The Lord continues to move in power, in spite of the trials and the pain of walking through the furnace of affliction while recovering from this major shoulder injury. God continues to pour out His Spirit in power and we see people saved, healed and filled with the Holy Spirit while walking through the refiner’s fire day by day. God uses everything for good though, and I encourage you to click here to read an example of just how he has done that in the past….

We just preached at a Hispanic church down near the border and the Holy Spirit was poured out in power. A young man named Mark, who just got saved back in April, testified after we prayed for him how for the first time he experienced the Power of God and was filled with God’s love by the Holy Spirit (this is such a key thing in the Christian life. Read about my own experience and how God uses trials for good here.) Many others received the same filling and empowering and equipping as well, and many spiritual gifts were released in people’s lives including tongues and prophecy.

We just conducted a wedding before this, the first I’ve ever conducted and preached at and the Lord majorly blessed the time with many divine appointments and opportunities to pray for others before, during, and after the event itself. Even others praying for me and my shoulder condition turned into Holy Ghost ministry times; a pre-wedding party at the beach ended with a Holy Ghost ministry time with many getting prayed for and impacted by God's power, and we were blessed by all the opportunities to serve and bless others that the Lord gave us through this and other things we've done lately. To hear the wedding message click here...

One after another God continues to bring forth opportunities to pray and witness to people and we are continually seeing the Kingdom of God made manifest through the Holy Spirit (who is mentioned in the Book of Acts over 70 times) poured out into people’s lives.

We just shared and then did some worship at a meeting for radio producers and ended up praying for and ministering to many while there as well. The Lord is continually teaching us on the need to listen to the Holy Spirit even in the smallest things. We arrived already considerably late to the meeting, however the Lord led me to not go straight in but to wait in the car. This was incredibly hard to do when already late. Against every urging of my flesh to rush straight in I sat waiting in the car feeling kind of ridiculous. Finally, after some time the Lord released us to go in. We found out we had just missed, by waiting to come in, a very heavy and disturbing scene with a person who was not a scheduled speaker getting on the microphone who was full of religiosity and putting a negative and heavy burden on people in the meeting from the microphone who then just up and left. Satan sometimes uses people like this to try and hinder the work of the Spirit, by waiting we stepped around the mess/slime session from the devil and were unhindered in ministering and were used to help some of those negatively affected, praying for them later on that night.

God is always full of surprises, a month or so ago we shared how we were short on cash and the Lord just spontaneously provided us a free pizza (link) when we pulled up at a pizza restaurant. Just recently after a night of ministry we were on our way home very late. We were short on cash and I was digging in the ash tray for some change to buy some shakes at a drive-through. We pulled up to the window and before I handed the guy the money he said "Nope, that's not needed," handed us the shakes and just giving them to us. Without saying a word the Lord moved on his heart. Little signs like that illuminate the Love of the Father with these little miracles of His grace and care. Like C.S. Lewis's Aslan, the Lord suddenly roars and miraculous things happen.

A few prayer requests: My shoulder dislocation injury was definitely a very, very painful experience, I think I'll wear more pads than a hockey goalie if I'm doing something like that again.

I've had in the past broken bones, sprained ankles and knees, torn ligaments, smashed my head, hands, fingers, toes and lots of other things more than I can count, in fact I've had stitches in just my head more than ten times plus twice in my chin as well as concussions and other injuries like crashing on a motorcycle while jumping a canyon and hitting the opposite wall head on without a helmet, being stabbed in the leg by a pshyco, being piledriven by a wave headdfirst straight into a coral reef, being flipped off a mountain bike landing on my head on pavement and then having the bike nail me in the face and many other injuries including major back injuries and neck injuries, but nothing was like the pain of this shoulder injury. So I'm not just some wimp whining here, this thing has been seriously painful, plus I've had months of sleep deprivation in the process cause it has been so hard to sleep with this injury. The recovery is quite a painful, stretching and challenging process because the tension between stiffness and pain must be continually worked out through lots of exercises that need to be done regularly to regain strength and mobility (i.e. recipe for soreness) for full recovery. So keep me in prayer before the Lord for a speedy and pain-free recovery as I and the physical therapist torture myself working this stuff out.

I recently saw the orthopedic specialist. This, along with all the physical therapy appointments is adding up in expense. The doctor also wants to do an MRI to see what might be damaged in my shoulder and see if I can continue to heal through just physical therapy or if I will need surgery to repair the shoulder for a full recovery. So I'm asking for prayer that there would be complete healing in my shoulder and no need for surgery. I have been progressing in the physical therapy department and have also received prayer which has greatly helped, so please pray and continue to pray for the Lord to heal this thing up fully in Jesus' name! Please pray for our finances too which are being hit extra hard with all these expenses.

The only people I know who do a lot of work for free are ourselves and a few other ministers and missionaries—not necessarily the way things are supposed to be but it is what it is. The doctors and therapists are happy to show us the door, however, if we don't pay our bills, which are mounting up to where we've been really stretched in a major way and could truly use whatever help you can offer, big or small it all helps. So we ask that you'd pray for our finances and please prayerfully consider us in your giving. We've had to postpone some things, especially some ministry that is far away at all, due to the strain it brings to the shoulder, opportunities that would ordinarily be bringing in some finances, so your prayers and financial gifts are all the more needed at this time.

Jesus People: It's the fourtieth anniversary of an event that defined the Hippie movement. Out of the cultural shift towards some disconcerting things, God was working behind the scenes springing forth a revival unexpectedly that gave birth to some of the biggest Christian churches in America today. Evangelist Greg Laurie, Pastor Mike Macintosh as well as Billy Graham Crusade music minister Tommy Coomes were saved through an unlikely figure risen up to preach to society’s fringe. Check out the story of how God uses the weak and flawed things and even moves in the midst of cultural decay to bring forth redemption. Click here to read more.

Make sure and check out our list of over 90 programs available on our webpage, iTunes and available on DvD and CD on our website and iTunes sites for our show Grace Alone.

Thanks for your prayers, if you'd like to contribute to help with our finances it would be much appreciated and will help us out especially during this time of trial. Remember that you can receive a full tax deduction for your contribution. Click here.