Romans 8.6 is very simple and clear. I love verses like that, it helps us frame the world. It says “to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace”. Now, here is the truth – only spiritually minded people can tithe. You cannot tithe and be carnally minded, and be immature.
Everyone of us is facing financial needs, so on a carnal level, on a sensual level, on a material level it is not rational to tithe. The only way you can give away any money towards the kingdom of God is to be spiritually minded, is to value spiritual principles such as tithing, firstfruits and sowing and reaping above your senses and feelings and ideas and traditions! That’s the only way.
Unless you mature enough to be spiritual enough to override your natural tendencies to be greedy, natural minded, selfish and looking all the time at your own needs, you cannot come to a place of peace with the teaching of tithing. That is why carnal, immature people do not tithe. They need to consistently override their own natural, carnal thinking day after day, week after week and month after month.
Coming home today! Yesterday, I spoke at New Creation Church in Canada at their midweek service on the Cry of Command. It was very well received, and we heard some testimonies of people who have been healed over the weekend of various different ailments. Being here has been such an encouragment, and Pastors Moses and Jennifer have been the most wonderful hosts.
A few years ago, I was at a pastor’s conference in America, and I had flown home and literally drove straight to our Guildford church to minister. I’m a little wiser now and leave a little more margin in my life but not by much! So anyway, I am preaching in Guildford, and at the end a couple come to me and say “you must be so depressed right now, we understand”. I said “I am full of joy” and then asked what they mean, because it was a very unusual comment to me.
It turned out a few months’ earlier this couple had gone to the US to a great big conference, with all sorts of international guest speakers, and they had – as was to be expected – a really good time. But then they got on the plane home and when they returned to “real life” they got very depressed and sad and all they wanted to do was go back out to America and go back to this conference. They presumed that I had the same feeling as them.
Firstly, whenever you go to a conference, you have to realize it is not real life in anyway. We have Heal the Nations every year (and it’s awesome, you should definitely be there – http://www.tree.church/healthenations) and it’s not every day. It shouldn’t be. We have teaching in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening, we have worship in the morning, in the afternoon and in the evening. By the end of the week, I am tired, I am working 14-16 hour days, pastoring in between sessions, always on the go, and by the end of the week, Amanda just wants to go find a non-Christian and get them saved! Most people are staying with Christian friends and family, in hotels, they get breakfast made for them, they go out for dinner, they are fellowshipping with Christians, they don’t have work to go to, they don’t have to tidy their house or wash their dishes or clothes. It’s a very different week. Even if you moved to Guildford to go to the wonderful church there, you would have to get a job, tidy up, iron some shirts, and so on. A conference is not sustainable, it’s meant to sustain your real life. I know this so I don’t get upset when it is over. I don’t like living in a bubble, I like being in one once or twice a year to get filled, encouraged and lifted, then I like to go and live in the real world and change it for the better.
Secondly, I am a man on a mission. I know 100% what God has called me to do with my life. And among other things, my task is to plant 100 churches in the UK. And I love coming back. The flight today is far more exciting to me than the adventure I have had here. My calling, my destiny is in the day to day, it is in the mundane, it is in my home. And I love it that way. I cannot imagine being depressed coming home. I fly home tonight, Friday will be a rest day, Saturday will be Healing Word conference, preaching in Nuneaton, Sunday will be preaching in Dagenham and Suffolk. I love it. I love the Tree of Life so much, and have miss you all so much, hence why I have been writing these letters every day to you all.
I meet far too many people who are like Yoda’s description of Luke Skywalker in the Empire Strikes Back:
All his life has he looked away…to the future, to the horizon. Never his mind on where he was. Hmm? What he was doing.” — The Empire Strikes Back
This is a reminder to all of us who think we would be happier and better Christians if we could just be here or move there or get here, and we do not enjoy where we are right now! You are missing out if you do not live in the moment. One of the worst examples of this I ever saw was a man who told me that he could never be healed in Tree of Life as he could only be healed in Woodland Park in Colorado. What a limited, negative, foolish view of God. Greg Mohr came to preach for us and this man told Greg Mohr that, and Greg told him what I told him – Tree of Life is such a wonderful church, and has so much good teaching, if you cannot receive your healing here, I don’t think you will receive it at Woodland Park. He went to Woodland Park and did not receive.
Wherever you go is where you are! Anyway, I have to pack for a flight, a very exciting flight because today I am flying to the greatest destination ever: HOME. I am flying back to my home town, and my home church, and this weekend I am going to serve at the church. That above all is what makes me happy, and where my joy is.
