Thursday night, 1/28/10 was more than "interesting." After some time in worship and a word from Hosea 6:3, our Nigerian brother Marcus began to pray aloud and many voices were lifted up in song and prayer. Together with Marcus' crying out, we punched a hole by the Spirit and the joyful presence of the Lord broke out. So as the message from Hosea 6, Ephesians 4, and Jeremiah 31 released faith, and the prayers of faith and the Song of the Lord released "Presence," joyful dancing, ministry, restoration, and healing ensued. Faith was strengthened and relationships were deepened. The promised healing of the broken heart happened as Isaiah 61:1 describes—a common thread of experience throughout this 21-day fast.
Here's what I shared concerning the outpouring of revelation:
Hosea 6:3: “Let us know, Let us pursue the knowledge of the Lord (press on to know Him). His going forth is established as the morning; He will come to us like the rain (literal Hebrew meaning to "rain" is "violent pouring"), like the latter and former rain to the earth.”
A great shift is coming throughout the church. To inspire a greater pursuit of the Spirit of revelation and hunger for the knowledge of the Lord, I related the "violent rain" outpouring described in Hosea to the prophecy of the new covenant in Jeremiah 31:34, "No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,' because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,' declares the LORD." This great shift of "all of us knowing God for ourselves" will occur largely because of the outpouring of prophetic revelation and will have a "leveling" affect on church leadership.
In the past, America’s church was built on teachers and pastors rather than apostles and prophets. And as precious and necessary as pastors are, on their own, they will not be able to release this next move of God. The five-fold ministry has been given to see the whole body—including pastors and teachers—enter into the measure of FULL stature in Christ. Ephesians 4:11-13 prophetically declares this truth: "It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God's people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ." And Ephesians 4:13 will be fulfilled before Jesus returns for His victorious Bride.
As the body of Jesus Christ, we will always have certain distinctions and focuses in different ministries, boldly celebrating these specialties instead of disputing or disregarding them. We are seeing a measure of this happening now in various "awakenings," such as with John Arnott, Bill Johnson, Mike Bickle, and Rick Joyner, Bob Jones, and Todd Bentley. Church leaders are coming together, respectfully submitting to one another and openly working together to pursue the presence of God.
The greatest revelation of the kingdom is that it is not an organization. It is a Family. We can do many things in ministry but without a sense of family as our backdrop, we forget our personal identity and eternal purpose that is anchored in the unfathomable love of our Father. Relating to each other as family instead of a member of an organization tests us leaders because it can sometimes appear unfocused. Family spends a considerable amount of time simply hanging out and loving each other. In reality, family time is an intentional move by the Spirit that teaches us how to enjoy each other as family like we will be enjoying each other for eternity.
Last night, young adults gathered together at the Lighthouse Prayer Room to simply love each other and to enjoy being together with the Lord. Being led by the Spirit isn’t synonymous with spontaneity but it will always be organic. We’ve all seen what a prayer meeting looks like when a few can swing their swords but we will see the results when the family swings one sword (Is. 27:1).
Humility is receiving boldly as a child. The key to inheritance is our revelation of sonship. Servants are not heirs, only family has that privilege. The last portion of our time together was spent receiving from the Father and blessing His beautiful name. It is His good pleasure to give us His kingdom. We lined up together and declared with one voice, “Papa! Get me with your best shot!” Haha!
Your bro, Nick Cruze
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