Swallow The Scroll

There is an interesting passage of Scripture in today’s One Year Bible reading. It is found in the Old Testament, Ezekiel 2:9-3:3, “Then I looked and saw a hand reaching out to me. It held a scroll, which He unrolled. And I saw that both sides were covered with funeral songs, words of sorrow, and pronouncements of doom. The voice said to me, "Son of man, eat what I am giving you—eat this scroll! Then go and give its message to the people of Israel." So I opened my mouth, and He fed me the scroll. "Fill your stomach with this," He said. And when I ate it, it tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth.” Holy Bible, New Living Translation ®, copyright © 1996, 2004 by Tyndale Charitable Trust. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers.

It is interesting the prophet has been called of God to deliver a hard message to a people who He(God) declares as rebellious. Yet, as Ezekiel eats the scroll, representing the Word of God full of pronouncements of doom because of their rebelliousness, he finds it is as sweet as honey in his mouth. You would normally think words of doom and sorrow would be bitter tasting words. I know from my own experiences that moments of sorrow and death, discipline and rebuke are not words sweet to the taste. They are words of bitterness and go down hard. Yet, Ezekiel found them sweet. I think I can understand this. The scroll was the Word of God! If we live to please our Heavenly Father, even when He speaks words of sorrow or rebuke, we find them to be sweet words because they represent His love for us. A loving father will take the time to speak not only the sweet words of love that go down easily leaving us wanting more, but he also speaks hard words to us when we have moments of rebellion and wanting to do things our way. Though these words are distasteful, when received with the right heart and attitude, they, too are words sweet and palatable. We recognize them for the words they really are - words meant to bring about change in our hearts and lives. Words meant to draw attention to our failure - not as though we are “failures”, but because we have failed to bring honor to the one who loves us enough to speak bitter words as well as sweet words.

The message of God through Ezekiel to His people was a message of rebuke and discipline. God was hoping these words would call them to attention and they would turn their lives around. While the message was sweet to the messenger it was bitter to the hearer because their heart was not tuned to the Heavenly Father Whose love was deep enough to say them. I must admit, there are times when the Words of the Father are bitter to me, but if I stay in tune with His heart even bitter words can be sweet. God goes on to say in Ex. 3:10 - “Then he added, "Son of man, let all My words sink deep into your own heart first. Listen to them carefully for yourself.”Holy Bible, New Living Translation ®, copyright © 1996, 2004 by Tyndale Charitable Trust. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers.

Bitter or sweet I will swallow the scroll deep within my being so that I might become the person God wants me to be.

Pastor Roger

Keeping The Fire

I preached a message yesterday to emphasize the importance of keeping the fire of God in your heart and life. Last week I spent some time with Dan Bohi and he shared this five finger concept of keeping the fire of the Holy Spirit in our lives.
Your little finger, which seems so unimportant at times, is the entry point into the Heavenly places where the fire of the Holy Spirit is burning at all times. Likewise, prayer is sometimes something we do out of habit, at a meal, or because we think we should - let's face it, prayer seems rather unimportant and mundane at times...just like our little finger. Yet, just try to live without the use of that little finger. Likewise, try to live without prayer. You can't - succesfully. Prayer must take on a significance in our lives. Just as you cannot ignore your little finger, you cannot ignore prayer. It is the language of the Heavenly Father - the conversation of Him to me and me to Him. Second, comes the ring finger - Obedience. I don't very often think of the ring finger being much of anything but a place to put a ring. Yet, as I gaze at my left ring finger I see a ring that represents a covenant of marriage with my wife, Kris. Within that covenant is a promise not only to Kris, but to God. I promised, long ago, to obey God's command to cherish and love my wife as Christ loves the church. I do everything possible to obey that command. As I look at that ring finger I am reminded of obedience and how important it is to obey the commands of my Heavenly Father in all things. Then comes the middle finger - Truth. It is longer than the rest and so quite recognizable. It has a longer reach than the other fingers. It reminds me how important it is to reach for truth. I must reach for and secure truth for it is what sets me free. Next comes the index finger - Faith. The index finger is probably the most powerful of all the fingers. Faith is the power base of our experience with God. It moves us to do what we do and live the way we do. Faith motivates us and keeps us. Faith gives us vision and hope - and without it we will not see God. Faith is powerful and is made complete as we pray, obey, and walk in the truth. Finally, the thumb - Anointing. The Word says we cannot please God without faith. Why? Because faith comes from hearing the Truth - the truth gives us a reason to obey - and obedience puts us on our knees in prayer. If we want the anointing we must pray, obey, walk in the truth, and excercise faith. When the anointing comes it enhances our desire to pray, obey, walk in the truth and have a faith great enough to say to the tree - "Be uprooted and thrown into the sea!"
Stretch out your hand - memorize these five truths - live in them - walk in the anointing - keep the fire of the Holy Spirit of God in your heart and life.

