The other day the message on a poster entitled “Change” caught our attention. It read, “A bend in the road is not the end of the road, unless you fail to make the turn.” The picture on the poster of a curvy mountain road only reinforced the mental image of our need for flexibility and adaptability when traveling the road of life.

  It reminded us also of the many people we have known through the years who lost direction and crashed because they could not recognize the bends in the road. Their course was set on a rigid path and they could not see the need to adapt, to change in order to reach their destination. Change is inevitable. Everything that is alive changes. (Actually, even that which is dead changes.) Our bodies change, our relationships change, our circumstances change. No matter how much we are enjoying or hating our present situation, we can be assured that before long, it will change. Our pastor often quotes the scripture, “it came to pass” saying, that’s exactly why it came, to pass.  

When we were young, change always surprised us. It seemed that just when we were all settled in a home or a job, something would happen to change our circumstances. We fought change because we viewed it as some foreign invader intruding into our lives. Through the years, though, we have come to realize that there is only One who does not change. “For I am the Lord, who does not change…” Malachi 3:6. He is our only stability, our only immovable, unchanging rock. Everything else is just shifting sand.

Opinions change, leaders change, fads change, and trends change, but Jesus remains forever the same. What He was in the beginning, He is now, and evermore shall be. If we pin our stability on anyone or anything other than Him, we will be sorely disappointed. There are some changes that are simply the result of living and growing. We would all wonder about parents who refused to buy new clothes for their child because they could not accept the fact that he was growing. As they squeezed him into increasingly smaller outfits, the resulting pain of constriction would no doubt cause severe protest from the child. Eventually the clothing seams would simply give way as the natural growth of the child forced the constricting, binding clothing to shed.

So it is with growth in a church or a ministry. Old ways, old patterns simply do not fit the new growth. We then have choices to make. We can either insist, as the parents we just discussed, that the new must fit in the old, or we can wisely tailor new garments to fit. Almost every mother has held a pair of baby booties and remembered fondly when they were filled with precious little feet. In God’s plan, though, those little feet grew and carried that child into God’s plan for his or her life. As precious as her memories are, the feet grew beyond them. And what parent doesn’t remember the growing pains that accompany each step in a child’s life? Some of them were physical as bones elongated and densified. Other pains were emotional as children faced new challenges in relationships and circumstances. Either way, we hurt with them for the season, but were always delighted by what followed, another season filled with new life and new experiences-all made possible by the new growth that had come about.

2=1 is growing and the past couple years we have experienced these growing pains. We have ached as our bones of faith were stretched and deepened. We have gone through ministry-wide challenges in relationships and changing circumstances. Now the new season of growth is here and with it will come all the challenges that will change the present. We are at that bend in the road that the poster illustrated. We are about to negotiate a turn and if your heart is not tuned carefully to the One who changes not, you could miss the beauty of the next stretch of scenery. During the past year the Lord has been emphasizing teamwork. There is now an exponential increase in vision and anointing flowing into the ministry throughout the nations. This season of construction has produced another powerful team working together. From the contributions of the leaders across the country and around the world, to the volunteers who have come to help and to the staff who have untiringly contributed we are watching a miracle take place. Each one doing their part to produce God’s vision for our ministry. Praise the Lord for the Team!

As exciting as all this growth is, though, it is already producing change. Our time is now torn in two, our energies are divided and our attention must be given to ever increasing needs. We are learning to prioritize in Jesus. It is consistently more important to hear His voice clearly, to know what He is saying about purchasing materials and hiring workers. Every step of the process is a learning experience and change is being required of each and every one of us. New relationships will be formed, new talents will be added to the team, another bend in the road. A new sense of purpose seems to have set in all our hearts as we await the Lord’s Word to cross over. We expect to see this new unity increase in the days ahead.

It is an exciting time in this ministry. God’s heart is for marriages and home and He is moving powerfully on their behalf. The anointing of Elijah to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, is flowing to the homes in this hour. Just as John the Baptist in the spirit of Elijah heralded the first coming of Christ, so the spirit of Elijah is going to herald His second coming. We witnessed in our spirits that this is going to be a powerful end-time move of God to restore the homes to faith and power before the return of our Lord. It delights us to see 2=1 leaders reach out from the fullness of the Lord within them to other marriages around them. We will need to embrace new methods and be open to God changing old ways. We must avoid being as those parents we described earlier who refused to dress their child in new clothes as he grew.

We must minister under the banner of the Lord, not ours. We must learn to walk together with those whose ideology and passions may differ from ours. We must love and honor our brothers and sisters even if we do not agree on everything. Our unity must be found in the Lordship of Jesus Christ, not in our 2=1 family. He is forming His marriage ministry team right now and we are privileged to be a part of it. As we emerge from our comfort zones and embrace the change He is bringing we believe 2=1 is going to be privileged to participate in one of the most powerful end-time moves of the Holy Spirit. As the spirit of Elijah moves upon the homes of the nations, as father’s hearts are turned once again to their children and children’s to their fathers, we are going to at last see those powerhouse homes on every block of every city of every nation-to His glory and honor as His vision is fulfilled.

Mike and Marilyn Phillips