stillhaventfound.org

YOU are invited to an event this Saturday night:

Event: Meeting for believers interested in 1) understanding and practicing healing, 2) John G. Lake Ministries (JGLM) which is starting in Singapore or 3) just connecting with others interested in healing so we can encourage and challenge each other to do the stuff together.

Speaker: Alastair Reid from JGLM

Date and Time: 31st July (Saturday), 7pm (snacks will be provided, but not dinner!)

Location: Teresa Ville Condominium function room (beside BBQ pits).

How to get there: Teresa Ville (1001 Lower Delta Road) is a condominium near both Harbourfront MRT (VivoCity) and Tiong Bahru MRT. To get there from VivoCity, take bus number 65 or 855 opposite VivoCity. The bus stop has a big green grassland behind it. Stop 4 stops after you get on.To get there from Tiong Bahru MRT, take bus number 123 or 195 from opposite Tiong Bahru MRT. Stop 3 stops after you get on.

What to expect: This is a very informal gathering of believers interested in healing and Curry Blake’s teachings and John G. Lake Ministries. Alastair, who’s helping to start JGLM Singapore, will share about how he came in contact with Curry and JGLM and how God is using JGLM to assist churches and believers in the area of healing. Through this, he’ll also share about destroying sacred cow doctrines of healing. There will also be time for praying for healing.

Who should come: Those who are simply here to find out more about healing and about Curry Blake and JGLM’s unique views on healing are most welcome to come. In fact, as long as you’re interested to learn more about healing (even if you don’t know who Curry Blake is), just come!

But more than this, generally I hate meetings that only result in talk and no action. I love discussion, but I also love practicing. Healing is to be practiced, not just talked about. And I’m not referring to practicing healing during the meeting - Alastair and many others would be glad to pray for any healing. But if you’re serious about connecting with people who desire to encourage and challenge each other to show God’s love to the world through practicing healing as a lifestyle - be it with JGLM or otherwise -, do come and meet other like-minded Christians.

If you’re thinking of coming, just drop me an email at idealist at stillhaventfound.org

I wrote the above details first because I know many people may not bother reading the below :)

The impact of the teachings of Curry Blake and JGLM on my life and others

Readers of my blog would know that I’ve been talking a lot about Curry Blake and healing recently. Just under 15 years ago when God changed my life, I read (and watched) a lot of Benny Hinn and Kathryn Kuhlman, famous healing ministers. I was amazed, but that was about all. I didn’t aspire to be like them. There was no way I thought I or any ordinary Christian could be like these and many other famous healing ministers.

About two years ago, I was introduced to Bill Johnson and Bethel Church and since then, I’ve become increasingly interested in the healing ministry. Bill Johnson and his church have influenced so many people around the world and made them believe that we ordinary Christians can actually go around healing people on the streets. I’ve been absorbed in the issue of healing for the past two years but never dared to step out and actually practice it. A few months ago, I came across Curry Blake’s Divine Healing Technician (DHT) training on mp3. I listened to all 19 mp3s (and then very soon another 19 mp3s from a different training) - his teachings have really transformed my thinking. Bill Johnson and Bethel got me passionate about healing and moved me away from the far side of the continuum of believing that only anointed ministers could heal people. Curry Blake completed the process and brought me to the other end and made me believe that you and I could pray for healing and expect and see healings occur.

During my trip to the States recently, I attended Curry Blake’s 3-days Divine Healing Technician training. Even better than that, I met different groups of people greatly influenced by Curry’s teachings who were going out on the streets and into shopping centers praying for, and often healing, whoever they saw. That was a super amazing experience that I’ve shared a bit on this blog (see my previous post) and will be sharing more in future.

Since coming back from the States, I’ve started to step out in faith and pray for people I see on the streets who need healing - with some clear results and some not so. I’m still learning and this is the beginning of my journey of stepping out. I still have a lot of questions, but I’ll still step out in faith believing in God’s healing power. I have no doubt that I will heal the blind, see people in wheelchairs walk, see cancer and other deadly diseases destroyed and the dead raised. If you’ve read my blog long enough, you know I’m not given to hype and so I don’t say the above lightly. I am someone special - I’m a King’s child - and so are you and I believe you can do exactly the same thing if you believe it and really get into all this. I would never have said the above a few years ago or even 6 months ago but listening to Curry’s teachings opened my eyes to see certain things in the Bible that now make me believe the above.

I dunno if I’ll agree with every single thing Curry says (I’m still new to this journey, have many questions and I’m still learning and formulating my own views on healing) and I believe in drawing and learning from different teachers (e.g. Joseph Prince, Andrew Wommack, Bill Johnson, Roger Sapp, etc) when it comes to healing and things related to healing, but I believe Curry probably has the best teachings in the world on healing. Many people would agree with me on this. Mike Bickle thinks that Curry’s DHT manual is the best on healing. Kobus van Rensburg loves Curry’s teachings. But perhaps one of the greatest testaments to the impact of Curry’s teachings is not that famous Christian leaders love Curry’s teachings, but that ordinary Christians like you and me have been so influenced by his teachings on healing that they’ve started stepping out and healing people on the streets. I’ve been with different groups of young Christians who’ve been practicing healing on the streets and they’ve credited Curry as being the most influential teacher in their healing ministry and whose teachings have increased their success rates tremendously. By the way, I greatly respect people who do it on the streets because I think these people are the real deal. They are putting their beliefs into actions and so they know what they are talking about.

First night of healing at Walmart

The first two nights, my friends and I went to Walmart after dinner to heal people. Before we went to Walmart, we ate at a fast food restaurant and here’s Caleb spending time talking to some youth and keeping his covenant to God (as he told me) to pray for everyone he sees that needs healing:

After dinner, we spent about 1 hour in Walmart. Michael and Ashley prayed for someone who had an injured leg. He came to get some medicine for the pain and left without needing any medicine as the pain had left:

At night, he called Michael, telling him that the swell on his face that was also prayed over had decreased significantly in size. JD also had the opportunity to pray for someone using a walking stick also and shared the gospel. For me, I approached 3 people but they didn’t really want to be prayed for.

When we reached the hotel at night, the five of us spent some time just worshiping God and soaking. They also prophesied over each other and over me. When they asked me if they could pray for me in any way, I mentioned my eyesight - I’m short-sighted. The four of them spent about 20-30 minutes just commanding the eyes to be healed in Jesus’ name. They didn’t just pray/command once, but continued for some time and took it upon themselves to see my eyes healed, though it didn’t heal. This may sound stupid and most of us probably wouldn’t think God would heal something like this, but we’re all convinced that if God can heal other diseases and other things, He can heal something like myopia. (More on this and contending for, and persevering in, healing in future posts). We ended the night by watching a video of Todd White, someone we all looked up to because of his ministry combining power (healing), love and the prophetic.

That night was the first time I’ve ever done this (praying in the streets or in shops for total strangers) with friends. It was definitely an experience for me and I learned to be more bold in approaching people!

Second night of healing at Walmart

On the second night at Walmart, we were joined by about 4 other young people, two of whom  (one was Nick) spent the previous night healing people in other parts of the city. We spent about 1.5 hours there in total and saw many healings - especially at the Shoes section:

In the afternoon, Michael had already grown a person’s leg during one of the training session breaks:

In Walmart, we approached a Hispanic lady on a wheelchair. We talked a lot to the Hispanic family and saw a few legs growing out, pain leaving from people’s bodies and lives being touched as we listened to them and told them about Jesus.

I spent time talking to my friends, seeing them in action and walking around Walmart looking for people to heal. I dunno if there’s an impartation of anointing, but what I definitely know is that when you hang around people who are experienced in this area and just talk to them, see them in action and join along with them - when you do that, you learn and grow bolder. There’s definitely growth by association.

Healing in a home on the morning of the third day

The first Hispanic lady we met at Walmart last night invited us to her house after just a few minutes of talking to us. So on the third day morning, we spent about 1 hour + at her place. We talked to the lady and her husband (they spoke mainly Spanish so two of us were doing most of the talking - one of the two was a Chinese Singaporean!). We prayed for both of them and pain in her shoulders and back left, her legs were strengthened enough for her to walk around without her walking stick and pain in his foot left. She started to shake her side in happiness and disbelief that pain had left her back and also cried. It’s such a sight to behold when you see people healed and they are so surprised yet full of joy! That’s Jesus touching their lives! Her daughter came and later we prayed for her and two people prophesied over her.

