Selfless in A Selfie Generation

Let me just say, right off the bat, that I love Social Media and could not be further from a hater. I LOVE sharing God’s word on all the media platforms. I feel like Instagram + the internet are some of the places that the Lord has called me to be a missionary. My businesses are all online and I literally cannot choose to not engage in social media, nor do I want to. I wholeheartedly believe that it is a powerful tool in the hand of God. It’s an incredible resource the Lord’s given us to impact society, and we are called to steward it well. I love this beautiful gift + I will do all I can to take it back for the Kingdom of light.

So if you’re feeling bendy or defensive or worried like, “Is she going to tell us to quit social media,” we can all take a deep breath. I’m not going there.

Where I am going is this: God doesn’t want to take us out of our generation, but He does want to partner with us to bring Heaven’s reformation into it.

God created the earth and gave Adam jurisdiction over it. Adam abdicated, handing reins over to the devil. The devil corrupted, distorted, and injured our world. God could’ve crushed the earth and tossed it in the can like ruined paper, but He didn’t. He sent Jesus and Holy Spirit to take back that jurisdiction for mankind so we could begin to rebuild all that had been lost in Eden. And I believe that’s what God wants to do with the Media.

I believe there is a clarion call in this generation for the vast territory of Media. I believe God wants us to take up Adam’s abdicated seat which Jesus won back for us. And I believe He has a mission for us to begin to rebuild. What was once stolen and corrupted, He wants us to take back and reinstate to God’s designed purpose.

I believe there is a way back for the selfies. A way back to the pure shimmering power of Eden.

Yes, there is a lot of narcissism + focus on self that goes around on social media. People are even looking into the scientific ways that using these platforms trigger our brain’s dopamine system. Dopamine, once referred to as “the Kim Kardashian of neurotransmitters“, is linked to reward-motivated behaviors and addiction. The notifications of likes, comments, and follows, serve as “reward cues” that condition us to expect a rewarding experience everytime we hear that ping or feel our phones vibrate. To put it more bluntly, receiving a social media notification lights up the same area of the brain as taking heroin or cocaine.

So definitely, we do need to be on the look out for that.

But I feel like we literally don’t have time to waste debating the merits or liabilities of social media, and we definitely should not be chewing over ways to deliver ourselves from it (the media was given by God, it’s here to stay, deal with it) because we have a huge commissioning on our hands to bring the culture of heaven into this deeply embedded earthly culture.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot over the past few years, and God keeps bringing me back around to the words: SELFLESS IN A SELFIE GENERATION.

The perfect antidote to the counterfeit is the original. Simply put, we don’t counter the narcissism or self-absorbed entitlement that seems to characterize most in this selfie generation by criticism or boycotting in the hopes that if we bash/ignore it long enough it’ll just disappear. No. We bring seflessness into the mix and watch as light manducates darkness.

There is a move of God that is calling forth His sons and daughters to take their place of royal authority with selflessness. A generation that would fast, pray, and seek Him on behalf of their spheres of influence, small or large.

God is seeking a generation of laid down lovers who would say, “To have my name known by many, or my soul known by God, I’d choose the second a million times over.” He is calling for a people who would fight the real fight, not put up a show in the limelight. He wants us to build the deep unseen wells, not broken cisterns that cannot hold water. To do the work that is seen by Him – whether it’s to rise up or kneel down – not what is seen by man yet unacknowledged by Him. A people set free from this addiction – addiction for applause, approval, focus on self – and living in wild abandon for the audience of one.

This selflessness is also pretty much encapsulated in Romans 12-15. Serving others with a joyful heart. Building others up by doing what’s good for them. Putting others before ourselves. Honor. Generosity. Mercy.

There’s a whole depth to explore when it comes to being selfless, but we won’t go into there here because then this would turn into a book. This article was meant to be a clarion call, a sounding of the bells to say, “Awaken, awaken. Rise up, you chosen generation. We put to death selfish ambition + narcissism in Jesus’ name. Let selfless faith come forth!”

So can I encourage you to dig deeper into what being selfless looks like for you specifically today? Will you take time to hear what the Lord is speaking + convicting your heart in this regard? Maybe let’s stop “fasting” from social media and instead? We start circumcising our hearts daily, so that these God-given tools no longer become our masters but our servants. Servants that serve to bring God glory.

