Mar 25, 2014

Bible Study on My Travel


Was sitting at the airport in New York yesterday, on my way to Pittsburgh. So happy about the two-year anniversary we celebrated at our daughter church SOS Church Bienne Switzerland on Sunday. I was working on a Bible study on the new covenant and the Spirit of Law of Life. Here's a brief selection. Here we go:
The New Covenant
This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel
    after that time, declares the Lord.
I will put my laws in their minds
    and write them on their hearts.
I will be their God,
    and they will be my people.
Heb 8:10


God decided to make a new and better pact with His people and in the long run, with all of his cherished humanity through His Son Jesus (Heb 8:6). The old covenant was replaced with a new and better one. Finally we became His people for real and He our God. We became children of the promise!

Jesus said in His sermon on the mount that He did not come to abolish the law and the prophets, but to fulfill it. Our righteousness was to go far beyond that of the Jewish Pharisees (Matt 5:17-20). The surprised listeners that day wondered how this would happen. That day Jesus sharpened the law yet at the same time His words breathed hope, authority and power. But how was this righteousness about to take place and be fulfilled?


After God had reconciled with us through Jesus' death and resurrection, He gave us His Holy Spirit. Through the Spirit it was now possible to live out the law through simply following the nudges of the heart. God wrote the commandments in our heart and minds when we were saved. Jesus meant that "the double commandment of love"; i.e. love God and your neighbor as yourself, was the fulfillment of the law and the new "commandment". This commandment of love replaced all the others. (Mark 12, Joh 13) Love does not want any evil (1 Cor 13:5).

One who follows the commandment of love must, and simply has no choice than to live pure. The Apostle Paul calls it "the Spirit of law of life " (Rom 8:2). We follow the Spirit who leads us on the narrow road that leads to life and ultimately leads us home to Jesus.

So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 
Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 
Gal 5:16 & 25

Through the new covenant we are circumcised in our inner being. A circumcision of the heart through an active and living faith. We received a new covenant-sign; love. We became His people. This happened completely supernaturally when we believed the gospel. We were born again through His Spirit because of grace and faith. By listening in faith we received the Spirit and not by following the law. The letter of the law that killed, suddenly became alive through the Holy Spirit. We now receive our encouragement from God and not from people. We stand in grace. We live through the victory of Jesus. We follow the Spirit.

See ya!

Mar 22, 2014

The Italian Dolomites

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God.
Rom 5:1-2


I'm sitting way up in the Italian Dolomites drinking espresso in the sun. The village Misurina is beautiful and not far from the South Tyrol border... I managed to order coffee and exchange some polite phrases in my poor Italian with the old lady that runs the hotel here. I actually studied Italian for two whole years. Proud of myself :).


I'm gaining strength all by myself in the Austrian Alps a few days. This is actually the place where I have my earliest roots... I was born in the little town Villach in Kärnten just a few miles from the Italian border, but lived a few years as a little child in Lienz, Eastern Tyrol just by the Dolomites... There was an earthquake in 1975 and we slept in the car, the entire family.
I stayed in Neustift outside of Brixen, Southern Tyrol tonight, and now went up to the Alps for a little while...

Seeking God, reading the book of Romans. Gaining strength and power. Want to go on running my race and finish strong...

See ya!

Mar 17, 2014

Mar 11, 2014

God's Word is not Chained!

Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, descended from David. This is my gospel, 9 for which I am suffering even to the point of being chained like a criminal. But God’s word is not chained. 
2 Tim 2:8-9

The crowd grew to 60,000+ the final night of the festival!

I am sitting at the airport in Istanbul, tired, on my way home to my dear Stockholm again. Soon I'll lumber around in my Adidas shorts in my kitchen in Tullinge again. In just a few hours I'll play cards and drink coffee with Maria and my teenagers...

I'll try to compile an amazing festival week in Sialkot, Pakistan. We gathered 115,000 people during three days of open air meetings! The crowd grew from almost 20,000 on Friday night to over 60,000 on Sunday! (Numbers from the Police, not our own). We estimate that around 35,000 precious Pakistanis prayed a salvation prayer with us and a genuine follow up work has already begun. Disciples are to be made, taught and trained! We ran out of follow up material!

Jesus baptizes in Holy Spirit at the Pastors Seminar!

We gathered around 500 pastors and evangelists for a two day seminar with focus on church planting and power evangelism. About 80 were baptized in the Holy Spirit and started speaking in tongues for the first time in their lives when Jesus dipped them in His fire! You know, He still does baptize in Holy Spirit and fire! Thank you Jesus!

Jesus performed miracles every night! Blind, deaf. mute and paralyzed where immediately healed and cried out their stories from the platform! Several tumors disappeared the final night.

Jesus opens deaf ears!
Sabia here had been demon possessed for 22 years, but Jesus set her completely free!
Soleyman had been deaf since he was a little child, but this night he started hearing again!

A little boy (7 years old) had had a large tumor right by his scrotum. Totally unashamed, he pulled down his pants and showed us that it had dissapeared! His parents were crying and rejoicing like crazy! A woman told us that she no longer could feel or find the large tumor in her left breast anymore! Yes! Either people lie very well, or the fact is that Jesus performs tremendous miracles! What do you think? I believe in MIRACLES!

Kiran had breast cancer, but Jesus removed the tumor during healing prayer!

We also saw God's mercy in many and very exciting ways. Favor with the Police Department, the Chief Mullah etc. Exciting to hear how thought through the local Pentecostal churches had planned the follow up. They will baptize thousands! I have no doubt about that!

Thank you Jesus! Thank you all prayer warriors! Thank you all financial supporters! Thank you to my faithful and hard working festival team! Thank you to my dear Festival General Peter Almqvist - without you, nothing works...

All glory to our mighty God!

See ya!

Mar 4, 2014

Monday Afternoon in Istanbul

I am enjoying coffee and reading the Bible in Turkey, on my way to Pakistan. Reading and meditating on the last three chapters of the book of Revelation.


Heaven - final destination, or beginning of life? Well, considering that life down here on earth lasts somewhere 80-120 years at its longest, heaven, or eternity should count as the start of real life... Do we really believe in our salvation message about both heaven and an eternity with God? Yes, and then death is really only a door right in the beginning of our timeline. Weird that there are believers that are both afraid of, and mourn death so much. Death anxiety does not align with true Christian faith. Death is both exciting and titillating for a genuine Jesus-disciple. Life here on earth is only a sneeze and blink in comparison to eternity.

It will be so wonderful to come home to Jesus one day. Everything will be so much better! A sort of sound longing for death is actually also Christian and gives us both perspective and right priorities. Heaven - what a hope! We just don't live here and now. Stuff. gold, silver is not life. We live 100% down here on earth of course, having a positive outlook on life, but also 200% for what is to come and is so much better - up there.

I hope you understand me. I am not tired of life or depressed, rather very hungry on life, before and after death. Peace for the future fills us when we spend time with God through the Holy Spirit. There is no room for worries about getting old or about death in the presence of Jesus. When we pass through the two dimensions and go from one life to another, better life, well yeah... then we die. We resurrect  directly to something that is stronger and better!


One day we will bow our knees before Him. One day we will see His face. One day we will lift our hands and worship Him - only Him! We sang about Him, prayed to Him and preached Him! Then and there we will meet Him! He that is our life! Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!

Then we will meet those who have gone before us. Then we will rest without sorrow, troubles or tears. Death, where is your sting?!

See ya!