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The Story
As a
prophetic parable David and Jenny Orton's life together has played out with an emerging and increasingly definable design and message.
Their personal
history falls distinctly into three decades representing three phases of development preparing them for the fulfilment of their life-assignment in the current fourth decade:
Formation 1971-1980 |
Christian Faith Centre, Sydney |
Expansion 1981-1990 |
Logos Foundation, Blue Mountains (also Perth,
Vancouver, Toowoomba) |
Focusing
1991-2000 |
Christian Revival Crusade, Melbourne |
Fulfilment 2001-current |
Lifemessenger, Melbourne | Each of the first three
decades was marked off by significant 'divine contacts', a major ministry crisis, an unsolicited invitation, and a geographical move. Without any human orchestration a boundary line formed in the last few years of each decade where questions were being asked and the kingdom quest for reality was reignited. This was soon followed by a sovereignly opened door and a new beginning.
These first
three decades clearly reflect the three major stages of development in the life of a leader: Formation, Expansion, and Focusing, leading to the fourth, Fulfilment.
In the preparation of a leader God sovereignly uses events, people, and significant circumstances. Each decade of David and Jenny's story shows new and highly significant
'divine contacts', people who were influential in the impartation of values and perspectives or opening doors.
The First Decade: Formation (1971-1980)
David and Jenny came to the Lord together as teenage sweethearts in 1970.
They met on the 28th November 1969 at a 'rock dance' which was unfortunately closed down by the police! It had been sponsored by the local Methodist Church!
David experienced a powerful conversion, turning from the eventual nihilism and despair of the hippie and counter-cultural movements of the late 1960's to a relationship with the living God.
They were
immediately connected to the catalytic centre of renewal for Sydney, Christian Faith Centre, pioneered by Paul and Bunty Collins from New Zealand. By 1972 David found himself in Bible School having been deeply impacted by a power encounter with God on the first YWAM Summer of Service in Australia (summer 1971-72).
Jenny also entered Bible School in 1973. They were married in 1974, both serving full-time with Christian Faith Centre.
Jenny as a receptionist/secretary and David in a youth and training capacity.
This first decade exposed them to the
worldwide outpouring of the Holy Spirit across all the denominations which became known as the Charismatic Renewal . More significantly, they were also deeply impacted by the positive effects of the mid-twentieth century outpouring known as the Latter Rain revival through such teachers as Peter Morrow (NZ), David Jackson (Aus), Kevin Conner (Aus), Ralph Mahoney (USA), and also through the writings
of Bill Britton and George Warnock.
It was also during these years that Bob Mumford and Ern Baxter came to Sydney invited by Paul Collins. A relationship between Australia and the five lead teachers of Christian Growth Ministries or what became known as the Disciple/Shepherding Movement ensued (Bob Mumford, Derek Prince, Ern Baxter, Charles Simpson, Don Basham). But more of this in
the second decade.
From 1972-1974 David received powerful prophetic confirmation of the call of God on his life. Through prophecy and the laying on of hands the prophetic nature of the call was made clear and the many perplexing turns in the road that were yet to come were foreshadowed. This laid the foundations for certainty in perplexing times.
During these years their church
pioneered in the areas of worship, intercession, renewal conferences, and publishing. What later became known as Restore Magazine (affiliated with 'New Wine' Magazine in the USA) came from the loins of Christian Faith Centre which by the 1980's enjoyed the largest distribution of any Christian journal in Australia at the time. Through the interplay of intercession, prophetic worship, and
leadership training 'Christian Renewal Centre' was also planted in Manila, Philippines which became highly influential in spreading the Charismatic Renewal in that nation. In addition, through the experience of intercession at Faith Centre the Australian prayer movement was born with the formation of 'Intercessors for Australia', pioneered by Noel Bell, one of the church elders.
However,
in 1975 the church purchased an office building to house all that was happening. It proved to be a flawed decision. The ministry was pushed into a financial crisis triggering false accusations from within the team against the founder, Paul Collins. What was one moment a highly catalytic breakthrough ministry impacting the spiritual culture of a city with an unquestioned ripple-effect across the
nation was in another moment self-destructing! While the church in some measure survived it never recovered momentum nor fulfilled its destiny. As junior team members David and Jenny found themselves on the street, without a job and without a ministry. David sold life insurance for a living and Jenny became a receptionist for an architectural firm. For another five years they stayed with the
ship under different leadership. The founding vision, anointing, and momentum were lost prompting David to ask many questions.
