Date Night With Holy Spirit

Hot. It’s hot tonight. When we got to the Healing Rooms it was 95 degrees out and there was nobody outside. I thought to myself, “It’s going to be hard to pray for people if we can't find any people”. Don't underestimate what God can do. In about an hour we found, and prayed for 12 different people that were on our Treasure maps. All but two, were either going into or coming out of the bars and clubs.

As far as some of the clues (words of knowledge) Holy Spirit gave us, it was a very eclectic mix of names, initials, colors, what people were wearing, headlight, red car, mustache/dark blue shirt, bar, and a bunch of generally weird clues. Three different members of the team received the clue of "back pain". God put them all together and led us on a trail of people that He lined up for us all through a two block area of downtown Kennewick. At the end of about an hour, we looked back in awe at what Holy Spirit had done. He had us at just the right place at just the right time for the right person and we had the right clues for that person. I will always be amazed at how He arranges everything for us. All we have to do is GO and DO what He shows us. It's easy and fun and a bit scary.

The first treasure we found was a young man in his mid-20's about to go into a bar. He was wearing clothes that were "gray/blue". I stopped him before he went into the pub, told him he might be on my Treasure Map, and asked him to look at our other clues. We had the initials of his first and last name and he was suffering with back pain. He had worked construction and had hurt his back. He told me the pain never left - it was always there. From a scale of 1 - 10, I asked him to tell me what the pain level was right now. He said it was a level 5 and he was hurting. He gave me permission to lay my hand on his back and pray for him. I had him check his back and he said the pain had dropped to a level of 2. God was up to something. I prayed again, and the pain left completely. We had just had an encounter with the healing power of God on the sidewalk outside of a bar. Over the next 15 minute I shared the good news of Jesus with this young man. He had just encountered the power of LOVE because God is love.

We found a group of four young black men with the clues, "in the street", "dark skin", "white shirt", "white hat" "green/white", name that starts with "K", "shoulder pain", and an unusual "green" color. We had clues for all four of them and they all received prayer, a prophetic word, and heard about the love of Jesus. When we first approached them they were commenting about the good looking girls that were entering the Comedy Club across the street. When we were finished they had all bowed they head in prayer to the living God and I doubt they think they were thinking about the girls anymore.

Roger had a description of a bartender on his map and it took him about four bars, but he found and prayed for that bartender. He was digging for God's gold and he didn't stop until he found what Holy Spirit had showed him. God is going to reward his perseverance with more open doors and more power to release God’s kingdom.

Thursday nights have become our date night with Holy Spirit.

What would the Church look like, if?

We have decided that teaching the Gospel without demonstrating the Gospel is not enough. Good preaching, good doctrine, and being good people is not enough.

We have decided that having a good church club is not enough, good fellowship is not enough, and just being a member of that club is not enough.

We have decided that having good Bible studies is good, but not good enough, that just making it to heaven is not our goal, and that knowing about God without truly knowing and experiencing God is meaningless.

We have decided that having good programs is not enough; that change without transformation is intolerable, and that staying the same is not an option.

We have decided that gifting without character is futile.

We have decided that singing songs without worshiping is shallow and having meetings without God showing up is pointless.

We have decided that having faith without works is not enough and having works without love is not acceptable - that our function comes out of our relationship first with the Father and second with each other.

We have decided that reading about the book of Acts without living the book of Acts is unthinkable.

We have decided that confident faith is good and bold faith is better.

We have decided that hearing about the Holy Spirit without experiencing Him is silly, that believing in His presence without seeing It manifested in signs and wonders is hypocrisy, that believing in healing without seeing people healed is absurd, and that believing in deliverance without people being delivered is absolutely ridiculous.

We have decided to be Holy Spirit filled, Holy Spirit led, and Holy Spirit empowered - anything less doesn't work for us.

We have decided to be the ones telling the stories of God's power - not the ones hearing about them.

We have decided that living saved, but not supernatural is living below our privilege and short of what Christ died for.

We have decided that we are a battle ship not a cruise ship, an army, not an audience; Special forces not spectators, missionaries not club members.

We have decided to value both pioneers and settlers - pioneers to expand our territory and settlers to build on those territories - but we are not squatters - people who take up space others have fought for without improving it.

We have decided to be infectious instead of innocuous, contagious instead of quarantined, deadly instead of benign.

We have decided to be radical lovers and outrageous givers.

