A taste of revival on the streets…

My wife and I just had a beautiful baby girl this Saturday night, so we didn’t get to go out on outreach this week. So I thought it would be a great time to post an incredible story of revival "out there". This happened a few years ago, but it permanently marked me and many others for seeing Jesus move on the streets. We feel that it was a “taste” of what the Lord wanted to release on a much larger scale.

Read it and weep.

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A taste of revival on the streets…

We had been going out every Friday night for about a year, attempting to reach the lost young people of our community with the love and power of the Gospel. We were green, not really knowing what to do. We got the kids attention by outfitting a huge army truck with neon running lights, a great camouflage paint job, strobe lights and blaring Christian rock music. When the young people would come over to see the truck, we would give them hot dogs, cokes and just try to get to know them. We saw some cool stuff from week to week and met a lot of good people, but we could never get consistent results. One week would be great, some kids would meet Jesus and another week would be a complete dud, with almost nothing happening. Part of the reason for this is because we weren’t preaching the Kingdom of God; it was more of a “Jesus loves you” type thing. Lesson learned.

Anyway, we were having a bad night. Nothing was happening. No one was listening to us and no one seemed interested in anything but mocking and ridiculing us. We were disheartened and discouraged. We were situated between a coffee house and a movie theater and there were a bunch of people milling around (maybe 400-500) walking to and from the coffee house and theater. Our problem is that we couldn’t get their attention for even a minute; everyone was hurriedly going from one place to the next.

Someone in our group (there were about 15 of us) suggested that we should pray, right out there in public. We agreed and on the movie theater’s sidewalk, we formed a small circle of about 12 people. We started to pray, softly at first, just asking the Lord for help. Almost instantly, a powerful anointing for prayer fell on everyone in the group. It felt like a mighty force pulling us upward. The anointing was so thick that we couldn’t even stand up and we fell on our knees, crying out to God in English and in tongues. People in the group started praying LOUDLY. I am talking about upper room, all by myself, no one around for miles kind of prayer and we all started doing it!

A crowd started to gather. I knew this because after praying for a few minutes in violent tongues out in public, I cracked my eyes to see a bunch of people coming to see what was going on. They were totally bewildered and you could hear them asking questions of us, although no on could answer (we were under a powerful spirit of intercession). “What’s going on? What are you doing?” they asked. Almost completely oblivious to the crowd now gathered, we continued to pray with all our hearts.

The tone changed from one of asking questions and curiosity to angry mocking and cursing. People were screaming, yelling and cursing at us. We had formed a circle on our knees. One of the teenagers in the crowd jumped in the middle of the circle and started to say something nasty, but right when he did this, he got the most horrified look on his face that I had ever seen! He looked as if he was on fire and he started to furiously scrape and grab at his clothes, letting out the most inhuman shriek I have ever heard. He then jumped out of the circle and out of sight. Another kid jumped in, taunting us as he entered the circle, again, he gave a horrified look, was clawing at his clothing and he let out a terrible shriek before jumping back out of the circle. You think they would get the picture, but this happened another three or four times. I and everyone else in that circle will never forget the sound of those shrieks, they were totally demonic and no human could have ever made them. I have heard them since, but only as people were delivered of demons.

The sound of the crowd reached a fever pitch, you could hear screaming, yelling, cursing, pleading, questioning and above all, bold and fervent prayer. I opened my eyes again to see our circle completely surrounded by people about 15-20 feet deep and there were easily 200-300 people surrounding us on every side. We started getting pelted with all kinds of garbage; cigarettes, coffee cups and gum. My wife was on my right side and I watched in slow motion as a loaded cup of cappuccino flew through the air and hit her on the back, scalding her badly. She was startled, but continued praying, even more fervently. I watched as others in our group, some of them young teenagers were pelted with trash, gum and cigarettes. Each and every one of them just shook it off and continued praying with all their heart.

We were in the middle of a riot. People had completely lost control. There was not even a hint of order or decency to be found in the entire group. People were cursing, ranting and raving. People were throwing things at us and it was getting more violent by the second as they started to push and shove us, trying to break up the group. But as quickly as it began, it ended. A group of five police cars arrived on the scene; the officers got out of their cars and started throwing people off of us. By the time they reached our group in the center, the crowd broke up and things returned to normal. We stood up from our knees, dusted ourselves off and headed towards our vehicles, shocked at what had just occurred.

