“Be still and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46:10)

There was a time when our vacations were so packed with frenetic activity that we would come back exhausted needing more time off to recuperate from the vacation!

We would make a mad dash from one “Top 10 attraction” to another, ensuring that all of them were included in our itinerary.

We have since wised up considerably and now take at least two consecutive days in a week of holidays to simply rest, relax, read, reflect and re-create, preferably beside a body of water. What a difference this makes when we return refreshed to face the demands of daily living!

Do we need to wait for an extended vacation to experience restful recreation? Of course not!

Jesus models a lifestyle that makes room for periods of rest on a more frequent basis.

In Luke 4:33-42, we see details of a day of ministry in Capernaum. He teaches in the synagogue, casts out an unclean spirit, heals Peter’s mother-in-law of her fever, and, that same evening, lays hands on everyone who was brought to him “sick with various diseases” and then drives out more demons.

I get tired just reading about how busy his day was!

But notice what he does following a few hours of sleep. “Jesus left and went to a secluded place.” The parallel passage in Mark 1:35 reads: “Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed.”

It has been suggested by scholars that this description of Jesus’ disciplined departure to a deserted place was not just a one-time event that happened on that particular day only, but a daily detail in his Day-timer.

Whether he spent this time simply resting (as Luke implies) or in prayer (as Mark amplifies), it was something he valued so much as to make it an integral part of daily living.

Jesus wanted his first followers to learn this important aspect of ministry right off the bat. When they returned from a successful mission trip He said to them, “Come you yourselves apart into a desert place and rest a while.” (Mark 6:31)

Perhaps we should not be surprised at the value Jesus placed upon rest. He was simply reflecting his Father, who rested on the seventh day following the six days of Creation (Genesis 2:2) and commanded His people to rest on the Sabbath (Exodus 20:9).

In addition to incorporating periods of purposeful rest into our vacation schedule, Sulojana and I have been setting aside a block of time every day where we simply rest—sometimes with reflective music playing in the background (Soaking) or in total stillness.

What a difference this time of rest makes! We are more productive, more sensitive to the voice of God and more responsive to the needs of others, especially each other.

When one of us gets cranky with the other, we can usually trace it back to a lack of quiet rest in our Father’s arms.  There is an uncanny correlation between how well we retreat and how well we treat one another.

On the road to destiny, we would do well to make time for planned periods of rest and prayer as Jesus did.

For when we heed his call to “come apart”, we are less likely to fall apart!

Whoever learns from correction is wise. (Proverbs 15:5)

It was one of the wittiest presentations of the entire three day Conference. Designed to impress upon the delegates the need to establish a full-time Youth Worker position for the entire province, it succeeded beyond expectations in achieving its purpose.

As the speaker came off the stage to thunderous applause, he was greeted by a ministry colleague who was also a good friend and a classmate from seminary.

“Great speech!” he exclaimed. “I just had one question though…was it meant to draw more attention to the speaker or the subject?”

Frankly, I was insulted by the insinuation that it was a purposeful attempt to shine the spotlight on myself than the mission I had set out to accomplish.

I gave Keith an icy stare and left rather abruptly.

However, I could not simply ignore the gentle rebuke from my wiser friend.

As a matter of fact, it is something that I still remember 30 years later, every time I am tempted to get carried away with humour—be it in a sermon, speech or article.

Correction is not something any of us relish receiving…yet, it is a necessity on the road to achieving our destiny.

Earlier this month one of our DWOD’s focused on the need to have “many counsellors.” (Proverbs 24:6). One of the most valuable services our counsellors can offer us is correction.

Their hindsight can become our foresight as we avoid the pits into which they fell, thus saving ourselves time, money and energy in the process.

No wonder that the Bible stresses the importance of heeding correction, especially in the book of Proverbs.

Recently, I was reading the 15th chapter and ran into these wise sayings, all on the subject of correction.

Only a fool despises a parent’s discipline; whoever learns from correction is wise. (v. 5)
Whoever hates correction will die. (v. 10)
Mockers resent correction, so they avoid the wise. (v. 12)
If you listen to correction, you grow in understanding. (v. 32)

As you can tell, Solomon points out the benefits of receiving correction as well as the perils of resenting it.

His most severe warning is in Proverbs 29:1: Whoever remains stiff-necked after many rebukes will suddenly be destroyed—without remedy.

When we see correction as one way that God uses others to advance us toward our destiny, we will not be insulted by it as I was then. Instead, we will be grateful for it.

Personally, I am thankful to God for all the people He has brought into my life over the past three decades, who have cared enough to correct me.

I would rather stand corrected than fall uncorrected!

How about you? Has God used others to bring correction to you? Please bless the rest of your DWOD family by sharing your experiences.

“But as for you, O man of God…pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness.” (I Timothy 6:11)

The power of hearing God for others and delivering those words to others had just moved from being an interest to a passion for me in 2006.

