Manifesting Presence of the Holy Spirit

Son Light Rising

31,000 feet over central US skies.
Night turns to day as vibrant hues begin to rise.
Empty and void, save for a billion stars,
gives way to shifting, a new birth… and new hope.

Pitch black space above gives way to colors shifting,
bending, blending; giving hint of a new day.
Black to blackish blue, fiery orange to subtle red.
No words to define these colors filling my head.

Silent… slow motion… sailing…
peaceful encouraging paradigm.
Son light rising…
a witness to change.

Ever increasing as time goes by.
The darkness fades to the western sky.
But then back to work, focused and drawn away.
Just a memory, and the glory of a new day.

Earth’s expression of His Kingdom of color,
Trees clap their hands and the waves crash and roar.
Mountains declare the King of all Kings,
and the rocks cry out the Glory of the Lord.

“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamed of in your philosophy.”

Act 1, Scene 5, Hamlet
William Shakespeare

Very wise words indeed!

Theology, as it is generally thought of today, is nothing more than a compilation of philosophy; a product of man’s thinking. The word “theology” appears nowhere in the Bible. King James, New King James, NIV, NAS… nowhere.

Philosophies are based upon thoughts and conclusions; they too are of the mind of man. And so, like a philosophy, a theology is a grouping of a person’s or a people’s conclusions.

Kingdom truth however is based solely upon intimate relationship followed by a resultant revelation.

Intimate relationship leads to a release of what one’s partner knows. When we love someone, a trust is established to release deeper things held dear to each.

Where God is concerned, when I become intimate with Him in love, He begins to reveal Himself to me by showing me what He knows according to what He desires for me to know.

What He knows has no bearing, nor holds no definition in this world. And so Kingdom truth is given by revelation. It can’t be concluded, we must be revealed to it.

Theologies outside of revelation are worthless. They are nothing more than what man knows. It’s the tiny box man puts God in. Kingdom truth, however, is more precious than gold and is limited only be how much of it God desires to release to us. It is also limited by our choice to receive it.

Theologies and philosophies, therefore, are conceived. How limited is the mind of man, and the sum of all our conclusions!

Therefore, the only way to truth that is of any value is love, the love of God, of Jesus and of the Holy Spirit. An intimacy that leads the church into the inner courts of God, the very, and only place of revelation knowledge.

How Do I Know?

Hubble sees galaxies incredibly distant,
incalculable stars in the heavens existent.
Vastness and distance light years away.
Who can explain such creation man’s way?

Back here on earth the world’s such a mess.
Children go hungry, the wars, much illness.
Nations of poverty, not one with real hope.
Lost people stumble, at the end of their rope.

Violence, haters, the Anti-Semitic,
killings and bombings, the darkness pathetic.
All testify the fact that such evils abound,
sadness, hopelessness, death all around.

So asks man this question, “Does God really know me?
If so, where is He? I must know, He must show me!”
“How does He care for this world, billions strong?
How can this God endure all this wrong?”

Hubble sees galaxies incredibly distant,
incalculable stars in the heavens existent.
Vastness and distance light years away.
Who can explain such creation man’s way?

Day and its’ light move slowly towards night,
removing all colors from our sight.
Colors now blending indiscernible light,
unable to tell which way is right.

Left to my mind, if honest, I admit I would fail.
But in the light of true love, all is made well.
Though the world is virtually falling apart,
in His Face, now I’m known, now I know, but in part.

Intimate Lover sees each one the same.
Father’s tears, teachings, understood in His Name.
Billions of people in this world today.
And the questioning ask, “How’s God able to love them this way?”

Hubble sees galaxies incredibly distant,
incalculable stars in the heavens existent.
Vastness and distance light years away.
Who can explain such creation man’s way?

I don’t know how He does it, no person can.
But this I will testify, I know by His blood stained hand!
I know by His still small voice and by His loving touch.
I know by His gaze that has pierced thru so much.

I know how He delivered me from addictions so strong.
I know by this tune in my heart, my new song.
I know that I know that I know I am saved.
I know of my home by the sins that He waved.

I know by the cancers healed in my sight.
I know by the dead raised to life outright!
I know by the weight of His Presence I’ve seen.
Glory filled rooms in the church, there have been.

I know by the unity being restored.
I know by religious boxes destroyed by the Lord!
I know By His stirring in godly church pastors,
to turn from dry rivers and stagnant old waters.

I know by what is that’s emerged from what’s not.
I know from the cold that’s been turned into hot!
I know by His intimate personal visitations,
of revival fires across many nations.

Unfathomable existence, Who can this be?!
Billions of light years, little earth He does see.
Father holds you child upon His knee.
Who has eyes to see beyond what man can see?

Knowing’s impossible till His Face we will know,
Intimate dance of faith, we must go.
A choice we must make before He will show,
By evidences to immense for our tiny minds to know.

Now is your time, leap of faith you must make!
Spirit now calling, reveals His heart for your sake.
This leap of faith we must make now to know.
Keep asking Him, beckon His Face to you show?

Till then…

Hubble sees galaxies incredibly distant,
incalculable stars in the heavens existent.
Vastness and distance light years away.
Who can explain such creation man’s way?

T. Scott Morton
3/18/04

War of the Ages

Battle raging, incomprehensible fight;
flashing swords, shields, scarlet red at the sight.
Angels battle with authority and power.
Demons killing, raging, losing ground by the hour.

Spirit hovers over the field,
watching, awaiting the Saints to yield.
Chariots empowered both day and night,
flying thru cities flashing glorious light!

Doors of heaven opening and closing.
Warriors declare the doors imposing.
Enemy’s dismay the violence of Seven,
when these doors release the powers of Heaven.

Gideon’s armies over all the earth,
obedient to Fathers supernatural worth,
see our fights are His to win or lose.
But, call it forth in the time we choose.

The time we choose? Let this no longer be!
Let’s sacrifice now, His victory we’ll see.
The battle is on, this end time play,
It’s no time to go our own way.

And in the quiet place of worship we stand,
two or more, hand in hand.
The vision gained, the purpose clear,
voices releasing the weapons they fear.

Gideon and I in loving submission,
battle won or lost, our weighty decision.
Will I chance or not in faith proceed?
The battle rages on, my call, my heed.

No longer is the time for idle division.
Lie down to fight, this humble mission!
“It’s here, it’s now to you I call,
Do your part? No! Do your all!”

Battle raging, incomprehensible fight;
flashing swords, shields, scarlet red at the sight.
Angels battle with authority and power,
And to you I call, this is your hour!

T. Scott Morton
3/9/04

Suffering within the Body of Christ

As you read this word, please keep in the forefront of your mind this fact: There is no record in scripture that indicates that Christ ever suffered from an illness. Further, when Christ went to the cross, His death was not as a result of illness, but of beatings, stabbings and torture.

Rom 8:1-2 Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death.

I completely disagree with any premise that would suggest God would or has ever allowed or ordained Christian suffering based in illnesses, nor of early death that might result from such illnesses. Jesus, and subsequently the apostles, made it very clear that the future Body of Christ (His Church) would endure the same sufferings that Christ did. Only in the same ways that Jesus suffered, no more and no less, are the ways that the Christian Church might suffer. Jesus and the apostles said this so that the Church would understand the wonderful process of being perfected by sufferings, to be made ready for out Bridegroom.

We are made dependant by sufferings, we are not to be shut down by sufferings.

While Christ was on earth, he healed the sick, cast out demons and raised the dead; and of which was over 1/3 of his total ministry as written in the scriptures. He was fully a man when he walked the earth. Certainly at some point in the earthly life of Christ, He got sick. Maybe it was a cold, or maybe a stomach virus or who knows what.

