The Florida Outpouring

After years of seemingly nothing going on, the attention of the Charismatic world has turned once again to Lakeland, Florida.  For those who remember, Lakeland had the first signs of what became the Toronto and Brownsville movements under the ministry of Rodney Howard-Browne. At that time, the church was pastored by Karl Strader and called the “Carpenter’s Home Church.” Years later, and after some drama, Karl’s son Stephen began pastoring a much smaller revival-oriented church called “Ignited Church” in a refurbished hardware building.

In Toronto and Brownsville, pastors brought in outside evangelists for short conferences which then extended indefinitely after God started doing something special.  In this instance at Lakeland, Stephen Strader brought in the intense Canadian evangelist Todd Bentley for a series of meetings at the beginning of April. For those who are not familiar with Bentley, he was a rough young drug addict who was radically saved at age 18. Not long into his journey, however, it became clear that Bentley was not the average conversion. Reaching out to whomever he could on the streets, he was soon speaking at youth meetings with mass salvations and attracting the attention of a larger constituency. Hungry for more of God, he began to pursue God in an intense season of prayer, which led to significant breakthroughs in healing and the word of knowledge. One of his mentors was Pat Coking, now known as Patricia King. After only a little time however, the power of God on Bentley’s life began to speak for itself and he was soon traveling the world in a crusade style ministry. After several years in that ministry, Bentley went through a “midnight of the soul” where God dealt more thoroughly with unresolved issues from his very difficult childhood. This was a very hard time for Bentley who had to withdraw from ministry, release staff and face some very challenging issues. He even had a heart attack during a crusade in Africa.  Only recently, perhaps in the past year, has he emerged into a new season. Regardless of what one thinks of Bentley’s ministry style or the events in Lakeland, at a fundamental level Bentley should be an inspiration to all Pentecostal Christians because his life demonstrates that not only can God save a man radically, but he empower him for incredible supernatural works of service in a short time. Bentley’s heroes include both Paul Cain and Jack Coe, both of whom he is reminiscent of. Cain because of the power demonstrated in his youth and pursuit for more of God, and Coe because of his relentless, driven, and aggressive ministry style.

Even without being present, it is easy to say that God has been doing something at the first set of meetings in Lakeland. Let’s consider the circumstantial evidence:

1. Bentley himself: An evangelist like Bentley has a very full schedule which he would not break unless there is good reason. Moreover, he is accustomed to the miraculous in his meetings and something significant would have to be happening in order to warrant a schedule change.
2. The pastor and the people. Unless you are in a cult, you cannot get people to keep coming to meetings after about the third day unless God is doing something special. Secondly, given that the Charismatic movement is given to hype, you need more than hype to create an international sensation. God has to do something.
3. Resistance from the devil. I find it no coincidence that just days before the revival, the eyes of the nation were turned toward Lakeland because of a demonically inspired savage beating of a young runaway. Moreover, Hank Hannegraff tends to only make effort to criticize a revival if God is actually doing something

The personal evidence:

1. Watching people testify in the meetings, it is clear that most of these people are normal sincere people who are getting touched by God.
2. I’ve had several friends who have attended the meetings. One who was at Brownsville said of the first Lakeland meetings, “The presence of God is definitely very strong, possibly even more than what we experienced in Pensacola.” Another urged me to go and described them as very powerful. Another sister, younger in the Lord, and never having been in a powerful meeting, came back and said she had never felt the presence of God so strongly.

So I clearly believe God is doing something in Lakeland. I think questions arise when we discuss the specific ministry style in the meetings, and the larger phenomenon of “revival” among Charismatics. Another friend of mine was recently at the meetings and said that while he also felt the presence of God in a strong way, he was glad he had not taken his unbelieving family members because of the style. In Toronto and Brownsville the issue was drawing undue attention to “manifestations.” In Lakeland, I haven’t seen that personally. The concern I have in Lakeland is that the search for a miracle may have taken precedence over the desire to help individuals.

