Tree of Life Blog

Fascination in end times seems to be at an all time high.  I would say I am being asked more questions about end times than anything.

Yet with all the interest, there is a lot of nonsense out there.  Some people are falling for date setting, for signs in the heaven that have nothing to do with God.  Other people are embracing the deception that end times have all happened, some are even saying Jesus returned in AD70!

So where do we go to find answers?  The Word

And in this series we get the Word.  Thirteen hours of teaching, covering the book of Revelation, the rapture, the antichrist and even aliens.

Enjoy!

http://www.treeoflifechelmsford.com/the-end-of-days.html

The world needs your gift, your wisdom, your unique point of view.  Keep going, keep believing.

I make no apologies for everything in this list being challenging.  You need to be challenged about how you handle money, or you will never walk in your dreams.  It’s that simple.

1. If you are not saving, you hate your future self.
2. If you don’t tithe, you don’t believe God is good.  Deep down you don’t really know the goodness of God and trust Him.
3. If you hate the word tithe, you hate the word prosperity.
4. If you are not giving to where you are being fed the Word, you are not acting with honour.  You cannot succeed long term in life without acting in honour.
5. If you do not work, you should not eat.
6. If you don’t provide for your own family, you are worse than an unbeliever.
7. If you don’t copy Abraham in tithing, you don’t really believe you have the blessing of Abraham, no matter how many thousands of times you declare it.  If you cannot believe God to increase your 90% more than your 100%, then you CANNOT and WILL NOT ever be able to believe for double your current income.
8. 90% of people below the poverty line in the UK have A) not finished full time education, B) had children while still teenagers or C) gone through a divorce.  Simple Biblical, sexual ethics makes you wealthier, it’s that simple.
9. If you haven’t got 3 months’ money in savings, you shouldn’t be getting married yet.
10. If you spend it as soon as you get it, you will never be able to spend big. And that means you are really missing out!

Sometimes I watch people make a foolish decision and I think “yup, that could be me, I have definitely been that dumb before”.  Other times I was people make a decision and I just don’t understand.  I don’t grasp how they got to that point or how their priorities could be so far from what the Bible teaches are the right priorities to a successful life.

Hear are 7 actions that I can’t get my head around.  I will love you, I will try to sympathise, I will try and empathise; but I just don’t get it!

7.  People who skip church to take their children to a park/ grandma’s/ football/ cinema/ party.   You have just trained your children to take the assembling together of the saints lightly.  As your children grow older, and eventually leave home, being in church will be one of the most powerful influences to keep them on fire for God and for Jesus.  If you treat church as an inviolable part of your calendar, your children will develop the same character.

6.  People who don’t monitor their children’s TV watching and internet usage.  They did a survey a number of years ago and found out that the children in Christian homes who grow up into adults who are still walking with the Lord are those who didn’t have a TV or internet connection in their bedroom.  Those who did, were not.  The correlation was almost perfect, in other words – get that TV out of their room, and get a decent Net Nanny service.

5.  People who turn up on time for work, for dates, for the cinema, for weddings, for funerals, for job interviews, for a train journey, for an aeroplane journey, for dinner, for the theatre, for a restaurant booking, for school, for college, for the PTA meeting; but still manage to walk in late to church every week as if somehow the journey to church and the things they have to do to get ready catches them by surprise.  I think it surprises some people to realize that we craft the 2 hour service as a unit, the opening, the declarations, the worship all lead into the preaching and the whole service is crafted to lift you and your mind to transform your life.

4. People who scream and shout and dance like crazy at their team kicking a ball in the goal, but when it comes to worshipping God stand like they have an ironing board stuck down the back of their shirt.  Let’s give God some glory – let’s kneel, dance, shout, stand, lift our hands, clap, stamp and make some noise!

3. People who know 100 bad jokes for every occasion, have memorized all the player’s stats for the season, but have never learned a single Bible verse.  Not knowing a Bible verse means going out into a combat without your sword guys.  Get some Word in your head!