I have nothing wrong with people going to conferences and events and travelling to meetings, I love it. Go for it. We put on two life-changing conferences a year, Gates of the City and Heal the Nations that if you went to both of those annually, you would never be the same again. We would love to see you there. But all conferences must end, and we have to get into a routine of loving where we are every Sunday, every Tuesday night, every day. Selah.
Love you all, hope to see as many of you as possible over the weekend. As I finish the final part of my epistle from Canada, I want you to know I am typing this with my own hands. Jesus loves you and Jesus is on your side!
Today, after our conference was finished, we had a scheduled day off at Niagara Falls. What a sight! We first went on a cable car over the river, then went underneath the Falls to see them from below which was staggering, then we went up to see them from the more traditional viewing angles and locations.
We think of water as being what comes out of a tap, or the kettle, or a bottle of water, it’s not often we see water moving that fast or powerfully. When we were in the cable car, the eddies were moving at nearly 40mph. There was a small boat that was literally surfing on them!
Water is powerful. When Jesus talked about the new birth in John 4 He compares the new birth to a well.
When you get born again, your reborn spirit becomes a well of Life inside you, giving you righteousness, peace, joy, healing and so much more. It’s great to have a well inside you giving you what you need.
But just three chapters later in John 7, Jesus says this:
37 On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink.
38 Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.”
39 By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.
If you receive the Holy Spirit baptism you upgrade from a well to rivers. Rivers is the plural of river, it means more than one! When you get the Holy Spirit power flows out of you through so many directions to so many people because the Holy Spirit loves people and wants to bless them.
The next time you see someone in need, ask yourself do I have a river for them? If you are baptised in the Holy Spirit and tongues, the answer is normally yes you do, so now do something about it. Lay hands on the person, pray with some authority expect power to flow out of you with force and impact that other person.
Expect songs to come out of you like rivers. Songs that change loved, songs that heal the sick, songs that lead people to the presence and glory of God. Songs that change lives.
Expect Scriptures to flow out of you bringing healing and health and abundance to the people who hear them.
Expect love to flow out of you and impact people, fix the broken people, humble the arrogant people and soften the hard hearted.
Don’t go another day not expecting rivers of living water to flow our our spirits through our souls to people all over the world. Expect to make a difference in the life of others. Expect increase. Expect abundance. Expect results. When you come near someone that water in you is going to rush into them changing their lives forever.
You are called to be a world changer, a life changer, a carrier of rivers of living water to the world, eroding rocks of doubt and unbelief and selfishness and bringing glory to people who need to know the life of God, get born again and get their own wells, and get baptised in the Holy Spirit and get their own rivers.
Don’t settle for less than a supernatural life. Expect rivers to flow. Out of you to offend.
Last night we had a second healing service here at New Creation Church in Canada. We saw a lot of people get healing from all sorts of aches and pains. One lady who struggled to breathe was healed, another took her glasses off and could read the words on the screen, quite a few people got mobility to their hands.
What I taught on last night was four steps to have a healing ministry based on Matthew 14.14. You have to be where the people are, you have to see the people, you have to love the people (yes, I spoke on my favourite Greek word) and you have to heal the people. That’s how Jesus did it, and we are supposed to function as Jesus.
This morning is Sunday, and we caught the tail end of our church service in Dagenham, and Lee did such a great job talking about doing what God has set before you. Everyone should listen to Lee’s message this morning, it’s inspirational and foundational.
My thought today for all of you is linked in what Lee said and is tbis: we destroy unbelief by doing something.
I could see this as I prayed for people last night. I would agree with them for their ankle let’s say to be healed and I would say move the ankle.
Those who did it were healed, those who hesistated I needed to spend more time with. Actions matter. The people who prosper God’s way are always people swift to give what He says to give. The people who are promoted to serve in bigger ways always served in little ways without hesitation.
Faith takes its eyes off of circumstances, faith looks to Jesus, faith makes bold declarations. But also, James is very clear. Faith without works is dead. Kenneth Copeland last June translated that Faith without actions thag correspond to what you believe never works.
That’s a powerful statement. If you believe you are blessed and highly favoured, but don’t tithe because you need every penny, your actions do not match your faith. If you believe that by His stripes you are healed, but skip church because you are under the weather… Your acts doesn’t match your words. If you believe that God has told you to step out in business but you are not doing it, you don’t really believe that God has told you.
I believe all of us have things we know we should be doing, but are not doing. It’s time to do them church. It’s time to do something.
In the book of Revelation chapters 2 and 3 Jesus wrote seven letters to seven churches. If Jesus wrote a letter to Tree of Life today, I know one sentence that would definitely be in it, because this sentence is in all seven letters to all seven churches. It is this: I know your works.