Increasingly dissatisfied with a more traditional Pentecostal ethos under the new leadership the decade came to a close with an unsolicited invitation. This came from Howard Carter, a Baptist pastor also from New Zealand, who had co-founded Christian
Faith Centre with Paul Collins, but had moved to the Blue Mountains with the ministry of Logos Foundation.
Paul Collins had brought this ministry to Australia from New Zealand where it had been influential in disseminating the Charismatic Renewal across the traditional denominations. Its main foci were renewal conferences, seminars, and publishing
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The Second Decade: Expansion (1981-1990)
The farewell from Sydney was 23rd March 1980, David and Jenny's Wedding Anniversary. They built a home in the Blue Mountains where Logos Foundation was headquartered, lived in it for five weeks and promptly moved to Perth, Western Australia with Howard Carter and a team to
plant a new work.
Howard's invitation the previous year was to be mentored by him. He had initially come into relationship with Bob Mumford and then in 1976 with Ern Baxter. Howard sat on the international council of the Shepherding Movement providing apostolic
leadership in both the Asia-Pacific region and areas of North America. The invitation was to spend one year with him in Perth and then relocate with him to Vancouver.
This open door was the stuff of dreams come true.
These men, among others, were the heroes
of the Renewal throughout the 1970's and 1980's. The Shepherding Movement, while flawed and highly controversial, was motivated by a genuine search for an authentic Christianity gathering an amazing and unprecedented groundswell. It provided a generation an opportunity to experiment with a more radical lifestyle of discipleship. It was an attempt to free Christianity of the enculterated reductions
of a more traditional and consumerist religion. However, with its emphasis on delegated authority and pastoral accountability the movement was open to abuse. Spiritual hunger, success, mixed motives, and the inexperience of new leaders all coalesced to form a dangerous mix. Many of God's people were spiritually abused with fallout that continues to this day.
David and Jenny were
not exempt. What began as a warm invitation to be mentored by a senior leader became a cold and manipulative relationship. Within a short while they were manoeuvred to the periphery both relationally and functionally. The cold comfort was that this became increasingly the pattern for several other prophetically wired leaders within the ministry.
From being a fulltime staff member David found himself on the margins selling life insurance again to support a young family, but without the Lord's release to leave the movement. With the help of those in the authority structure over them they searched their hearts for the fatal flaw in their characters that caused such divine
resistance. Darkness and a heavy despair blanketed their lives. For another eight years they remained faithful, including the selling of their home to fund a return to Bible School. This time it was a Leadership School raised up by the Shepherding Movement in Vancouver. With a three-month-old and an eighteen-month-old in arms they flew to Canada with high hopes.
On their return
to Australia, however, David went back to life insurance building a business for the third time from scratch (ultimately he will return to the insurance industry a fourth time when they relocate to Queensland in 1987). In addition, while supporting his young family he laid the groundwork for starting Logos Bible College in the Blue Mountains and in addition delivering half the teaching load.
He continued in this for the next five years.
During this time he was asked by Howard Carter to come back on staff. Upon selling his insurance agency to free himself and signing a contract not to re-enter the insurance industry he was told there was no money for his appointment. The very
next week another staff member was put on.
The wisdom writer aptly says that, "Hope deferred makes the heart sick". David by this time had been promoted or demoted in his leadership roles no less than five times. Finally, in frustration he gathered several of his peers who were in senior leadership in the movement to ask their advice, the response of one being, if the call hasn't
come to pass by now it never will. It was now 1989 - seventeen years after the initial call.
At the same time David began to dialogue with the 'shepherd' over him in the structure concerning some of the shepherding practices. This continued until 1990 when through a set of providential circumstances, including several words of knowledge and amazing 'coincidences' Howard Carter was exposed
for a twenty-year pattern of immorality. In consultation with Ern Baxter he was publicly stood down by the local leadership team and was taken from this life twelve months to the day with seven tumours on the brain.
Within three months of Howard Carter being exposed and stood down David received an unsolicited phone call from Victoria. It was an invitation to raise up a ministry training
college for a Pentecostal denomination in Melbourne.
