We are going to go into something this Sunday and next Sunday that are going to be very interesting.
I was planning on talking about angels and how they're active among us this morning and it's going to be postponed until next Sunday morning.
Jim, are you back next Sunday morning? You're back? Good.
I thought you were gone this week.
Oh, okay. Good. I need you here.
I was planning and I had it all kind of laid out the beginning of the week and then by Wednesday as I was continuing to put things together,
you know, different points I want to make, the Holy Spirit started asking me questions like, well, how did that happen?
How did this happen? And finally I stopped and I said, why are you asking all these questions?
Because when he leads you, generally he uses questions. He doesn't always just make statements. He uses questions.
It's to the glory of God to conceal a matter and the glory of a king to search it out.
So God will hide something, then he'll ask you questions and he expects you to pursue. Go find it.
So I finally said, why are you doing this? He said, you're presuming too much.
You're presuming that the people will all understand the background of what you're talking about.
Oh, well, that's a good point.
So I started backing up with his questions and I decided, you know what?
In order to get us on the same page, rather than just jump in and talk about the supernatural and angels,
maybe we should talk about what we mean by the supernatural and lay that groundwork before we jump forward.
So we are going to do that this morning and I have some wonderful points on here that I want you to remember,
but I don't have a PowerPoint because somebody got married this week.
And I just felt letting them alone is better than my PowerPoint.
So I'll screen share a little bit. Besides, he changed everything.
So yesterday it all came together, so it would have been the day after the wedding I'd have been asking you to do stuff.
And I know you'd have done it, but I just thought, I'm not going to do that.
So I'll screen share a little bit of my notes when we get to that point.
But Mary and I have always been focused on the work of the Holy Spirit and the supernatural, always.
That has been part of my life since before I got into the ministry.
And the supernatural or how the supernatural operates actually has to be protected.
If you don't protect it, you lose it.
You say, why would you have to protect it? Who do you have to protect it from?
This is going to sound odd when I say it, but it's true.
You have to protect it from the church, from believers.
You have to protect it from religion.
The greatest enemy to the supernatural operating is not the devil.
It's the church.
And you'll understand that as we go a little deeper this morning, that'll make more sense to you.
But we've always tried to make a place for the Holy Spirit to be free to work and guard that anointing and so forth.
We're dealing with this church in our ministry in Minnesota.
It was January 2004.
We were driving, bringing our first load up to put into storage from Colorado.
And we were signing the papers on the house and everything that we're living in.
And going through Nebraska, north of North Platte and south of Valentine through the Nebraska Sandhills,
the Lord made two statements to me.
Because I was asking, why are we doing this?
Because we knew it was God.
He wanted us to do this, but he hadn't told us why.
I said, why are we doing it? What are we supposed to do?
And he made two statements. He said, this is for the generations.
And number two, the church in Minnesota is to be built on the word and the supernatural.
Hang everything on those two.
That statement is in our vision booklet on page 62, it's number five.
Because it became a foundation stone of what are we doing here?
So the scriptural precedent is, and I'll talk about these little bit generations
and then the second one, that's our theme for this morning.
The scriptural precedent, if you look in Scripture,
the precedent is where you have the supernatural happening, you have angels involved.
It's not always mentioned 100% of the time.
But it's mentioned enough that he's giving us the picture
when God is doing something among us, chances are really good angels are involved.
So we'll jump off on that next week and move forward.
I want to go back to this point he made.
He said the church in Minnesota is to be built on the word, the Bible, the Scripture, and the supernatural.
Why the emphasis on the supernatural?
That was the first question that went through my mind.
Why would it be such a big deal to emphasize the supernatural?
Well, overall it's, again, once I get a little deeper,
if we don't have the supernatural folks, we got nothing.
That's just best way to say it.
We've got a bunch of philosophy, a bunch of opinions,
but the supernatural is the heart of everything.
But once we, you know, we're up here a little over 21 years now.
And the information I get is not always accurate
because I don't always get it from other pastors,
but other church people will say things to me,
people that go to other churches.
And I know that what they say is not always accurate
because I know that sometimes things you say
about who we are is not always accurate.
I've heard that from other people, too.
They said, what? We do what?
No, let me clarify that.
I got half a truth there, but it's not the whole thing.
So I might not be getting the whole picture from other input,
but we've been up here long enough now that
when you look in, if you put a stick pin in the map
where we're located and go out, I would say 20 miles,
make a circle, 18 miles, something like that,
and just make a circle around us,
who in that circle as a church is emphasizing the supernatural?
The information I'm getting, nobody.
And it might even go out further than that.
So one of the reasons he emphasized
build the church on the supernatural
is because if you've raised children,
of course he's our father, we're his children,
he's raising us.
If you as a parent have raised children,
you don't always give children what they want.
You give them what they need.
Because if you just give them what they want,
this is going to be a disaster.
So you give them what they need.
Well, this area apparently is not too crazy
about the supernatural.
They don't want it.
But he's saying, but they need it.
So we pick up the reputation
of being the weirdos in the land.
And we do have some of that reputation.
I go, oh, you go to that church.
I've heard things about that church.
It was brought up in...
We were in the modular.
We weren't up here more than three, four years.
And someone brought up...
I had a question and answer time during a service.
And someone brought up, they said,
you realize you have a reputation out there.
I said, do we?
What does that mean?
Well, people think you're kind of weird.
I said, why?
Well, it's all the Holy Spirit
and speaking in tongues and all that stuff.
Aren't you concerned that
that's going to cause church growth problems?
We're meeting in the modular on our property.
Of course I want church growth.
I want to get the modular off.
I mean, only get it off our property.
I said, well, here's my answer to that.
I can't do anything about that.
I mean, if people think we're weird
because of certain things that we see Scripture saying
and we're involved in,
I can't change that
because it was not my decision to decide on what I preach.
This is a Jesus problem.
And if people think we're weird,
well, then we're weird.
I said, but I guess I'm naive enough to believe
that not only are there people who don't know Jesus yet
who will want and need what we are offering,
but there's Christians up here
who are hungry for the supernatural
and want God to do things
and God's going to link us up in time.
So we've just stuck to it.
But a lot of times people, everybody,
especially if you have a church background,
you have probably had some bad experiences
with something supernatural.
So we need to talk about it a little bit.
So he said that for the generations,
what does generations mean? Longevity.
The focus.
The younger generations. Longevity.
This is not a flash and a pan.
This is supposed to go on for generations.
The word, build it on the word and the supernatural.
The word, well, our name comes out of the word.
First John 1, 1 through 3.
What we have seen, what we've heard,
what we've proclaimed, what we've touched with our hands.
