In a video clip from “Charis Talks”—published by Charis Bible College—Emily Jacobs, a Charis graduate, says she would tell her younger self to trust in God. Her words may be relatable and encouraging for many believers.

“I wish I could go back and tell my younger self that it’s going to be OK,” Jacobs says. “God will come through and provide everything for us. … With God, I believe you can do anything, really. It’s not scary. He loves us so much, and He wants us to succeed. He’s not going to tell us to do something and then watch us fail.”

Watch the full video clip here.

Kim Walker-Smith debuted her new single “Insatiable” through Jesus Culture on Thursday evening. The song is about pursuing friendship and intimacy with God—and how God will not rest until He has all of us. Listen to the new single here and let us know in the comments what you think. Will this be the next big worship hit in churches nationwide?

This year, Youth With a Mission (YWAM) celebrates 50 years of training, equipping and sending young people to the missions field. The organization, founded by Loren Cunningham in 1969, released a video on its official YouTube channel this week commemorating how things have changed in the last half-century—and how the organization’s mission has remained the same. In an archive clip, Cunningham shares the prophetic vision that inspired YWAM: “I was out in the middle of the Caribbean, and the Lord gave me a vision: … It was waves of young people going from everywhere to everywhere by the millions.”

Watch the video here.

Rick Joyner broadcasted live on Facebook Wednesday afternoon to address lingering questions surrounding public accusations against evangelist Todd Bentley and Joyner’s own involvement in the ensuing controversy. Joyner denied all allegations that he was part of a Bentley “cover-up,” and encouraged the creation of a third-party council of Christian arbiters who could determine the truth of the matter.

On August 22, Stephen Powell accused Bentley of “sexual perversion” involving both male and female interns. Powell said Bentley got drunk, looked at pornography, used crude language and offered a male intern money in exchange for sex. Bentley has denied these allegations, calling some of them wild exaggerations and others complete fabrications.

Joyner was part of a “healing team” created for Bentley in 2008, after Bentley stepped down from ministry due to an affair. Powell has accused Joyner of overlooking Bentley’s sins and not disciplining him properly.

In the video, which was hashtagged #RicksRant, Joyner said he has had lunch with Todd and Jessa Bentley, who told him they have been “falsely accused.” He said he has no spiritual authority over Todd but does still consider him a brother in Christ. Joyner also said the Bentleys consider him to be their spiritual father.

“I had lunch with Todd and Jessa yesterday,” Joyner said. “You know, they’re struggling. They really could use your prayers. You could imagine what they would feel like, and even if you think they’re guilty, this is not the way things are supposed to be done. They feel like they’ve been falsely accused of just horrendous things. They’ve been convicted and found guilty. I got together with them to encourage them that there may be a way for them to be exonerated or found guilty. I made it clear. I said, ‘Any of the stuff you’re guilty of, it’s going to be found out.'”

Joyner also flatly denied allegations that he has been protecting Bentley or covering up his misdeeds.

“Personally, I’ve been accused of covering up stuff,” Joyner said. “I’ve never wanted to cover up a single thing for Todd’s sake, for their sake. Anything that isn’t true—for their sake, it needs to come to the light.”

Joyner did not say whether he believed the allegations against Bentley, instead suggesting that “biblical due process” through some sort of governing judge or judges should be implemented.

On Wednesday, Dr. Michael Brown said he would “assemble a group of trusted and respected men of God who will review the charges against Todd and make a determination, in accordance with 1 Corinthians 6.” Joyner said he and Brown independently arrived at that same conclusion, and urged people to pray for the council of arbiters.

“I feel like it is really the Lord moving [Brown],” Joyner said. “He had some good ideas for people who should sit on [this council]. He didn’t think he should sit on it and be a judge in this situation. I don’t think I should be. I’m too engaged. I know too much. I shouldn’t be. Even in a regular court, I should be recused. I think the process is just beginning. I have great hope for it.”

Joyner said he fears without established arbiters, many more ministries will be attacked and scandalized in the coming years. He expressed once again his distaste for public accusations.

“I think without this [council] happening, we’re going to have increasingly devastating attacks on people,” Joyner said. “Ministries [will be] destroyed, brought down—some of them may deserve it. Some of them may need it. But that’s not the way it should be done. And when it’s done the wrong way, far more people are hurt. We’ve got to learn in my opinion to not be quick to convict and condemn until people have been subjected to biblical due process. … You may be right in your accusations, but you have opened yourselves wide to the accuser. Look at all the ministries that have been devastated by doing that.”

