Growing up in a room filled with greatness

Growing up in a room filled with greatness!

I realize after 46 years of living how blessed I was from the very beginning.  I happened, by the selection of God, to be born into a family that already had two children and was already involved in ministry.  In my early days of ministry observation I had the opportunity of spending many days watching my Grandfather, my Father and my Uncle do the preaching, teaching and leading.  After a few years of memorable observation I began to get active in ministry myself.  I knew I was in a family that had clearly had the church calling and was totally involved in it.  My mother would sing the church into heaven and the ensemble would sing people into great praise.  I was so blessed and when I consider all of it I am very thankful that the Lord chose the place for my birth and the family it was to be in.

Apostle Duane Youngblood

I called this post "Growing up in a room filled with greatness" because for most of the first 15 or so years of my life I slept in the same room as my older brother, Apostle Richard Youngblood.  My brother is four years older than I am and he was my male hero.  I paid so much attention to him growing up and listened to his every word.  He was gifted and played the drums then went to the organ.  He would dance in a way that was so profound to me.  He was Richard to many but to me he was the person I would talk about and tell my friends I would have beat them up if they messed with me.  He was also the man I wanted to be.

Having a hero matters.  I have learned over the years that the way I have looked up to him and wanted to do what he did was special and sent from God.  I am so glad that in my heart of hearts we never competed with each other, even though people tried to make us compete.  I have learned over the years that when you have an older brother who loves and respects you it is priceless.  I remember the day my brother preached his first message.  I was probably more excited than he was.  I watch him take major steps towards his destiny and he was clearly a man of faith.  Having Apostle Richard Youngblood as an older brother helped me chose the right path.

I am glad I was growing up in the room he grew up in.  Many nights I got to talk with him and listen to him and I learned his strengths and weaknesses and he mine.  I saw his passion and I saw his pain.  He taught me more about loving than any book I had ever read.  He was the only man for many years I totally trusted and he is one of the men I credit with my drive to do what I do well.  I clearly grew up in a room filled with greatness.  When I consider God allowing me to be four years younger than my brother and having the opportunity to learn from his insight and wisdom, I know the love of God and certainty of his call upon my life.

I am writing this to say to men and women all over the world that if you are an older sibling and you have pushed and managed life in front of your younger siblings like my brother did for me, you have blessed them and given them all the reasons they need to succeed. 

Apostle Richard Youngblood

When I consider how my brother now leads a wonderful church, lead leaders, host a national talk program, travels and ministers, has a successful marriage, and has fought his devils and won, I am so glad to be his younger brother and having had his great example.  I pray that all younger siblings will appreciate the sacrifices our older siblings have had to make while we sat and watched and learned.  I watched my brother fast and pray, read, study and strive for greatness.  Watching him made me go after it with all my might.  

If you have been blessed, like I have, to grow up in a room filled with greatness thank God and hold on to the person because the ties built in those days will make great sense as you grow older.  I love my brother more now than I did then because we have been through more.  I also know he has my best interest at heart and because he is still hungry I will continue to have an example of how to go after the things of God.

Thank you Jesus for choosing me to grow up in the room with Apostle Richard Youngblood.

I hope this post will allow you to celebrate those who caused you to push and inspired the greatness of God in you to arise.  If you had a Richard Youngblood in your life appreciate them because they went through so many things you did not have to simply because they were older and had no older to look up to.

In it for Jesus and celebrating his gifts in my life,

Apostle Duane Youngblood

 

Anointed for greatness!

Here I sit having been saved since 1977, having preached 29 years and 46 years old.  I realized at 10 years of age there was something special happening in my life and I knew there was a wonderful God impacting my life.  I still remember that August Sunday night in 1977, when my older sister gave her life back to Jesus, how I felt such a pull on my heart to come to him too.  I remember walking down to the front of the church and saying I wanted to be saved.  I wanted the Holy Ghost.  I remember a little while later speaking in other tongues and dancing and praising God for this new dimension I had walked into. 

That same year I began singing solos and there appeared to be something special happening there too.  When I would sing something happening in the church.  I would sing "He touched me and made me whole", "It's in my heart", "On Christ the solid Rock I stand" among others.  I felt something special every time I sang and every time I served in ministry.  I clearly had an anointing on my life at a very young age.

Tonight as I type this and look back I felt compelled to type to so many of you who tasted early anointing in your life and somehow have seen trouble or situations come seemingly to destroy the true impact you were born to have.  I have been through it since 1977.  In 1979, at 12 years of age, my life changed never to be the same again as my inner world crashed and the anointing on my life was no longer the only thing I had developing in my life.  It appeared the enemy was permitted to sow a seed in me while others slept.  This seed would damage my heart, my mind and my character.  Little did I know at the time the full impact this seed would have but I was no longer that 10 year old who sang and the anointing would fall.  I sang, the anointing fell but afterwards other battles developed in me. 

