Walt and Jack used to work together for 5 years at Aliso Creek Presb. Church in Aliso Viejo, Ca, and they became great friends. Then we left Ca. and Jack went on to produce the movie, "To End All Wars," which was a truly great movie. This is what he wrote to Walt after reading his blog for Christ Coastal Church.
"What is missing today is an adequate understanding of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Yes, he's a person, but that is confusing in a certain context - in learning how to appropriate him. The spirit of something is its core values, or to say it in another way, the heart of it. It involves our disposition, our mood, our attitude, our feelings. We say the home team crowd had great spirit at the football game. There was a great spirit in the crowd. We say after meeting with someone we liked that we love her spirit - she is kind, she is compassionate, she is loving, she makes us feel good to be around her.
I wanted To End All Wars to have "the heart of the Father." There seemed no other way to quite say what I wanted. When we want the heart of the Father, we want what he wants, love what he loves, even hate what he hates. But to have his spirit is to have that heart. To have been with a person who has his Spirit is to have been with the Father.
The way I think we get that spirit is to sit in his presence and fill ourselves up with his love, and then go out in that love. I may have to stop 20 times a day and read a Biblical passage, just a couple of verses, to remind myself, to put myself in that "mood" again, to be full of love, to be full of his Spirit. That's why Paul said be full of the Spirit, walk in the Spirit, don't quench this Spirit - it's the heart of what it means to be a Christian. It's how living by the spirit was going to be different that merely living by the law. Being given the Spirit, the New Testament believer would naturally carry out the Law that the Old Testament believer was trying to do without having the Spirit - though some obviously did have the Spirit.
Too many of us think we're saved, on our way to heaven, have the rules, and then try to "obey" God, and think because we're "good" most the time, that we're living the Christian life. But we don't try to take that extra step to go to him and get full of his Spirit. We think that our new identity is enough - we don't need to "have" anything else. We don't know about being "full" of love, so we simply try to be compliant. Well that, to me, is the leaf that we put on in the Garden of Eden to cover our brokenness. Our compliance, our being good, our "obeying" God, is good, but is not enough. We need to learn the difference in who we are when we're experiencing a personal revival inside from his Spirit, and the normal human attempt to be good and stay out of trouble.
I don't know what more to say about this, but it's the difference in what you're saying about the Word and the Person, or about the Church and the Spirit-filled believer."
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Christ Coastal Church Prayer Update for March 2010
Dear Family,
I want to update you on where we are in this church planting adventure in Southport, NC.
A fresh study of the absolute necessity for the Church, the Bride of Christ, was crucial for me. Ezekiel 47:1-12 is a loaded passage which includes the Source (:1) of the water of life, the Flow (:3-4), the Size (:5) and the Effect (:9). Check it out sometime, and be encouraged to pray for the Church with the living Water, blessing the nations!
And yet, don’t miss this: while we can talk about what all is needed in the community and the world, let’s not forget that the “mainest thing,” as a little girl named Marcie from Mississippi used to say, is the Spirit of Christ. The world’s greatest need is still the gospel, and Christ really is the Answer to that need. If we’re not careful, we allow CNN or even FOX set the agenda for how we pray!
That leads me to the second piece of study in our living room: If the greatest need for Brunswick County and Southport, NC is the Savior, then do we know what that will look like, what to pray for? Note the transformation that occurred to a little village in Samaria in John 4. It is a shocking story with at least 10 major, unsettling surprises: Right after a night time visit with a big shot in the covenant community of Israel Nicodemus (John 3), John tells us about a visit with a woman of Samaria at high noon.
Note: (1) the Self-emptying of the Savior, the Son of God, tired and vulnerable, in an unfriendly land (the focus of 500 years of hostility). Instead of giving in to custom to withdraw as a woman approached, He remained seated and even asked for a drink of water (:6-9)!
(2) the “gift of God” to which Jesus refers is not a Book (the Torah for the Samaritans or Law and the Prophets for the Jews (or the Qu’ran for the Muslim)~but a Person--Himself :10-13 [see the connection now with Ezek. 47 – “the well of water springing up” Jeremiah 2:13, Isa.42:6] !
(3) the “Magic” Water exceeds our expectations (:13-15)!
(4) the Spring for Others (not kept to ourselves :16-17)!
(5) the Escape into Religion (who has not played this game when the Spirit of Christ comes downtown, to Main Street, in our hearts :17-20)?
(6) De-Zionizing Tradition (wow! This is something the evangelical world had better learn, especially today :21-25)!
(7) the first “I AM” in John’s gospel (:26)!
(8) the first (gulp!) female Preacher- (“it’s in the book”, guys :27-30)!
(9) the Invisible Food for all disciples of the Lord Jesus :31-38)!
(10) the Identification of the True Savior of the World (guess who gets to announce Him first, in John’s gospel – the Samaritans :39-42)!
