Two things happened in recent months to up the ante on some things that have been niggling at me. The first one was viewing sessions online from a conference held at a megachurch, and noting how much the junior speakers were copying the mannerisms either of the senior pastor or of an international speaker who visits every year or so. The second one was reading an obituary for Gerald Coates (https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2022/april/died-gerald-coates-new-church-pioneer-charismatic.html )

Even though imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, it really bothered me that these junior speakers were taking on these mannerisms, either unconsciously or consciously, instead of finding their unique authentic style. Hopefully it is only a phase these junior speakers are going through as they grow. God made each of us unique, according to His own specific purposes, therefore when we start looking and acting like clones or copies of each other we are obscuring His plans for us.

As I read through the obituary I was astounded at how far the ripples of Gerald Coates’ ideas had gone, and by how uncritically these ideas had been swallowed, and by how much they are still guiding principles - especially in the modern day prophetic movements. Yet, even by the obituary account, he did some very disturbing things e.g. preparing for a communion service and then part way through the meeting deciding not to complete it.

Because it does matter what you believe. Believing and acting on erroneous teaching is going to be far less fruitful than believing and acting according to true teaching. Erroneous teaching does not please God, Who is the source of all truth, and erroneous teaching leads many people astray. Indeed it is the 10% error mixed in with 90% truth which is the most dangerous combination of all due to that combination’s power to deceive the greatest number of good people.

The way Jennifer Eivaz explains this is useful:

Jennifer Eivaz, Prophetic Secrets, Chapter 7,
“One of the signatures of God’s prophets is that they love the truth and embrace the plumb line of the Word. They demand an adherence to the Scriptures from themselves and others, especially from other prophets and prophetically anointed people. When a lie gets into the foundation, however, then all the biblical boundary lines become altered through the lens of the lie. I like to point out Proverbs 22:28: “Do not move the ancient boundary which your fathers have set” (NASB). The context of this verse is an instruction to leave ancient geographical and property boundaries in place, but in principle it is an instruction for handling God’s Word. We also read, “Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it; you shall not add to it nor take away from it” (Deuteronomy 12:32), and several other Scriptures warn us not to add or take away from His words…
The undercurrents of hyper-grace thinking in the modern prophetic movement have neutered much of true prophetic ministry, as far as I am concerned. Many prophetic words now carry the vagueness of the typical horoscope, are lacking in scriptural precedent and then get delivered in a passive communication style with no edge or perceptible anointing. Furthermore, such instructors have drilled into their prophetic communities that personal prophecy is strictly for edification, exhortation and comfort, which is scripturally true, (1 Corinthians 14:3) yet neglects other New Testament Scriptures that clearly stretch prophetic ministry beyond that criteria*. Again, if there is a lie in the foundation, then everything comes under that distortion, and so prophetic words are often adjusted or neglected to fit the hyper-grace paradigm rather than reflect the heartbeat of the Holy Spirit.”

(*) References weren’t given for this, but I assume the prophet Agabus whom God used to warn His people that a time of famine was coming (Acts 11:28), and that Paul would be delivered as a prisoner to the Gentiles (Acts 21:10-12) was in Jennifer’s mind. The first was news like Joseph decoded from Pharoah’s dreams, which led to effective preparations to combat famine conditions. The second was news indicating that God’s hand was in this seemingly alarming prediction, as it was in Simeon’s prophecy to Mary the mother of Jesus about a sword piercing her soul. Effectively it was a message saying, don’t resist this, it is part of My plan, trust Me even though it currently doesn’t make sense to you.

Therefore it is important to remove lies from the foundation.

So I am going to take each part of the precis of Gerald Coates’ teaching as given in the obituary and see how it stacks up against Scripture and Tradition. I admit that I have no idea whether the precis as given is a faithful and accurate representation of his teaching. But much of that precis has become generally accepted in Christian communities and it needs to be critically examined.

The first part of the precis is
“God will not be tied to 17th century language, 18th century hymns, 19th century buildings, and 20th century religious inflexibility,”

God’s word says, ‘But when the Spirit of truth comes, He will lead you to the complete truth’ (John 16:13a). That means God was leading our 17th century brothers and sisters into all truth, our 18th century brothers and sisters into all truth, our 19th century brothers and sisters into all truth and our 20th century brothers and sisters into all truth. If we ignore what God taught previous generations then we are denying ourselves aspects of God’s truth that can only be unfolded over lengthy periods of time. ‘Test all things, hold on to what is good’ (1 Thess 5:21) applies to this. Usually the test of time is sufficient. If multiple generations of believers have considered something worthwhile enough to be handed down and preserved, then it should be held onto and not discarded.

The Gospel message doesn’t change: Jesus, Son of God, was born in our flesh, to suffer and die to redeem mankind from sin. Vindicated by God through His resurrection from the dead, He has become the Saviour of all who believe in Him. He has been appointed to judge the living and the dead.

However how we present that Gospel message will change. How we present the Gospel message to a mother’s group in central London will be different to how we present the Gospel message to nursing home residents in western Canada, and how we present the Gospel message to native tribes in Indonesia will be different again. When St Paul went to Athens he studied what that culture considered important and used that scrupulosity in religious matters as his starting point for presenting the Gospel. Acts 17:23-34.

So while we’ll translate the very best of 17th century language expressed in liturgical prose, prayers, biblical commentary and theological treatises into modern idiom, we will keep using any 18th century hymns and lyrics if they have been in more or less continuous use, we will treasure our 19th century church buildings as a proclamation from one era to another of the faithfulness of God. The pains caused by sectarian divides between denominations we’ll happily leave in the past, because no one considers them good nor worth holding on to.

There will certainly be 21st century expressions of faith that haven’t been seen in human history before since we are to live by ‘one age shall praise Your doings to another’ Psalm 144(145):4b just as much as ‘sing to the Lord a new song’ Psalm 96(95):1a. It’s a ‘both-and’, not an ‘either-or’ way of living out our faith in the living God. As Jesus Himself said, a wise scribe brings out both new and old treasures from his storeroom, cf Matt 13:52

The second part of that precis is “God is changing His church. We are part of that change!”

God is the author of the church, and it is very clear that God doesn’t change. It is also very clear that when God decrees something, it is for all time; both the good (eg the promise of royal succession to David) and the bad (land that remains uninhabited).

James 1:17 It is all that is good, everything that is perfect, which is given us from above; it comes down from that Father of all light; with Him there is no such thing as alteration, no shadow of a change.

2 Cor 3:18 And we, with our unveiled faces reflecting like mirrors the brightness of the Lord, all grow brighter and brighter as we are turned into the image that we reflect; this is the work of the Lord who is Spirit.

‘Abide with me’ hymn: O Thou who changest not, abide with me.

Eph 2:20-22 You are part of a building that has the apostles and prophets for its foundations, and Christ Jesus Himself for its main cornerstone. As every structure is aligned on Him, all grow into one holy temple in the Lord; and you too, in Him, are being built into a house where God lives, in the Spirit.

