Oh it's the fullness of your spirit!

Shekinah glory come; Shekinah glory come :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztXeKaMjtas

^^Onething 2011 video from IHOP





The One Thing Conference these past two nights have been amazing... I've seen so many other people from our city praying and worshiping God and experiencing his presence and I've gotten to pray and connect with some new people- it's SO awesome feeling the holy spirit flow like that in such a place! I can never get over how great God moves in such prayer meetings and worship conferences. The guest speakers are great.




One of the girls that was singing was Audra Lynn- she's one of the main girls that sings Come Up Here, Take your Place, and some other IHOP music. I wish I knew who the other girl singer was- she sings this song that we played a few times at youth camp and the guy is always singing with them... The people at this conference is actually their main team that records and plays spontaneous worship and prayer music ay IHOP. The worship is absolutely AMAZING!
One of these days when I actually get to go to IHOP... well.... it's gonna be awesome. :)


I really want to be at the break out sessions to learn more about the college but if I can't that's okay.

There are so many things heavy in prayer right now...

God has been showing me all of these passions I never knew I had. I never knew I had a passion to sing like four months ago and now it's like coming out of me.

He's moving like he's never moved before... and so are we.

Tomorrow night- the last night of the conference will be for sure interesting...


Good night :)

lately

So I've been thinking a lot lately about my plans ahead as far as this summer and my Sophomore year of high school... it's so hard to believe that this year is coming to an end already- it feels like my first day of school was last month, but I suppose that's how life goes in this time.

I typed a LOAD but blogspot decided to be rude and delete it... *glare*

Anyway, I've been thinking about next year and this upcoming summer. This summer will be busy as usual. Going to Baltimore to see my dad, coming home, going to youth camp, going to kids camp as a junior counselor and here comes my second year to slap me in the face. ON TOP of that we're suppose to be moving right before I leave on my trip... and people are wanting me to do marching band next year. I want to do it! I really do. But I can't go to band camp, therefore I won't know the music, and I'll be spending my time catching up with that and doing Raiders AND getting used to my schedule...
To tell the truth, it really comes down to what matters in the long run.

I LOVE band.
Most of my friends will be in marching band next year.
But I'm going to be honest- I won't have time for it.
Seriously.
I'll hardly have time for raiders.



I want to focus on First Priority and campus ministry next year. My school needs it more than anything else... I wanted to do it this year but I was so stressed with how much changed and was too nervous. I saw visions and expected them to happen right away, but it doesn't work that way. Baby steps into God's plan is what needs to happen and focusing on his plan. Sometimes it rough but I've gotta push other things out of the picture in order to keep God first and the calling he's put on me... I know his calling for me because it's implanted in me, and that is to minister to those around me and influence them and to start campus ministries. It's SO big on me that I see revival in my school and I CAN'T let that down. That doesn't mean I'm not close to God if I do an EC activity. I just know how I am when I get a crowded schedule- I started getting stressed and won't have time to spend with God and seek him out. And that's what HAS to happen in order for campus ministry to go on.

I don't even know what all will happen. I just need to get students together with passion for Jesus and run with it. Start events like the Bound4Life deal, Flag pole day and doing dramas and concerts. Just having bible studies, meetings and the spreading of the gospel. SOMETHING BIG is coming to my school and God's placed it on me to go out and pioneer what he wants done, no matter what I have to give up and how much of my life it will consume. I live for eternal consequences when it all comes down to it... and this benefits eternity... so as hard is it may seem at times, I've got to do this. Even if it means giving up some stuff. It's disappointing a little, but you know what? It won't be when I see what God starts doing on our campus. And it'll be worth it all.

That reminds me... God's love makes it worth it all.


Maybe people will doubt and the potential I have to run for God and pray for him to spring up the wells of life where my friends and students are.

Maybe when I suggest revival in my school I'll get a doubtful or judged look like "Sure, whatever."