Another decade closed with another move. To Top of Page
The Third Decade: Focusing (1991-2000)
January 1991 saw David
and Jenny with their young
family arrive in Melbourne to serve with Christian Revival Crusade (CRC), a home grown Pentecostal movement founded in the 1940's.
David's brief was to raise up a state ministry training college.
The very first CRC State Council Meeting attended by David was
not a positive one. In fact, it dissolved into a factional debate between state and national interests. Unfortunately for David the issue was the training college his job! It was deferred for a year and so David and Jenny survived by licking stamps and stuffing jiffy bags for a year. They serviced the CRC mail-order Video Bible College. Finally, after that year the movement presented seven
students for a full-time one year training programme which David facilitated during which he received an invitation to join the pastoral team of one of their leading churches; thus, their relocation to the beautiful Mornington Peninsula on the south eastern edge of greater Melbourne.
However, by 1993 it became evident that a dysfunctional situation had existed in the leadership dynamics
of the church for some time. With David's presence in the mix plus a significant outpouring of the Spirit manifesting in holy laughter the awkward peace was jolted. Apart from human frailty and issues of control a clear ministry values conflict between programme and presence emerged.
This continued for another five years, finally ending in David's forced resignation of January 1999.
The irony of the situation was that while this division was occurring in David and Jenny's own backyard David was being used to catalyse pastoral unity across the nation. Starting in 1994 he had drawn together a strategic gathering of senior ministry leaders from
across Melbourne with a common heart for relationship and unity in the larger body of Christ.
From these beginnings, in 1996 they launched pastors' prayer summits across six of Australia's major cities. These were a four-day no-agenda citywide gathering of pastors and
spiritual leaders to seek the face of God. Hundreds of pastors from more than twenty denominations were deeply impacted with annual summits still continuing in many of the cities ten years later.
Even so, with David's pastoral resignation in 1999 a shift was signalled. With
leadership tensions also emerging in the Australian pastors prayer movement, in consultation with his associate Terry Dirks of International Renewal Ministries (Portland, Oregon), David resigned his leadership with pastors prayer summits and his citywide roles in 2000.
Another watershed at the end of another decade! To Top of Page
The
Fourth Stage: Fulfilment (2001-current)
This became their darkest hour. David and Jenny were dislocated from their church, ministry, livelihood, and friends. While the financial settlement from the church was generous they carried some ministry debt personally which in time had its effect. They went into financial melt-down and survival mode. For five years they were laid low
by the Lord. Despite knocking on several doors nothing opened.
However, through a providential connection with a consultant/coach they took time to refocus on the original call, tracing their time-line, noting the formative events and crises, decisions made, and values proven by those decisions. Through this and the many prophetic words over their lives they were able to focus down and
articulate clearly their life-assignment. The confusing Babel of circumstances, the many perplexing twists and turns of the road began to make sense. They were not crazy, or fatally flawed after all! God had called them. He had sovereignly overseen the journey to work deep within them something of Himself. And thus they had, in this new phase of destiny fulfilment, finally become in some measure
the message they were to proclaim.
This enabled David to put pen to paper, writing the manuscript for, Snakes in the Temple . At the same time their paths crossed with Marc Dupont, a prophetic minister instrumental in the 'Toronto Blessing'. Marc became a friend, kindly introducing David to the publishers and writing the forward for the book. While immediately accepted for publication even
this, once finished, had to sit for another year before the Lord would release it. Another strategic development, soon after finishing the book manuscript, was David's entry into internet publishing in 2002. Without any expertise the Lord enabled him to build his own website and he began posting fresh prophetic articles. Apart from these things they remained the whole time in a posture of waiting
for the Lord. This was done in what became jokingly known as the 'bat cave', David's study. Only one faithful intercessor prayed with David and Jenny throughout the whole five years. All that could be done was to wait for the release.
This finally came in February 2004 with David and Jenny miraculously convening the
 Open Heavens Over Australia Conference
with six supporting churches and the simultaneous release of the book. The conference was held at the convention centre, Melbourne Park, home of the Australian Tennis Open with fifteen hundred people gathering from every state of Australia, New Zealand, Africa, and USA for an awesome time in the presence of God.