We have decided that we are a mission station and not a museum:
Therefore:
1. We honor the past - we don't live in it.
2. We live in the present with our eyes on the future.
3. We see past events - successes and failures - as stepping-stones not stop signs.
4. We pursue learning in order to be transformed, not learning in order to know.
5. We are people of engagement not observation.
6. We focus on what could be, not on what is or has been.
7. We are not limited to the four walls of this building. Our influence is not restricted by location - Not even the nations are out of bounds.
8. We are more concerned about how many we send out into the world than how many we convince to come into the building. This building is meant to be filled and it will be - but it will not be the measure of who we are or the measure of our effectiveness.
9. We raise up world changers - not tour guides. We train commandos, not committees.
10. We are a people of our destiny, not of our history.

We have decided that it is better to fail while reaching for the impossible that God has planned for us than succeed settling for less.

We have decided that nothing short of His Kingdom come, His will be done in our world as it is in Heaven will satisfy.

We have decided that we will not be satisfied until our world freaks out and cries out "Those who have turned the world upside down have come here too."

Decisions That Define Us © 2005 David B Crone

The New Treasure Hunter - Shelley

June 3, 2010

The first Thursday of the month in downtown Kennewick is “Art Walk”. All the galleries and artists have open houses and display their art works on into the evening. On this evening, a large group of young kids were playing music and there were a lot of people enjoying the performance. What a perfect night for a treasure hunt!

After a time of worship and prayer with the Healing Room people, Julie and I sat at a table in the Bridge Church and wrote down the clues Holy Spirit gave us. Terry joined us a little late. There was a young lady named Shelley just hanging out listening to the music so I asked her if she wanted to join us. She had never gone treasure hunting before. She said yes. I gave her a map, prayed for her, and told her to write down any clues she felt Holy Spirit was giving her. She wrote down a name and “knee” for something that someone might need prayer for. I wanted her to get one more clue so I told her to look at the stick man on the treasure map and to draw an arrow towards a part of the body and God would give her one more clue. She drew an arrow to the “arm” of the stick man. A few of the clues on my map was the name “Paul”, “knee”, and a drawing of a “skull”. The “skull” drawing looked like something one might find as a tattoo on someone. Very weird clue!

We joined the crowd of people on the corner listening to the kids playing their music. In that large crowd there was a lady with a soft cast on her arm. Maybe she was the clue on Shelley’s map. While Julie and Terry were praying for another lady, Shelley and I approached the lady with the cast on her arm.  We told her that God had highlighted her to us and that we believed she was God’s treasure. We showed her Shelley’s drawing with the arrow towards the arm and asked her about the other clues. I asked her if the name “Paul” meant anything to her. She pointed towards her son-in-law seated in front of us. His name was Paul. Her daughter had a bad “knee” and she was seated next to Paul. The weird clue “skull” was her grandson. He walked up to us and there was a large picture of a “skull” on his tee shirt. It looked just like the drawing on my map. Holy Spirit had given us clues for her and her whole family.

At that time she knew something supernatural was going on and she opened up to us about her life. She told us of the surgeries and the battle with breast cancer. The next step for her was total disability. We told her that God had led us to her for a reason and that Jesus loved her so much He picked her out of that large crowd of people. We had a prayer meeting right there on the sidewalk. We even got to pray for her daughter’s knee. Holy Spirit revealed to this lady that God loved her and that she was special to Him. She was so special that Jesus died on a cross for her salvation and healing.

God used the brand new Treasure Hunter, Shelley to lead us to His “Treasure”.

Our group of Treasure Hunter had the privilege of praying for four other people that night. This was an example of one of them. God is so awesome!

I Will Never Be The Same

The Bridge, Richland went for it this past Saturday and I got to be a part of their 2nd Treasure Hunt.  About 13 of us showed up; enough for 3 teams.  I was asked to share a few stories of recent Treasure Hunts and did a short time of instruction.  I had the pleasure of being teamed up with three awesome revivalists and we had a great adventure.  Our clues led us to a small park and then to the Uptown Shopping Center in Richland.  In the course of about 50 minutes we found four groups of people that were on our "Treasure Maps".  Just finding each group with the clues that Holy Spirit had given us was miraculous.

 

Our first location was a small park.  The lady in our group had a clue of “guitar on the front of a black shirt”. The 1^st person we see when arriving at the park is a man with a black shirt with two guitars on the back. Close enough! We got to pray a blessing prayer with that couple and started looking for who else the Lord wanted to touch in that park.

