Are you have a conference hangover? Yes, some of you? Hey, you're like I'm hoping
this is the dream interpretation class because can we do like a practicum
where we do nap time and then we interpret our dreams? Yeah, come on we can
do this. I always am super excited about this time because I feel like this is
the backstage pass to everything that we do here at Bethel in the prophetic and
and the goal of this this time in this day would would be that throughout the
day you would get practical tools for life and ministry in the prophetic and
and whether you're leading a ministry in a school of ministry or in a church
environment or even in a home group environment or you're just you're just
starting out in the prophetic as an individual you're gonna get tools and
and and and I feel like almost so to speak you may have walked in with a
tool belt and you're waiting for the the exact things for for the different
moments of ministry and you're gonna get throughout the sessions you're gonna
hear from a bunch of our team and our goal is to give you what we have
personally you're gonna get Ben Armstrong you know you're gonna get his
stuff but you're gonna get Kim Koch she's incredible and you're gonna get
all her stuff in her flavor and it is a big deal of ours you know we say the
prophetic looks like you and I think what you'll do is you can walk away from
a day like this and be more equipped than 90% of the church in the in the
prophetic and that's that's fun that's amazing and it's I think it's it's
really worthwhile and that's why we spend the time to do this and that's why
we love that you're in the room and and you're joining us online and those of
you why don't we just turn around wave at the camera say hello to everyone
joining us online as well we want to equip the nation's that's part of our
job it is to be generous with what God has given us and it is an apostolic
mandate on our lives is to be generous with what God has given us give it away
and reproduce reproduce so that's what you're gonna get today are you ready
you're put on your seatbelt this is like fast drink from the fire hose flood of
heaven you're gonna have a fun time we'll get a few breaks just some
practical things for those that are in the room there's coffee and tea and that
kind of stuff just be mindful as we're doing it we are we do have everyone
joining us online as well so please just don't walk straight in front of the
camera and like get get in their way but feel free at any time if you're dozing
off to grab your coffee and wake up but we will have breaks throughout and and
you'll be able to use the facilities and stretch and and do whatever so really
the first session what I wanted to do is is break down what is leadership and
leadership and and how do we promote people in our environment how do we grow
them up how do we identify leaders in our environment in the prophetic because
you know I think some people come in and and they think oh oh in order to be
on the prophetic teams you know we do have an application and there's a sense
of confusion sometimes because people think oh well what like what's the
application look like well ours looks like give us a hundred prophetic words
and we'll see if they're accurate and then if they're accurate you get to be
on the team now you know you're nervous and that was nervous laughter I could
hear it serious but but in all actuality that's not that's not what we're looking
for in in and capturing people for our teams and I know Kim will spend some
time on this but our deal is more character driven because the gifts are
easy we can learn those really easy we can practice this stuff but if you have
the wrong attitude how many ever played sports
Sports in your life.
How many ever played sports with someone
who was excellent at what they did,
but they had the worst attitude?
Yeah.
How many of you wanted to play with them?
No, you didn't want to play with them.
They are not good teammates.
It poisons the whole system,
and this is what happens when we get so focused,
sometimes in ministry, on the gift itself.
We can get focused on the gift itself,
and we forget that giftedness
has nothing to do with character.
It does in this way.
It has something to do with the character
of the one who gave the gift,
not the one who received the gift.
So the gifts that are on my life,
the gift of the prophetic that's on my life,
the gift of wisdom that's on my life,
the gift of healing that's on my life,
it doesn't have to do with whether or not
Ben Armstrong has great character.
It has to do with the fact
that Holy Spirit has great character.
Holy Spirit's a gift of the Spirit,
and it actually represents his character,
his generosity towards us.
How do you know if Ben Armstrong has character, then?
How do you know if he really is connected
with the Holy Spirit?
I mean, Scripture says this.
If you abide in me, and I abide in you,
you bear much, oh, you mean not gifts?
Sometimes we get it confused,
and we think somehow, if someone's gifted,
oh, they must be connected to God.
They must be like super close with God.
Potentially, potentially.
But some years ago, as a leader at Bethel,
I know, I'm telling on myself,
but God is so good at doing this in the Bible.
He tells us the good, the bad, and the ugly,
and part of healthy leadership is being transparent.
Not just transparent, but being vulnerable.
Because there's a lot of people being transparent
all day long.
You can look at the transparency
of their every awesome moment.
Right?
And they're like, well, I'm vulnerable.
No, no, no, no, you're not vulnerable.
You're transparent.
I know you're not vulnerable,
because when someone posts a negative comment on your thing,
you delete them as a friend.
Right?
That's not vulnerability.
Vulnerability is like, hey, I'm gonna be real with you,
and you can feed back to my life,
and not only can you give me feedback,
but I'm gonna receive it,
and where I need to adjust, I'm gonna adjust.
And that's super healthy.
Now, years ago, I can remember a time
where I was sitting down with my wife,
and I was talking to her, I was a little frustrated,
and I said, baby, I've been a little short
with the kids lately.
I just haven't been as patient as I should be with them.
And I just, I feel like my words haven't been as kind
as they should be lately.
And I just feel like I'm just not as loving.
And all of a sudden, it was as if a light bulb
turned on in my head, and I looked at my wife,
and I said, baby, I'm disconnected from the Holy Spirit.
And I realized I was naming off fruits of the Spirit.
