(May 2020)
In the recent days and months, the world has been aflood with buzzwords such as “change”, “life no longer business as usual”, “new normal”, etc. as we grapple with a global pandemic that has affected almost every area of our lives.
With absolute certainty, the world will not come out of this pandemic unchanged. We will not be the same. Social norms and lifestyles will change. Our outlook and perspectives will change. The way businesses are run will change.
What does this mean for the people of God? We will also not be spared the winds of change and without a doubt, the Church of Jesus Christ will emerge from this crisis drastically different.
Before we are quick to embrace and flow with these tides of change, however, we need to PAUSE and ask ourselves very honest questions – “What about ourselves are we going to change? What does God want us to change? Will this change be for the better or will this change be for the worse?”
While change is a part of growth and progress, we must not succumb to the pressure of change for change’s sake. I have often said this, “Don’t do something because it works. Do something because it’s right. What works may not be right but what is right will eventually work.”
There are truths, beliefs and core values for the people of God that are far more important than being effective and relevant. Change by all means change, but it must not be at the expense of compromising our truths, beliefs and core values, because these are the very foundations upon which our individual and corporate faith should and must be built upon.
The Change God Wants to Bring
One of the great prophetic promises for our generation is that the LORD will change the understanding and expression of Christianity on the earth before the return of Jesus!
This season of change is a New Beginning. Isaiah 43:18-19 says, “Do not remember the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing, now it shall spring forth; shall you not know it? I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.”
The LORD is doing a new thing. He is going to restore and revive the Church to what we see in the book of Acts and even beyond. He is shaking, shifting and sifting so that a New Normal will come forth in the Church of Jesus Christ – what was normal in the book of Acts will become a New Normal for us. He is preparing a Church that will arise and shine in the midst of increasing darkness and crises.
What does this New Beginning and New Normal look like?
To fully understand, grasp and position ourselves to enter into this New Beginning and New Normal, we need to PAUSE, WAIT and ENGAGE Him at the place of PRAYER and from the posture of LEANING INTO His heart, His wisdom and His Word. It is at the place of seeking and hearing that He will release details of what He is going to do and what this New Beginning and New Normal will look like. We must not assume that we know and pretend that we understand.
It will look VERY different from what we have seen and experienced before. Past revivals can only give us a faint grid of what it could be like. Past experience can also cause us to put God in a box and influence our expectations. If we do not position ourselves and lean in to hear and receive His heart, wisdom and plan for this new thing, then we will continue to build as we have always built in the past. Some of what the Lord is going to do will cause many to take offense, particularly if we have not the eyes to see and ears to hear, and have not spent time with the Lord to receive His heart and wisdom for what is to come.
This is a season where the Lord wants to share His secrets and His wisdom at a level that we have never walked in and understood before. HOWEVER, deep secrets and deep wisdom require us to go deep into that hidden place to find Him and His heart.
This is a season of ENGAGING the LORD at the deepest levels of His heart and in the secret place so that we may EMBRACE what He is about to do in order for us to ENTER into the fullness of this New Beginning and New Normal!
This is a time to pause, be still and listen, so that we are positioned to receive the wisdom that is NEEDED and the divine blueprint that is REQUIRED to navigate the new days that are just around the corner.
A DIVINE UPGRADE is coming as we reset and re-align to the LORD!
