Big Is The New Small

10 SPIRITUAL TONICS by ~Abraham Feinberg

• 1.  Stop worrying. Worry kills life.
• 2.  Begin each day with a prayer. It will arm your soul.
• 3.  Control appetite. Over-indulgence clogs body and mind.
• 4.  Accept your limitations. All of us can’t be great.
• 5. Don’t envy. It wastes time and energy.
• 6. Have faith in people. Cynicism sours the disposition.
• 7. Find a hobby. It will relax your nerves.
• 8. Read a book a week to stimulate imagination and broaden your view.
• 9. Spend some time alone, for the peace of solitude and silence.
• 10. Try to want what you have, instead of spending your strength trying to get what you want.

Which of these 10 Tonics resonate most with you?

Prayer Donor from Matthew Sloop on Vimeo.

I wanted to share this video with you about an organization, whose sole purpose is to unite and connect the world and the church in prayer.  The organization is Prayer Donor, you can check out their site at PrayerDonor.org.  I personally know the founder @MatthewSloop who is the real deal and they have been great supporters of BigIsTheNewSmall.com.

They have developed a site where you can basically share prayers and pray for others, all around the globe. It’s a great daily reminder and opportunity for us to pray for others and tool to remind us the power of prayer.  Check out the site, post a prayer, donate some prayers (pray for others.)

“Prayer is of transcendent importance. Prayer is the mightiest agent to advance God’s work. Praying hearts and hands only can do God’s work. Prayer succeeds when all else fails.” ~E.M. Bounds

Do you take the time to pray for others?  Are you guilty of saying I’ll pray for you and moving right along without even taking a second to pray?

I’m typing this quick post from my phone as I’m out on a ranch somewhere in the middle of Southern Oklahoma, where my cellphone & Internet coverage is intermittent at best. That’s actually a good thing.

I’m a part of a year long discipleship, leadership group comprised of Christian leaders from all walks of Oklahoma City. The leadership team along with each person in the group has a vision of being Salt & Light to the Oklahoma City community.

It’s been a great evening of fellowship, riding around on all-terrain vehicles, touring the ranch, seeing cows and historic landmarks where horses, buggies and Native Americans once roamed.

Right now the evening is wrapping up and I’m just spending some alone time with God. My cabin mates are in bed and I decided to stand outside in awe of how close the stars appear when you are not in the city. You can see a pic from the back porch of my cabin above.

It’s quiet and I have a lot of loud noises and ideas rumbling around in my ever so busy head. Right now I’m alone with God and things are beginning to move a bit slower. All of the ideas are becoming more clear… There is a lot that I can see, I can’t to do all of the things that as of right now I can only see.

Not sure I’m going to move to the country; however I can guarantee I’ll make it a point to find some alone time with God somewhere in the middle of his creation and that somewhere will not be in the city.

Shh, quiet can you hear it. In the sill of the night I hear God’s whispers. You know why I can hear His whispers? It’s because I’m Alone With God!

Are you taking time to be Alone With God?

When you read the phrase featured in this blog title “The Crying Church.” what comes to mind.  Seriously, just think for a moment about the imagery and the thoughts that are going through your head right now.  Believe it or not people are thinking a wide range of emotions; everything from The Sissy Church, The Complaining Church, The Worshipping Church and slew of other thoughts.  The reason for this post is to share my thoughts on “The Crying Church.”

I’ve been on staff at LifeChurch.tv for well over three years and have never really experienced anything like this weekend.  Yesterday we were in our final week of our At the Movies Series and the movie was Fireproof.  If I am being honest the acting in Fireproof was less than stellar and I wasn’t expecting to be awed.  There was one little problem, which was actually a good problem… God used the movie coupled with some amazingly pure worship to rock people’s world.  All six experiences people were balling, sniffling, crying and broken.

I had a guy come up to me in tears and said he had been attending LifeChurch.tv for 8 years and had never experienced worship like that.  I had another guy come up to me in tears and say that it was his first time to attend our campus and that he had been looking for a church home for his family and he’s certain that he found one.  We had a couple, one of which is on staff stop by and visit our campus; the guy complimented worship and said he really enjoyed the worship, but he felt goofy because he was crying through worship.  I was standing at the back talking to my Campus Coordinator in a later experience and she was in tears as we watched one of our Switch Students on stage helping lead worship. 

It didn’t stop there, I had my oldest son with me this weekend and he actually helped me with my talking time on stage and I got a little teary eyed afterwards, realizing he is growing up.  I walked into the last experience and as I got near the front, I saw my sister-in-law worshiping her heart out with tears streaming down her face.  TEARS, TEARS, TEARS!  I went to close out our last experience which has mid-sized attendance and as I proceeded to do the invitation tfor people to accept Christ there were several people who raised their hands and then several more, then a couple, then a guy who came to church for the 1st. time in 20 years, then a struggling married couple (who I’m counseling this afternoon and whose daughter prayed w/ me in the lobby and cried through her prayer), then a dad, then a teenage girl, then another and another and another all the way up to nearly 20 people in one medium-sized experience raising their hand and making a decision to accept Christ.  Did I mention that they all had tears in their eyes and my eyes began to water up?  Not to try and sound mancho but crying is something that I rarely do; however I was happy to lead The Crying Church.

There are all types of tears and I have even heard tears be referred to as “Liquid Prayer.”  There are tears of pain or suffering 2 Kings 20:5; tears of joy Genesis 33:4; tears of compassion John 11:35; tears of desperation Esther 4:3; tears of agony or labor; Isaiah 42:14 and tears of repentance Joel 2:12.   I’m not sure what types of tears were being cried; however I’m assuming all types.  I do know one thing, this weekend there was a “liquid prayer” revival going on and my church was The Crying Church and I loved it.  We need more crying churches, crying people, crying stories and crying hearts.