A lot of us say “Jesus knows my heart”, and I’m sure He does, but that’s normally an excuse for you to sit down, lick your wounds and fail to extend the kingdom of God. But Jesus did not tell the church, I know your heart, I know it’s tough and I know you are struggling, and I know how much you needed that new TV. Jesus said I know your works. He knows what we do, because what we do is what matters. Our intentions, attitudes, declarations, platitudes, conversations – none of it matters if we don’t do something.
What are you doing to do today? Go and do it! Selah.
Last night, I spoke at the first night of a Healing Conference for New Creation Church here in Toronto. Although I had prepared a message on healing is a done deal, God told me during the worship that most people in the room knew that, and what they needed to know was how important and crucial it was that they called those things that be not as though they are and how to speak their miracle into being.
So I immediately changed track and taught for an hour on Romans 4.17. We saw several people healed and the response and commitment to stand on the Word was exceptionally powerful. I can tell the church is pastored well by the hunger and excitement for tbe Word of God.
As I am writing this, I am in the green room of the church, and I can hear from the main hall my daughter Lydia preaching to the ladies, and my goodness, it is powerful. She is also speaking on the power of words. Mark 11.23 and 24! It’s awesome.
So while I am here in Canada, maybe some of you need some mouth surgery. Give up gossip, stop lying, stop speaking defeat and weakness and start declaring the Word. This conference is actually being held in the Charis Bible College in Toronto, and look what I found on the notice board:
Don’t spread offense. How do you spread offense? With your mouth. By passing on gossip, by lying about people, by speaking death. Your words have power so speak life not death.
So many people are snared and trapped by their tongue. They are held captive by their words. They said they couldn’t do it, so they couldn’t. They said the giants were too big and they were. They said incurable and incurable was.
Some people have no issue with this, but I want you to be different. I want you to choose your words carefully and use your words as tools to get you to your destination. Speak your destination. Speak you are healed, bleesed, prosperous,. Say out loud you are the head and not the tail. Say out loud you are more than a conqueror.
Most Christians know what the Bible says and most Christians believe it. Where most Christians are missing it is in the saying.
Mark 11.23 says:
That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith.
Mark 11.23, KJV
Most Christians don’t doubt and believe that what they say is coming to pass, but they are missing it on the saying part. They are not saying what they want to happen.
They talk about demons, about curses, about sin, about circumstances, about sickness, about poverty, about everything other than the desires of their heart. They whine ABOUT their mountain, rather than SAY UNTO the mountain.
Do you have a mountain in your life? Something stopping you doing God’s will? A barrier to success? Is it sickness, an inability, lack of finances, people coming at you? Stop whining about it and command it to move. Speak like a commander, speak like a conqueror. Speak like a king.
Seriously, the number one thing you can do to walk in Victory is to get your tongue to speak and declare God’s Word and then command your mountains to move. Don’t read this and think nice post… Do something about it. Speak life
Selah.
I’m still writing, Lydia just finishing speaking to thunderous applause, and now Amanda is speaking. It also sounds awesome. Pray for all of us. Tonight I am at the Healing Conference again and expecting great results.
Yesterday, we visited the Museum of Illusions in Toronto where we were reminded not every thing you see is real.
Tonight I am doing a healing service here in Toronto, and the revelation we need to grasp at Tree of Life ties both of these together – you should not trust your senses. Living by trusting your senses is called by Paul “living by sight”, and that’s the easiest way to live in defeat. It’s also referred to in the Bible as being carnal, letting your body led your soul, rather than your spirit.
Now I could tell you all on the very basic level, don’t believe the symptoms of sickness, don’t believe the symptoms of poverty, believe the Word. And that’s all true, and some of you need to be doing this in a major way. You see the problem, then you trust the problem because you trust your senses, then you speak the problem. That’s a very low way of living.
Trust the Word over your senses. That’s living by faith.
Now that’s all true and very important to all of us, but there’s another form of trusting our senses that has invaded the church and it is definitely causing Christians in Tree of Life to fail to listen to their destiny.
Let me explain, and I believe my words will provoke and inspire you to grow this week while I am ministering in Canada!
There was only one person in the Bible who impressed and amazed Jesus with his faith. A Roman centurion who had a sick, paralysed servant. This man comes to Jesus to ask for healing and Jesus says I will come to your house to heal him.
Now, just press pause on that right now. Don’t run ahead in your mind. Think about what Jesus coming to your house means. You can see Jesus in your house. I mean physically see him standing in your house. Your servant would be able to see him, feel his hands touch him and feel the power in Jesus and feel it go into him. You could audibly hear Jesus’ voice as he command your arms and legs to work again.
