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Where did the days of deep spontaneous worship go? Did God's wave of times of worship go away and if so why or did we as his people decide it was too much work to prepare for worship so let's just go back to what always was. What are your thoughts? We'd love to hear from you.



How can we as pastors, musicians, actors, artists work together to bring us all closer to the King and who he is and give him the honor that is do him

Sometimes, a little germ of an idea turns out to be much more than one could ever imagine.



For Pentecost, this year, our small team prepared an interpretation of Paul Wilbur's Let Your Fire Fall, from the CD Holy Fire. We've done this piece many times previously, but always with the full set of 7 Spirits banners and it was a big production. In our particular church space, such a big expression is not practical. So we needed a fresh way to still do the piece with power, but scaled to our physical space and size of our team.



What we did was to do the piece in 3 parts: The first 2 verses, I danced with a large fire flag in solo interpretation. Then the Spirit of the Lord banner processed to it's position on the platform. Last, two dancers brought in one of our 30-foot fire silks and stretched it across the front of the church. I danced under and around the billowing silk and it was released over me to fall gracefully to the ground at the end of the piece... let your fire fall.....



Simple, right? But with a little twist, so to speak...



Navigating a 30 foot length of fabric up a center aisle and making a turn to get the silk positioned across the front is awkward at best. I saw a picture in my mind of the two silk bearer winding themselves into the center of the silk, completely enveloping their bodies and bring the silk up the aisle that way. We worked out the logistics and timing, and at the words "come and glorify Your Name"....the dancers turned outward, unrolling the silk and began their billows.



It was a dramatic way to reveal the silk....but it was more than that. The message for the day was about the scrolls in the book of Revelation. And a connection was made to believers as living scrolls...with destiny written within that must be opened and unfurled in order to fulfill Gods' purpose for our lives. And that the same Lamb/Lion that was worthy to open the scroll in Revelation had the power to break the seals on our "scrolls".



It became clear that God had not just given me a clever dramatic device--it was much more. Our choreography was the picture of the "living scrolls" unrolled in the presence of the Holy Spirit. And the fire silk, which represents the Spirit and fire and life of God, expanded in a huge explosion of wind and life as it billowed, filling the space with its magnificence. That part was a picture of how huge the impact of our sanctified lives can be.



Something happened to the viewers of that imagery as well.....God awakened sanctified imaginations to see into the Kingdom. To see the bigness of God and the searing life that can result when we open our lives to Him. And all from a simple choreographic that was devised (seeminly) to solve an awkward traffic problem. God is so awesome, is He not?



If you'd like to listen to Let Your Fire Fall, you may do so here in the <URL url="http://zionfirefriends.com/index.php?showtopic=1890">members audio library.



CD: Let Your Fire Fall, Paul Wilbur <URL url="http://www.amazon.com/Holy-Fire-Paul-Wilbur/dp/B0002BNYVY/?tag=zionf-20">Holy Fire

It's another of those questions that's been swirling around in my head for a couple of weeks. :hamster: At what level is fantasy okay and when is it sin? When does imagination and make believe move to the dark side?



I'm launching this here in hopes that some of our pastoral types will chime in with their own perspectives as this is really a hot button topic within the church where our teens and twenty-somethings are concerned. Heck, even as a woodworker, I'm confronted with it! More on that in a few paragraphs.



When I was a little kid, the television superhero was Superman. Every Saturday, his black and white, leotard and tights clad caped self came flying into my living room. Between Davy Crockett and Superman, I could not make up my mind what I really wanted to be when I grew up. I had a faded red bath towel that was my cape. I would assume the posture, usually either laying on the bed with one fist outstretched, on my way to do some world-saving good. I could hear the cheers from below, "Look, up in the sky! It's a bird, it's a plane, no, it's SUPER-DEAN! Some days I wore my coonskin cap, too. It must have been a sight.



I was imagining what it would be like to have super-powers. I was imagining what it would be like to be the best shooter in Tennessee with an Indian for a pal. I never jumped off the roof or out of trees to try and fly. I knew that when I jumped in the air like Superdude did, my feet never strayed far from the sod. I was not kidding myself. I knew who I was and I knew who I wasn't.