And the only way I actually have fruit happening in my life
is when I'm abiding with the Holy Spirit,
when I'm connected with Him.
Yes.
He's the vine, we're the branches, right?
We're connected, and that connectedness
does something in my life where my words are kind.
Hey, guys, it doesn't show up at church first, right?
Fruits of the Spirit's easy at church.
We just kind of put them on as we walk through the door
after we were just fighting with our kids and spouse.
And then we treat everyone super nice.
It's awesome.
Probably not a great judge of whether or not
my fruit life is really happening and my connection.
with the Holy Spirit is happening.
Where does it happen first?
Your closest relationships.
Your roommate, your spouse, your kids,
maybe even your work environment.
That's where it's gonna show up first.
Do you have the fruit of the Spirit happening there?
And I realized in that moment,
I was disconnected with the Holy Spirit.
And here's what's crazy.
I was still traveling the world, preaching the gospel,
people were getting saved, healed, delivered,
prophesied over, my prophecy was accurate,
my word of knowledge was accurate.
All this stuff going.
I thought I was good with the Holy Spirit.
They let him be a pastor.
Yeah, I repented.
I said, baby, will you forgive me?
And I went to my kids and I said, will you forgive me?
And I went to Holy Spirit and said,
Holy Spirit, forgive me.
For getting so focused on my gifts
that I forgot to abide with you.
Because against these things, there is no law.
In our leadership, in the way that we're delivering,
in the way that we're operating in the prophetic,
we want to deliver something
that it will always land in people's hearts,
that will always affect their life.
How many of you would sign up for some kind of course,
if you knew that course would teach you
that every time you operated in one of the spiritual gifts,
you would represent God every time?
Who would sign up for that course?
Yeah, well, there's a lot of keys in scripture
that actually teach you that thing.
And let's get focused on abiding with Holy Spirit.
Let's get focused on 1 Corinthians chapter 13.
You know, love is patient, love is kind.
Oh, that sounds like fruits of the Spirit, right?
There's this loving relationship.
1 Corinthians 13 is written smack dab
in the middle of 1 Corinthians 12 and 1 Corinthians 14.
I do math.
That's good, Ben, you can count.
My point is this.
Spiritual gifts, 1 Corinthians 12.
1 Corinthians 14, spiritual gifts again.
Especially that you would prophesy.
And smack dab in the middle of that is this love chapter.
And somehow we get confused as prophetic people,
and we get stuck with the idea that potentially,
this was written for a wedding ceremony.
How many of you ever been to a wedding
and the minister, the pastor, the priest,
whoever, the officiant, or maybe a cousin
reading scripture, love is patient, love is kind.
And then they try and tell the husband and wife
to be all these to one another.
Well, that's great.
It works.
It does work, and it works in the context of marriage.
But the problem is it was never written
in the context of marriage.
It was written in the context of the administration
of gifts of the spirit.
It's saying your gifts look like something.
I love Heidi Baker.
She says love looks like something, right?
Your gifts look like something.
It should look like love.
It should look like those things.
So if you take any one of your spiritual gifts,
I wanna know that I'm living in character
and connection with the Holy Spirit.
I wanna know that I'm abiding with him
and that fruit's gonna happen.
How do I know that happens?
Well, I can just take one of the spiritual gifts
and substitute the word love
and put one of the spiritual gifts in there,
and now you see how that gift should look.
The prophetic is patient.
The prophetic is kind.
The prophetic doesn't boast, does not envy.
The prophetic's not rude.
How many of you ever heard rude prophetic?
I've heard it in my life.
The prophetic's not easily angered.
We don't need angry prophetic people.
The prophetic, it keeps no records of wrongs.
It doesn't delight in evil, but rejoices in the truth.
What's the truth?
The truth of who people really are.
Our job's not to call out sin.
These are all the things that we're looking at.
person's life, and we're looking at these things to say whether or not they should get a badge.
We actually have badges, right? Elijah, show everyone your badge. See, he's got a badge.
You get a badge. You get that badge not because you're super gifted. Well, he is gifted.
He's super gifted. But the thing is, he gets to keep and represent that badge because he has a
connection with Holy Spirit. Because the character of his life, I can see through the fruit of his
life. And sometimes people are so frustrated, no one will listen to me. I am so prophetic,
don't they know? Yeah, you're also mean. You're also impatient. You're also not kind.
You have zero self-control.
They're not impressed with your gift. They need to be impressed with the fruit on your life.
Against these things, there are no law. You want to become irresistible?
And for those of us who are leaders in prophetic communities or trying to develop a prophetic
community in our environment, that's got to be our focus. That's got to be what we're going after.
That's got to be what we're hungry for because these things are what we want to reproduce.
Reproduce. Some years ago, when I got hired on as the prophetic ministries director, which
we, I didn't ever, there wasn't a prophetic ministries director. There wasn't like,
oh yeah, yeah, that position. I know that one. I had to define it, you know?
And I love that because it's important that titles and positions don't define you, but you define
them. When I first came to Bethel or back to Bethel in 2006, 2007, I told my wife the first
week we were here, we went home from church and I said, hey baby, we're pastors here.
She said, what do you mean? I said, we're pastors. She's like, yeah, I hear that, but what do you
mean? I said, we need to live out of who we are and never wait for a title or position
to actually happen. So let's just happen in this environment. Let's be who we are from the get-go
and not wait for anything like that. And let me tell you this. If you will pursue your passion,
then titles and position will pursue you, but they'll never define you. You get to define them.