I dare say that’s what most people want when it comes to healing. They want to see Jesus, they want to feel Him touch them, they want to feel fire and glory alll over their body, they want to feel something happening, they want the fleece to be wet and the ground dry, they want to see fire in someone’s hands, they want the minister to lay hands on them, they want to hear the evangelist say “God is telling me there is someone in the room tonight with palsy”. And that entire list has one thing in common.
Everything on that list is sensual, carnal and in the physical realm. To receive your healing that way is living by sight, looking at the physical realm and expecting God to come and mollycoddle you.
It is not in any way living by faith. The centurion rejected getting healed that way and said boldly that all he needed was God’s Word and that was enough. That is living by faith.
We have to stop needing material confirmation of spiritual truth. Great faith, the kind of faith I want you to live in, the faith of Abraham, does not need something carnal or physical to trust God’s Word. It puts God’s Word above everything. There’s nothing wrong with experiences, but we do not need them, we need the Word.
I just recently heard a pastor say (not a Tree of Life pastor thankfully, I’d hate to have to come back from Canada and fire someone) that there was absolutely nothing better than hearing a certain minister in person in the UK, that having them there in person was essential to him.
It isn’t.
Jesus is essential. Can we all remember it is ALL about Jesus?
But we cannot see Jesus with our eyes or sense him, so we – being carnal – fix our eyes on preachers we can see. Again, I’m not against preachers, love the fivefold, I’m not against travelling to minister, I’m in the middle of a Healing conference as I write this, but my go will be to point people to Jesus.
Of course, a non-Christian or a brand new baby Christian who cannot see Jesus, that’s OK for us to be Jesus in the flesh to them, but for a pastor to think that, they need to grow up. And if you are part of a great church like Tree of Life Church, you should honour all our wonderful pastors who love invest so much into you day after day, but ultimately it’s not about us, it’s about Jesus and the Word.
You want to be healed? You want to live in victory? You want to be out of debt? You want to win every single battle? You want to amaze Jesus with your faith? Then just go with what the Word says. Just believe the Word. You don’t need me to call your condition out, you don’t need Richard to lay hands on you, you don’t need Lee to have fire flow from him into you. You don’t need to see a certain preacher in private, you don’t need anyone to come around your house or to your hospital bed, you don’t need Jesus to appear in the flesh, you don’t need an audible voice.
You have a Bible. You have the Word of God. That is all you need. Don’t let your circumstances, events or anything in this world define you. Your senses are unreliable, God’s Word is totally reliable. You might feel sick, you are healed. You might look broke, you are rich. You might feel unholy, you are righteous and pure.
Praise God you have a support system. A pastor who is writing to you daily while on Canada, a church full of people who love you, a God who gave us the Holy Spirit and all those wonderful, glorious gifts. You have such a team of great pastors at Tree of Life who are always pointing you to Jesus.
Praise God for international ministers who come to the UK, But understand this, you do not need them. All you need is the Word. Thomas needed a touch and a look to believe the resurrection, you didn’t. And you don’t need it to believe any other promise in the Word. Have some faith in your faith! Start trusting God just based on the Word. If the Word says it, it is so. If Jesus says you are healed, you don’t need a visitation. (Your life will change so much when you stop going to see ministers out of desperation and you go in faith).
Some of you don’t always go to church because you don’t feel it, you either don’t feel desperate enough or feel spiritual enough. Grow up and just go because that’s what the Word says, go to church. If the Word says it and that settles it with you, every day will be a day of victory. Every day will be a day of success.
The greatest day of your life will not be some guest speaker or some feeling of fire, it will be today because today you read the Word and believed it.
This is truly living by faith, not needing any training wheels to know what God said is true. It’s true because God said it and that is enough for me. That’s where I want you to be.
Selah.
Love you all, looking forward to seeing you all soon, especially at Heal the Nations.
Today we went to an outdoor store, selling bows and arrows, camping gear and the like. There’s really no equivalent in the UK. I didn’t buy anything but if I did, all my UK money would be worthless. They are absolutely not interested in my money because this is a different kingdom.
When you travel to a different nation, a different kingdom, the currency is different. The shops are different. The food is different. The cuts of steak are not the same. They may not drive on the same side of the road. Everything is different. And as the one who has travelled we are the ones who have to adapt to the new kingdom.
Now, it’s exactly like that in God’s kingdom. One of my big concerns is people who live like Christians but are not different. You have not just changed kingdoms, you have become a whole new species of being. To quote Paul walk worthy of your calling – or you say “try acting like you have a reborn spirit”! That’s the theme of today’s chapter of our epistle from Canadaland: walk worthy of your calling. Act like you are saved. Live like you are in a new kingdom.
