I think we are missing something...

Im grateful for what I see and hear in Lakeland. Same thing for Charlotte, and anywhere else God is choosing to localize Himself. When you connect with that, it is radical. I have hours of testimony of God visiting me, and changing me radically. There is no substitute.

What I dont like, and dont agree with, is the emphasis on stadiums and meetings. It is a concoction of human minds. The idea that if something is happenning, we must therefore get as many people around the man with the strongest personality, and keep this machine going as long as possible, is not only bizzare from a scriptural standpoint, but ineffective for the long run.

I love Todd Bentley. I love his childlike heart, and his willingness to go for it. But it is a strain for me to watch new wine coming through an old wineskin. The intensity of charismania (and I is one) is not an indicator of difference, only intensity. It is too easy to suggest that because someone yells, screams, has angelic experience, shakes, laughs etc... that the "wineskin" is different. The wine might be, but the vessel doesnt have to be qualified.

I have made wine. Surprisingly good wine. I made it 2 different times, using the same vessels. The last batch is really good, but different. Same glass bottles, and similar oak casks.

So I am all for this thing. Im going. I want impartation, I want the wine. Im a lush at heart. But I dont see anything different at all yet except the duration. And every time I hear about building a center, or a building "for this move of Gawd", or similar language, I just groan.

Im not against meetings, Im not against gathering. But I am against setting up tabernacles on hill tops to try and keep everything going. As impressive as Moses and Elijah are, they arent the Son. We have to abandon the old things (the Law and the Prophets) as the focus when the Son is there. The old things pass away, and they still serve their purpose, but they were to point and lead to the full one.

In addition, the primal church wasnt built via meetings. They had them, and it was an effective tool, btu the reality is the church. the body, the ekklesia, were a living organism going about their day. They gathered house to house. Im not a fan of "house church" any more than I am a fan of any other form. They all have people in em, and they all get sick. Im a proponent of "the Church", wherever it is, wherever it goes.

The numbers dont work. I know about the prophecies about stadiums. It hink they are great. But I dont beleive those visions are the sum of what is going to happen, only a sign of what will happen. When we see those things, then we will know a move is afoot. But you couldnt get a significant part of the population exposed via stadiums.

Think of the numbers. Lets say each state has a stadium that can seat 100,000. Thats 5,000,000 total. The population is 350,000,000. It would take protracted meetings, over 70 days, non stop, with 100% turnover (people only coming to one meeting and going home) before the population would be touched. All dya,e veyr day, no stopping. Ask Randy Bohlender about the sheer finances needed to pull that off.

Now take that into perspective. There are 6,500,000,000 people worldwide. So if what I just said above happenned, less than 5% of the world will have been touched.

Yes we have media, yes we have communication mechanisms. But there is no way 50 anointed people can run long term meetings in the US, let alone outside it, for long enough, to touch a huge % of the world.

God never did it that way. Not when we was here in the flesh.

This whole idea of meeting centric Christianity has got to finally die. When the Body stops understanding itself primarily as an entity when gathered, the power and ability to sustain a tremendous wave of grace, mercy, healing, love, affection, deliverance, justice etc... i.e. "The Kingdom" will be simple. I beleive it is already here, just with an "old wineskin".

End of diatribe.... for now.