2. People who will drive 5 hours to go to a conference to hear the latest cool guest speaker but who think 40 minutes is too far to go to a decent local church.  I know which one will help you more in the long run, and it’s not the latest cool guest speaker.

1. People who don’t write down their goals.  You go from 30% likely to achieve your goals to 71% likely just by *writing them down*.  We need to move forward – write your goals down and start to dream big.

This is the most important conference we as a church have ever put on.  I say that without any sense of exaggeration or hype.  We have gathered our own leaders and preachers and pastors and evangelists.  There are church networks ten-twenty-one hundred times the size of ours who could not gather such a gifted and powerful team of preachers.  You are going to be fed so well in the next 4 days it’s unreal.

We kick off on Wednesday 12th August (that’s tomorrow) at 7.30pm at Kingsley Hall, Parsloes Ave, Dagenham.  There is parking in the place, but not much, but parking in all the surrounding streets is free.

I am bringing a message that is going to help you get out of second gear and into sixth gear in terms of believing God for your destiny and the things He has in store for you.  I don’t think you will ever be the same again.  This message has been bursting inside me for several months and it is going to explode.

Then Thursday and Friday we have sessions at 10am, 3pm and 7.30pm.  Then on Saturday we have sessions at 10am and 3pm.

If you need any more information, please email ben@treeoflifechurch.org.uk.  You won’t regret it.  This is the greatest gathering of grace preachers that has ever happened in the United Kingdom.

One of the things that happens a lot is that people as Christians are told “judge not”.  It’s like a mantra.  The whole world has embraced it now – we must not judge.

Now if you take that to logical extremes it’s absurd!  There are two pieces of meat, one is rotten and smells, the other is awesome looking.  Don’t judge, eat both of them!  No – you would never do that.  We all make judgments when we buy clothes, buy food, eat food, buy a new house, a new car.  We have to judge to make decisions.  All judging is is simply looking at the evidence and making a preference or decision.

Now, it is clear from the Bible that there are times we are supposed to judge, and times we are not supposed to judge.

In Matthew 7.1-5. Jesus says don’t judge the speck in someone else’s eye when we have a plank in our eye.

So there is one situation is when it is wrong to judge – when what is going on in your life is worse than what is going on in their life.  It’s strange that when our lives are a mess we immediately want to rip someone else’s life apart to make ourselves feel better.  I’ve met cocaine addicts who feel good about themselves because “at least it’s not heroin”.  We fail so we try and pull people down with us.  We try and blow other people’s candles out to make our light shine brighter.

It’s amazing how as a pastor I can be with a couple whose marriage is falling apart, they are on the verge of divorce, he is secretly drinking, she is overeating and they are both depressed.  Yet, they will storm out of the church because they disagreed with some minor side point I made on the end-times!  No – when you have a plank in your eye and you need help, that’s when you don’t judge.  You don’t go to criticize, you go to get a lifeline.

If you are drowning, don’t refuse the lifeline because the person throwing it is smoking, or drinking, or black, or white, or too old, or too young, or all the other stupid reasons we discriminate against people.  You need the lifeline – you have a plank in your eye.  If you need help, get it.  Don’t leave church over minutia when church is helping put your life back together.

It has been really hard for me recently, as a few people have stopped attending our church and I saw their Facebook pages – not filled with hatred for the church, but just missing life.  Where they used to talk about love, about victory, about joy, about healings and miracles they were seeing – now it’s just life.  Here’s what is going on a work today, here is my lunch.  Whatever.  It’s just missing that life.  They left church because they made a judgement on a speck, when they need someone to help remove the plank from their eye.  They ran away from our lifeline because we didn’t meet their requirements but they are drowning.  I only hope they find someone else and by then are so desperate they won’t care that the next church has also got a speck or two!

When you have a plank in your eye, stop looking for specks, stop looking for reasons to judge and get annoyed, and get the help you need.

5.  Captain Complainer

No, church this Sunday is not going to be perfect.  Well done, you worked it out!  Imperfect people are going to come together in an imperfect manner, with an imperfect system, rub up against each other, and be imperfect.  If you come to church looking for something to complain about then I assure you that you will find it.

