Hi all,
Most of you know my life and my transparency, regularly sharing elements of our lives from funny things our oldest (handicapped) son says, to dynamics between Barb and myself, to some of the things the Lord has recently shared with me 'hot off the press' as the saying goes. What you see is what you get. 
 
My experience with vertigo 
A couple of years ago I got very, very tired during a series of meetings and travel, work around the house, our time with Chris each week, and the demands of ministry to pray, study, write, correspond, email, Skype and such - it is constant because of the growing world-wide network of our house church friends and affiliates, and those who don't do house church, but have been blessed by the teachings I share. 
 
And I tend to need only 5-6 hours of sleep, have lots of energy, and need activity. Torture for me is inactivity. I need to be doing something, and I have to get out of the house daily. Rare is the day I don't venture outside. 
 
That particular morning I sat up to get out of bed and suddenly within my mind I could not tell up from down, right from left. It wasn't that the world was spinning, it was that I didn't know up from down but for what my eyes told me. It wasn't dizziness, in which the world seems to spin rapidly on a horizontal axis, this was vertigo: The sudden inability to determine up from down, right from left. The world doesn't spin with vertigo, a person just doesn't have any reference to up or down or left or right. 
 
I had to immediately think through what was up and down, left and right. I remember looking at the red glow of the digital clock on the nightstand and focusing on that as I lowered myself back to my pillow, and I lay there on my left side until things returned to normal within myself. 
 
I experimented. I discovered I could lie on my left side or on my back, but if while on my back, I turned my head to the right to any degree past vertical - just staring at the ceiling - the vertigo swept in. I would quickly turn my head back to the left to stop it. I could not turn to nor lie on my right side without a massive wave of vertigo envelope me. 
 
Just sitting up and walking required tremendous concentration to mentally assert what my eyes were telling me and tell my brain I was upright. Putting one foot in front of the other had to be thought through, each step confirming that was down and a firm reference point for my brain to focus on.
 
I fought to stay upright by sheer mental concentration. I was just trying to get up for the day. My body was forcing me to take a day off to sleep, rest, do little more than watch old movies on TV. I was more or less normal the next day, but still feeling 'fuzzy' kind of like jet lag in my mind. By the 3rd day I was normal. 
 
There is a time to command the body, and a time to listen to the body
Some Christians become so enveloped in a particular stream of teaching they think they can command, proclaim, speak their world into existence while ignoring common sense and due diligence. That is presumption: The act of thinking something is God's responsibility when in fact it is our responsibility.
 
I once had a man who worked for me come to my office early one afternoon asking for prayer. He said he got headaches daily in the early afternoons and he had prayed for himself, had hands laid on him for prayer, commanded, proclaimed, bound and cast out the devil and all the 'usual suspects', but was no better. 
 
I guess I was the last resort I thought to myself after he told me everyone who had prayed for him and all he had done to be healed. So we sat down and I did what I prefer to do when about to pray for someone, which is to sit in silence and see what the Father would say or reveal. Instantly I heard the Father say, "He is dehydrated. Tell him to drink water and cut back on the coffee, which I've been dealing with him about."
 
He was shocked, absolutely shocked at how 'unspiritual' that word was. He was a bit like Naaman the leper of II Kings 5 who balked at the command to wash 7x in the river Jordan to be healed, but eventually humbled himself to do so. My friend was expecting a great, loud, commanding prayer from the Seer to rid him of his headache. "Just drink water? Really? Is that all there is?"
 
The next day he reported in - headache gone! He had been drinking water steadily through the morning, cut back to 1 cup of coffee at lunch and drank water with it, and was fine. Two weeks later he checked in again; never a headache since that day. A year later we saw each other and he was still amazed that something so simple had cured him. 
 
So there I was at the Dutch conference
I was tired from trip preparations before we went, then jet lag and travel, and then right into the conference. I woke up Friday morning with vertigo, but was determined to be healed and function normally. That night, as our son Brian led us all deep into worship my eyes were suddenly opened to the Lord's realm, and Jesus was there. 
 
I thought He would come over to me and lay hands on me, but all He said to me was, "No, I'm here to minister to hearts and souls tonight. You did it to yourself", and then He turned to walk in our midst, putting His hand on several people over the next several minutes. The testimonies afterward were amazing and in some cases deeply personal. His presence was SO strong, so many touched...but not me. 
 
