“Whatever God has promised gets stamped with the Yes of Jesus. In him, this is what we preach and pray, the great Amen, God’s Yes and our Yes together, gloriously evident.” (2 Corinthians 1:20 MSG)

Back around 2003 / 2004, Pastor George prophesied over Stephanie and me concerning 2 things:

1: that we would be on the forefront of a movement within Foursquare
2: that we would be holding babies

In 2004, at the 2004 Foursquare Convention, the Lord really impressed two things on to my heart:

1: I will be be a part of “a new wind”
2: I will be planted as an oak tree where my roots will grow deep and out of maturity the roots will grow and bring forth new shoots that will grow into trees themselves, through that root system.

I never have been one to believe that the Lord’s prophesies need to be taken completely literal. At times, I have considered all of these prophesies one in the same, concerning our Simple Church. I have believed that these babies would be just Spiritual babies, because clearly after so many years, and doctors telling us that we don’t have much of a chance to conceive, clearly God was not meaning physically having a baby.

This morning I was awaken at 2 am, with a small voice in my head that reminds me of the vision of the oak tree. This voice was telling me that now I am maturing, my roots are growing deep in my faith, and they are now bringing forth fruit, the new baby.

As I am laying here typing this, trying to hold back my tears, I clearly can understand that the Father’s promises are yes and amen and His mercy is new every day. I completely believe that these promises are for our Simple Church as well, but this morning, I am understanding that the Father’s plans are many fold, and He unfolds them through our lives at the right time.

What an amazing child-like feeling to abandon my way of doing things, and trust completely in what the Father is doing on my behalf.

With faith as a child,
- Keith

By Keith King  (February 5, 2012)

I have been amazingly surprised at this book! As a Simple Church pastor who has already read Cole’s Organic Church,
I mistakenly believed that this book could not shed new light on how I do church; man was I wrong.  This has been the most highlighting, note taking, and status posting book that I have read in quite a while.

Through the first part of the book, Cole has us questioning everything up front. Is what we know and hold dear the Truth, or tradition and is relativism and post-modernism inherently a bad thing, is just a couple of the soul and spirit type of questions that are discussed.

Cole challenges us to completely examine how we are “doing church” and urges us to transform into “being the church”.  With this new Church 3.0 mindset we become less about programs and methods and more about relationships. It is not that “ministries” stop existing, but now they are birthed out of relational needs verses attraction models. Evangelism is less about events and strategy and more about influencing those around you.

I would even go as far as question our “out reaches”??? Why do we keep focusing sending out groups of people into neighborhoods where we have no vested interest? Just so that hopefully a few will COME to our church and MAYBE receive Christ.

What a better way if we can take these same church leaders, teach them what it means to be Jesus to the world, and have them to completely share life with those around them, bring Christ right to them in an intimate way?

Cole also raises a great point of discussion about the Church being the front door to heaven. This was never the church’s role, that role belongs solely to Christ. But not only have we allowed the church to be the front door, we have adapted a mind set of that this “front door” experience is it, that this moment in our faith is the precipice. There is so much more that God has for us after we become His children. God does not call us to get saved and wait for heaven to come, He calls us to Himself so we can bring His Kingdom to earth, and we have to keep both in mind that the Kingdom is to come, and the Kingdom is here.

(Church 3.0 by Neil Cole Pat 1 of 3)