As I finished the poem, an urgency came over me and I started to walk around the stage and spoke about the glory of God in Christ that can change the human heart and transform each one of us into living testimonies of his grace not because we are perfect in ourselves but because we are forgiven.

Our struggle, our weakness (and his strength in us) is the testimony of grace that people needed. The transparency of confession. The faithwalk of repentance. The power of forgiveness and the ministry of reconciliation. Each one rooted in the cross. I spoke about all of it.

Stories poured out of me. Truths that I had never realized myself seemed to appear on my lips and the silence was deafening. The darkness out in the audience did not allow me to see what effect my words were having but I didn’t care. I felt swept up in a great storm of emotions, confessions of sin and bold transparency, rising and then falling again, swirling and settling and all the while there was nothing more than a collective sigh from that great cloud of witnesses as we were swept into the throne room of the Almighty God and the Spirit of the Lord was upon us and people would cry out and laugh and sing and clap and stand up and stamp their feet and break out in spontaneous worship and then, after it was quiet, I would begin to speak again…

A chair appeared at some point and I sat down. A Bible was thrust into my hands, my Bible, I realized dimly…and then I was teaching again….no, it wasn’t me….even I realized that….and it both thrilled me and scared me.

That is when I realized that this Burden of Glory was not really my burden at all. It was a yoke that Jesus and I wore together. It was a burden that caused the Holy Spirit of God to groan and travail within us for the hearts and souls of men and women. This Burden of Glory belonged to Christ and we share his burden, his ongoing sufferings for his people, so that we may also share in his glory.

A long time later, I stopped. It was over.

I was done. He was done.

The seats in the front row were empty except for a few hardy souls here and there. The majority had left. I was stunned at what I had done and was immediately filled with shame. I stumbled off the stage and overheard someone say, “It was only supposed to be a five or ten minute thing…” I started to weep. My wife was there and we left, memories of other shame filled moments from my past rising up to chase me out of that sanctuary.

My wife didn’t say anything. She looked at me with more than a hint of fear in her eyes. When we got back to the hotel room, I flung myself on one of the double beds and fell asleep fully clothed. Our children were staying with friends so we were alone. I slept like a dead man not wanting to awake and face my shame.

That Sunday morning was overcast and rainy and reflected my murderous mood. Like Elijah on the mountain, I was angry with God for letting me get carried away like that. I wanted to hide in my cave and be miserable by myself. My wife tried to encourage me to go to church but I was afraid someone would recognize me. She went. I stayed.

After an hour of flipping through channels on the television, I suddenly realized that I had gotten the Sunday morning worship service being broadcast live from the Stadium. They were doing it like a news report…..no, wait. It was a news report. Something was going on. The local news was reporting a disturbance at the worship center that morning. I hoped my wife was alright. I threw out a spontaneous prayer and then listened intently to the broadcast.

“This is Lisa Jennings with CJNK reporting live from the Hillsong Conference at Westend Stadium.” The pretty reporter looked stunned and disheveled. “Nobody can quite understand what is going on here at the conference, John.” Apparently she was talking to the news anchor back at the studio. “Thousands of people are headed to the stadium here in Westend,” she was saying. “Far more than anybody had planned for. Traffic is a mess. People are abandoning their cars on the road and parking on the grass or wherever there’s a spot available…”

She listened for a moment on her headset.

“No, nobody seems to be able to tell us what is going on.” She was obviously flustered. “Apparently, people have been here all night, sleeping on the floors…” She paused and then looked straight into the camera. “I can’t confirm the details,” she said, “but apparently there are hundreds of people inside the stadium crying and laughing and praying. It’s all quite disturbing.”

She took a deep breath. “There are reports of miracles. People able to see again, walk again…..everyone is coming here.” Then she blushed as she heard her producer shouting at her over her headset. At least that’s what it looked like watching it on television. Apparently, she was told to get some eye-witness accounts.

She turned toward someone walking by and tried to ask a question but she was ignored. Finally a couple stopped.

“So, what’s going on at this conference?” she asked. “Were you here last night?”

My heart hammered loudly in my chest as I watched the drama unfold.

“No,” the woman was saying. “I got a call from my sister and she insisted that I come down this morning. I don’t know what’s going on but they say that God is at work and we don’t want to miss it.” Her voice rose a bit at the end and they pulled away.

The reporter let them go only to quickly grab another. She physically grabbed his arm and pulled him towards her.

“Do you have any idea of what’s going on here this morning?” she asked and shoved the mike in front of his face.

“Yes, God is at work,” the man replied. “It started last night and it’s probably too early to tell but it looks like a revival has begun.”

“A revival? What do you mean?”

“Well,” the big, black man said, “a revival is when God breaks out of church and starts to invade the community and city, and even the country with miracles and healings and, especially, transformed lives.”

“Invade?” the reporter said. “That sounds dangerous…”

“Yes, it is,” the big man said. Then he was quiet for a long moment looking at her. The reporter didn’t know what to say. “Would you like to join us inside?” he finally asked her quietly.

She nodded and then handed her mike to the cameraman without a word and turned to face the stadium. The big man crooked his arm as an invitation and she walked with him arm in arm toward the stadium joining the streams of people already going inside.

The last thing I heard before they cut back to the anchor in the studio was the cameraman shouting after her, “What am I supposed to do now?”

I smiled. God was at work and I loved it.

Then, out of the blue, there in that hotel room, I heard Him. He spoke. I know that people say that all the time, but I’m serious. He spoke. He said it as clear as a bell. “It’s not about you.”

I knew those words, of course. They are the famous words of Pastor Rick Warren that opens his book, The Purpose Driven Life. What is life all about? What is the purpose of life? It’s not about you.

I knew it was true.

My shame the night before was rooted in the flesh. It doesn’t matter if I spoke too long. It doesn’t matter if people leave. It doesn’t even matter if anybody accepts what I said. It wasn’t about me. God had spoken through me and that was all that mattered. He could have used the dog next door if He wanted but He used me.

He was pleased to give me the gift of significance. To matter not just because I was His son but also in joint ministry, in common purpose with Him empowered by the Holy Spirit, a chipped, broken clay pot wanting nothing more than to share the treasure placed within.

I didn’t need to go back to the church to take my bows. That would spoil it. It was time to go back into the desert with God who is my true Promised Land.

When my wife got back bubbling over with news a few hours later, she quickly agreed and we left for Buenos Aires that night and were happy to go home. She shared all her news on that 36 hour flight and the time flew by.

Apparently, she was behind it all initially. When they saw that we had registered for the conference, they contacted her and my wife had suggested keeping it as a surprise. The pastor and most of the worship leaders were followers of my blog. My wife was the one managing the power point and blog posts on the Jumbo screen. It all made sense now.

But it didn’t make any sense at all.

Nobody expected what happened next. Not even me. Yes, I was only supposed to speak for a few minutes before Pastor Houston came on stage. Yes, it had gone on for seven hours and most of the people eventually left. But around 700 people had remained, many on the floor praying so that the seats looked empty.

The pastor had personally sought out my wife that Sunday morning to send his thanks and promised to stay in touch. Apparently, the leadership of the church had been hit hard, decimated in the back room while watching everything on close circuit television. God had shown up in a powerful way. The reality of His Presence had changed everything. The focus on continuous renewal and walking in the Spirit at that church over the years had prepared the way and now it appeared that God was breaking out into a community wide revival the likes of which Australia had never seen before.

Where it would all end, only God knew but we were thrilled to be used for His purpose and His glory….the burden of Glory that we share with Christ.