But if you pursue the title and position, usually every time it puts you in a box
and that's all you get to be and it will define you.
And so we're in this role. We came here as school of ministry pastors. They invited us in to be
school of ministry pastors. I did it for seven years and then got invited to be the prophetic
ministries director. And a couple of unique things happened at that moment. About a month
before I stepped into the role, Chris had already asked me to do this with another lady named
Crystal Stiles. And we were just kind of pioneering this whole thing. Well,
we had been doing it for almost a year and Crystal was moving and Crystal was like, okay,
we need someone to run this full-time. And at that moment, we had a remodel going on
on our big building over at College View. And they had these big air conditioning units that
they were pulling off and replacing with new air conditioning units. And the old ones they took off
was a certain brand, but the new ones that they were putting on were called Armstrong air
conditioners. And I felt like from that moment, God was actually physically matching up what he
was doing in the spirit saying, hey, you get to shift the atmosphere in this place.
And then when he did that, right after he began to speak to me and he said, Ben,
whatever you do, I want you to do it with three words in mind. And this is our leadership model
here at Bethel Prophetic. And everything we do has a flavor of this. Number one,
Ben, I want you to do everything with excellence in mind.
Whatever you find to do, do it as unto the Lord, right?
Do it with excellence.
If there's anything worth doing, it's worth doing well.
And I say excellence because I think there's this idea that we can get stuck in at some
times called perfectionism.
And we live under the weight of that one thing that I didn't get right, and it makes
me a total failure.
It'd be like this.
For a couple of years, my wife kind of got in this mindset, and she'd tell you this.
I'm not telling on her, but she'd tell you this.
She would say, oh, when we fight all the time, and I'm like, what are you talking about?
We do not fight all the time.
You just don't know reality.
I'm like, well, maybe not.
But we fought for five minutes today, and I'm pretty sure the day is 24 hours.
So 23 hours and 55 minutes, we didn't fight.
And you're saying we fight all the time because we fought for five minutes.
Can I propose that we're doing better than you think?
And I think we get in that mindset when we're looking for perfection.
We're like, I've got to do it 24-7, and if I don't get it all right all the time, I'm
a failure.
I know.
Other people think that way.
Not you guys.
I'm just talking about other people.
That's why I say excellence, and that's why I think God is after excellence.
He is after that.
Perfection is a potential end goal, but God is in love with process.
And I love the way Dan Fairley put it a couple of weeks ago when he was talking about grace.
Grace meets me right where I'm at.
If I'm in sin, if I'm not perfect yet, grace loves me right there.
But it loves me too much to keep me there.
And then I grow line upon line, precept upon precept.
We're not looking for perfect people in the environment.
I can deal with rough edges.
What we don't deal with is a bad heart.
And so I can judge fruit on a person's life.
How do we promote these people?
How do we figure it out?
I'll get to that in a minute.
But you need to stay on the three words.
So excellence.
We're going after excellence.
And he said, Ben, once it's excellent, you need to go to the second word, which is sustainability.
It's got to be sustainable.
Whatever we do, whatever we're pursuing, whatever we're growing, can it be sustained?
Can it still happen if Ben Armstrong or Chris Vallotton's not in the room?
Yes it can.
Okay.
Then now we get to step into our apostolic mandate, which is called reproduction.
That's the final word.
So excellence, sustainability, and reproduction.
Reproduction is the apostolic model.
Once you get excellent at something and it's become sustainable in your environment with
real people, not virtual people, not the metaverse.
I've seen people on the metaverse destroy their TV, crash through the coffee table.
It was real-ish, ish, ish.
Let's be careful that we're not reproducing something that we haven't created an excellence
and a real sustainability with real tangible people, real tangible community.
We're dangerous.
It gets dangerous when you don't actually, and it doesn't have to, I'm not talking about
you have to have 10,000 people that you do this with.
I'm like, we've got a small group.
We've got a home group of five people.
We've been practicing this for five years.
We're all doing it.
We're doing it healthy.
We're doing it under accountability, and now more people want to join, and so now we're
going to reproduce.
Now we're going to split from one group to two groups.
And it's not it's not the division of oh, I don't agree with you
So we're gonna divide and go over here and start our own thing. No, we've actually grown something
cellularly and
It's the nature of life to to cells do
Divide to grow something bigger, but we're still part of one body
We're still together
Now that cell may divide and become a hand
And and and that this cell may divide and become a foot, but we're still part of one body
We just are different parts different expressions
we've got so many people here from all over the world and
Joining us from all over the world with all kinds of different backgrounds
all
Kinds of different family backgrounds family experience cultural backgrounds
cultural experience
even church experience
Maybe you come from a certain denomination. Dr. V. You'll hear from him later. Dr. Ralph finstra my buddy. I
Love this guy
Hey, he's he's ordained it in the Reformed Church
And I asked him to keep that as long as they'll have him
Why because it's amazing it's incredible it's an expression of
of Christ on the earth and
And it may be a different flavor, but this is what makes us amazing is when we have this diversity
That actually looks like the kingdom every tribe every tongue every nation
Are you with me? Is this okay stuff? I
Think we should all have an apostolic model in whatever we're doing
That means once it's excellent and sustainable
It's my
Privilege and
Responsibility to gift that away
To empower others to take that all over the world like Brazil
Come on team awesome
So, how do we
How do we begin to promote?
people in our
environment
How do we begin to promote them? How do we identify?
