A Word from God

Every year at LifeGate church they have what they call a Presbytery.  

They invite three presbyters people who claim to speak for God from other churches to spend a week or so "prophesying' over church staff members and then over people throughout the congregation.  At each event after the six or so staff members are brought on stage and prophesied over  told stuff about themselves that they already knew, the presbyters people who claim to speak for God spend about an hour or so selecting people in the audience to stand and receive their own special word from God.

*Before I go any further, I want to make it clear that I honestly think that most of these presbyters do believe that whatever thoughts that come to mind at that moment really do come from God.  But I also think that some of them know darn well that they don’t.*

This is an event that attendees of this church don’t want to miss.  Come on, the chance for someone to pick you out of the crowd to receive a word from God directly? In front of everyone? No way is anyone going to miss that if at all possible!  People pray for weeks before the actual event, begging God to speak to them during the Presbytery.  They skip work to attend this event.  Every day they would go to the event hopeful, just sure that God was going to speak to them and every day all but maybe ten people would go home disappointed.

Clay and I were never disappointed though.  We attended each of these Presbytery events while we were members of this church and even though there were a few hundred people at each one, my husband was selected to receive a word.

Every time.

We were all told at each event that these presbyters would only be choosing people out of the crowd at God’s prompting. That it would have nothing to do with who you were, who you knew, where you were sitting, or what you looked like.   Clay is a pretty big guy with piercings, tattoos, and a four-inch mohawk. He’s just not the type of guy who is ever overlooked in a crowded room. But I’m sure that had nothing to do with him being chosen to receive a word from a presbyter every single year.  Right??

I really don’t remember much of what he was told the second and third year but I remember the very first “word from God” that he received pretty well. I remember it because it was so absolutely wonderful. It was the kind of word everyone prays to hear.

After pointing to him and asking us to stand he stared at us for about 20 seconds and then said:

"You are a man of faith.  God has given you this gift.  You are a man of faith.  He wants you to declare it. Blessings will come to you if declare it.  Green pastures, financial blessing, cup runneth over.  He wants to bless you.  He wants you to rule! He wants you to reign! You are a man of faith!  Say it!  Declare it!  God says “If you do this, I’m going to give you everything!”

That’s probably the best word from God ever right?  Financial blessing!  Cup runneth over! Rule! Reign! Everything!  

Who wouldn’t grab on to that with both hands and hang on to it for dear life?  And we did.  Oh boy did we!  Never mind that he was laid-off just 2 weeks later, and then laid off twice more in the next 18 months.  That was pretty frustrating, but we held on to the promise.  God said He’s going to give us everything!

  

 Now, throughout these last couple years since leaving that church, I have had a few facepalm moments.  Every time I learned that I had believed something that wasn’t true about Jesus or the Bible.  Every time I had to unlearn something and learn it the right way.  Every time it occurred to me that I had taught someone else something that was nothing but new age apostasy.  

Even still, when I think I know something about the Bible I have to ask myself if it’s something I know because I learned it through prayer and study of Scripture or is it something I think I know because a church leader at LifeGate told it to me?  But let me tell you, the facepalm I gave myself when I realized the real truth behind that ‘word from God’ might have even left a bruise.

The words of that prophesy big fat lie from the devil played through my head..

He wants you to declare it.~ Declare what?  

The gospel? Scripture? That he is a sinner who if not for the death of the Son of the Almighty God upon a cross to pay for his sin that he would be destined to suffer the wrath of the Holy Father in the lake of fire for all eternity?  That Jesus is the Son of God who was raised from the dead?  That it is only through Jesus that anyone can repent of their sins, receive forgiveness and go to the Father?

Nope.  None of that. Just declare that he is a man of faith.

Blessings will come to you if declare it.  Green pastures, financial blessing, cup runneth over.- He wants you to rule! He wants you to reign!~ Money, power, blessings, everything you could possibly want! Focus on this!  It’s all about you! 

But rule what?  Reign over what?  Himself?  Others?  Or perhaps he will reign in victory over all the debt we would incur while he was laid-off three times..?

