Newfrontiers Europe Conference - Session 2

"Being Obedient to Faith" - 11th May 2008.

"The Presence of the Lord is here in such a wonderful way - that is the most important thing. It's not such a disaster if the speaker doesn't turn up. But if the Presence of God does not turn up, then it is a disaster. Then it is almost like you wish that the speaker hadn't turned up! I feel the heart of God towards you as a people and I do say this with integrity - you don't always feel such a sense of God's affection towards a group of people - the heart of the Father towards you is that He delights over you.

It is unique to find a family of people who so fully celebrate the wonder of the New Covenant - who embrace the freedom of grace - embrace the truth of the truth of the Word of God and are not nervous or unafraid of the supernatural power of God.

I believe a wave of glory is going to come over Europe and I believe it has already begun. I do believe it will come first to people who have positioned themselves deliberately for that wave.

I grew up in the city of Durban which is famous for it's good surf and one of the greatest pleasures of my youth was surfing regularly. You had to deliberately position yourself for a wave. You could not do it accidentally. If you were too far out or too close in, you would miss the impact. If you were too far to the left or to the right, you wouldn't catch the peak. You had to time when to start paddling to catch the wave. But once you caught that wave, you were in heaven. You could do so many amazing things. You would go into the green room - the whole wave breaking over your head and you standing up straight and the pressure gets into your eardrums because the wave is closing out the air!

Then it can spit you out and you can do all sorts of wonderful things. Just prior to a revival - there is a sense of positioning yourself - there is a paddling - a faith paddle. But once you catch the wave from that moment - the entire reality of church life changes. I wanted to talk tonight about sustaining supernatural ministry - I really had a brilliant message but I don't think I am going to preach it tonight. I felt the Lord say;

"Release a prophetic word over the people - a teaching/prophetic word about the wave of glory".

When the glory of God comes we need to be prepared. But the Lord is coming - ready or not. We need to be established in what our identity is. Your failures and sins do not define who you are. What you are in Christ defines you. Romans 5:19 says though the obedience of the one man many were imputed righteousness. I am glad that the righteousness I stand in before my Father is not based on my performance or even my obedience but it is based on the obedience of the one Man - last Adam - Jesus Christ. I believe in obeying God.

Romans 1:5 says we are called to the obedience of faith - not to the obedience of the law but to the obedience of faith. When you believe how perfectly righteous you are all the time in Jesus Christ, it releases a spirit of obedience but never at any point is my identity based on my performance or my obedience. Through the obedience of the one Man, you have been made righteous. In other words when this becomes a revelation you have an identity that is established in something so solid - you have a fool-proof righteousness - you have a failure-proof righteousness and you have a devil-proof righteousness because your righteousness is not based upon your obedience - your standing before the Father is not based on you but on one Man.

Our identity will not fluctuate up or down based on our performance. We have got nothing to prove! Isn't that a wonderful relief?!

3 years ago in the city of Reading just outside of London, we did an outreach and every morning I spent 2 hours training the ministry team. We had about 100 people that took holiday and came to be trained in the morning and then in the evening this ministry team were the ones that prayed for the people. In one morning I spent 1 hour telling them all about my failures in the ministry. All the people I prayed for that did not get healed and all that died. 1 hour! At the end of that hour I said; "Is there anyone sick here?". Yet they came up and we saw some of the most amazing miracles that morning!

One of the men is now with us in Hong Kong! He got so miraculously healed and said; "I want to go that church where the leader talks about all his failures and THEN the miracles happen!". That night in the outreach in a hall possibly twice this one, Glenda and I prayed for a lady with M.S in the chronic advance stages and she had been in the advance stages for years in a wheelchair. She could not walk at all and couldn't lift her legs up at all. After letting her get soaked in the anointing for 20 minutes, she got up, stood up and walked around the building with me in front of a large crowd of people.

It is the anointing that does the job - not us!

Her husband was crying, I was crying and I told her husband to get in the wheelchair and let her push him around. I tell you tonight with truth - I do not have any gifts of healing. It is a very dangerous thing to say that person has special gifts - that's why they get miracles. I am so tired of people buying into that lie; "Oh Rob gets breakthroughs wherever he goes because he has got special gifts".

Let me tell you - it's not because of special gifts. The move of God follows a message.