Whether or not someone's healthy, how do I actually experience them? This is what
Boundaries are for and Kim's going to spend some time talking about prophetic ministry protocols
But I you need to know this in in the world when we hear boundaries we think control
When we hear boundaries or rules or structure while we're prophetic like I need freedom
You can't control me I mean I hear from God
You
Ever heard that before like I hear from God this is important like
And there's there's something about boundaries that are so important. They they tell me whether or not you're a sheep
Or and they'll tell me whether or not you're a shepherd because it says that the
shepherd comes through the
Sheep gate and the sheep know the shepherds voice and
Anyone else who tries to come in not through that gate?
They recognize
It's a wolf. It's something bad. They're like, oh, wait a second
That's not the shepherds voice. They say they run away from them
It doesn't say they entertain the voice
Be wary of the people in the environment who try to lead the people
But don't honor the boundaries and authority and structure set up
It happens too many times
it happens too many times and sometimes it's just
Because there hasn't been a healthy structure set up and a healthy communication of that structure
Let's not just automatically say all that
That person's got a bad heart.
Jezebel's spirit right there.
I see it.
That man is crazy.
Don't listen to that.
No, like that's not demonize people
just because they're ignorant.
And I'm not saying stupid, I'm just saying ignorant.
They don't know better.
We get to bring that health in the community.
Whether you're a leader in the community,
leading something, or you're one of the team members.
You get to bring that level of truth
and information to the environment.
We become banks of the river.
Oh, actually, or you become the current in the river.
And they try and swim the wrong direction,
they're gonna feel resistance.
You know, one of our protocols, this is a fun one.
Is we don't do in our sessions ministry,
direction, correction, warning kind of stuff.
That's reserved for mothers and fathers.
And so we're not always mothers and fathers
in someone's life when you're randomly talking to someone
who showed up on the prayer line
or showed up to receive ministry there.
And so at one point we were doing some ministry
and our teams were, they're all out rocking it.
And some of us leaders are on the side
just watching how things going.
And one of the ladies came over pretty concerned.
And I watched her come up to Dr. V.
You remember this, Dr. V?
And she comes up and she's like, hey, my partner.
Every word is directional and correctional
and telling them where they're supposed
to be missionaries to and all this kind of stuff.
And Dr. V in his infinite wisdom,
that's why he's called a doctor, because he's smart.
I was wondering how he was gonna deal with the situation.
And he said, oh, well, why don't you just go let him know
what he's doing?
And confront him on that.
And she's like, me?
Well, yeah, you experienced it.
You were with him.
Why don't you communicate with him
and remind him that's outside
of what we're supposed to be doing?
And so with a lot of, I would say a fair amount of anxiety,
a fair amount of fear and trepidation,
she goes back to this young man, appeals to him,
has about a 15-minute conversation.
And it was a little shaky at first,
but they figured it out and went back to prophesying.
They went back to doing it and doing it the right way.
Let's be careful that we're not like,
oh, I put it this way, a lot of times in leadership
and a lot of times in the, especially the prophetic ministry,
especially the prophetic ministry,
we don't give people a chance to practice.
It's like you give, how many of you are parents in here?
Raise your hand if you, okay, almost every one of you.
When my children were young, I got them a bike.
Now, the bike started out with training wheels on it, right?
And then I didn't just put them on it
and say, all right, have fun, see ya.
I actually put elbow pads on them, knee pads.
You know, they got a helmet on.
They can barely even walk the amount
of protective gear they're on, let alone ride a bike.
And you know, have you ever seen those kids?
Come on, it looks a little awkward.
And then you run right alongside of them,
holding onto the bike, even though it's got training wheels.
And you're coaching them on, oh, pedal, yeah,
you're doing it, you're doing it, you're doing it,
come on, woo, woo, woo, you know?
And as they're going, but this is what we do
in the prophetic.
We give a person the bicycle with no elbow pads,
no training wheels, no nothing,
just open your mouth and speak.
Just let the Holy Spirit speak through you.
And it's not working, like, what, no, what?
Something must be wrong with me.
Or they prophesy for the very first time
and they fall asleep.
prophesize something negative, right? They see the dirt. They don't know we're not
looking for dirt because they haven't been trained. Well, then what do we do? We
take the proverbial bike away from them and say, ah, obviously you were never
intended to ride a bike. That'd be like giving our kids a bicycle and they try
it out and crash. Like, obviously you're not gifted at this. Come on. God never
does that, but somehow we do that with the prophetic ministry. And good
leadership structure actually allows for boundaries to be there so that you can
learn and grow. And how do we promote the people in that environment? Well, number
one, you get promoted. It says that both Samuel and Jesus Christ, it said of
Samuel, remember he grew in favor with God and man. And it said the exact same
thing of Jesus Christ. Now here's the difficulty. I wish that there was more
details about how they grew in favor with God and man, but you see Jesus as a
young boy, an infant first, then somewhere at 13, but really nothing in between.