When something is presented in the scriptures as a point of record, God has a reason that it be written. We therefore can surmise that since there was no record of Jesus being ill, His illnesses had no further meaning into the Church that would be to come. If Christ illness was a suffering as a manifest example to the Church to come, it would have been recorded in the word.

In this way, Jesus allowed Himself to be our perfect example of what it was to suffer for the cause of Father God. He was our example of what it was to be filled with the Holy Spirit and moving out in the power of the Holy Spirit to reap a harvest. He expressed His heart as fully a man filled fully with the Holy Spirit in the very same way we must believe and live ourselves. Jesus said that we would do the very same things and suffer the very same things that he personally exemplified while here on earth. He moved out in power and was hated for it. The result… persecution.

However, Jesus sufferings did not include illness. Rather, Jesus healed people from illness to testify to the healing power of Christ. His sufferings were based in hatred. He was beaten, yelled at, hated by the world, falsely accused and judged, and yet he still loved unconditionally. None of Jesus sufferings were infirmity based, rather, he healed infirmities by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Before the cross, healing power was not available in the same way, and so there was a clear difference in the manifestation of the Holy Spirit that became available because of the cross. This was then and remains today the very power of the cross. The power of the cross is not for our selfish gain (such as taking away suffering). The power of the cross and all such miracles of healing are for the benefit of the lost and for God’s glory. As such, His power is far more for the harvest than it is for us. We get in-filled with the Holy Spirit, become revealed to Kingdom truth and anointed with Kingdom power, and then we give it all away.

It is the “giving it all away” part that results in persecution and sufferings. Neither of Satan or the world desire for the Church to take it to the streets! Persecution and sufferings are designed by the devil and the fallen flesh of man to cause those who are moving out to cease and wallow in there infirmities. The devil’s primary purposes are to lie, steal, and ultimately kill. The primary tools of death are demonic spirits of infirmity. They come to steal life, the very opposite of what Christ came to do. Demons remain only by the rights we give them. They remain because of the religious lies the Church has accepted. One very big lie… that such events of illnesses within the Body of Christ are sufferings that we should accept for “our spiritual growth and for the glory of God.” How patently false! And this is clearly so when one examines the word of God. So there they are, lies, theft and death, all wrapped up in one process… infirmity.

If the devil, being “anti-christ”, comes to kill with tools of infirmity, then how is it that God would ever use infirmity to bring life?

The devil is only allowed to traffic in that which he has been given a right to traffic in. And so he traffics in the law. This is the very key premise of deliverance. Satan works in the carnality of our outer man. He works in our minds to get us to fall into whatever sin we can be tripped up in. When we sin, the devil gains rights against us. Satan is a legalist. The scripture says that the “accuser of the brethren” (satan) accuses us day and night (Rev 12:10). He does so legalistically. But the consequence of the law changed through the completed work of Christ on the cross. Christ’s death became our “get out of jail free card.” Through faith in Christ and the work of repentance we become released, free of charge. Infirmity is tied directly to the broken condition of this world. But Christ came to save the world through faith in Him and in repentance.

Luke 5:31-32 Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”

So we must ask what do we the Church adhere ourselves to? Do we adhere to the law which leads to death? Or do we adhere ourselves to mercy and grace that leads us into life in the fullest? And where does this idea come from, that our fullness does not happen until Heaven? This too is patently false. Persecution happens out of fullness, infirmity does not!

Does not the word say that adherence to the law of the word rather than the law of grace results in death? Look closely at these scriptures:

Rom 7:21-8:2 I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God– through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin. There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.

But now I have to choose what truth I will live in. Will it be the “truth” of the world and our soulish thinking or the truth of the Spirit, the very Kingdom of God come on earth?

If I choose to be under the law of sin and death and give the devil the right to make me sick, I will get sick. Whatever I choose to come into agreement with becomes either the right for the devil to come in, or the power that forces the devil to flee from me.

If I agree that sicknesses are from God, then the devil has a right to traffic in it. Problem is that the Church has come into agreement for generations that sicknesses are allowed, even used by God for the purpose of our benefit. Indeed God turns the bad things to our good. But He did not cause the bad things to happen in the first place! God is our way out of trouble, not our way into trouble!

This is why the Lord gave us the Holy Spirit; so that we might be dependently led into all truth. This is opposed to the independent conclusions of our earthly minds. Lies become exposed in the manifesting Presence of the Holy Spirit. Therefore it is of the mind by which we fail. For this reason, our minds must be in the constant state of change, out of the old and into the new. The mind must change, not of our own doing but by the Councilor who leads us into all truth, namely the Holy Spirit.

There is a famous line from the movie Dune, “Without change something sleeps inside us and seldom awakens.” “The sleeper must awaken!” So it is with the church. The sleeper (the church) must awaken to the truth made available to it generations ago:

John 16:13-15 “However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. “He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. “All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of Mine and declare it to you.

We can’t figure this thing out on our own. All Kingdom truth is in heaven and we are down here. Therefore what is real truth cannot be concluded, it must be revealed. But if the power of the Holy Spirit is vacant in a church or in a person’s life, that person is left with only his/her mind to make conclusion.

Spiritually speaking, human mental conclusions rarely are correct. Because the very specific point of any spiritual truth, the very definition of a spiritual truth is Kingdom based and therefore must be Kingdom given. If I am concluding, I am only stabbing in the darkness as to what is true in heaven. If I conclude of my own thinking, I conclude in error. Therefore spiritual truth comes only through a state of complete dependence. For those who operate in independent thinking, worldly truth is easy, but spiritual truth is all but missed.

In order to be revealed to this issue of illness, we need a paradigm shift of the mind. We must choose to humbly receive rather than pridefully conclude. We must come out of the natural way of thinking into the spiritual way of knowing. Even Spirit filled believers can miss truth if they have set their minds firm on a lie they conclude to be true.

We need the manifest Presence of the Holy Spirit to come and change our minds through our own conscious agreement. We must be willing to let God change our mindsets and realign us with the Kingdom of heaven. If Christ is a King, then Heaven is a Kingdom, not a democracy. Furthermore, what is true in the Kingdom so far outweighs any definitions the world establishes on any issue. How can one presume Kingdom truth by what one experiences in a short lifetime of experiences on earth?

If all the knowledge of the earth through all time is contained in one grain of sand, then beholding the beach full of sand before us as the whole of Kingdom knowledge gives us a small idea of how much more vast is the Kingdom of God! Who are we to make any conclusions outside of the revelation that comes through the Holy Spirit of God.

And did not Jesus teach us to ask of God, “Lord your Kingdom come, your will be done one earth as it is in Heaven.”

Alignment with the Kingdom of heaven and the manifestations that result will always result in persecution from a contrary world. This is because Kingdom truth is almost always in enmity with worldly “truths”. So we must stop thinking as the world does and start thinking with the supernatural mind of Christ. We will be persecuted when truth flows into darkness. We will be persecuted when the sick are healed, demons are cast out and the dead are raised! But those persecutions do not include illnesses that we should embrace or accept.

It is also important to say that the devil does bring sicknesses in the form of intrusion. I know this from personal experience. But when such things come, we have, by way of the cross, a given authority to command them away. We don’t allow such spirits to stay. When we do allow them to stay, we come into agreement with it and in disagreement with what God says. This does not contradict the premise of this discussion.