Ok, if you take some time to join our living room study here, you will be able to pray with us with more enthusiasm. We want the Lord to connect some dots for us on site, but also to help people praying for us in this “parachute drop” of a church plant.
That’s what this email is about: this is an unashamed plea for pray-ers. Would you prayerfully commit to pray regularly with us and for us? Do you know how easy it is to “mess up” in this venture? Yes, I guess you folk who have known me through the years do have some idea. And while you’ve prayed for me, sometimes holding your breath, you’ve always been able to thank Him for my wife and family.
Now we are in earnest: please let us know if you are in the position in your busy schedule to take us on for vital prayer. I would give anything for 120 prayerful, expectant brothers and sisters lifting up this work and the Shepards….for the Holy Spirit to show Himself in all facets of this mission development. It is all about “Thuh Relationship” with the Lord Jesus, and not some strained and testy religious talk about “church,” as this culture knows it. And yet how I long to see them all come to know a different kind of “Church,” the Bride and Body of Christ, where they will find the Living Water through the vital relationships with His own folks!
We are desperate to hear from you. Soon, we will have the website I’ve talked about before, up and running for regular reads from us.
How we love you all! And how we thank God for you all!
Walt
I want to update you on where we are in this church planting adventure in Southport, NC.
A fresh study of the absolute necessity for the Church, the Bride of Christ, was crucial for me. Ezekiel 47:1-12 is a loaded passage which includes the Source (:1) of the water of life, the Flow (:3-4), the Size (:5) and the Effect (:9). Check it out sometime, and be encouraged to pray for the Church with the living Water, blessing the nations!
And yet, don’t miss this: while we can talk about what all is needed in the community and the world, let’s not forget that the “mainest thing,” as a little girl named Marcie from Mississippi used to say, is the Spirit of Christ. The world’s greatest need is still the gospel, and Christ really is the Answer to that need. If we’re not careful, we allow CNN or even FOX set the agenda for how we pray!
That leads me to the second piece of study in our living room: If the greatest need for Brunswick County and Southport, NC is the Savior, then do we know what that will look like, what to pray for? Note the transformation that occurred to a little village in Samaria in John 4. It is a shocking story with at least 10 major, unsettling surprises: Right after a night time visit with a big shot in the covenant community of Israel Nicodemus (John 3), John tells us about a visit with a woman of Samaria at high noon.
Note: (1) the Self-emptying of the Savior, the Son of God, tired and vulnerable, in an unfriendly land (the focus of 500 years of hostility). Instead of giving in to custom to withdraw as a woman approached, He remained seated and even asked for a drink of water (:6-9)!
(2) the “gift of God” to which Jesus refers is not a Book (the Torah for the Samaritans or Law and the Prophets for the Jews (or the Qu’ran for the Muslim)~but a Person--Himself :10-13 [see the connection now with Ezek. 47 – “the well of water springing up” Jeremiah 2:13, Isa.42:6] !
(3) the “Magic” Water exceeds our expectations (:13-15)!
(4) the Spring for Others (not kept to ourselves :16-17)!
(5) the Escape into Religion (who has not played this game when the Spirit of Christ comes downtown, to Main Street, in our hearts :17-20)?
(6) De-Zionizing Tradition (wow! This is something the evangelical world had better learn, especially today :21-25)!
(7) the first “I AM” in John’s gospel (:26)!
(8) the first (gulp!) female Preacher- (“it’s in the book”, guys :27-30)!
(9) the Invisible Food for all disciples of the Lord Jesus :31-38)!
(10) the Identification of the True Savior of the World (guess who gets to announce Him first, in John’s gospel – the Samaritans :39-42)!
Ok, if you take some time to join our living room study here, you will be able to pray with us with more enthusiasm. We want the Lord to connect some dots for us on site, but also to help people praying for us in this “parachute drop” of a church plant.
That’s what this email is about: this is an unashamed plea for pray-ers. Would you prayerfully commit to pray regularly with us and for us? Do you know how easy it is to “mess up” in this venture? Yes, I guess you folk who have known me through the years do have some idea. And while you’ve prayed for me, sometimes holding your breath, you’ve always been able to thank Him for my wife and family.
Now we are in earnest: please let us know if you are in the position in your busy schedule to take us on for vital prayer. I would give anything for 120 prayerful, expectant brothers and sisters lifting up this work and the Shepards….for the Holy Spirit to show Himself in all facets of this mission development. It is all about “Thuh Relationship” with the Lord Jesus, and not some strained and testy religious talk about “church,” as this culture knows it. And yet how I long to see them all come to know a different kind of “Church,” the Bride and Body of Christ, where they will find the Living Water through the vital relationships with His own folks!
We are desperate to hear from you. Soon, we will have the website I’ve talked about before, up and running for regular reads from us.
How we love you all! And how we thank God for you all!
Walt
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