Jul 29 2011
Fire and Fragrance Harrisburg DTS Date Change Expounded…
Hey friends my name is Jeremy Bardwell and I am the director of Fire and Fragrance in Harrisburg. I wanted to fill you in on the journey we have been on as a community that has led us to push back the start date of our DTS. This is a big shift for us but we couldn’t be more excited about it as we dream about the future!
Our heart in pioneering a Fire and Fragrance community into the Northeast of America is to plant a community focused on revival in America and training for a new wave of missions to every nation from university campuses!
As we look unto that goal of being a “beachhead of revival and revival training” on the east coast we began to realize that one of the biggest hindrances to true revival culture would be for us to become “training centered” instead of “ministry and revival centered.” Essentially, the grave danger would be to become a people with all the right answers without a gospel/revival lifestyle. The danger would be, to “know” everything about revival and never simply live it in our daily lives! To train others into a lifestyle we are not actually living ourselves.
As we prayed into the fall for us in Harrisburg we felt the Lord’s loving voice alert us that if we didn’t practically shift we could head down that road! We eagerly received the word and praised the Lord for His faithfulness to us! He had showed us a great pitfall and how to navigate around it! Truly His leadership is the best!
So, from this word, we knew the Lord was calling us to push back our September Fire and Fragrance DTS to January 2012 and truly live out our values! He began to speak to us about this fall being a time of ”intentional community,” and “great open doors” in the region! We know that as we center our community on “ministry to the Lord and ministry to the lost” God is going to pour out even more on our training when we start up in January 2012!
We have never felt such openness from the Lord, and with such expectancy and joy about what He is doing!
We know that many of you care for us and are following us on our journey, so, I have wanted to catch you up on our prophetic journey! We are truly feeling like children born of the Spirit and led by the Spirit! Our Fire and Fragrance community has grown now to 30+ full time staff and everyone is ready to dive onto our faces before the Lord to see further into what He is leading for this fall. Please join us in prayer and feel free to share words dreams and scriptures with us! We love running with friends who are intimate with Jesus, and hear His voice.
If you have any further questions or senses from the Lord please feel free to contact us at fandfharrisburg@gmail.com. We will be announcing soon what our DTS will look like in January. He is giving us exciting words!
Blessings,
Jeremy Bardwell
Fire and Fragrance Harrisburg
For more about what God is doing through the School of the Circuit Riders and my family check out:
www.bardwellblog.com
Jun 7 2011
You never see THIS in the Headlines!
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By Jeremy Bardwell: www.bardwellblog.com
After having been in 6 nations in the last 2 months, my already crazy mind has been inundated with new experiential information and stimulating thoughts about what God is doing on the earth.
May 13 2011
A Context for Replication and Multiplication- Part 1
In the beginning God created. The creative process of replicating and multiplying began when God, through Jesus, created the earth and all that is within it. The crescendo of that marvelous creation was of course that which was most replicated from His own fabric. This replication was into man who was “made in the image” of His creator. The mission of man was to be fruitful and multiply, subdue the earth and have dominion. God began the process of replicating Himself into His creation and then empowered man and newly formed woman to do the same by not just multiplying but actually replicating the original DNA. That replication was the power of the multiplication to actually have godly dominion so that the result would be more of Eden on more of the planet!
As we all know, the replication of the DNA of life was broken by an insertion of humanistic thinking in the mind of man through the deception of the enemy. This insertion would prove to be fatal to godly replication and though multiplication would continue it would no longer be the extension of a garden called pleasure but rather of a fallen, broken, self centered DNA. Replication broke, multiplication continued, death was abundant and life was dormant in the heart of man.
For four thousand years we have almost no replication of the original life of Adam. Rather we have individuals who almost pulled new covenant theology into an old covenant era through their faith in a coming savior. They were rarely ever able to replicate themselves, though a seed of faith was preserved until the time that the God would do what no man could ever do. Cymbals smashed, bells rang, angels trembled, and Satan wept as God took on flesh to once again make replication of Life possible on the planet! Through a cup that was drank, a side that was pierced, a brow that was thorn-crowned, and blood that was spilled an old nature was killed, sin was atoned for and the chain of only replication death was broken!