These presbyters deceived, puffed up, liars claim that the words that they give come directly from God through the Holy Spirit.  But what is the primary work of the Holy Spirit? To bear witness of Jesus!

 “But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.” ~ John 15:26.  

There was no mention of the Son of God.  No mention of the Gospel.  No mention of who He is, what He’s done.  Nope, it was all about Clay.

“If you do this, I’m going to give you everything!”

“And the devil said to Him, I will give You all this domain and it’s glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. Therefore if You worship before me, it shall all be Yours.”~ Luke 4:6-7

That is what they do.  These presbyters tell you good things about you.  In fact, before they get started giving these messages from God they will tell you that a true word from God will only build you up.  A word from God will never make you feel bad, guilty, ashamed or bring you down in any way.  

*If you want to continue believe that don’t ever read anything from the Old Testament prophets, or anything from the book of Revelation*

After Clay and I learned who God really is, after we realized that this church was not teaching Scripture and after we understood the meaning of Sola Scriptura; we knew that these prophetic words weren’t really from God.  But up until that moment, we believed that word we were given.  We believed it completely.  

For four years!

So why does everyone love the presbytery?  Why do we sit there hoping and praying that a presbyter will call on us and give us our very own personal message from God? Because it will be happy and exciting and full of great stuff all about us!  And if any of it makes us feel bad or convicted, we can just toss that aside because that’s what we want to hear.

Just eat the fish and leave the bones right?

People have told me that they know that these prophetic words are really from God because they were told things that no one but God would know or because what they were told actually came to pass.

Please..  Television psychics do the same thing.

And I ask you, just because someone was able to tell you something that you don't think anyone else would know, why do you just assume that it's from God?  

Because the devil would only tell you bad stuff?

He didn't tell Jesus bad stuff, why should you be any different?

No wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Therefore it is not surprising if his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness, whose end will be according to their deeds.~ 1 Corinthians 11:14-15

It's not just the leaders of LifeGate who do this.  It's everywhere..

Beth Moore, Joyce Meyer, Gateway Church, Elevation Church, Bethel.

Tons of people do this. It's not just church leaders anymore either.  Anyone can approach you and say they have a word from God.

Most of the people who attend churches like this believe that God has given them special messages for others at least once in their lives.

"Words from God" given in churches like Lifegate all do the same damage.  They minimize the importance of Scripture throughout the church.  

The Bible becomes something that just sits on our nightstands or something to carry to church in pretty bible cases, but rarely opened.

It becomes insufficient.  

Why spend time in prayer or study Scripture when we can just go to someone and ask them what God has to say to us?

Or better yet, we can just decide on what we want to hear, ask God, and then accept the first happy thought that pops into our heads.

Just read your Bible.

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires. ~ 2 Timothy 4:3

“If you want to hear from God, read the Bible.  If you want to hear from God audibly, read it out loud.” – Justin Peters

*please don't bother commenting on this telling me that you know that the word you received really was from God because you could back it up with Scripture. I'll delete it. Anything in the Bible can be twisted to suit your needs.  It happens ALL THE TIME.*   

In the beginning..

On January of 2015 LifeGate church put on their first “Greater Glory” conference.  

Clay and I were still members of the church at this time.  In fact Clay was providing security for David Perkins, the speaker at the conference. 

The last day of the conference was the last day we attended LifeGate Church.  

The next day I went in, sat down at the computer and removed as much of our information as I could from their database, emailed the pastors to tell them that we would not be back, I put my set of keys on the desk, and we left.  This wasn’t planned.  We hadn’t set a date to leave LifeGate, we hadn’t discussed it with anyone, we hadn’t found a new church.  

We just left.

I had wanted to leave for almost a year prior to that but Clay wasn't ready.  But something happened at the conference that sealed it for him and at that moment he was ready to go.

Maybe I'll explain what happened in another blog post..

For the first four years that we attended LifeGate we were happy.  

Really happy.  

It was our first experience belonging to a church and we were devoted members. 

We made friends with leadership quickly and volunteered constantly- helping our friends prepare meals for everyone on Wednesday nights, setting up luncheons for funerals and I made two thousand phone calls reminding people to give money to the church (not even kidding).  

