(What you are about to read contains information that had to be changed or left out such as names and places to keep confidentiality)

Not a Word, Not a Look, Not a Movement

It was a day that began like most. I woke early, clothed myself, got ready, made breakfast and walked out the door. Only this morning was different. I was going on a ride… a ride that I will never forget.

Shortly, I found myself about 3 hours from home picking up an older gentleman. We had a couple quick stops to make, one at a local restaurant and another to drop off a package and before we knew it, we were headed down the thicket-lined highways back towards home.

As we were riding, his personality was nowhere to be found and all I was left with was 3 hours of East Texas road and no one to talk to. He never said a word, he never looked me in the eyes, and in fact, he never even moved. We jammed to the musical arts of Ozzy Osborne, The Toadies, a few East Texas country radio stations and even some Tejano for about an hour. During the course of this time, I thought to myself, “I bet he has NEVER accomplished all this in one ride before!”

It was just that thought that got me thinking…

EURO AFRICAN BAPTIST YOUTH CHOIR

"I Want to Follow Jesus"

If you followed me on the Race, you may remember this…

In November of 2010, a group of World Racers entered Zomba, Malawi. They went with the sole purpose of unleashing the Kingdom of God. Among all, one thing left them in tears. That was the sound of the Euro African Baptist Youth Choir. As they stomped and sang their way in the back door, the hair on the necks of every foreigner in that place stood straight up! By the end of the first song, they were ALL sobbing. It made no sense to them as to why they were crying at the sound of a youth choir but what they did understand was that it was ultimately the most beautiful sound that had ever hit their ears….

 

NEW CD COVER - "I Want to Follow Jesus"                        EURO AFRICAN BAPTIST YOUTH CHOIR

Well, I was one of those foreigners in that little church in the nook of a mountain in Zomba, Malawi. As I learned about a week into our stay that the church only had enough funds to feed the children once a day, I began to pray for those children, the church and the surrounding community. I was broken for the people there. After I had been praying for about a week, the Lord told me to gather the youth choir and produce a CD of some of their best songs. The Holy Spirit told me to tell their story, get their music out and help them raise funds to feed the children in the orphanage/choir by taking donations for the CD. Soon after, I asked Pastor Gama how much it would be to feed the children all month and he said $106. I, at first, assumed that this meant 3 times a day but evidently, Malawians don't always eat 3 meals a day like Americans do, so the $106 goes to feed all 15 orphans TWICE a day for one month!

As you can probably guess, we produced the CD. On November 13, 2010 after about 4 hours and 17 songs, at about 6pm, we finished recording and the choir called a day. The finished CD, "I Want to Follow Jesus" has 19 tracks (17 songs and 2 short interviews) and it is an a cappella CD filled with a lot of heart, heart simply giving thanks and worshiping God!

EABYC Promo Video

Working WITH.

(THIS ONE IS A BIT LONG BUT TOTALLY WORTH IT.)

There is always more than what meets the naked eye, am I right? Well, what if I told you that the Kingdom of God is at work in power all around you but you were missing some or maybe even all of it, would you believe me? Let me give you a small peek into something that rocked me to the core this past year while traveling the world, serving 11 different countries in Jesus name.

While in South Africa, I was given this piece of hardcore Truth: “There is a BIG difference between doing things FOR God and WITH God, FOR Holy Spirit and WITH Holy Spirit.”

Before we get into that, let's remind ourselves of a few things real quick….

1.   Holy Spirit is the power of God at work in us (Luke 24:49).

2.  Holy Spirit was given to us when Jesus left earth (John 20:22) and the Spirit still dwells in His children (Romans 8:9, Luke 11:13, Galatians 3:14, Ezekiel 36:27).

3.  When people in scripture, or now for that matter, operate(d) “in the Spirit” or were “full of the Spirit”, powerful things happened (look it up!).

