Minutes from the Des Moines Meeting

Last Friday I got back from a wonderful trip to a four-day international general meeting of the Body of Christ hosted by the assembly in Des Moines, Iowa. This was my first time in Des Moines, and I had a great time! I enjoyed the fellowship with friends on the van there and back as well as at the meeting itself. I stayed in a hotel room with my pastor Bro. Encil Edmonds and had a good time with him too. (Even if he does sleep with the TV on all night and made fun of my skim milk!) ;-)

There were so many good things said by the ministers who spoke at this meeting that I could not hope to convey it all. It would be well worth it to order the DVDs from the meeting. I certainly left the meeting feeling like we had been well fed.

One of the salient features, for me, was the preponderance of international ministers who added so much depth to the services. Nearly half of the preachers were from outside the US, and they had such good things to say. It seems that God has been moving mightily around the world. The gospel message is truly reaching to the ends of the earth. There is much work still to do, no doubt, but thank God for men who have had a burden to labor in God's field abroad as well as here at home!

Here are just some of the highlights from the meeting that I wrote in my notes:

Tuesday night

Bro. Glenn Goodwin (Des Moines) opened the meeting with a message about the direction Christianity in general has been moving over the last 100 years as well as a call to us to be different than the "Wal-mart community church". His point was that churches have often catered to the desires of the community rather than being built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets. We are to be a peculiar people! Some quotable quotes: "You don't judge a church by the problems it has, but by the way it handles the problems it has." "You will not ever be fulfilled until you're useful." "His burden is light but it still must be borne."

Bro. Eddie Gatsi (Zimbabwe) said, "As long as you are in the house of God, the space you are occupying is valuable space. God gives us space to become productive."

Wednesday

Bro. Dowson Meme (Mbale, Uganda) read a couple of scriptures from the old testament, one of which had Elijah seeking the Lord's voice in the wind, the earthquake, and the fire, but finding it in none of these. In the other location, God's voice was heard out of the midst of a fire. He used this to illustrate that we need to be ready to hear the voice of the Lord wherever it is found.

Bro. William Waters (Warren, MI) said that we are to adopt the priorities of Jesus Christ.

Wednesday Night

Bro. Langston Mboneka (Haboroni, Botswana) contrasted a fountain and a cistern. He pointed out that a cistern is something that is made by man. It collects dirt along with the water. A fountain, on the other hand, is natural, springing up from the ground, made by God. We want to be drinking from the fountain of living waters, not collecting tainted waters in our man-made cisterns!

Bro. Norbert Nwokeji (Nigeria) told of the first time that he came to Des Moines in 1985 and heard Bro. Lloyd Goodwin prophesy of the healing of the Body.

Bro. John Githinji (Hartford, CT) was very entertaining. He asked the rhetorical question, "Have you ever stood up to preach, and God sat down?" Other quotable quotes: "When the glory of God departs, man tries to manufacture his own glory." "There is not an African body, an American body, and an Indian body. There is ONE body! This is why I'm not going to start out by saying, 'I'm sorry I'm from Africa; I'm sorry I'm black; I'm sorry I'm white.' I'm your brother! God put me here! I'm not going anywhere!"

Thursday

Bro. Narrain Richards (Elmont, NY): "The image has become reality, and the shadow has become substance." (I just thought that was such a poetic way of expressing Christ's fulfillment of the Old Testament!) "There is an absolute God, but none of us knows Him absolutely. He does know us, though." How comforting to know that He knows me! "Egypt can make you a leader of man, but only the wilderness can make you a true servant of God."

Bro. Steve Wilkinson (Bourbannais, IL): "Grace by no means removes us from our responsibility. It enhances our responsibility because it removes any excuses that we may have in our minds." Particularly when we fail God, we may feel that our failures prevent us from doing His work, but grace removes that excuse. Not only does grace allow forgiveness of sin, it empowers us to serve Him in spite of failure. Bro. Wilkinson went on to point out the similarities between chastening and teaching (indeed, they're often translated from the same word). "Teaching is about showing us how to live a disciplined life and make wise choices." "A pastor comes with a set of strengths and a set of weaknesses. We can't focus on a minister's weaknesses or he won't be able to do a thing to help us." "Some day we'll be looking back at death rather than forward to it."

Bro. Billy Brown (Humble, TX): "We come to church to see what Jesus is doing and we read the morning paper to see what God is doing. God is still in charge of the world." "It takes you and God to get you saved. Phil. 2:13 shows that God helps us to want to do His will." "It's important to preach the gospel, but it's necessary to live it. Phil. 2:16 mentions 'holding forth the word of life.' We do this through our actions, by living that word of life."

Friday

Bro. Rick Moore (Akron, OH): "A teacher's greatest responsibility is to let his student become wiser than him." "Solomon made lots of mistakes, but we don't tear out the Proverbs or Ecclesiastes from the Bible. It wasn't Solomon that wrote those things alone, but God inspired him. We can't help but be marked by the spot of the teachers of our past, but we're seeking to be marked by the 'spot of his children.'(Dt. 32:5)"

This is just a sampling of the great words that I heard. I highly recommend the DVDs or CDs of the meeting. Thanks to my friends Aaron and Gina as well as the rest of the Des Moines assembly for your hospitality last week. I enjoyed hanging out with you and the kids and I definitely plan to return to Des Moines to visit again in the future!