The Galatians lost the supernatural of God because they went under law again and performance pressure to earn the blessing. The supernatural disappears when we are trying to impress people with how gifted we are instead of letting them know how weak we are and vulnerable when we are praying for people to come out of wheelchairs, we are more surprised than the people watching! We do it - but it was God!

The only gifting that I have and others have are Ephesians 4 gifts is to equip and train people to do things.

Not everyone has that gift to train people to do things but every believer has the ability to walk in grace - to condemn condemnation - to accuse accusation - to grab guilt by the throat and get out the religious boat and realise that you can float and wear your Father's glory coat. When you are clothed in grace and not living with guilt and condemnation not because you have never sinned or made mistakes because you all have!

I am so tired of the church being shocked at people's sin! The last I checked there is not one person on the planet who does not sin at one time. I am so shocked that we are still shocked!

I know why some people don't confess their sin in the context of communities they live in and open transparantly about their frailities and vulnerabilities in some of the religious contexts they are in. If you are swimming with the sharks - don't let them know you are bleeding. People say; "Look how many problems there are in this grace message - people start feeling insecure to being open, honest and vulnerable". Problems are always there. Grace brings them out in the open when God can lovingly deal with them.

There was a lady who climbed up into her dark attic and switched on the flash light and saw all the dust and said; "Oh no - look how much dust this light has caused!". No the dust was always there - the light brought it out. Under law, sin and problems go into hiding and the longer man controls the Church - the Bride of Christ - with laws, rules, guilt manipulation and control, the more and more miracles leave - the supernatural disappears, it's just good sermons, good theology spoken with brain power and not anointing.

I believe one of apostolic's ministry has been side-lined as an optional ministry - that is what Jesus did all the time, every day - miracles, signs and wonders. The book of Acts was moving in it all the time. If you are going to move in the anointing you will face opposition. Almost every time you read it in the book of Acts that great signs and wonders broke out, the very next verse will say; "And opposition arose".

You preach the message of grace and anointing and opposition WILL arise. If you don't know what defines your identity then you will cave into the pressure.

You don't have to perform or prove anything to men - you don't need man's acceptance or man's approval. You get your identity from the Father - you are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus! You honour one another in work and in team and all of that - but your approval and identity comes from heaven not earth. When I see people rushing up and saying; "I want a double portion of the anointing" - my heart leaps with joy and fear. You are asking for a double portion of persecution, rejection and opposition.

When a nation loses revelation of grace and the power of God - it goes into the dark ages. When Martin Luther had a revelation of grace and justification by faith those of you who are history scholars will know this - not only did it bring revolution to the church, it brough revival to secular society. It's not the Renaissance - its the reformation that released inventions, science, art, political change and human rights. For centuries the church was held under the oppression of darkness, law, rules, superstitions, lack of the anointing, signs and wonders - just fear and control, science and inventions were slowed right down. Now secular society sees that the Church has no role in secular society because we have shaken off religion and can go on and architecture a good political society without God. The devil knows that if churches rise up in the anointing and the message of grace and freedom, nations that are desperate for transcendance encounters with the heavenlies are going to pour into those churches.

Do you realise that demons were coming out of people with shrieks and going? Only the anointing can do that.

We have a man in our church in Hong Kong that went to an evangelical legalistic church for many, many years - secretly he was bound with homosexual pornography. All the heavy-handed holiness teaching telling him he shouldn't do things didn't help him at all - he was bound. He came and sat in our church and was just massaged with the message of grace that you are - even with your sins - the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus because it's not based on your obedience but the obedience of the one Man. First he could not believe this was Christianity and he sat there for a few months. Then one Sunday the anointing came on him and he fell on the ground. I had no idea what his hidden problem was. I just saw in the Spirit a demon leave him and go in the discerning of spirits and I knew he was free - whatever his problem was.

The next week he phoned me and told me about his homosexual pornography problem was that he had for years. He had burned all his pornography material - that was 3 years ago and he is a magnificent young man standing up free in Christ today.

There is a civil war going on in the church today - sadly civil wars are the worst because it is a brother fighting a brother. Sisters fighting sisters. It is the most horrific thing you can imagine and it is over the issue of how we the church define the goodness of God. People say God gives you cancer, God killed your child to punish you for your sin. Then there are others who say no - Jesus healed all who were oppressed by the devil. The civil war is over the issue of law and grace but it is really about who controls the church.

