Tomorrow I'll be in Malaga on the south coast of Spain. Andrew is there already (fighting the 24-7 bulls), as well as Derek and Amy, whose 'prophetic wedding' we celebrated in Prague last June.

The Americans like it big and up-front: a new movement known as the '30-Second Kneel Down' is sweeping the nation as high school students boldly kneel in prayer for the teachers, students, and administrators of their schools. The vision of this movement is 'to see a generational awakening come to the youth generation around the world, in order for them to reap a last days' harvest.'

Talked with a friend of mine about control and manipulation in so called 'free churches'. It's amazing how much this is happening. The quote of the day comes from a pretty dysfunctional pastor: "You're not allowed to have your own vision. You should submit to my vision. Different visions cause di-vision in the church. I am your father and God will lead you through me." BTW, these kind of things are also happening in reformed churches.

Updated the list of national prayer initiatives in the Netherlands. It looks like we organise more than we pray, but still it's encouraging to see so many good developments. Prayer is clearly on the agenda in our nation.

Problem: In many of the clinical cases of young and older people with depressions, you will find that they have one common denominator: most of them do not have a close intimate friend.

Solution: Cultivate friendschips through small groups or micro-churches. Or let's take it once step further: instead of planting churches, let's plant friendships. Instead of 'greenhouses' or church planting groups, what if we had 'friendship groups'? What if we found ways in our everyday life that we could befriend people we work with, we meet on the street, or the absolute stranger in the mall?

Result: Friendships cultivate discipleship, and true apprenticeship with Jesus Christ. And this is Jesus' Great Commission.

More wisdom at http://housechurch.blogspot.com.

Decided to join the international leaders meeting of 24-7 in Malaga, Spain, next Saturday till Wednesday. Sense God is up to something.

My son David has a dog named 'Vlekkie' who makes music. Actually it's his younger brother Peter's dog, but the animal was quickly confiscated by David. Now Vlekkie helps him to make imaginary coffee for mum and dad, and attends imaginary school. You already guessed it: it was playing weekend.

Hey, today is my BIRTHDAY! Believe it or not... I'm 35 now, getting a bit middle-aged already. ;-0

Working hard in the office. Making decisions on several meetings, thinking about a new structure for the Joel News website, answering e-mails, writing reports... (pretty boring, huh?)

Tonight I'll be leading a meeting in Amsterdam with Jon Peterson (insert) and Michael Sullivant from Kansas City on 24 hour prayer and city reaching. Should be good.

Ah... our theoblogian is responding to the '15 traits of a postmodern apostle' mentioned earlier. He called it the '15 trials of a postmodern apostle'. The first five are back-stabbing, thin wallet, red-eye, dumb tax and what-about-Bob's. Like it.

Andrew Jones just introduced a new species of bloggers: theoblogians.

Tomorrow, on September 18, over 3 million youth around the world will pray for their nation. See You At The Pole started in Texas in 1990 with just a few young people and has been growing ever since. It is now in 20 countries and is one of the largest youth prayer movements in the world. Another interesting movement is Joel's Call in Germany.

Preached in Xpoint this morning on the wedding in Cana where Jesus changed water into wine. As you may know this was the miracle with which He started his public ministry. Happy coincidence: this weekend was also Taco's 30th birthday. And what's more: on the day before his birthday he signed the contract to sell his company for a 'very nice' price, which is also a miracle of provision. He is now free to finish his theological studies and move on with God.

The weather was great the past three days, so I continued my 'bike pilgrimage' from Egmond to Echternach, mainly following the Oeverlandroute.

The first track from Leerdam to Boxtel offered all kinds of river scenery and included crossing the Waal and the Maas by ferry. I enjoyed a lunch break and a little nap in the beautifully restored fortification town of Heusden. Via Den Bosch with its great medieval cathedral and the estates of Sint-Michielsgestel I reached Boxtel. I prayed for a 'house of peace' and found an excellent 15 euro B&B address.

The following day I cycled the 100 km from Boxtel to Roosteren through a variety of rural landscapes. From Best along the Wilhelmina canal to Nuenen, then on to Mierlo, the moors of Strabrecht, Someren, Ospel, Grathem, the white and romantic town of Thorn close to the Maas, through Belgium until Maaseik, then crossing the river (and the border again) to end up in Roosteren. I treated myself to a hot bath to soak my weary legs.

The last track (today) from Roosteren to Maastricht, along the Maas and the Juliana canal was easy, just over three hours. I paid a quick visit to the statue of Saint Servaes (the first apostle who brought the gospel to the southern part of Holland) and was impressed by the abundance of Scriptures on the bronze doors of the cathedral dedicated to him.

9-11, one of those remarkable dates that we will not easily forget. When the WTC came down I was in Berlin with 30 city reachers from Europe and the USA. We had just watched the Transformations video and talked about what would be needed for our nations to return to God. Then the news came in of the terrorist attack on the WTC and Pentagon. It was hard to choose: pray or turn on the tele. We prayed and then turned on the tele, to see the drama repeated over and over before our eyes. Still it's hard to believe what happened. And probably it's even harder to believe that 9-11 didn't change the spiritual climate in the USA (see Barna). Andrew Jones was also in Berlin at the time and shares his own reflections.