In my early teens, I fancied myself a magician. Yup, another caped gig. Not a magic-based magician, mind you, but more the illusionist sort. Sleight of hand, gadgets with a gimmick that gave the illusion of magic. Again, no illusion that I had any power other than being able to learn how to lure your eye away from where the "magic" was actually being made. Dear ole Mom kind of helped me in this line. She shared some of the fun and silly things that she used to do with her brother and mother during the Great Depression for fun. No money, no way to go anywhere, they made their own fun. I only remember a couple of pretty harmless and silly things. Take a pan of water, sprinkle pepper on top of the water. It will stay on the water, pretty much wherever you sprinkle it. Rub your finger on a bar of soap (without the other person seeing) and put said soapy finger into the water while uttering your favorite magic word. "Presto change-o" and the pepper flees to the edges of the pan. Pretty neat and a great way to fool a little kid or to tell a silly story. Mom had a LOT of these.



And then, there was "the problem". I would not know it was a problem for years to come, but it was right there in my face. One of the things that Mom & her mom used to do back then was to play with a Ouija board. Some pronounce it as a WeeJee board. A board with letters, numbers, and a few words along with a little triangular pointy thinger that you rest your finger tips on and it would move. And move it did. My mom was amazed. She'd never seen a stylus move that fast. I began to ask it deep questions. I was NOT in this for amusement for very long. I wanted answers to what was to come, even at that age! I had unwittingly crossed a very fine line between the positive spiritual realm and the not so positive supernatural.



For the next seven years or so, I found that I had "powers" that not everyone shared. I could often enter a room where there was a Ouija board, and I could tell what it was going to say! Sometimes, it would move with only my fingers on it, sometimes if it was just in my lap. Telekinesis is being able to move things or affect objects through thought alone. Remember Yuri Geller who used to bend keys and spoons on that same black and white TV?? I found myself reading some pretty far out tales about some pretty far out powers. I dabbled in mind-reading and had some pretty amazing experiences with it. From MILES away, even though the experts said that was not possible. And I'm talking tens of miles, and once thousands of miles! Made phone calls and confirmed the things I "heard" in my head. Pretty spooky stuff, looking back on it.



It got bad enough, or good enough, that three of us in service were not allowed to play cards at the same table. They thought we were using signals or code. No, thoughts only.



I HAD POWERS!!!!! Some of Superman's powers seemed to have taken up residence in me. In puny little ME! Amazing. Still could not fly. Never played with astral projection or I might have figured that I was flying, too! uperman:



Dabbling. Dabbling. A little dab of fantasy, a dab of abracadabra, a dab of what if, and an exposure to a dab of the power of the spirit realm, and my head was HOOKED! I did NOT grow up in a Christian home. I attended a Sunday school fairly often, but not with my parents. Mom was a Baha'i until a month or so before her death, so I had a dab of that, too. Strictly schooled Baha'is would probably not have approved of the dabbling either, but she wasn't and I wasn't strictly schooled. It was more of a social club. I've known people from church-going homes who would say the same thing. It was social, surface-s stuff and not anything that would protect heart and soul.



It was not until years later, after Christ was in my heart, and after I read a book by Dennis & Rita Bennett about the Holy Spirit and how to let Him be part of your life that I realized what I had been "dabbling" in.



Think about our culture. Think about the entertainment dabblings that we can face any day of the week, and that our kids are often immersed in! Cartoon characters, good witches and not so good witches, magic of the very real sort, the influences of Wicca, crystals, amulets, role-playing games, and all sorts of things that seem to border on the fantasy side, but just might be moving the boundaries unless we're careful. nake:



I promised another story. I'm a woodworker. I love to make square things round on my lathe. One of "THE" most popular toys for the last several years have been "magic" wands, a la Harry Potter and company. People ask me, "Will you make me a magic wand for my grand-baby? He really loves Harry Potter movies!" And they get offended when I tell them no! And they don't understand when I tell them that I've given up magic for Lent!



