ELEVATION NORTH has NEWS for YOU!

     THE NEW YEAR HAS DAWNED … and held within the newness of its days we’ve already come face to face with the complete spectrum of good and evil.  Time has wasted no minutes.  These first weeks of the year typically provide strategic places of the heart where battles are fought and won as we feel called to fast and pray.  And this year of 2016 is no different – other than perhaps more intensified.  Well, let’s say it like it is:  way more intensified!  This new year just took the battle zones up by several notches.  And actually, these battles are won only when fought in a warrior’s stance:  on bended knee.  There’s no time for sitting around and ignoring the sounds of attack.  Within us must arise an impassioned battle cry that curdles the blood of the prowling enemy.  The time has come to ask ourselves the pointed question that demands an honest answer:  “am I battle-ready?”  The battles are here, dear ones – the time has come for us to become trained warriors in the army of God for one reason!  Victory!  It is victory that equals our very survival.  While we must be trained and alert, we need not fear!  God’s angel armies encamp around us, and they are standing guard, poised to help us in this good fight!

     As the battles have been flung in our direction and in the direction of our family and friends we hold dear, we realize that we MUST KNOW WHOSE WE ARE!  That defining knowledge of the heart will make us or break us.  If we know … we will make it!  If we do not, we will find ourselves adrift and we will crash on the perilous rocks of life.  We will experience either victory or defeat.  Perhaps you have felt this way in recent days – we want you to know that you are not alone!  There ARE answers that bring us spiritual strategies for victory in any battle that comes our way!

I said … I CANT GO ON … but Jesus said, I WILL CARRY YOU.

I said … I AM TOO TIRED … bus Jesus said. I WILL GIVE YOU REST.

I said … IMPOSSIBLE … but Jesus said, ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE.

I said … I AM STARVING … but Jesus said, I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE.

I said … I AM DEHYDRATED … but Jesus said, I AM LIVING WATER.

I said … I AM GOING TO DIE … but Jesus said, I WILL RAISE YOU UP.

(credit to online site, AMEN)

     Our God tells us that we are HIS; that we are NOT alone; that He will give us everything we will ever need to not just survive in these days, but to flourish!  How we respond to the battles – determines whether we will win or lose. 

     As my husband and I began our corporate 21-day fast at Elevation North this year, he suggested that we choose one family member to focus our prayers on for an entire day, along with whatever else God led us to seek His face for as we entered our “war-room” of prayer.  I know he was inspired by God to have us implement this strategy of prayer, because as we near the end of the fast, what has occurred has been so precious and priceless that we do not intend to stop!  While any fast comes to completion for a season, we will continue praying for our family in this way.  We let each of them know that THIS DAY IS THEIRS for us to pray over them all day long and we ask them for anything specific we can include in our prayers.  The answers to prayer have come in God’s way – not always by our wishes … but the spiritual connection that has been raised up between us across the long distances that separate us has drawn us closer than ever before.  While we do not see each other for months and months, praying for our family this way renders any distance powerless to keep us apart.  We are engaged in prayer all day long, knowing what they are needing from God and desiring to give to Him … and we feel ever so closely connected!  We share the tears of struggle, the longing to be more than we are, the battles that need to be won, the personal cries for victory in many arenas of our lives, the opportunities put before us for ministering to others within and without the church walls … and so much more!  And now we have put into place the power that comes from praying as a triple-braided cord rather than by ourselves.  (Ecclesiastes 4:12)  Now our prayer strength cannot be easily broken … we hold each other up, accountable and encouraged through the hope that Christ brings to us new and fresh each day!

     How many spiritual breakthroughs will take place in our families … in our churches … in our own lives as the season of this new year’s fast comes to a close?  Only God knows!  I believe that the outcomes will go on and on producing continued results and fruit for the glory of God!  It is time for us as the people of God’s church to not be still or stagnant, but to get up and MOVE into the places of victory that God is preparing for us.  We will never experience and receive them if we do not get up from where we are at – and MOVE forward!  I love the message that Pastor Steven Furtick from Elevation Church in Charlotte, North Carolina shared during their recent recording of a new worship album.  In part, this is what his challenge was:  “We can’t stay here – we’ve got to go!  We’ve got a charge to keep; we’ve got a God to serve!  We’ve got a gospel to preach.  We’ve got broken hearts to bind; we’ve got hurting people to heal.  MOVE, CHURCH!”  I echo his anointed message.  “People of Elevation North in Owatonna, Minnesota … let’s go!  We’ve got a God to serve!  MOVE, Elevation North!”   

Serving Christ Joyfully . . .

Pastor Doug and Debbie