Pagh's Blog

Michelle Bachmann Dinner Prayer

2010-04-13T14:44:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, April 7, I was blessed to give the opening prayer at a fundraising dinner for Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann at the Minneapolis Hilton. About 2,000 guests were in attendance. Special guests included: Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, and FOX News Commentator and Talk-Show Host, Sean Hannity.

The following is the text from the prayer I shared:

Let’s stand and turn our hearts towards God.

In the book of Philippians, God Word declares:

“Always be full of joy in the Lord. I say it again – rejoice! Let everyone see that you are considerate in all you do. Remember, the Lord is coming soon. Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. If you do this, you will experience God’s peace which is far more wonderful than the human mind can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.” (Phil. 4:4-7)

As we continue to celebrate the joy of Easter, let’s bow our heads in prayer:

Our loving and gracious God; there are many things in this world that cause us to worry these days. We are concerned for our families, our schools, our places of business, our government, our communities and this nation that we love. We confess that we often battle anxiety in a world challenged by poverty, disease, natural disasters, terrorism and war.

Yet you have counseled us not to worry about anything but to pray about everything. So, this evening we begin this wonderful gathering in prayer. We turn to you, O God, and give thanks for our many blessings in life. We thank you for the delicious meal and inspiring program that we are about to share.

May your blessings of love, wisdom, life and health rest upon every honored speaker, every guest, and all those who serve us so graciously in this beautiful setting. We speak peace here on behalf of the one who declared, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.”

We ask a special blessing tonight on Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann, her husband Marcus and their family. We thank you for her passionate service to our country. We ask that you would continue to bless her with every good gift as she seeks to be your servant. And, we pray for all those who are serving in government; in local, state and national offices.

We ask your blessing on Governor Pawlenty and his family. We also ask your blessing on President Obama and his family. And Lord, may your protection and blessing rest on our military, especially those who are serving in harms way separated from the ones they love.

But tonight, almighty God, we gather with a great burden to pray for our country, the United States of America. We repent of our sin and turn to you, O God. We ask that you would not remove your hand of blessing from us but continue to guide and lead this great nation into justice and truth.

O Lord, we thank you that you are not finished with us yet, and that even though this world often feels out of control, you are yet in control. O Father, we praise you for your Son who is the light of the world. And we declare that because of Jesus, we are not called to curse the darkness, but to let his light shine through us.

Pour out your Holy Spirit, O God. Transform this nation from the inside out! Move in the hearts of people everywhere that together we would express the love, the compassion and the character of the One who is the author of every true and lasting freedom and the foundation of every great nation.

In Jesus’ name I pray! Amen and Amen!

Report from the International Transformation Network in Honolulu, Hawaii

2009-11-10T08:35:00.000-08:00

Hello friends and partners,

Thank you for your prayers and support for our team here at the ITN conference in Honolulu, Hawaii. The conference was moved here rather than Argentina this year, under the leading of the Holy Spirit, so that the delegates could be a blessing to Hawaii and more accessible to people from Asia where God is moving in such powerful ways. There are 540 “international delegates” representing 27 countries, and much to our delight, another 500 Hawaiians that have joined our evening meetings! This is an answer to prayer. But even better, many of the historic wounds that have kept Hawaiians isolated even from one another are being healed!

Josh and Christina VanVooren and Larry and Kirsten Tate have been wonderful partners and representatives of Christ Church. We are enjoying our conversations with so many awesome Christian brothers and sisters from around the world. There are seven new DVD Transformation stories being introduced throughout the conference. One of them is “The Ongoing Story of Transformation in Elk River, MN.” It will be shown on the last day and I will share that morning. We filmed this summer and I’m very pleased with the result. It will be fun to show it to our church family some Sunday morning.