Overall, the three days going out with other young people (probably all in their twenties) and healing the sick was just totally awesome! I’ve seen all this in Youtube and read so much about how even ordinary people (like you and me) went to the streets and the public to heal people and demonstrate God’s love and power, but living it out together with others was just a crazy experience! These experiences alone were well worth the cost and time of the whole trip! I had even more experiences later on in my trip which I’ll write about in future posts.

After attending Bethel Church (Redding), I spent nearly two weeks in Colorado. I’ll share more about that next time but fresh on my memory now is my time in Arkansas for Curry Blake’s Divine Healing Technician (DHT) training from 8th to 10th July.

I’ll start by saying that my three days in Arkansas for this training contained times that were easily some of the best of my trip - and perhaps in my life - and yet also some of the worst of my trip.

A great bunch of friends

The night before the training, I took a flight from Colorado Springs to Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport (XNA) in Arkansas and arrived about 11pm. Visiting a small city in America without a car sucks. My cab ride to the hotel cost me a good US$40! I prayed that I wouldn’t have to take a cab each day to and from the meeting place as the trip would probably cost about US$30-US$40 each way! Arkansas isn’t exactly a place to go for tourists - the most famous thing about Arkansas is Bill Clinton, who was a former Governor of Arkansas. There’s pretty much nothing to do in that part of Arkansas (except that the headquarters of Walmart is located here) and there isn’t much public transportation. I was hesitant to arrange a trip to come to this training - I knew it’d be very costly (not just air ticket but also hotel and transportation), but I guess I really wanted to come because of the impact Curry has had on my thinking. And I’m definitely glad I came.

On the morning of the first day, I got up early and waited at the hotel reception. I knew that more than 20 people staying at the hotel were going to the training so I was going to ask for a ride. Eventually, I got a ride with a group of four fantastic people (Michael, Ashley, JD and Caleb) - a truly awesome bunch, without whom my time in Arkansas would have been so much less meaningful. They were in their twenties and were from various parts of America - one completed an internship at Mike Bickle’s International House of Prayer (IHOP), another spent the previous month at Bethel Church in Redding and a couple leads a house church in Kansas City. Here they are with Curry:

Throughout our time there, we went everywhere together. We chatted extensively throughout this time about healing and all. We talked about Curry Blake’s teachings and on healing how it compared to Bill Johnson’s - I really enjoyed this part because I had been thinking a lot about all this (like in my previous post) and our conversations helped refine my thinking. They were people who prayed for people on the streets - some with more success and some with less. When Michael, the driver of the car, first heard that I wanted a lift, he asked me if I had uneven legs (legs of uneven length) because he doesn’t allow people with uneven legs to ride in his car. I knew what he meant - if I had uneven legs, he would pray that God would grow and even the length of my legs. He had grown the leg of the receptionist the night before when he first came into the hotel. I was really excited when I heard all this as this was what I wanted: to be around people who do the stuff so that I can be challenged by them and do it together with them. I wanted to do that during the Bethel Conference though there wasn’t much time in between sessions and sessions ended too late. And I really wanted to do it during this Curry Blake training too. I didn’t just want to just learn and not go out to the streets to heal people. God answered my prayer by giving me a great bunch of friends to be with the whole there days.

Conversations about healing and the prophetic

We had great conversations. Conversations I dream of having with friends, but I don’t have many Christian friends into healing and the few into healing are not familiar with Curry Blake or what he teaches. We had very constructive and thought-provoking discussions after the sessions. We analyzed Curry’s teaching (agreed and disagreed here and there), honestly wondered why some of us had so little success, wondered how we could grow in this area, etc. One guy talked about how when he was at Bethel, some students used the power of God to stick coins on the wall! I think this is probably some stuff students do and not endorsed by the leadership and I think it’s probably an immature way to use the power of God, if it’s indeed the power of God - see this video by a bunch of guys I met and stayed with after my time at Arkansas and before I returned to Singapore.

I talked with them about my struggles in moving in the prophetic and one of them shared about how a friend of his made him move out in faith by telling someone that he was gifted in the prophetic - which pressured him to step out and listen to God to give that person a word on the spot. He learned through being pushed to take risks and he suggested that I give him a word there and then. I turned the tables and asked him to give me a word (ya, I wasn’t willing to take risks in this area - I need to learn to do that!). He gave me a word and it was a pretty accurate word of knowledge. Another guy also told me about a picture he saw of me and that was pretty accurate too.

Pastor Joseph Prince in America

Every city I visited in the States, I was pleasantly surprised to meet people who love Pastor Joseph Prince’s preaching (they watch it on TV).  The same was the case at Curry’s training. I’ve probably encountered about 15 people in total throughout my trip in five different cities (Redding, Denver, Colorado Springs, Bella Vista in Arkansas and San Jose). When they know I’m from Singapore, the first thing they ask is if I know Pastor Joseph Prince! One lady told me she wakes up 4:30am every morning just to listen to him. Another tells me of how she and a relative of hers have been healed through listening and applying the message (of confessing our righteousness of God in Christ). Another spoke of how he was liberated from condemnation and guilt. And another that both Curry Blake and Joseph Prince were his favourite preachers. By the way, I heard that Curry Blake is trying to hook up with Joseph Prince / New Creation Church and I think Andrew Wommack also. If this does materialize that would be super awesome! I’m hoping that both Curry Blake and Andrew Wommack would come to Singapore one day!

Success rates in healing

I don’t want to be a person big on numbers, but numbers are important. I don’t want to overemphasize numbers, yet on the other hand I don’t want to understate the importance of numbers. While I don’t like it when a Church keeps on focusing on numbers, I think it’s equally wrong to totally neglect numbers. To me, seeing the fruit is in a sense seeing the numbers.

Before I attended Curry Blake’s training, I read people saying that he had 85% success rate in healing, which was supposedly one of the highest around. During the training, one of my friends asked Curry what his percentage of healing was. My friend was uncomfortable with Curry preaching such an absolute message of healing without any compromise or toning down of how we have the power in Christ to heal all the sick and raise the dead, etc. So he asked Curry what his success rate was - believing it has to be 100% if he’s to preach such an uncompromising message of healing. Curry’s response was that he has between 94% to 96% success rate.

I’m not going to put down Bethel because I’ve learned so much from them and Bill Johnson and gang first got me into all of this. And I’ll continue to learn from them but I also want to learn from others and finally evaluate what I’ve learned by going to the Bible. What I heard through talking to some people is that Bethel’s Healing Rooms sees only about 5% success rate. While this is through some pretty good sources, feel free to take this with a bit of healthy skepticism (I do) - after all, in a sense this is hearsay. I’d also do the same with Curry’s supposed success rate. I wouldn’t want to compare Curry’s success rate with that of Bethel’s because besides not being 100% sure of the exact figures, I also think context is important. Furthermore, I didn’t see a great deal of healing during Curry’s conference - something I’ll write about later in this series of posts.

However, I’ve talked to at least four people in the States who got started in this healing business having been influenced by Bill Johnson and Bethel. But the moment they latched onto Curry’s teachings, they saw a dramatic increase in the success rate of their healings, which they attribute to understanding healing in the way Curry teaches - as opposed to the way Bethel and others teach.

Like I said above, I don’t want to be putting Bethel down and it’s not my intention to create division and pit Curry Blake against Bill Johnson. However, as I’ve suspected since I heard Curry Blake’s Divine Healing Technician (DHT) mp3s online, there are definite differences in teachings. And Curry’s teachings have not only caused my faith to increase and inspired me to start stepping out more and more, but it’s also dramatically transformed the thinking and rate of success of others.

Dogmatic Curry

Curry is definitely dogmatic about what he believes in. I’ve listened to a few of his DHTs where you’ll hear him disagreeing with a lot of other ministers and popular teachings on healing - he’s not afraid to be outspoken and dogmatic about it. Being dogmatic isn’t necessarily bad. I’m generally not attracted to people who are too dogmatic, but I think Blake makes a lot of good sense and his message needs to be heard. A person being dogmatic wouldn’t make me not hear his message. Prophets were/are dogmatic and they were not nice people. During my trip, I heard two leaders who were prophetic in the sense of speaking forth an important but unpopular message that the church needs to hear. One was Curry and the other was David Watson, which I’ll write about in future. Like prophets of old, they have strong convictions (often politically incorrect) and tend to either piss people off or draw strong followers to their messages.