I've run out of room for today, next week I'll share what the Father told me that Saturday afternoon about the Lord's remark 'You did it to yourself' and about what He said about the condition. Until then, blessings,
 
John Fenn
www.cwowi.org and email me at cwowi@aol.com

Hi all,
I wrote this series in large part to talk about how the manifestation of the Spirit is commonplace and doesn't happen with labels attached. A person will have a sudden 'knowing' about a friend's situation, or a friend's name or face will cross their mind and instantly they will know they need prayer or are 'down' or under stress about something - those words of knowledge and wisdom are given by the Father that we might first pray, and then perhaps, perhaps, reach out to that person. But He doesn't label them for us at the time - He just does it and the labels are given merely to help us understand how He communicates to us. 
 
The point is that these things are normal Christianity that occur as a matter of life, here and there, as He directs our steps. We read the gospels or Acts which are compressed periods of time - the gospels focused on 3 1/2 years and Acts over 30 years, and wonder why God doesn't move through us like that every single day. 
 
We need to drop wrong thoughts like 'When is the Lord going to use me?'. "I'm not doing anything for Him, I feel so useless", to focus on the fact Christ is in us, and He will provide opportunities as we look for them as a matter of the course of life. 
 
Other gifts
There are other gifts like the 'energy' gifts I mentioned in the first of this series. These are gifts the move us, energize us, motivate us to do things. Paul names these manifestations of the Spirit in Romans 12:3-8 and they include such things as giving, organizing, teaching, mercy, serving, exhorting, seeing things right/wrong, and so on. These are more than our personalities, these things move us from within to interact with others, and they are as much as the Spirit of God as giving a prophecy. Paul says each person has their grace, and we can only live in our grace, not another's. 
 
In the Old Testament we see still more gifts, especially around the building of the tabernacle of Moses. In Exodus 31:2-6, 35: 26-35, 36:1, 8, God describes men and women in whom He put wisdom as He calls it, to work with wood, metal, stones and gems, linen and weaving and sewing, and all manner of skills so they can build the tabernacle. They have that 'wisdom' or we might say talent or skill or know-how they are born with, because the Lord put that in them. Those things that motivate people are a manifestation of the Spirit of God as much as prophecy or healings!
 
The rest of the charismatic gifts that I didn't spend time on: Healings, special faith, and miracles, are gifts where you have to be in a special situation to see the Spirit of God manifest. Most of us don't want to be in those situations that require special faith or miracles. Healings of people are a manifestation of the Spirit like prophecy or knowing how to work with fabric or wood, and it is plural in the Greek. Gifts of healings. 
 
Some people find they have a gift for certain types of healings. To one maybe nearly everyone with a muscle/bone issue they lay hands on gets healed. To another maybe it is system things like circulatory or electrical systems of the body they have a gift for. It varies. It doesn't matter what manifestation one might commonly see, for we are all told to lay hands on the sick. The Holy Spirit will manifest as needed rather than sticking to such and such a gift. In other words, we have the One who manifests Himself for a person's good in us, rather than just us being limited to 1 manifestation of the Spirit and that's all we get.
 
Miracles such as bread multiplied, ax heads floating, water parting, are not common, but they happen to those in situations that need that manifestation of the Spirit. Special faith is what carries a widow through a funeral or a sudden knowing someone has about a tragic situation, and they know their loved one is safe - it tends to 'drop in' a person, that special faith for the special circumstance. 
 
We have the Source in us
You will never find yourself in a situation where He won't do what He needs to do to help you. While certain manifestations of the Spirit flow with your personality better than others might, you have the Holy Spirit in you, so whatever you need is what He will do - you don't have x gift and that's it, too bad if you find yourself in a situation that needs y gift!
 
He deals with us according to how He created us
The day after a noted teacher had spoken at the church where I was on staff, I had an Bible school student come to me saying, "I wish the Lord would talk to me like He talks to him. The Lord talks to directly to him, so bluntly to him."
 
I asked her what she would really do if the Lord talked that bluntly to her, and she replied: "I don't know, probably dissolve into a pool of tears because that seems so harsh." And yet she wanted that kind of bluntness.
 
I told her that her laid back, easy going positive outlook on life is the way He created her, so He will speak to her gently, as a process over time rather than confrontational. She looked amazed because she said, she was always jealous over people who had the Lord talk bluntly to them. That day she learned that some of those people would probably like Him to be more laid back with them and gentle, and she had peace. 
 