4.  This is God's mandate for His children: “The Kingdom of God is at hand. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. Freely you received, freely give.” -Jesus (Matthew 10:7-8)

My aim is not to drill you scripturally because, well, you have been reading or hearing scripture all of your life. Just let me give you something concrete and full of Truth here.

Let's get focused back in on the “for” or “with” topic again.

Doing things FOR God is good; there is nothing wrong with that but we just end up doing, well, that's just it, DOING. We often hear the commonly used phrase, “it's a relationship, not a religion” don't we? Let's put this in perspective for a second. When we do things FOR God we live by the law (do's and don'ts) and in a way, we are doing things to ‘live up to' or ‘gain approval' of a God who doesn't want that from us. This just pushes us into a religion and not a relationship. It becomes a ‘do and don't' thing. We live in a religion when we do things FOR God and this was not intended for God's children (Romans 8:21). Doing things for God is good and fun but that's all you are left with a ‘good time' and a pat on the back from time to time.

Doing things WITH God is a whole different ballgame. When we work WITH God, we work where He is working, we are doing the things He is doing and with that comes the power that I mentioned earlier. I mean, come one, God did give us HIS Spirit! After all, Mark 16:20 says, (Mind you, Jesus had just left earth) “And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked WITH them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs.” Jesus was gone but still working WITH. Hmm… interesting! Working WITH God means that we are listening. Doing things WITH God leaves you scratching your head at the end of the day saying, “WHAT JUST HAPPENED!?” and worshipping in Spirit AND Truth at the same time, knowing and experiencing the heart of God for His children in sometimes tangible, Kingdom form!

The book of Matthew (7:22-23) says, “On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do mighty works in your name?' And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you….'” We can do things in ‘Jesus name' all of our life but still not work WITH Him. We can do mighty things for the name and sake of God but not really know the Spirit of God. We can do things in the name of Jesus and miss it all. We can miss the Kingdom of God unleashing before our eyes OR we can do things in the name of Jesus and watch the world change before our eyes. Our response is the determining factor. You see, we can easily neglect the power of the Holy Spirit and God's desire to work through us if we don't sit back and listen for it.

I was a youth minister for two years while I was in college and not once did I ask the Lord, “Where do you want us?” or “What do YOU want us to do?” I never listened to see if God was saying, “Turn left” when my plan was to turn right. I just planned things and we did things FOR God. There was no power in it. Nothing extraordinary happened and the Kingdom of God was not enveloping earth. I was a leader who planned and did, not listened and obeyed.

Being a believer and working with God is as easy as listening and obeying. That, my friends, is relationship, a Spirit filled, powerful, Kingdom bringing relationship!

You know, I had always heard extreme stories of God telling someone to do a headstand on the street corner or God telling a woman to do a cartwheel through church, or even God telling a man to punch a woman in her stomach to heal her and miraculous things followed. I always wondered if these were true. Well, let me tell you something, the Lord speaks to His children in crazy ways!

