Ekblad News Updates

Homeless in Paris, Christmas 2011

2011-12-20T11:17:00.001-08:00

Many people struggle to step beyond what can feel like a formidable barrier to talk about Jesus or offer to pray for blessing or healing for strangers in public settings. Since my last update regarding my own struggles to stop, listen to and offer spiritual support to homeless people and others, much has changed.

This past month I’ve stepped over my invisible line, stopping and offering to pray for a number of people on the street. I’ve been surprised and sometimes delighted by people’s responses. Like when I offered to pray for a old hunched-over lady from Romania who begs in front of the Louvre, who kissed my hand and blessed me, and told me how her son is a Pentecostal pastor.

That same day I stopped beside a man from Bulgaria who bowed before those walking by near the Belleville metro, his forehead on the pavement, hands clutching a cup in front of his head in a gesture of extreme humility. When I gave him a two Euro coin he got up and warmly thanked me in broken Spanish. I learned that his name is Petrof and that he’s been in Paris about 3 months. “I don’t like to do this. I am used to working but cannot find a job,” he laments. “I’ve just come from Spain where I worked as a truck driver,” he says, pulling out his Spanish truck driver license. I offered to pray for him and he gladly accepted, telling me he is an Orthodox Christian. I prayed for his back pain and he said it went away. He too kissed my hand and thanked me profusely, giving me his cell phone number in case I hear of work or an address he can use to receive mail.

When we first moved to Paris I had a mental picture of individual French Christians inside big soap bubbles—only a thin, easily-broken barrier between a private and public faith. In fact the ideology of laicité came into being after the French Revolution, when a clear differentiation between the church and the secular state became part of the official French national posture. Many Protestants were glad to have some official limit to Roman Catholic influence, which dominated the nation for centuries. Laicité now functions to prohibit Muslim girls and women from wearing burqas to school or work, holding Muslims back from public expression. While this ideology has not silenced everyone, it is officially illegal for government workers or ministry or other non-profit workers who receive any public funds to talk about their faith unless they are specifically asked.

Many of the nations’ most effective ministries to the poor, immigrants, the homeless and others on the margins were started by Christians. Most of them now separate social service from any public witness regarding faith or anything spiritual. Most Christians I’ve talked with feel pressure to keep their faith private, and yet long to step out into greater freedom, which feels like almost a transgression.

In mid November I was asked to speak in a Reformed church near Valence (St-Laurent-du Pape) on getting beyond blocks/paralysis in evangelism. At the end of my talk an area pastor came to the front, deeply moved & began to really exhort people, at one point yelling out: "Ça suffit! Ça suffit! "That's enough! That’s enough! We mustn't be silent any more.” Many people came up for prayer, including a man who sobbed as he asked Jesus for greater confidence and boldness.

This past Friday night I finished my last night teaching an 11-week mission course at the Service Protestant de Mission Défap. The previous Friday, just after sessions on missional community and prophetic evangelism we had broken into five groups of four course participants and went out on the streets at 10:30pm to pray for homeless people and others. After a final dialogical Bible study on the Angel of the Lord’s seeking and finding Hagar in Genesis 16, sending her back to religious insiders Abraham and Sarah, we debriefed the previous week’s outreach.

Participants reported rich encounters and prayer times with homeless people, and experienced first hand the joy of seeking and finding God’s precious people like the angel must have-- and being evangelized in the process by these contemporary Hagars (whom the angel prophesied over and sent back to the “elect”, perhaps resulting in their change of heart). It seems that the bubbles are bursting and people are feeling called to reach out to people on the streets and beyond. Our next street outreach is set for Friday night, January 13, beginning with a time of corporate worship and prayer at the Eglise Reformée du Marais.

Please pray for the many homeless people this Christmas season. The weather’s getting colder and wetter. Pray also for those here in France who are feeling called to reach outside their comfort zone to share God’s love, for inspiration, determination and sensitivity to the Spirit.

Tonight is the official launch of Luke and my blog Homeless in Paris. Take and look and keep visiting at http://thehomelessinparis.blogspot.com

Expecting and not (yet) seeing Jesus’ healing power

2011-09-24T06:31:00.000-07:00

Continuing to expect Jesus’ healing here and now is often harder than writing it off as unrealistic or something to be awaited on the other side of death. Everywhere I travel lately I meet people and communities crippled by disappointment.

A man in Iceland prayed for days that his sister would come back to life after a drug overdose. A pastor of a church in the UK died of cancer in spite of massive prayer efforts. A close friend’s Pakistani Christian friend who advocated for minorities was gunned down in Islamabad in March. I myself have been discouraged by the slew of revenge killings in a Honduran community dear to my heart—and now by a close friend’s decline in a long prayer-bathed battle against cancer. What disappoints do you have, small or big?

“How many of you have been disappointed by God?” I asked a group of inmates back in July. Many were honest enough to admit frustrations at God not apparently answering prayers: their girl friends’ refusal to turn away from drug habits or the courts denials of their requests to be admitted into drug court rather than going straight to serve long prison sentences. Others were afraid to admit their disappointments—especially at a time when they really need God’s help. Many assume that being honest with God might get you on God’s bad side.

I have been learning to bring my complaints to Jesus, and encouraging many to risk transparency with God through the clear articulation of disappointments. Martha and Mary have been helpful teachers, and I’ve discovered the fresh relevance of John 11—a chapter dedicated mostly to people’s complaints to Jesus—who doesn’t punish them (or us) for being real but goes with them and us to the depths of grief—through the darkness and towards the other side.

The story begins in John 11:1-3, where Mary and Martha are mentioned, and Mary is forefronted as the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair—a bold act of transparent worship in the house of a judging Pharisee (see Lk 7:36-50). Mary is a true devotee who represents those in relationship with Jesus who come to him expecting answers to prayers.

Mary and Martha send word to Jesus about their brother Lazarus: “Lord, he who you love is ill” (v. 3). Jesus deliberately stays where he is for two days, and Lazarus dies. By the time Jesus approaches Bethany Lazarus has already been dead four days.

Martha goes out to meet Jesus, while Mary stays back, grieving in the house. “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give whatever you ask him” (v. 21).

Martha’s complaint is strong and so is her faith. Yet in the ensuing conversation it is clear that she has no expectation that Jesus can or will resurrect her brother before the last day (v. 24). Jesus responds, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me shall never die,” and invites her to believe-- in him. Her affirmation of faith in the aftermath of premature death, that he is Christ, Son of God, the Coming One energizes her as she stands before him. She goes back and takes pastoral liberties, tricking her despondent sister into approaching Jesus with two well-intentioned lies.

“The teacher is here and is calling you” (v. 28). Intercessors affirm as real that which is not yet actual based on what they believe to be true. Jesus was not yet in the village, as the next verse clearly states. Nor had Jesus called for Mary. Martha’s faith jumpstarts Mary’s. She gets up quickly and goes to him.

When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at this feet and repeats Martha’s exact complaint but without Martha’s confession of faith: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

Jesus is deeply impacted. He doesn’t correct her, explain himself or in any way justify his absence. A series of verbs shows Jesus’ increasing closeness to Mary, Martha, and their dead brother. He sees her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he is “greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved.”

Jesus shows God’s willingness to go with us fully into our pain. Rather than distancing himself through theological reflection Jesus asks: “Where have you laid him?” (v. 34). The people invite him deeper into the concrete details of their upset: “Come and see,”-- and Jesus weeps.

Jesus’ empathy leads some in the crowd to complain as I sometimes do: “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?” (v. 37). The crowd doesn’t complain directly to Jesus as Martha and Mary do, but talk about him in the third person.

Regardless of different people’s ways of addressing Jesus, the text says nothing to critique people or to justify Jesus. Rather Jesus shows a willingness to go even deeper into people’s root disappointments and loss, inviting them (and us) to intercession to the point of discomfort and even offense. How far will Jesus go? Much further than we will it seems.

Jesus is described as being “deeply disturbed” but not intimidated as he comes to the tomb, a cave with a stone lying against it. Jesus commands: “Take away the stone.”

Martha represents the realist. She’s the voice of those who accept the finality of death and impossibility of repair. “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.” Martha resists Jesus descent into the grave.

Jesus addresses her unbelief with a challenge: “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?”

They take away the stone and Jesus is there, face-to-face with the rotting corpse of his friend. He cries with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!”

The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “unbind him, and let him go.”

Many of the Jews witnessing the event believed in Jesus, and I have been feeling compelled to put my faith more fully in the person of Jesus than ever before. Though opponents sought to kill Lazarus and did manage to kill Jesus, and John the Baptist while Jesus was still alive—his resurrection means he himself continues to be the resurrection and the life for us—before and after death.

I’ve spent untold hours these past months grieving the death of the men of Mal Paso and of my own and Tierra Nueva’s seeming powerlessness to stop the violence. I have felt freer to speak my laments and complaints directly to Jesus—and it seems my faith, my intercession and my longing for transformation are increasing. There is so much about prayer and God’s action in the world that I still do not understand. So much remains a mystery. I am glad right now that the violence in Mal Paso has actually stopped. A calm appears to be returning to the village and TN’s Honduran leader David is feeling encouraged.

Please continue to pray with us for the Kingdom of God to come more and more to this village and to Minas de Oro—and for wisdom and strength for our leader David. Please continue to pray for Tina’s healing.

May Jesus increase your faith to bring your uncensored disappointments, complaints and grief directly to him in prayer. May you experience first-hand God’s presence, goodness and power as you come into Jesus’ Presence and as he goes with you into your difficulties to bring resurrection and life.

Mal Paso: Overcoming Evil with Good of Being Overcome

2011-08-04T13:45:00.000-07:00

There's a village in Honduras called Mal Paso “Bad Step” that is dear to my heart. Four men were murdered in a string of vengeance killings from February to June. In response, Tierra Nueva’s (TN) Honduran leader David organized a prayer walk that brought together TN house-church participants with Pentecostals, Catholics and other villagers—a very beautiful and unusual sign of unity. I sent out a prayer update about this last month.

Then in early July three more men were brutally murdered within a week. One of these men was Teodoro, a friend who first hosted TN’s agricultural meetings and eventual Bible studies in the corridor of his house in Mal Paso in 1984. Teodoro, David’s cousin and next-door neighbor, was shot to death right there in the corridor where TN first began.

David has been right at the scene of all these killings, attending to the massacred bodies of men he’s grown up with. He has accompanied the families to bury and mourn their dead and has been deeply shaken. All of these men were people he and our ministry has sought to draw into friendship with Jesus, friend of sinners. But it looks like’s the ruler of this world is winning on this beloved front—and this deeply troubles David and me.

There are no police investigations or effective law-enforcement in the region. The closest police post has young officers without transportation. They themselves fear for their lives in this wild-west-like region that is increasingly home to bands of heavily-armed young gangsters often composed of deportees fresh from prison sentences in the US.

The very people who are doing the killings are men who we at Tierra Nueva refuse to give up on! And yet we feel quite impotent with our naked gospel and prayers. We long for miracles, for Jesus’ way to be more attractive than the dominant approach, the “realistic” killing of enemies that alleges to bring security.

These recent deaths have been especially hard for David. David sees his neighbors arming themselves and living in the terror of the ambush, which involves incessant rehearsing shooting to kill first or be killed.

“I refuse to do this Roberto,” says David—who continues to be won over by Jesus’ call to love and bless enemies.

In all of my years of ministry I have never met such a grace-filled man of peace as David. He has poured himself out for his community, and together we have sought after these very men on the margins who now are dying. Last week another young man was shot to death on the road out of town to the fields that I’ve visited hundreds of times, and rumors are flying that others we know are on the list.

“Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (Rom 12:21) is a beloved Scripture that we read and seek to practice. But how do we overcome evil with good?

David has given his life in love for this village and we’ve backed him up for over 27 years. We’ve helped the village install gravity-flow potable water and irrigation systems, establish agricultural committees, purchase land for landless farmers, implement re-forestation projects, begin an adult education program “Educatodos” (Educate Everyone) that is helping many who have only completed third grade continue their education.

TN has conducted group Bible studies in Mal Paso for years, drawing growing numbers of people. We have continued a more personal house-to-house visitation and prayer ministry for individuals and families. We’ve organized village fiestas and healing services where we’ve seen many people healed in Jesus’ name and filled with the Holy Spirit. I’ve brought teachers and spiritual leaders to Mal Paso from all over the world. David has organized a weekly worshiping community, and we established a number of house churches in this town.

We seek to overcome evil with good in every way we know how—but it seems we are not succeeding. I have even made contact with a Honduran General who is a Christian, asking him to help get a police post in this village at the request of the villagers. After an initial phone conversation and a number of emails, I'm not hearing anything back.

A number of families most affected by the violence have now moved away, including David, who has moved to the nearby municipal capital where TN is officially based. Others who are hearing of alleged threats via rumor are trying to move. The woman in charge of TN’s Educatodos has just told us her family is likely to move soon, taking another one of TN's key leaders out of the area.

I'm in conversation with our Honduran leader, David on an every-other-day basis by phone. We’ve been grieving together, praying for each other and trying to move forward. We see that we are at risk of losing hope, of adjusting our expectations of Jesus’ reign to the reality of Mal Paso’s violence.

Jesus’ warnings to his disciples in Jerusalem just before his arrest and crucifixion are both sobering and encouraging. They describe what we are now seeing.

At that time many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will arise and will mislead many. Because lawlessness is increased, most people’s love will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end, he will be saved. This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come. (Matt 24:9-14)

Please pray for David, for Gracie and me, and for TN’s Honduran faith community members:

that Jesus would keep our hearts soft and that we would endure to the end in our announcing of the gospel of the kingdom.
for wisdom for David and for me as I advise him.
for protection for David and his family, and also for Jorge, Arturo, Beto and others who remain in the village.
for those who are plotting more violence—that they would have encounters with Jesus, the Prince of Peace.
for an end to the violence in Mal Paso and a growing movement of forgiveness and reconciliation.
for Mal Paso's leaders and members of "hogares en tranformacion" (households in transformation)-- that they would experience Christ's peace and protection and be bright shining lights and agents of peace.

Please pray for Jesus kingdom of peace to grow stronger and the message of Christ’s victory over death to flourish and make a visible difference in this time of crisis.

Lamentation makes room for breakthrough

2011-07-13T09:42:00.000-07:00

In my travels I often minister in places where people’s expectations of God’s intervention to bring healing or any kind of transformation are low. This is usually because they’ve suffered big disappointments: praying for friends and family who haven’t been healed but remain ill or in pain, or have died and not been resurrected.

Disappointment naturally leads people to accommodate to the status quo. We too often adjust our theology and practice to make room for prayers not being answered. On a recent trip to England Gracie and I ministered in a church that had been through some major trials and big losses, including the death of their beloved pastor from cancer five years before.

I was speaking on Acts 6-8, one of my favorite sections of Scripture these days—and was struck in a whole new way by the realism and idealism in this story. Acts 6 begins with the apostles’ selection of seven people “of good reputation, full of the Spirit and of wisdom” to serve widows at an early church version of a soup kitchen. The apostles feel called to prayer and ministry of the word, and lay hands on these seven to serve in keeping with Jesus’ way of indiscriminate love.

I continue to be amazed to read how the first of the seven, Steven is consequently “full of grace and power, performing great wonders and signs among the people” (v. 8). Then right away in Acts 7 he preaches a mega sermon that enrages his audience to such an extent that they stone him to death and widespread persecution of Jesus’ followers results.

Such a big blow to these first Christians, who’d already been through so many devastating disappointments. Jesus’ betrayal by one of their own and his arrest and execution were fresh in their memories. His resurrection certainly brought radical hope, but Jesus then left them in his ascension.

Gathering and waiting was not in vain. The Holy Spirit was poured out at Pentecost, and frightened, timid apostles were transformed overnight into bold witnesses. But persecution followed swiftly: arrests, threats, beatings, orders to not speak in Jesus’ name again. Acts 5 ends with the apostles going away from their flogging “rejoicing that they had been considered worthy to suffer shame for his name” (v. 41).

The apostles laying on of hands leads to empowerment for healing and preaching, which leads once again to martyrdom and unprecedented persecution that scatters the remaining six table servers throughout Judea and Samaria, leading to house-to-house searches, arrests and imprisonment (8:1-3). As I was preaching a verse I have mostly overlooked struck me as critical for my English audience:

“Some devout people buried Stephen, and made loud lamentation over him” (8:2).

Loud lamentation over Stephen shows how seriously these early Christians took their disappointment and pain. Lamentation, the public and private expressions of grief, of disillusionment is essential. I wondered whether this community needed to give louder voice to pain, to complaint, risking the loss of faith to receive faith anew.

I invited people suffering from deep disappointment and despondency to come forward for prayer and was surprised by how many came to the front, some of them weeping. As Gracie and I began to pray the Holy Spirit came strong and people were being visibly touched. People were comforting and praying for each other and the love of God was so tangible and deeply moving. The presence of God was so strong that many people where not able to remain standing.

After a while Gracie and I both received some words of knowledge for healing and we invited people with various conditions to come for prayer. Person after person was being healed as we had people praying for each other and Gracie and I ministered to many.

I’ve been recalling many examples in the Gospels where people who come to Jesus expressing their grief or honest assessment of their lack of relief are met with Jesus’ apt response. I feel inspired anew to bring my uncensored laments, complaints and needs before Jesus, and am finding my expectations for his saving touch increasing together with an intense longing for God’s realm to come here and now.

It’s important to note that lamentation is not a technique that guarantees immediate breakthrough. After loudly lamenting Stephen’s death, things don’t get immediately better. Saul does house-to-house searches and drags people off to prison (8:3). But in the next story Philip, the second person ordained to care for widows, flees to Samaria where crowds hear his preaching and see miraculous signs.

“For in the case of many who had unclean spirits, they were coming out of them shouting with a loud voice; and many who had been paralyzed and lame were healed. So there was much rejoicing in that city” (Acts 8:7-8).

Persecution leads to scattering, which brings God’s strong presence to the excluded Samaritans and soon to the African continent through Philip’s next encounter (8:25ff). Philip's dramatic faith adventure continues as the Spirit transports him to his next assignment, inviting us into ours.

Waiting for Miracles

2011-06-08T20:08:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday my 16-year-old daughter Anna and I attended Bruce Cockburn’s concert in Seattle. Bruce’s music inspired and sustained Gracie and I during our years in Central America in the 1980s—when poverty, death squads and wars weighed heavy... and has continued to greatly bless us. Bruce’s song “Waiting for a miracle” inspires hope and active waiting for God’s intervention, which we often get to witness and continue to long for in greater and greater measure.

“…You rub your palm
On the grimy pane
In the hope that you can see
You stand up proud
You pretend you're strong
In the hope that you can be
Like the ones who've cried
Like the ones who've died
Trying to set the angel in us free
While they're waiting for a miracle

Struggle for a dollar, scuffle for a dime
Step out from the past and try to hold the line
So how come history takes such a long, long time
When you're waiting for a miracle…”
View here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgdIjvBMwoA

The other night as Bruce sang and played this song, my thoughts hovered over two immediate situations, one already being accomplished, another awaiting resolution.

Three weeks ago I came into the jail on a Thursday night to lead four back-to-back Bible studies. John, a guy in his late forties bounded into the multipurpose room, eager to attend the first gathering, scraggly goatee surrounding his crooked smile. He had good news to tell.

“Hey, remember when you prayed for my back two weeks ago?” he asked excitedly. “Well, I woke up that next morning and pain was gone, and it hasn’t come back.”

“Wow, really? That’s great news! Tell me more,” I said. “So how did you hurt your back and how long has it hurt?” I asked.

John told how when he was twelve years old (he’s now almost 50) he and a buddy were pushing a mini-bike along a road at night when suddenly they were hit head on by a man on a motorcycle. His friend was instantly killed, and he was thrown critically injured into someone’s front yard. 42 bones were broken, including a disk in his back. After four years of hospitalization where he was regularly put on morphine and meth, an addiction started that led to a life-long drug problem and four prison terms.

"I've been in nearly every prison in Washington State," he said. On top of that he saw his dad lose his leg in a boating accident and his uncle die of a heart attack as he witnessed the horrific loss.

“I’ve seen lots of terrible things,” he recounted, “including my brother die beside me on a couch after a 13-year-old shot him in the back of the head with a 22.”

“All these memories replay in my head all the time” he continued, “and I’ve been mentally tormented as a result. My back has hurt continuously all these years… until two weeks ago when you prayed,” he recounted, with joy on his face.

We give thanks to Jesus for this miracle, and pray for God to lift off trauma and cleanse his memories. I look forward to seeing him again tomorrow night to find out how he's doing, and if he's experiencing any relief from his tormenting memories.

In contrast to the “already” of this long-awaited breakthrough, conflict brews in a dusty village in central Honduras. I’m told the story of a man who migrated to the USA over ten years ago, putting his brother in charge of his land. He sent money down and his brother managed it with great care, avoided common pitfalls of drinking and trouble, and flourished. Siblings became jealous of his success, and spread lies against their brother that stirred up a bitter family feud, including conflict between the brothers. The brother who managed the farm was brutally murdered in February, and a cycle of vengeance is now underway that has led to the recent murder of the brother recently deported from the US, followed by the assassination of his nephew. More killings are expected, and law-enforcement are absent from the scene in Honduras’ current governmental chaos and resulting power vacuum.

Tierra Nueva’s main Honduran leader is deeply involved in peacemaking efforts and is in need of our prayers at this time. This coming Saturday at 2:00pm he and Tierra Nueva’s house church members are conducting a prayer walk around the village, interceding for an end to the violence. He has succeeded in engaging the participation of the Catholic and Pentecostal leaders, who will be joining the procession. Please pray for God to protect our leader, giving him great wisdom and success in his peacemaking efforts. We are praying and waiting for miracles— conversion and true repentance of those now caught up in the cycle of retributive violence, and an end to the death campaign and resulting terror in the region. Pray too for TNs growing house church movement, 'hogares en transformacion' (households in transformation). I’ll keep you posted.

New Ministry Assignment in France & Highlights from Integral Missions leaders gathering in the UK

2011-05-16T16:24:00.000-07:00

There’s a growing spiritual openness among French people both inside and outside the church that was clearly visible during a short visit in late April, 2011.

I sat beside a French woman on a train from London to Paris who ended up sharing her life story and faith journey with me. It turned out that like me she'd been a serious rock climber. But she'd had to stop climbing 4-5 years back due to restless leg syndrome. After telling her about an inmate who God healed of this condition last month during a Bible study, she wanted me to pray for her, and expressed true openness to Jesus. Spiritual hunger among ordinary secular French people is spurring French Christians to seek more training and empowerment for ministry.

I arrived in Paris to attend a two-day course on deliverance that drew a crowd of people from across the city, eager to experience breakthrough. The course was excellent, and I was also able to check out an apartment for our family and schools for Anna (16) and Luke (18). Gracie and I are now preparing for a special ministry assignment in France through Tierra Nueva beginning September 1, 2011. For one year we will be based in Paris with two of our children. Our Tierra Nueva leadership team will run the ministry here in our absence.

Gracie and I attended seminary in France from 1989-1991, completing our MDivs there. Our oldest son Isaac was born at the end of our stay and Bob completed a doctorate in theology from Institut Protestant de Théologie in Montpellier in 1997. For the past 20 years we have maintained our relationships with friends and faith communities and with Eglise Reformée de France pastors and seminary professors. French versions of Bob’s two books have been published and he has been doing regular speaking in churches and training of jail chaplains in France for the past 7 years.

We have been invited to minister and teach with a church in Paris that is experiencing rapid growth and is serving as a theological and ministry training center to equip and empower French Christians. Our desire is to deepen our knowledge and experience of inner healing, deliverance and discipleship so we can bring these desperately-needed skills and knowledge back to Tierra Nueva and beyond. Because of our years of involvement we are uniquely prepared to bridge divergent streams in the body of Christ through a growing ministry of reconciliation.

We appreciate your prayers as we prepare to leave and work with our Tierra Nueva leadership to arrange for our specific tasks here to be covered in our absence.

Integral Mission Roundtable Highlights

Just before the train ride to France I spent four days in the England with 25 Christian leaders from around the world at a roundtable on Integral Mission organized by Tearfund-- a Christian charity in the UK.

The leaders had been called together by Jenny Flannagan, a previous WTC mission student of mine who now works with Tearfund. The hope was that like-minded leaders could clearly identify global mission challenges and priorities, signs of God’s advancing Kingdom and hear what the Spirit is saying to the churches. And this certainly happened.

It’s hard to summarize the many rich discussions, presentations and times of worship. I return home more convinced than ever that followers of Jesus must humbly learn from each other, seeking unity and collaboration rather than each building their own organization & name. Jesus’ prayer in John 17 shows his conviction that oneness brings the world to faith in Jesus’ being the Father’s sent one

“That they may all be one; even as you, Father are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me” (John 17:21)

Here are some highlights for me from the roundtable.

Melba Maggay from the Philippines shared how loan officers are trained to naturally share their faith, bringing microfinance and evangelism together in a dynamic approach. Women on the margins are being empowered by economic opportunity and over 30,000 people are coming to faith every year.

Claudio Oliver from Curitiba, Brazil critiqued notions of progress that applaud Brazil’s economic growth as one of the Big Four, or BRIC nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China) as idolatrous. He emphasized how critical it is for integral development groups to remember that Jesus’ kingdom radically differs from dominant notions of economic and material progress that make the Western lifestyle the destination.

Ash Barker of Urban Neighbors of Hope shared about his ten years living with his wife and children in the heart of a Bangkok slum, where 80,000 people live in a 2 sq. km area. He pointed out that 1.2 billion people live in slums, and that 2 out of 3 slum dwellers live in the 10/40 window where there are the least number of Jesus followers. He referred to a recent survey where 80% of Christian respondents answered “yes” to the question “did Jesus spent time with the poor,” but only 2% answered “yes” to the question “do you spend time with the poor?” His call for Christians to relocate into places of darkness and need echoes the witness of Servant of Asia’s Urban Poor, Servant Partners, Word Made Flesh, InnerChange as well as Iris Ministries, Tierra Nueva and many others.

Jenny Flannagan talked about more and more Christians in the UK are discovering the imagination to live differently, go against the culture in some way, not getting on the ladder. Sign of something else being visible. Network of people trying to live in estates, building relationships with neighbors, rooting ourselves somewhere. Going against what parents expect. Another compelling logic.

Here are some highlights about what people heard the Spirit saying to the churches:

* Our responses to disasters bring people to faith—little churches working alongside people, with compassion over the long time—this leads people to believe. Need concrete things: signs of the kingdom, acts of compassion, otherwise we’re pie in the sky. But also we need a vision.
* The destination is outside of our control--- in Christ. Our destination is Jesus, who takes us to the Father.
* Need to repent of our confusion between the kingdom of God and development. Need to redefine success.
* Sign of the kingdom: putting the name of Jesus, rather than our own names in the highest place. Losing our name & perhaps our funding… to find our true identities.
* Must be ready to bear witness to the hope that lies within us.
* Call to discern what God is doing in a place, who God is doing it through, how can I support them.
* How do we trust God rather than in methods, knowing what’s God’s role and what is ours. Need to create the space, and trust God to do the supernatural part.
* Feeling the challenge to let go of competing, and presenting our ministry as robust. Let’s live instead in the vulnerability… fragility. Need for demolition sometimes. In Jeremiah 1:10 there are four verbs of demolition followed by “build” and “plant.” We’re good at saying: come do this. But not good at “stop that.” We need to learn how to agree with what needs to be broken down, demolished.
* Importance of bridge building. Reminding ourselves of “inside influence.” We all have networks. Need to expand those networks. Especially in media, business, church. At the end of the day: who gets the credit? We have models that says “we do.” But in the kingdom if poverty is being alleviated, if Good News is being preached to the poor… that’s what’s important.
* Two individuals from two separate small groups both received the words: “Shut up,” “listen,” [let’s not be] “lukewarm,” “stop” [doing what Spirit isn’t calling us to do].
* The term “Visitor” on our Tearfund badges was underlined as a reminder that Jesus Kingdom is not of this world and we are “strangers and aliens” even though we anticipate “on earth as in heaven.”
* Season of networking and journeying together. Building each other up.
* Need to avoid standardization at all costs. Need to keep the diversity. All the fruits are different. Fruit salad.

Just two nights before the big royal wedding in London, Andy Flannagan took four of us into the British Parliament where he works in an outreach to MPs (Ministers of Parliament) who are Christians. We were able to pray for God’s Kingdom to break in our own intercessor lobbying efforts right in the lobby between the House of Lords and the House of Commons, (where the very term “lobbyist” began).

I return home excited to see Tierra Nueva moving forward in our corner of the globe, pursuing God's kingdom of mercy and love among prisoners, gang members, immigrant and people in recovery. At the same time I can see God's call on Gracie and I to carry the riches we've gained in the trenches of ministry across lines to other camps, leveraging what God has taught us to raise up leaders across the body of Christ who eager to learn from Jesus, the poor and from each other for the advancement of God's reign.

Finding God's Treasure: John

2011-03-20T13:29:00.000-07:00

Last month in Cheltenham, England I decided to end a five-day course on missions at Westminster Theological Centre’s Residential by sending students out on a mission. My teaching covered diverse dimensions of mission: Biblical overview, advocacy & human rights, reading the Bible with people on the margins, healing and deliverance, liberation theology, sustainable development… For our last hour most everyone excitedly agreed to divide up into small groups to go out on the streets on a “treasure hunt.”

The notion of “treasure hunt” comes from Jesus’ parable in Luke 15 of the woman who loses a precious coin, sweeping her house clean until she finds it. Jesus’ second parable is about a shepherd who leaves the 99 in search of the one lost sheep “until he finds it.” More recently “treasure hunt” strategies have been developed in books like Kevin Dedmon, The Ultimate Treasure Hunt: A guide to supernatural evangelism through supernatural encounters and Mark Stibbe’s Prophetic Evangelism.

Everyone was nervous and excited as we numbered off so as to have five groups of three. One of the students, John seemed uncomfortable and asked to be excused from the mission. Another student, Rowena, asked if she could stay back and pray because she didn’t feel up to walking around town.

Once everyone else knew their group number & before breaking up we prayed for divine “intelligence” or clues regarding the “treasure” God had for us to find out on the streets: places, names, physical characteristics, conditions God wanted to heal, clothing color, etc. We took five minutes for each of us to write down thoughts and impressions that came to mind before breaking up into groups, praying for each other and then sharing our thoughts/impressions in our small missional groups. Our plan was to offer to pray prayers of blessing or healing for people we found who fit descriptions we received in prayer. We agreed to return 30 minutes later to debrief.

In my group Jan’s list of impressions included a man with beige overcoat holding umbrella, lower back pain. Rob had written down “black and white,” “Z,” confetti and arthritis. I envisioned a big parking lot, a bright blue car, a man with grey pants and black shoes and knee pain.

Since there were acres of big parking lots adjacent to the Church of England complex where we were meeting, we headed into the parking lot looking for blue cars and men with grey pants, black shoes, beige overcoats with umbrellas, “black & white,” & confetti. We searched through parking lot after parking lot, finding blue cars, but nobody anywhere on the streets matching any of the other clues! I was feeling some embarrassment, thinking: “Oh no, I’ve set up our groups for disappointment” and “did we hear wrong—all of us?” Praying for breakthrough, we headed back towards the church with only 5 minutes left before we needed to meet up with everyone else in the classroom.

We were heading back across the last parking lot, no treasure yet found when suddenly from a distance we spotted a man with a beige overcoat approaching a blue car. We picked up our pace. Were his pants in fact grey? (I later learned that in the UK pants=underpants & “trousers” is proper English). The closer we got the more the clues matched. Yes, his trousers were grey. Yes he had black shoes. He even was carrying an umbrella!

Then he spotted us and walked towards us, arms outstretched. It was John—the student who had opted out. John was the treasure we’d been sent to find! While his lower back and knee were pain free—his hip was hurting. We prayed for him and were all very moved and delighted by God’s seeking and finding of John, the reluctant one, one of our very own sheep, through us.

We then spotted a white Z pattern on the bottom of a young man’s shoe that faced us as he sat on a concrete planter with one leg crossed over the other. He had a black coat with a white collar, matching Rob’s “black & white.” We approached him and learned he and his girlfriend were homeless. While they didn’t have knee or back pain they were glad to receive our prayers and blessing.

We returned excitedly together with John to our classmates and heard some beautiful testimonies from other groups who had had found treasures of their own. I include John’s testimony and photos below.

Trying to run away from God

My name is John. Last week I was on a Residential Study Week in Cheltenham with Westminster Theological Centre. The pace of the teaching was extremely intense, with lectures from 9.0 am till 9.0 pm. By the end of the week I was exhausted, and longing to go home. Our final lecture commenced at 5.30 pm on the Friday, and you can imagine my dismay when our lecturer, Bob Ekblad, announced, "we're going on a Treasure Hunt in Cheltenham at the end of this lecture." I thought to myself, "Oh, no, we're not."

When it was time for the Treasure Hunt to start, I told Bob I would not be taking part. He was disappointed, as he wanted us to bless the people of Cheltenham, but he agreed to my request to stay behind in the classroom and pray for the others. At this other point, another student named Rowena said she would also stay behind and pray. The remainder of the class, including Bob himself, split into groups of three, and went to different corners of the room to pray, and to ask God for pictures of the people He wanted them to bless. Bob was in a group with my fellow students Jan and Rob.

All the students dispersed around Cheltenham, while Rowena and I stayed behind and prayed. After 5 minutes, I told Rowena, "I'm sorry, I can't stay any longer. I'm anxious about the journey home, and I need to find the three first-year students I'm giving a lift to." I left the building and went across the road to Trinity Church to find my passengers. I found two of them, Sarah and Tim, but Lee had gone missing. Sarah surprised me by presenting me with a beautiful bunch of spring daffodils.

As we needed to wait for Lee, I decided to use the time by walking across to the car park in Portland Street to put Sarah's daffodils in the boot of my car, which is a blue Peugeot. I put on my beige raincoat, on top of my grey suit, and carrying my umbrella, went to my car. As I was closing the boot, I was conscious of Bob Ekblad, Jan and Rob walking across the car park towards me. Jan was laughing, and the closer they got to me, the louder Jan's laughter became. I could hear her saying, "It's John!! Would you believe it? It's John!! Ha, ha, ha!!" I was puzzled as to why she should be so surprised to see me, as we had spent the whole week together in lectures.

