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That title phrase is what I heard the Spirit of God expressly say these words to me the other day as I prayed over our media outreach to Boston Massachusetts and this United States of America.
Not by the pen of St. Paul in his epistle to 'Christian Partners' during perilous times, but by the clicking of a computer keyboard on email, I share them with you, the 'Last Days Church' in the earth today.
A nd pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains.
Colossians 4:3 (New International Version)
Not just any ol' door. But a massive door? A BIG door! An EFFECTUAL door! A PRODUCTIVE - FRUIT - PRODUCING - SIGNIFICANT door!
Mass Communications:
T o mass millions of lost souls in an age of increasing dangers of natural, man-made and supernatural forces, all prophesied thousands of years ago.
TV, Radio. Stadiums. State Houses, Billboards. Book Publishing Houses.
I was praising God today because He has indeed done all of this in our ministry through the past thirty years, opening many promising but challenging doors of utterance. And as Paul asked, I ask for your prayers too. Because with opportunity comes great responsibility. We then, do not choose the low road, the path of least resistance when battles arise. We are willingly tethered to our assignments if we take the calling of serving Christ seriously. Paul was in jail for his commitment.
I am ever amazed at Christians who so lightly throw their pledges and commitments to Him and each other aside when circumstances don't suit. Dr. Kenneth E. Hagin taught this to us in Bible School years ago and I have never forgotten it, but I have wondered if some people ever read it in the Bible:
Psalm 15:4
... but he honoureth them that fear the LORD. He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not.
I've just shook my head through the years at folks who tell me "I'll be there on such and such a day. Wild horses and the end of the world couldn't keep me away..." And you never see them. They don't even call. How many pastors cringe when they hear these familiar words from a fresh new face after a Sunday service: "Oh Pastor! THIS IS MY CHURCH!" and sure enough they forgot the address next week.
I was in a large civic center some years ago where over five thousand people had gathered for a week of camp meeting style services. The first night a famous evangelist stood before them, all in the flesh, spewing and jerking people to make pledges for a thousand dollars each. He finally got it done, with everyone slithering under their chairs with worry. Then he turned to the host and announced loudly, "Well there is your $17,000 budget met on the first night! You won't have to worry about another ounce of it. You can just get on over into the spirit and enjoy these folks and the Lord!"
With that he walked off proud of himself, wiping away the sweat. I knew the man and I knew he was a good sincere soul. But I looked at the host's forlorn and worried face. I didn't want to be a doubter, but a few years on the convention circuit had taught me a thing or two about common sense and human nature opposed to faith and good character. I figured most of them wouldn't pay that pledge. And I supposed that the host would be stuck with a whopping big bill for that civic center, those speakers, hotels, meals, transportation, advertisement and a slew of other things most people never consider, never mind the overtime bill the evangelist had just racked up with the union workers at that arena there while he pulled all that past the planned closing time! Whew!
I am also ever amazed at ignorance when people write me hateful emails or letters accusing me of being money hungry when I share things like this. Most have no clue what goes on behind the scenes to turn on the lights in their church and keep the floors swept, never mind a big camp meeting or ministry that could ever reach multitudes. They say, "Well, ya know if God sends you he'll pay the bill." And it's true He will. But most generally he uses people and quite often they like the goods from the glory side of things and find the faith side that demands a reciprocation or stretch, rather distasteful.
A true saint, a good preacher, a faithful servant of the Lord WILL get blessed, but if people refuse to share of their carnal goods when they have shared of their spiritual goods, they'll loose their harvest and they'll wonder why it seems the Lord has forsaken them at the gas pump.
I knew a couple in Washington DC one time that were minding a home for my board members. They didn't have any money. They were missionaries from abroad and they needed to fix a broken appliance in that house with no budget. After much prayer, the Lord told them to just go have lunch on the patio where they'd lovingly been putting a prayer garden in for their hosts. They had no money but they were giving all the same of themselves. And the Lord honored it. Suddenly a big crow flew down the alley and dropped a wad of paper in a drain pipe above the row house. Something fell into a rain barrel below. The couple, curious, investigated. To their shock it was a large wad of money, cash! And it had cobwebs on it. Forgotten long ago in some hidden place where God sent the bird to fish it out for his faithful servants! And there's more. The Drain above the barrel was lose. After taking it down for repair, that couple found hundred's of dollars, deposited the same way over a period of time, all wedged in the drain spout. Why, God had led them to the pin point location of blessing in their missionary journey! And they bought the needed appliance for their unsuspecting hosts and sowed again, blessing them with Holy Ghost laughter as they listened to the amazing story on a cell phone.
