Journey To Jerusalem With
Christ and Close Companions:
Contemplate Jesus’ feelings journeying with his disciples

Luke 3:21-23 share his baptism as Beloved son/daughter
Luke 4:1-15 His temptation and ministry to those in need
Luke 4:16-30 rejected by hometown
Luke 4:31-5:28 Disciples fascinated at first
Luke 6:1-11 Criticized by religious leaders
Luke 7:35 Jesus’ ministry questioned by John the Baptist
Luke 9:41 until the end his disciples begin to doubt
Luke 9:54 Jesus rebukes their bad spirit toward others
Luke 9:57-62 People reject his invitation with their excuses
Mark 3:21 His family thought he was “out of his mind”
Mark 8:17 Rebukes his disciples for their hardness, unbelief
Mark 8:32 Peter “rebukes” Jesus
John 6:67 asks his disciples, “Will you also leave me?”
Luke 22:45-46 Why are you sleeping? Rise, watch, pray.
Mt 28:17; Mk 16:14 Even with them post-resurrection some still doubted.

Jesus Is the Son Of Man

Jesus felt emotions like us, including frustration and loneliness. Jesus wept over Lazarus and Jerusalem and in anger cleared the temple. Jesus as a real boy, teen and man. His favorite name for himself was “The Son of Man.” I wrote a song, “Jesus is the Son of Man.” Jesus walked, Jesus ran, Jesus is the Son of Man. He laughed out loud and cried real tears...

Jesus' willingness to please the Father by submitting to water baptism and facing the Tempter showed us what restored humanity can be. He came out in the power of the Holy Spirit healing the sick and hurting. He went to his hometown and was rejected (they tried to kill him). He was spurned by religious leaders. His own disciples went from prideful excitement to bewilderment to confusion to forsaking Him in the hour of his greatest need. When Jesus said, "Blessed are you poor, hungry, humble and hurting..." He knew what they all felt. He embraced poverty, pain and chose to be powerlessness to protect himself. He was hungry, alone, imprisoned and even homeless. So He could say, “In as much as you fed and helped the poor, and visited those in prison you did it unto Me.” (Matthew 25:40) -PD

2011 A Year of Tending: focus, faithfulness, fruit
Rev 2:5 to restore First Love for Christ and for one another

ask grace to remember, repent and redo.

Testimony of hearing God’s Voice
by Steven E. White

This last week I felt the Lord giving me a word regarding my current path in life. I'd been praying and listening for guidance on what to do after I finish the degree I'm working on. For the past several years I've become gradually more distant and taciturn toward the church, for a number of reasons. This last January I was finally at a place where I could come to Dwight and share what had been going on and start turning my walk back toward the Lord. With the start of the new men's small group and some other changes in my life, I believe I finally heard something from Him, though the answer what not what I expected.

This is what I heard: "Why are you eager to learn what's around the next corner in your path in life, when you're not correctly on track in your daily walk? Focus on where you are now, stay Faithful to the path I've already shown you, and you will see Fruit."

The picture in my head as I heard this was: I am on a hand-cart on a railroad track. I am moving through a valley, deep and kind of dark in places. I've just come out of a heavily wooded area, there was little visibility there and sound didn't carry. I was coming into a more open and brighter area of the valley. Ahead I can see the track starting to rise and take a sharp turn to the right quickly passing beyond the hills into what I do not know. This is the change in my life I feel is coming and have been seeking knowledge of. As I look around, I feel the cart vibrating under me while I'm moving forward; it's not a smooth efficient journey. Kneeling and peering under the cart I see that the wheels are not fit flush against the tracks as they should be. I hear a voice telling me the message I wrote above. If I turn myself, for the cart is an expression of my will, and focus on His path for me and stay on that path, I not only will travel with greater speed, but I'll have momentum coming into the turn ahead and be able to take the hill at speed. If I'm not correctly on the track, it may still be possible to surpass the hill, but the journey will be much longer and harder than if I'm moving, if you will, at God Speed.