Clay took care of repairs that their maintenance people didn’t know how to do themselves and he helped form the security team.  

For the last year I volunteered in the office four or five days a week making phone calls and doing data entry.  

Clay and I would stand in the senior pastor's office and pray over him before he would go out and give his “talks” on Saturday nights. For 5 years we practically lived at LifeGate church.  

We were popular, and we liked it.

But we were naive about the whole church thing.  Aside from the boring church services we were forced to attend as children (that we never paid attention to) this was what we thought church was supposed to be. 

Colored lights, fog machines, loud music, people dancing and singing to feel-good songs played in upbeat tones to get us all hyped-up and ready to listen to a feel-good sermon all about us.  

The pastors were funny, they threw candy from the stage, and handed out free copies of Jesus Calling, Heaven is for real, The Circle Maker, The Shack and any other self-centered heretical book they were promoting at the moment.  They even used props and drew pictures to keep us all engaged.  It was fun.  We were “doing life together”.

From the beginning there were things that didn’t sit right with me and at first I chalked it up to being a new Christian.  After all, I was still learning “church”.  Even as I read more of the Bible and began to see that what I was reading wasn’t lining up with what I was seeing or hearing at LifeGate, it didn’t sway me.  These were my friends!  They were like my family.  In fact, I liked a lot of them more than certain members of my real family.

So what if something they preached from the pulpit didn’t exactly line up with what I read in the Bible?  There are so many different ways to interpret the Bible right?  Was it really a big deal that they used verses completely out of context as long as they loved Jesus?  That’s what’s important isn't?  That we love Jesus? 

 Everything else is religion and legalism.  It’s the relationship that counts!  

Besides, just because I thought that particular verses meant something else didn't that just prove that the Bible means different things to different people?

The Bible was alive.  We were told that all the time.  

And things that have life change all the time.

Duh!

Yeah, for real..  I actually believed that..

At the time I had no idea what a Confession was or why they were so important.  Plus if anyone had told me about them at that time I would have ignored them or said something like "how do we know that the people who wrote the confession were right?" which is exactly what the people who still attend that church (and others like it) say when I mention a Confession now..

At the time I truly believed that how you feel was what was important.

Besides, they were pastors!  Obviously they knew much more about the Bible than I did.  So I disregarded what I read and how I understood it and went with whatever they said while pushing aside the “but that’s not what the Bible says” thoughts whenever they came into my head.

But then my husband’s cousin sent me a Bible class in the mail.  The Levitical Sacrificial System.  Wow!  This was the “meat” that I read about in the Bible! I completed the class and then took it again.  I learned and wanted to learn more.  

This was when I started asking questions about what I was reading in the Bible.  

Simple questions like:

Are the 10 Commandments given in the order they are given for a particular reason?  

Every single person I asked (six pastors including the senior pastor and one person who was actually employed at a bible college at the time) couldn't give me an answer except to say “I’m not really sure” or “I’ve never wondered about that, let me know what you find out”.  

How do we know that certain books of the Bible are actual historic events and not just parables to teach a moral lesson?  

I mentioned three books of the Bible specifically when asking this question- Job, Esther, and Ruth.  

I asked three of the pastors. 

The first one said “I know they are real historical events, but I will have to check some of the books I kept from college to explain why and I’ll get back to you.”  

He didn't.

The second one answered with a couple questions of his own- 

“why do you need to know? Why can’t you just have faith that they really happened?”

 He never actually answered any of my questions.

Now that I think about it, he never answered any of my questions that pertained to the Bible specifically.   

The third pastor said “I'm not sure, I'll look into it and let you know”.  

He did come back later with an answer and then admitted to me that while he was online looking for the answer he also learned that Luke was not one of the twelve apostles. 

He actually said “I didn’t know that”.  

He had been a pastor for 20 years and he didn’t know that. 

*sigh*

If you didn’t pick up on it, one of the books I asked about was the book of Ruth.  

Ruth!  The wife of Boaz and the mother of Obed.  Obed was the father of Jesse.  Jesse was the father of David.  How can it be that not just one pastor, but THREE pastors did not know that Ruth was the great-grandmother of King David?  