As Curry mentioned, one of the most powerful and faith-filled ministers, Smith Wigglesworth, was not a nice person and he didn’t have many visitors or friends. After all, these people aren’t out to win friends and be likable, but to speak the truth. Speaking the truth often means going against accepted wisdom of the day and being politically incorrect. Curry would probably acknowledge that he’s not a super friendly and sociable guy. He may come across quite arrogant to some and put a lot of people off with what he says and his teachings, but I’ve heard many have accepted his teachings after strongly disagreeing with them initially (because they went against a lot of things they believed in) and struggling with it for some time. I’ll definitely be writing more about Curry’s unique teachings on healing on this blog, some of which I’ve already touched upon in my previous post on two ways to minister.

An important theme on my mind going into the Bethel Church Kingdom Culture Conference (since encountering Curry Blake’s teachings) has been the issue of ministering (e.g. healing) to people through:

1) Praying for more of God (experiencing more of Him, His touch, His anointing, His leading) in order to be more effective to do His Kingdom work

versus

2) Knowing what you already have in Christ by faith (His anointing, His presence, etc.) and thus going out to do the work of the Kingdom.

As I’ll write more in future, I see Curry Blake, Andrew Wommack and Joseph Prince as emphasizing more of the latter (view number 2). Bill Johnson and Bethel seem to focus more than the above three on the former (view number 1), while not neglecting the latter (view number 2), as you’ll see below. I wrote a bit about this tension (though in the context more of sanctification than empowerment for ministry) here and also something similar related to healing (being led by the Spirit vs. going by faith and in the authority of the Scriptures) here. Three messages I heard during the conference made me reflect more about these two different ways of doing ministry or being empowered for ministry - or whatever you wanna call it.

Kris Vallotton on Desperation for God

In Kris Vallotton’s first message on Wednesday night (23th June), he touched a bit on this theme. This wasn’t the main point of his message - his message was on believing in people. But he mentioned about how Graham Cooke (a prophet) said out loud during a meal with many people (including Kris),

I don’t wanna be desperate for God.

Kris was struck by that statement and wondered what Cooke meant. I dunno if it was Cooke or Kris who gave the explanation, but it was this:

Being desperate means you have a dysfunctional relationship with God.

Kris mentioned that “The reason we have visitations (of God) rather than habitations (of God) is because we don’t think God can tolerate us.” He also mentioned that he couldn’t sing “I’m desperate for you” anymore - I think he was referring to this Vineyard song “Breathe” which I mentioned here.

Anyway, I think the whole point of it all (at least what I took from it) is that we need to recognize that God is always with us - that is, view number 2 above. His presence is always with us whether we feel it. And sometimes being too desperate for God (His presence, His anointing, etc.) can be reflective of the fact that we somehow don’t recognize that in Christ and by faith we’re already anointed, already have all authority and already have God’s presence in and with us always. God is already with us - it’s not as though we’re trying to get Him to come to us. He already inhabits us.

I’ve heard Bill Johnson say in a few of his past sermons something like in our private prayer with God, we can act desperate or hungry for more of Him and more breakthroughs. In public when ministering, we don’t show this form of desperation. Now, I’m paraphrasing him and I may be missing his point slightly but I think what he’s trying to say is that in public we thank God for His presence and we go by faith healing the sick - i.e. view number 2 above. Perhaps we shouldn’t always show that desperate side. In private times, we wrestle with God and cry out to Him for more victories and power - i.e. view number 1 above.

Bill Johnson on Rending the Heavens

Bill Johnson spoke on Thursday morning (24th June) and he said a lot of stuff related to the above theme. By the way, Bill Johnson’s sermons are fantastic. Sometimes you hear people speak about books in which every sentence contains so many insights that one has to read slowly and chew on each sentence. Bill Johnson’s sermons are kind of like that. A lot of sentences he says contain so much insight. His style is very different from Kris. Kris is more of a preacher and Bill I think is more of a teacher. Both complement each other well.

Anyway, Bill said stuff like:

The renewing of our mind in Romans 12 is to get our minds consistent with what we already have.

We need to learn to access what’s already been accomplished - it was done 2,000 years ago.

This reminds me of what some other speakers I’ve heard recently said. I believe it was Rob Hotchkin, who ministers with Patricia King of Extreme Prophetic, who said in Covenant Vision on 6th June that:

Fasting is to get things out of the way that is preventing me from knowing I already have everything.

And during the recent Asia Conference organized by City Harvest Church, I believe it was Reinhard Bonnke who said that we shouldn’t ask for Elijah’s anointing or double portion because in the New Covenant we have Jesus’ anointing. He also mentioned that according to Matthew 28, God’s with us always and so why pray for God’s presence to come when He’s always with us? Even if he (Bonnke) doesn’t feel anything, he still appropriates God’s presence by faith and thanks God for His presence. David Yonggi Cho mentioned that our attitude in our prayers shouldn’t be that of begging God for something we don’t have, but of proclaiming (the things we already have).

The above quotes from Bill, Hotchkin, Cho and Bonnke all emphasize view number 2 above. We’re not trying to get something we don’t already have as we already have it all in Christ. If only we knew what we already have in Christ, we would be able to do miraculous things. And I absolutely love the above way of looking at fasting. It isn’t to get more power or change God’s mind. It’s really more for our own heart and to position ourselves better to receive more from God. It doesn’t earn God’s favor or power - it merely gets rid of things that are preventing us from knowing and experiencing how much power we already have in Christ. Or as Curry Blake said:

Fasting doesn’t get you power. Fasting gets you out of the way so power can flow easier.

The power isn’t something you need to get but it’s already inside you - you already have it. Fasting merely gets you out of the way and allows the power from within to flow out more easily.

Bill also mentioned how it’s not totally accurate to ask God to “rend the heavens” because

…we already live under an open heaven.

The phrase “rend the heavens” comes from Isaiah 64:1,  “Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down”. But that was in the Old Testament and before Jesus came. Jesus rended the heavens and tore the veil separating us from God on the cross! Understanding Biblical Theology (which I explain a bit more here) would help us to see the fulfillment of that passage in Christ and that we shouldn’t be singing or praying that verse as New Covenant Christians.

I mentioned singing because there are songs - e.g. Misty Edwards’ “Rend” and “Oh How We Want You To Come!” - that seem to use the “rend the heavens” motif to refer to either Jesus’ second coming and/or the Spirit coming down powerfully in revival. Now, I don’t know if such interpretation is good theology, but at least Bill did seem to think that in at least an important sense that the heavens have already been rendered in Christ’s first coming and that therefore it’s probably not appropriate to ask God for an open heavens when Christ already rended the heavens.

Again, he’s trying to emphasize point 2 above. It’s sort of like that quote:

I don’t pray/wait for revival. I am revival.

Or as William Booth said:

I am not waiting for a move of God, I am a move of God.

That may sound arrogant, but it conveys an important truth. In Christ, we have the authority and power to bring revival and a move of God everywhere we go. God’s asking us to go out and heal the sick and raise the dead, etc.,  and not to pray for revival to happen. When we step out in faith, we create revival around us. God has already rended the heavens and come down in the form of Jesus Christ and He lives in us through His Spirit. So we don’t need to pray that God will rend the heavens. Rather, we need to recognize that He already has done so and that we can be revival to this dying world.

Interestingly, Kim Walker (probably my favorite worship leader at the moment) sang Misty Edwards’ “Oh How We Want You To Come!” on Jesus Culture’s Everything album. Early on in the song, she said these phrases:

We invite Your presence in this place tonight, O God.

We’re desperate for you tonight, Lord.

This represents view number 1 above.

Bill Johnson on Operating out of the Presence vs out of Principle (of faith)

Bill Johnson spoke the last message on Friday night (25th June). Interestingly, here he seemed to be talking about the importance of the presence of God (by this I believe he means something close to the tangible presence and thus something close to view number 1) as he contrasted operating out of the presence vs. operating out of principle (of faith).

I have to listen to this message again, but I believe he’s giving priority to operating out of the presence (view number 1). At least, he thinks this should be normal. We operate out of principle (view number 2) only when we can’t operate out of the presence. That is, it should be normal for us to perhaps feel God’s presence or leading to pray for healing. But if we don’t, we go by faith and still pray and believe for the person’s healing.

