Dare to Believe Blog
The Outpouring From 24/7 Prayer
Have you read the book “The Grace Outpouring” by Roy Godwin? If not, I highly recommend it. I am so inspired by this story told about a Welsh retreat center where God’s presence has been pouring out for years. It has me wondering if this could happen here.
I am inspired by their commitment to host the presence of the Lord. They emphasize prayer and worship as key to the unique and special grace the Lord gives them. It is a simple testimony of people who love Jesus, are faithful to worship, pray and love others. What has resulted is a beautiful outpouring of God’s presence and healing. In a little place no one knew about.
Today’s world is a very different place than it was even a few short years ago. God is moving in unique ways through unique people. As I network with Christian leaders around our region, I hear the same testimony.
Each person’s story with the Lord is distinctive, but He is making foundational changes in churches, familie...
Learning to Hear God’s Voice Through Dreams
I have been having some very interesting dreams lately. How about you?
Some of my dreams are very strange and seem to go on and on. There is a lot of chaos in my dreams right now, but it makes sense because there is a lot of chaos in the world, too.
Shortly after Gary and I were married, I started realizing that my dreams meant something more than I had been taught.
Both of us grew up in the Christian church and dreamt a lot. Yet our churches taught that while dreams were a Biblical experience, they were no longer sent from God.
Two dreams in particular got my attention.
The first was a similar recurring dream that both Gary and I were having. In these dreams, we were each living in a big mansion.
Because these were recurring dreams, Gary and I would discuss them with each other. We actually began a playful competition to see whose dream mansion was bigger and better. Both of us thought maybe these would be the mansions we would live in when we arrived in heaven.
One day we co...
Clearing the Air: Making Way for God’s Presence
When Gary and I arrived in California last week, the sky was smoky and smelled like a campfire.
Prior to our arrival, we tracked the air quality numbers. The Redding air quality was rated “very unhealthy,” but showed an expected improvement to “unhealthy for sensitive groups,” so we chose to make the trip.
The usual views were obscured, the surrounding mountains hiding in the haze. On the third morning, a gentle breeze greeted us from the north. The smoke began to clear, and we began to see outlines of the mountains. By the next day, as the breeze continued, the mountains came into full view and the air quality was upgraded to “good.”
This “air quality” experience seems to reflect the spiritual state of our world in this season.
As the physical forest fires in California have clouded our vision in the natural, so the destruction, fear, illness, hate and confusion have clouded our ability to see spiritually. The smoke of hopelessness, fear, hate and division are a haze around us. Th...
Rebellion vs. Partnering with God
I had the privilege of learning from John Paul Jackson, founder of Streams Ministries International. The first time I went through one of his classes, he taught about the reality of lawlessness and rebellion and how it undermines all God wants for us.
John Paul used Numbers 16 to describe the deadly decay a spirit of rebellion brings. This story shows us rebellion is a spiritual issue and how much the Lord hates the spirit of rebellion.
I am sure Moses was not perfect. He was a godly man – one who God worked powerfully through. But he was still a human with imperfections. Moses and his brother Aaron had offended and frustrated many people in the nation of Israel.
Yet God appointed Moses as a spiritual leader and insisted His people honor Moses’ God-given spiritual authority. Even when they didn’t agree with it!
I encourage you to read Numbers 16 for yourself. An instigator named Korah rebelled, and as a result, he and his men died, along with their families. As horrible as this was...
God Rules!
This ceiling will never get painted!
The room in our house that I use as a home office, decades back, was shared by both of our sons. My husband Gary built them bunk beds and they shared the room. Our oldest son did the big brother thing and took the top bunk.
I had not thought about that in years. Today, as I am sitting at my desk I happened to glance up. There in the corner above my book cases, on the slightly yellowed popcorn ceiling is written in pencil, in a child’s handwriting, “God Rules”.
A simple two-word statement from a child’s hand decades ago brought an unexpected and much needed calm to my spirit.
My momma’s heart was filled with the remembrance of how my son has loved the Lord since childhood. He’s now a grown man. His personal faith journey takes unique and interesting turns. Nevertheless he knows God. God knows him.
As I write this we are in the midst of the stay at home order in response to the spread of the COVID-19 virus. There is such an interesting mixture of...