Joyner said that if this council is successful—and sets a precedent for handling future church scandals—”all the controversy” will be “worth it.” He also said he may not be blameless, though he did not know what he might be guilty of.

“I want to go back and check,” Joyner says. “I’ve been challenged on some things. I may have fouled up or violated some things myself. If so, you would have a rant with me apologizing for those things. But if this process continues, and I believe it has been a valid due process, you probably won’t hear from me any more about this.”

For King & Country recently recorded a new version of their Christian radio single, “God Only Knows,” featuring country music star Dolly Parton. The song’s lyrics encourage believers to remember that God loves the lonely, ashamed and rejected.

In the video’s YouTube description, the duo called it the “final version” of the song, writing, “Our friends… this perhaps is the most thrilling new music video release we’ve ever had. It is with great enthusiasm that we give you the final version of ‘God Only Knows’… featuring the legendary Dolly Parton.”

Has Dolly improved the song, or do you prefer the original? Watch it here and then let us know in the comments.

Pastor Steven Furtick says Satan will try to distract you from fighting him by instead creating other obstacles or battles you need to fight. In a sermon clip posted to YouTube, Furtick gives the story of David and Goliath as an example, positing that Eliab—David’s older brother—was meant to be a distraction to David.

“This is what always happens when God is trying to do something in your life,” Furtick says. “The enemy will always present another enemy—that is not the real enemy—to keep you distracted from fighting the one that you’re called to defeat.”

Check out the full video here.

Matt Chandler, pastor of The Village Church, says the church needs to stop falling for the lie of Christianity’s decline and instead pursue revival. Chandler recently returned from a summer sabbatical and said in his August 25 sermon he’d been thinking about the importance of “fire and form” for the church. He says he was inspired by Australian pastor Mark Sayers, who said if the church was going to be renewed, if it was going to be revitalized, if it was going to see revival, it would need “fire and form.”

“God can move in our day with such radical power that things many of us believe are lost can be renewed, revived and reformed,” Chandler says. “Now this is hard for many of us to believe. I know that because of how quiet you were when I said it.”

But Chandler says to understand the concept of revival, we must first dismiss the lie that Christianity linearly grew, was universally popular in years past, and is now suddenly on the decline.

“There’s this idea that there was this time in human history where everybody went to church, everybody believed in Jesus, everybody knew their Bible, and everybody was glad to be a Christian,” Chandler says. “Now look at me: That’s never happened ever. Ever. So when you believe that lie—and in America, that kind of works like, ‘All our founding fathers were Christians, they all loved Jesus Christ,’ and that’s just not true. Some of them did. Absolutely. Certainly there was a shared moral vision, but most of them were theists. Gosh, one of them cut up the Bible and made his own Bible, right? So you can’t be like, ‘Our founding fathers loved the Lord’ when one of them took some scissors to the Bible.”

Instead, Chandler says, both the Bible and church history show that faith has consistently ebbed and flowed. That’s where the concept of revival comes in—the moments when the Spirit suddenly surged and revitalizes a church desperately seeking the Lord. Chandler lists the Great Awakening, the Azusa Street Revival and the Jesus Movement as recent examples of this phenomenon in the U.S.

“If you think there was this day in American where everybody loved Jesus and loved the Word of God and followed after Him, then you’re looking at what appears to be the decline of Christianity in our day and age,” Chandler says. “And you’re like, ‘Oh my gosh, all is lost. We’re seeing the death of the Christian faith.’ … It never works that way. It’s not a straight line in the Bible as well as in Christian history. There is an ebb and flow to the power and presence of God.”

Chandler points to 2 Chronicles 7:14 as a useful guide regarding what triggers revival: “If My people, who are called by My name, will humble themselves and pray, and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”

“Here’s what’s funny about that,” Chandler says. “The key to renewal and revival has nothing to do with things outside of the church. It has everything to do with what’s inside of the church. … So if you are outraged by politics, if you are outraged by this and that, then really, I think, you’ve placed your hope on the wrong thing. Like regardless of who runs 2020, Christ is the King, and if you put your hope there, you’re going to get angry. … What terrible, fragile things to put your hope in. Nations have come and nations have gone, but Christ has remained constant.”

