40 Days of Feasting.. and i'm Never the same

To put these last 40 days into one word or one sentence is literally impossible, there for I shall write you a novel. : ) The front is where I attend “church” only I don’t like calling it that, so I guess the front is where I attend worship! Its intense and God has a special anointing on that place and the leadership there. Anyways so they called us to a 40 day fast for the elections, it ending November 4th 2008 the date of the election. Starting out this fast I wanted to fast mainly food, but after almost passing out several times I decided, to still fast other things, but I mainly be feasting on God! Isn’t that fun like a fast isn’t fasting from things, its feasting on God and his word. So these last 40 days I have been so hungry for God and at the same time so full because he kept feeding me!! Ah I get excited just looking back at what he has done. I’m looking through my journal as I write this and I’ll just give you some little nuggets of what God did!

9-29-08… Monday night I was at the front were we were all crying out for India because of all the persecution and the killings of Christians. I sat there so upset because yes this affects all believers, but I have been there! I personally know some of the Christians that this is affecting and my heart broke for them. But as I’m crying God places a heavy burden on my heart and my broken heart because more broken and I’m deeply broken as God speaks to me, saying… This pain that you are feeling, this broken heart that you are feeling, is not me crying for my sons and daughters in India who are getting killed for me, because they get it, I cry for you guys, the ones who don’t get it, the Christians who aren’t willing to die for me, my heart breaks because I wonder if you would really die for your faith…. Talk about conviction!

*One night as I sat in the presences of God, I realized the Presences of God is truly unmatchable, intoxicating, an encounter I long for everyday.

9-30-08… Got kicked out of a strip club parking lot for praying!! Haha his presences it a threat to the enemy.

“JESUS”-I learned Just His name is so powerful. That name can make people feel uncomfortable with in one second! Ha like at starbucks when the person ask you what you do and you say I am the Lords servant you can see them get all uncomfortable and change the subject and all I did was say his name! I have seen people just say Jesus and the person is healed. People all over the world but you hear about it in countries like China and Middle East, and now India, Christians are being killed because they are telling people about this King and I don’t hear about any Mormons or Jehovah witnesses getting killed for their faith because there so something about our God that is a threat because just his name has power in it.

10-6-08…. It seems like this whole fast God was teaching me about what it truly means to be a Christian because I just finished the heavenly man which is an intense book of a Chinese Christian, then I saw a pastor speak from Rwanda and later I heard a speaker from Turkey speak. The Turkey man has seriously been through so much torture, they would pull off his toe nails and pull out his teeth and if he passed out they would splash water on him to wake up so he could feel the pain, and they would pull his arms and legs so they would be stretching out his body in ways it shouldn’t be! And at the end of all this, he seriously was half dead, and he would pray the Lord’s prayer, and the guards were like you are crazy! But they couldn’t believe he was still alive so they said tell me about this Jesus that you are praying too, and he got to tell them all about his savoir! Ha how cool. But at the end he was just like ok now what do you American Christians do? Do you sacrifice anything for your Lord?

10-10-08… I go and hang out with old people at this assistant living home, and there is one women in particular who I see every time, her name is Virginia. She is so cute and fun and is always laughing. But today she was sad because she said..i just realized that I’m all alone I have no family and I’m just lonely and that makes me sad. I notice she had a bible in her bag so I said- Lets look in there because that book has some good stuff about Joy in it. And so we look at verses about joy and rejoicing, but then she asked where can we find a verse about peace, because she said I want peace.. and I go Oh Girl he is all about peace! Ha so I found this verse, “now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in everyway. The Lord be with you all.” And I didn’t read it to her, I just found what page it was on and then she read it herself out loud, and as she was reading it, the presence of God feel in the thickest cloud ever! She started to breath heavy, and I’m like Virginia are you ok? Because you know shes old and stuff and she could be dying on me, and she says.. I can feel it, I can feel him giving me the peace and its taking my breath away, then tears started to stream down her face and she got noticeable chills (goose bumps whatever you call them) then she said I feel a breeze against my back like I’m floating because I have so much peace, seriously it was like God took her out of this world and into the supernatural for like five minutes! And I’m just sitting there, being memorized as I watch God physicaly touch this woman! It was crazy. Then she is so cute, she goes I use to think a piece of chocolate was the best thing ever but this is so much better! I think it was a prophetic word to me, lol!

10-14-08… a pastor shared this story. Back in the holocaust days, there was this church that sat right in front of some railroad tracks. And every Sunday at the same time the church was meeting the train would ride by with Jews inside on their way to be killed and they would see the cross on the church building and they would cry out for help. This happened every Sunday as the church was in silent prayer the train would go by and the cries were unbearable. So the church had a meeting and deiced to switch their service around and so when the train went by they would be in a time of praise and worship, and when they would start to hear the train coming they would play a little louder and they would turn up the music a little more so they could wash out the disturbing cries. Our nation is doing that today, as we sit back and watch babies be aborted, as we sit back and watch the porn industry reaching record high profits. We are in our little church turning up the music to wash out the cries of the world, the cries of the homeless the orphaned, the lost, and the unloved. How much longer will the church continue to go on with normal life, turning up the worship music, to forget about the lost in this nation and this world? Its really ironic if you think about it.