Jesus had 33 years to walk the earth and leave behind enough revelation and leadership to lead the whole planet back into Edenic intimacy with His father. Strategy would be incredibly important for this mission. The time was short in relation to the massiveness of the call. What strategy would he employ? Again and again Jesus would declare that He only did what He saw the Father doing. And so the preeminent one employed the same strategy as in the beginning. Through death and resurrection he restores Eden to the planet, but no longer in a geographic location but in the human spirit being restored to life and living in unbroken fellowship. As Adam was created in the beginning, Jesus finds 12 and leads them into Eden through three years of discipleship and the opening of a narrow gate that would empower them to enter into what they had been taught. Just as Adam received the breath of God, the disciples were filled with that same breath and the DNA of life was reinserted into the hearts of a remnant now living in an Edenic reality in their hearts. The strategy: Eden, a remnant with the seed of life, and the recommissioning of a mandate to be fruitful and multiply. Replicate not just in physical children, but in individuals and nations.
We are going to begin a series on the importance and the value of replicating and multiplying. The Gospel of the Kingdom was always meant to spread like a mustard seed in a garden and like leaven in dough. Though it would start small, it would influence in ever increasing circles of impact and transformation. The gospel without replication and multiplication is only partial in application. It can’t be kept to an individual without becoming stagnant and lifeless in the end. It was created to outgrow its soil, overflow its container, and never stop. One of the greatest enemies of the growing kingdom has been the individualization, isolation, and independence of the western gospel. We have turned our faith into something completely internal, individual and almost unrecognizable to what we read about in an early church that seemed to so violently overflow from its containers that it actually caused fear in those that looked on. Of course it began internal in the heart of each man through a restored Spirit, and the breath of God, but it never stayed there. Jesus had given them a strategy and they saw it as their sole purpose in life. Plant the seed! Cultivate the Garden! Replicate the DNA! Multiply the garden!
Today God is gripping the heart of a generation to once again look outward and see themselves as the continuation of a Kingdom strategy to take back the planet and restore worship to the Father. Replication of Life and multiplication of that reproduced life could be summed up in one word: Discipleship. So simple, so forgotten, so Kingdom! Over the next weeks we will begin to unfold some of the context and foundation for the need for a discipleship movement to sweep the planet. Not a shepherding movement, not the creation of a system of overlords or hierarchal leadership structures but rather a vein of pure discipleship where Jesus is replicated in the hearts of his followers and discipled followers are multiplied all over the Earth replicating more Jesus and multiplying more followers.
All of this is in relation to a word that continues to come through dreams, angels, teachings and many other forms of confirmation in regard to the Circuit Riders. God is doing something on the Earth in raising up a generation of leaders that exalt and look like Jesus. This blog is in response to these words. Stay tuned for weekly articles along the same lines. For the coming months we will be unfolding a four-corner foundation to a new breed of leaders God is raising up. The first stone we are laying is the stone of replication and multiplication.
May 13 2011
Gideons 300
And the angel of the Lord appeared to him, and said to him, “The Lord is with you, you mighty man of valor”. Judges 6:12
One man, full of the fire of God, is as unstoppable and impacting as a lightning bolt to a dry field. One such man in the Bible was Gideon. Gideon began full of fear, intimidation, and insecurity. Rightfully so for a man who was so oppressed by another people that he was forced to hide his wheat threshing in a wine press. So great was his disillusionment that not even the Angel of the Lord was able to catch his attention at first. That is, until, they made eye contact.
Then the Lord turned to him and said, “Go in this might of yours, and you shall save Israel from the hand of the Midianites. Have I not sent you? Judges 6:14
Those eyes are no normal eyes. In Daniel and in the book of Revelation that Man, the Angel of the Lord, the Son of God is pictured as a man with fire in his eyes. Any creature with a soul cannot help but be set ablaze by those fiery eyes. From this dramatic and life changing encounter with the Angel of the Lord, Gideon would never be the same. He soon finds himself destroying his family idols and before long as the sole leader of the Israelite armies. His radical encounter did not stop at the place of encounter and good journal entries. It required a very practical obedience to attain the dramatic revelation.
So Gideon took ten men from among his servants and did as the Lord had said to him. Judges 6:27
The transformation from zealous fire filled moments with the Lord to the practical outworking of the Word of the Lord is the difference between just a lightning strike to a dry field and the impact of an entire forest fire! One dramatic lightning strike with the right conditions can, in a short amount of time, result in thousands of acres of forest on fire that becomes an unstoppable force, even with all of mans technology. This is what happened when Gideon went from encounter to practical obedience. An army formed and that army was courageous.