We found out that while most of the group had been in the center of the riot praying, there were several others on the outskirts talking to people. In the 15 or 20 minutes we had been in there praying, they had led about 12 people to the Lord! Most of the people were totally confused and bewildered, but our team on the outskirts told them that they were witnessing a demonstration of the power of God. They agreed that what they were seeing was supernatural and gave their life to the Lord on the spot.

My wife and I got in my car and headed back to our church, where they were having a meeting. We walked in the door, covered in coffee stains, gum in our hair and looking like we were just drug through the street. We were a little beat up, but excited. We went to the front of the church and gave testimony of what had happened to us. The whole church rejoiced that the Holy Spirit had manifested Himself in saving power.

Miraculous healing through a word of prophecy!

Hey there,

We didn't get a chance to go out on outreach this week as several folks from our team were out of town. Right before I left town however, I received this testimony from a lady in our church. This is a spectacular healing through a word of prophecy. Notice that the healing didn't take place until the person receiving prayer did what they were told to do in the prophecy. Notice also that even though several months passed between the time of prayer and prophecy, the power of God that arrived on the scene was no less potent.

Jesus is King!

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Ryan,

I called you today to tell you some great news!

Several months ago in Nashville, several people from the church prayed for my Mom’s boyfriend Larry. He had some problems with addiction, Emphysema, Asthma, High Blood Pressure, Liver Disease and Hepatitis C.

When we prayed for him, he felt heat over his chest. I prophesied to my mom that the Lord would heal him, but that he would have to stop smoking first. Well lately he has been getting a lot worse. In fact, he’s been so bad that he is no longer responding to breathing treatments. The doctors told him that there was nothing more they could do because his lungs were almost completely deteriorated. The doctor rated his lung capacity at 0% and he was referred to a pulmonologist.

After this report, my Mom told him that she wouldn’t buy him cigarettes anymore. This was two weeks ago. Immediately after giving up cigarettes, he started vomiting and coughing up a bunch of junk. Yesterday, he went to the pulmonologist; the appointment was to get him set up on oxygen at home.

After examining him, the doctor told him that he didn’t understand what was going on. Larry explained that he felt better since he quit smoking. The doctor told him that he had never seen a case like his before. The doctor told him that emphysema didn’t go away just because you stopped smoking, there is no cure. The doctor then told him that he no longer had asthma or emphysema and that his lung capacity was 84% !!

After that appointment, Larry went to back to his liver specialist for further tests on his liver disease and Hepatitis C. At his last visit, his enzyme level was at 9000 (dangerously, deathly high) They checked him yesterday and he was negative zero! They told him that they didn’t know why, but he is showing absolutely no symptoms whatsoever of Hepatitis C! They drew five tubes of blood and are doing a bunch of tests to try and explain.

When he heard this report, he remembered what I said (the Lord would heal him, but that he would have to stop smoking first) and was speechless. I told her to tell Jesus thank you!

Hee-hee!

Cancer healed through anointed handkerchief!

Weekly Report
March 6^th – 13^th

This week, we went out and led a couple people to Jesus through words of knowledge and the power of God. However, the coolest story we heard this week was from a lady in our church. She works at a local post office and has seen some awesome miracles and demonstrations of God’s power from time to time, but this story takes the cake.

In this story, there is a miraculous healing through the laying on of an anointed handkerchief. Now this kind of thing in the story below is not uncommon. We have seen many miracles as people have prayed over handkerchiefs and cloths, believing that the power of God was able to do the impossible. Here’s the scripture for it.

And God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul: So that from his body were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs or aprons, and the diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out of them. Acts 19:11-12

Check this out.

Sent in by Christie

A long time ago, I had a dream where I prayed for someone named Billy. I just knew that if I came across a Billy, I was going to pay attention.

I heard at work that a coworker of mine’s brother was in the Hospital. His name was Billy. The Doctors had told him that his leg was eaten up with cancer and impetigo (a nasty bacterial infection) and that he was going to lose it. He was in an auto accident three years ago and had rods and pins in his leg. It never healed properly and would get infected from time to time.

Hearing this story from my coworker and knowing his name was Billy, I prayed over a handkerchief (Acts 19:11-12) and told Billy’s sister to put it on the leg and command the cancer to come out in Jesus name. This was on Saturday.

When I saw her on Monday, she told me that she did what I told her that it must have worked! She placed the handkerchief on the leg and commanded the cancer to come out, in Jesus name. Immediately after prayer, a piece of diseased skin fell off the leg wound and it began to fester and spurt what looked like mold and mildew. This continued for over a day. The Doctors decided to put him in a whirlpool to speed the drainage and cleaned the wound. The test results came back in confirming the presence of cancer, but after it drained out and after dressing the wound, the doctors believed it was gone.

