THE SEASON OF PAIN THAT IS AFFECTING SO MANY
IN THE CHURCH RIGHT NOW HAS ALSO AFFECTED ME.  THROUGH SOME SERIOUS HEALTH ISSUES AND OTHER SERIOUS ISSUES, I HAVE COME THROUGH A TRUE WILDERNESS THAT HAS TESTED MY FAITH.  GOD HAS DELIVERED ME, AND CONTINUES TO DO SO. 

THIS HAS LED TO CHANGES IN THE VOICE OF THE WATCHMAN
and WARRIORS OF GOD MINISTRIES and TO ME.

THE SEASON OF PAIN:  

     There has been a major attempt to deflect those of us in ministry the past few years from fully fulfilling our call in this most critical portion of our lives and ministries.  I am one of those who has had to be shaken by the Lord because I was letting the pain and worries of the hour get to me.  I confess this to the Lord and to all who reads this.  God has reminded me that I am a Watchman for these last days, and though I had not stopped crying out the alarm, I had been limited greatly by illness and both situations and problems of life, with pure attacks of the enemy added in there.  I feel as if I have come out of a personal long, dark night... and God is giving me light and hope.

     In the past few years, I have watched men and women of God fall morally who had stood firm in their faith for many years.  I understand the increased pressures of this hour, but I also know that the answer to lust is the love of God and the Truth.  We don't have to fall to sin.  We don't have to give into the seduction. 

     I have watched others out of pure discouragement and depression step down from the stand that they once kept.  It is as if the "hope" of anyone who has an effective uncompromised ministry is the target, and that affects faith.  If you lose your hope, then the loss of faith is not far behind. When faith is affected, the ministry loses its power and discouragement sets in.

     If you are not careful, if the parts of your life that you have sown your time and love and energy into suddenly is ruined or taken from you, then you face a decision.  This usually comes at a time that you are ready for it.  Many times they follow a victory when we have rejoiced and let down on our prayers a bit because we are enjoying the victory.  But when you go from joy to pain, you have to decide if you are going to dig in and pray until God delivers, or let the pain overwhelm or worse, consume you.

     I have seen some corrupted by the love of money and preach more greed than gospel, losing their power with God but convinced of their spiritual superiority just as the Laodicean Church model in Revelation 3.  I have seen churches who still run good numbers, but the message is watered down and not addressing the evils of the day.  I have witnessed pastors using someone's contemporary book instead of the Bible at the pulpit.  Others still have made their pulpits into podiums for political parties (which is run by the spirit of this world system or cosmos) that sound more like a political forum than a church that preaches the gospel.  In fact, it has come out in the news that some pastors are being paid by the U.S. government to preach compliance to the government instead of the gospel.  How much is your soul worth?  Do we fear God or the government more?  Who gave their lives for us that we could have life?  Have we been bought by the blood of Jesus Christ, or are we for sell to whoever is buying this week?  You cannot serve God and money.

      In the same way, I have seen "another gospel" that preaches "another Jesus" that is not the Jesus of the Bible.  They are popular with the crowds because they downplay the taught Bible (Word of God... the Truth) and now preach a more contemporary message of diversity which denies the words of Jesus in John 14:6 and John 10:7-11.  They preach a gospel that smiles at sin and requires no repentance.  It preaches an "inclusive" gospel that denies the message of Jesus Christ and feeds the lie that all religions are the same and it doesn't matter what we believe after all.  It claims that true Christians are intolerant for believing that God gives us truth, instead of just blindly accepting any idea or belief system as equal to God's truth.  True  Christians are intolerant to sin, just like God is.

     There are not many roads to God, for God gave us His way (John 14:6 - Greek Hodos... a way or path not made by man... in other words God put it there).  Jesus is "the" way, and not just a way.  The way is the one that God sent... and gave all for.  Anyone trying to come any other way is as a thief and robber to God.

     I now need to give my own testimony and apology to those at Warriors of God especially who has been disappointed in me as I dropped off of the grid... completely there for a while.  I cannot tell you everything, for some things are personal and don't need to be shared.  But I will tell how God has delivered me and apologize to you who I might have hurt through my own weakness as there was a long time when I just could not interact online. 