When the three of them came face-to-face with me, I asked them, "Did you find any of the people on your list?" Jan, still laughing, said "We have now." I looked around, but could not see anyone else nearby. I asked, "Who did you find?" She replied, "We found you!!" When they had been praying in the classroom, God had given Jan a picture of a man in a beige raincoat carrying an umbrella; and He had given Bob a picture of a man in grey "pants" (meaning trousers) getting out of a blue car.

Jan announced, "You are our treasure, John, and God has told us to pray for your back pain." I replied, "Praise God, I don't suffer from back pain, but I have got a sore right hip as a result of sitting on those small metal-framed chairs in the classroom for twelve hours a day." Bob, Jan and Rob gathered round me and prayed for my hip. I felt a warm sensation immediately, and have not had any pain since.

I know that God was smiling, as He saw me trying to run away from His plans for a Treasure Hunt, when I fact I was running headlong into Him.

John Auton
Servant of God and Disciple of Jesus

Jesus' relentless pursuit of inmates inspires others to follow

2011-03-13T13:01:00.000-07:00

These days I’m more aware than ever of the extreme need for effective ministry in jails, prisons and juvenile facilities around the world. Two weeks agao I returned from 15 days of speaking in France and the UK. I’m seeing tremendous hunger for God and desire to step into direct ministry there and here. Everywhere I go I find people longing to step more closely alongside Jesus in his ministry of announcing Good News with concrete signs confirming the words.

A highlight in France was a visit to a French jail in the heart of Clermont-Ferrand in the Massive Central mountain range three hours south of Paris. Jean-Paul, a young Pentecostal pastor who does one-on-one visits with inmates invited me. He has also started a house church for people on the margins. He had never led a group Bible study in the jail and wanted me to help him get one going. Guards escorted us down narrow stone corridors through thick wooden doors with huge medieval-like key holes and giant black iron hinges. Men who’d signed up were led into a small multipurpose room one at a time by burly guards. We ended up with 8-9 men from France, N. Africa and sub-Sahara Africa.

Jean-Paul opened in prayer and I talked about our ministry to inmates in Skagit County. Soon we were reading the story of Jesus’ call of Matthew the tax-collector and the men engaged well, surprised by Jesus’ following of Matthew to his house, eating with his tax-collector/sinner friends and sending the law-enforcers away to learn what it means to have compassion. These men didn’t seem to have ever heard that Jesus is a friend of sinners. They were especially moved when we got some words of knowledge about conditions Jesus wanted to heal then and there: a heart condition, depression, night mares, back and knee pain.

“Is there someone here who was stabbed in the back and you’re still feeling pain?” I asked, launching out on a faint impression. “Yeah, I am,” said a N. African guy. He was open to receiving prayer and said the pain went away immediately. Jean-Paul and I prayed for several others who claimed immediate relief from back and knee problems. I was deeply moved to see these men touched by Jesus’ real Presence to heal. Jean-Paul just wrote me to say his first Bible study after I left went really well, and that Muslim man was healed of a back problem.

Upon returning to work with Tierra Nueva last week I went with Ryan to the jail for our Sunday Bible studies for inmates in B-Pod. In the midst of short reflections on Scripture we prayed for a man with restless-leg syndrome and another man with a broken hand. On Thursday night Chris and I did our four back-to-back Bible studies where I was surprised by one of the groups who declared proudly that they were “the God pod,” and had been meeting regularly for prayer and Bible study.

“So when did that start?” I asked. An older Caucasian guy answered confidently: “It was after two of us who suffered from back problems found that our backs weren’t hurting anymore, even with these uncomfortable beds, after you guys prayed for us a few weeks back. That kind of starting things off for us I guess,” he said happily.

Today Chris and I met with last week’s Sunday groups in B-Pod. I invited the men to put out their hands to receive God’s love, the Spirit’s Presence and we prayed for Jesus to pour out his Spirit on us all. I then invited the men to put their hands where they needed prayer, and most of the guys put their hands on their hearts.

Then I got an impression of one of the men’s foreheads hitting and shattering the windshield of his car, leaving him mentally confused, and decided to ask if anyone had been in a head-on collision and gone through the windshield. The guy I was looking at said:

“Yeah, I have. I went through the windshield and was thrown from my truck going 85 mph, was all covered with blood. I prayed for this guy, lifting off shock and trauma and praying for freedom from confusion he’s felt since the accident. After I sat down one of the inmates told me that this was the guys we’d prayed for who had the broken hand, and that two days later it was completely healed. This guy looked like Jesus’ special care and pursuit was really starting to sink in. The guy with the restless leg syndrome then told everyone that since receiving prayer the week before his legs were almost completely better.

While I am fully aware that healing is only one dimension of Jesus’ ministry, I am deeply moved to see how impactful it is for these beat-up men to experience God’s love in such tangible ways.

I was also moved by the growing interest among French Christians in reaching out to people in their prison system. The publisher of the French version of Reading the Bible with the Damned (Lire la bible avec les exclus) just published the French version of A New Christian Manifesto. I had two radio interviews with national catholic stations and will be featured in the French Catholic weekly Temoignage Chretien (Christian Witness), regarding ministry to inmates and others on the margins. In the UK, too, I have received invitations to train chaplains and to visit prisons in London and Manchester.

The harvest is plentiful and the workers are increasing and wanting training. Please pray for even more hunger and fruitfulness as our Tierra Nueva teams reach out to women, men and juvenile offenders here in Mount Vernon.

Good News from Honduras

2010-12-15T16:22:00.000-08:00

This morning I awoke in the dusty Honduran village of Mal Paso to barking dogs and roosters on the last day of a rich, seven-day visit to our ministry. After packing my bags, braving a cold shower from a bare white PBC pipe, and eating a delicious breakfast of beans, eggs, chicken and tortillas I said goodbyes and I took off in my 4x4 rental for Tegucigalpa to catch my flight home.

Tierra Nueva’s Honduran leader Angel David suggested that he accompany me on the first hour of my journey. Honduras has been especially unstable of late due to a devastated economy, political and moral chaos. In our once-peaceful town of Minas de Oro there has been an alarming increase in home break-ins and armed robberies. Police defend those who pay them, and look the other way when citizens shoot to kill local thieves.

On the road into Tegucigalpa bands of young men with AK-47s, often freshly-deported from the US, have been assaulting motorists and kidnapping people—often killing those who resist. So Angel David’s company was comforting—and we were able to wrap up some plans to encourage a beautiful wave of God’s Presence that is growing into an unstoppable remedy to crime with its resulting insecurity and fear. And I am now on a flight from Houston to Seattle.

Angel David leads Tierra Nueva’s growing movement of young leaders emerging from home Bible study/prayer groups we’re calling “Hogares en Transformacion” (Households in Transformation). These began 2-3 years back when he began visiting some of the poorest and most spiritually-alienated families in Minas de Oro. He spoke to them of Jesus’ special friendship with sinners, listened to their problems and prayed for them. We’ve been amazed to see Jesus heal one person after the other in ways that directly confirm the message of God’s unconditional love for the poor and undeserving.

Last week over 50 young leaders from these households from age 13 to 70 gathered for two days for teaching on the ministry of Jesus with lots of worship, conversation and prayer. The third day we took two truckloads of main leaders (28) on a day-long field-trip to visit Tierra Nueva’s 15-acre coffee farm high in the mountains of Yoro (first two photos below, second photo showing Dago and Angel David) to check on the harvest for our Underground Coffee Project in Burlington. Many of these young people had never been out of their villages. We met and talked with the workers as they picked coffee and saw the new coffee processing plant.

The last two days Angel David and I have visited most of the leaders in their homes. Here are some highlights.

Carina (third picture below), is 15 and eagerly accompanies us from house to house, laying hands on people in need of healing and commanding pain to go in short, non-religious commands. “Go away sickness in Jesus name,” she says, hands placed on a woman’s congested chest. The woman coughs and sputters for a few minutes and then announces that she’s cleared up and feeling better. We pray over her and her husband’s house for God’s protection from evil spirits that torment them at night, before heading down the trail to another home where more healing and peace are offered and received.

Carina’s father left for El Norte (the US) years ago and is now with someone else. Carina looks to Angel David for paternal support and receives it—like many others who text him day and night with “textos para cobrar” (“collect texts” that he pays from his credit as they can’t afford their own minutes) for their raggedy cell phones.

Elena (not her name) is another emerging leader in her early thirties who came to every event hungry for learning and prayer—though she was strongly rebuked by a man who goes back and forth from her to his wife in another village. Elena was traumatized at a young age when her mother paid someone to kill her father after he reputedly cheated on her. She consequently dropped out of school after third grade and began selling goods and then her own body in the capital. She has four kids from three fathers. When we visit her she wants prayer to forgive her mother and be free from deep crippling resentment.

Elena just finished 4th grade in an adult education program that Tierra Nueva sponsors called Educatodos (Educate Everyone), which now has over 30 participants. I attended the graduation two nights ago and saw Jorge, Angel David’s 65 year-old brother and veteran TN promoter receive his 6th grade diploma. Angel David (53) himself graduated from 7th grade this year!

Yesterday Angel David introduced me to a group of notorious young men who he visits weekly in one of Minas de Oro’s poorest neighborhoods. Nearly all of them are now enrolled in 4th grade with Educatodos, and Angel David has organized them into a soccer team that played Mal Paso’s young men yesterday (photos below). We visited the parents of the most at-risk youth, whose older brother is in prison for robbery.

We visited Abram (59) and his wife Ana Gloria (58), parents of two young men who attend all of Tierra Nueva’s activities and are emerging leaders. We watched Abram’s lame ankle strengthen and Ana Gloria become free of knee pain before our very eyes.

Lester is a young man we recently helped with a $150 loan towards buying a cow to start a butcher business. He has now built up enough earnings to provide for his parents, grandfather and younger siblings.

I’m convinced that a peace movement is on the rise through these hogares en transformacion that combines practical skills-training, education, Bible study, prayer for healing and deliverance, subsistence agriculture and loans for micro-enterprises. Regular pastoral visits by a growing cadre of workers empowered by fresh impartation of the Holy Spirit keep things moving forward. Angel David and I discovered a scripture that seems to encompass much of what we are witnesses firsthand:

“Encourage the exhausted, and strengthen the feeble. Say to those with anxious heart, “take courage, fear not. Behold, your God will come with vengeance; the recompense of God will come, but he will save you.” Then the eyes of the blind will be opened, and the ears of the deaf will be unstopped. Then the lame will leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb will shout for joy. For waters will break forth in the wilderness (Isaiah 35:3-6).”

Please intercede for Angel David and these emerging leaders, for:
· Wisdom and strength
· Growing spiritual hunger, awareness of God’s goodness and understanding during the Bible studies.
· Favor from religious and civil leaders in the community.
· Protection, conversion and new hope for the young bandits of our region.
· Financial support for our many projects in Honduras.

Check out my website for my photos (www.bobekblad.com) and order some coffee at www.undergroundcoffee.com

Have a blessed Christmas!

Bob Ekblad

Signs of God's Kingdom Now: Witnessing Jesus' work among the Mennonites in Iowa

2010-11-19T18:08:00.000-08:00

I recently spent four days ministering at Sugar Creek Mennonite Church in Wayland, Iowa. There I witnessed varied signs of Jesus’ Kingdom coming together here & now in ways rare & desperately-needed in North America.

Sugar Creek is a historic peace church in the Anabaptist tradition. They believe in Jesus’ teaching on love of neighbor and enemy alike—which works itself out in lavish potlucks, barn raisings and other community-oriented good deeds and a commitment to resisting war.

Over 20 of Sugar Creek’s members were conscientious objectors in WWII-- an unpopular outworking of following Jesus in choosing to love and pray for (rather than kill) national enemies. Like many peace churches, living out Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7 is a high priority. Nathan, the pastor, had invited me to share on dimensions of discipleship less known & practiced by his congregation-- the gifts of the Holy Spirit & healing prayer.

Right after the morning service in the lineup for the potluck I had my first surprise, prepping me for the next three evening sessions. A woman in her early 80s who walked with a cane was complaining of knee pain and her fears of a knee replacement. I offered to pray for her there in the line, and after flexing and testing it she said in amazement that the pain had completely gone away. Wow, I’d never seen someone that old have their knee healed!

That night I shared my own spiritual journey and invited people who desired more of the Spirit to come forward for prayer. The last time I’d given this talk in Stockholm nearly the whole church had come forward. This time I awkwardly stood there as nobody budged except to go out the back doors. Finally a man timidly approached and said: “well, why not, I supposed I would want more of the Holy Spirit” and asked me to pray for him. I blessed him and prayed for his back too. I later heard that someone had commented: “doesn’t he know we are Mennonites?”

Fortunately I had done an exercise where I had people with pain raise their hands and asked those in the pews around them lay hands on them and pray for their healing. I also had prayed for an older man who used a walker and complained of mental confusion and imbalance after a stroke.

A few people lingered, and eventually asked for prayer. The first three or four people apologized before stating what they wanted prayer for, speaking near identical refrains: “I know that we get our healing when we die, but….” -- clearly a tendency towards under-realized eschatology. I was perplexed by Sugar Creek’s brand of selective embracing of Jesus’ teaching & practice—and they proved themselves open to stepping into greater expectation of Jesus healing and liberation in this life.

It turned that that in the narthex that first night the man with the walker who’d had the stroke was meeting the people coming out of the sanctuary, without his walker!, saying excitedly that he was almost completely better. I just got word that at his last physical therapist session a few days ago he was told he didn’t need to come back—and that he’s back to his normal state before the stroke.

Monday and Tuesday nights were well-attended as many of the people who had been prayed for by others the night before were relieved of their pain. The word had gone out and people in need of healing were bringing family members and friends--- and we ended up praying for a lot more people. One man with 4th stage lymphoma just wrote me saying his blood test showed such dramatic improvement at his appointment three days after prayer that chemotherapy has been called off for the time being and he doesn’t need to come back for a checkup until February.

People laughed when I pointed out that Jesus didn’t encourage the masses to wait until they died to receive their healing—even in the 1st century when life-expectancy was so low & people didn’t have to wait so long to die! And yet I realized as older people kept reporting being healed that my low expectation for God to heal people with normal aches and pains of aging was being challenged. Jesus’ ministry of healing & deliverance, his embrace of the excluded, love of enemies & proclamation of the Good News of the reign of God must all be pursued with expectation for this life—even though God’s Kingdom will not be fully realized until the next.

God Encounters in Europe

2010-10-04T18:54:00.000-07:00

During a recent trip to Sweden, England and France I’ve had some encounters that seem divinely orchestrated—and the Spirit seems to be calling me to continue to make myself even more available. Are you by any chance feeling a similar call these days?

My trip began in Stockholm where I was speaking at Elim Kyrkan’s annual Transformation Conference. Spiritual hunger was evident from the first night, when 95% of the people came forward for prayer!

The next day after a session on hearing the voice of God I co-lead a workshop on prophetic evangelism with Norwegian pastor Sverre Bjørnhaug and his team from Bergen. They and their ministry school students regularly walk the streets, praying for people’s healing and blessing people in different ways. They had lots of inspiring stories.

Sverre had a group of 35 of us divide into groups of three to try a “treasure hunt” in downtown Stockholm. We started by asking God to reveal to each one of us individually “intelligence” regarding the “treasure” (specific people) that God might want us to find that afternoon. We each asked the Holy Spirit for places, clothing, names, needs for healing. Scandinavians, who tend to be very reserved, are especially affected when God reveals personal information that only God could know through people who approach them with humility and genuine care.

A woman from Norway, another from Botswana and I compared notes and between us had a 7-11 store, waterfront, a pub, bus stop, and a park bench, a businessman with a black & white tweed jacket who had a bad ankle, a man with a green jacket with a neck/back problem, and a homeless man on a park bench with a dog. We brought food coupons and flyers inviting people to the church and took off on our adventure.

Near a local 7-11 store the Norwegian woman boldly approached two different businessmen with offers to pray—but they refused, stepping up their pace to get away from us. We continued toward the waterfront, stopping to talk with two immigrant workers from Hungary who sat smoking on some steps on a break, their hair covered in sheet rock dust. We asked if we could pray God’s blessing on them and they awkwardly accepted. “I hear God saying that you are a very caring father,” said the Norwegian woman to one of the men. He shook his head and spit on the ground, looking like he was about to cry—and seemed very moved as we prayed for him and his family and gave him a food coupon and an invitation to the church.

We continued down to the water and across from a bar, right near a bus stop we spotted a grey-haired businessman in a black & white tweed jacket. The woman from Botswana took the lead, asking him if we could speak with him. He brushed us off and moved quickly away, but a man in his late 30s with a green rain jacket stopped to talk with us. We explained what we were doing, how we’d asked God to show us people he wanted to bless, and wondered if he had a problem with his neck or back. He said he did, accepted prayer and immediately felt a difference. He was very curious about us and asked us lots of questions.

The Norwegian woman took a risk and asked him if he was struggling with feelings of rejection and inferiority when he’s with his father. He looked shocked and said: “well, the grey-haired man who just brushed you off is my father, and yes I am struggling in my relationship with him.” I asked if his father had a bad ankle and he said that yes he did. This guy began to cry as we prayed and talked with him about God’s strong love for him, and we prayed for Jesus to heal his father’s ankle. We headed back to the church and heard stories from others who had had experiences of both rejection and breakthrough on the streets.

During my week of teaching at Westminster Theological Centre in the UK we saw God at work healing a number of our students. One woman who was unable to eat and swallow normal food after a stroke was completely healed during communion, as was a man with his arm in a sling.

On the Eurostar train from London to Paris on Friday I sat beside a woman in her early 30s from Argentina who spoke only Spanish. She asked me what I did and then told me that she grew up Catholic but didn’t believe in God and felt no need for religion. “I believe in myself,” she said, repeating a common confession of faith I’ve heard from many secular Europeans and Latin Americans. I asked her if she’d ever read about the life and teaching of Jesus in the Bible, and she said she hadn’t. I encouraged her to try reading the Bible for herself, told her a few stories of healing and encouraged her to open herself to the possibility that God is real and can make a difference in her life. Her mouth was all smiles but her eyes looked like pools of sadness. In response to my asking if she’s struggled with feelings of emptiness and depression she poured out her heart about her long struggle with depression and failed relationships. By the end of our journey I can only hope that she was more in touch with her need for God.

On Saturday in Paris I walked by a heavily-bearded homeless man in rags who lay on his back on the sidewalk, looking completely dejected. I had a picture of my hand on his heart, praying for him for healing, but brushed it off and continued on another block. Thoughts of the Levite and the Pharisee walking past the man beaten by thieves haunted me and I finally turned around and approached him, stooping down to ask if he was in pain. “Yes, and I haven’t been able to sleep,” he said. He timidly accepted my offer to pray for him and God’s presence came strong as I put my hand on his heart. When I finished he told me he was an atheist. “Even so God sees you, knows your suffering and loves you a lot,” I said, and he looked like he wanted to believe it.

I had repeatedly called the airlines prior to my Sunday morning departure to change my dreaded Paris-Houston-Seattle itinerary to a direct Paris-Seattle flight, and then tried to get out of my assigned seat in the center of a center row to a bulkhead or emergency row—all to no avail. Once on the plane I found my seat surprisingly taken, and the steward ushered me to the opposite side of the same row to an aisle seat beside a man who I immediately noticed was reading a Bible.

I struck up a conversation with Groduowski, a Polish jet engine mechanic who barely spoke English. He told me how he grew up Catholic but had no active faith until he had recently begun reading a Bible given to him by missionaries doing street evangelism in Warsaw.

“My heart comes alive when I read the Bible,” he said, showing his favorite verse from Revelation 21:6 “I will give to the one who thirsts from the spring of the water of life without cost.” “God gives this living water for free,” he said, his eyes shimmering.

We shared different Scriptures with each other and I asked him what he knew about the Holy Spirit and Jesus’ sending of disciples to not only announce Good News but to heal the sick, cast out demons, etc. I referred him to Matthew 10:1, 8 and Luke 9:1-2 & 10:1, 9, 17-18 and he looked up each text and read them with wide eyes. He had never received any teaching on being filled with the Spirit for the ministry of Jesus and gladly wanted prayer when I offered to pray for him. He left assuring me that he would talk with his pastor and that I shouldn’t be surprised if I get invited to speak in Warsaw.

I’m now on a flight from Houston to Seattle, excited to get home, but with a new openness and desire to make myself available to God as I go about normal life—and I encourage you to do the same.

Cambodia Transfigured

2010-08-10T10:10:00.000-07:00

Last week I spent three unforgettable days with my family in Cambodia. There we saw signs of Jesus’ Kingdom shining in a land still under the shadow of death. I now find myself thinking daily what it would look like for the light of Christ to shine even stronger there and here-- so people can really see it.

Gracie and I were invited by Servants of Asia’s Urban Poor—a team of people from New Zealand, the Philippines, Australia, Japan and Canada called to live and minister in slum communities in Phnom Penh. The first day I led a short retreat for the staff and Gracie and I prayed for each of them. We visited some of the families in their homes amidst the squalor of the slum communities where they are seeking to live humbly among the poorest of the poor, bringing Jesus’ light.

A highlight for our family was being driven from place to place around the city in a Tuk Tuk assigned to us for our stay. Looking out at Phnom Penh we saw myriads of motorcycles, often with three-four people. They moved like tropical fish in schools, flowing through intersections, turning in front of on-coming traffic, often with people texting or talking on cell phones as they drove their worn-out motorcycles. A father and his three two sons laughed as we took their picture— the older boy clutching two turkeys on the seat between he and his younger brother.

We had an alarming visit to the genocide museum Tuol Sleng, the former office S.21 of the “Kampuchea Democratic” from 1975-1979. Pol Pot had established this office to detain, interrogate and eventually send off to the “killing fields” thousands of people deemed enemies of the regime.

We wandered through the cells and torture chambers, reading the stories of victims and perpetrators, looking at instruments of torture, and the photos of hundreds of young people who were executed. These photos still haunt me. Young men and women, their shoulders pulled tightly back as their hands were bound behind them, exhaustion and terror in their eyes. Many had been forced to lay for days side-by-side like sardines in rooms, shackled, forced to remain silent, before being tortured for days while being held in narrow wood-walled cells. Eventually their captors would tell them they were being taken to study. They were photographed, blindfolded then driven 30 minutes out of town to a big field with pits. There they were forced to kneel on the pit’s edge, where their captors executed them and buried them in mass graves. Somewhere between 750,000 and 2.5 million Cambodians were killed during the Khmer Rouge’s reign.

I have since read historians who argue convincingly that the United States’ secret carpet bombing of Cambodia from 1965-1973 is directly linked to Pol Pot’s rise to power (http://www.yale.edu/cgp/Walrus_CambodiaBombing_OCT06.pdf). The 2,500,000 tons of bombs dropped on targets in Cambodia (more than all the bombs dropped during WWII) traumatized the country—and unexploded ordnances (bombs) still litter the countryside today. Unexploded spiritual ordnances in the people and the land most certainly require detection and removal too—a massive task that needs to be done with great sensitivity.

Walking through the Tuol Sleng genocide museum disturbed me on another level—genocide on display as a tourist attraction. I first noticed this when a beggar with a severely burnt face and another maimed man approached us as we got out of our Tuk Tuk at the museum to join throngs of mostly foreign tourists to look on the shame of atrocities committed. The museum was poorly kept up: an introductory movie of the poorest quality, photos fading and pealing— reflecting the very shame that it exposed in it’s featuring of crimes committed by Cambodians against Cambodians.

That very day judges were deliberating on the sentence of Dutch—the head of that very prison—and the next day his 19 year sentence was announced—over 30 years after these events. In one of the nicer neighborhoods along the river, restaurants drew tourists by advertising free movies after dinner on the Cambodian genocide and “killing fields.” Shining light that exposes atrocities and shames perpetrators does not bring the desperately needed healing and deliverance—but rather numbness, resignation or even anger and further destruction and abuse. True repentance comes through the light of Christ.

“Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand,” preaches Jesus. Confession and repentance are most certainly needed in Cambodia—but larger global powers like the USA (and most certainly aware Christians) need to be involved. Last week’s commemoration of the 65th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was a missed opportunity for the USA to publically apologize for the 214,000 killed there. Yet the work of peacemaking is more hands-on then simple apologies.

We visited some of Servant’s many ministries to the poor that they have turned over one-after another to Cambodians: a rehabilitation center to street youth addicted to sniffing glue, Justees, a silk-screening operation run by young graduates of the rehab program that makes tee shirts with justice statements, a nutrition center for malnourished children, an outreach to people with disabilities (see www.servantsasia.org).

Gracie and I prayed for several people suffering from pain, and found that Jesus was quick both heal and to reveal hidden terror and anxiety from trauma rooted in Cambodia’s wartime violence. We saw a deep need for spiritual mine sweeping, and found ministry workers desperate for more of Jesus’ anointing to address widespread abuse, infidelity, HIV/Aids and other issues and to keep energized themselves.

Since last Friday, when Eastern Orthodox Christians celebrated Jesus’ transfiguration, I find myself thinking how critical it is to right now, in the midst of ongoing conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq and Israel/Palestine to pay special attention to the Father’s spotlighting of Jesus’ person, teaching and way of redemptive suffering, that Moses and Elijah discussed with him before the watching disciples. “This is my son, my chosen one; listen to him!” (not to misunderstood OT justifications of violence via Moses/law and Elijah/the prophets!).

“And we ourselves heard this utterance made from heaven when we were with him on the holy mountain. And so we have the prophetic word made more sure, to which you do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star arises in your hearts” (2 Peter 1:18-19).

Please pray for the many Christian workers seeking to bring the light of Christ into the darkest places in Cambodia. Please pray for Om Neang, a Cambodian woman working with Servants who established the nutrition center-- that Jesus would heal her of lung cancer. Pray for the other many workers of Servants of Asia's Urban Poor, for great wisdom, strength, health and more of Jesus' anointing so they can bring the best news of God's Kingdom to the people of Cambodia.

Preaching the Gospel to the Dead

2010-07-18T02:19:00.000-07:00

In April I traveled to the steamy, tropical island of Leyte in the Philippines to participate in a Holy Given Mission School where I became involved in a mission I never could have anticipated.

On the third day the worship leaders WanHsi (Singapore) and Juliana (Brazil) led us in several hours of worshipping. They longed to see the group of young Filipino leaders step into greater freedom and authentic expression in their worship and prophetic voice. It was during this intense, prolonged worship that I had a vision as I looked out the window at the lush tropical hill towards the Pacific Ocean.

I saw hundreds of Japanese soldiers standing in the lush grass under the coconut trees outside the classroom, looking intently in at us through the windows. I’m not sure how I knew they were Japanese, but they looked more like prisoners of war from another time than active soldiers. On the opposite side of the room, facing the street I saw crowds of Filipino people looking in at our group. What might contemporary Filipinos and the enemy combatant dead be looking for from worshiping Christians?

I met with pastor Ferd and shared what I saw with him. He told me that a number of Bible school students had had visions of headless Japanese soldiers marching around the land. “Many of the local people are afraid to come here because they believe there are spirits of the dead Japanese here on this land,” he said.

I asked pastor Ferd about the Hill 120 World War II memorial several kilometers down the road. In 1944 US General Douglas MacArthur had led the Allied troop invasion of the Philippines. In the naval battle just offshore in the Gulf of Leyte the Allied forced destroyed many Japanese ships, causing locals to name it “the red sea” because of all the blood. After pounding the Japanese stronghold Hill 120 from sea, MacArthur came ashore and took the hill after killing many Japanese soldiers, planting the American flag at its top (See the film “Letters from Iwojima” for some valuable perspective on a similar invasion of a Japanese island).

Pastor Ferd explained that the tourist Hill 120 down the road was not the actual site. I was actually looking out the window at Hill 120 from our classroom as we worshipped—the very site where many Japanese, but also Allied and Filipino soldiers had died. Why had God shown me these Japanese prisoners of war? What was I to do with this vision and what did it have to do with the mission school?

Internet research turned up MacArthur’s victory speech on Filipino radio from Leyte, and I read words that I found deeply disturbing. “I have returned… By the grace of Almighty God our forces stand again on Philippine soil-soil consecrated in the blood of our two peoples. We have come, dedicated and committed to the task of destroying every vestige of enemy control over your daily lives, and of restoring, upon a foundation of indestructible strength, the liberties of your people. The hour of your redemption is here. Rally to me.”

I thought about the 20-foot-tall bronze statues of MacArthur and his men down the road, and was struck by his messianic pretention and over confidence. MacArthur seemed to see himself as the Filipino’s Savior-liberator. Filipino soil certainly was not consecrated in the blood of two peoples—Americans and Filipinos. America blood consecration certainly did not give the USA the right to keep Filipinos in a debtor state after the war.

Allied “liberation” was followed by the US’s bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and MacArthur went on to govern Japan in the aftermath of the war. US victory in the Philippines did become the basis for a new imperial domination as the US followed suite after Spain and the Japanese to establish a beachhead into SE Asia that would later serve them in the Vietnam War and other interventions. One of my big concerns is that Japanese and SE Asian’s would have a confusing understanding of Jesus, his Kingdom and missionary activities through their identifying the US as a Christian nation.

As I kept investigating I learned that the Bible college was founded in the 90’s by American missionaries as a beachhead for mission, with the name “World Evangelism Bible College.” But locals referred the college as the “White House”—another clue that the land was still associated with imperial domination.

In fact the Spanish had “discovered” this island and others when Magellan came through. They’d also established a fort there because of its strategic location facing the Leyte Gulf and the Pacific Ocean shipping lanes. For Filipino Christians to step into their authority God’s sons and daughters, heirs of this land and a missionary people with a prophetic voice it seemed clear that lies had to be exposed and perceived debts cancelled.

But why had God shown me this vision of Japanese prisoners of war? The Japanese were hated by the Filipino people because of their ruthless occupation. They had raped, stolen livestock, killed people and committed other acts of brutality. Yet these soldiers had been forcibly recruited and had probably not had the opportunity to hear about God’s love for them in Jesus—especially not from the American soldiers who killed them. So is it absolutely too late for these poor souls? Why had I seen them as still living on this blood-soaked land?

1 Peter’s description of Jesus’ preaching to the spirits in prison who died during the time of Noah kept coming to mind, but I had never heard of anyone enacting 1 Peter 4:6: “For the gospel has for this purpose been preached even to those who are dead, that though they are judged in the flesh as men, they may live in the spirit according to the will of God.” What does this mean for our practices here and now?

Pastor Ferd and I wrote up prayers of confession and declarations (below), and planned a worship service atop Hill 120 for that Friday. That morning with guitars, drums and communion elements in hand we hiked with all the students up into an overgrown bomb crater above the stone fortifications of the stronghold, worshipped, spoke the confessions, and celebrated the Lord’s Supper together.

While most of the students worshipped in the crater, pastor Ferd, a few other Filipino students and I climbed to the top where we symbolically took down the American flag, replacing it with a pole and banana flag for the Kingdom of God. We spoke words of forgiveness and the Good News of Jesus’ death to reconcile us to God “while helpless” and “enemies” (Rom 5:6,10) over the Japanese soldiers and others who had died there. We prayed prayers of cleansing and blessing over the hill, the Gulf of Leyte, and the Bible college—for a fresh wave of God’s Presence to empower the church to announce the Gospel of Jesus’ Kingdom.

While it is hard to know the impact of such confessions and declarations, my dear friends from the Holy Given school reported that there was a breakthrough for the students in their worship and prophetic ministry—and no more complaints of nightmares involving the Japanese dead. Some of the students said they perceived deep cries released from the land as we declared forgiveness and others have said the hill feels “different” and “much better” now. My hope is that all of us, our ministries, and lands can become cleaner carriers of God’s Holy Presence to our communities and to the nations—remembering always that Jesus works through us as we are, in spite of all our personal and social failings. My hope is that those who are watching us will see less of us and our agendas and more of Jesus and his kingdom.

I am now in Maylasia with my family speaking at a global missions conference, and we will be in Cambodia, Thailand) this coming weekend and next week. Please pray for us, for spiritual discernment, direction and God’s Holy Presence as we travel, meet the people and minister.

***
Confession of sin on behalf of the American people (led by Bob)

I confess the sin of the United States of America before the Filipino people and the people of Japan of taking credit for Filipinos being liberated from the Japanese as stated by General MacArthur. I confess and repent of the sin of messianic pretention, self-aggrandizement (visible in statements like of MacArthur’s on Filipino radio: “I have returned” and “rally to me”.

I renounce the lie that the USA and Allied forces (soldiers and/or commanding officers) liberated, redeemed or in any way saved the Filipino people, and declare the truth that Jesus is the only Messiah/Christ and Savior of the Filipino people and world.

I renounce the lie that Americans/Allied troupes are capable of “destroying every vestige of enemy control” and “restoring upon a foundation of indestructible strength, the liberties of your [the Filipino] people. I declare the truth that Jesus Christ has conquered the Ruler of this world and all demonic powers through his life, death and resurrection, and through his reign through the Church, his body “who not even the gates of Hades can withstand.”

I ask the Filipino people for forgiveness…

I confess and repent of the sin of the USA of imperial domination and control in the aftermath of WWII, and of using it’s favor with the Filipino people for it’s own interests—establishing military bases, intervening to establish pro-American national leaders. I confess and repent of American use and abuse of Filipino political leaders and other citizens in violation of the best interests of the Filipino people, especially the poor, and of the sin of abusing women as prostitutes around the military base.

I confess the sin of General MacArthur, who representing the USA called on the spirits to save. I renounce the call: "Let the indomitable spirit of Bataan and Corregidor lead on." We declare that only Jesus saves.

I cancel MacArthur's call to "rise up and strike", and pray the prayer that Jesus teaches us to pray: "Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be they name (Jesus), thy kingdom come, they will be done, on earth as it is in heaven...." We counter MacArthur's call with the invitation "rise up and worship!"
I ask the Filipino people for forgiveness…

I confess and repent of American missionary ignorance of and/or agreement with US imperial interests, and of American Christians benefitting from favor according to the flesh for the purpose of expansion of their missions.

