Jesus Men

Yes, it has been a lot longer than I had planned for my third post. There is a draft post about grace which is work in progress, and loads of things in my heart, but I can only really get to writing and publishing in the small amount of spare time outside the call of pastoring the church here in London (plus the various other blogs I seem to be contributing to!) :-)

This post was meant to be on grace - and that post is still coming - but I was so overwhelmed by things that Rob Rofus said during the Grace and Glory Conference in Hong Kong last year, that I had to post this teaching and prayer concerning men. These words come during a ministry time during session 5. It might seem a bit disjointed at first read. Rob is ministering, encouraging, praying, there is a song, there is some teaching. I have just transcribed it as it happened. Please read with an open heart and allow the Lord to minister to you:

"Forgive us for taking the culture of the world as men, Lord. So afraid of intimacy, so afraid of closeness, so afraid of emotions openly expressed. We thank You for the example of David, Lord, a real man, a masculine man, a warrior, a mighty warrior, a man who killed many people in battle, a great warrior in the army of Israel, the king; yet a sensitive and tender poet, a romantic, a lover, a tender-hearted man. Oh give us men like that in the world today - warriors who will stand up and fight and yet they know tenderness, intimacy.

Jesus, the Son of God, who stood against the most evil force on the planet, religious demons behind Pharisees; He stood against them sometimes alone, and would not buckle under their pressure, or intimidation. What a man and yet He could stand before Lazarus' tomb and weep and shed tears and say 'Let the little children come to Me for such is the kingdom of heaven.' This Jesus who could look at a woman caught in adultery and say to her, 'Woman, where are your accusers? Neither do I accuse you."

Such tenderness in this man, Jesus of Nazareth, fully God yet fully man, weeping with compassion. Showing such kindness, that even on the cross dying for our sins looks down at John and says 'John, behold your mother', pointing at Mary - thinking... thinking about His mother while He's on the cross with the sin of the world on Him - He's still wanting to make sure that Mary, His earthly mother, is looked after by His disciple John, the one that He loved.

What kind of man is this? So full of masculinity, so full of male authority, yet so tender, so intimate, that He let John the apostle put his head on his own chest at the last supper, and was not embarrassed by the contact of a physical man touching His chest in public, so innocent and pure.

What happened to the church? This bridegroom does not need our love but He desires our love with a passion. He desires our love with a passion.

Father, we want signs and wonders and miracles, we want these things. But they are not our priority - You are! We're not seeking healing, we are seeking the Healer. We're not seeking miracles, we're seeking the Miracle-worker. We're not seeking deliverance, we're seeking the Deliverer. We're seeking You, we want to be captured by Your jealous love. We want to respond - we love You, Lord because You first loved us.

I pray for men right now, that where their emotions are still locked up, under a disfunctional, illegitimate, unrighteous cultural conditioning, that is contrary to the culture of the Kingdom, or locked up because you had a dad whose emotions were locked up... Your children need to see tears in your eyes, your wife needs to see tears in your eyes, your friends need to see tears in your eyes...

Jesus had tears in His eyes. As we sing this "I love you, Lord" the Spirit of God is going to come on you and release your emotions to be able to weep, to be able to cry like Jesus of Nazareth. And it is for the ladies aswell, and it is not weeping because of remorse, it's not weeping because of guilt, it's weeping because you're liberated to be a fully completed human being, with all your emotions released in freedom - where religion has made you a robot, made you mechanical, the Spirit of Life releases you into friendship and sonship into the fulness of your humanity.

We love You, we love You, we love You, our Lord.
We love You, we love You, we love You, our Lord.
We thank You, we thank You, we thank You, our Lord.
We thank You, we thank You, we thank You, our Lord.
We thank You, our Lord.

The Holy Spirit is here to confirm His Word. He's been doing it already. But if you've had your emotions locked up, supressed, because of fear of expressing them, people frowning on you, being misunderstood, trying to be macho...

A lot of the research going on in the church world today is trying to tell us the reason we don't have lots of men in the church is because men don't like to sing in public. That's a lot of rubbish - they sing at rugby matches. So they do research on society and current cultural trends and make the church conform to that rather than seeing society conformed to the Kingdom.

They say men don't like to hold hands in public. Well I've seen men hugging each other on rugby fields and cricket fields when they score a try, so I don't believe that either. They say men don't like to cry in public; well I've seen Aussies, survivors of the Galipoli campaign in the Second World War cry in public about their lost friends.

It is just anti-Christ - to cry and do all their emotional stuff outside of church. But in church there's a spirit of religion that's locked people in. It's an anti-Christ spirit, its anti the finished work. Right now the Spirit of God is moving on men and women, and is unlocking those emotions, setting you free to be the person God created you to be...

{Time of praying in the Spirit.}

Let fears be broken off our lives. Let the flood of Your glory bring freedom, Lord. It's broken... Freedom, release...

And now may the grace that gives us unusual favours and advantages in life, the grace of the Lord Jesus; and the love of God that never fails is never withdrawn and is unconditional; and the exquisite delight and fellowship with the wonderful person of the Holy Spirit the Comforter who is alongside of us to help us, be with all my brothers and sisters, in this place now and forever more. Amen