This we proclaim to you concerning the word of life.
That's where our name comes out of.
First John 1, 1 through 3.
So the word has always been a premium here.
It's always...
We're going to speak for 45 minutes or an hour
about the word.
He said, why do you preach so long?
He said build the church on the word
and the supernatural.
If you build it on the word,
you have to give the word some preeminence.
He didn't say build it on skits.
You know, some churches are built on that,
and if that's what God's asking him to do, well, cool.
He told us to build it on the word.
So we spend a lot of time looking at the word.
It's a premium.
And then he said build it on the supernatural.
Well, there's the fly in the ointment right there.
Because I know for a fact
we'd have been out of this building
two or three times already
and we'd be four or five hundred people
if it weren't for we're so weird.
And I say that lightly, Lord.
But, you know, the...
and we'll talk about some of it this morning.
But this area of Minnesota
is not big into the supernatural.
They don't like it, they don't want it.
I don't know what the issue is, but they're not big into it.
So as a result, when someone shows up and says,
here we are, it's like, whoa.
That's a different bunch.
So what do we mean by supernatural
and why do we need it?
Can't we have church without it?
Okay, well, let's look at it a little bit.
Let's look at the why do we need it first.
And here I'll try to see if I can
screen share these scriptures just a little bit.
And that way you can see the scriptures in front of you
and then I'll turn it off and turn it back on later.
Presuming it connects, it did.
Mark 1620.
And they went out and preached everywhere,
the Lord working with them
and confirming the word through the accompanying signs.
Why did pagan, heathen,
people who had never heard of Jesus,
which was most of the world,
believe the message?
Signs and wonders.
The supernatural confirmed what they were saying was true.
Without the supernatural, Christianity would no longer exist.
Now somebody is going to say,
yeah, but the last part of Mark is not
in some of the early manuscripts
so we're not sure it's accurate.
Well, let's just find a different scripture then.
So Paul and Barnabas stayed on there for a long time
speaking freely and fearlessly and boldly.
See, now they're talking to pagans, to heathens,
to people who know nothing about the Christian God.
They continued to bear testimony
or they spoke boldly in the Lord.
The Lord who continued, who continued?
The Lord continued to bear testimony to their word
of his grace.
How did Jesus weigh in on what these guys are saying is true?
Granting signs and wonders
to be performed by their hands.
The reason the early people
who knew nothing of God were converted
was because they preached the message of God
and what he did and his forgiveness of sins
and grace and so forth,
and they're all going pfft.
Nice story, but how do we have any idea it's true?
The Lord weighed in on it.
And miracles and signs and wonders took place.
And all of a sudden these heathen, pagan people were going,
oh, I haven't seen that before.
Hebrews 2.
How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation
which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord
and was confirmed to us by us who heard him?
Besides this evidence it is also established
and plainly endorsed by God who showed his approval of it.
Of what?
How shall we escape if we neglect great salvation
which was first spoken to us by the Lord?
So the Lord talked to us, Jesus talked to us about salvation
and was confirmed to us by those who heard him,
the apostles, they heard it,
they saw the signs and the wonders.
Excuse me.
Besides this evidence, besides the apostles
and the things that took place with Jesus,
it was also established and plainly endorsed by God
who showed his approval of that message by signs and wonders
and various miraculous manifestations of his power
and by imparting the gifts of the Holy Spirit to the believers
according to his own will.
Why do we need it?
Because it is the thing that sets us apart
from every other religion.
We are supposed to have the supernatural operating
to confirm the message.
Or we're just philosophizing.
We're just sharing all kinds of,
well, this is what we think and this is what we say
and this is what we believe, why do you believe it?
Well, I don't know, there's a book that was written a long time ago.
Yeah, but is anything real?
Well, yeah, the book says we should be healed
but you know, he doesn't do that anymore
so I don't know what kind of proof to give you.
Ah, see, we have a problem now.
He wants to confirm it with the supernatural.
There's two things that set us apart
from the other religions of the world.
One is the resurrection
and the second is the message is confirmed by the supernatural.
Otherwise, we're no different than any other man-made religion on earth.
We have nothing really to talk about
other than a theory.
It might be true, it might not be true
because we've got no power tied to it.
We've got nothing to give proof
and God says, I want to give proof, right?
From the beginning I said I'd give proof.
I'll work with you giving signs and wonders.
That's the supernatural.
So we're no different than any other man-made religion without it.
So now I'm going to throw something in there.
There's a little basket of reasons
why so many of the younger generation
exited the church in the last,
the beginning of the 2000s was the worst,
late 90s and early 2000s.
There's a little basket of reasons,
but one of the reasons in that basket
is because the average church has no supernatural.
And what happened is these things came along.
And all of a sudden our young people were exposed
to any idiot who could get on there
and get a channel on YouTube.
Any person who could make a statement
on Instagram or Facebook
and all of a sudden all these
areas of input started coming in
and not all of them were friendly to the gospel.
So-and-so says that Christianity isn't even true.
Mom and Dad, how do we know it's true?
Well, the Bible says so.
So-and-so says the Bible isn't even accurate.
It contradicts itself.
And all this doubt, all these questions
were planted with a new way of media.
And there was nothing happening in the church
to confirm the message is real.
No supernatural.
So what happens?
I'll just go and figure it out myself.
I don't believe it anymore.
So that became a problem.
And another thing that becomes a problem
is if the supernatural is not active,
we are actually less than witchcraft and Satanism.
Because in witchcraft and Satanism,
the supernatural is active.
I mean, just go back to Moses and the pharaoh
and his magicians.
They operate in the supernatural.
It's just our snake swallows theirs.
In the end, God wins.
And someone asked this question,
well, if God is all powerful,
why doesn't he just obliterate
and wipe out all that other realm of supernatural?
Because God is humble.
God is humble.
Humility doesn't force someone to kneel.
Humility invites them to kneel.
And God's humble.
He's not going to force anybody
to do something they don't want to do.
But once they can put curses and hexes on us
and destroy our lives
and we have no means of pushing back,
we're worse off than they are.
They're getting something done.
We're not.
Amen.
So the supernatural has to be active.
So supernatural.
What is supernatural?
What do we mean when we say
the church in Minnesota
build it on the word and the supernatural?
What do we mean by that?
Anything that isn't natural
in the physical realm.
Anything that isn't natural.
Something happens that is different
than the natural order of things.
And there's two sides of that.
There's God and the demonic.
You got God works on that side
and the demonic works on that side.
But just the basic level of supernatural
is the presence of God in the house or not.
Because for the presence of God
to be among us in a way
that we can sense it like,
oh, that's different
than I've ever felt anyplace else.