But apart from feeding your own ego, incessant complaining helps no one.  People turn up early, serve, love, care and work.  Why not join the building party rather than the tearing down party?  That’s the kingdom mindset.

4. Mrs Invisible

You know the person who says “they are with you in spirit” but are not actually there!  Turn up this week, don’t be there “in spirit” be there spirit, soul and body!

This week, turn up – then look to the person on the left of you and on the right.  Smile at them, encourage them, let them hear you singing and saying “Amen”.  You have no idea how much you encouraged them.  You also got a lot more out of the worship and the Word than if you had sat on your sofa eating  Coco Pops and watching Jeremy Kyle claiming you were there in “spirit”.

3. Flirty Fred

Church is not your pick up joint, it’s not your real life Tinder app.  It’s not for that purpose.

You genuinely have no idea how sleazy you look trying to chat up all the ladies, and you have no idea that everyone – yes, everyone – has noticed.  You are making people uncomfortable – not least of all your own wife or girlfriend standing innocently there waiting for you to stop making a fool of yourself.

It’s not that we lack a sense of humour, your inappropriate comments are genuinely not funny!

2. Lord Lateness

Yes, I know that you are so egotistical that you think church can’t possibly begin until you are there, but the truth is it does.  The programme has been calculated and designed to help you as a complete service, but you walking in late means the ushers are out late, children’s registration helpers are out late, you are disrupting the service and you are missing out on the full value of the service.

But hey – at least you got that extra 15 minutes beauty sleep!

1. Gertrude Gossip

I think this is the worst person to be in church.  The Bible says:

A gossip separates close friends (Prov. 16.28)

There are no quarrels without gossips (Prov. 26.22)

Gossips can’t keep secrets (Pro. 11.13)

You don’t want church to be a place where there is quarelling, where people can’t be close friends.  Remember what Grandma used to say: if you can’t say anything nice, shut your big ugly mouth!  Seriously, button it.  Zip it.  Sellotape it.  All three.  We are building a church that hates gossip.

BONUS PERSON:

1. Pyramid Patricia

I know some people want to make a bit of extra money, and I think that’s a great idea.  I am not against working hard and not against entrepreneurialism.   In fact, I am for it.

But church services and business do not mix.  Especially when it comes to the sort of pyramid schemes of selling that involve selling something perishable or reuseable all the time.  No one in the church wants your shampoo, your fibre, your vitamins, your grass, your gas provider, your email telephone service.  And if you keep talking about it all the time, people will avoid you.  Keep your business out of the church.  Email me and we’ll put you in the directory, if people need your services they will phone you.

During our leadership conference last weekend, Greg Mohr pointed out that you cannot believe for something that is outside of your grace.  If it isn’t in your destiny, it isn’t going to be something you can believe for (of course, everything in redemption is freely ours for all of us).  You can only believe for what is yours – what is in your jurisdiction.

As I was pondering this on Sunday evening, Greg Mohr was preaching in our Guildford church about healing.  It was a very powerful healing meeting – but one of the comments was “Healing is in our jurisdiction”.

And it is – healing is freely yours; sickness must leave when you tell it to leave.  You are the boss of your own healing.  So is everything in the cross.  But some things are not in the cross, and some things are not in your jurisdiction.

For the next few weeks I just want to think out loud concerning this concept of jurisdiction, and I want to give you a Scripture I have never seen on a fridge magnet:

You should mind your own business and work with your hands (1 Thess. 4.11)

One of the things Christians seem to struggle with is minding their own business.  You need to look after what God has given you – that’s a full-time job.  You don’t have the time to correct and look after and mind everyone else’s business.

When you start telling people what church they should be going to, what they should wear, how they should be praying – you are not minding your own business.  You need to mind what God has told you to do.  It always amazes me that the people who see themselves as the self-appointed spiritual police are often those without their lives in order.

Someone tells someone “you should go to this church” and you find out they don’t even go to church.  Someone tells you how to treat others but is bossy and rude to those around them.  People without a ministry telling you how to minister.  Saul telling David to wear his armour.  People who have never pulled someone out of a wheelchair telling you how to minister healing.  People who haven’t made a penny out of business running business seminars.

