Fire On Your Head

Recently I was interviewed by Eric Nevins on his show Halfway There, thanks to another mutual friend connecting us.

Here's the description from Eric's show:

Today, Steve shares his journey from a conservative denomination to a charismatic one. You'll hear his heart to see God and be inspired by his following the next right step even as it led him around the world. Steve currently has an online business while he serves in Peru – that's modern tentmaking!

Listen to Steve's story now!

Stories Steve shared:

• Working as a tentmaker in Peru helping authors publish their books
• Growing up in Ontario, Canada
• Giving his life to Christ around age 15
• Devouring tapes of teaching
• Connecting to the Brownsville revival
• Speaking in tongues for the first time
• Praying for people in the line
• Going to Holland as a missionary and feeling frustrated
• Realizing that Peru was the next place he would live
• Writing a blog and his books

Resources we mentioned:

• Playing With Holy Fire: A Wake-Up Call to the Pentecostal-Charismatic Church by Michael L. Brown
• From Holy Laughter to Holy Fire: America on the Edge of Revival by Michael L. Brown
• Jonathan Edwards: On Revival by Jonathan Edwards
• Streams of Living Water: Celebrating the Great Traditions of Christian Faith by Richard Foster

Thanks to Eric Nevins for having me on his show!

Sorry to those of you who've been patiently waiting for me to come back to the podcast. Time has just kind of slipped away from me, and I didn't realize how long it's been since the last episode was published live. 

I plan on coming back to it, but the hiatus is "indefinite" for the time being for reasons I share in this half episode before getting into a selected chapter from a recent audiobook, Divine Healing Made Simple I narrated for Praying Medic. 

Contact me if you'd like to receive a free promo code to listen to it on Audible. 

Here is the link to my Buy Me A Coffee link if you'd like to cover my editing and hosting expenses for this podcast so I can move forward again with it outsource some things to speed up the production process for new episodes.

Blessings and fire on your head.

Audible UK link for the book: Divine Healing Made Simple

I tackle a couple of world events. I say a "couple", though it's true, but I spend more time disproportionately focused on the situation of John Allen Chau, the missionary who was killed by The Sentinelese tribe on the North Sentinel Island off the coast of India. I felt like I needed to say something and offer my perspective, hoping that my slant is unique not just because I'm also a missionary — plenty of missionaries are chiming in on social media. Not just because I have a platform to do so, and not just because I have any opinions. But I feel like this is one of those gray areas and the rightness or foolishness of his actions which led to him being killed are not as black and white as people taking sides about this would insist it is. I respect and agree with my brothers and sisters in Christ who feel Chau counted the cost and will receive a martyr's reward, while I ALSO have reservations and feelings that the perspective he went about this the way he did was also a bit misguided. But after that I have difficult with the oversimplifying of this that people on both sides are doing. Since the topic is multi-faceted, I decided to turn on the mic and share my thoughts verbally, for those of you who would want them, so there's less confusion about what I'm saying if you can hear me out instead of just reading me out. And hopefully not adding to the noise. I've also thought of many other things I could have said and thoughts I could have included in this recording that I didn't, but there are a lot of misconceptions about what a missionary is as it is that perhaps I'll explore in another episode or find a suitable guest to have a discussion with about these things. But suffice it to say, I hope you get some value out of these thoughts today. Blessings to you! My Relevant Blog Links: Missionary or Glorified Tourist? When Mission Isn't Sexy Do You Know What Your Missionaries Are Actually Doing? Things Your Missionary Will Never Tell You External Links: John Chau, Missions, and Fools - Ed Stetzer, Christianity Today John Allen Chau: Do missionaries help or harm? - By Toby Luckhurst BBC News

I got to be interviewed by Ryan J. Rhoades, founder of Reformation Designs this past weekend. He does a weekly FB live interview series on the subject of branding. We talked about writing and publishing books, of course. This is the raw file, unedited, so there were a few glitches, and you hear me say um and uh a lot more than normal as a result.

We covered a lot, but if you're ready to soak in some information like a sponge or writing a book is something you've been wanting to do then this video should help get you off to a good start.

Ryan and I have been in conversation for some time now and we've finally joined forces and are providing a comprehensive package for authors and writers wanting to create an excellent, professional and high quality book.

Ryan will be doing all the visual branding (covers, social media images, website artwork if needed, etc…) for our authors, while I'll continue coaching writers and helping craft their content.

If you're not an author yourself but know someone who could use our help, we offer a 5% referral fee. If you refer someone to us and they become a paying client of ours, we'll award you 5% of what we earn on that project.

Creating a book is a huge endevor, and since we value and appreciate that someone is coming to us and trusting us with bringing their "baby" into the world, we want to thank you for recommending us to them with a paid referral.

If you would like to work with us on your book, or need help creating it, get in touch and book a call with me below and we'll see if we'd make a good team together. After booking you will be re-directed to an application form which will help us know more about your project before the call.