Afterglow

I have been basking in the Presence of God today recalling the wonderful things He has done in the last 72 hours of my life and the life of our church. People forgiven, people sanctified, hurts healed, offenses surrendered, the past placed in the past…the list goes on. This thought sums up the entire 72 hours – “People prayed, God spoke, people listened, God spoke, people responded, God sent forgiveness, freedom, His power, His Presence, people received. Waco Community Fellowship is forever changed. Changed into a reflection of who God desires us to be. Changed into a people without fear and bondage. Changed into a people with courage to tell our community about Jesus. Changed into a people who desire to praise God with their lives and lips.
Last night Dan spoke about the “Burnt Offering” and the significance of “taking out the ashes” so the fire can once again burn brightly and intensely, as fire is quenched when we keep ashes in the fire pit. Nearly 30 people came to the altar taking ashes to the ash heap – letting go of the past, letting go of offenses. A couple of folks went back more than once as it was obvious they were obeying the voice of God in their hearts Who told them there were more ashes to throw out.
I am listening intently to God to know just how to approach Sunday as our entire atmosphere has changed. A Sunday School teacher even asked what they should do on Sunday – as they, too are basking in this incredible new freedom. What a wonderful place to be – no preconceived ideas about what should be, only an absolute surrender to what will be as the Holy Spirit guides and directs. Advice? Stay in the Word and on your knees. What is supposed to sung, shared and preached will flow from the heart of God into the Sunday School teachers, the children’s workers, the youth pastor and the pastor – then we will have what we call church.
Thank God that He does not change. Thank God that He is faithful. Thank God that He still wants to inhabit the praises and the hearts of His people.
Pastor Roger

Revival Comes To Community Fellowship

Little did I know that I would once again see the Presence of God enter into the church. I saw that when I was 16 and now 42 years later I have been blessed to see it again. Some would contend that two and half hours of church on a Sunday Morning would be enough for the next couple of weeks, but then to spend four hours in the evening is just simply…fanatical. Well, then mark me down as fanatically in love with being in the Presence of God. I watched in wonder, amazement, and joy as the Presence of God broke through in our church today. Evangelist Dan Bohi spoke, later I learned not on what he had planned, about Elijah, a man “just like us” and Moses, “not the right person for the job”. He asked the question as to why we are not living in the miracles of God and the Presence of God. He asked where the passion and the fire have gone. I watched as 100% of this congregation rose to their feet in response to needing a fresh fire and wanting a fresh fire of passion rekindled in their hearts. Not 99% - 100% - every person that was there! In my church? I never thought I would see that. Fifteen or twenty, but all 130 people? Then the altar filled, not with every person, but to capacity and still no one left. The Presence of God filled the place and revival fire began.
Tonight – where do I start and what do I tell? I will make it short – Dan’s message of the necessity of “Spirit” and “Word” coming together in the church again, brought us to the understanding of why it is so difficult for these two to come together - Sin and fear. Sin and fear keep us from experiencing the beauty and power of God in our lives and in the church. After laying the Word out to us he invited those who had sin to confess and fear to shed, to come forward and do so. It started, and Lord forgive me, much to my surprise, it didn’t stop for the next three plus hours. Person and after person confessing sin and repenting, being filled with the spirit, asking for and confessing complete heart purification. From confessions of pornography to confessions of hatred and bitterness from a childhood of abuse – person after person came forward to be cleansed and filled. God did not fail to show up nor did He fail to cleanse and fill with His Holy Spirit. In a dry and desert place, rivers of living water came flowing and refreshed the heart and soul of this group of people at Waco Community Fellowship tonight. No more fear, no more night – and this is only Sunday. WOW – Wonder of Wonders we have Monday and Tuesday to go. It is not yet complete, but the Glory of God has indeed broken through in Waco. To God be the glory!

