Update from Duke

Hi! This is D-love Duke reporting from the promise land in Springfield Ohio. It blows me away that the same love our Father has for Jesus and the same love that Jesus has for the Father is ours to share. That this God of all grace, by His doing picked us up and placed us at His banqueting table to feast and drink of His love. For as He is so are we in this world; check out the context in First John. Amazing Love.



Your prayers, support and friendship are so vital especially during this great season of change and transition. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

I present an appeal to you all. Jesse, Micah and Stephen in their band "Like A Child" are going for it. This is it. It is amazing to see the growth and evolution of their music; Yet not just in their music but in their individual gifts and callings; specific to each one. More and more opportunities are opening for them; to play, perform and minister in the world in the public eye.
This friday they are playing at Un Mundo, one of the few coffee shops in the area; they will be playing from 7pm to 9pm. They will be playing in bars and saloons. They will be playing in other towns as well. They need your backing and support; especially in prayer. They also are planning to produce another CD as soon as the money is available. Their music, their ministry and their divine originality is a treasure and gift to not only the Body of Christ but the world.
Part of my appeal is that you would prayerfully consider supporting them financially or invest in this new recording project. Your prayer and partnership is awesome.



Personally, the Lord is developing and placing me in relationship with two men, who happen to be pillars in the area. It is crazy because we are so different from one another, in gifts, callings and background. I remember when i was in 8th grade, I dislocated and broke my leg playing football. The break and dislocation was so bad that I had to wait 3 days for a specialist to show up. Then they put me out then as team they put me back together. My thoughts are that in these developing relationships It is going to require the specialist work of the Holy Spirit to assemble, join and fit us together. Please agree with me that the Lord will define and establish these relationships in harmony with His plan and purposes. Your agreement is powerful.





Remember, you are loved and treasured of the Father. With all sincerity your brother in Jesus,
D-love Duke

P.S. I might be coming up to the NW by myself to visit many of you. Appreciate your prayers on this.

Address: 1555 S. Limestone Street
Springfield, Ohio 45505

Phone: 360-643-0826

Creative Miracle Testimony

Hey so a few weeks back God healed my toe and I posted it to you guys. Well now he blows me away even more and gave me a creative miracle.

My friend Stephen called me from Bethel last night. He's going to BSSM (Bethel Supernatural School of Ministry). He was telling me how the Spirit was being poured out big time at that night's meeting. He then told me that he had been flat footed his whole life and Kevin Dedmon got a word about arches forming. He got prayed for and arches formed. What he didn't know is that I was flat footed too. I told him and he began to pray for me. I felt fire and tingling on my feet. My brother put his hands on my feet and I literally saw arches form before my eyes! I stood up and I felt way different. I even felt something in my back pop. I felt more balanced, like my weight was being distributed more evenly. Literally 10 minutes before he called I was praying for signs and wonders. That I would see signs and wonders. So Jesus answered what I asked for, just not in the way I was thinking. I was asking for other people and he does it for me. Haha.

It really made me wonder! He really is a good God. Being on the receiving end of His healing and miracles is really blowing me away! He's blessing me big time. Yahoo! King Jesus is good! Again testimony is the spirit of prophesy. If you need a creative miracle in your body just receive it. Right now just release your manifest presence and glory in the room King Jesus! Your presence is the treasure. When the King shows up, the kingdom stuff shows up. Just turn your affections to Him right now. There is no formula. But if you wanna close your eyes, hold out your hands. Just receive. I declare healing to their bodies! Creative miracles right now! Right now! Thank you Jesus. Someone's eyes are being healed! Take it! Someone's back is being healed! Take it! Someone's knees! Take it! I see some scar tissue dissolving in someone's body. Like it's located in your bones. Like a build up of cartilage looking stuff in your back. I'm not a doctor so I don't know what that is. But just take it!

Amen!