Something is here.
That is supernatural.
That is not natural
in the normal physical order of things.
So now since both sides work in it,
when you walk into a church,
you walk into a service,
you walk into a Bible study and sit down,
first thing you should be sensing
which spirit is in charge here.
Because there's a lot of churches
who believe in Christianity
who have the demonic realm in charge.
And I'll explain to you here in a bit why.
And when you sit down in there,
boy, you can feel it
if you're trying to be in connection with it.
Just because they have a Christian name on the sign
and they sing amazing grace
doesn't mean the place isn't loaded with demons.
You say, well, why would it be?
Hang on, we'll get there.
We'll get there.
But both sides can operate in the supernatural
and I've got news for you.
We are continually being affected
by the supernatural one side or the other.
Ephesians 2 says,
before a person knows God,
they are living their life
according to the prince and the power of the air.
Who's that?
That's a demonic realm. That's a devil.
Well, I don't serve any God or devil.
You don't see it.
If you're not serving God,
you are serving Him.
You say, how?
Well, it goes on and explains
by following the dictates of their flesh.
See, the demonic realm works through our flesh
to get us to do something.
God's realm works through our spirit
to get us to do something.
And when people are not trying to submit themselves
to what they sense God is asking them to do,
they will automatically do what their flesh wants them to do.
Who gave them that idea?
Well, who started the whole sin thing?
Who got in...
Where did the old nature thing come from?
That all is demonic. That's all devil.
So when we're following the flesh,
we're following the devil.
So to say, well, there's no supernatural
that is affecting me at all.
You're just ignorant.
You just don't get the big picture.
The big picture is either we're following God
or we're following the devil,
or we're in the middle wrestling with
both.
We want to follow God and we're just captivated here
and we've got to get some freedom,
some deliverance, whatever, so we can follow Him
more perfectly.
So one of the basic things is,
does, you know,
that's why you can go to so many churches.
Pastor Eager talks about this.
They went to seventy-some churches
over a two-year period of time before they came here.
And I thought, that's awesome.
Because he got to see some things we never want here.
And you can go to all these churches
and there's no presence of God.
There's no supernatural.
The presence of God is supernatural.
It's just dead and dry as a bone.
They put the choruses on the wall.
One, two, three, here's what we're singing.
There we're going to have prayer.
Then after that, there's going to be some announcements.
And after that, the ladies group is going to talk
about their pie baking contest.
And we're using that for a fundraiser.
And then the pastor is going to speak on this.
Well, where's the Holy Spirit in any of this?
What if he wanted to change the order?
Well, we can't. We got it written out.
See, there's no supernatural.
And the place is just dead and dry
spiritually.
Might be a wonderful group of people.
But just dead and dry spiritually.
Nothing's going on.
Well, I beg to differ.
There is something going on.
If God is not there, I can tell you who is.
There is no vacuum in between those two.
Either we're under the influence
of the demonic or we're under the influence
of God.
And it always shows up in the fruit.
You say, but people give
and there's nice buildings and we sing
songs and
so do the Muslims.
They got nicer buildings than we got.
Because we're giving them all our oil money.
Or we were.
Just because you have a physical thing
doesn't mean you have a spiritual happening.
So
is God free to move
by his spirit?
If he is, supernatural things will
happen. One of them is
the presence of God shows up.
It's just basic.
And if the time comes that the presence of God doesn't
show up here for two, three Sundays in a row
I am highly disturbed
and on my face figuring out what did we do.
Because it's not that God
doesn't want to show up.
He's not showing up. This is an
us problem.
So we have figured out.
So let's talk about it a little bit.
Here I'll go back and I'll show you my
list. And
I want you to have a visual on this
so you can see what I'm talking about.
Supernatural.
What do we see as supernatural?
Do you realize that the first basic
thing that I think almost every Christian
church believes in the salvation of
people's souls, people getting saved
is a very supernatural thing.
Let me break it down to how someone
who knows nothing about salvation would look at
this. I had a friend
they invited me to go to
their church. So I went.
When I was sitting there
I started feeling this weird
feeling.
And I was getting
really bothered about
things that whatever that guy
was up there talking
some things he was saying was really bothering
me.
And I felt like maybe I need to do something
different with my life.
So that guy gave an invitation
anybody who wants to
pray to God do that. So I prayed
to God. I got up
came in the front and I prayed to God.
Who's God?
Well God is a spirit
I guess.
Okay? So I prayed to a spirit
and after I was done
praying
the guy who was talking
the whole time told me he said
well now a spirit has
come to live inside you.
Okay?
And this spirit will want to
talk to you and will want to lead you
through life.
So you need to read this book
because this book will
help that spirit talk to you.
So I've been doing this
now for about six months and you know
my life is changing. I don't know
if it's that spirit that's doing
something or the words of that book.
I don't know what it is.
But I have a spirit living inside
me and now I
pray to a spirit every
day.
You know how freaking weird that sounds
to a natural mind?
Somebody who's not thinking
spiritually at all. They have
no concept of spirit realm
stuff.
They're going to think these people are really
weird.
They got a spirit inside them.
I do.
There's me in this temple.
There's a holy spirit in this temple.
And hopefully that's it.
I don't want any other spirits
in this temple with me.
Hopefully that's it.
But just the thought of salvation
is
very supernatural.
When you put it into the natural
mind
and how we think about life naturally
to get saved, very supernatural.
You sit in the presence of God
it will soften your heart. That's
supernatural.
You'll leave a service
or you'll leave a Bible study where the
presence of God showed up and it just
feels a little different.
You're not as ugly as you were
going in emotionally.
You're not as harsh. You're not as mean.
Something softened
and changed
inside.
Maybe it's that spirit thing
you invited in
that's doing that.
Yeah, it is.
Supernatural.
And that spirit that you invited in,
which by the way is the holy spirit,
is going to talk to you about your sin.
It's going to talk to you about what you need to start doing that's right.
And it's going to talk to you about the fact
don't worry about the demonic realm they're judged.
Just learn how to live above them.
Right.
That is not natural.
How many people who don't know anything about God
have that happen?
At the point of salvation, he'll
talk to them about their sin.
But see, that whole thing is
not natural. Hearing God's voice.
My mother was
all disturbed
because
our church I
grew up in
was trying to have some supernatural
things happen. And we had some.
I won't say there wasn't any. We had some.
But we believe
that God could speak to us.
I grew up assembly of God.
And we believe God could speak to us.
And one neighbor
came one day. I remember I was like in junior high
or something. One neighbor got a hold of
mom on the phone or came over and talked
or whatever and she said, I just need to tell
you that the community thinks
you're your little cuckoo
because you say that
God speaks to you.
