Natural evangelism

"We give people who we are much more than what we do. The Latin saying had a clever ring to it: 'Nemo dat quod nor hat.' No one can give away what they do not have. And transformed people tend to transform other people -- just by being who they are."
-Richard Rohr, the founder of The Center for Action and Contemplation.

I like this quote because it captures the reality of sharing the Christ life as it is supposed to be shared...natural and honest, not contrived and forced.

What a great article on books

I quit too...

"I quit," said Charlie. "I walked out. I don't want to teach anymore. Every time I walked into that classroom, I died a little bit."

Tony Campolo says: I could understand him. I'm a teacher, and I know what it's like to go into a class and pour out your heart to students, to let every nerve inside you tingle with the excitement of your most profound insights. I know what it's like to passionately share the struggles of your existence, to lay your soul bare in an attempt to communicate your deepest feelings.

Then, when it's all over, some student in the back of the room raises his hand and says, "Do we have to know this stuff for the final?"
(from a Tony Compolo story)

Oh how this conversation captures my irrepressible apprehension about the way we try to capture God through church services. The more I wrestle with it, the more I find myself coming to the same conclusions...it's so much vanity.

Almost sacrilegious ... this attempt to re-share truth, it's like trying to regurgitate a meal into some recognizable form that someone would want to eat.

It's like trying to explain sex to a virgin...vs the mystery of two lifelong lovers making love...a sacred bloom of passion, with a depth of knowledge that makes your knees weak.

It's like a picture of the grand canyon vs standing on the edge of it and feeling it's ancient winds lift your small spirit off the ground and into the clouds.

A strawberry flavored candy vs one plucked fresh from grandma's garden that when tasted, sends a bolt of flavor right into your socks!

I've concluded that all I can really do is take off my shoes in front of this small burning bush and hope that it will continue to burn...and hope that I can remember the way here and pray that my face will still burn when I get back...

Oh the tragedy and mystery of it all.

Am I really?

Someone said that stuff I have been writing is "Iconoclastic"

icon·o·clast
Etymology: Medieval Latin iconoclastes, from Middle Greek eikonoklastEs, literally, image destroyer, from Greek eikono- + klan to break —more at CLAST
Date: 1641
1 : one who destroys religious images or opposes their veneration
2 : one who attacks settled beliefs or institutions

I'm not sure what to think about that...

Here is my response to the question asked to me on "why should we plant churches, when there are so many in most big cities?"

Life gives birth to life. It's God's way in nature and in the spirit. If something is alive it gives birth. Birth is not only God's intend means of keeping the species from going extinct but also the means of perpetuating culture, faith and family.

One church in a region, many congregations so that "church" can be cared for. Most people are not cared for because our churches are too big or structured in such a way that real relationships and Jesus style life together isn't surviving the religious agenda and calendar.

Do your statistics and you will see that most regions are not significantly encompassing many non believers at a very healthy rate. There are thousands not being touched. It's not about who isn't doing it or why they are not but how can we. And if we can than we should in God's timing and way.

What If we narrowed the conversation down to this statement:
How come there are so many Christians gathering together to worship the Lord and love each other and serve their neighbors? And should more gather?

You would say: Go for it! Most likely, right.

Thinking gets all complicated when you start saying: where should they gather...and that has been one of the most sterile producing conversations going on in the church.

Jesus had the same conversation with the woman at the well...she was hung up on all the same religious mumbo jumbo about...who & where. Thank God Jesus said a day was coming and now is...that is different from a "place & who" centered church.

I got all screwed up in my thinking when the church got a hold of me as a young Christian. I lived out the "natural" result of following Jesus as a teen. I got saved, connected with the ones the Lord brought into my life as friends and mentors and began learning and loving on Jesus. I also started sharing Christ...around me and in different places...I simply went. The result...we began to grow. Church life began to happen in small but potent places and times. If maturity could have helped father it and breathe life on it...something amazing could have happened at times.

Simply stated: we make it all too complicated.

Money usually makes it complicated. It's like art and music...if the only reason one seeks to "do art" is because they want to make a living at it...then they are going to be a frustrated artist and probably starve too. Most don't make much money at it. But if you do it because you have to do it, because you would die if you didn't...than you are a true artist.

Take a walk down the street on a typical Sunday morning...you will find your reason for the Lord's call to gather...the harvest is plentiful.

