Just finished the 3rd day in Butare, Uganda. I promised this pastor that I would come some day and hold revival services for him. I have finally arrived. The place was packed all three days. I did a service in the morning and in the afternoon and Cindy met with a packed house of women in between. Terriific response for both of us, but wow, I gotta tell ya, that last service was through the roof!
We started picking up momentum right about when the Lord changed the message on me. I was just about to launch into a message about the Alabaster Box and the power of praise – I was so excited with what the Lord had shown me – and just as I am about to get going, He changed it to Jonathan and the power of having a vision for God.
I should’ve realized that we were about to take off like wild horses, but it was all I could do to just hang on. We ran for 45 minutes and ended with Noah and his brother praying with everybody standing on their feet. But then it began to settle down a bit and I felt this little nudge to ask who wanted to make a holy commitment to God for revival. Whoa! Here they came! Chairs and benches tumbled out of the way as the whole place rushed forward.
I don’t know how long we prayed, but it was so intense that several people lost it. It was overwhelming. These people will not forget this service for a long, long time. It may just be the match that lights a revival fire in this area.
That seems to becoming a pattern out here with these out-of-the-way places that are just primed and ready for God to pour out His Spirit on them. That was the case in Gitega, and in several other places that we revisited. Transformation comes and changes a little church to a large, on-fire church with several planted churches birthed from them. All because of one meeting when the glory came down.
I don’t know if I’ll be back this way again. I have a feeling that after 10 years, this may be my last excursion to Africa. Regardless of what path the Lord sends me down, we lit a fire here. I have no doubt that God will begin to move way out here in this back country rural area in ways that were never expected.
You just never know what God will do, where He will choose to do it, and how He will do it. That’s His prerogative. He is, after all, God.