I’ll Go With You - Intro

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 21:55:39 GMT

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“Sandi told me you and her had a good talk.”

“Sandi told me you and her had a good talk.” It was 1996, I had just returned from our annual college camp out. Looking back I think it’s hilarious that we called ourselves Chi Alpha even though weren’t an official Chi Alpha group. I was attending New Life in Marysville having decided to go to this church based Bible college after visiting Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It’s funny how three days in Tulsa can help you hear the Lord tell you to return to California.

New Life had been in revival for the past ten years. At the time I arrived the church was running around 800 in a small community called Linda just over the bridge from Marysville. Filled with blue collar workers, former drug addicts and reformed inmates New Life was a church located on the fringe of society. It ministered and served the broken. It walked where Jesus walked and saw the fruit. New Life was lead by the great man of God, David Hood, who was larger than life to the many who called him Pastor. Pastor Hood just didn’t bear fruit, he bore fruit that remained. Several of our churches within the NCN District and beyond are a part of his legacy. Rodney and Sandi Waters were a young couple with a three year old daughter and they were New Life’s Chi Alpha pastors.

It was my first time away from home and they had now become my second family. I didn’t know anything else besides family and I could be found sitting on their couch, eating at their dinner table and tagging along with them daily. During our college age, “Chi Alpha” camp out I had confided in Sandi that I struggled with same-sex attraction. She thought I was teasing since I’m a big joker. I’ll never forget her response, “What? No way . . . But you wear earrings and paint your toenails.” We still laugh at her response to this day. I’ll never forget how nervous I was. I literally thought my heart was going to beat out of my chest. It was 1996, no body was talking about this type of thing in the church and if they did they were usually extremely condemning. I remember hearing preachers on TV mention it but never in a redemptive fashion, only condemnation. I remained locked in the devastating tension of my sexuality not reconciling with my faith. I would lift my hand with an unspoken prayer request all through my teenage years in my youth group, wishing that someone would one day unlock the door to this prison I found myself in.

I thought for sure Rodney and Sandi were going to send me back home and never let me play with their three year old daughter Haley anymore. Instead, they loved me even more. “I don’t really know how to help you.” Rodney said, “But I know someone who can. His name is Bob, he’s a counselor in Yuba City. If you want me to, I’ll go with you.” Rodney didn’t know it but he said the words I had been longing to hear. I already knew he couldn’t help me. I was convinced that no one could take away my emotional desires to connect with a female and while I had never acted out sexually I would spend years wandering from one emotionally dependent relationship to another trying meet a deep need.

I’ll go with you is a phrase that families use. Family doesn’t let you face hardship and tragedy alone. Family says, “If you’re in prison, I’m in prison too.” That day I had no clue the journey I would take and how influential Rodney and Sandi would be in my life. All I could see was my brokenness but they saw potential. This wouldn’t be the last time someone within my AG family would see my potential and would “go with me” but it was the start of trusting and believing that I needed others in order to survive. I love the first part of the verse Psalm 68:8, “He places the lonely in families.” While I am alone I’ve never struggled with debilitating loneliness because I have a family that continues to go with me.

The Boulder Of Unbelief

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 21:38:59 GMT

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The boulder of unbelief is predicated on the assumption that I’ve already experienced everything available to me and there is nothing more.

It’s funny how when you go through dry seasons you forget what rivers of living water felt like. When you’re making more withdrawals from your spiritual bank account because of ministry you realize that the amount of deposits need to increase. The account can get lopsided quickly and your spirit dries up. Recently a minister noted in one of his messages, that the Lord always announces His coming but He never announces His departure. I must say this is true in my own life. The Holy Spirit makes His entrance well known but there are times I’ve found myself searching for Him unaware that His presence had slipped out the back door days or months ago.

Many struggle with this idea that we invite the Holy Spirit. The argument is why are we inviting Him when he’s already here and He says I will not leave you nor forsake you. I agree He is everywhere, but I want him here. Scripture also reminds us that He is close to the broken-hearted. Lord, come close I pray. I found myself praying a very specific prayer in early 2022. “Lord, increase my capacity to contain more of you.” The warning lights on my souls dashboard were screaming at me. Overwhelm was creeping in and my patience with people (God’s most prized possession) was starting to wain.

I was still struggling with a huge amount of imposter syndrome also known as the enemy whispering in my ear everyday . . . “How in the world did you get this position? You know you’re a secretary, you don’t have what it takes. You’ve been elevated to your highest level of incompetence. You think all those young male youth pastors are going to follow you? You haven’t youth pastored since 2000 you’re irrelevant. You know you’re a woman right, they won’t follow you. They won’t follow you. They won’t follow you.” It was like the old days when your CD player would get stuck on one phrase. The crazy thing about the enemies lies is that they carry a lot of truth to them. He was right, I wasn’t enough, I didn’t carry the most influence in the room and I had leaders on my team that were much better leaders than I was.

For a long time I didn’t even realize these thoughts were circling around inside my mind, I just knew I felt overwhelmed and deflated. I realize now this was a spiritual battle and like a small bird pecking at me the enemy was trying to break me down and get me to quit. The constant nagging from the enemy was destroying my confidence tripping other lights on my dashboard and they started blinking . . . I was now becoming desperate and I had no idea that desperation is the best place to be.

