Thirsty

I haven't had an entry since Brazil. I felt speechless. I've told my wife a lot about the trip, but I find it hard to share with others. I learned so much. My previous blog entries were just the tip of the iceberg. I understand what John meant when he wrote,

Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written. - John 21:25

I only experienced two weeks on this trip, and I feel it would take volumes to show everything I learned.

Being back has been different. I'm not satisfied with life as is. To steal an analogy from John Piper, it's like I grew up playing in a sandbox. My time in Brazil was like two weeks at a beautiful beach. To go back to my sandbox feels empty. I've seen more. I want more. And thank God, there is always more.

I can't wait to see what God will be doing at my church. I love my church and I know that God wants to pour Himself out on us. We've had two great services since I've been back, but I want more. I woke up in the middle of the night a few days ago and the Lord was calling me to pray. I was praying in my living room for more of God's glory. I saw a large waterfall coming down on central Pennsylvania. The Lord said, "This is only for the thirsty." Am I thirsty? I can always use a drink; but am I fighting to receive a drop from His hand?

In July of 2007, I went to Washington DC to spend the day with some friends. It was scorching hot. We were walking the mall and we couldn't take it any more. We found a small stand on the one corner and they were selling drinks. It was so hot and they were sold out of water. I hate gatorade, but I needed something. I was thirsty. I wasn't dying of thirst, but I was really dehydrated. I bought the gatorade and shared it with my wife. It was wonderful. It was still gross tasting, but quenching my thirst felt great.

I want to be thirsty for God. Even more than this story above. I want to thirst after Him like it was life or death. I have been challenged many times since I have been home. I will continue to be thirsty. I will continue to chase after His cup.

The best night

Each night has been better than the night before. Last night we were at a hungry church and every sick person was healed. We went to the same church last night. God said that tonight, He wanted to show them how hungry He is for them. I changed the message and spoke about the Father's heart. There were so many confirmations from the Lord that this was His message.

The night before we there were only about 50 people. Tonight there was 150 people. We healed about 15 people tonight. We also saw 17 salvations and 4 blastings. But the biggest miracle of the night was the emotional healings. We prayed for almost everybody and almost all of them needed emotional healing. We counted at least 50 people that received emotional healing, but you could probably count everyone.

We gathered in a circle around the pastor after the service and prophesied over him. He was so gracious. I have been to two churches in the past four days. I would love to see them again in a year or so to see what the Lord has done. Both churches have an amazing future ahead of them. God is so good.

This is a short post because I have to run. This might be my last post before I return home. I'll do another post when I return home. I can't wait to bring this fire home.

The fire has fallen!

Each night has been better than the night before. We went to a different church tonight and I preached again. Before we left for the hotel, I started to feel the presence of God. My face was beginning to go numb and I was getting a little dizzy. This may not seem like the Spirit to you when I describe these things, but I'm getting more familiar with how God moves. He moves differently with each person. But I know that when certain things happen to my body, I know He's present. As I'm typing this my face is tingling. You have to pay attention to how God is moving. He may not tingle for you, you just have to know what He's doing.

As we waited for our van to leave for the church, I began to have a strong desire to see God move differently tonight. I wanted to see salvations and healings, but I wanted God to come in an Isaiah 6 kind of way. On the van, I told the team to expect God to fall in a powerful way.

During worship, I could sense the hunger in this church. It was a church of about 50 and they were such a family. It reminded me of a smaller version of my own church. We played with the kids before the service as they had a special outreach with different games. They had a such a family atmosphere at this church. And this family was hungry. They kept repeating a phrase during one of the worship songs. i asked my interpreter what it meant. They were singing, "Look on me, Lord." This just confirmed the hunger I was already feeling.

I went up to speak and changed everything that I had prepared. I asked for the glory of God to fall. Everyone in the church felt the Spirit come in a powerful way. After a few minutes of crying out to Him, we did words of knowledge. Sometimes, without thinking, God will give you words while you speak. This isn't as common, but it does happen. It happened last night. We were saying the words of knowledge and one of the interpreter's were next. She didn't have a word. The microphone was handed to her, and without thinking she said, "Ana, eye condition." She actually said the name of a specific condition, but I don't remember which condition. She had no name and no condition in her head, but it just came out of her mouth. A girl name Ana stood up with that exact condition. She wasn't healed right away, but that interpreter prayed for her, she was healed.