Preliminary conclusion

I don’t think both ways of ministering are mutually exclusive, although I think Blake tends to see it as such - or at least he emphasizes view number 2 so much that it gives people the impression that he thinks only view number 2 is valid. However, it’s helpful to understand the distinction and to reflect where one is upon this continuum. In my own journey, I’ve moved from view number 1 towards view number 2. From the very beginning of my Christian life, I thought that only specially anointed leaders could do healing. And thus if I wanted to heal the sick, I had to really seek God a lot for such an anointing. That made me ignore seeking to do this stuff - better just leave it to the experts because they’re gifted in all this. When I read Bill Johnson, it moved me along towards view number 2. He’s trained so many ordinary Christians to heal the sick and there’s no reason why an ordinary Christian like me couldn’t heal the sick.  With Curry Blake’s teachings (and re-reflecting upon Andrew Wommack’s and Joseph Prince’s), something changed in me and I moved even further along the continuum towards view number 2 - as well as increased in confidence that I could heal the sick.

Perhaps my view is like this. Bill Johnson would say that operating out of the presence (view number 1) is normal but if there isn’t that sense of the presence, we should still operate out of the principle of faith (view number 2). However, at this point of my journey I would tend to see that operating out of the principle of faith (view number 2) as normal and if we happen to operate out of the presence and direct leading of the Spirit (view number 1), that would be wonderful, but it isn’t necessary.

Now I love Bill Johnson and I’m not sure if I’m representing him and his church correctly. But my experience is that those from the “prophetic” and “glory” camps (which Bill is partly in - at least he doesn’t disassociate himself from them) tend to prize some tangible anointing and leading of the Spirit in ministering above the authority that comes from the Word of God. My feeling is that while he tends to do this less than those in these camps he hangs around with, he does emphasize the importance of view number 1 more than say Blake, Prince and Wommack.

The danger of emphasizing view number 1 (or at least prioritizing view number 1 over view number 2) is that people don’t pray for healing unless led clearly by the Spirit to do so. Or at least (and here’s the important thing I think) they don’t feel that their prayers for healing would work unless they have some kind of clear leading from the Spirit. And so they don’t pray or they pray without faith and thus don’t see results. And I’ve seen a lot of this in my experience.

So at this moment of time, I see the dominant ministry model as operating out of faith and authority through knowing who we are in Christ and what Christ has already done for us (rended the heavens, given us authority, anointed us, etc.) - and not merely ministering healing (or whatever) only when we feel some “leading of the Spirit”.

Curry Blake once went to meet up with a man who later became his mentor, Lester Sumrall (who himself was mentored by Smith Wigglesworth). He had two questions on his mind that he wanted to ask Sumrall. One was “how to know the will of God” and the other was “how to be led by the Spirit”. Curry knocked on Sumrall’s office door, went in and even before he had the chance to ask his questions, Sumrall suddenly said:

To know the will of God, read the Bible. To be led by the Spirit, do the Bible.

To be led by the Spirit is thus to do what the Bible says. And if we believe the Bible says we’re to heal the sick (Matt. 10:8, Mark 16:18), then that’s good enough a warrant for us to go out and pray for every sick person and expect healing - not just those we’re specifically led by the Spirit to do.

Curry Blake says that:

The greatest faith is to be able to apply a general command to a specific situation in your life.

By this he means that (in the context of healing) faith is to apply the general command of healing the sick to every sick person we come across. This is what we should be doing and not waiting for a specific leading for God has already led us in the Scriptures to pray for every sick person we come across.

I’ll end with this seemingly blasphemous quote from Smith Wigglesworth which speaks of the importance of ministering to people (healing and other things) even when we don’t have a direct leading of the Spirit:

If the Spirit doesn’t move me, I’ll move Him.

This is not the end of my journey and therefore I’m still learning. Comments are always glady accepted.

PS: The above was written before I attended Curry Blake’s training. I’m in the midst of his three day Divine Healing Technician (DHT) training now in Arkansas and have talked about the above issue with many people - which they’ve been thinking about and grappling with too. I’ve also been with some friends to Walmart and we’ve seen healings and lives touched by God! How amazing is that!!! More thoughts in future posts :)

(Some of the above quotes and description of what was said by various people are all paraphrases from my notes because I don’t have the actual recording. Though they may not be the exact words, the concept should be more or less spot on, although do take into account my fallibility and that I’m writing from my own perspective and lenses.)

Getting around Redding

Redding is a small city as expected - which means no good public transportation. My 15 minutes taxi cab from the airport to my cheap motel (situated at the heart of the red-light district) cost me US$30. I knew I was going to struggle to get around because because most people had cars and I didn’t. I managed to move around (using public buses) fine during the first day which was quite free, but I knew nights were going to be a problem because the meetings would end around 10pm and the last buses were around 7pm or so.

Anyway, on the first night, it seemed like everyone had transport to go back at night. Either they would have their own car (or go in a friend’s car) or if they were visiting for the conference they probably would have rented a car. I didn’t make plans to rent a car and so was kind of stuck. I didn’t want to call a cab - a ten minutes ride back to my place would set me back a good US$15-$20 - and so I made a decision to walk all the way back if nobody offered me a ride. I do lots of long-distance walking (praying along the way) in Singapore so this wasn’t such a big deal. I had my directions ready and all - planned from the morning! It would have taken me at least 1 hour of walking pretty much in the dark (not every street is lighted like in Singapore). Of course I would have preferred someone fetching me back and I did pray that a good soul would see this poor fella walking back from church and offer me a lift :) And so I walked back and soon a lift I got - not just for that night, but for the next few mornings and nights too. Thank you Sharna, Sierra and Melissa!

Worship

Worship was awesome. I’m not one who speaks about the strong presence of God or whatever. All I’ll say is that the musicians and worship leaders were great, I loved the songs and the flow, and I enjoyed worship a lot. I’m still not sure if we should be focusing on whether worship was good or not, whether the presence of God was strong or not or whether we enjoyed worship or not, etc., but nevertheless it was great as expected. Kim Walker of Jesus Culture wasn’t there, but Chris Quilala was playing drums most of the time. And I was especially captured by a new song - Deeper Waters - by a Bethel worship leader William Matthews.

Books galore!

Bethel had a great bookstore! I spent quite a bit of time there browsing and talking to other book lovers. I bought about 12 books in the end - only those that I knew I probably couldn’t get so easily in Singapore. Almost all of them had to do directly with healing or the prophetic. One of them was These Signs Shall Follow by Aaron McMahon. This book is interesting because Aaron isn’t a big time author or minister. He was a normal “Sunday Christian” before he spent three years at Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry (BSSM) which transformed his life. And so he wrote a book about his experience and how every Christian can move in the miraculous. I like what he wrote in the introduction:

I am not the pastor of a church. I’m not the leader of an internationally-renowned ministry. I’m not the son of a famous minister. And I’m not (yet) a prolific author. It is for these reasons that I feel eminently qualified to write this book. I am you, the reader.

I love reading and learning from people like that. Sometimes you read from great Christian leaders and what they write is just too far above where you are at the moment. So I thought this would be a good book and one I can learn a bit from.

Another book I bought was Can You Hear Me? by Brad Jersak, which looks like a real solid book on hearing God and listening prayer. I also got Doing Healing by Alexander Venter, which is a book I had been wanting to get. It’s a Vineyard book which, according to the bookstore lady, is one Randy Clark thinks is the best on healing. Vineyard’s view on healing has actually been the one that has influenced my thinking in the past 10+ years but I’m starting to differ a bit from it after encountering Andrew Wommack’s and Curry Blake’s teachings.

I got books one to four of the biographical Supernatural: The Life of William Branham by Owen Jorgensen. I had been wanting to get this series as I’ve heard good things about it. William Branham is a highly controversial figure because he’s taught some weird stuff. But even his critics have said this of him:

To this day his gifts of supernatural knowledge of those to whom he ministered remains unparalleled, even among modern healing evangelists (D.R. McConnell).

There can be little doubt that he was endued with power to a degree that has rarely been seen since the days of the apostles (Andrew Strom).

I do plan to read as many of John G. Lake’s and Smith Wigglesworth’s books as I can over the next few years (let’s see if I have time!!). William Branham’s teachings probably aren’t as solid as theirs, but the miraculous power seen in his ministry seems unparalleled so I think there’s something one can learn from his life. Bethel doesn’t carry book five ( or later) of this biographical series because that book touches on Branham’s questionable teachings. Anyway, the four books are on the year two reading list for the BSSM students.

The last book I’ll mention here is the Bethel Church Healing Rooms’ book of over 500 testimonies recorded by the Healing Rooms prayer teams in 2008. The 2009 book is yet to be released but I’m going to read through these testimonies from 2008, be encouraged and pray that God would do the same things (and even greater) through my life.