I confess and repent of the sin of labeling Japanese human beings made in God’s image as “the Enemy,” of taking their lives rather than loving them, praying for them, and evangelizing them. On behalf of American Christians I ask forgiveness from the Japanese dead and their relatives and people for any confusion they have about Jesus due to Christian agreement with violence and war.

Confession of sin on behalf of Filipino people (led by pastor Ferd)
On behalf of the Filipino people I confess the sin of believing the lie that General MacArthur and the Allied forces liberated the Philippines, eradicated the enemy and restored liberty. I declare the truth that only Jesus liberates, saves and restores freedom through his death on the cross, where he took upon himself the sins of the world, forgiving humans and defeated the Ruler of this World, the Enemy, Satan.
I confess and renounce the sin of rallying to a human savior, and embracing General MacArthur and the USA as liberators—of putting confidence in man/humans rather than in God.

I confess and renounce the sin of subservience, of letting ourselves be dominated and controlled.

I confess and repent of benefits our people have received from subservience and accommodation of empires (Spanish, USA, Japanese). (security, dependency, not taking responsibility, passivity, corruption).

I confess and repent of the sin of hatred of Japanese enemies and the Japanese people, and the sin of harboring resentment, bitterness and the sin of discrimination.

I choose to turn away from any perceived benefits from this Bible College’s association with USA, the “White House” and the action of the Allied Forces (status, financial benefits). I turn towards Jesus and choose to turn over this land to him as Prince of Peace, Savior and Lord.
Time for others to confess....

Forgiving Our Fathers

2010-05-15T13:50:00.000-07:00

On May 2nd I returned home from a week of teaching on the Island of Leyte in the Philippines. I took the 16 hours of flights (each way) to help out with the Holy Given Mission School, a two-month induction into the ministry of Jesus. These schools are designed for grass-roots leaders, bringing them into the bigness of Jesus' vision for the Kingdom of God, and into the intimacy of fellowship with the Holy Spirit.

The Filipino leaders-in-training were mostly under 30: earnest, open, ready to give their lives as pastors & teachers, evangelists, prophets, or apostles. One morning I felt led to speak on the importance of forgiving our human fathers. I have been struck by the relevance of the last few verses of the Old Testament, where Malachi writes:

“Behold, I am going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord. and he will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the land with a curse" (Mal 4:5-6).

My first day of teaching focused on training students in proclaiming Good News to inmates and others on the margins. Our second day was spent putting the teaching into practice in a steaming hot 600+ inmate prison in Tacloban City, where Filipino inmates gathered hungrily for worship, Bible study and prayer ministry.

Conditions were worse in this prison than many I’ve visited, with inmates sleeping on cement floors and having to supply their own food or settle for filthy prison rice slop. But the men’s reports of abandonment, neglect and violence at the hands of their fathers echoed what I’ve heard in France, Mozambique, Guatemala and in our own county jail. I borrowed a club from a guard for Bible study on Psalm 23s “rod and staff” verse, which is a “toxic text” for most, who do not associate these words with images of God as protecting, comforting shepherd.

“How many of you have been beaten by something like this when you were a child, or at other times?” I ask, holding a wooden club worn from overuse.

Nearly everyone raised their hand, including many of the Holy Given students. Unresolved trauma and hurts from human fathers most certainly affect people's ability to trust God as Father. Distrust sabotages close communion with God, which erodes our relationship of trust, dependency and love as God’s children—which in turn disempowers us in life and ministry. Certainly the world is reeling under the curse coming from unforgiveness-- and pastors and leaders-in training are also often in serious need of extending forgiveness and seeking reconciliation.

On the third day I taught and ministered on extending forgiveness to our human fathers. Here is a testimony from Richard, one of the students. (You can see more photos, updates and testimonies on HG Leyte school on the HG school website - www.holygiven.org)   

“I just want to thank God for the privilege He has given me. I am set free from anger towards my father. My earthly father is the reason why I am affected like this. He planned to kill me when I was in the womb of my mother. He didn't want the responsibility. He told my mother - just kill that baby so we can be set free from the responsibility and the shame.

My anger became bigger as time went by as I was affected by what they had done to me. My eyes were damaged because of the medicine my mom took to abort me. My height was affected too - I am 31 this coming May, but still my height is like a 13 year olds. This is because of the medicine. I am thankful because my brain and my senses were not damaged.

It was very hard going to school, I suffered very much. When I was in elementary school I could read, but by the time I was in High school my eyes deteriorated into college.    In college I met the Lord Jesus Christ and I realized that He has a great plan in my life. I said, “Lord, why did you allow that my father did these bad things to me if you had a plan for my life? If you loved me, why did you allow this to happen, why was my father hard on us?

When I was in grade 1, my father left us, and he abandoned us. From that time until now, the only person supporting us is my mother. She is in Hong Kong now working to support us. I am thankful that my siblings and I have finished studying. I am thankful that the Lord got me, and that He has a purpose for my life. He gave me a task that is easily fulfilled.

Yesterday, I recalled those hard times that I had in school – the teasing of my classmates and relatives. I told the Lord that it's so hard, my situation before is not easy, but look at me now, I am here and I'm on the top, and you're using me, and you moved in my life.    Do you know the song ‘God will make a way’? That's a very encouraging song, I hold on to the promises of the Lord, and he will make a way in my life.

Yesterday, I totally released the anger I had towards my father. I said, “Lord, thank you for sending Brother Bob - you moved even in the very private things of my life. Thank you for teaching me how to forgive my father and for moving on. I am totally 100% set free from the anger - I plan to call my father and tell him I'm sorry and that I love him so much despite what he has done to us. I plan to share the love of God. I want my father to be saved - as God had done for me, I want it done for him as well.

I want him to serve God in spirit and in truth. Lord, you are very very good, you fixed everything in me. I am very much blessed because I am set free. My heart seems 70 kilos lighter since I prayed for my father. I am thankful to the Lord, to God be the glory.”

Adjusting to stranger and alien status: update on Feliciano, Andrey and Guatemalan inmates

2010-04-17T07:21:00.000-07:00

The Bible tells us that as followers of Jesus we must view ourselves as aliens and strangers and exiles on the earth (1 Pet 2:11; Heb 11:13). Yet simultaneously in God’s eyes we are “no longer strangers and aliens, but fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household” (Eph 2:19).

Yet as a US citizen whose primary identity is citizen of the Kingdom of heaven, my calling includes advocating for those suffering under actual stranger/alien immigration status so they can freely live and minister “on earth as in heaven.” The following is a prayer update on three important cases.

On Wednesday April 7 my colleagues Chris and Bethany accompanied our 52-year-old Mexican pastor friend Feliciano down to Seattle to our meeting with Claire in Senator Maria Cantwell’s 32nd floor office. We told Claire that our aim was to win her over to become Feliciano’s advocate on behalf of our Mixteco immigrant workers who need his pastoral presence. Feliciano is currently in deportation proceedings, but pastors a 600+ member church in the Skagit Valley.

Claire seemed won over by Feliciano, and supportive enough to pass our petition on to the next level—the Washington DC office. Our hope and prayer is that Senator Cantwell will choose Felicano and his family as a sort of poster family for immigration reform—which is so desperately needed in the United States at this time. Please continue to pray with us that Senator Cantwell will agree soon to submit a Private Bill for Feliciano Lopez and his family to be granted permanent residency status.

That same Wednesday I continued south to Tacoma to the regional immigration detention facility to testify in a hearing before a federal immigration judge on behalf of a 25-year-old Russian immigrant named Andrey. The detention facility is a private prison surrounded by razor wire that houses 1,200 immigrants in deportation proceedings. This was a powerful experience for me. After passing through security we met with 25 of Andrey’s Russian Pentecostal immigrant family members and the attorney before proceeding through three prison doors into a courtroom at the heart of the prison.

Andrey’s wife asked if her grandfather could pray before we entered the courtroom. He put out his hands and began to pray in Russian. I felt a strong presence of God descend over my head and shoulders, causing my eyelids to flutter and cheeks to heat up—and then I couldn’t keep from crying. Many of Andrey’s family members couldn’t hold back the tears—and I thought of Jesus before Lazarus’ tomb—lots of love, but a suffering sort of love.

It turns out I knew the judge. She had been present when I had preached in Seattle United Methodist Church years ago. In that sermon I clearly remember describing our ministry as inspired by our experience of the Holy Spirit as Advocate/Comforter before the Satan/accuser, who manifests through internal voices and external powers. I gave some examples of external powers like the Department of Homeland Security prosecutors, and county prosecutors who’s job it is stand with the laws over and against people.

I had preached about the need for followers of Jesus to stand with people before powers that accuse, defending them so they may experience relief-- more abundant grace and life here and now. A woman came and introduced herself to me after the service as a prosecutor for the Dept of Homeland Security—and there she was last Wednesday as presiding judge in Andrey’s case! She recognized me with a nod and smile as I took the stand beside her to present my testimony.

My 45-minute testimony felt like a prophesy over Andre—who has repented, gone through a profound conversion and has responded to a call into pastoral ministry during his year in our jail and subsequent year in immigration detention. The other family members testified—and I heard the hard news the next morning that the judge saw not legal way to keep Andrey from being deported.

Only one option remains—which involved me approaching the local county prosecutor here to try to get him to lower the official amount of time Andre was charged to serve from 14 months (he’s already served over 2 years) to 364 days—which according to complex immigration law would take him out of the “aggravated felon” category and save him from deportation.

Please pray for our local county prosecutor, and for me. The last time I approached him on Andrey’s case he refused to help. It would be tragic if Andrey was deported back to Russia with a lifetime bar to re-entry—as his entire extended family now lives in Washington and Alaska after a long struggle as a persecuted minority during Soviet times in Russia.

On another front, the three Guatemalan gang members made it through Holy Week without incidents thanks to many prayers from people all over the world. Please continue to pray that they will be transferred to a safer prison—and for funding, wisdom and protection for their beloved chaplains.

All of these cases involve people who God has called into pastoral ministry who are experiencing their stranger and exile status in harsh ways. While I am sure that God can work through them anywhere they end up, we pray that the ruler of this world will in no way detain them from stepping into their most fruitful lives and ministries.

Redemption not Deportation

2010-02-02T17:19:00.001-08:00

For over 15 years now Gracie and I have ministered among Mexican migrant farm workers here at Tierra Nueva in Burlington, WA. We have seen many immigrants suffer terribly-- and things are only getting worse. Immigration reform is critical at this time and must include far more than an opportunity for the millions of undocumented immigrants residing in the USA (12-20 million) to become citizens. Reforms are also desperately needed to overhaul the failed 1996 Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) to give young men and women labeled “criminal aliens” opportunities for redemption.

Four Biblical texts need to be remembered and heeded these days by followers of Jesus who are about announcing the Kingdom of God. After all, we ourselves, regardless of our legal status, are invited to consider ourselves as "strangers and aliens" in this world (1 Pet 2:11) and citizens of heaven-- of which we are ambassadors.

"You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt (Ex 22:21).

"The Lord protects the strangers; he supports the fatherless and the widow" (Ps 146:9).

"I was a stranger, and you invited me in" (Matt 25:35).

"Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by this some have entertained angels without knowing it" (Heb 13:2).

Last month while in Honduras Gracie called me about a close friend from Mexico named Ignacio whose 21-year-old son Jose was in jail charged with a DUI and possession of a controlled substance; as a result he was subject to a Border Patrol hold. If he is convicted, he will serve his time and then be deported back to a country where he has never lived, with a possible lifetime bar to re-entry. He will be separated from his US citizen wife, three year old daughter and family. “Is there anything we can do?” Ignacio asked in desperation.

I was talking with Gracie by cell phone, having just arrived in a Honduran town where we had lived for six years in the 80s promoting sustainable farming to stem the exodus from rural areas to cities to the USA. Two days before a 23-year-old man from a nearby village had been shot to death by someone he had threatened. The INS had deported him two months before, after he served time for a minor crime in a US jail.

“He had been working for three years in different states but then was arrested and deported. Like many young immigrants who have been in the USA, he came back with a serious drug problem, all disoriented and not wanting to work for $3.00 a day,” said Angel David, Tierra Nueva’s Honduran pastor whom I joined to comfort his grieving mother. The US-based MS-13 and Barrio 18 gangs were exported and rapidly spread throughout Central America when the INS deported vulnerable immigrant youth from violent American urban centers and prisons.

What could we do to keep Jose from being deported? Since he is married to a US citizen he might be able to apply for a waiver, depending on the seriousness of his conviction. However, people can be stripped of their residency status or barred from ever becoming a legal resident through committing a crime involving drugs or “moral turpitude”, which includes nearly every offense. This is because IIRAIRA created a terrible two-edged sword: the threshold for a having a crime be considered the most serious crime (an “aggravated felony”) has been dramatically lowered to include any theft or violent offense that receives a jail sentence of 365 days, even if the sentence is “suspended.” Shoplifting a pack of gum can thus be equated with the murder of a policeman or rape of a child). At the same time the ability of immigration officers and judges to offer forgiveness has been severely limited.

The law now puts tremendous discretion in the hands of our current prosecutors, and immigrants are too often left to the county and municipal public defender systems, which are chronically underfunded. Prosecutors now hold all the cards in can determine what charges to file and what plea agreements to accept, often well aware that what might be a great “deal” for a US citizen will impose a horrific “collateral” immigration consequence upon the immigrant: exile from work, home and family. This is coupled with the inability of our overworked public defenders to gather the resources needed to fashion resolutions of criminal charges, like drug treatment, community service and education, that allow the immigrant to make amends and reintegrate as a productive member of society. In contemporary America justice too often requires hard cash.

Ignacio and his wife Maria, like most immigrant workers, don’t have cash to pay for a private attorney for their son—who really needs drug and alcohol treatment and not jail time. They migrated to Washington State from Nayarit 15 years ago when Jose was 7, and other kids were 5, 3, 2 and 1. They had been unemployed and landless and were eager for work. Like many undocumented immigrants, they have struggled at the bottom of American society, taking on minimum-wage jobs in construction, slaughter houses, meat-packing plants, landscaping and field work.

I think back to a forum Tierra Nueva hosted more than a decade ago when a local berry farmer shared with the regional head of the INS his longing to see his many beloved workers be offered the chance to become legal permanent residents. “You know sir, that’s not what you really want,” said the INS chief. “If you give these people status and they will go after the America Dream. Then they won’t want to work for you anymore and there will have to be another wave of illegal immigrants to provide the workers to harvest America’s crops.”

Could the current political impasse that is keeping undocumented immigrants “illegal” be a deliberate mechanism to keep people in a state of perpetual slavery? Until ordinary Americans become aware of the desperate plight of immigrant workers, the sorry state of our justice system and shrinking pathways of forgiveness and begin to make their voices heard the plight of people on the margins will worsen. As people get to know immigrant workers as friends they will hear their stories and learn how oppression in America is sustained by laws and economic forces that encourage immigrants to come here but then force them to remain in the shadows. Personal relationships with immigrants will motivate ordinary Americans to put healthy pressure on prosecutors, judges and lawmakers to enforce laws in ways that favor all people and communities and change laws that don’t permit full consideration of each person’s humanity.

Last night I met with Jose during a bilingual Bible study in Skagit County Jail. His father Ignacio has spent the afternoon repairing my car after he and Maria had attended their son’s first court hearing. “We’re doing everything we can,” I assured him. “Esta bien, gracias,” he said smiling as they led him back to his cell.

A few weeks later a dear friend and prominent pastor of Mixteco-speaking immigrants from Oaxaca, Mexico who lives across the river from us was picked up the Internal Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and put into deportation proceedings. Though he has lived in the US over 15 years, oversees a crew of field workers for a local berry grower and pastors his people tirelessly-- there is no legal remedy available other than getting our congressional representative to submit a special bill to Congress for his family to be granted legal permanent residency status. We at Tierra Nueva are pursuing this option-- and would appreciate your prayers for us, pastor Feliciano and his family.

New Earth Refuge: Encouraging, healing, equipping and empowering leaders for transformational ministry

2009-12-19T07:24:00.000-08:00

Fifteen years ago Gracie and I moved an hour North of Seattle to Burlington and launched Tierra Nueva del Norte out of our home. Chaplaincy in Skagit County Jail and in area migrant labor camps put us into direct contact with people in crisis: addictions, warrants, homelessness, relationship conflict, immigration troubles, unemployment…. far more needs than we could ever meet on our own. Thankfully has been sending us more and more colleagues.

We now have a cadre of 15 or so co-workers engaged in TN’s ministries and growing English and Spanish/Mixteco worshipping communities and still others in Honduras. Gracie and I continue to share a full-time position as pastors with Tierra Nueva.

We feel increasingly called to raise up ministry workers both here and abroad. Seven years ago an opportunity came up to buy a 35-acre forested refuge on the Skagit River near La Conner (see photos at http://bobekblad.com/newearthrefuge.html . Here we receive God’s empowering love in ways that strengthen us to both write/reflect and go out like never before.

In partnership with Tierra Nueva, where we focus on direct outreach to people on the margins, God has given us a vision to establish a refuge to bring encouragement, healing, and equipping so leaders can be raised up and sent out refreshed to minister to the “least.”

Already we are offering lodging, hospitality, training and spiritual support to our staff, seminary students and many others engaged in ministry to society’s least who are often discouraged and at risk of burnout.

We established New Earth Refuge as a Washington State Non-profit Corporation and now have Federal 501c3 recognition allowing us to receipt tax-deductible donations. The buildings all belong to New Earth Refuge. With help from many generous friends we have completed a retreat center that can house 25 guests. We are committed to:

1) Refreshing, encouraging and launching ministry workers and church leaders: through spiritual retreats and personal ministry appointments for vocational, healing and deliverance prayer.
2) Equipping future leaders: for transformational ministry to people on the margins of society nationally and internationally. Plans are underway for regular Schools of Transformational Ministry.
3) Gathering leaders: for prayer and conversations about theology and ministry strategy.

We have completed construction and have been in full operation since June 2009. Due to growing exposure to the global body of Christ through Bob’s writing and teaching we’ve seen an increase in people coming our way for courses and conversations, like the following:

• “Our Religious Impulse: Encountering Religious Otherness,” Mars Hill Graduate School, June, 09.
• “Set the Captives Free”—a course on finding freedom from spiritual oppression that drew over 50 participants & included swimming in the river, July 26-30, 09.
• “Breaking the Chains: Biblical Perspectives on Resisting Personal and Structural Evil,” Regent Weekend School, (Oct 2-3; 23-24; Nov 20-21, 09).
• “Reading the Bible with the Damned,” (Jan 15-16, Mar 9-10, Apr 9-10, 2010)
• Weekly Tuesday Tierra Nueva council meetings, staff prayer & training.
• Monthly area pastors prayer gathering.
• Weekend retreats for area churches.
• Gathering of 20 regional leaders to pray and envision together (Sept., 09).
• Healing prayer appointments with many people from the USA, Canada, and with missionaries serving in Africa, Latin America, the UK, Korea, Cambodia & Singapore.

We are already receiving donations from guests that cover utilities, taxes and upkeep for New Earth Refuge. Our biggest need is for a final $148,000 to pay off a line of credit used to complete construction.

We share this vision with you to both to let you know about this new dimension of our work and to request your prayers. If you feel led to help us meet our final financial challenge gift are tax-deductible. You can donate online through PayPal by clicking on the donate button under New Earth Refuge on our website at http://bobekblad.com/donate.html or through regular mail at:

New Earth Refuge
19438 Best Road
Mount Vernon, WA 98273

Please come by for a visit if you are in the area!

May Jesus bless you with peace and joy this Christmas!

Yours in Christ,

Bob and Gracie Ekblad

Redemption not Deportation

2009-12-12T12:36:00.001-08:00

For the past 15 years I have served as a pastor of Tierra Nueva, ministering to immigrants from Mexico and inmates in Skagit County Jail here an hour north of Seattle. I regularly see immigrants suffer terribly due their inability to become legal residents or avoid deportation on account of sometimes even minor criminal activity. Immigration reform is critical at this time and must include far more than an opportunity for the millions of undocumented immigrants residing in the USA (12-20 million) to become citizens. Reforms are also desperately needed to overhaul the failed 1996 Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) to give young men and women labeled “criminal aliens” opportunities for redemption.

Last week while in Honduras my wife Gracie called me about a close friend from Mexico named Ignacio whose 21-year-old son Jose was in jail charged with a DUI and possession of a controlled substance; as a result he was subject to a Border Patrol hold. If he is convicted, he will serve his time and then be deported back to a country where he has never lived, with a possible lifetime bar to re-entry. He will be separated from his US citizen wife, three year old daughter and family. “Is there anything we can do?” Ignacio asked in desperation.

I was talking with Gracie by cell phone, having just arrived in a Honduran town where we had lived for six years in the 80s promoting sustainable farming to stem the exodus from rural areas to cities. Two days before a 23-year-old man from a nearby village had been shot to death by someone he had threatened. The INS had deported two months before, after he served time for a minor crime in a US jail.

“He had been working for three years in different states but then was arrested and deported. Like many young immigrants who have been in the USA, he came back with a serious drug problem, all disoriented and not wanting to work for $3.00 a day,” said Angel David, Tierra Nueva’s Honduran pastor whom I joined to comfort his grieving mother. The US-based MS-13 and Barrio 18 gangs were exported and rapidly spread throughout Central America when the INS deported vulnerable immigrant youth from violent American urban centers and prisons.

What could we do to keep Jose from being deported? Since he is married to a US citizen he might be able to apply for a waiver, depending on the seriousness of his conviction. However, people can be stripped of their residency status or barred from ever becoming a legal resident through committing a crime involving drugs or “moral turpitude”, which includes nearly every offense. This is because IIRAIRA created a terrible two-edged sword: the threshold for a having a crime be considered the most serious crime has been dramatically lowered (so that shoplifting a pack of gum is equated with the murder of a policeman or rape of a child), and at the same time the ability of immigration officers and judges to offer forgiveness to the truly deserving has been severely limited.

The law now puts tremendous discretion in the hands of our current prosecutors, and immigrants are too often left to the public county and municipal defender systems, which are overwhelmed and underfunded. Prosecutors can determine what charges to file and what plea agreements to accept, often well aware that what might be a great “deal” for a citizen of the US will impose a horrific “collateral” immigration consequence upon the immigrant: exile from work, home and family. This is coupled by the inability of our overworked public defenders to gather the resources needed to fashion resolutions of criminal charges, like drug treatment, community service and education, that allow the immigrant to pay his debt to society and reintegrate as a productive member. In contemporary America justice too often requires hard cash.

Ignacio and his wife Maria, like most immigrant workers, don’t have cash to pay for a private attorney for their son—who really needs drug and alcohol treatment and not jail time. They migrated to Washington State from Nayarit 15 years ago when Jose was 7, and other kids were 5, 3, 2 and 1. They had been unemployed and landless and were eager for work. Like many undocumented immigrants, they have struggled at the bottom of American society, taking on minimum-wage jobs in construction, slaughter houses, meat-packing plants, landscaping and field work.

I think back to a forum Tierra Nueva hosted more than a decade ago when a local berry farmer shared with the regional head of the INS his longing to see his many beloved workers be offered the chance to become legal permanent residents. “You know sir, that’s not what you really want,” said the INS chief. “If you give these people status and they will go after the America Dream. Then they won’t want to work for you anymore and there will have to be another wave of illegal immigrants to provide the workers to harvest America’s crops.”

Could the current political impasse that is keeping undocumented immigrants “illegal” be a deliberate mechanism to keep people in a state of perpetual slavery? Until ordinary Americans become aware of the desperate plight of immigrant workers, which is sustained by laws and economic forces that encourage them to come here but then force them to remain in the shadows, the sorry state of our justice system and shrinking pathways of forgiveness and begin to make their voices heard the plight of people on the margins will worsen. As people get to know immigrant workers as friends they will become motivated to put healthy pressure on prosecutors, judges and lawmakers to enforce laws in ways that favor all people and communities and change laws that don’t permit full consideration of each person’s humanity.

Last night I met with Jose during a bilingual Bible study in Skagit County Jail. His father Ignacio has spent the afternoon repairing my car after he and Maria had attended their son’s first court hearing. “We’re doing everything we can,” I assured him. “Esta bien, gracias,” he said smiling as they led him back to his cell.

Fruitfulness in Honduras

2009-12-12T10:59:00.000-08:00

Angel David is 52 and serves as Tierra Nueva’s Honduran leader due to his tireless service on behalf of the area’s most marginalized people. I have known him for 26 years and watched him grow fuller and fuller of grace and truth. Now he leads TN’s new initiative to establish “hogares en transformacion” (households in transformation)—a house church movement focusing on people in extreme poverty who are excluded from the church.

Two days before TN’s Mexican pastor Salvio and I arrived for a nine-day visit he tells us how he heard gunshots on the dirt road below his house. He ran down to find a 23-year-old man he had been a godfather to dying in a pool of blood, shot to death by someone he had threatened. He carried him to his mother’s house, his upper body soaking up blood and brain fragments, and they loaded him into a pickup to be transported to Tegucigalpa. He died en route.

“Like many young men from our area he had gone to El Norte looking for opportunities, worked a few years in different states before being arrested and deported back to Honduras,” explained Angel David. “He came back with a serious drug problem, all disoriented and not wanting to work for $3.00 a day. I used to invite him to play soccer with the other young men, and always insisted on holding his revolver for him as we don’t let people play armed, and now he’s dead and the young man who shot him is on the run,” said David.

Years before we had tried to intervene in his family’s life after a local pastor had insisted that his father return to his first wife to escape the punishment of eternal hell for adultery. The young man’s father had at that time left his current wife and eight children to return to a previous partner in another part of the county.

We held a four day leaders school to directly confront negative images of God and the Bible that often lead to disaster. Some 60 participants were involved, many from Angel David’s home gatherings. Afterwards we traveled from village to village to tell people about our new initiative and pray for them.

Last Sunday afternoon we visited our new 15-acre coffee farm high in the mountains of Yoro and met and prayed with old friends in the village of La Fortuna. It is exciting to see the tremendous potential of eventually being able to fund TN’s Honduran movement through coffee sales while at the same time providing quality coffee for our ex-gang members in Burlington to roast and sell Underground Coffee.

We then descended to Guachipilin, a village that runs up and down a steep mountainside. Back in TN’s heyday nearly all the famers there had converted their eroded lands into highly productive contoured terraces, winning them a national ecology award. We stood among a gathering of peasants overlooking a sweeping valley and Angel David introduced our visit.

“Tierra Nueva used to come with files and machetes and hoes to promote conservation of soils. We are still about this but now our first priority is to discover in the Bible about a God who loves sinners, to invite the Holy Spirit to fill us and to see Jesus heal people of their sicknesses.”

He described how our team were there to pray for people to be filled with the peace of love of Christ. He then prayed for the Holy Spirit to come and we began laying hands on people while Carlos from Catch the Fire in Raleigh played guitar and sang “Fire of God, fire of God, come breath on us” in Spanish.

Angel David, the six of us from Tierra Nueva in Burlington, Carlos’ English wife Catherine and other Hondurans who had attended our course fanned out an began praying. A whole line of peasant women were crying softly as they received prayer.

Next we prayed for those in pain and a woman who said she suffered from pain in her back, joints and throughout her entire body began to weep and loudly cry out as she bent over double. A bit worried I asked her what was happening.

“I feel heat in my whole body, and all the pain is gone,” she said.

Many others were healed that afternoon of all sorts of aches and pains. From there we jumped in our pickups and drove the bumpy roads to Las Delicias—where the local Catholic leaders who had all attended our course hosted a worship and healing service for the community.

There I felt led to have the children lay hands on people in need of healing. Six young kids came forward to volunteer. I invited them to lay hands on a woman with pain all through her head, neck, and shoulders. I had them send the pain away like they would order a dog trying to eat their dinner to leave the kitchen. "Vaya para afuera!" (Go out!) they said over and over. The woman began to cry.

"What is happening?" I asked her. "I feel heat all over... and the pain is going away." We kept praying until it was completely gone and the kids prayed for others too.

It was a delight to see the Spirit move so powerfully in our outreaches after having earlier in the week experienced God’s empowering presence in our course.

On the third day of our course after teaching on baptism/empowerment by the Holy Spirit we prayed for people and many were deeply touched in ways that I have never seen in Honduras. Adults, youth and children were overcome by the Spirit—surrendering themselves to God’s love without resistance. This was very moving and our leaders there were all very surprised and delighted.

There was healing happening every day-- nearly always accompanied by heat and often by tears. One man named Hector, an old friend and once TN promoter who is over 65 had severe back problems that have kept him disabled for 15 years. He had come with a cane that he used to walk everywhere. After going through a fire tunnel he began leap and was ecstatic:

"I'm healed! I'm healed" he shouted and jumped. He left his cane under his chair-- a souvenir I've brought back from the trip.

On the final day of the course we had a worship and healing service in the center of Minas de Oro-- which we never have done. Some 60 people came-- mostly our course participants, but also some others. The worship was powerful and many people experienced God in new ways. Nearly everyone lined up at the end to receive prayer to step fully into Jesus ministry of sharing good news, healing and deliverance.

On our sixth night I had a powerful dream where I met a Latino man in his office. He looked at me and began to prophesy in an ecstatic way: (esto va ser fructifero, pero muy fruitifero) "This is going to be fruitful, but VERY FRUITFUL! he yelled, pointing at me. I began to cry and fell to the ground in the dream. I woke up panting rapidly and heavily. I fell back asleep and the same Latino man came back to confirm the same message.

Our Honduran leader Angel David was amazed by what God is doing and sees unprecedented thirst. He's worried about how he's going to lead this new movement of the Spirit-- which is exactly what it feels like.

The six of us from Tierra Nueva got to assist in a beautiful new thing that is happening after 27 years of work there in Honduras. Please pray:

For Angel David, Ramiro, Elia, America and Dagoberto-- our main TN Honduran leaders. For wisdom, courage, unity and love to reign. Pray also for strategies to reach young men who are either contemplating heading to the US to work or those recently deported who are longing for new opportunities.

Prophesy and Reconciliation

2009-11-26T14:43:00.000-08:00

I am amazed by how the Holy Spirit is at work actualizing Jesus’ work of breaking down the “barrier of the dividing wall” (Eph 1:14) through the gift of prophesy. Prophetic words bridge divides between God and humans, the past and present, believers and unbelievers, people of diverse ethnicities, nationalities, theological traditions, political ideologies, bringing reconciliation amidst every imaginable difference. God is at work reconciling the world to himself, gathering his children into a united family in Christ.

And why should I be surprised? Early in John’s Gospel it is written that those who receive Jesus and believe in his name are given authority to become God’s children who are “born of God” (1:12-13). Intimacy with God is a lifelong process that grows as we learn to hear the Father’s voice, see what God is doing, become transformed by his compassion and engage in Jesus-like actions. Jesus says:

Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of himself, unless it is something he sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner. For the Father loves the Son, and shows him all things that he himself is doing; and greater works than these will he show him, that you may marvel (John 5:19-20). (See also Jn 5:30; 8:28; 12:49).
As we become more aware of our identity as God’s beloved sons and daughters, the Father will inevitably seek to reconcile us with estranged siblings. Friendship with God will also lead us into friendship with God’s many friends, including sinners, bringing us across every imaginable wall of separation as the Father makes us one as Jesus (John 17). Intimacy with God is an invitation into Jesus’ way of discerning his ministry of reconciliation.

For most of my Christian life I was estranged from the body of Christ charismatic. Years of ministry among the poor in war-torn Central America and among undocumented immigrants and inmates in labor camps and a jail in the United States put me at odds with my government and with many evangelicals and charismatic Christians who supported its wars and laws. I was inspired by Jesus’ life and teachings in the Gospels, the desert fathers, liberation theology and people like Dorothy Day, Archbishop Romero, Jean Vanier, and Mother Theresa. I pursued academic study of Scripture, contemplative spiritual practices and sought to combat the roots of poverty and oppression through contextual Bible study, sustainable development and human rights advocacy.

Week after week over a ten-year period I counseled inmates and immigrants in crisis and led bilingual bible studies in our local jail and storefront at Tierra Nueva in Washington State. I saw firsthand how harsh laws and immigration policies, poverty, drugs and alcohol destroy people’s lives. I became increasingly discontented with the gospel I was sharing, and longed to see more of God’s power to bring transformation. My desperation for breakthrough in ministry became so great that I ventured across the line into an ecumenism broader than I’d ever considered-- attending a pastors’ and leaders’ conference at the infamous Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship.

I was struck from the start how much the Holy Spirit was moving during a session on the importance of forgiveness. As the speaker taught and prayed vivid memories came to mind of offenses and judgments held against people in my distant past who I felt compelled to forgive. After another stirring session on Jesus’ ministry announcing the Kingdom of God I lined up to receive prayer with hundreds of others for greater fruitfulness in ministry, and soon had my turn before a young man from the UK on the ministry team. His words opened me up as he spoke what only God could have shown him:

“I see you in a circle of men in red uniforms, I think they are prisoners,” he started out, getting my rapt attention. “The Father is saying ‘I am delighted how you love my prisoners and I’m going to give you deeper revelation from the Bible that will make their hearts burn,’ he continued, moving me with this reference to my favorite picture from the Emmaus road story in Luke 24:13ff before a final unexpected clincher. “He is releasing an anointing for healing on you so your words will be confirmed with the signs that follow.” I fell to the ground overcome by the Spirit, my hands burning. I continued to be touched more and more by the Holy Spirit at that conference in ways that transformed my life and ministry.

Since that time God has used me to invite many others from diverse camps in the body of Christ across lines of division to receive from each other. Over the past six years I have learned to identify the Spirit’s promptings to pray for people in ways that show me Jesus’ longing to reconcile people. Once after a Bible study on Jesus’ healing of the bent-over woman in Luke 13:10ff a Chicano gangster named Santos asked if I would pray for him for lifelong nervous tick that caused his face to dramatically flinch several times a minute. Upon praying I got an impression that he had been beaten in the head by his father as a child. When I asked him he nodded and began to weep. After leading him through prayers of forgiveness of his father his humiliating tick went away and he gave his life fully to Jesus. A Chinese woman in London was healed of chronic back pain and insomnia last April after she forgave her father for beating her, her siblings and mother after the Holy Spirit revealed this prophetically. While I have seen God heal hundreds of people over these years in many nations and subcultures, what most touches people is the recognition that God personally knows, loves and welcomes them into his family and offers the Holy Spirit to bear witness that they are indeed his children (Rom 8:15-17).