If we preach a mixture of law and grace then man controls the church. If we preach pure New Testament freedom in Christ - the fullness of the Holy Spirit will come on the church and we will see the flood of God's glory come through Europe.

The enemy is fighting that with everything he can. Don't fight the civil war with your brothers and sisters. Target the devil - he is behind it all. Let's love one another - let's show mercy and grace but let's not water this message down we are fighting for more than just personal happiness and peace. We are fighting for whole societies and communities to be covered with the glory of God. I've got this prophetic thing about the glory of God but I feel constrained not to go that way. There were a number of people healed here last night. Paul was healed of a condition that he has carried for 12 years. Tell us what happened;

Testimony: "12 years ago I had an accident with a motorcycle and my arm was out of the socket - so for 12 years very regularly my arm would be dislocated. Until last night with the prayer of Rob - I can move my arm now whatever direction. It's completely God!!".

I didn't lay hands on him so I didn't really pray for him. I said; "Check your body". So he very carefully began to move it. He moved it back and back and he could not do that before. I am feeling a bit weird tonight - a bit insecure because you saw how I preached last night and I had a great preach here tonight and I feel like the Holy Spirit wants to confirm what was preached last night. We are going to do what Dave Holden spoke about - getting out of our comfort zones. I am sure that there are about 12 or 15 people healed. I am sure a lot of people weren't healed. How many of you have sickness or disease or a condition in this place tonight? Oh - look at my failures! I prayed and you didn't get healed.

How many of you have pain from an accident or a car accident? Often what happens is if you haven't been healed for a long time then there comes demonic oppression over that area to try and make it worse. Then we begin to manage the pain and think we have to live this way. I believe the Lord wants to heal you tonight. I want you to soak in the anointing - address that sickness and disease and command it to go! Pray boldly with authority and with faith! Ask them and boldly do something that you couldn't do before! Ask them to check themselves. How many of you feel some improvement? Or you have got your full healing right now? Those people raise their hands! Give the Lord a clap! There are others who weren't healed when people prayed. Jesus Christ prayed for a blind man twice. Let's pray for those people one more time.

You have got nothing to prove - let God prove Himself! Let your healing fire fall Lord! Check your bodies. Those that weren't healed on the first prayer but now feel healing - raise your hands. Can anyone translate for the Latvians?!

Testimony: "I went to get healing for my neck, hands and nails. I don't have visible proof but I felt Jesus touch me and was aware of His love and He has touched me and healed me!".

How many want more of God?! How many of you are ready to start paddling to catch the wave of glory? How many of you as leaders are not willing to let things settle down into passivity in your normal Sunday service? Under the anointing you will stir faith in the people?! The word "exhort" in the New Testament in the Greek does not mean to tell people they must do something.

When you exhort people to worship God and believe God, it means you empower the people to release faith into their hearts to do it.

Most services will settle down into a bland, boring meeting if leaders allow it to. Miracles seldom happen where there is grace and freedom and liberty - that is why we have had people healed here tonight. If you want more of God - just lift your hands. Revival is ripping a hole in the roof to get into the Presence. Revival is wild and scary!

Father, I ask you will confirm last night's message in a release of power of New Covenant glory. May we carry something tangible and transferrable! Fire Lord! The anointing is getting stronger and it comes for a purpose.

He is putting mantles on people - a coat is being thrown over your shoulders. The voltage of heaven is being built up and up here! In 2004 people were sitting on beaches in Asia and had no idea that a tsunami was about to hit. They were going about their lives as normal when suddenly a tsunami hit. In a matter of seconds everything changed! The whole beach and environment changed and nothing was the same again and it will come to people ready and positioned and it will break religious barracades. They can put religious fences and religious walls but just as Jesus Christ walked through walls and appeared to His disciples so there are no barracades big enough to stop the tsnuami coming. Nothing will be the same!

The rain of the glory is coming like a flood! Fire will sweep through and all the fire breaks won't stop it. This fire is going to burn!

The only thing that will this wave will destroy is legalism and self-righteousness. Fear of rejection will stop you moving in the supernatural.

Jesus had to put people out of the room before He could raise Jairuse's daughter - I would never want to be someone Jesus has to put out of the room before He can do a miracle because I am observing critically. Anytime fear or intimidation comes to you - recognise it is not from God - it is an illegitimate authority that will hinder the supernatural!