Recall that the blueprint for the post-exilic temple given to Ezekiel was complete in every detail. It was the temple finished to perfection that God showed him. In that blueprint were no plans for change, alteration or expansion.

But the temple still needs many workers and lots of time for it to be built to completion. So God’s plan for the church takes time and effort too, and that plan is perfect. The plan doesn’t need to change, but the members of the church do need to be aligned with that plan, and to allow God’s work of transformation to occur in us so that we look more and more like Him.

We cannot say that God is changing the blueprint for his church. We can say that God is calling each member of His church to grow in greater holiness and in greater alignment to His will. That growth and alignment requires repentance and our co-operation with the grace of God.

Whenever sin disfigures holiness and whenever sin dislodges us from alignment, then we need repentance, restoration and healing. When this happens on a large scale, then there is a corporate need for repentance and realignment. The church is always in need of reform, because all her members on earth are sinners, but God’s blueprint for the church remains constant and unchanging.

How can we tell if we are in alignment? Study the foundations laid by the prophets and apostles. There are many documents written in the 2nd and 3rd centuries A.D. from Christian communities founded by the apostles. Clement, Justin Martyr, Polycarp, Ignatius of Antioch, and the Didache, are some of them.

Each generation is called to do their part in maintaining the parts of God’s blueprint for the church that have already been built and to do their part in the ongoing building works. There are things that this generation is called to do that are only possible because previous generations have done their part. Likewise there are things the next generation is called to do which depend on our generation fulfilling its part of the building plan.

The third part of the precis is attributed to him: “Coates continued to live up to the name of the network he founded to the end, “clearing the ground of unnecessary religious baggage and making a way for what God was doing.”” The group he inspired believed that “a whole new style of church is being born,” as they stripped away traditions and dogmas and returned to the authentic New Testament way of doing church.

All generations of the church look to the New Testament church, and in particular The Acts of the Apostles, for ongoing inspiration and renewed motivation for how to live out the call to holiness and the call to mission, for how to love God and for how to love neighbour according to the model of Jesus.

But since the promise of Jesus remains true, that the Holy Spirit will lead us to the complete truth, it is an error to ignore what the Holy Spirit has taught His church between Apostolic times and now.

That’s like saying to the best Teacher ever, we want to go back to the basics of addition and only addition; we think all this subtraction, multiplication, division, logarithms and matrices and stuff are unnecessary add-ons to addition, we don’t need anything else, we can judge for ourselves what we absolutely need and what is superfluous.

Yet anything organic of sufficient age, like a tree, has dead branches that need to be removed on a periodic basis, or new shoots in odd places that need to be pruned. None of us are immune from picking up purely human traditions along the way and giving them higher value than we ought to. However, that kind of necessary periodic trimming is very different to cutting the whole tree down to the roots and beginning again. Even God Himself promised not to ever destroy and begin again after Noah and the Flood.

Those dogmas might seem superfluous, but they represent understandings that had been wrestled out over centuries over matters of exceeding importance. They are boundary lines within which we can safely continue to theologise about our experiences, and beyond which are heresies which destroy faith.

We can even look back now on the traditions which eschewed movies, make-up and modern fashion and see a wisdom designed to assist young people to found marriages with realistic expectations and for deeper reasons than how attractive the prospective spouse was.

What if that re-emergence of the charismatic dimension of faith experience was initiated by God to re-invigorate existing churches from within, and to so draw them into the unity that only the Holy Spirit can do -and what if further splintering of faith communities was not His plan at all?

Yet every tree of sufficient age also needs new shoots, some of which will be vigorous enough to eventually become new branches. But they do need to be produced from the whole tree and not poking out through the heavy bark near the roots. To grow properly as God intends, the church needs both the old and the new, and the old needs the new as much as the new needs the old. We are back to both/and thinking, not the ‘new without the old’ as espoused by the third part of the precis.

The fourth part of the precis is attributed to this ‘new church’ movement, and therefore to Coates as well: “They preached that the Holy Spirit was moving in the last days before Christ’s second coming to restore the church to her original purity. God would erase denominational divisions and bring new unity.”

Many minds have pondered the question of how unity could be possible given the huge number of denomination and non-denominational Christian communities. This is one of those answers. But their vision of unity is with no rules and no structure, just moving together under the Holy Spirit. Would the God who laid down very precise laws for temple worship and dispute resolution, the same God who appointed kings, priests, levites and elders of tribes, not want rules and structure?

The answers come in three general forms,
unity according to the highest denominator,
unity according to the lowest denominator,
and unity among the charismatic/Pentecostal leaving the non-charismatic to decay and disappear.

This third general form of answer seems to be prevalent in the megachurch movement which places high value on the manifestation of charisms and in those Christian communities that are still Pentecostal in name and in fact.

The second general form of answer is the most widespread. It goes something like this, if you believe in Jesus as your Lord and Saviour and accept the authority of the bible, if we can agree on the essentials and leave the other stuff in God’s hands, then we do have a unity, albeit imperfect, but the best we can hope to achieve this side of eternity.

This kind of thinking has given rise to so many ‘non-denominational’ Christian communities. It is thinking along the lines of David Wilkerson: “I am not preaching some denominational doctrine; this church does not belong to any denomination. We are not Assemblies of God, we are not Baptist, we’re not Methodist, and we’re not Catholic. We’re just Holy Ghost people believing the Bible.”

The first general form of answer is normally overlooked. It knows that true unity cannot be achieved unless it is unity in both love and unity in truth. Our differences in belief about God are a barrier to unity. It also knows that the original design of God matters, no matter how unpopular that may be. True unity is only to be found in the church that can trace its origin back to Jesus Christ and His apostles. The only church with that claim is the Catholic Church, all the rest have a founding date later than 33A.D. and a founding leader who is not Jesus Christ (Luther, Henry VIII, Wesley, Smyth etc). It also has rules, structure, and visible unity through the pope, the current successor of St Peter.

Can the Holy Spirit accomplish the first form of unity? Given the number of conversion stories I have read where God grants infused knowledge, and the people I personally know who have experienced this gift of infused knowledge, yes, it is quite possible. If God can arrange an army of 5000 men to travel to a remote spot on the shores of Lake Galilee to witness the multiplication of loaves by Jesus, He can do anything.

The fifth and final part of the precis is this: “The Holy Spirit is on a collision course with all forms of inflexible Christianity,” Coates said. “Denominationalism is sin! It is heresy! There is no way round it.”

There are some things that Christians are supposed to be inflexible about, for example: the ten commandments, protection of life from conception until natural death, belief in the bodily resurrection of Jesus, marriage being a permanent, faithful and fruitful commitment between one man and one woman.

He may be referring to the inflexibility of a pastor preaching on God’s favour instead of what the Holy Spirit had been prompting: repentance. He may be referring to the inflexibility of the leadership of a conference who changed nothing in the lineup after a profound prophetic word asking that we beg Him from the bottom of our hearts for an outpouring of the holy spirit; the music team continued to sing worship songs too instead of songs of supplication. He may be referring to an invitation to generosity that was ignored. He may even have been referring to how territorial about where we sit in church.

