Need a quick reference of the Onething Conference Schedule on your iPhone? Look no further.

If you are in Kansas City coming to the conference or whether you are tracking with is on your computer, tablet, or smartphone, below are two free calendars that will automatically import the conference schedule on your phone. Below are two calendars. One is the Main Stage Schedule and the other is the Prayer Room schedule. Blessings!

Click here for Conference Main Stage Schedule.

Click here for Conference Prayer Room Schedule.

***These are subject to change

One day while in the in the prayer room about four years ago, I came across an article[1] that succeded to break through my familiarty with much of the Christmas story, drawing me to linger longer at the relationship between the angels and the birth of Jesus.

This baby is announced by the host of heaven. We must be careful to not let our familiar usage of the word host to lead us to think it simply means a large number or quantity. This is not how this word is used in the Bible! The biblical usage of this word in the Greek (transliterated stratia) is a term consistently employed to speak of military personnel or a group of soldiers![2]. With that key insight in view, let’s pull back from the sentimental Christmas wrap cluttering the Gift of who this Babe is and what is taking place.

Imagine the Terror

Imagine if you dwelt in a small rural town and heard that the town had been surrounded by a multitude of men. Furthermore, these were not just any men, but an army clad in military attire bearing arms of formidable force! You would probably feel like countless others on history’s pages who frighteningly quaked moments before their homes and lives were ravaged in the spoils of war. Imagine that after hearing the announcement, trembling, you and the rest of the town are summoned to come out to the mighty brigade surrounding the city to hear an announcement, undoubtedly a doom-laden one. Yet, to your surprise, the armies proclamation was…PEACE.

This is essentially what the LORD did in sending the angelic host to announce the birth of Jesus. He sent a fierce army who’s message ultimately trumpeted peace. But why did the LORD orchestrate this? Why were the armies of heaven dispatched to sing at Jesus’ birth? Let’s look at Luke 2 again:

10Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. 11For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. 12And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.”(Lk 2:10–12)

The LORD of Hosts Lying in a Manger

The angel of the LORD speaks to the shepherds concerning the identity of the Babe who has been born. He is Savior, Christ (messiah), and LORD (Lk.2:11). While much could be said about all three, we will focus only briefly upon the Babe’s identity as LORD. The angel’s announcement that the baby in Bethlehem was LORD or Yahweh implies that He is the LORD of hosts, the captain of the armies of heaven.

…the song sung on the fields of Bethlehem is not being sung by a heavenly choir, complete with long robes, arranged in neat rows with sopranos, altos, tenors, and basses andsinging a song of victory—or even a song of simple praise and ‘glory to God.’ This στρατιά is rather an army of angels —a multitude of the heavenly army (we can infer from Matthew 26:53 that theremay be as many as twelve legions) —and they are singing their song in full battle array, and the words that they sing are, in essence, a celestial version of ‘Hail to the Chief.’” [1]

Think about it. The armies on high have come to proclaim the birth of the Man of war (Ex.15:3; Ps.24:8) whom they undoubtedly have a history with. It was this Babe who led them against Pharoah (Exodus), rallied them to strengthen David (2 Sam. 5:10, 22–25; Psalm 18:8-19), and poised them for battle in flaming chariots seen by Elisha (2 Kings 6).

However the gracious irony is that the birth of the Man of war, is proclaimed as “peace.” His armies proclaim this arrival as one of amnesty. This Man of war came to save the objects of His wrath (Eph.2:3) from the day of His wrath (Rom. 2:5–6).

Essentially He came to save us from Himself and His own zealous wrath against sin. This Day is the Day of the LORD of hosts, when He will come again to make war upon those who despised the riches of His forbearance and the amnesty provided in His Lamb-blood [3]. The military multitude who announced peace at the birth of the Man of war, will come again accompanying their LORD (2 Thes. 1:7–10) singing a different song concerning their Captain in Rev.19:1–8.[4]

Responding

The lowly birth of their Commander was not sufficient to curtail the angels descent upon of the Son of Man nor their song of the glory of His grace. May His birth likewise strike the chord of praise in us at a condescension inconceivable. And like his father David who kept his sheep in the fields of Bethlehem (1 Sam 16:19), One greater than David has been born in Bethlehem who will likewise put himself in harm’s way to save His sheep from the mouth of the lion (1 Sam.17:34–35). How much greater is He than David? He is David’s LORD (Ps.110:1; Matt 22:43–46) whose goings forth are from everlasting (Micah 5:2) – Selah.

Question: What is your favorite meditation on the Christmas story? How have you penetrated through the familiarity?

Grace and peace to you,

The Candlers

At the top of the list of its uniqueness are its people, the glory of this nation. The people of Singapore are the consistently the world record holders in their national past time, eating. They have a strong value and love for family and hospitality. And while they are some of the most brilliant and hard-working people I have ever met, they carry a love for life and a hunger for learning.