Front and center is the typical problem of expecting people to fall out every time they are prayed for. Now, let me say that people do get slain in the Spirit, and I’ve seen some clearly get hit by God in the Lakeland meetings I’ve been watching.  But my experience tells me that even in a powerful prayer line not everyone falls out. Sometimes the Lord will knock over almost an entire congregation, but that’s fairly rare too. I think a lot of what we see today is a mixture of “courtesy drops” and people getting nudged or outright pushed, because somehow this validates to everyone that God is really doing something great. In reality, anytime we inflate what God is doing, it ultimately has the opposite effect. Skeptics feel confirmed, people who want to believe feel that they have to examine to see when God really did move, and the unquestioning end up believing that things which are not really God moving actually are.

This, and other nuances, like saying “Bam”, cutting people short who clearly need more help, and telling the crowd to do prophetic gestures, I think encourage the wrong atmosphere among the people. So do I think God is doing something in Lakeland? Absolutely. Is it the revival that I desperately want to be a part of? No. But you know what, it could be the first link in chain, like it was the first time around. In both Toronto and Brownsville, people took the initial flavor of the revival and brought it into their own contexts. The original Lakeland revival was very different than Toronto, which was very different than Brownsville, even though they were all from the same fountain at Karl Strader’s church. And as for Todd Bentley in the new Lakeland setting, even given my stylistic considerations, I still think he’s a great man of God who should be commended for going after God in a way that most people only talk about (and getting a hold of Him). I do not put him at all in the same category with men who just want fame, money, and hype. Perhaps it is just that sometimes he wants a miracle too bad.

How to Preach in the Spirit

Definition of Preaching

When you go into a church for the first time, you can never be sure what is going to be offered from behind the pulpit as “the sermon.” There is quite a wide spectrum of what is considered appropriate, depending on the speaker and the context. Often times what it called “preaching” is not really preaching at all. Here are seven different kinds of message you may hear in church:

1. Moralizing – If the speaker is not born again you will get moralizing. Two major messages are “we should be nice to one another” and “God works in mysterious ways”
2. Esoteric Teaching – A speaker with a lot of education or who thinks too highly of himself may talk primarily about Greek, Hebrew Bible Background, or something else very impractical to make an otherwise simple point.
3. Informational Teaching — This is teaching without a lot of specific application, but which really educates the listener. Great study or insight lies behind this message designed to inform the audience.
4. Practical Teaching — Someone with a gift to understand and open the Scripture may share with you practical insight for living.
5. Condemning Preaching – Some speakers, usually itinerants rather than pastors, think that the harder they are on you, the better it is for you, and that they are being bold for being so hard on you. They will push you down and exalt themselves, sometimes with great talent and zeal.
6. Evangelistic Preaching — Someone with an evangelistic gift will always be able to tie the message back to “come to Jesus”
7. Exhortatory Preaching — This is preaching designed to get you motivated to make some kind of decision in your life, or to inspire you about something.

So in some churches, you never hear real “preaching.” What is called preaching is actually some kind of teaching. The ultimate purpose of preaching is not to inform, it is to persuade. If you are not persuading, you are not really preaching. If teaching is what you do on Sunday morning, that’s fine, but do not call it preaching.

Constructing a Message

This leads us into the construction of the sermon. There are various theories. People talk about a “3-point” sermon. Sometimes you will see up to 7 points. Sometimes they are even alliterated. I believe in the “one point” message. Because preaching is persuasion, all points in the sermon should lead up to one main decision point. People will not remember a bullet list of activities, no matter how good it is. Move them to the willingness to change, and then work with them at the altar or in follow-up. This is not to say a good sermon can not be complex, it can, but it has to have one main point that all of the others build up to or support.

