Suddenly God is about California Revival, the Jesus Revolution, the organic church and emerging church movement, prophectic words and dreams, historical revivals, prayer, God's people and our friends like Lou Engle - The Call, Todd Hunter - Three is Enough, Todd Bentley and Dr. Eddie Gibbs.
Yesterday, I received this awesome e-mail from my grandmother in response to a e-mail I had sent out to different folks to expect a sudden move of God. She wrote:
Dear Randy. I don’t know what you are predicting but let me tell you an answer to prayer. My dearest friend in the church here is Elsie R. Her son Monty was in the Navy and has been an alcholoc ever since we moved here 22 years ago. He wouldn’t let anyone talk to him. He became very ill about tow weeks ago and was in ICU at Veterans Hospital. One of our staff and Jack S. my dear friend since 1943 went to see him yesterday. He had been in a coma but yesterday his mind was clear. They presented the plan of salvation and he was gloriously saved. He died about 8 hours later. We spent the afternoon comforting Elsie and rejoicing with her that that he was saved ( like the thief on the cross )
Blessings on you, Grandma
Imagine! God brought this man out or a coma just long enought to accept JESUS as his savior and then he dies. WOW. Isn’t God Awsome?
Today is June 6, 2008 a warm day here in California. I find myself in shock as I break the format of my blog in order to pay honor and respect to my friend of ten years, Greg Garza.
I met Greg Garza in 1999 at Rio Hondo College during a time when I found myself facing challenges on the job. Greg greeted me with a warm, friendly welcome and smile, the same friendly welcome and smile I would come to know for the following 10 years.
Greg was perhaps the best example of what most people would think a Christian man would look like. Greg was patient, he was kind, even when he was going through a difficult time he was always, and I mean always friendly to everyone he met on campus. Greg always made himself available to those who had problems and would listen attentatively however long it took for someone to vent and spill their troubles on the ground, very rarely did he ever interupt and if he did, it was just to ask a simple question so he could be more clear about what the person was going through. Once that person stopped talking or had composed themself enough to get through the point, he would offer simple counsel and advice. Maybe the person wouldn’t agree with everything Greg had to say, but they were comforted knowing that he was one person they could turn to even if just for someone to talk to during personal crisis.
I can not recall one time in the ten years I have known Greg Garza at Rio Hondo College that he did not extend the hand of friendship to me or ask me how I was doing - even when he knew I was doing pretty crapy.
Greg never failed to be available for representational meetings when called into the Human Resources office or a meeting with a supervisor or other work related issue, he was always there - and I thought he always would be there. I thought wrong.
The loss of Greg Garza goes beyond any work culture or environment - though that is where I knew him best. On more than one occasion Greg had called me at home, and had even given me his personal cell phone number so I could call him when things were challenging.
How do you take the life of a man who has given so much of himself, unconditionally and freely with little more than receiving a “thanks Greg”, and summarize it into a few paragraphs? It’s impossible, you just can’t do it. So I am not even going to try.
Greg Garza was my friend and a co-worker. I wish I had taken more of the opportunities I had to spend with him for lunches and other things. I am forever grateful that God gave me a friend like Greg Garza to help me grow from a young man into a man. He taught me so much about being a man of good counsel, integrity and friendship. I still have more growing to do, I just wish he was going to be around so I could talk with him and eat more of his yummy CSEA event hamburgers.
So this entry into the Suddenly God web blog is in your honor Greg! I HONOR you for who you were, I HONOR you for what you have done for so many of us at the College, I HONOR the legacy you have left that few will beat or come close to matching. You have left a legacy to be remembered for the rest of my life. I could never figure out where your passion for justice and uplifting the downtrodden came from, but I have always admired that about you.
Though people come into our life and some leave early - you will be missed beyond measure!
More recently Greg had been giving me advice for audio equipment and video equipment for a Christian Video Production Ministry I have been developing www.3cirevolution.com - in association with CCCI church.
Greg Garza was the audio/visual technician at Rio Hondo College. The knowledge and gold nuggets picked from his brain about microphones, wireless systems, etc. saved me a lot of time and troubleshooting. It was a real pleasure to be able to spend more time this year interacting with him in various capacities than in the past. I am also greatful that I recently had the opportunity to share with Greg how valuable his friendship and counsel was to me. You can never tell or remind someone enough how much they mean to you before they are suddenly gone.
Greg, you have taught me so much. I will miss you.