But when they worship the Lamb of God, when their cries of His all-glorious worth intermingle with the songs of the seraphim, you might need to pinch yourself, because you may for a moment think you may have joined Moses and the 70 elders of Israel atop Mount Sinai worshiping the LORD. And like the Sinai feast of old (Ex.24:11) I wouldn’t put it past the Singaporeans to bring out the food in the midst of their songs of worship

I love the LORD for the international family of affection that He is joining together all over the earth. Though I am 8,000 miles away the paint on the walls in this house has dried in similar shades of home. Psalm 27:4 and Leviticus 6:12 coat the walls in conviction, passion, and perseverance here in Singapore as they do in Kansas City.

Have had a wonderful time so far in Singapore and we are just getting started. Singapore is a 24+ hour flight from Kansas City, whew, OK, enough on that <smile>. This is my second time to Singapore, my first time was about 10 years ago when Dana and I did a ministry trip with Gary Wiens. This time, Jesse Underwood accompanied me, an aspiring worship leader at IHOPKC. After a long journey through Hong Kong, we arrived, got refreshed, and began getting acquainted with this fantastic city. Jesse and I came to participate in a conference called The Call, hosted by Onething Ministries Singapore. The conference begins tonight, so this is just a short preview of our journey here and a brief snapshot of what we have seen in Singapore.

So why did we come to Singapore?

• Because of the worth of Jesus to receive praise from the ends of the earth.
• To call and awaken a generation to the role they are to play in this unique time frame.
• To strengthen the church in Singapore to become a people of one thing (Ps.27:4).

Grace and peace to you,

The Candlers

Anew year commences, and with it comes the gift of a fresh start and a renewal of vows paid to the Lord in days and months and years past. Like a new dawn to a long night, a new beginning immerges, and something within me leaps with a new breath. Yes, it’s time to renew the sacred pledges, the holy chasings. This past year’s offering is one that I might not have chosen but am grateful for nonetheless. It is the gift of fresh awareness of my dependency, and more specifically, my spiritual dependency.  How dependent I am to keep this heart alive, to cause this heart to burn in deeper love. My weakness He has etched more deeply upon my soul this year – the rocky crags of my barren land. He’s caused my clinging to dig deeper into the Vine, desperate and dependent. I have seen how utterly and even bitterly weak I am – how I’ve nothing apart from Him. These are necessary knowings. For only in the clinging comes the fruit bearing and never by any other way.

I lift my eyes to the rising glimmer upon the horizon of this new year. Love must win again this year. 

 And so carrying this year’s gift as deep etchings upon my soul, grateful and humbled, I lift my eyes to the rising glimmer upon the horizon of this new year. Love must win again this year. And Expectation, wide-eyed as a child, rushes ahead of me with candid liveliness, her eyes searching for the One in whom all hope is anchored. With questions of, “Will He come again and answer me?” and, “Will He meet this weakness with His beautiful strength?” marking her trail, she dares to press. With lucid and piercing eyes, she immerges from the fog of yesteryear, compelling all behind her to follow her fixed gaze.

It’s time to believe. It’s time to arise. It’s time to be stirred in the deep of me and let raw longings for the Holy One lift their voices with strength. For He, as Expectation’s wide-eyes remind me, fiercely attends to His desire to bring me forth victorious, blameless in love, and filled with the fruits of bright righteousness (Eph. 1:4; Phil. 1:11). Forgetting what is behind, that which I am not fit to measure, I press forward (Phil. 3: 13; 1 Cor. 4:3). With fresh remembrance of my raw weakness engraved vividly upon my soul, I arise. With sweet consolation found in the remembrance of His rich abundance and extravagance, I begin the race and the holy chase of 2012.

From my book Entirety,“… In the midst of the Christmas season, let us meditate on the greatness of Jesus’ full-givenness in love for us…” We know and think of Jesus from our first sight of Him, a helpless Baby lain in a manger in an environment so primitive and crude. We recall the stories of His youth, how He taught in the synagogue and how He grew in wisdom and favor with God and man (Lk. 2:52). We know Him later in His ministry to the masses, His teachings and His healings, His words of profound authority and weight, His compassion and demonstrations of love unparalleled—ultimately culminating in a cross of utter self-giving, the supreme symbol of love, the image of the greatest offering ever given.