10-21-08… Pastor Phil, who God uses him to heal his sons and his daughters, anointed me and prayed that I would receive the gift of healing like he has! Sweet!

10-27-08… I truly feel the freedom I have to follow Christ! My family is still having a hard time in supporting me and the crazy dreams God has placed on my heart. But when my family and society makes comments like I won’t be able to do that, It doesn’t affect me anymore! Like I hear them but I don’t, if you get what I’m saying! Because the freedom that I have in Christ has been so real and so powerful this last month, that I have experienced freedom in him and no one can discourage me now because I am free to follow Him!

10-30-08… along with this 40 day fast, the Pro life campaign has been doing a 40 days of life, where have they been praying for the end of abortion. So at some of the planned parenthoods where they perform abortions ( not all of the planned parenthood perform abortions, but a lot of them do.) people have been standing on the grounds praying. The front took this Thursday to pray in front of this building for the whole day! I was there for only 2 hours but what God spoke to me in those 2 hours was something I needed to hear and I think all Christians need to hear. On the way to this silent protest we heard this song that has the lyrics ‘don’t walk away’ .. and I was praying I was praying that God wouldn’t walk away from his unborn babies here that he would save them and then he turned that prayer around and spoke to me, saying… Leslie you don’t walk away, now you have seen it, you have actually seen in with your own eyes a building in which they take the lives of innocent unborn babies. You are now responsible for making this aware to people, because you have seen it, now please don’t walk away.

11-1-08 …. I could speak forever about this night! But basically I was visiting a home church with me Sister Lauren, and there was a guest speaker there. And she was majorly gifted with the spiritual gift of prophesy! And we worshiped and she spoke a little but most of the night she was just prophesying and praying over people. And my sister went before me and I was like ahhh this is crazy, because everything she was saying was right on in a way they she would never know but only God would give her the knowledge of what to say and what to see. She prophesied over me and God gave her the same knowledge about me! And what she said to me was the devil is trying to kill your dreams he is trying to steal away the gifts and the dreams God has given you. And of course that is so true and close to my heart that is was like I was sitting in my fathers lap weeping and asking him to help me hold on to these dreams that he has given me, and he said he would : ) so that’s good : ) haha I love it. And then ok for the last month or so I feel like I have been able to see more, like into the supernatural, or the spiritual whatever you want to call it. I feel like God wants to show me angles and such, but I’m just not excepting it, like I can almost seem them, but if I just receive what he wants to give me then I will seem them, so this has been going on for awhile and I was thinking about it this night. And Crystal the girl that was prophesying goes… Oh girl you are a seer and God is going to start to show you things, he wants to show you vision and angles, you will start to see into the supernatural… ahh I don’t care who you are, that is straight up crazy cool right there. The next night God gave me 2 visions already to speak to people!!

11-3-08…. In YWAM I feel in love with the sound of acoustic guitar. And my favorite thing to do is worship, seriously! So I have been wanting to get a guitar so I could worship God all the time and make my own worship and I just love that guitars are all over the world, and worship really brings the presences of God. So if I’m traveling the world being a missionary I would love to know how to play guitar so I can invite the presences of God in every place I go. So ya but I am poor, and couldn’t afford, so I was just praying you know God if you want to give me a guitar I receive it! lol. Now I have a little money saved up and I could buy one if I wanted to. But the other day Lauren was talking to one of our friends about praying and she used.. oh ya Leslie is praying for a guitar as an example as to what they were talking about. The next day she showed up to my house and said God is answering your prayers because he told me to give you my guitar!!ahhh so I should stop writing about it and starting playing it, now I’m praying for the gift to supernatural be able to play it haha just kidding but seriously because I have no idea what I’m doing!

11-4-08… ELECTION DAY! The whole day the people from that front where praying the whole day the voting polls were open, so it was 7am -11pm, because it wasn’t just when the polls were open in FL but from the west coast to the east coast. And this whole fast people have been saying your just praying for the elections?! But really its so much more than that! I haven’t even prayed once that God would put one of them over the other in office. We have been praying that our nation would turn back to God that we would seek his face, that we would realize the sinful nature of this nation and repent! That night I had to work so I got to The Font at 7pm and you could tell people were warring for the nation!! Because they weren’t sitting down and saying a silent prayer we were pacing the room crying out! When God placed something on someone hearts they would go up front and pray into the microphone so we could stand in agreement with them. One time someone brought up the subject of sex trafficking that in California there is something on there ballot that is so insane! Its not a matter of weather sex trafficking will be illegal or legal it’s a matter of the cops not being able to investigate cases concerning this issue! So this was a major cry out as guys went up there and repented of their lustful desires and prayed for the men who were doing this to girls 3x younger than them. We prayed that the words on this ballot wouldn’t be confusing but they would turn into a vision of these little girls sold into this sex slave industry. Lauren got up front and prayed, because she has been to Thailand where sex industry is huge and she has seen men drag women in prostitution by their hair because they think they own them for that night, and cops just stand back and watch it happen.. its because we have become numb. So we were praying for God to make people feel the pain, make them not numb anymore, but make us aware of this horrible act. And be careful what you ask for because the whole room just cried out because we could feel the numbness breaking and we could feel Gods broken heart for these men and women!

