Seriously?

I am extremely fortunate to live in a small place known as Kansas City. Maybe you've heard of IHOP? No, no, not the pancake place, the other one. The one that prays 24/7 and sings worship music unceasingly.

Yeah, the one a lot of people call a cult. I pray for those people. A lot.

Moving on.

In this place, known as Kansas City, Missouri, and at this house of prayer, there have been, since november, meetings known as awakening meetings, from wednesday - saturday (Not through All of those days. though. Just from 6pm-12am.... Just thought I'd mention that)

These awakenings meeting have an amazing start, which you can read here.  And since then, God has been totally pouring out his heart over the people involved (And by involved, I mean anyone who joins in. Not just here, but also by webstream, etc. And small awakening meetings have started up other places too, I think...)

Every night is better than the last. Every night people go deeper, and deeper, and deeper.

But what of the teens?

Well, yes, they are people too. And a bunch of them have included themselves. A school here, called the Daniel Academy, has been "invaded" by the Holy Spirit, touching hearts, causing people to break out in joy and tears and various forms of manifestations (shaking, falling over, etc), and healings... The list goes on. Not just the TDA teens, but others as well.

So what is my problem?

The other, other ones. The ones that come just for friends.

Example:

Today I went for dinner at an awesome family's house, got home, got on FB. My friend tells me that she missed me tonight. I said yeah, I wish I'd been there, did anything awesome happen?

She says no, not really. (Just an added note.. This is the friend who, when the whole thing started three months ago, she texted me multiple times telling me to come cause God was touching people and it was amazing)

Now, a few hours later, and people are still tweeting and posting mobile uploads of the awakening meeting that went past 12. 

This isn't the first time, though it is happening more and more. And by the pictures uploaded, the videos taken by people....

One can see awesome stuff was happening.

So what's up with her answer, "Nope not really."

The problem is, a lot of kids are treating this like a social event. Great, (the) God (Who so happened to create the world) is here and encountering people... Wanna go hang out in the student lounge and drink soda? (Note, if it's in parenthesis, I added it. Just to throw it into perspective.)

Sure, for the first week or so kids came to touch God, but then they didn't really encounter Him, and so they got bored. Now it just makes a good excuse to hang out.

Ok, so you didn't get your heart broken open like a piñata, you didn't find joy unsurpassable, you didn't have an encounter with God that totally healed you of whatever emotional scars you may have, and you're not seeing feathers, gold dust, or finding yourself unable to stop laughing. At least, not in the first few weeks.

Does this mean you stop dedicating yourself to worship and prayer and being with God so He could meet you and heal you and all of the above stuff, and instead you wander off to McDonalds for an hour until you have to get back before your parents notice?

Apparently, it does.

And, confession here, I don't know what makes me feel worse; the fact that my friends all do this, or the fact that I can't say no to them when they ask me to come with them.

Yeah, so this all sickens me, this "Let's hang out cause we've all done this prayer stuff before" (Not that they say that, but if you break it down, that's really what they're saying...)

And I sicken me. Sure, I want to be in there, with the people who've found joy or who aren't stopping till they find it. But when my closer friends show up and say "Hey let's go to McDonalds I'm hungry," or "Let's go to the student lounge, cause it's loud in here..." Do I say no, I'm trying to find God? No... I say sure and follow them quietly as I fail to follow (and occasionally argue with) the voice in my head that's screaming at me to turn around, go back, and start praying.

Is this you? Yes? No? Maybe?

This isn't just with the Awakening. This is pressing into God in general. Picking God time over friendship time. Cause if your friends are against you spending time with the God who made not only their hearts, but the stars and, well, everything... Then they realllly need prayer... And maybe you need to back away from them a bit.

Not that I'm saying totally ditch your friends (I get the feeling of deja vu as I write this part, heh). I'm saying, make your life right with God, make it a flowering garden with God (see Song of Solomon, and I could add a few other references to explain that but I'm too lazy to find them...). Then hang out with your friends. Don't let your social life strangle your God life. You can still have friends and hang out with them. You should have friends. Jesus had friends, didn't he? But when there's a worship concert going on at your church, unless you Promised to go to the movies with your people, you'd probably come away with a lot more from the worship concert. Just saying.


If you're perfectly fine with just morning devotions, and going to church, then... well, idk I can't tell you how to live, I can only give you suggestions...


But the closer you get to God, the more you devote yourself to finding Him, the more truly alive you'll be. 

How about this. We all start listening to that pull in our hearts. The one that says PRAYYYY YOU NEED TO BE CLOSE TO GOD!!!!!
 I will if you will (I'll still try even if you decide to not to... just fyi...)

If you don't have this voice yet, that's ok. Go pray. Like, now. Get get off your computer, find your Bible, put some worship music on, and devote the next however long to God.

If you're not encountering God, don't give up. Seriously, if you fail 8th grade, or get fired from a job, you don't quit, you repeat the grade. You get a new job. You take the driver's test again. Study harder, try harder, if you're still not on dry land, the idea isn't to let yourself drown in the ocean, or starve to death on the tiny raft of boat. You keep going till you reach Lannndddd. (Yes, I did just used a cheesy metaphor. The raft or boat can be compared to life just believing in God, being a christian, and staying away from sin. But you knew that already)

I'm not going to point fingers at people. I'm not going to call anyone a bad Christian or a bad person. I don't judge people. But I will judge bad decisions and actions. And then talk about them here.

If you're reading this after coming back from praying like I suggested before, kudos.

Anyways. Please keep me in prayer... My family's going through crap (none of which will probably ever be discussed here, methinks) and thus it need peace, and I need willpower to pick devotion over having a blooming social life.

If you want, you can email me at endlesstunnels@gmail.com with prayer requests, questions, etc.

Also, if you're looking for good christian music, click here. I'll probably write some stuff about music sometime within the next month or so.. But other pressing topics keep getting in the way. (hehe....)

And if you want to see the awakenings, for free, there's that link from above, and if you want to listen to free webstream of the prayer room, here's a link to that one for you.

Now, goodnight, or good morning, or good... something to you all, my dears, and may you have a blessed day!

~Silver