How do we explain the unseen to the naive? How do we as seasoned soldiers in the army of God explain to the next generation that the seeds of dabbling reap a crop that might consume them? How can we make it real to them? I think about Elisha and the guy I call his stupid servant, Gehazi. Gehazi just did not get it. He lied to Elisha about where he'd been when he was trying to influence someone else, he did not seem to at all understand the huge mantle that was on Elisha. The one scene that I wish I could replicate, where I wish I could be Elisha for the many teens and twenty-somethings in my sphere, is where Gehazi was in a panic about all the myriad of soldiers that were about to descend upon them. II Kings 6:8ff. The king Aram and all of the Arameans were mightily ticked off at Elisha. Gehazi is quaking in his sandals at all who were set to not just come against them, but set to surely overwhelm and utterly destroy Gehazi & Elisha. So, Elisha prays a simple but powerful prayer, "O Lord, I pray, open his eyes that he may see." God answers, Gehazi sees, his jaw drops, and there just is no more problem.



How much we are like Gehazi in that we can't trust what we can't see? How much more are the young people in today's culture like that. There is no belief that marijuana is a gateway drug. Oh, addiction will never happen to me. No belief that smoking tobacco causes cancer. Oh, cancer will never happen to me. No belief that "innocent" parlor games like Ouija or Dungeons & Dragons have serious spiritual consequences. "It's just a game, lighten up!" Oh, watching a television witch twitch her nose and make things vanish isn't harmful. Or her not so nice witchly mother, sister, uncle, and cousins doing evil magic things to harm or harass. Those things aren't harmful, just entertainment! And dare we talk about Harry potter and the HUGE magical following replete with incantations and spells that are apparently documented to have come from very serious black magic sources?



And there are indeed fantasies that are not evil, but still pretty close to magical. Think of the Rings trilogy. There is lots of supernatural stuff that goes on there, complete with warlocks and wizards and all the rest. Or Narnia. That's pretty fantastic, too. Where does the line get drawn in those? Both give some pretty sobering glimpses of the spiritual realities that are really out there. The good guys win in the Rings and the Narnia scenarios, but there are heavy doses of supernatural if not magical powers involved. Good teaching tools, perhaps? Ways to expose people to a reality they are not ready to accept let alone face?



How do we fight this fight? How do we champion for a Gehazi generation?

ANNOUNCING the opening of <URL url="http://zionfirefriends.com/index.php?showforum=65">AARON'S BEARD, a forum for pastoral perspectives.



Because we have some pastors here as ZFFriends, we are opening a forum for them to speak to us with exegetical studies, sermon notes or exhortations that they want to share with worshipers that visit here. The forum will be for that, and also for non-pastor types here to raise any issues or questions they would like pastors to address. It is our hope that lively exchanges will happen here that will build up the worshiping community and strengthen the connections with our leaders. No everyone has experienced being properly pastored, or maybe even being pastored at all. We can all learn something about the give and take that is required for healthy church and ministry relationships.



We hope that this forum fills with information, ideas, and teaching that will build us all up in our ministries and relationships.



We are giving pastors an icon designation <IMG content="http://z3.ifrm.com/2/81/0/p159622/ichthus.png"> so that anyone reading the topic knows the perspective of the writer. And, a new emoticon! hepherd:



If you want to see who our pastor members here are, go to the bottom of the Member page and search for the PFriends group. Oh, and if you are a pastor and we somehow missed adding you to the pastors member group, send us a PM or post here so we can give you the proper designation.

We would like to make an honored place for the pastors among us to add their wisdom to the discussions here at ZFF. We have designated this forum for that purpose, in order to give recognition of their calling and glean some benefit from their experience, wisdom and advice.



If you are a pastor and are not identified as such in this community, please PM Dean or me so that we can assign you the special name icon <IMG content="http://z3.ifrm.com/2/81/0/p159622/ichthus.png">. That will allow other members reading your posts to have a sense of the unique perspective you bring to the discussions. We welcome your contributions of sermon notes, insights or exegetical studies you feel would benefit members here.



Members are also free to start question or issue topics for responses from a pastoral perspective, and of course can also participate in any discussion here, not only your own.



It is our hope that even more understanding between worship artists and the shepherds they serve with can come from this format.

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This is exciting stuff. I'm writing the copy now. Stay tuned for the explanation and what I think is some info that will bless you!