It would appear that God was still using me but the struggles that I could not voice where having an impact that it has taken me many years to process.  The enemy thought he would damage the goodness of God that was clearly present in my life.  He thought he could prevent what seemed certain when I was 10 from happening.  He thought if he polluted the water no one would ever be able to drink from the fountain flowing through me.  His one mistake was I had tasted the pure anointing before his pollution.  This past week I sat and watched the Full Gospel Baptist Fellowship conference on the Word Network.  As I sat on my couch and watched I heard God say I anointed you for greatness.  I anointed you for great connections.  Now Over the past few years I have been digging out of some serious holes.  I have been working on being authentic and unlearning many things I learned trying to avoid the inner pain and struggle I have had being me.  When I heard the Lord say these words to me I looked on twitter and see someone I knew for many years and I saw how they positioned themselves.  I saw what walking with the conviction of God could do for you and why the enemy works so hard to cause us to discredit the goodness of God in our lives.  I saw that God had taken me through a difficult road with many celebrations and many pit falls.  God, as a loving Father, had convinced me of his love for me and that he was returning me to the anointing I walked in at 10.

Recently I have sensed a strong presence of God and a clear understanding of what he wanted of me like I had not in many years.  As I sit here and write tonight I want to encourage the people who this blog is being written for.  You may feel you have failed and that it is too late for you or maybe you have been written off by someone.  Listen, this is your time to rise and claim what your father said is your.  In the Kingdom we have an inheritance and it cannot be revoked.  No WEAPON FORMED AGAINST YOU SHALL PROSPER.  For many years in my life a weapon I did not invite, did not want and had nothing to do with it being formed against me kept me so busy that I almost forgot whose and who I was.  That lying devil had convinced me to turn on myself.  He had me believing I could only serve a few people because my name was tarnished and I had hurt some people.  What I now know is my story contains glory.  My story does not help everyone but it helps the right ones.  I have been aimed for some people in the earth who I have the stuff that will help them process their freedom and their rights as kingdom citizens. 

My friend, don't allow the enemy to convince you that greatness cannot happen for you now.  You have been anointed for greatness.  I am telling you that I am so convinced that I am anointed for greatness that I know every connection from this point forward is a connection with a greatness agenda.  I am called to father sons and daughters and see people raised to their full potential in Christ.  I am not on the earth for projects but I have been called to raise people.  Don't you sit there one more night and allow the enemy to beat you up.  You have what it takes to do what you have been called to do in the earth if you have God's word.  The thief needs you to walk away from what is yours and allow him to have it.  When I was at my worst I never wanted to hurt nor to hurt anyone.  The enemy exploits us and then uses what he knows about us against us.  Let me tell you again "NO WEAPON FORMED AGAINST YOU SHALL PROSPER!"  You are the chosen of God and you have been anointed for greatness.  So CHAMPION get up get to the starting blocks and get ready because your new race is about to begin and this time run with patience and know that God will bear you up in your every trial.  Do not give up this time.  This is your best year and the King has appointed you for a job no one else can do therefore making you necessary.  Do not fear who has rejected you because your stuff only works for those who receive you and who you have been assigned too.  Be blessed and let's live this life to its fullest.  You ARE anointed for Greatness!  That enemy wanted to run me off because he had peaked my anointing.  Now I will make him pay by the changed lives and the souls that come into the Kingdom.  Join me and let's be ALL we have been anointed to be.  YOU ARE ANOINTED FOR GREATNESS!

Apostle Duane Youngblood

The Effective Church

I am so glad for all the Lord is sharing with his church/body right now.  Recently I have taken the time to seriously look and consider what an effective church would look like in the earth.  In the book of Acts you see a very effective church, being persecuted and disbanding but yet preaching as they went and more churches being started along the way.  When I look at The United States of America and all that we call church I sometimes get frustrated because I now understand that what makes us effective is "Our Difference".

The World is working so hard to get the church into reality shows, and talent shows and on and on and on because in the field of entertainment it is all about "Self".  Rarely on the reality shows about Christians to they really highlight life in submission to Christ as the way to success.  They show success and they show life but the connect to true submission to Christ and living for him is missed most of the time. My friends we will never be able to do what the world does as it relates to the money they can spend to put on a production but our difference is not in the lights, the staging, the banging mic systems, it is in the Christ we really have to offer the people and the power of God present in the Holy Ghost.  The more the church is getting away from the Holy Ghost/Spirit the more we are becoming common.  Larger numbers are coming in but few are being effectively impacted by the church because the Acts church knew the impact was connected to Jesus and all his Kingdom brought to men. 