Just crazy!   People should learn to mind their own business.  In other words, before you open your mouth – ask the question: is this really anything to do with me?

And with great power the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.

That’s Acts 4.33 above.  The early church had not just grace but great grace, with the Greek word for grace being megas, it would not be wrong to declare that the early church had mega-grace operating in the life of the church and the life of the people in the church.

What does that mean to operate in mega-grace?  It means that there was a great freedom for people to be themselves, it means that they had a special favour from God, that miracles were easy, that the gifts were flowing, that people had a genuine love for one another and cared for one another, encouraged one another.  It meant people had no agendas, but just loved one another.

People lived in the revelation that God’s method of dealing with them was grace – so they believed for healing, for debt release, for fruitfulness, for increase, for life, for abundance, for happiness.  And they walked in it.

People knew that the only way they could receive was grace, so they showed grace.  Secure in who they were in Christ, they loved others as themselves, they gave freely with no thought for reward, they served and loved.

Isn’t that awesome?

But did you know that God loves us as much as the early church?  God doesn’t want them to have had great grace and we get little grace.  They don’t get mega-grace, and we have to make do with micro-grace!  No way!

So how can we, in our churches today, flow in mega-grace.  Well, the answer is there in the verse plain to see: the apostles were giving testimony to the risen Christ.  This is so simple, we have missed it: the more we talk about the resurrection of Jesus the more we operate in the grace.

The more we talk about the law, about behaviour, about how sinful we all are, the more we talk about us and how wonderful we all are, the more we talk about psychology and pontificate – the less we operate in grace.

The more we talk about Jesus Christ and the fact that He is alive – He has defeated sin and hell, He has defeated sickness and shame, He has defeated poverty and lack.

And He is here right now.  With us – in the midst of us, for us not against us – able to save to the uttermost anyone who believes.  The more we can believe that His power and goodness will come through for us no matter what, and the more we flow in mega-grace.

You want a church of mega-grace: then mega-preach mega-resurrection.

Today we have a bonus second post as Arthur Meintjes very kindly allowed me to reproduce this great wisdom on our blog:

Did You Know?

God, the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ is a God who is no respecter of Persons!

This is one of the greatest revelations that the Apostle Peter received when he went to Cornelius’ house.
(Acts 10:34 KJV)
“Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons:”

(Romans 2:11 KJV)
“For there is no respect of persons with God.”

To be a Respecter of Persons means to show “partiality”, or to teat people with “favoritism”:

God never changes, He is the same Yesterday, Today and Forever!
If He is a God who does not show Partiality, or Favoritism to one he will not show it to anyone.
That means what he will do for one, He will do for all!

To say that God will forgive one mans sin, but will not forgive another mans sin because his sin is worse or particularly sinful, is to say that God is a Respecter of Persons!

(1 John 2:1-2 KJV)
“1. My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not.
2. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: And he is the PROPITIATION for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.”

Jesus is the PROPITIATION or “The Satisfying of the perfect justice of a Holy God against Sin! ALL SIN!

To say that God’s will is that all be healed, and that He heals all our diseases. But that it is also God’s will not to heal certain people or certain diseases because of their grave SIN, is to accuse God of being a Respecter of Persons!
Men receive that consequences of their sin, it’s not God’s Judgment for Sin!

(Psalms 103:1-4 KJV)
1. Bless the Lord, O my soul: and all that is within me, bless his holy name.
2. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits:
3. Who forgiveth all thine INIQUITIES; who healeth all thy DISEASES;
4. Who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies;

It is God’s will that ALL people be healed of ALL our diseases, weather it be cancer, diabetes, flu, heart disease, Ebola, mental disorders, dyslexia, autism, MS, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and even AIDS!

For God to Judge any man today for an act of SIN committed, is to deny that Jesus Died on the Cross!

God is the God who heals ALL OUR DISEASES, AND WHO REDEEMETH ALL OUR DESTRUCTIONS!