I have been wrestling through a 'lack of peace' with a few things… and the fact that I realise the root of the issue is most probably in my life has really burdened me. I just have a lot on my heart at the moment and feel a bit trapped. The reason I feel so trapped is that I really cannot share it in many contexts since I would hate it to cause division and confusion.
I am really struggling with church and Christianity and my expression of church. I love God, and realize my salvation is based on Jesus' complete work on the Cross. I am not pointing fingers at a specific church. I love and respect my leaders, and acknowledge the massive selfless sacrifice people have made to contribute and build into my life. I have always been committed to the family God has me in, and committed to the vision God has for my family.
I lost my peace a couple months back. I had started regularly attending the intercession sessions on Tuesdays and Friday morning. It was during this time that the warning light came on in my spirit and my peace flew out the window.
In the UK they have any number of Television Channels with Séances and Astrologists and Illusionists. I obviously don't watch them, but have on occasion while channel flipping come across these channels where I have seen 'Séances' who prey on audiences. They usually have an Audience of a couple hundred, and the 'Mind reader' or 'Séance' who will stand in front of a live audience , and say things like... "I think, I feel there may be a woman, but it may be a man, who is sitting in that part of the audience. (PAUSE) but no, it may not be there, I feel it may be over here on the right. A woman, or maybe a man who has recently lost a man. Yes that's it, I think you have recently lost a male figure in the past while, or in the past but it is still seems like it was recent. Yes, you lost your husband, or maybe your son.. it may be a boy or a child." I don't watch the stuff, but in the short exposure to it I realised the obvious superstition attached to it. I also recognised the potential for the occultism, but also that the Séance was manipulating responses and reading body language and at the end of the process eventually found someone who had recently lost a husband or a son or even their dog. I know how possible it is to manipulate people by eliciting an emotional response. We are usually unable to think with rational clarity if we are emotionally engaged. That's why all these Scam Emails work. You switch on someone's 'greed' switch, and they let down their defence to believe that they really do stand to receive millions of dollars from some deceased president in a distant country.
It was during these sessions that my 'warning switch' was flipped. I lost my peace. I have to admit that it was not instantaneous. I cannot say that one person prayed one thing caused me concern. All the prayers were biblically sound intercession from pure hearts. But it was during the intercession, that I realised that the sense of disquiet I felt was exactly the same as what I had in watching the Séance on the television channel. Over those couple weeks I listened to my family members in intercession share things they had 'seen'... things that they 'felt' God was 'saying'. I really sensed that I was seeing a spirit of superstition at work.
This is where it becomes difficult, I have just thrown a stone at the Church … and I don't mean a specific church, I mean the Bride… and I spent the next weeks repenting for my pride and arrogance that I could question people's motives. So I looked inside myself and questioned how many times I have 'manipulated in prayer'. I know how to press the right buttons. I can bring a man to tears by praying about 'sonship', or about ' God's purpose and destiny and promise'… all good things… but when wielded manipulatively in a self promoting fashion… it was pure witchcraft. I had to repent of praying 'emotionally' for people in the past. My heart has been to bless and see people established… but if I am honest I have prayed manipulatively upon more than one occasion in the past, in order to establish myself in the eyes of others.
I believe with all my heart that God speaks to His children. I have no doubt that God desires to speak to His church and through His church. I believe I have 'heard' God guiding me clearly and specifically through His Word, and by the gentle 'nudging' of my heart, and even through visions. I have testimonies of how God has used Words of Wisdom to powerfully bring about change in lives. During one service, I believed the Holy Spirit was showing me a picture of a girl in a wedding gown who had been raped. Her wedding garments were torn and tattered, and she was soiled. I shared it, and when I called the pastor the next day to repent and say I am sorry for sharing such a crazy thing in Church, he told me not to worry that a girl had responded and God had ministered powerful restoration to this girl who had seen her chances of future marriage and intimacy destroyed by the abuse she suffered. A girl came up to me two years later and thanked me and told me that she was the girl who responded. So yes, I do believe in God speaking now, himself, and through his children, and through normal family members, and through prophets, and through nature… and yes even in intercession in pictures.