Duane and LaShawn Youngblood

People want to be free.  People want to be at peace.  The only problem then is, as leaders in the Church Jesus died for, we must offer them all of him he is offering them.  We cannot water it down so it fits.  We cannot make it seeker friendly.  We cannot fix it so they like it.  The reason the Gospel of the Kingdom works is that we can always find people looking for what we have if we are only willing to give it to them in it's raw and rare form.  You see what Jesus handed the Apostles at Pentecost in the upper room was enough to turn Jerusalem upside down.  What he gave them was the same Spirit that he lived with and by and the same power to bring about change and the authority or right to use it. 

We have the authority of God to function using the power of God and we need not apologize for it.  I am sitting in my office typing this as I prepare to sit with a group of Elder at my local church and discuss this whole idea of "Our Difference".  We cannot give up any more ground trying to be famous, rich or known.  It is enough that they know Jesus.  It is enough that they receive Jesus and it is enough that they follow us as they see us following Jesus.  I am sure some of you sense what I sense.  I trust you can see that this is the perfect time for the Church to arise and be "Different" in a culture of so many norms.  We don't need to apologize for the anointing or for how we praise God.  When men need an answer they will come looking for those who have an authentic relationship with an authentic King and that is the Church Jesus is building.  I'm all in and I hope you are too.

Duane Youngblood

Getting to the people God called you too

I woke up early this morning and the Lord was impressing upon my heart a new book.  I found this very interesting because I am just releasing a book tomorrow.  I knew I was hearing God though because he began to show me the chapters for this new book.  What I heard God say was help people get to the people they are sent too. 

Immediately I saw a person in a car knowing they needed to be somewhere at a particular time but uncertain of where it was nor how to find it.  I believe many of us have been in that place and may still be there.  What I saw was the many things that happen on the road to the place I call "My Appointment". 

From what I have written so far I hope you see that the first piece of information we all need to know is where the appointment is.  The problem with that belief is that we may ignore the reality that God is using your story to get you to the people who will need your journey as much as they need you.  Wow what a reality!  My journey matters!  The enemy of our minds and even some people will try to make you deny your story or forget your story but God's plan includes it.

We really need to know that God will not reveal "My Appointment" until he gets us to embrace the journey.  The journey prepares us for the people prepared for us.  We must walk in the steps ordered though and delight in knowing that by the influence and power of an all knowing God we will arrive.  I am not suggesting that you have nothing to do in this matter because you do.  I am really suggesting the critical importance of allowing the hand of God freedom in your life to help you navigate through the places we call "Traffic", "Broken Down", "Accidents", "Lost" and "Moving too slow".  On the journey to "My Appointment" I may encounter all of these but they are going to be a part of my preparation as I am finally shown the people I am sent too. 

Many of us got started in ministry thinking we knew who we were called to.  Remember Paul in the scriptures, he was having the Believing Jews thrown in jail, killed etc.  He felt is was the right thing to do until his journey took him on the road to Damascus.  It was there a light shined on him and revealed more of the plan for his life.  Paul was a strong radical Jew and now found himself being called to go to Gentiles who he had nothing in common with.  God took him to the desert and to the place called alone and there he showed him "The Appointment".  Paul saw the people he was really called to reach and he went after it with all his might.

I promise you that you will have your Paul moment.  I remember mine.  I was sitting in a jail cell and God said this to me "You have agreed to do 2/3's of what I called you to do now I need you to accept the last 1/3".  When I said yes things began to work out for me and writing this blog addresses some of the people I am called too.  You see God is on time but not our time.  He is wise but not with man's wisdom.  If you and I simply learn to stay engaged in our own lives and continue to walk we will see that the journey, with all it's issues is priceless because when we get to the place called "My Appointment" and look back we see it all in a whole new light.  I know I am and I am sure you will too.  Keep moving!

Set it in order and watch God work

Several weeks ago I was awaken by the Lord and challenged to bring a new level of order to The Life Church.  The Lord spoke to me that If I established this order he would do the work he longs to perform among his body.  I have studied the five-fold and governmental order many times before but this time I saw an urgency to get into the truth and establish it in a fresh way in the church I was sent too.   I was led to look at 1 Corinthians 12 and this is what I saw:



1 Corinthians 12:25-31


25 That there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another.

26 And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member be honoured, all the members rejoice with it.

27 Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular.