Pre-service prayer meeting

There were pre-service prayers before the service for about an hour. I went to two of them. I expected it to be some intercessory prayer time but it was totally unlike your typical intercessory prayer meeting. It’s really more like a time of soaking in God’s presence!

The first night I went to the prayer, I saw people moving in circles around the room with background music. Some people were already drunk in the Spirit. I was wondering when the real prayer was gonna start. However, soon I realized that this was the pre-service prayer! Background music was being played and people just walked around in circles worshiping and praying. Gradually, more and more people started to be filled with the Spirit and got drunk in the Spirit. This was your typical pre-service prayer meeting, so they told me! Interesting! Anyway, during this time, people who felt led would prayer for others and even prophesy over others. And I received a pretty accurate and encouraging word from one person.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what intercessory prayer is (I hope to write more about this one day) and this just makes me reflect even more on the area of prayer and intercession in the light of the New Covenant!

Healing

This conference wasn’t technically a conference on healing. Bethel has conferences specifically on healing (i.e. learning to minister healing) and I wished this was one of them but it wasn’t. But anyway, there were a few times during the sessions when the speaker called for the sick to stand up and asked those around them to pray for healing. There were also times after the sessions were over when the ministry teams were called to the front and those needing healing went forward to be prayed for. There were healing testimonies. I wouldn’t say a huge number as I expected from a church like Bethel, but definitely more than you’ll see in other churches. There were a number of creative miracles - one person testified to metal inserted into her body no longer being there after prayer. When people stood up for healing, a group would surround them to pray for their healing and I think I was in a group twice and both times there wasn’t any healing. I was interested to learn of how people trained in Bethel prayed for healing and how similar or not it was to the way Curry Blake and Andrew Wommack teaches.

Healing Rooms

I had to leave for my next conference early in the morning on Saturday (26th June). Bethel Church Healing Rooms take place on Saturday mornings and so I wasn’t able to stay for it. I wish I had been able to do so! I’ll definitely visit them the next time! Anyway, I also heard there was a prophetic booth that people could go to during this time too.

Impartation

On the last night, Bill spoke on healing. After he spoke, there was a fire tunnel where Bill laid hands on everyone before they walked through a tunnel where ministry leaders prayed for them. A lot of drunkenness in the Spirit. Bill mentioned that the impartation through laying on of hands was one of the main reasons people should be coming to this conference for. Bill and the other leaders lay hands on people to impart all they’ve got and learned. Anyway, I’ve been thinking about the issue of impartation - the importance, the excesses, etc.

Drunkenness in the Spirit

I’m referring here to a person just being overcome by the Spirit of God and acting drunk - perhaps just like in Acts 2. I first encountered this phenomena in 1995 when the Toronto Blessing came to Singapore. People acted drunk and did stuff that they wouldn’t normally do, they laughed uncontrollably and they fell under the power of God. Very similar things happened in this conference during the pre-service prayer time and on the last night during the prayer tunnel. I’m not averse to all this because I saw tons of all this in 1995 during many of Rodney Howard-Brown meetings in Singapore.

I haven’t personally experienced all this. I’ve asked many people, myself and God why this is so! I’m not crazy over experiencing such manifestations - because these are just manifestations of the Spirit’s work in a person. The more important thing is the work of the Spirit. It’s about the fruit that results, not the physical manifestation that takes place. However, I am desperate in a sense for all that God has for me - more of the Spirit’s work in my life please! If manifestations occur, then I’d welcome that even if it’ll make me feel stupid! People have told me that God still needs people to “stand” in the presence and not be too affected! So I do think about this issue and do ask God for more of Him while not being condemned or thinking there’s something wrong with me because other people experience something I don’t.

One thing I like about Bethel is that while you have all these manifestations and signs and wonders (e.g. “gold” dust) going on, I feel they don’t make it a big issue. The focus is very much blessing the community and the world through what we’ve experienced and I think that’s the right focus.

Boldness to pray for healing

Throughout the conference, I was able to sit either on the 3rd or 4th row from the front. The lady in charge of the event allowed me to go in early (while everyone was still lining up) as she saw from my name-tag that I was from Singapore (I believe I was the only Singaporean there). They do try to give preferential treatment to people who have come from faraway places! So I had a good view throughout and shook Bill Johnson’s hand on one occasion.

On the last day, I sat with a nice lady named Sonja. She shared how she has prayed for people (outside of church during her everyday life) and they were healed. She’s not a leader or anything - just a very simple lady who’s learned to be bold enough to pray for people. This is what I’m so impressed about - Bethel creating a culture among their members of doing kingdom work wherever they are. By the way, she works at the best Chinese restaurant in Redding - Peter Chu’s skyroom - which is located at the Redding Airport. I treated her to a Chinese dinner one day and I told her she can give me a treat the next time I return - and I do intend to return to Redding again! So if you’re going to Redding to visit Bethel and arrive at the Redding airport, do drop by and have a meal at the Chinese restaurant there and look for Sonja. She’s very friendly and I’m sure would help you in any way.

Anyway, in my life I’m becoming more bold in praying for people’s healing. I can’t say I’ve seen results yet, but I’m not giving up. A month ago in Malaysia I was bold enough to ask a hearing impaired person who was going around selling stuff (he tried to sell to me) if he would allow me to pray for his healing. He didn’t want me to do so. In Redding the night before I left, I asked the motel manager if he’s sick in any way and if I could pray for him. He mentioned that another guy from Bethel prayed for him before (I was encouraged to hear that truly these people are taking active steps to pray for people). I told him I’d still like to pray for him but somehow his boss called and he had to do something urgently so I didn’t push it. And a few days ago, before a new friend I made during the conference (another one, not the Kingdom Culture one) departed, I spoke a quick and simple prayer for healing - or technically, spoke to her body and allergies. I dunno what the result was. But anyway, results or not, I’m still gonna press in, learn more and build up my faith to heal people.

Bethel’s Kingdom Culture Conference is over and I’m in Denver now for another two conferences. I’ve had about an average of 4 hours of sleep over the past few nights! This trip has been and will be fun and exciting, but I don’t exactly have a relaxing schedule! Not complaining though! :)

Where do I start about writing about the conference? Let me just start and see where this goes. First, I wish I was able to spend a longer time at Bethel. I’ve told friends many times that if I were like 10 years younger, I’d love to attend the Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry (BSSM) for at least a year, if not longer. Many people ask me why I don’t consider going to a Bible College or Theological Seminary. That was a dream of mine for many years beginning about 13 years ago. My response would be that the past 15 years of reading, writing, learning, serving, being in different churches and exploring different Christian traditions have been the greatest Bible College experience for me. I’ve definitely learned more through all this than I would from 3-4 years of traditional theological studies. I don’t need more of such knowledge. If I were to consider any “Bible College” or ministry school, it would be BSSM or Randy Clark’s Global School of Supernatural Ministry or some place similar like Andrew Wommack’s Charis Bible College. Once one has seen and heard the stuff that goes on in places like Bethel, I don’t see how one can go back to a form of Christianity that is without power!

Why would I want to spend precious hours reading, learning and writing a paper about some moot academic and intellectual point of Christianity or theology when I could be learning about how to activate my faith and move in healing and the prophetic? Now don’t get me wrong. I’ve spent the last 15 years reading a lot and learning so much. It’s served me well. Early on in my Christian life I struggled in relation to the issue of grace and that led me to believe in the message of grace and ignore a lot of “mixture” I hear from the pulpit. But even during this time, there were things I just wouldn’t go into because I think it’s just too academic and irrelevant to my Christian life and me making a difference in the lives of others. I’m glad for what I’ve learned and I think there’s probably a place for all that. But definitely not at the expense of seeing power in one’s Christian life. Why can’t I do what Jesus and the Apostles did? It’s easy for me to make up an excuse and say that all that probably isn’t for today because after all I haven’t seen all that taking place very often. You hear it preached, but when it comes to demonstration time, reality doesn’t live up to the ideal. I know charismatic Christianity. I was transformed in a Pentecostal church 15 years ago and so I’ve been a charismatic at heart my whole Christian life. And yet, hey, I haven’t seen much power even in charismatic churches. Christianity has to be filled with the power of God to transform lives - setting people free from bondages, healing of sicknesses, etc. This was the kind of power that Jesus and the Apostles demonstrated. I know the last few sentences may be a bit judgemental and critical of many churches and Christian traditions (hey, I’ve always acknowledged I’m fallible and so this is my own fallible and biased perspective - so those who disagree with me have gotta forgive me!), but after all my years of experience in different Christian traditions, the kind of Christianity in a church like Bethel, while not perfect, is very close to what I think Christianity should be like.

