I was born on a Saturday and in church by the Sunday (just about) and we were never late. My dad was the Pastor and my mom played piano for Sunday school. You get the idea. I grew up in "church". I started by sleeping under the pews and ended up preaching to those sitting in the pews. I've been part of leadership structures in the "church" since I was 13 years old. I spent over 50 years in the institution many people still refer to as “church.” I have some experience. I was a Worship Leader (from 17 years of age), a Youth Pastor, Cell church District Pastor, Missions Coordinator, Executive Pastor and eventually the Senior Pastor for 13 years before resigning from the institution.
I come from Huguenot stock, who came to South Africa over 340 years ago with the purest form of the gospel in the Earth, at that time. My father’s family pioneered in the Pentecostal season in South Africa. My father pioneered in the Charismatic season in obedience to God, and broke away from the Pentecostal denominational control. A generation later, God called me to pioneer into a new season, and I had to walk away from institutional control systems. I now function as a father of a household in the holy nation that God is establishing in the earth. God is bringing His house (this holy nation) to maturity so that His corporate son will be an accurate representation of Him in the Earth. He matures the house by turning the hearts of fathers to the sons and of the sons to their fathers. I am a son and I am a father.
I keep referring to “church," because I am convinced that the enemy sowed tares amongst the wheat ever since the Roman Empire established the institution that was called "the church" to control the people. This caused a great deception as to the authority of the true church (the sons of God) as man gave away divine authority to be subjugated under institutional control structures. Institutions have simply been perfecting the same control systems for various reasons. Well-meaning people have been perpetuating these systems, in the name of God. They are not the enemy. They are also victims, who remain powerless against the true enemy, since they operate by illegitimate authority that cannot overthrow the enemy in the Earth. God is exposing that and is raising up his true church, the sons of God, the family of God, the house of God, the Holy nation.
Even though I have come to the conclusion that the institution is not the church more than 20 years ago, I felt a mandate to remain in the institution and prophesy over the "dry bones". I didn't know if they could live again, but felt the burden to be a voice to all those who knew there must be "more" than what was called "church".
As father of the house, I had committed to restructure the congregation away from institutional control to function as a family. Sadly, as it came to the final decision, the institution's Directors Board decided not to restructure and to "reset" to how things were 18 years before. I had already resigned from the employ of the institution, and simply walked away from the institution, it's structures and facilities, to function purely as a family.
I have been married over 30 years to a wife, that I can see all the more clearly now, God gave me for this season. We have 3 adult sons and a teenage daughter. I love family. The natural family is so beautiful and precious because it is a shadow and type of the family of God.
In 2015, God joined Charlotte and I to Sam Soleyn, who became our spiritual father. Life has never been the same since. We have learned to function in divine order and to serve the sons the Lord has given us with the grace He has given to us for them. I am a father in a spiritual household. In this household there are fathers of families, who serve the sons that they have a grace for. We relate to Sam as the apostolic grace over us. Together we all form part of God's holy nation.
The original intent of God has always been to put Himself on display in the Earth in the form of Son. Adam's fall caused man to live as an orphan, separated from the Father. Jesus came to reconcile us to the Father and to restore us to His original intent. In Christ we become the corporate son. In order for the corporate son to accurately represent the Father, we must come to maturity. God turns fathers to sons and sons to fathers to bring maturity in the family. The house of God is His family, not buildings or institutions. God is raising up the standard of Christ, which will bring judgment to inaccurate representations of Himself in the Earth.
I am no longer under the illegitimate authority of an institution, but am served by the authority of a spiritual father, who continuously points me to Christ. I too, serve as a father in a household of sons whose hearts the Lord has connected to mine. With divine order being restored in the house of God, we will see the mountain of the house of the Lord arise above the other mountains in the Earth.
I will continue to challenge the lies of the enemy and speak freedom to the sons of God. We will reproduce healthy Kingdom families as fathers raise sons to maturity in Christ. While we love all of those who remain in the institution, we do not love what the enemy has done to disenfranchised the sons of God, causing them to cede their authority to the institution. By continuing to live the standard, we expose the lie by which the enemy brings deception.