Great little thoughts on big stuff:

"Being controlled by the opinions of others is a guaranteed way to miss God's purpose for your life."
-Rick Warren

"I think all Christians would agree with me if I said that though Christianity seems at first to be all about morality, all about duties and rules and guilt and virtue, yet it leads you on, out of all that, into something beyond. One has a glimpse of a country where they do not talk of those things, except perhaps as a joke. Everyone there is filled full with what we should call goodness as a mirror is filled with light. But they do not call it goodness. They do not call it anything. They are not thinking of it. They are too busy looking at the source from which it comes."
- C.S. Lewis

"To risk is to lose one's foothold for a while; not to risk is to lose one's self forever."
-Soren Kierkegaard

"When the old wineskin is dying, the new wineskin is created by those who are not afraid to be vulnerable."
-Graham Cooke

Cicero once said, "A room without books is like a body without a soul."

"When the old wineskin is dying, the new wineskin is created by those who are not afraid to be vulnerable." -Graham Cooke

You’re just seeing a fresh soul vein opened up of late.

It's flowing pretty freely, a bloody mess maybe, but it had to happen.

I love one of the parts of an article I sent out the other day where the pastor said: "Every few years he has to reinvent himself a bit or he will die a little."

That's defiantly taking place right now. I'm owning my thoughts, daring to share them more and truly seeking to walk out a more authentic walk...or at least daring to try to find it.

The old dress shoes just don't fit anymore and walking in them has cramped my toes and furrowed my brow...I'm taking them off.

Yes, it may stink a bit, i've been smashing my feet into these things for way too long...I wish I had listened to the pain sooner.

I'm a bit sensitive (a better word might be raw) right now too; at least until I get some callousness on these feet.

I'm not sure what or if, I will wear any shoes in the future...but right now, free toes are marvelous!

Yep...it's quite difficult trying to do this as a "leader" but in the end I think that's a better quality of leadership than not doing it. But the fact is...life demanded it. I had gone as far as I could go in those shoes...they served me well for the time they were intended to protect me.

But everyone comes to their own burning bush sometime and hears the command to..."remove your shoes...the ground you are on is holy ground."

Moses heard it and so did Joshua.

I'm hearing it right now and like Joshua it comes right as I'm being commissioned to lead a "new generation" into the Promised Land. It's a strange time to hear a call to get naked feet. No call to strap on some trusty army boots. No seemingly wise command to clamp on some steel toes butt kickers...no, simply let your feet touch the cool grass of the earth.

A leader with bare feet...strange indeed.

Does it scare some people? Yes it does.

Does it scare me? Yep!...but that’s ok…at least I am coming alive again.


"To risk is to lose one's foothold for a while; not to risk is to lose one's self forever." - S. Kierkegaard

Remedies for Radio Rash

Here are a few more thoughts on the stuff that is causing me Radio Rash:

* Don't try so hard, just make music that you like and that is honest about who or where you are.

* Don't feel like it has to be a complete novel in one song...sometimes the beauty in life is when you are "caught a moment," The first breath after a first kiss...the taste of something not the whole meal...

* Let me wrestle with the words...you don't have to make everything so clear. Ambiguity allows me to interact with the music and allows magic to happen. Each song can mean something different for everyone.

* Don't produce music that always smells like it just came out of the wash...the story of the jeans is how they got dirty too. Scars make for great storytelling.

* Quit acting like a choir boy...if I wanted to listen to a girl I would...be a man.

* Remember Jesus chose a wild man to baptize him into public life not a priest...beginnings are important...where you start can define where you end up sometimes.

* People live in the world, a world which God made and owns, tell me about how you live in this place without losing your center. I've not been to heaven but I live on earth. Talk to me about the stuff that I see, hear and feel everyday but need to hear about it through other eyes, so I can see my world anew.

* Be influenced but be you...crossdressers make lame musicians and poets.

* I need to hear the war cry again...much of the music out there seems created for the nursery. Give me something that changes the temperature of my blood, makes me want to yell like a man not whisper like a woman.

* Be creative...God isn't monochrome. With a world full of instruments and cultures you would think Christians would discover that music is far more than a keyboard, bass, guitar and drums. Discover sounds, explore more, dare to trust sound more than lyrics. The typical moment of instrumental pause is about as long as the typical spontaneous praise in churches...short, awkward and hurried. We need to linger more, allow music to marinate on us. There is power in sound, the ocean heals not by words but sound.