The Spirit that came on Jesus at his baptism, which his followers received at Pentecost inducts us into filial intimacy and membership in God’s borderless family. The tongues of fire that rested on each one gathered ignited their tongues to proclaim the mighty deeds across the boundaries of language and culture. Peter’s use of Joel 2 to interpret the coming of the Spirit re-enforces this notion of the prophetic as barrier removing: sons and daughters, young and old, female and male slaves all will prophesy (Acts 3:17-18). An angel of the Lord spoke to Philip, directing him to go to the road to Gaza where he met an Ethiopian eunuch who came to faith and carried the gospel into Africa (Acts 8:26ff). Peter received prophetic revelation in the form of a vision that opened him to minister to Gentile Cornelius (Acts 10). As we grow in intimate communion with God we will find ourselves bringing Good News across borders that show that in fact the dividing wall of hostility is down and “[we] are no longer strangers and aliens, but [we] are fellow citizens with the saints and are of God’s household” (Eph 2:19).

Setting the Prisoners Free

2009-10-12T21:31:00.000-07:00

Whenever I go into a jail or prison I am changed. This past June Iris missionary Ania Noster invited me to lead Bible studies in a prison and jail in Pemba, Mozambique. Ania had begun visiting inmates some eight months before and was passionately engaged—and I soon saw for myself why.

We first visited a prison in Mieze and led a Bible study on the parable of the lost sheep to some 100 inmates. The men sat three abreast in a deep, narrow corridor lined with cell blocks that divided the prison in half. We stood in the same corridor a few steps above. After an opening prayer and introductions we sang a few worship songs together in Portuguese.

We sat down to place ourselves closer to the people’s level and a volunteer read in Portuguese Luke 15:1-2, which was then translated into the local language Makua.

“Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to him to listen to him. And both the Pharisees and the scribes began to grumble, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them.”

I gave a quick summary of the characters, telling how tax collectors were viewed as thieves, and asked the men if any of them knew any thieves. Everyone laughed as they looked around at each other. “Jesus was a friend of thieves and sinners. All of the thieves and sinners came to him to listen to him,” I continued. “Where would Jesus find thieves and sinners in Mozambique?” I asked. “Right here! responded some of the men” – and there we were to re-experience thousands of years later the same Good News.

I suggested that thieves and bad people must have felt his love and total acceptance. The law-abiding people criticized him for hanging out with criminals, so he told them a story. Though it was far from an ideal place to act out this parable, I asked for a smaller, light weight volunteer to be a sheep and a stronger bigger volunteer to be a shepherd and found willing actors in a flash.

Men read the parable of the lost sheep in Portuguese and Makua and I then asked the man playing the sheep to go as far as he could away from the others into the depths of the corridor. He found his way back there and waited. I then asked the men how people end up getting lost, getting into trouble. People mentioned drinking, steeling, poverty, drugs, rape and other things. Then I sent the man playing the shepherd to go find the sheep, place him on his shoulders and bring him back, inviting the rest of us to his house for a big celebration.

The stronger man went and lifted him on his shoulders while the other inmates clapped and cheered. Once back I asked the inmates and the man playing the sheep what he was doing when the shepherd found him? The men seemed delighted to see that the sheep wasn’t doing anything, just being lost. The shepherd came looking for him, “until he found him!”

“What did the shepherd do when he found him?” I asked. “Did he yell at him, beat him, or sentence him to prison time?” Acting out the story made the answer obvious. The shepherd found him, rejoiced and carried him back, inviting all his friends to a big welcome party in his honor. There’s even a big party in heaven over a sinner who is found/repents!

“How many of you would like to be found, brought home into God’s house and celebrated?” I asked. I told the men like I have many times in Skagit County Jail that Jesus is looking for them and will not give up until he finds them. “But you can give him permission to find you sooner rather than later if you’d like,” I offer. “If you are interested in being found now, I invite you to welcome Jesus into your life and surrender to his love.”

At this invitation there’s was a massive response. I could see that people were very moved as they prayed in Portuguese or Makua to give their lives over to Jesus. We then offered to pray lay hands on each man to bless them and pray for physical healing. Ania, the Mozambican interpreter and the four or five other outside ministry team people and I spent the next forty five minutes or so praying for every inmate.

I was moved to see how nearly every man had scars on their arms, faces and legs from knife or gunshot wounds. I went and prayed for men who were laying sick in their beds in some of the cells together with a Mozambican pastor. We left warmed to the core by God’s love reflected towards us from these open, desperate Mozambican men.

A few days later Ania took my son Isaac and I and some other Iris School of Ministry students to the Pemba city jail where I led another Bible study. The jail was much dirtier and bleaker then the prison, with inmates crowded in a yard guarded by AK-47-bearing women and men guards. While the majority of inmates where Mozambican, we met men from Kenya and other African countries, and there were 15 or so Bangladeshi men squatting together in their own little alcove. A line of women inmates leaned against a wall listening in as a Mozambican pastor led worship and began to interpret my Bible study.

In this jail like in many jails and prisons in poor countries around the world, food was a meager serving of rice and people slept on a cement floor and had to relieve themselves in an uncovered hole in the ground. After a Bible study we passed out small loaves of bread to the famished inmates, prayed for people’s healing, and saw many people get visible relief. I prayed for one older man who had open sores covering his entire body—allowing me only a small patch on the top of one of his bare feet to place two fingers.

Before leaving I talked with the Bangladeshi inmates. They had been picked up trying to cross Mozambique illegally from Tanzania en route to South Africa. They said they’d been there four months without an attorney visit and knew nothing about how to get released.

A younger man wanted prayer for his arm, which he couldn’t straighten out and pained him greatly after a fall. I gently held his swollen elbow and prayed for Jesus to heal him. As I prayed I asked him to begin to try to move his arm. At first he winced and couldn’t straighten it. Little by little as we continued to pray he was able to completely bend and fully straighten his arm. Astonishment then joy came over his face.

“My friend wants you to know that he thinks you are magnificent!” said the interpreter. I insisted that this was Jesus’ doing as the entire group of Bangladeshi’s and Indian men looked on. We prayed for God to act on their behalf, liberating them from the jail.

The next day I met an influential Muslim businessman whose family were originally from India who has befriended Heidi and Rolland Baker. He agreed to meet with Isaac and me to talk about advocating for the Bangladeshi inmates release. While I never confirmed that he was able to get them released, I could see that advocacy must accompany proclamation both here, in Mozambique and everywhere else where I have done jail ministry.

Since our return I have often remembered these poor prisoners and prayed for them, and also for Ania, the Bakers, and Iris Ministries’ many missionaries and Mozambican pastors. Please pray for them, and for God’s wisdom and direction for Gracie and I too as we discern our role in equipping the body of Christ for ministry to people on the margins.

In the last few days I have received invitations to return to Mozambique next summer to teach Mozambican leaders and possibly prison chaplains; and to Bordeaux, France to train French jail chaplains.

Meanwhile in our own local jail officials have just told us we can no longer lay hands on inmates or offer services with more than two of us ministering. Please pray for at Tierra Nueva as we continue to share God’s amazing love in Jesus to men, women and juvenile offenders here in Skagit County. Pray for doors to open again for us to minister more freely, advocate more effectively and see prisoners find spiritual and physical freedom.

God, fishing and deliverance from death

2009-09-06T00:05:00.000-07:00

A few events have caught my attention this past week linking God, fishing and the need to be vigilant on both spiritual and day-to-day fronts.

Last week our 16-year-old son Luke and our dear friend Troy were on our floating docks in front of our house, fishing for humpy salmon in the Skagit River. Troy lay on his back under a big dead tree that leaned over the water, casting and reeling in slowly. Luke stood on another dock beside him, casting out into the blue-green river.

Luke, lamenting that they weren’t catching fish like others in many boats around them, was comparing his lack of s uccess fishing to his frustrations at not experiencing God’s tangible presence. Why do some people seem to feel God’s Presence, getting touched or healed in ways that excite and encourage them, while others go to all the same places and want more of God but don’t feel or experience anything for themselves? That question was about to be partially answered, not in church but right there on the river.

Luke saw some fish rolling down steam and ran down the bank and cast out. Immediately he had a fish on and yelled to Troy, who jumped up with his pole, caught up with Luke, cast out and himself hooked a salmon. They skewered the fish through the gills on a tree branch, but Luke’s fish’s gill broke, leaving Troy’s fish hanging there bleeding all alone.

“I looked at the fish all covered with blood and thought it looked like it was being crucified,” recounts Troy. I took it down and lay it on the sand and placed my hands on it, giving thanks to God for its life. I felt the life leave it and just then heard a big crash.”

While Luke was reeling in another fish, Troy ran over to the dock to see what had happened. The big dead tree had broken in half, falling into another dead tree which had been propelled down onto the dock right where Troy had been laying. Just then Luke ran up and said:

“Whoa Troy, if you’d been there you would have been dead.”

Troy couldn t help but see the connections between Jesus and the fish: “It’s like the fish gave its life for me. He pondered in detail the amazing timing of his deliverance from near certain death.

“When I was laying there on my back casting I had decided to take 7 more casts. I was reeling in slowly so each cast was taking about 2 ½ minutes. I was on my second cast when Luke caught his fish. About four minutes passed between when I jumped up and when the tree fell on the dock. If he hadn’t caught the fish I would have been there another 15 minutes or so.”

In the next half hour Luke and Troy caught their limit, bringing 8 fish up for a Pascal barbeque dinner. But the story’s not over yet…

The following Sunday we had a big baptism service way up river on the bank of the Skagit near Tierra Nueva. Gracie and I baptized 14 of our community members in the cold Cascade flow amidst anglers whose lures and sand-shrimp nearly entangled our joyous baptisms. The Holy Spirit was coming on strong as people came up from the water, making it hard for Gracie and I to stay standing (see http://s616.photobucket.com/albums/tt246/waharpist/baptism%20august%202009 .

On my way up from the bank I received a call from Lourdes, a farm worker whose family has been part of our ministry for our entire 15 years here. Her husband Boni had=2 0been under his truck when the jack failed and the truck fell down on his chest. He was in the Emergency room and they wanted me there quick. I rushed to the hospital and hung out and prayed with the family around my traumatized friend who should have been dead. Just as the doctors made us leave the room so they could take an X-ray, two paramedics rolled in another of my beloved charges, Jose who had just fallen out of a tree.

For the next few hours I was in the ER, going from Jose’s room to Boni’s, praying for them and talking with their families. Boni is now recovering from a broken collarbone, dislocated shoulder and lots of scrapes and bruises and Jose from a broken neck.

While not all suffering and calamities can be avoided and God can rescue us in spite of ourselves, these events have reminded me of the need to be vigilant, paying close attention to what God may be warning us about or calling us to. But how do we discern God’s protective, saving presence in our lives?

Earlier in the summer I had noticed the leaning tree and consciously imagined a similar scenario, but put off cutting it down as I figured in would fall on it’s own during a storm when no one was around. If Luke hadn’t noticed the salmon surfacing, ran down the bank, cast out and hooked the fish Troy would likely have been killed.

Lordes felt strongly that her family should go to Tierra Nueva’s service but Boni needed to rep air his truck so he could go to work the next morning. Jose dropped his tools several times while climbing the tree, wondered why, ing his tools from the tree and even says he kept dropping his tools as he climbed the tree, wondered why, but says he kept pushing himself to get the job done even though he was really tired. Peter’s words ring true and inspire me to greater attentiveness.

“The end of all things is at hand; therefore, be therefore sober and watch unto prayer (1 Peter 4:7) and “Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls about like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brothers who are in the world” (1 Peter 5:8-9).

We give thanks to God that all of these friends are alive and ask you to pray for Boni and Jose’s speedy recovery and for provision for their families.

Word, Spirit and Street in Mozambique

2009-07-17T09:30:00.000-07:00

At the end of June I returned from two rich weeks in Mozambique with my oldest son Isaac—a trip that took us from the cooler South (Maputo) to the more tropical North (Pemba) of the country and across the diverse landscape of the body of Christ.

Isaac and I tasted the banquet awaiting us, sitting at table and ministering together with mainline Christians, Catholics, evangelicals, Pentecostals, villagers, inmates and missionaries. This is the first of several reports on this fascinating and deeply encouraging trip.

I can see clearly that the problems facing Africa require that the body of Christ come together like never before. Looking at some of today’s most tenacious social problems in the light of Scripture can shake the church out of complacent accommodation. Being further empowered and led by the Holy Spirit to step into Jesus’ ministry of healing and deliverance may be the only hope to get us past the impasses of enlightened talk and programs.

This trip began with a course on “Lectura Popular de la Biblia” (street-level Bible reading) at the Seminario Unido de Ricatla in Maputo. Dutch theologians and missionaries Hette and Petra Domburg and recently-elected general secretary of the Mozambican Council of Churches Marcos Macambo coordinated an amazing coming together of 35 pastors from many different mainline and evangelical denominations for five days of stimulating Bible study and fellowship.

Luiz Dietrich and Adeodata Maria dos Anjos came from CEBI (Centro de Estudios Biblicos) from Brazil—offering their wisdom as Catholic theologian activists from out of a movement with a long history of social engagement in the light of Scripture. Adeodata gave a talk on her work establishing water cisterns, promoting sustainable farming and Bible study with Catholic base communities in Northeastern Brazil.

Luiz is a Bible scholar with a passion to see quality exegesis reach the poor. He brought stacks of small booklets in Portuguese that inspired me in a project I’ve been aiming at for years: to prepare bible study and theological reflection materials that draw from quality scholarship that bring the best to the least.

Maria Makgamathe of Ujamaa Centre for Biblical and Theological Community Development and Research in S. Africa led a Bible study on the rape of Tamar in 2 Samuel 13:1-24 that exposed contemporary attitudes towards rape in African society. The men were able to see how our attitudes often parallel those of many of the men characters in this Biblical narrative who in various ways contributed to Tamar’s rape and it’s tragic aftermath – Amnon, Jonadab, Absalom, David. Tamar’s resistance and lament were prophetic cries that visibly empowered the women gathered there at the conference.

The following week in Pemba I led 35 of Iris Ministries lead pastors in this Bible study. They lapped it up and wanted more—confirming my belief that the charismatic renewal desperately needs the resources of socially-engaged Bible scholars and popular education movements like Ujamaa and Cebi. See http://www.sorat.ukzn.ac.za/ujamaa/resources.htm for a write up of this Bible study and info on Ujamaa’s Tamar Campaign.

Bongi Zengele of Ujamaa of Ujamaa led a Bible study on the woman caught in adultery in John 8:1-11, linking the crowds condemning, scapegoating actions to people’s marginalization of people living with HIV/Aids now in Africa. There in Maputo over 25% of the population are HIV positive. Shame and fear of exclusion and condemnation keeps this scourge hidden. Bongi got the group of Mozambican pastors talking more directly and openly than they probably ever had about the most sensitive social issue affecting everyone.

I led the group in a biblio-drama on the same text where we acted out Jesus’ confrontation with the Scribes and Pharisees, which illustrated clearly how Jesus’ writing in the dirt takes the condemning, shaming gaze off the woman. We pondered how Jesus’ challenge “whoever is without sin cast the first stone” turned the accusers’ attention away from the woman and towards their own hearts. His stooping to write on the ground once again keeps Jesus himself from standing over the blamers as accuser, since he came not to condemn but to save (John 3:17).

One afternoon Hette took me and Isaac out to visit a small Presbyterian congregation of some 20 people in the village of Boquisso. While the people were embarrassed by their teetering grass church with its rusting sheet metal roof they formed a tunnel and worshiped as we went between them into the dirt-floored sanctuary. I led them in dramatic reenactment of Jesus’ healing of a woman in the synagogue who was bent over double in Luke 13:10-21.

In response we prayed for people with pain in their backs and stomachs and those suffering from night terrors. After the first woman was healed I showed her how to pray for the second, who experienced dramatic relief from back and stomach pain as we talked her through consciously receiving her healing from Jesus as a free gift. This is a radical idea in a culture where traditional healers charge for their services. As they were praying for the third woman suddenly she began dancing and worshipping, overjoyed to be immediately released from pain. I had all the remaining people pray for themselves, and people were overjoyed by the healing the some 18 of the 20 experienced.

An older woman named Elsa who was the closed actual equivalent to the bent over woman Jesus healed in Luke was not getting relief. Finally after Hette and Isaac hung in there with her and welcoming God’s presence, her stomach pain left. When we left she was not yet straight. Please remember her in your prayers—that Jesus would totally heal her and inspire this congregation to step deeper into God’s Kingdom.

The next day I spoke on jail ministry, leading the group through a Bible study on Jesus’ call of Matthew in Matthew 9:9-17 I’ve done in the jail and with MS-13 gang members in a Guatemalan prison. Some of the pastors were so inspired that I heard the next day that I will likely be invited to return to for a longer national-level training on prison ministry.

The final day was spent discussing the “see, judge, act” or “reality, bible, community” approaches to reading Scripture in the light of pressing community and social problems where we sought to integrate our approaches. We then divided up the group into five groups which each prepare Bible studies that addressed a social problem like HIV/Aids, domestic violence, orphans, water, crime, corruption, etc.

Hette, Luiz, Adeodata, Isaac and I left together that Friday afternoon on the same plane northward. They were off to teach a course to a Catholic community on Revelation and Isaac and I to teach Iris Ministries Mozambican pastors and international Mission’s School participants—which I will write about in my next update. That weeks experiences and conversations sparked thirst in all of us to experience more of Jesus’ Kingdom here and now—to the extent that we ended up praying for more of the Holy Spirit’s anointing right there in the airport before our flight.

Please pray for these news friends and for Mozambican pastors and leaders—that street/reality, bible/word, Spirit and community would come together as Christians come together in unity as Christ’s body in the world. We long to see the word carefully read to illuminate God’s loving presence at work in the darkest places of our hearts and world. At the same time we pray for faith to expect the Spirit would confirm the words with concrete signs of liberation following.

Setting the Captives Free

2009-06-10T22:14:00.000-07:00

Bob Ekblad
Jun 10, 2009

This last year many of us at Tierra Nueva have felt a need to go deeper into God’s love and presence and into Jesus’ ministry of deliverance to people oppressed by personal and structural evil.

Jesus describes God as having sent him to proclaim release to the captives and to let the oppressed go free (Luke 4:18). In Acts 10:38 Peter summarizes Jesus’ ministry as he witnessed it “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power… he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.”

We want to see people (ourselves included) freed from forces like shame, fear, control, anger, abandonment, rejection, addictions, lust, and greed, as well as from indebtedness, criminal behavior, legal oppression, racism, gang and national allegiances and other macro powers.

You are invited to join us for four days and five nights of worship, teaching, participatory Bible studies, discussion and fellowship focusing on Jesus’ teaching about deliverance and getting filled up with more of the Holy Spirit.

Topics include: revisiting cosmology; hands on teaching on deliverance, inner and physical healing; the importance of forgiveness; freedom from the stronghold of shame, fear and control; deliverance from micro and macro powers; hearing the voice of God; adoption and empowerment.

Bob Ekblad and the Tierra Nueva staff will provide the teaching, worship leading and personal ministry.

When and Where: Sunday night July 26, 4:30pm – Thursday night July 30 @ 10pm At Tierra Nueva, 102 N. Pine, Burlington, WA

Cost: $145 per person or $200 per couple.

Lodging at New Earth refuge $20 a night (single bunk beds in separate women and men’s dorms) or $75 for four nights.

To register or for more information contact Admin@tierra-nueva.org
and/or check our website www.tierra-nueva.org

Miscellaneous healings

2009-05-20T19:52:00.000-07:00

The last two Wednesday evenings Tierra Nueva pastoral colleague Emily Martin has taken me with her to visit Mixteco-speaking farm workers from Oaxaca, Mexico who have been attending our Sunday evening Spanish service. The new arrivals from Oaxaca are some of the poorest of Mexico’s poor. They come from remote, impoverished villages where they have had minimal access to education, running water, electricity and health care. They come desperate for work on local farms to sustain their families.

I make my way up rickety stairs and knock on a hollow door before entering into a run-down room full of people and minimal furnishings. Luisa, a Mixteco woman in her early 30s nurses her infant on a stained mattress that takes up 1/3 of the room. Teen girls have big banana leaves laid out on the kitchen counter that they’re busy dishing corn, chicken and sauce into to make tamales. Paulino and his uncle Raul greet me politely, pulling out a child-size plastic chair for me in the center of the room. Raul is tired for a hard day’s work near the Canadian border where he was planting blueberries.

This night Emily download and burned onto a disk a recorded message from globalrecordings.net in these people’s particular dialect of Mixteco that effectively summarizes Abraham and Sarah’s story in Genesis. The 10-12 people living in this one-room apartment all gather around a near broken down CD player and listen intently, smiling and nodding as they hear of Abram and Sarai’s journey as migrants from Ur to the foreign land of Canaan spoken in their own language.

A 16-year-old boy holds a flip chart of drawings of Abram and Sarai’s life that goes with the recordings. This boy was recently released from an immigration detention center for minors after spending four months in custody after U.S. Internal Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents raided his apartment. They had deported all the adults but kept him detained in a special house for minors in Seattle since he’s an orphan with no home to deport him back to-- until Emily negotiated his release to family and her own custody.

I summarize the story, emphasizing God’s call to leave all securities behind in order to be blessed and consequently become a blessing to every family on earth. These people had already left everything, embarked on a precarious journey and are here in what they thought might be a sort of Canaan. Will God meet them here as God had met Abram and Sarai when they came into new, foreign territory?

We ask if anyone needs prayer, and Paulino motions to his wife Luisa, who child now lays fast asleep in her arms.

Paulino interprets as she tells us how she hasn’t been able to lift anything heavy due to severe pain in her stomach just below her rib cage. She also has lots of pain when she tries to move her head from side to side. I invite people to put out their hands to receive the Holy Spirit. Then we lay hands on the Luisa and pray for relief. “What are you feeling I ask?” All she says is “ini” (heat). I ask her to move her head from side to side to see if there’s improvement and she says it’s lessening. We pray again and keep asking her. When it’s time to go she says the pain is all gone. Later in the week we learn that she is able to lift with no pain in her stomach. The following Wednesday we learn that many suffer from regular night mares. We invite them to place their hands on their own heads and we pray for God’s protection and relief: for dreams from heaven to replace night terrors. People are desperate for Jesus’ help and openly receive and seem to benefit almost immediately.

Last Sunday other farm workers showed up at our Spanish service. We saw five people we prayed for healed of different chronic aches and pains. It is beautiful to see people experience the reality of God—even though many still struggle to pay rent, find adequate work and help their children succeed in our complicated school system.

Signs of God’s Kingdom here but not yet are evident in the following testimony by a beloved Tierra Nueva community member Susannah Reyes.

“As I attended the past seminar at Tierra Nueva, one of the most incredible things happened to me on the last night.

I usually watch people receive prayer and have watched some overcome by the Spirit. They are sometimes not able to stand, because they are so overcome. I’ve sat back and watched this with some skepticism, yet wanting it so much to happen to me. I wanted it so much, I guess I wasn’t allowing it to happen. The more I wanted it, the further it got away from me. Or maybe the Lord knew I wasn't ready.

Anyway, the person giving me a ride was leaving early. I got up to leave, but Elizabeth asked me to wait and receive prayer. So I stayed to worship and pray once again. Another person offered to give me a ride, so again I got up to leave. Once again, Elizabeth intervened and asked me to stay and receive prayer. So I stayed and returned to prayer.

I am an addict in recovery. I have been in remission for two years. As I stood there deep in silent prayer, I was asking for forgiveness for having been an addict and all of the hurt and wrongs I had done to my family and others, and also the magnificent temple God had given me to care for. All of a sudden I felt Bob's hand on my forehead and he said, “You are not an addict.” At that moment I felt something deep from the pit of my stomach come up and out of my chest. It was so intense I couldn’t stand and felt myself falling. I had finally totally been overcome by the Holy Spirit. I lay there in total peace for some while.

That experience freed me. My identity was no longer an addict named Susannah. I am Susannah and I have a disease called addiction. God released me from this horrible bondage. God heard my heart. I am God's child!”

Susannah wrote this testimony just a few days before she was found dead in her apartment by TN staff member Elizabeth—our beloved Susannah had passed away of natural causes.

Please pray for Susannah’s family and join us in thanking God for her beautiful testimony and her life. Pray for God's continued presence and ongoing signs of Jesus' Kingdom here and now as we minister to Mixteco and Triqui farm workers here in our valley.

Believing and Receiving the Sign of Jonah

2009-04-10T15:23:00.000-07:00

I am convinced that God is longing to take us deeper into Jesus' death and resurrection this Easter and beyond.

I have been meditating on Jesus’ words in Matthew 12:40 “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign shall be given it but the sign of Jonah. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”

In the past I interpreted Jesus ’offer here to give his contemporaries the sign of Jonah as something less than the signs that people craved. But Jesus really wanted to do far more for people. He came to die at human hands to undo the power of sin and death forever. He carried the world’s sins and sicknesses, violence and oppression with him to death and burial into the heart of the earth. He did this in total submission to the Father’s will, yielding himself up to death. He showed us the way into the deepest place of baptismal death, demonstrating total trust in God.

Baptismal death is the way forward to life empowered by the Spirit-- who raised Jesus from the dead.

Think about Jonah. When the storm was raging, threatening to sink the boat, the pagan sailors are described as knowing that Jonah was fleeing God’s Presence. “What should we do to you that the sea may become calm for us?” they asked him (Jonah 1:11). Jonah responded: “Pick me up and throw me into the sea (1:12). Rather than take the whole ship down with him because of his rebellion, Jonah submits to God’s judgment-- or to the consequences of his rebellion. He cries out from inside a fish that God sends to swallow him:

“You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the current engulfed me. All your breakers and billows passed over me… I descended to the roots of the mountains. The earth with its bars was around me forever. But you brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God. (John 2:3,6).

Jonah partially embodies baptismal death and new resurrection life that Paul describes in Romans 6. “Therefore we have been buried with him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”

Resurrection power follows baptismal death in the life of Jonah and Jesus. Once vomited out by the whale Jonah heeds the original call to preach to his national enemies, the people of Ninevah. The anointing was apparently so strong on Jonah’s preaching that the whole city believed in God, repenting in sackcloth and ashes visible on everyone from the King to the animals.

After Jesus’ baptism and wilderness temptations we see amazing power and authority. Fishermen drop their nets and immediately follow him and everyone who is sick and demonized are healed and delivered (Matt 4:18-25).

Yet the sign of Jonah Jesus describes does not include the resurrection. The sign Jesus leaves his compatriots with and us too this Good Friday is simple and radical: submission to God to the point of death.

Today I feel called by the Spirit to once again lay down my life, my agendas, my theology, my everything in total submission to the Father. Jesus himself calls disciples to take up their crosses daily and follow him. Where he goes is to the cross. It is there that he saves us as we are crucified with him—the righteous for the unrighteous to bring us to God (1 Peter 3:18).

God can only resurrect the one who has died. This Good Friday and Easter weekend let us yield ourselves totally to God— not out of despair but in hope: ”But if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who indwells you” (Romans 8:12). Blessed Easter death and resurrection.

Apply for Tierra Nueva's May School of Transformational Ministry

2009-03-16T20:21:00.000-07:00

Come to Tierra Nueva's School of Transformational Ministry: Going Deeper—Word, Spirit, and Street

Dates: Friday, May 1 at 6:00pm – Friday, May 22 at 10:00pm

Here at Tierra Nueva we are seeking the Gospel that has the power to save people on the margins and mainstream of society from powers that oppress. We have been ministering among poor peasants in Honduras since 1982 and working with immigrants, inmates, ex-offenders and gang members in Washington’s Skagit Valley since 1994. Learn about particular challenges and approaches to sharing the Good News of God’s transformational love in Jesus with marginalized people in North America. Join Tierra Nueva’s ministry workers and worshipping community for three weeks focused on experiencing God’s transforming love, following Jesus, and participating in the Kingdom of God here and now. Live together with others in a lush forest alongside the Skagit River at New Earth Refuge—a beautiful new retreat center on the Ekblad’s 35 acre property. Join us in a new move of the Holy Spirit to bring together orientations that are too often kept separate in the body of Christ: word, spirit and street.

Word

How do we read the Bible with all our questions, integrating both head and heart? What does it look like to read the Bible with people who consider themselves damned? Who is Jesus and how did he come to fulfill the Old Testament? What was his ministry in his context and what might that look like in today’s world? Explore Biblical perspectives on salvation, healing, and deliverance, as well as advocacy, peace-making/reconciliation, forgiveness and prophetic ministry.

Spirit

Enter into a deeper encounter with God through immersion in the Holy Spirit. Spend quality time in worship, contemplative prayer, and soaking prayer as the wellspring of daily activity. Receive God’s love and liberation for yourself and learn how to flow in the grace and power of the Spirit. What are the gifts of the Spirit? How do gifts awakened by the Spirit guide us in life and ministry, into hearing from God and entering the Kingdom? How does the Holy Spirit guide our theological reflection and Scripture reading? Special emphasis will be placed on learning how to hear the voice of God for personal direction, healing and deliverance, group discernment, and local, national and global social issues.

Street

Learn about the streets and the margins, with a special focus on Tierra Nueva’s context. What are some of the burning social issues of our time that affect people on the margins? Meet farm workers, ex-offenders, gang members, judges, prosecutors, public defenders and others who work with people on the margins of American society. Learn about social advocacy from Tierra Nueva ministry workers who work with ex-offenders, gang members and immigrants. Visit courts and migrant camps. Read and discuss books and watch provocative films.

Schedule and Themes

The journey begins on Friday, May 1 at 6:00 pm with introductions, worship, teaching and prayer. On Sunday morning we will join the 16th Annual Farm Worker Solidarity March, walking with farm laborers and advocates from Burlington to Mount Vernon. In the evening we will eat and worship together at Tierra Nueva’s bilingual service. Each day following will begin with worship, followed by morning sessions on key topics relating to our themes of Word, Spirit and Street. Afternoon sessions will vary between hearing from judges, gang members, farm workers and TN community members regarding aspects of advocacy and accompaniment of people on the margins. There will be many opportunities to receive prayer ministry. There will also be opportunities for quiet time, recreation and celebration. Topics covered throughout the course include:

History, Vision & Mission of Tierra Nueva

Knowing the God of love and experiencing God’s Spirit of adoption

The Ministry of Jesus and the Kingdom of God

Understanding Baptism and Christian identity & authority

The gifts of the Spirit & the five-fold ministries

Cosmology 101: The problem of evil and Jesus’ cross

Developing a real-world (contextual) theology appropriate to the margins

Poverty and social marginalization North and South

Sustainable development, relief and accompaniment

Developing a Biblical understanding of prophetic ministry in personal ministry and social engagement

Being Guided by the Spirit in Ministry

Developing and leading contextual Bible Studies

Faith Formation and leading not-yet-believing people into a living relationship with God

Faith formation for people on the margins

Healing Prayer

Facilitating deliverance from powers that oppress

Christian non-violence

Pastoral Ministry and spiritual accompaniment

Understanding the legal system, advocacy & accompaniment

Advocacy before other government institutions & the social welfare system

Prophetic Evangelism

Preventative health & self-care: hygiene, nutrition and exercise

Required Reading (ideally before arriving)

Bob Ekblad, Reading the Bible with the Damned, Westminster John Knox: Louisville, 2005.

Heidi Baker and Shara Pradhan, Compelled by Love: How to change the world through the simple power of love in action, (Mary Lake: Charisma House, 2008).

Brad Jersak, Can You Hear Me? Tuning in to the God who speaks, (Abbotsford: Fresh Wind, 2003).

Charles .H. Kraft, Deep Wounds, Deep Healing, (Tonbridge, Kent: Sovereign World, 1993).

Fees (partial scholarships may be available)

Tuition $600

Accommodation $340

Food $460

Total $1400

If you have questions or are interested in applying please contact us at tntransformation@gmail.com

Check for more information soon at www.bobekblad.com or www.tierra-nueva.org

Words Confirmed by Signs

2009-02-07T16:25:00.000-08:00

"And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them, and confirmed the word by the signs that followed (Mark 16:20).

In early January Nick Bryant and I spent a week visiting our Honduran Tierra Nueva colleagues. We weren’t sure how we would find the ministry, since we hadn’t sent any money down to pay our original 15 village trainers (promotores) for over a year. We have been importing specialty coffee from them and had helped them set up a water purification and bottling plant as a micro-business to supplement their subsistence farming.

Our hope has been to see a new movement of the Spirit really get ignited that will engage new and younger leaders in Jesus’ ministry among impoverished Honduran peasants. We had been dreaming with TN coordinator Angel David about ordinary poor people being empowered by the Holy Spirit to announce Good News of God’s transforming love—with signs following to confirm the words.

We have always been about concrete signs of God’s love— which have included gravity flow water projects, contoured terraces of corn and beans,intensive gardens, composting latrines, preventive health education, and reconciliation between enemies and different streams of Christians. But we all need more of God’s love coming into our lives over and over again in both social and personal ways.

On this trip we took along John Arnott and his grandson James from Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship in Toronto. John is a veteran pastor and leader of a movement that began in Toronto 15 years ago when the Holy Spirit came more powerfully than anyone was used to, transforming people’s lives in amazing ways. He and his grandson are very humble and open people who long to see God’s Kingdom come. We all got to see the love of God poured out over and over everywhere we went—which included people’s homes, village churches, community centers, coffee farms and the airport.

We rented a Toyoto 4x4 pickup that was nearly always packed out with our Honduran colleagues and new, younger people who joined us as we traveled from village to village. John generously provided money so TN could throw two entire village feasts— the first ever that people could remember in both Mal Paso and Las Delicias. Over 200 people showed up for each feast—first to worship and then to hear teaching or participate in a dialogical Bible study. We then invited people in need of healing to come forward.

In Las Delicias it seemed that nearly everyone came forward for prayer—including the village Pentecostal pastor, Catholic lay leaders and many who do not normally participate in church. The first person we prayed for described feeling heat throughout their body and immediate and complete relief from their back and neck pain.