But I suspect he was talking about liturgy, and particularly about the rituals of liturgy. Yet there is room even in ritual liturgy for responding to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, knowing that God is a God of order and not of chaos. It is having the sensitivity to let the Holy Spirit work in the post Communion time and not ruin everything with mundane announcements. It is inviting the people to recommit themselves to God by praying the creed more mindfully. It is inviting people towards the end of the homily to raise their hands if they want God to be more active in this part of their lives, to let the hush linger, and to promise to pray for anyone when the liturgy is over who wants extra help from God in this area of his/her life.

But the Holy Spirit is a gentleman. He always invites, He never forces His will. After a long time of prompting without positive response the Holy Spirit just departs quietly and leaves the person. The worst thing of all is to be left in your error without the Holy Spirit to nudge you out of it, because if you don’t know you are in error you can’t get onto the right path.

Yes sometimes the Holy Spirit takes drastic action like knocking Saul off his horse on the road to Damascus. However this would have been buttressed with many prayers from Christians for Saul to be saved, forgiven, converted, and this action of mercy was aligned with God’s amazing plan for Saul’s life.

Is denominationalism sin? If it prevents someone from receiving all that God has for them in the Christian life, yes. Anything that splinters the body of Christ into more parts is against God’s express will That They All Be One. Taking refuge from accusations of denominationalism by being in a non-denominational church is just being in a nameless denomination.

Is it heresy? Well if you are not where God has placed – and guaranteed - the fulness of truth….then you are in error. If that error is about serious enough matters, then it is heresy.

If God established one church which from the beginning was united in Jesus Christ and recognised as the pillar and bulwark of truth, with rules and structures and visible unity, aligned to the perfect blueprint given from above, then Yes you do have to do something about it and there’s no way round it.

Jesus said, ‘I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life’.
Therefore the truth matters.
Truth is something you can either accept or reject.
Truth is something you can’t change.

​It does matter what you believe.

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A printer friendly version is available for download below.
​6 x A4 pages.

​In the various phases of the Plenary Council process nostalgia for the third rite of reconciliation has re-emerged. It is one of that trio of things that never seems to go away (third rite of reconciliation, married priests, women priests) despite having official definitive pronouncements from Rome to the contrary.

In the Catholic Church the Sacrament of Penance may be celebrated in three different ways, called rites.
The first rite is individual confession to a priest.
The second rite is where a group of people gather together and listen to the Word of God, go through a guided examination of conscience together, then go and confess to one of several priests gathered for the rite, and finish with a hymn of thanksgiving and a priestly blessing; it is also known as the communal rite since it is done as a community of faith.
The third rite is an rite for emergency situations only, and carries the understanding that those who received the sacrament under this rite will present themselves to one of the other rites as soon as practicable after the emergency is over.

The third rite is a provision for situations like going into the frontline of battle at short notice. In such situations it isn’t possible to give the first rite to all those who desire it, due to time constraints, and yet they are facing the danger of death. It was used to good effect by priests who made themselves available for the first responders (firefighters etc.) who were on their way to help those trapped in the Twin Towers in New York in 2001. There is also some rationale for using the third rite in nursing home situations where residents are gathered for Mass and many of them no longer have full cognitive abilities. All of them are facing death in the not so distant future.

But during the 1980s and 1990s somehow the third rite became mainstream in parishes prior to Christmas and prior to Easter. There was normally a single celebration of the third rite in the week or so prior to Christmas and in the week or so prior to Easter. It seemed like the answer to the dwindling numbers of priests (many left the priesthood in the 1970s) and the dwindling numbers of people coming to the first rite of reconciliation. The clergy loved it because they didn’t have to spend so many hours in the confessional. The laity loved it because they didn’t have to say their sins out loud. Consequently, whenever there was a celebration of the third rite in a parish, it was standing room only.

At first the people were reminded that this was a conditional rite, and the condition was that they sought out an opportunity for first rite or second rite as soon as possible. As you may imagine this condition was observed poorly, and towards the end of this era the condition wasn’t mentioned at all.

Filling a church swells the hearts of both priests and laity, and those standing room only experiences are remembered fondly.

However, I’ve never read a single conversion story that includes a third rite of reconciliation as its turning point. I’ve never heard an anecdotal one either. If the third rite of reconciliation was leading people to conversion to Jesus and commitment to Him, then there should be conversion stories a plenty. Use of the third rite pandered to a consumerist approach to faith. All you had to do was show up, sacrifice around an hour of time, and hey presto, you had a clean slate with God. Like a car going through a car wash, and emerging cleaner but unchanged. It didn’t call anyone to missionary discipleship. It felt good, too, the atmosphere at the start was solemn and expectant, and the atmosphere at the end was joyful and light-hearted.

Use of the third rite didn’t lead to an increased use of the first rite, in fact it led to significant decrease in use of the first rite, and significant decrease in the regular parish times for the sacrament of penance.

Worse still, those who had participated in the third rite of reconciliation didn’t know for sure which sins had been forgiven and which sins hadn’t been. No one talks about it, but they all experienced this hopeful unknowing. We all hoped we had completely clean slates with God, but we didn’t know for sure.

With the first rite and the second rite, you do know for sure. That’s because you have described those sins out loud and have heard absolution of those exact sins out loud.

This hopeful unknowing was detrimental because it was unwittingly reducing the sacrament to a sacramental. A sacrament does what it says, independent of the faith of the recipient. (eg. Baptism changes a person into a child of God. Ordination changes a man into a priest.) The effect of a sacramental depends on the faith of the participant. In practice when the third rite of reconciliation was celebrated those with more faith and more contrition had less hopeful unknowing and more confidence in God’s pardon; and those with less faith and less contrition had more hopeful unknowing and less confidence in God’s pardon.

Grace may be free, but it is far from cheap. It was purchased by the sorrows, humiliations, wounds, blood and death of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, on the Cross. Accepting the forgiveness and pardon of God, purchased at such a price, is supposed to fill us with such gratitude that we freely decide to devote our whole lives to His service. It is supposed to fill us with a desire for holiness and an ongoing commitment to seeking greater holiness and freedom from sin – with the help of His grace.

While I fully understand the nostalgia of many for those experiences of full churches and joyful and light-hearted atmospheres, it is like the nostalgia that a reformed addict has for his/her addiction of choice. It’s far from helpful, and reminiscing on it does us no good whatsoever.

Thankfully Rome saw the bad fruit coming from the misuse of the third rite of reconciliation and returned it to its original purpose - for large groups in significant danger of imminent death.

Jesus is the good shepherd, and we are His sheep. When a shepherd tends the wounds of his sheep, he does so sheep by sheep, individually. Likewise, Jesus the good shepherd and doctor of our souls treats us individually, one by one, in the sacrament of penance (first rite and second rite). He listens to us (we confess our sins), He diagnoses the source of the soul sickness, He often gives us words of advice and encouragement to continue the battle with sin, He grants us absolution, and He gives us a something to do as a token of our desire to be fully converted to Him (act/s of penance). Jesus is able to do this through the priest, because the priest in the rite of ordination has completely surrendered his life to Jesus, and therefore what the priest does in the sacraments is done ‘in persona Christi’. Yes it is a mystery, but Yes it is also the reality we experience.