A person's personality may naturally work well with prophecy, especially if they are naturally an encourager, a story teller, one who naturally comforts people. But that same person would not necessarily flow with the discerning of spirits, which sometimes requires confrontation and directness in the Spirit and often to a person's face. 
 
A person who sits quietly and observes may naturally flow with words of wisdom and maybe specific healings, but because they are naturally quiet they won't be given to prophecy or interpretation of tongues. 
 
Paul told the Corinthians "Those who compare themselves with themselves are not wise." That's good advice. Don't look to how the Lord deals with others or how He moves through others, focus on Christ in you - learn how He moves within you. Very often He is within speaking in one way, but a person is so unhappy that He doesn't speak or manifest Himself through them they way He does with x person, they miss His voice, gifts, and flow through them. 
 
First, learn to shift your mind's attention from the natural senses to what is in your spirit man - do this regularly, train yourself in it. Feel His presence anytime you want simply by doing that. If you learn to do this, how He manifests Himself in your life will take care of itself, for His presence in us is the point - that is the focus. It is from that intimacy and presence all you need in life flows. Amazing grace! New subject next week, until then, blessings,
John Fenn,
www.churchwithoutwallsinternational.org or email me at cwowi@aol.com

Hi all,
I was walking home from class (college) one night, worshipping the Lord as I went. Suddenly my tongues shifted to English without me doing anything to make that change; it just flowed up out of me, out of my heart of love to the Lord. What I said was beautiful in my praise and worship to the Lord but I wasn't sure what was happening. 
 
It wasn't until much later I realized I had interpreted my own prayer language. I have a cd/MP3 series or two on the subject of tongues so I won't spend a lot of time here, but will just cover some basics. 
 
During a visitation with the Lord in which He taught me about this subject, I asked him "Why tongues? It's so controversial in some circles!" He replied (Shortening the conversation to hit the main points): "Consider the Father's problem. Man was delegated the earth, but then man let sin into the world. If you can receive this, understand that for the most part, we operate by invitation in the earth." 
 
(That gave me pause and a hundred things raced through my mind that suddenly made sense - He reserves the right as Creator to use creation, which explains nature going crazy in the last years before His return in an effort to show man he really isn't in control like he thinks. And I had long realized He isn't in detailed charge of everyone, but by invitation becomes involved with those who wish Him to be involved, or He becomes involved if one of His children asks Him to become involved in an unsaved friend or loved one.)
 
He continued. "This means man has to pray to invite us to become involved. But man doesn't know how to pray because his knowledge is limited*. The Father had to find a way to impart to man His unlimited knowledge for a situation so that man could pray that back to Him, giving Him legal authority in the earth to act." *Romans 8:26 
 
"He does this by giving a person a language or languages they have never learned, filling those words with His knowledge according to His perfect will for that person or situation, and then allowing them to pray it to Him. We will not be blamed on the last day. All will see everything done is legal and upright...just and good." 
 
Tongues, involving all 3 parts of you
My experience has been that people who are more cerebral, more focused on the intellectual, often are the ones to have difficulty with tongues, because tongues flows from the spirit. These are the ones not used to being aware of their spirit man because they live in the realm of the intellect. I have to talk to them about times in their life they sense something down inside, felt convicted, dirty, grieved, when they said or did something they realized they should not have. 
 
Most have to search pretty deeply to bring those memories up, because they by the way they were created, relate to the intellect first and foremost. We might say they have emotions, but they are not emotional. They move almost entirely through life with their brain rather than their spirit, and they don't relate to emotional people. The things of the Spirit are not emotional, but a person who knows his or her emotions is in contact with their inner feelings and is therefore used to including those feelings in their life. A person who lives from the intellect very often does not. They have emotions, but they are overridden by intellect. I hope that makes sense - it isn't a negative trait, just the way they are created.
 
So when it comes to sensing the Lord's communication, compassion, or 'feeling' in their spirit, it is a learned skill, a new chapter for them, for they approach tongues from the intellect though it be of the spirit. That makes it difficult for them. 
 
That was me
When I was 16 there was a gap between being born again and when I received the Holy Spirit. My spirit man was recreated by the Holy Spirit, and that allowed me to function in the things of God, but I had not received the Holy Spirit Himself. As a result I hungered for more. I remember telling the Father one day: "I don't want to seem ungrateful, but, is this all there is?"
 