Sometimes it takes a significant amount of time to see such things cast away. These are very rare. They are forms of prevention set up against ministries who are moving in great deeds. Perseverance results in success though. And if we don’t have the vision that we will succeed we can so easily give up. But out of these events God gains great glory in the testimony of the faithful who persevered. The classic example is Job. These are the kinds of events that much of the church points to as God ordained events. Again I say no they are not. The author of death comes from one place alone… hell.

Healers not Infirms

Infirmity is not of the Lord for the purpose of sufferings that we should endure that bring glory to God. If Christ meant for this to be so, then why did He command us to heal the sick under the power of the Holy Spirit?

God never contradicts Himself. If so, He would be a liar and in so being, completely disqualified.

We have all authority to command sickness to flee from the lost, that they might be saved, and from those in the Body of Christ, that they each might be free to reap the reward of Christ’s sufferings. Besides salvation, this is what Jesus died for!

We live a life full of personal experiences and witness the lives of our forefathers’ experiences. It is so easy to build a theology around those experiences. We might say that because we have not experienced healing from illnesses, it must be God’s purpose that illnesses exist. In other words, we tend to define what truth is by what we and our forefathers have experienced.

However, we must have the courage to believe for greater things than what we have believed in or have experienced. We must have the courage to think out of the very small box of our own thinking, however intelligent we might be. Our faith must return us to the first church and restore us to the manifest power of the Holy Spirit once again. We need to trust that we will experience healing first hand. We need to just get up and start moving in it. We must persevere until we see it come to pass. The old adage applies, “If at first we don’t succeed, try and try again.”

I have heard it said many times, “Faith without experience is dead.” This is the absolute truth. If one has not been experiencing the manifest Presence of God, one doesn’t yet have faith for it. CHOOSE RADICAL FAITH! Then you will experience the power of God; then your faith will explode! Believe and then go rock your world regardless of persecution by from what people might think.

Self Gain

The focus on power and God’s use thereof is never to be seen for our own gain. And I think this is where there is much confusion. As I see it, there is always confusion where self is the focus. We want to know the “whys”, but most times there are no answers this side of Heaven. My focus is therefore not on myself and my whys, but on the harvest and the reward of Christ’s sufferings.

We see so many “Christian healers” on TV making a mockery of the healing ministry. Meanwhile when someone (like Todd Bentley) who is really moving in truth, they become discounted as a result of those who make a fool of Christianity. The problem lies in those who are in the “Business of Christianity.” Healing is never selfish; it is always selfless, as Christ lived His life.

Why?

So why do we deal with so much sickness? Maybe it’s the mass accumulation of sin from generation to generation, and which is ever increasing. Even the patriarchs who lived well before our generations lived hundreds of years beyond the current lifespan… before the accumulation of worldwide sin. Who knows? That’s a question I’ll talk with Jesus about when I see Him in a few years!

But I am convinced of this, sickness is, for whatever reason a right of the enemy and not a work of the Lord.

In a lesser way, sickness is simply the way of the world. We deal with it to some extent or another in our everyday life. But the power of the cross and the manifestation of the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in Heaven, are supposed to manifest into the world the greater power that forces illnesses and death to yield.

Illness leads to death… but the counter to illness is the power of the cross that brings life, exercised by the Saints who are operating in the revelation of it.

I know of certain Christians who have dealt with terrible illnesses that have lasted much of their lives. But I must say that when there seems to be no other answer as to why such things happen, we tend to come into agreement with a false theology that says that sicknesses therefore must be from God as a punishment, or to repair some flawed character. This is great error!

Today, much sickness is in the world. The reason is because the enemy is hard at work, not because of an angry God who is operating in forms of judgment. The reason that sickness is so prevalent in and around the Church is because the power of the cross is so missing in the way God meant for it to exist within and outside of the Church.

I am convinced; infirmities and death are under the authority of the blood of Christ, not over it.

In closely reading the New Testament scriptures, I find no direct reference to the Saints being made sick by God to perfect character flaws. Job was affected so that the Glory of God was revealed through him and then fully restored, and so was Lazarus. But neither was being disciplined. So was Hidi Baker who has also been afflicted time and again for her works in the harvest fields as has been her husband Rolland. They both have been restored.

There is something greatly in error when infirmities come and then remain.

I cannot connect the concept of Christian suffering to sickness. The suffering that Jesus speaks of is a persecution for invading the world with the Kingdom of God through a dedicated life. Beatings, judgments, anger, conflicts of every kind, the sword and murder are what are defined as sufferings, not sickness or early death as a result of sickness.

We must know that the Saints have been given the authority, even the command to deal with sickness and command it away in the exact same way as Jesus exemplified. We can’t command God’s sufferings away, but we can command sickness and death away. The reason for this is to show the mercy of the Father that leads to repentance and salvation into the world.

Notice that the following scripture suggests that Jesus healed all from that which was inflicted upon them by the devil:

Acts 10:38 “…how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.

Of what value is wrongful suffering? And from where do such things come? Certainly suffering is not given by God to perfect ones character. I can never agree to that. Look closely at this scripture:

1 Pet 2:19-25 For this is commendable, if because of conscience toward God one endures grief, suffering wrongfully. For what credit is it if, when you are beaten for your faults, you take it patiently? But when you do good and suffer, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God. For to this you were called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps: “Who committed no sin, nor was deceit found in His mouth”; who, when He was reviled, did not revile in return; when He suffered, He did not threaten, but committed Himself to Him who judges righteously; who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness– by whose stripes you were healed. For you were like sheep going astray, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

The point is that there is no sense in a suffering that comes from sin. The result is healing so that the mercy of the Father might be shown.

Consider this promise to Israel:

Deut 7:13-15 “And He will love you and bless you and multiply you; He will also bless the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your land, your grain and your new wine and your oil, the increase of your cattle and the offspring of your flock, in the land of which He swore to your fathers to give you.”You shall be blessed above all peoples; there shall not be a male or female barren among you or among your livestock. “And the LORD will take away from you ALL sickness (emphasis ALL), and will afflict you with none of the terrible diseases of Egypt which you have known, but will lay them on all those who hate you.

The way I see it, sickness is a manifestation of the failure of the church to understand and operate in the power of the cross.

Consider the following example set before us in Acts:

Acts 5:14-16 And believers were increasingly added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women, so that they brought the sick out into the streets and laid them on beds and couches, that at least the shadow of Peter passing by might fall on some of them. Also a multitude gathered from the surrounding cities to Jerusalem, bringing sick people and those who were tormented by unclean spirits, and they were all healed.

The key word here is that they were all healed. Every one who showed up was healed. Now if any one of them were undergoing sufferings established by the Lord to correct character flaws, it makes no sense that they would have all been healed at that time. The anointing of healing overcame all infirmity. It was this very anointing that Jesus died on the cross for His Church to move in. And scripture says, “It is the anointing that breaks the heavy yoke.”

If God establishes infirmities for our benefit, then how is it that God would heal people of that which He had Himself established?

Though no one is perfect in operating under the anointing, clearly the Lord is restoring these Kingdom revelations back into the Spirit filled church that hold no limits to the love that emanates this very power.

The Spirit of the Lord is just now moving to restore the fullness of Pentecost. In such a way, I am convinced; we will see a day in which entire cities will be sickness free. In fact Bill Johnson at Bethel church is operating on this very word and believes this for his city of Redding, California.

Bill Johnson has a writing that I strongly suggest… The Supernatural Power of a Transformed Mind. He speaks directly to these very issues we discuss, including those things of the mind that block such understandings. Bill Johnson not only writes about healing, he has a long confirmed record of success in both the ministry of healing and the understanding of it.