Micah

Update from Duke

Greetings from the promised land of Springfield, Ohio. This is D-love Duke reporting. You heroic child bearing women, I salute you! Transition! Transition! Transition! Oh the pain! Oh the joy! Breathe--hee, hee, hee. Yes, yes! No! No! Give me an epidural! Beam me up Scotty! Well you get the idea. Major change and transition at hand, as the Lord is transforming us both in heart and thinking. Like the cicada or the butterfly the shedding of the old skin of yesterdays light is wrenching. Yet our God of all grace is faithful to His work in us and through us to make us like Himself. I'll get back to this change stuff in a moment...

A couple months ago, Maureen and I were awakened to a 1 or 2 a.m. semi-automatic gun fire, approximately 12 rounds, followed by sirens. Last week 2 blocks away an armed robber gunned down by police. We certainly aren't in Chimacum Dorothy!Yet the Kingdom of God is Here! And this place will never be the same.

The last two months of 2010 were so frustrating. What the heck are we doing? Why are we here? Feeling so lonely, isolated and disconnected. Frustrated with the church system; frustrated with people etc. We found ourselves in the familiar territory of desperation and need."Lord, I give up--clue us in that your plans and purposes would prevail." Maureen and I found ourselves coming together in agreement with simple prayers.. The answers are coming and as Micah wrote in a recent song, "hope is dancing on the horizon!" and we are rising to dance with it.



Back to the change stuff; It cuts into the depths of who I am--mind sets of thinking--old security blankets and giving up my special binky, a comforting and familiar friend. Can you you teach an old dog new tricks Lord? Only You know.
Well here it is:

I was walking the trails in the woods near Crabill Homestead, and I heard the Holy Spirit say, "There is no place for pride in My Kingdom". I responded with, "yes, Lord get em; deal with em etc," Hello, Mcfly are you in there? Knock, knock! "I'm talking to you Duke!" I am against you in your pride, but I give grace to the humble. I have been caught! I have been found out! the problem is in me. Oh the wretchedness, oh the highmindedness ; the blindness of it all. I have realized the main source of this frustration is simply an expression of pride and crossing a line into criticism and mental judgement. I have such a prophet/justice perspective that left unchecked, gets me in a whole lot of trouble. What is the source of this pride? How did I get it? Knowledge puffs up--and the knowledge, I'm talking about is not just information, but as divine originals we all have a history, a unique path of experience and revelation in relationship with the Lord. These God ordained valid and vital experiences are the tools and ways He shapes and conforms us to the image of Jesus. And only the Master Potter knows the perfect process and path for each of us. In my own life this path and process has developed mind sets and a world view that is limited in light to the divine original I am. Yet the problem arrises when I superimpose through the filters of thinking my path and process on others--the way I have walked is really the more spiritual way. What ignorance, arrogance and small limited thinking on my part.



We all have different gifts, callings and unique expressions in and from the Lord. My calling is the most important; my gifts and expressions are the most vital. The eye! No, the ear! No, the hand! No, I say, no, the feet! I am guilty of thinking that my gifts and calling are the most important. How desperately I need grace to think with sober judgement, be me without trying to control you. There is one calling that none of us can escape--the call to love. We are commanded to live a life of love. Be imitators of God as dearly beloved children and live a life of love. The goal of this instruction is love... Above all else put on love and love one another. God is love and His love fulfills all the Law and Prophets. Love, His love is the very expression of His kingdom... for God so loved..that He gave... His love to us, in us and through us is other worldly, supernatural and humanly impossible apart from His life in us. In light of the love list in I cor. 13 my own lack and wretchedness has been exposed. Love is patient; love is kind,...... Love keeps no record of wrongs... etc. Yet I have blindly walked in spiritual McCarthyism with my little black book filled with suspicion and speculation, an I'm right your wrong mentality. I forget that mercy triumphs over judgement and love covers a multitude of sin. Love is forbearing--it puts up with one another.



Thanks for putting up with me. I'll share more later.

Thanks to all who are partnering with us on this great adventure.

Love Bro Duke

Healing Testimony

MY JESUS IS ALIVE AND HE IS GOOD!

I broke my toe and for the last 5 days or so I've been hobbling along with crutches. Even the slightest bump on my toe would bring terrible pain. Earlier today Jesse just tapped it and it brought such bad pain I had to take 3 Ibuprofen. I've had it wrapped, iced, elevated. It's been green, and swollen.

