What is IHOP-KC??

My first impression of IHOP-KC is a place where people gather for worship and prayer for 24/7. I had this understanding of IHOP for the past 9 years. After I sat through some classes here, I realized that IHOP is more than that.

IHOP is International House of Prayer in Kansas City.

It is an international missions organization committed to
1. Prayer (intercession, worship, healing, prophesying, etc)
2. Fasting
3. the Great Comission (proclaiming Jesus to all nations with power as the way to establish His justice in the earth).

IHOP's work includes gathering, equipping, and sending missionaries as dedicated intercessors and anointed messengers working to see revival in the church and a great harvest among the lost.

This is IHOP-KC three-fold vision
1. to call forth, train and mobilize worshipping intercessors that operate in the forerunner spirit as end-time prophetic messengers (Isaiah 40:3-5; Luke 2:36-38)

2. to establish a 24/7 prayer room in Kansas City as a perpetual solemn assembly that "keeps the sanctuary" by gathering corporately to fast and pray in the spirit of the Tabernacle of David, as God's primary method of establishing justice ; full revival unto the Great Harvest (Lev 6:13; Ez 44:15; Lk 18:7-8)

3. to send out teams to plant houses of prayer in this nation and in every nation of the earth after God grants a breakthrough of his power in Kansas City (Luke 24:49; Acts 1:8). At this time IHOP send out people in a soft way that they initiate. However, after God's grants a breakthrough of the Holy Spirit in power then IHOP will send out anointed messengers (authority in intercession with signs and wonders) in an aggressive way.

(notes from "The Forerunner Ministry by Corey Stark)

Intro class

Jerry and I finally got a chance to take a picture during our break between classes. Usually we're so focused that we won't remember to take picture.

Ooops! Hahaha, our dear classmate, who is also in our small group... Steve. He is an artist (I should take a picture of his drawings... so beatiful) and a chef. He can't see the color blue, but he can draws and paints so well. What a miracle! One of the way he worship God is through his drawings. In the prayer room, you see people praying, reading the Bible, singing, and also drawing and dancing.

Steve has a sense of humor. They're trying to show how confused they are with the End Times teaching... so funny! This picture is taken right after our weekely End Times teaching on Revelations. I love that class! One time I wasn't feeling well physically but I insisted to go because I didn't want to miss this class.

This group of people are lining up, all facing our teacher, because it is our Bible trivia time on the book of Revelations. Each week 2 teams will compete to answer questions. This is fun! You have to raise your hand fast enough to be the first hand up so you can answer the question. It not only test your knowledge, but also how fast you raise your hand.
This is team 5, the Simeon. They're the 50 and above. This week they were competing with team 2. It was quite interesting because all the rest of us who are not in team 2 were very supportive on the Simeons. No one wantsedthem to lose... even though they did lose by a few points behind. Naturally people have a tendency to side with the "weaker" or the "elderly".

This place is not the Global prayer room where the ongoing 24/7 worship and prayer carries on. This is called "Justice prayer room". It is more like a place where new worship teams do their 2 hour set of worship and prayer. This past Wednesyday, we had this whole prayer room to our own class. A worship leader recruited some of the talented musicians from our Intro class and formed a new worship team. Our whole class was excited. They didn't have an opportunity to get together and practice, they just got up there and started worshiping. It was awesome!

The guy that was leading the worship, can't really see him in this picture, was playing the keyboard. His name is Jonathan Rizzo. All, except for the electric guitarist and the chorus leader, were from our Intro class.

This cute girl is our class' favorite! A lot of people like to take turn to carry her and take care of her during classes so her parents can take a break and concentrate on the teachings. She doesn't cry much. She isn't afraid of stranger too. She makes very cute sounds. This one time my friend's husband got to have her during class, so I took her picture. She was chewing my friend's watch and she made all these cute noises... so adorable!

Loose park - part II

Looks like Joshua is hanging on a tree branch...

Daddy and Muelmuel.... Joshua took this picture...

The camera boy...

Beautiful couple...

Joshua took this picture for us...

Beautiful flowers... beautiful boy...

Beautiful family...

Beautiful water fountain...

Beautiful Rose Garden inside Loose Park

Loose park - part I

One of our outdoor family time is park. Time to let them run around or ride their bike. We found this Spray park inside the Loose park but we got there way too early 9:30am and it isn't opened till 11am. Well, we'll try again next week. Since our schedule is pretty tight during the rest of the 6 days, so we use our day off Monday to bond with our children, and to do grocery shopping.

Daddy's heart

One of the big change we're going through since we came to IHOP-KC, is Cheryl's heart towards her daddy. Cheryl has become very attached to Daddy now. During Jerry's morning devotion time, when Jerry is connecting to the Heavenly Father's heart, Cheryl would climps on Jerry's lap and has her connecting time with her father. Jerry doesn't mind Cheryl scribling on his devotional journal. I can imagine when Cheryl grows up and sees this scribling on Jerry's journal and find out it was her scribling, it will means a lot to her because her daddy allows her due to his love for her.