But they don't know what's coming.
They may not even understand it.

I, for one, do.
I saw it... and I'm ready for whatever God tells me to do next so I can run with it and, along the way, find the other burning ones in my school that will run with me.

It's the greatest awakening man will ever see, and it's coming to my school and my city.

International House of Prayer (IHOP) and NHOP (Nashville House of Prayer) are holding a ONETHING 2011 conference in Nashville this weekend... I'm SOOOO excited!!!

I remember going last year and not knowing much about it. Even so, the conference definitely put something on the inside of me. It was AMAZING seeing all of those college people and some high schoolers praying for their campuses and worshiping God... this year I could imagine it being a little different since I'll know who and what to expect, and I KNOW it's going to be so much better!!!! :D It starts this Thursday night, goes on all day Friday and all day Saturday. It's going to be so awesome, I know God's going to move there. I'm as excited to go there as much as I am the Ramp.

I didn't really even start getting into IHOP until then and a while afterward. After praying for what future plans God had for me, it dawned on me and sparked a passion on the inside of me one evening after Sunday night prayer- and from that moment I knew what I was doing after I graduated. In my heart, right then and there, it was like God planted something in me that I was to go there. Not to a professional college like I'd thought, but to be honest I'd like IHOP a LOT better than being stuck here in Murfreesboro going to MTSU or any other college. I'd thought about it because I was worrying about a career like the stupid high school requirements are provoking me to, but now it's like I know for sure- God is sending me to IHOP. And when I go there a lot of things are going to be different, opportunities are going to arise, I'm going to meet new people and I'm going to be a part of that ministry. I don't know how long and I don't know if I'm coming back to Murfreesboro to stay afterward. I'm so sparked with inspiration... the creativity of God and what he's doing in this generation is not only all over them- but the place is like a dream.

:)

This weekend will have a lot to bring...

I give you all my worship,
Jesus I love you...

http://mediasuite.multicastmedia.com/player.php?v=e6sqpj83

I found that Matt Gilman IHOP song...




I look back on my entire life and wish I had walked in love when I wasn't.
But it's okay. We all have moments like that... and it's awesome that we have a God that loves us so much that he cast everything we've ever done as far as the east is from the west [and sent his son to die for us so we could have love encounters and a relationship with him]...

I've spent a lot of time crying out to God lately... and the one thing I've cried out is to teach me how to love people and to love myself, and to teach this generation how to love him and one another... Just a glimpse of his love for us is so breath-taking. The way we love will never measure up to the way he loves... but our job is to strive to love more and more each day as if we could... to look like him and act like him and think like him everyday no matter what happens...

It was like I had a revelation of his love but I never knew how to apply it to my walk...
and now that I have things have began to change...
I can hardly begin to imagine the awesomeness of these love encounters with God coming onto people... them crying out to God for a love encounter because it's like they can feel God- they don't know how, but they can feel him...

I can't wait for that day...
And that day is here...

Prayer Sunday was so thick. That song that Matt Gilman was singing on the IHOP stream has been playing over and over again in my head ever since then [as if my spirit itself were singing it.] I can't remember all of it but it really had the anointing of God on it and it was just awesome. I only remember a few of the lyrics- such as "Eyes like flames of fire " and "For the beauty of this man."
So much was happening. I'm glad we all had it prayed out- it's really good... it was amazing.