Lots of people have been searching lately for Todd Hunter’s new Three Is Enough website. At this time it is not the easiest thing to find on the Internet so let me go ahead and post this link to it:
On Todd Hunter’s website he provides a lot of information to what he call’s TIE or in other words THREE IS ENOUGH including his promised FAQ’s in which he addresses some of the questions that those of us lucky enough to be involved in some of his pre-publish meetings got to put to him for answers.
Here is FAQ number one which I know I for one put down as a question: What is the ultimate goal of TIE?
His answer: What’s the ultimate goal of TiE Group? To assist people to routinely follow Jesus for the sake of others in the places they have the most organic and authentic community. For most people this is the workplace.
Commentary of the Todd Bentley MSNBC reports on the Florida Healing Revival
On Thursday, May 29, 2008 - NBC News Producer, Alice Rhee posted what I imagine may be the first of their articles about Todd Bentley and the healing outpouring in Lakeland, Florida. Here is a quote from that article located on the MSNBC website http://fieldnotes.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/05/29/1075189.aspx
“LAKELAND, Fla. – “Holy Spirit fall! God is here! We want more! More, more, more!” That’s what Canadian evangelist Todd Bentley yells out nearly every evening to the thousands who gather to hear him preach. The 32-year-old Bentley looks more like a biker than a minister, with body piercings and tattoos all over his arms and neck. But the crowds don’t seem to mind how he looks. They just want what they believe Bentley has – the ability to heal them.”
It is exciting to see MSNBC take interest, in my opinion of all the news media sources - MSNBC has always provided the most interesting and in-depth reports on the more controversial aspects of the Christian church and claims of God outpourings. I remember the first investigation of theirs about founder of the Vineyard Church, John Wimber when God had been moving back in the 1980’s. It was the most well presented news investigations I had seen at the time and it still impacts me today.
I, not being much of a movement follower but instead being focused on the state of the local churches in California haven’t spent much time following the Lakeland meetings, however I did recently spend the evening with quite a few others at Mott Auditorium in Pasadena with Todd Bentley. He had felt God wanted him to come to California and keep this one event from his schedule that had been created prior to the original five week meeting in Florida which ended up being indefinitely extended. He had told us that he had to sneak away that day and would be returning the following morning.
I think it would be awesome if MSNBC will investigate and follow-up with some of the healing claims - especially the more outrageous ones like people rising from the dead, which is one area I believe the church as well as most news media fails to do. We are after all in a time and age of information that provides world wide media attention via the Internet and satellite television and we have more tools and resources for investigating things than any other time in the history of mankind. Why not put these claims to the test when they occur and see how far down the rabbit hole we can go?
I mean, if this really is God healing people through Todd Bentley and his ministry team or even if it is simply just people getting “mysteriously” healed, wouldn’t everyone want to know about it?
What do you say, MSNBC? Are you up to taking on the challenge that Todd put to the media that he would provide a list of names and contact information to any media agency that would take up the offer?
I was talking with a few friends recently who have been watching Todd Bentley in Florida since it began on GOD TV. They have been recording the events during the day and watching it in the evenings. I asked them recently, Have there been any visible healings recorded on video? They seemed to think there had been, so I asked, “Has there been any visible healings like arms growing on live TV where there were no arms, or legs growing or fingers, etc”. One of my friends said that there has been one man who was prayed for whose leg seemed to be re-growing since his prosthetic leg was no longer fitting and that Todd Bentley had asked him to come back again for more prayer.
Having been around these kinds of things before and even having prayed for people myself who have come back later saying they were healed, I have often wondered if anyone has ever been healed in a manner where it is caught on video and apparent? I anticipate that this is just a matter of time even if such a thing does not occur in Florida, however I imagine when that does occur, professors at conservative seminaries will attempt to discredit it and blame it on something other than God.
Also during this discussion I mentioned that more than likely, most people who would see such healing on television would think it was some form of Character Generated Graphic (CGG) effect similar to those in the movies. I think this is why it is important that news media like MSNBC or others be allowed to come in and document or investigate or maybe even be the crew capturing such unusual events since they do not necessarily have a particular “religious” agenda other than reporting on some out of the ordinary events…
Added: June 30, 2008 - Cary McMullen of The Ledger - posted an interesting article about concerns local city pentecostal pastors and the Assemblies of God have about the Florida Outpouring. I found the information very presented, balanced and interesting to read. The Ledger.com