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A Word In Season: Grace To Perfection

I had a dream recently that I believe was a kairos prophetic word for this particular season in God’s calendar.

The message in this dream is particularly important for those who’ve been feeling fear + anxiety + strife to fulfill their mission from God for this year.

There is a message of peace, hope, and encouragement from the Father to you: He has pledged Himself to you. You are not alone. He will shoulder your weakness and make His strength yours. He will provide all the resources you will need to accomplish everything He has sent for you to do. He is committed to your success.

Steady your heart and listen to what the Lord has to say to you today.

The Dream

I found myself in a school classroom. It was 5pm. I had a mandarin assignment due at 7pm after which there would be a mandarin exam I was to sit for (context: the chinese language is NOT my strong suit). I had nothing — I didn’t have anything to show for my assignment, much less be prepared for the exam.

I was in a downright panic. I ran all around the school trying to find help from friends, teachers, schoolmates, but no one could help me.

Then the teacher walked into the classroom. She saw my agitation but remained very calm and said, “Today is the day of the Full Day Class.”

She showed me the timetable and I saw what looked like a weekly class timetable, and above the day right in the middle (where Wednesday would be) were the words “Full Day Class” and the schedule for that day was the only one filled from beginning to end. The funny thing was that it wasn’t filled with classes like mandarin, math, or science. Instead, it was filled with classes named “Grace” “Identity” “Helping you to finish your assignment”.

I peeked into the “Helping you to finish your assignment” classroom and saw many small groups of older students mentoring the younger ones to help them in the assignments they were struggling with.

Then I woke up.

I was perplexed for a time, but the Lord began to reveal the message of this dream while I waited on Him.

The Interpretation

Assignments: The Lord has rallied His children and delegated assignments to each person. Every one of us has a designated mission to fulfill in this season, and we don’t have to look far to find it. He has already placed that seed of knowing deep in our hearts.

Classrooms: These assignments are to be completed in the School of the Holy Spirit. According to the nature + purpose of the assignment, the Lord has placed us in specific classrooms (e.g. mine was a mandarin assignment and therefore I was in the mandarin class). This means that the area of calling is also the area of intense molding, refining, growing, and stretching. He is doing this because our greatest potential can become our greatest downfall when operated outside of His wisdom + covering.

Away from our natural strength: The Lord is going to call us to things that we might feel inadequate to do (e.g. mine was mandarin). In the face of our mission, we might feel small, weak, helpless. He is sending us on missions much bigger than our natural capabilities because He wants us to learn to do it with Him. We need the Teacher, who is Holy Spirit. He is the only one who can guide us to the resources we’ll need. He wants us to live like Jesus did, “I can do NOTHING apart from the Father” (John 5:19). We must learn to operate in heaven’s wisdom and not man’s wisdom, His strength instead of our own.

5pm-7pm: 5 (number of grace) to 7 (number of perfection) means that His grace will meet us and carry us through to perfection. We are moving past 6 (number of man) which means that we will no longer be able to do things by our own strength or wisdom. He demands excellence in the work of His children’s hands, BUT He also empowers us with the grace we will need to do that.

Full Day Class: We are right smack in the middle of God’s timetable – in between grace and perfection – and He is extending this period in His grace until we are able to finish our assignments.

Identity: In order to finish well, we need to come to a deep revelation of who God is in ALL His fullness, and who we fully are in Him. God is going to shake off wrong mindsets + foundations. He is going to expose the lies. It will be a challenging time as we are being stripped of many things that have been part of us for so long, but it will also be beautiful as His light of truth begins to heal and build us up stronger, faster, better than before.

Helping you to finish your assignment: The Lord will be sending along our paths the right people at the right time. At the start of the dream, I ran around asking fellow schoolmates for help but they couldn’t/wouldn’t help me. When the Teacher, Holy Spirit, directed me to the class, that was when I found people who’d gone ahead who could and would help guide me along. We must be careful not to run around seeking man-made wisdom and affirmation as we try to finish our assignments. Instead, we need to wait on Holy Spirit for discernment to know who the right people are that we can allow to speak into our lives.

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We are at a beautiful, momentous point in time, and I’m praying that we would all finish stronger than when we began!

