Dear Friends,

“Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do amazing things among you.” Joshua 3:5.

As we move into a time being birthed, I am reminded that birth is preceded by pregnancy. Are we pregnant; are we filled with faith? Faith that God is going to birth something that is far greater than the good things we could produce on our own?

Can we believe together that we’ll be a part of something transcendent? Something marked by God’s activity – the One whose thoughts are higher than ours and whose ways are not our own?

I don’t want to create a future on our own. I want to be part of ministry that is empowered by God and far exceeds our own capacity to dream, plan, and execute.

I desperately want to see our community follow God as God’s Kingdom advances . . . to participate in that movement . . . to do only the things we see God doing and say only the things we hear God saying - - - TO LISTEN AND OBEY.

I want our community to be filled with faith and power in ways that can only be recognized as GOD. As we’ve gotten to know people in our neighborhood, I’ve become more and more convinced that people are not waiting for a new definition/explanation of Christianity, but rather a DEMONSTRATION of Christianity.

A demonstration of:

the love of God that goes so far to insist that we love our enemies;

the unconditional love and mercy that always and forever says YES to every human being;

the care and concern for the poor and oppressed;

the concrete presence of God with all those who suffer and know brokenness;

the power of God to heal, redeem, and restore - - - AND SO MUCH MORE.

To be demonstrators, we must consecrate ourselves. The context for miracles and wonders is always sacrifice. After all, birth comes with the pain of labor. We sacrifice by setting ourselves apart unto the Lord; by embracing a heart posture that wants to know God and make him known on the earth.

Sometimes consecration means taking that step of faith and watching God do what we cannot do.

And sometimes it means stepping into spaces where either God shows up or we are utterly humiliated.

Darren Kerstien