If I drove the way I drove at home, on the left of the road, using miles not km, I would be in trouble right now. Sadly, many Christians get saved, enter the kingdom of God, and then act the same way they did in the old kingdom. They still steal, still lie, still play political games. I’m still dealing with other Christian leaders playing games and bring dishonest to grow their ministry, and that’s because it hasn’t dawned on them they don’t live the old life in the old kingdom any more.
The new kingdom has many principles that if you put them to work, things would work for you. The principle of sowing and reaping, according to Mark 4, is of course the principle of all principles, yet even today I meet many Christians either totally unaware of what sowing and reaping means, or they are aware, but are not consistently using it in their lives to increase and grow and walk in Victory.
You will never prosper in the kingdom of God without understand and DOING sowing and reaping.
What was the last thing you sowed? I assume you tithe, but people keep proving me wrong on this. It stuns me that any Christian would expect to prosper, see miracles and be in ministry, without the lowest level of fidelity in their finances, the most basic level of living. Tithing is such a small, tiny application of faith, so fundamental to us growing in Christ, it still surprises me every time a Christian tells me they don’t tithe. It would be like someone telling me they are a chef but think it’s legalism to go into a kitchen. This is the fundamental level of operating in the new kingdom we live in.
What was the last seed you sowed of humility? When was the last time you genuinely let someone else go before you and rejoiced in their success. When was the last time you supported someone else and promoted them? I see few doing that in ministry or in business. Even siblings. Come on now! Sow these things.
What was the last seed you sowed of God’s Word itself? What I mean is when was the last time you had a problem, and rather than doing what you felt like doing, rather than doing what made sense, you studied the Bible until you found out what God said about that situation and did what God said by faith. That’s the approach Mary took when Gabriel spoke to her… Let the Word be real in me. Let me be in line with the Word. When was the last time you took the time to make sure you are in line with the Word?
We have Christians who marry non Christians because it feels right, people who choose the church they are most comfortable in – or the church they think will benefit them and their ministry the most – when the pastor isn’t even Spirit filled and a tongue talker, and preaches eight minutes on nothing every Sunday morning. We have Christians who are living together, Christians supporting causes that hate Christianity and hate the Bible. All because they do not sow the seed of the Word in their heart.
Jesus said Him dying on the cross was a seed. What was the last thing you died to? What was the last thing you didn’t watch of listen to? The last place you didn’t go, that you died to because you knew Jesus did not want you to do it. Are you still going to church the weeks you feel like or are you there like clockwork, feelings or not? You are in a new kingdom now, and there is a new King in your life called Jesus. When was the last instruction you obeyed even though you didn’t want to?
What was the last thing you did for someone else without a spotlight on it? What was the last piece of wisdom you sowed in your life? I know pastors who cannot go to a conference unless they are platformed, or at the very least think they can make a few connections – and they miss out on so much wisdom because of it, and it shows.
We had an elder leave the church a while back, and when we took over his living church there were many problems as he didn’t teach the Word first. He also did some work for us that my son had to spend hours redoing because he didn’t listen.
I told the Lord this was a big surprise, his attitude was so wrong, the way he left so ungodly.
The Lord showed me that a few years ago that same elder wasn’t at Heal the Nations and went to another churches’ conference that same week. The reason he went was they gave him a session to speak at. The Lord showed me that this man had always out himself above what was happening at Tree of Life. He was born again, had taken a plane from the kingdom of Satan to the kingdom of God, but never acted like he was in a new kingdom.
There are several people in Tree of Life right now who are also in other churches, some gaming for positions, others hoping to get our church to sponsor their ministry, or at least use our people to help them. These are people who are using us, NOT sowing into us. One person told me, I only come to Tree of Life, because you know such and such a pastor and I believe you will get me a chance to get a job with him. There is no sense of seed there. No sowing means no reaping.
I’m saying all of this because I love you. I don’t desire your giving, I desire fruit to your account.
I want everyone in Tree of Life to be as fruitful as possible. I want you to be fruitful. It pains me to see people so unfruitful when simple steps like turning up at church every week, bringing a notebook, tithing, dropping their agenda, genuinely serving from the heart. True seeds sown and they wouldn’t be so unfruitful all the time.
God woke me in the middle of the night in March 2010 and called me to inspire people to dream big and challenge them to make the right steps to walk in those big dreams. It pains me to see people lost and confused and not in their dreams. But you will never walk in any dream if you do not learn sowing and reaping and out it into every area of your life.