Secondly with regard to construction, there are some who believe that all sermons must be “expository.” This word is filled with different meanings by different people, but usually it means that one must work with a single passage, and that the sermon must follow and teach the content of that specific passage. While good sermons can be preached in this way, there are many problems with limiting all preaching to this mode. First, it misunderstands how the Bible is written. The entire Bible is woven together like a tapestry with each text echoing or foreshadowing other texts, so it is mistaken to believe that a single passage must stand alone. In fact, what we see the apostles doing in the New Testament is what we as preachers should do — weave together relevant Scriptures on a topic to meet an occasion. Therefore, I believe the primary mode of teaching should be what expository preaching gurus eschew as “topical” sermons.

That the sermon should match the occasion seems obvious, but in fact, this too is a major departure from much stock wisdom. Some denominations preach from the “lectionary” which tells you which passage to preach from each week. If one were to do expository sermons from the lectionary, then any given week you would know exactly what the sermon would be! Preaching is for the benefit of human beings, not the other way around. The great preacher accurately discerns the situation that he or she is walking into and construct the appropriate message. What is God doing in the congregation at that time? We should speak to the context that we operate in. If you are not the regular preacher, then ask yourself, “What can I uniquely contribute?” How can you supplement the work of the primary preacher in a way that is complementary and not undermining.

Preparing the Message

Once our orientation toward giving a message is correct, we can turn to the process of developing a message. The first and foremost principle of all great preaching is the maxim that “the man is the message.” Do not preach out of your head, preach out of your convictions. Preach out of your identity. If you preach from the head it will inform, but if you preach from your heart it will transform.

Once you have identified the context you are walking into, what you can contribute, and what the people need to hear, you should have some broad area for your message. This broad area should intersect with what God is doing or has done in your own life. As you begin to weigh various topics before the Lord, one will tend to stir your heart more than others. Now do exactly the opposite of what preaching books tell you to do. Find the Scriptural support for your message. This can be a story which demonstrates the principle, or it can be series of Scriptures which build various aspects of the message. My preference is a combination of Scriptural principle, Scriptural example, Personal example, and Historical Example. This marshals every kind of evidence to prove the point you are making. In general this preparation process should be done “before the Lord” and as you study and research, you should be ready to have your message modified by what you are both learning and hearing.

Once you have the message, you need to go to focused prayer. This is not the kind of prayer where you ask God to bless the message, etc. This is the kind of prayer designed to get His heart into your heart. It is designed to fill you with passion and the power of the Holy Spirit. Allow the Lord to bounce parts of the message around in your heart as you seek His face for the people you will be speaking to. When you walk out into their midst, you should come loaded with God. In this way your natural preparation meets your spiritual preparation.

Delivering the Message

The goal of the preparation process is not to develop a word for word text for you to read. If you do read it, you will not be able to flow with the Spirit, if you do not read it, you will get lost in the text. Instead, you should prepare a outline. The outline should lay out a map of how each of the points flows and ultimately supports the main point.

Having the Spirit move in your preaching is all about speaking from the heart and being yielded to God. This very simple principle defines the process: Your audience will be conscious of whatever you are conscious of.   If you are concious of yourself then they will also be conscious of you.  If you are conscious of them, they will be aware of themselves.  However, if you are conscious of God, they will be conscious of God.   The goal then is to move through the sermon being conscious of God and of God’s love toward them, not conscious of how you look or how your presentation is going.    You have to speak from the heart and from reality.   Do not hide your personality while you present, express it.   The more real you are, the more anointed you will be.

As you begin to speak from your heart to the people from what you have prepared, the Lord will carry you along through the message, and you will most likely find that at some point, the Spirit will come and grip your heart with passion.  Move into this and give full expression to the Spirit.  This may be in tears, increased volume, or decreased volume but you have to have the courage to express what the Spirit is doing in your heart as you preach.   As you do this, His power will move out among the people.   Preparation and delivery intersect in power.