Youth in Australia and the Pacific are rising up to pray. This network is similar to the one we launched in Herrnhut.

Sometimes I wonder why working on unity is so complicated, while the principles are so easy...

Today was my mum's birthday. It was nice to visit her. On our way back to Utrecht our car started smoking pretty badly. The Wegenwacht told us that our faithful Nissan Sunny Florida is probably finished, which would be a real pity.

Brian McLaren wrote a nice article on the postmodern transition in leadership.

3,000 Swiss youth recovenanting with God for their nation. I just found the pictures of the Rütli event in April 2002. Seems pretty powerful to me. Also check out the main website.

I put the pictures from Herrnhut online.

I enjoyed our two-day seminar in the monastery in Helvoirt. There was a good flow between John and our national team. We connected the local prayer leaders in regional small groups and gave them several practical assignments to work on. This was appreciated as it helped them to think more strategically and take practical steps towards transformation.

I'm leaving now for a two-day seminar/retreat for local prayer leaders in the Netherlands. John Mulinde from Uganda will be with us. Should be good.

Just found a blogspot on '15 traits of a postmodern apostle'. I think I like this simple and radical approach.

Believe it or not... Reinhold started blogging and Andrew designed a nice header for him.

It was good to connect with Sürü and his team of creative communicators. The centre they run is a great place to train a new generation for ministry. It was also funny to find out that we share a common interest in Celtic communities and a more holistic lifestyle. On Sürü’s request I gave a little teaching about this for the team and also mowed the lawn (talking about a holistic lifestyle ;-).

The Vierwaldstättersee is a vast (and romantic) lake in the heart of Switzerland. I enjoyed taking the cable car up to the Rigi mountain and walking down along the two hour hiking track to Weggis. Also very relaxing: sitting at a wooden bench on the shore of the lake, watching the ducks and the boats in the late August sun.

Yesterday evening I visited Reinhold Scharnovski and his family in Thun and connected with Susanna Rychiger of the Swiss 24-7 base. Today I met up with Ueli Haldemann in Schaffhausen to talk about EPL and transformation issues. Now I'm back home with my lovely wife and two kids, who said they did not even miss me...

I’m still joyful about our young leaders gathering in Herrnhut. It was a significant meeting for at least seven reasons:

1. It was the right meeting with the right people at the right time. The Lord confirmed this in several ways. What we didn’t know for instance is that the dates of our arrival and departure coincided with two main dates on the Moravian calendar: on 21 August the first missionaries were sent out and on 27 August the 100 years prayer chain was started. This was more than symbolic, because Connect Europe turned out to be a time of birthing of new movements of prayer and missions among the emerging generation in Europe. Friendships have been established between 50 young leaders from 12 nations, and I expect many new initiatives and partnerships to come out of this. I believe the Lord wants to release a youth prayer movement in every nation of Europe.

2. God released a fresh flow of the prophetic and every participant learned how to prophesy over people and nations, and received personal encouragements and confirmations from the Lord.

3. The heritage of Herrnhut is a strong link or partnership between prayer and missions and I believe God used the weekend to plant some new ‘apostolic seeds’ in our hearts to pray over and act upon when we return home. Also we prayed into the destiny of Herrnhut, for the restoration of 24 hour prayer in that place and for a fresh missionary move that will again impact the whole world. On 22 August at 22.22 h. the Welsh 'trigger anointing' was activated and we went up to the watchtower to loudly call Herrnhut to wake up out of her sleepiness. Not realizing that village people go to bed at 22.00 h., we saw the immediate and literal fulfilment of this call. The mayor came up to us and he was not amused. :-)

4. We heard great stories of what God is doing among young people, especially related to prayer. Everyone was able to share his/her dreams and receive prayer and encouragement. We learned from national youth prayer movements that are already in place (like The Call in the Netherlands), and from innovative models of youth prayer (like the boiler rooms in the UK). Because implementation is often a weak link in prayer movements, we gave the participants a number of practical suggestions for follow-up and for starting a movement in their own nation.

5. At the end of our time together we performed a prophetic act based on the second part of Ezechiel 37. We took two pieces of wood. On the first piece we wrote the names of the 12 nations/tribes that were represented in Herrnhut. On the second piece we wrote the names of the remaining 28 nations/tribes of Europe. Then we put the pieces of wood together and prayed and prophesied that our generation in Europe will be unified under the lordship of Jesus Christ and that He will use us as a mighty baton in his hand to defeat his enemies. To make it practical we committed ourselves to continue as a network.

6. Although our leadership team didn’t know each other beforehand, we flowed graciously together, as the Spirit of God led and inspired us, each in our different giftings, in a non-programmed and inclusive, but nevertheless targeted way. This was a good experience and made it (at least for me) the best EPL meeting in years. At the end many people came up to us telling they appreciated the style of leadership, so by Gods grace we were able to model something good.

7. Last but not least: we had a lot of fun, both in the leadership team and the big group. The tense soccer game between Holland-Switzerland-Germany and UK-Italy-Wales ended in 4-5. A number of people received a second baptism in the camping swimming pool.

So far for now. Next week I plan to write a more extensive report.