That is why the opportunity to learn from one of the pre-eminent prophetic equippers of our time was simply too good to pass up.

Add to that the fact that he was not known for teaching outside of his own ministry framework…I just had to be at the Prophetic Equipping School at Catch the Fire, Toronto.

Then came the much-anticipated opening session.

As a newbie to prophetic ministry, I was expecting to hear quite a bit about how to develop and grow in the gift.

Much to my utter disappointment, his three hour talk had no reference whatsoever to a technique or a text that could even remotely be classified as a teaching on growing in the prophetic.

Instead, John Paul Jackson spoke passionately about why we needed to focus on developing our character above everything else.

He shared how he was once part of a group of 25 or so well-known prophets who had a reputation for being extremely accurate. They were in high demand all over the body of Christ.

Yet, at the time of speaking, two decades plus down the road, only 4 of them were still left standing.

What happened to the other 21?

Their gift was still intact, but their reputation was not. Most of them had fallen into one form of sin or another.

That is why he wanted those of us who were just getting started in prophetic ministry to get this truth seared into our spirits right off the bat.

“Focus on developing your character first and foremost. Keep it in the forefront at all times. It is the key to keep on growing in the prophetic.”

To be perfectly honest with you, I didn’t really get it that day.

Today, seven years later, I am beginning to appreciate the reason why John Paul Jackson took three hours to drill it into us.

Sad to say but over the years, we have indeed seen a number of high profile gifted men and women of God who moved mightily in supernatural gifts–be it healing, miracles or prophecy–fall from grace.

There was nothing wrong with their gifting (charisma in the strictest translation of the Greek word). Their downfall was directly related to the upkeep of their character…or lack thereof.

Your gifts will take you places, even within the Church. But the gifts of the spirit cannot be sustained for long on the tree of life without the fruit of the spirit. Therefore cultivate the soil of character.

This is why after a detailed discourse on the gifts (Charismata) in I Corinthians 12, the apostle Paul says:“I will show you a still more excellent way”and goes on to stress the importance of love (Character).

Yup, Character trumps Charisma.

May the Holy Spirit sear this truth into your spirit forever.

As Jesus was getting into the boat, the demon-delivered man begged to go along, but he wouldn’t let him. Jesus said, “Go home to your own people. Tell them your story—what the Master did, how he had mercy on you.” The man went back and began to preach in the Ten Towns area about what Jesus had done for him. He was the talk of the town. (Mark 5:18-20)

It was one of the most dramatic transformations recorded in the entire Bible. Here is how Mark describes the man’s life before his encounter with Jesus:
“This man lived in the tombs, and no one could bind him anymore, not even with a chain. For he had often been chained hand and foot, but he tore the chains apart and broke the irons on his feet. No one was strong enough to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and in the hills he would cry out and cut himself with stones.”

His life was at the mercy of the Legion of demons. Once Jesus had driven them all out, the people of the town found him “sitting there, dressed and in his right mind.”

If ever Jesus needed a testimony to open up his meetings and prepare his audience to expect more miracles…there it was! More precisely, there he was…begging for the privilege to travel with Jesus.

But Jesus tells him to be a Home-Based Missionary instead.

Can I be honest with you? The first time someone prophesied over me that I had a call to the nations, I was SOOOOOOO excited!

Now, as the Lord uses Sulojana and me to deliver a similar word to someone, often we sense that excitement in those to whom we minister as well!

Yes, it is indeed exhilarating to realize that God would deem us worthy of being sent to the nations.

It did not sound like a very glamorous prophetic word: “Go home to your own people. Tell them your story—what the Master did, how he had mercy on you.”

Yet, when he acted in obedience, everyone was amazed at what the Lord had done!

After all, they knew him before Jesus came on the scene. His testimony had the greatest impact on those who lived closest to home.

Those who knew us well before we met Jesus can tell the difference He has made in our lives better than anyone else, amen?

I still recall the change that our hometown witnessed when Mr. Singh, the town drunk, met Jesus and had his life turned right side up.

There was no better talking testimony to the transforming power of Jesus than this man who once used to stagger along the streets, now walking uprightly with the Lord.

Even his physical appearance changed completely as he gained weight. The sight of him walking to church with a Bible in his hand and his family in tow every Sunday spoke volumes to his non-Christian neighbours as well as lukewarm church members.

He was indeed “the talk of the town.”

How about you? You may not be called to travel to the nations of the world either. Most of us are not.

Let that not be a discouraging word, though. Instead, take heart!

You too can be an amazing home-based missionary!

“My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry.” (James 1:19)

In his classic book “How to Win Friends and Influence People”, Dale Carnegie tells of an evening he spent at a dinner party hosted by a book publisher. One of the guests at this party was a distinguished botanist.