They sent him home the next day, cancer and impetigo free!

Yea… Jesus is very cool.

Jesus walks the streets...

Saturday Morning Report
March 5^th, 2005

Changing things up a tad, we decided to soak in the presence of the Lord while we drove downtown to mix with the poor. We were intent on taking the Gospel of the Kingdom with healings, signs, wonders and miracles following to the neediest of the needy, the poor and homeless of Atlanta. We arrived juiced and expectant as to what the Lord would do and we were not disappointed at all! We preached and we prayed for several people, all of which were believers and confessed Jesus as King and Lord.

A man with a cane and a very noticeable limp walked towards us, we went over to him and asked him what’s wrong. “My leg” he told us. “What, do you have pain?” I asked him. “All the time” he said. I asked if we could pray for him and he agreed. We told him that God’s Kingdom, or rule and reign was on the earth and that Jesus is King! He heartily agreed and claimed to be a believer. “You’ve heard the Lord’s Prayer then?” we asked him. “Sure” he replied. “In the Lord’s prayer, Jesus asked His Father, let Your kingdom come and Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. You want to go to Heaven because you know that when you get there, you won’t have any pain, right?” Yup. “Well, Jesus prayed that Heaven would come to earth. If He has His way, your fell no pain, right now”. “Ok” he agreed.

So, we began to pray, “In Jesus name, be healed!” We asked him how it was and he told us that it was 60% better. “Well, 60% in one minute is pretty good, I wonder how we could do if we prayed for two minutes. Let’s pray again”. We continued to pray and asked him a minute later how it was, “About 90%”, he said. Almost there! We prayed one last time and a smile broke out across his face. “Check it”, we told him. “It’s better!” he said. All of the pain had left his leg and he was ecstatic! He started moving and checking it, walking up and down the sidewalk.

A lady went limping by, stopped and was watching intently. She wanted in on the power of God! She walked up as the guy went happily hopping down the sidewalk, moving his newly healed leg all around. “My leg is hurt too” she said. We gave her the good news of the kingdom and told her that what happened to this guy could happen to her too. Her left knee was all swollen and stiff with rheumatoid arthritis; she told us that it hurts all the time and sometimes she can barely even walk. “Let’s pray” we told her. We started to pray and in about 3 minutes, her leg was completely healed! All the pain, swelling and stiffness were completely gone! “Wow! Thank you so much”. She promised us that she was a believer and also that she would give away what God had given her.

Good day.

The power of God leads to salvation...

Friday Night Report
March 4^th, 2005

Fired up and ready to go, we soaked, basked, baked and sautéed in the Lord’s presence, intent on seeing the powers of the Kingdom flow through us. Lord Jesus, let our lives, hands, eyes and ears be a clear channel through which Your great power can flow!

Driving up to the parking lot with the kids, it was obvious something was up. There were a lot more kids out there than normal and the atmosphere was electric! We wade into the fray, looking for a “God Encounter”.

There was a group of Portuguese guys hanging out with some hot rods. They saw us approach and started talking to themselves, pointing and mocking. We already have quite a reputation out there and people are either afraid of us or mock us. These guys were mocking us and that provoked me something fierce. I lock eyes with the big guy in the front of the group and start walking towards him. He can’t believe that I am coming towards him and they start really laughing and mocking.

I walk up to him and introduce myself, but it’s obvious that they are just playing with us. Through the broken English they fire a couple little barbs our way, not even trying to conceal their disdain. I ask them if they speak Spanish, they say yes. I reply with, “El reino de Dios esta aqui!” (The kingdom of God is at hand!), which is the only Spanish phrase I know. They laugh and we start into them. I tell the big guy, Junior that I have something for him from the Lord, but does he want to hear it. He gets real nervous and starts backing off. I taunt him with, “What are you scared of, chicken!” That’s enough to inspire a little courage and he agrees to hear what we have to say.

We start telling him what the Lord shows us, simple stuff about creative gifts in his life. It’s obvious that the words are hitting the mark and he crumples into the car he’s leaning on, like the wind was getting knocked out of him. We admonish him to serve God with His gifts instead of serving himself. He’s very serious now, listening intently to what we have to say. He calls over a couple of his friends that don’t speak good English and he starts to translate as we tell these guys things about their destiny and purpose. We work over two of his friend’s real well and go back to Junior. I flat out tell him that he needs to give his life to Jesus and he agrees. We pray with him right then and there and he commits his life to Jesus, the power of God breaking through!