Then I read the way the authors of the New Testament thought, and read the experience of the apostles in the 50 days between when they were born again upon seeing and believing the resurrected Lord, to Pentecost when they received the Holy Spirit. There was a 50 day gap between receiving the recreation work of the Spirit and receiving the person of the Spirit.
 
I read what Jesus said in Luke 5:37-38 about how you have to make the wine bottle new before putting in the new wine, for the old bottle (the non-born again spirit) would be destroyed if you tried to put the new wine (the Holy Spirit) in it. 
 
I read in Acts 8: 15-17 how the evangelist Philip brought people to Jesus, but Peter and John came and laid hands on people to receive the Holy Spirit. There was a gap between believing on Jesus and being born again, and receiving the person of the Holy Spirit. 
 
I read Acts 19: 2 where more than 25 years after Pentecost in Acts 2, Paul came upon some he thought were believers in Ephesus and asked: "Have you received the Holy Spirit since you believed?" Indicating Paul's belief was (still) like Peter and John's, that a person receives a recreation work of the Spirit to be born again, and then the Holy Spirit Himself at the baptism with the Holy Spirit, and that there is often a gap between believing and the baptism with the Spirit.
 
As I said above, I have a series on tongues if you want more detail about how your prayer language can become more flowing. But you may be in the 'gap' between born again and receiving the Holy Spirit - I encourage you to see the Baptism with the Holy Spirit. Note in the NT it is baptism WITH the Holy Spirit, not IN. When we are baptized WITH water our bodies displace the water when we are immersed, but when baptized WITH the Holy Spirit we do not displace the 'water' of the Spirit, but He saturates and permeates us; spirit, soul, and body. 
 
Start by getting in touch with your inner most heart and why you are glad you are saved, why you love the Lord...and let that flow not out of your thoughts, but from way down inside, in your heart...and out of your spirit if you continue, will be words you never learned in part because at some point in your worship, your native (learned) language will become inadequate to express your love to Him. Will wrap up the series next week. Blessings,
John Fenn
www.cwowi.org and email me at cwowi@aol.com

Hi all,
Few manifestations of the Spirit are more misunderstood and misused than prophecy. Paul said in I Corinthians 14:3 prophecy is a divinely inspired word for 'edification, exhortation, or comfort'. That's it. Nothing predictive in simple prophecy. 
 
You may have often prophesied without realizing it. You may have said something to a friend like, "I just feel in my spirit it will be okay" because you felt a peace in your spirit for a friend and had that reassurance. That was prophecy. A divinely inspired word of edification (to build up), exhortation (encouragement), and/or comfort. The labels are for our understanding, He is humble and doesn't announce the labels - He just meets the need. 
 
Interpretation, not translation
Tongues that are interpreted equal prophecy, as both are inspired words that build up, encourage, or comfort. In the same way the interpretation of tongues is an interpretation and not a translation, very often prophecy is like that as well. 
 
A translation is an exact duplication of a message into another language. An interpretation leaves room for the person giving the word to apply their own personality, education, culture, and words into the message. That is why sometimes when a person prophesies they may say, "Thus saith the Lord". The Lord doesn't speak King James English when He gives a message, but the person giving it interprets the message through their education and culture. 
 
A person may sense something in their spirit and put words to what they are sensing. A person may have a witness, something they perceive, or discern in their spirit and put that into words for a person.
 
A prophet will hear the Holy Spirit Himself and repeat those words verbatim. A prophet receives words about nations, leaders, and events in nature on a regular basis. A simple prophecy is interpretation of something perceived in one's spirit intended by the Lord to encourage, build up or comfort a person. 
 
On a personal level, when the Lord gives me a word for someone, I most often actually hear the Holy Spirit speak, just as the prophet Agabus did in Acts 21:11 when he told Paul, "This is what the Holy Spirit says: The man who wears this belt will be arrested by the Jews and turned over to the Romans." Most people will hear words and/or sense feelings and put them into their own words. Sometimes a person who is not a prophet will hear the Holy Spirit Himself speak, but that is not as common. They will 'hear' something vague, maybe see an image in their spirit, then put that into words for a person - very common. 
 