The Bible clearly says so.

I'm not talking about new Christians here, I'm talking about pastors.  It’s literally their job to know this stuff!

I realized that if I wanted to know more about the Bible that I wasn’t going to learn it from the leaders of the church (ironic eh?) so I enrolled in theology school.  By this time I knew that LifeGate was seriously selling people short as far as educating them in Scripture, but I still stayed. 

 I still wanted to stay.  

Sure I grumbled occasionally because I wasn’t learning anything that I didn’t already know, but all in all LifeGate Church was a great place to be.  

By this time my husband and I were even more popular, we were part of the in-crowd. Everyone knew us, and some of the pastors were telling visitors about me and my “amazing testimony”.

I really did have an amazing testimony. Something that can only be described as a “God thing” really did happen, and it lead me to the pastor’s office where I repeated the prayer that saved me got me started on a journey toward my salvation four years later.  The problem though, for those first four years I really did think I was saved.

I wasn’t and neither was Clay.

I’m not going to go into everything that happened leading up to the moment that I sat in that pastor’s office repeating a prayer that would save me give me a false sense of security for the next four years but suffice to say that all at once I was aware that everything I had believed about God and myself up until that moment was a total lie and that I needed to know the truth.

So, I sat in the pastor’s office and told him what had happened.  

Then for the next hour or so he told me about himself and how he used to be a selfish guy who wasn’t interested in who Jesus was, but one day while he was visiting this little red church he ran down to the front, fell on his knees and cried and then confessed that he was a sinner and needed Jesus and then he was saved.  There was quite a bit more detail than that but that’s the gist of it..  So I repeated the prayer, admitted that I was a sinner, asked Jesus to please come into my heart, and I was saved!

I wasn’t though.  

I thought I was.  

I really did.  

I was doing everything I was supposed to be doing.  Serving, attending every event, leading a table at Hearts, giving money so people could go on mission trips, joining prayer groups, volunteering at the homeless shelter, handing out money to anyone and everyone, and was part of a small group full of other popular people.  

I read my Jesus Calling book every day, read the bible for two hours every morning, and then studied it for another two hours at night. If there was something a Christian should be doing, believe me I was doing it.

But I wasn’t saved.  

I was simply a person who went to church a lot and did a lot of stuff there while handing out a lot of money. 

And then one day I watched a video on Youtube by David Platt talking about how it doesn’t matter what any particular scripture means to any particular person; what mattered was what the bible said it meant. 

I actually jumped off my couch and yelled "YES!"

Over the next few weeks I searched for more videos.  

That David Platt video led me to a video of Todd Friel and that led me to videos from the Strange Fire Conference put on by John MacArthur and that led me to a video seminar by Justin Peters, and that led me to a video called 10 indictments against the modern church by Paul Washer, and that is what led me to God.  

That is when I really heard the Gospel and understood what salvation was, who Jesus really was, who and what I really was, what it was that Jesus was saving me from and why I so desperately needed Him. 

People please, seriously..  

Saying a prayer inviting Jesus into your heart is not going to save you.  

Nothing you do is going to save you.  

Not a choice or a decision that you make.

No one is saved without hearing the gospel and no one hears and understands the Gospel without God giving them the grace to do so.

You don’t have to believe me.

Read the bible and find out for yourself.  

Have you read these?

Usually when I'm discussing a Confession or a Catechism in a group or on social media, someone always says “I don’t adhere to a particular confession or Catechism, they don’t matter anyway.”

When I hear that, my first initial reaction is to say “That tells me that you have never actually read any, you don’t know what they say and you probably don’t really know what they are.”

I don’t say that though.

But I want to.

I’ll admit it.  It bothers me when people say that.  

It’s like saying “I’m not a Calvinist or an Arminian or a Molonist, I’m just a Christian”.  Which is ridiculous because if you are a Christian, you either believe the doctrine of Calvinism or you believe the doctrine of Arminianism or you believe the doctrine of Molonism (by the way, Molonism is just stupid and if you believe it you should repent). 