I spoke for less than five minutes instead of an hour. That was all that was needed. We began praying for everyone and there were many healings. Out of 50 people in attendance, 23 were healed! I think every person that was sick was healed. God has lit a fire in that church and it will continue long after we are gone. We are going to that church again tonight. We plan on doing a fire tunnel. This is where we get in two lines and face each other. Than we have the entire church pass through while we all pray for them. It's going to be awesome.

Salvation!

I preached again at the surfboard church, Bola de Neve. It was even better than the night before. I got to got out and minister before hand. We saw two people healed and we blessed several more. God is really moving powerfully.

While we waited for the service to start, I noticed the worship team was playing It Is You by the Newsboys, but of course they were singing it in Portuguese. I went up to the mic and began singing it in English. They asked me to join them for the worship service. We sang several American songs. It was awesome. Worship was so powerful. What a great opportunity too. I have now led worship on three continents. God is so good.

We did words of knowledge and saw three people sovereignly healed. I then made a call to salvation before the message. I really wasn't expecting much and I wasn't sure if I was going to do it. But I stood amazed as 23 people came forward! There was only about 100 people there total! I guess there was a rehab clinic that came that night and all of them received Christ. And they were exited about it. They were yelling and they were full of joy. What an amazing night.

But it got better. After the sermon, we saw another 17 physically healed, 20 inner healings, 5 received calls into the ministry, and several received a powerful touch from the Lord. God is so good!

I won't go into all of the specific testimonies, but they are all amazing. I love God so much. I will do anything for Him. I can't wait until the Spirit falls on central PA like He's been doing for so many years in Brazil. William Penn prophesied over PA 200 years ago. The fruit of that prophecy is now coming. God will sweet over PA like He has done in Brazil. Now is our time!

The Power of God

Last night was my first night preaching. Since we are in the second phase of our trip, the schedule is a lot easier. I was able to sleep in some which is good because I was starting to get sick because of the physical stress on my body. The church we went to was another Bola De Neve church. This is the surfboard church I talked about earlier. This is another one of those churches, just smaller. It had about 100 people there last night.

The church is located along a strip that is full of shops and people. Before the service, we sent some of our team out to evangelize on this strip. We didn't have enough interpreters, so I stayed at the church with some of the team while the rest of the team went out. When they came back, they testified that they saw 17 physical healings, 5 emotional healings, 3 salvations and 1 person drunk in the Spirit. They took a video of that last one. They person was a worker in a department store and she was caught up in holy laughter. It was quite amusing.

We did words of knowledge at the beginning of the service where we call out certain diseases that the Spirit is letting us know is present. Three people were sovereignly healed at just the mention of the condition. Another two people were healed when I prayed over the congregation.

Next was the message. I had to use an interpreter which I have used before in Kenya. It went really well. There were two salvations in response to the message. Then we sent the team out to pray. There were about another 40 healings and another salvation. Since it wasn't a large church and we had a large team (about 20) I wasn't going to pray for people. But the pastor came to me and pointed to his knee. Without an interpreter, I prayed for his knee and it was 50% healed. I prayed again and it was 100% healed. It's great when even the pastor receives healing.

It was an awesome night and I know it's only going to get better. We are going to the same church tonight. I can't wait to see what the Lord is going to do.

While we were waiting to go to the churches, we were walking around the city looking for people to pray for. We prayed for two men who both felt lighter afterwards. I believe they were set free from oppression and they received peace from the Holy Spirit. The one man thought we were Mormons because he thought that all Americans were Mormons. Jesus brings healing. Mormons don't.

Challenge

We didn't have ministry last night so I want to give an update about some revelations I've been receiving. There are so many so I'll attempt to be succinct. We had a day of impartation yesterday which was awesome, but I won't write about that right now.

Even before leaving for Brazil, I was able to move in the prophetic and I received impressions of angels. I asked that God would increase both of those these gifts. I want everything God has for me. There is always more and there is always enough. God is abundant with His blessings. His storehouses know no end. Jesus said,

I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it. - John 14:12-14

I believe these words. I will ask Him for His gifts because I know He wants to give them. I Corinthians 14:1 says

Follow the way of love and eagerly desire spiritual gifts, especially the gift of prophecy.

The Greek here means to lustfully desire the gifts. I have been lustfully desiring the gifts of the Spirit while on this trip. I am constantly feeling angels all over my body, especially my ears. I can't tell you the different sensations I've been feeling. It took a couple of days, but I figured out that the Lord is giving me greater sensitivity to His voice. This is a confirmation of past prophetic words. Also, one of the team member here confirmed it again saying that He sees me as a prophetic worshipper (he didn't know I was a worship leader) and the Lord is taking me to a new level. I have talked to at least two others who are having these same sensations.