We had this man lay hands on the next person— who experienced the same sense of God’s burning presence and total healing. Immediately we would recruit anyone who was experiencing God’s Presence to help pray for others. It was delightful to watch people witness God’s power flowing through them— effecting change that was immediate and visible. After each healing in Las Delicias we would give a round of applause for Jesus after each testimony. People were so excited to see God moving like this that they didn’t even seem to want to eat.

In several houses where we met and prayed for people we saw person after person experience God’s Presence, which brought healing, peace, joy and new hope.

In one house John showed us how to pray for an older man who had a leg that was over an inch shorter than the other due to a lower back and hip problem. He had the man sit tight against a chair and gently held his legs out as we all prayed. A whole room full of people watched the leg actually adjust out so they matched.

When I returned home I remembered this during a jail Bible study as I was looking at Joe—a strapping young part Native American, Hispanic and Caucasian guy with a Mohawk who stood with shoulders sloping leftward complaining of bad back pain. I had him sit down with his back against the chair—and sure enough one leg was over an inch longer than the other. Seven or so inmates and I gathered around him as I held his legs out and we invited the Holy Spirit. His leg adjusted out to match the other one right there in front of everyone, with guys commenting “it’s efing growing dude, check it out.”

Joe was totally healed and looked shocked and really touched as he noticed his shoulders were level. His fellow inmates told me he talked about all the time until he left for three years in prison last Tuesday.

Last week when I attended a pastors conference in Toronto I got to see the love of God poured out once again in a generous offering taken for Tierra Nueva. $42,000 was given, allowing us to purchase a 16-acre specialty coffee farm that we had visited during our trip. This farm will help sustain Tierra Nueva’s growing house church movement in Honduras (Hogares en Tranformacion) and our Underground Coffee project to help ex-offender and gang members called into ministry here in Washington State. Last week we completed the purchase of this farm and even began our first coffee harvest. You might want to try some of this delicious coffee, which you can order online at www.tierra-nueva.org

Please pray for Angel David as he pastors a growing group of young and older leaders committed to announcing God’s Kingdom- on earth as in heaven from house to house and village to village in Honduras. We want to see a growing harvest of people so delighted by the reality of God’s love streaming into their lives that they can’t resist passing it on.

Finding Steve: A Testimony of Healing and Intercession

2008-12-02T21:36:00.000-08:00

Recently an old childhood friend Steve Klippert wrote me an email, recounting to me an amazing story of healing of cancer and diabetes. Somehow I was involved in this healing—but certainly not through any prayers I am consciously aware of praying over him. I had long forgotten this friend from grade school, and hadn’t had any contact for some 40 years. I have been praying quite regularly in the spirit throughout the day and at night for the past year. I have felt compelled to do this as an act of pure faith. I have also been asking God for breakthroughs with diabetes, as many of our immigrant workers here suffer from this. I am very encouraged to see that God is at work and has linked me back together with a friend who is involved in similar work. Here is his amazing testimony of healing and renewal of friendship and a call to pray for Jose’s healing too.

Testimony

My name is Steve Klippert. Shortly after moving hundreds of miles from my home where we’d lived for decades, I became very ill. The original diagnosis was a terminal condition called retroperitoneal sarcoma, a very aggressive cancer, with a death rate within five years. This "mass" abutted my kidney and pancreas. After many tests and procedures, specialists surrendered that they had never seen such a thing and that surgery was necessary. The prognosis was not hopeful and my family and I were given five scenarios: 1. mass too involved with other organs and there was nothing they could do; 2, removal of the pancreas; 3. complete bowel resection; 4. removal of mass and hope for the best; and, 5. systemic metastasis (spreading of malignancy) with hospice to be considered. As the surgeons were mystified at this mass, my wife was on standby in case of complications or need to consent to life changing procedures once the operation began. This operation was scheduled for eight hours, but expected to go longer. As we just moved, we had developed only casual friendships and were still looking for a church that was Christ-driven. We were alone and I was mad. Mad at God for sending me away, scaring me and my family, and I told Him so.

On August 20, 2008, as I was being prepped for surgery, I prayed and I was told to "find Bob". This made little sense to me as I did not know any Bob's, not even any of the surgical team nor their support staff went by this name. My family and I were alone, as we had only made casual friendships in the area and were still looking for a church that was Christ-driven. After surgery I awoke to amazed faces, my wife in tears and my doctors proclaiming that not only did they not find any cancer, but the mass (the size of a lemon) was successfully removed. Furthermore, I was not confined to intensive care.

I immediately got out of bed, a remarkable feat when considering the surgery, the ng (nasal gastric) tube, carotid artery port, catheter, and various machines I was attached, to find "Bob." This was my mission, my quest that had to have an end, a meaning more than just a mere message. I only returned to my bed under the threat of physical restraint. It was that night that I felt the warmth, security and essence of God who told me softly, but firmly that I must find an old school pal that I had not seen or heard from in forty years named Bob Ekblad. This mystified me as I did not know where he was or even if he was alive. Once released, I would try to "find Bob".

On August 25, after several days in hospital I was given solid food and the nurse brought me a regular meal: pancakes with syrup, toast with jelly and a cinnamon roll. I was astonished to see this as I was a diabetic and these sugary delights were forbidden. I ate with the finesse of a toddler, scooping the sappy grape jelly from its plastic hold when a nurse came in screaming: "The doctor forgot to order a special diet. Stop eating, it could kill you!" My blood sugar was taken...normal. They again took my blood sugar...normal. An endocrinologist was summoned and stated my diabetes was cured; he called it a "medical anomaly", I call it God's grace.

Once home, I googled Bob Ekblad, half expecting to find nothing or discover him selling insurance in Omaha. I read about Bob, his work with convicts and how his ministry was similar to mine as I also work with felony offenders.

I currently work for the New York State Department of Corrections in Albany, New York. I am responsible for policy management, implementation of alcohol and substance abuse treatment programs for several State prisons, the most notable is Attica Correctional Facility. Before these administrative efforts, I supervised a staff of 16 counselors and previously was a 'front-line' counselor working with violent felony offenders, many with life terms. I have witnessed the grace of God in many of their lives and I am especially grateful for your [Tierra Nueva’s] community reintegration efforts with those society considers to be the least, last and lost.

I realize how God through his children intercedes in miracles. If you are troubled, "find your Bob" you will not have to look that far.

In response to my question: "why do you think God wanted you to find me?" Steve wrote:

"My thinking is that you provided the answer during our phone call when you stated that you have been praying intensely and anonymously. Perhaps God wants to remind us of the power of intercession and that His will comes to those we do not know or have forgotten; that as flawed and frail humans all of us need some encouragement with something tangible and concrete and that the power of healing is not a myth or parlor game.

My first feelings were denial in "finding Bob". I initially thought it was a result of medication or that I heard somebody looking for "Bob". However, this message was not an echo or aberration; it was set deep within and the more I tried to ignore it, the more life it had. I became frustrated at the lack of clarity... "find Bob". Bob who? How many Bobs did I know? Maybe I thought it was a coded message, but no matter what Bob spelled backwards was still "Bob". Discovering the essence of this meaning became somewhat of an adventure. Every time somebody came into my room I espied their name tags, listened for nicknames or maybe I would be referred to a specialist named "Bob".

For me in my work and continuing relationship with God, I see despair, humans who live life backwards, killing time; the keeper vs. the kept. I dwelt in this environment, adversarial without end, merit or rationale. Faith is not only tested, it is questioned. Christ knows this and He is a pretty funny guy. Here He knows I am lost, feeling abandoned and sets me off on an adventure. Not just an ordinary adventure, but an adventure to "find Bob". Darn slick. Through you which was through Him I am healed, WOW! Not only have I been restored, but my guess is so have you. Could ANYBODY think of a more incredible scenario.. who would have 'thunk'? Imagine me barely able to sit, plucking away at the computer and finding your ministry! It all makes sense.

Here's a challenge- call someone, maybe your parents or a friend, tell them this story. Not that credibility is an issue, but I have all the supporting documentation for those who ask. I feel your hand upon my scar and with that an image of a man sitting on a padded surface (bed or futon like contraption) bent over engulfed in prayer. This will not leave me. I do not debate this, analyze its existence or disguise it in hyperbole. It is a core construct, that which transcends and transmutes all I have known before. I am truly blessed in the spirit and so are you. God touched you to touch me...Bob Ekblad from Bellevue Christian School, the kid who used to keep his ten speed bike in his bedroom. Is NOT Christ the coolest or what!! You know Christ and His father are high fiving over this..what a perfect plan!

He told me: "Steve and Bob, my precious children, I am not done with you yet. You must carry this living gift to all you see, through your healing others will follow. This is my design and now your duty and obligation. I spin stars upon my fingers and cure disease. You are the proof of my everlasting love and mercy".

Praying for Jose

Three weeks ago, Stuart, a friend who owns the little grocery store by our house asked me to visit his Mexican friend Jose. Jose has stomach cancer and diabetes. The doctors have said he won’t live till Christmas. He wants to be sure his wife and children will have his social security benefits once he dies. I visited him and his family, prayed for his healing and anointed the hands of his wife and children with oil to continue praying. At that time Jose couldn’t eat but was fed through a feeding tube that went directly into his stomach. He could hardly get up from his hospice-provided hospital bed in their apartment. Gracie and I just visited them tonight and were startled by the change. Jose was up and eating at table with his family.

“I feel much better. The doctors think I’m eating just a little, but I’m eating a lot,” he said, smiling. His wife said that they have been praying together every night and feel God’s peace.

“Before we never prayed, but all of this is bringing us close to God,” she said. I told them the story of how God healed Steve of cancer in his stomach and diabetes and they were delighted. We were moved by Jose’s visible faith. We gathered around him and together with his wife Maria and three children we prayed for his complete healing.

Please pray for Jose with us—that God would completely heal him and bring others to faith through his testimony.

The Jesus Pledge: Giving Allegiance to Jesus and the Kingdom of God

2008-11-14T12:24:00.000-08:00

On November 4, election day here in the USA, I had the privilege of speaking before some 2,000 students and faculty at Messiah College in Pennsylvania. An orchestra played at the beginning while young women students processed in carrying flags of all the nations. The students lifted high their flags, and I kept thinking that these symbols of national identity were taking people’s focus off the human beings carrying them—made in God’s image and likeness. The girls placed all the flags into stands and I was surprised that the American flag was in the second row, somewhat hidden. After the opening prayer though I opened my eyes to find the flag had crept to the front left corner—the most prominent position. I thought of the first commandment:

“I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything… you shall not bow down to them or serve them” (Exod 20:1-4).

The prohibition of images is because human beings are God’s image bearers, created and placed in the temple of God’s creation as those given authority to exercise dominion (Gen 1:27-28; Psalm 8) over all of creation—including the authorities and powers. Moses, the prototype human being in a prophetic role before the powers was to be “as God to Pharaoh” (Exod 7:1).

That morning I spoke on how God had elected each and every one of us, adopting us as beloved sons and daughters. Each of us are made in God’s image and likeness, and Jesus is the perfect embodiment of an empowered bearer of God’s image. He is God’s anointed one, the Messiah/Christ, and God has raised us with Christ and made us sit with him in the heavenly places now (Eph 2:6). Through his Holy Spirit we too receive the anointing, and become little anointed ones (christians or anointlings).

On election day and thereafter, when we may tend to put hope in candidates and even “a new spirit of patriotism” (Obama) I invite people to remember rather that God has chosen each one of us, and is recruiting us and empowering us with the Holy Spirit to follow Jesus to announce his Kingdom, on earth as in heaven.

This does not mean we do not vote or promote structural change. We are called to be advocates for the poor and oppressed, to pray for our leaders and even to submit to them— but never at the expense of our highest allegiance to Jesus and his kingdom. But now is the time to remember that deep change does not happen through elections or legislation but through the process of conversion and empowerment from the bottom up.

In subsequent chapel later last week I introduced the US version of the Jesus Pledge, which I am including below. I encourage you to prayerfully read it and consider joining a group we’ve just set up on my facebook—where we’ve posted an international version of the Jesus Pledge (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=49000126270)

The Jesus Pledge

What is the Jesus Pledge? A movement of Christians from the United States who feel compelled at this time to reaffirm our allegiance to Jesus as Lord and Christ, and the cross as God’s way of overcoming evil. We, therefore, give our allegiance to Jesus and the pursuit of God’s kingdom above all else, and renounce allegiances to nation that in any way compromise our calling and identify us with war and the use of force instead of Jesus’ life-giving love displayed in his earthly ministry and in his death for the world on the cross.

Manifesto

We confess that Jesus is Lord, the full revelation of the God of the Old Testament and that before Him every knee will bow. We confess that Jesus is Christ, Israel’s Messiah, and Savior of the world who conquered the power of evil on the cross. We agree with Jesus’ call to undivided allegiance to God: "No one can serve two masters…” (Matt 6:24), and “Love the Lord your God with all your heart…and your neighbor as yourself.” We also reaffirm that: “God so loved the world…” and now sends us with that same love to our society’s outcasts and our country’s enemies. Like Jesus, we must say ‘yes’ to the kingdom of God, and ‘no’ to all allegiances that compromise the furthering of that kingdom.

As followers of Jesus Christ who are citizens of the United States, we are troubled when God’s name is overly identified with our country’s wars and laws through Christians remaining silent or actively promoting them as ordained by God. We believe any union between the name of Jesus and our government and its leaders is both idolatrous and a hindrance to the witness of the Church. Killing our enemies and enforcing dehumanizing laws in the name of God deny Jesus’ call to love our enemies and to join him as a “friend of sinners.” This is the time for genuine, widespread repentance and change.

Pledge

As a follower of Jesus Christ, and in keeping with my baptismal vows:

I renounce allegiances to the world and nation that would lead me to justify the use of violence, war or any type of force that are incompatible with Jesus’ teachings and his witness on the cross. I affirm God’s mission for the Church to serve as ambassadors of the kingdom of God, announcing forgiveness, promoting healing, peace and reconciliation – by loving and blessing those considered our enemies.

I renounce the flesh as it manifests in a spirit of national pride, superiority and self-interest that pursues our nation’s dominance for our own economic and material benefit and security. I affirm that my primary earthly place of belonging, identity and loyalty is in Jesus Christ and his body -- the borderless, worldwide family of God, and embrace his way of humility, service and love of God and neighbor.

I renounce Satan, the accuser and deceiver, and turn from his lie that America is God’s elect ambassador of freedom and Christian values whose mission justifies and requires the sacrifice of human lives. I affirm God’s kingdom as manifested through Jesus’ life, death and resurrection and through his Church empowered by the Holy Spirit.

Action

I encourage you to join our group on facebook http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=49000126270 and watch for a website we're setting up jesuspledge.com where we want to provide resources to a growing movement of Christians seeking greater faithfulness and commitment.

The Kingdom of God coming close

2008-10-23T17:22:00.000-07:00

A bunch of us at Tierra Nueva got together a few weeks ago to talk about our Spanish worship service. The tremendous diversity that is typically referred to as the “Hispanic community” has challenged us to re-think how we move forward with our faith community.

Most of the farm workers these days are far from fluent in Spanish and far from Christian. They speak Triqui and Mixteco and pay homage to a diversity of gods and goddesses. Many go to brujos (traditional healers/witch doctors) and practice a very syncretistic religion. They need to be introduced to Jesus through direct prayer and simple but dynamic Bible study. They also need church to come to their apartments or camps as they work long hours, and have large families of kids that need to get off to school early. So we’ve decided to make our Sunday night Spanish service shorter and simpler and visit people and establish faith communities in people’s homes using Luke 10 as a model.

In Luke 10 Jesus sends 70 recently appointed disciples two-by-two into every town and place. They are to look for sons/daughters of peace who will receive them. In India and Mozambique the body of Christ is growing fastest through leaders who spiritually discern which homes to visit and then practice Jesus’ approach of blessing people with peace, not moving from house to house, eating with the people, praying for this sick and announcing “the Kingdom of God has come near to you.” I got to experience the power of this last night and Salvio, Victoria, Emily, Mike, Chris and others at Tierra Nueva are stepping out in this way too.

Last night Emily encouraged me to call on a Triqui-speaking family who hadn’t been coming to Tierra Nueva for many months. Unfortunately I went alone, but you can come along now back into this encounter. After dropping my son Luke off at gymnastics I called Felipe (not his real name) who welcomed me to his apartment without hesitating. As soon as I stepped through their door Alejandra (not her real name) sat me down, offered me a soft drink and brought a bowl full of hot tortillas and meat to me and Felipe.

I wondered if they were discouraged because Alejandra had been healed of a swollen and painful leg problem several times, but the pain kept returning. I suggested that maybe it’s possible to lose healing if you are going to more than one god for help. I invited Felipe to read Exodus 20:1-4 and learned that he hadn’t been able to read for a long time, which I figured was because he’s 50 and probably needs reading glasses like Gracie and I do. In fact this had frustrated him, causing him to lose interest in our Bible studies. I suggested that we go together later to get some glasses at Food Pavilion, and then read Exodus 20:1ff’s “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before me” and talked briefly about how God wants us to recognize only one healer/liberator/savior—who we know as Jesus.

“Like you Felipe or me, how would you feel about Alejandra being with another man while she's with you?" I asked him. He shook his head. They had a big poster on their wall with the American flag on it and I said "in America many Christians pray to Jesus but also believe in the flag and put their trust in the political system. Maybe it’s because we don't trust that only Jesus can rescue us. We want to be sure we're protected so we go to more than one god. Does that happen in Oaxaca?" I asked. He nodded reflectively. I then asked if we could pray again for Alejandra.

Before we began praying Felipe started chatting away in Triqui to his wife. I asked him what he was saying and said he was explaining to Alejandra that we can only serve one God. I was super encouraged that he explained it to her completely on his own. I prayed for her but nothing changed. “It’s the same,” she said matter of factly. He told me more freely that he thought it was witchcraft. So we prayed against that, but Alejandra said the pain was still there. I asked if they had an idea of who is cursing them. First he said he didn't know. Then when I kept asking he said he thought it was his ex-wife who was mad at him for leaving her in Mexico years before and not sending money, and then for his relationship with Alejandra.

I talked with Alejandra about how important forgiveness is and she forgave without hesitation. Then I prayed, sending back blessings, love and peace to the woman who cursed them and to the brujo/a. After this prayer Alejandra said all the pain left and a big smile came on her face.

After praying for Alejandra I said "let's go to Food Pavilion Felipe to get you some glasses,” and off we went in his van. It was fun choosing the glasses together, trying to figure out the strength and model. We came back and we tested out his new glasses by him reading Romans 12:21 "do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." We had talked about this before we sent back blessings, peace and love to their enemy, and Felipe smiled and was really into the verse and excited he can read again. It brought us all great joy to see the Kingdom of God come close. So much joy that I can’t wait to go out again.

Jesus inside Guatemala's gangs

2008-10-02T15:10:00.000-07:00

A week ago Sunday I returned from four intense days in Guatemala City working with "Estrategia de Transformacion," an initiative that supports, encourages and trains a group of ex-gang members and committed pastors engaged in transformational work with active gang members. I also visited a former Tierra Nueva colleague who now works in a project to exhume, identify and photograph the remains of indigenous people massacred by the military in the 1980s. The trip was a home-coming of sorts as Guatemala was the place God called me to work with the poor and where I’d called Gracie asking her to marry me during some of the worst violence of a civil war in 1980.

I hadn’t been to Guatemala in 20 years, but there I was, this time to go into two prisons housing some of the most violent gang members and to train chaplains and ministry workers who currently serve the poorest of the poor. What a privilege! But my memory of the terror from the violence was also rekindled. Torture, savage killings and beheading commonplace in 1980-81, fed by US policy, are still happening, now among rival gangs of young men and the police—and the fatherless young gang members are being scapegoated for nearly everything, including the violence they have inherited.

Joel Van Dyke leads this gang ministry and hosted us. Joel is a street-wise Christian Reformed pastor/missionary and Latin American Director for the Center for Transforming Mission who’s been in Guatemala 4-5 years. He’s full of vision and passion to develop the chaplaincy ministry and many other initiatives after pastoring an inner-city church in Philadelphia for some 15 years. The first day Joel and a Guatemalan chaplain took Chris, Angel David (whose been with Tierra Nueva Honduras for 25 years) and me into the gang wing of a big prison guarded by machine-gun toting soldiers.

The guards opened the doors and left us off in the midst of 180 young men, many with tattoos covering their faces and upper bodies. Unlike our local jail, marijuana smoke, cell phone calls, a prostitute and dispute over a woman made it hard to get people’s attention for the Bible study. But we were able to get away with what we do best in Skagit County Jail. Chris played and sang over the men after I asked permission to lay hands on each one and pray for God’s Presence to heal, fill and bless them. I could sense that each hardened guy softened as I prayed, but the men had to be careful not to express outwardly that they were being positively affected.

Churches are viewed as rival gangs, and often act that way—pulling people away from their most functional family of “homies” into something often marked by legalism and exclusivity. The gangs are even more legalistic and brutal. Two of the chaplains who visit another prison shared with us that five inmates who accepted Christ and expressed a desire to change were found dead the next day, executed by fellow gang members, a warning to others not to leave the flock. Yet a number of guys told me privately afterward that they appreciated the Bible study on receiving Jesus as their personal body guard—a particular reading I do of Psalm 23 and Luke 15. I was disturbed to learn from Joel, who just finished his doctoral thesis on the gangs, that as many as 80% of the gangsters are from evangelical homes. Legalism begets legalism unless it is directly confronted and healed by Jesus’ grace and love.

That afternoon we got a tour of a forensic laboratory that deeply moved me. There we saw the bones of men, women and children exhumed from mass graves in the highlands. We were shown skulls and entire skeletons that were respectfully laid out on tables so the technicians could determine, age, identity and cause of death. I was shown bullet holes in many of the skulls, including that of a 16 year old girl. We saw storage rooms full of cardboard boxes with the already inspected remains of hundreds of yet unclaimed people labeled by name, site, village and region. My former colleague told us the lab has processed 5,000 of the 200,000+ ”disappeared” by the military during the 1980s. What is the link between the violence of the civil war and the gangs? I continue to wonder.

The next day we went to Central America’s most infamous prison to visit the gang member inmates of perhaps the most notorious gang in the Western Hemisphere. They’re arch-enemies of the gang we’d visited the day before and had proved it three years before by killing and beheading 45 of their members.

Once again the guards let us in with 110 or so inmates. We hang out and talk with a number of men, some of whom had first joined the gang while living in Los Angeles before they did prison time in the US and were deported. I later heard from Joel that many of the gang members had lost their fathers to the death squads or the war in the 1980s. Adrift and afraid, many migrated as young teens to the USA, often ending up selling drugs and joining a gang.

A few days before leaving for Guatemala I had a dream of a heavily-tattooed gangster with a hole in his right side. I saw someone fitting that description, and ended up needing to ask him where I could find a bathroom. I followed him into the dark recesses of the prison, and after using the toilet he humbly asked me if I’d like to see his cell. There in the cell this man who’d been shot in his lower abdomen, sentenced to over 120 years, one of the top chiefs of this gang invited me to sit down on a plastic chair and hear about his belief in God. I offered him a CD of contemplative flute music for worship and a copy of my book Reading the Bible with the Damned, which he warmly accepted. We prayed together for God’s peace and presence in his life and he was very grateful.

From there we went straight into Chris singing over a group of 40 or so inmates, while I once again was granted permission to lay hands and pray over each one. I then led a reflection on the call of Matthew in what turned out to be a breakthrough Bible study. I described how Matthew was a tax-collector—a member of a notorious class of people that nearly everyone hated.

“Who might fit the description of tax-collectors today?” I asked. Gangs in Guatemala force businesses in their territories to pay “protection taxes” [from themselves] and taxi drivers to pay “circulation taxes”- and the men smiled and looked at each other, acknowledging that they fit the description.

“So what was Matthew doing when Jesus called him?” I ask. The men look surprised when they note that he wasn’t following any rules, seeking God or doing anything religious, but practicing his despised trade when Jesus showed up on the street and chose him.

“So let’s see if Jesus made Matthew leave his gang to be a Christian,” I suggest, and people look closely at the next verse. There Jesus is eating at Matthew’s house with other tax-collectors and sinners and the disciples.

“So who followed whom?” I ask, excited to see people’s reaction. The men could see the Jesus had apparently followed gangster Matthew into his barrio and joined his homies for a meal.

“So what do you think you guys, would you let Jesus join your gang?” I ask, looking directly to the two chiefs of the gang? They both had big smiles as we looked at Jesus’ reaction to the Pharisees’ distain.

“Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.” I ask them if they are at all offended to think of themselves as sick—and they don’t seem to be at all. I’ve got their attention and Jesus’ final word to the religious insiders hits these guys like a spray of spiritual bullets from a drive by:

“Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners.” I knew from experience that they were letting Jesus inside and hearing his call to follow. Last Thursday back in our local jail two groups of ten inmates all welcomed Jesus into their cells and into their lives after talking through this same Scripture with them.

But that day we still had to leave the prison. On our way out I wonder about the warden just as Joel suggests we thank him. We step into his office and shake hands. I acknowledge that he has a very complicated job needing lots of wisdom and ask if we can pray for him and bless him. “Bueno” he says, and I ask if we can lay hands on him. He accepts but just as we begin praying he suddenly pulls out his hand gun, takes out the clip and empties his pockets of other clips. “This is more proper!” he says, placing his gun and ammunition atop his file cabinet. He receives our blessing and we offer to pray for healing for an injury related to a machete fight that left his arm, shoulder and chest with shooting pain.

“All the pain is gone,” he tells us with a grin after we pray. We leave amazed by the truly special unique Spirit who disarms and loves both gangsters and warden.
That night and the next day we ministered to the seven chaplains and some 50 ministry workers, teaching on forgiveness and praying for God’s Spirit to refresh and renew people. The Holy Spirit came in beautiful ways, with lots of crying and people all wanting prayer. Angel David was delighted to see how God visibly touched these spiritually hungry men and women as we prayed together over each one.
I am sure there’s a need for more and more of God’s healing, transforming presence—brought right into the heart of the places of greatest wounding and pain. I’m also certain that honestly facing the truth of Guatemala’s violent past and of America’s participation is critical for forgiveness to lead to true reconciliation and peace.

Please pray for Joel Van Dyke, my former TN colleague, and the gang chaplains and other ministry workers in Guatemala—for strength, empowerment, wisdom and protection. Remember too the gang members both in the prisons and on the streets—that Jesus’ kindness would penetrate and transform hard hearts. Pray too for Angel David, who returned to minister in Honduras, excited to recruit younger people into active ministry to the poor and Chris who is now back in Burlington pasturing his own flock of local gang members. Please keep Gracie and I in your prayers as we leave next week to visit our son Isaac in Argentina.

Extreme Intercession: Bringing God's future into the present

2008-09-17T16:49:00.001-07:00

I’ve felt compelled to preach lately on a story in the gospels that I’ve always disliked and wished I could delete from the Bible. I’ve called it a toxic text in that it seems to depict Jesus as exclusive, unfair, even mean. Now I’m finding this text extremely challenging and even inspiring.

In Matthew 15:21-18 a Canaanite woman comes to Jesus desperate for help for her daughter, who is “cruelly” demonized. Jesus ignores her, rejects her and humiliates her by referring to her as a dog, and then finally relents and delivers her daughter. What is happening in this story? What does it mean for us?

The Syrophonecian woman approaches Jesus desperate for breakthrough. Not a Jew herself, she “comes out” of her region, leaving her allegiances and securities to enter into Jesus’ Jewish world. She exercises exemplary prayer protocol. She cries out, and the text uses the same language as Exodus, where Israelite slaves cry out to God (Ex 3:9). She addresses Jesus by the Greek equivalent of the proper name for Israel’s God, YHWH, Kurios. “Have mercy on me Oh Lord!” She identifies Jesus as “Son of David,” a title that identifies him as Israel’s Messiah.

Jesus doesn’t answer her even a word. Yet the woman presses in, persisting dramatically in her intercession. Jesus’ disciples don’t help either. They cold-heartedly order Jesus: “Send her away, for she is shouting after us” (Matt 15:23). While Jesus doesn’t send her away, he excludes her by saying: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (15:24). How are we to understand the limited ministry priorities of Jesus “only”?

Jesus’ answer shows he still committed to his Father’s agenda to raise up Israel as the kingdom of priests called to be a blessing to every family on the earth (Gen 12:1-3). God had called Abram and Sarai out of Haran, Israel out of Egypt and then again out of Babylon to bring justice to the nations (Isaiah 42:1), to be a light to the nations, to open blind eyes, set prisoners free (Isa 42:6; 61:1ff) “so that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth” (Isa 49:6). Israel had been stiff-necked, rebellious. Yet God’s gifts and call are irrevocable. Jesus’ plan is to start with the lost sheep of the house of Israel who remain the beloved of God—in spite of their offender status. He wants to see his people mobilized. He will not give up seeking after lost sheep until he finds them. When he sends out the twelve on their first mission trip he is precise in Matthew 10:5-8 and consistent with his stance here:

“Do not go in the way of the Gentiles, and do not enter any city of the Samaritans; but rather go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And as you go, preach, saying, ‘the kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons…”

The Syrophonecian woman refuses the Jesus’ time-line for ministry. Though she’s destined to be a future beneficiary of God’s coming Kingdom (once Israel becomes obedient), she refuses Jesus’ silence and rejects his “not yet.” Jesus’ silence and rebuttal provokes her to pursue him relentlessly in a way that makes her an exemplary intercessor. She comes and bows down before Jesus with a desperate prayer right out of the Psalms: “Lord help me!” Are we as relentless?!

Jesus responds by simultaneously upgrading his people’s “lost sheep” status to “children” and downgrading her to scavenger dog: “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs” (vs. 26). Yet there on her knees at his feet, like a dog before children prone to kindness to their pets, she humbles herself further before Jesus and Israel: “Yes Lord, but even the dogs feed on the crumbs which fall from their master’s table” (vs. 27). The woman humbles herself to the extreme, acknowledging the oppressed Israelites who Jesus calls to their highest vocation are her masters.

Many scholars think there is a historical basis for arguing that this woman was wealthy. I’m not so sure. But if so this woman would then be recognizing the place of the poor as bearers of the Good News to the world and her masters!. At the same time her humble yet relentless pursuit of deliverance for her daughter there and then is a call to seek the future things of God’s kingdom here and now. Jesus is willing to change his mind, to give her and us the future now.

Are we willing to leave our region (nation, ethnicity, denomination...) in pursuit of the Gospel that has the power to save? Do we love enough to cry out, follow after, humble ourselves to such extremes so as to call in God’s future promises into the present? When we pray “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven” let us expect an acceleration of God’s coming salvation. While in Korea I found myself compelled to pray for every North Korean knee to bow every tongue to confess that Jesus is Lord—since that is in God’s future (Isa 45:23; Phil 2:10).

Now I’m on a plane to Guatemala where I and my Tierra Nueva colleagues Chris and Angel David will be crying out for healing and salvation of hard-core salvatrucha gang members incarcerated in the Guatemalan prison system. We want to see them touched and converted by Jesus’ love now, so there will be no more victims of brutal gang violence. Please pray with us as we train ex-gang member prison chaplains and at-risk urban youth workers over the weekend.

Living under an open heaven: reflections on Genesis 28 and 35

2008-08-20T20:49:00.000-07:00

Departure from family, homeland, traditions, land of slavery are everywhere in Scripture as precursors to revelation, fruitfulness and every kind of blessing. Whether you leave in response to God’s call or are driven out by forces that oppress (Hagar, the children of Israel), an exodus is key to faith.

Jacob leaves Beer-Sheva (“well of the vows,” place of accommodation?) in Genesis 28:10, on his way to Haran (“cross-roads, paths” -- the place of Abram’s original call and departure). Jacob flees the righteous wrath of his older brother Esau, who he just robbed of his father’s blessing through premeditated fraud, lies, and trickery. Far from every security, a rock under his head as a pillow, fugitive deceiver Jacob dreams of a ladder ascending to heaven. Angels are ascending and descending. God appears beside him and says:

“The land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring; and they shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south; and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your offspring. Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” Jacob names the place Bethel—God’s House.

Men in the jail are always surprised that God doesn’t arrest Jacob and take him back to face justice. People expecting compliance with laws or other prerequisites in exchange for divine favor are intrigued that Jacob is running away and then just sleeping when God gives blessings and promises. Such grace and extreme promises of blessing to the bad guy are unheard of, especially among criminals.

I have felt compelled to share these reflections in France, Korea and here at home over the past few months. Is this good news too good to be true? How can we stay in this place of grace where help comes under an open heaven and God promises permanent presence and fruitfulness in every direction?

Jacob isn’t won over immediately. Right after waking up he even says: “If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and clothing to wear, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God” (Gen 28:21).

It takes Jacob 21 years of working an “infinite” amount of time (7 is symbolic for a totality of years for each of his two wives and herds) to make him finally flee Laban’s oppression. A wrestling match with God who blesses him yet again, and his enemy brother’s surprising forgiveness finally win him over. Now he is ready for God’s call to live in a place of perpetual grace:

“Arise, go up to Bethel and live there. Make an altar there to the God who appeared to you when you fled from your brother Esau” (Gen 35:1).

Limping Jacob’s hardships and experience of divine grace have made him truly understand what is required. He tells his family to put away their foreign gods, purify themselves and change their clothes-- and they do it.

Jacob and his people strip themselves of every competing security as they head towards Bethel (the House of God). A terror from God falls on the cities around Jacob that keeps anyone from pursuing his clan (Gen 35:5). What would this look like for us today? What are foreign gods we lean on that need to be put away so we can live under an open heaven? What adversaries do we need to see flee from before us?

In a church in France I visited, culture and the generous social system stood out as potential idols. In Korea they were parental approval, upward mobility, and honor. In our Burlington church we thought of money, materialism, sports, self and nation.

I find myself continuing to ask the Spirit to show me what I am leaning on that is keeping me from Jesus’ life of freedom and fruitfulness. Like Jacob and Nathanael, I want to experience the blessings of living in God’s continual presence without any other props. I want to witness and experience for myself Jesus’ word to Nathanael. “You will see the heavens opened and angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man” (Jn 1:51)—each and every one of us. I want to see God’s love and grace poured out through me and others in every direction—north, south, east and west. I long to live in God’s house 24/7—here and now, before and after I die.