Fresh Winds Of The Holy Spirit

If one was pleased with what God did on Sunday, then what expression could one use to describe what God did last night? As a pastor I could do nothing but laugh. Laugh? Yes, laugh - not a laugh brought on from some sort of a joke, but a laugh brought on by the Holy Spirit as I stood "dumbfounded" at what He has decided to do with our church. About 100+ people came to the service - about 65 of those came to an altar to "sanctified" - filled with the Spirit - emptied of self! I laughed with pure joy as I saw this most incredible response to the call of God. I want to share a portion of an email from one of our people - "I woke up at 5 this morning and could'nt go back to sleep. I can't wait until the service tonight. We went to ...... church for 29 yrs and we have been in Community Fellowship for 7 years. I have never been in a service like last night. This is exactly what we have been praying for. This is what its all about. Jesus definitely was there and I could feel a love of all the people for Jesus and each other. It was overwhelming. I didn't want it to end."
What else can I say? One more service tonight - what will God do? This does, however leave a pastor in an incredible delima - after standing before people who were not "getting it" before this week, I will now stand before a people who do "get it". What's the delima? What/how do I preach? The whole atmosphere is changed and charged. Well, I really do know the answer to that, it's just a question I never thought I would ask myself. I realize that as I listen to God, His Holy Spirit will equip me with His Words - just like before - only now I can truly expect a response and more importantly I can expect a people to be listening with different ears. This demands more time in the Word and more time on my knees in order to be so filled of God and empty of self that the Spirit flows through me. No longer will people listen with "passive" attention. They will listen "intently" expecting to hear from God through me. No more "self-effort" to try to bring about some sort of response to the Word of God. The effort now is reading enough of the Word and praying enough in the Spirit to insure the people DO hear from God - not from a pastor who preached from the "barrel" or preached a sermon given to someone else and given a tweek here and there to make it sound like my own - and nearly every preacher knows what I mean.
Come Holy Spirit - we NEED You! I will check in tomorrow with another report of an incredible God Who has done another incredible thing at Waco Community Fellowship.
Pastor Roger Huff

Traditions or Doctrine?

I have had the chance to be away for a couple of days sharing thoughts and ideas with some of my peers in ministry. It has been refreshing and invigorating as my mind and thoughts have been challenged, contradicted and confirmed. One of the things I have given thought to lately is this, in the church I am afraid much of what we have done is give time to developing our traditions into doctrine. One simple example of this would be how a house of worship "does" its Sunday morning worship experience. Chairs must be in a particular place and arrangement, lighting must be just so, there must be certain elements involved in the experience, we must dress a particular way and we must sing certain songs or types of songs. It is a challenge to find any of these "musts" in scripture, our denominational tenants, or anywhere at all. Yet they have become such an important part of "church" we are unable to "worship" if any of them are absent or changed.
Some people long for the "good old days" and others beg God for something new. I am of this thought - I simply want what God wants. I am convinced, however that what God wants is not tradition developed into doctrine. Nor does He want doctrine developed into tradition. No, I am convinced God doesn't necessarily want anything new or want to revive anything old. I think God wants us to experience something fresh. A fresh annointing, a fresh touch, a fresh infilling of His spirit, a fresh touch of unconditional love for a world full of hurting people, a fresh compassion to touch people where they are. I long for something fresh. The old is past, the new becomes old - but the fresh is an everyday experience.
My wife, Kris loves fresh flowers in the house. But, within a few days they are old, wilted and even begin to smell as they rot. Even the water in which they stand becomes cloudy and dirty - the life gone from it. "Fresh" means simply that. If I am to keep fresh flowers in the house for her, I mean really fresh, I must take time to go to the store every day and purchase fresh flowers. That can be time consuming and expensive. But, even the day after they are purchased they begin to die. So it is with God - we must go to Him on a daily basis to recieve a fresh touch from Him. We cannot last for days, months, or even years with what we got "in the good old days". We must develop the doctrine of being freshly annointed DAILY or we transform the doctrine of "fresh" into the tradition of the "good old days" and soon find ourselves standing with wilted souls in dirty water that gives no life. To remian fresh with God can be time consuming and expensive. However, just as it is wonderful to see and experience fresh flowers in our home, so it is even more wonderful to experience a fresh touch from God everyday - no matter the time consumed or the energy spent.
Just a thought.