I could continue for hours, but I won't. I just challenge anyone reading this to press in. The Lord wants to bless you even more than you want to receive blessings from Him. Just remember, "You may ask Me anything in My name, and I will do it."

Amazing

Another awesome night. I didn't blog two nights ago because there was just too much to type. I had an amazing night of intercession and revelation, but no specific things to share with the world wide web. But last night was different.

I have been praying that the Lord would use me more in healing. In three days, only two people received healing when I prayed. Hundreds have been healed on this trip and I praise God for these two, but I want to see more. I prayed yesterday that God would bypass my mind and my understanding and use me to heal.

I've been giving out impartations and prophecies like I have a never ending supply (which I do) and I've seen people be blessed, blasted and blown away. I feel much more comfortable and in my element doing these things. But healing has been rough. I wanted more.

We were with Jamie Galloway last night. When we came up to minister, we had over an hour to pray with people. And there were a lot of people. We started out with impartation. That got me going. I was in my element and people were dropping like flies. Apparently, Jamie made an announcement after a while that people could come up for healing. i didn't hear this because of praying with people, but people needing healings came up. The first lady said there was pain in her stomach. I looked and in the Spirit, I could see something being cast out of her stomach. I said, "En nome de Jesus, I speak the pain and cast you out. You must leave now en nome de Jesus." She instantly fell back in peace. I told her husband that if she's not healed when she gets up, we'll pray again. She was down for about 5 minutes. When she got back up, she was completely healed!

I prayed for another guy with a broken hand. I said a simple little prayer and he said everything was back to normal. Another lady came up saying she had panic attacks and she was full of fear. Instantly, I saw fear departing from her from head to toe. Lots of spirits of fear where fleeing. I began speaking what I saw and casting out fear. She began to feel the power of the Lord. We changed the prayer so that she would be filled with the Holy Spirit. This mild mannered lady began to receive powerfully from God and got completely blasted.

There were so many other stories from last night, but they're just too much to list. God did an awesome work last night. We aren't doing any ministry tonight as we transition to the next phase of the trip. On this next phase, we will be leading the service. I will be preaching starting tomorrow for the next four days. I'm preaching at two different churches both about 200 people or so. I'm expecting those nights to be the most powerful. Books won't contain the testimonies of what God is going to do.

Can you hear me now? Bom!

As mentioned on a previous post, before I came to Brazil, I had an impression that God was bringing creative miracles. A creative miracle is a healing that takes place where something new was created. In October, I prayed for a lady with metal in her which hindered her range of motion. I prayed for her, and she was completely healed. Either the metal disappeared, or she was still able to move with it in. I've seen x-rays of people who used to have metal and now don't. And I've seen x-rays where the metal was still there, but now it bends like a normal body part. It doesn't matter how it happened, but it was a creative miracle and not just a normal healing.

I saw a new ear, new legs, a new heart, and I know there's more! I've been waiting to see it and pray for it. We were in a service tonight led by Randy Clark. We were called to the front to give words of knowledge. This is where our team would mention a body part or condition that was given to us supernaturally from the Holy Spirit. When talking about words of knowledge before, I felt the Lord telling me to speak about the ear. But tonight I felt nothing.

Every time we've talked about words of knowledge on this trip, my left ear tingles. In my vision, I saw that it was a woman who received the new ear. I always planned on speaking this. Tonight, I felt the power of God, but my ear felt nothing. I was getting no other words of knowledge. I knew I didn't have to give one, but my faith was high and I wanted to share. I asked the Lord to give me some kind of sign to tell me to speak this word or to shutup. I felt nothing.


I decided to go for it. The Brazilian congregation was told to stand up when they heard their condition called out. There were about 40 of us and I was in the middle. By the time it was my turn, there were already many people standing for other conditions. I spoke the word, "Creative miracle. Female. Left ear completely gone." I saw one lady stand up, but we went down the line so fast, I wasn't sure if it was in response to my word or not.

We wanted to see if some were sovereignly healed by just hearing the word. Some were, but not that lady. Then Randy prayed over everyone. More were healed, but not that lady. Then they told whoever wasn't healed, they need to go to the team member who spoke that word. Now was my chance!

To my surprise, three ladies with deafness in their left ear lined up in front of me. All of them had their ears, so it didn't fit the word exactly. But it didn't matter. I was going for it! I grabbed an interpreter and we began to pray. We prayed for the first lady several times. We really fought for her. But she wasn't being healed. She didn't even feel the Spirit. I felt the power, especially in my right hand. My right hand was shaking a little and I felt a slight tingling sensation throughout my body. But she felt nothing. And she wasn't healed.

