First Week Stories & Stuff We Have Been Learning

First week stories here we go…

1.Bill Johnson has spoken twice and each time he has blown my mind.

2. Jeremy Riddle was here to do worship and everyone was like ya its no big deal.

3. On day one I was given two words of knowledge and a word of encouragement that was spot on! Yesterday I was given a word of prophecy about my giftings and I am eager to see what comes of that. Call me if you want details...

4. Yesterday we broke up into revival groups, which is to be like our family for the next 9 months and we began to pray. Well the Holy Spirit fell on the room and the Lord told me to pray over this girl. Then He told me to ask if this other girl wanted to speak in tongues. I was like Lord I don’t think that is such a good plan. He insisted so I asked and she said "Yes!" so I started to pray and I thought to myself “Lord you better show up cause I sure can’t do anything”. Well then she started speaking in tongues. Crazy tongues. The Lord gave me a word and He said “Praises of the Nations”. I broke down and worshiped it was so powerful.

It has been an amazing first week!

First Week Learning…

We have gone over a lot of operation type stuff and some of it was boring but necessary. While other stuff blew my mind! What I would like to share with you are the schools core values, which rocked my world a little bit.

BSSM CORE VALUES

A Culture of Love
•We will always strive to love you and deal with you out of love.

•Jesus said, “Love your neighbor as you love yourself.” It is very important for you to receive God’s love (and ours) and love yourself. Please keep love as a driving force in all that you are and do.

An Empowering Versus a Controlling Culture
•We work hard to get you to turn on your Holy Spirit-powered self-control and internal motivation so you reach your potential. An empowering culture consists of powerful people who consistently chose love, honor and respect.

•Verses a controlling culture which motivates primarily by the external power of fear and punishment.

Ownership
•You’ll never reach your full potential until you take responsibility with the Holy Spirit for your own personal greatness.

•As long as you merely perform so that you don’t get in trouble you haven’t taken responsibility for your own life.

•We will rarely work harder to solve your problems than you do and will work to solve them with you, not for you.

Honesty and Accountability
∞ Trust is the foundation of all good relationships. Trust is built on honesty and integrity.

∞ Telling half-truths, cheating or lying destroys trust so we expect you to be honest no matter what it costs you.

∞ Please be honestly transparent in small groups, with RGP’s and overseers—especially when you’re scared—so you can learn to trust someone more than you trust yourself.

Risk
∞ Faith can be spelled “R-I-S-K.” If you want to grow, you must take risks.

∞ If you don’t fail once in a while, you’re not taking enough risks (obviously we are not talking of moral or character failures!).

∞ So expect to fail some at BSSM (again, not moral or character failures) as this is normal for risk-takers.

∞ When you are asked to take a risk by BSSM leadership, please press through any fear you may have and do it quickly.

Honor
∞ Honor exists in God between the Father, Son and Spirit. We didn’t invent it, we follow God’s example in giving it.

∞ Life flows from honor as implied by the 5th command to honor parents so Israel would live long in the land.

∞ There are levels of honor in the Kingdom. We have been called to a rectangular table, not a round table where all have an equal voice. Take the low spot like Jesus says in Lk. 14:10 and let the host move you up.

∞ Please be careful not to confuse celebrity and fame with honor. These are worlds apart.

∞ Always deal with God, your leaders, each other and yourself with honor and respect.

∞ Try not to choose your behaviors out of fear of punishment. Do the right things to honor God, your leaders, your peers and yourself.

Confrontation
∞ We have a confrontational culture. If you do something that we think needs to be adjusted, we will talk to you about it.
∞ If your leader does something that you think needs to be addressed, you are invited to talk to them privately about your concerns. Don’t talk to others about an issue until you have first talked to the person that offended you. If this does not go well you may then request to speak to them with their supervisor.

Supernatural Power
•We expect the supernatural to happen often. You will find yourself in situations where if God doesn’t do a miracle, it won’t work out right. This is when you cultivate faith and pray with the humble but expectant heart of God’s child.

∞ You will be expected to walk in the supernatural power of God. Get used to it, it’s normal.

Servant Royalty
∞ King Jesus said about Himself, “For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve.” You are royalty—like your heavenly father—princes and princesses of the King. But like Him, you are kings and queens who serve.

∞ You are not paupers, beggars or slaves. Learn to think and live out of you true identity.

∞ So, lead with a king’s heart and a servant’s hands.

Mind of Christ
∞ We have the mind of Christ and our mind is being renewed so you’re not merely to mimic we want you to think.

∞ Teaching you how to think is just as important (if not more so) than teaching you what to think. We’ll do both!

You Can Call Me Kermit The Frog

Why you ask? Well for one its lonely being green and for two, I have moved right along from the lily pad in the swamp to the Golden State of California. As I sit here at Bethel surrounded by mountains and radical people I will admit it all feels a bit surreal.

The past week has been absolutely amazing. To say we hit the ground running would be an understatement. I am not quite sure where to start…

Worship. We have had worship everyday in a place that has been prepared for the last 13 years. The best way to describe the room would be to say it has been thoroughly marinated in the Holy Spirit and the Presence of God. The other students are as hungry if not hungrier than I am for the presence of the Lord. I can’t quite describe what 800 starving people are like but if you remember your history the Russian Revolution was started by one such mob.

Teaching. The leaders are incredibly gifted teachers. The amount of truth here pierces my heart like a sword. I am a bit nervous about not being able to carry the large amount of treasure placed before me. And for those of you worried I was off to join a cult one of the schools favorite slogans is, “Turn on your brain.” But they did say next week we would be studying goat sacrifice… just kidding.

I feel honored to be around people with a like mindset. I feel extremely honored to be drawing from wells I did not dig. But the longer I am here the more I feel honored and privileged to be sent here by you guys. The Lord has blessed me deeply through your sacrifice and prayers. Known you have sown into something amazing. I can not express my gratitude and awe. I stand humbled in your generosity.

I realize this is a bit vague but there will be more juicy details to follow… You can call this the Readers Digest Version.