An outline helps you be real while moving to the ultimate point.  Each point is there as a kind of way marker.  As you speak from the heart, you reach points of transition, and the outline will help you make the transitions without getting lost.   Each point is something that you share from your identity and preparation, and it may take on some different forms as you present it.

Closing the Message

You have to close the message with and opportunity to respond.  Starting and ending are probably the hardest parts of the message.  When you begin, it can be difficult to find the place to latch on to, which allows all of your preparation to flow out of your heart.   There are crafty ways of priming the pump, but the simple way is to explain the context.  Why are you going to give the message that you are going to give?   That will lead you into the message easily.

On the closing end, it’s easy to ramble on once you have tapped the well, so in preparation work on how what you are saying leads to a specific point of decision, and then have the faith to go with it when you reach it.   Call the people to respond while the iron is still hot, not after you have shared a bunch of additional principles.  I remember one evangelistic meeting I was in, where he really got the Spirit, but the altar call took at least 15 minutes, by which point people were more antsy than anything else.

The Jesus Movement and The Vineyard

A little understood but very important chapter in American Church history is the Jesus Movement. Just as the hippie movement, which the devil staged to undermine American culture was peaking, God started a surprise — he swept tens of thousands of hippies into the Kingdom of God. A young hippie named Lonnie Frisbee was crying out to God in the desert looking for reality, and God showed up. Although God used many people in many ways during the Jesus People, Lonnie was the Pentecostal spark. He was relentlessly evangelistic, transparent and disarming, and very anointed. He’s been written out of history because it later became clear that he struggled with homosexuality. It’s funny how we write the embarrassing out of our history.

At the same time Pentecostal pastor Chuck Smith and his wife had been praying to reach out to the hippies, and Lonnie showed up. A powerful combination of Pastor/Teacher and Prophet/Evangelist was born, and so was the movement. The Calvary Chapel that Chuck pastored exploded rapidly, not just as a church, but soon as an entire church movement. Once the church had grown, however, Smith no longer wanted the moving of gifts of the Holy Spirit in the meetings, and limited it to what they called an “afterglow.” Among other things, this led Frisbee to separate from Smith and see other pastures.

In time, the direction that Smith had taken the Calvary Chapel caused others to be restive as well. Kenn Gulliksen and John Wimber became leaders of small group of churches that wanted more of the Spirit. Eventually, they invited Lonnie Frisbee back from the wilderness he had been in, to work with them. On Mother’s Day 1980, after Frisbee’s talk, he called upon the Holy Spirit to come into the meeting, as he had done in the early days of the Jesus People, before He was put in the “afterglow” meeting. The result was a dramatic outpouring of the Spirit on the youth. This caused consternation among some of the elders, and when Frisbee confronted them, the Spirit hit in a powerful way there too. Frisbee was eventually sidelined due to his struggles with sin, but a wide door had been opened for the Spirit to move in this young group of churches, with Wimber at the forefront.

The Vineyard was an offense to the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement of that day. It rejected the Shepherding doctrine, the Initial evidence doctrine, the prosperity doctrine, and like it’s Jesus People roots, de-emphasized outward holiness. For many Pentecostal/Charismatics it created an offense — God was pouring out his Spirit among a group of people that rejected their distinctive doctrines. For evangelicals, however, the Vineyard was the perfect doorway. A Bible oriented former seminary instructor from a Bible oriented movement was opening up the Spirit that without the other baggage that makes evangelicals cringe.

Around 1989, the Vineyard became aligned with the “Kansas City Prophets,” leading to a dynamic combination that shook the world. Now, inside of the Spirit-filled, yet evangelical vehicle, was a group of extremely gifted prophetic ministers. Not since the 1950’s and William Branham had prophecy had such a major voice and impact on the future of the church. One Anglican Minister named David Pytches was so impacted that he wrote a book called “Some Said it Thundered.” Cessationist seminary professor Jack Deere was swept into the movement and wrote the incredibly powerful “Surprised by the Power of the Spirit” when he met Wimber, and “Surprised by the Voice of God” when he met Paul Cain. At the same time, the old Pentecostal order was crumbling. The Shepherding Movement had been discredited, and the prosperity doctrine had taken a major hit with the fall of Jim Bakker. The eyes of the Charismatic world were on the Vineyard.

