Samuel Clough

I have a few things I need to post that I have not gotten down yet.  In the meantime, I wanted to pass along two excellent articles.  These are from “The Burn 24-7″ which is a prayer and worship ministry that is also focused on missions.  I had the chance to hear their founder when I was at the last Luke 18 Project Leadership summit and was very impressed.

The first article is on Urgency and Legacy, two things that are sadly lacking among us.

http://theburn247.com/blog/2008/06/13/urgency-and-legacy/

The second article highlights the fact that we tend to focus on ministries and techniques, while the whole end of it all must be God Himself.

http://theburn247.com/blog/2008/06/13/he-wants-this-more-than-we-do/

The days we are living in are very serious. We must prepare for the days ahead. They will be days of great glory as God visits His pure church and days of great terror as judgment comes and evil increases. We must stay so very close to the Lord that we may endure and overcome (note Jesus’ message to each of the 7 churches at the beginning of revelation).

I recently came across this prophecy from Stanley Frodsham. Stanley was involved in the Pentecostal movement in the first part of this century. He knew Smith Wigglesworth who actually performed his wedding. I am not posting this in response to anything in particular, but just because I think it is incredibly valuable for us to heed this word and allow God to speak to us through it. It is truly preparation for the days ahead. This is very long for a blog post, but read on. It is worth it.

I can’t believe I’m posting another film. I have some other things to post, so I’ll try to get them up soon. I just stumbled on this film called “Expelled.” Basically it’s a documentary that is now in theaters starring Ben Stein (!). The film examines the bias against intelligent design that is now the de facto standard in main stream academia. I have observed this before such as when a court ruled that there could not even be a sticker on science text books mentioning that evolution was a theory and that other theories existed.

While I have not yet seen the film, this is a serious issue. I have noticed that leading scientists who are Darwinists no longer debate on the merits of their theory but rather have adopted an elitism that holds any possibility of God to be absurd and therefore any scientific theories involving intellegent design to therefore be absurd as well. Rather then debating evidence and merits, they choose a rigid platform that allows them to treat dissenters as if they are not even worthy of consideration. They no longer debate point by point but try to push their agenda by presenting that there is no debate at all and anything other than Darwinism is beneath the consideration of any civilized person.

I went to see “Horton Hears a Who” the other day with the kids and some of their friends. While this may seem to be just another children’s movie on the surface, there is actually a much deeper message in Horton that we must communicate to our children and others around us. I very rarely say this about a film because most films are not worth the time spent to watch them, but it looks like God is speaking to a generation through Horton. Read on to see why.

“Then Jesus said to His disciples, If anyone desires to be My disciple, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me.” - Matthew 16:24 (AMP)

The call to deny yourself is central to the Christian faith. Although it is something we do not like to talk about, denial of ourselves is a fundamental requirement of following Jesus. Most of us read this verse and immediately consider the obvious things that we are called to turn away from. Most of these things are external and obvious sins of the flesh.

The problem is that in our basic understanding of this directive, we often fall short of what God is actually aiming at. We are so used to external religion that we read this statement and our mind immediately filters through all the fleshly, outward things that we need to contain or even purge from our lives. While this is helpful to be sure, this is just the first stage of what God is wanting to do and if we do not push beyond the outward observance of this commandment we will miss something that is vital if we are to truly know God. Missing this thing can be the difference between living as a nominal Christian and living as one that knows God.

Faith is a significant issue in the Scriptures. We are told that without faith it is impossible to please God (Hebrews 11:16). We are told that faith is the door to access salvation and unlock the benefits thereof. Jesus is very clear that at His return He is going to be looking for faith on the earth (Luke 18:8). Paul exhorts us to walk by faith and not by sight (II Corinthians 5:7). Throughout the Scriptures faith is very clearly presented as the thing that operates the Kingdom of God. We cannot be redeemed without it. We cannot please God without it. We cannot even access God without it.

Why is faith so important in God’s economy? Why does He put such an emphasis on it? In this age of materialism and science where we trust only what we can inspect and verify with our hands, faith seems to be a superstitious relic to a non-believer, and the believer often fails to grasp its significance and operation as well. To really understand faith, you must go back to the garden to an interchange between Eve and the serpent that literally changed human history forever.

But how are people to call upon Him Whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in Him of Whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without a preacher? And how can men [be expected to] preach unless they are sent? - Romans 10:14-15b AMP

I was recently reading a section in Apostolic Foundations when the verses above simply jumped off the page. I believe the key to the whole passage is found in the last sentence that begins verse 15. The critical word here is sent. Now, this sort of passage is most typically used to support missions and other administration issues that revolve around the practical issues of sending men to preach the gospel. I certainly have no problem with this as there are financial and logistic tasks involved in the sending of men to preach the gospel, but I do not believe this is the heart of what God is trying to convey here.

The issue of sending and of being sent is critical if we are to recover the life that pulsated through the New Testament church. The word sent that is used here in verse 15 is the word “apostello” and it is from this word that we get the word apostle or “sent one.” If we are going to recover the reality and power of the first century church, we have to recover an accurate understanding of the word apostello and just what it means for men to be sent to preach the gospel. We desperately need to understand just who is doing the sending and how men are to be sent. To recover the reality and power of these words we need look no farther than the church at Antioch.

The pro-life campaign 40 days for life just ended. It was 40 days of seriously considering the abortion issue before God. Early in the 40 days I was outside a local abortion clinic just quietly considering the issue of abortion in prayer. As I was considering the issue of physical abortion, immediately the issue of the spirit of abortion and how it permeates our society and our lifestyle came to me. It was as if the Lord was saying that the most critical thing was to consider the spirit of abortion in my own heart that I could then have power on the issue of physical abortion. When we think of abortion we tend to think primarily of the brutal, physical act of abortion in the womb. However, this physical act is only the most brutal demonstration of a principle that is found throughout our culture.

At the root of the issue of abortion is the issue of pleasure and the free pursuit of it with no accompanying responsibility and no pain. This pursuit of pleasure becomes intense enough that we are willing to sacrifice even ourselves and others in our pursuit of it. I fear that this root runs much more deeply in us, believers included, than we know. Take a minute and just consider a few of the ways this spirit has quietly permeated our lifestyles.

The film Bella is now in limited theaters. I would encourage everyone to go see it. It chronicles an unusual love story between a man and a woman who is considering an abortion. The movie’s message is pro-life and revolves around unconditional love and saving the unborn child. Whether we like it our not, films have become the primary story telling medium in our day and that’s why it is important that a new generation of believers make films that move the heart and mind to goodness and greatness rather than just entertain. I have no idea if the film maker behind Bella is a believer or not, but from the early reviews it is truly a great film. If nothing else, I think we as believers need to vote with our dollars and support this type of film making so that we may see more films of this kind of caliber. Tells others about the film and see if it’s showing in your area at www.bellathemovie.com. I plan on seeing it this Friday.

Here’s the official trailer on youtube.

An underground church is forming in America. It is not forming around the issue of physical persecution but rather around the issue of devotion to Jesus. It is a group of believers who are asking the question, “Is Jesus really worth everything?” If He is, it means that He must affect every area of our lives. Over on in earnest expectation, I caught the preview of this video that chronicles this movement in America. This underground church cannot be defined by any one ministry or under any one label, but this looks to be a great film chronicle of at least part of the movement.