What does May bring?

April showers bring May flowers, and May flowers bring pilgrims. But I believe that God is beginning to rain down His Spirit and that May is going to bring the MOVE OF GOD into this County. I wanted to let everyone know that our noon hour prayer group that started back in September of 07 is now beginning its ninth month. That is enough time to give birth and that is exactly what we are expecting! We are getting ready for God to birth something here in Ford City, Kittanning, and all of Armstrong County. I am praying that God prepares us all to be midwives to aid in the birth process.

We are also taking our prayer time to the Kittanning Riverfront Park beginning May 5 at the gazebo. And not only are we going to pray we are going to worship, preach, and reach out to people who will be walking through the park. We are going to be breaking down strongholds that Satan has put up in this area by the POWER of Jesus' name. I expect to see people delivered and set free from drugs, alcohol, cancer, homosexuality, promiscuity, and any other disease, habit, and sin that Satan wants to afflict people with. You name it, and we're overcoming it (Rev. 12:11). We are taking authority over this area by the shed blood of Jesus. I believe we are going to see the feeding of the 5,000 with the bread of life.

I pray that as many of you that can join us during that hour each day, will. We need people to share their testimonies and pray for people. I'm excited to be a part of what God is doing and I pray that you let the fire of God burn in your heart.

Wait and Expect!

I have to admit, that God is teaching me what waiting really means. The word wait in Hebrew means to wait (obviously) but it also goes into a deeper meaning, to wait and to expect. If you look up the word expect in the dictionary, one of the definitions for it is to be pregnant. I know I've shared this before but there is so much in the word wait. If we want to see answers to our prayers, our relationship with Jesus go deeper, the world we live in changed, it takes us waiting with expectation that our prayers have been heard and will be answered. This means that we have to get rid of our 'microwave' personality, or wanting everything in a second. Good things come to those who wait. Or should I say, "God's best comes to those who wait on Him." Look in scripture on those who tried to do things on their own instead of waiting on God. Saul began losing his kingdom because he would not wait on God. Moses had to wonder in the desert for 40 years because he didn't wait on God.

Let us all learn how to truly wait upon the Lord so that we can POWER UP and live out the life that Christ intends for us to live out as believers.

Oh Yeah!

I have to admit that I had a fun time playing against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Here is a quick recap of the night. There were 11 on my team playing against a Steelers team made up of Najeh Davenport, Trannan (a WR they just signed), Bryan McFadden, Arnold Harrison, Mike Vorello, Anthony Madison, and a couple of other guys that I can't remember. The night started out with me hitting the first shot of the game, a 3 from the right corner. Right after that shot, I hustled down the court and blocked Najeh Davenport going in for a layup. That was nice. I finished with 3 points in the first half. The second half I had 14 points. I hit two 3's, had a couple of layups, and a steal that led to a layup. It was exciting finishing the night with 17 points.

It was also exciting seeing the many faces from the church that were there cheering me on. I know that God gave me that opportunity for a reason and now I'm asking God what it will lead to. I didn't get to talk to any of the Steelers. They roll in 30 minutes before the game starts, get changed, do warm ups, stretch, and the game started. At the end of the game, they went to their locker rooms and that was the end of that. But I believe God will open doors from this for me.

Thanks for everyone's prayers.

Waiting on God...

Yesterday, we looked at waiting on God for strength and direction and most importantly POWER! I invited people down for prayer whether they needed a healing or just power. What a powerful time of prayer. And to top it off, Andy Polka shared a testimony with us today at noon prayer. He came down for his left hip that's been bothering him since he rolled his 4-wheeler. He was having a lot of pain and felt gout setting in yesterday. He came up for prayer yesterday limping and today he ran across the front of First Presby giving glory to God for his healing. And I mean he ran across the front. Praise the Lord! We serve an awesome God. As we continue to wait on Him, I believe we are going to hear many more testimonies.

Waiting on God with all of you. - Pastor Craig

Wild Wednesdays!

