Wednesday, June 17, 2009

escape velocity...

NASA scientists often talk about something called "escape velocity"- In layman's terms it is the speed an object needs to be traveling at to overcome the force of gravity. If we can make an object go fast enough, (without causing it to burn up due to heat friction), it can escape the influence of gravity on the earth.

Now what does this have to do with following Jesus- Well are you tired of certain besetting sins in your life? We "psyche ourselves up" to escape from a pattern of sin (let's pretend it is anger- something I don't struggle with...or am I adding deception as another problem ugghhh). We use lots of energy to avoid sinning with anger. The heat and pressure increases on our life...and then... uggghhhh; we the "gravity" or craving of sin gets to us and we crash- and we are still stuck in the same base problem. (Sort of frustrating... and I am now really angry about it.)

So what's the issue? The problem is not about trying harder, but its about recieving more! Assuming that we are exerting emotional and psychological energy (our human will) to resist sin, The issue becomes receiving God's grace. Grace is the free gift of power from God. It is grace that gives us the ability to go faster and escape the "gravity of sin".

In general, the power is manifested in the inner man to handle life with joy and victory. 2 Peter 1:3-4 tells us, His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them, you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. However, the same paradigm also works for manifesting God's grace in the physical realm (prophecy, miraculous healings, and other miracles in the natural realm).

In this passage is a promise from heaven that God will empower us to escape the grip of sin- as we set our hearts to love Jesus and His righteousness. Things such as fasting, prayer, serving, giving, avoiding offense (a grace killer) and pursuing righteousness position our life to recieve more of God's grace safely-without "burning up". When a whole community practices this out of a heart of love for Jesus, a corporate grace is released that transcends anything we could do individually.

Q: Are you ready to launch out for righteousness and escape the gravity of sin?

Friday, May 22, 2009

Israel Mandate conference...

The Israel Mandate Conference is coming up June 5th-7th.

This is critical for IHOP-KC's overall ministry mandate. The other day God showed me that the Israel mandate is critical to making all of the other IHOP-KC mandates to work well.

Jesus clearly told all of us that He will not return to earth in Matthew 22:37-39 until Israel cries out, "Blessed is he (Anyone) who comes in the name of the LORD." Generally, Orthodox Jews are very hostile to the idea of Jesus Christ of Nazareth being the Messiah. Many of them view anyone who turns to Jesus like this as committing "high treason". Meanwhile, secular Israel is suffering from an identity crisis in which they would rather be like everyone else who is deeply prosperous.

It will take extreme trouble and pressure along with an undeniable apostolic witness by the entire Gentile Church (confirmed by widespread signs and wonders; wisdom that is mind-boggling, love that is stronger than death along with apostolic conviction) to provoke Israel to jealousy and then salvation.

God is raising up a worldwide prayer movement centered on the final inbreaking of His Kingdom (i.e. the 2nd coming of Jesus). Jesus will only come back when the whole Church from every nation is ready and invites Him. (Matthew 24:14; Revelation 5:9-10; 22:17.)

Are you ready?

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

IHOP 10 year anniversary

Tommorrow is IHOP-KC's 10 year anniversary and there is a special program at FSM.

It is going to be quite a rush to get to the meeting because there are 2,500+ people in the IHOP community and the building holds roughly 1,500 people.

IHOP-KC opened on May 7th, 1999. I remember that week pretty well as it was on that day (a Thursday) when the revival at Bethel College (where I was attending school) began breaking forth as a few hundred students gathered to pray- something unusual for that school at that time.

Jess

Saturday, May 2, 2009

the glory of the 1st commandment

Over the last few weeks, I have been reviewing some of my most strategic prayer assignments that I have been involved in related to IHOP-KC.

All of them have "Onething" in common: They were all deeply rooted in a tangible expression of the 1st commandment.

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. This is the first and the greatest commandment. (Matthew 22:37-39)

In all of the special prayer assignment cases, God gave me an opportunity to love Jesus in a physical, tangible way in terms of time, money, physical strength etc. In every situation, God made his pleasure known after He empowered me to walk this out.

Q: What happens if a small group of people walk this out fully in a deep way? The world wants to find out!

Jess Gjerstad

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Newsworthy updates...

Here are some important newsworthy updates...

1. I've been studying the breakthrough anointing. I also know that with this anointing comes an extra measure of problems... (oooyyy...I wish I knew everything I knew now about this anointing in early 2008; it would have really saved me from some serious problems!)

2. Wanted in Myanmar: 100 apostolic church planters that can rapidly make disciples of Jesus. Must be firmly rooted and grounded in the love of Jesus, radically love Jesus, love people, and be prepared for hardships, opposition, and have a martyr spirit (i.e. "I'm ready to pour out my 'steaming blood' in this place for Jesus...")

3. May 7th 2009 is the 10 year anniversary for IHOP-KC. We were all asked as staff and IHOP family to share our memories and honor people. I had to pick on the "AA" association from my pastoral care days.

4. Reading a new book, "Healing the Tongue" by Derek Prince. It seems like my tongue needs healing and my pocketbook needs a prolonged "restoration" process (thanks to IRS).

It seems after a long period of lots of nothing happening...that something is happening again.

Friday, April 17, 2009

storm spotter training.

Yesterday, I went to the final session on storm spotting in Peculiar MO. Before coming to IHOP, I have always had a fascination with weather and storm. Here is what I really want to see:

1. A relatively calm storm season nation-wide until...

On a very strategic day...

A sharp negative-tilt trough punching in from the Northwest with height falls in excess of 200 Mb; A rapidly deepening surface low tracking from central Kansas to central Iowa between 18z and 06z with a central pressure of less than 995 mb falling to less than 980mb; LLJ from SSW at 60+kts; 500mb jet from the SW at 100+ kts; 300 mb Polar Jet and Subtropical jet blowing 120 kts+ interacting with strong divergence; several days of rich gulf moisture advecting northward; surface temps into the low 80’s and dew temps in the upper 60’s in the warm sector across eastern Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas, Eastern Texas, Eastern Oklahoma, Illinois, Indiana, and into the south east; overtopped by lapse rates of 8 degrees Celsius/km; with rain/snow on the back side of the mid-latitude cyclone (temperature contrast of 50 degrees or so).

For any meteorologists out there, lets root/pray for a set up like this...

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Writing on and on...

Well, it appears that there may be some hidden open doors forming related to my writing. This next Wednesday Meeting will be really interesting as it is a potential opportunity to "sell" my writing.

I guess I have 3 different books on my heart-

1.) Spiritual warfare at the End of the Age; This one is in the works. More on this one later.

2.) Governing prophetic people- the heart of the matter; Prophetic people can either cause a breakthrough or a breakdown depending on the humility level of the prophetic people AND the rest of the team. Bottom line- HUMILITY IS REQUIRED!

3.) Something on Israel and practically why it is necessary to pray for Israel. (Most of the wildest prayer stories I have are related to Israel.)