MY APOLOGY

     I want to publicly apologize to those that I have let down over the Warriors of God Forum and this website.  I apologize to those especially who hung in there the longest as Brenna and Sooo.  Because of health issues (both mine and my wife) and other issues that have been personally devastating to me, I had to put my energies into what I could, and hold on with everything that I had to the Lord and His promises.  I mean, I had to hold on to the Lord for dear life it seemed, and pray that He would deliver me.  I am not complaining, and in fact I am thankful to God for delivering me.  God has sustained me and brought me through.  Everything is not over quite yet, but God has brought me out of the valley of the shadow of death and into a place I have never been before. 
     I know that I did not go through what Job did, and do not want to.  But for over a year, God kept leading me to Job.  In fact, God sent someone to me at least twice with a message for me out of the book of Job.  I know this might not make sense to anyone else, but it did to me.  It was as if I was as helpless as Job to change some things.  I was sitting in the doorway (this is the way that God showed me) with the door open to the promise.  But I was so sick (in more ways that physically) and weak, that I just could not get up on my own power and walk through the door.  I had to wait on the Lord to come and deliver me.  Over and over again, I prayed that He would deliver me... and somewhere along the line, spiritually I got up and have started through that door for God has come by and delivered me!
     Some things died in me that needed to die in that wilderness, but God is replacing them with something new and there is a new "touch" of God in my life that I have never known.  There is a new discernment (best way that I can describe it) that I have not had before.  God is definitely in control of it and not me, but it is bringing with it fruit and I am thankful.  Understand that I am not fully there yet, and there are still health and other issues and I desire your prayers both for our family. 
     There is a truth that I must have.  It seems that God sometimes gives me insights to help others, but I struggle and have to seek the Lord daily for my own walk.  I suppose that is as it should be, but right now I need to know something.  I am walking to my promise and I am going with the Lord.  But I need some guidance on a few things before I make my next step.  Until then, I am obeying the Lord including being totally transparent here.  I am a private person actually, and this kind of exposure is uncomfortable for me.  But there are others in their season of pain right now who might read this some time... maybe it can help.

     In fact, let me take a few minutes and talk to someone... I feel led to share this with whoever you are.  See, we preach it, but sometimes when it's our world that falls apart then it isn't so easy to preach it anymore.  It is hard to believe it for ourselves when we have been shaken and our world has fallen apart.  We know its hypocritical.  We feel hypocritical when it happens, but if we are honest with ourselves and God, then we know it is time to pray and just cast ourselves on the altar during these times.  
     Sometimes, things are dying in our lives that are just going to die no matter what we do.  If God wants it to live, He will breathe life into it.  But sometimes the wilderness is to let things die in our lives (or literally in us) that just don't belong there anymore.  They might have never should been there, or maybe they did once but has passed their season on our lives, and we just don't want to let them go. 
     But you can't have the new that God has for you until you let go of the old that has passed.  Sometimes, we have trouble admitting its dead after we see it there dead.  I am speaking metaphorically here.  This can be applied in so many ways, but I have found that God has been doing some major spiritual surgery in my life and in my thought processes.  I had to let go of some things and now by faith, pick up what God has for me now.  The true hypocrite preaches to others what they are doing themselves, and feels no remorse for their own weakness.  When we feel hypocritical for preaching faith and then having a trial of this magnitude of pain, we aren't really hypocrites if we can admit to it. 
     Confess it to the Lord... confess your weakness... confess what the pain is trying to drive you to... look at it squarely in the face and understand that this needs to be brought out before the Lord and confessed.  There might be a real need of repentance that you did not even recognize before this.  You are being shaken.  Trust in the Lord to finish the work in you and raise you up.  You might lose something (or even someone in some cases) that you love, but its out of your control.  Peter asked the question about losing wives and families, and Jesus gave him a very strong promise if that happened.  That promise was for this life and for the life to come, do you remember? 
     Know that you can't do it yourself.  Stop trying.  Get your hands off of it.  Quit trying to fix it, you just can't.  GOD CAN.  God will the way that He wants to if you will just let go and grab onto Him instead.  Let Him give you what He wants you to have.
     Once you have done this... once God has brought something new in you and starts leading you out of this place of shadow and death, rejoice and be thankful!  Obey Him and don't look back.  Keep your eyes on the mark of the prize of the high calling.  We don't have much time left.  Jesus is coming so very soon and God is shaking; we will either stand or fall when it is finished.