What an awesome Wednesday night. We seem to be having great discussions every Wednesday that get better and better. We got on to talking about experiencing God for yourself. It can be so easy to hear a sermon on Sunday or Wednesday and think, "Wow, that was powerful" but never do anything else with it. If someone tells me that God can heal, I need to believe it and step out and begin to pray for people. Not just take the persons word for it and never put it into action. Oh, to live out what the Bible says!

We also got into expectation. We need to EXPECT! This word has stirred me up. I looked its definition up in Merriam-Websters Online Dictionary and it said, "to be pregnant; anticipate or look forward to the coming or occurrence of." When a woman in pregnant, they expect that a baby is soon coming. I believe this church is pregnant with a move of God and we need to continue to expect great things. And not just the church but YOU! Each one of you has things being birthed inside of you and there needs to be an expectation of those things coming forth. We don't just come Sundays and Wednesdays to come. I pray that we don't. Come because God is moving and we are expecting His moving in our lives. And don't just expect on Sundays and Wednesdays, expect everyday. Become aware of what is going on around you by keeping your eyes on Jesus. Ask Him to circumcise your ears and eyes to hear and see in the Spirit. And begin to WAIT on Him for what He would speak to you. We'll get into WAIT this Sunday.

There is Power in the Name of JESUS!

Sorry for not posting for awhile. I've been wanting to post and just haven't taken the time. I got this video today and thought it was something everyone should check out. Enjoy.

Remember...

Do you remember the game Pac-Man? I do. I used to play it on the original Atari system. What a game. Here is a brief overview of the game to jog any memories. Pac-Man has to eat pellets that are lined up on a maze. To keep him from his task are 4 ghosts named Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and Clyde. To stop the ghosts, Pac-Man has 4 POWER pellets that he can eat and then chomp the ghosts. It was a great game.

This all leads me to the new series that we will be starting this Sunday, April 13. It is entitled, "POWER UP!" I look forward to looking into God's Word and seeing what He has to say to us about powering up to face the challenges of today. And yes, we will look at how our lives correlate with Pac-Man's. I truly look forward to all that God will do in releasing His power to help us POWER UP! Look forward to seeing you there and please, invite a friend.

I also wanted to take time to thank Tim and Katie Bennett and their daughter Emily for a wonderful time at church this past Sunday. What a wonderful ministry they have as evangelists. The word he spoke on "Identity Theft" was powerful. I look forward to them coming back again in the future.

I have to say that the thing that stuck out most to me from this past Sunday, and that I think I will never forget, was his thoughts on why we need baptized in the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongues. In case you missed it, he mentioned how our tongue is uncontrollable (James 3) and that when we are baptized in the Holy Spirit God takes control of our tongue and we speak in other languages. What better part of the body for God to take control of than the one part that is uncontrollable for us as humans. It was a revelation to me and the reason why we need to seek being baptized in the Holy Spirit everyday. So let us seek the baptism in the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongues, whether you need filled for the first time or the hundredth time.

My Wednesday

I just want to say it is good to have Les and Bernice Rishel back from Panama. If you didn't already know, they spent a month in Panama helping the YWAM base that we support there. It was great hearing their stories last night of what they got to do down there. Bernice shared a quote that was funny and at the same time, if you have ever been on a missions trip, the truth. She said, "The only thing you can be sure of is that you can't be sure of anything." They shared how they would receive word of what was going to happen the next day and then when the next day came they would receive word that things had changed. They were able to do wonderful things for the YWAM base but it's wonderful to have them back with us.

Also, I got to see the Bodies Exhibit at the Cargenie Science Center in Pittsburgh. What an exhibit. It was a little scwemish for me but to see what God created was incredible. I got a laugh at how some of the cards explaining things would say, "Through the evolutionary process." I don't know how you could talk about evolution when you see the intricacies of the human body and how it all works. There is no way that billions of years ago we just exploded onto this earth. There is just so much that goes into how a body functions and you get to see it all. One interesting fact that I found out is, your eyes are as big as they will ever be from birth till death. They change very little as time goes on. Amazing. As I stare into Chloe's face, it seems that her eyes are so small. But they are as big as they will ever be.