Jesus Culture Encounter Re-cap

Written by Banning Liebscher Thursday, 21 February 2008 16:00

Wow! I'm not even sure where to start. How do I recap what God did less then 48 hrs. Encounter was off the charts. We had crazy, passionate, radical young revivalists gather from 24 states and 6 nations for two days to seek God and encounter His presence. Everyday I live with a sense of overwhelming gratitude that I am alive in this hour of history. This is the greatest hour of history ever and I'm alive right in the middle of it. Sometimes I think I put on these conferences just so I can get a guaranteed front row seat. It's priceless for me to be able to sit back and just watch God show up and touch people's lives. He is possessing these young revivalists.

Thousands of lives being set on fire, falling more in love with Jesus. It's impossible not to be encouraged by the testimonies we hear from the conference and all the things that happen after the conference when the young people and their leaders get back to their city. For years I read books on revival and I longed to see the things I read about. But now I realize we are seeing what I used to read about and more! The things that stirred within me a hunger for me I am now experiencing first hand. Revivalists being raised up and released who are seeing souls saved, lives set free, signs and wonders, angelic encounters, cities and campuses being transformed. It's truly awesome.

It was so good to have Dutch Sheets with us this year. He is an apostolic father who brought such a timely and empowering word about an Awakening and our role in it. I could so feel an impartation when he was speaking to actually experience the Awakening he was describing. If you weren't able to make the conference or just want to hear the sermons again you can go to our media player and the two sermons are available. Something was deposited in our lives that will bear fruit for years to come.

This year because of the growth we have been experiencing we had to have an overflow conference at Bethel. We sold out the Convention Center and opened up Bethel for those who couldn't get in to the Convention Center. And sure enough, the overflow conference blew up! I've got to give a big shout out to all of those that were in that conference. God showed up because of the hunger in the lives of people attending there. Right now we are working on next year to make sure everyone gets to go to the live conference.

We recorded our annual Jesus Culture worship CD/DVD at the conference. Kim Walker, Chris Quilala, and Melissa How (formerly Wise) tore it up! As always, the young people tore the roof off the place with their worship. This CD is going to be incredible. I've been listening to the rough recording and already think it will be our best CD/DVD yet. It's an amazing experience to gather with thousands of youth and young adults who love to worship and pour themselves out in passionate love for Jesus.

Our next stop will be in Australia in March, then we head to Dallas/Ft. Worth in May, then Atlanta and Orange County in June, then back to Redding in July, then England in October. If you are in any of those areas make sure you come out and run with us.

On a side note, our T-shirts will be online at the webstore very shortly and you can always pick up the worship CD's from there as well (Kim Walker's new CD just came out).

Keep Burning!