We prayed a blessing for her, then moved on. It was difficult to move on because we worked so hard and nothing happened. But we began praying for the second lady. She saw the other lady not get healed. We fought and fought for her. Nothing. Nada. Zip. I asked if she felt the presence of the Lord and she said she felt a little shaking. My shaky right hand was on her, so I didn't think anything of it. I think even if I pressed in more, she wasn't going to receive. We moved on.

By now, I'm exhausted. My interpreter didn't say anything, but I could tell by the look on her face she thought the same thing I did when the next lady came up. "Oh no. Just make it stop. Nothing's happening. Now this lady is here with her husband and they've seen two others with the same condition go away without a change." But we pressed on and prayed for her. We fought and fought and fought. Nothing.

We asked her if she felt anything from the Spirit, and she said she felt a little shaking. Same as the previous lady, but this time... my hand wasn't on her. I realized that with my shaking and both of these ladies receiving a little shaking, than the Spirit must be here. I explained this and we thanked the Lord. We fought and fought and fought. We asked her if she felt any different. While she spoke to the interpreter I was thinking, "Come on God. This has to happen. Don't let her give the same answer. I'm exhausted and nothing's happening!" The interpreter quietly said, "She's 60% better."

I was filled with faith. We wanted 80%-100% better. We prayed again and fought and fought and fought. This time...80%. We wanted more so we fought so more. 95%. We continued. After a while, it was almost there. She said she a little bit more. So we prayed and fought so more. Then came the words, "En todo." All. Complete. 100% healed!

As the burden was lifted, I felt such joy. I prayed a blessing on her and her husband. As I walked out, I saw them from a distance telling some of their friends. These 30 somethings were acting like 12 year old girls. They were so giggly and exited. One of her friends looked over at me and I just laughed. Praise God.

In all, 71 received sovereign healings, about 20 salvations, 5 deliverances from demonic oppression, and through the direct prayers of our team of 40, we saw an additional 97 healed. Including my one deaf ear.

Darkness and Light

Yesterday started differently than the rest. I jumped up at 2AM in great pain. I had a charlie horse in my right calf. I haven't had one of those in many years, and this is by far the worst one I have ever received. I was trying to be quiet since my roommate was sleeping. I had to stop rubbing it because to even touch my leg caused even greater pain. This was severe. I said, "En nome de Jesus" (in the name of Jesus) and it stopped suddenly. It wasn't like a normal healing. This was weird. It stopped and I instantly knew this was demonic.

I've heard stories of past years where demons would manifest in the hotel rooms. We prayed over our room the first night, but we didn't pray this night. I noticed that one part of the room was darker than the rest. I knew an evil spirit was in the room. I know this sounds like fiction, but this is real life! I woke my roommate up because I wanted to pray. After we prayed for the spirit to leave, he said that he was having a dream at the exact moment I woke him up. The dream was about spiritual warfare and he said we were getting clobbered. He said it wasn't a good dream at all. So for those of you reading this that thought I might be exaggerating, you can see that the evil spirit was tormenting us both.

I felt the spirit wasn't completely gone so I went to the intercessor's room to have others pray. The spirit left and the rest of the night was fine. The thing is, I never felt any fear. I was the edge of fear and it was very serious, but I wasn't afraid. I knew that this meant the enemy thought we were a threat. What the enemy used to discourage us, completely encouraged us because we knew we were making an impact.

That night we went to a large church that is on fire for God. It is a surfer church. The pulpit is a surf board and the offering boxes and old skateboards...literally. It's called Bollo De Neve, which means, Snowball Church. Will Hart was the evangelist that came with us. The Spirit was heavy and ready to fall. The anticipation was building and everyone wanted an impartation. We expected to pray for the sick, but the Spirit wanted us to pray for impartation.

Normally, when I feel the Spirit on me, I feel tingles. But as I prayed, the tingling was so intense, my face was literally numb. My stomach became numb and I knew the Lord wanted me to place my hand on the stomachs of the people I prayed for. As I did this, people was keel over slowly and begin to fall facedown. I always wandered why people fell backwards when the Spirit came on them. I prayed in the past that if the Lord would use me in this, I want them to fall facedown like in Leviticus and other parts in the Bible. I was giving impartations of the glory of God.