Carnegie was so fascinated by what this man had to share that he literally sat on the edge of his chair and listened for hours while the botanist spoke of exotic plants and experiments in developing new forms of plant life, yadi, yada.

As he was leaving the party, the botanist turned to the host and said that Dale Carnegie was a “most interesting conversationalist.”

Needless to say Carnegie was totally flabbergasted by this compliment, considering he had hardly said anything at all.

He writes: “I had him thinking of me as a good conversationalist when, in reality, I had been merely a good listener and had encouraged him to talk.”

You have probably heard something similar to these words before: “God gave us two ears and one mouth, so that we would listen at least twice as much as we speak.”

Although these exact words are not part of Holy Scripture, other verses express the value of listening more than talking.

“Too much talk leads to sin. Be sensible and keep your mouth shut.” (Proverbs 10:19)

“Even fools are thought wise when they keep silent; with their mouths shut, they seem intelligent.” (Proverbs 17:28)

Abraham Lincoln is credited with adapting the latter into this more popular version: “It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.” Ouch!

Perhaps no other verse expresses it quite so succinctly as the one cited earlier from James 3: “Be swift to listen and slow to speak.”

Easier said than done, though. Amen?

Yet, it is indeed a key to becoming known as a conversationalist.

Sulojana and I couldn’t help but wonder…

If this is indeed true of our relationship with other human beings, how much truer still is it when it comes to our conversations with God?

For the longest time in my life (can you say decades?), I was one who was swift to speak and slow to listen.

Prayer was primarily a time for me to do all the talking. Correction. Venting and Asking with a dash of Thanking.

Clearly, prayer was no conversation 🙁

However, when I finally saw the light and started to reverse course, everything changed!

I was amazed how much God had to say to me when I was “swift to listen!”

There was an appreciable increase in the intimacy of our relationship when I started becoming “slow to speak.”

Interestingly enough, it started to manifest itself in human relationships as well. Wow!

Dear DWOD friend, we bless you to develop and grow a reputation as “a most interesting conversationalist”–here on earth as it is in heaven. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

“But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”  (Isaiah 40:31)

How often have you heard these words before?
How often have you quoted this verse to someone else?
How often have you taken these words to heart?

Chances are the answer to all three questions is: “More than once!”

For the most part, we have interpreted the expression “wait” on the Lord to mean staying still in His presence and waiting for Him to fill us up, to infuse His strength into us…or something to that effect.

Moi aussi.

Not that long ago, my friend Matt Tapley, Lead Pastor at Lakemount Worship Center in Grimsby suggested we look at the word “wait” in a different way.

He asked us to consider how a server in a restaurant “waits” on us when we sit down to eat at a particular establishment.

The servers who catch our attention (and our tips) are those who make sure that they pay close attention to what we want–exactly how we want our steak done, our potatoes dressed, etc.–and then deliver it according to our wishes.

Matt wondered what would happen if we were to re-define our times of waiting on the Lord according to this analogy.

Rather than focus on what we want, we would focus on Jesus and Him alone.

We would pay close attention to what He says as we seek to know the desires of His heart–what He wants us to do, how He wants us to serve Him at that particular moment in that particular place, etc.

Then we would do accordingly.

I don’t know about you, but Matt’s words stirred up something in my spirit.

You see, I had made waiting a rather passive time, when I tried to focus on Jesus’ face and just spend time with Him.

But I had not really made an attempt to know the desires of His heart.

To be very honest, I was waiting for the fulfillment of Psalm 37:4 when I spent my time waiting on the Lord. “Delight yourself in the Lord and He will grant the desires of your heart.”

There was a bit of a personal agenda in that waiting…I wanted Him to grant the desires of my heart.

Anything wrong in desiring this? I don’t think so.

However, I could see that Jesus would be so happy to have me get to know the desires of His heart first.

He gave us a hint of this in the story of Mary & Martha in Luke 10:38-42. Even though it looked as though Martha was the one playing waiter, in reality it was Mary.

No, she did not wait on Him hand and foot. But she sat at His feet and focused intently on discovering what was on His heart at the time.

You may recall that Jesus had just set his face like flint toward Jerusalem (Luke 9:51) where He was sure to face suffering and ultimately death.

He needed someone to wait(er) on Him. Mary did. And Jesus declared that she had “chosen the better part.”

How about you?  Would you also follow Mary’s example?

Two nights ago, I was soaking and seeking Holy Spirit about what He wanted (us) to do at last night’s Miracles, Signs and Wonders Meeting at Morgan’s Point United Church.

Frankly, I was taken aback by what I heard.

I wanted to make sure that I had heard correctly. So I shared what I had received with my in-home Holy Spirit consultant, aka Sulojana.  She did not bat an eyelid.

If you were expecting me to shout: “Praise God! Glory, Hallelujah!” you missed the mark completely, my friend!

