Annual Convention Results

This past weekend we were blessed to by the ministry of two friends from Columbus, Ohio. They did an awesome job preaching the word. We had a few notable miracles over the weekend, including some healed of conditions that had plagued them for 20+ years! One man came forward on Friday night to receive prayer and testified later of God healing his heart condition. The next night he was at the altar again testifying. In the Saturday night service his daughter, who was born with a hole in her heart, was also healed of her heart condition!
On Sunday night we had our Holy Ghost crusade. It is important to note that this is a local church convention, not a large crusade. As the spirit of God fell we had about 130 people receive the Holy Ghost! In that crowd were several children (which I have rarely seen in this nation) and one man who had a stroke about a year ago. His mouth is completely paralyzed, he cannot speak, yet as the Holy Ghost fell God healed his mouth and loosed his tongue as he spoke in a heavenly language! It was a great weekend and we were thankful for being a part of it!

First Night of Convention

Last night we were out for the first night of our convention with international guests. Curtis preached as the guests were not arriving until this morning. It was a great night. There was a real move of God in the Spirits of people. It set the tone for what we believe will be a great weekend. Pray that hundreds would receive the Holy Ghost this weekend! I have been at this convention for 4 years now, and last night we had over 1000 people which is the largest first night crowd we’ve ever had. And this is in the midst of a time of real terror in this nation. I believe God is choosing to do great things now to show that He is in control! By faith I want to openly thank God for the miracles we are about to see in the next 3 days!

Prayer Covering

Please keep us in your prayers this week. We will be part of a convention team that will be in services from Thursday – Sunday. This team will include two international visitors who will be the featured speakers. Last year at this convention we had the privilege to see 150 receive the Holy Ghost. The two years before that we had over 200 per year get the Holy Ghost at this convention. We are trusting God once again for a mighty move of the Spirit and are trusting God for many miracles and many souls filled with the Spirit. Please join with us in praying to that end.

Friday Night

Last night we had another English service. We are ding these most weeks and the response has been good. We always seem to have a good move of God and the people come ready to worship. Last night we had between 50 and 60 in attendance and I spoke on the importance of remembering our past. Looking to what God has done for inspiration and faith to help us believe he can do a great work for us today. At the end of the service I prayed a dedication prayer over those who wanted to be a part of the last day harvest.
After the altar call and closing prayer I was touched to find there were four people who stayed in the altar for a half hour after the church doors were all but closed. To be blunt about it, so much worship here, and at home, is emotion driven. When the crowd disperses and the music stops, so does the worship. It moved me to see people so desiring to be used of God that they broke with the cultural norm and really got a hold of God.
As I was walking and praying with these people as they lingered in the altar God began to speak into my heart. He said that the majority of His children live for him pressing towards the mark, the finish line. However, this majority feels the mark is heaven – that is their goal. He then said to me, it is the few, like those at the altar last night, who press for the prize of the high calling which is more then just making it to heaven. God said these few have set their goal at getting to heaven as the person God called and designed them to be. To be cliche, God was reminding me, my goal ought to be nothing less or more then being all that he wants me to be. If we are pliable in his hands, he will use us for great things!
We thank God it was another great Friday night in His house!

False Praise?

Over the weekend, while traveling to service, our driver told us a story. A lady we had interviewed about our nanny position had called him to see if he could get her the job with us. She told him he was so nice, so smart, spoke such good English, etc, etc. He knew she was trying to get on his good side so he would suggest we hire her. He cut her off and said, “Everything you are saying is true, but don’t be trying to put your butter on me!” Of course he meant, “don’t be buttering me up” but “don’t put your butter on me” has a nice ring to it!

My Weekend

Over the past weekend we were able to attend another local church convention. It was a great time in the Lord! We were just outside the city in a large Christian colony. The pastor, who we have visited before, normally has a Sunday crowd of 40-50 people. During the convention we had about 250 in attendance Friday night and over 400 in attendance on Saturday night! God blessed this gathering with his presence! Despite the fact that these people were not very educated in worldly or spiritual matters (most are “Christian” but had never read the Bible or attended church and had certainly never heard of the Holy Ghost) we still had at least 3 receive the Holy Ghost with the Biblical evidence of speaking in other tongues! We also had many miracles happen as people put their faith in Christ. Of the more notable miracles there was a man who had come to church with “cement hands”, very bad arthritis that made it feel like he had his hands immersed in a bucket of wet cement. He had had this condition for many years but when we prayed his joints were loosed and he is now moving his hands like a young man once again! A young lady, about 25 years old, had come to church with a serious eye condition. For 9 years she had lived with an intense pain in her eye which gave her bad headaches and impaired her vision. However, while I was giving my testimony of how God had changed my life, she believed that God could change her life as well. She raised her hands, and without anyone praying for her, she trusted God and was instantly healed. Her vision was restored and the pain was gone! Thank God he is still in the miracle working business and thank God he is still changing lives!

The Secret Revealed

Okay, I know pretty much all of the handful of people who read this blog are already aware of this. However, to fully reveal last week’s secret we had to travel to St Louis last week to be interviewed by the international Foreign Missions Board. They were discussing our application to be upgraded to full intermediate missionary status. Basically, for those of you outside of our organization, this is full recognition of our work and it will allow us to raise support from any where in North America and it will give us some benefits as well. This is a big step for us and we are thankful to all of you who hold us up in prayer. We have tentative approval from the Board and we will find out details of this appointment in the coming weeks, however, it was announced at our General Conference that we have been appointed as missionaries so it seems that all went well with our trip. We are all back on the field now and are doing well. Thanks again for all your support. I kept the purpose of our trip a “secret” just in case things didn’t turn out so well but thank God he directed our path and everything went great.