Some more encouraging scriptures:

IKing 17:17-24 Now it happened after these things that the son of the woman who owned the house became sick. And his sickness was so serious that there was no breath left in him. So she said to Elijah, “What have I to do with you, O man of God? Have you come to me to bring my sin to remembrance, and to kill my son?” And he said to her, “Give me your son.” So he took him out of her arms and carried him to the upper room where he was staying, and laid him on his own bed. Then he cried out to the LORD and said, “O LORD my God, have You also brought tragedy on the widow with whom I lodge, by killing her son?” And he stretched himself out on the child three times, and cried out to the LORD and said, “O LORD my God, I pray, let this child’s soul come back to him.” Then the LORD heard the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came back to him, and he revived. And Elijah took the child and brought him down from the upper room into the house, and gave him to his mother. And Elijah said, “See, your son lives!” Then the woman said to Elijah, “Now by this I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the LORD in your mouth is the truth.”

1 Pet 5:6-10 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world. But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you.

Many blessings and the powerful strength of love to all who read this word!

T. Scott Morton

My wife is big on dreams. God gives her earth shaking dreams almost every night. She has an anointing for it. But I rarely get dreams that I remember. When I do though, it usually means something important for me and/or for others. Here is one I got last night worth sharing:

I was walking down an empty streetway towards where I knew God was residing. I had to get there! As I walked down this street, snakes appeared one after another to stop me from going forward. Just for a second I was in a measure of fear. But then the authority of Christ welled up within me. I pointed straight at each one of those snakes and said calmly but firmly, “You get out of my way.” Some moved immediately, others required contending with for a period of time. But finally the road was clear. Then there was a house and I went in. God was there. When I stepped in, there was a rotating table full of boxes. I knew these boxes to be filled with personal provisions. The table rotated quickly and I would reach and take a box, one at a time. It was like God was saying, “Here take this, now take that, and now take this,”. And it was all happening so quickly. Then I woke up.

What the Lord was saying to me/us in this dream is so big. Mainly, He is going to provide for our every need, but we need to press in to Him, past all the stuff that would hold us back, past all the issues and the people and the things, into His Presence. And it will be from there that we will be fully provided for with every earthly and spiritual need.

Lord greatly bless you with every spiritual need through Jesus Christ, until the day you are with Him!

Scott

Dependency

Regarding the Bible, the word of God is the all inclusive, complete and one and only definer of God’s character, of His heart and desire. Everything we do, all that we understand of God, and every future step we take should very much align with the “revealed” word contained in the Bible. However, while the Bible is our reference, it does not “contain” God. That is to say that God is not limited in what He does today nor in the future by the words within the Bible. God gave us the Bible to be our perfect reference, but Jesus died that we should have the Holy Spirit to be our guide.

Understanding the will and heart of the Father for now and the future requires a combination of both the word of God and the Holy Spirit that reveals the word of God in meaning for us today. This is a critical combination. For without the Revelator, the Holy Spirit, we are left to “conclude” what the word of God means by our very limited intelligence. The result becomes religious error. Not to sound demeaning against humanity in any way. Rather, in humility, we understand that we are completely dependent upon God for our spiritual growth or understanding. If we go by what we think over what God knows, we miss the mark of truth. The key to understanding is found in the humility of dependence that results in the Lord being willing to transmit His thoughts into our hearts and minds. This is critical!

Jesus exemplified all that we are to be in this life. He said, “I do nothing but what the Father tells me.” He was totally dependent on that direct line of communication he had with the Father. Jesus said further in John (paraphrased), “I will not leave you as orphans… I will give you another Helper (Counselor in the NIV) who will lead you into all truth. He will not speak on His own. He will speak only what He hears. He will take from what is mine and make it known to you.”

John 14:25-26 “All this I have spoken while still with you. But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.

John 14:15-18 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever— the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.

In my humble opinion, John 14, 15, 16 and 17 (besides the entire book of Acts) are the most important passages in the Bible. Jesus was about to die and complete what He came to do. But He had been God right in the face of these disciples! He spoke to them directly of the word and the truth. He even used parables for the purpose of teaching them the need for revelation wisdom knowledge! But, there was “perfect communication”. God was walking with them. Yet even though Jesus was right there before their eyes, even then, what He spoke of to them all but went right over their heads! Why? They had yet to receive the Holy Spirit, the revelator. Jesus had to complete his work before the Holy Spirit was to come to them (us!).

Jesus had to go to the cross. He had to finish His work. He was about to leave. They were sad. Then Jesus lovingly said, I am not going to leave you without a way to know and understand the truth. He said to wait for the Holy Spirit. Even then they did not understand. But they were obedient to wait for the Holy Spirit as Jesus directed. After the cross, they did just that. At Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came.

So, Jesus died, rose again, spoke for another few weeks after the miracle of resurrection to the amazement and utter disbelief of the saints. He was risen back to His rightful place next to the Father. And now it is as it was on that day. God is on His throne; Jesus is right by His side. But the Holy Spirit is here.

The Holy Spirit came at Pentecost. They got blasted! They spoke in the tongues of every nation. Then they understood what before they had missed.

If you look carefully at the word, you find that even Mary, the mother of Jesus and Jesus’ brothers did not fully understand the purpose of Jesus, even up to the cross. But the Bible then records that after Jesus was risen, they got it. They became key disciples. What was the difference? Before the cross, they did not understand. After the cross the understood easily. The answer:

John 16:12-14 “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you.

Here’s the key: They understood not of their own thinking. They were given revelation knowledge that built up their faith. They got it through a combination of humility, dependence and waiting on the Holy Spirit for revelation understanding as Jesus directed them to do. When the Holy Spirit came, they understood. When the Holy Spirit came, the church began. In Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit fell, there was a ruckus radical outpouring of joy. It caused a commotion. It caused a stirring of hearts. People from all around came to hear Peter’s explanation of what had just happened:

Acts 2:1-6, 2:1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them. Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. Then they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them speaking in his own language.

Acts 2:14-17 Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: “‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people.'”

Peter was holding the very first church meeting! In the humility of dependant faith, some got it. In the pride of their own thinking, others did not. But the result of that day was that three thousand souls were saved. That is the power of revelation knowledge. Those that believed… they got it!

To understand the Bible, today as it was back then, indeed we need the written word of the Bible. But even more then the word, we need the Holy Spirit’s revelation just as on the day of Pentecost. We need revelation knowledge not only for understanding of the written word, but to unlock what it means for us today and in the days to come. We need revelation knowledge to know the seasons we are in and to know where to turn to and what to avoid. We need revelation knowledge to express truth into a dying world.

How this happens is not by our own understanding or conclusions, but by the Holy Spirit of God in and upon us (John 14:18 above). I am not talking about the Holy Spirit we get at regeneration (point of salvation) which marks us for eternity. I am talking about the Holy Spirit we receive in the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Just as these men and women of God were baptized in the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

Acts 8:14-17 When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them. When they arrived, they prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit , because the Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them; they had simply been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus. Then Peter and John placed their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

Acts 19:1-7 While Apollos was at Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at Ephesus. There he found some disciples and asked them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” They answered, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” So Paul asked, “Then what baptism did you receive?” “John’s baptism,” they replied. Paul said, “John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. He told the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus.” On hearing this, they were baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus. When Paul placed his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied. There were about twelve men in all.

Notice, there are three baptisms that Paul spoke of in the above event. 1. Hearing the truth unto conviction (John’s baptism). 2. Receiving the truth unto salvation (Baptism of Jesus). 3. And then the third and very separate baptism of the Holy Spirit. This would be the baptism into the power of the cross to gain understanding, and to give others that same understanding.