**It’s funny how the presence of God can change a mood so quick because one minute we would be crying the next laughing and the next yelling with passion. But then God placed it on my heart to cry out for the church to wake up! And I wanted to go up in front and pray and get everyone pumped up and ask God to wake us up! But God had a different plan, he brought me to my knees with tears rolling and rolling down my face saying I’m sorry. He spoke to me saying the church is having an affair. Instead of being in love with Jesus and his presence, the church is having an affair with religion and denominations. We have lost sight of his face and the intimacy that we can find in him alone. And if we can hear the sound of rain coming and if we were made for battle then we need to wake up. We have lost sight of Him, because if we were following and seeing his holiness, his mercy, his greatness, his power. Then we wouldn’t walk past an adult book store without doing anything, we wouldn’t stand to have thousands of orphans just in my city alone that I live in. Also before I got to the front that night I was downtown where I stopped and talk to a homeless man, Vince. Vince has been homeless for 25 years and when I asked him if I could sit down and just visit with him he said no one ever just wants to sit down and visit with him. The election day I notice how many church buildings we have. I always knew we had a ton but when you have huge signs and people saying vote here you realize all the church buildings. If each church would take in and house one orphan then we wouldn’t have any more orphans that are with out a home and with out love. When God had me pray that prayer I was overwhelmed with sadness, as I myself was being convicted, I’m not just hating on the church here, I’m saying I think we have lost sight of our first love and I know that breaks his heart and in turn it breaks me to the point where I can’t get off of the floor but all I can do is just lay there and cry at my fathers feet. All I can do is lay at the foot of the cross and thank you for what he HAS DONE and in the same breath same I’m sorry for what I HAVEN’T DONE.

God has dramatically changed my walk with him in this these last 40 days, to the point where he has stolen my heart and I have told him that I never want it back. The Holy Spirit has moved in my life in ways that I have never experienced. The Holy Spirit has invaded my comfort zones so much and it’s the most exciting thing ever! Sometime I get discouraged working 2 jobs all day everyday but now that I’m walking in this new truth and asking God everyday to use me to bring him glory and asking him that everyday I have an encounter with him, everyday is an adventure! I can’t get enough of it and everyday I want more! After this month I will never be the same. God has revealed himself to me in a whole new way and I have seen him and heard from him in ways that I never had before. I love it when I see more of him and less of me in my life! Sometimes its funny and hard though because I had a day of work and I went to the bookstore to read a book because I’m too cheap to actually buy it..haha, but I’m sitting there next to this woman, and it was like I couldn’t even sit there and relax and read a Christian book because God was speaking to me about this woman next to me! Its like I’m reading this book about God but does this woman even know who he is! Ah so I have learned if I want to be alone or just relax I need to just stay home because now I can’t even go to starbucks anymore with out God asking me to talk to that person, but love it! I love every minute of it.

I have learned also that the Holy Spirit is Crazy and powerful and that when we have an encounter with Him he moves in ways that can’t be explained… I use to think it was weird to see people like fall to the ground, or speak in tongues, or shake, or cry really loud, but now I realize that person is having an encounter with the king of kings and they are having an encounter with the same spirit that raised Jesus Christ from the dead! So how can they just stand there and not be moved by him? Ya God is like my best friend and we laugh together and we are all casual but he is also the only living God who spoke life into existence and that is pretty intense, so as we are seeking his face and we see him and when you encounter Him some crazy stuff happens! Because that’s just how he works, its called taking God out of the box.

God just keeps changing my views on missions. Now my mission is to tell people about this amazing man named Jesus and lead them to have a relationship with Him. I still have a heart for the poor and unloved. I am still planning to go to Africa but am having a hard time finding an organization to go with. I found this one that is awesome, but I just don’t know if its hardcore enough for me.. and then I found the worlds largest slum in Kenya! Ahh its crazy like 1.5 million people in this one slum and like 400,000 orphans, now that’s hardcore.

I don’t know what my future holds, but I know who holds my future! “In China we have no possessions to hold us down, so there’s nothing preventing us from moving out for the Lord.” All I know is that I don’t want anything to hold me down because I want to be able to go when God tells me to go.

…….When God truly moves in our heart and in your life you cannot remain silent. There will be a fire in your bones, like Jeremiah, who said, “ His word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot.” Jeremiah 20:9 Our God is an all consuming fire….These days I set myself on fire and people come to watch me burn! You can never really know the scriptures until you’re wiling to be changed by them, God has been offending my mind to get into my heart. This God, man he is a life wrecker haha he has wrecked my life to where I can and will only live for him.