The young man in our group had just showed me the drawing of a "pair of wings" on his map.  He thought it might be on a Pontiac Firebird car.  A moment later I saw a young lady in her late 20's wear an "orange" tee shirt with a large butterfly on the back.  The butterfly "wing" kind of looked like the drawing I had just looked at.  We went for it and approached the women in the parking lot.  We told her what we were doing which got her curiosity going long enough for us to see if anymore of our clues fit her.  We asked her if she had any pain issues or problems in the "lower back" or with her "arm".  She told us she suffered from arthritis in both of those areas.  The clues of "family issues" and "sleep disorder" also fit her and we then had the privilege of praying for one of her children and against the sleep apnea that effected her getting a good night’s sleep.  The lady in our group laid her hand on the young lady's back and we invited the healing power of Holy Spirit to come and break arthritis out of her body.  Awesome!  She said her back was getting warm and tingling.  Warm and tingly is good.  We knew Holy Spirit was touching her.

This young lady had just recently joined the Mormon Church.  We didn't want to get into any debate with her.  We wanted her to have an encounter with the real Jesus and the power of Holy Spirit and she did.  We shared the love of our Jesus with her and gave her some contact info if she had questions.  God is so good!

 

Uptown Shopping Center:  What a good place for a couple of divine encounters.  The young man on our team had a clue of "blue sweater or coat".  I though there is no way we would ever find that clue as it was almost 85 deg's out.  Guess what?  We weren't there a minute and he found a lady on a bench wearing a "blue sweater".   There was a Navy Veteran with her and we got to share Jesus with him and pray for his back.  The presence of Holy Spirit touched him right there on the sidewalk.

The last "Treasure" meant the most to me.  God is a God of love, and he loves people through us.  We had just finished praying for the Vet and the young man on the team got a headache just above his eye.  He normally doesn't get pain like that so he knew it was someone else’s (word of knowledge).  We hadn't walked 20 steps and I noticed a "green/yellow" tattoo on the shoulder of a young lady that had passed going the other direction on the sidewalk.  I chased her and her parents down and showed her the "green/yellow" clue on my map.  The rest of my team caught up with me.  What was awesome was that the moment the young man on the team walked up to her, his headache left.  The young lady's name was Amy.  I had a clue of "A _ _" on my map under the name category.

It was then that Amy's parents told us that the cancer had come back.  She had recently been diagnosed as having a brain tumor.  It was the cause of her headaches.  She showed us the scar on her head where surgery had been done about four years earlier.  Now the cancer was back.  We then proceeded to have church right there on the sidewalk.  The love of God was poured into that family through us, the church.  The prayer of faith by the laying on of hands was offered up to Daddy God.  The Spirit of love surrounded us all. 

I will never be the same.

Bookmobile

My wife and I partnered with the Kennewick Healing Rooms this Thursday night.  She had a good analogy for what we do; they are the library and we are the bookmobile.  Sounds like someone who works in a library.  The point is, we both bring the kingdom of God to people, but we get to walk around more. 

After prayer and worship and just getting into the presence of Father God, we got out our treasure maps and wrote down some clues (words of knowledge) to lead us to the people God wanted to touch that night.  Some of the clues that led us to two young ladies that night were, "black/white" = appearance, "flower/rose" and the color "red" = unusual.  We also had what looked like "angel wings" in the prophetic art part of our map.

God's timing is perfect.  Thirty seconds earlier or later and we would have missed them.  Walking down the sidewalk we stopped for less than a minute looking at a painting of a "red flower" in a store window.  We looked up to see two young women in their 20's walking toward us. They had just walked out of a tattoo parlor a couple doors down the street.   Both of them were wearing clothes that were "black/white".  One of them also had a large tattoo of a large "red flower" on her shoulder.  We had found God's treasure!  After we had talked to them awhile we also noticed a tattoo of what looked like "angel wings" on her back.   My wife was going to write down the clue of "music" earlier but talked herself out of it, and this young lady also had musical notes tattooed on her wrist.  When it doubt, write it down.

After telling them what we were doing and getting to know them better, we asked if we could pray for them.  We showed them some other "clues" we had on our Treasure Maps.  One of our clues was a problem in the "neck area".  The other young lady said she suffered from Scoliosis.  I asked her, on a scale of 1-10, what was her pain level was?  She said the pain was at a level six.  My wife laid her hand on her neck and prayed the prayer of faith over her neck and spine.  After prayer I asked her to check out the pain level again.  She said the pain was gone.  Awesome!  We then shared the love of God with them and how much they were loved by Him.  We then prayed for the presence of Holy Spirit to come and touch them and make Himself real to them.

The presence of God showed up on a sidewalk in downtown Kennewick on a Thursday night!  I never knew being the church could be so much fun!