I would never say that God is totally absent from any Christian church or tradition. I think there’s truths deposited in all traditions. And I don’t think Bethel’s form of Christianity is perfect or that they can’t learn anything from other traditions. But I think Bethel has got a lot of things going right for them and I’m very impressed. They are very well grounded in the grace and love of God - and the importance of knowing one’s identity in Christ. Joseph Prince’s books are sold in their bookstore and some conference attendees I spoke to know and love Joseph Prince’s stuff. As I mentioned before, I first heard of teachings on the love (grace) of the Father from the Toronto Blessing (some call it the “Father’s blessing”) 15 years ago. This whole focus on the love and grace of God may not have originated from Toronto, but I know the segment of Christianity that some call the Renewal movement sees all this (the love and grace of God) as totally foundational to all that they are doing. It is not just a teaching, but a message that undergirds everything they do.

Yet Bethel goes beyond just the grace message - without leaving it behind. One of my favourite messages during the conference was Kris Vallotton’s afternoon message on Friday. He spoke about believing in people. By the way, Kris’ life message is all about our identity in Christ and how we’re children of the King and thus royalty. He came from a really terrible family background (with unloving and even abusive? step-fathers) and thus he knows the importance and transforming power of experiencing the Father’s love and knowing who we are in Christ - which is really what the grace message is all about at its core. Anyway, Kris’ message was a very moving and inspirational message about how we ought to believe in people and love them even if they don’t deserve our love - just as God loved us even when we didn’t deserve it. And through believing in people and loving them despite their faults, we help them achieve the wonderful destiny God has for them. I’m starting to like Kris more as a preacher and communicator.

I loved his message, but here’s the point I want to make - which I’ll develop slowly. New Creation’s messages are focused solely on the grace of God (the indicatives of Scripture). Most other churches like City Harvest Church would focus primarily on what we ought to do for God (the imperatives of Scripture). I’ve argued on this blog (see here) that our preaching should not focus solely on the imperatives of Scripture - yet it also shouldn’t focus solely on the indicatives of Scripture. If I had to choose between a church that focuses solely on the indicatives and one that focuses solely on the imperatives, I’d choose the former - that’s why I appreciate New Creation so much. But I’ve also argued that I think Paul and the Scriptures don’t do an either-or thing. They talk about both. And it’s not just about preaching both in any fashion. The important thing is getting the relationship between the two correct. The imperatives ought to be grounded in the indicatives - the power to live for God and love Him and people comes from knowing how much God loves us. That’s the way Paul wrote his letters - e.g. Ephesians 4-6 (imperatives) come after Ephesians 1-3 (indicatives).

I don’t think we should ever have the imperatives as the dominant focus of our ministry or preaching. If we always hear about what we have to do for God and what God expects of us, we’re not going to live victoriously. And the sad thing is that most churches do preach a steady diet of imperatives after imperatives. That’s why New Creation exists and is so popular - that’s why so many lives have been transformed there. On the other hand, I also believe that we shouldn’t just focus on indicatives always. That’s equally unbalanced (by the way, this has nothing to do with mixing law and grace for I’m not saying we have to balance law and grace!). Some may argue that preaching the indicatives and grace will automatically result in transformed lives. That is, we don’t need to hear preaching on the imperatives because that will happen automatically. Well, I totally agree that preaching grace will transform lives. But Paul obviously thought that something more was needed in his teaching/preaching than mere indicatives because he didn’t just write Ephesians 1-3, but wrote Ephesians 4-6 too!

Now, my point is that there has to be a way that avoids both extremes of focusing almost solely on the indicatives or focusing almost solely on the imperatives. Could we preach in a way where we talk about what we should do for God yet do it in such a non-condemning way that people are inspired to live for God and become more like Christ? If in our minds the greatest accomplishment in preaching is to ensure that legalism and condemnation is totally avoided, then we’ll constantly make sure that our messages are totally devoid of any form of imperative because that could be dangerous - as is commonly thought. But I think Paul saw it differently. Constantly on his mind wasn’t the fact that legalism and condemnation need to be avoided. Yes, the grace and love of God is a totally fundamental message we need to keep returning to. There will never be a time when we never need to hear about the gospel of Jesus Christ. However, there are many other things in Scripture that would not be touched upon if we only talk about the gospel and the grace and love of the Father. To be sure, these (love and grace) ought to always undergird every other message. But we don’t have to be afraid of preaching the imperatives, or the “law of Christ”, as some people call it. These have nothing to do with the law of Moses. In the New Covenant context, there are lots of exhortations and imperatives made by the Apostles - and these are made to New Covenant Christians! Preaching them isn’t mixture if we properly bring out the fact that they do not save one and that the empowering to do them is found in the gospel and the grace and love of the Father.

When I hear messages from Kris Vallotton (e.g. like the above) or Bill Johnson or Andrew Wommack, I don’t feel condemned. They preach messages that touch on the imperatives and other things that may not be directly related to grace, yet it’s not in a condemning or negative way because the message of the grace and love of God (indicatives) is always there empowering our actions (imperatives). In fact, such messages inspire me to become more like Christ and I’ve learned tons from them.

I see in Bethel a church totally immersed in the grace and love of the Father and one that prioritizes intimacy with God and prizes His presence. There’s no hint of legalism, serving God through self-efforts or exhausted worn out Christians there. Messages aren’t focused solely on winning the world or serving God. But along with a culture that values intimacy with a loving and gracious Father and His transforming presence is a strong belief that we receive from God in order to bless others and the community. And the members actually do that as anyone who knows a bit about Bethel would know. Many non-Christians I talked to know Bethel and have only positive things to say about the church. They know the people are blessing the community and doing good. Members go out to pray for people and demonstrate the power of the Kingdom of God. They do so not out of obligation, hope of reward or fear of punishment, but out of an overflowing of God’s love for them and in anticipation and expectation that God would demonstrate the power of His love to the lost. I can’t help but feel this culture of joy and excitement. It’s a culture that not only believes in receiving from God, but also in giving it all away. It’s emphasized there that God doesn’t show His power and love so they can keep it for themselves or keep it in the Church - but so that they can give it to the world. Freely you have received, freely give. It’s such an exciting culture and perspective they have.

So here’s a church totally saturated with the grace and love of the Father, yet one impacting its community and the world in a tremendous way. It shows that it’s possible for a church to be grounded in the radical grace of God in a way that doesn’t result in passivity on the part of members, but rather in them freely giving away what they’ve freely received.

I was in two minds about sharing about my trip to the States here because I don’t want to reveal too much about myself personally on this website. But I’m going to do so anyway!

I’ll be on a trip to the United States from 22nd June to 15th July. Those who know me well know that I’ve been involved in ministry to international students and I’m very passionate about that. I haven’t shared a lot here for various reasons, but I hope to do so more in future. Anyway, because of this ministry interest, I’ve been in touch the last two years with a large para-church organization from America (that reaches out to international students) which is hoping to be more active in Singapore. They invited me to their national conference and their headquarters in the States so we could both get to know more of each other - with the view of me perhaps becoming a ministry representative for them in Singapore. I said I’d go if they paid for the trip - and so I’m going! So blessed!

Since I was going to be in the States, I thought I’d make good use of my time there and arrange to go to some other conferences on my expense. It’s so incredible that two conferences (involving two Christian leaders whose materials I’ve been devouring recently) take place before and after the above trip. So I’ll be going to Bill Johnson’s Bethel Church’s Kingdom Culture Conference from the 23rd to 25th of June. And also to Curry Blake’s Divine Healing Technician training in Arkansas from 8th to 10th of July. I’ll also be visiting my brother after in San Francisco on the way back to Singapore.

So this trip will be awesome! Two things that have been on my heart for the past two years are reaching out to international students and moving in healing. And so I’m excited for this opportunity to learn more about both during this trip.

[I don't know anyone who will be going to the Kingdom Culture and Divine Healing Technician conferences. So if anyone who's going happens to read this, do drop me a comment or email at idealist at stillhaventfound.org and we could meet up! :)]

If anyone would like to pray for me, do pray that I’ll have a life-transforming encounter in the states and learn a lot!