Then the three companies blew the trumpets and broke the pitchers- they held the torches in their left hands and the trumpets in their right hands for blowing- and they cried, “The sword of the Lord and of Gideon!” Judges 7:20
Last year, as I sat in the Ohana Court in Kona, HI I watched a lightning strike moment. A modern day Gideon, Lou Engle, was preaching with all of his heart and the spirit of God was like electricity in the room. As Lou shared his heart about raising up a house of prayer that contends against every demonic house, you could feel the courage being released in the room to hundreds of young people. They stood before a man who had both life-changing encounters and years of simple practical obedience. As the altars opened so did the heavens and the result was explosive. I had no choice but to fall on my face and recommit my own heart and life to a kingdom that transcends all human ambition, good ideas, and lofty visions. As I knelt with my forehead on the cool concrete I felt the Lord tell me to open my eyes. As I looked from my angle on the floor all I could see was a steady stream of feet filling the front of the room. It seemed almost every chair had been emptied and all had responded to the invitation! As I watched these feet go by, I felt the whisper of the Lord say to me, “They are coming.” When I asked who was coming, the response I sensed in my heart was, “Gideon’s army is coming.” The worship continued, the response was long and deep in many hearts and the evening was capped off by an exclamation of Loren Cunningham that we were to mark this day on our calendars. Something significant had happened in the Spirit. In the last nine months I have pondered that night many times and that simple phrase the Lord spoke to me. I believe there are numerous applications to it!
I don’t think it was any coincidence that six months later we had almost exactly 300 students show up to our training schools. This quarter began in January of this year and was one of the most explosive dynamic quarters I have been a part of in 13 years of working with YWAM. The depth of encounter was profound. And just as profound was the simple and practical discipleship that was carried out from those life-changing encounters. Just today, I stood at the infamous Plaza of the Nations, a fountain surrounded by dozens of flags and stones from every nation in the world, and waved goodbye to three teams heading off for three months of faith-filled outreach in Mozambique, Jordan, and France. I truly believe this was part of a Gideon’s army and that it was the first of many waves to come.
I sense with all my heart that one of the most profound fulfillments of this Gideon word from the Lord will be The School of the Circuit Riders that we will be running in Kona, HI this summer. The heartbeat of this school is to deeply encounter the Lord in the secret place, the corporate place, and in every place. From this place of encountering God we desire to lay a solid foundation of the authority of the Holy Scriptures in our lives. From the foundation of the Word and the life-giving power of the Spirit we seek to develop godly character, a lifestyle of joy-filled repentance, and total abandonment to instant, joyful obedience to the Lord. We will be emphasizing the simple gospel, practical discipleship, and a life that will go anywhere to see Jesus glorified!
The lightning has struck, the fire is growing, and an army is being mobilized. What if all 300 of Gideon’s men became Gideon’s of another 300 who also did the same? Could we see a forest fire that would literally be unstoppable?! I believe so. I can see the feet moving even now. “They are coming”. Is God calling you to be one of those that would gather this summer? Does revival burn like fire in your bones? Pray and seek the Lord, perhaps God is calling you to this 300!
Apr 7 2011
HARVEST AT HARVARD
I look around the room to see 60+ Harvard students crying out “Hallelujah”, laying everything aside and giving praise to the Lamb who is worthy! I thought this was a great way to end our amazing time at Harvard with the incense of worship rising from the campus! The past 21 days have been amazing from people being healed and a Harvard philosophy student getting saved, to being able to lecture at Harvard Kennedy school as well as lead a worship night in one of the oldest buildings at Harvard University!
Apr 1 2011
HARVARD UNDER FIRE!
My eyes scanned the room from behind the mic, skipping from face to face, watching people cry out to God in authentic love and longing. More »
Mar 21 2011
This kind only comes out by…(Part2)
Jesus’ answer to the disciples question is a key to all breakthroughs in every area of life…
“Because of your unbelief (little faith), for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, Move from here to there, and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.”
Interesting that Jesus points to “little faith” as the problem and “mustard seed faith” as the solution. Those that have seen a mustard seed will know that it is one of the smallest seeds in the plant world. Faith could not get much smaller in size than a mustard seed. Yet the distinction of the mustard seed is that though tiny in size it is mighty in potential. Though small to the eye, it is packed with life and future growth. It is a great influencer in the garden, even to the point of providing nesting limbs for birds of the air (Mt. 13:32). So, possibly Jesus does not mean little in size when he speaks about our disease of unbelief but rather little in nutrition. Another way of describing this unbelief would be to call it poverty of faith. Faith may exist as an entity but is in poverty of substance. It has the exterior shell of verbiage but is impoverished in interior life. The mustard seed is the solution because, though small in appearance it has all the necessary elements for great life! And so is the faith that brings breakthrough. It may feel small, looks small, sound unimpressive, but can carry tremendous power for transformation, healing, and deliverance.