Share your thoughts, stories, tears, liquid prayers…!  When was the last time you attended a Crying Church? 

This precious little girl that attends my church named Rylie Faith Tran had a fundraiser today.  Rylie has leukemia and I blogged about her situation here a couple of weeks ago.  The fundraiser was great and there were a bunch of people that showed up, including the local news stations.  Check out this video, check out Rylie’s story and please lift this family and this precious little girl up in prayer.

God is Good, All The Time and this Family has FAITH…  Rylie “Faith” Tran!

THE ANNOINTING OIL 

I remember this scenario as though it was yesterday; I had just began my journey into full-time vocational ministry at LifeChurch.tv.  I was the Associate Campus Pastor at the Edmond Campus and had been there for about 30 days.  I was Gung-Ho and ready to attack hell with a water pistol, if your know what I mean.  I remember a lady coming up after one of the experiences and needed prayer, so one of the other Associate Campus Pastors grabbed me, so that we could pray for her.

We proceeded to the staff offices to begin praying for healing for the right side of her body and for her Dr.’s appointment the following day.  I remember the other Associate Campus Pastor who will remain nameless; looked at me and then looked at a bottle of oil on the Campus Pastor’s desk.  I looked at him, with a look like “why ya lookin’ at me…” he proceeded to say go ahead Pastor Scott get the oil.  (Let’s Pause Right Here, I didn’t get a handbook with my calling to ministry… just a step of obedience and trusting God to use me in some way, and this was the first lesson in not knowing what I’m doing… Un-pause.)

This whole process of being the anointer with oil was new for me and I was going to have to just trust God to walk me through the process.  I grabbed the oil, opened the lid, shook a little on my finger… think think, I made a cross on her forehead (it seemed like the spiritual thing to do), anointed her in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and then we prayed for her.

I wasn’t quite sure if I did the right thing so I “Googled It” and Yes, I was right on the money. {smile}   Everything except for giving her a klennex, that was just a bonus and a courtesy. {smile}  I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength and discernment!  BTW- I have not seen any anointing oil at LifeChurch.tv since then!

Ever found yourself in one of those situations where you didn’t know what to do or say?  Thoughts?

My 9 year old son Wesley doesn’t like watching the local news; as he thinks it’s “nothing but negative and scary.”  The local news is supposed to be a snapshot of our local area, our surroundings, our world…  As I was watching the news, thinking, praying and listening;  I was reminded that my son has a point and it was motivation to post this ranting run-on sentence; I apologize in advance:

I am sick and tired of all of the negativity, as I was watching a totally false negative campaign ad against a personal friend of mine, who in my opinion happens to be one of Oklahoma’s top politicians, I just shook my head, then I listened to the story about the young girl who was kidnapped and found with help of the amber alert, then the story of the prison warden’s wife who ran off with an escaped inmate for more than 10 years, he said this she said that, voter fraud and then one of my twitter buddies said the deaths of Jennifer Hudson’s family being murdered is all over the news in Chicago, the people are buying up guns because the fear of their gun rights being negatively affected, people are hanging a look-a-like dummy of V.P. Candidate Sarah Palin suspended with a noose around her neck and calling it Halloween art, the bail-out, and this truck driver allegedly saw a little girl bound and gagged riding down the street, and these guys were caught planning the assassination of Presidential Candidate Barack Obama and a thief runs over a Lowe’s security guard, OU’s defense is not any good, the Governor allegedly gave over the limit in campaign contributions, he said this-she said that, this ignorant person dropped the “n-word” in addition to saying everyone should “own one” and to top it all off, Joe the Plumber aint even a freakin’ plumber… 

Are You Freakin’ Kidding Me…  Stop The Freakin’ Madness!  

I see why an innocent 9 year old or 40 year old for that matter can thin the news is “negative and scary.”  This Madness is not just happening because we are a week away from Nov. 4th although it ’s heightened.  {Ugh}

A small silver lining: The stock market is up nearly 900 pts., gas is as cheap as it has been in a long time ($1.95) and the Oklahoma City Thunder kick off their inaugural season tonight.

The Real Silver Lining: God is Good… All The Time!    Praying…

There are some early mornings where I sit quietly in my office and just just stare at the wall or my bookshelf and reflect on how blessed that I am, my family is and our country is.  Well this morning was one of those mornings where I just simply stared at my bookshelf and every once and awhile I will just look at all the books on my shelf for some inspiration which to write about.  As I was glancing down the many titles and genres of books… my eyes became fixated on this book entitled “A Man of Faith.”

I took this particular book off the shelf and began to read through the pages of a book about a young Texas Governor whose gubernatorial leadership was based on his strong faith.  I began to read through the pages about his relationships, friendships and counsel he sought from all types of Godly spiritual leaders.  I reflected on his claim to fame as the Texas Governor being his faith-based initiatives and how he obtained the title of being a compassionate conservative.

As I sit here right now there is a much different scenario, situations have happened and this man sits in the white-house with an abismal approval rating and many people whom downright despise him… how times have changed.  By no means is this a “political post;” however God did speak to my heart to share that our President is A Man of Faith, has a family, has challenges, has feelings, seeks God, falls short… and inspite of all that, he is the leader of our country.  The same thing will be true for the new leaders that we elect in 34 days and let us always be mindful of this verse in Romans:

Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.  Romans 13:1

Through all of the political rhetoric and nonsense; let’s seriously pray for our leaders on both sides of the isle!