Are there lots of conversion stories that feature the first rite of reconciliation? Yes there are, and they are rather plentiful in stories that feature the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults (R.C.I.A.) in their conversion stories. Preparing for the first rite of reconciliation prior to the Easter Vigil is often a major undertaking, well beyond a person’s previous experience, dreaded in advance, because it does require confronting the reality of personal sin, but greatly rejoiced over afterwards.

Nothing, but nothing beats individually hearing these priestly words after confessing our sins,
‘God, the Father of mercies, through the death and the resurrection of His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, has reconciled the world to Himself, and sent the Holy Spirit among us  for the forgiveness of sins; through the ministry of the Church, may God give you pardon and peace, and I absolve you from your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.’

If we remember Rev 3:16 ‘Since you are only lukewarm, I will spit you out of My mouth’, then it will be easy to reject any practice that smacks of ‘What is the least I’ve got to do to scrape into heaven?’. God wants sons and daughters in deep relationship with Him, and rightly has some antipathy towards those who want His priceless gifts with as little effort as possible and with as little relationship with Him as possible. When a parent only sees a child when they want a cash advance, and not at any other time, the parent still deeply loves that child, but is so disappointed about the might-have-been’s, the shared experiences that didn’t happen, the heart to hearts that never had a chance to begin.

The sacrament of penance makes sense when it is a regular part of a deep and ongoing loving relationship with God. It also makes sense when a prodigal returns and wants to re-start such a relationship with God.

Granted, many of those who came to the third rite of reconciliation no longer knew that more was possible. Many may not have been in a confessional since they were at school. Fear of facing and admitting our sins is a deterrent we all experience. That fear doesn’t go away, but it does lessen if we overcome it on a regular basis. Those who do overcome that fear and confess to a priest (first rite or second rite) experience the wonders of God’s mercy, compassion and help. It is reprehensible that we speak so little of the benefits and blessings of individual confession. It is reprehensible that we promoted the misuse of the third rite of reconciliation and did so little to promote the first and second rites.

Please may this nostalgia for the misuse of the third rite of reconciliation cease. Amen.
​
Please may the wonders of God’s mercy to be found in the first and second rites of reconciliation be proclaimed effectively and without ceasing. Amen.

Many parishes are stuck in what seems to be an endless, and fruitless, cycle of sacramental preparation for children; First Penance, First Holy Communion and Confirmation.

It doesn't seem to make any difference whether in a diocese First Holy Communion comes before Confirmation, or vice versa. Even delaying Confirmation until the teenage years makes no difference.

Lots of parish resources are poured into the sacramental preparation of children, and then we don't see those children and their families again.

Because they don't know how else to do it parishes feel stuck, and all parishes seem to be doing much the same kind of preparation.

However a few parishes have begun experimenting with different models for the sacramental preparation of children, and the initial fruit is good even though the different models require significantly more man-power and teamwork.

If you don't mind reading through cathartic layers of grief and pain explaining why the current models don't work as a lead in to a description of these experimental models, then these 9 pages are for you. P.S. There's a bit of ranting included too.

But our human grief and pain is only a drop in the ocean compared to the grief and pain of God at this situation. The desire of His Heart is for life-long relationships of deep intimacy with these youngsters, not for the precious sacramental gifts won by His Passion and Death on the Cross to be disdained so thoroughly.

If we desire to please Him, then we must whole-heartedly seek fruitful alternatives to replace our currently fruitless models of sacramental preparation of children.

Dear God, please send Your Holy Spirit to help us pioneer effective new ways of bringing children into the fulness of the sacramental life which You long for them to experience. Amen. 

Lord Jesus, grant us a holy dis-satisfaction with the way things are, and sufficient holy frustration to do whatever it takes to find and implement the new sacramental preparation pathways You have for us. Amen.  

This was an online seminar which took place on Saturday 11 Sep 2021.

Some people are called by God to write in various ways, and for different purposes. When they partner with Him, His message finds a positive response in many hearts.

But as Jennifer Eivaz discusses in the seminar, it requires discipline and skill, wisdom, prayer and hard work, to co-operate with such a calling from God.

At times, in order to bring hope and healing to many, God calls people to write about the darkest and most vulnerable chapters of their lives.

If any of this is striking a chord with you, then may these 10 pages of notes be of assistance to you. 

It is time to work towards the erection of the Central Coast Diocese in New South Wales, Australia.
​
When the Broken Bay diocese was erected back in 1986, firstly that unfortunate name was chosen. Who wants to be a part of a diocese with broken in its name? Yes, it was named for the major water way that runs through the geographic middle of the diocese.

Secondly it went against the general principle that dioceses as far as possible coincide with local government regions and have borders along landscape features. So we see that the Great Dividing Range separates Lismore and Armidale dioceses, and the Murray River separates dioceses in New South Wales from dioceses in Victoria.

Broken Bay and the national parklands that surround it are large. The minimum distance on the freeway between the Central Coast and the Northern Suburbs of Sydney is between Kariong and Waitara, that’s around 48kms, 30 miles, or 35 minutes driving time. It takes another 12-15 minutes to get from Kariong to either Gosford or Woy Woy, and longer for every other locality. Getting from The Entrance (one of the larger parishes) to Kariong is 37 minutes driving time.

And all of these driving times are for good driving conditions, no rain, no fog, no heavy traffic, no stalled traffic, no accidents, on 3 lanes of freeway in either direction. It is usual for Central Coast residents to allow a time buffer when heading down the freeway to Waitara and beyond. Good driving conditions are rather uncommon.

This is an active disincentive for Central Coast residents to attend diocesan events, which are usually held at Hornsby/Waitara, Pennant Hills, or sometimes Chatswood.

Then there is the cultural divide as well. Below Broken Bay (the waterway) there is affluence. Above Broken Bay (the water way) are areas of socio-economic disadvantage.

It took a long time for the Central Coast to be officially recognised as a region, and to get the kind of government funding that goes with that status. But it happened.

Then a few years ago, the two local government councils on the Central Coast were merged: Wyong Council and Gosford Council. It hasn’t been a smooth merger, and there’s been financial woes and an administrator appointed, but we do now have one council for the region.

Recently two more things have happened. The bishop decided that there should be a focus on the Central Coast and a series of consultations and opportunities to dream of better have been happening over the past few months. The other thing is that we used to have an upper Central Coast deanery and a lower Central Coast deanery. Now there is only one deanery for the whole Central Coast.

This seems to be part of a step by step preparation for the erection of a Central Coast diocese.

It would be the logical next step, and it would have a big positive impact on the Central Coast.

Obviously working together as a single deanery is going to take a while to get used to, and nothing like this seems to happen quickly. But it is a big step in the direction of becoming a diocese.