You know how during worship sometimes we would sing repeatedly "Jesus Jesus...." or "阿爸父...". It not only warms up our heart to sing the name of our Lord Jesus or calling our Father in heaven, it also must be very sweet to our God's heart. Lately I've been hearing Cheryl singing a lot while we're driving. Many times I hear her singing "bababababa....." with different tunes. Her relationship with Jerry has grown so much lately that she sing of her Daddy whom she loves and who loves her. Just listening to her singing "爸爸爸爸babababa..." melts my heart. It was the sweetest thing as parents can hear from a 21months old daughter. Of course, sometimes Cheryl would also sing "爸爸...媽媽...哥哥...." Because we all like her a lot!

tornedo warning

I cut Cheryl's hair last night. Her hair was growing real long but she doesn't have a lot of hair. So I decided to cut it short so she can grow more hair. Somehow that was a concept taught when I was little. Also, it is hot in the summer, short hair is easier for mom to take care of. Anyway, her brothers didn't like it at all. They like her long hair and 2 pony tails. It is interesting how boys, in such young age, already have a understanding of how beautiful long hair is for girls. Personally, I like Cheryl with long hair too. But before we can enjoy that, we'll wait till we try and see if she can grow more hair. :)

I like the tall trees at this park, called Loose park.

Right behind the boys is a little tree, very cute.

I call this tree "Christmas tree".

I'm wondering how these trees would look like in winter time when snow cover them.

Must be very beautiful....

Today was our day off. In the afternoon, Joshua and I walked to the prayer room and when we were in there, we both heard weird alarm sound. I looked around, nobody seemed to be bothered by it. That alarm sound was repeating itself. I was sure it wasn't some kind of voices I heard from God, it almost sounded like the feedback on the mic at first. I was really bothered by that alarm so I packed up my belongings with Joshua and I was going to go home. On my way out, I saw a ursher and so I asked her. She told me it was a tornedo warning. What? Tornedo warning??? First time in my life! She suggested that I stay in the prayer room, closer to the front section. So Joshua and I went to sit on the front section and continued with our reading (he was drawing real cool stuffs!). I thought, what if tornedo hits our community? I had a confidence that God will protect his people, the tornedo will stop when it come close to the place where worship and prayers are offered up to God 24/7. I was glad I was in the prayer room when the tornedo warning went off. Then, I thought of my husband and Joshua and Cheryl. Yes, God will protect them too. Even if God allowed anything to happen to us, we will see each other in heaven for eternity.

Anyway, later I found out that the tornedo warning doesn't end till 7pm and it was only around 3pm. At 4pm, I decided to take the chance to walk home. The ursher told me she usually would stay inside building during tornedo warning, but she also said it was up to me if I want to walk home. So I did. Joshua and I were running all the way home. Well, I just walked very fast while Joshua ran. He really did! I didn't know he could run like this. Hahaha. We got home in just a few minutes. Well, the sun did came out hours later and we did went to the park and had our family walk around the park. Those pictures posted here were taken when we were at the park this evening.

The Power of a Focused Life (Corey Stark)

When we have a vision, it will keep us focused and disciplined with our time. When we have a vision, we will have restrain that line up with our vision.

Lately as I review my notes, I came across this set of notes and I realized even though we have really tight schedule here, I haven't been using my time wisely. So after some talk with God, I started to change my way of using time that is 'in betweens'. Guess what? I am now able to read more Bible, do more cleaning of the house, and spend more time with God as well. There're a lot of things that we want to do but have nothing to do with our vision, and that are unnecessary.

Proverbs 29:18
Where there is no vision/revelation/focus/commitment,
the people perish/cast off restraint.

I've heard many people asked me how do we hear God speaking to us? How do we know what vision God gives us? 3-4 of the most impotant things that the Lord has given to Mike bicle were just WHISPERS. Why weren't they trumpeted so we won't miss it? The Lord said "The humble and the hungry will obey the whisper." When the Lord has to doble or triple the volume, then there is a real downside related to testing and demonic persection whether you obey or not, but especially if you don't obey. For a hungry man the whisper is sufficient. These whispers are really holy invitations from the Lord and they are optional, He will not force us. I believe we all have heard whispers from the Lord before. Only the Lord knows how important these subtle invitations are for our future.

These invitations are exciting at first. But they quickly become a labor. The joy became a holy burden. The lord uses these divine burdens to prepare us for even greater future assignments, while forming our spiritual root system and DNA. These commitments form us, as well as, birth the purpose that we don't even know about yet.

So, let's just be attentive to the whispers from our Lord, and be faithful in the days of smallness, don't wait till the future or till things become big and seemed important.

Happy Birthday, Samuel!

