We are in a pillar moment of history. The church across the globe has been given an invitation to enter into an internal expression and external understanding of Christianity unlike any other. But at the moment abortion, pornography, bitterness are rampant in the church - especially in America. How can we step into our calling while we are filled with compromise and complacency?

We have grown used to our barrenness (even formed false theology around it), and we have lost our reverence for holiness. We aren’t concerned with the sin in our lives. Especially the ‘little’ sins. Do we not know that dealing with our sin and barenness is a matter of life and death? There is a massive shifting coming to the world wide Church: God is going to change the face of Christianity, and each of us will find ourselves standing in one of two places: 1) Saved and anointed; or 2) Unsaved and offended at God.

Just because you are saved now does not mean you will be saved then. You and I have to work out our salvation.

DEALING WITH SIN AND BARENNESS

We must deal with the sin and the barrenness of our life or else gamble our very salvation. But we can’t deal with it in the way we are used to. Sin is in our very nature so to overcome it we have to get outside of ourselves. We cannot free and purify our own heart by exerting our own will.

It is through the grace of God that we grow in sanctification. He alone can lead us into maturity.

If all human strivings end in moral bankruptcy (and having tried it, we know it is so), and if righteousness is a gracious gift from God (as the Bible clearly states), then is it not logical to conclude that we must wait for god to come and transform us? Strangely enough, the answer is “no.” … for happily there is something we can do. We do not deed to be hung on the horns of the dilemma of either human works or idleness. God has given us the Disciplines [lifestyle practices] of the spiritual life as a means of receiving His grace [maturity in God]. The Disciplines allow us to place ourselves before God so that He can transform us.

- Celebration of Discipline, Richard Foster

EVERYBODY THINKS OF CHANGING HUMANITY AND NOBODY THINKS OF CHANGING HIMSELF

You will only do a fraction of what you could in the power of God if loving God is not your highest goal. It is good to seek to change the world, but first you must be holy and clean or the anointing of God will crush you.

If you are not in daily prayer; if you are not regularly fasting; if you are not actively and practically seeking to know God - then I imagine that you are backslidden. Backslidden from your invitation of intimacy, nobility and power.

I am backslidden. There is no doubt in my mind. I feel the pain of the distance between where I am right now and the invitation the Lord has given me. I know that there is more.

WORK OUT YOUR SALVATION

There are 100 other things I would rather do than pray, fast and read the Bible. But I have committed to do them. I force myself into these disciplines when I don’t want to because I know, that through them I will find encounter. I am working out my salvation in partnership with the Holy Spirit.

The lifestyle practices of prayer, managing my time and money, making a covenant with my eyes and bridling my tongue do not earn me the anointing. Rather, they are preparing me for when the anointing comes. So when God wants to meet me in a new way, I am where He wants me and I don’t miss the move of God in this generation.

Our world is full of superficial people, talking about something they have no depth or reality in. It is my responsibility, and yours to stay in our prayer closets until we get an encounter.

Even if it takes 50 years, because I’m talking about so much more than a little bit more Holy Spirit here and a little bit over there. I am talking about the very hinge of history towards righteousness or towards evil that rests upon the watchfulness of the Saints.