It's best when we give and can bless someone. Then we get blessed. But God is greater than it all. Just don't let your opportunity to get blessed pass you by! Buy an extra gallon of gas for distressed stranger today at the pump. Pay the toll for the car behind you and tell the toll booth agent that Jesus loves them and to pass on the good news to the blessed car coming along. My sister Meg did that for years in Baltimore and I marveled at my little sister's kindness and simple method of effective evangelism to strangers she has never met for a thank you or acknowledgement. Meg has great faith and she encourages me. Everyone should have a sister like that. But if you don't, God has one in the family of Christ, just thank him for the friends you have and the friends and partners you need!
It's a fight to keep high ground once awarded and conquered. We have to continuously be vigilant in prayers of intercession over every outreach in this ministry. We have to keep the vision before the people and fail not to communicate as Paul admonished leaders.
For my 'carnal man' flesh side, it would be so much easier to cave in to the recession talk and cut backs. But our daily Radio Show of Morning Song and our open doors at TBN and DAYSTAR are too precious.
WE HAVE TO GUARD THIS
MASSIVE DOOR OF UTTERANCE.
D ue to the panic of many partners who have contacted us with apologies and desperate prayer requests in the wake of economic upheaval, we have felt the bite too. More than 50% of the funding dropped in December and not to one ounce of foolishness or unwise spending on our part. It costs $2,300 a month for the DOOR of RADIO to over a million ears in spiritually dry New England. It costs over $10,000 to produce one more TV documentary on revival or American Christian Heritage. It costs over $600 for airline travel to most cities where I preach and pray for people who are healed and grateful I used faith to come their way!
Faith pleases God. He's not all about little smiley bookstore cherubs in Christianese land! He's put the enemy under our feet but he's called us among wolfs, to fight a good fight of faith, to reach a sin filled world with extraordinary resources in hard times and good times. Eternity doesn't wait on man's changing tides.
God wants to do things in a BIG WAY!
It's not that He or his servants have a big ego trip. It's because there is a BIG HARVEST going to waste as I write. Jesus wept. The shortest most to the point verse in the New Testament. He wept for the harvest and the lack of laborers. His mission was not in vein but too many souls would miss it.
God sent the biggest most expensive answer he had to save souls; his son Jesus. He didn't send second best, an angel, or an ordinary man. And God was on an urgent time line, so how do we excuse ourselves the leisure of not hooking up with that?
Please pray and use your faith to join me in GUARDING A MASSIVE DOOR OF UTTERANCE in BOSTON.
It would only take 10 people in this nation to care enough, who are able to sow $1,000 to pay off the current radio bill for this quarter. It would only take 23 people to sow only $100 per month to pay each day of broadcasting!
How do you eat an elephant?
 One bite at a time. It's really very easy. It's just about prayer and caring enough to do it. Even 230 people giving only $10 per month would lick this thing.
Wouldn't it be a joy to get a report like that from me and my partners next week? The radio station would be thrilled and so would I.
Recently the chairman of the entire nationwide network called me to congratulate me on the quality of the show and encourage me to expand it across America.
We CAN DO THIS partners! And there will be a rich harvest if we do!
Much love to you all.
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ANOTHER MASSIVE DOOR
How to Guard it
State House News media Galleries are eye opening places to sit while covering news-breaking events of government, not only for the obvious stories unfolding on the legislative floor, but for observations behind the scenes of who shapes the packaging of news and of what they focus most attention on.
All around me, during the nation's first major battle of 2004 over gay marriage, I watched the news crews scooping sound bites that would shape public opinion from the risers where we sat crouched balancing recording devices and journaling pads. Though not many of the legislators arguing below us were openly gay, quite a few of the media next to me covering their side of the story for major networks were.