The lady who shared
this with my mother
was a Christian all her life.
She went to the congregational church
in town. They were good
friends. And she wanted
my mom to know, maybe
you should tune this down a little bit.
People think you're crazy.
So in reverse,
what we're saying is
the people from the congregational church
didn't believe God ever spoke to you.
Because she was in with the community.
Okay, so now let's go back to a statement
I made earlier. The anointing
or the supernatural needs
to be protected and guarded.
From who? The church.
Religion.
If my mother
would have gone along
with that lady's belief system
she would have stopped hearing
the voice of God right there.
If she said, oh,
well I don't want them to think I'm crazy.
Well maybe, maybe God
doesn't speak to me.
No, you need to protect the fact
you hear God's voice and you need to
take a stand on it or you're going to lose it.
Who are we protecting it from?
The unsaved?
You know, do you know what the unsaved ask?
Really? God talks to you.
Explain to me.
What does that sound like?
Because see, they're inquisitive.
It's the traditional
religious bunch of ghosts.
That doesn't happen in our church.
It can't be God.
It's probably demons.
So you actually believe
a demon could speak to me but he can't?
Who's bigger here?
Hearing Raymond Words or God
speaking to you specifically about a situation
you need to believe for.
Praise and worship. Getting beyond yawning.
Flipping the page.
That's not praise and worship.
That's singing songs
in a very poor fashion.
What does Scripture say?
The day will come Jesus said
when they will worship me
in spirit.
If what we're proclaiming to God
is not gushing up out of our spirit
it's not worship.
Singing words
is not worship.
You let the presence of God
show up and the anointing show up
all of a sudden praise and worship
intensifies and something starts
moving in here.
And it's like, oh God
I love you.
We start getting emotional heaven
forbid in church.
That's another thing religion and tradition
says you absolutely do not do.
You never get emotional
in church.
That one's not in the Scripture either.
In fact the opposite is in the Scripture.
Healings begin to take place.
It just happens.
Miracles begin to happen. Why?
Because they're supernatural.
And we're inviting God
to be God to us.
God wants to heal us
more than we want to get healed sometimes.
God wants to work in us
more than sometimes we want
him to work in us.
I'll give you a real blunt case of that.
I had a guy who was going down
a prayer line. He had a physical problem.
I knew he was on disability with the government.
He got a couple thousand dollars
a month to live because he had a disability
for this issue. He was standing there.
I said, what do you need prayer for?
He said, I want this issue healed.
And immediately
the Holy Spirit said, ask him
this question.
When you're healed, will you give up your disability
and go get a job?
Now, you would think
the immediate answer would have been, yes.
Why would I have to do that?
I said, because then you'd be lying to the government
because when you got the disability
you had the problem.
God's going to heal you of the problem
you no longer need the financial support
because you can actually go get a job.
He said, oh, I never thought of it that way.
He said, I don't know.
Maybe I'll think about that.
Turned around and went and sat down.
Never did pray for him.
God wants to heal that man more
than that man wants to be healed.
That wouldn't even surprise me.
It's like, really? Wow.
Being baptized in the Holy Spirit
with speaking in tongues,
do you realize that
that is supernatural?
According to Scripture,
people say, well, it's just gibberish.
According to Scripture, it's not gibberish.
According to Scripture, it's a language.
I can show you three, four places
in the New Testament where it calls it
and refers to it as a language.
It's supernatural.
Every time somebody speaks in tongues
something supernatural is taking place.
They're speaking in a language
from their spirit that they never learned.
That's supernatural.
I just think it's weird.
Well, if you get into the word
and read it for what it says,
well, but our pastor, I don't care
what your pastor says.
You know, the ones that
in Acts that were
looked at as more honorable
and noble were the
which Christians?
Berean Christians.
Why?
Because they went home
and studied to see
if what Paul was saying was actually
true.
Believe it or not, there's things
pastors say that are not
true.
And it would do us well to study
and make sure.
Visions, dreams, knowings.
This is all
supernatural stuff.
Demons manifesting in a service.
That'll happen.
That's supernatural.
That's both sides of our
work now.
And you know something else, the bottom one there.
You get the supernatural going,
the presence of God moving, religion
and sin will stir up
and begin causing all kinds of problems.
I've had people say to me,
we don't want revival in our church
because revival brings division.
It'll divide our church open.
And I said, well,
here's my opinion on that.
When revival comes, it's going to reveal
what you already have in your church.
It's going to bring it right to the surface
and say deal with this.
And there's going to be people who are going to say
I don't want to deal with that, just like the guy
who didn't want to get healed so he could keep
his disability.
You'll lose them.
But really, is that a big loss?
They're not going to want to follow
what God's asking them to do.
You'll lose some people in revival,
but you know what? You'll also gain a whole bunch
who do want it
and are hungry for it.
There's an intentional effort
needed to make either side manifest
for the demonic
to manifest ongoing intentional
willful sin
by the people, especially the
leadership.
Now I'm talking in a church setting.
If you have division in your church,
God's not in charge.
Division is not of God.
There's demonic forces at work.
When I grew up,
I thought it was normal.
You know, every year at the beginning of the year
they had their church business meeting
where
they show what the finances did
and give different reports
and then let the people weigh in on
what they're seeing and feeling and wanting.
I thought it was normal
that
fights break out at these business meetings.
Growing up, it happened every year.
I remember I was in junior high,
came home from a basketball game.
They were having business meetings.
So they said, just walk down the church.
We'll pick you up after the business meeting.
Just join us and we'll go home together.
So I walked in the back door of the church
and this lady was screaming
at the top of her lungs.
I don't remember
what she was saying.
She was just giving her
another business meeting, apparently.
That's how you let
the wrong spirit in.
Because where you find
strife, you find every
evil thing, Scripture says.
If you've got strife in the body,
you will find every evil thing
and out of it comes gossip
and criticism.
We go home and we talk about the church people
and we talk about the pastor
at Sunday meal every Sunday.
And we decide what's God
and what's not God.
That is all demonic.
That whole thing is demonic.
Talk about what God
is telling you and what God
showed you.
What God's doing
in your life.
What happened to you during prison worship?
But to eat people up,
to eat the pastor up,
show me anywhere in Scripture
where that's of God.
That's how you let
demonic forces get in charge of the church.
You say, we're a Christian church. Sure you are.
On the sign.
But under the surface,
you've got all kinds of demonic stuff going on.
And there's an anointing
and there's a presence that comes with that.
And when you walk in
and sit in those places, you know it.
You can feel it. It's like, holy moly,
what spirit is in charge here?
The place gives me the creeps.