A quick glance at the Catholic Directory for Australia reveals that Broken Bay diocese is rather populous compared to other dioceses in the nation. Nowhere near Sydney, Parramatta and Melbourne for population size, but even a fifth of Broken Bay diocese would have more population (persons, and Catholic persons) than many other dioceses in Australia.

Therefore population-wise a Central Coast diocese is plausible.

We also have a lot of high-rise development along the railway corridor south of Broken Bay (the water way), which means there’s plenty of population to cover the loss of Central Coast population. At the same time, due to the rise in people working from home, and its relative affordability, the Central Coast is getting an increase in new residents – thereby also increasing the viability of becoming a diocese.

But the ability to produce sacramental and catechetical resources for Central Coast children and adults, in language which resonates with them – priceless.

And to be able to get to diocesan functions without having to brave the freeway – priceless.

And to be able to bring our young people together locally to prepare for things like World Youth Day pilgrimages, (without having to go to night meetings – because they are always at night – and then drive back on the freeway in night conditions, and then turn around and get up early for the 5.30am commuter train to the Sydney CBD for work or study) would make such a difference. The pilgrimage costs could be planned to suit Central Coast budgets too. – priceless.

Our young people would have their own identity rather than feeling like poor cousins at every Broken Bay diocesan gathering, where so many of the other young people from Broken Bay have attended select private schools, and are either studying at, or have graduated from, the best Sydney universities. – priceless.
​
O loving God, our highest and best good, if this is part of Your divine plan for the Central Coast region, make it happen. Amen.

For the past 2 years we've all been through a very difficult season, where many of us have felt like our lives have been in a holding pattern. God hasn't been absent. I see His work in the lots of people who have been freed from old patterns of life, especially with regard to dependence on alcohol and nicotine.

But after the desert comes the promised land, and after death comes resurrection, and after sowing in tears comes a harvest of joy.

There needs to be some kind of change in us, to enable us to participate in the torrents of grace that God wants to pour out on all humanity, as promised in Joel 3:1-2.

God seems to have answered this need for an inner change through a talk given by Katherine Ruonala at the Australian Prophetic Summit in Brisbane on 14 Jan 2022.

A transcript of that talk is given below, 10 x A4 pages.

However, if you have the time and technology, watch it via YouTube www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYg-ufMJMjI

Details about when that talk starts and stops are on page 1 of the transcript.

And there's a possibility that one of the prayers she prays during that talk is one you might like to pray yourself each morning.

You can download that prayer below, 1 x A4 page, 4 to a page.

I know that there's a special grace upon this talk. It caused me to confront some very deep-seated mindsets. Someone else I know received eye salve from God which has been life changing.

​So, please share it.

May the Holy Spirit grant me grace to write worthily about the stupendous gift from God that holy water is. Amen.
 
For any Christian brothers and sisters, please bear with me, Scripture references are coming -eventually-, for this is part of your birthright as children of God and members of His church.
I apologise in advance for any jargon that is incomprehensible to you, despite my attempts to reduce jargon.
 
For any Catholic brothers and sisters, it is past time that you knew what a gift of God holy water is, and how to use it with the intentionality of faith. For many of you it has been something culturally there, used mainly out of habit, and you’ve either never heard a good explanation, or its been decades since it was last mentioned in a homily.
 
For any other brothers and sisters, if you have faith in the goodness of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and believe He is willing to use such lowly means as blessed water to help the creatures He has made out of love, you are not excluded.
 
What is holy water?
It is water that has been set aside for special use; and blessed by a priest from any Rite (denomination) which has unbroken apostolic succession from the Apostles. Roman Catholic, Eastern Catholic Rites and Orthodox Rites legitimately claim this. The blessing over the water may be as simple as the gesture of the Sign of the Cross over the water, or according to one of the many approved prayers of blessing (see Appendix). Sometimes, but not always, there is an addition to the water of blessed salt.
 
What is the Sign of the Cross?
It can be made by anyone, either signed across the body or vertically signed over a crowd (eg by priest or bishop) or horizontally over something (palms for Palm Sunday, oil, holy pictures etc), or even traced on a forehead. The first part, ‘In the name of the Father and of the Son’, has an accompanying gesture going top to bottom; the second part, ‘and of the Holy Spirit. Amen’, has an accompanying gesture going across either right to left or left to right depending upon the tradition of your Rite. It invokes the holy Name of the Triune God, it reminds us that in this Name we are baptised, and it recalls to us the price paid by Jesus on the Cross to win us such salvation.
 
Why is a priest needed?
Because the priest when he speaks as a priest is both a minister of Almighty God and a representative of the whole Church (that’s every member of the church in heaven, every member being purified in purgatory, and every member on earth).
Thus when a priest uses the Sign of the Cross or an approved prayer of blessing (which always includes the Sign of the Cross), he is blessing the water both in the Name of God and in the name of the whole Church.
 
If you are beginning to think, gee, that’s some heavy-duty prayer power: you’re spot on.
Holy water not only carries the blessing of God, but also the prayer power of the whole Church.
 
But holy water is not a sacrament; but a sacramental.
 
A sacrament does what it does, by the power of God it changes a person. A person is different pre and post Baptism; not a child of God before, a full child of God after. A person is different pre and post Marriage, unmarried before, married after. There are no degrees of being baptised or being married, you either are, or you aren’t.
 
A sacramental is different because it requires faith to activate it, and the greater the intentional faith when using it, the greater the power of God released.
 
We see things used in a sacramental way in Scripture.
On one of the training missions of the apostles while Jesus was still with them, they took oil with them to anoint people for healing. Mark 6:13. The woman with the haemorrhage had faith that if she but touched the clothes of Jesus she would be healed. Mark 5:25-34. Post-Pentecost faith was so great that even the shadow of St Peter when sought with faith by the sick obtained healing. Acts 5:14-15. Such was the faith of believers who surrounded Paul, that they grabbed anything he touched, (handkerchiefs and aprons), and whisked them off to the sick, and God rewarded their faith with healings and deliverances. Acts 19:11-12.
 
What can holy water accomplish when used with faith?
 
From St Faustina’s Diary (601) Once, when one of our sisters became fatally ill and all the community was gathered together, there was also a priest there who gave the sister absolution. Suddenly, I saw many spirits of darkness. Then, forgetting that I was with the sisters, I seized the holy-water sprinkler and sprinkled the spirits, and they disappeared at once. However, when the sisters came to the refectory, Mother Superior remarked that I should not have sprinkled the sick sister in the presence of the priest, as this was his duty. I accepted the admonition in the spirit of penance, but holy water is indeed of great help to the dying.

(PDF available of St Faustina’s diary: https://benedictinesofdivinewill.org/uploads/3/4/3/2/34324596/st._faustina_kowalska_-_diary.pdf )
 
(My two cents worth: she did the right thing. God revealed what was going on, she acted. With death immanent there was no time for trying to tell the priest what was going on spiritually in the room, and then convincing him and getting him to act. When God reveals the presence of evil, He wants it gone! 1 John 3:8 It was to undo all that the devil has done that the Son of God appeared. We need to remember that as death approaches the fight over a soul for its eternal destination is intense, and to surround our dying loved ones with prayer, with holy things, have holy water at hand, and to obtain the best thing of all for them - the sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick.)
 
