Scoobs Ministry

Stephen always had the innate ability to encourage, support and help others. This behaviour is commonly referred to as the 'Gift of Exhortation' in the Bible, Romans 12:7-8 (more on gifts here).

Jesus of course was the ultimate encourager. He spoke words of hope, peace, and courage to both the crowds and His closest disciples. Even as He approached the cross, He comforted their troubled hearts with promises of His presence and eternal life (John 14:1-3).

Another example of an "encourager" in scripture is Barnabas. His real name was Joseph, but the believers gave him the name "Barnabas" which meant 'son of encouragement' (Acts 4:36). His life clearly reflected the gift of lifting others up, strengthening their faith and mentoring, and supporting early believers (Acts 11:24). Other examples of exhorters are Paul (whose letters overflowed with exhortation, encouragement, and strengthening words to believers), Moses, Joshua, Deborah and Timothy.

In my humble opinion, he also had the Gift of Faith with his motto being 'do your best, God will do the rest'.

The Gift of Faith is a special. It’s not ordinary faith. It’s a powerful, supernatural confidence in God that He gives to certain believers for specific situations. This kind of faith goes far beyond the everyday faith all Christians have when they trust in Jesus for salvation. It’s an extraordinary faith that helps someone believe God for the impossible when it’s needed most. I saw this faith in him before I arrived in Canada and when he dealt with the repercussion in his personal and professional life from refusing mandated and possibly unsafe vaccines.

He believed like Peter, that 'We must obey God rather than men' (Acts 5:29), and agreed with Paul who firmly stated 'I am not ashamed of the gospel' (Romans 1:16). He stood stubbornly for God and risked losing friends and professional opportunities but still maintained a gentle and encouraging heart for others.

It was our neighbor Pam took us to Sunday school at the Lower Barrackpore Presbyterian church where he spent his early years learning about Jesus. Later on in his early adulthood due to an invitation of his childhood friend Jason Jackman 'Slingshot' Titus he learned more at the Gospel Lighthouse Lower Barrackpore Church, Trinidad.

While lying on a bed for almost 4 months, after his motorcycle accident in Maracas Bay 2002, I think it was at this point he had time to consider his life and God's place in it. With that foundation set, he remained at Gospel Lighthouse until he left for Canada.

In Canada and now an adult in 2003, he attended the Victory Pentecostal Church of God many years ago. He also visited and attended the Christian Apostolic Covenant Church when he visited Mauritius. Stephen also viewed, listened to and financially supported Billy Graham Ministries , One for Israel, Beadchaim, Andrew Womack Ministries and Sid Roth Ministries. 

In Canada he was a member of a church for a bit but soon got caught up with work and travelling. As an adult in a new culture, a lot happened during that time that caused him to consider different viewpoints from many different people with different backgrounds.

Years passed and with new information and viewpoints gained, he had a lot of questions. And he questioned me.  He was trying to make sense of new viewpoints he did not consider before. For example - what about the people who never knew Jesus or didn't get a chance to accept him? or, how can a loving Father allow people to go to to hell? Is Gilgamesh Noah? Who created aliens? After answering his questions or sending scriptures and videos to help him, he had his own communication with God to get more clarity and settle his mind and heart.

After many years of this, through questioning everything and his own personal time and experience with God, he choose to believe that what he was taught about Jesus since a child and what he read and understood in the Bible as an adult is truth. He came to the conclusion that while we are taught to be respectful to what others believed, we are also taught that God alone is true and every man is a liar and in his own words, 'Nothing in this world is worth more than God.'

Over the past 6 years since I have been living in his apartment with him, I noticed his increase in wisdom of the Bible and commitment to and faith in God. 

In the past few years, the entire world was beginning to learn of the deception over countless years by the following systems - Political, Secular including Business, Education, Science & Technology, Social & Community, Cultural & Media and the Religious, Military systems, Organizational & Institutional leaders, Philosophers, Economists and Social Reformers through social engineering, the media and drugs.

He saw the reality of what was behind the systems of the world and what the end result of it was - control.  He saw the world being programmed by groups manipulating information, hiding truth, creating problems, creating problems to have the opportunity to solve the created problems, forcing pharmakia, shifting cultural beliefs, causing political upheaval, participating in heinous acts with young children, blatant refusal of God's truth, agencies creating division, forcing beliefs - all of which resulted in confusion, mass hysteria, chaos and insanity.

He also noticed the intentional, ongoing and targeted to attack our mental, physical and financial well-being to leave drained or overstimulated, sick and confused. 

He believed the leaders we trusted, knowingly and strategically used their power to create an environment to get specific responses from us which they use to control us and gradually reduce our freedoms to keep us in a place of servitude to those above us. 

Through his experiences and recent revelations of the world's systems role in controlling us he concluded the only person who doesn't manipulate us is God - God lays it out clearly stating two items on the menu, choose Him or reject Him. 

After many discussions with him these were the conclusions Stephen came to - the Bible consistently shows that Jesus never manipulates or forces us to follow Him. He (Jesus) invites, He never forces. Jesus presents the truth, invites all of us into relationship, and leaves us with a choice - free will to choose or reject Deuteronomy 30:19. Also, that God gives humanity a clear choice - follow Jesus or go our own way and while Jesus offers salvation and fellowship, He doesn’t break down the door of our hearts. Additionally, that neutrality is impossible but the choice is ours Matthew 12:30; and not choosing Jesus is, by default, rejecting Him but it’s still our choice, it is not coercion. And finally, salvation is through belief, not force as love requires freedom - God loves us John 3:16 therefore forced love or faith isn’t love at all.

