Fresh news from the Front.

Good Day!

Allow me to press ‘pause’ in John for a moment and share a few things, as I take you with me on a journey I was just able to make.  In a real sense, the journey began in the Spring of 2000, when the book fresh wind, fresh fire was recommended to me to ‘jumpstart my prayer life.’  I read it, and yes, it did just that! 

You see, the author, Pastor Jim Cymbala was and is “real, raw, and relevant.”^* In his first book, FW,FF, he simply tells the stories of transformation he and his struggling band of believers witness as they come to the end of themselves and cry out to God to come and do what only he can do.  God loves that entry point.

Why did the stories of answered prayer mean so much to me personally?  Cymbala’s stories of desperate prayer to a faithful God armed me to fight the battle of my lifetime when my two-year-old was at death’s door and languishing 12 years ago.  I have continued to equip myself, as a believer and minister, by studying Cymbala’s subsequent books, which continue to teach the same basic thing:

         We serve a great, big God, and we are meant to know him

         and walk with him by being people in the Word and people

         of prayer.

Friends, make a note to yourself right here: Christians need to learn more and more all the time, and ought be equipping ourselves with good and godly reading, and of course, the Word of God every day!

Last year, I got to make the 2800-mile trip from California to Brooklyn for a pastors’ conference rightly titled, “Be Encouraged,” which for me, was one of the greatest thrills of my lifetime!  As I write, this year’s conference is over, but I am looking out my hotel window at Brooklyn, (where the Nets’ new center looms large), wanting to share a fresh word with believing readers from Alabama to Zambia. 

Leaders came from all over the world to partake of the Brooklyn Tabernacle experience, which includes unequalled music and worship, in an ethnically-diverse fellowship.  The choir … oh, the choir … two hundred voices strong, ensconced on the stage beneath a large sign that says “God is Love.”  It must surely be a taste of the music of Heaven!

Love is palpable when you are around the B Tabernacle.  People love God, love one another, love those who come through their doors, and love serving those in and around the New York area.  The preponderance of love is reason alone to go to the church.  It is like nothing I have ever experienced in a familiar or unfamiliar church, particularly in a large urban setting.

Besides loving people well, the other major distinctive of B Tabernacle is a commitment to corporate prayer.   As Cymbala stated on Sunday, ‘the most powerful person in the world is the person who prays because he becomes linked with an almighty God.’  Perhaps you are like me, and your prayer life is sometimes less than vital, may I simply remind you (and myself), that if you take time to pray, you align and link yourself with the all-powerful God of the Universe!  Start your day seeking God, spending time with him, asking for his grace and wisdom.

Amen.

Simply do it .... pray!

*– as per my Crip friend from Long Beach, who told me when I spoke, ‘Paasta, you gotta keep it real, raw and relevant.’