This whole area of faith could of course be pages and pages of study and understanding, but in this situation lets not go beyond Jesus simple statements. Small faith with an interior life produces massive fruitfulness and growth. Small faith with no interior life hinders the kingdom. Very practically speaking, this mustard seed could be likened to a growing, vibrant relationship with God in the interior that leads to a life of obedience and risk that “moves mountains”. It starts with a willingness to take small risks, pray for headache to go away, but in the end, over time, it develops to a faith that raises the dead! It can begin with simply discipling one young person and end with discipling nations. It could start with a simple Jesus loves you to a check out lady and end with seeing many come into the kingdom.
After Jesus exposes unbelief as the key to the hindrance the disciples faced in getting breakthrough, he makes a second point that we do not want to miss. He points to something beyond just His current faith but He also speaks to His history in the Father. “However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.” Obviously Jesus has not stopped in this instance, fasted, given a couple of hours to prayer, and then healed the boy. He is not speaking about his immediate actions but rather pointing to a history that has empowered Him to bring breakthrough even over this demonic power which was stronger than the average. The needed breakthrough required a greater authority than some of the weaker demons that the disciples had encountered. Jesus had instant authority because of His history of devotion. The hours, days and seasons that He had logged in prayer and fasting enabled Him to be ready in the moment to effortlessly cast out the demon.
Now, real time, 2011, out our front doors, no matter where we live… the enemy wreaks havoc on our communities, cities, and nations. Not entirely, we are all aware of amazing testimonies that are perhaps greater in magnitude and frequency than any period of history. This is not a doomsday declaration. It is just a reality. In the midst of all of the good that is happening, there is much pain, suffering, sickness, bondage, and sin. Whether in the newspapers, on the Internet, or with our own eyes we are daily confronted with the need for more breakthroughs. It is not Ok that babies are being aborted by the multitudes of millions. It is not ok that cancer kills so many. It is not ok that families are breaking up more than sticking together. It is not ok that the church stands powerless in the face of so many strongholds in our present day scenario! There must be more! Jesus did not die for powerlessness, wishful thinking, and waving white flags of retreat! He said that the gates of hell would not prevail against the revelation of his messianic identity as Son of God and savior of man (Mt. 16:16). He said that the Kingdom of God was within us (Luke 17:21). He said that He has overcome the world (John 16:33). He said that He died to destroy the works of the devil(1 John 3:8) and to set the captives free (Luke 4:18). We know all of these truths. We pray them, shout them, read them, and yet in many of our hearts we are aware that there is so much more than what we are walking in.
It is time to come out of shame and condemnation at the thought of our lack, but instead to approach Jesus with a teachable heart and deep conviction of our need for breakthrough power! He has given us His word as an unshakable foundation of the revelation of who He is, who we are, and what He desires to do. He has filled us with the very same Spirit that raised Him from the dead (Romans 8:11). He has seated himself at the right hand of the father making intercession for the saints (Romans 8:34). In fact there is nothing more He can give us. There is no more pizzazz He can place on the gospel. It does not need more pizzazz, it just needs believed and lived out!
So, we find ourselves facing a wall much like the disciples. We find ourselves looking around for a solution to every impasse. We find ourselves just hoping to get Him back on the earth to take care of everything when in fact He said it was better that He go(Mt 16:7). Obviously we all want Jesus back and we are to pray and live unto this end. But in the mean time He has given us everything necessary to see heaven invade Earth, disciple nations, preach the gospel to the remote corners of the earth and walk in breakthrough over every stronghold! The issue is not getting more sap out of heaven, the issue is a people on the earth who would believe with mustard seed faith and a people who would build a history in prayer and fasting to be able to break the opposition of the enemy. Could it be this simple? I think so. Obviously there are a hundred tributaries flowing into every stream of revelation, but what if it were simple again. Pray, fast, believe.