Just before I left the U.S. this past year something happened. It was the 6^th day of World Race training camp and my team and I were directed to ask God for a vision of something (I had never asked God for such a thing!) specifically to direct our unknown ministry of the day. They said it could be something as simple as a pair of socks or a color. I prayed for God to give me a vision and I could see (in my mind) myself walking up to an old abandoned house and there was someone cutting him/herself. I was of course freaked out and wondering where my mind had gone! I asked God to give me something “of Him” and again I received the same vision. Once more… the same vision! I was thinking, “Where's the socks God!?” Finally, I told Him, “God, if this isn't of you, give me something else” and I got the same thing for the fourth time. Convinced, I went to share with my team. Once we all shared what God gave us, which was an old abandoned house, someone cutting them self, an old black Lincoln, broken handcuffs, a homeless person, steps and the bright colors orange and blue, we headed towards Atlanta, GA. As we walked the streets of this rich neighborhood, I thought, “You've got to be kidding me! An old abandoned house HERE!?” Not a mile from where we parked, we saw an old black Lincoln halfway out in the road. We walked around it and kept going. As I was making sure I was listening to the Spirit, just past the car, I got, “turn to your right”. As soon as I turned, I saw right across the road from the Lincoln, among mansions, was an old abandoned house! My jaw hit the ground! While looking around the house and praying over it, I got a phone call from one of my teammates who had walked on. “Colby, we need your help. Can we come get you?” As soon as we walked up to where we were going, I saw a homeless man sitting on a park bench about to pull the razor blade across his arm (he was already covered in scars) and start cutting. Thomas was his name and we found out that he had just been released from prison (broken handcuffs). We listened to him, poured into him, told him what God says about him and prayed over him for a while. Just after our goodbye hugs as we began to walk away, Thomas said, “I was sleeping right here,” pointing to the ground next to the park bench, “when you found me right?” “Yeah, why?” asked my friend. Thomas looked straight at us and said, “I usually don't sleep here,” as he pointed back up the street, “I normally sleep on the steps of an old abandoned house up there across the street.” It all made sense then! This was it! This was the man that God had in mind to encounter that day! Well, as if we were finished with imparting the Kingdom of God on Thomas, we walked on only to discover on the sidewalk a bright orange arrow pointing across the street to the house and a bright blue arrow pointing back to Thomas. That day, I am sure of it, Thomas met the Kingdom of God how he was supposed to. It wasn't some group of people before or after us passing out tracts, it was a group of people willing to listen and obey the voice of the Lord!

As if that story is not enough, prior to entering China (month 9), our contacts kept telling us, “We don't know why you are coming but we're glad you're coming.” Once we got there, we heard the same thing quite a few times and were also told that they had nothing for us to do. “Just wait around for something. We'll either find something for you or you can just find something yourselves”, we were told. On the second or third day of waiting around, I couldn't take it anymore. I was talking to Jesus and He told me just to go outside. I finally went outside and started walking around the apartment complex. While walking and ‘talking' with the natives, God told me, “I'm going to bring two white people your way today”. At this point, I had only seen one white person in that big city. I kept walking and the Spirit began to stir. For an hour and a half or so I walked and prayed things I knew nothing of. As I was praying, I got to one point on the sidewalk, God stopped my feet and said, “Stop. Stay right here.” I stayed for, I don't know, twenty or thirty minutes until after looking at the mountains to the right for a bit, I looked left and an older white couple was walking straight at me! As soon as they got within earshot, I told them, “I've been waiting on you two!” They looked at each other and then said to me, “You have!?” “Yes ma'am, the Lord told me to come out here and while walking around, He told me that He was gonna bring you two to me,” I quickly replied. “Well praise the Lord!” the wife said, “We don't know why you're here but we're sure glad you're here!” Yeah, they said it! A bit after they told me that they were from Texas, which was a HUGE blessing, they told me that they needed my help and wanted to know if there were more people with me. I was then informed of an English Café that they were opening up on Wednesdays and Thursdays to help the community with their English. If that were not enough, as soon as I got upstairs to tell everyone (my team went crazy), my teammate Rachel walked in only to say, “Guys I heard about this English Café that we should look into helping at this month!” Well, as the Holy Spirit proves Himself again, we worked with the café all month and had some divine encounters!

I could go on and tell you about how the Lord told me to give my cousin another ‘option' for his back (major surgery was inevitable according to doctors) and then God healed him at a wedding, or how when praying for a guy with knee problems in Africa, the Spirit told me to stretch out my hands toward a man with problems in his hand and God healed him on spot too, or how the Lord tells me things about people all the time, I repeat those things to them and the people freak out at how I knew that and then I tell them what God wants them to hear. I could go on and on and on about operating in the Spirit and working WITH God but I don't believe I have to. I will not say that Holy Spirit is going to speak to you like you always thought but I will say it like I did earlier… listen for it and obey it no matter what and you WILL see, hear, feel, smell, and taste the Kingdom of God as it comes crashing to earth before you!

Working with you and with the King,

Colby Gardner