St Teresa of Avila used to say she knew by experience how powerful holy water is to put the Devil to flight. ‘I used to drive him away,’ she said, ‘by the Sign of the Cross: but, it seems to me, it was only to return again; but when I used holy water also, he no longer dared to return.’
 
St Teresa of Avila writes: ‘I have often found by experience that there is nothing from which the devils fly more quickly and return not again than from holy water. They also fly from a Cross, but they return again immediately. Certainly the power of holy water must be great; for my part, my soul feels particular comfort in taking it, and very generally a refreshment and interior delight which I cannot express and which comforts the soul.’
 
St Epiphanius writes that at Tiberius a man called Joseph, obtained from God a cure of a lunatic by taking water and making the Sign of the Cross over it while praying, ‘In the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, crucified, depart from this unhappy man, you infernal spirit, and let him be healed’, before pouring the water over him.
 
What does the Church believe holy water used with faith can do?
 
Always it is a reminder of baptism, and the power of God at work in us due to baptism.
But it is also a prayer request for the forgiveness of sins,
a prayer request to dispel sickness,
a prayer request to protect from evil,
a prayer request to drive away evil spirits,
a prayer request for protection from danger,
and a prayer request to dispel the causes of sickness and plague too.
 
Here’s one of those prayers. It is one of those used by a priest to ask God to transform water into holy water. It tells us a lot about what the Church has believed God does through holy water, based on many centuries of experience.
It is well worth pondering over on a regular basis.
 
Blessing of Holy Water
O God, for the salvation of mankind
You built Your greatest mysteries on this substance, water;
in Your kindness hear our prayers
and pour down the power of Your blessing + into this element,
made ready for many kinds of purification.
May this, Your creature, become an agent of divine grace in the service of Your mysteries,
to drive away evil spirits and dispel sickness,
so that everything in the homes and other buildings of the faithful
that is sprinkled with this water may be rid of all uncleanness and freed from every harm.
Let no breath of infection, no disease-bearing air remain in these places.
May the wiles of the lurking enemy provide of no avail.
Let whatever might menace the safety and peace of those who live here
be put to flight by the sprinkling of this water
so that the health obtained by calling upon Your holy name
may be made secure against all attack.
Through Christ our Lord. Amen
 
Impressive, isn’t it?!
 
Regular uses for holy water are:
-As a reminder of baptism as we come into churches and as an acknowledgement that we need purification to come into the presence of God. Dipping fingers in the holy water and then making the Sign of the Cross is the way Roman Rite Catholics do it.
-To claim a place for God, and at the same time cleanse it of any lingering evil attached to it. The rites for blessing of new churches, new schools, new presbyteries, new parish offices, new graves all include splashing the holy water around.
-At home near the front door, or the door of a bedroom, for blessing as we go in and as we go out (Psalm 121:8, Deut 28:6). The Israelites touch the Shema as they come and go from their homes to remind them, ‘Hear O Israel, the Lord your God is the one God …etc’. Deut 6:4 So in some sense, holy water is our version of the Shema.
-It is recommended that homes be blessed by a priest each year using holy water; this is often done during Eastertide.
-The annual blessing of the fishing fleet has prayers and the sprinkling of holy water.
-Asking to have your new car blessed, which is seeking God’s blessing and protection upon its use, has prayers and usually holy water.
-At funerals the coffin of the deceased is sprinkled with holy water, as part of the other reminders of baptism (lighted Paschal candle, white cloth over the coffin)
-Holy Water is used in exorcism (priests appointed by a bishop) and in deliverance ministry.
-There’s quite a long history of holy water being used to assist the purification process of the holy souls in purgatory.

‘As the flowers, withered by the heat of the sun, are refreshed by the gentle shower of rain, so too Heaven’s flowers burning in Purgatory, are refreshed by holy water.’(St. Theodatus).
 
St John Macias used to sprinkle holy water on the ground for the souls in purgatory while praying: ‘By this holy water and by Your precious Blood, wash away all my sin, O Lord, and relieve the souls in purgatory,’ and then make the Sign of the Cross.

On All Souls Day it is traditional to gather at the local cemetery and to pray for the dead. Part of the rite of blessing of graves for All Souls Day includes this:
1746 While the following litany is sung or recited, the minister sprinkles the graves with holy water and, if desired, may also incense them.

The faith of the Church believes that sprinkling drops of holy water is also a powerful prayer for loved ones present or absent, living or dead.
 
If you can get your mind around the concept of holy water being liquid intercessory prayer, then these practices make sense, if they are done with faith in God who hears our prayers; however we make them. At all times our faith is in the God who has blessed the holy water, and heard the prayers of His Church, not in the holy water itself. Using holy water is begging His blessing, His protection, and His cleansing and purification.
 
If you have made it this far, you will now have enough knowledge to understand why the enemy of our souls wants to eradicate holy water.
 
That’s why the notion of removing holy water from churches during Lent is not an idea that came from God. Lent is a time when people are intentionally fighting temptation and trying to eradicate bad habits. It’s when they need the assistance that God gives through holy water more than ever!
 
Yes, the holy water is removed on Holy Thursday night after Holy Communion and returns during the Easter Vigil. But the Church sees the Holy Thursday – Good Friday – Easter Vigil as a single liturgy in 3 parts.
 
It is a source of extraordinary shame that during the Covid years our churches capitulated to fear of infection by removing holy water from the holy water fonts. Granted, some parishes with faith-filled priests managed to find ways to allow people to access holy water in a way considered safe.
 
How did it happen that there wasn’t an outcry and a refusal to comply?
How did it happen that so few take seriously what the Church believes?
May God forgive us.
 
Re-read what the prayer says….
May this, Your creature, become an agent of divine grace in the service of Your mysteries,
to drive away evil spirits and dispel sickness,
so that everything in the homes and other buildings of the faithful
that is sprinkled with this water may be rid of all uncleanness and freed from every harm.
Let no breath of infection, no disease-bearing air remain in these places.
May the wiles of the lurking enemy provide of no avail.
Let whatever might menace the safety and peace of those who live here
be put to flight by the sprinkling of this water
so that the health obtained by calling upon Your holy name
may be made secure against all attack.
 
It means holy water is a weapon par-excellence against any kind of infection and plague when used with faith.
 
Read that again.
 
It means holy water is a weapon par-excellence against any kind of infection and plague when used with faith.
 
If we had faith, we would have been splashing it everywhere during Covid, and at the very least encouraging the Asperges (sprinkling rite) as part of the penitential rites at the start of the Eucharistic Liturgy.
 
But by and large we rolled over, leaders and people, and emptied the holy water fonts.
We sadly put our faith in scraps of cloth over our faces, medical intervention and lockdown, instead of in Almighty God and in His Almighty power to save. We didn’t even have a clue what spiritual treasure we were giving up for the sake of fear.
 
Who wins if our holy water fonts are emptied? The evil one and his minions.
 