You can feel it.
Unforgiveness.
Refusal to repent.
Unresolved anger.
Hate. Refusal to change.
Clinging to dead tradition.
Religion. All that stuff
will release the demonic
in your church, in your home,
in your life.
Well, I'm a Christian.
I just refuse to repent of certain things.
I wouldn't play that game too long
because from God's side
you may lose the, I'm a Christian.
Refusal to repent
is rebellion.
It's direct disobedience.
You can't be a Christian
and rebel on God
and stay that way too long.
Choose this day
who you're going to serve.
And
you'll let the demonic
loose in your life, in your family,
in your house.
For God's kingdom to manifest
which? Supernatural.
Ongoing intentional hunger
for His kingdom to manifest and rule.
We have to want it.
When we had those
early years and
hopefully
I'm hoping that we can
pull some pictures and videos off
of we found some stuff from the modular.
I have to give kudos to my daughter
for this because she was in the office
at that time. And she was
documenting everything by video
put it on hard drive.
So we've got some good pictures.
Jim, you love
how you look back then.
I pulled the picture up
yesterday and I thought
he was a lot younger then.
Of course I can say the same thing
about me. It's the same deal.
I just look more mature now
than I did then.
But she documented. So hopefully next Sunday
and we're talking about angels stuff
we can show some of that stuff.
But there's some rules for the road
for the supernatural from God's kingdom
to manifest.
Did I lose my...
Let's see if I can get that back.
I'll have to stop it
and restart it
and see if it comes back.
I want you to see this list.
We have to pursue the things
of the supernatural if we want them.
Ongoing repentance.
What does it say in Acts?
Repent so that times of refreshing
may come.
Ongoing submission and surrender
to God. What did Paul say? He said,
I die daily. There's stuff daily.
I have to say, okay, God, I'm sorry.
Forgive me. I will submit. I will surrender
in this.
Holding his word is a high standard.
True love being shown.
Not artificial stuff.
We're nice to their...
We're like a salesman. We're nice to their face
because we want something from them.
And when we get away from them,
we trash them. No, that's not true love.
Trying to be spirit-led
in praise and worship and in prayer.
Willingness of the leadership
and the people to follow what the Spirit
is trying to do.
If you don't have the leadership
involved in wanting the supernatural,
it will not happen.
They will shut it down.
The people can be as hungry
as the day is long.
But if the leadership,
God works through a structure
of authority. Just how it works.
And if they're not in agreement with it, it won't happen.
Humility, forgiveness,
true concern for each other.
If you have leaders who are insecure,
that's toward the bottom.
Leaders that are insecure,
you say, what do you mean insecure?
I went and spoke at a church.
I'll just give you the whole story.
I think I have time to do this.
I went and spoke at a church. Had a prayer line at the end.
God pointed a guy out to me who was struggling.
I pulled him up to the front.
I walked up to him. He was standing there.
I said, can I pray for you?
He came out and I went up.
I stood in front of him and I just got pushed backwards.
Just stepping into his presence.
If I wouldn't have stepped back,
I would have fallen over backwards.
I said, man,
you got a spirit of rejection on you.
It pushes people away from you.
It doesn't let people want to get close to you.
I said, do you have trouble getting
close to people? Do people leave you?
Do they betray you?
He said, oh, man, all the time he starts crying.
I stepped into his presence.
It would have knocked me over.
It was emanating out so strongly.
I said, do you go to this church?
He said, yes.
I said, pastor, come join me
because this is not going to be a one-time affair.
This is going to take some time.
We're going to pray with him,
but there's going to be some mind renewal things
going to have to happen.
Come pray with me,
and I stepped into his presence
this, that, and the other. We prayed for him, etc.
That was Sunday morning.
Sunday night, before service,
pastor pulled me to the side
and he said, you know that praying
for people and stuff like you did this morning?
We're not going to do that here.
I said, really?
Nah, it...
he had some kind of lame excuse
and I could tell by the look on his face
this was
how would you say
beyond what he normally operated?
And he didn't
to and to in my mind
he didn't want to look bad to his people.
Like, here this guy comes in
and all of a sudden there's supernatural stuff happening.
What's wrong with you?
He didn't want to take that chance.
So he just squelched it.
He said, you can speak tonight.
He said, we're not going to do this praying for anybody
and don't call anybody out and blah, blah, blah, blah.
If the leadership
does not want
the supernatural
could even be because they're insecure
and how they operate in it.
It won't happen. He just shut it down.
Sometimes you have to bind and loose.
If you get into
some of these churches that have
a lot of demonic activity going on
as the leadership
and as the pastor, you're going to have to
end that
and loose the heavenly
realm to be free in that service.
Or it don't make any difference
if you believe it or not. The demonic
will keep that place locked
down.
Keep it locked down.
I got all kinds of stories I could share
but I don't have time.
When these things
become the norm in a church
or in a meeting
angels begin to operate
and fulfill God's word
being pursued.
Those things. Ongoing
repentance, submission, surrender
allowing ourselves to enter
into praise and worship more than out of our head
but coming out of our heart.
And you know these are just
some of the things, not all of them.
When they become the norm
the supernatural begins to operate.
It doesn't happen right away.
Sometimes there needs to be
ongoing pursuit and hunger and desire.
You have to chip away at things sometimes
but it will come. You say why doesn't
every church have it happening?
They may
have not been taught it's possible.
There are certain denominations
who don't believe in the supernatural
operating at all even though they get
people saved but they don't see that as
supernatural apparently. I don't know.
It could be just a plain
honest I didn't know we were
supposed to kind of thing.
People don't
want the supernatural.
Why wouldn't they want the supernatural?
Because it's going to expose
their attitudes, division,
strife, gossip, criticism.
It's going to get called out.
I've been saying this more lately
to our staff and to our board.
We don't do division here.
We won't do it.
Because the presence
of God will lift. He does not
operate where there's division. I said
we don't do it. I said I'll call people out.
You said
why were you telling them that?
Because people will come to me
and say do you know so and
so said this about you or the church?
And it's bad.
No, I didn't know that.
I'm going to want to go talk to them.
Will you verify that
they said that? Oh no,
no, don't involve me in this.
Well now how am I supposed to go talk to them?
You need to grow some gonads and stand up for what's right.
And not take this wimpy way out.
Especially if you're in
leadership at word of life. Is there
stuff going on that is in that
list and
you don't have the gumption
to say no, we're not
doing that.
Well your head's going to be on the chopping block
for leadership too. We're not doing that stuff.
We're not going there.
And if somebody's got a problem
with me they should come talk to me.
And if they don't I find out about it.