I’m not from City Harvest Church (I attend New Creation Church) although I attend their meetings occasionally. I attended the Asia Conference last month and was very inspired by it. In this blog, I’ve always maintained that I think City Harvest is an amazing church and that I respect Pastor Kong Hee a lot. I disagree with a lot of things they do too, but that would not take away the great respect I have for them.

I’m writing this post for the same reason I’ve written a lot of posts on this blog in defense of New Creation’s teachings - because I think there’s been a lot of unjust criticisms against the church and the pastor. I definitely believe there’s a place for constructive criticism - and I think I’ve done a lot of that in relation to New Creation’s teachings, whether one agrees with my views or not. So it’s not that I don’t think there’s a place for criticism. But I’ve just seen too many negative criticisms and words going around - especially by fellow Christians - and so feel compelled to write this post and more importantly write a positive prayer of blessing for the church and the pastor, as well as invite others to do the same.

I personally believe Pastor Kong Hee is innocent - this is relating to the Commercial Affairs Department (CAD) investigations. I do so because I believe in giving people the benefit of the doubt. I’d be surprised if a pastor like him was out to make money. I believe his vision for God’s kingdom trumps his desire for person gain. On the other hand, if he’s found out to be involved in intentional deception for personal gain, then I wouldn’t be too surprised because I’ve been a Christian long enough. People fail - just look at you and me. Great leaders fail too. I respect and honor him and Pastor Prince, but my faith is not in them or any human leader.

If Pastor Kong Hee is guilty, then I would still support him, as I would support any other Christian leader in the same situation. Support as in pray for him and honor him for the work he has done - not agree with what he did. I’d welcome him back to ministry (perhaps after some time) if he repents. But if he doesn’t repent, then I’d still love him as a brother, pray for him and speak positively about him, while of course hoping he repents. There’s no need to cast more judgments upon him. God’s love to me is unconditional and we’re called to offer that unconditional love to all. That’s what grace and mercy is about.

Now isn’t really the time to come to premature conclusions as many are already doing. We should be praying for him and especially his church. If some of his church members seem immature in idolizing him, seeing him as infallible and the investigations as purely the work of the devil, well, then disagree with them but pray for them. Many young people in New Creation idolize (or seem on the verge of idolizing) Pastor Prince too - but I wouldn’t want anyone to stop listening to Pastor Prince’s sermons because of that. In the same way, let’s not be too critical of City Harvest because of some overzealous members when we can channel our energies positively to pray for the church.

While I think it’s an over-reaction to say that this investigation is purely the work of the devil, it’s equally an over-reaction to say that the devil has absolutely no role in this matter. We’re fighting a spiritual war, not one against flesh and blood. Nobody knows the proportion of the devil’s involvement in all this. And we don’t really need to know. We can be sure God will work things for good and we should just be praying for the church and the people involved.

Whatever happens, I really hope City Harvest continues on with their great vision to impact the world. I’ve always said this to my friends: I see in City Harvest Church people that I know no other English speaking middle-class church could reach out to. And I thank God for their ministry. We definitely need churches like City Harvest in Singapore and it has been a huge blessing to Christianity in Singapore and the world. May they continue to do so with or without Pastor Kong Hee.

Let me end with a prayer for Pastor Kong Hee and City Harvest Church:

Dear Father, I thank you for City Harvest Church and Pastor Kong Hee. I know the church and him are precious in your eyes. They are as much your children as other Christians from other churches. And I know you grieve with them because of what some of their leaders are going through.

I don’t know whether Pastor Kong Hee is guilty or not, but bless him mightily during this time. May he stay faithful to you and draw closer to you. If he has done wrong, may we all know there is always grace available for where sin abounds, grace superabounds - and may that grace lead him to repentance. Whatever happens, just pour out your grace and love upon him and the other leaders and the church in a tangible way. Cause them to come out of this situation even stronger for Your Kingdom.

May City Harvest Church continue to grow. Let no member fall away whatever the outcome of the investigations. While they continue to give their support and appreciation to the leaders under investigation, cause them also to look only to, and trust only in, the One who is all perfect and all beautiful - Jesus. May Jesus be glorified in all this.

I speak good and wonderful and beautiful things to City Harvest Church. Bless each and every member in the church. May the gospel of Jesus Christ continue to shine forth from them and may they continue to be light in a dying world.

In Jesus’ most precious name. Amen.

I invite anyone through the comments section to write a prayer of blessing upon Pastor Kong Hee, the leaders under investigation and the church as a whole.

I recently finished all 19 sessions of Curry Blake’s Divine Healing Technician (DHT) course (downloadable from here) and I’ve been so impressed by what I learned (I finished it in just over a week) that I’ve decided to go through the series again and share some notes and reflections.

Let me give you a bit of context as an introduction to this series. God first changed my life in around 1995 in an Assembly of God church and I remember that I started to read and watch Kathryn Kuhlman (I bought some old videos of her miracle crusades) and Benny Hinn and was simply amazed at how God used them to heal people in their meetings. Benny Hinn and Kathryn Kuhlman conducted mass healing crusades. In their healing services, they preach the Word to build up faith and worship till the “anointing” comes then pray for healing from the platform. People get healed and come up to the platform to testify of God’s miraculous healing. Many people also “fall under the power” as they pray for people on stage. Around this time, the Toronto Blessing came to Singapore and I was again amazed at the manifestations (falling, laughter, etc.) I saw (I never experienced any personally) during that time - especially when Rodney Howard-Browne came to Singapore.

While interest in these charismatic leaders and phenomena slowly faded as I explored the world of the Reformed faith (Calvinism), social justice and then more progressive and post-evangelical (not liberal) theology, I never ceased to be a charismatic at heart. I would occasionally speak in tongues, but I never thought I could move in healing or prophecy or the power of the Spirit or the anointing of the Spirit like those big shot charismatics. I’m just not gifted in this area, I thought.

About 2 years ago, I was introduced to Bill Johnson’s ministry and that’s transformed my thinking. He’s teaching people to do the stuff Jesus did - to go out to the streets and heal the sick. It’s not only for the elite Christians (the Benny Hinns and Kathryn Kuhlmans) to do this, but for every Christian. Learning from him was instrumental in changing my mind to think that maybe I don’t need to be a superstar Christian to do all this. You and I could do it too. After all, so many people who’s been trained under him and his church people have been doing the stuff on the streets!

The conference I attended recently has also furthered my interest in healing and renewed my interest in the Vineyard heritage. John Wimber, a founder of the Vineyard movement/churches, was probably one of the first prominent leaders of recent times (the last 20-30 years) to teach that every Christian can do the stuff and heal - that’s one of the distinctives of Vineyard.  Bill Johnson is probably the successor to Wimber in the sense of his great influence today in equipping the church (lay people) to heal.

An even earlier pioneer of this view of equipping the saints to do the stuff Jesus did was John G Lake (1870 - 1935). In 1915, Lake started training Christians to heal - he called them Divine Healing Technicians (DHTs). From 1915 to 1920, Lake and his DHTs reported over 100,000 confirmed healings. He also started the first Healing Rooms which inspired the later formation of hundreds of Healing Rooms all over the world, four of which are located in Singapore (these healing rooms are not affiliated with the John G. Lake Ministries and actually operate according to a slightly different healing philosophy from them - they’re more in line with say Bill Johnson’s view on healing).

Let me just say that it is a big deal when you have people like Lake, Wimber and Johnson believing in equipping the church to do the stuff Jesus did. There are many great men and women of God who moved in the miraculous, but it’s something else for these leaders to be able to teach others to do the same things they do and the same things Jesus did. John G Lake reproduced himself, unlike many great men of God. When I see Benny Hinn, I stand in awe of him (yes, there are lots of flaws in him but God uses him mightily). You hear wonderful things about Smith Wigglesworth too. But these people take center stage and don’t teach others to do what they do. And you get the feeling (at least I did and I think many people do) that you’re just not anointed and gifted like they are and probably would never be able to do what they do - and that somehow the promises of Jesus of healing the sick and all are for people like them, and not ordinary people like you and me. You also get the feeling that such wonderful miracles would only take place in an atmosphere for healing where the anointing is strong and all - it probably wouldn’t happen without such an atmosphere like on the streets or in the supermarket! But when I look at Lake, Wimber and Johnson’s ministry, it’s so different. Your perspective changes. When I look at the impact they have had on other normal Christians like me, I begin to have hope that I don’t have to be a big shot to be used mightily of God.