Go out for lunch with a friend… Go to give, to give comfort, wisdom, to pay the bill, to find out ways to help them more.
Don’t be the one always looking for a handout or leg up. Just you work on sowing seed and watch God bring the harvest.
Every church service you go to, living church, or Celebration Church, look for ways to sow. And start with ways out of the spotlight until you have got this right. Don’t be like the guy who week two at Tree of Life emailed me ten ways he could serve, and all of them included the phrase “up the front”… When I suggested he start serving up the back he left the church shaking the dust off his feet. Unless he has learned to sow, he will still be a very fruitless man.
You are in a whole new kingdom. It’s a better kingdom than the one you got saved from, but some things are different and can be uncomfortable when you do them for the first time. Turning left as a far side turn is still strange to me right now. Sowing and reaping might seem strange to you because you are used to grabbing and fighting and manipulating but that’s a different nation, you are a Christian now, so do what is right no matter whether it feels strange.
Someone said my teaching on tithing made them sick to the stomach. That’s a commentary on their stomach not on what is right to do in God’s kingdom! Just like when I feel strange turning right on the red light (you can do that here!) is a commentary on my upbringing not the right thing to do in Canada.
Selah.
Don’t read this post and nod. Sow something. Sow your finances into the church, and sow your life into this weekend, and sow your heart into the Word of God, and do what He tells you to do. You have a new King, live like it.
So this morning, I woke up in Canada for the first time in my life. Today is a rest day to relax and adjust to the time difference. And do an hour round trip to get a toy for a friend!
And I must admit, I am not good at relaxing. I have to force myself to have a day off. I was on the plane yesterday and wrote six chapters of a new book the Lord instructed me to write to fivefold ministers. I’ve gone through emails, dealt with pastoral situations and all sorts yesterday, but today I need to rest.
God set that pattern in motion. 86% work, 14% rest. It’s a good ratio, perfect in fact. It’s in the Ten Commandments, which of course means over the years both Jews and Christians have gone overboard in implementation and come up with some strange ideas, but the principle is very sound: everyone’s diary should have some white space in it, some margin, some space where nothing is happening. That’s where you recharge, that’s where you dream, that’s where you work smart not hard.
Now like I said, I struggle to do that. I’ve always worked hard, I have worked from 14, worked through school and uni, worked my way through Bible College, and today I still, all jokes about pastors only working Sundays aside, still work exceptionally hard. I have to refocus to ensure I have rest time. I have to put rest into my to do list, treat it as an essential high priory task. I’m sure some of you are in the same boat… Make sure you rest.
We’ve pressed pause on a few things at the Tree of Life Family because I can see my pastors and elders also need some more rest time and we cannot drive people, especially volunteers 24/7. God didn’t do 24/7 and He does not need to eat, sleep or use the bathroom.
It’s good to rest, but in my experience most people do not work as hard as they should. Entertainment and amusement is better than it has ever been, computer games and films more realistic and engaging, there’s social media, travel is cheaper and easier. The problem many people have is that they are not productive enough.
I go on some Pastor’s social media, and you think – has this person retired? They are just always on holiday, even when they are not they are. That kind of constant rest does not grow healthy churches or healthy Christians.
The most extreme version of this is David who quit his God given role of leader of the king’s armies and stayed at home and ended up meeting Bathsheba while on furlough. Idle hands are the devil’s hands indeed. Whenever I read about a pastor having an affair I am immediately confused as to how he even had the extra time! If we get busy about the kingdom, we won’t have time to be selfish.
My appeal today, ironically on my day off, is don’t take too much rest. Rest one in seven like Jesus did. Then fill the other six days with hustle, bustle, working, praying, going to church, getting there early, serving, investing, loving, witnessing, helping, producing…
Proverbs 14. 23 says there is profit in hard work. I see a lot of people never profit because they don’t work hard. I regularly meet Bible College students and graduates who know the Word, are personable, engaging and could be great pastors, evangelists, etc. But they aren’t. Because they are not profiting because they are hardly working, not working hard. They are saying they live by faith, but faith comes by hearing the Word and the Word says if you don’t work you don’t eat.
Or they have a job but want the pulpit but never work in tbe church, they don’t even turn up regularly. We had a Bible College graduate storm off because he turned up so late to do his offering talk the service was nearly over, I was wrapping up the sermon! He wanted us all to have say there waiting for his glorious moment.
Another one wanted more money a month than Amanda and I got paid together to work two days a week because he was so anointed and special. And he barely did any work on those two days.