My friend Anthony called me, he was sharing testimonies of encountering angels and how he found a gem. We did a little impartation to each other over the phone and then I asked Him to pray for my toe. (This whole time we're on the phone I have my foot wrapped and I'm standing with my crutches). He saw my dad laying his hands on my foot. So I took off my wrap and got off my crutches. My dad put his hand on my foot and Anthony said a simple prayer. My dad lifted his hand and suddenly we heard a pop. It wasn't painful, my foot just made that sound. And I was able to stand. I walked all throughout the house. Jumped. And all the pain was gone! I pulled on my toe that just hours early would hurt if it was just bumped. I wiggled it. My toe was healed!

If you're reading this and you need healing, you're getting it right now. Receive it! His presence is gonna fill the room you're in. If you want to, put your hand on your body and declare healing.

Micah

Change and People

It has been an interesting year. Full of upheaval and homelessness and change. Some of those changes have been really obvious: selling our house and moving halfway across the country for example. Some of those changes have been a lot more subtle.



I've been really challenged to rethink people: how I relate to them and how God wants me to relate to them. I'm not a people person and I haven't been for a long time, to the point that I have felt like I could be completely self sufficient without friends or any thing else. That sounds pretty harsh. And you know, I've never felt like I should apologize for that. But in the last six months God has really been speaking to me about how prideful I am, and about how much that self sufficiency is a mask for crippling fear. I don't care what anyone thinks of me, and that is a good thing.

But people mean something. They mean something to my Father. And yeah, people are difficult. They aren't easy. Friendships aren't easy. If they are, there's something wrong I think. Conflict and challenge are neccesary. Without them we are all wallowing around in shallow water with each other. People hurt (themselves and you). They won't ever understand you perfectly. You will never understand them perfectly. But that's what's beautiful. We see in part but God sees in full. And what you have of God is something I have no comprehension of. By denying people, I'm denying my God. I will only ever have a partial picture of him. I will always be limited to what I can understand, to what I can hear. I will be missing out on the countless revelations of who He is through someone else. I'm only hurting myself. And yeah, I'm making myself pursue people because it's no longer natural for me to do it. But God's working with me. He never intended for me to be alone.



It's freeing to no longer rely on other people's opinions and to have confidence in who I am in Christ. But it's also a defense carried to an extreme. I'm safe behind my wall, completely unaccessable and unavailable and unassailable. It's cold isolation. And I'm tired of it. I want more of God and I've only allowed him to show parts of himself to me because of my pride. I can only be endlessly grateful for God's intense mercy and grace in my life. I would have given up on me a long time ago. I'm thankful for the humbling work of the Spirit of Truth and Revelation. And I need more. It's an incredibly painful thing to have God show you truthfully what you look like. And it's not easy to let him show you. I can only lay myself at his feet and receive his incredible love through discipline. It hurts. But it's a neccesary hurt. And I want to embrace it fully.

I'm thankful for all of you who are reading this. You've meant a lot to me and my family and I love you guys. Thank you for loving me inspite of myself. And for revealing new and different aspects of who God is to me.

Leah



P.S. Just for the heck of it, here are a couple videos of two of the boys new songs! Check it out and let them know what you think!

Supernatural (thoughts by Jesse)

There is nothing natural about being born again. There is nothing natural about being a child of God. It's supernatural. Everything about it goes against the nature we are born into. Everything about it wages war against the natural man. You can't be a child of God and be normal, by the world's standards. You can try, but, if you are born again, you won't succeed. The Christian life is a supernatural life by nature. It's abnormal to the world. Normal to God obviously. But definitely not normal to the world. It's offensive to the world. If you are born again, if you are a child of God, you will offend people. It's a given. Because the Gospel is by nature offensive to the world, offensive to the natural man. It requires us to die to ourselves, to our efforts, to our abilities. And that's offensive. I'm not saying that you should go out and try to offend people. I'm just saying that it will happen, because it's a part of the Christian life.