Isaiah 35 is an excellent chapter. Anyone who is reading this should look into it- it's what this generation is and it's what God is shaking in the spirit. It applies to this time. :)



One thing I have learned is that many people have an idea that getting into deep places prayer like that is some sort of special gift and blessing... and it is. But it isn't anything to stress over at all or get angry about if you can't find yourself getting into those places. God has called us to different places- so we won't always get the same thing. Some people are called to deeper places of prayer and some people aren't. That doesn't mean God is favoring anyone- he loves us all dearly and that's why he's set aside an individual plan for each of us that is all different from one another. Each is unique and specially made by him for you. (I don't know about you guys but that makes me feel rather special... :P )

The creativity of God is beautiful, too. (You'd have to think he's creative, I mean look around you at what he made.) The way intercessory prayer is- getting into deep prayer- it just takes you out of the little box religion has marked as "This is how we pray" and tossed it into an ocean of colors and deep places (hope that wasn't too metaphorical.)
Prayer isn't a box. It isn't black and white. It's not a file cabinet or a catalog. It's a river, and it's like a colorful world. You jump in and the holy spirit will teach you what to pray for that time. We can't pick things to pray about using our minds.

"Okay holy spirit, this is me talking and tonight I want to pray about the government leaders of Canada and the revivals in that country."
Problem... You can't tell the holy spirit what you want to pray about. He tells you what he wants you to pray about.
While praying for revival in Canada may be awesome, is it what he's telling you, or what you want to pray about? (I've faced this a lot myself to be honest, but it's gotten better recently.)
Anyway, the point is, there is most certainly an order in prayer, but it's not a logical thing. It's not a thinking process or analytical in-depths observation- it's learning to flow with the holy spirit and him teaching you to pray. And it's awesome!

Usually in corporate settings there is a purpose for that prayer, and other things we have we've got to pray out on our own time. When I pray for people in school, like groups, individuals, and even school in itself there are times I'll have to do it on my own time because praying in corporate settings involve different things. Revival in schools won't be on everyone elses' hearts in prayer at Monday night prayer (unless of course God is prompting everyone to pray about this)- however, things concerning the body of Christ (just for example- there is obviously more) is. And that is what we press into- what he has set. :)




Anyway, now that I've said this, let me get to why I really wanted to write this blog tonight...
I've had more of these dreams lately and they all feel so real. Like it's a real life thing and what's happening is either here now or it's soon to come. And it's so mind-racking and appalling.

One dream I had months ago was of a group of my friends in school. One of the guys I'd been praying for (I know this will sound a bit weird...) had all these crazy bugs on him. And everyone was freaking out because they were like over-coming everyone and biting everyone to the point of where it could kill them. It was like a disease spreading. I didn't know what else to do, so I layed hands on his head and shouted "In the name of Jesus I command all of those bugs to go- they have no authority and I speak them off now!!!" and suddenly all of the bugs scattered and he fell on the ground and it was like we broke into a prayer meeting... It was crazy!!!

Another one was random, but at another part past all of the randomness of my dreams there was this guy that I'm pretty good friends with in school and he was at IHOP- It was at some conference they were having, like Onething maybe in the prayer room. I remember he had his hands raised and was praying and singing and shouting to God. I know he's saved and he goes to a living church for sure, but I've noticed he's the kind of guy with a shell, and in that dream it was like the shell broke and he was worshiping more. From what I've heard he's been responding to God more the past few months from some people... and it's awesome.

Another dream I had there was this girl I'm really good friends with in school- we've been talking about revival and things lately, and I dreamed she was worshiping God with a few others too, but that part was only a glimpse. I believe in the same dream there was another part where there was this group of people and we were all praying together, and one of the guys I've become good friends with lately was there, and I remember laying hands on him and was praying, then I prophesied and from there this girl we were praying with (can't remember who she was) fell over and the guy I was prophesying over had this look of shock but he started praying too.

I had several dreams a bit like this back in July before I even came to high school- but I remember one was where this Christian revival band came to the high school to play and it was sort of like a little Ramp with fewer people. But anyway all these people got saved and filled with the holy spirit... (THAT's what's come up a lot- people getting the holy spirit and getting like revived and revolutionized... This generation and time we're living in is a time full of people desiring to have a real actual encounter with God.)

These aren't the first dreams I had. And I doubt they're the last...

With all of that and the dreams of revival in school I had over the summer before I even went. They've occurred more frequently...