I suddenly realized that the decisions on the floor at the time the gavel fell on closing arguments were never going to carry as much weight by elected public officials as by cunning word smiths who would turn the helm of the battle any way they wished by the phrases they would coin for the points they would persistently push in brainwashing mode until the public were swayed into believing their arguments instead of the elected officials.
And unless you were in that gallery, how would you ever know anything but what they told or showed you?
Sure enough, newspapers across America still repeat the unqualified claim that gay marriage is now legal in MA by a law passed. It is a pending situation even yet, never having been passed into law, only pushed into effect by an unelected judge, continuing to be fought in both legislative and court appeal battles. But since most Americans were not present in the gallery that day, and only heard the stories spun cunningly to press this point, they remain ignorant of that fact. And in ignorance, the brainwashing continues that some law on the issue was passed and became iron clad law, and further more the media assures them it is non reversible.
We perish in many things for lack of knowledge and mostly because the knowledge is too troublesome to obtain, or deal with. It usually necessitates effort to be exerted beyond the notion of a false peace that people prefer. It follows a false teaching, half truth that was popular in the 1800's and poisoned the theology that crept into the 21st century,
To counteract the age of reason, and avoid the stress of the burgeoning industrial revolution, at a time when people only wished to seek God's peace and recover from the civil war, preachers in popular camp meetings began calling the masses away from institutions of higher learning, away from military careers, away from greed-filled ventures and ever-increasing complicated politics.
It sounds like this: "If it stresses you, it couldn't be from God. He isn't the author of confusion, Poverty is spiritual strength, Jesus is love and peace etc " and later in the 1960's, "Only if it feels good, do it "
Jesus is indeed both of those miraculous things, love and peace, the real Hebrew word for it: "Shalom" peace [Nothing missing. Nothing broken]
But our founding fathers, who'd lost lives and fortunes for the cause of our liberty and peace, rightly understood the balance of these truths adding the counter wight into the equation of the right to peace and the pursuit of happiness:
"Fight the good fight of faith", "Be sober and vigilant", "If you don't work you don't eat", "I send you as sheep among wolves", "Be harmless as doves but wise as serpents", "God is the God of witty inventions." "The devil comes to kill, steal and destroy but I have come that you might have life more abundantly", "God delights in the prosperity of his servants", Give and it shall be given unto you", (Sowing and reaping )", And the industrious lives of the apostles and Jews, that Jesus lived amongst, were testimony enough to the fact that He intends us to chose the high road for true peace and fulfillment, regardless of the price or momentary afflictions to achieve it.
It was a destructive path of least resistance that left our colleges, white collar work places, media industry, military and politics largely void of Christian leadership, filled with eager replacements who brought atheism and sin to rule over.
The majority of Christians today are poor, not in leadership roles, not seeking to mature, not pressing to highest levels of faith, sick, and not actively involved in ministry of either their church or that of missionaries, evangelists or other Over 90% only attend church on a spotty basis. Over 50% who do attend do not work there. Over 80% do not hold high paying jobs, leadership positions, government positions, media positions, military positions, own homes, earn a degree or much else that would put them in the key positions of maintaining a vigilant lifestyle over any semblance of a peaceful society.
They suffer the consequences, complain and do nothing about it. Prayer? Well that would work, but there are fewer intercessors today of the real sort than ever before. And of what does bend the knees more often than others, is emotion based, not word anchored. Zeal wears you out and gets nothing more accomplished than a Santa Claus sugar coated wish list.
"Labor that ye may enter into rest."
Anything of a natural or spiritual existence that is worth its weight in natural or spiritual gold takes, effort, preparation, and vigilance. The high road. Not the peace-nick low road to destruction. Narrow is the way; the way to on the high road.
I love Dodi Olsteen's testimony of how she was given up to die of metastatic cancer of the liver, but took the Medicine of God's word literally, speaking it like doses of an intravenous continuous drip, until, hour after hour, day after day it destroyed her tumor. Thirty some years later her hard work, vigilance and high road path kept her in good health. Hearing her tapes, I chose the same path when facing the report of a tumor growth the size of an orange in 1994. It worked. I listened to those scriptures daily and nightly for almost a year, EVERY DAY. The force of consistency, the labor of DOING it, built up my faith, brought back my health and destroyed the growth with no surgery or medical intervention. Yet I share that with sick people and so few take me up on the challenge to do likewise. There is a high road and a low road. One is difficult and leads to victory. One is lazy born of false peace and leads to destruction.