If you want to succeed in life you have to work at it. I’m in Canada speaking at a healing conference. I have more invites than I can manage to do healing conferences right now. Mainly the Healing Book. How did that book come into existence? Because for 40 days I got up and for at least one hour, mostly two or more, I wrote on healing to get people in the Tree Family healed. Those emails saw a lady healed of hundreds of tumors and my son Adam – also a grafter – put them into book form.
A lot of you want to have a book. Very few of you have spent aorund one hundred hours writing. That’s the power of work. You might know more than I do on healing, but if you don’t work it doesn’t get done.
When I go, I want to be able to say like Paul, I ran my race, I kept the faith. But if you never run you cannot run a race. If you don’t work you can’t work it.
Right now Jesus is working hard building the church. While I am here in Canada, my desire for everyone in Tree of Life is that you put your hand to the Plough and actually work.
When I come back will you be where you are when I left, or did you get up an hour earlier every day and write that book in your heart? Will you get your charitable trust sorted out, your business registered at company house? Will you build what you need to build, design what you need to design, sign up for the course. Going to Heal the Nations will be work. Travel is work, taking time of work is work, getting into the Word takes work. Will you work on building up your faith this summer? Or will you keep procrastinating?
Keep hoping that you are so special that you are an exception to the Biblical principles and that someone else will come along and do all the work for you? Will you let another week go by that you will never ever back and not work for your dreams, for the kingdom, for Jesus Christ?
Grace doesn’t mean not working, it means to get to work. To do work that matters. Don’t send me an email telling me I don’t understand Grace if you are limiting God and falling apart like a two dollar suitcase. If this message means you let Satan steal your lunch and pop the bag, I contend it’s you who doesn’t get Grace. You need to live in the balance of grace and faith, not the balance of grace and laziness.
There is no dress rehearsal, you only get one chance at this. Work!
Selah.
Love you all, Tree of Life is in my heart and I am believing for great testimonies from this post. I’ve already had several from yesterdays!
I am currently in a taxi heading to the airport getting ready to fly to Canada, and I was about to pen a short WhatsApp message to my sons about some things they need to do in my absence, and as I was doing that, I felt I should pen some thoughts to the Tree Family about what to do this week while I am away too. Not sure what to write, but I will keep writing and see where we end up…
If you didn’t know, we are off to Canada. I’ve never been to Canada before, but we met a wonderful couple at a Pastor’s conference a few years ago, and they have invited us to come minister. We are very excited and honoured indeed.
Now, if you back around five years, we were at another Pastor’s conference (I invest so much in my personal development, that’s a revelation for some people – invest in yourself, buy a book on faith and read it, book in to Heal the Nations, make plans to be at church this weekend before seeing what you feel like Sunday morning!) and one of the speakers who is now a dear friend was Prophet Jerome Fernando.
During one of his sessions, Jerome prophesied over me that my apostolic ministry would come to the forefront and reach a new level after my first trip to Canada! This is my first trip to Canada, so right now we are waging warfare with our prophetic word to see this happen.
Maybe that should be the theme of this post. Waging war with a prophetic word. That phrase comes from 1 Timothy 1.18:
This charge I commit unto thee, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went before concerning thee, that thou by them mightest wage a good warfare,
1 Timothy 1.18, KJV
Paul, an experienced senior minister, is writing to Timothy, a younger and more inexperienced minister. Like any pastor in a charismatic church, Timothy has received several prophetic words. We presume he is able to separate the wheat from the chaff and isn’t moved by some word from some wannabe that doesn’t resonate with his spirit or doesn’t even agree with the Word of God. But Timothy may have been a bit passive… Well if God said it then it will happen. Well if it is meant to be, que sera sera.
And Paul had to interrupt this train of thought with the most strongest of language… Grab those prophetic words, Tim, and fight. War. The Greek word is stratia. It means to violently assault and attack something. It means to go aggressive and stop an enemy.
If you have got a prophetic word about anything, you cannot just sit there, twiddle your thumbs and say that you are under Grace.
We are saved, delivered, transformed by grace through faith, so we need to reread the genuine prophetic words we have received, we have to pray over them, dream them, imagine them, meditate on them, declare them, find Scriptures that line up with them and declare them. We have to be aggressive. We have to carve out time in our lives and do this.
I have several prophetic words about my future. About the churches we will plant, the Nations we will go to. We don’t just sit there and go, hey ho, that’s nice… We fight. We declare, we pray, we believe, we listen and read and reread. That is what we must do.
