So... I had quite the eventful weekend. This and more to follow...

Gary Best was in the 'Peg to lead a "Naturally Supernatural" conference at WCV this past weekend. He was speaking about the Kingdom of God in the classic Wimber-Vineyard style. It was low key, anti-hype and very pro-Holy Spirit. Yeah.

So, over the course of the weekend, I prayed for three people who claimed to have received significant healing from God, one guy who was dealing with lots of shame and God affirmed His love to, and probably some more people that have faded into the ether of my memory. And Saturday night, Gary talked about asking for the kingdom to come and then waiting to see what God would do.

He also spoke strongly to not needing it to happen to me, but rather being happy about and blessing whatever God does in the community, because what is good for one person in the community is good for all of us! So, here I was, anticipating God's kingdom on the verge of breakthrough and waiting to see where I could go and bless what He was doing, when it turned out that He had me in mind. The Holy Spirit fell on me and proceeded to do a whole bunch of stuff in me over the next hour or so.

I hesitate to say too much simply because it's not about me. It's about the gift that He's trying to turn me into for the sake of others. He spoke to my fear of rejection, my need for courage to rise above that fear and spoke powerfully that He would be more than enough in these things. This, amongst a lot of other things such as: it turns out that I have not completely arrived on the other side of my shitty childhood (surprise surprise) and still need God's continuing grace and healing in my life. I thought that I was finished with all of that stuff, but that's of course wishful thinking. How is it that I'm so much of an idealist and a pessismist at the same time?

Anyways, this has mostly been a rambling for my own benefit. I had been in a season where God was more of a concept than a person. He was an idea more than an interactive, loving Father. Well, now I've been reminded that God's actually a person! A ridiculously powerful and loving person at that... Oh, did I mention that He's really good too?

Anyways, I'm not even sure if I'm gonna post this. I'm not the kind of guy who wants to be an experientially driven Christian. I've seen that road and I've rejected it. But if God's a Person, surely there's a role to be played in experience?

Anyways, I think I'm done this stream of pondering. What I know is that God has done what I didn't even know that I needed Him to do. Thanks Father. You sure know how to be God.