Samuel, too, you see him as a young boy. Remember, he's learning how to hear the
voice of God. Speak, Lord, your servant's listening. He's learning there. And then
you don't hear much about him until he's the prophet of Israel some thirty
something years later. That's hard. I need to know what they did so I can create a
school of promotion. The school of how to find favor with God and man, right? Because
that's what we do. We're looking to be good robots. Do it exactly like
someone else did it, and two plus two equals... Yeah, exactly. But that's how it
is with God. He's like, two plus two for Dr. V equals ten, two plus two for you
equals four. It's like, well, that's not fair. Yeah, that's relationship. It's
different. God's going to treat you like you need to be treated. This whole push
for everyone gets a trophy, everything's fair, is not kingdom. And what does it do?
It creates weak children who feel like they should be entitled to
everything. Gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme. My kids used to say, Dad, that's not fair.
You gave Maddie something and you didn't give me something. And I'd say, yep.
But it's not fair. I know. But so I'm like, yeah, enjoy that. Until you can
celebrate your sister getting favor, your favor and breakthrough might be a
little further off. Or if you celebrate your sister, it can accelerate you into
the favor that's on her life, too. We train our kids like, life is not fair. I
don't know. Like, we train fairness in school and then we put them in real life
and wonder why they fail. That's just not how God does things. In my
relationship with my children, I'm going to treat each one like they need to be
treated personally. And then throughout, we're going to celebrate that. And we're
going to learn to celebrate each other and not expect everything to be given to
us all the time. So how do they grow in favor with God and man? I mean, how do I
judge favor? How do I judge the favor of God on Kim's life? We're not supposed
to judge, brother. No, I can actually judge some things. I can recognize things. I can
recognize the fruit of the Spirit on Naomi's life.
Recognize that.
That's how I know if someone has favor with God.
If you abide in me, I abide in you.
There it is again.
You bear much fruit.
Against these things there is no law.
That shows me that you have favor with God.
The fruit of your life shows me the favor
that you have with God.
And then the other part is favor with man.
Well, favor with man is two-pronged.
It's community and leadership.
You gotta have favor with both
and that's why we have protocols.
That's why we have a leadership structure
where we say we have some boundaries.
Why?
So the community can get to know you
and leadership can get to know you.
Here's the problem that I see happen many times
in prophetic ministries
is maybe the person has favor with God
and favor with the community,
the favor with the people,
but the leadership doesn't know them.
And they're trying to do their own thing over here
apart from leadership.
You know what happens then?
You get a church split.
And then in the other way,
maybe they got favor with God
and favor with the leadership,
but the community's never experienced them.
And we have people come in here from all over the world
and maybe galaxies as well.
They're like, hey, don't you know me?
I'm Joe Awesome,
the intergalactic prophet of four galaxies.
I'm like, awesome.
Yeah, but our community doesn't know you.
I know you personally,
but would you do me a favor
and would you go through the same training
that everyone else gets in our environment
so our community can get to know you
and build relationship with you?
Because if I promote you in an environment
where they don't trust you yet,
I'll lose their trust for me as a leader.
That's why we don't just bring anyone in to,
and oh, you don't have to live by our rules.
And we get a lot of prophets who want to come here.
Hey, can I speak at Bethel Church?
And I'm like, yeah, probably not.
We don't have any relationship with you.
We need relationship.
Well, who are you connected to?
Because we're connected to a lot of people.
Maybe we have the seven degrees of Bethel Church,
like, okay, you're connected to this purpose.
And well, we're connected to them.
We know them, they vouch for you.
Okay, we can start building relationship.
Our community doesn't know you.
So could you make sure you, when you are here,
we're gonna give you this spot
and we're gonna see how that goes with our community first
before we open up something else.
Why?
Not because we don't like a person or anything like that.
We're giving people opportunity
to grow in favor with God and man,
and that's how people get promoted.
Are we patient enough with that process?
See, in the world, boundaries are meant to control me.
In the kingdom, boundaries are meant to promote me.
It's all about your promotion.
That's our structure, and that's what we try and stay with.
I talked a little bit about authenticity and vulnerability,
but I'll bring it in connection with 1 Corinthians 11, 1,
where Paul says, follow me as I follow Christ.
Leaders who are authentic and vulnerable.
I'm not talking about, oh, hey, I sinned last week.
Just wanted to tell you all.
And then the next week, I sinned again last week.
Hey, don't worry, I'm authentic, I'm vulnerable.
No, I'm not talking about sin or moral issues.
I'm talking about being real with life, with one another,
being real with the good, the bad, the ugly,
and those are the types of leaders we can follow.
You know, I know, I've heard the quote many times,
never trust a leader that doesn't have a limp.
You know, that doesn't have, what are they saying?
Don't trust a leader who's perfect,
who has an image of perfect
and only shows you perfect all the time.
You need to know, like, there's the rub of life,
there's the real of life with that leader,
and those are the leaders we love to follow.
They're real with situation, you're like,
oh, I feel a little more.
successful in life. They have issues too. They fought with their kids. They do marriage counseling.
Marriage counseling is great. Like, you should do that. Connection codes with Glenn and Phyllis
Hill. Love after marriage. Like, that kind of stuff. Like, and what's great is this generation
that's growing up right now, they've broken through the stigma of counseling.
They like it. Now, there's a jeopardy that we, well, I go to a counselor and I just go to the
counselor my whole life and never do anything about it. And it's permission to stay in your
stuff. No, that's like saying, well, I have grace. I have grace. God forgave me again today.
Right? Are you still with me? Are we sleeping in heavenly places? Christ Jesus.
