This Week's Teaching | Prayers

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Scripture tells us not to quench the Holy Spirit's fire. That can apply to spiritual fervor or zeal, like being "on fire!" But most of us aren't trying to extinguish our enthusiasm about God. If anything we wish we had more, not less. So it doesn't make sense that Paul would warn us not to quench our enthusiasm about God.

There's another way to hear this that makes more sense. Rather than being "on fire for God," we can think of being "in the fire of God." Jesus said that the Holy Spirit would bring conviction about sin and righteousness and judgment. The Spirit's conviction is like a consuming fire, burning away what doesn't belong. The flames can be fanned through hardship, or prophecy, or even just an inner witness. It's tempting to put out the fire of conviction by downplaying it or resisting it. But when we learn to live in the fire, we experience the fullness of God in our lives!

Devote the next half hour to considering whether you are quenching the Spirit. Watch the teaching above with your bible in hand. Then ask God, "Show me any areas in my life where I am quenching your Spirit." And if he shows you anything, stay in the fire until you have been consumed by him.

Scriptures references in this week's teaching:

• 1 Thessalonians 5.19
• Exodus 24.17
• Deuteronomy 4.24
• Hebrews 12.29
• Luke 3.15-17
• John 16.7-11
• 1 Thessalonians 1.5-6
• Ephesians 4.30-5.20

• X242 Network. Keep praying for our X242 network of microchurches. Pray for our microchurch hosts and leaders. Pray for new church plants and for the people who desperately need to be connected to God through this simpler way of being church. Specifically ask God for miracles of healing and rebirth. 
• Health & Provision. Pray for those among us who are sick and in need. May it be said of us that "there were no needy persons among them."
• "Sam," Himalayas. Thank you for praying for "Sam" last week. He tells me that God is answering our prayers for protection from those who were actively targeting them for persecution. The threat is always there. So please continue to pray for safety and courage and provision in his travels to explain the gospel to an illiterate and impoverished people.
• Israel microchurches. Keep praying for the network of microchurches in Israel, that doors are opened for the gospel to be heard and received. Pray for the witness of peace and unity among Israeli and Palestinian followers of Jesus.

Thank you to those who support X242 financially. It helps us to help others. 

This Week's Teaching | Four Things to Pray For

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Where are those with the gift of healing?

​I've had wonderful conversations with people who believe it's always God's will to heal. I also hear that some believers believe God never heals, but I've never had a serious conversation with anyone who holds that view. For me personally, where I land is that God can heal and does heal, but that he doesn't always heal — unless, of course, you include getting our resurrection bodies as an ultimate healing.

I totally believe the resurrection is our ultimate healing. But honestly, in conversations about whether God heals, the "ultimate healing" answer usually feels like the wild card that we play as a last resort. But maybe that's okay. In fact, if we allow "ultimate healing" as a possibility, we can plead with one voice, asking and believing for God's best in every situation. 

But for those of us who lean skeptical, it's good to be reminded that "ultimate healing" is not the only healing. Not only did Jesus heal blind people and deaf people and lame people and dead people, one time he also healed Peter's mother-in-law of a fever. God cares and desires for us to be healthy. That should be a core belief, ahead of debates about when and how he heals, and whether he allows suffering.  

I believe God still heals these temporal bodies, even ahead of our ultimate healing. Part of that is just what he does every day.

We tend to forget about this ongoing miracle of creation, where he has designed these bodies to heal themselves! Amen and Hallelujah. We should thank God everyday for that.

But technically, it's not a miracle, if "miracle" means something that doesn't happen naturally. Healing is just something that our bodies do naturally for almost our entire lives. It's just natural.

But then one day they don't heal.

And that's when we cry out for God's supernatural intervention. That's when we gather people for prayer. That's when we lay on hands. That's when we ask him to do what the natural isn't doing. And that's what I believe God still does.

Sometimes he heals supernaturally through our collective prayers. We are all called to this. But I also believe he has gifted some people with a spiritual gift of healing. 

But to our shame, we usually put such healers in cages or on stages. We either tell them to settle down and be normal (put them in cages). Or we make celebrities of them (put them on stages). Both should be ugly to us.

In my spirit, I believe God is calling for a new sending out of normal people with the spiritual gift of supernatural healing. And I believe the Holy Spirit is especially crying out for those who need no hyped up special event. What if the gift of healing looked more like a social visit than a concert? I've heard many stories where healing like that happens. I know some of us are having such conversations when we gather. It's good to tell the stories.

I believe God is calling for this in our times, and churches like ours that have stepped off the stage are especially situated to receive this expression of God's love. And that's what I'm asking for in this week's teaching.

