Steward's Portion

 

This Journal is a record of my time at the International House Of Prayer in Kansas City (IHOP-KC). Specifically, it covers time spent in the Intro To IHOP internship (Track One), which lasts 3 months.  As a journal, this is simply a personal look into my day-to-day experiences and thoughts as I pursue God and His call to receive from Him at this church / missions base.  For those wondering what I’m doing here, and what prompted me to make the move to Kansas City, please see “The Last Hurdle” for more details.  And for those family and friends who would like to follow me vicariously along my journey, this journal is provided as a window into my personal struggles and triumphs along the way.

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1: Welcome to the IHOP-KC Missions Base! — 1-14-2011, Friday

IT’S BEEN A LONG TIME COMING, but we’re here.  It’s really happening.  So much has taken place to get us ready for this present step in our walk with God.  While I’ve mentally prepared myself for the reality of what God is calling us to, I find myself feeling a bit like a child edging out toward the deep end of the pool.  It’s the feeling of being ready for Heaven, but then finding yourself on the brink of death, about to enter something you’ve never experienced before.  It’s scary in the flesh because it’s the end of the line for much of what you’ve grown accustomed to, and yet it’s a time filled with anticipation in the spirit because it’s the beginning of something so much greater than you’ve ever known.  For me, this is not far from reality in that I’m preparing to, metaphorically, “die to self,” and all the things that have kept me distant from God in the area of intimacy.  It’s time to begin walking with God in a radical new way.

As we checked ourselves in, we were were assigned to one of 7 small groups.  All 7 groups will be together for most everything, and will have plenty of group interaction, but will meet separately for more intimate fellowship and counseling.  There are over 300 of us attending this internship, from all over the world.  Mingling among our fellow interns, my wife an I were struck by all the similar stories of how God called people away from family and familiarity to come learn to walk with Him in a far deeper way.  We saw our heart reflected in the hearts of everyone around us.  It was an Elijah moment for us, in that we felt a little like Elijah when God informed him that he was not alone in his pursuit of God, and that there were 7000 others of like mind and heart that God had called out to follow Him (Romans 11:2-5).  It’s exciting to see yourself in the larger picture of God’s will.

I opened up my Internship Manuel, and my eyes fell upon the following paragraph in the introductory welcome:

“We want to encourage you to use this opportunity wisely by immersing yourself into this lifestyle of prayer, personally and corporately, and to respond wholeheartedly to the call that caused you to leave your family, friends, and home to come to Kansas City for this season.”

It’s not easy to drop everything for 3-6 months and yet so many people have answered God’s call to be here.  It’s not a decision you make rashly.  But when you truly hear the call of God, your heart burns in a way you cannot ignore.  It pulls you, like a magnet, towards the goal of the call.  And when you get there, the peace of God fills you with an overflowing sense of satisfaction and knowledge that you are where you belong.  In this we are definitely not alone.

The internship is divided into two parts, Track One and Track Two, each 3 months long.  At this point, we are only intending to participate in Tack One, but I’m beginning to get the sense that God is going to call me all the way through.  That’s not confirmed yet, but I feel something every time track two is mentioned.  We’ll see.  To go all the way through will require missionary style support to enable most people to survive financially, and already, we’ve seen the provisional base that God uses to support the people He calls.  Depending upon the donations from perfect strangers takes faith, but this is a place of strong faith.  God is too hard to miss here to struggle with faith issues for long.

Turning the page in my manual, I came to a section called “Internship Expectations.”  The first point reads:

• Expect God to deal with your perceived identity and destiny.

Immediately the study that God had me start just prior to the internship (and thus still in progress) came to mind.  That study specifically focused upon my identity and destiny and connected it with loving myself in Christ.  As I reread this bullet point, I got a knowing that this was one of the major things that God had brought me to IHOP-KC to learn.  This is no small thing.  It’s a life changer.  You live and act according to your perception of yourself.  I already know that I am bound and locked down because of my self-perception.  I know that who I think I am is not who God thinks I am.  When I make that transition over to His way of thinking, I will be a different person for all intents and purposes.  That is huge to me.  More than I can express in words.  We all want to change ourselves and be someone better.  Being set free in your true identity in Christ is how it’s done.  As Clark Kent, I’m ready to take off my glasses and be what God intended for me to be in His Kingdom.

And this was just our orientation day.  I’ve never been more filled with hope and expectation for the future.