Those are the leaders we follow. How do I really define whether or not someone
in our environment, now, there's a difference between being on the ministry team and then
leading a ministry team. Right? There's levels of leadership. We see what they do with one thing,
and then we promote them to another. And sometimes you won't know whether they're a good leader or
not until you put them in a position that makes them squirm a little bit, and maybe is beyond
where they're at. Sometimes it's the resistance of a new thing that exposes issues that wouldn't
be exposed otherwise. I'm not saying I promote everyone in our environment so we can expose that
issue that they're not willing to look at, but I am saying there's a certain level of pressure that
comes on us that pops the zit, so to speak. I know that's graphic, but I'm like, no, there are
certain things in God that before that moment in your life wasn't a big deal.
And I'm not even talking about moral issues. I'm just talking about Holy Spirit. Maybe it was like,
hey, there's a pebble in your garden. How about we get rid of that? Hey, that branch is looking
funky over here, and it's actually going to take away from what you have over here. Will you let me
prune that off and nip that off before it gets too big? Will you allow me to do that?
And a lot of times, because of our situation, we're, I'm in my sweet spot. I'm on easy street. I'm in
this thing. I don't have to deal with it. It's not a big deal. No big deal. Until you get pushed up
into another leadership, then it becomes a bigger deal and exposes those places that need to be
pruned. Great leaders constantly prune. What are we pruning for? Fruitfulness. We're not pruning
because we're bad. We're pruning unto greater effectiveness, greater growth.
It's so valuable. And how do I recognize these new leaders? Number one, Paul puts it this way
in the book of Timothy. He's writing to Timothy, and he writes these two letters. And in 1 Timothy
118, one of my favorite scriptures, and I quote it all the time, right, team? You're like,
I've heard this one before. I know. It's the Word of God. It's pretty powerful.
1 Timothy 118, Paul is speaking to Timothy, and he's really encouraging him, giving him a charge.
He says, Timothy, my son, right? My son. Our leadership structure is all around mothers and
fathers. Who takes ownership of an environment like a mother and father? Who walks by and see
trash on the ground and picks it up? Who turns off the lights when they're the last in the room?
Yeah, moms and dads, the ones who pays the bills, who have ownership of the house.
You know, I can remember when I was a kid, the statement, hey, what were you born in a barn?
Shut the door. What were they saying? Take ownership of your house. You're not an animal
born in the barn. You own this place. You're part of a family. Take ownership. That is the
leadership model. That's the promotion model. And Paul's talking to Timothy, Timothy, my son.
Now, listen to this. In one version, it says,
Timothy, my son, I give you instructions in keeping with the prophetic words made over
your life so that with them you'd fight the good fight of faith and have a clean conscience.
And I get it, yes, the prophetic words themselves are weapons that give us faith and a clean
conscience, but it's not just the prophetic words, it's the instructions of healthy mothers
and fathers.
I give you instructions in keeping with what the prophetic words once made over your life.
Good mothers and fathers, they care about your prophetic destiny.
Good leaders in the prophetic, we care about your prophetic destiny.
You care about someone else's prophetic destiny.
You see them the way God sees them.
You view them the way God views them, and you are invested in giving instructions like
a coach or like a father or a mother and direction that helps them apprehend their future.
And what's it cause when I have good instruction and direction from a father or a mother and
I have my prophetic words and I use both of them in conjunction with one another?
They become weapons that create faith in my life.
Faith for what?
What I can't see.
My future, that future awesome Ben, that's way over there, gives me faith for it.
Not just that, it doesn't just give me faith, it gives me a clean conscience.
Has nothing to do with thinking about sin there.
Clean conscience in the context of that scripture has nothing to do with sin, has everything
to do with thinking of yourself like God thinks of you.
That's what a clean conscience is.
You know what?
If we fully thought about ourself the way God thought about us, there would be no room
for sin.
That's the cleanest conscience you can have.
It's not, did I not think about a sin?
You won't have time to think about a sin.
You will never have a craving for that thing because you're so enamored with the thoughts
and ways of God and who He says you are and you'll think like Him.
The goal is to have the mind of Christ.
Clean conscience.
People don't need to hear how bad they are.
They need to hear their prophetic destiny.
Years ago Bob Jones was giving a prophetic word to a young man at a church and he calls
out the young man and he says, hey, you're called to write songs that will shift a generation
and you're going to lead worship and you're going to do all this stuff and prophesize
over this young man.
The pastor comes up to him at the end of the service and says, Bob, obviously you're not
a prophet because if you're a prophet, you would know that that guy just had an affair
on his wife and he's not going to do all that.
Bob said, yeah, he already knows that about his life.
What he doesn't know is that he's supposed to write songs, lead worship, and change a
generation.
That's a real father.
That's a real mother.
The grandmother who keeps praying for their kid.
The mother who's like, hey, what's your son do?
He's studying pharmacy right now, pharmaceuticals.
You know, mom has that perspective of their children that never gives up and sees the
best and they pray into that image every day until it's established.
Who gets promoted?
The people who show up.
Who shows up?
The owners.
They show up early.
They're the first one there.
Don't tell me, oh, I'm just so prophetic.
I was caught up in some glory, something.
If you're really.
Prophetic, like leadership-wise, we tell our teams,
like, hey, you're not gonna get promoted
if you can't show up on time.
And I don't quite trust your words
if you can't show up on time.
Because if you really are prophetic, you know the future,
you should be getting there
before everyone else gets there.
And the prophetic prophets,
and the prophetic, prophetic people,
should be the most stabilizing force in the church.