Obviously this translates nicely to our everyday walk with Christ. Focus on Him and what's He's giving to us to do, Faithfully keep our walk straight day by day, and we will see the Fruits of our labor manifest in our lives.

-Steven E. White

2011 A Year of Tending: focus, faithfulness, fruit
Rev 2:5 to restore First Love for Christ and for one another
ask grace to remember, repent and redo.

Repositioning to fire up first love: Small groups

Acts 2:42-47 Holy Spirit places us not only in the body but into small groups. In small groups we pray, share and practice ministering together. We share how Christ has been present in our daily prayer and lives all week. That one night together can stir us to “remember, repent and redo” all week long and keep stirring our hearts in the warmth of “first love.” On the other hand, when left alone all week, our fire and love will tend to grow cold because of sin and the spirit in the world.

Like a fire needs fuel and needs stirred, imagine a fire of burning logs compared to lone logs which lose their heat.

A physics teacher explains why lone logs don’t burn completely or produce much heat. A lone log can only heat the immediate area around it, consequently by itself it loses energy. A lone piece of wood cannot create an atmosphere of heat whereas wood bundled together actually create a micro environment where heat is conserved and passed to each other increasing the overall temperature. Together logs create air flow pockets, by lifting each other up and allowing oxygen to access more surface area. They burn hotter. Three or more pieces together form sheltered pockets of glowing embers that reflect heat to each other thereby sustaining the burn. Logs grouped together reduce the surface to volume exposure to cold air and increase the surface to volume area for hot air, each stick reinforcing the others ability to burn hotter and more complete.

Holy Spirit knew what He was doing in putting His burning ones in small groups that met house to house. These small groups bundled together reduced their exposure to cold air and reinforced each other’s ability to burn hotter and more complete.

Believing and togetherness were not separate acts. To believe was to be together and to be together was central to their believing. Scripture reads, “Those who believed were together,” not, “Those who believed stayed at home.” Through the small group we see the House God builds is to be set ablaze with passion and love so that we overflow into the world around us. We burn better for him when together. -PD

What does is mean to meditate on Scripture?

Meditation on Scripture is something the Bible instructs us to do. It is more than just concentration. It comes from a Hebrew word (maggah) meaning “to murmur” or “mutter,” or the word suach meaning “to talk to oneself.” The New Testament word equivalent means “to ponder or imagine,” such as in Luke 2:19 where Mary “pondered things in her heart.”

Meditation differs from studying in that studying focuses on understanding while meditation focuses at obedience. When we study, we ask questions of a text while meditating is responsive and we let the text ask us questions. Studying is head work. Meditating is heart work. Meditating may focus on a single phrase or word of a verse.

Meditating helps us to ask, “What is God saying to me?” and respond to God like Samuel did with, “Speak, Lord, your servant will hear.”

Meditating centers around taking in Scripture or a Biblical story as we would food. We take it before the Lord in quietness and begin to digest it until it becomes a part of us. If our Bible studying is solely from a critical or evaluative approach, we will only end up agreeing with what it says. That doesn’t always meant that we HEAR HIM. To meditate on Scripture means that we are catching the Spirit.
Psalm 1:2 says that the righteous man meditates on his law “day and night.” That means in the good times and bad (when the light is shining and when it isn’t). The more we meditate on God’s Word, the deeper it soaks into our spirits. When it comes alive inside of us, we discover that His power ignites us and it becomes our desire to follow Him more closely.

Take time to meditate on the verses as you go through these daily exercises. If you do, they will become more personal as God’s Word clears your thinking.