The overall level of testimonies and teaching just continues to accelerate. For example, last night we heard from Pastor Brian Burton from Phuket, Thailand. It was like reading the book of Acts. People are coming to the Lord by the hundreds… whole villages. Miracles are taking place on a daily basis. Seven million dollars in bribe money has been returned by officials from the government, police and business that is being used to build schools, hospitals and care for those impacted by typhoons and tsunamis.

Tonight we heard from Pastor Kong Hee from City Harvest Church in Singapore. His congregation has 25,000 members and worships in an arena larger than the Target Center. They impact 640 million people a week through a television teaching ministry. They are providing spiritual covering and teaching resources for 5,000 underground cell churches in China. His wife, Sun, is the leading “pop” recording artist in Asia with many #1 records and is impacting the whole media/music/entertainment industry. Here’s a “Transformation Church” that is training every member to be a minister in the marketplace and is impacting all of southeast Asia and China. Amazing!

I have been working closely with Ed Silvoso and Dave Thompson in coordinating the program and the workshops. With so many amazing testimonies to share it is quite a challenge to “orchestrate” these days together. We are leaning heavily on the Holy Spirit and have been very blessed by how things have come together. I have been privileged to speak and be used by God in a variety of ways. Today I led two workshops on “Developing a Transformation Church” along with fellow pastors Brian Burton from Thailand and Poncho Murgia from Juarez, Mexico. There were about 100 in attendance at each workshop, both pulpit and marketplace ministers. There is a tremendous desire for resources to give traction in the local congregation, so Faith Beyond Belief was enthusiastically received once again. A man from Japan asked for permission to translate it for the churches there. There is also great excitement for future releases of “At a Crossroads” and “Enemies No More.” So, this is an avenue of service that God has given us at Christ Church to be able to bless others around the world!

God has also put it upon my heart to host a Transformation Church Pastors Conference in Minnesota next June. Please join our team in prayer even now. As we have shared the idea with some pastors here at the ITN conference there has been a great response. We would welcome pastors from around the world for a 2-day conference at Christ Church and in our communities that would be open to people from our 5-state region. Then, we would bus just the pastors to a resort/camp somewhere in Minnesota for 3-days of “retreat time” in deep fellowship, equipping, personal ministry and lots of fun. Pastors are needing to get connected and receive at a deeper level as we develop Transformation Churches around the world. We will pray and see where God takes us!

Thanks again for your prayers and support. The witness of Christ Church and the Pray Elk River movement continues to encourage many others. We look forward to sharing more highlights and insights this coming Sunday!

The Father's Heart

2009-10-09T14:22:00.000-07:00

I took a risk this past Sunday but one nudged by the Holy Spirit. After 18 years at Christ Church I told my congregation, “I am blessed to continue serving as your pastor, but today I also commit myself to be a spiritual father.” Why this offer?

We live in a world of spiritual orphans! The hole in people’s hearts is so often the result of a deep wound from a father – neglect, abandonment, abuse, harshness, unfaithfulness – you know the list! There are plenty of other experiences in life that can cut to the core, but the impact of a “father wound” is especially devastating because these experiences are almost always correlated with God.

That’s why Jesus not only “redeemed us” by paying the price of his life, but “reconciled” us to the Father, restoring a relationship broken by sin. The Apostle Paul put it this way: “For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’ The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now, if we are children, then we are heirs – heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ.” (Romans 8:15-17a)

Friends, through the miracle of the cross we have become sons and daughters of a heavenly Father and brothers and sisters with Jesus and one another! We’ve been adopted into God’s family so that every earthly wound from our past can be healed.

Your Father’s love for you is so amazing! The disciple John wrote, “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” (I John 3:1a) Don’t let your past experiences define you any more. Don’t let the world press you into its mold any longer. You are not the sum of your history or the opinions of others no matter how hurtful! You’ve been given a new set of credentials.