Since I was five years old I’ve known the lamb of God, but in 2022, I met the Lion of Judah. It was early January 2022. I was home sick for a week with the flu. It wasn’t COVID thank God but vile enough to keep me away from others. I was just doing my daily quiet time when I found myself weeping . . . Uncontrollably weeping. I felt His presence so strong. Now I often think of Obed-Edom when David knocked on his door and asked if he could drop off the Ark of the Covenant for a few months. Had He come to my house?

I hesitated thinking perhaps I was just hormonal and this would soon pass, but these emotions, feelings and awe remained. I couldn’t stop praying, I couldn’t stop crying and I remember trying to brush my teeth but I couldn’t stop speaking in tongues. What in the whole world is happening to me? I called my Dad. “Daddy, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“What do you mean baby?”

“I can’t stop praying.” I’m sure he could hear my voice cracking.

“Oh baby that’s beautiful.” Now his voice was cracking too.

I couldn’t find anyone to explain to me what was happening. I was waking up at three in the morning with a ravenous desire to pray. I was being woken up in the night to the Lord loudly filling me in on what was happening in peoples lives and telling me to pray. And even on those rare occasions I would fall back to sleep my entire body would jolt as though I had been pushed and would find myself wide awake. In my prayer time His presence would be so thick that I w felt as though I was wearing a heavy apron like they place on you at the dentists office when taking your dental X-rays. I was living daily in awe. My productivity level was dwindling and I was no longer satisfied with the high I received from checking things off my to do list.

I was now living with this fire in the pit of my stomach and a desperate urge to tell people about Jesus. I remember getting out of my car at Starbucks in Sacramento. The man next to me was doing meth right there on the curb smoking it off a small piece of tinfoil. I sat down next to him, put my arm around him and asked him if I could pray for him. Who am I and where did this boldness come from? My heart was so tender and so broken for those in my community that I would weep. I found myself sitting on top of Pastor Hoods grave crying out for revival and asking the Lord to do it again.

My ministry changed. I now had the Lion of Judah inside me and He was roaring to get out. Before I would speak at a church the Lord would give me a prophetic word for them. . . when I was praying for people at the altar I would start hearing from heaven what God wanted me to say. I would only get one word and after I opened my mouth it would just start flowing. I’d never met these people before but yet I was telling them stuff that made sense to them and gave them hope.

I had no language to explain the encounters I was having in the spiritual realm. I doubt that anyone who went to Bible college in the 90’s learned about open visions, closed visions, seeing in the spirit, interpreting dreams, hearing the audible voice of God, angelic visitations, trances (mentioned 5 times in the Bible notably Acts 10:10-17), being caught up in the spirit (2 Cor. 12), Transportation (Acts 8) and 3rd heaven encounters. Stay with me here . . . When a person tries to experience these type of encounters on their own they are entering dangerous territory. We do not seek encounters but we seek to encounter Him. These type of revelations from heavenly realms sadly are linked more often to new age, shamans and counterfeit experiences rather than men and women of God.

People started to notice I was different. I had a new confidence and knew exactly the direction the church ministries department needed to go. God started speaking to me and letting me know that revival had left the shores of heaven and was coming to the west coast. Three times he said, “Prepare, Prepare, Prepare.” Wow! How do you prepare a generation to see the glory of God? You first must overcome their unbelief. Nothing combats unbelief like a testimony. I started to read stories of revival. I couldn’t read enough. I started to see a common threads, that prayer lays the groundwork, testimonies raise the faith ceiling and young people usually lead the way. I started story time with auntie Char Char at our camps and begin to tell students about revivals, why they happen and how they change entire cities.

While I have been filled with the Holy Spirit since I was 12 years old I have never experienced a power or bold like I did in 2022. I soon found others who were having the same type of experiences. I started to call them my revival tribe. In all my 25 years within the district I have never seen His presence manifest like I see it currently in our churches. Many churches are hosting a Sunday Night worship services, Youth services are having extended worship sessions, students aren’t letting the worship team leave the stage and will continue singing and worshipping even after the musicians have set down their instruments. Even as I type this Asbury college in Kentucky just had a 12 hour chapel service. Friends, we are hearing the rumbles and His presence is growing closer and closer.

Nahum 1:6 reminds us that boulders are broken into pieces in His presence. The boulder of unbelief is being crushed and the Next Generation will lead the way. No longer is the Holy Spirit relegated to the basement like a weird uncle on Sunday mornings because we couldn’t trust Him around visitors. We have unleashed him and we’re hungry for more. Scripted 1 hour Sunday services is no longer enough to feed our hungry souls. It’s happening, the Lion of Judah is roaring showing us there is more.

charla-blair

I’ll Go With You - Intro

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“Sandi told me you and her had a good talk.”

The Boulder Of Unbelief

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The boulder of unbelief is predicated on the assumption that I’ve already experienced everything available to me and there is nothing more.

Tips for writing great posts that increase your site traffic

Tips for writing great posts that increase your site traffic