welcome to a new day

volleyball kicked bottom. pursuits won, woo woo. to the woo woo. breakfast of weetbix has been tasting amazing lately... its honestly my favorite meal of the day. start off with 7:15 intercession then lead right into breakfast? God then food does the soul well. here's why i will never forget today. and Lord help me if i do, i'll get another dose of spiritual reality.

my day started (kinda) at 4 am, cuz i signed up to do my hour of 24/7 prayer. i woke up less than excited, but determined to get some solid prayer in. 10 minutes in i was in a room with a few people from here, a few people from home, and a few unknowns or people from my past, digging through a kitchen fridge looking at pizza to eat.. so prayer didn't go over so well. there were a few points i thought i was out of bed and ready to head over to the prayer room, but i was actually still fast asleep. i think i justified sleeping through it because i was going base prayer at 5:30am anyways.. but anyhow! nick woke me up an we headed over.

now the leader of morning prayer/intercession is a big german man named sam, and he is awesome. he clearly has a love and understanding for Jesus, and his actions and teachings show it. he's the one who made me think about my intimacy and identity with God. but anyways! there is a lovely woman named claire in the family ministries team, and she has had an immensely dark spiritual life. she's only been a christian about a year and still has a lot of baggage, so to say. last night apparently she blacked out, and ended up about a mile away, covered in blood. she wanted prayer.. sam said ok! lets do it. so she sat in the middle of our little 7 man circle, and sam told the other guys an gals to brace her. she looked at me cuz i was new and said 'don't be afraid, this will be weird but you are protected by our God and you don't have to worry'. this... put me immediately in an uncomfortable position because i knew exactly what was about to happen. the second sam started to pray, she started writhing around, thrashing and screaming in a voice that was not hers. sam continued to pray, telling the demon that she belonged to Christ, that she was bought by the blood and that it had no right to be inside of her anymore. the demon protested and screamed that she belonged to it, and that it was gonna get sam too. clearly he has been through this before, because he was unphased. (oh by the way, she had a leg free and kicking so they told me to grab hold of it. i was holding on hard with both hands and it was really a struggle.. she was very strong. .. not something i'm used to, but something i've been aware of.) but... after about 3 minutes of hard prayer and struggle she started to cough and then slumped over, saying thank you in her voice. we stood her up and started praying thanks to God, (i was so relieved..) but then all of the sudden she turned again and went after sam. he just quickly allowed us to pin her down against the ground, i had an arm, james had her feet and nick had both arms and sam was above her praying intensely again. there was more arguing with the demon that was called.... something with a 'b'... not beelzebub or anything but mebe it was boltergiest or something... don't really care. her arm was even stronger than her leg had been, so it was getting tiring trying to hold on... (sam was so intense, but at the same time so calm. he stopped screaming for a second, and looked around at us and like he was a teacher explaining 2+2 was all 'this is this kind of demon.. this is what it does, this is where it comes fro- GET OUT OF HER!' it was nuts.) after about 5 minutes she started coughing again and went limp once more.. this time it felt real cuz she laid there for a few minutes then we helped her up slowly. we prayed about bangledesh and other places where the church is starting and christians are multiplying but i really couldn't focus.. me'n nick had a really good talk afterwards, just about life and living and how real spiritual warfare is and ah... just so good. i've never felt more reassured in my life. it was scary as anything, but afterwards just knowing how powerful and absolute and real our God is let me breath new life into my faith.

that was all before 6am... later, our speaker of the week was having his last lecture, aaand he was giving us white rocks to represent our invitation to Gods holy banquet (heck yes we are special.) but anyways, he was praying for us, and anointing us with oil and inviting the holy spirit to come and fill our lives. it was so calm.. so surreal.. the whole room was alive in worship but it was so quiet.. they prayed over bill henwood for awhile (he's been battling cancer for quite some time, he's the director of crystal springs) and all the students had their own interactions with God. i was just so happy to be having experiences on such opposite extremes in the same morning. today isn't gonna leave me for awhile hopefully. claire is back to being a sweet woman who genuinely loves God. i was a little shaky in the morning but i feel so close to all my staff and new bros'n sisters... my one on one is gonna be with tyler, a really cool guy from minnesota who's crazy into adventures and whatnot and is our paramedic and cool beans things. one on one with him will be sweet, and rims is his other one on one so we can bond more too. we guys are just gonna be our own small group in the house, 9 of us, nice'n perfect for getting intimate. MAN i can't wait to see what else happens.. haven't even been here a week.

my favorite verse i've decided is that verse in 1 kings... could be 2 kings... i have it written down but not here so just trust me. elijah is on a mountain (or maybe jeremiah.. but probably elijah. does it matter? no.) and he is asking to see God. a huge earthquake came and shook the earth, but God was not in the quake. then another big huge thing, which God also wasn't in. then fire, an God was not in the fire. but then came a gentle whisper, and thats where elijah found God. makes me smile...skillet has it right when they sing their chorus (i forget the name as well! flip!)

your a silent rain, your a hurricane. you are everything i cannot see i can't explain. (excited fist pumps)