Prayer entails intimacy with God, discovery of God, the knowledge of God, and passion from and for God. It leads to oil in our lamps, fire on our lips, and agreement with Gods desires. Mt 6:9, Eph 1:15-23, Phil 1:9-11, Mt 7:11, Mt 25:1-13, Lk 24:32, John 14:15, John 14:21
Fasting is brokenness in God and a place where in weakness He is made strong. It is a posture of the heart as well as refraining from certain things. It is: Our neediness, his provision, our weakness, His strength, our humility, His ability, our desire to know Him and His desire to be known. 2 Cor 12:9, Matthew 5:1-12, Mt 6:33
Faith is the substance of things not seen and the evidence of things hoped for. It is impossible to please God without it. It comes by hearing His words and obeying. It is the muscle of Kingdom building. It begins with a word from Him, leads to an agreement with Him, and results in an act of obedience. The outcome is God getting glory, man getting liberty, and the Kingdom being extended. Hebrews 11:1, Hebrews 11:6, Romans 10:17
Mar 21 2011
This kind only comes out by…(Part 1)
This kind only come out by prayer and fasting…
The stage was perfectly set for Jesus to lay out an everlasting truth about the nature of breakthrough over seemingly impenetrable walls. The story begins with Jesus being transfigured right in front of his three closest disciples. In the midst of the transfiguration, the disciples are overcome with the emotion and magnitude of what they are seeing and experiencing. In His zeal for the moment, Peter suggests that they build dwelling places for the three transfigured ones! In a rage of jealousy for His Son, the Father booms from heaven, “this is my Son in whom I am well pleased. Hear Him!”
Peter’s life highlight turns into fear, humility and a face full of dirt. It is as if the Father discerned their heart motives and thoughts and made sure that the disciples knew that the “great man of the law” and the “great prophet” are never to be equated or exalted to the position of the beloved Son! “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in times past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the worlds…”(Hebrews 1:1). Only my Son is worthy of the dwelling place of man! Jesus is to be heard above all and all are to be heard through the life and teachings of my Son! Hear Him! The Father has always sought, in great jealousy, to exalt the Son.
Upon arriving back at the base camp, Jesus finds a desperate father and his defeated disciples. Not only was the master gone, but also the three, and the other nine found themselves against a wall that none of their past experiences or even present level of anointing could break through. To them, the wall represented an impasse and the way around, over, or through was locked in something they did not know. Whatever demonic spirit was causing this sickness in the child, it was so intense that it was trying to take the child’s life through burning and drowning. A desperate father does not take no for an answer very easily. Though the disciples had hit a wall, the father was not giving in.
Jesus premises the soon coming miracle with an indictment against the widespread (generational) faithlessness and perverseness. To be faithless literally means to not be true to allegiance or duty and to be without credibility. To be faithless is to deny action to the one that we have given verbal allegiance to. Rhetoric without action. This disease runs rampant in today’s generation. Somewhat comforting, is the fact that we are not the first faithless generation. Massively convicting however is the statement of Jesus hardship in “being with” this type of generation. His love for us is unending and unconditional! However, His pleasure and delight is to dwell among a people of faith. Oh, that He would find a faith filled generation on the Earth and find pleasure in dwelling among that people! Let us be that people.
Not one of Jesus’ words is rash or wasted. This is not simply a Jesus venting session where His inner frustration accidentally becomes verbal. Jesus would not lower himself to such places. These words are an invitation to be something different and a context to what is about to take place in front of them. Jesus rebuked the demon, it came out, and the boy was healed from that very hour.
Imagine the shock on the faces of the disciples as their impenetrable wall became a miracle highway right in front of their eyes. No crazy antics, no hours of perseverance, and seemingly very little effort and the stronghold was dethroned in the boys life. The disciples were not shocked at the healing as much as their inability to achieve the same results. They had seen many healed and set free by their own hands. Their puzzlement was over their lack of breakthrough in this instance. In embarrassment, the disciples wait until the crowds have dispersed to find out why that had found themselves powerless in this situation.
“Why could we not cast it out?” This needs to be the question that everyone of us come to. Have we become so calloused to powerless Christianity that we no longer come with desperate questions to the one who wants to give answers. Have we become so accustomed to seemingly impenetrable walls around us that we have stopped pushing against them and instead set up camp in the midst of them justifying their existence in our lives and nations through creating theologies that give us comfort in the midst of perpetual powerlessness. Oh for a better day! The only things the disciples had going for them in this moment was humility, teachability, and desperation. Powerlessness can not keep leading to shame, condemnation, and defeat but rather to humility and a heart that diligently seeks after answers! Let us repent of our calloused defeated hearts, receive His forgiveness and move into a posture of fresh hunger, asking, and readiness to hear what He has to say to us! Surely He did not die to render us powerless against the strongholds of the enemy. Surely he meant what He said when he declares that He came to destroy the works of the enemy.
Jesus’ answer to the disciples question is a key to all breakthroughs in every area of life. Stay tuned next week for more on this parable!
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