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Epilogue: Into the Future
From this point it has been an amazing trajectory. Since 2004 there has been a convergence of lives and vision to where David and Jenny find themselves surrounded by an awesome team. God has sovereignly drawn them together and they are the strength behind all that is currently happening through the ministry of Lifemessenger. Prophetic people,
intercessors, pastoral people, creative people, and ministries of helps and administrations have been brought together to participate in what God is doing.
Even though much is still embryonic, in eighteen months fifty leaders have being mentored through six Leadershift Days, nine Tabernacle of David schools/seminars/prophetic worship days have been convened, and numerous conferences and
church services have been addressed. A prototype 'simple church', 'The Vine', has been planted with the potential for multiplication and an estimated 40-50,000 people are being reached through the internet each month.
More importantly, God has invested a message. Through three decades he has been patiently moulding a man and a woman in readiness for destiny fulfilment - to embody a message
that will be carried to the nations. In divine delay, disappointment, and betrayal they have been required to lay their 'Isaac' on the altar and trust God to raise it up.
In 1972 God spoke to David through the call of Ezekiel:
Then He said to me, "Son of man, I am sending you to the sons of Israel, to a rebellious people who have
rebelled against Me; they and their fathers have transgressed against Me to this very day.
"I am sending you to them who are stubborn and obstinate children, and you shall say to them, 'Thus says the Lord GOD.'
"As for them, whether they listen or not--for they are a rebellious house--they will know that a prophet has been among them.
"And you,
son of man, neither fear them nor fear their words, though thistles and thorns are with you and you sit on scorpions; neither fear their words nor be dismayed at their presence, for they are a rebellious house.
"But you shall speak My words to them whether they listen or not, for they are rebellious.
"Now you, son of man, listen to what I am speaking to you; do
not be rebellious like that rebellious house. Open your mouth and eat what I am giving you."
Then I looked, and behold, a hand was extended to me; and lo, a scroll was in it.
When He spread it out before me, it was written on the front and back, and written on it were lamentations, mourning and woe.
Then He said to me, "Son of man, eat
what you find; eat this scroll, and go, speak to the house of Israel."
So I opened my mouth, and He fed me this scroll.
He said to me, "Son of man, feed your stomach and fill your body with this scroll which I am giving you." Then I ate it, and it was sweet as honey in my mouth.
Then He said to me, "Son of man, go to the house of Israel
and speak with My words to them.
(Eze 2:3-3:4)
Like Ezekiel, David and Jenny have been required to first "eat the scroll with lamentations, mourning, and woe" before they could be released to speak. The true prophetic oracle is only ever born in the crucible of God's dealings.
Another key word came in 1973, through the laying on of hands and prophecy:
"If you return, then I will restore you-- Before Me you will stand; And if you extract the precious from the worthless, You will become My spokesman. They for their part may turn to you, But as for you, you must not turn to them.
(Jer 15:19)
To be a spokesman for God demands the separation of the
"precious from the worthless" - of the divine from the human - the "piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, discerning of the thoughts and intents of the heart" (Heb 4:12).
This occurs:
First, at a very personal level:
Jeremiah had been bemoaning his lot, questioning God s justice in
his suffering due to the prophetic call. But now he had to settle, in the face of personal injury and injustice that God may not be fair, but that he is just. Only in returning to the Lord in brokenness in deep yieldedness to the sovereignty and justice of God would he stand in the counsel of the Lord and be his mouth; and
Second, at a corporate level:
Because the prophet had settled these issues privately he could now stand publicly without fear nor favour, separating the precious from the worthless in a public arena, and thus be God's voice.
And so, a man and a woman over three decades have walked in the footsteps of the prophets. They have had to eat the scroll and experience the
captivity of God's people, seeing the inner workings of the religious system and indeed of their own hearts, so as to speak into it with authority. They have been sent to pronounce the judgement of God on the idol strongholds and set the captive free.
Four decades after the counter-cultural movements of the 1960's through which David's prophetic wiring first emerged the 1969 school report
describing David as having "matured into a well-mannered radical" has itself, in some ways, proven prophetic.
All the glory goes to God for His faithfulness in bringing David and Jenny through their many trials to this season of destiny fulfilment:
Faithful is He who calls you, and He also shall bring it to pass
(1 Ths
5:24).
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