My booking calendar: http://meetme.so/SteveBremner

Also check out Ryan's new podcast, The Creative Revolution Podcast

Derek Snook, self-described son of a Baptist minister and entrepeneur joins me to discuss his recent book, The Definition of Success: What Living Homeless Can Teach You. He tells me what was intended as a one-night experiment lasted a year, and years later he has decided to publish a book about how this experience had an impact on him and what he learned from it, including a well-paying temp agency he started and recently sold.

Definitely a different take on "loving your neighbor as yourself" if I ever heard one!

A few interesting points that came up in our discussion:

• While Derek could have quit this experiment at any given momenty and gone back home, most homeless and less fortunate don't have that option
• How living in bubbles in our culture is destructive to indviduals and groups, including the toll isolation is taking on mental health in general
• The intriguing way a city's layout is actually important to society
• What can we do to erase the barrier between wealthy and poor churches, as well as the racial divide, even in the church, between black and white congregations

Relevant Links:

Derek's website at dereksnook.net

Follow Derek on Instagram.

Get a copy of his book from Amazon.

Check out Derek's 2015 TedX talk at this link: https://youtu.be/haoTlVcg0PE

Dr. Brian Simmons, lead translator for The Passion Translation of the Bible joins me this week for an insightful interview and discussion.

In this episode we cover:

• How he handles peoples' criticism that he's a "lone ranger" translating the Bible; and how he learns to listen to critics in case God is speaking to him through them
• Epiphanies he had while discovering the appropriate words in the text while translating the Bible into a tribal dialect as a missionary
• How his translation work has helped him see a few popular Bible passages we've been misunderstanding in English
• We also discuss our mutual favorite book of the book, Song of Songs
• I also ask Brian if Jesus spoke in tongues (a question I've been asked since releasing my book on Lies People Believe About Speaking in Tongues.
• The importance of translating meanings not just words
• And much more...

Relevant Links and Books Mentioned in Today's Show:

What's God Really Like? by SJ Hill, audiobook narrated by yours truly.

The Passion Translation dot com - The TPT's official website

Passion Movement dot com. - Support the Work of this Translation

Stairway Ministries - Ministry website of Brian and Candice Simmons

Brian Simmons on Audible.

Here's an 18-minute clip from the audiobook version of What's God Really Like? Unique Insights into His Fascinating Personality.

Get the full audiobook at https://www.stevebremner.com/sjbook or on Amazon at this link.

Enjoy!

Florida State Representative Kimberly Daniels and pastor of Spoken Word Ministries church in North and South Florida joins us this week to discuss her brand new book Breaking the Power of Familiar Spirits: How to Deal with Demonic Conspiracies from Charisma House.

We discuss:

• Her background including before she came to Christ and was bound by drugs
• How she got into politics, first as a council member in Jacksonville, FL and then as a member of the Florida House of Representatives
• How one can have soul ties not just to other people, but also to ministries and places
• Strategies of the enemy to attempt to cause you to not fulfill your calling
• The balance in her life as a pastor and a public servant
• Witchcraft, fetishism, and cursed objects that can bring trouble into our homes.

This was a very fascinating conversation, and I hope you enjoy it (which I believe you will).

Get Kim's book on Amazon.

Check out her Facebook page at State Representative Kimberly Daniels.

Check out her ministry website at KimberlyDaniels.net.

I recorded an impromptu episode a couple of nights ago, rather spontaneously and share some of my thoughts and things I've recently learned about the Day of Pentecost. If you're a Bible detail geek like me, you'll be just as fascinated to reflect on the times and seasons of the Lord and patterns in Scripture. Such as the things we glean about Pentecost by looking at just what the people of God were celebrating in the first place on that day when Jews from all around the world had gathered in Jerusalem to celebrate the Feast of Harvest or the Feast of Weeks.

This week's episode is a shorty but goodie. Hope you are uplifted and edified by it.

Dr. Michael L. Brown joins me again, this time to talk about his newest book, Playing With Holy Fire. It was a privilege and an honor to have him back on the show again.

We discuss some of the excesses and abuses that plague the charismatic movement and Pentecostal church, as well as other aspects of the abuse of funds and "fame" of some preachers, all in a gracious tone, without calling anybody out by name.

For those of you listening and you have no idea who he is, he's got a lot of other books and sermons he's given about various topics, like revival in America, personal holiness, Jewish apologetics, the culture wars, to name a few. He's also a national radio show host his show is called The Line of Fire. He was one of the leaders of The Brownsville Revival, which birthed the FIRE School of Ministry that I went to in my early twenties. Books Mentioned Today:

• Playing With Holy Fire: A Wake-Up Call to the Pentecostal-Charismatic Church
• Authentic Fire: A Response to John MacArthur's Strange Fire
• Whatever Happened to the Power of God? & It's Time to Rock the Boat

Relevant Links:

• Ask Dr. Brown
• The Line of Fire Radio
• Charisma
• Town Hall
• Ask Dr. Brown YouTube Channel