Ultimately, Wimber and the Vineyard distanced themselves from the Prophets. The seeds had been sown however for a new expression. God began to pour His Spirit out at the The Toronto Vineyard. The Toronto group was ultimately also disfellowshipped by Wimber as well for the excessive “dog barking” behavior. While I believe Wimber had just cause for both of these splits, the net result was that Apostolic gift of Wimber and the prophetic power were separated, and both suffered. Toronto became increasingly chaotic, and the Vineyard became generally more conservative toward the gifts.

The Toronto Movement was in many ways the culmination of the Jesus Movement of 25 years earlier. Toronto, led to Brownsville, which became a major force for renewal of Pentecostals worldwide, reshaping especially the Assemblies of God but others as well.

When we look back at all of this history, it raised many difficult questions, which ultimately lead many to conclude that none of it was from God. Instead of understanding that the “wheat grows up with the tares” some are quick to label everything Charismatic as not of God because of the problematic aspects. I believe these problematic aspects crop up precisely because we attempt to move more deeply in touch with God. A healthy functioning of the gifts of the Holy Spirit in and out of the church is very damaging to Satan’s Kingdom, so he must either convince us that we can’t move in them, or he must pollute our use of them so that it is not healthy. I for one will never be deterred by the errors and excesses of others from pursuing the real and deep touch of the Holy Spirit which we all need to live. If anything the stories like Frisbee, Toronto, and Paul Cain, show that God can use anyone who is willing.

A Charismatic View of Evangelical History

It’s very difficult for most of us to understand the church context we exist in because we live in a time where boundaries have been blurred. However, our past tells us a lot about who we are and should be, so it’s important that we understand it. This is made more difficult by the fact that, if they do understand it, few Charismatics want to talk about the history that made them who they are because of some excesses that have cropped up. So you have to go on a treasure hunt. After nearly a decade of fellowshipping between various branches of evangelicalism and reviewing our history, I feel like I understand the various pieces which weave into the fabric of the Charismatic movement.

There are many ways to tell the Charismatic story, which could include the Full Gospel Businessmen, the Jesus Movement, The Vineyard, and others, but at the 10,000 foot level what were the seminal moments and movements that make us who we are and distinct from others? Below I’ve drawn a picture.

The first thing to see here is that Pentecostalism and Fundamentalism were once part of the same large evangelical holiness movement, which around the turn of the century was fairly united under the leadership of D.L Moody and his disciple R.A. Torrey. When Azusa Street hit, all of that changed, however. The movement was broken into two parts: those who embraced the tongues and those who didn’t. Those who did not were the original “Fundamentalists.” They fought hard against the liberals for the inerrancy of Scripture and other cardinal doctrines of the faith. They were mostly dispensationalists.

By the 1940’s many within the Fundamentalist movement were dissatisfied with with the spirit of Fundamentalism. It had some very separatist, anti-intellectual, and edgy components. When Billy Graham came along after WWII, a new moment began, and under the leadership of men like H.J. Ockenga, a new brand was born: Evangelicalism. This was to become just the opposite — inclusive, intellectual, and softer. The Evangelicals became the mainstream and launched a host of ministries, seminaries, and ultimately a new moment in America.

At the same time, on the other side of the railroad tracks, the tongue speakers were launching a worldwide movement, so that 100 years later, there are hundreds of millions all over the world. Azusa street was a deep and powerful revival that shook the Earth — some say literally — the great San Francisco earthquake began just days later. Pentecostalism did not keep the fire indefinitely, however, and by the 30’s people were beginning to wonder where the original power had gone.

