Monday, July 4, 2011

Exploding with Joy! (Part2)

I guess I'd best get back to blogging about my weekend, while it is still fresh!

SATURDAY


Saturday morning was full of more good-y greatness! It was a beautiful, sunny morning with birds chirping and fish jumping in the lake outside our tent.

The session brought even further revelation from the day before, and more rooting out of the weeds and sowing of the flowers in my life.

Robin Pasley started out the session with some beautiful words. I'm having a hard time portraying in words what happened in the room and in my heart that morning, so bear with me...

She told us that the enemy wants sonship to be hard, but it's not! And the enemy wants healing to be scary, but it's not!

She talked a lot about healing and forgiveness and reconciliation.

She talked about judgments that we hold in our hearts; judgments about ourselves, judgments about others, and judgments about God.

This got me.

This is where the Spirit convicted even more deeply.

She said, "If we have a judgment that someone just 'is that way,' we can't reconcile... If we have judgments, we can't forgive or receive forgiveness."

These judgments we make, especially about others, just deciding that they are "just that way," cause us to the lower the bar of expectation for the one the judgment is about and does not allow for us to believe in the best future that God has dreamed of for them. Ouch.

Then we took time to write down some of these judgments we have about others and ourselves and the Lord. My list felt very long. We talked about how these judgments are in the air around us and poison the air we breathe. We fill up balloons with this poisonous air and hold onto the balloons. It was time to let them go.

After sharing with the people at our table about some of the things on our list, Ben and Robin stopped us and reminded us that we need to break these agreements we've made with the devil in the name of the Lord Jesus and by His blood, which has redeemed us, and proclaim the truth instead. There were several people who stood at the microphones and broke these agreements publicly. It was beautiful. My husband was one of them. Actually, he was the first. It was freeing.

There were so many people that we stopped sharing at the mic and started doing it at table level. We were with some wonderful people who blessed us by their vulnerability and their encouraging words. Wow! So blessed.

I was able to go through a lot of things on my list...

In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by His blood, I break the agreement that I made with the devil that we (me and my husband) will forever be in a season of trial and suffering and never experience abundant life in this lifetime: I claim the truth that Jesus has given us abundant life here and now and that the Father gives good gifts to His children.

In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by His blood I break the agreement that I made with the devil that no one understands us (me and my husband) and never will so we will always be on our own to get through this life; I claim the truth that we were made to be who we are for a purpose and God's purpose for our life is good and will prevail and He will send us the support that we need.

In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by His blood I break the agreement that I made with the devil that the people in my life will always hurt me and it isn't worth opening myself up to them because they don't really care about me; I claim the truth that relationships are the heartbeat of the Father and He plans to speak to me and bless me through the relationships I have and to use me to bless others.

In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by His blood I break the agreement that I made with the devil that my husband will never be accepted for who he is so I can't accept him for who he is and am embarrassed by him; I claim the truth that my husband was fearfully and wonderfully made to be just who he is and who he is is good, actually, amazing and I am truly blessed to be by his side and have no reason to be ashamed of or embarrassed by him!

Phew! Freedom. Beautiful healing.

"Hahaha you devil; you're not gonna steal my destiny!"  -Doug Roberts

There was a lot of other knowledge and wisdom that Ben and Robin Pasley presented, as well as Joe Steinke, but that will have to be in a another blog specifically about the Kingdom and sonship...

That afternoon I went to the "Parenting" breakout and Tom went to the "Sons vs. Slaves" breakout. I gleaned great pearls of wisdom from the beautiful and amazing couple who led it (Dave and Polly Uher, who you will hear more about in the Sunday post) and the equally so couple who accompanied them (Gary and Karla Adolphe, who you will also be hearing more about). Good things to bring home and start practicing!

Our breakout ended early so I went to join the breakout Tom was in. Boy was I in for something special!

When I got there Robin was talking to Tom about being baptized in the Holy Spirit.  **screeeeach!** I heard those breaks causing smoke. I know. I was a huge skeptic at this point myself.

A little background: Tom and I have talked about this many times before. What we think of it, our experiences, etc. However, it has been something that has still been really "out there" to me. I actually considered going to the "Holy Spirt" breakout they had added to Saturday's list to hopefully find out more, but decided I'd keep working on my perception and relationship with the Heavenly Father that weekend and maybe get some more info about the Spirit next year.... Lol. That makes me laugh now...

So Robin was talking to Tom about how being baptized with the Holy Spirit is really just about receiving more of the Lord. Tom had been struggling that day with the concept that the Holy Spirit is the "adapter" to make the "head knowledge" become "heart knowledge" and what that was going to look like for him. As Robin was wrapping up about simply receiving more of the Lord, she asked if anyone else wanted it, too. I had a huge urge to raise my hand and join my dear husband at the front to be "baptized" in the Spirit, too. (I use quotations for "baptized" because I think it's just a misnomer; it's actually just about receiving more of the Lord through Holy Spirit.) I really wasn't sure of all of the details and logistics of it, but I knew that I have been praying to receive more of the Lord for months and maybe even years and this was exactly what I needed. I figured I'd make sense of all of the rest of it later.

Robin prayed over me. I didn't fall over or start convulsing or anything dramatic like that. I felt a warm sensation envelop me. I felt the presence of the Lord closer than I ever had before. I heard the voice of the Lord! My prayers were answered!

Wow.

No other way to describe it.

You might be thinking all skeptically that it's all just a bunch of hocus pocus nonsense that doesn't mean anything. I'm sorry for you. I used to think the same thing. I was sorely wrong.

I'm so glad that the Lord decided to reach out to me and bless me with His Spirit in this way, even though I was planning to put it off for another year.

I did get a chance to talk to Tom later about what Robin had been saying before I got there. Here is an excerpt from my journal about the whole thing:

"So basically what it boils down to is this: Yes, we receive the Holy Spirit the moment we put our faith in Jesus - as a deposit. But we need to be baptized in the Spirit for Him to fully reveal Himself and to more or less "draw" on the deposit. Which makes sense@ The Holy Spirit is a Gentleman. When we place Jesus as Lord, the Holy Spirit is placed in us. But He will not move and act to His full capacity until we invite Him to do so by choosing to receive Him.... AND Jesus was baptized by the Holy Spirit even! If Jesus wasn't too "spiritual" [already] to need such a thing, how could I think that I don't need it??"

You can think what you want about this. I think it is awesome! And I hope that you are encouraged and blessed because of this revelation I have had.


Anyway, I am not the same person I used to be.

This became more and more clear to me on Sunday, which you will have to stay tuned to hear about...