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2: Consecration – 1-15-2011, Saturday

TODAY was the day all the interns bought their books.  Then it was training for ushering in the prayer room and main services.  When you put interns into all the activities on the missions base, it gives them an opportunity to walk out what they are learning.  It will definitely take me out of my comfort zone.

After that, we spent 4 hours learning and praying about consecration.

Consecration is a voluntary act of committing oneself to God.   The word, “consecrate” literally means, “to unite by force with the sacred.”

Con (expressing intensive force), sacrare (dedicate), from sacer (sacred).

The entire internship spent time learning what it is to live in constant consecration.  I saw that as an absolute beginning to the kind of walk Dawn and I are after.

And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.  (Matthew 11:12, KJV)

God’s word is spiritual, not physical.  While some religions use physical force to serve God, consecration uses a spiritual violence that goes after sin in one’s own life.   Thus, violence is simply expressing the kind of force  one uses in dying to self.  It’s violent, and it kills.   But it kills all that opposes love within you, and frees you to walk in life.  God permits this kind of violence, because it strengthens men, and makes them more alive in Him.

Jesus set John the Baptist forth as a model of human greatness in the sight of God.  John’s measure of greatness was not the number of people he reached; it was his resolve to remain consecrated and living a holy, violent life without compromise.  His greatness was found in his consecration to the Lord.  He was dead to self, but alive to God.  This is our calling.

This is now a pillar in my life.  It’s now in focus, and part of my intentional Christianity.  More on this later.

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3: Welcome Home, This is Your House Now – 1-18-2011, Tuesday

UNITY was the word of the day.

How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!  {^2} It is like precious oil poured on the head, running down on the beard, running down on Aaron’s beard, down on the collar of his robe. ^{3} It is as if the dew of Hermon were falling on Mount Zion.  For there [in unity] the LORD bestows his blessing, even life forevermore.  (Psalm 133:1-3, NIV)

The International House of Prayer in Kansas City (IHOP-KC), is, in fact, the Father’s House (Isa. 56:7; Jn 2:16) operating in a forerunner spirit of Elijah (Mal. 4:5-6; Lk. 1:17) that is focused on the poor of the nations, the fatherless, orphans and the widows (Ps. 68:5; Jas. 1:27).  This is God’s calling upon the church He called my wife and I to.  So what does that mean for us?

And foreigners who bind themselves to the LORD to minister to him, to love the name of the LORD, and to be his servants, all who keep the Sabbath without desecrating it and who hold fast to my covenant— {7} these I will bring to my holy mountain and give them joy in my house of prayer.  Their burnt offerings and sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations. (Isaiah 56:6-7, NIV)

God has called us out as foreigners, and set us in the midst of this reality.  And the first step of our adoption into this church is the joy of the Lord.  So today they welcomed us each personally, prayed and prophesied over us, and explained something very important to us.  Before we can really move forward, we must know who we are to God, and learn what it means to love God according to the first commandment, and then love others as we love ourselves, according to the second commandment.  The full revelation of how God see’s us, and deals with our failures, is a freedom like no other.  So many of us are bound by lies and failures that we can hardly function let alone embrace what God has called us to.

So this was our teaching today.  We heard all about the amazing reality of our place in God’s heart.  The fact that God has eternally bound Himself to mankind (in the incarnation of Christ) is breathtaking.  God is not only invested in mankind, but created us to be His inheritance.  Ever wondered what the inheritance of Eternal Perfection and Completeness is?  Look at yourself in Christ.  And that right there was the crux of our teaching today, in that most cannot see themselves in Christ, but only in the flesh which is condemned to be put to death.

It’s no coincidence that God pressed me to begin a study on this very subject just prior to our first class.  This is only the beginning of study for me!  My personal prayer on this day has been that God would free me from who I think I am into who I really am in Christ.  Who ever that is, we haven’t met yet.  Soon though, very soon.

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4: Preparation, Get Ready – 1-19-2011, Wednesday

EVERY DAY BEGINS with worship and with a few words of knowledge.  But I was surprised when one of the staff who was giving out words of knowledge looked up like he had an announcement and asked, “Does anyone here have a father who’s name is Gary?”  I thought for a moment that he was asking who among the interns was a father who’s name was Gary.  But when no one raised their hand, he repeated it.  He was looking for someone who had a father who’s name was Gary.  Well, I do.  So I slowly raised my hand, as if I was unsure what my father’s name was.

