Freedom from Freemasonry

Ummm....what to do on a free Saturday? An eight hour seminar complete with three hours of renouncing curses of the ancestors? Yes, please. Sign me up! haha yes, this is what I did all day, well, most of the day. CTF was putting on a Freedom from Freemasonry workshop/seminar and offered a significant discount to SOM'rs. Since Freemasonry is ridiculously popular even today and has its roots deeply planted in the English and American heritages I figured I should go. The sins of the fathers reap curses on the children up to the 10th generation when it comes to certain sins; that encompasses over 2000 people! Wow, I'm a-thinking that the likelihood that in a group of over 2000 people (speaking of my family here), mainly from the Motherland but also all over Europe, there is at least one who was a practicing Freemason. Scary thought is that most FMs don't truly understand the gravity of what they are practicing. At every level there are curses they vow upon themselves and either directly or indirectly upon their families as well. Yikes!

So we spent the morning learning more about the secret society and then the afternoon session was spent renouncing, repenting, and breaking off all curses, vows, and other nasty things that have come through our family lines. Seem superfluous or kooky? Well, most of the chronic conditions that people suffer with today (illness death and disease, poverty and money problems, marriage and relationship problems, and mental and emotional issues) most likely come from generational curses. This doesn't necessarily mean that it came from FM but these guys curse just about everything so it could be. I encourage you to check it out for your family and become educated about the issue. So many people consider such things harmless when they actually carry a lot of the demonic with them. Therefore, I proclaim freedom and the blood of Jesus on my house. Amen.

And for a less weighty issue for the day....I was sitting next to my friend Peter from Slovenia during the discussion today and he met a lovely lady in the group who was also from Slovenia. She was so nice and even offered to take several of the students out for lunch at the Asian buffet nearby. What a blessing! It was so nice to fellowship with her, and she is such a witness of the generosity of God. One thing she said during lunch also stuck out to me: instead of just blessing any establishment where you go, go one step further and release the anointing on it. If you are filled with the HS, you carry the anointing within you and therefore have the authority to release it on others, so do so! Again, the simple things confound the wise...
Peace.

Thursday = good day

So currently I am acting as a chat moderator for our weekly CBN broadcast. We run 7-9pm EST every Thursday and today I'm in the chatroom. Perhaps that means that I should not be typing up a new blog at the same time but.... :) Today has been quite fun. I was planning on running this morning but rolled over instead. No guilt. I did try to look decent today (meaning I didn't wear sweats and looked nice) but then I passed the auditorium which had a notice that said we would probably be getting sweaty during worship, sooooo I went back to my room and changed. Dale led worship; he doesn't play an instrument or sing and is our main sound guy. He played songs/mixed from his laptop and it was nuts...aka dance music the whole time...aka I spent 35 min going crazy...aka the way that worship is supposed to be! AWESOME! Guess I didn't need to go running this morning anyway.

This week we are looking into Church History with Gerry Plunkett. I've heard most of it before, but was really hoping to dive into the more recent revival movements. Hopefully we will get to that a good deal tomorrow. I do find it interesting how different groups got started and then how they transformed into something completely different. It's quite sad really what happens when people take moves of the Holy Spirit and then try to institutionalize it. It just doesn't work like that because soon you just have a spiritually dead legalistic group rather than a living moving Body of Christ. So, point of the story is stay alive! Always depend on the Holy Spirit; He is God after all.

Another highlight of the day was scrubbing the tiles on the wall in the kitchen during my Thursday afternoon duties. Hanging around the guys who were washing dishes made me miss my dear brother (shout out here. ha. Love you, Kyle!). Seriously, if the world was just inhabited by women, this would be an utterly depressing world. Guys make life interesting, help us females not take ourselves so seriously, and provide some humor. So today, ladies, appreciate the men around you in a new way and grant grace where it's needed. :)
Peace.

Kalamazoo!

