The Glory of God is a man fully alive

Last night I had the privilege of sitting under the ministry of Greg Burson, a prophet from New Zealand who shared an incredibly impactful message about ‘becoming the Gospel,’ and I can still feel the vibrations of joy in the depths of my spirit.

In the Old Testament times, when a prophet was on his way into town, rumours of his coming swept through every home and social circle until the excited chatter of people eagerly awaiting the his arrival, filled every street corner. Similar rumours of excitement preceded Greg’s visit, as we heard that he is a man with a prophetic mantle that operates under the anointing to bring the words of God with sharp accuracy into the lives of individuals.

Last night’s service at Glenridge church was nothing short of amazing. As I walked into the building I could feel a thick atmosphere of expectancy that had begun to accumulate, and my spirit within me recognised the excitement in the hearts of the people that had come worship their King and hear the words freshly on his lips. Worship was glorious; it was a heaven-meets-earth experience. A large building full of passionate hearts lifted up fragrant offerings of praise to the enthroned God, and then experienced the atmosphere of heaven collide with that of the earth causing a sweet presence to settle over every person. Then Greg stood up and ministered in this atmosphere of expectancy and delivered one of the most gracious, freeing, spirit-filled yet simple messages I have heard in a while.

He spoke about becoming the Gospel message as Christians rather than preaching it at every person we encounter. ‘Conversation is the verbal act of hospitality,’ he said, and by simply saying hello or sparking off a real, down-to-earth conversation with a stranger, you are in fact,  through your life rather than your words, ushering the Kingdom of God into their lives and bringing the light of the Gospel to them. Gone are the days of reciting a memorised verse that tells a person what a rotten sinner they are and then leading them in the good old sinner’s prayer before walking off and patting yourself on the back for ‘winning a soul.’ God is not into stale religion, he is into conversation and he always meets us ‘where we are at’ and speaks to us in our language. God is a conversational God that likes to speak and is always speaking, after all, he isn’t called “the word” for nothing.  We as sons and daughters of the Most High, are invited with open arms to join in with the divine dialogue of heaven and the trinity. The Lord wants to share with us his deepest thoughts and vast mysteries, but he also wants to have a best friend relationship with his people whereby we are constantly and casually conversing with him always, not only when we are on our knees in prayer, for prayer is essentially about conversation not one-way commands and supplications. Greg then went on to fire off spot-on prophetic words into the lives of many people he had never met before and brought life, hope and the freshly spoken word of God into the lives of members of the body of Christ. Although I didn’t know many of the people he was prophesying over, I could help but gush forth excitement as I watched fellow brothers and sisters in Christ experience impartations of heaven into their lives. The gift of the prophetic is exactly that, a gift.

Over and above the preach and witnessing the Greg’s prophetic flair in action, I was truly blessed by his life. ‘The Glory of God is a man fully alive,’ and seeing an intimate lover and friend of the Lord share about his walk and let his love for the King overflow, was like a breath of fresh air. He struck me as a man ‘fully alive’ because he simply knows Christ and knows Christ unsurpassing love. I was so encouraged by this man’s life as he is not puffed up, pretentious or claiming to be something he isn’t, but through the knowledge of his identity that lies hidden in Christ, he is completely ‘himself’ as he is a man aware of his union with Jesus and has a beautiful ‘best friend’ relationship with the King of heaven and invited us all to partake with him in the divine conversation of heaven.

After the service, there was a buzz in the room, and I could see life, light and freedom in everyone’s countenance. Sometimes a harsh word is delivered and you can feel it in the air and see it upon people’s faces once the meeting is over, but last night’s word was beautifully adorned with the richness of Grace and freedom, not to mention being hysterically funny for 90% of the time, Greg is definitely a Kingdom comedian (Joy is the serious business of heaven.)

After the service last night, I truly feel as though my spirit has been enlarged with the atmosphere of heaven and I have received rich deposits into the depths of my being; deposits of freedom, encouragement and the love of God. I am once again in awe of the too-good-to-be-true message of the Kingdom and as I take a step back, I once again see that life as a Christian is full of excitement, fun, joy and supernatural activity every single day, and is everything but boring, stale, religious and condemning.

I cannot wait to see the fruit that is to be borne in the lives of everyone that was blessed by Sunday’s service as I feel as though it was a call of God back to the place of intimate relationship and conversation with him.

The fountain of joy has sprouted forth in my heart and I feel full of the goodness of my glorious God.