He then began to tell me about my inheritance.  Those gifts, revelations, and special blessings that my father has received from the Lord are available to me, they are mine to receive.  He then proceeded to flesh this out with pictures and imagery that all spoke to a fear inside me.  I was concerned that I, for all my effort and failures, was going to miss out on anything significant from the Lord.

So even beyond the inheritance of gifts was a strong conveyance of assurance.  I was told that, just as children are like a quiver of arrows, so shall I be one who hits the mark.  My father had released me as one releases an arrow and I was headed for a bulls-eye.

I hadn’t really realized it before, but in my desperation for intimacy with God, and in the years that have passed without so much as a tingle of God’s presence, I have been harboring secret fears that perhaps I wouldn’t make the cut.  Perhaps I would make a good effort, and accomplish some good things, but truly reaching my potential, hitting the mark as it were, was never going to materialize in my life.  I hoped things would change, but I was pained by the absence of God’s manifest presence in my life.  I’ve seen so many others enter into this intimacy of Divine romance, but not me.  I was just alright, but not much more.

So this gave me reason for pause.  Beyond the obvious, why did I need to hear this?  Why was I singled out and given this word in front of everyone, as an announcement.  What was I to do with this?  How do I take a hold of a spiritual inheritance?

Then our class started.  Today’s subject was on how to get the most out of our time in the 24 hour prayer room.  Each day, we spend at least 4 hours in the prayer room, from 1-5.  And if you can’t connect with God there, it can be an endurance run.  Connecting with God in a serious way is part of the prayer room experience.  Sure, you can spend the time praying nice prayers in there, but you can do that anywhere.  This is more than a room with worship, it’s a place of Divine meeting.  It’s a place of encounter.  So our class was provided with many possible ways to engage God intimately.  Not gimmicks, but biblical examples of how God has called us to approach Him and enter into His presence.  This was very, very valuable for those of us who have little to no idea how to meet God in a serious way.

So, it would seem to me that God wants me to discuss my inheritance with Him in the prayer room.  There is purpose in inheritance.  There is also love.  I need both.

I want to see where this leads!

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5: Revelation and Apostolic Prayer – 1-21-2011, Friday

TODAY’S CLASS TOPIC was an introduction to the book of Revelation.  As an introduction they covered the purpose for this revelation and its relevance to the church.  Revelation gives us more insight and specific information on the end-times than any other book in scripture.  It’s purpose is to give us the necessary information that would help strengthen, encourage, and prepare God’s people, as a mature bride to prevail in victory in this glorious yet difficult time.  The church needs to be prepared in understanding, character, and power, before Jesus returns.

Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory!  For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready.  (Revelation 19:7, NIV)

We, as the Bride of Christ, are not merely along for the ride.  We are partnering, and participating in what God is doing upon the earth, even before the Lord returns for us.  I think this is what I understand the least — our participation in the end-time events that are coming.  I’ve been immersed for so long in a spiritual culture that intends to do nothing but survive until the Lord returns.  The idea of partnership, and what that entails, is wholly missing from the teaching I’ve received thus far.  I’m very excited to start learning about this here at IHOP.

In the afternoons we usually head over to the prayer room for 4 hours.  But today (Friday) we went to the Justice Prayer Room for training in apostolic prayer.

Apostolic prayers are God-centered prayers that the apostles prayed.  Jesus and the apostles, including Paul, all have prayers recorded in the New Testament.  These apostolic prayers are God’s very own prayers written in the Bible by the Holy Spirit.  There are approximately 25-30 of these prayers recorded for us in scripture, all giving us insight into the language of God’s heart.  They are prayers that began in God’s heart, and are a gift to us, providing us with insight into His strategy for His Kingdom.

The Bible promises us that prayers according to God’s will shall surely come to pass (1 Jn. 5:14-15).  So these God-authored prayers canonized in the Bible provide us with a Divinely directed opportunity to co-labor with God to see His purposes released in the earth.  Thus, when we enter into the heart of the Lord expressed in these apostolic prayers, claiming them as our own and gaining focus into God’s purposes, we are partnering in an established move of God.

If you watch the prayer room in the afternoons (usually around 4:30pm central time) you’ll see this in action.  The worship team participates in these prayers in what’s called “antiphonal team ministry,” which simply means that they will answer, or follow your prayer by repeating in song the key phrases you highlighted.  This allows everyone in the room to enter into your prayer and participate in an outward expression of partnership.

As it stands, it looks like we’ll be doing this in the Justice Prayer Room every Friday to enable us to confidently participate in the Global Prayer Room if we so choose.

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