One thing I know for sure is that we've gotta embrace for what's ahead as the generation of God and as the body of Christ, because whatever's coming, it's coming on fast.

There was a shift in the things of God.
Now the walls are down...
and the flood is here.
This IS the movement.

The Winds of a Dream

This is an essay I wrote on February 4th, 2011 for my Honors English class.
The topic was anything having to do with 3 goals we want to accomplish within the next decade or so.






The Winds of a Dream




There was a point in time when I would wake up, and go to bed feeling as if I’d just shoved my way through another day of living. I would get up, go to my small middle school with only about 15 kids in each class, get made fun of along the way, mocked, shoved down and emotionally tormented, and I would come home. I felt like a zombie, walking around lifeless, day after day with the same things happening over and over again. I often wondered what my future beheld, and most of all, I would question God, who I’ve always looked to for help. “God, why am I even here?” I would cry. “What purpose do I serve by being on this earth? I’m a Nobody; there is nobody here who likes me or even accepts me for who I am… Why can’t I hear you speaking to me?”
I may not have been able to hear God’s voice speaking directly to me… but through all of my distress, a still small voice deep within me told me that there was more to live for.

There came a day when I began slowly waking up to life and realizing its true meaning- what we were made for. I began seeing that there was just more than just pushing through life and coming home feeling unwanted and out of place. No matter how hard I had tried to fit in, even at a young age, I wouldn’t. And it was because I didn’t belong fitting in. I didn’t belong in the box marked “Normal” by society. It wasn’t my calling, and it certainly isn’t anyone else’s calling to look like everyone else and be the same and “fit in”, either… I found that I belonged standing up and running with the breath of life greater than any other living on the inside of me. I became a dreamer, dreaming of the changes I would see in my generation as we rose up together- a generation realizing that we don’t have to be the same, living the same thing every day, struggling with the cares and challenges by ourselves. I began dreaming of my generation discovering through the testimonies of others and from God himself that there is so much more we can strive for if we just press harder and have a real passion…
Most of all, I began dreaming of change.
This dream that I’ve now set as a goal to be attained in life is to live this life God has in store for me- to live out the plan he’s laid down and run this race set before me with passion. While running this race of life, I want to run as light and a fire. I want the people around me- my friends, peers, and people I don’t even know to see that it isn’t me as a person that’s different- if I didn’t have God, I wouldn’t be anything. I want them to see that difference that God has put in me- that thing that separates real, passionate, true running followers of Jesus. I’m even willing to say that I want glory of God himself on me as go throughout my life so that when people see me, they will see him and want him. I want to be someone who, when people see me, there will be a passion sparked within them to live the God-walk and chase him. That’s a pretty big demand, some would say. “I don’t know about that, you’re just a person, you know. Who says you can be a Christian and have God all over you and not other Christians?” Well, are those Christians pursuing God, or are they living their comfortable average Christian life, being completely satisfied with spending time with God for two hours or less a week and going home and living the same week that they’ve lived for the past twenty years?
We can’t be afraid to press on, step up, and be who we are. It’s so important that we press on, and I want to be that person that inspires people to do so.

I walked into the doors of Oakland high school on my first day. I walked aabout the campus and observed the different people and different things that were going on. As I constantly prayed for my school, asking God what kind of ministry he wanted me to do there, I realized something so vital toward what is soon to happen. Beneath all of the chaos, the drama, the sin, the façade everyone attempts to put up to hide who they are, there is something big that lies dormant beneath the campus of this school and this city- a blazing passion for God that resembles fire, and what does fire do when it starts?
It spreads.
My goal is to be one out of many students who initiate that movement, that awakening of revival and passion for Jesus in our school and this city. It’s so important not only to me, but also to this generation and to our future. Why are we driven toward our college dream? Why are girls so focused on dreaming of their future husband and children? What drives a teenage boy to show up at every single football practice for his high school team to get dirty, tackled, and bruised?
Passion.
Passion is what drives us toward something… and in this case, something with meaning. While here at this school, I want to hook up with other students with the same passion for Jesus. Even if there were no other students here who had a heart to reach their school for God, because of the passion I have to pursue the kingdom of God, I would continue praying and initiating a movement anyway, mostly out of follow what God wants me to do. Before I set foot on this campus I was praying for the students and faculty and for the love to be shown to them by the way true Christian students live. We’re living in a generation that is tired of being lied to, and that is sick of playing religious games. They want the truth, but they’ve been blinded by so many lies and so much ordinary, patterned, traditional religion that they don’t even know what’s real, and they’re afraid to test what they believe... It's time for us as Christian campus students to step up and do what we were called to do, and out of this, be the leaders of an awakening that is soon to spread throughout our city and eventually the world.