* Uncork the passion please. If God is love and passion is the very flame of the Lord, than why do Christians seem like the prudish icicles around? Can't we write about anything that most of us think about most of all anyway...sex. Sure, you don't have to get all graphic but why can't someone write a song like Dave Matthew's does; that makes you want to find your wife and show her why you married her! Come On!

I've got Radio Rash

I've got a bad rash and I picked it up from listening to Christian radio.

I know as a "pastor" some would squawk that I shouldn't be slamming "Christian" radio but I must confess...it really sucks. I am sorry if that offends you but my head goes numb listening to that stuff. Sure there is an occasional; bright spot like a shaft of sun that breaks through on a maddening long run of cloudy days but that's rare.

I love music but I have not been able to hear that much good stuff in my day to day life.
I am musically anemic I think.
It is the result of a poor music diet that I picked up from some bad influences in the church.

I need help.

Could anyone please recommend some good tunes that won't make me sleepy or leave me feeling like I just was serenaded by my grandparents?

I don't want some plastic Christian copy culture stuff either.
No over the top, syrupy sacred, gospel bloated, message heavy stuff.
I like my doctrine to come primarily from the pulpit or books not the CD.
I listen to enough worship to sprout angel wings, so I am not worried about...balance.

I need something that engages me, catches me by surprise, moves other parts of me that have rusted from lack of cultural oil.

I feel like the church has turned me into the Tin Man in the Wizard of Oz. I've been plated over in armor to protect me from the culture but in the end I lost my heart.

I know that just because I gave my heart to Jesus that it doesn't mean it gets turned to stone. So much of my life came alive in Christ but not so for poor old music.
It got circumcised and I think they took to much off the top...it looks more like a castration.

Why is that?

Why did music's legs get amputated in the church?
We've had to exchange audio razor blades for religious butter knives.
What used to electrify...now petrifies.

Oh! The horror of it all...

We need help...any suggestions?

How long have you been alive?

Tony Campolo tells a story about how he challenged his students by asking them, ‘how long have you been alive?’ They responded by reciting their birthdays, almost without thinking. Then he turned to them and asked again, ‘how long have you really been alive?’ and went on to tell of a time that as a child, he stood on the empire state building and for a few brief moments, as the wind whipped his hair and the panorama overwhelmed him, felt fully alive. Then he turned to his students again and said, “now, how long have you been alive?”

Some years ago I went skydiving with my friends Fergus and Wendy in Fort McMurray, Canada during an impending rain storm. It was one of those days when you could see the vistas of the horizon and watch the heavy grey clouds roll in like a blanket. It was undoubtedly not a pristine skydiving opportunity but we were anxious to get in a jump, despite our best interests. As we rose to meet the sky the clouds extended over us like
A cotton canopy. We levelled out at approximately 6500 feet and flew just under the chouds. I was able to stand outside the door, hold on and wipe my hands through the fluffy billows, splaying them behind me. For that moment, I was truly alive.

I remember vividly the day I sat with Marianne in the pre-op ward awaiting her first cancer surgery. As I sat on her bed, our hands clasped together, we began to share in an intimate few minutes of mutual love and joy. We reflected on our lives, the fun and happy times, the pain and the sorrows of what we were experiencing. I confessed to her my fear, and she to me. We laughed and cried, kissed and hugged, wishing this moment would go on for eternity. For that moment, I was truly alive.

I once heard it said that if I had my life to live over again I’d live more moments. Just time after time of nothing but moments. Too much of my time has been spend in dismal boredom, fleeting days of just living but not being truly alive.

lifted from a great blog at:
http://scott.newheights.bc.ca/

So much of evangelism to me is so plastic, insincere, agenda driven, statistical and icky.

Plus so much of the push for it is simply unrealistic. It lays a burden upon people that becomes something they can't live up too. It's high pressure sales, it's door to door product pushing, it's dinner time phone calls, it's Amwayish insincerity.

I hate it, I don't do it.

Simply ask people" "How many people have you led to the Lord" and the truth will be out. It simply doesn't happen that way. You can act like it does, preach like it does, demand that it should, impress others with your stats, guilt the shy with your stories but in the end...it doesn't happen that much.