I submit that without this work of the Holy Spirit in our lives, as believers, we are as dart throwers with blinders on. Throwing the darts at what we think is the dart board of truth and missing miserably. All the religions of the world were born from the ways of man’s thinking. Thousands of good sounding arguments, all of them missing the radical mark of Godly Kingdom truth.

There is one truth, one way, One God under one name. But that is the most basic of understandings. The first work of the Holy Spirit is to reveal this knowledge into the heart of the brand new believer. But for us who are in the Body of Christ, God wants us to be moving in a radical truth that will result in thousands saved in one day as on Pentecost. This is easy when the Holy Spirit is welcome to do His mighty work.

We have all experienced events we cannot explain in which God was moving on our behalf. We who believe know that the supernatural acts of God occur today. But I am sensing the Father wanting us to embrace the Presence of the Holy Spirit in such a way as to see the radical things of God happen right here regularly, right now in our everyday lives. Not for our benefit (though we benefit greatly), but for the benefit of the harvest at hand. And the harvest is RIPE where we are! Brothers, we might be in one of the most ripe areas in the world for a rich harvest! It starts with supernaturally given revelation knowledge. It matures in signs that do nothing but point to the wonder of Jesus Christ… namely healing the sick, casting out demons and the raising of the dead.

It’s not a lack of faith that holds these things back, though that is a part of the problem. More so it is doubt.

Brothers, allow me to be an encouragement to you. I am a witness. I have seen it with my own eyes. The power of God is just as available to us today as it was for the first church in the day of Pentecost. There has been no change except decreasing faith and increasing doubt over the years since the cross. This is the only reason we don’t see as much of the miraculous as they saw in the first church.

I have seen with my own eyes the blind see again. I have seen with my own eyes, the cancer ridden healed outright in an instant. I have seen demons flee time and again. I have seen the power of God rest on a person full of anger and rage be turned into an absolute wreck of joyous liberty… tears of joy streaming for hours. I have seen the addicted delivered from their addiction in an instant… I was one of them. I have watched the countenance of the face of a doubter as the Holy Spirit of revelation came on… the face turned from darkness and sadness to shocked understanding and a fresh new peace.

But, these are all the things Jesus was doing in the three years he was teaching. These were all the things the apostles and those that followed them did after Pentecost. All through history, these things have been happening to those who believe. And did not Jesus say:

John 14:12 I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.

But all this starts with revelation knowledge. And so I encourage you all. When you study the word of God, seek first the Face of God. Start with a state of worship and seek the Presence of God right by your side before you ever open the word. When you sense His Presence with you, then open the book and just see the wonder of what He will reveal to you! Oh there are many ways to study the word and I am not saying this is the only way. This is just an encouragement.

This is where it all begins. This is how we stay on the same page. This is how we become overcomers. This is how we gain the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in Heaven! This is how we reap a real and lasting harvest. Be filled with the Holy Spirit!

It all starts with not just the “logos” or written word, but the “rhema” or revealed word. It requires the overcoming of the pride of our own thinking followed by an honest state of dependence, just as Jesus is fully dependant on the Father and as the Holy Spirit is fully dependant on the Son. So it is with us. Without dependence, we spin around with doctrines in error. We lose the power and all that goes with it. We end up religious and lifeless, just doing church as usual with little ground being gained. That sounds harsh. But this is what the Lord is leading us out of today.

So I would ask you the same question that Paul asked the Ephesian disciples, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” If not, then allow me to invite you. This is a free gift gained through faith and available to all who believe. It’s yours for the asking. But it comes with a price, and which is this… “humility, death to self and lower still.” Kingdom greatness and Gods glory becomes manifested in this way.

May the Lord fill you richly and deeply in the Holy Spirit!

With love in Christ,

Scott Morton

12/1/08

A commentary in part as a response to the article “Beware of Strange Fire”, by Peter Horrobin. His essay appears in Charisma Magazine, dated September, 2008.

We are getting closer to the time when the supernatural will no longer just be a curiosity. It will become absolutely necessary. But there will always be those who will come against it, even when the miracle stands right before them. So it was also in the life of Jesus Christ over 2000 years ago.

Forward

I have the greatest respect for Peter Horrobin. This forerunning man of God has been an inspiration to my wife and I when we delved some years ago into the ministry of deliverance. Peter broke the mold of religious thinkers that said that demonic manifestations were few and far between in our day. Through Peter, many have seen the light of truth of our authority in Jesus Christ to rightly wage war against the devil’s schemes, that the devil is fast at work in the world, and that people can be healed and delivered from these manifestations by dealing with root issues. In my opinion, his pair of books, Healing Through Deliverance, Part 1 and Part 2, are the books to read for those moving in the ministry of healing and deliverance.

What I write is more in addition to Peter’s writing than it is a critique. I hope you will take it in that vein of heart as you read? Peter raises some very important points regarding false manifestations in revival that we need to consider as we progress in successful end time ministry. However, there are even more important issues that I would respectfully debate and which I speak to herein.

Regarding Lakeland

I have been a study of revival for many years now. Having witnessed many events of the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in many countries, I have become experientially convinced that this is the only right way for church to operate effectively in the world in the days ahead.

What I have found is that in as many places as the Holy Spirit has manifested, there have been great volumes of criticism from both the world and the church who had heard of what was happening in revival. Sadly there has been volumes more criticism then there has been affirmation of events of God’s manifest presence. Every experience of revival fire I have witness has come with radical, and when seen with worldly eyes, very controversial manifestations. However, without fail, every place I have witnessed the manifesting presence of God, I have found great evidences of healing, deliverance, the even the dead being raised and certainly large numbers of salvations. I have come to know that when God manifests his power in the earth it always offends the flesh of the people who hear of it, and certainly so when it visibly and forcibly displaces darkness. But why so much criticism when God’s manifestations have lead to so much supernatural godly change?

We have two forms of existence that are in constant enmity with what God does in the world. They are the devil and our own flesh that we each wrestle with in our members. Paul writes about this flesh curse that he personally dealt with in his letter to the Romans, chapter 7.

Sadly, I have found there to be far more questioning and judgment against such moves of God than there has been excitement and agreement. Even more disturbing are the critical words coming from the church rather than from the world.

It’s human nature to question that which we do not understand. Likewise it is biblical to question supernatural manifestations to ensure their origins. Certainly it is a good thing to weigh what we are witnessing from God. We must assure that what is happening aligns with the word of God coupled with Father’s revelation knowledge, so that those ministering are doing so under the authority of Holy Spirit filled apostolic coverage, and that they are doing so by revelation given by the Holy Spirit. However, the error in almost all critiques I have witnessed comes into play when people evaluate by what they think rather than by faith centered revelation. Many argue by their own interpretation of the Bible over revelation given through the Holy Spirit of that very word. The word alone is not enough. For events of supernatural change can only be understood and then accepted from a heart of faith rather than by logical conclusion or literal and legalistic translation. In fact everything of the Kingdom of God can only be understood within the context of faith and then revelation.

All down the history of the church, it has been the error of making cranial judgments outside of revelation knowledge that has silenced so many revivals since Jesus completed work on the cross.

Simply said, when we argue with our very limited mental conclusions, we do so from the flesh of what we think rather than from the revelation of what God knows. As such, one cannot police the flesh with the flesh. It must be done only by way of the revelation of the Holy Spirit coupled with the word of God. Otherwise we heap division upon division. Error, disunity, division and degradation result from such ways. What my flesh believes is in error might very well be of the Lord. So if I attempt to erroneously correct that which needs no correction, I establish division when such was not warranted. It is to this very serious issue of error that I speak.

