It's been a week!

It's pretty much been a 12 hour day of being in the presence of the Lord. I got home after the Encounter God Service (EGS) and decided I wanted to paint. That is what you see to your right. Once it dries, I am going to paint scripture over it. I have one of three passages to use. Haven't decided which one yet.

This mornings' teaching was on fundraising. The teacher was a YWAMer (as well as an IHOPer...which when I was both, got dubbed a YWHOPer), and actually kept mentioning all these people that led my school, or taught different sessions. So, that was neat. His teaching also shattered a lot of our skewed ideas about how important it is for us to be at Ihop, doing what we are doing. We are positioning our hearts before God, to be cleansed, and to share the redemptive and awesome power of God out of that. And on top of that, learning hard-core Truths about the Word. Things that are so plain, but in the world, we tend to miss. Ihop's message is of the intimacy with Jesus, and the end-times, so we are all having radical shifts in our thinking. It's great. I have learned over the past couple of years to really embrace, and enjoy, when God shows me that my thinking is wrong about something. Of course, I do grumble sometimes...a lot of times, but I 'get it' when I come out renewed on the other end.

We spent five hours in the prayer room after that. Which, of course, was really intense...again. This was something they were singing, and it was sooo beautiful. I have heard it several times in the past week, but it just affected me in a new way today:

Creator God, He is Yahweh
The Great I Am, He is Yahweh
The Lord of all, He is Yahweh
The Rose of Sharon, He is Yahweh
The Righteous Son, He is Yahweh
The Three-in-one, He is Yahweh

Yahweh

Another one that affected me in worship this morning was:

Let your glory shine
For all to see your light
You are the Lord God Gracious
This is who you are
The Bright and Morning Star
The Spirit and the Bride say come Lord Jesus, Come!

The EGS service tonight was on the first commandment...to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind (Mt 23:37)
There are 2 EGS services a week. Friday night, which the focus is on intimacy with Jesus, and on Saturdays, the focus being end-times. I was soooooo excited, because Dana Candler was speaking. I am reading one of her books right now called Deep Unto Deep. I have been reading it for about 6 weeks now, and am in chapter 3. It has radically transformed me, and it takes me DAYS to soak in one page. Sometimes, just one thought.

Her teaching was on "Living Wholehearted Starts Now," and I just want to say..."It rocked." :) She talked about how God asks us for everything. Wholehearted love is always fully, never in fractions. And how God has the right to define love, because He IS Love. We were created to abandon ourselves unto Him, and will never be satisfied if we don't. But we have to start now. Because we will use the same muscles tomorrow that we use today. So, if we don't just DO something now, we won't tomorrow. He wants to invade our space now, because He is after love in every season. And we abandon, and grow in love in the commonplace and everyday circumstances. Jesus, became lowly to be with us...and though He never 'considered equality with God something to be grasped,' He took time to do the ordinary. Dana said that "Jesus knew human experience. He knew monotony. In all ways He is our brother. Jesus didn't say every day tasks were unfitting or too insignificant." It's true.

I think that might be why I decided to paint today. Because I keep saying I will, but never do. I am glad I did.

Tomorrow is our day of consecration in the prayer room. Five hours we will devote to giving God the next 12 weeks to do what He has called us here to do. I am excited. And then starting Tuesday, our real classes will begin.