Not Happy

I'm not happy. 

I'm restless, fidgety and having a hard time focusing on anything. 

My soul is troubled and my mind is perplexed. 

The status quo is unacceptable and I refuse to pretend everything is OK when it's not. 

If things continue this way, I'm done.

Most Pastors would be content with a congregation of 200+, no debt on the church, hitting all of our goals for the past year, a stable cash flow and a recent 100% vote of confidence from the membership but I'm not.  Don't get me wrong....  I'm thankful.  I love our people and love my job, but there's something down in my spirit that refuses to believe that this is the pinnacle of what God has called us to.  I've reached a place of divine discontent  which is really a positive thing.  Here's why:

We cannot fully embrace vision for the future until we have become dissatisfied with the status quo. 

My discontent tells me it is time to fully embrace what God intends for Fountain of Life to be in 2011 and beyond.  What God has done these past 15 months is amazing and its importance for the life of the church cannot be minimized.   Understand this: until we as a church are living out the great commission in the context of the vision God has placed before us, we are no threat whatsoever to the Kingdom of darkness.  For over a year we've focused on relational connections and implementation of our discipleship model.  Now we need people to disciple.  We need conversions and a full-on demonstration of what life in God's Kingdom is all about.  As our guest speaker last Sunday so eloquently put it: We've corssed over, now we need to get out of the boat because something supernatural is waiting for us there.  

I will not rest at night until we are there and then I pray that God will once again stir up my divine discontent with the status quo.  It is that divine discontent that paves the way for new vision to be heard and embraced. 

Where's your discontent?  What's keeping you in the boat?

Is Really Such a Thing as a Move of God?

As I typed the title to this week's post I thought to myself "this could ruffle some feathers" I'm not trying to ruffle feathers but I really want to generate some discussion on this topic because I hear the phrase "move of God" dropped from the mouth of preachers and congregants alike. Usually it's in a context as follows: 

• "We really had a move of God last Sunday"
• "What our church really needs isn't another program, but a move of God"
• "God only moves when people......(you fill in the blank)"
• "There's a great move of God happening in.....(insert city/country name here)"  

I'm sure if you've been in church for long you've either heard or used one of those phrases or others like them. For sometime I've wrestled with the term "move of God" and pondered its meaning. What defines a move of God? In Pentecostal/Charismatic experience a "move of God" is usually measured by a few factors: the number of people slain in the Spirit, the amount of time spent in worship and intercession or the number of meetings that have taken place (5 nights a week for 2 years etc...) I've come to the conclusion that it's probably one of 3 things:

 

1. A purely subjective term that is defined by the person and/or group of people experiencing it.

 

2. Something so great, awe-striking, life-changing, city changing and amazing that it can't be defined in human terms.

 

3. It doesn't exist at all. (What I mean by this is that God is perpetually moving and active in the hearts and lives of people and all we have to do to find Him is to Seek Him.)

 

Rather than give my opinion here in the blog, let's discuss it. This should be lively.