Praise the Lord everybody. I haven’t written much on this trip, I guess because all the exotic stuff about being in Africa is becoming routine. Even the excitement that we have in services here is … I don’t want to say routine, but I’ve had a thousand or more services like this and how many times can you tell the same story? I must be getting old, callous, or accustomed to the supernatural.
This trip has been different than the others; possibly the most important one. For one thing, we have been attacked by the devil harder than we have ever been, so that has to tell you something. But there have been new open doors that I have not had before. For instance, I was invited to meet the President of Burundi (a Born-Again Christian who has two of my books), I’ve been on an hour long broadcast on national TV in Rwanda as well as a couple hours on Radio Rwanda and another station. I’ve preached at the biggest churches in Burundi, passed out a thousand “Four Steps to Revival” and over 200 Bibles, and seen over 400 souls get saved in just this trip alone.
But it’s the intensity and violent outpourings of the Holy Spirit that is what I am finding extraordinary. I’ve had services before that were so anointed that you felt like you were floating, where people could actually see the glow of the Shekinah Glory. I’ve had healing lines where EVERBODY got healed, and services where the church we were at doubled and tripled in numbers within a week or so. But there is something deeper about this trip that I have not sensed before. Maybe that’s why I have gone through so much fire.
Yesterday and today really put a point on things. We are done with Burundi and Rwanda, and will be finishing up here in Uganda for
a week or so before I finally go home. (I’ve been gone for 2 months). Up until now, we have not seen any serious healings on this trip — there were 100 of them on the last trip to Uganda, but none so far on this one. That changed yesterday.
We were way out in the mountain villages. At first, I was a little dismayed yesterday as we struggled through an hour of mountain dirt roads to end up at some little church on top of a mountain. Here we had come all this way, spent all this money, time, and energy (that I was just about out of by now), for this little tiny church? Why didn’t someone tell us that it was going to be such a small crowd way out in the middle of nowhere! (Can you tell I’m getting worn out and cranky?)
Stupid me. I should have had a clue when I saw all the tarps strung out over the field. But at least I sucked it up, knowing that I have been in this situation before and have seen God pour out incredible anointings on these little tiny settings … just like with Cornelius in Acts 10. It has happened to me more times than I can remember.
Sure enough, here they came. From all over, for miles around, walking for hours to get there. It wasn’t the number of people that got me – it was the intensity of their desperate hunger for God that really grabbed me. Preaching to this crowd was like dropping a match on a tank of gasoline. How do you describe the workings of the Spirit that takes place in the realm of the soul?
And then came the healings. At the end of the second service on the first day, Pastor Noah called for everyone to place their hand on wherever the pain was as I got up to pray for the healing. Several people came up to tell us of the debilitating things that they got instantly healed of, but one guy came forward who had a broken arm. He couldn’t pick anything up, couldn’t twist it or put it behind his back, or even touch anything. It was really broken … until we prayed. When he put his hand on where the pain was, God also put His hand on it and healed it completely in an instant. We could see where the scar was. He could hardly believe his own eyes! God really does do the supernatural.
Today, however, was even more special. As far as I’m concerned, healing the blind is right up there with raising the dead. It’s always scary for me to pray over someone who is blind. I’m sorry, but I have a real struggle with the challenge to my faith when that happens. And yet, earlier this year an old lady received her sight when I prayed over her. Still …
So I was in my ” Oh God, help me, I’m scared ” mode when I was asked to pray over a man who had lost his sight two years ago. So I prayed. And prayed, and prayed, and prayed. Can’t feel anything. And I can’t ask him anything because he doesn’t speak English. So I prayed some more. Then Noah prayed over him. Then we both prayed. Noah asked him if he could see, and he said he could begin to make out fuzzy shapes. Whoa! That’s just like in Mark 8 when Jesus prayed over the guy and he could barely make out shapes. Now I’m encouraged. This just might really happen!
We prayed some more, and now he could see better – not perfect, but better. Noah held out his hand, and the guy saw it and shook it. Noah told him to follow him as he backed up and then turned, and the guy followed him into the turn. He could see! Yeah, you heard me. He could see!
Why am I so surprised? It is one thing to talk about this happening to someone else; it’s entirely another thing to be faced with this kind of a supreme challenge to your faith. I have made it through many times to see God do things that were supernatural, but living in a carnal world casts a shade upon you that keeps supernatural faith at arm’s length. You have to reach hard for it every time. I don’t know if it was me, Noah, or the blind man, but somebody reached out and touched the hem of His garment.
I wish you could see some of the things we are experiencing here almost every day. This is really happening. God is moving in incredible ways. I have said it over and over and will say it again – the last great revival prophesied in the Book of Joel and Isaiah will begin in Africa because they are so desperately hungry for God, and He will use them to send the fire around the world. I believe I am seeing the very beginnings of that Great African Revival.
Brother Dale, dale@revivalfire.org
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