Like it or not, you are either a Calvinist, an Arminian or a Molonist, regardless of what you call yourself.

Don’t believe me?  Look them up.

Anyway. The confessions.  

Before you announce to the world that you refuse to adhere to a confession (or just argue about them on Facebook) read them and then decide.

The 1689 London Baptist Confession

This is the confession my church adheres to.

Did you know that when looking for a new church that one of the things you should ask is "what confession does your church adhere to?"

If they say they don't adhere to one at all or that they have their own (red flag!) you should be asking a lot more questions..

Or just move on to the next one..

The Westminster Confession

This is very similar to the London Baptist Confession except the part about baptism.  It's Presbyterian so they believe in baptizing infants (they don't believe it's a saving baptism though)..

Martin Luther's 95 Thesis

Almost every Christian pastor on the planet has talked about Martin Luther nailing his 95 thesis to the door of the Wittenberg Castle Church.  But how many of you have taken the time read it or really have any idea of what it actually says?

The pastor (and I use the term loosely) of my ex-church was always bringing it up, usually when he was introducing the next weird thing that a church really shouldn't be doing.  He would remind us that at one time Martin Luther defied the “legalistic and religious” church in order to bring them down and expose them.

He always described that moment as Martin Luther challenging the church as if he were standing on the steps of the church, his hammer ringing out, boldly confronting them with the real truth and daring them to deal with it!

Well guess what?  

That's not really why he nailed his thesis to the door.  In fact, he probably didn't even use nails and a hammer, but glue.  He wasn't defying or challenging the church, and he wasn't trying to start a reformation.

He loved his church.

He didn't even expect what he put on the door to cause such a scandal.

The door of the church had always been used as a community bulletin board.  Lots of people glued stuff to it.  It was where the people would go to read the latest announcements.

Luther’s thesis was just one of many announcements glued to that door.

Martin Luther was unhappy about the selling of merits and felt that the practice was unbiblical, so he posted his reasons (the 95 thesis) on the door and requested that they would hold a debate to sort it all out.

That was it.

It was the younger people in the town who saw the thesis, had it copied and sent it out to the surrounding towns.

It was after that, that Martin Luther began to learn more and speak out more and eventually became the great reformer that he is known as today; and even then, he still clung to a few heretical ideas that no one who brags about that moment wants to talk about now.

The Heidelberg Catechism

A personal confession of faith written in 1563.

It's absolutely wonderful.  

I'm in the process of writing down a portion of it every day along with a Resolution (see below).

The Cannons of Dort

Written by a synod of Reformed theologians in Dordtrecht, Netherlands, in 1618-19.

It's main purpose was to set the record strait about the conflict between Calvinism and Arminianism.

I read through it every couple of months.

I'm going to start copying a portion of it daily when I finish going through the Resolutions and the Catechism. 

Jonathan Edwards' Resolutions

If you have never read anything by (or about) Jonathan Edwards, please do!

He was a Puritan pastor and theologian, thought by many to be the greatest theological mind that this country has ever produced. His preaching, which helped spark the  First Great Awakening, emphasized man’s sin, God’s judgment, God’s sovereignty, the necessity of personal conversion, and justification by faith.

He wrote these resolutions when he was 17 and 19 and read them out loud to himself once a week until his death.

And he went on his way…

I was listening to Pilgrim’s Progress this morning while I was cleaning the kitchen. If you haven’t read it (or listened to it) I really encourage you to do so.  

Long story short, it’s about a guy (Christian)who learns that the city he lives in is doomed for destruction and that there is a way to be saved from it. So he goes on a pilgrimage to the Holy City. On his way he is helped by some and hindered by others. He is helped by people named Evangelist and Prudence and Charity and so on and so on. He is hindered by people named Sloth and Worldly Wiseman and Obstinate.  

You see the pattern I’m sure.

Once Christian truly understands where he’s going and why he is going there, his interactions with those who hinder him or question him begin to change. In the beginning he listens to them, follows their lead and ends up in trouble.  But after a while you’ll notice a change in his behavior. People approach him along this road and warn him of the dangers ahead and tell him to turn around or go back or to take a different road but he tells them what he’s doing, why he’s doing it, and what will happen when he gets to where he’s going and then you’ll read “and he went on his way”.