We went to Sweet Tomato (Souplantation) to have dinner for Samuel's birthday. When we were eating, Joshua asked "I thought we're celebrating Samuel's brithday!". And ya, celebrating birthday shouldn't be just eating... so we take turn saying something we're thankful for having Samuel. While we were saying all these nice thing about Samuel, he just smiled and smiled. Yes, I'm very grateful to God for giving us such a sweet boy, Samuel. I remember times when I was mad at Joshua and Samuel would come to me and give me a loving smile and said "I love you, mom". Those words really touched my heart. Sometimes when I disciplined Cheryl for taking things away from her brothers' hands, minutes later I'd find Samuel give up the 'thing' in his hands and give it to Cheryl. Samuel is a very considerate boy. Before he sleeps, he would always ask me this question "Is Daddy gonna come see me later?" He looks for the affirmation that Daddy will come to see him later. Whenever I say 'yes', he would give me a glowing smile.

When he gets up in the morning, he would looks for Daddy. Of course, he is a gift from the Heavenly Father to Jerry. Samuel was born on 爸爸節.

I remember when Samuel was born, he had apnea. Even when I was discharged from the hospital to go home, I insisted to travel to the hospital everyday to visit Samuel in NICU. He was more important to me than my physical recovery. I remember I would cried whenever I hold him in my arms. God gave me wisdom to speak words of hope and live to him whenever I get a chance to see him. I told him "Be a good boy and breath!" He did! Praise God for healing Samuel.

Samuel is so blessed to have Joshua, Cheryl, Max and Brianna to celebrate his birthday, a beautiful creation of God. Yes, birthday is a time to celebrate because God creates a unique and precious human being in His own image. I can imagine the rejoicing going on in heaven for the birth of every human beings. Birthday celebration is a time to remember the value of a person. I want my children to know that they are important because they are created by God, and God has a destination and calling for their lives which will unfold to them as they grow up and seek God. I want my children to know who they are in Christ.

Birthday is a time to share and give. Contrary to my childhood, I want my children to know that when it is their birthday they get to share goodies with their friends. I remember when I was a child, birthday is about me me me me me and what I want! I was very selfish. I'm glad I don't see that in my kids, yet. I learn a lot from Jerry's kindness. Jerry bought some fruits, juices, and snacks for our classmates for Samuel's birthday. Samuel's birthday became an opportunity for us to give and share. Giving is a big thing here at IHOP. They teach us to give when we don't have much, like the 2 coins of the widow Jesus was impressed by.

Pleasing who?

I just had a great time with the Lord in the prayer room. I was reading the book of Acts for my devotion as usual, and these verses stood out to me

Acts 4:19-20
...Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God's sight to obey you rather than God...
Acts 5:29
...We must obey God rather than men!

As I was pondering on these verses, how the apostles replied boldly to the people who were jealous with their ministry and persecute them... then I heard the worship leader at the prayer room and her team sang

Your yoke is easy
Your burden is light
Your yoke is humility
You laying down of Your life

They were singing of Jesus. Earlier I heard them singing about how we want to live for God and not for man's approval... Then I thought how is your yoke easy and light and humility and laying down of life??? Can laying down of life easy???

Then the worship leader entered into prophetic singing of the Words. Let me summarize what he sang, very anointed prophetic song.

Jesus serving his father (Joseph) day after day,
serving his mother (Mary) day after day,
In the strength of His youth He still stay the same, serving his parents,
doing nothing big (because He didn't start His ministry till he was 30)
People came to Him and asked
"Why are you still here? What are you doing here?
Why are you still not accomplishing anything?
Why don't you find a wife and have your own family?
Why are you wasting the time of your youth?
Why wasting your strength...?"
Then with a smile on His face,
Jesus said he was doing what His Father (Heavenly Father)'s will.
His reward is from the Father and His approval is from the Father.
He wasn't depressed. He wasn't sad or mad. He wasn't miserable.
He wasn't missing out any good thing.
He was having such joy in obeying the Father's will

That's right. Jesus didn't do anything out of His own, but He did everything in accordance to the Father's will. It is in obedience to the Father's will, that Jesus, fully God, came to the earth in the form of human being, He humbled Himself and allowed Himself to be limited in human frame, born to a virgin, went through infanthood and childhood like you and me... and healed many and performed many signs and wonders... and finally he laid down His life on the cross so He could redeem us the sinners who are under the curse!!!

It suddenly dawn on me that, even though sometimes obeying God's will might seemed hard to us, but it is actually freeing us from stress and burden that weren't meant for us. Like Jesus, we can have the joy that He had in obeying the Father's will.

Then the worship leader sang
Let the joy that was in You be in me.

Yes, changing diapers can be a joy for me. Cooking meals after meals can be a joy to me, cleaning up after the kids around the meal table everyday can be a joy to me. Living by faith, with no monthly income as a security, can be a joy to me. It is a new lifestyle here, living as an intern of intercessory missionary, can be a joy to me. Yes, let the joy that was in Jesus when He obeyed the Father be in me too.

That's how His yoke is easy, His burden is light, His yoke is humility, and laying down of His life.
Yes, we must obey God rather than man.