And what is the Christian life? It's not a changed life, or a rearranged life; it's an exchanged life: our life for His. It's not us living for Christ; it's Christ living through us. It's not about religion, conversion, principles, doctrines, whatever. It's a lifestyle. We are literally born again. Our lives start at birth, right? Well, so it is with rebirth. Our lives begin again. And that's supernatural. When something is supernatural it is "attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature," as the dictionary on my Mac states it. Being born again definitely goes beyond the laws of nature, don't you think? It's like a dog becoming a cat, or vice versa, depending on whether you're a dog or a cat person. We go from the first Adam to the last. We literally take on a new nature when we are born again. The old nature, the Adam nature, the nature that compels us to sin, is done away with and the nature of Christ takes its place. Actually, that transference took place a long time ago, over two thousand years ago, when Christ died and rose again. Talk about supernatural! And when we are born again we receive what has already been done, what has already been paid for.



In May, when we first arrived in Ohio, Micah and I were worshipping together at a friend's house, spontaneously singing whatever plopped into our spirits, as we like to do. Micah started singing "highly unusual, highly unusual" over and over again. Later, he sang on a different chord progression, "highly unusual, supernatural God." Yes, God is highly unusual and supernatural. He's not, as we would like to think, normal, comfortable or natural. He supersedes the natural. And He forces us outside of our comfort zones. Being born again forces us outside of our comfort zones. It makes what was once comfortable uncomfortable. But where do we go from there? Too often we fall into traps of comfort, or at least I do. We move from one place with God to the next and stop there until it becomes comfortable, instead of moving on and up to higher places of relationship with the Lord.



Comfort produces stagnation, lukewarmness. And that's not something I want. I want to grow. I want to be pulled and prodded and yanked into all sorts of new places and experiences. I want a kick to my spirit every time I start to drag. And that takes people. It takes the Bride, the Body of Christ. That's why we need each other. We are Jesus to each other, different aspects of Him, different lines in the same poem. We need each other to grow, to move, to enter the uncomfortable, the unusual, the supernatural. And the supernatural is where we belong.


- Jesse

Thoughts on Family

Here are some things I've been thinking about on church family. Meaning the body of Christ. I'd love to hear what your thoughts are on it.

It seems it should be a no brainer that God's all about relationship. But we're hit with an anti relationship society in our western culture . We live in a culture that devalues marriage, family, and even just pure covenant relationships with people. It mocks and discourages having a pure brotherly and sisterly relationship with the opposite sex. And has no understanding of an intimate relationship like David and Jonathan. Our culture also has rampant fatherlessness. So with all that in mind we tend to carry that carnal mindedness into the way we function in the body of Christ. Unintended.

A very true statement my Dad said is that we can look at the way people relate with others, or look at the depth of their relationships, to determine how they relate to God and how deep their relationship is with Him. If people say they're in deep relationship with God, or have intimacy with him, yet have very shallow relationships with people, then it's safe to say they probably aren't as close to the Papa as they say. If you're shallow and casual with God, you'll be shallow and casual with His kids. Even when there are deep one's in relationship with the father and others, they may commonly be persecuted because they don't line up with the rest of the peoples value system. While God values relationship and love, with Him and others, the world and many in the body of Christ value positions, talents (or gifts) and externals. God looks at the heart.

God's all about relationship, His government doesn't function like the earthly system's government. It functions as a family, all the way through.
Family means "a group consisting of parents and children living together in a household.• a group of people related (or relating) to one another by blood or marriage." That's interesting. We have His blood, so we're all His kids and we are all His bride cuz we're married to Him.

We should really look at how we are relating to one another and how we value one another. Do we value people for what they do and what they have or do we value them for who they are. . . Sons of God.


I'd love to have some things added to the conversation.



I'll end this post with a couple Bill Johnson quotes to chew on . . .
‎"In the world you perform for identity so that you can be accepted. But in the kingdom, you are just accepted and that is your identity and out of that comes your performance."

‎"Insecure people fill their lives with business to drown out the cry of the orphan spirit."






Your brother Micah