On Discipleship

Generally speaking, discipleship can only be done one of two ways. Discipleship can be done of the law and which is based upon what man thinks. Or, discipleship can be done by people filled with the revelation wisdom given by the Holy Spirit which leads to a radical life of spiritual maturity. One leads to bondage, the latter leads to spiritual and supernatural growth in the Holy Spirit.

Either through teaching, impartation through words of knowledge and the prophetic, or impartation through the laying on of hands, indeed ministry through impartation is a critical part of discipleship and which is what Paul and the apostles regularly ministered in (Hebrews 6:1-3, Romans 1:11).

Those who disciple by the Holy Spirit act as transferring agents who take what they have received from the word, complete that knowledge by revelation understanding through the Holy Spirit, wait for the supernatural anointing and then give it away to the church according to each person’s need. At its’ most basic, the gospel of Jesus Christ and the basis of the very church of God is first to be received in power and then transferred to others. How can this be done without impartation in all its’ forms? The most basic call to the church is to “impart” truth supernaturally.

A leader that operates successfully in the Holy Spirit by revelation and anointing ministers out of the experiences of God. To minister out of what one has concluded alone is by a dead faith. For faith to result in real change requires the event of change we witness. That witness becomes our experience. The experience leads to a higher faith. Faith without experience therefore is dead. As such, discipleship from head knowledge is all but lifeless teaching.

Book knowledge alone is not enough, and so the Bible alone is not enough. However, when the Holy Spirit shows up with experiences of God, our faith is raised up and it becomes alive. It quickly transfers from babies level head knowledge to maturing heart knowledge, followed by the reception of anointing born from experiences in the Holy Spirit that lead people to Kingdom success. This form of discipleship is right discipleship and which is the only effective means to spiritual growth for those being discipled. For without the revelation knowledge of the Holy Spirit given in times of dependant intimacy, discipleship can only be by conclusions of the intelligence of the mind of people. It takes both the absolutely necessary word of God and the manifestation of the Holy Spirit coupled together to gain right discipleship. It is this latter ingredient that so many who speak of revival error so totally miss.

The word alone is not enough for right discipleship nor is it so for right correction. That is legalism by good sounding arguments and mental conclusions. The word and the Spirit are required for right understanding and right leadership. Discipleship then falls right in line with the heart of the Father in a radical Kingdom way rather than a limited worldly way.

It is this false notion of discipleship through the word and blind submission to authority that is the very root of so much division and woundedness in the Body of Christ today. It is a strategy that is demonic and which is how the devil controls large church structures to keep them powerless and devoid of the Holy Spirit. When we trust in the mind of man alone and willfully reject the manifestations of the Holy Spirit from a lack of understanding or for form of order, we cut off the lines of power from Heaven to earth and become dependent on people for spiritual growth rather than Father God. The result becomes a church full of many ideas and theological deviations born from the mind of people rather than by a singular supply of Kingdom truth that manifests by revelation of the Holy Spirit. For the Holy Spirit will not show up unless he is fully given the reins of control of our meetings. This is not a giving up of control as so many religious leaders would suggest, this is true biblical submission of a leadership to the authority of the Holy Spirit, a trusting in faith.

Jesus Christ died on the cross so that we would have all that we need to defeat satan in all that satan brings. According to John 15-16, Jesus left earth and ascended into Heaven, but would not leave us as orphans. He gave us the Holy Spirit in all his glory so that we would be rightly equipped to win every fight. Now, with Jesus back with the Father, the Holy Spirit would become the revealer of all truth. One then can easily see that the number one goal of satan is to render the church Spiritless. He knows that if he can do this, he can silence the flow of revelation knowledge, prevent spiritual growth and block the power to heal, deliver, and raise the dead. We lose faith, start to think and then think our way into lower lesser arguments that place man in control of our meetings instead of God.

If where the Holy Spirit is, there is liberty, then what does this say about places where the Holy Spirit is not? In a word… bondage. Therefore, satan’s number one goal is to put the fire out wherever and whenever the fire starts. Like an effective military general, the devil will strategize and attack with high priority places of high Kingdom effectiveness. So it is with satan against the Spirit filled church, or wherever the Holy Spirit shows up. Sadly, so it also is with most arguments that have been leveled against revival fire in Lakeland Florida and on down the ages of revival history.

By most accounts of Lakeland, millions of souls have been saved and/or affected in a godly way. Thousands of people have been confirmed healed. Many confirmed dead people were raised during the Lakeland Revival, and we are to call this strange fire? By whose argument are we declaring this so? Is this God’s argument or by the words of good sounding mental assumptions?

Beware of strange fire? As for me, I am far more concerned to expose the leaven of legalistic worldly arguments that put Holy Spirit fires out. Such arguments bring way too much credit to the ability of the devil to warp people’s minds. Somehow we have assumed that God is or has become incapable of silencing demonic forces whenever God decides to show up in meetings with supernatural power. We tend to far more fear that what is happening is demonic rather than to consider that what is happening is of Father God. We have decided that by our policing efforts, we can do better than the Holy Spirit at silencing the enemy’s strategies.

Likewise, one must be there and personally experience a thing to rightly discern the thing. There is a favorite bumper sticker I have seen and which holds true in regards to this discussion. It reads as follows: “If you haven’t been to Iraq or Afghanistan then shut up about it.” Harsh as this might sound, the same concept applies here. If one has not clearly heard from the Lord about it, then one has no place speaking of it.

In reality, when we step in front of God to silence what we presume are demonic manifestations, we grieve the Holy Spirit. Who actually departs is not the devil, but the Holy Spirit. And this is exactly what the devil wants. So I must then ask, whose argument are we making when we criticize unusual manifestations of the Holy Spirit by what we think rather than by what we have been revealed to?

Indeed there were errors in Lakeland and which has been so in every revival that ever was (…of which none of them are my place to judge). No person is without internal flaws. However, in shedding light on these errors, let us not throw the baby out with the bath water? Revival is messy. People’s issues get dealt with in mass, even leadership… God’s plan accelerates in ways we do not understand. Light get’s shown on the devil’s works and the devil does not like that at all. It’s a messy business. Indeed revival will never look like a dead religious church service that results in little or no ground gained. We just cannot apply our cranial conclusions to what God does and how he does it.

On the other hand we cannot stand by and allow the devil to infiltrate revival with any level of error. So how do we rightly discern and intervene? The answer is found in intimacy and dependency.

Intimacy leads to revelation knowledge straight from the throne room of God. When two become intimate with each other, both expose what is in their hearts. Our dependant heart results in Kingdom knowledge being purified by the desire to be sure that what we speak is Father’s truth alone, not our own. The result becomes what Father knows about us and his plans. It’s the very Father heart of God that becomes known in revival. And when we know what God thinks over what we think, the picture is always so much better, bigger, brighter and more beautiful. Independent thinking therefore blocks these truths, as it does Father’s heart, as it does revelation knowledge as it does supernatural manifestations! Independent thinking is a deadly way as to Kingdom business.

Discipleship can be ministered out of relationship or out of the law. One way leads to radical supernatural life. The other way leads to darkness and lifelessness. In essence, one can say that dependant intimacy leads to life from the dead. Certainly if intimacy leads to a vibrant unified marriage, is it not far more so the same with our intimacy with the Father and with King Jesus?

The entire process of spiritual growth is found not in the literal word of the law, but within the intimacy of relationship that manifests a deep relationship between people and Father God inside and then outside of the church. Intimacy leads to the deep thoughts of your partner… Then, God becomes pleased to let us know what’s in his heart.