I'll go talk to them and I'm expecting you to go
with me because hopefully you take a stand
for the truth also.
Well I might lose a friend.
Well, we lose a friend.
At least we won't lose the anointing.
They might be my friend too.
People love you until you tell them what
they're doing wrong.
And you find out if you're their
pastor or not.
Let's go back down to where we were.
That went deep real fast.
The leadership doesn't want the supernatural.
Again, reasons up above.
Fear.
Fear of the unknown. Fear of something new.
Fear of it being demonic. Fear of it getting weird.
Let me talk about it getting weird a bit.
And these are all fears.
When you talk to people who don't under...
They might be Christians, especially Christians
who don't have any experience
with the supernatural.
Those are the first four that usually come up.
Not always in that order.
But those are the first... oh my.
We've never heard of that before.
It's something new.
It could be the devil.
Well, yeah, anything that's supernatural
has to be the devil.
Well, what's going to happen?
Fear of the unknown.
We just don't want anything to get weird
because the Scripture says everything
should be done decently and in order.
Well, I agree with that.
But decently and in order,
in whose opinion?
Is this God's opinion?
Or is this our opinion?
Because if I'm asking all of you
what decently and in order means,
I'm going to have 20, 30 different definitions.
He will have one.
And His always centers around
the moving of the Spirit.
Whatever the Holy Spirit wants to do,
that's decently and in order.
You say, but it gets weird sometimes
when the supernatural happens.
Oh, I'm there with you. I'm first one to agree with that.
And that's why I get the big paycheck
because I'm the one who is responsible to shut that down.
That was a joke.
I think this side got it, but I'm not sure that side did.
I don't want to do it on the table.
I'll do it on the platform.
When I was growing up until I was probably junior high,
we did not have air conditioning
in the church, so in the summer, the windows were open.
And there were times
the Spirit of God began moving
and you could sense it in the atmosphere.
And there was two grandmas
and I don't know where they learned this from,
but they would turn around,
kneel down by the bench.
It was a wooden bench and they would start doing this.
Now that's weird.
We had people from the town
saying, what is going on in there?
Because, see, the windows were open.
One guy said to my dad,
it sounds like you people are hurting cattle.
You say, what was the problem with that?
Well, first of all,
the supernatural goes awry
when the flesh gets going
or the demonic gets going.
I was too young to know in that case
was that demons and torment?
Or was that their flesh?
They don't know what to do with this presence,
so they sought some place
or whatever,
and they'd get going, man.
They'd go for five, ten minutes.
And I was like, as a little kid,
it was just like, I don't know,
I didn't know.
It's not my responsibility.
I'm a little kid.
But you know what?
Our church never grew
till those two women died.
Wow.
New people would not come
because if new people came and that happened once and...
They didn't even wait for the end of the service.
They just win.
Now, whose fault was that?
That was Pastor's fault.
We didn't have any pastor
who had the guts
to deal with that
because he was afraid of losing his job.
You know what Scripture calls that?
A hireling.
You've been hired, Jesus said it in John 10,
you've been hired to do a job,
but you're not a shepherd
because a shepherd will lay
his life down for the sheep.
Go ahead and fire me.
But this craziness
stops.
Yeah, but you're going to hurt all the relatives
and they'll all leave. Well,
they're going to have to make that choice.
But this craziness stops.
It cost me my job.
Well, it cost me my job.
But I'm not going to stand before God
and he says, what in the world
were you thinking, man?
It can get weird.
So over the years
I've come to draw a line in a place
when it comes to weird.
Of course,
some of the things up there
I had listed, the average Christian
who knows nothing of the supernatural
thinks is weird.
Go to any
church within 10 miles
and I'll bet you
8 out of 10 of them this morning
if you would stand up during their praise
because everybody sits
till the last song with the last chorus
could we all stand.
Okay?
While they're sitting, you get up
and raise your hands and say, God, I love you.
I worship you. Just say it out loud.
8 out of 10 churches may be more
in this area.
We'll think you're weird.
Weird is all in the mind of the observer.
That's right.
However, there are some things
that God observes and he thinks are weird.
Yeah.
And it's our job not to let that happen.
Like pounding on the bench
and screaming.
That you could just,
you know, the presence of the Lord that was there
I was in junior high when they finally
drifted away.
But by that point I was aware of the presence
and you could just feel it lift
when they would start their antics.
You could just feel it lift.
And it's like somebody needs to stop that.
Somebody needs to, even in my little head
I was going, that's not right.
Something's wrong here.
But it took care of itself
in its own way.
But
where I draw the line
is here.
And this is one of the things
that we all need to learn because
the end of Hebrews chapter 5
says by exercising
our senses
we learn to discern
good from evil.
So it takes practice.
We have to learn to do this.
But if it
if it starts feeling
in my spirit like it's flesh
it needs to eventually be dealt with.
Maybe not immediately
depending upon how weird it is
because we're not out to hurt people
and embarrass them.
But at some point you're probably going to have to talk to them and say
yeah, I'm not there with you.
Something don't feel right.
And the other thing is
if I can find it readily in Scripture
I'll go with it.
If it's not readily in Scripture
I'll back away from it.
You say, why would you do that?
Well, the primary reason
is I don't want things to get weird.
I want the real deal.
I want the real God manifesting.
And I'm not saying that some of the things
that happen are not
scriptural. I mean are not God.
I don't see them in Scripture
but they still could be God.
So now you have to
measure that with
your spirit.
What is God telling you?
What is the presence?
What happens in the atmosphere when they do that?
Because the spirit of God
when it's not him
he'll just lift.
He'll just back off.
So did the spirit of God just leave the place?
Or did it get stronger?
What's going on?
But we do have to
measure so it doesn't get weird because
we're all learning number one. Some people like
attention, number two. Some people
don't know what it's like to hear the spirit of God
and they just go with their flesh. They get excited.
So we have
to guard for that.
But if it's not in the Word
you're not going to hear me promoting it very much.
It happens.
I think we have some pictures of it at the modular.
We had Glory Dust show up.
It is really hard to find that in the Word.
There are some Scriptures
you can find that are like, maybe.
But it's
really hard to find it.
But yet I know it was God.
When
Ari was a baby
and Mary and I were
in Duluth
discussing whether we should adopt her or not
we're sitting at
we're in this motel. We got a good deal
at this motel that has the circulating
restaurant at the top.
I don't remember the name of it but what a
radicent.
So we're sitting in that circulating restaurant
discussing what do we do with this?
Are we supposed to adopt her or are we not?
We're sitting eating and Mary says look at her.
And I looked.
The whole side of her face
was covered with an oil and Glory Dust.
Glory Dust looks like
glitter.