He finally understood the entire world manipulates -everyone around us manipulates us in some way or another to get what they want from us and or to control us.

He came to the realization that manipulation involves deceit, coercion, or control for selfish gain. Jesus uses truth, love, and the offer of grace. The Gospel of Jesus calls to repent and have faith - never through fear tactics or control but through the reality of sin, love of God, and promise of eternal life. 

His summary - choosing Jesus results in eternal life and relationship with God. Rejecting Jesus results in separation from God. And the choice always lies with the person.

The Dream I told Stephen about

About one month before Stephen went home to be with our Lord, he asked me to pray for someone at his workplace, someone he met while travelling. We were in his kitchen and I casually told him I think he was doing his ministry well. It was good to see him actively involved and serving in his ministry. I added that he was always good at encouraging others and but now he knew  almost as much as I did and on some topics even more even more than I did so it was good to see him pairing it with sharing the Word of God. He didn’t say much in response, but about a week later again in his kitchen with a huge grin on his face, he told me something I’ll never forget. He said - “You don’t know how good it made me feel when you said that. I feel so happy, like I’m finally really doing something for God.”

I laughed a little because many of us feel that same way -we want to serve the Lord but not always sure or know how to serve Him. But we still try and do the best we can and trust that even the small things done for Him, matter. That is what Stephen did - even when we are not always sure how, he was kind and supportive doing the best he could to bring a bit of encouragement, joy or peace to someone who needed it.

I had a dream about Stephen long before his baptism in Mauritius 2015. I shared it with him via Skype messenger. He didn’t think much of it at the time as he totally ignored the dream and was only interested on how large his muscles were in the dream as he was shirtless in the dream.

The Dream 

I copy pasted from Skype (corrected most of the abbreviated words and typos)-

Spooks, hear this dream I had of you! I just tell Lars about it. It's a bit weird but just listen - I was in the dream. I was looking at myself from above and saw myself clothed in a transparent pool like a large above-ground glass cubic pool. I was wondering how i get in this pool. I avoid the beach and pools. I was wearing a white shirt.  But I could only see the top of my head in the dream and the sleeves of the white shirt and white pants, and my hair was very thick, very curly, and very long. The people I met in Mauritius were looking down into the water as well and touching it. The water was crystal clear and sparkling in the transparent pool.

Then I got out of the pool and looked around. I saw you relaxing with your face facing towards the sun shoulders and arms outstretched bare in the sun. I walked with the people who I now recognized was from the church here in Mauritius, to where you were.  As we got closer I realized you were actually inside another pool reclining back with your head leaning back on the edge of the side of the pool.

 I noticed your rectangular cuboid pool was a lot bigger than my pool - about 5–6 times the size of mine and the side that your were reclining on, was carved into or against a rock whereas mine was free standing.

You didn't open your eyes when I got there. So I called your name. I was trying to introduce you to these people -my friends you did not meet yet as they were from Mauritius.

When you opened your eyes, I introduced you to them but just you smiled and nodded at everyone. You didn't say anything to them. Then I started talking non-stop thinking that was rude of you and I was hoping you would say something to them. 

While I was talking to you and introducing you, your hair started growing a lot longer and at a fast pace and getting thicker than mine in the dream.

I also noticed you had a huge, thick beard. And I thought to myself, “When did his beard get so long? I can't remember his beard being that long ever”. Then again I thought to myself "the beard looks'good on him, he should keep it." It wasn't growing as fast as your hair but it was getting thicker and longer at a slower pace.

As your hair and beard grew, I noticed sand and a few small pebbles were stuck in them, but you didn't try to remove them. Then I realized why. I saw the water in the pool rose up and washed them away each time it happened and pretty soon the water and your hair was sparkling clean.

Then I saw tiny 7 colour from the back home swimming up to you and trying to actually tangle themselves in your beard and hair. They got caught in your hair and beard they just stayed there which was a strange thing to do. I thought maybe they confused it with ribbons of sea weed. Then I started noticing more movement in the water closer to your feet -more small fishes swimming around in the water and making their way up to your arms and closer to your beard and hair.

While I was thinking about your beard and still continuing to introduce you to my friends, suddenly a lot of fishes were now jumping into your pool from other pools of water around the outside your pool.

They were splashing around and wetting all of us standing around and more and more kept jumping into your pool swimming around your beard and hair and jumping splashing around. I noticed some of them were stuck near your calf area. When you noticed this you took your focus off the people I brought over. You then you talked for the first time - you said 'excuse me' and you lifted off  from your reclining position and reached down and using your arms to move the water forward and by doing that you moved the fish that were close to your feet where the most recent fishes that entered your pool were and the ones by your calf forward. Then you said 'I need to help them', As you keep moving them forward, more fishes jumped in and the water became slightly discolored. End of the dream.

Then I get up and wrote all the details down so I could remember in the morning because it was very vivid and real.

Spooks, this is what I think it means -