So what about Curry Blake? Well, he is the overseer of the John G. Lake Ministries and he’s one of the foremost authorities on John G. Lake. He is also the successor to Lake that Lake prophesied about. Now, I don’t really care about all this except that if John G. Lake was one guy used so mightily of God to recover the vision that every Christian can heal and Blake is his prophesied successor carrying out the same vision (Blake has trained tens of thousands of DHTs who are seeing tens of thousands of healings per month), I think Blake would have something to teach us. Furthermore, if it’s true that he has one of the highest success rates of healings (this is what I read about - I always take things with a pinch of salt, yet am open), then maybe he has some important insights to share that I want to know.

Bill Johnson’s hero is also John G. Lake - unsurprisingly since Bill Johnson’s ministry also involves training people to heal. The very interesting thing for me is that Curry Blake actually teaches certain things on healing that are different from Bill Johnson. I’ve learned a lot from Johnson and will continue to do so but I feel Blake has taken me to another level of faith through just one week of listening to him and recognizing where he differs from Johnson and how I can learn from such differences.

A bit on New Creation Church here. I think New Creation’s view (theology) of healing is actually closer to Blake than it is to Johnson. The difference I see between Blake and New Creation is twofold. Firstly, Blake equips members to practice healing which New Creation doesn’t really do, as I’ve mentioned here. Secondly, from my observation, I don’t see a lot of healings in New Creation for a huge mega-church of 20,000 - as compared to the reported tens of thousands of healings by DHTs. I guess the low numbers are not surprising because members aren’t taught to heal. Even in their healing meetings, you don’t see many being healed. Now, I know what I just said is going to get me in trouble. But that’s my honest assessment and observation. It’s not an indictment upon New Creation because I love the church and the church is gifted in other areas like the teaching of grace. I don’t see the prophecy supposedly given to Pastor Prince that the church would be a miracle/healing center fulfilled just yet - but I hope it does in future and I hope we see all Christians in New Creation being equipped to do healing because New Creation has a fantastic foundation (the message of grace) to build on for people to start moving out in healing. Having said that, I do note that most churches don’t see a lot of healing anyway so it’s not as though New Creation is odd. But I’m not going to pretend that I don’t wonder why I see so few healings in New Creation (for a church of 20,000, I stress). Bill Johnson and Curry Blake grew in their healing ministry because they first acknowledged that the results they were seeing wasn’t good enough - it wasn’t up to the standard they saw in the Bible. If we want to learn, improve and grow in any area, I think the first thing is to be dissatisfied with status-quo, not be comfortable with it. I want to be honest enough to acknowledge that if Jesus said we all can heal the sick like Lake, Wimber, Blake, Johnson (and even Pastor Joseph Prince) believe, then surely there ought to be more healings than I’ve been seeing in the past 2 years in New Creation and in the church in general. In Blake’s and even Johnson’s ministry, healings are taking place like nobody’s business. I’m here to learn from people like them and find out why there’s such a difference between what’s proclaimed that can happen because of Christ and His finished work and what actually happens.

My thinking is very simple. If the Bible says that we shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover, if we’re called to go out and heal the sick, if Jesus says we can do his works - and even greater works because He goes to the Father and He’s given the Holy Spirit to us - if it says all this, then something is wrong in Christianity today because we’re simply not seeing the kind of results that the Bible says we can see or should be seeing. It’s very simple. It’s either that there’s something wrong with the Scriptures or with our interpretation of it or with us - our faith or unbelief or whatever.

And so I’m on this journey and open to learn from different people on healing - especially those that see results and train people to see results. That’s why I’m very attracted to Blake’s take on healing and that’s what I hope to share in future posts.

Throughout this conference, I tasted a form of charismatic Christianity quite different from the kind in New Creation Church. In fact, Vineyard and many charismatics would differ from New Creation on things like physical healing, inner healing, prophecy and deliverance. Not a huge difference because New Creation is still a charismatic church, but a big enough difference for people to note that New Creation does do things quite differently.

I think it’s what Pastor Prince and others (maybe pastor Henry?) have experienced early on in their charismatic Christian lives that have shaped their thinking and practice today. And I’ve heard enough through Pastor Prince’s sermons to know that they are wary of what they feel are extreme charismatic practices - he often makes fun of and disagrees with some common charismatic beliefs and practices related to prophecy, demonization and healing. I appreciate the discernment they’ve tried to show as there needs to be a lot of discernment in the charismatic movement! I do agree with some of the criticisms Pastor Prince has put forward and am challenged to think more about others which I may not agree with. Sometimes, however, I do feel that he’s tended to over-react in the opposite direction, but I’ll not be dogmatic about my disagreements because I’ve still much to learn and am open to learn from him and others.

So while I’m certainly no expert in all of this, in this post and the next one I’ll write down some thoughts (and questions) that have been on my mind:

I think one of the major differences I see between New Creation Church on the one hand and say Vineyard churches and churches like Bethel Church in Redding (pastored by Bill Johnson) on the other is in terms of equipping. John Wimber, a founder of the Vineyard, believed that “everyone gets to play” - i.e. lay people get to do the stuff like healing and deliverance and not just pastors or leaders. John Wimber and Vineyard thus believe in equipping and teaching the whole body of Christ to move in the gifts of the Spirit. They don’t believe we need to go to some anointed leader for ministry because God can use everyone and each of us (not just leaders or pastors) should seek to be equipped so that we can bless others. In the same way, Bethel Church is famous for equipping people to move in the Spirit - not just within the church walls, but especially so outside the church walls as in these testimonies of healing happening in a grocery store and at Disneyland. This equipping emphasis is the same for Curry Blake’s ministry.

New Creation Church is probably the best in the world for the preaching of the message of grace, but it’s very much focused on one person and the teaching/preaching gift of one person. To me, this has resulted in the neglect of equipping the lay people to move in the various spiritual gifts. To be sure, New Creation doesn’t believe that only Pastor Prince or the pastors are anointed to heal, but that every member can heal. But they definitely don’t equip them in this area or provide opportunities for members to practice the various miraculous spiritual gifts.

Through speaking to many New Creation members (past and present) and through my own experience in different cell groups, leaders and the members aren’t encouraged to move in the spiritual gifts, nor is time made available for it - the main focus of the cells is the teaching. Pastor Prince and other top leaders seem to be able to move in the various gifts, but it seems to stop there and not go down to the cell leaders or even more importantly the cell members.

Pastor Prince has mentioned before (something like) that there’s no need to teach or learn about hearing God’s voice because we all do hear God’s voice if we’re Christians. In a sense, that’s totally true. I believe we all do hear God’s voice. But that’s not really the issue. When Christians say they don’t hear God’s voice, the problem is that they find it difficult to distinguish between their thoughts, the devil’s voice and God’s voice and many Christians (like myself) desire to grow in this area and move in the prophetic gift (following 1 Cor. 14:1). There is a need and a place for teaching on this subject and encouraging Christians to practice hearing (discerning) God’s voice for it’s not something that happens automatically. So I disagree when the need to be taught about hearing (discerning) God’s voice (and the need for practice) is dismissed so easily and Christians are not equipped to move in this area.

The same for prophecy. I think it can definitely be unhealthy if everyone goes to seek out another person who is gifted in prophecy for a word for their lives, but the solution isn’t to neglect prophesying (1 Cor. 14:1). The potential abuse of a gift should not result in the neglect of it, but rather the proper and biblical use of it.

My idea of a local church isn’t that of a group of people centering around the gifts of one person, or even the gifts of the leaders. Every member should be equipped - they should be taught to pursue them and they should be given opportunities to develop and practice them and move in their various gifts in ministry to the rest of the members. I mentioned before what happened in a service at Church of Our Saviour (COOS). I think it’s wonderful when the youth were used by God through Words of Knowledge and Gifts of Healings to heal the sick. That’s the body of Christ functioning - each playing a part. No one is a spectator when everyone is equipped to move in the gifts God has given them. But first they have to be intentionally equipped.

The many practical things I’ve learned since the conference have all been due to the leaders I’ve encountered understanding the importance of equipping the body of Christ. The leaders I’ve met have all acknowledged that we can all do the same things that they do. They’ve acknowledged that we all have different gifts which we can use to serve each other.

To be sure, understanding the Word is important for a Christian’s growth, but there’s more to doing church and blessing others than understanding the Word of God.

In the next post, I’ll share a bit of my thoughts on common charismatic practices like generational curses, conditions for healing, inner healing, intercessory prayer and the desperate attitude (for God’s presence and just more of Him) common in many charismatic churches - as it relates to New Creation view of things.