There were some healings last night. A man with braces on his legs was able to walk without them. Another man who had extreme shortness of breath that hindered him from walking up stairs was healed completely. I prayed for my interpreter's father and his neck was completely healed. He had a compressed nerve in his cervical spine that was causing radiating pain into his arms. He said he was completely healed. I prayed for his knees as well, but nothing happened. I am not shaken by this. How can I be when the man received a touch from the Lord!

I could go into so much more but these posts are already ridiculously long. Keep praying for me and for the people down here. And start expecting things to change back home. God is doing these same things through us. Now is our destiny! Now we will walk in supernatural power!

King of Glory, have Your glory!

An amazing second day. Each day keeps getting better.

Worship has been blowing my mind. I've been receiving such revelations and I've been crying like such a little girl. I'm not a cryer, so you know it has to be the Lord. Musically, this might been one of the best bands I've seen. Not just worship bands. Not just Christian bands. But one of the best bands I've seen, period. I've seen a lot of shows throughout the years, but their musicianship is amazing. But not only that, the worship of the Heavenly Father is breathtaking. God is so evident. I can't explain it all. Part of me can't wait to lead worship again and spread this fire, but the other part of me wants to never lead worship again because I can never reach this anointing on my own. But God gives graciously and I'm believing that for me and my church.

I'm a team leader, which means I'm responsible for 6 of the youth. We meet together and pray together. And they come to me with questions that I usually don't have the answers to, but I know how to get them. They're great kids and I love working with them. I'm not much older, but being a daddy gives me a different understanding of the Fathers heart. I have looked my team like my own. I know the Lord is going to bless us.

I asked them what they wanted out of this trip and the consensus was near unanimous. They all want to hear more clearly from the Lord and to see the angelic. These are two areas that I have some experience in and hope to grow in myself. I know that Lord placed us together and we had an awesome time of prayer lead by Timothy Berry that we would each receive this. God poured down on us. I felt a strong heat, like a fire resting on my back and neck.

I also signed up to be a preacher. We had three sessions today explaining what's going to happen with that. That's not for another week, so I'll explain it here later. But we had a time of impartation today for the preachers and teachers. I received a lot from the Lord but didn't understand most of it. We went down to worship right after, which if you don't remember from above is amazing, and the Lord began revealing things to me. Everything from the impartation began to make sense. I saw the eyes of the Lord, like the wheels in Ezekiel, and they were covering the walls of the entire room. They were searching to and fro for true worshippers. I think everyone of us, all 300 or so, were true worshippers tonight. There were enough eyes to watch all that was going on. Nothing is beyond the Lord. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of Him to whom we must give account. (Hebrews 4).

All I have to say now is, Mais Senhor! (More Lord!)

I Made It!

After approximately 25 hours of traveling, I made it to Brazil. We had long layovers and delays because of hurricanes, but I'm here now. Praise God.

There were about 15 of us flying out of Harrisburg together. Even though we didn't know each other to start, we grew a quick bond. We watched out for each other and laughed a lot on this long journey. As we got to Sao Paulo and waited for our buses, we met even more people. Friendships come easily. I'm sure my facebook account will have many new friends in the coming weeks.

I think one of the best things about the group of us (13-29 year olds) is that everyone is on fire for God and wants to see Him move in poder (Portuguese for power). I know people who want to experience the miraculous, but sometimes, I feel that I'm kind of out there on a limb. I read about past revivals, and current ones, where people experience God like the way people experienced them in the Bible. But not everyone is comfortable with that in current times. I feel at home with all of these new friends (a couple hundred of us). All of them are nut jobs like me. We actually believe God can part a sea and heal the blind. He did it before, He continues to do it, and He'll do it through us!

Our bus ride was about 6 hours from Sao Paulo to Curitiba. When I was awake, I got amazing views of the Brazilian countryside. As for mountain ranges, it is very similar to Pennsylvania. But the trees and forests are much more lush with a larger variety of plants. Palm trees, banana trees, banana tree fields, pine trees, and many other kinds that I couldn't identify. What a beautiful country.

We got to the hotel around 9pm Curitiba time (one hour before EST) and after getting kind of cleaned up, we had an awesome night of worship. I forget the name of the worship team, but I'm bringing home one of their CD's. I don't usually cry that much in worship since I'm leading it so much. But to just sit and soak while an anointed team rocks the house is a true blessing. I still prefer to be playing guitar and singing, but it is a nice change every once and a while.

I should be able to update this daily, so I'll go ahead and close this out. Mais poder! Vem aqui! (More power! Come in the place!)