What I actually felt like saying (but chose wisely not to) was more like: “Uh-oh! Now that I’ve got a reliable witness, I have to go through with it!”

 

Receiving “unusual” directives is not exactly unusual…but this one was a stretch!

 

Sunday evening came. The meeting began with a powerful time of worship.  In between songs, I scanned the congregation and noticed a new couple. She was standing; he was sitting with his head down.

 

A few minutes later, I leaned over to grab a drink of water and spotted the man heading out the door. Not quite sure what was going on…

 

We moved on from worship to a time of sharing testimonies. I watched as one of our friends went out the door and returned with the other man in tow.

 

Within moments it was pretty apparent that this man was in excruciating pain. He had trouble sitting down. He kept changing postures until he could be comfortable. It was not easy.

 

My heart went out to him…I wanted to rush and lay hands on him. All Holy Spirit would permit me to do was take a prayer cloth and ask him to apply it to the point of pain.

 

We moved on to the offering and then the message, which was essentially an elongated version of yesterday’s DWOD on the power of Expectancy.

 

Now it was time to move to ministry time. As always, we asked those who came seeking a healing/breakthrough/miracle to identify themselves.

 

Our usual pattern is to ask them to stand while others gather around them and minister as Holy Spirit directs.

 

But that was not the directive for this meeting.

 

So, we invited them all to come and sit on the front row.

 

Then, are you ready for it…we invited everyone else in the congregation to form a line and walk past them, so that our shadow could fall on them as did Peter’s in Acts 5.

 

Of course, we had made it perfectly clear that just as Peter’s shadow released what overshadowed him, namely the Holy Spirit, so would ours!

 

We asked for progress reports after the first pass…there was some improvement in the gentleman with excruciating pain. He felt some warmth in his stomach area. That’s all.

 

We thanked God for what He was doing and waited to see what to do next.

 

Two of our ministry team sensed that Holy Spirit was directing us to do another walk-past. We obeyed.

 

When we checked again, we discovered that the pain had subsided even more. Now he was sensing the presence of God in his chest.

 

We continued to praise Jesus for the progress and sensed that we needed to do one more round of Shadow Healing.

 

This time the change in his body was nothing short of miraculous. He was smiling. He was walking without pain. Wow!

 

Yeah, God! Praise You, Jesus! Thank You, Holy Spirit!

 

(You can listen to the entire ministry time, should you so desire).

 

Do you realize that you too have something in common with Peter?

 

Same shadow. Same Holy Spirit. Amen?

As a result of the apostles’ work, sick people were brought out into the streets on beds and mats so that Peter’s shadow might fall across some of them as he went by. Crowds came from the villages around Jerusalem, bringing their sick and those possessed by evil spirits, and they were all healed. (Acts 5:15-16)

You have most likely read this passage before…more than once.  You may have even heard a number of sermons based on it.

Chances are that the focus was on how the anointing on Peter was so strong that he did not even have to lay hands on anybody to heal them or deliver them from demons.

As a matter of fact, this phenomenon has often been cited as a fulfillment of Jesus’ words in John 14:12: “I tell you the truth, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done, and even greater works, because I am going to be with the Father.”

And it certainly is. After all, the gospels do not record a similar incident.

People touched the hem of Jesus’ garment (Mark 5:27-29, 6:56) and were healed. Some were healed when He simply released the healing word (Matthew 8:13, 15:28).

Of course, many were healed when He touched them or spoke words over them.

But, there is no healing miracle or deliverance that happened when Jesus simply passed by those who were sick or demon-possessed.

It is truly an amazing phenomenon, not to mention an accurate fulfillment of Jesus’ promise.

You know what is equally amazing?

The expectancy of those who came from the villages around Jerusalem, believing that all they had to do was to be on the sidelines and wait for Peter’s shadow to fall on them.  At that very moment they would be healed and/or delivered.

Would you agree?

Let’s look at another scenario.

We are told that when Jesus ministered in his home town of Nazareth that “He did only a few miracles there because of their unbelief.” (Matthew 13:58)

They did not expect Him to do anything miraculous…and it was so, according to their faith (or lack thereof).

This is in stark contrast to what happened in Jerusalem with Peter, isn’t it?

They came expecting the miraculous…and they got it!

So, let me ask you this today: What is your expectancy level?

Yes, you believe that God can do it. Yes, you’ve seen God do it for others.

But if it hasn’t happened for you, yet…could it be related to your expectancy level?

Would you take a moment to ask the Holy Spirit if this is the case?

If the answer is No, praise God! Your mission is to help others raise their level of expectancy.

If He says Yes, would you please take a moment to visualize all those people who lined the streets of Jerusalem waiting for Peter’s shadow to fall on them?

Ramp up your expectancy level to theirs.

When the Holy Spirit overshadows you, get ready to witness the miraculous!