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As the Lord leads.

TRANSFORMATION OF THE CHURCH

One day, while in the shower, (that is, from a bucket) in Nairobi, Kenya, the Lord gave me a revelation.

I had just seen the amazing new TBN broadcasting auditorium on TV, filled with beautiful people (it seems compulsory for preachers to have glamorous wives, generally much younger than themselves!), fantastic choirs, singers and setting, all broadcast over 47 satellites.

In the shower the Lord showed me a picture of the Pentecostal church. How it started in storefronts and homes, of how rejected these first weird 'pentes' were. But these early pentecostals remained fully committed to the cause, staying close to God, for they were then at the forefront of God's revelation and indeed, presence.

Gradually however, Pentecostalism (now with a capital 'P',) has become mainstream. Pastors (and now Bishops) have become elevated beyond a job description or a calling, to positions above the people ' a new priesthood. In the west, new pastors must be seminary trained, and are likely receive a reasonable salary from the beginning of their ministry. No longer is their real sacrifice in being 'called' to ministry.

In our services, the emphasis has changed from listening to the Holy Spirit and following His desires, to a concentration on excellence and good order, to the near exclusion of the Holy Spirit leading us. Worship times, unlike the days of the storefront believers, are based on a proven formula of thanksgiving, praise, then worship, followed by (maybe) a prophecy, then the Word and finally ministry ' until we all go home after exactly 2 hours.

Next comes an emphasis on building buildings 'for the glory of God', as so grandiosely epitomized by TBN. I have been involved in three different pentecostal churches over the years and have seen this process in practice. All churches that started meeting in homes, then storefronts or halls, before being 'called' to build or buy a church. The church then has to be rebuilt to be bigger, or ancillary buildings added, so that a 'church complex' is created.

Often too, we hear the statement, 'God is in the house'. Wow! Fantastic! But is it true? Is God really in these beautiful structures man has created? Or rather, is He in the hearts of the people who inhabit the house? Or again, has He departed altogether, to allow us to 'play church' in the beautiful temples we have built.

The process of 'monument building' that started in the fourth century AD with the Roman Catholic Church, and which continued after the Reformation once those churches became mainstream, continues today as Pentecostalism enters the mainstream also. This seems to be the process of a 'maturing church'.

The Lord showed me that the people He calls on to impart the next revelation are those with the kingdom within, those dissatisfied with the established status quo, those hungering for more of Him. Those whose emphasis remains on the spiritual, who have not been seduced by the inevitable physical emphasis of the 'maturing' church.

Today God is calling out another new generation, as He has in times past. It is a new generation desiring to move forward into the new (but old!) truths of submission and obedience to the Father's will, of servanthood and sacrifice, a simple people with hearts sold out to God, those who will finally fulfil the Great Commission. A Church not of Pastors, Programmes and Property, but of 'kingdom people', who, through their sacrifice, will usher in the return of Jesus.