This past weekend was fantastic. The ride to Kalamazoo was a bit long and the two hour delay at the border didn't quite help. There was a lengthy line on the bridge and then my van had to go inside because the non-North Americans hadn't been stamped for the US on their way into Canada. We stopped for a delicious and nutritious lunch at Wendy's and made it to the church (New Day Community Church) around 7pm for some HOMEMADE lasagna! So much better than the pan-bought kind. Andrea and I stayed with a lady Carrie and her daughter Heather because we had the car and were able to drive wherever we needed...such a blessing. (this whole weekend had God's favor all of it...it's so fun when you look for it/expect it because He doesn't disappoint) We stayed up late talking about all things creative and life: inspiring.

In the morning I got to take a walk through the woods in the backyard before breakfast. I love nature. Carrie spoiled us every morning with the utmost deliciousness and sent us on our way. Saturday we were at the Iglesia, the building where they hold young adult meetings on Sunday nights close to the college campus. We learned about how God had given it to them, and we prayed/prophesied over it. After, we cleaned up some of the neighborhood and then went to the top of the hill overlooking the city and prayed over it-so awesome. With a little down time we were able to go through "downtown" a bit and look through some shops before going back to the Iglesia for the community cook out. I tried very hard to be social and mingle...still not easy. :)

Sunday Olivia and I had the opportunity of preaching at New Day. I spoke in the first service about The Cross. The Holy Spirit was definitely with me, it went a lot better than I thought though I listened to the recording of it and I have a few speaking tendencies that could be worked out. lol. Olivia spoke on "Hearts of Stone" which was quite good as well and at the end of each service our team prayed for anyone who wanted it. Words are flowing a lot easier now which is exciting, thanks Daddy. This was probably one of the main highlights of the trip for me.

We were at the Iglesia again Sunday evening and HS was there noticeably even before worship started, which was powerful too. People got up to dance which we were told never happens and there was a sense of freedom or that God wanted to bring freedom to people's lives. Joe gave his testimony and we prayed for anyone afterward. The drive home Monday was long and rather uneventful. The DVD player in our van went out halfway through the movie which was upsetting to those in the back who could see it. There were ZERO cars on the bridge at the border and only about 4 cars at the check point and the guy just let us through! PTL x 100! So awesome! We made it back in time for dinner (not sure if that is a good or bad thing) and were happy to get out of the car. Wonderful weekend, can't wait to see what our full outreach holds! 
Peace.

Back to the Homeland!

Tomorrow Team BABES is hitting the road around 9:30 and heading for the border. I'm quite excited to go back to the States though it won't be home or anywhere I really know. We are going to Kalamazoo, MI for mini-outreach and will be there through Mon. I would love your prayers for safety, for the team (unity, good time, growth, etc.), and especially for Olivia and myself as we will be giving our sermons on Sunday morning to the congregation at New Day Community Church. Excited for the opportunity but nervous as well of course. I did finish writing it thankfully, but it needs a lot of practice in order for it to come off naturally.

Friday will be mostly driving with dinner at the church when we get in. Saturday we will be helping around the community, cleaning up the streets and such and then later hosting a bbq for the community as well. Sunday we will be at the church most of the day and we head back Monday. We will be staying with host families and I hope to be a blessing to them as well.
God bless!

Be Proud of Me, Mrs. Fields

I love/loved my high school; by far the best academic experience of my life. It taught me a lot, not just about the course material, but about study skills, time management, and limits (not just in the mathematical sense). It still holds true that these were the four years of my life where I survived on the least amount of sleep, was the most stressed, crammed the most activities and responsibilities into my life, and had made some of the best memories than any other time to date. Granted, I am only 22. Seeing as it was such a formidable time in my life, I sometimes find it hard to believe that the experience wasn’t yesterday but four years ago. Wow, time flies, but thankfully I can say I am not the same person I was four years ago. 

While at college I realized how much I was changing and here at SOM I find myself changing still; I hope to never get off this train. I think back to AP English with Mrs. Fields senior year, a class of mainly girls who were all a bit too concerned with the shape of the “inkblot on a paper.” We were all accused of being “eager beaver overachievers” and warned that we had our “wires wound a bit too tightly and better be careful because they were about to SNAP!” Boy, was she right though then I didn’t know any of other way of living.