Plus you get a lot of guilty people that become a poor tool of outreach.

Insincere, guilty, pressured people stink as evangelism agents...period.

To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best day and night to make you everybody else, means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight, and never stop fighting. - e. e. cummings

I read that out of a little book called Posers, Fakers & Wannabes, by Brennan manning & Jim Hancock.

In the first little chapter was a story about Brennan as a monk in his earlier years. He described an episode during a catholic ritual where at the outloud reading of Psalms 51 by a superior, they would enter their cells and whip themselves with coiled telephone wire to rid themselves of their lust.

He shares how he scourged himself in religious fervency and zeal leaving blood blisters on his back and buttocks. He recalls hearing a fellow penitent lashing himself rigorously in the cell next to him. The man was so zealous Brennan was sure the man was going to wound himself severely, so he peeked in the man's cell.

To Brennans horror, bewilderment and dismay, there the man was sitting on his bed with a "bemused smile and a cigarette in his left hand. It was the wall he was whacking, not his own body, thwack, thwack, thwack..."

Oh, how I laughed! Oh how I cried...

Strange reaction, I thought to myself about myself, as I sat there on my couch feeling all to guilty for loving such a display of religious defiance.

The apostle Paul said there are those who teach a version of Christianity that creates a mindset that revolves around "do not handle, do not taste, do not touch" type of discipleship. It lifts up those who can live out "harsh treatment of the body." They are the "extremely zealous" they make you go "wow they are committed." He says they often have a lot of "regulations...human commands and teachings" and that on the outside and to the ear not attuned to Jesus life, they have "the appearance of wisdom."

But you know what? You can whip your butt until you bleed with the biggest, baddest, ugliest religious cat of nine tails you can find in your current hyper spiritual toolbox and still not "restrain sensual indulgence."

Lust doesn't extinguish that way...it actually grows.

Sorry to throw water on your spiritual superman fever that is burning you up but the heart can't be changed by such ways.

You can chain a wild dog to the porch all you want but soon as that little noose is loose...he's gone!

Paul said such thinking that permeates so much of Christian example, conversation and teaching is really "the basic principles of this world." It's not wisdom from above but from below. It's a way of living that Paul says we have to realize that we died too. That's not our path anymore. In fact Paul goes so far as to say...Why do you submit to it's rules?"

Why do we?
Why do you?
Why do I?

Paul call some of their hyper false spirituality tactics "self imposed worship."

How much of what we call "worship of God" is self imposed stuff versus God imposed? How much of our daily Christ life is merely the fruit of human thinking, man made rules and traditions that have arose out of religious minds of the earth not spiritual minds from Jesus?

How much of this dog like butt sniffing that goes on in religious circles is of God?
People sniffing around making sure everyone is in line, being good and not an impostor. Paul called such people "The dogs" in Philippians 3:2. There is a whole lot of uptight Pharisees checking our shorts to see if we are circumcised or not. It's chronic...spoken or unspoken it's there. I know because I have been one for a long time and I am tired of living that way.

I am tired of the pressure to judge, fix, correct, straighten out, spank, corral, frighten, pressure, guilt, condemn, and look down on others. I know nobody says they do that but I have and I see it all the time.

I'm weary of feeling like I have to save the world and that for others to stay saved depends on me and my ability to be good enough. This constant feeling that everyone is teetering on the edge of God rejection and that one slip up from you and their eternal soul's blood is on your hands is too much. My God! That's a massive weight to bear...who can handle such pressure? I don't want to impose such a ball and chain on believers.

Right now, evangelism with big meetings is in a very hard place—not only in trying to keep it going, but because of its results. Three out of four people who make professions at crusades never show up in any church. That’s partly due to the fact that in our notions of evangelism today, being converted has nothing to do with community; it just has to do with your “personal relationship” with God.
-Link via Jason Clark

"One of the many things this story tells us is that Jesus was not brought down by atheism and anarchy. He was brought down by law and order allied with religion, which is always a deadly mix. Beware those who claim to know the mind of God and who are prepared to use force, if necessary, to make others conform. Beware those who cannot tell God's will from their own. Temple police are always a bad sign. When chaplains start wearing guns and hanging out at the sheriff's office, watch out. Someone is about to have no king but Caesar."
-from Bruderhof

The kind of work God usually calls you to is the kind of work that you need most to do and that the world most needs to have done. The place God calls you is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.