28 And God hath set some in the church, first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, governments, diversities of tongues.

29 Are all apostles? are all prophets? are all teachers? are all workers of miracles?

30 Have all the gifts of healing? do all speak with tongues? do all interpret?

31 But covet earnestly the best gifts: and yet shew I unto you a more excellent way.



We must understand how important this passage is to Local church development. The scriptures clearly are speaking to the body of Christ as a whole but also to the local church. God’s heart is that everyone in the body receives what they must have. When Paul was writing this to the Church at Corinth he clearly stated the mission of God is to establish an order that will first provide for the care of the members but also create a flow that will protect the body in a world that seeks to subvert it through bad information.


In 1 Corinthians 12:28 Paul say God hath SET some in the church……the word “Set” In the Greek understanding is "to put," is used of "appointment" to any form of service. So what this is saying is God has appointed some in the church for a particular service. We must see that without what God has set we cannot be the people we are called to be and do what we are called to do.

So what did God set in the Church? The first appointment he made to the church is “Apostles”. The word for “First” in Greek is “Proton” and means first in time or place and first in rank. Where the word Apostle is we see the “Sent” ones. The Greek word is a compound “apo, "from," stello, "to send". So literally the apostle is sent forth from God first and confirmed by men. Apostles establish, provide structure, release vision and operate in the power of God to clear a realm for the move of God that is coming among and through the people. If God sends someone a work is about to happen in the place where he sends them….(Acts 13)


The second appointment he made to the church is “Prophets”. The word for “secondarily” in Greek is “deuteros” and means second in time, place or rank. The word for Prophets means "one who speaks forth or openly", "a proclaimer of a divine message," denoted among the Greeks an interpreter of the oracles of the gods. We need the heart of God interpreted so people will KNOW what he wants and what he is doing or about to do.



The Third appointment he made to the church is “Teachers”. The word for “thirdly” in Greek is “Tritos” and means “in the third place”. The word for Teachers means “One who undertakes the work of teaching by the Holy Ghost and establishes the truth of God’s word in the hearts of those in the Assembly.



We must understand order matters because the rest of the verse proves it out. The verse goes on to say “after that miracles” and the words “after that” in the Greek means thereafter or afterwards and is related to order and not time. This means he is telling us that Once the Apostolic, Prophetic and Teaching is prioritized in order and rank and time that order releases miracles. The Greek for miracles is “dynamis” and in this verse it means “Power in action” which is used 118 times in the New Testament as it relates to the working of miracles. We must understand that once the order is set miracles just happen….



After he says miracles he says “then” which is the Greek word “eita” which means next and is related to time. This means that when the power is seen in action God will give cause for gifts of healings, helps, governments, diversities of tongues. We cannot expect to see the need for these to manifest until the order is set and the power of the body is in action. The word of Governments ( Greek = kybernēsis) metaphorically it means, "governments or governings," said of those who act as guides in a local church, would be better understood as those who administrate or rule over an area in the local church and this is critical because if and when the move of God happens among a people order must be maintained on one level while the Spirit is flowing on many levels.


We must understand the critical importance of One being sent by God, released by Men in Authority to the PLACE of God’s intended move. When that gift is SET and establishes itself and its function the Prophetic needs to come in and announce the code of God that belongs in the hearts of the people in that place. The announcing of the NEW code or the announcing of the Restoration of the Code enlightens people about what God has prepared for them and now is being released. When the Apostolic and prophetic work together like this there is an immediate harvest for the Kingdom because people see what has been hidden or blocked through unbelief which may be the result of many things….


In most of the Epistles this is the purpose for the writing of Paul. He was concerned about the blocking of the flow that was happening in the local body due to some rejection of an established principle or order of those SENT. We must understand that the local church will have to work very hard to see great results when we reject the order of 1 Corinthians 12: 28. We will never operate at our full potential until we believe God loves us enough to provide for us the things that cause the power of God(which cannot be hindered among the submitted) to flow and be in action.

We also need the false Apostle’s of our day to be returned to being Elders with a different office and assignment. The title Apostle has become just like Bishop and other titles in some church circles. Opening a church does not make one an Apostle. Having a few people call you their Spiritual Father does not make you an Apostle. Apostles are sent into a region with a mandate from the King to establish the foundations of the Kingdom so the people of the region get what the King has determined is theirs. There are New Apostles being birthed yearly for new missions of the King and you will know them by the results and the confidence they have in their relationship to the King and his Church. Let’s Live in this information NOW!

If we do we will see the manifestation of everything he said we would see. I'm ready. Are you?

Duane Youngblood