Let’s head towards Bethel now, laying aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, fixing our eyes on Jesus—our only security.

Light Shining in the Darkness-- Reflections on the Olympics and the North Korean Border

2008-08-12T09:34:00.000-07:00

As I watched the dramatic opening ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics last week (8/8/08) I kept thinking of my visit to the North Korean border five days before. The contrasts and comparisons between our day at the demilitarized zone (DMZ) with Holy Given School of Missions participants and the Olympics are messing with my head and heart.

The day before our tour a young woman from North Korean who had come to faith in Christ the night before had shown me a drawing she had done during an exercise in hearing God. She had drawn thick clouds covering her homeland. Rays of sun were barely breaking through in a few places—signs that God’s saving Presence cannot be shut out. In contrast to the lightshows, surreal lighting of the torch and spectacular fireworks of the opening ceremony in Beijing it poured rained as we crossed into the DMZ between South and North Korea into fog under dark clouds covering lush mountains.

In contrast to the parade of the fittest of athletes from nearly every nation, I followed a long line of ministry workers from frontline ministries in Kurdistan, Ukraine, Korea, Thailand, Pakistan, India, Lesotho and 13 other countries down a narrow tunnel towards North Korea. This tunnel hewn out of rocks descending 25 stories underground was one of three that North Korea had hewn out of the rock so troops could invade S. Korea. Now it’s a heavily guarded tourist attraction that ends in a pile of razor wire—a serious impasse at the border of a hard place.

I descended with Chong Bok (Chuck), a South Korean businessman who has taken off 5 weeks to attend the Holy Given School. We discussing our callings and his growing desire to engage in ministry to the poor and oppressed.

Over the week I was In Seoul I learned that many Olympic athletes had been living and training there because of Beijing’s debilitating air pollution, flying the short distance into China for events. As our humble training was happening there in Shalom Mission Church, and I was stories of persecution and trials in North Korea and elsewhere.

Human rights in North Korea remain among the worst in the world. There is no freedom of religion and Christians are often tortured, imprisoned and murdered. Deviation from state doctrine is met with ruthless and devastating punishment. Around 200,000 are believed to be held in prison camps with no hope of release (see http://www.amnestyusa.org/all-countries/north-korea/page.do?id=1011213&n1=3&n2=30&n3=963 and references below).

I have been amazed by the level of skill and dedication of Olympic athletes competing in all the events. These people have hours training to perfection, pursing records, medals and glory for their nation. Are we taking our faith and callings so seriously? Yesterday in our Tierra Nueva staff prayer we read together 1 Tim 4:6-16; 2 Tim 3:16; Heb 5:14; 12:11-12 and were struck by Paul’s emphasis on deliberate training.

“For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come. This is a trustworthy statement deserving full acceptance (and for this we labor and strive), that we have fixed our hope on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, and especially of those who believe. Prescribe and teach these things (1 Tim 4:8-11).

We discussed the challenges of our ministry to gang members, inmates, juvenile offenders, farm workers and the mainstream church. We are feeling called into a higher level of commitment both here and as we think about the larger world.

I think back to my Saturday at the border, when my friend Darrell and I stood under umbrellas and prayed with three N. Koreans at a special overlook where you can normally look into North Korea (see photo on my blog www.bobekblad.com). I looked out into the fog towards the border, praying for the fog to lift, the rain to stop, even for an instant… and it did. I saw a lush, green ridge where a North Korean guard post stood and prayed for the light of Christ to shine on the guards and the people of N. Korea.

We ended our time at the border praying together for North Korea at a sparkling train station that is poised to send trains into Pyongyang at the earliest opportunity—bringing products, a lifestyle to thirsty new consumers. I’m now home pondering how I can best prepare and train people to bring the light of Christ, the Gospel of the Kingdom of God into the dark and thirsty places of our world. Please pray:

-- for us as we prepare more courses and a ministry school through
The People’s Seminary and the completion of our retreat/training center New Earth Refuge.

-- for the Holy Given School still going on In Seoul, Korea

-- for the underground church in North Korea

Hear a conversation between Darrell, me and Lesley-Anne in Seoul http://pacificministries.googlepages.com/bobandlesley.WMA

Holy Given in Korea

2008-08-01T15:33:00.000-07:00

For the past five days I have been teaching a group of 100 grass roots leaders from 20 countries gathered here for a month at the Holy Given School in Seoul, Korea. My friend Lesley-Anne, a veteran missionary from New Zealand is the firey founder of these radical mission schools that she coordinates around the world (www.holygiven.org). Korean pastor Deborah has gathered her friends from Korea and the world to partake in a feast of worship, teaching on the ministry of Jesus, healing, deliverance, ministry strategizing and exotic & sumptuous Korean food.

People are visibly hungry for teaching and a fresh touch from the Holy Spirit—and it’s a great joy to minister here. Healing and deliverance happen in many of the sessions-- like yesterday when a young woman from N. Korea began weeping over the terror and shame of her life. Her three siblings had been killed by the authorities and she’d been raised by abusive people. She came to faith in Christ the day before. Amanda, another New Zealander gathered other women around her to pray through her pain.

I led a session on the importance of forgiveness of our fathers and mothers. Nearly everyone came forward for prayer and people wept aloud as I led them through prayers. One African man from Lesotho told how he had never been touched or shown any kind of affection by his father or grandfather. Rather they beat him regularly with sticks. Crying was not allowed, as men don’t cry. He is a pastor with a deep heart of love for his nation. He longs to see men come into his rural church but laments they see needing God as a sign of weakness that would bring them unbearable shame.

Today I taught on reading Scripture at the margins and led a Bible study on Hagar in Genesis 16. I broke people into groups and had them identity the forces that oppress them and how they feel. I had each group name a scribe and share their answers. I sat there and took notes in amazement, feeling moved and privileged to hear people’s raw and real responses.

Koreans talked about fearing parents and authority figures who pressure them to do things they don’t want or that are beyond their capacity. A woman said she felt pressure to be recognized and approved by God. A young man told how he felt forced to conform to the misery of the status quo and his longed to move out of society and start over. An older woman said “imagine being married to the men who pressure people to conform. Many women feel oppressed by their husbands and want to escape their marriages. Sometimes we wish they would just disappear.” Men from India talked about spiritual oppression and confusion from the 3 million gods and goddesses worshiped in their nation. A young woman from Singapore said she and others of her generation feel oppressed by money and the endless pressure to achieve.

People from Mozambique, Zambia and Lesotho mentioned HIV/Aids, witchcraft, poverty, violence and polygamy. A Pakistani mentioned fear of Islamic terrorism directed against Christians. Others ministering in Islamic countries mention the fear of being discovered, persecuted or expelled for being Christians.
We talk through Sarai and Abram’s abusive treatment of their Egyptian servant Hagar in Genesis 16:1-6 and people see direct comparisons to their lives. We discuss at length in small groups how the messenger of the Lord finds her by a well and offers her a new life of dignity and hope.

“When Hagar fled into the desert she had no choice and no options. She was a slave and couldn’t return to her master or to her country. There was no other way forward for her apart from the Lord appearing to her and helping her,” a woman comments.

People are moved by how the Lord calls her by her name, asks her about her life and promises her great blessing—regardless of her low status. He sends her back, which people interpret as a call to live under structures of oppression knowing that God sees, does not approve but is with them too bless them. People look encouraged. Many will soon be going back to dark and difficult ministry contexts.

Tomorrow we go to the demilitarized zone at the border of N. Korea. Sunday I fly home after preaching. Please keep all of us in your prayers.

Creation groaning: waiting for emowered children of God

2008-06-30T23:32:00.001-07:00

My 13-year-old daughter Anna and I just returned from a three-week trip to Paris (5 days), Pietermaritzburg, South Africa (3 days) and Pemba, Mozambique (the rest). In each of these distinct places we heard the groans, saw the longing in people's faces for more meaning and transformation, and witnessed God's Kingdom breaking in.

Paris is a city of great sensual appeal. Fashion, the arts and aesthetic beauty are ever alluring. Tastes and scents invite participation. The streets are filled with the young, the beautiful, the unique and altogether interesting. Yet in the face of all the cultural bounty I was struck by a pervasive loneliness, emptiness and entrapment. I met a young American super model in the metro who was taking home $2,000 a day. She told me the four months she'd been there were the hardest in her life. She was beautiful, successful but lonely to the point of despair. "Vanity, vanity, all is vanity and striving after the wind" was apparent in Paris.

Yet in the Eglise Reformée de Belleville where I ministered I saw people reaching out for connections deeper than any culture can offer. There in the heart of Paris' Jewish and North African communities people come together to worship, read the Scriptures, hear the Word preached and eat together. I saw people longing for authentic community that's not easy to come by in the hustle of urban Europe. The leadership is challenged to facilitate community in the face of emptiness. Immigrant youth are being served by an after school program. People streamed forward to receive prayer, healing and deliverance all afternoon.

Next stop was Pietermaritzburg, South Africa where we were hosted by good friends and Univ of Kwazulu-Natal professors Gerald and Bev West and Jonathan Draper. These people are veteran activists, pastors and teachers who train up theologians for all of Africa. The Aids epidemic, post-apartheid affirmative action policies, rampant violence and poverty and social chaos both at home in S. Africa and in surrounding nations like Zimbabwe have brought the Doctors of the Word down low. I was impressed by the humility of 8-10 Bible profs Anna and I met with one night for dinner and discussion. I was struck by honest grappling over ideas that matter both that night and the next day at a "theological café" where I presented my new book to profs and grad students at the University. Where is the Gospel that has the power to save? These people are hearing it, being held up by Jesus and are still in the struggle, but with no easy answers or quick fix-all plans. They seem to realize with Jesus that "these can only be cast out by prayer and fasting."

Final stop Pemba and then Maputo, Mozambique. Iris Ministry is still in the midst of amazing growth with as many as 9,000 churches?!—900 of them in the last four or five years in a part of the country thought to be impenetrable because of an exotic mix of traditional African religion and Islam.

We did a village outreach where several thousand showed up, and it wasn't easy. Some people came up for prayer to mock those ministering. They pretended to be sick and then sprung up and pranced off "miraculously healed" before laughing friends. Many of the visiting Canadian ministry team caught people trying to steal their cameras off their bodies. Yet truly hurting people approached us too, humbly asking for prayer.

We saw Jesus heal lots of people of all kinds of ailments. I witnessed someone get their sight restored and a deaf mute child say "mama" for the first time to his mother who was overcome with joy. We returned to the vehicle to find that Heidi Baker's and my back packs had been pulled through a broken window in the land rover. That night the regional pastors recovered our journals, book bags and other odds and ends—but Heidi's expensive phones, cameras and $2500 cash and our camcorder and MP3 player were lost.

A few days later Anna joined me as I preached in pastor Juma's home church in an impoverished village in the countryside outside Pemba. Pastor Juma is an Iris pastor who has started some 30 churches in the 6-7 years he's been a pastor. Children, youth and adults pounded the sloping dirt floor of the church with their bare feet, dancing to wild drumming that accompanied simple choruses led by one song leader after another. After a good hour and half of exuberant worship I preached on ordinary believers' authority and empowerment for Jesus' ministry and had people lay hands on themselves for healing. A good thirty people were healed on the spot and we invited those still suffering to come forward for more prayer. 20-30 people came forward and we watched nearly everyone experience relief as Anna, pastor Juma and our two American Iris worker friends laid hands on people. This community had experienced numerous miracles of multiplication of food. They seemed to embody Jesus' beatitude: "blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled."

Back at the Iris base I alternated between teaching 120 or so mission students from around the world and 110 Mozambican Bible school students. On both teaching fronts people were hungry and open. The Westerns were feeling their limits. They worshipped from the heart and responded to my invitations and the Holy Spirit came every time. Heidi asked me to help her pray for the Mozambican pastor candidates to be filled with the Holy Spirit. This was pure joy, watching seasoned Pentecostal Heidi explain being totally yielded to Jesus and open to receiving an unmerited gift. We laid hands on people and saw the Spirit touch them. Many had visions and spoke in tongues for the first time: not Portuguese, not Macua… but languages from another realm not of this world.

Anna is the third of Gracie and my three children to go with me on a mission adventure at age 13. We had a great time together watching movies on the airplanes, eating out, going to a game park, swimming and even scuba diving in the Indian Ocean, drinking coke, going on outreaches and praying for people's healing together. Anna has had the impression that God only helps and heals poor people and criminals. But when she got violently sick on the last day in Mozambique and I sent out a desperate email for prayer and she saw God come to rescue her through many divine appointments with people who prayed for her and a doctor from Cameroon we met in the Johannesburg airport who treated her. We made it home safe and sound and invite you to pray with us for our friends in challenging places.

For pastor Serge Jacquemus, the church elders and members at Eglise Reformee de Belleville and for Randy Greer, an American missionary friend of mine who heads us the church's after school program for immigrant youth. For Gilles, Aude, Linda and Jan of Eglise Reformee du Marais, who lead a deliverance ministry and church in Paris. Pray for strength, wisdom and breakthrough in evangelism, discipleship and community building.

For Professors Gerald and Bev West, Jonathan Draper and the many others at the University of Kwazulu-Natal in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. For Heidi and Rolland Baker, pastor Juma, and the many missionaries and African pastors and leaders working with Iris Ministries in Mozambique. For Hette Domburg and Petra Doorn and other professors of Seminário Unido de Ricatla in Maputo, Mozambique. Pray for strength, protection, ongoing fruitfulness and wisdom for all these people as they train and send out more and leaders.
For all of us here at Tierra Nueva as we minister among immigrants, inmates, gang members and in mainstream churches and seminaries—for grace, provision, more of God's anointing to announce the best news and break chains of addiction and oppression.

France, S. Africa, Mozambique final prayer update

2008-06-29T11:42:00.000-07:00

Special thanks to those who have prayed for us over the course of these three weeks in France, S. Africa and Mozambique. The trip was very demanding and extremely rich and rewarding.

The last I wrote you was to ask for prayers for Anna, who began vomiting and having intestinal problems on our last day in Mozambique. God truly helped us through a difficult time in amazing ways. We were picked up at the Maputo airport by an English couple who hosted us the night and following day of Anna's sickness. They took care of Anna, the host mom rubbing her back as she threw up, taking her to get a malaria test to rule out malaria, watching Anna as I met with a Dutch couple who are professors in the local mainline seminary and as I taught a group of 50 Mozambican pastors.

As I was heading to teach my class on Iris' Maputo base I ran straight into Duncan Smith from Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship, who came to the house and prayed for Anna's healing. The group of 50 or so pastors then prayed for Anna too. We made it safely to Johannesburg but Anna was weak as she'd been unable to hold down any fluids.

As I was waiting to get our boarding passes in the Air France line Anna lay exhausted on the plastic waiting room seats until she had to find a bathroom. On her way back from the bathroom there in the airport she ran into a girl from a team "Frontline Ministries" that had sat next to her on the plane. She had just spent three weeks in Swaziland ministering with Iris pastors. She gathered her team of 12 or so young people around Anna and prayed for her.

When Anna got back to the Air France counter I was in the middle of talking in French with a man from Cameroon who worked with Doctors without Borders in Maputo. He was a physician in charge of a clinic for Aids patients. He examined Anna as we stood in line and was there to help me catch her as she fainted. He then took us to the airport pharmacy and got us medications. He continued to check in with us throughout the flight to Paris.

Anna was fine throughout the 12 hour flight to Paris, three hour layover and 9 hour flight to Seattle. She is recovering and still needs some prayer for intestinal problems. We are glad to be home and very thankful to you for keeping us in your prayers. I'm mentioning below some of the highlights of our trip which you participated in through your prayers.

Anna and I had a great time together. Lots of fun traveling and swimming in the Indian Ocean. We even got to go scuba diving for three hours!
Gracie and Luke experienced God's strength and peace in our absence. Isaac also had some important breakthroughs in Argentina.
In France we saw lots of deliverance and God's Spirit touch many people as we ministered.
Friendships with theologians in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa were significantly strengthened and broadened. Mainline, liberation theologian-oriented Christians are increasingly open to Holy Spirit empowered ministries like Iris. I hooked up Heidi Baker with my good friend Gerald West (Academy of the Poor) who she has now invited to teach in Pemba.
We saw Jesus heal many many people of all kinds of ailments. Anna participated directly in praying with me for Mozambican villagers.
I got to pray with Heidi for the 110 or so Mozambican Bible school students to be baptized in the Holy Spirit & saw the Spirit really show up and fill these humble men.
Sessions with the Iris Missions School students went really well. I met a Scottish Presbyterian pastor couple who long to see renewal come to the Scottish Presbyterians in Glasgow.
Everywhere we went we had divine appointments with leaders in France, S. Africa and with people from all over the world. I am expecting some invitations to Korea and Scotland and have already been invited to lead a pastors retreat for French Reformed Church pastors hungry for spiritual renewal in Paris at the end of November.
Everywhere we went people prayed for us and blessed us in many ways. Tierra Nueva has not brought in enough for us to be paid for three months now. God is providing for us through unsolicited, unexpected gifts and honorariums. We will see where all this leads as our family grows and our actual financial needs are increasing.

So we thank you for your prayers. Pray for us

For strength, direction and God's increasing presence for breakthrough as we go into our season of accompanying migrant farm workers and continue our jail ministry and worshiping communities over the summer.
For our annual conference Going Deeper: Word, Spirit, Street beginning July 13. We'd love for you to join us if you can.
For finances so we can finish construction of New Earth Refuge, which can be completed by the end of July with another $25,000.
For God to raise up more regular financial supporters for us for our work with Tierra Nueva and New Earth Refuge.

May Jesus continue to take you deeper and deeper into his baptism!

Bob

Kingdom of God comes in Mozambique, trip update #3

2008-06-20T09:12:00.001-07:00

This past Wednesday I taught my first large group session of Iris Harvest Mission School to the 120 or so students here. I spoke on evangelism as recruitment into the ministry of Jesus and invited people feeling called by Jesus to recruit others to come up for prayer. The whole group came forward-- which is not so surprising considering this is a highly motivated audience.

Right after the session Anna and I went out to Mieze, a village where there was a mobile health clinic day. There was a doctor and some nurses and lots of prayer people. Many people were helped and we saw lots of healing too. Physicians and prayer happening together. Then we returned and I gave a 7:00 talk to the students on my spiritual journey, ending with my own confession and repentance for judgments I had made against Pentecostals, Assembly of God, Four Square, Charismatics, right wing republicans, evangelicas, fundamentalists... I invited the Spirit to show people if they needed to confess their judgements against brothers and sisters in the body of Christ. Many people came to the mike and made public confessions and asked forgiveness. It was really powerful. Then I invited people to come up for fresh fire from the Spirit. Everyone seemed to come forward and the Holy Spirit was very strongly present. People were laid out all over the straw mats as the Spirit came stronger and stronger. Really amazing.

Yesterday Heidi Baker, Anna and I and some others went out to do an overnight outreach in the bush some 2-3 hours away. There was another group ahead of us showing the Jesus film, and several thousand were gathered watching when we arrived-- an amazing mass of impoverished humanity! We prayed with people for what seemed like hours after the film. Anna and I saw lots of healings-- backs, head aches, knees, shoulders. Then Anna got overwhelmed as we had the crowd pressing in on us. She got up on the flat bed with Heidi and I kept praying. I saw God really move to heal people-- even someone who was partially or totally blind get their sight back! Then when we returned from our praying to the land rover we found a window broken out and all Heidi and Anna and my most important bags were gone! In Heidis bag there were two I-phones, $2500 cash, camera, residency documents. In ours our digital camcorder, journals, bible, water purifier, $100 or so and other things. We were disappointed, but tried not to let it get us down after seeing God move so beautifully. A bunch of local pastors rallied together and spend the whole night trying to locate our stuff. They kept coming back to wake up Heidi (who was in a tent right next to us, so we woke up too) to tell us their progress. Finally at 5:00am they came back with all of our journals, bible, back packs and other non valuables-- which was great! We just returned feeling tired but full after lots of signs of Godś kingdom and great fellowship with Heidi and others.

Keep us in your prayers. I preach in Mieze, a nearby village from 8:30-1:00pm or so on Sunday. Then teach most of Monday and Tuesday. We fly out on Tuesday night to Maputo. Meet with a theologian from the mainline denominational seminary who is interested in talking on Wednesday morning. Then we fly out Wed afternoon for S. Africa, Paris and home!

Pray for safety, Gods ongoing presence and continual ministry through us and to us.

In Christ,
Bob

Word, Spirit, Justice in S. Africa and Mozambique

2008-06-15T07:22:00.000-07:00

My 13-year-old daughter Anna and I arrived in Pemba, Mozambique yesterday afternoon after a rich three days in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. We keep seeing signs of a new move of the Spirit, though in early stages perhaps.

I spoke to a group of professors of Scripture from the different seminaries and the school of theology associated with the University of Kwa Zulu-Natal. We had a meal together at an Oblate community on the outskirts of Pietermaritzburg, where I was invited to present a summary of my new book A New Christian Manifesto. There were Catholic, evangelical and mainline Bible scholars-- feminist, contemplative, liberationist. I was amazed at peoples openness and excitement. I spoke the next day at a theological cafe at the university to some 30 professors and graduate students-- including a prof of Islam who is himself Muslim specializing in Islam and traditional African religion. He had some profound questions about Jesus that really moved me.

Conversations with my friends Gerald West-- OT prof and his wife Bev, a theologican and Jonathan Draper, a NT prof were stimulating as usual. These people are veteran Christians who have seen all the abuses from every side. They are not easily won over by any new thing and are incredibly astute-- and yet always open. I see a hunger for the Kingdom of God-- but not for any variety. Rather the authentic kingdom which brings true empowerment to the poor and freedom with dignity to the least.

Mozambique has moved us already to the core. Last night we went to a worship rave at Iris, where orphan kids together with Western mission students danced with abandon under the stars. Today we worshipped for hours in Iris' new church just a quick run from the dazzeling Indian Ocean, dancing and crying out to God for more revival in Mozambique. The poverty is worse than last year since food prices are up. Please continue to pray for Anna and I, our schedule includes lots of teaching in the both the mission school (110 Western participants) and the Mozambican Bible school (over 100). Pray for:

I will be teaching Monday - Thursday afternoon (June 16-19) in the Iris mission school and Bible school. For wisdom in selecting teaching subjects, for God's presence to really bring clarity, healing and empowerment.
On Thursday-Saturday (June 19-21) Anna and I go on an outreach into the bush with Heidi Baker. Pray for protection and God's kingdom to come.
On the following Sunday-Wednesday I teach.
Pray for Anna-- for protection, openness and connections.
Pray for divine appointments and friendships
We fly home June 25 and arrive in Seattle on June 26.

Blessings in Christ,

Bob

Bob and Anna's Trip to France and Africa

2008-06-12T01:03:00.000-07:00

Anna and I arrived in Johannesburg, S. Africa yesterday morning and here in Pietermaritzburg in the afternoon. We've almost been gone a week and things are going amazingly well. We are having a lot of fun together, starting every day in Paris with fresh pan au chocolats and croissants-- and lots of amazing meals. Anna however says she's tired of fancy things like roast duck and misses peanut butter and jelly! Here are some highlights and some new prayer requests:

1) I preached and ministered Sunday at the Eglise Reformee de Belleville-- a big reformed church in Paris. I invited people to come forward if they wanted to give Jesus permission to really take them deeper into baptismal death of the flesh so they could be wholly given over as sons/daughters of God, empowered more fully by the Holy Spirit. People came forward in droves and the Spirit really touched people. Then we had another session all afternoon, praying for many many people. There was lots of deliverance, quite amazing really. I was really moved by how many people are suffering from deep loneliness and isolation.

2) On Monday we met with Gilles Boucomont and his team from another Paris church. They had just taught for a week in Burlington. This is an important connection. Then I went out with Elian Cuvillier, the New Testament prof from the Eglise Reformee seminary in Montpellier who just happened to be in Paris when we were. We really connected and I am once again amazed to see how mainline intellectual French Protestants are so hungry and open to the Holy Spirit and to entering more fully into the ministry of Jesus. We stayed the entire time with the President of the French Bible Society, Bernard Coyault and his wife who is a pastor. We had great conversations.

3) On Tuesday I ministered "prophetic presytery" style to the pastoral team of Eglise Reformee de Belleville and then did a book signing at the main bookstore of the Eglise Reformee de France's national office. The French translation of Reading the Bible with the Damned is out and doing really well.

4) Then we were wisked off by taxi (since there was a train strike) to the airport for an all night, 12 hr flight to Johannnesburg. Last night I spoke to a gathering of all the Biblical studies professors from the seminaries in this city (Catholics, protestants, evangelicals) based at the Univ of KwaZulu Natal and elsewhere. They asked me to share about my new book A New Christian Manifesto. I shared openly about the new move of the Spirit that I see, where word, spirit and ministry to the poor/marginalized are coming together. The profs were very excited and we ended up having a long discussion. I am amazed at people's openness-- especially since these people are not from charismatic camps but are theologians of liberation, contemplative Catholics, feminists, post-colonial theologians, academics. The Spirit is truly at work bringing together the body of Christ.

5) Today I speak at a "theological cafe" before professors and students and the Univ of KwaZulu Natal and then have dinner and breakfast meetings with profs and others. Please keep us in your prayers. Tomorrow the NT prof and my good friend Jonathan Draper is taking us to a game park. Yeah! Then we fly to Johannesburg and fly out Saturday morning for Iris ministry in Pemba Mozambique.

Please pray for ongoing divine appointments and God's wisdom, direction and annointing for conversations with professors/leaders.

Pray for Ilona Dobeyn who is suffering from cancer here. We have prayed for her and she seems to be improving.

Pray for protection for us as we travel, and for Gracie and Luke back home and for Isaac in Argentina.

Pray that God would really prepare us for our 10-11 days in Mozambique (June 16-26).
Pray for Anna, for her health and an open heart. Pray for our time together as dad/daughter-- that it would be the best.

Feel free to write if you get any impressions for us (bob@bobekblad.com).

Blessings in Christ,

Bob

Raising the Dead, Good Friday 2008

2008-03-23T11:29:00.001-07:00

At the end of Matthew Jesus commissions his disciples: “Go and make disciples of all the nations.” He tells them to baptize people, “teaching them to observe all that I commanded you” (Matt 28:19-20). What did Jesus command his disciples? Am I practicing these things and teaching others to do the same?

There are many things that Jesus commanded. Reading through Matthew’s Gospel looking for Jesus’ commands is challenging. There are many that are very well known, like “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of people” (4:19), “let your light shine before people” (5:16) “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (5:44), “seek first his kingdom and his righteousness” (6:33), “do not be anxious for tomorrow” (6:34), “do not judge lest you be judged yourself” (7:1), “ask and it shall be given to you, seek and you shall find, knock and the door shall be opened to you” (7:7) “enter by the narrow gate” (7:13).

Especially challenging to me right now are Jesus’ instructions to the twelve he send out in Matthew 10:7-8. “As you go, preach, saying, ‘the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.”

I recently returned from eight days visiting Tierra Nueva in Honduras. My colleague Nick and I went around with the Honduran TN promoters visiting villagers they attend to. Everywhere we went we led Bible studies to materially impoverished, spiritually hungry people. We prayed for lots of sick & hurting people and saw lots of healing. We saw Jesus take away migraines, tooth aches, pain in backs, necks, shoulders, abdomens, knees, ankles, ovaries. We prayed for several Catholic lay leaders in one village who were profoundly touched by the Holy Spirit, falling to the ground under the power of God’s love. We also prayed for people who were not visibly healed, four blind people who did not receive their sight and three dead people who did not raise up.

On the third day of my trip I was planning to meet beloved TN promoter Jorge in a high mountain village “Iran” at 9:00am. That morning though the news reached us that there on the mountain right where we were heading a white Toyota pickup like the one I had rented had been ambushed by four masked men with AK-47s. They had shot and beheaded the 22-year-old driver, shot his mother through the lungs and killed his 44-year-old worker. People said this was a revenge killing as the 22-year old had reputedly killed someone from the village of Iran back in December. We called off our trip as the four armed assassins were at large. As we stood in the park below our house trying to decide what to do when the Toyota pickup rumbled down into the square, bullet holes riddling the driver’s door, blood flowing out the back, the bodies covered with plastic bags. People ran to look at the dead. I stood there trying to shake off Jesus’ imperative: “raise the dead!”

I began to walk towards the white pick up, praying in the Spirit, dreading the moment. I didn’t want to look on these poor men. Yet I imagined the power of God being manifested there, and thought of the impact of Jesus raising these slain. I remembered Jesus’ words about not doing his own will, but only the will of his Father. I asked Jesus to show me the Father’s will, to show me what the Father was doing in heaven. The words that came to my mind surprised me: “He who lives by the sword, dies by the sword.” I doubted these to be God’s Word as they seemed too convenient, an escape from practicing Jesus’ commandments. But I didn’t feel peace. Then I thought to myself:

“I’ll go to their homes tonight during the wake. I can always pray for them then and that will give me time to get greater clarity.”

I remembered later that Jesus himself waited several days after Lazarus died to pray for him. That day we went off to a remote village, Zapote, and had a Bible study and prayer time with 15 men from an old Tierra Nueva committee. But we returned around 7:00pm and then had to decide again what to do.

Everyone told me not to go to the wakes, which in Honduras are all- night events, mourning around the body. My Honduran friends told me there had been lots of armed robberies after dark in our town by gangs of young men and that I shouldn’t go. As the night went on though I found myself unable to relax. I was feeling pressed to go down to pray over these dead men.

Nick accompanied me down to the first house. Groups of men hung around outside. “The situation is very sensitive,” a Honduran friend told me. “There are groups of armed men already heading out after the killers. There’s going to be more vengeance.” I walked inside the house. Women and children sat around a rustic wooded casket in the middle of the room. Inside was the 44-year old man who had been hired that day to help and protect the targeted 22- year-old. He had been carrying a gun, but hadn’t known how to use it when they were attacked. He was shot as he fumbled around trying to figure it out. He had just been deported by the US Border Patrol after working in the US for a few years.

I held his mother, a Christian active in a local Evangelical church, as she wept: “He was my right hand man.” “My God, my God. He was my provider, my beloved son, my son, my son.” I held her for a long time, praying and listening. Eventually I went over and looked through plexiglass at this poor man as I silently prayed and prayed for him to be raised, watching for any signs of life. “O Jesus, Son of God, have mercy. Bring your peace!"

We went to the next house of the 22-year-old who lived just down the street. This was a much bleaker scene as the family were not Christians and the mother was hospitalized in critical condition in the capital. Two days later she too died. I could feel a mix of rage and despair as I approached the house. People sat in what looked like numb submission. I held the father and we talked and prayed. I prayed that he would not feel pressured to retaliate. I then prayed over the young man’s body, silently speaking resurrection life into him, crying out for God’s intervention, for peace to come, for the violence to end.

The next day we went out visiting three poor peasant communities on the other side of the mountains. In four houses in a row we encountered blind people who we prayed for and anointed with oil. An old woman, a young man who had lost an eye, penetrated by a flying metal shaving while filing his machete. We prayed for a lady who was blind but also had an open ulcer on her lower leg. Heat came all over the open sores as we prayed, but she didn’t notice any change in her eyesight. We prayed for her husband’s back and hip pain and eyesight, clouded by cataracts. He told us excitedly that the pain completely left his back and hips and that his eyesight was improving—but I wondered about his eyes, thinking that maybe he was telling us what he thought we wanted to hear.

As we left I saw his middle-aged son sitting on a stool in their dirt-floored kitchen. “Are you in any pain? Can I pray for you?” I ask. “I’m not in pain, but you can pray for me.” “For what?” I asked. “For my salvation,” he said. “What?” I asked, surprised. “That I would be saved,” he said again. This man was apparently touched as we prayed for his parents. Did he feel God’s Presence? Though his mother’s eyes were clearly not opened, his spiritual eyes were, to the point that he felt drawn to ask Jesus to save him and fill him with the Holy Spirit. Yet I still long to see actual blind eyes opened—and am encouraged by my friend Heidi Baker, who after years praying for the blind without result is now seeing many blind eyes opening.

While I have not yet seen the blind receive their sight or the dead raised I find myself strangely longing to pray for more and more blind people, and for the dead, as Jesus directs. As I seek to open myself to practicing the ministry of Jesus, I find my heart changing, my pride and fear fading and an unexplainable confidence rising up inside. Something dead inside of me is coming alive… a new hope in the impossible.

On this Good Friday as I contemplate Jesus’ death, I think of these scenes of several weeks back and pray: Jesus, you yourself submitted to death. All of us too will die. Yet you call us to stand before death like you did: letting ourselves be affected by it, yet boldly facing it, willingly submitting to it for ourselves—yet resisting it for others. You wept for Lazarus, but then you commanded him to raise up. You stopped a funeral procession and raised a woman’s only son. You raised up the synagogue official’s 12-year-old daughter. Your disciples also raised the dead and I hear reports of it happening around the world today. Have mercy on us. Free us from our belief in the power of death, violence, and sickness-- and from our unbelief. Fill us with faith in your superior power at work within us. Let your resurrection power become visible among us, more and more, here and now.

Word, Spirit and Ministry to the Poor Embracing at New Earth Refuge and beyond

2008-02-14T23:44:00.000-08:00

You may already know that Gracie and I have stepped into a new dimension of our ministry: praying more for individuals and groups here at our home-based retreat center New Earth Refuge and teaching (¼ time) here in the US and around the world. We continue to share a position directing and pastoring Tierra Nueva. At Tierra Nueva, here at New Earth Refuge and in our travels we find ourselves inviting people into the ministry of Jesus, praying for healing and empowerment and equipping people to announce the Kingdom of God.