     Back to my testimony:  God is God, and He is Lord of my life and is delivering me.  It seems that it is a process that is not finished yet, but I trust Jesus as the author and finisher of my faith.  I publicly admit that I have been very discouraged in the past few years.  It was on and off for a while, and then became constant for a long time.  Besides health and other more private issues that had to be overcome, I have had to overcome depression during this time.  Preachers aren't supposed to get depressed.  Have you heard that?  It isn't said too much outwardly, but people think that way I believe.  Pride is broken in me... I admit to this weakness that by faith I am still overcoming.  I let the pain get to me.  I was living in constant mind-bending physical pain with some health issues, and when other pains were added to it... I found that I could not carry it without it crushing me.  We aren't supposed to carry it ourselves, but things happened so fast I kind of forgot that until it was too late.  That depression hurt my ability to minister and even upkeep these online ministries.  I am sorry.  But once again, I am thankful to God for deliverance.      
     God is raising me up, and the new thrust He is leading me to take will bring new people into these forums and website... but to those who were affected by my own weakness, I am sorry and ask you to forgive me.  There were times in the past 2 years when the only relief that I truly had is when I taught or preached at our local church.  Sometimes the Holy Spirit would move mightily through me in this process and I would have a little relief from the pain.  I would try to get online and share what I was doing in the local church during those times.  When the anointing would flow through me, I would be relieved... and the rest of the time, it was a struggle to interact with others which certainly hurt my ability to minister online and in person.  If you knew me personally, you would know that besides loving people, I just like people.  I like to talk one on one and interact and share.  I got to where I wanted to stay in a dark room and not see anyone.  It was so against my normal personality, but there was so much pain.  I learned just how human I really am.  
     I actually lengthened the length of this wilderness period for me because I frustrated God's attempt to heal me (not realizing it at the time of course).  I will not share all that has occurred, but I have been hurt and tried to act as if I was alright when I wasn't.  Pretending you are alright when you are not is NOT faith.  The more that I did that, the less I could minister to others... in fact, it got so bad that I hardly communicated with anyone online and distanced myself to my real-world friends.  I tried to act like I was okay, but I was far from it. 
     I think that it is in these times that ministers sometimes fall to sin.  I know that there is this temptation (in whatever area you are weak in) to try and find some way to alleviate your depression and hurt.  If you hurt badly enough, then you will seek some way to relieve it.  God is the right way, but sometimes all of us don't flow with the Lord but fall back into old patterns.  I have learned to be less judgmental of others in this also.  For if you quit praying in the season of pain, then the flesh starts guiding you into the old paths of sin to just try and find some relief to the pain.  Sometimes ministers fall during that time after years and years of faithful service to God.  You just want to make the hurt feel better.
    Believe me, I understand if you are feeling this way and reading this.  See, in these wilderness times, sometimes the Lord lifts the hedge as with Job and we are truly tested.  What is really inside will come to the surface.  It is your weaknesses that are being exploited against you.  We all have them.  Don't kid yourself, giving into it will make your life even more miserable and just hurt others and disappoint our very Lord who loves us and gave everything for us.  There is actually a good that God is trying to lead us to through these painful times.
     I learned about some weaknesses in me during this time that I did not even know that I had.  I learned also about the grace of God that moves and delivers us when we do not deserve it. 

• I learned that there are new beginnings that are based on what God says and not man.  

• I have learned to depend wholly on what the Lord says and not what man thinks. 

• I have learned that if we obey the Lord and stay in His Word (led by the Spirit), that it might not make any sense to the traditional church world, but God will empower you to do it and bring fruit from it. 

• I have learned to be "reckless" in my faith as a little child is.  As a little child just trusts their daddy to love them and not lead them into a  trap or deceive them, so I am learning to trust the Lord. 

• I am learning that I don't have to figure it all out before I start moving... if God says go, then I need to go right then. 

•     So, if this ministry takes a radical turn, it is because God has shown me that I was holding back in a fear that I should never have had.  I was afraid of running some believers off who tended to lean to more traditional ideas, and would have felt uncomfortable in us directly ministering to people that are bound in deep darkness.   I really loved them and did not want them to leave, and at the time did not recognize that I was holding back over them.  This actually started a number of years ago, you see.  If you obey the Lord and someone leaves, then it was not for them to be there.  That is another hard lesson.  I didn't want to lose anyone, and the root of that was a "fear" that God did not want me to have.  I have been stripped of much (not quite everything) and now God is giving me what He wants me to have and giving me marching orders on the direction He wants me to take... and I am going to obey the Lord.

This season of pain for me has led me into some very new territory, and the Lord has only just begun to take me there.  As I leave the pain and enter into the promise, I am thankful.  I also recognize that I am going to put myself and my abilities into the Lord's hands.  There are some people out there that need to know that God loves them.  They need to know that even though they have gone through some terrible and sometimes terrifying things, that God loves them and wants to deliver them.  It is our call to reach out to them in faith and give them Jesus. 

Our hope... my hope must be in the Lord Jesus Christ.  We have all sinned and come short of the glory of God, and we all need Jesus.  There is a war going on over souls.  So many have been taught the wrong thing, and so many are going to stand before God some day and try to argue that they are saved when they were never really born again.  The Gospel must be preached.  The Word must be taught.  The Truth must be given by the power of the Holy Spirit.  This is the goal of this ministry.  I want to follow Jesus.  I want to die to myself and have His life.  I want to know Him more and more.  I want to be found "in Him."  And I want to help others to Jesus as well.

There are some in "unusual" circumstances and in deep darkness.  Jesus Christ is the light that will break the darkness and deliver them from those chains.  This is my call... my responsibility to God.  By faith, I trust Jesus to help me fulfill it.

GOD IS SHAKING HIS CHURCH, AND THE SHAKING STARTS WITH THE MINISTRY AND THEN SPREADS TO THE REST OF THE CHURCH.
A TIME OF VISITATION HAS COME.

SOME WILL STAND AND SOME WILL FALL.
BUT GOD IS CALLING OUT HIS CHURCH FOR ONE LAST THRUST INTO THE HARVEST.  WE MUST DECIDE IF WE WILL OBEY IN THIS DARK HOUR.