In Jesus you are a “new creation,” a child of God, the son or daughter of the King, and your heavenly Father’s gift to you is inner healing. That’s why the Apostle Paul prayed, “For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being.” (Ephesians 3:14-16)

Strength and healing from the inside out! We can’t do this ourselves no matter how hard we try. And what strength will this be? As a child of God, his Spirit dwells in you, your identity is established in him and you receive power to experience the full measure of God’s love in Jesus Christ. The hole in your heart can only be filled by this healing from above.

Paul saw these wounds in the lives of the young Christians at Corinth. And so he said, “Even though you have ten thousand guardians in Christ, you do not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. Therefore I urge you to imitate me.” (I Corinthians 4:15-16)

To experience the kind of transformation and growth that God desires for our lives I believe that we must know our heavenly Father first, and then, we must each have some spiritual fathers (and mothers) here on earth who are willing to say, “I urge you to imitate me.” Not perfect… but willing to put it all on the line for Jesus! More than a guardian… a father.

I’m blessed to have two amazing earthly spiritual dads; my father, Gary Pagh, and my mentor, Ed Silvoso. They not only love me but they encourage, challenge, lead and call forth the best in me. That’s the kind of father I want to be both for my family and for my congregation, Christ Church. When I made the offer to be a spiritual father something shifted in me and in this local church. I pray that God will use it to bring breakthroughs for individuals, families and the kingdom of God.

An Unexpected Guest

2009-09-24T12:46:00.000-07:00

On May 3, 2009, the Lord blessed us with an unexpected guest at Christ Church in Otsego, Minnesota, USA. It was to be a big day for our church family as our Facility Development Team would be unveiling architectural plans for our much anticipated future church facilities and relocation to 37 acres of new property. These plans had been in development for more than a year. I was to follow this presentation by re-casting our mission and vision as a Transformation Church. Here’s what happened!

As I arrived at church at about 8:15 a.m. Sunday morning there was a “Suburban Taxi” sitting all by itself near the light pole on the office end of our parking lot. I wondered, “Is someone getting a ride to the airport later?” It is unusual to see a taxi in our community because we are well outside of the Twin Cities metro area.

I parked my car out on the overflow lot as usual. As I got out of my car and began walking towards the church building, the taxi driver, a black man who looked to be about 40 years old, got out of the taxi and began walking towards me. He called out, “Are you the pastor of the church?” I shouted back, “Yes I am.”

As we met there in the parking lot he said, “My name’s Billy and God sent me here to pray for you today.” My immediate response was, “Praise the Lord! Let’s do it.”

He took my hand and prayed a beautiful prayer for me and for the whole congregation. I was struck by how loving, encouraging and peaceful his prayer was. As he finished the prayer… still holding my hand… before I could even say thank you… he looked me right in the eyes and said, “Tell your people to keep their eyes on Jesus… Don’t be discouraged… God is about to bless you.”

Almost stunned by his words I said, “Thank you. I receive it.” He turned around and starting walking back towards the cab. By the time I looked up, trying to take in what had just happened, he was gone. I came into my office and wrote down the three phrases right away so that I would remember them exactly.

I have never had an experience like this in 29 years of ministry. What an amazing affirmation from the Lord on the day of the “unveiling” of our future plans. The signs all around tend to fill us with fear and discouragement. But God says, “Keep your eyes on Jesus… I am about to bless you.”

I encourage you to receive this word personally as well. This was either an angel or an obedient taxi-cab driver. I may not know until I get to heaven. But I do know in my heart that this was a word from the Lord for me… for you… for our church family… for this whole area… and for anyone who will receive it. God has his hand upon us! Transformation is happening!

Ed Silvoso has taught me that when we are given a blessing like this it is important to say, “I receive it,” just like you would reach out and receive a gift from a friend or loved one. So I encourage you right now to extend your hands and say out loud, “I receive it!”

Whatever your situation is today, you can know that God loves you, he has not forgotten you, and he will provide for every need in abundance. I encourage you to continue to pray and seek the Lord and see just what God has in store! I love surprises!

Humbled by the Love of God,
Greg Pagh