America's woes are not only the fault of sinners, but of Christians avoiding the high road and all it demands of them to be there consistently, not just from goose bump to goose bump.
Now, getting back to the State House; another massive door of utterance:
As I left the building a Democratic congressman who had showed appreciation for my
Republican Christian Perspective, thanked me for my efforts and prayers. Then he gave me this word of admonition and advice:
"People don't want to be told the truth when it would spoil hard work and great effort, especially leaders in the church world. I know it was a major feat to pull off a gathering of the thousands of Christians out there in those pre-dawn hours, and to hold them here on that common for their demonstration of prayer, the march, a stand in, a rally, but we see them every day in Washington and protestors here in Boston too. And we've learned to dodge them, get around the annoying traffic jams they spur, tune out the shouts to keep focused thoughts of hours of preparation for the task at hand in this State House. You've missed the point. All of you; " (But I must ad he wasn't trying to put us down. He also told me how much he appreciated us being there and the prayer furnace going on down below in the basement. He told me that personally it had strengthened him. He was trying instead to show me how it all came across to those in the gallery making the decisions. Neither side had ignored our mass gatherings. But the most immediate impact was more easily obtained elsewhere as he went on to explain;)
I was stunned. "Why?"
He explained, "It takes less effort to show up and follow public guidelines to sit in the chairs of this gallery here. It's open to all citizens. Today it's fairly full, but every other day it's nearly empty."
I could see the greater value in this idea. Though I participated in the rally outdoors too and know that it did show up in the news, I could see his point: To the ears that counted that day on the legislative floor and the media gallery, the crowd outside were just faces and noises and some irritating thing in the way of an oppressive job's overload of dealing with the public. But when the arguments were being made on the floor just moments before, I'd seen the legislators looking around the room, making eye contact with colleagues, media and even gazing up into that gallery for immediate reactions of confirmation to what they'd expressed. Those few, those faces, those bodies had their attention.
Position, not just only hard work, not even necessarily many, but the required few in the right place at the right time had made a difference to those men and women deciding such a critical issue that day. They could not hear the prayers in the basement and had tuned out the crowds in the common. (But I know that God heard them! It wasn't in vein, it just wasn't the fullness of the equation. Our faith and prayers have to also be accompanied by our works too and on a consistent basis. Hit and miss just doesn't cut it.)
I had passed by the Nurse's gallery on my way out and had a chill run down my spine as I heard the forerunner in the gay side saying these words, "I don't know how those Christians got their people here in mass today but my experience with church people is they'll let this die down and get back to life as normal. Zeal is not what we're banking on here today." All too well, I knew what she meant.
It's every citizen's duty to be here on a regular basis to make a free government work. It's every man's obligation to care. Our forefathers gave us a say in democratic government instead of oppression by kings, and we may have it calmly, civilly right here" He pointed around the marble halls.
That is how government for the people, by the people, of the people works.
"But they don't care. It's not important to them. Let somebody else take the responsibility... So they do and they are here today pushing their agenda because those out there didn't wake up until the panic button was pressed. It's a miracle that all of you pastors got them here but the greater miracle would be if they stayed. If they returned. If their voice was often heard and their faces seen in that gallery. If they could learn about government first hand and understand how to use it and make it work. That would be the America our forefathers dreamed of."
He looked so distraught and weary as he cupped a hand on my shoulder, "Not like this today. Did Jefferson or Witherspoon or Adams ever think a Democrat like me would pass through these hallowed halls cupping my ears in disbelief as people scream at me to allow men to marry men? I didn't sign up for this! I asked to be elected to represent government not insanity. Jesus help us all. Pray for me."
As he walked off I looked back at the gallery one last time that day. Its massive door was swinging shut as a guard stood near it.
God gives gifts of administration and government by his spirit yet how many times do we ever have alter calls of hallowed measure in reverence to pray for young people who might come forth to be elected? We don't even have alter calls for missionaries to serve anymore in the church world because so few wish to support them. Never mind troubling the waters for this?