God answered this question in dramatic fashion through the ministry of William Branham. A man with an incredible Bible-style prophetic gift, he stirred up what ultimately became the Healing Revival of the 50’s and the Latter Rain. It was the Latter Rain which was to distinguish Charismatics from Pentecostals, however. It brought new emphases: a victorious eschatology, laying on of hands for impartation, five-fold ecclesiology, and most of all personal prophecy. The Pentecostals, especially the Assemblies of God, rejected this new move and to this day these idea separate Pentecostals and Charismatics.

Some extreme doctrines began to dominate the Latter Rain, however, and this gave the impetus for a number of cultish movements, which gave the movement such a bad name, that few dare associate with it by name. One stream of the Latter Rain went on to form a second movement known as the “Shepherding Movement.” Responding to the needs presented by the vast numbers of hippies getting saved in the Jesus Movement, 5 leading ministers began teaching on principles of authority. This eventually led to some major abuses, and more cultish groups. Although there was great error and destruction mixed into the movement, I believe God did have an original purpose in it, and it was not just a demonic scheme. What strained out formed the basis of most modern “apostolic” groups.

Part XIII – A Tree and a Tower

In the devil’s first attempt to set up his kingdom on earth, what does he build? A tower. A tower in Babylon (Babel). Now, in modern parlance, a tower is usually thought of as a vertical structure like the Sears Tower, but the ancients did not possess the technology to build tower’s of this kind very high, so if they wanted to build a something tall, they built what we would today call a pyramid. It is not surprise then, that in Egypt, the type of evil in the Old Testament, and of power in the ancient world, they would build massive pyramids. Most likely they were continuing the pattern passed down from their ancestors in the Babel experience. It is no surprise then too that we find this pyramid imagery associated with various demonically inspired groups.

Looking at this “tower” what can we learn about the structure of the devil’s Kingdom? Ever heard the term “pyramid scheme”? In a pyramid scheme, the people at the top benefit from the people at the bottom, in successive layers of financial gain and deception. Such systems are really not businesses, they are wealth transfer systems, where the people at the top take money from the people at the bottom, and the people in the middle get a cut for making it happen. What is remarkable is that every demonic system works just like this. There is only one stone atop the great pyramid (at least originally), yet the base covers 13 acres! As a system, then many many people can be controlled and exploited by a single individual, ultimately, spiritually, the devil. Thus the devil is always trying to set up systems like this.

What do we find God’s Kingdom compared to by Contrast? A close look at Mark 4:30-32 shows that Jesus is not just comparing the Kingdom of God to a mustard seed, but also to the tree or bush that grows from it. In fact throughout the Bible trees, and tree-like images are used when discussing the Kingdom of God. In the beginning, the Tree of Life is the centerpiece of the garden of Eden, and in the end the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations (Rev 22:2). Jesus uses the fig tree as an image in explaining God’s dealings with Israel. In Romans 11, Paul’s extensive discussion of Israel and the church is all based around the metaphor of an olive tree. I believe, then that the tree is the structural foil to the pyramid.

Looking at the elm pictured above it is interesting how a tree is basically the opposite of the pyramid. A massive trunk supports a multitude of small branches and leaves. At the top it is wider than it is at the bottom. In a pyramid, the rulership is expressed from the top down, with each higher stone having only contact with the stones immediately above it, so that only those at the very top have any contact with the capstone. In a tree, however, all are connected. They are connected through the life that is in the tree. This is the spirit of Jesus saying “I am the vine, you are the branches,” (John 15:5). We are all in him, and connected to him, therefore it is possible to organize in a way that is impossible for the dead and dying world. The lifeless stones can only be top down, but because of the life in the tree, it is possible to be all be in agreement and fellowship because of the life (Jesus) in the tree.

Instead of stacked stones, there are dependent branches. A large branch, has many smaller branches which depend on it, and the smaller branches have leaves. Those that are strong support those that are weak, and all are in fellowship, not through fear but through mutual love.