When I heard that it made me think about sharing the gospel and why so many who profess to be believers do not make an effort to share the gospel with others.

When I ask other believers why they don’t go out and share the gospel I generally receive the same answers. 

They tell me that it’s just not something they are called to do. 

I can't think of a nice way to say it, so I'll just say it.

That is a lie. Every single believer is commanded by Jesus to go and make disciples.

Including you!  

Some say that they don’t because they don’t feel that they know enough about the Bible to share it with others. This too is an excuse. If you are a believer and you know that you are saved and you know how you came to be saved then that’s all you need to say. Or you can just hand them a Bible or a tract with the gospel written on it and say “did you get one of these?“ or if you are too afraid to do that, just leave it somewhere. 

My husband can put a tract in someone’s pocket without them even realizing it but that’s a whole other blog post. 

I know people personally who say that they know they’re supposed to and that they want to and that they’re angry with themselves because they don’t.  

That’s the answer that I struggle with more than any other answer.  Seriously, you know you’re supposed to, you want to, and you’re mad that you don’t.   

But….?

Then it occurred to me today while listening to Pilgrim’s Progress that maybe the reason that they don’t is because they aren’t really sure what they are responsible for and what they aren’t.  Maybe no one has actually told them how.  Sure, they know that they should and why they should but they don’t know how.

I suppose you could do that circle thing that's all over Youtube.  I guess it's more popular than I thought.  Personally, I don't like it and I wouldn't chose that method myself (I'll tell you why if you're interested) but there are other ways.

When Clay and I first started our homeless ministry we thought that we needed to build relationships with the homeless first. You know, talk to them, get to know them and help them to know us before we could share the gospel with them.  It didn’t take us very long to realize that wasn’t really going to happen.  We do know a couple people by name and we do stop and talk to them when we see them but most of the people we interact with in those situations aren’t really interested in what we have to say. They are either tweaking and can’t focus on the words coming out of our mouths or they’re just waiting for us to shut up and hand over to them whatever it is we have to give.

I was disappointed because I didn’t really feel that we were making a difference. I didn’t feel that we were making disciples and we certainly weren’t building relationships.  It wasn’t just homeless people though, it was anyone we tried to talk to. 

Practically no one outside of a church wants people to talk to them about Jesus.  They just don’t.  The funny thing is- the Bible even says that. We are all haters of God until God sees fit to give us the grace to feel any differently.   

Until God enables us to love Him, we don’t.  We won’t. Period. No talking or arguing or pressing is going to change that.

So after several attempts at sharing the gospel with strangers (homeless or not) we had to take a long look at what we were doing wrong and what we needed to do to fix it. So we thought about all the attempts that people had made through the years to get us to convert to Christianity. They would try to convince us. They brought pastors to our house, sent missionaries to our door; people would say things like “Jesus loves you” or “you can be happy if you accept Jesus”.  

Even that day I stepped into that man’s office at Lifegate church. Almost 2 hours of talking, arguing and convincing me to say the prayer to accept Jesus into my heart but not a word of Scripture. There was no Gospel. There was no conviction of my sin. I didn’t even really know what sin was or what was so devastating about it. Yet I walked out of that office believing that I was “saved”. I didn’t really even understand what I was saved from! I just wanted that horrible, panicky, I don’t understand what’s happening feeling I had been experiencing to go away.

It did, but it was soon replaced by something else..

(another blog post perhaps).

It wasn’t until four years later when I heard some guy by the name of Paul Washer preach the real gospel on YouTube did I truly understand how much my sin was an offense to God and how desperately I needed a Savior that I was truly saved.

It wasn’t someone inviting me to church that saved me. It wasn’t the dozens of conversations I had with others throughout my life trying to convince me to become a Christian that saved me. It certainly wasn’t by observing the behaviors of other Christians, nor was it the relationships that had been formed with anyone either.

It was the gospel. 

It was scripture. 

It was the hearing and the reading of God’s Word at God’s appointed time that saved me.