Chandler then lists Holy Spirit manifestations like being slain in the spirit as an example of revival fire falling. It’s a continuation of his comments from 2017, when the Baptist megachurch pastor said he disagreed with cessationists and declared that signs and wonders are for today.

“This passage is saying if you want a movement of God—it’s not that God’s not moving, right?” Chandler says. “He’s moving. There’s never been a moment in human history where God’s not saving and setting free and breaking spiritual bondage and calling unto Himself. That’s not what we’re talking about here. … This movement I’m trying to highlight is like when the cup can’t hold the water. Are you tracking with me? Like when you have to rethink everything because the Holy Spirit blows the walls out. … Renewal [and] revival is when you’re like, ‘We’ve got to rent the CAC and just baptize 400 people at a time because wow. People are confessing and getting slain in the Spirit out in the parking lot and coming clean with their sin and disorder, and the Spirit of God is doing things that are rocking everybody’s imagination. It’s confusing. It’s weird. It’s wild. But I know you can see the fruit of the Spirit in it.'”

Watch the full sermon here.

On August 24, Lauren Daigle performed a concert at the Ohio Reformatory for Women and spoke to women at the facility’s Tapestry Therapeutic Community. In a video of Daigle’s visit, she remarks this is the fifth time she has visited a prison. (In February, Daigle worshipped and visited with inmates at the Folsom Women’s Facility.)

The Billboard-topping singer also preached about God’s love to the inmates during her concert.

“The one thing that we can always do is look up,” Daigle says in the video. “You can look up and see the sky. You can look up and see the kindness of God, and His extravagant love for each one of you. And I know sometimes that can be hard to wrap your mind around, but let me tell you something, He doesn’t see you by your faults, or maybe the things that you’ve done or the things that have trapped you and ensnared you. But He sees you as children, as His own, beloved from the Most High King. That’s who you are.

“If you ever question your identity, I tell you what—just open up a Bible somewhere and watch His sacrifice, watch His love for you. It doesn’t change just because you’re in here. His love for you doesn’t waver just because of the things you have done or the things you felt have gripped you for your entire life. … I see you and me as the same. I don’t see us separated at all. I don’t see a difference. I see you as people. We’re all people. We’re all on this journey of life together.”

Watch the video here.

After days of teasing big news on his Twitter account, Lee Strobel announced that he had partnered with Colorado Christian University (CCU) to open the Lee Strobel Center for Evangelism and Applied Apologetics. The announcement video, embedded here, features Strobel, CCU president Dr. Don Sweeting, and Lee Strobel Center executive director Mark Mittelberg discussing the vision for this new center.

“We are so thrilled about what we believe God is going to do to use this center to spread his message of hope and grace and love and redemption and eternal life all over our country and beyond,” Strobel says. “We’re not talking about creating ivory tower scholars. We’re talking about creating people who are winsome in sharing their faith, but who are equipped to be able to defend it in an increasingly skeptical world. We want to work with and through local churches and really bring local churches alive in evangelism in a new way. That’s what this center is about. We really believe God is going to use it to make a huge difference, and who knows, this may the epicenter of revival in America. That’s our prayer, and that’s our hope.”

Mittelberg adds that time is running out to evangelize unsaved people with the gospel.

“There’s one thing we can do here that we will not ever get to do in heaven, and that’s take risks and stretch and prepare and then reach out and reach people who are far from Christ who are dying to know the good news of the gospel,” Mittelberg says.

Pastor Bruxy Cavey—teaching pastor of The Meeting House in Oakville, Ontario—explains in this classic video why it’s ultimately foolish to try and predict exact dates for the rapture. Using the example of Edgar C. Whisenant’s 88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988, Cavey demonstrates that no human guess can be accurate because of Jesus’ claim in Matthew 24:36 that no one—not even Jesus Himself—knows the day of His return.

“When it comes to these predictions, do you know what the success rate is?” Cavey says. “Zero.”

Cavey believes that Scripture intentionally leaves the end times and the future somewhat vague in order to keep our focus on what is most important: Jesus Christ.

“The Bible gives us enough information—not that it says nothing about it—it gives us enough information about the future to encourage us and keep us Christ-centered,” Cavey says. “When we move past that, we begin to abuse, I think, the revelation of Scripture and use it for sensationalism in ways it wasn’t intended.”

What do you think? Watch the embedded video and let us know in the comments.