But, I came to a realisation that what I was seeing and discerning what not the 'voice of God'. I sensed that I was seeing in the intercession and intercessors the same 'superstition' I had seen in the audience of the Séance programme. I see so much superstition in the Church. I feel like a member in the audience of séance show, with people prophesying and seeing figments of their imagination and proclaiming it to be the word and the will of God... I see superstition and manipulation in prayer...And before you feel I am judging people.... I point my finger at myself! I am the worst of this counterfeit....
I had someone pray for me in February and He said... 'I feel God showing me a pen'. I thanked him and blessed him. In the same breathe it caused me concern. When I read God's Word, He speaks eloquently with awesome prose/poetry... He speaks so clearly to Adam, to Eve, to the Serpent, Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Laban and Joseph ... and that is only in Genesis... When God speaks in images to Jeremiah it is an incredible clear and distinct communication…its beautiful poetry:-
"The word of the LORD came to me, saying, "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,before you were born I set you apart;I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.""Ah, Sovereign LORD," I said, "I do not know how to speak; I am only a child."But the LORD said to me, "Do not say, 'I am only a child.' You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. 8 Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you," declares the LORD.Then the LORD reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, "Now, I have put my words in your mouth. 10 See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant."The word of the LORD came to me: "What do you see, Jeremiah?" "I see the branch of an almond tree," I replied.The LORD said to me, "You have seen correctly, for I am watching to see that my word is fulfilled."The word of the LORD came to me again: "What do you see?" "I see a boiling pot, tilting away from the north," I answered.The LORD said to me, "From the north disaster will be poured out on all who live in the land. 15 I am about to summon all the peoples of the northern kingdoms," declares the LORD. "Their kings will come and set up their thrones in the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem; they will come against all her surrounding walls and against all the towns of Judah. etc etc etc"
I am not pointing fingers at the intercessors, or at the pastors or at the church.... I know that if there is a problem with the church, it means there is a problem with ME... because I am the church... And it is likely that my rebellion and pride filled heart needs to cry out to God for mercy.
If God speaks today, and I believe He does, when was the last time I heard him speak with the poetry of His conversation with Job:-
" Would you indeed annul My judgment? Would you condemn Me that you may be justified?Have you an arm like God?Or can you thunder with a voice like His?Then adorn yourself with majesty and splendor, And array yourself with glory and beauty.Disperse the rage of your wrath;Look on everyone who is proud, and humble him.Look on everyone who is proud, and bring him low; Tread down the wicked in their place.Hide them in the dust together,Bind their faces in hidden darkness.Then I will also confess to you That your own right hand can save you."Look now at the behemoth,which I made along with you;He eats grass like an ox.See now, his strength is in his hips, And his power is in his stomach muscles.He moves his tail like a cedar;The sinews of his thighs are tightly knit.His bones are like beams of bronze,His ribs like bars of iron.He is the first of the ways of God;Only He who made him can bring near His sword.Surely the mountains yield food for him,And all the beasts of the field play there. etc etc"
If God speaks today, and I believe He does, when was the last time I heard him speak with the specific clarity of His instruction to Peter:-
"...go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin..."
I feel that the Donkey who had its mouth opened by God to rebuke Balaam was more eloquent than what I am seeing and experiencing at the moment.
Where am I going with this.... I know God speaks to His children, I am concerned by what I am seeing and am part of...What I discern to be false prophesy and testimony...I also realize that I don't want to swing the other way of "Thus Sayeth the Lord"... because much of what I have seen of that from American 'prophets' who have been prophesy such conflicting things that anyone trying to discern the voice of god from them would be even more confused.
I cannot judge... but I desire to 'hear' my God like He intends His children to hear him...I don't want anything to do with superstitious false testimony... and I am concerned. I don't want to sow confusion or bring division, or cause people to stumble. I am aware that in life when I start finding fault with others, I need to very quickly turn my fault finding inwards, and repent, because I invariably find that my attitude is rooted in pride and rebellion etc. Here is the second point that is crucial to my understanding of where I am at. DESPITE REALISING THE PROBLEM MOST PROBABLY LIES WITH MYSELF, I HAVE TO BE AWARE THAT WHEN MY PEACE LEAVES ME, IT MAY WHEN BE FOR A VERY SOLID REASON THAT I SHOULD INVESTIGATE AND NOT IGNORE.
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