It’s feeling more and more like we are preparing people for something new and expanding. A renewal movement appears to be underway. We are certainly seeing more and more healing, conversions and other signs of God's presence among immigrants, inmates and also in the churches. A friend recently sent me a prophetic word spoken by British revivalist Smith Wigglesworth in 1947. While it was about England, it seems to apply to here too. He prophesied then that in the next few decades there would be two moves of the Spirit characterized by “a restoration of the baptism and gifts of the Holy Spirit” and people “moving out of historic churches to plant new ones.” He saw a third larger move combining word and Spirit as following. I quote:

"When the new church phase is on the wane, there will be evidence in the churches of something that has not been seen before: a coming together of those with an emphasis on the word and those with an emphasis on the Spirit. When the word and the Spirit come together, there will be the biggest move of the Holy Spirit that the nation, and indeed, the world has ever seen. It will mark the beginning of a revival that will eclipse anything that has been witnessed within these shores, even the Wesleyan and Welsh revivals of former years. The outpouring of God’s Spirit will flow over from the United Kingdom to mainland Europe, and from there, will begin a missionary move to the ends of the earth."

Gracie and I are seeing more and more groups and individuals that have focused primarily on Scripture cross-pollinating with those who have focused on Spirit (and vice versa) in ways we have not seen in our lifetimes. During a November 2007 trip to France I led Bible studies and a retreat for word-focused Scripture Union International’s European workers in Alsace and French Reformed pastors in Paris. In both places there was a lot of spiritual hunger (see trip reports on my blog (http://www.bobekblad.blogspot.com and the forthcoming article on Word and Spirit in Catalyst at http://bobekblad.com/publicationsnews.html).

Many individuals and churches everywhere also are feeling called to reach out to the poor and marginalized—a third essential chord. Word, Spirit and ministry among the poor are coming together like never before. People in North America and Europe are longing to see action. Yet fruitfulness in ministry is only possible as we are rooted and grounded in God’s loving Presence, pursued in worship, Bible study, contemplative prayer and service.

On a mid-December 2007 trip to Colorado Gracie and I ministered in a church in the Aspen area that faces huge ministry challenges. The Aspen area has one of the highest per capita undocumented worker populations in the United States. These people serve as construction workers, dish washers and gardeners for people of extreme wealth. We taught and preached on Jesus’ ministry of announcing the Kingdom of God to the poor to an enthusiastic group, and ended with a healing service where the Holy Spirit really came to heal and bless people.

Right here in Northwest Washington we also see signs of a movement of the Holy Spirit. Increasing groups and individuals come to us for prayer. We are aiming to complete our two bunk houses and meeting room to meet the growing demand for one-on-one prayer, retreats and courses.

We are deeply encouraged by people’s support for both our new calling and for the construction of our larger prayer, teaching and hospitality building. The structure is now complete, with windows, doors, siding, roof and decking. We currently need $50,000 for floors, insulation, electrical, sheet rock, kitchen and other finish work so we can begin hosting people. Eventually we will need another $150,000 to pay back a loan that has helped us build everything up to this point. Please prayerfully consider whether you feel called to help us complete the building. We welcome you to visit us, see the progress and receive prayer yourself.

Tax-deductible contributions can be given online through PayPal on my website (http://bobekblad.com/donate.html) or mailed directly to New Earth Refuge, P.O. Box 410, Burlington, WA 98233.

We value your prayers for the following international commitments happening in the next five months.

February 16 I leave for nine days of outreach with Tierra Nueva in Honduras followed by two days speaking at Lubbock Christian University.

Speaking engagements increase beginning in March once my new book A New Christian Manifesto: Pledging Allegiance to the Kingdom of God, (Westminster John Knox: Louisville, 2008) comes out in late February.

In April I will be the keynote speaker at the Scripture Engagement Roundtable of the Forum of Bible Agencies International in Amsterdam. I will then spend four days speaking in Paris as the French edition of Reading the Bible with the Damned (Lire la bible avec les parias) comes out in late March.

In June I will be heading to Pemba, Mozambique for two weeks to teach Mozambican pastors and mission students in Iris Ministries Holy Given Missions School, accompanied by my 13-year-old daughter Anna. This will be my third time working to train pastors in Mozambique—where revival is outpacing training in an amazing move of God’s Spirit.

May God richly bless you this Lent as you remember and celebrate Jesus’ life, death and resurrection to save this broken, beloved world.

Yours in Christ,

Bob Ekblad

Turning the hearts of parents and children towards each other

2007-12-22T11:17:00.000-08:00

I have been especially pondering the last two verses of Malachi this Advent, longing to see more and more reconciliation that prepared the way for Jesus.

“Behold, I am going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord. And he will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the land with a curse” (Malachi 4:5-6).

Elisha was always my favorite prophet of the Old Testament. His humility before his master Elijah was impressive and he ended up doing twice as many miracles: literally 14 to Elijah’s 7. So why was Elijah sent as a forerunner to the Messiah, and not Elisha?

My question was answered by Ron Kuykendall, an Episcopal priest friend from Florida who came and did some teaching at Tierra Nueva’s The People’s Seminary in September.

Ron taught that Elijah is the prototype spiritual father, and Elisha a prototype spiritual son. Elijah is the only Old Testament prophet who passed on a double anointing. Elijah embodies God’s heart: that our sons and daughters (spiritual or biological) would go far beyond us, standing on our shoulders. John the Baptist embodied this with his attitude towards Jesus: “He must increase. I must decrease.” He pointed to Jesus, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29),” and not to himself. “After me comes a man who has a higher rank than I,” he continued.

Jesus surely had a much greater anointing. And yet he too embodied towards us his disciples the father heart visible in Elijah: “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go to the Father. And whatever you ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son” (John 14:12-13). Surely Jesus sent us his Holy Spirit to empower us to continue in this same tradition, as we continue to prepare for Jesus’ final return: “the great and terrible day of the Lord.”

In the jail where I serve as chaplain most of the men and women are estranged from their fathers, and often their mothers too. Gangs are on the rise everywhere in part because of a crisis in father/child relationships. The church too is disempowered in part because of rivalries and ruptures that need to be laid down. I long to see the turning of hearts between actual biological fathers/mothers and daughters/sons and also between spiritual children and their parents. Reconciliation, healing and true empowerment begins with forgiveness, as the following story shows.

I first met Santos (“holy” in Spanish) twelve years ago when he was a 20-year-old Latino gangster doing six months in Skagit County Jail. Santos is unforgettable because of his warm, sensitive spirit. He also has a nervous wince that hits his left eye like a crashing wave every thirty seconds. Halfway through a Bible study about Jesus' healing of a blind man by applying spit to his eyes two Thursday's ago, Santos said: "I feel kind of vulnerable asking for this, but can you pray for me to be healed of this nervous tic in my left eye? It's been bothering me my whole life, but more and more lately."

With only five minutes before the guards came, I invited the other inmates to gather around Santos, and placed my hand on his left eye. Immediately I got the strong impression that his father had hit him in the head. I asked whether this was true, and Santos began to cry and say he was beaten a lot when growing up. Later he told me that as the oldest, he'd often taken the blame for things his younger brother and sister had done, to keep them from beatings.

I briefly told him that when someone sins against us, it brings great suffering, but if we hold resentment and unforgiveness, the sins of the other person infect and continue to hurt us. He said he was willing to forgive. I led him in a prayer of forgiveness, and he even began to bless his father. I prayed that the peace of Christ would come over his face and that the nervous flinching would be calmed in Jesus' name. The presence of God came over all of us. It was very peaceful.

The next day, I called Santos to check on him. He said he was 100% healed and the twitching had stopped. I called him four days later and he says he's still completely healed—the tic has not returned. He has had this problem for 32 years. “People who know me are all noticing it!” he said. He also told me that the night he forgave his father, his dad called his girlfriend's house looking for him—something his father rarely if ever does.

I am profoundly grateful for this new beginning as hearts are turned and Jesus comes again, and I long to see more. May you experience this Christmas season reconciliation, healing and peace born out of forgiveness as you anticipate and welcome Jesus’ coming.

Empowerment by the Spirit in France

2007-12-05T17:42:00.000-08:00

On Saturday, November 17 after a rich five days with Scripture Union in Alsace I flew to Paris to spend the weekend ministering in the Église Reformée de Belleville followed by a three-day retreat for French reformed pastors.

The church is Belleville is one of the largest churches in the Église Reformée de France. Like many churches in Paris, its membership is diverse: many French people together with first and second generation immigrants from Africa and other countries. I even met a woman from Mexico and people from Columbia. The Belleville church is at the heart of the section of Paris with the largest Jewish community, many North African immigrants and a burgeoning arts scene. Unlike most churches in the Église Reformée de France which are highly intellectual and traditional, Belleville is more evangelical and has been deeply influenced by charismatic renewal.

Serge Jacquemus is the pastor-- a good friend who did graduate studies with me in Montpellier in 1991 who I later met up with in 2004 at a pastor’s conference at the Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship. Randy Greer is an American missionary friend of mine also ministering at Belleville. He leads an inspiring after-school program serving North African immigrant youth. Serge has invited me to minister in Paris for the past few years, hoping to see his church reach out more effectively to the neighborhood, empowered by the Holy Spirit. I arrived in the middle of a national transportation strike, but the Saturday afternoon training drew many people. We acted out Jesus’ encounter with the woman caught in adultery and the woman bent over by an evil spirit. These stories served as a basis for inviting people to drop their stones of accusation and to step into Jesus’ ministry of announcing forgiveness and deliverance from evil spirits. Nearly everyone came up at the end to receive prayer for freedom from invisible powers that oppress them (shame, guilt, fear, unworthiness).

Sunday morning I preached two services to the 500 member church. I spoke on the Spirit upon Jesus and the anointing for ministry to the poor, prisoners, the blind and oppressed based on Luke 4:18ff, ending with fire tunnels where everyone could lay hands on everyone. People enthusiastically engaged in this style of prayer after I presented it as a near perfect enactment of the values of the French revolution: liberté, égalité, fraternité (freedom, equality, brotherhood). The priesthood of all believers happened as people excitedly formed two long lines facing each other to make a prayer tunnel. Nearly everyone in each service passed through at least once, receiving prayer from the many who laid hands on them calling for God’s Spirit to come to heal, fill and empower.

A three-day pastor’s conference began the next day at noon. Since all the trains and subways were still nearly shut down by the national strike, only 20 or so pastors were able to make it to the retreat. This was ideal since the focus of the retreat was on ministering personally to each pastor. Pastoring in France is particularly challenging. French society is increasingly fast-paced and impressively secular. Pastors of the historic Église Reformée often minister in traditional parishes to small, aging congregations made up of members often spread out in a wide geographic area. Ministry opportunities to non-Christians are very challenging. The majority immigrant population is North African and Muslim. Pastors are highly trained professionals who know Scripture and theology well, but have had little training in ministering physical and inner healing, deliverance and prophetic ministry. Though they place a high value on the priesthood of all believers, they often feel stuck when it comes to really seeing parishioners get empowered to step into their callings.

My focus was to help them become more secure in a Biblical theology of empowerment based on Ephesians 1:3ff and 2:7ff and many other texts and in ministry with the gifts of the Spirit (Eph 4:7-10; 1 Cor 12-14). Many pastors bear the weight of an entire congregation’s calling and suffer under their own and other’s expectations that they have to be gifted to meet every need. My hope was that they would become more comfortable receiving more from the Holy Spirit and facilitating people’s empowerment to move in the gifts of the Spirit. I presented on the five-fold vision of ministry in Ephesians 4:11-16 and we discussed and practiced how to identify and recruit people into callings such as apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor and teacher with the objective of equipping all the people (Eph 4:11-12).

We used a “prophetic presbytery” style of prayer we practice every week as a staff at Tierra Nueva. This involves laying hands on each other, blessing, praying and sharing impressions, pictures, scriptures—perhaps in some way similar to ways early Christians ministered to each other (Acts 13:2-3; 19:6; 1 Tim 4:14; 2 Tim 1:6). After beautiful worship and some teaching, over the course of three days each pastor had a turn to sit in the middle of a circle to receive prayer and prophetic words of encouragement and direction from the leaders of the pastoral, each other and me. We laid hands on each one and invited the Holy Spirit to come to fill, bless and reveal. It was amazing to see how God spoke consistently and personally words of clear encouragement, comfort, clarification of gifting and direction. After praying for some 25 people each one of us had significantly more experience by the end of this retreat to take this model back to our ministries and parishes. There is still so much to learn about discernment of spiritual gifts and empowerment for life and ministry, but I came home deeply encouraged by the power of people humbly gathering around each other to bless and build up.

Please keep these French pastors and the Belleville church in your prayers: that the Spirit would keep filling them more and more. That the light of Christ would shine brightly on them and through them for their families, communities and for France.

Word and Spirit are Embracing

2007-11-28T11:21:00.000-08:00

I am seeing increasing signs of the coming together of currents in the body of Christ that are often divided. Those committed to meeting God through thoughtful study of Scripture are cross-pollinating with contemplatives and Holy Spirit-focused charismatic Christians in a powerful confluence that is gradually reversing Jesus’ reproach to the Saddusees: “You do not understand the Scriptures or the power of God” (Matt 22:29). This reversal is desperately needed today, as people need the message and preaching of Jesus Christ to be “demonstrated by the Spirit and power of God” (1 Cor 2:4).

On Thanksgiving Day I flew home from Paris after a rich 10 days of teaching and ministry in France. The first five days were in Alsace at Scripture Union’s French retreat center Rimlishof. There, Tierra Nueva intern Troy Terpstra and I met with some 50 Scripture Union workers from 22 European countries for five days of presentations and conversations. Most of the people had read my book, Reading the Bible with the Damned in preparation for discussions on how to effectively engage people in liberating reading of the Bible.

People from different European countries presented their research on many topics related to Bible engagement. Andrey Cherniak of Scripture Union Russia spoke on Lectio Divina and then led an optional contemplative reading of a Bible passage that many attended. David Pritchard from Madrid sat us all down like children to show us how to engage little kids in an approach called “godly play.” He told us the story of Abram and Sarai’s journey of faith and then had us respond with colored paper, pens, crayons or however we felt led. Others spoke on how to effectively engage grade school children, teen agers, traditional church goers or secularized European adults in transformational Bible study. Others presented their expertise on websites, interactive electronic gaming systems and contextually sensitive publications of various sorts. I was inspired and amazed by people diverse approaches and giftings.

Every morning I led a Bible study to demonstrate ways of reading the Bible that I’ve found effective both in the jail and among mainstream Christians. People responded enthusiastically to these Bible studies and bibliodramas. I shared about my growing desire to be continually filled with and led by the Holy Spirit and the anointing in my reading of the Bible and in my ministry—rather than depending upon my education, experience and natural abilities. Jesus himself emphasized this when he said: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me and he has anointed me to preach the good news to the poor.” If Jesus himself needs the Spirit upon him and the anointing “today” and every day, we too need God’s continual Presence upon, in and before us in everything we do. People seemed inspired to seek more of this anointing that John talks about, the chrisma that abides in us and teaches us about all things (1 John 2:20, 27).

People were interested in talking further about this vast theme of Word and Spirit. I witnessed people’s spiritual hunger firsthand when some 25 came to an optional soaking prayer time one evening. God’s Spirit came very beautifully, bringing comfort, encouragement and healing.

I was excited to learn that these leaders together will be training some 10,000 Bible study facilitators in the months before summer to work with children, youth and adults throughout Europe. Let’s keep these many Scripture Union workers in our prayers: that the Spirit would guide them in their announcing of good news to hungry people throughout post-Christendom Europe (see www.su-international.org). I will write again in a few days about my time in Paris.

Couple Experience Healing & Hope at New Earth Refuge

2007-10-26T21:22:00.000-07:00

New Earth Refuge's construction project is moving forward daily. Gracie and I are thankful to God and our supporters for the nearly $50,000 that has been given since August. We have now completed all the framing, the roofing and are just now installing the doors and windows. We are confident that gifts will continue to come in so we can complete the electrical, plumbing, insulation and interior finish.

We are especially encouraged that our ministry here at New Earth Refuge at our existing guest house has been growing. Groups, individuals and couples are coming here more and more to receive prayer from Gracie, me and others at Tierra Nueva. People are experiencing healing and renewal, as you can read in the testimonial from Laurie below.

"In June I returned from riding a friend's horse. It was a vigorous ride to say the least and the next morning I woke with terrible low back pain. As the days passed instead of getting better the pain grew worse. It spread from my lower back up to my neck and shoulders leaving me unable to drive or do daily household chores.

Despite seeing doctors and physical therapists over the following weeks the pain did not go away. The summer passed as I sat in the chair feeling hopeless. With two children, one autistic, and a marriage that was all but over I could not imagine why God would allow this to happen.

Finally, in August I thought that maybe God was trying to tell me something. I began to pray. Quickly God began to bring to mind all the things I had done to contribute to the poor state of my marriage. I called my husband and apologized for all the things I had done and was so quick to blame him for. Needless to say he was shocked but accepted my apology.

A few short minutes later a friend arrived at the house. I told her of the events of the morning and she mentioned that she knew of someone who would pray for my back pain. I wrote his name down but I wasn’t sure how I felt about “healing prayer”. My skeptical side just does not want to believe it, for several reasons I suppose. I certainly do not want to look like a sucker and what am I supposed to do with my faith if for some reason they pray for me and my back does not feel better.

Later, another friend dropped by and I was shocked to hear her tell me that she also knew of someone I should see who would pray for my back pain, Bob Ekblad, the very name I had just written down. Despite my skepticism and discomfort this seemed more than a coincidence to me.

I tried to schedule a time to see Bob but somehow no time seemed to work so he offered to pray for me over the phone. During this prayer time Bob mentioned that I may have some people in my life I need to forgive and encouraged me to ask God to bring those people to mind. Over the next several days names and events came to mind like waves on the beach and I spent a lot of time dealing with forgiveness. My back pain, however was still there and discouragement was setting in. What I wasn’t thinking about was healing was taking place in my life just not in my back yet.

Finally my husband and I were able to schedule some time with Bob at his home. We arrived and were introduced to a woman by the name of Amy who was also there to pray with us. After brief introductions Bob and Amy placed their hands on me and began to pray. At first I was afraid this would not change anything. Then my back and neck began to feel hot and cold at the same time....like BenGay. Amy mentioned some impressions that she was receiving that were so accurate I was overwhelmed. How could she know that? Bob mentioned to me then that he had a strong impression I had been given a gift of evangelism. The association I had with that word made me very uncomfortable at first until Bob explained to me what evangelism really meant-- sharing naturally the stories of God's work in my own life first. The pain in my neck and shoulders was gone.

Bob turned to my husband and asked whether he had pain in his left shoulder. This really surprised him as my husband had been suffering from pain in his left shoulder for years, as well as his right knee, but had said nothing about this to Bob. Before praying for him Bob expressed to my husband that he felt very strongly that my husband had a prophetic gifting, that he was sensitive to hearing God’s voice. Like me, my husband was resistant to this until Bob explained to him that it was more like your own thoughts then a “booming God voice”. Then Bob began to pray. Again Amy mentioned the impressions she had and again she was so accurate. Bob asked my husband how he felt and the pain was no longer there.

We left that evening knowing that God was not only doing a physical healing in our lives but healing our marriage and our lives as a whole. God did so much more for us than we ever thought. Since that day we have been asking God to teach us more about the gifts He has given and we are excited for the future."

Laurie Hinkley
Anacortes, Washington

For more testimonials check out my blog at www.bobekblad.com

God Meets Our Needs

2007-10-24T07:55:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday and Friday a number of remarkable things happened that have encouraged my heart, and hopefully will encourage yours. I keep seeing God heal people and provide for needs in humble yet very real ways.

On Thursday night I went into the jail to do my four bilingual Bible studies. There were only two Mexican men in the second Bible study-- Francisco and Guadalupe. I knew them pretty well as they’d been incarcerated six months. As soon as we sat down I felt two sharp pains in my left wrist, the one closest to Guadalupe’s right hand as I faced him. Since I had no known problem with my wrist I asked Guadalupe if he had pain in his wrist. “Si,” he said, showing me a red, swollen wrist bone he’d damaged when he fell playing handball in the jail recreation room.

“What’s really bothering me though is the pain in my chest,” he said. “I’m trying to get into the doctor here as it’s really hurting and I’m worried.”

I offered to pray and he agreed. I placed one of my hands on his wrist and the other on his chest. As I prayed I felt a warm cushion of air over my hand—like there was an invisible hand laid on top of my hand. “Do you feel that warmth?” I asked, and he nodded. After praying, Francisco read that day’s reading, the story of the healing of Naaman in 2 Kings 5. While Francisco read the passage Guadalupe kept leaning back in his chair, stretching out his arms. Finally I asked him if he was having a hard time focusing on the reading. “Are you still in pain?” I asked.

“I can’t focus on the reading. I’m too surprised because the pain is completely gone, in my wrist and in my chest,” he said. “Only God could have known about this pain,” he said, and tears streamed down his face. We gave thanks to Jesus and offered him our lives, something these two men have been doing week after week since they came in. I prayed blessing and protection over them. They will both head off to prison on Tuesday to complete the 20 months remaining of their sentences for dealing cocaine.

Later that evening I met one-on-one with Epifania—a 51-year-old Mexican woman. Epifania is a migrant farm worker and beloved member of our faith community. She has just been ordered deported but was transferred up from a Federal Detention Center in Tacoma to Skagit County Jail to face some new charges of possession of cocaine. She praised God that I had come and told many stories of praying for people’s healing while in the immigration detention prison (see our upcoming Tierra Nueva appeal letter at www.tierra-nueva.org). I told her about what had just happened with Guadalupe and his wrist. She told me that she too had a lot of pain in her wrist, and I remembered that indeed I had felt two sharp pains. I’m still not accustomed to watching for and catching the clues the Spirit gives to show me what God is wanting to do. Apparently God wasn’t through healing wrists that evening. We prayed and sure enough her pain went away. I am continually impressed by God’s kindness and goodness. God cares enough about our little, very personal problems—which was brought home powerfully for me personally the next day.

The next morning I drove up to attend the last morning of one of Toronto Airport Christian Felllowship’s five-day International Leaders School of Ministry in Aldergrove, BC. Towards the end of 45 minutes of worship I ended up praying with Murray Dueck, a new friend who leads a prophetic school in Langley called Samuel’s Mantle. He began prophesying “I see you like Mario in the video game, collecting gold coin after gold coin, more and more of them as you go from level to level in the Spirit.” He said he thought this represented both my spiritual inheritance and God’s financial provision. I was encouraged as two days before the bank had notified us that our personal checking account was overdrawn more than $2,000. I had no way to cover this, but just the day before a friend had sent us an unexpected personal gift for $1,000. I sat down feeling encouraged and moments later another friend at the conference, completely unaware of Murray’s words, handed me a folded check written out to me for another $1,000.

God was aware of my financial need and ministered to me through his servants just like he’d brought healing to Guadalupe and Epifania there in the jail. May God richly bless you and pour blessing through you as you seek first the Kingdom of God.

A New Christian Manifesto: Pledging Allegiance to the Kingdom of God

2007-10-10T15:18:00.001-07:00

I am delighted to learn today that my new book will be published by Westminister John Knox Press in early February 2008.

This book seeks to articulate the new work that God is doing in our lives and ministry over the past 4 years. God is clearly reconciling divergent streams in the body of Christ so the Kingdom of God can advance on behalf of the least. The social and charismatic prophetic streams are being drawn together into a dynamic unity with contemplative, evangelical and mainline currents. Advocacy, justice, peacemaking and dialogical Bible study belong together with ministries emphasizing God's Presence to heal, deliver and empower. Word and Spirit are flowing together to empower people from the bottom upwards so that God's Kingdom can advance more fully in the darkest places.

This project began on the beaches of Mozambique in June 2006 as I received prayer from Rolland Baker, Supresa Sithole, Jose, Francie and other leaders of Iris Ministries.

As the group prayed over me before my son Luke and I departed, Supresa suddenly began prophesying that I would write a book, that many would read. “Urgent, urgent, urgent, urgent, urgent!” he said with his thick African-Portuguese accent and he circled me repeatedly, thrusting out his right hand towards me with each declaration. That day we flew to South Africa to visit Gerald West and Jonathan Draper. That night in Gerald West’s vacation house on the coast south of Durban I awoke in the middle of the night with chapter and themes rushing through my head. This continued the following night at Jonathan and Marian Draper’s home in Pietermaritzburg. I am looking forward to sharing this with you all soon.

God Confirms the Words through the Signs that Follow

2007-10-06T09:07:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago I ran into a big, tough looking Caucasian guy named Philip during one of our Sunday afternoon Bible studies. “I’m the one you made cry back in April when I was in here. You healed my back,” he said.

I immediately remember him and feel embarrassed that he doesn’t say Jesus healed his back. I feel awkward at times about healings that happen, and am especially perplexed that so many people are finding relief from pain in their backs, necks, shoulders, knees, etc. I find myself continually pondering the purpose and value of healing.

I often think of the final verses of Mark’s gospel, where the narrator writes: “And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them, and confirmed the word with the signs that followed” (Mk 16:20).”

For years and years now I have been reading the Bible with people on the margins, many of whom are violent men who have heard lots of preaching from parents, judges and evangelists without seeing the reality of God’s saving, healing presence. Hearing the words without experiencing the power of God can anesthetize us to Good News that should turn our hearts towards God’s heart of love. Paul himself consciously avoided putting confidence in his ability to articulate the gospel. He writes to the Corinthians:

When I came to you, bretheren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God (1 Cor 2:1-5).

I remember well that Sunday in April when Philip was healed. I had invited a group of 15 or so men to put out their hands like I often do so we can invite God to put the anointing of the Holy Spirit for healing onto them so they can pray for themselves or others. “You guys are all made in God’s image,” I said and often keep saying.

“Your fingers weren’t made for gun triggers. Guns were made for your hands. Your hands weren’t made to slap around your girlfriend, to cling to a crack pipe or fight your enemies. Your hands were made so you can bless people. God made you to carry the Holy Presence. Maybe you don’t have enough trust to give your hearts, minds and the rest of your bodies to God. But I challenge you to present your hands to God right now as a kind of experiment or small step of faith,” I say.

Nearly all the participants that Sunday had put out their hands and I prayed. I then invited them to put their hands where they had pain and we prayed for God’s healing Presence to flow through their hands into their backs, necks, heads, hearts—wherever it is needed. That Sunday ten or so men claimed to experience immediate relief. Some were laughing, others crying or looking seriously perplexed. Philip had dropped his hands from his shoulder and lower back almost immediately, looking dejected. I asked him how he was feeling from across the circle of guys.

“The same,” he said, his head hung in shame. “Can I pray for you some more? I asked. “I guess, he said, trying to be polite.

I learned that his shoulders had been wrenched when the police had wrestled his arms behind his back and hand-cuffed him. His lower back had been damaged by the cuffs digging in behind his back.

“Do you need to forgive those officers for excessive use of force?” I asked, knowing that forgiveness and healing are intimately connected.

“No,” he said. “They were just doing their job. I’m a big dude.”

I prayed something like this. “Jesus, thank you that your love for Philip is constant. You’re call on his life is still there. Nothing has disqualified him. I ask that you would reverse the damages done by the police so he can fully know your love.” I then walked back to my place across from him in the circle and asked him how he was doing.

“I feel okay I guess, but as soon as I move my hands behind my back I’m sure I’ll feel that shoulder pain,” he said, and began to move his hands behind his back to the hand-cuffed position. He did this a few times, with increasing awe coming over his face until he said: “I’ll grant it to you. I’ll grant it to you. There’s no more pain.” He dropped down onto his plastic chair and began to sob.

So there he was over five months later, reminding me that I’d made him cry. There was no time to talk then as the Sunday group was big and we only had 20 minutes. After we finished looking at that Sunday’s scripture I suddenly got an impression that there was somebody there who needed healing from serious back pain. I immediately doubted this, a voice in my head mocking me that I’m always imagining these things. I went for it though, asking, and a Mexican man raised his hand, just as the door clicked open and the guard announced that the study was over. I quickly went over to the man, placed a hand on his back and commanded the pain to leave in Jesus’ name—accompanying him to the door, praying as we walked.

This past Thursday Philip showed up again to our Bible study. I ask him if he can share the story of healing back in April and he readily agrees. He tells a group of eight or nine guys about how he had grown up in the Catholic Church and had religion forced on him. “I didn’t believe at all until last April when I came to the jail. He told about how Jesus healed his shoulders and lower back. He then told about how he’d had a Mexican cellmate who didn’t believe in God at all and had never been to church, but had really serious back pain. “I told him about how God had healed me and convinced him to come. He received prayer, and before we were even back to our cell the guys back was completely healed,” he said in delight.

He then told how he’d been jumped by some gang guys and beaten up there in the jail pod just after this and they’d transferred him to another pod. He told how he had three big bumps on his head, and how he’d motioned to Chris and I through the glass and we’d indicated back to him with hand signs that we would pray for him.

“I woke up the next morning and the bumps on my head were all gone and I was completely better. Now I can say that I believe for the first time,” he said. “So what convinced you?” I ask. “Why do you now believe?” “This may sound kind of cheesy,” he said. “But it’s all these healings.” That night another Mexican man was there who said that his back was wrenched from the police throwing him to the ground and cuffing him. We pray for him and his pain goes away on the spot. Jesus keeps confirming the words of Scripture and the testimonies of new believers. The message is passed on as God’s power becomes visible here and now as the Kingdom of God comes close.

I appreciate your prayers. That God’s healings Presence would continue to touch people there in the jail, at our weekly English and Spanish services and wherever we go, confirming the words with the signs that follow.

Recognizing the God Who Clings to Us Always

2007-09-21T11:14:00.001-07:00

Lately, I have been especially watchful for God's presence with us as we await provision in times of scarcity at Tierra Nueva and New Earth Refuge. Someone recently asked if I ever wonder whether our financial hardships are signs that God is not blessing our ministries, or that we are somehow out of favor. When payroll is due and there is nothing in the bank, we do find ourselves examining everything, open to changing course if needed. During times of famine, it is tempting to imagine leaving for greener pastures or launching another tiring fund-raising campaign. But humble God is mentoring me. It seems Jesus longs to see us take the best theology he’s taught us further and deeper, learning to see him and receive from him in the “least of these” whom we can easily disregard.

In a recent Sunday dialogical Bible study at Tierra Nueva, I was struck as we looked at the journey of Ruth. In the story, Elimeleck, whose name means “my God is king,” together with his wife Naomi and their two sons, Mahlon (sickness) and Chilion (fragility) leave their hometown of Bethlehem (house of bread). They travel as immigrants, due to a famine (lack of bread). Did they feel somehow pushed to migrate to meet the pressing needs of their sons “sickness” and “fragility”? We are invited along on Naomi’s journey to discover how God is king in ways far different than Elimeleck, Naomi (or we) might normally think.

Elimeleck and Naomi migrate to Moab where their two sons marry Moabite women. There, Naomi’s husband and two sons die . . . and her image of God is about to die, too. The strategy of leaving for greener pastures apparently didn’t work. In fact, God did come through in the end, as the famine lifts in Bethlehem “when God visited his people in giving them food” and Naomi decides to return home . . . alone. She urges her two daughters-in-law (who are foreigners) to go back home and even return to their gods. Ruth refuses, clinging instead to Naomi and telling her: Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you; for where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried (Ruth 1:16-17).

In the next scene, Naomi returns with Ruth to Bethlehem, where Naomi insists that the townspeople do not call her by her name, which means “My Gracious” but Mara, “Bitter”: For the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went out full, but the Lord has brought me back empty. Why do you call me Naomi, since the Lord has witnessed against me and the Almighty has afflicted me? (Ruth 1:20-21).

Naomi is angry at God, whom she envisions as harsh and punishing. Yet she appears blind to God’s presence with her through humble Ruth, her widowed daughter-in-law from Moab, whose name means “friend” or more precisely “comforter”—evoking the paraklete Holy Spirit, our defender, helper, comforter, guide. Ruth has just pledged total allegiance to Naomi, clinging to her. It is through Ruth that Naomi experiences redemption, as Boaz, a wealthy relative, embraces this nobody foreign widow, opening the storehouses to them both and fathering a child, Obed (Servant), who is a direct forefather of Jesus, Israel’s Messiah and our Savior (Matt 1:5).

Ruth’s clinging reminds me of the description of Genesis 2:24—a man clinging to his wife and the two becoming one flesh. Paul reads this as metaphorical of Jesus, the bridegroom’s union with the church (Eph 5:29-32). Is Jesus with us like Ruth was with Naomi—a clinging, close presence that we could easily disregard? Who has been clinging close to me whom I haven’t recognized? Who has been clinging to you?

This June, enough donations came in to Tierra Nueva to cover all expenses except my paycheck and Gracie’s. It was July 19 and our mortgage payment was due to be electronically transferred. Our account was nearly empty, short $1,000 to cover the mortgage payment. I came out of the jail at 9:30 pm, tired after four bilingual Bible studies. In the jail parking lot, a Mexican man to whom I have ministered for a number of years was waiting for me in his car. I assumed he wanted to talk with me about an upcoming day in court. Instead, he directed me to get in the back seat, and then sat beside me, pulling out his checkbook. “I want to give you this, Roberto,” he said, handing me a check for $1,000.00. I was shocked, and have since been meditating on God’s Ruth-like, clinging presence with me through unexpected mediators.

Since I first met him in a jail Bible study over five years ago, this man has at times clung to me for advocacy and friendship, as he has gone through many struggles. I have watched him take on “my God”, like Ruth took on Naomi’s, leaving behind his avowed atheist mindset. He has become an increasingly fervent believer, as God has rescued him time and time again from losing his legal permanent residency status and being deported far away from his young daughter. My faith has become much stronger as I have watched God rescue him over and over. He has ministered to me in many beautiful ways, even as he has needed my support. Yet I have often failed to recognize Jesus’ close presence mediated through him and others.

Now he has brought our family through the hardest financial month to date. Should I be surprised? No! This is God’s way of being Emmanuel (God with us), choosing to encounter us through the hungry and thirsty ones, the stranger, naked, sick and imprisoned one (Matt 25:35-36). God has chosen foolish things to shame the wise and the weak things of the world to shame the strong (1 Corinthians 1:27ff). And the strong ones like Naomi and Boaz certainly have their place too. In fact God has been blessing us more and more through stronger ones too.

Over $35,000 has recently come in gifts from a number of supporters for New Earth Refuge, which us being completed at a rapid rate.
Tierra Nueva made it’s August payroll on time.
Cascade Lumber gave us a generous reduction on lumber costs.

