02/01/12 Monday
Today we arrived in Toronto. We were met with what the weather people referred to as the first extreme winter blast for the season. Although the air temperature was supposed to be -15oC, the cold northerly would through a chill factor bring this to -35oC. The cold temperatures hit us as we stepped out of the Toronto Airport. Having come from summer in NZ, this was a little bit of a shock to the system. Although we had a shortened day through the time zones, we were tired and standing in this cold chill at 5pm waiting for the hotel shuttle to come and pick us up. Arriving at the hotel, we decided to settle in and go without dinner rather than face the cold blast and walk to the nearby centre for a feed. The picture of Karen standing beside the car was taken after two days of sunshine which had no impact on the snow.03/01/12 Tuesday
This morning we took a taxi to the Catch the Fire site and registered in the Leaders School of Ministry that we have been looking forward for several years to do. There would be around 30 people doing this course, from a wide variety of nations, and probably around half in transition, not knowing where their next step is likely to take them. We chose to take the package where accommodation and meals are provided on site. The rooms are bunk rooms, with single bunks to provide accommodation for singles. We have secured a whole bunkroom to ourselves, so we have placed two mattresses on the floor.
By 10 am we were into it, starting with teaching from Mark Virkler on learning to hear the voice of God. Jesus walked in the dynamic of doing only what He saw the Father doing, and saying only what He heard the Father saying. We too can walk in that dynamic because as the Father sent Jesus, so Jesus now sends us.
This teaching provides a good basis for learning to hear God’s voice and to hunger to learn more from Him. He sets the foundation that all our positive thoughts that we have are from God (the Holy Spirit is the Comforter); all our negative thoughts are from the devil (who is the accuser). There is a need to embrace the positive and reject the negative. He highlighted the need to listen to the spontaneous positive thoughts rather than relying upon our reasoning and analytical thinking. The spontaneity is more likely to be sourced from the Holy Spirit, whereas the reasoning from our own thoughts.
Mark was with us for 2 days of intensive teaching, and by the end of it our minds were on overload, but our hearts were invigorated.05/01/12 Thursday
Peter and Heather Jackson started today sharing on the Father Heart of God. Unlike the teaching of Mark Virkler this has been more a time of just imbibing and taking in with very few notes as they shared many testimonies, including their own, of the wonderful love that the Father has for us. These testimonies were absolute treasures, and moved our hearts so that we become more aware of the Father’s heart towards us personally.
Heather shared how she came out of a life of abuse, including rape, and her healing came when the Lord called her to go into a prison to minister on the love of the Father where the majority of the prisoners were sexual offenders.
The Jacksons have learnt much of their heart stuff through the experience of adopting a teenager from an extremely abusive background. Many of the facets of this testimony were extremely touching, and analogies were drawn which gave rise to a glimpse of the our relationship with the Father.
Thursday also brought the Heavy Rain Conference, specifically a conference for youth. As part of the LSOM we were able to attend the evening meetings on Thursday and Friday.
06/01/12 Friday
The Jacksons continued to minister on the Father’s heart in the morning. The key thing that we got out of what they shared this morning was some of the basic attitudes of a shame based culture. They outlined 7 points and we were both challenged by these points. Many are reasonably typical of Kiwi culture.
07/01/12 Saturday
We were able to sit in on the Heavy Rain Conference today. The guest speaker for the morning was Kris Vallotton speaking on wholeness. Both of us enjoyed and were touched particularly by one of the testimonies that he shared.
The testimony is as follows: Kris was tired, and wanted to get the prayer line over and done with as quick as possible. At the end of a prayer line was a woman who had come up with crippling arthritis. Kris just wanted do a quick prayer, but the Holy Spirit told him to tell her that her healing would come through her husband praying for her. Her response showed that this was not a welcomed suggestion. She was asked if her husband was there, and yes, he was sitting right at the back. Kris sent the wife to get him and observed unfavourable interaction between the two. He reluctantly came up and when asked to lay hands on his wife and to pray for her he responded praying wasn’t his thing. Finally Kris got him to do what he asked, and to everyone’s utter amazement, his wife was totally healed despite none of them having faith for it. Later Kris asked the Lord why He wanted the husband to pray. The Lord responded that the husband broke her, so he had to fix her. The husband had had an adulterous relationship many years before. He had asked her for forgiveness but she had never trusted him. She had become bitter, and so had he. By having her husband pray for her, it not only would heal her physically, but it would heal the relationship between the husband and the wife.In the afternoon, we decided with three others to go for a longer walk (probably about 8 km) to one of the local malls. We ended up coming back in the dark, ending up in a large truck yard, following what appeared to be a road on the Google may on a phone! We slept well that night.
08/01/12 Sunday
As we stepped out of the School of Ministry building to go to the café for breakfast, we were greeted with a light dusting of snow on the ground. This soon melted as the sun rose, but we managed to get a couple of pictures before it did.Below is the School of Ministry Building where are living and having the school
Today has been quite a relaxed day. We attended the Church Service in the morning (they didn’t have an evening service) and spent some of the afternoon catching up on sleep.
The sense of the God’s Presence has been strong during all our times of worship. We begin each day with a time of praise and worship in the school. The worship during the conference meetings and the Sunday Church services also was very good. The focus of Catch the Fire for 2012 is cultivating and atmosphere of the Presence of God.