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The Story Of Us: Part 2

I’m finally back with a continuation of the story of how Alex and I met + got together! Before we continue, make sure you read the prologue first and then part 1. Alex & I love how God wrote our love story. We’ve shared that story to many, and have been asked to share our wedding vows to youths learning about God-centered relationships. But I’ve struggled with writing about it because it is so very personal + sacred to me. Also, every time I’ve sat down to write this story, our marriage has come under attack and I’ve given up. But over the past year God has been challenging me to do it – let His work in our lives be a light to others. Because it’s not just about how God wrote our love story; it’s about how God came into the lives of two broken people and wrote something beautiful out of that mess… and how we get to live the story He’s still writing. So this is our story, the story of us.

~

So a little recap because part 1 was posted almost a year ago! We ended off the first part of the story with Alex and I arriving at the same conference in June 2011 as complete strangers amidst 1,000 other people. By that point, God had brought us both individually through a year of intensive “revival prep”, and we were both full of zeal from the Holy Spirit for revival + unity + a prophetic generation in South East Asia. (Note: we had the zeal, but it took us a few more years to learn to walk it out with wisdom… and we’re still learning!)

We were also lonely. We wondered if anyone else would ever understand the intensity of the past year + the big things God was speaking in our prayer closets + the journey we each felt called to ahead.

That’s me on the bottom-right in June 2011, on one my rare count-with-one-hand days out of the prayer closet. Because some people want to know, my hair was much shorter then because I’d shaved it off a year ago (to walk with someone special through a difficult time) and it was growing out again at that time.

Samantha (Open Heavens Conference, June 2011)

I was late for the first session. I had just leaped off a ferry from Batam Indonesia, where, over the past 3 days, God had placed a burden for that nation in my heart for the very first time (it’s pretty cool how this happened right before I met Alex, who is an Indonesian, at the conference. God’s pretty sneaky like that!).

I soft-stepped into the large hall, found the closest + most inconspicuous seat available, and sank into the soft seats with a sigh. I was tired from the morning’s travels back to Singapore, still trying to process all that had happened over the past few days, and quite frankly, I was heart-sore. I’d been spending so much time waiting on Him in the prayer closet that I hardly met people any more + I had probably alienated many of my friends. I knew it was His season for me, but it was hard to keep the faith sometimes and it was crazy lonely and I just really wanted a friend who could say, “God said this + that to you?! So cool, me too!”

As I sat through the sessions on that first day, I was so moved by the bond that James Goll and his late wife Michal Ann Goll shared. They were ministry partners + apostolic leaders + a father and mother to prophets… but most of all, they were second-best-friends whose first best friend was Jesus. I’d never seen a friendship and love like theirs before, and this prayer kept wafting up to heaven from my heart, “Lord, if I ever get married, I want a marriage like this or none at all.”

A fresh vision for Kingdom marriage was birthed in my heart. Little did I know that the Lord had set it all up to prepare me for my first encounter with Alex.

During the tea break that first afternoon, I eagerly made a beeline for the book table, hungry for all the books that could teach me more about God. When they announced that the next session would begin shortly, I had to kinda burrow my way out of the throng.

And that was the moment.

With my head down in an attempt to squeeze my way out of the crush, I bumped right into a tall, solid, immovable pillar wearing a tucked in Nike shirt, jeans, and sneakers. Startled, I looked up and came face-to-face with his conference nametag “Alexander Wiraatmaja”.

Alex in June 2011. He was the guy everyone knew as “the dude who wears t-shirts tucked into jeans and sneakers” :p

Alex (Open Heavens Conference, June 2011)

“I was excited. I was lonely but didn’t know that I was. I was in a new season and it was the first prophetic conference I would be attending. From the start of the conference, I knew that James Goll had a prophetic word for me. I waited and waited, but nothing happened on the first day.”

To be continued.

(I promise it won’t take a whole year this time)

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Idream of Eden. We were made for the Garden and the full pleasure of paradise. We got separated at Eden and we spend our whole lives searching for a way back into that secret paradise. All of life's pursuit + pain + questioning can be traced back to man's search for home. Our deepest instincts tell us that we are not home outside of this reality, and our souls will never stop searching until we return. Only there will we find rest and our true being. There, we begin to dream again the dreams that have laid asleep in our hearts all along.

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