Just imagine how much lasting damage to the evil one’s schemes could be done by a whole lot of ordinary believers splashing holy water about with faith.
 
Now read this prophetic word via Michele Stickells:
I saw an angel stirring the waters, then I hear, The angel is stirring up the waters of ancient wells, that have become dry and redundant. I see it's time that God wants to restore the wells that hold the ancient anointing, to bring forth the end time anointing that will bring revival. I also see mantles lying in the dust, waiting to be picked up; they also carry past and ancient anointings. The Holy Spirit is moving across the nations looking to see who will see what He is doing, and be ready to receive from past ancient anointings that have remained dormant and hidden for an appointed time, for it takes an ANCIENT ANOINTING TO RELEASE THE END TIME ANOINTING !!!
 
(Apologies, I can’t find the original source on this, but it was released prior to 4 May 2018 when I first blogged about it, so that might be why I can no longer find it on the internet.)
 
Please, do not ever neglect the gift that God has given us through the faith-filled use of holy water.
 
May our holy water fonts in churches and elsewhere never ever ever be emptied again because our fear of sickness and our fear of government sanction is greater than our faith in Almighty God – He who is always in control and always bringing our greatest good out of every circumstance. Amen.
 
 
Appendix
There’s many other prayers for this purpose. Here’s a sample of ones in common use in the Roman Catholic Rite:
 
Prayer over Water 1/At Mass
God our Father, Your gift of water brings life and freshness to the earth;
it washes away our sins and brings us eternal life.
We ask You now to bless this water,
and to give us Your protection on this day
which You have made Your own. (ie Sunday, the day of the Resurrection)
Renew the living spring of Your life within us (refer John 7:37-39 and John 4: 13-14)
and protect us in spirit and body, that we may be free from sin
and come into Your presence to receive Your gift of salvation.
We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.
 
Prayer over Water 2/At Mass
Lord God Almighty, Creator of all life, of body and soul, (refer Genesis 2:7)
we ask You to bless + this water:
as we use it in faith, forgive our sins
and save us from all illness and the power of evil.
Lord, in Your mercy give us living water, (refer John 7:37-39 and John 4:13-14)
always springing up as a fountain of salvation:
free us, body and soul, from every danger,
and admit us to Your presence in purity of heart. (refer Matthew 5:8)
Grant this through Christ our Lord. Amen.
 
Prayer over Water 3/At Mass, Easter Season
(This prayer is for use during the Easter Season.)
Lord God Almighty, hear the prayers of Your people:
we celebrate our creation and redemption.
Hear our prayers and bless + this water
which gives fruitfulness to the fields, and refreshment and cleansing to man.
You chose water to show Your goodness when You led Your people to freedom
through the Red Sea and satisfied their thirst in the desert with water from the rock.
(Refer Exodus Ch 14, Exodus 17:1-7)
Water was the symbol used by the prophets to foretell Your new covenant with man.
(Refer Isaiah 55:1-11 and Ezekiel 36:16-28)
You made the water of Baptism holy by Christ’s baptism in the Jordan:
(Refer Matt 3:13-17, Mark 1:9-11, Luke 3:21-22, John 1:29-34)
by it You give us a new birth and renew us in holiness.
May this water remind us of our Baptism,
and let us share in the joy of all who have been baptized at Easter.
We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen
 
The following prayer is used to call down God’s grace on water at the Easter Vigil and as one of three prayer options for Baptisms, to make water into Baptismal water by God's grace.
 
Blessing of Baptismal Water/Easter Vigil/Baptisms
Father, You give us grace through sacramental signs, which tell us of the wonders of Your unseen power.
In Baptism we use Your gift of water,
which You have made a rich symbol of the grace You give us in this sacrament.
At the very dawn of creation Your Spirit breathed on the waters, making them the wellsprings of all holiness. (refer Genesis 1:1-3)
The waters of the great flood You made a sign of the waters of Baptism, that make an end of sin and a new beginning of goodness. (Refer Genesis 6:9-9:17)
Through the waters of the Red Sea You led Israel out of slavery, to be an image of God’s holy people, set free from sin by Baptism. (Refer Exodus Ch 14
In the waters of the Jordan Your Son was baptized by John and anointed with the Spirit.
(Refer Matt 3:13-17, Mark 1:9-11, Luke 3:21-22, John 1:29-34)
Your Son willed that water and blood should flow from His side as He hung upon the cross.
(Refer John 19:31-37)
After His resurrection He told His disciples: ‘Go out and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.’ (Refer Matt 28:16-20)
Father, look now with love upon Your Church, and unseal for her the fountain of Baptism.
By the power of the Spirit give to the water of this font the grace of Your Son. (Refer Phil 3:20-21)
You created man in Your own likeness: cleanse him from sin in a new birth of innocence by water and the Spirit. (Refer Genesis 1: 26-28)
We ask You, Father, with Your Son to send the Holy Spirit upon the waters of this font.
May all who are buried with Christ in the death of Baptism rise also with Him to newness of life.
(Refer Romans 6:3-11)
We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.

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​A PDF version for sharing, and easier printing is provided below, 8 x A4 pages

Yes a book review is a little unusual for this blog, but the book reviewed is also a little unusual. I came across Kim Meeder’s writings some time ago during my regular internet meanderings, but it has only been recently that I’ve actually read some of her books. All of them thus far have been good, wholesome and inspiring. Her book ‘Bridge Called Hope: Stories of triumph from the Ranch of Rescued Dreams’ is a good place to begin to read her books.

258 pages, Kindle; 256 pages, Paperback
https://www.amazon.com/Bridge-Called-Hope-Stories-Triumph/dp/1590526554

Each chapter is usually a stand alone story, although there are some chapters that form a story arc, so it is suitable for read aloud time with children and grandchildren.

Kim Meeder runs a horse ranch dedicated to rescuing and rehabilitating abused horses, and dedicated to assist the healing process for disabled children, youngsters in juvenile detention centres and women who have suffered trauma. It is a safe place to try something new and become a little stronger after taking the risk of learning to ride on a pony or of touching and learning to groom a horse.

The book contains (at least for me) some eye-opening knowledge about horse management, a living example of what it means to live guided by the Holy Spirit, examples of God’s plans being much bigger than our own, and plenty of take-home quotes to chew over.

Horse management
Not ever having gone through a stage of horse-crazy, I learnt a lot about communication between horses and horses and horses and humans. It was a real eye-opener on what it takes to keep a horse healthy, food, water, shelter, sufficient space to move about in, hoof care, medications to deal with worms and other nasties. Likewise it was an eye-opener on the barbaric practices to obtain ingredients for beauty products from pregnant horses. Truly it takes an extraordinary amount of painstaking work to bring an abused horse back to physical and emotional health.

Guided by the Holy Spirit
Time and time again through the stories Kim’s first recourse is to prayer. Then she does expectantly wait for answers, and is also responsive to moments when she is invited to stop, listen and look deeper at situations. Willingness to drop everything at a moment’s notice to serve others in need is another part of that responsiveness to the leading of the Holy Spirit.