As you watch this week's teaching above, open your bibles so you can follow along:

• Romans 12:3-9
• 1 Corinthians 12:4-31, and 14:1

• Pray for "Sam," the pastor we helped buy winter coats to give out to poor children in the Himalayas. He is being targeted with a severe threat of persecution. Where he lives that can include sanctioned violence as well as imprisonment and fines. Pray for an angelic host to surround him and all those he ministers to. Pray for safety and courage in his travels. And pray for his enemies who are persecuting them, that they would put their faith in Jesus.
• Pray for a minister in Israel who has a small network of microchurches, and is relating to our network. Pray that doors are opened for the gospel to be heard and received. Pray that it would be said in Israel what was said in the early days of the church, that "many of the priests became obedient to the faith" and "many were added to their number." 
• Pray for our own X242 network of microchurches, that the gospel would grow in our midst, and that we would be ready to respond to the call to plant new churches. Pray for me (please) as I am in active discernment about how best to encourage and support the planting and nurturing of microchurches wherever there is interest.
• Pray for those among us who are sick and in need. May it be said of us that "there were no needy persons among them."

​Amen!

This Week's Teaching | SRQ Meetup | Compassion | Call to Prayer

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Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? How you answer that question depends on what you were taught, or not taught. There's a lot of confusion about it. And there's a lot of division around our opinions.

I love that our network includes people from different teachings and customs. Some of us have had charismatic experiences and answer the question from that perspective. Others of us have been taught a more theological response to the question and give that answer. I think the conversation is most rich when we slow down and listen, without arguing about who has the right answer, or who has the Holy Spirit.

Recently the church that meets at my house was studying in Acts and we had such a conversation. I found it moving. It was a safe place, but I always feel the tension that most people experience with it. We've all felt judged by others and others have felt judged by us. But when we slow down and listen to each other's stories — I'm talking about the stories of those who have experienced the transforming work of the Holy Spirit in their life — when we listen to each other's stories we find a common theme: Surrender. And we celebrate a common witness that is greater than sign gifts or theological statements. We see how the Holy Spirit is actively transforming us through the daily decisions to live what think of as a surrendered, holy, spiritual life.

When that is true in your life, you can answer the question with humility and confidence: Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? Yes, today I am living a surrendered, holy, spiritual life in the name of Jesus.

That's what this week's teaching is about. And here's the scriptures so you can follow along in your Bible as watch above.

• ​Acts 19:1-7
• 1 Corinthians 12:29-31

Because of your generosity, we've recently been able to help a single mom with rent, and are helping an elderly couple with necessary repairs to make their mobile home inhabitable again after Hurricane Ian. We also have an Amazon wish list for a family who lost everything. Since it lists their names, I don't want to link it here publicly. Please email me if you'd like to help personally and I'll send it to you.

Father, we pray for those among us who are sick, and for those who have sick loved ones. Hear our prayers. Heal their bodies. Have mercy. Speak the word of healing over them.

Lord, we pray for those among us who are struggling to fully trust you. Show yourself to them as we open up the scriptures, and share life together. Show yourself to be good, loving, and powerful. May the name of Jesus be highly honored among us, and take its rightful place in their hearts as they are baptized into the Way.

Lord, fill us each with your Holy Spirit. Renew our devotion to you. Renew our resolve. As we lay down our lives in joyful surrender to you each day, may we be renewed in every way. Make us holy, renew us spiritually. Yes Lord, may we live surrendered, holy, spiritual lives in the name of Jesus.

Father, remember those who are still trying to put their lives back together after losing so much in the recent hurricanes. Answer their prayers. And lead us to those we can help in tangible ways.

We pray peace for the cities in which we live. And we lift up our brothers and sisters throughout the world who risk everything to follow you, and especially those who risk all to explain the gospel under great threat.

Lord Jesus, come quickly.

Amen.

This Week's Teaching | SRQ Meetup | Call to Prayer  

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If we follow the world's ways, we will hate our enemies. We'll fight against them, pay them back wrong for wrong, and cheer when they get what they deserve. And it will feel sensible, like the right thing to do. To be sure, Christians are on the side of justice. God will repay everyone according to their choices, and we will rejoice that his judgments are always right. But those who follow the way of Jesus learn to do something so radical it's almost unimaginable. In this week's teaching we attempt to imagine it. We look at Stephen's final words as he's being martyred. He prayed, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." What if you prayed that for your enemies, and God answered it?

As you watch/listen above, follow the scriptures below in your Bible.

• ​Acts 7:58-60
• Luke 23:34
• Luke 6:28-36
• Romans 12:14-21

• As the U.S. feels the political divisions this election week, pray that God's "kingdom would come and his will would be done on earth as it is in heaven." Pray that we would be known by our love for the Lord, for each other, and for our neighbors. Pray that our conversations would be filled with grace, seasoned with salt, ready to give an answer for the hope we have in these last days.
• Pray for the global Church, and especially those who are suffering persecution. Pray for those risking their lives to explain the gospel to those who haven't heard yet. Pray that they would proclaim it fearlessly and effectively. Pray that many would come to faith.
• Please keep praying for those in our network who are discerning their first steps in planting a microchurch. Pray that their conversations would be fruitful, and that we would know how to encourage and strengthen them.

Amen!