time to put them out there.

While I've been feeling for a while that judgement was on the brink - as I believe most of us believe these days - my true conversion to the "judgement-is-nigh" side didn't really happen until March 6th, 2011. I woke up at about 4 AM and started undergoing some intense spiritual attack. It's hard to explain except that I felt every lie I've ever fought in my entire life was trying to hit me all at once. I prayed in the Spirit until I fell back asleep about an hour later. Sometime during my sleep, I had this dream:

I was sitting three rows back, three rows over of what appeared to be a small, underground church meeting with various church leaders that I knew of. We were all praying and worshiping together when my eyes locked with another leader's eyes. Immediately, his eyes began flashing various dots and dashes at me in a very specific order. Upon waking up, the Spirit immediately told me a few things: the dashes and dots are Morse code, the three seats back is three years, and the three seats over is three stages. I quickly got my computer and figured out what the Morse code meant. It ended up being a reference to a Bible passage: Ezekiel 7:3, "Now is the end come upon thee, and I will send mine anger upon thee, and will judge thee according to thy ways, and will recompense upon thee all thine abominations." After reading the rest of the passage, I was so filled with awe over the Lord, that I collapsed. My heart broke over my country and I fell to my knees in tears. Three months! That's June of 2011! Lord, give me clarification. Help me to understand.

I pondered this dream in my heart and shared it with a few close people for the next while. A couple weeks later, I had another dream on March 19th, 2011 in Cedar Rapids.

The dream was very specific. There would be an order to a series of earthquakes that was going to hit the United States. My dream started with a map focused on the Central United States around the St. Louis area, I saw an earthquake happen at this location. Shortly after, the map zoomed out and I saw two other earthquakes take place - one around Colorado, and another around the East Coast. These earthquakes happened almost simultaneously.

This dream combined with my other dream lead me to believe that these earthquakes would happen on June, 7th of 2011. I prayed about this date and asked for further clarification. The night of June 6th, 2011 - I had one more dream about everything.

And then I saw myself standing before a car. And the car's name was Judgement. The hood of the car was open and the Lord God said to me: Pour the oil inside the car, but pour only one-quarter of the oil. And so I did so. And then the Lord God said again: Pour the oil inside the car, put pour only half of the bottle. Again, I obeyed the voice. Then the Lord God said again: Pour all the oil inside the car. For the third year has come to pass that my judgement will be fulfilled upon this place, and my vehicle of Judgement will travel the nation because they have not heard my voice. And so immediately I was in the car called "Judgement," and I was riding through the country that was the United States. First, I saw that many small towns and businesses had been abandoned because of great economic difficulties. Next, I saw that great storms and tornadoes were heading across the United States. Specifically, I saw a storm that was traveling through New York so "that I may wake up and know this dream has come from the Lord." Finally, I was driven into a courthouse, where I saw the falling of the freedom in America and a new door open to persecution. All these thing were supposed to happen gradually over a period of three years, until in 2015, things were utterly unrecognizable as America. 

I woke up from this dream knowing that the judgement signs would be gradual, but I still expected to see the things come to pass. First, I saw the storm on June 7th, 2011 that went through New York City. Second, on June 7th, 2011 there was the first small earthquake my first and second dreams predicted on the New Madrid Fault line. Then again, on August 23rd, a nearly simultaneous earthquake happened that shook near Washington DC and Colorado. Just like my second dream had said. While all these things: the economy, natural disasters, and government changes have been subtle, they have been coming to pass. And coming exactly as the Lord has shown me. I don't say these things claiming to be anybody, but I say them saying the Lord has fulfilled a word he showed me, and I feel it is a responsibility of mine to share those words with others.

One other important dream I had the other day was this:

I was walking along a long dirt road, where I again saw the signs of judgement. Fallen governments, huge storms, and economic disaster. However, the people I was with refused to recognize these signs as judgement from the Lord. Instead, the put up a little "display shelter" where a great geyser loomed over the city in a seemingly harmless fashion. Above the geyser, the people inscribed, "The Great Judgement" as a mockery of how "great" the judgement was. The Lord God told me in my dream, go over near my judgement. As I did, a huge blast of water from the geyser blew me off my feet and left me in a state of disarray. The Lord warned me, "The signs have been given, do not ignore. My judgement is coming. People will say "it is slow," but when it comes, it will come quickly. (Much like the message in Habakkuk 2:1-3). We are warned in the Bible, people will say, "Peace and safety, and then sudden destruction will come upon them." Just be ready. Be ready.

I do not say these things to scare you, nor spur you into some kind of year-2k type thinking where you store up 20 years worth of canned food. I say these things to warn you of what is to come so that your faith will remain strong, and so that you will draw nigh unto God during these difficult times that we're entering into as a nation. My opinion is not fact, it is speculative. I don't have perfect understanding, but God has shown me some very specific things that have come to pass - and I would warn others that judgement really is coming, and coming soon. And that we should prepare ourselves for the things the Lord has in store for our country.

Go and be blessed in Jesus' Holy Name.