You know, what's the church built on?
The foundation of the apostles of the prophets.
Foundation.
It's there first.
It's on time.
It's solid.
It's not weird.
For weird's sake.
I mean, I'm weird.
But not just to be weird, right?
It's if God tells me to do something,
I'm gonna be obedient, and I'm gonna model that to people.
This is good stuff, Ben.
I really, I'm feeling it.
This is awesome.
Fathers and mothers and healthy leaders,
they actually create an environment
where it's safe to take risks.
That's why research and development,
hey, we wanna do this fun new thing.
Well, I'm gonna make sure to show up
with the fun new thing.
Why?
Because years ago, my son, Connor,
he had a brilliant idea.
I didn't know this idea, but he was young,
and he had a scooter, you know,
those little Razor scooters.
And I am downstairs in this two-story house,
and I hear this noise, this crashing noise,
and this metal drywall things,
and I come running around the corner,
and Connor is upside down with the scooter
tangled in his legs, going, oh,
and wind knocked out of him.
He finally catches his breath.
I'm like, buddy, what happened?
I tried to ride the scooter down the stairs.
That's awesome, that is so cool, son.
Hey, next time you plan on doing that,
would you call me and make sure we're here
just in case something like this happens
and you need mom and dad?
I celebrate the adventure.
I celebrate the sense of risk.
I celebrate that you tried, that's amazing,
that's incredible, you're crazy cool, that's amazing.
Man, I would be scared, you weren't scared.
He's like, no, but now I'm a little scared to do it again.
I'm like, yeah, that's learning.
I'd be scared for you if there was no,
like, oh, maybe I should think about this the next time.
Can you just make sure mom and dad are in the room
when you're taking risks like that?
Where there's relational connection.
I have community helping me out, giving me feedback.
I have my leaders giving me feedback
because I'm not only just good at this, I'm good at this.
Prophets and prophetic people come into their fullest,
most mature expression when they're rightly connected
to God and rightly connected to community.
If it's just God, I'm concerned.
Well, God told me and no one can change my mind.
Awesome.
Why don't you go do that over there?
You just can't do that in here because in here,
we do it within the context of family,
within the context of community.
And I said it in my session at the conference,
I said, the nature of deception, right?
The nature of deception is that you don't.
know you're deceived. That's why it's called deception.
What keeps me from being deceived? Healthy community. People who know who Ben Armstrong is.
And they know the Bible. And they know God. And they're like, yeah, 90% of that sounds good.
Over here, that doesn't sound like the Bible. The devil loves to stand at the door of research
and development to try and impart at least one little lie. He's not going to be overt and try
and feed you 100% devil. He's like, yeah, take all that good God stuff and now let me
twist it a little bit. It's exactly what he did to Jesus when Jesus was led into the wilderness.
He goes into the wilderness and he takes the Word of God and tries to use it on the Word of God.
I'm like, what? Like the spirit of stupid. I mean, he owns that. I mean, it is just like
that. That's what he gives away all the time. And he's like, ah, man, I'm like,
bro, devil, Lucifer, weren't you in heaven a long time? You're trying to use the Word on the Word.
I'm like, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. That's that guy you're trying to use
the Word of the Word against. And it's like, what?
Sheesh. If you really think about it, sometimes it's hilarious what the devil does.
He's hilarious and he loses every time. I'm like, he's got one thing going for him. He's tenacious.
He just keeps trying. It's like a flailing animal that's dying, doesn't know it's dead already.
Problem with him is he's dead for eternity, just rotting, festering, torment.
That was deep. You're like, yeah. Don't feel sorry for the devil. Don't feel sorry for him.
Part of our leadership model, we talked about this idea of every tribe,
every tongue, every nation, this whole diversity model, which is God's idea.
It's God's idea. He created all of us. And one good thing, have you ever met someone
that you instantly had an affinity for? You're just like, oh, we're like best friends and we
just met. Anyone ever met someone like that? You just got along with them? Have you ever met
someone you didn't have that with? It was the antithesis of that. It was like
the whole other side of that. You met them and you're like, yeah.
You're out of here.
We're going to have people in church that are like that. What do we do with that?
What do we do with the people? I don't like their style of ministry. It's just not right.
Like we have a corner on every style of ministry.
It's like, that just rubs me the wrong way. And then we get into like,
they're probably doing it from a bad heart.
Right? Not you guys. Just like me. I'm just telling on me. I'm like, you guys are great.
Oh, bless their hearts. Well, me, I'm like, oh, there's probably something wrong with them.
And then I go to try and use my prophetic gift to dredge up the dirt in their own life.
Have you ever? I'm like, you guys are like, I can't believe they pay this guy to do this.
They should fire him. No, I'm just telling you real that comes up in your mind in a moment. What
do you do with that? I can remember it happening some years ago.
there was a particular minister here at Bethel Church. Oh, at Bethel. Yep. And I had that
feeling. I met this person and I had that feeling of like, oh man, their ministry
style makes me cringe. That's, that's horrible. Ah, I don't like that. And
instantly I knew I was partnering with offense. I was partnering with accusation,
the accuser. I was partnering with, I don't like things that don't look like
me. I'm just telling you. We all have done it. And I said, Lord, would you forgive me?