After another event at the State House in 2007, bone weary from 8 months of vigorous hard work of organizing, preparing a program, and platform, I walked away from the back door of the same building. This time I'd been able to get the crowd inside and we nearly filled it. There were legislators and honored guests there listening. weeping and the state house staff hugged me as I left.
But the door has remained closed all year because of so few laborers willing to continue the sacrificial work and levels of giving and resourcing the efforts.
State House doors are open to me all over the nation because of those events and a presidential candidate helping me to utilize them and understand the process. But this demands a TEAM EFFORT. More people could if they would. But that might be stressful and this is where most folks draw the line. Jesus didn't. He weathered the storms of the Galilea one night in great peril to preserve life and press on for someone's deliverance. Our forefathers in the Mayflower pressed on and those on the battle fields.
But unless we gain greater awareness, support, prayer and action another Massive Door of Utterance risks to be closed. GUARD IT!
F reedom isn't Free and if you fail to use it you will lose it.
America its time to chose the high road not the path of least resistance where there are no gates or doors needing your hand to turn the knobs and your presence to guard the opening.
Long after the State House anit- gay- marriage rally subsided, the news fervor died down, the bills to keep fighting the battles for the Mass Family Institute and others grew. Calling for funds from crowds that were now distracted in other concerns of life, yielded less and less through the months, awarding the other side once again. If we fail it is not to be said it was the will of God. It is to be asked, where were the laborers, the sacrificial givers, the people on the high road?
Where were the guards over these doors of utterance and power?
I held a huge event at the same State House last year and hoped to come right back at it again. But people told me, it was too strenuous and effort, too time consuming, to costly, to demanding. Pledges of both people's time and money died away. I have grieved over that. The door is still open but more could be done, should have been done, must be done.
In this I learned another of life's difficult lessons about dealing with people, even 'good' Christian people; "Trouble me once. Trouble me a little while - but not always," "Stretch me some, but let me flex back to the way I was, comfortable - thank you!"
It's not enough to pray for a massive door of utterance to preach the Gospel. But we must guard it with all diligence, reverence and responsible civic action continuously.
As my harp instructor once told me,"Practice DOES NOT make perfect! ONLY PRECISE, PERSISTENT practice makes perfect!"
Why are massive doors of utterance, and of government eluding our grasp? We are hitting amiss and not often enough, in the minority, not the majority.
Freedom always costs you something;
Sacrificial Money. Sacrificial Effort. Sacrificial prayer time.
Attend rallies. But visit your congressmen yourselves! Write them. Support those who do. Attend Town Hall Meetings and educate yourself and your children about how our government works. There in the main vein of it, close to it's daily heart will be the change we seek, not only through the ear gate of sporadic noisy rallies. (Though I love them! It's been a joy to be a part of the rallies in Boston, and on the Washington Mall. The Bible tells us to fail not to gather ourselves together in such times when gatherings are called for, what about all the in between times?)
More sinful laws will flourish at home and more soldier's lives abroad will be lost to protect our careless freedoms unless we the
Silent majority WAKE UP!
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| PARTNERS NOTE:
A MASSIVE DOOR OF UTTERANCE in BOSTON.
It would only take 10 people in this nation to care enough, who are able to sow $1,000 to pay off the current radio bill for this quarter. It would only take
23 people to sow only $100 per month to pay each day of broadcasting!
How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. It's really very easy. It's just about prayer and caring enough to do it.
Even 230 people giving only $10 per month would lick this thing.
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SAY NO!
To
RECESSION!
Psalm 91
promises that
Those who dwell
in the presence of the Lord will see a thousand fall on their left side and ten thousand on their right but it will not come near them in the
STAY HIGH IN YOUR FAITH FOR FINANCES
I wanted you to see the card on my refrigerator that
Kenneth Copeland sent his partners. It really blessed me. They have grown from extreemly lean times, living as poverty stricken students on the river bank of Tulsa near my home to being in charge, as God's servants of world wide ministry that reaches millions. God doesn't time in bad times or good times.
Why not print it and cut it out and post it with me. Let's confess God's blessings and
"Call those things that be not
as though they are!"
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