I believe that one of the most important things that we need right now in the UK, an attitude of aggressive war waging. I am seeing a creeping passivity forming in the church right now, at a time where we need to be extending God’s kingdom like never before. We need to grab the sword and fight. Have you spoken God’s Word over yourself today? Have you prayed in tongues and built yourself up today? Have you out some immense images in your mind, and cast down teeny tiny picture and selfish images and every high thought that exalts itself against Christ? Have you taken time to fellowship with the Lord and get your marching orders for the day?
Has God given you a prophetic word and you can barely remember it? FIGHT!
I was at a pastors conference (again! I know! Because that’s part of my warfare, going to the blacksmiths to get some weapons) last October. In that conference, Bob Nichols, prophesied over me about finances.
I have a huge dream and need a huge amount of money to do it. You could give me about £50 million right now, and I would know exactly what to do with it. I am dreaming like that. I know if God gave. Bob Nichols a word about my finances over anyone else in the room I have to listen and fight with it. So I bought a new wallet and I got it engraved with the first sentence from the prophetic word.
Every day I reread that first line and meditate on the word. I am not passive about it, I am aggressive with it.
It’s a war in my mind and I intend for God and glory and goodness to be on the winning. And then there is a war in the church to live the high life, not fall into petty doubts, small thoughts, and so on. Stop scrolling through Facebook looking for someone to sort out and bring down to your small level, dream bigger and get excited about your dreams…
Fight for the Words you have been given. Stand, be aggressive, you are a child of the living God. You have been called for such a time as this. Find out what God has called you to do and do it. Stand up and stand on what God has said to you.
Stop being so passive. One of the problems I am seeing recently that makes as passive is a sentimentality that has nothing to do with Scripture.
When someone falls over, we want to show love, but we show a sentimentalism, we get down with them and we say “poor you, that so sad, we understand” rather than say get back on your feet, stand on the Word, you are more than a conqueror, you are above this, get forgiven, move forward and keep fighting. That’s might sound unsympathetic but it is true love.
Paul didn’t tell Timothy to get counselling for his timidity, he didn’t tell him we understand life is tough. Paul said that spirit is not from God, you have power, love and a sound mind. You have prophetic words… Fight with those words, get aggressive, get off your backside.
That’s the Biblical way to change your life and walk in Victory. Fight, fight, fight.
The next verse after 1 Tim. 1.18 starts with “Holding Faith”. That’s my desire for everyone in Tree of Life while I am in Canada, hold the faith. Hold is the Bible word for pregnant! It’s first used when Mary had Jesus and was pregnant with him! We need to get pregnant with faith.
It was Fathers Day on Sunday and my thought was how much having my children changed my life. It changed Amanda more! We need to be pregnant with faith, hold that faith and trust in the Word inside us so much it changes our shape, our future, our priorities, our time keeping, how we spend our money, when we get up in the morning, what we do with our spare time. Grab faith and never ever let go.
When God speaks to you, whether through the Word or through a prophetic word, hold on tight, and do not let go.
Satan is trying to mug you and steal your prophetic word, Hold on tight, fight like a mad man. That’s my word for you all. Satan will try any trick to stop you getting to church this weekend, fight like a madman to get there. Satan will try to break your dreams, fight! Fight fight FIGHT!
And the good news for all of you is I am fighting for my word and my ministry will reach a new level. Ministry is a synonym for serving. So if my serving gets lifting to a new level, you all get served better and more effectively. Selah!
We shall all have to wrestle with greed as we renew our minds. Solomon says there is nothing new under the sun, and he says: Whoever loves money never has enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with their income. This too is meaningless. (Ecc. 5.10).
If we love money, we will never have enough money. That’s not a good place to be in. Proverbs 15.27 actually tells us that the greedy will ruin their own houses.
One of the reasons some people do not tithe is greed. They cannot bear to be without their 10%, they need all 100% of their income. You can always tell the greedy because whenever you teach on tithing, they are going to complain! Proverbs 28.25 says “the greedy stir up conflict, but those who trust in the Lord will prosper“. We all have to choose which side of this verse we want to be on! One of the characteristics of good leadership according to Peter is “not pursuing dishonest gain, eager to serve” (1 Peter 5.2).
There are many people around who are greedy. They want more and more all the time, especially when it comes to material wealth and possessions. They want to get rich quick and without God! Because these people want more and more so much, they cannot get the idea in their head of giving ten percent consistently and reliably. It makes more sense to their heart and mind to keep as much as they can! Greed is one of the biggest problems you can have in your spiritual life. Greed has destroyed so many lives – and through greed, many churches are deprived of tithes that they can use to extend the kingdom! Greed steals blessings!
Let’s break the power of greed over our lives right now and become radical, joyful, consistently, godly tithers! Let’s invest our finances into the kingdom of God the way Jesus has called us to!
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