“That was God”

My friend Greg organized a treasure hunt Sunday after church and we met at South Hills Church on 27th Ave.  Enough people for two teams joined the fun.  For me, this was one of the most powerful times I have experienced, ever.  Our team had location clues of Starbucks and Walmart.  The word of knowledge that turned out to be common with all three of the groups of people that Greg and I prayed for was "diabetes".  When I shared this clue with our team, Greg mentioned that one of the youth pastors of his church had been diagnosed with diabetes just a couple of weeks before.

Team member, Robbie, said we were to go to Starbucks first and then Walmart.  When we arrived at Starbucks, there were only two customers there:  the diabetic youth pastor that Greg had just mentioned 15 minutes earlier, and his assistant.  We told him that he was on our treasure map.  We had an awesome prayer time on the sidewalk outside of the Starbucks during which we commanded the diabetes to go and we prayed for the healing power of God to come.

The next evening, Greg ran into this pastor at the church showing everyone his iPhone.  He had on app loaded on it that tracks his blood sugar levels. Up to the time we prayed for him his levels were from 265 to 496, depending on diet.  But, after healing prayer, the blood sugar levels had dropped to the 120 range.  The diabetes had also damaged his eyes to the point that he had to start wearing glasses but after prayer his eyes cleared up and the glasses were no longer needed.  This young pastor left for a conference in California during which he texted Greg to tell him he had started to eat stuff like cookies and there was no change to his blood sugar levels.  He could not do this before.  God is awesome!

The next place on our map was Walmart where our group of four split into two teams. Greg and I were together. Some clues that led our team to the next encounter were:  ladybug, yellow/green, bicycle, knee problem, diabetes, name that started with "M", and a "5 pointed star".  Ladybug had to be one of the weirdest clues ever.  We went to the gardening section of the store with no results.  Turning right after leaving the garden section and next to the "bicycle" aisle, I spotted a young man wearing a "yellow/green" hat.  As we walked over to talk to him, I noticed he had a "5-pointed star" tattooed on his arm.  Things were really getting interesting now.  His name was "M"ike and he had problems with his "knees".  His step-mom was with him and she was very negative about what was happening. I asked Mike if he knew anyone suffering from "diabetes."  He pointed to his step-mom and said "she does."  At that point she said that "this is very weird" and walked away.  I think she was a little afraid because what was going on was supernatural.  By this time Mike was into it.  He let us pray for healing of his knees and we prophesied into his life.  The step-mom came back and I commanded the diabetes to leave her body and the kingdom of God to come over her.  She was about 6 feet away.  As we left, Greg heard the mom tell her step-son, "That was God."

The next family we prayed for also had a 5-pointed star tattoo, the letter of her name, diabetes, and four other clues.  The prayer time was amazing. 

The kingdom of God had come into the Walmart store.

Remember the "ladybug" clue?  Orin was the one that received this word of knowledge.  Guess what?  As Robbie and Orin were walking around the other part of Walmart, a real ladybug landed on Orin's shoulder.  What are the odds of that?  God has an awesome sense of humor!

A New Chapter….

We've started a new chapter in this great adventure in the kingdom of God. On Thursday nights, we meet with the Kennewick Healing Rooms staff.  They meet at The Bridge Church, and pray for the sick and hurting.  After prayer and a time of entering into the presence of Holy Spirit with the Healing Rooms staff, we have started "Treasure Hunting" on the streets of downtown Kennewick.  There are many taverns, clubs, tattoo parlors, and small business in the old part of downtown Kennewick.

Tonight Roger and I went out.  The first treasure we found fit the clues of “long blondish hair", "plaid top," "lamp post," and "relationship issue."  As soon as we went out the front door of the church, Roger spotted her a half-block away and he knew she was on our treasure map.  She and another woman were taking a smoke break outside one of the taverns not far from a lamp post.  After sharing with her how much God loved her, she wanted prayer for some relationship issues with her boy friend and someone at her work place.  It was a good start for the evening.

Next we walked by a small business that was closed for the day but still had people inside.  Roger saw a couple he knew and they let us in to visit.  There were two other guys there who were working on a motorcycle.  One had a "light tan top" and his name started with a "T". I called him over and told him I believed he was on our Treasure Map.  I asked him if he was having problems with his "left knee" and he said he had injured it about a year before. With that word of knowledge he opened up and told me about his life.  His was a life of pain, prison, and brokenness.  He was really trying to straighten up his life.  He let me pray a prayer of healing for his knee.  During that prayer I also felt led to pray for his finances which he later said was a really big issue for him at the present time.  The presence of God was in that place.  During the time I was praying with "T", Roger prayed for the other three people in the store.  Awesome!