Frederick Buechner

The question is not what you look at but what you see.
-Henry David Thoreau

EARTHSHAKERS!

There is an immense resistance and opposition in the spirituals around us at this moment. I can sense it, feel it and almost taste it. The constant mental hammer blows on my mind have been tiring to say the least. I know that we are moving into occupied territory and that much hangs in the balance at this time.
I know that what we say and what we do matters.

The prophet Joel spoke of "the earth quaking before those who are the army of the Lord" (Joel 2:10). I know and can sense that quaking taking place in the depths of lives and the course of the future right now. I can almost feel the deep fissures that are moving and the sound of old earth breaking and giving way to something else emerging. The ground isn't stable right now, it is moving and that is an uneasy and a dangerous and yet, exciting time. Things won't look the same after a quake. People's lives change after a quake. Somethings die in earth quakes too.

God uses earth quakes, He swallows some in quakes and opens doors that no man could have opened for others.

There are two prophetic men who has been chained in a prison.

There are those who are not saved that can only be saved by an earthquake.

Destiny hangs on a shaking.

I believe this shaking is going to result in a harvest.

I also believe that this shaking is going to result in a releasing of shackles that have held us bound.

The result is that "whole households" are going to be saved.

Our wounds are going to be washed and great joy is going to be released.

I'm just trying to hold on in the "midnight"...(Acts 16:25-36)

Please pray for us.

Scripture is bold and my prophetic inspiration is not:

NEW GENERATION ARISE!

It is a day of darkness and gloom, a day of thick clouds and deep blackness. Suddenly, like dawn spreading across the mountains, a mighty army appears!
How great and powerful they are!
When the rains of God's purposes are about to pour it is often like the dark thunderclouds of a storm that arise. They can be ominous and a little frightening but they also speak of a great outpouring coming. It has been very dark in your life, the storm has been brewing and you are not sure if it is the end or not. But the Lord says to open your eyes and see that the storm is good...it is bringing the rain!
The dawn of God's purposes for your life are unfolding even now, will you see it? A great work and a powerful force for good is marshaling, will you believe it?

The likes of them have not been seen before and never will be seen again.
A NEW GENERATION is arising that will accomplish and do things that have not been done before. There is much ahead that requires a willingness to go into the future with new eyes and an open mind. The church will have to fold up her tabernacle and be willing to move with the cloud and fire of God's purposes. Will you be mobile? Will you be flexible? Are you a wanderer or a settler on this planet?

Fire burns in front of them and follows them in every direction! Ahead of them the land lies as fair as the Garden of Eden in all its beauty.
Behind them is nothing but desolation; not one thing escapes.
The passion that is smoldering in the depths of this company is scorching. They burn and the results of their burning are devastating to all that is safe, comfortable and lukewarm. The fire on them is uncontrollable. It races across states and oceans on the wind of God's Spirit. It leaps across stateliness and ignites on any heart that is dry and ready for a spark of potential. What starts out small grows fast. Nothing the fire touches is the same...it either joins or is consumed or left altered as the fire sweeps by. Many won't know what hit them until it passes.

They look like tiny horses, and they run as fast.
Look at them as they leap along the mountaintops!
Listen to the noise they make - like the rumbling of chariots, like the roar of a fire sweeping across a field, or like a mighty army moving into battle.
Like wild horses they run and what they do, happens fast. They are children of the wild wind not temples of stone. They move unpredictably and quickly. You turn and they are off and running. They move on mountaintops and often leap over valleys of trouble and despair and religious gullies that have many trapped and stuck. They dwell in high places. They abide in mountain mists where God speaks and walks. Look to the hills and you will see that their hearts are up in the burning mountain. A battle is what they are looking for. They make noise. Those who like it quiet better move on because the roar of the fire is deafening at times. The sound of God is a trumpet in this hour and the Lord is crying out with a LOUD VOICE to Lazarus.

Fear grips all the people; every face grows pale with fright.
Fear of loss, fear of losing the known and having to face faith.
Predictability is comfortable. Sin hides in the familiar.