So Mary took a napkin, wiped it all off
showed me the napkin.
Nothing on the napkin.
Totally disappeared.
Huh.
We keep eating.
Didn't take five minutes to look back at her.
Her whole head was covered
with like an oil and just glitter.
Gold. Just glittering.
And Mary wiped it off again.
Nothing on the napkin.
That's supernatural.
That's God
weighing in with a sign.
And a wonder.
And a wonder is always
something that makes you go,
I wonder.
But
that was God weighing in.
Saying what
his thoughts were on the situation.
Can you find that in Scripture?
Boy, it's hard.
There's some
maybe references to it in the Old Testament.
But it's hard to find in Scripture.
So it's not something we promote.
Because when somebody says
hey, show us that in Scripture.
It's like...
That one's hard.
But I tell you what, if it shows up
what are you going to do with it?
Now you have to measure it.
You have to weigh it. Is this God?
Is this not God?
And it'll show up and it'll be just be heavy.
I mean you can just the whole floor.
We got some pictures of the module. The whole floor is glittering.
And you come back five minutes later
it's all gone.
All gone.
It's a supernatural thing.
That happened.
But yes.
We try not to let things
get into the flesh or get demonic
because then that just becomes a display
and it gets weird.
So we try to draw the line there.
Guarding the anointing.
It's the church leader's job.
It's the pastor primarily.
To make sure
the Holy Spirit
is welcome to move.
We invite
him to move.
But we're also not
going to just
do whatever comes to our mind.
Let's stick with Scripture
and let God reveal Himself.
And I won't go through
those three because I want to
save some time.
But if you go back through, how do you do it?
We go back through those lists
that I gave you.
And apply that.
That's how you do it.
So let me give you some quick examples
here before we're done.
Of course
we've been pursuing this all our life
so we've got all kinds of examples from Colorado
that in my opinion don't apply
because the church is here now.
So let me start with
how it started here.
Where it really, the supernatural
really locked in
and started taking hold.
And I mentioned it to you
last week or two. It was Father's Day
June 15th, 2008
not 19, 2008
and we were talking
about revival and the move
of the Spirit and God moving
and I
asked anybody who wanted to agree
with me on this, that
the move of the Spirit
would manifest in the church.
I
asked them to come forward
and I'll pray with them.
We'll grab hands, whatever. We'll pray together.
Well the first one up there
was Heather, Heidi's sister.
First one up there, she's in line.
I thought, cool. First one
boom, I grabbed her, she grabbed me
and the power of God hit
both of us. Like I said
I think it was on the falling under the power.
It felt like I was lifted up but it went so fast
it's hard to peg it
but it felt like I was lifted up a bit
and thrown over backwards.
Next thing I know, I'm laying on the floor in my back
and she apparently
had the same thing happen because she fell on top of me.
She's laying on top of me.
That's when it started
right there.
And remember
I said, first thought that went through my mind
she's looking at me and I'm looking at her and I thought
yeah this is weird.
This is
awkward.
But she knew it was God
and I knew it was God
and so she rolled off
and then I got up
and kept praying with people and so forth.
That Sunday
the atmosphere
in the modular
changed.
And I'll tell you
next week
what I believe happened.
I'll give you a hint.
Open Heaven established.
It changed.
We came out of that Sunday
the next Sunday I told Mary
I said man the presence of God
is heavy in here. We got to do something with this.
So I called Jim
he said hey let's do a meeting
in August and let's nurture this.
In other words let's just make room
for the Lord to just
do what he wants to do.
So we had a week of meetings in August
and I'll pick up from there
next Sunday. Move forward
but
it's been a lifelong pursuit.
So the fall of
2008 after that week
of meetings
I felt like we should do a study
on open heaven. Having an open heaven.
Scripture speaks of having an open heaven.
It gives us examples of open heaven.
And the Scripture also speaks of the heaven being like brass.
In other words it's hard.
The prayers don't go through
it just feels like it's dead.
There's no life in it.
So I started
working on a booklet
that this one
on a book I call them booklets but it's a book
where we studied open heavens
in the beginning of 2009.
And I told Jim I'm writing a book on this
come join us and
let's see what God does.
And he agreed
to come back.
That meeting
went for we were
planning for a Wednesday through a Sunday
and it went for three weeks.
Wednesday through Sunday, Wednesday through Sunday, Wednesday through Sunday.
And
there'll be some pictures from that next week.
So that meeting was in January.
It started in June
on Father's Day.
August we kind of nurtured it and brought it along.
And it just kept building.
Well in December
I have the written
account of a man who had a vision.
I'm just going to read this to you as quickly
as I can.
You won't be bored.
So if I go past 12, you won't be bored.
I first would like
to explain that I am not a pastor, preacher
or teacher. I am not an extra special
or better than anyone else.
I am just a human that was given a vision
of a small fraction of what God's great
of God's great glory.
I pray that I can describe what I saw in this vision
with exact accuracy to the best
of my ability.
The date was Sunday December 14th
so now it started
2008 in June, Father's Day.
It enhanced during that week of meetings
in August. I'm now
writing that book
on open heavens and how do we get it
and how do we sustain it
and he gets this vision in December
we started the meetings three weeks,
two and a half weeks later.
He said, I was standing
at the end of the drive at 3640
County Road 6. The sign
to my left said
word of life. So he was standing
the word of life signs hanging on the mailbox
so he was standing to the right side
of the mailbox in this vision.
I know where I am. I am at the home
of Pastor Vernon Mary Pelts.
That's where the church was in the modular at that time.
At that time I noticed an enormous
angel to my right. Its beauty
was breathtaking. He had long
hair past his massive shoulders.
His hair was held in place
with a large gold band that circled
his head. The headband
had a purple stone in the front of it
and was engraved with a pattern which he
showed here, just
the up and down pattern around the headband.
His face was very muscular
and commanded respect and authority.
He stood taller than a
full grown oak tree.
He had a large gold staff
in his right hand.
His eyes are bright blue
and it seemed like they could see right through me.
Feel the atmosphere shift?
Just...
Okay, let's go to a scripture for
it.
The testimony of Jesus
is the spirit of prophecy.
Revelation 19.
Just testifying
about it.
Invites the atmosphere to open up
and do it again.
Okay?
So his robes were so if I get a little...
because I get sappy when I feel the anointing
so work with me.
His robes were white with gold trim.
His wingspan was at least
40 feet.
This was a big kid.
It was hard for me to breathe. I couldn't speak.
My legs got weak and I fell down.
The angel picked me up
but I couldn't stand. I fell down again.
He helped me to my feet
one more time. With a smile on his face
he directed me up the driveway
to the center of the property.