Offendability from the Supernatural

I’ve seen just about every manifestation in the Holy Spirit we read about. Shakes, quakes, laughter, tears, simultaneous laughter and tears, flailing about, running, running in place, cat calls and the like. I’ve seen it all. Well, maybe not… But in every single event, my flesh was definitely challenged. Every single time it was as if the Lord was asking me, “Well son, what do you think about this?” In each event I had never once entertained the notion to allow evil to coexist in the room with what God was doing. So pure had been the manifestation of God’s heart in these experiences that I would not dare to presume to step in his way.

Still though, my flesh was offended by many things I saw. However, there had always been this wonderful sense that the Father and Jesus were in the room. I had no fear that darkness was anywhere near what was going on. Oh there were demons in the room, in people who were being healed. But they were being dealt with by the Holy Spirit and angels authoritatively resident in the room as well! Jesus was being testified to in an unmistakable way. I knew that when the Holy Spirit was in residence, that he was in control of the meeting, not man and certainly not the devil.

It was obvious to me that God created the devil and had all power over him. So I never feared the devil in these meetings, however strange the manifestations became. God was dealing with many of our issues, however that looked like. I wonder, come to think of it, what are those things supposed to look like?

When the Holy Spirit shows up, people’s issues get dealt with, and darkness flees. What does that look like in the natural eye? Well, I can testify… wonderfully wild! This is not an allowing of evil to coexist with good as some would suggest. It is an inviting of wounded people into Father’s loving presence who are dealing with issues to be set free from those demonic forces. Devils become exposed and then depart forcibly! Can you imagine how quiet a meeting would be if no one with demonic influence was allowed into our meetings? There would be no one to minister to! (This, by the way, also speaks to the need to take this radical Spirit filled way out into the streets!)

Now there were times that I had witnessed demonic interruption, but those times were patently obvious and very easily dealt with. Likewise when people were ministering out of the flesh or worse, that too was easily known by submitted leadership who were being made known of it by the Holy Spirit. The difference between darkness and light is spiritually obvious for those who are moving in the Holy Spirit. Even for those who are not Christian, the difference between love and hate, between Christ and antichrist, between light and darkness are very obvious.

Ultimately, the witness and revelation of what is of light or of darkness can be completely blocked by what we choose to think, by what we accept or reject or by what we believe or do not believe. Therefore the very key to an understanding of what is light or what is darkness is found not in the intelligence of what one thinks, but rather in the condition of one’s heart and the state of one’s faith. The unyeilded mind can do nothing but get in the way of God.

What I have found in every experience of the Holy Spirit were those who got it and those who judged it. For truly I have seen that it has always been and will always be that the manifestations of the Holy Spirit are a great offense to those who do not get it. This very truth was recorded in Acts as an end result of Pentecost. There were many people who were drunk in the Holy Spirit as Peter spoke of, but there were many who questioned what they were seeing and then rejected it. Reference Acts 2: 13

Discernment

I completely agree with the argument that we must never allow things that are demonic or fleshly to have safe passage within revival. But the problem is in how we discern what is or is not of God. The very essence of revival is the manifest presence of the Holy Spirit. However, when the Holy Spirit shows up, he does so almost always in ways that people would not expect. Just as Jesus showed up as a carpenter to confound the wise, so the Holy Spirit shows up with manifestations that also confound the wise. Herein is a key principle in that God always asks the question, “Who is in control of this meeting? Is it man or the Holy Spirit? Is it what you think or what I know?”

Certainly the devil works to counterfeit what God does so as to gain a divisive “in.” But when the Holy Spirit is moving in revival, the “Helper who leads us into all truth” makes known those strategies easily to those who are in charge by way of discernment. In such a case, we need to silence those voices. But we need to do so without getting in the way of God. And so the only way to rightly discern is to allow God to supernaturally lead from the heart. We hear his voice and only then do we act as the Spirit leads.

I cannot witness a manifestation and because of my offense say that this is not of God. I must be in connection with the Holy Spirit, hear what he says about it and only then take action according to his desire. In so doing I overcome my fleshly disagreement with God. This is what “testing and approving” is all about. Right testing and approving is found in the hearing, not by conclusion. It starts with the written word but then is finalized with the Spirit’s revelation; only then can right action be taken. When the Holy Spirit shows up, it’s easy to gain the truth. Darkness is very easy to discern in times of God’s manifest presence to those who lead.

In regards to “testing and approving”, those who use this argument to criticize spiritual manifestations almost always take the focus of this statement out of context. One must continue past 1 John 4:1 and read through to verse 6:

1 John 4:1-6 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world. You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world. They are from the world; therefore they speak as from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God; he who knows God listens to us; he who is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.

There is one and only test as to the validity of any ministry or manifestation. Does it testify the full gospel of Jesus Christ into a dying world? What is demonic will not testify to the gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s that simple. We make it much harder than it really is by applying this concept falsely against those who are honestly ministering in the Lord. We go well beyond what this testing and approving means when we focus this argument against manifestations we do not understand. The simple question to ask those who manifest in the supernatural is this, “In what you are ministering, do you testify to Jesus Christ in all his truth?” Demoniacs will recoil when asked this question. Error is based in antichrist. It is easily found out. Using the above scripture to criticize against what is a God thing is an act of agreement with an antichrist argument.

An Example

What if someone were screaming on the floor in joy and tears? What if many were doing so? This sounds out of order and just plain weird doesn’t it? As a leader assessing the situation, I might be offended at what I am witnessing. It seems out of order. It just doesn’t feel right as I think of it. My fleshly response might very well be that these people are manifesting demons. And this very well might be true even when God has a plan in it all! But then the Holy Spirit tells me that he is “working something out in these people, leave them alone and let them release it.” If I choose, out of my offense to get up and move a certain person out of the meeting, what have I just done? I have just stepped in the way of God. Specifically, I have just placed a block between the Holy Spirit and this person who is being ministered to. On the larger scale, I have without discernment just said “no” to Holy Spirit manifesting what he wants to bring into the church meeting. How grievous is this error! This very error is the quickest way to stop the manifestation of God’s Presence in a place. The authority has just gotten in the way of The Authority for fear in whatever form.

Every revival that has ever been has been silenced in this very same way… someone in charge got in the way of God. Someone declared that which was of God as something that was of the flesh or demonic. This is a false accusation of the Holy Spirit. My goodness this is a form of blasphemy to the Holy Spirit! Let us not forget how many times Jesus was accused of being a demoniac. Jesus offended their thinking by what he did that was outside of their mental comfort zones.

We must understand that our flesh is in enmity with the Lord, however mature or however in submission we might be. Therefore we all deal with the flesh until the day we go to Heaven. True spiritual maturity is found in the sign of how well we keep our flesh in check. Paul calls this perseverance (among other things we persevere through). Therefore a key part of good discernment is found in the ability to persevere.

Inside the church circle, as leadership, our flesh will always be challenged by what the Holy Spirit brings. The Pharisees were confronted with the very same decision process. Was Jesus and his miraculous ways of God or not? For us, how offendable will we be when God shows up with the radical stuff? Will we get in his way by what we think, feel or fear? Or will we let God be God as he does his great works in our meetings? If God created the devil, does God not have all power and authority over whatever the devil might do? Indeed yes! But how we overcome the devil, in all his wares, is not by our own strength. As the Word says, “It is not by power, nor by might, but by the Holy Spirit, says the Lord!”

How very important is the position of leadership! How very important is a right understanding of discipleship based upon complete spiritual dependence. For the difference is life or death, liberty or bondage within the church, joy in the Holy Spirit or religious country club meetings of little worth. No wonder why satan is so interested to put the fire of the Holy Spirit out whenever it manifests!