For the past year I've met up with a core prayer group at my church, and we've met every Sunday evening as a small group of four with some of our youth leaders. It all was founded upon the desire to pray for our schools, college campuses, awakening, our city, our body, and mainly the plan God has for each of us as individuals. Knowing the plan God has for us and our future is so important, because when we pray it out he plants it in our heart. After this past year, something began stirring inside of me for even further into the future for after I graduate high school. I'd always wanted to go to a college and study journalism and something of that sort, and I still strongly believe that one day as an adult I will come to that road. But after I graduate high school, I've realized quite recently that my heart is drawn to not attend college in the town I live in which I'd originally thought about, but to go somewhere quite far. I feel so drawn to another place I've known about for not very long. This university college is more of a mission base known as The International House of Prayer in Kansas City, Missouri, or otherwise known as IHOP University, KC.
It's strange to think that after I graduate from high school I won't be jumping into an immediate college in pursuit of a career like most people, and like I've always seen myself doing. I'm not exactly sure what all I will be studying at IHOPU; it's a mission base that focuses on raising up college students to go out into their cities as prayers, missionaries, and people in absolute pursuit of God. At the same time they have job-training and different school areas for students to choose- for example, they have the Fore-Runner's Missionary School in which they teach students the principles, costs, and deep studies of being a missionary no matter where they may go, while another school, called the Fore-Runner Music Academy, gather students that have a heart for music and teach them to play instruments and sing together (though this isn't your average Sunday worship group). This music falls deeper into connecting with God during the worship and learning to flow with music. In small schools like these they have more narrow groups, and my desire is to seek out a place in the Music Academy and in a writing and journalism school. I'm really looking forward to pursuing this college; and however things turn out after I get out, they will turn out. In the mean-time, I am setting myself up to follow God's voice and the plan he has for me. Honestly, I'm excited to go to IHOP KC- I couldn't have picked a better place by myself, and I didn't even realize it until after I got a heart to pray after God's plan!

Thinking about the future ahead and all of the possibilities it has to bring is exciting to me. It makes me excited to see the good things that will turn out, and it may not be an easy trip, but in the end I know it’s going to turn out the way it’s meant to. I absolutely cannot wait to see these things come to pass. Perhaps they'll happen a bit differently than I expect, but I am still looking forward to these goals and I'm pressing after them with all of my heart.









Criticism is welcome, just let me know what you think. It wasn't a strict 3-paragraph-One-topic essay as they would usually strap on us. The point of it was to expand our writing, imagination and creativity because in the past years we were shoved in a small, limited box of what we could and couldn't write about that had to be perfect and black and white (As Mrs. Walker claims... I personally agree.)

As for the last paragraph of the essay, I know it's short but I was running out of time so I just jotted down what I could.

Ps. Ignore the paragraph format, the computer I'm using is an ancient IBM from school.

Between past experiences with God and the one I'm going through now, I've never been quite like this.