In Him,
Richard Linberry

I Love It When You Worship


I love it when you worship
When you reach deep inside
And offer me
the things you hide

I love it when you praise me
When you give to me your pain
And still
proclaim my reign

You reach Me
You reach Me
You reach deep inside of Me

I love it when it you worship
Though you think I’m far away
Your sacrifice
More dear to Me

I love it when you come
Just to be with Me
And let Me fill you
With My Love

I reach you
I reach you
I reach deep inside of you

I love it when you worship
I enjoy your simple songs
I love
To dance with you

I love it when you work
I enjoy you while you play
Everything about you
Reflecting Me

We reach When you reach my heart
We reach When I reach your heart
We reach Together we reach the world
PD 2.21.2011

Stress Fractures

By Richard Lineberry

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart,
O God, you will not despise.
Psalm 51:17

In my military days, I was trained as an X-ray technician. We learned all about bones and all the bad ways they could be injured. We learned about something called a stress fracture which was the result of repeated trauma to a bone such as a heel or other foot bone. Athletes, such as joggers, who jog too much can gradually get a tiny fracture which is really hard to heal because even walking makes it worse. Only two things will help a stress fracture: removing the weight that causes the stress and resting.
The word brokenness, in Christianity, has come to mean any sort of spiritual condition where you come to the end of your rope or the bottom falls out of your life. Such things as heart failure, financial crises, loss of job, etc., can be real stressors that drive us either to a state of depression or to God. Prolonged trials can create such a weight on us that we just....break. The good news about a broken bone, though, is that once it heals, the repaired area is stronger than before. That should speak to us.
Jesus continually sought out broken people. He said it was the sick that needed a physician. The woman at the well (John 4) was broken down with peer rejection, shame and failed relationships. Jesus quenched her thirst with the living water of the Holy Spirit. Another woman with the issue of blood was financially bankrupt by her condition and desperate for healing. She reached out and touched Jesus with faith and her stress was relieved. God knows how to change broken hearts and bodies.
Whatever condition you find yourself in, remember that “God does not despise a broken spirit” and He “draws nigh to them” (Ps. 51). If you find yourself in a powerless situation remember that God is most attracted to the humble. He specializes in situations you have no ability to change. Don’t assume a victim role where self pity steals your faith but know that God is building a testimony in you and making you a wounded healer that can continue the ministry of Jesus to those around you.

Good questions about the
FRUIT of healing Prayers

There are no perfect healing prayers or ministers but God answers prayer. Be FAITHFUL, pray and keep FOCUS on Him.

1. Can God use a person who is sick or has constantly sick family members or who has character weaknesses etc… to teach on healing and pray for the sick?

Answer: Rom 11:29 “The gifts and callings of God are irrevocable.” Scripture doesn't base Holy Spirit grace manifestations (1 Cor 12 "gifts") on character nor life nor family or ministry "successes." One of the greatest healing ministers and men of faith was Smith Wigglesworth who sometimes battled his own infirmities (like Paul Doherty and all of us who pray for others). Smith on a number of occasions would heal many sick each day in meetings but go home to pass kidney stones. OUCH!

2. How do we keep faith to pray for healing when we don’t see people being healed (or saved, or finances change etc…)?

Answer: Healing sometimes involves unknowns because there are many factors (unrepented sin or a person not ready to take responsibility if they receive healing). Sickness is present because of the fall; we live between two kingdoms-heaven and darkness, and our thinking has been influenced by naturalism (what is seen or touched is real). So, we are uncomfortable with mystery and things unseen like faith and obedience. Richard McAfee used to say that he knew God could heal but not what he would do. My posture generally is to take authority over sickness unless I sense He has another specific will in this case.

3. How do we know to pray if someone may be dying?

Answer: I learned from Richard to always ask first, "Is this a sickness unto death." If I sense "LIFE" then I declare LIFE. If I feel "Release" I try to help people be in faith and agreement that nothing is lacking if God comes to receive this person. As Christians we know death is a change not an end. From our natural or earthly mindset we may feel prayer has failed if one dies but we don’t see the whole picture. Historically Christians have rejoiced for those who went into Christ's presence while at the same time sharing and supporting one another in grief. How else can martyrs and saints so freely offer their lives, and take risks. Let’s RISK. -PD