Graham Jones blessed us again last night before moving on to revive and encourage another body of believers in the U.S. (That’s not Graham, by the way, that’s his daughter. She’s cuter than Graham.) Some of my notes:

He talked about building a culture of revival. Preparing a people so when revival hits we (first) recognize it and (second) are able to sustain it. That was cool because we talked about that very thing recently at a meeting of the musicians over fried food. Good to know it wasn’t just the calamari talking. (Because that would have been creepy … haha. I’m stopping … but laughing at my own bad joke anyway.)

My favorite part was this little, mind blowing revelation about the man with the demon-possessed son. Read. I always read that (and heard other people teach that) as though that particular demon only came out by prayer and fasting. Graham explained he has a different theory. Jesus isn’t talking about the demon in verse 20, so it’s odd to think He would have jumped back to it without clarifying in the next verse … He’s not schizophrenic. Graham proposed that Jesus was talking about “this kind” of unbelief – since He’s talking about unbelief – only comes out through prayer and fasting. That makes so much sense, and just exploded a little something in my head when he said it.

Also neat: The last word of the Old Testament is “curse.” The first word of Jesus’ first sermon is, “blessed.” My buddy, Titus, is reading his Bible cover to cover. He was telling me last night that he’s in Micah now and is really excited because he can “almost see the red letters.” I think sometimes we don’t realize the full measure of the blessing and grace that was poured out on the earth through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ because we never really lived in the Old Covenant system. We become believers and step right into the better covenant.

It was fun, too, because He’s been speaking to me a bit about the beatitudes. I think it’s time to perhaps do a little more study.

PS- I’m speaking to the youth tomorrow night. Please keep us in your prayers.

I’ve been praying for a humble spirit, really only for a few days but I think it’s one of those prayers that the Lord just jumps on. It’s starting to hit me in my prayer time, and I’m almost not sure how to deal with it.

Yesterday morning, for example, it was really hard to even bring myself before the Lord at all. I sat down in front of the couch like I always do and was suddenly aware of how completely holy He is, and how completely holy I am not. I had all the right scripture in my head about coming boldly before the throne, and His dying while I was a sinner, the grace of His blood shed, etc. It still took me a little while to get in there, although I can honestly say I did not fall into condemnation in the process.

This morning was worse because I was thinking about yesterday. Still feeling very unworthy, but at the same time knowing by experience that He wants to be with me anyway.

What do you do? You can’t love Him back enough. You can’t do anything to earn or deserve His love. At the same time that’s not an excuse to backslide and give up, because the last thing you want to do is break His heart that way. I’m hedged in.