How do I deal with that? How do I deal with that thing? And God said, why don't
you serve that person's ministry? Well, you know, I, God, I don't get paid to do
that. I get paid to do this over here, what I like to do. You ask me a question, I just
gave you the answer. What are you gonna do? And I went up to this particular
person and said, hey, I, I, I lied. I said, I'd love to serve your ministry.
But it's actually, it was true because love is a choice. I would love to serve your ministry.
And I did it for two and a half years on a consistent basis. And within the first six
months, all of a sudden, I began to see things that I liked. I began to see a perspective. I
began to see an impact that that person's ministry style had that my ministry style
didn't have. I began to learn and grow and receive from someone who didn't look like me.
Romans 8, 19 is a key scripture for this. All creation longs for the sons of God to be revealed.
I'm a created being. So what does that mean? I long for you to be revealed in my life,
even if I don't like you. In God's infinite capacity to meet every single need that any
person ever had, it's crazy that out of his love and sovereignty, he chooses not to do that.
Let me explain. He chooses many times to take attributes of himself and he puts them in Josh,
and he puts them in Josh so that if I want the fullness of God, I have to value Josh to get that
attribute of God. And God does that with individuals. He does that with churches. He
does that with church denominations. He does that with cultures, nations. I'm a nation's man. I love
nations. Why? Because every time I go to a new nation, I experience a new culture, I get more
of the multifaceted glory of God in his nature. I get more of him. Why? Because God has reserved
unique aspects of himself to be only revealed in those people. Makes me have to value them.
And then I find myself becoming more and more mature because I have feedback from people who
do not look like me. And I start growing in a way that's incredible, in a way that's powerful.
Let's talk about this last one. I'll wrap up with this. Five minutes and then you get a break. Come
on, get ready. Coffee's over there, or in your kitchen. Come on. 1 Timothy chapter 3 verses 2
through 5. Now the overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate,
self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach. He must manage his family well. If
anyone does not know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of God's church?
My wife's statement is this. Revival isn't revival until it shows up in my home.
What's she saying? It's got to start here first. If that doesn't affect this in a
positive way, then something needs to change. Then that's not real revival
because it starts in family. It started in a family and it's going to stay in
family. Family is the container. It is what Stacy was talking about, the
ecclesia. It's the community of believer. It's a family model and I've got to
take care of my own family first. Now let me just tell you this
because some people are like, well my daughter isn't serving the Lord anymore.
How old is your daughter? She's 21. Well she's an adult. She has choices. Did you
raise her that way? No I didn't. Well okay, like you're not
disqualified from leadership because your children made a choice. Otherwise
Jesus is disqualified from being a Savior because look what Judas did. You
betrayed him. Well I thought Jesus was the best leader in the whole wide world.
Potentially the whole universe and all eternity, right? Except he had Judas and
he had Peter who denied him and all the other disciples except for one were
scattered when Jesus gets murdered on the cross.
But it's like how did he care for them? He gave them the same
opportunities. The same opportunities to serve. The same opportunities to make
choices. That's what leadership does. It actually gives freedom to make choices
to see what people are going to choose and then their choice defines their
character or where they're at in life. It's been really special right now this
this season where both my daughters just recently, my daughter Kira, she's 21
on the 22nd. She's like, God's been speaking to me dad. I'm like, yeah what's
he been speaking? I know this is crazy and I said I'd never do it but I feel
like I need to go to school of ministry. I'm like, yes.
Now part of mom and dad's deal was we never wanted to force that on our
children. It needs to be their choice. Well my daughter grew up in this
environment and it's been really painful for her because it's a very transient
environment. We have people coming in and going. It's coming and going,
coming and going and she loves deeply and she gets these friends and she loves
them so deep and the trauma of losing the level of friendship she had when
they go and then having to start over with someone else has been so hard. She
says, I don't know if I could ever do that again. It's painful but she just
made that choice. My other daughter Madison, she was crying on the front row
yesterday during the Inspire sessions, those season sessions and God's just
touching her crazy snot cry like she's just in it with God on her knees.
Rebecca Cooper's prophesying over her. You know, Haley's preaching her face off
and like she preached all our faces off. It was awesome and all is happening. It's
so incredible and she's like, hey dad, a friend of mine, her best friend
growing up, they spent all kinds of time together. Her dad had a dream of Madison
and in the dream she was going to a ministry school and the ministry school
was $11,000 and she's like, well I can't afford that. I don't have the
money for that and I knew instantly what this dream was about. She did
too but she didn't want to admit it. I'm like, hmm, funny it said ministry
school and this week she's like, hey I really feel like I'm supposed to go
to school of ministry as well. So both my daughters. Now I'm just waiting on
Connor, my son, come on. This is his year. But both my daughters and she's like, hey
dad, did you know that ministry school, three years, cost $11,000 to go to school?
I'm like...
Like, hmm, I knew that.
But I'm like, I'm pretty sure I might
be able to get you a deal, might be able to get you a deal.
Let me talk to my boss, KV.
All right, well, hopefully we gave you
some meat in that session.
Lord, would you seal those things
in our hearts and our minds and give us a great ability
to not only apply it in our own life,
but to be able to reproduce it in our communities
and in the places and spaces that you've gifted us to lead.
And that starts with our family, that we
would reproduce that level of leadership,
that level of father-mother leadership
style in our own family.
And we'd reproduce it in a way that looks like the kingdom.
In Jesus' name, amen.
How long is our break?
15-minute break.
Stretch, have fun, we'll see you soon.