Learning Humbly

As we continue to move through “30 Days to Live”, I was very moved in my own spirit this past week as we examined the subject of “Learn Humbly”. The Lord spoke to me in a number of ways and into a number of areas in my life. Most of us do not learn humbly. We have to learn the hard way. Too often we walk into circumstances thinking we can figure it out on our own and/or blaming someone, God or society for the circumstance in which I find myself. In my generation we were told to “pick yourself up by your bootstraps and get going”. This mindset has bred in us an “I” mentality that always gets in the way of learning humbly. We cannot learn humbly when we think we can tough it out and think or will our way through a tough time. I remember when I was on the basketball team in high school, one of my coaches always said, “There is no “I” in “Team”. There is no room for “I” in our Christian journey. We must live a life of total and utter surrender to God. He knows me better than I know myself. I must live a life of taking responsibility for my own failings understanding the reason I probably failed was not the fault of my friend, family, God or some other entity – it was my fault for not seeing every circumstance in life as an incredible opportunity to learn humbly. Of course there are circumstances that come into my life over which I have no control and should not take blame for. But even then those circumstances can, and will be times for us to learn humbly and grow through them. Paul said in Philippians 4:12-13 – “I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through Him who gives me strength.” NIV That is the necessary attitude to learn humbly. Next time you think you just can’t get through the hard times in life take a look at the following web links and re-evaluate your circumstances. God is bigger.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Vujicic
http://www.lifewithoutlimbs.org/

Be Strong and of Good Courage!

Three times in a short passage of scripture(Joshua 1:6-9) God tells Joshua to "be strong and of good courage..." I wonder a little over the term "good courage". Is there a bad courage? After digging a little deeper it seems this is what is being said, "Be courageous, but be careful." Often we are courageous to do things that have little positive impact on our lives. Like when we are in school and do things that take courage, but they usually end up costing us a trip to the principal’s office. Joshua is about to take over for Moses. Can you imagine the feeling of inadequacy Joshua may have been experiencing? Following Moses? But God comes to him and tells him - be courageous, but be careful. Be careful in what? Be courageous to do what? Joshua was God's choice to lead His people and it was going to require great faith on Joshua's part to take the people into the Promised Land. At the same time it was going to require that he be careful. God tells Joshua to be courageous, take the land! But be careful to follow My instruction. The two are inseparable - be courageous, but be careful. God further tells Joshua that as long as he is courageous and careful he will not fail. In these days we must be courageous - we might even need to take a risk for God. And in taking that risk if we are careful to follow God, He promises we will not fail. So in living out your life, what courageous thing will you do for God as you follow His Word? Remember, follow His instruction and He will empower you to be courageous and take a risk to do something you have never done before - for Him!
Pastor Roger

Living Passionately

Do you live your life with passion? Some of us have a passion for hobies, some have passion for work, some have a passion for football or basketball, and some have a passion to become a couch potato after giving a hard day at work. All of us have a passion for something, the question is "Is our passion being directed to the right things for the right reasons?" Too often our passions are misguided or misdirected and we find ourselves doing great in one area while we are dangerously close to loosing it in another area. One of my favorite verses is Matthew 6:33 - "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." NIV. The reason I like this verse is it gives me the right reason to be passionate about the right thing. Be passionate enough to seek God first in everything and God will see to it the right things are added to my life at the right moment. I have only one thing to do then, seek God first. The result, I have enough time for the right things, I have enough money for the right things, and I have enough energy for the right things. When the wrong things come along, I have enough strength to say "no" and stay on course in my passion for serving God first. So how are you doing in the area of "Living Passionately"? And where is your passion directed? Let me know how you are doing.
Roger