Please keep us in your prayers: for God’s Presence to increase, bringing healing, liberation and provision.

I challenge you to ask God to open your eyes to God’s humble yet saving Presence that is with you now, and to read through the book of Ruth.

Abundant blessings in Christ,

Bob Ekblad

Join Us In Establishing New Earth Refuge

2007-08-28T14:08:00.000-07:00

Gracie and I feel like we have stepped over a threshold into a whole new dimension of life and ministry. In 2003 after over twenty years of ministry among broken and impoverished people we came to a place of deep frustration and desperation. While we were witnessing signs of God’s Kingdom, we longed to see more. Why did the Gospel we share not seem to have the power to free people from addictions, diseases, mental illness and powers like depression, anger or pride? “Where are the works of Jesus we read about in the Gospels, or the ‘even greater works’ Jesus promised his followers would do?” For years we had proclaimed the good news, “The kingdom of heaven has come near” (Matt 10:7), but were baffled by Jesus’ imperatives: “Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.”

In 2003 we both began to have deeper experiences of God’s Presence. We had benefited hugely from our long membership in Les Veilleurs, a French spiritual fraternity committed to contemplative spiritual practices. But we were estranged from anything labeled “charismatic” due to negative past experiences. Apparently God wanted to bring us into a broader ecumenism, linking us with the larger body of Christ in some new ways. Gracie and I received prayer at conferences in Seattle and Toronto that led to powerful experiences of the Spirit that have healed, refreshed and empowered us in new ways, drawing us deeper into the heart of God.

In the past three years we have seen many people healed of all kinds of ailments and delivered from spiritual oppression. We have witnessed God heal people of chronic pain, migraine headaches, asthma, TMJ, cancer, arthritis, liver and kidney conditions, abscessed teeth, broken bones and more. I even watched two deaf people receive their hearing! We have seen Jesus free people from depression, insomnia, anger, jealousy and addictions to drugs, alcohol and pornography. While there are many we pray for who have not yet experienced healing, we long more and more to see the Kingdom of God come to bring relief, light and life in dark places. We especially long to see people everywhere recruited, equipped and empowered by the Spirit for a fuller engagement in the ministry of Jesus. And we are now seeing this like never before.

Gracie and I are now transitioning from years of direct ministry with the poor to a more- focused emphasis on raising up ministers and missionaries with a holistic vision for announcing God’s Kingdom. We still continue to do direct ministry with people on the margins and cannot imagine ever stopping. However our desire is to see people trained up who combine care and advocacy for the marginalized and vibrant Bible study with moving in God’s power to minister healing, and deliverance.

Here in our home we regularly pray for people’s healing and empowerment for life and ministry. Every Monday our Tierra Nueva staff and interns meet here for prayer and we receive groups of students from Regent College, individuals from around the U.S. and from other countries.

I think of Chris, who came to us for mentoring straight after graduation from Berkeley at age 23, cynical and disillusioned after years of study and work with inner-city youth in Christian ministries. He moved into the TN building and began attending courses & prayer gatherings at TN and at our home. He accompanied me to Honduras and Toronto and joined me regularly at the jail. Now he is fuller of grace and joy than ever-- pouring out his life accompanying inmates, pastoring young gang members and leading worship. Chris regularly prays for healing and sees God touch people much as we do.

Ryann arrived at TN burnt out and disillusioned too, fresh from four years at Western Washington University. God met her powerfully at TN courses and as we prayed for her. She left her job and life in Bellingham and joined us as administrative assistant and outreach worker. She is now an effective prayer team member in the migrant labor camps, family support center and worshipping communities. Ryann prays for people’s healing and empowerment and sees God touch people in beautiful ways.

This is the exciting adventure that we now write you about. We still feel called to share a full-time position directing and pastoring Tierra Nueva. Now though, we are doing new work in a complimentary direction. Rather than taking on additional employment outside our ministry to meet the needs of our family (with three children, ages 12, 14 and 16), we have decided to make people more aware of our evolving prayer and itinerant ministry and invite people to partner with us. We have set up New Earth Refuge as a separate 501c3 non-profit.

Here on our 35 acres on the Skagit River Gracie and I show hospitality and meet and pray with individuals and groups: for physical and emotional healing, and for discernment of and empowerment into callings. We want to help more people like Chris and Ryann, hungry for rejuvenation and radical ministry, be launched into their callings. Currently our retreat center that sleeps 20 is all framed up, awaiting $150,000 to complete construction. We need this building soon as people are coming to us for retreats, courses and larger prayer gatherings. In addition, we are feeling excited about a growing national and international itinerant calling.

Since the publication of my book Reading the Bible with the Damned in late 2005, I am receiving invitations to teach and minister locally, nationally and around the world in many different denominations. In the last two years I have ministered all over the United States and in Canada, France, Spain, Mozambique, South Africa, Honduras, and Venezuela among Lutherans, Presbyterians, Catholics, Pentecostals, Episcopalians, Eglise Reformée de France and others. A French translation of Reading the Bible with the Damned (Lire la Bible avec les Damnés) is being published this September. My new book New Earth Manifest(o): Seeing and Entering Jesus’ Kingdom will be published by Westminster John Knox Press in early 2008. Book sales and speaking bring in very limited income, as many groups we serve are themselves struggling financially. Mostly, writing and speaking lead to more opportunities to pray for spiritual renewal and empowerment to people who are in the trenches of challenging ministries around the world.

A fresh move of God’s Spirit is surging up in many unexpected places: in jails & prisons, among bands of friends, in prayer groups, ministries with the marginalized, and in churches of every denomination. We want to serve and spread this movement, where transformational Bible study, advocacy and justice on behalf of the poor, and contemplative spirituality (which Gracie & are still committed to) are coming together with evangelism, healing, deliverance & prophetic ministry. We are committed to promoting cross-pollenization and reconciliation so a whole and healthy body of Christ can face big and complex challenges to advance God’s kingdom.

We invite you to join us in this exciting new venture. Please consider how you might want to partner with us. Our biggest need is to complete construction on New Earth Refuge. It is especially critical that we complete the roof, install windows and doors and side the building before the rains come in the fall. After much prayer and consultation with friends we have decided to step out in faith and resume construction beginning this Monday (Aug 6). We are personally putting everything God has given us into seeing this vision become a reality and are excited to see how God is going to provide. If you are a carpenter, electrician or have other skills or access to discounted items (i.e. cedar siding, kitchen appliances, bunk beds, sheets..) please contact us. We also need financial and prayer partners committed to sustaining us in this new dimension of our calling.

You can learn more about New Earth Refuge at http://bobekblad.com/newearthrefuge.html and about my itinerant ministry by checking out his new website at www.bobekblad.com. You can contribute directly on line through our website at http://bobekblad.com/donate.html or by mail to the address below. You may have already received a version of this letter that we sent out two weeks ago if we had your address. If you are interested in giving monthly support, in receiving occasionally mailing please contact us at bob@bobekblad.com and send us your address.

We welcome you to come by and visit and come to Tierra Nueva for a course or worship. You can check out our schedule at www.tierra-nueva.org

Yours in Christ,

Bob and Gracie Ekblad

New Earth Refuge
19438 Best Road
Mt Vernon WA 98273

God's Word is Very Close: Jail Visitations

2007-07-18T09:15:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday in the Skagit County Jail and at Tierra Nueva I led Bible studies on the OT lectionary text, Deuteronomy 30:8-14 that we saw enacted right then and there. Here are some highlights. Things got rolling after a volunteer read verse 8.

“And you shall again obey the Lord, and observe all his commandments which I command you today.”

“How do you guys react to the word ‘obey’ in this verse, I ask. “Does it make you feel good, bad… do you find it uplifting… attractive?” I continue.

People were at first afraid to be critical of the Bible, but gradually heads are nodding “no” and people admit they didn’t like the word—and not just because they are criminals!

“It makes me feel small, like I’m being talked down to,” one guys says.

“Sounds really hard,” says someone else. “Something I’m going to fail at.”

I point out that in fact this word, shama in Hebrew, is poorly translated. It literally means “hear.” I have someone re-read the verse replacing hear for obey:

“And you shall again hear the Lord, and observe all his commandments which I command you today.”

Everyone likes this much more. Hearing is more about living in relationship with someone living, who keeps speaking. Everyone appreciates the benefits of being guided by God’s voice described in the next verse.

Then the Lord your God will prosper you abundantly in all the work of your hand, in the offspring of your body and in the offspring of your cattle and in the produce of your ground, for the Lord will again rejoice over you for good… (Deut 30:9).

We talk about Moses’ teaching that hearing the voice of God can lead to breakthroughs in every area of our lives: our families (the offspring of your body), our financial life (the offspring of your cattle) and survival/subsistence needs (the produce of your ground).

Hearing God’s words for us “today” is about walking in God’s presence, over and over again. Hearing includes paying attention to what is written in Scripture, but most importantly being turned towards God in relationship.

If you hear the Lord your God to keep his commandments and his statues which are written in this book of the law, if you turn to the Lord your God with all your heart and soul.

People are deeply encouraged by the next verses, that describe God’s word as easily perceived and very close.

For this commandment which I command you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it out of reach. It is not in heaven, that you should say, who will go up to heaven for us to get it for us and make us hear it… But the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe it (Deut 30:11-14).

People agreed that when something is in your mouth, it’s really close! Some chuckled and looked surprised… intrigued. I imagine they’re fantasizing about crack/meth pipes, beer bottles, Mexican food… If God’s Presence is actually that close!

Most people on the margins, and especially habitual offenders see Christianity as too difficult for them. I could see visible relief on people’s faces, and then began thinking about how people could actually experience God’s closeness right then and there, before having to go back to their cells.

“I think God wants to show us how close he is right now by healing some people. Anyone here experiencing physical or emotional pain?” As I spoke I got an impression that someone had pain in their upper left ribcage—kind of a strange place for pain I thought, probably just my own imagination. Lot’s of people said they had pain though, and one Native American man said he had pain in under his left arm, the upper ribcage! Seven or eight people needed healing and our time was nearly up.

I invited people to put out their hands and practiced a version of healing prayer I’ve been doing a lot lately.

“If the word can be in our mouths, then why not invite God’s healing presence onto our hands? Then we can place our hands wherever it hurts and experience God’s nearness right now-- even on our hearts if we’re experiencing anxiety or emotional pain. Put out your hands if you want and let’s pray,” I suggested.

Everyone’s hands were out and I invited God to anoint our hands, to send the Spirit onto our hands for healing. I then told people to place their hands wherever it hurt. The men put their hands in various places: some on their lower backs, others on their necks, hearts, knees, sides. I invited them to repeat a prayer we regularly use: “This healing belongs to me because I am a child of God. I receive my healing now as a free gift in Jesus’ name.”

When we finished this quick prayer I asked people to check out their bodies. Immediately a number of people said they felt better.

A Mexican farm worker in his early twenties said his back pain completely left. A middle aged Caucasian man who said he was a diabetic and had a wound on his toe that might lead to amputation said he felt tingling all over his toe and the pain was all gone. The Native American guy said his upper ribcage was the same. I told him that God can work through our own hands, but likes us to receive from others. We gathered around him and prayed some more and he felt relief.

“I can breath much deeper,” he said with a smile.

“This is efing tight” says a young guy with a recently shaved head to my right. He kept moving his head back and forth, a big smile across his face. “My neck was all stiff and painful. This s**t is cool. I really like this church.”

Later at our English service at Tierra Nueva a few in our community experienced healing as we repeated the same Bible study and prayers. I am continually amazed and deeply thankful for God’s closeness as our Savior and Healer. God’s word is very close, ready to guide, help and prosper us, whenever we’re in need.

Witnessing the Kingdom of God in Mozambique and the Skagit Valley

2007-06-29T19:55:00.000-07:00

It’s been a week now since my 14-year-old son Luke and I returned from 11 days in Pemba, Mozambique. This was my second invitation to teach Mozambican pastors, 200 of which are now in a three-month training program. I also taught 160 students from the United States, Canada and Europe attending the three-month Holy Given Missions school. I really enjoyed being able to share reflections on the Bible and ministry that have come out of years ministering to inmates, immigrants and Honduran peasants. I was encouraged to see that teaching out of our “trenches” was so well received by people facing very different and similar challenges half-way across the world.

Most of the Mozambican students are fairly new Christians, fresh out of villages dominated by a syncretistic mix of Islam and witchcraft. Most had come to faith in Jesus after witnessing or experiencing miraculous healings and freedom from demonic oppression, together with teaching and preaching by committed and passionate Mozambican pastors who are part of move of God’s Spirit that is sweeping Africa.

One pastor-in-training told how he decided to follow Jesus into pastoral ministry after a long process of God working in his life. First he was healed of blindness after his wife led him to a village pastor for prayer over a three-month period. Then after fleeing to Malawi as a war refugee and becoming a fisherman, he was attacked by a crocodile that nearly killed him, ripping apart his thigh. Unable to afford or even find a doctor, he once again received prayer and was healed. “Now I feel called to fish for men,” he says with a smile, pulling up his loose pants to reveal two huge scars cutting diagonally across his thigh.

We went out on an overnight outreach with Heidi Baker, other visitors and a humble pastor, Leite, who has already established eight churches along a long, increasingly narrowing dirt road that went on forever into the bush. That night a whole village showed up to watch the Jesus film, probably the first film ever shown in this remote village without electricity. Unfortunately, the generator-powered system failed that night. Even Heidi and others' preaching could barely be heard.

Luke and I wandered at the back of a crowd of disappointed onlookers. I began talking haltingly in Portuguese with a man who smelled like he’d been drinking. I talked about farming as best I could as he and other laughed, and then a fluent Portuguese-speaker showed up to interpret for me. I asked a young man if he suffered from feelings of terror in the night and he looked surprised and said “yes, every night.” I told him about how my 12-year-old daughter Anna has been calling out for Jesus to help her at night for years, experiencing relief. I told him how Jesus was victor over all evil powers, sickness and death through his death and resurrection. I assured him that Jesus was there with us right then and we he could call out for help and Jesus would hear. Even with his Muslim skull cap in place this man was desperate enough to try. He asked Jesus to save him, and then let me pray for him. By then a small crowd had gathered around. I asked if there were others who suffered from terror at night. “All of us” someone replied, and every head was nodding agreement. I invited them to call out for help from Jesus and then prayed for them. One woman came forward needing prayer for pain in her thigh from a farming accident in her field. We prayed and Jesus immediately healed her. The next day Luke and I learned that a form of cannibalism is practiced by the witchdoctors in this village that likely underlies people’s fear.

The next day we also helped Heidi and pastor Jose pray for a five-year-old boy who was deaf from birth. After a few minutes of prayer the boy was able to hear for the first time! I was amazed by how desperate and receptive these impoverished villagers were to ask for and receive direct help from God. It is exciting to witness God’s Presence bringing relief.

Holy Given school students from Western nations come all the way to Mozambique to learn to minister to the poorest of the poor. Most of the students are in their mid to late twenties, thirsty for the authentic Kingdom of God and open to being recruited and empowered to help it come about. Many discover they are not called to full-time ministry in Africa. Students were encouraged by stories from our ministry to inmates and immigrants right here in our own North American back yards.

I am happy to be increasingly engaged in recruiting, equipping and empowering people for direct ministry, whether that be right here at Tierra Nueva’s People’s Seminary, in Mozambique, France, Cincinnati, Austin or anywhere. I am also glad to get home and back to our life and ministry here.

Last night in the jail in one of our bilingual Bible studies Chris and I prayed for healing and saw Jesus come and touch everyone. We began by inviting a small group of inmates to put out their hands. “God wants you to see that you don’t have to be all righteous and perfect in order for God’s healing presence to flow into you for yourselves and others,” I said. Several of the men commented that they felt heat, tingling, coolness or nothing at all as we invited the Spirit to come on their hands. I invited the guys to place their hands wherever they were feeling pain, as four were suffering from pain. Each man received immediate healing: from chronic pain in a collarbone, neck pain, pain in the back of the head and another from a swollen knee from an accident in the jail. We prayed some more for the guy with the bad knee, as his healing wasn’t 100% at the beginning. He said he felt the ace bandage loosen as the swelling went down right as we were praying. He got up and started walking around without a limp. A Mexican man whose collarbone was healed told us that a month before after we’d prayed for his lower back he’d experienced immediate relief. “For eight years I couldn’t work or run, and was unable to sit without pain. Since that day I've had no more pain,” he said with a smile. I asked an inmate to pray for my head ache and felt heat flow from his hand and the pain go away. All of us were moved by Jesus’ generous, healing presence, some to tears. We ended by inviting people to put their hands over their hearts and welcome God’s love deeper and deeper into our beings.

Please keep us in your prayers:

· For our five-day course, "On Earth As In Heaven," on the ministry of Jesus and the Kingdom of God, July 8-12 at Tierra Nueva (see www.tierra-nueva.org)

· For funding for our retreat center New Earth Refuge http://bobekblad.com/donate.html.

· For Iris Ministries in Mozambique and Tierra Nueva.

If you want to receive regular updates via email, sign up at http://bobekblad.com/donate.html

Jesus Encounters on the Road

2007-05-31T22:14:00.000-07:00

Two days ago I headed out with my Isuzu Trooper across the North Cascades Highway for an overnight trip to Winthrop to speak to a group of Christians about things God is doing and to pray for healing.

As I headed up the steep highway into the mountains steam began to pour out from under my hood. An overheated radiator soon forced me to pull over, high in the mountains far out of cell-phone range. Still a good hour from my destination and barely on time without this inconvenience, I grabbed my backpack and began hitchhiking. The first car stopped and dark-haired Native looking woman motioned me in. I squeezed into the back seat as the driver’s heavily-tattooed arm moved piles of clothes off my seat. He was headed right past where I needed to go, and soon we were off, throbbing rock music blaring out of speakers tirades against injustices. “System of a Down” she said.

Since I had been worshipping and praying the whole way to that point I continued to pray, now for this couple. All I could see most of the time of the driver was his long pony tail. Occasionally I caught glimpses of his eyes in the rear view mirror. They looked like pools full of pain and sorrow.

Thirty minutes later we crossed Washington Pass, passing snow drifts and granite faces that caused the driver to turn down the music and slow down. “You ever been through here?” He asked.

“Yeah, fairly often. Beautiful isn’t it?” I said.

“So what do you do for a living?” he asked.

When I told him I was a pastor he kept asking several more times, like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. I told him I minister to inmates in Skagit County Jail and to others on the margins. I told him how much I enjoy working with people who feel like they’re damned, like no one cares, like they’re too bad for God to want to help. I told him how I am convinced that God has special affection for violent men, and then asked him what he does.

“Tattoo artist,” he said. “Just did one for this young lady who I hardly know. Now we’re off on a drive for a few days. Maybe we’ll head on down to Mexico.”

“Where did you learn how to tattoo?” I asked.

“In prison,” he said, knowing now that I was at least somewhat safe. Turned out he’d been out 2 ½ years after doing 21 years, beginning when he was 17.

“Been through every prison in the State,” he said, and went on to tell me how “effed up” the whole prison system is. “Doesn’t do no good for nobody,” he said. “I taught classes for ten years to new inmates on how to survive doing time.”

I told him how I longed to see churches welcoming ex-offenders, helping them when they get out, like we try to at TN’s Family Support Center. We arrived where I needed to get out and I offered to pray for them.

“Not while I’m in the car,” he said, half joking. It seemed to me he really wanted prayer but didn’t want to look weak in front of his new girl friend. I blessed them and ran up to my meeting, only 15 minutes late!

That night I taught on Jesus’ ministry of welcoming outcasts, preaching life and healing, focusing on Acts 10:38, where Peter tells “how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.” At the end many people came up for prayer for empowerment by the Holy Spirit for the ministry of Jesus. A number of people received healing for different physical problems too.

The next morning my friend Patty drove me back over the pass with radiator patch and gallons of water to my car. It started right up and she took off. A few minutes later it was overheating again and died. Unable to start it, I was once again stranded in the mountains, until a Forest Service worker stopped by. He arranged for a tow truck already in the area to tow me home. Then we talked for the next hour all about how much damage methamphetamines had done to his community. He had seen a lot of good people bite the dust and was moved by stories about of how Jesus is finding and healing broken, hurting people. He’d once been an idealistic hippie and seemed still quite open to a big but realistic vision like the one Jesus preached and practiced.

The tow truck driver finally arrived and we were off on another adventure began. This guy had worked security in a casino for 16 years, taught karate and was a lead guitarist and singer in a rock band. I sensed he had lots of physical pain and after telling him a few stories about healings in the jail he told me he too could use some healing for his right shoulder, left elbow, and neck. I prayed as he drove and he kept checking himself out until he dropped me off, saying the pain had all gone away. Though he’d been outside the church since he was a kid, he knew he needed to forgive lots of people and wanted peace and joy in his heart to replace resentment and anger. “I’d like to come to your church he said,” as he dropped me and my Isuzu in the Tierra Nueva parking lot.

Now I’m home again and excited to see what God wants to do next. Please keep us in your prayers:

My son Luke and I leave for two weeks in Mozambique where I’ll be teaching in Heidi Baker’s Holy Given School. Pray for our protection and Presence with us on our journey.
Finances for New Earth Refuge—we’d like to finish construction on our prayer center but still need $125,000.
Finances for Tierra Nueva for our May payroll—still need $14,000 in the next ten days.

Blessings in Christ,

Bob Ekblad

Breakthroughs in Caracas, Ekblad Update #4

2007-05-22T15:04:00.000-07:00

Bob Ekblad
May 12, 2007

Dear friend,

I’m writing you a more detailed than normal report of my recent 8 day ministry trip to Caracas, Venezuela, because of the amazing series of events enlivened by God’s beautiful Presence. I lead a series of courses on the ministry of Jesus and Kingdom of God for a group of North Americans and Venezuelans living among and ministering to the urban poor in impoverished urban barrios. In the days before leaving National Public Radio labeled Caracas the most violent city in the world due to the high number of robberies and murders in the lawless, drug-infested barrios carved into the mountainsides surrounding the city where over half the city’s five million people reside. On my way to the airport a friend prays for me over the cell phone. He tells me a sees a picture of a rusty lock that looks like it could never open. Then he sees a rusty key inserted and the apparently impossible happens—the padlock opens.

I meet my Tierra Nueva colleague Chris in Caracas, fresh from travels through Mexico and Central America. We stayed with Innerchange workers John and Birgit Shorack and their three children and ministry worker Ryan Mathis in their home and ministry center, perched high in the heart of a maze of winding roads, alleys and paths through a ramshackle of brick cubes and tin roofs of barrio “Pedro Camejo.” The Shoracks are veteran ministry workers in dark and difficult places. They began their ministry to Caracas’ impoverished barrio dwellers five years ago after serving over ten years in inner-city Los Angeles. I counseled, prayed and taught their staff in the mornings. We led Bible studies and prayed with families and walking the streets where muggings and killings are commonplace in the afternoons and early evenings. We were all delighted to see Jesus free people from pain in every home we visited, as we gathered family members, ministry workers and neighbors around whoever needed relief and invited God’s Kingdom to come, right where we were "as in heaven."

Ryan, a 24-year-old American living and working there with Innerchange was attracted to the “bad guys” in a special Jesus-like way. Though he had been traumatized by numerous muggings and encounters with dead bodies on the streets, his love led him to boldly and respectfully reaching out to the hated malandros (no goods, hoodlums, thieves, scum), who terrorize the barrios with constant muggings, even in broad daylight, at gunpoint, and in taxi jeeps that come through.

Even though Ryan had nearly left due to the trauma of these holdups, he had been pressing in and interceding for the malandros and trying to make connections. Reaching out to the barrio outlaws is a particularly risky venture. Not only are they themselves armed and dangerous, but they have enemies seeking to kill them at all times, making you a potential target as their associate or a victim caught in the cross fire. Ryan invited Chris to go visit two of the most infamous guys he had befriended, hoping to find the worst of them, David, known as “Calimero.”

Calimero was a 19-year-old man caught up in drugs, thievery and violence. Calimero had on different occasions robbed nearly every one of the ministry staff and their children. He and his fellow bandits had held up taxi drivers, busloads of people and likely been involved in the killings that have been claiming growing numbers of victims every month.

Ryan took Chris with him to seek out and find Calimero. He had felt inspired to give something special to this guy who was always taking, offering him a prized poster of Jesus’ face made up of verses from the gospels. Calimero received Ryan and Chris into his tin-roofed shack hide-out, where he had lived alone since he was orphaned years before.

“We blessed Calimero straight out, while most of the neighborhood wants him dead, and he received it," says Chris regarding their visit. "I started getting words of knowledge and went for it, right there outside his shack house. Spot on stuff going into the voices he hears that torment him at night. Then his friend shows up and I immediately got an image of his wrist being yanked. Thinking maybe the police had grabbed him I asked. Yep, the police had tugged him by the wrist for blocks this week. I asked if I could pray for him. When he agreed to let me pray, I put my hand on his wrist and prayed for God to restore the respect the cops stole, and thanked Jesus that he’s about restoring the things the enemy steals and how God respects him and adores him, and knows these details in their lives and sends us to tell them because he is a good papi and cares a lot.”

Calimero then invited Ryan and Chris into his house, something unheard of as most people in the barrio didn’t know where he lives and "friends" don't even go in. When Ryan suggested that he wanted to bless his place Calimero shyly agreed, his ear is torn like a scrappy dog's off the streets from a fight.

“He is dark, wearing nylon shorts,” recounts Chris, “old basketball shoes, a tank top and cap. Very shy, quiet. I would even say sweet-- but I hear he is the most feared around here. Kids with guns, man, not terrorists. We spend over an hour in this empty shack of rusted metal sheets nailed to scrap two by fours with the back wall blown out overlooking a great view of all the valley's barrios. We silence the voices. Even his hand is extended. We talk about how God is pursuing him, but not to hurt him like others in the barrio, but to embrace him. God knows that hurting people who aren't doing good is like burning a house down that has trash in it instead of just taking out the trash. God knows how to take the bad stuff out of us and cast it out, burn it like the trash around here. He likes this. Then Ryan gives him a really cool poster of Jesus' face made from scribbled words, passages." That night, on a risky beer run Chris sees Calimero on the corner. He smiles and the first thing he says is that the poster is up.

The next day Chris and I lead the staff in a session of prophetic worship and listening prayer, where we seek to come into God’s presence as a group to discern what God is doing in our lives and in their ministry. The Spirit is present powerfully, touching everyone in different ways that they hadn’t experienced. One gets hit with uncontrollable laughter, another with weeping, another begins speaking in tongues for the first time, someone ends up on the ground, hands and feel burning up as God’s presence comes with a feeling a weightiness. Birgit, the mother of the team who says she does get prophetic words or feels says has a vision where she sees Calimero’s body wrapped in the Jesus poster. Not wanting to affirm this after the breakthroughs with Calimero the day before, I awkwardly underplay it.

The next morning the whole team heads out of town with leaders of the house churches for a two-day retreat in the mountains. Nearly all of the 35 or so who attend the retreat live in impoverished barrios where violence is rampant. I teach on the ministry of Jesus and the Kingdom of God. At one point Chris sang a song he wrote in Skagit County Jail based on Luke 7:34, where Jesus is judged by his enemies as “a gluttonous man, and a drunkard, a friend of tax-collectors and sinners” that simply repeats the Spanish version of the refrain: “Jesus, friend of sinners, we love you.” After a few lines he replaces the Spanish word for sinners, pecadores, with malandros, causing some to visibly wince. I decide to lead a session on the relationship between forgiveness and deliverance from evil spirits based on the parable of the debtor who is forgiven and then refuses to himself forgive.
According to Jesus’ parable a slave owing ten thousand talents begs a king to forgive him his debt rather than selling his wife, children and all he has. The king feels compassion and releases him, forgiving his debt. The slave in turn seizes and chokes a fellow slave owing only a hundred denarii, throwing him in prison rather than forgiving him. When the king hears about this he calls him in and asks: “Should you not have had mercy on your fellow slave, as I had mercy on you?' (Matthew 18:33). He then hands him over to the torturers until he repays all that was owned him (18:34). Jesus ends his teaching with a stern warning: So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother or sister from your heart" (18:35).

We discuss how living according to human justice rather than in the mercy of God leads to being delivered over to the accuser, who torments and tortures us, requiring us to live according to the harsh demands of human justice: demanding that we pay back everything we owe. I remind people of the prayer that Jesus taught his disciples, where we pray: "forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors” (Matthew 6:12). I briefly present Leviticus 19:17 “You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall reprove your neighbor, or you will incur guilt yourself.” I point out that the Septuagint version translates the end of this verse fittingly with “so thou shalt not bear sin on his account.” When we hold judgments against people in our hearts we are allowing their sin to infect us. We are carrying their sin rather than letting Jesus bear it.

I suggest that as we drop our judgments against people that are based on justice we will become free of any of their guilt or sin that we bear due to our resentment and bitterness from unforgiveness. When we confess our sin of judging and drop charges against others, any legal right for the torturers (evil spirits) to torment us disappears. I invite people to confess their bitterness, hatred and judgments and to drop their charges against enemies and others who have offended them. I insist that our forgiveness has nothing to do with our offenders confessing, asking for forgiveness or deserving our pardon. This is about extending the grace that has been offered freely to us by God in Jesus on the cross. I pass out paper and pencils and invite people into a time of listing names of people against whom they hold judgments, writing the specific offenses beside their names. We invite the Holy Spirit to come, bringing to memory people who God is calling us to forgive. For the next twenty minutes or so people write reflect and write. Some cry as they write. I am sure that many malandros stalking their barrios received pardon.

We end that session with a corporate prayer where we drop our charges against people who have offended us, forgiving them and blessing them in Jesus’ name. I place a big cast iron frying pan in the middle of the circle and invite people to crumple up their papers and place them in the pan. We burn the papers and invite God’s Spirit to fill us with love and the strength to live in a place of mercy rather than judgment.

The retreat ends and the bus arrives, driving us down from the mountain paradise and back to the barrios in Caracas. People seem full of joy, singing and chatting as we bump down the mountain road. I wonder what sorts of breakthroughs await us all as we re-enter the violent streets of the city. As we descend towards a nearby town a man stops our bus, warning us there’s been a tiroteo (shootout) just ahead. He suggests we go down the mountain a different way. The bus driver obliges, but after heading down another road he stops, realizing he’s completely lost. He decides to turn around and head down where the shootout happened. People in the bus are visibly agitated. Though they live with violence every day, someone begins vomiting and others are crying. We head past several groups of people where the shootout took place. They are visibly rattled: traumatized and angry looking. We make it back to Caracas fine, and take a jeep taxi back up to the barrio. Then we learn the bad news. An hour after we’d left Calimero had been stabbed repeatedly by someone just around the corner from the Shorack’s home. He’d staggered down the road where he fell and slowly bled to death below the corner of his most recent crimes.

We pray for Ryan, shocked and sobbing. The next day we have a final session and end with worship. We remember Birgit’s vision and are perplexed. We decide to embrace it as a sign of this community’s newfound ability to hear from God. We agree that Birgit’s picture of Calimero wrapped in a poster of Jesus’ face is an image of a certain kind of victory. Calimero “died not wrapped in hate,” reflects Chris, “but in so little time knowing Ryan, died with the one thing given to him that he didn't have to steal. This gift was a picture of Jesus’ face, the only thing on his wall he eagerly put up, and symbolically now wrapping him in the friendship of Jesus in a world that doesn't love orphans-gone-thieves like that.” I see Ryan’s gift to Calimero as preparing him for his buriel, much like the woman’s pouring perfume on Jesus’ feet prepared Jesus for his. We wonder and hope that Calimero will be the key to the rusty padlocked neighborhood where this team has been ministering for four years now with little fruit.

This seems confirmed that night as Ryan and John head off to attend the wake. Ryan returns late, sobered and more hopeful. He tells of hanging with other young men around Calimero’s still body, malandros like Calimero, who smoked a concoction of heroin and other drugs together in Ryan’s presence in memory of their fallen companion. Ryan’s deeper rapport with the malandros is certainly hopeful. His calling is deepened now and the stakes are getting higher. The need is certainly clearer and more urgent than ever to live out an embrace of these kids like Calimero, who's blood is calling from the street like an invitation to Ryan and others so seek a Gospel that has the power to truly save, heal and liberate the most broken and violent ones-- who rob by day and can trust no one. The team is pondering a vigil through the barrio for Calimero and all those dying in the streets, both innocent and perpetrators. Upon returning from the retreat one of the house church families found bullet holes across the front of their home. Others witnessed a woman shot and killed after throwing herself in front of her son’s assailants, taking the bullets.

Chris, who had weeks before hung with murderous gangster “mareros” sentenced to life in prison in Guatemala’s gang prisons sums up the heightened sense of calling he himself feels after this experience.

As in Guatemala, where I just was with the gangsters in the prisons, it is common for the community who feels understandably paralyzed in fear at the spread of such youth in their neighborhood to just wish these mareros and malandros dead. To wait silently, lock your doors, and hope that either the police lock them away somewhere darker or their own cohorts get to them first and kill them directly makes a kind of sense. But when you get to know one or two, the mention of a dead malandro that has the name of the one you saw with God's eyes hurts. It makes you weep and come together in prayer and feel like you want to do this for the rest of your life with Jesus, even if you catch a knife or bullet yourself. It’s funny how love works, and how Jesus gives it so heavily and points us with it in the oddest directions.

“Very truly, I tell you,” says Jesus. “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (John 12:23-24). The worst that the enemy can throw at us, death, is paradoxically the very thing that emboldens Ryan and Chris following Calimero’s murder. God turns the enemy’s weapon into a catalyst for fruitfulness and victory as new disciples find themselves unable to resist the call.

Please remember the Shoracks and the entire Caracas Innerchange team in your prayers: for protection, breakthrough and fruitfulness. Pray for us here at Tierra Nueva (TN) too.
• For financial provision for Tierra Nueva during times of scarcity.
• For $125,000 still needed to complete the building of New Earth Refuge healing prayer and hospitality facility that will sleep 20+
• For Thursday evening and Sunday afternoon bilingual services in the jail and Sunday evening English and Spanish services at TN.

Abundant blessings in Christ,

Bob Ekblad

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