WHERE'S THE FIRE...Extinguisher?

I guess it was bound to happen sooner or later. I was hoping for later. God has allowed me to pastor a great church, True North Church in Minerva, Ohio for a year now. Looking back over that year, I get excited as I remember services marked with a powerful presence of God's Holy Spirit,  powerful anointing and powerful change in hearts and lives.

In yesterday's service, I'm sure there was a powerful presence of the Holy Spirit, a powerful anointing and I'm praying that there was powerful change in hearts and lives. However, for whatever reason, God allowed me to go through the entire service feeling completely alone and totally unable to sense his presence, anointing and power. It was awful - for me.

I must admit, my desire was to get through the message and get off of the platform as quickly as I could. I felt nothing other than like the message was going down in flames. I sensed nothing and I wasn't about to try to manufacture something just so I could feel like we had a church service.

I have had similar experiences before, but seldom during a church service. Ironically, before the service, someone reminded me that our faith isn't, or, at least, shouldn't be based on what we feel or don't feel. Good thing, because yesterday, I had nothing - in the way of feelings.

No matter what you feel or your lack of feelings, know that your faith can still be strong.

A Friend's Dream

A friend of mine once had a dream in which he saw the Lord. In the dream, the Lord said, "Follow me," and started running. My friend said that he started running after Jesus but he could not keep up and he lost sight of the Lord in what he described as a fog. He ran for a while more and then just stopped. 

After what seemed like several hours the Lord returned and asked him, "What happened?" 

"I tried to keep up but I couldn't, I didn't know where You went," my friend explained.

Jesus, smiled and replied, "Yes, but you saw which direction I went, all I asked was for you to follow."

"I will never fail you. I will never abandon you."
Hebrews 13:5 NLT

Following no matter what I feel or don't.