By the way… Scriptures say that perfect love casts out fear. So when perfect love manifests in our meetings, what do we have to fear? Intimate dependent leadership discerns these things.

True Authority

God forever seeks to know from leadership if we are going to give up the reins of control or keep them for ourselves. True revival manifests only when we give up the reins of control in a willful state of complete dependence to the Lord. This is not giving up our need and biblical call to exercise authority in our meetings, rather this is a new way of understanding how to minister that control. This is right authority exercised in the church. The Bible says to submit to all authorities we are under. But for the authority structure of the church to be in right order, church leadership must themselves be under the direct authority of the Holy Spirit in every meeting.

Jesus exemplified pure authority in that he did nothing but what the Father willed. Likewise the Holy Spirit brings nothing but what Jesus speaks. The three are in agreement in everything. That agreement is born out of relationship. Relationship is born out of intimate dependence. Therefore, as goes the leader so goes the church. Spiritually, as a member of my church, I can only go as far as my leadership is willing to go. This is why when leadership buys into arguments that silence the Holy Spirit, the whole church gets silenced.

As to demonic forces, we know that the devil is fast at work to infiltrate the church with sin, good sounding arguments that introduce false leaven and forms of manipulation that lead to internal control. But how we are revealed to these strategies and how we successfully silence them can only be by the ongoing manifestation of the Holy Spirit to bring revelation knowledge that they even exist. If the church is devoid of the revival Spirit, it has become devoid of the only means to be made known of such demonic strategies! The result is that the church can only be in error as to how it deals with the demonic and the flesh. The result can only be forms of legalistic control by the mind of people. If the Holy Spirit is out of the church, the devil is most certainly in the church!

In order to keep the devil and the flesh of people out of our church meetings we must be seekers of intimate relationship with the Father, with Jesus and now more than ever with the Holy Spirit. Out of this relationship we gain the heart of the Father. When we gain his heart, we gain deep understandings of what he loves and what he hates. We start to see Father’s plans and then he shows us the plans of the devil that comes against him. God knows everything, including all of the devils schemes. Our spiritual eyesight becomes far clearer than it would be without Father’s presence and synergistically so. In a word, we gain discernment.

The scriptures are not the only means to gain right answers to these questions. Bill Johnson says, and I agree, “The Bible defines God, it does not contain him.” The devil knows the scriptures better than any person does. But does satan’s knowledge of scriptures make him right? He uses the scriptures legally to attempt to gain ground against people and the church. He succeeds in that when we come into agreement with his lower arguments. What we agree with, either knowingly or unknowingly is so very powerful as to our success in all things.

What the devil does not have is the revelation power of the Holy Spirit and the blood of Jesus. The church must recognize that Jesus did it all. His blood is our weapon and the release of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost is our power behind this blood. Both are required for success against all things false. The blood is powerless without the Spirit. Jesus would not have been raised outside of the Holy Spirit’s power to be risen. If God is the entire flashlight and Jesus is the light bulb of truth, then the batteries that are the very power of the Holy Spirit are necessary to make it all work.

If I simply demand submission to authority by what I read and mentally conclude from the biblical word, without the blood and the manifesting presence of God, I can only be but in error. This, in time, results in the manifestation or religious demonic spirits who, through our flesh, control and manipulate the religious church by legalism and condescending authoritarianism.

Church leadership has no right to just demand parishioners to blindly “submit” without being in total submission to the Holy Spirit first in their own walk. That is not a right exercise of authority; it is more a form of legalistic dictatorship.

One Last Point

Take a very careful read of Romans Chapter 7. You know that Saul of Tarsus (Paul) was a murderer as he persecuted the Christians. Then God shed his supernatural light of revelation on Paul and Paul changed. But according to Romans 7 we are made clear to the fact that Paul still had issues he constantly dealt with. Here, Paul speaks to the law that reveals sin as sin. He then says that the law only has shed light on his miserable state. This was not a declaration of who he was as the former Saul; he spoke this of his present state.

Romans: 7:15-25 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living within me. I know that nothing good lives within me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do – this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God – through Jesus Christ our Lord!

Paul was transparently exposing his existing fleshly nature to the Roman church. By his honesty, he was showing us all how invaluable was the complete work of Jesus cross to his current soul. The simple truth is that Paul was not without sin, even while he was in the highest place of leadership.

When Todd Bentley made whatever mistake he made while at Lakeland, who are we to slap him down and say that this whole thing in Lakeland was “Strange Fire?” I can imagine how many critics there were of Paul’s ministry in his day that came against Paul with these same accusations, with Paul openly admitting that he was dealing with issues of the flesh.

If a prerequisite for leadership were perfection from sin, if all leadership were to be completely honest, there would be no church at all, and no one in Heaven. So maybe Todd blew it. And certainly there needs to be repentance. But to disqualify him is like saying to the apostle Paul, “Paul, here is where you sinned. Therefore, what you are manifesting is strange fire, and you are now disqualified to continue in ministry. Likewise we all need to beware of your strange fire.” This is great error.

Who is without sin today? Let him cast the first stone at Todd Bentley. As Jesus said to the Jews who were about to stone him in John 10:32, “I have shown you great miracles from the Father. For which of these do you stone me?”

Conclusion

Who is in control of our meetings? Is it the law or is it the Holy Spirit? When the Holy Spirit shows up in unique power how will we respond when the Lord asks the question, “Well, smarty pants, what do you think about that? Is this the devil or is it me?” Leadership must know, they will forever be asked these very questions.

Strange fires can only be exposed by revelation knowledge, not by what we think. Revelation knowledge comes only by way of the manifestation of the Holy Spirit. But if the Holy Spirit is not welcome because of “people in the way”, we are left with nothing but fine sounding arguments. This is what the Lord is warning us so seriously about in our day. Fine sounding arguments are no less than the tools the devil uses to silence God’s power in the earth. When the devil has done that, he traffics without check to bring division and destruction into the church. For the Holy Spirit is the power behind the light that sheds on darkness; no power… no light. We have to ask ourselves this very serious question, “Who are we arguing against when we judge revivals by what we think?”

Therefore, error is not found where the Holy Spirit manifests the Kingdom of God on earth in ways that confound people’s thinking, as was seen in Lakeland. Error is found where the Holy Spirit is not in residence. These places are where today’s Pharisees are found. These places are where there is so little Kingdom expression manifested outside church walls. Today, God is very much in the business of restoring his church to these radical Spirit filled standards as in Pentecost that resulted in such miracles as 3000 souls saved in a day.

Strange fire must be come against indeed. But it can only be revealed by Spirit filled people. Strange fire manifests in witch covens. It traffics in humanism, worldly spiritualism and in false cultic religions and to those who are deeply blinded by false doctrines. We know these false doctrines by who they testify to, Jesus or the world. Strange fire manifests to those who seek only what their itching ears want to hear. To apply this argument to those who love the Lord from the heart is way out of order.

There are many who would warn to beware of “strange fires.” When such warnings come by way of those truly moving in the Holy Spirit with revelation knowledge that has come from the Lord, then such warnings are critical. However, when such warnings come from those who are not operating in revelation, they do so of the flesh. To correct the flesh with the flesh is sure to put whatever fire is of God out. That which is supernatural is always in enmity with the flesh of man’s thinking.

I personally witnessed the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in Lakeland. I watched the Holy Spirit do miracle after miracle, including for my mother and my wife. I personally know that what happened there was very much in line with the Father’s heart. Had the manifestation of “strange fires” occurred there, even the most casual of godly observers in residence would have recognized it.

T. Scott Morton
http://www.tscottmorton.wordpress.com
tscottmorton@hotmail.com