God’s bigger plans
Two stories in particular stand out for me as examples of this. One is the sudden death of a much-loved horse, and the bigger plan was to teach a youngster about how to open her heart to new love after a time of grief. The other is the tragic house fire suffered by a single parent family, and the bigger plan was to provide not only a better home, but also a whole new set of supportive relationships.

Quotes to chew over
Horses are incapable of lying.
‘I trust You Lord, I trust You, even though it doesn’t make sense. I trust in You.’
Being loved changes us all.
If God is in it, He will provide for it.
Faith like the wind, is invisible … but what it moves is not.
Words from a father, ‘Maybe sometimes I treated my daughter too much like a princess…but that’s only because when I thought of her as my daughter…I felt like a king.’
Just because we’re not where we want to be…doesn’t mean that God has abandoned us.
Instead of asking, ‘Lord, how can I get out of this season of pain?’ ask ‘Lord, what can I get out of this season of pain?’
Everything changes when we choose to release our grip on ‘my plan for me’ and rest in God’s plan for me.
It never was about serving me… it always was about serving You.’
Hope is not only something we should aspire to attain…it is also something we should aspire to give.
It might not be how you think… but the Lord does answer prayer!

Before the beginning there was God, a being of pure love, infinitely good, infinitely wise, infinitely powerful, infinitely just.

Love delights to pour itself out. This Love who created us in His own image and likeness taught us, ‘Love your neighbour as you love yourself’ did it first. Love loved itself first, understood itself perfectly, and such was the power of that Love that Love begat itself, and the perfect outpouring of Love (The Father) to Love (The Son) and the perfectly reciprocal outpouring of Love (The Son) to Love (The Father) together begat Love (The Holy Spirit).

The harmony and unity of this being of pure love is perfect and spectacularly beautiful, and so amazing that determining where The Father ends and The Son begins, and where The Son ends and the Holy Spirit begins, and where the Holy Spirit ends and the The Father begins, and where the The Son ends and The Father begins, where the The Father ends and The Holy Spirit begins, where The Holy Spirit ends and The Son begins is more difficult than pin-pointing the exact location of an electron within an atom.

Love delights to pour itself out, and Love delights even more when its Love is reciprocated. Love is life-giving and fruitful, so the infinite being of pure love began the vast plan of creation. The sheer scope of the intelligence which created matter out of nothingness, and the infinite variety of inanimate things, animate creatures, creatures with souls and creatures of pure spirit, is breathtaking and we only experience a tiny part of it.

Everything created by Love is full of goodness. But for Love to be reciprocated, the creatures with souls and the creatures of pure spirit needed to have the capacity to choose Love or reject Love, and that choice had 3 aspects, to love or not love itself, Love, and other creatures.

Some of the creatures of pure spirit got so caught up in love of themselves that they began to believe that they surpassed their creator and had superior intelligence to their creator and rejected Love by refusing to obey and by refusing to trust in Him. These sad creatures we call demons.

Choosing to not love is a destructive force, and the demons knowing that they could not hurt God Himself, set themselves to destroying creation and especially set themselves to destroying the creatures with souls.

The creatures with souls were tempted not to obey (eating fruit that was forbidden) and tempted not to trust (that God’s instructions were not for their complete good and that God’s instructions were holding them back from better things). They gave in to temptation.

But Love’s plan was much bigger.

The Son consented to enter into creation as a creature with soul and by a sacrificial and expiatory death to pay the infinite price of reparation to the being of pure love, the only offering capable of giving creatures with souls the opportunity to regain the power of choosing Love.

When that Price was paid, The Spirit consented to enter souls who welcomed Him, and wherever He found goodwill in those souls The Spirit empowered them to resist temptation and to choose Love; He empowered them to live the Love that The Son had modelled to them, a life of complete obedience, trust and generosity (a.k.a. outpouring). It is a triple empowering, to love ourselves, to love God, and to love each other; to love in ways beyond our natural abilities due to His sacramental gifts, His spiritual gifts and His charismatic gifts. It is allowing The Spirit full freedom to love through us; to love ourselves, God and others as only The Spirit can.

The Plan of The Father, The Son and The Spirit is to bring each of us fully into the divine communion, unity and harmony of His being.

Every action that is a Yes to Love is a step closer to that Plan.
Every action that is a No to Love is a step away from that Plan.
       
................................................................................
​A one page PDF version of this is available below:                                                

A few days ago this word was released by Heidi Bryden via His Kingdom Prophecy:
https://www.hiskingdomprophecy.com/the-great-outpouring-is-beginning/

While there is far more to it, these few lines from it alone are worth holding close to your heart as 2022 begins. They are worth looking at again and again:

I saw an open portal in the midst of the clouds like a circle, and a stream of water poured down out of Heaven onto the earth.
This was surrounded by the great Cloud of Witnesses as they peered down through the portal into the earth. They were excited, watching where the water was falling.
Upon the earth a few people danced in the stream of water that poured from Heaven, rejoicing that Revival had come.
The long-awaited outpouring of The Spirit had begun!

And indeed there are parts of the world where this has already begun to happen:
https://www.elijahlist.com/words/display_word.html?ID=26590
An excerpt:
A holy fear and awe of the Lord swept through that place as we watched the Holy Spirit, night after night, heal people, deliver people of demons, draw many to Jesus, and fill little children with the Holy Spirit. I've never seen so many people delivered of demonic spirits in my twenty years of ministry. I've never seen the power of God move on this level. I've never seen so many young people become radically changed by one touch from Jesus. Redemption and restoration flooded through that tent and has continued to spread through families and states all across America, as people who visited the revival have gone home to see everything change!
Jennifer Martin, Nashville, Tennessee, USA  20 Dec 2021
 
We have a choice.
We can focus on all the horrible things happening in our world today, and the depths of the swamp.
OR we can focus on what God is doing.

We can choose to fill our hearts with bad news or with good news.

One will fill us with fear, the other will fill us with faith and expectancy and hope.
 
For many of us it is time to turn from alerting others that the swamp is real
and to watch for what the Holy Spirit is doing, and to align with that.

Others are doing a great job with swamp alerts eg
https://www.theblogmire.com/reflections-on-another-year-of-covidian-lies-and-how-the-truth-will-ultimately-prevail/
 
Consider this: St John the Baptist leaping and dancing in his mother's womb, welcoming Jesus on behalf of all Israel, and that it was only after this leaping and dancing 'a la King David', that the Holy Spirit hit St Elizabeth.
​
Maybe it is time to practice a bit of extravagance in worship.
 
My son took the imagery given to Heidi Bryden and put in on paper.
​
May it help you to keep this promise of God close to your heart.
May it help you to bring to nothing all the attacks of fear.
May it help you to focus on what God is up to in 2022.

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Of course, sometimes it is the extravagance in worship that calls forth the Holy Spirit, and sometimes it is the active presence of the Holy Spirit that starts the leaping and dancing, and sometimes each builds on the other in a glorious holy spiral towards more of God.

​Come Holy Spirit!