The danger of personal prophecy
In Jeremiah 23 the Lord tells Jeremiah about false prophets and in doing so leaves lessons for our generation in His description of their 'words'. The first element has to do with their personal lives. In v9-14 the Lord says their personal lives are not for Him, but they are in the midst of sin. For us in modern times, look at the person who is prophesying over you. Is their marriage and home life in order? If they are single, are they free from lust and sexual sin? Are they morally upright?
 
I was once called to help a house church (not in our network) as an outsider, hoping to reach two men who would listen to no one. These single men would draw away single women about their age into a side room and "prophesy" over them, and their "prophecy" always had romantic tones. "My daughter, I love you says the Lord, like lovers going away to spend time together to share their hearts, come away with me says the Lord" and such, as the one speaking would run his fingers along her hair, and many such things as that.
 
You can imagine how uncomfortable these men made women in that house church feel! But they would not listen and were asked to leave. Their lives were filled with lust and they were speaking out of their own immoral lives and of their own lust.
 
Jeremiah 23: 16 - the Lord says false prophets (prophecy) "make you vain" 
They appeal to pride and self-esteem. He also says they speak out of their own heart, not out of the mouth of God. People can have a direct word from the Lord for a person whether that be something predictive like a word of wisdom, or a prophecy, and then cross the line and start speaking out of their own heart, out of things they sense about a person. 
 
In Jeremiah 23: 32-37 the Lord says a false prophet has false prophetic dreams and they are proud to be known for their dreams - they may boast either within themselves thinking they are something when they are nothing, or outwardly to make a name for themselves. Their burden the Lord says, is not for Him, but for their own words and agenda. 
 
Honest mistake by the inexperienced 
I was a speaker at a prophetic conference and was waiting my turn in what they called 'the green room'. Also waiting was a man noted in personal prophecy circles and his assistants, and they all wanted to pray for me and see what the Lord said. So I sat in a chair in the middle of the room while they gathered around.
 
At the time I was still a Bible school Director, overseeing over 600 students who would pass through in a year, a large staff and a multi-million dollar budget in a mega-church. I taught daily and was part of the larger decision making process as an 'elder' in that church. 
 
When they started prophesying they were exactly accurate. It was encouraging, it included words of knowledge and wisdom. Among the things they said from the Lord were that I was eager to move out on my own, and that time was coming. It would be like a rocket taking off, slowly at first and gaining momentum, and to stay faithful until that time...all was right on. 
 
I thanked them, started to get up, but they insisted I remain seated for more. This is where they started prophesying out of their own heart. You see, because a person has the Holy Spirit in them, and He is the Spirit of truth, a person may perceive another person's gifts, personality traits, and have the essence of that person's life bear witness in their spirit. That does't mean it is a prophecy, but just something they sense about that person. 
 
Where people get off balance is they then try to take that and turn it into a prophecy. As I sat there they said things like right now I'm doing nothing, but one day the Lord will use me to teach, He will one day use me administratively, and He will one day use me to oversee many people. 
 
They were sensing in their spirit what I was currently doing in my job respofsilbiies, but were turning that into a prophecy about my future - wrong! They were speaking of their own hearts. They were good people, just not mature in these things. 
 
A student came to my office in tears after a noted missionary shared during chapel. She wanted to know why she was so moved by him and not other speakers we'd had. I asked what she felt called to and she said 'missions'. I told her that her spirit bore witness with his spirit and call, and that witness, that commonality, welled up in her and mover her to tears. 
 
On the negative side, a person who grew up around alcoholics may be able to pick an addict out of a crowd because their spirit bears witness with the spirits around that alcoholic, because they grew up around spirits like that - very common. But it is not a prophecy nor does it make one a prophet to sense these things. 
 
I had a woman hand me a 20 page "prophecy" she had transcribed from a recording that a supposed prophet gave her that said basically nothing of value. It went on and on about how wonderful she was, how God had great plans for her, and it said that simple message over and over in various flowery ways for over 20 pages. Single spaced. Front and back. She asked what I thought about it, and I told her it wasn't the Lord past the first line or two, if at all. She was very angry with me, revealing she wasn't looking for the truth, but for further stroking of her ego. 
 
If you notice prophecy in the Bible, even if it is a prophet's words predicting something, not just the simple gift of prophecy, it is always concise, to the point, direct, and relatively short. I've run out of room for today...to be continued, blessings,
John Fenn
cwowi.org and email me at cwowi@aol.com