So that’s it. That is all you are responsible for. You are NOT responsible for convincing anyone, converting anyone, hounding anyone, pressing or pushing anyone. You don’t have to be their friend. You don’t have to make them your project. You are not responsible for their walk with Jesus or how they learn or what church they go to. All you are responsible for is sharing the Word of God with them.

God does the saving. 

Not you

 Not the pastor

Not a church 

Just God.

 There is no one way to share the gospel.

 Some people go door-to-door, some people preach on the sidewalks, my husband works in foreign countries where he shares the gospel with people who have never heard of Jesus. He even shares the gospel with people who could possibly kill him for doing so. 

But he also sticks Bible tracts into Fifty Shades of Grey books at Walmart, hands Bibles to waitresses and leaves tracts on mirrors in public bathrooms. 

I have a friend who orders Bibles by the case and then rents a table at a flea market and puts up a sign that says “free Bibles”. She doesn’t preach to them, she doesn’t argue with them, she just lets them have a Bible. That’s it.

So don’t overthink it. Don’t let it overwhelm you. If you can’t bring yourself to approach a stranger and tell them what they need to hear to be saved, just hand it to them and then be on your way.

It really is that simple.

Just get out there and DO SOMETHING.

You can purchase tracts just about anywhere on line or at any Christian book store.  This is where I buy mine http://www.tractplanet.com

or you can email me and I will give you (or ship you) some for free.  

I have bibles too.

You can get tracts online for free at http://www.bibletractsinc.org

You can read Pilgrims progress for free too

https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-pilgrim-s-progress-new-edition

Once you believe it...

Every three months or so, LifeGate Church (the church I used to attend before I was saved) hosts an event called Healing Rain.  People go in the hopes that they will be healed.  

First a guy gets on the stage and talks about the healing power of God, and then the real reason everyone is there begins. The prayer teams line up in pairs in front of the stage.  The music is turned up.  The lights are turned down.  People in search of healing come forward.

I came forward.

I stood before Pastor Connie and another girl.  I told her about my epilepsy.  Well, I didn’t actually tell her about it, all I said was “I’m epileptic” and she took it from there.

She said “Ok, lets do this”.

The girl with her put her hands on my left arm, bowed her head and began to mutter gibberish (they call that praying in tongues) while Connie put one hand on my chest and her other hand between my shoulder blades and then told me to relax and "just let it happen”.  Then she began to declare that I was healed while gently pushing me backward and then forward again. Back and then forward.  Her words became a chant “praise Jesus, she is healed. Praise Jesus, she is healed. Praise Jesus she is healed”.

She began to push harder and faster. Back and forth, back and forth. While her voice became louder and her chant picked up the pace.  The girl next to her raised her voice, her gibberish becoming more feverish. I could hear the other leaders and their assistants chanting and yelling over whomever they were praying for, and I knew that people were already hitting the floor.  The pushing intensified. The chanting grew louder, the gibberish sped up.  I relaxed and “let it happen”.

And then I was on the floor looking up at Connie who was leaning over me, stroking my forehead and telling me  “God rejoices for you”.  She said “God dances in heaven for you”.  Then she told me that from that moment on, I needed to repeat to myself  “I am the daughter of a king!”  Every time I had a seizure, every time it felt like I was going to have a seizure, or every time I even thought about a seizure.  She said that I needed to say it to myself all the time, “I am the daughter of a king!”  Every time I saw her at the church after that she would say to me "who are you?" and I was supposed to reply "I am the daughter of a king!"  She told me that I needed to keep saying it until I truly believed it.  And once I believed it, I would be healed.

That was four years ago.

I still have epilepsy.  In fact, we now know that I have a serious autoimmune disease that causes seizures, Crohn's disease and Ankylosing Spondylitis.  

Maybe I don’t believe in God enough?  Maybe I don’t fully comprehend who I am in Christ?

Maybe I just don’t have enough faith?

Maybe it’s my fault.

Or maybe..

Just maybe..

That’s not how it works and I just fell for a big fat lie..

The kind of lie that millions of people all over the world are falling for because of churches like LifeGate.

Click here ——> THE HURT OF HEALING