As I stood at the center of the property
I could see the four corners of the property
and in each corner stood an angel.
Each of them were the same size
as the first angel I saw.
Number one. So he just names them.
Numbers them. He doesn't name them. He numbers them.
Number one would have been
on the northwest corner because he was
standing looking south. It was to his right.
So this first one he saw was at the northwest corner.
There would be one on every corner.
Angel number two
stands at the far right corner by the garden
which is the southwest corner.
He looks almost the same as angel number one.
Massive long hair with a gold band
that circled his head.
It had a purple stone in front of it
and was engraved with the same pattern.
He was armed with a spear
and a large shield.
He also had a look that commanded respect
and authority. Angel number three
stands at the corner of the end of the dog run
which is the southeast corner
right across from the modular.
He looks almost the same
angel as number one and two. Very massive
long hair with a gold band that circled his head.
It has a purple stone in the front
and has a large same engraving.
He has a large breastplate
shaped like a heart and is decorated
with large gems of different colors.
He is armed with
two large swords.
And angel number four stood at the corner
northeast corner.
He also looks almost the same
as the others. Massive
along with long hair with a gold band
that circled his head and has purple stone
with each same engraving.
The one in the northeast corner
is an archer. Now notice each one
was armed differently.
Northeast corner is an archer
armed with bow and arrows.
Once again amazed by the breath
Let me see if I can read it.
The breath taking beauty
and splendor. I could
hardly breathe. My legs
felt like soft noodles. I fell down
face first.
I couldn't move. All I could do
was just lay there.
I was awake in bed at this time.
It was 2.12 a.m.
So I got up and got a drink
and went back to bed. 2.31 a.m.
Same night
I was back into the
vision. I was standing again still
at the center of the property.
So it picked up right where he left off.
I was watching the four angels as they guarded
the property constantly watching and
grooming keeping out the demons
and evil spirits.
At this time the colors changed
from what seemed to be normal colors
of purple and gold.
It would look like
a large black light was
turned on and all
the colors turned neon and
different shades of gold and purple
and they would pulse
the colors would pulse and
change shape.
This is when I saw the openings
in the sky.
Then I saw the rest of the
angels even more beautiful
than the first four.
Overwhelmed by the sight
my legs grew soft again and I
fell to the ground. Started
thanking God for what he was
showing me. Praising his name
and I was shouting glory, glory, glory.
Then I heard a voice
say stand up and it was
angel number one. He helped
me up again and with a smile
he said we're just getting started.
And then he returned to
his spot, his post.
Angel number one
pointed to the sky. The sky
is silky purple with gold
rips or cracks in it.
So he's not seeing physical
now. Well he hasn't been
seeing physical this whole time.
But he's seeing the heavens
rip open.
Above the house I saw
two openings. First opening on the
side of the house where Pastor
Verne's office is. It was very
bright and extends from the ground
to heaven. The light is gold
and it pulses.
There is an angel that watches
over that opening traveling from
earth to heaven in that
opening. The next opening
is on the other side of the house.
It was larger and brighter than the first
and it extends from the ground to heaven.
The light is gold again and it pulses
and there's also an angel that
guards and watches over this opening
traveling from the earth to heaven.
Is there any scripture
for anything like that happening?
Jacob's Ladder.
Thank you.
Jacob's Ladder. I'll bring that
scripture next Sunday. One of
the first things that are different about this is
there were smaller but brighter light
that circles the larger one.
So it was circles of
light and they grew dimmer as they grew
away from the light. The next opening
is a very large one over
the church. It is guarded by
four angels.
The angels are in charge of opening
and closing this opening.
This opening does not stay completely
open like the others. It opens
and closes with worship.
I am now
standing in front of the church building. I
see the people going inside.
I can hear the worship
start
people praising God and glorifying
his name. I hear the drums.
Then I saw the angels
start to get excited and started
moving with the beat spreading their
wings. The angels
will dance with us and worship
with us as we worship.
Got a lot of stories about that.
Next Sunday. I felt the ground begin
to shake. The opening started
to get brighter and wider. I
could hear the drums get louder.
The people were shouting praises
blowing horns and dancing.
Horns is the shofar.
The opening is
very large and gold
liquid drops
like honey
go down from the opening
through the roof of the
modular, the roof of the church.
The louder the drums
get, for you old
people, the
louder the drums get
the wider the opening
gets.
As the opening
gets larger, more
angels are sent to
guard it.
The heavens are opening.
There are holes all
over dripping
with gold.
He said, I'm overcome
with the spirit of God. My legs get
soft again and I fell down.
End of what he saw.
So what do you do with that?
Oh, my.
Someone comes and hands that to you.
After the progression of things
and then 2009
we focus on open heavens.
How do you get in open heavens?
What do you do to sustain it?
And God just rips the place open.
And it's been open
ever since.
When we moved here
we specifically
called
those angels to come
because the church was no longer there.
We invited them and called them over here
that first
2013, our first meeting here
that's when Jim saw the well
that we needed
to pursue and dig
and
I'll get into
those stories next Sunday.
Those angels showed up here
and I saw the night they showed up
the service they showed up
when they moved over.
It was an unbelievable sight.
I wrote it down and I'll read it to you
next Sunday.
So there you've got a very, very
supernatural happening that is Scripture.
You can look at Scripture and find it.
You find it in numerous places.
You find it in Jacob's Ladder.
You've got the same thing happening
with the transfiguration.
Heaven's open
and things are happening.
There's, yeah,
but God wouldn't do that for us. Why not?
Why not?
And you know what?
He wouldn't only do it for us.
He'll do it for you.
Every believer
should be walking under
an open heaven.
Nothing restricting
our access to God.
And for that to happen
angels are spirits
sent to minister to us.
For that to stay open
He said it in there.
You have to have
angelic protection to keep that open.
So angels become active
when an open heaven
forms over you.
You have now angels going up and down
keeping and guarding
that open heaven.
I've never heard
of anything like that before.
I hadn't either.
But yet, after that
the presence and the power
of God showed up
unbelievable.
Unbelievable.
So when we talk about
angels, I thought, well before
we go into all the things Jim's seen
a bunch of stuff,
Julie has seen quite a bit of stuff.
I've seen quite a bit of stuff.
Others of you, some of you haven't
shared it with me, but I know others
have seen stuff.
And we'll start with the modular and then
we'll talk primarily about this building
and what goes on in this building
on a continual basis.
We're going to talk about that
but I thought, unless we talk about
the supernatural, if we just jump
straight to that, that could sound
really weird.
Because there's going to be some stories
that are going to stretch you.
They're going to stretch us
a little bit and that's okay.