The attackers march like warriors and scale city walls like trained soldiers.
Straight forward they march, never breaking rank.
They never jostle each other; each moves in exactly the right place.
They lunge through the gaps, and no weapon can stop them.
These are warriors not consumers. They are wild men and women who long for something that makes their blood tingle in their veins. They want gasps not yawns.
They long for a company of warriors that guard each other's back. They revel in the skill of their comrades. The stronger each is, the more they accomplish. They abhor the skill of only a few…what good is it? They train for war not peace. They serve one who came with a sword and offered them a life of service without the assurance of peace.

They swarm over the city and run along its walls.
They enter all the houses, climbing like thieves through the windows.
They have a heart for the city not just churches. They are in the city more than in a church building. They know that God has called them to houses, homes and places where the people are living. They don't wait for them to come…they go to them. They have no affinity with butt sitters but ache for the swarming ones.

The earth quakes as they advance, and the heavens tremble.
The sun and moon grow dark, and the stars no longer shine.
You know when they come and when they leave. They don't slip out of services, slump in chairs, cuddle with quiet. The earth moves and the heavens respond to their presence because there is a God weight on them. He has inhabited their feet and the weight of His glory is on their mouths. Stone yields water to their whispers. The ground swallows the enemy at the sound of their dancing feet. Natural lights go dim at the brightness of their joy. Worldly lights fall from the sky of idolatrous hearts and the true SUN rises in their midst. HE IS AWESOME in their midst. He steals all the attention. They are simply the boring moons and HE is the GREAT SUN. All things revolve around the powerful force of HIS presence. All things are pulled and held together by HIS all consuming presence. You can't compare with HIM. Your fancy pants, your bling-bling and all the shinning lights, colored smoke and charisma you can muster is dung in their eyes. They won't settle for a gold calf in the valley of man's creation when the GOD OF ETERNITY beacons them to ascend the mount of GOD. They don't want Moses or Aaron they want GOD.

The LORD leads them with a shout! This is his mighty army, and they follow his orders. The day of the LORD is an awesome, terrible thing. Who can endure it?

God is leading this generation of the shouting one. They hear His voice and are on the move. A new day is emerging.
-Joel 2:2-11

Rejoice in the Lord your God!
For the rains He sends
are tokens of His forgiveness.
Once more the autumn rains will come
as well as those of spring. -Joel 3:23

I received a word form the Lord last October about the autumn and spring rains that were spiritually falling in October and would come in 2004. My life was dramatically flooded in October and November of last year. The Lord sent some amazingly reviving rains in the autumn of 2003. A good deal of the prophetic inspiration in that downpour was from the book of the book of Joel and Mark 5, as well as Daniel & Esther.

One verse that was spoken like a trumpet in my spiritual ear was in Mark 5. The whole part where the Lord said that the dead girl had to die but was just sleeping and would surely rise but only by the power of the word of the Lord Himself.

There was only a father and mother, a few disciples, Jesus and a dead girl in the room.
A gathering of generations focused on one thing...another generation coming alive.
Little did I know that in the spring of 2004, we would be launching an all church Saturday night service at New Hope Christian Center. Little did I know that the Lord had a gathering in mind of multi-generations with a heart to empower, disciple and father a new generation to arise and take the land of promise.

The dead girl won't arise without fathers and mothers.
She won't awaken without disciples in the room.
There will be no resurrection life without Jesus, the lord of Life in the room.
There will be no miracle without driving out the unbelieving crowd.
Only those who long for her love will see LOVE awaken her again.
The natural rains are falling outside; can you hear them watering the seeds of autumn?

This last weekend was our 4th BLAZE youth conference and it was so powerful!
Dead things came alive.
Destiny was set in motion for many.
Youth, young adults and adults were impacted by the Spirit and Word of God.
Some were saved, some were healed, and some were called.
Fresh vision for families and lost loved ones was imparted again.
God broke in on clouded minds and hearts and pulled back the veil of the future and showed many the next steps in their journey to apprehend what God apprehended them for.
Cold dead hearts that had given up on loving and being loved were melted and revived.
Drug paraphernalia was placed in my hand in faith that a life of forgetting would be replaced by a life of purpose and passion.
The holy armor of purity was strapped on with renewed passion and zeal.
The shield of faith was taken up and the sword of the spirit was gripped with boldness for the fight.
The troops were brought into ranks and new leaders were born.
Vision was restored spiritually and naturally.
New lands were tattooed on the souls of new missionaries.
Another new worship project was born with a generous and sacrificial gift.

God sent the rains…