…unless we push back that curtain to the scenes before the shepherds and kings, we will not know the unutterable greatness and scandalous entrance of this One who gave Himself unto those who were once His enemies…

When we think of Jesus, we begin with these images and these conceptions, for this is how He first revealed Himself to us. Yet there is more to His story than the frail beginnings of Bethlehem, and unless we push back that curtain to the scenes before the shepherds and kings to that which preceded the angelic host on Bethlehem’s hillside, we will not know the unutterable greatness and scandalous entrance of this One who gave Himself unto those who were once His enemies—the One who laid down His life, His all, not just in part but in entirety. Jesus, the Living Word, was God from eternity, begotten before time, dwelling in the unapproachable light with the Father, inhabiting the everlasting ages before the world was made in all glory and majesty (Jn. 1:1-2). Perpetually worshipped by angels, He possessed all things from all eternity, and to any onlooker of the adoring heavenly hosts, there was no apparent reason for this to change.

Yet in the heart of God, from this love of the Holy Three, there was a plan of scandalous proportions rooted in outrageous love, and the crux of that plan involved the unthinkable departing of the Begotten Son from the shrouds of unapproachable light and the unimaginable emptying of Himself in the assumption of a human frame. It meant the unthinkable mystery that God the Creator would enter the world through the womb of a young maiden whom He Himself created, and ultimately, the shocking culmination of God hanging on a cross—the eternal statement of His endless hatred of sin and everlasting love of mankind.

The Baby that we find in the manger was the same One who was eternally the Possessor of All, the Author of Life, the uncreated One who was with God from everlasting (Mic. 5:2). He did not consider His eternal exaltation as something to be grasped and used for His own gain, but rather He chose in transcendent love to empty Himself of so great an exaltation, making Himself of no reputation and taking on the form of a bondservant (Phil. 2:6-7).

Out of the erupting love and desire of the Godhead, the Son left the covering of unapproachable light and the vastness of His heavenly riches, wrapping Himself in the profound obscurity of poor humanity and becoming to the natural eye nothing more than a newborn Jewish boy, and later a typical young man, son of a carpenter, from Nazareth. In these obscure, ordinary beginnings, the extraordinary occurred: God took on the plight of humanity, the weakness and frailty of our dilemma and forever assumed His identity as our Brother, making us bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh forever.

Trouble-free Christianity? No such thing in the mind of Jesus? Jesus tells us that each day has its fair share of trouble,  ”Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.“

But what “trouble” is in view here? In the immediate context of Jesus’ address, the subject matter at hand concerns being troubled (i.e. worry) over two categories of life. First, the basic necessities of life like food and clothing (Matt 6:31-32). Compared to the rest of the world, we in the West face less anxiety if we will eat today, but even this is changing as those living in poverty has reached an all time high in the US, especially children (see here).

The second category is trouble over treasures (Matt 6:19). What treasures? we think to ourselves. My mind naturally conjures up images of pirate chests of gold and large family inheritances of money and land. Yet, I have a sense that treasures simply speak of anything we value beyond basic necessities. In other words, those with treasures are not “those other rich people” but us.  Jesus was speaking to us, those with treasures, or things that have an objective value to us day to day. What are these treasures?  Things like our vehicle, phone, computer, garage door, water heater and more. These are things that are valuable to us, our treasures.

In the passage above, Jesus links worrying with our treasures. Well, for our family, this last week (month?) has been cause for much trouble over treasures. Yes, my above list is not merely an arbitrary laundry list, but “treasures” which have either broken partially or fully in recent days. As each day unfolded, a new treasure broke resulting worry over fixing or replacing that treasure.

Of course, it is not “bad” to want to fix our treasures. The danger comes when we are troubled more by broken treasures now than we are troubled by broken treasure in the age to come (kingdom of heaven).  Therefore Jesus warns us that every day will have trouble, both basic necessities and treasures.

In the midst of treasure trouble Jesus invites us to worry more about treasure in His kingdom. My tendency is to seek Him first to fix my treasure. 

This sort of trouble will not end, but continues assuredly each day. He implores us to not set our heart upon a trouble-free treasure day because it is a pipe dream.  If we do this, we will never get around to seeking first an inheritance in His coming kingdom which is in accord with our righteousness. In the midst of treasure trouble Jesus invites us to worry more about treasure in His kingdom. My tendency is to seek Him first to fix my treasure. When I become treasure troubled, I subtly allow the cares of this life to choke the life-changing power of the word from my heart (Matt 13:22). When the implanted word of God is choked, my inward transformation is stunted, and my future kingdom inheritance endangered (James 1:21, Matt 13:23). Knowing that each day will be filled with trouble, Jesus, in all of His tender directness, beckons us to to seek treasure in His Kingdom first. Whether our trouble is due to the breaking of our treasures or the basic necessities of life, He invites us as He did David, “Seek My face“, to which our hearts cry out, “Your face, LORD, we will seek!” (Ps. 27:7-9).

Question: What treasures have troubled you lately? Did you maintain a focus of seeking heavenly treasure in the midst of it? Why or why not? Leave your comments below.