a divine conspiracy is going on

For the past two months or so, I sense something of a "divine conspiracy" going on as a result of attempting to play this game with minutes.

It is weird. Yet not that weird, since we see a "divine conspiracy" going on in the book of Acts. That is, for the Jesus-follower (by that I mean someone who has practically made it their #1 goal in life to become an apprentice of Jesus) the miraculous should be normative.

Frank Laubach, when he played this game, he noticed that God was "melting away obstacles" and making the road before him ever so smooth.

I am experiencing something similar. It feels something analogous to Magneto from X-men walking on a metal path, having pieces of metal fly a few feet right in front of his feet to continually extend his path as he walks.

As I trace how God has specifically "engineered" this path of mine in the past two years, especially the past two months, I can't help but to feel that although the odds seem stacked against the soldiers of Christ, the deck of cards is rigged, so that when Christ the dealer deals the cards, it seems almost obvious that there is order and a design/plan in the midst of seeming chaos, just like a piece of jazz music which is a piece of harmonious chaos. It seems that someone has "monkeyed" with how things unfolded. Something, or Someone is behind the scenes invisibly manipulating things in front of the curtain.

I am reading a book called "Kingdom Triangle" by J.P. Moreland now. In it, his main thesis is that the early church miraculously expanded (against all odds) through 3 main reasons on the part of the responsibility of Christians. They follow as:

1) They had a thoughtful Christian mind that defended legitimate knowledge of God (and not just "blind faith") and they articulated this stuff (what we'd call "Christian worldview" nowadays) to non-Christians in a respectful yet persuasive manner.

2) They engaged in spiritual formation to Christlikeness to actually produce no-nonsense Christlikeness through die-hard discipleship.

3) They acted out of expectation for the miraculous supernatural acts of the Holy Spirit (stuff in line with the stuff we see in Acts).

J.P. Moreland says that all over the world right now, Christianity is growing at rapid/unprecedented rates. Unfortunately, North America seems to be an exception to this trend. He believes that the Church of Jesus needs to revive all 3 points of the "Kingdom Triangle" to bring out revival to the Church in North America. I find myself strongly agreeing with Moreland on this one (let alone a lot of other things. I really respect this guy).

One of the ways that I feel God has arranged things to help equip me to help bring out city-wide revival to Toronto is to be equipped in multiple facets of the Christian life and to be balanced in growth. Balanced growth in multiple dimensions of Christlikeness is a big thing for me now. I don't want to neglect any significant aspect of Christlikeness in my walk with God.

So, with respect to the Kingdom Triangle, I feel that in all my 5 years of undergrad in Toronto, I really focused on establishing a solid Christian worldview and was equipped in defending it against secularism/atheism. However, I wasn't really that hot on spiritual formation. Come these past two years on East Asia STINT. I REALLY grew a ton in spiritual formation. I still have a lot to learn, but I feel that I have steady ground for my feet to advance on.

As for the 3rd point of the triangle, I feel that I am relatively weak with respect to Charismatic gifts and powers of the Holy Spirit. This is partially due to me being a Baptist where this stuff is hardly ever practiced. I don't fully blame the denomination. I mean there are some grounds to be cautious on the abuses of Charismatic gifts as well as distortions of weird theology on it. However, I think it is wrong for people like myself to think just because it has been misused and abused, that it can't bring out significant advances for the Kingdom if used properly. Afterall, if one just reads 1 Corinthians 14, one cannot deny that Paul was very "charismatic" without any apology. I hear things about how the charismatic/pentecostal denominations helped bring about some revivals in the 20th century. I can sort of see why. These guys have passion. They have fuel. They got zeal. The body of Christ needs its adrenaline (with balanced proportion).

Come the last few weeks. Within the last few weeks, I have started to attend this charismatic church called lifesprings. Their theology seems pretty sound, I haven't head any heresy or anything, and Andrew Tam recommended it, and I trust Andrew. I have really started to get exposed to this charismatic stuff.

I volunteered to participate in a "prophetic ministry" session a couple nights ago where 3 people experienced with the gift of prophecy prophecied on me together (they do this in groups of 3 ppl exercising the gift so that there's some sort of group accountability and that if two or more ppl feel consensus from the Holy Spirit, there's a higher chance of avoiding error).

I was very surprised. In a good way. I've never been prophecied on. These guys were telling me what the Holy Spirit was telling them in a supernatural way! I just met them 5 minutes beforehand without any previous conversation, just sat in silence in front of these 3, and they started saying stuff that's been deeply etched in my heart for the past while! This stuff I hardly tell anyone (not due to fear, but b/c no one asks). It's crazy! They were saying stuff like "I feel that X and Y is true about you." and they were right! It was also beyond any vague unfalsifiable descriptions. They kept on hitting dead on like they were on fire like Kobe or something. It was a little surreal at first. I had so many "HOW THE HECK DID YOU KNOW THAT ABOUT ME?" I even started laughing (out of my heart's disbelief of how prophetic they were). Hopefully they didn't find it rude, I mean I wasn't laughing at them, I was just laughing at the fact that they were just so dead on. I wasn't afraid of any dangerous heresy or anything, for everything they said was in accord with biblical principles (I felt). I also had some pretty astonishing/surprising prophecy about my future and stuff. Sort of intimidating and exciting if its going to come true.

All this to say, I feel like ever since I started to play this game, in general, I feel like I just entered an RPG where I'm aprt of a storyline that is already planned ahead of time, where events follow an intended pre-meditated plan by a storywriter, and I'm just in for the ride. This is exciting. The past few weeks have especially been the case as I reflect on the recent order of events that have fallen on my lap, with various serendipitous random "helpings" from friends who "just so happened" to help things unfold in a pattern (the pattern I experienced lately has been strengthening the second point of the triangle [spiritual formation] as well as being introduced to the third in a charismatic community [lifespring]).

The crazy part too is that when I went to the 1040 event featuring Jaeson Ma a few nights ago, all that city-wide revival for Toronto stuff I felt that God had independently put on my heart while I seemed all alone in East Asia. I mean, this was during the past two years before I was exposed to any of this Toronto city-wide revival stuff. And yet, I felt a growing passion to be a part of a movement that brings city-wide revival to Toronto, without anyone by my side to dream this God-given dream with. Then all of a sudden, the 1040 event comes. Wow.

This is like an RPG, but only better. For in RPG, one's experience is at most vicarious. But this is real life. It's realness is so real.

I don't even need to play RPGs anymore to get the effect. I just need to play the Game with Minutes. It as the added bonus of being intertwined with all my daily activities so I don't have to shirk any God-given responsibility. It's also free.

Game on!