Busy just comes so easy for me and is quite often a theme in my life so it doesn’t really come as any surprise that the word God has been telling me for several years now is “REST.” While I may not fully understand ‘rest’ I love it. The act of resting is absolutely amazing. Learning to understand that I don’t have to do anything in order to please God, I just have to be is quite liberating, a certain stress reliever. I used to always think of myself as an even-keel type of person, but there is such a difference in being chill on the outside and having a sense of peace and calm on the inside. 

Peace.

let's stretch

Today a group of seven of us went downtown for a bit of Power Evangelism. We define this as evangelism where we rely on the Holy Spirit prompting and what God is saying to us about and for other people as opposed to handing out tracts or yelling on a street corner. The first stop was Tim Horton's for a coffee and to see what God was saying and who He had words for. We split in two groups and headed off. My group (David, Philip, and me) headed to the Eaton Centre, the rather ritzy mall, and started looking for people that God highlighted to us to speak to. I was looking around but started having a problem: no one stood out because everyone was standing out to me. How was I supposed to pick who God wanted me to tell that God loved them when His heart and desire was for every one walking past me? I started being drawn in every direction and not knowing where to go. All the lostness and unsettledness of everyone was swirling around me and making me quite overwhelmed. I was becoming so aware of God's love for seriously everyone. We often hear or say that God loves everyone but when we see unsightly people we rarely believe it for them, but here I am seeing it is so.

I spoke to a girl on the escalator and then followed the guys. We spoke to a lady and David said God was opening up a job change in a couple weeks. She said she was a Christian too and that she was indeed changing jobs in two weeks! How cool. We were able to pray for her and then went into Sears where we talked to another couple who said they were Christians too. As we prayed for them we each gave a prophetic word which they said were all spot on, which was great since we had also had a few people that we approached who were less than willing to hear what we had to say.

We met up with the other group for a bit before setting out again. We tried a prophetic game with two guys but didn't get anything right and then tried to give a word to a woman who rejected it (I still believe that the word was right). Some were feeling a bit discouraged at this point. We made our way toward the poorer side of town where there is a mission and such. The guys gave a Tim's card to a guy simply as a blessing and then David asked some kids if he could join their bball game. That didn't work out but we were able to give them some cards too and found out they were Christians too. It was cool to see that giving them the cards was a blessing.

When we started heading back the other group got to tell us how they got to be a part of God healing a girl's leg. She had a severed ligament or something and after praying three times she was able to take off her brace and walk normally and even jump! God is awesome. 

Older Than We Thought

This Wednesday we had our second social and this time the theme was an "old person's social" so we were all to dress as old as possible. Each outreach team also had to put together a dance to perform...as old people. haha. Team Finland, which now has a name - Team BABES (Boys And Babes Evangelistic Society) - is pretty chill but we did put together a little something to Thriller. (Another team used part of the song too but it was a different part so it worked.) It was fun to do and especially fun to see the other dances. The SGL's dressed up fabulously though a bit disturbing.  Two were dressed as the nurses of "Halfway to Heaven Nursing Home" and the others were residents some sane and others not quite there. The best was Earl who walked around drooling the whole night in a bathrobe. So disgusting!

We students also got into the dress-up activities. I found the guys who dressed like old ladies to be the most hilarious. We even had a "Moses" and a Santa Claus.... I guess they could be the epitome of old. I tried to make wrinkles on my face but it didn't go so well; I kinda just looked dirty, but others got the jist. Many went to Value Village for costumes but I didn't feel like spending money for old clothes so I just wore a skirt and my roommate's sweater. Too bad I wasn't at home; I could've just raided Mom's closet! haha sry, Mom, your clothes really aren't that bad....anymore! :)


There were also games of course: 1. one team member is the hands for another whose hands are behind his back and feeds him pudding as fast as possible 2. one team member lays on the floor under a chair with his head sticking out with another standing on the chair with his arm extended at shoulder height; whichever team drops the most pudding in the mouth of the 'layer' the fastest wins....a bit messy (I definitely did NOT volunteer for this game) 3. BINGO! we won one round and won some candies. woot. Good times. Hopefully we'll at least have one more social before we go...wonder what that theme will be.