There were many times when I went through spiritual drastic changes, such as my first Ramp and last Summer when I was with my dad. At that time I didn't really have any friends around so I prayed for God's love to pour out on the city I was in/from- Baltimore. My dad lives in a neighborhood that may be considered the ghetto compared to Tennessee. A lot of the families in the area are unemployed, drug dealers, addicts, homeless, or have a low income. Things were so different there and it was, in a way, a new view of culture. I never lived there long even when I was little to understand, but being more knowledgeable at 14 than before I noticed differences. I prayed for the kids and families in the neighborhoods and I prayed for my school back in Tennessee. My excitement for high school was building, and even during that time I prayed more often and would get into God's presence more while I was there. I felt like it was just me and God since I didn't have my prayer group or anyone else around. I missed them but it was good for that time and I got so much closer to God.


Now it's almost the same thing... except I haven't left.


A lot of these changes aren't easy. Most of them hurt for a little while and I'm like "God, why am I even doing this?" or "How do I get out of this? What do I do about this?"

It took a while but I learned why a lot of my church leaders are the way they are and do what they do, and I respect them even more and I've had a taste of the things they've gone through to get where they're at. I've always had a desire to run after God. I would look at the leaders in my church and the people I knew were the prayer-ers, like Mrs. Blonda and Miss Heidi and Angie and Mrs. Patty and others. Then I listen to music and some sermons done by people from the Ramp and from Misty Edwards and see how different they are and I pray that I can get as close to God as they are. What they do is an honor and a sacrifice they've been willing to make in order to obtain the plan of God and get a better view of his plan, and there are very few people on the earth who've decided to really take that path and sacrifice those things for God. I admire them.

It's the real choice of whether you're going to follow God with literally your all or not. If something is messing you up you drop it instantly because you want nothing to keep you from ascending into higher places of God and prayer. It's not only that but it's so many other things I can't even put into words. It's the faith of not being afraid to get closer to him. Getting so close to God in his presence is scary, almost, but the desire of his heart more than the comfort or settledness of this world that drives you. You quickly stop relying on the things of the world and you start thinking in this new and clear way.
One of the things the girls in FCA mentioned this morning at their meeting is that no matter how strong of a Christian you are, you're always going to face trials. It's true. We're all going to go through something that is difficult, but that isn't an excuse to run away. I've almost ran, I'm not going to lie or act hypocritical. I might feel like running away in the future. But the desire to see God and be close to him will always over-rule that because I've placed him first.

One reason I see it's hard is because I've had to draw a boundary line.
I'm to a point where I don't rely on people anymore, but I have to rely on God alone. That may sound crazy, but it's an actual deeper relationship with God. Jesus is my ultimate best friend and I don't rely on anyone else to be my best friend or the one person or group of people I tell everything to... I can't. I can have friends obviously- really good friends with good relationships... but there will always be that line that I can't ignore... there are consequences. The truth of the matter is I won't always have a best friend here on earth. Sometimes I've had problems facing that, because I see other people my age and even older than me having a best friend or that friend they're always around or a group of people they tell everything to and I think "Where's mine?" and sometimes it makes me want to cry even thinking that. I'm to a point where I've pushed that away because I've prioritized the best friend in the entire universe and when I've prioritized him, I'm following his plan.

This doesn't mean you can't have a best friend on earth, I never said that... but is Jesus your ultimate best friend or not? Did you draw a line or not? Are you letting too many things out in other people?

I had fear of being alone, but it's like I've been to this place that is so intimate with God that it doesn't matter anymore.
Sometimes when I'm in school I feel like an emotionless statue, because everyone else is rocked and moved by drama, fear, pain, what they think is love, and what they think will fulfill their desires... but I can't be moved by any of that. I don't get excited about rumors or fights or crushes. I don't get moved by people talking about me or lying to me or acting like they're better than me. I'm moved by the fact that my school and my generation is going to be awakened. The move of God and revival springing up inside of the hearts of other students moves me, not the cares of this world.

To be honest, I'd rather be in that place than any other place I was in before.

And as long as I'm looking at it from the top of the mountain, it'll be light.