Buchanan City

We’re here in Buchanan City. Buchanan would be a moderate city for Liberia, but it’s really, really run down. We met with the Governor and his chief Religious Officer for the area. They are both strong, excitable Christians. As the Religious Officer shook my hand, he said, “I can tell there’s fire in your eyes.” I thought, wow, this is a good sign.
The services we had were a conference for over 20 churches in the area that wanted to join the Revivalfire Movement of Liberia. This is a new organization that was set up by Pastors Momo and Theo to continue the message of revival that I brought back in 2014 during the Ebola Crisis. About 50 people showed up ready to absorb everything they could. They want revival and are like sponges soaking up everything I tell them.

Services were great. I didn’t need an interpreter, and that always makes it so much easier. The schedule was for two services a day – one in the morning, one in the evening, a women’s conference on the fourth day, and then an ordination service for me to anoint, commission, and ordain pastors and apostles to this organization. I guess that makes me a bishop now.

Right from the start, the momentum started to pick up and the services were on fire. Blazing services! The Spirit of the Lord was moving so strong that they were with me every step of the way. Some of them would even quote verses before I got around to quoting them. No matter how strong or controversial I was, they were right in sync with me. They got it!

I passed out the Four Steps to Revival and our Revivalfire brochures to everyone. They held on to them as if they were life preservers. These people were serious. They were serious not only about revival, but about what it takes to have one. They understand that there is a price to pay for any move of God, and but that the messages that are coming out of America – the bland, Jesus-loves-you messages – are not doing anybody any good. Those kind of homogenized, placid messages will never effect change because they don’t challenge the hypocrisy that inhabits the church.

The questions at the end of each session reflected that same understanding. “What about false prophets that say things that never happen?” “What about ordinations and titles?” These were things that they knew were wrong but had inserted themselves into the church. They exhibited a level of understanding that you don’t see in many other places.

In other places where we do not see that level of understanding and participation, we still see great moves of God because there is always a handful of people that are willing to light the torch and head off into the darkness to plant churches and start revivals. So what can we expect here? If only a handful have done great things in other places as a result of these meetings, what will happen here in Liberia where the response is so much greater?

I am pretty excited, but I am so worn out that it is only the excitement that keeps me up and running. When I get back to the hotel, I collapse. I’m not as young as I used to be. Or is it that the devil is fighting us stronger because he can see what is happening here?

It may not be easy out here, but I am looking forward to some great things to happen.

Advertisements

Read Full Post »

Soft Brown Earth

The African soul is tied closely to the earth, almost as if was somehow merged with the soil from which we have all come from. It’s not the bare feet or the rural setting that you find here, but more of a huskiness and an earthy feel to everything, from their art and music, to the brightly colored primitive designs of their fabrics that they wrap themselves in that lends color and atmosphere to the air you breath. It’s as if their connection with Mother Earth inhabits their very breath.

Western sophistication seems artificial in contrast. Our high-paced electric intensity, lit in the neon lights of our digital society, may seem brighter at first glance, but somehow loses a depth of color that hints at a depth of soul that is shallow in comparison. It’s something that is hard to put in words but can be felt when you are here, immersed in their midst.

True revival is not based on money or sophistication. Actually, I believe those things actually work against a true revival. When we become set on our own artificial substance and abilities, we lose the essential reliance upon God that is an absolute requirement for God to move among us.

Not” by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the LORD of hosts.” (Zech. 4:6)

Revival will break out in Africa first because they need Him more than we do in the West. Yes, they have a long way to go in other essentials, but their hearts have a childlike reliance on God that we have lost. They can learn to do those other essentials, but it is not so easy for us to change our soul.

I don’t know what to think about all these things. I look out over the patchwork of tiny garden plots amidst the shambles of worn out shacks, poverty, and dirt and I wonder how will God do this? Is this really possible that He will raise these simple, earthy people to a place of revival that the world will envy?

But then, that would be just like Him to do that.

Me? I will just keep on hammering out this message that He has given me. It seems to be working everywhere that I have brought it. Sometimes I wonder how that is possible to go to places no one else will go, to wring out my soul to a small people in small churches in desolate places, and watch them ignite in place after place.

The Lord gave me a vision once where I could see myself taking precious seeds and sticking them deep into foot-high furrows of soft brown earth. The seed will germinate in its time and miraculously reappear as a harvest.

I don’t have to know how; I just have to keep planting that seed into those soft furrows of earth and pray that the rain will soften the hard fallow ground back home.

Read Full Post »

Liberia – week two

The air settles heavily on you like a moist blanket, weighing you down and tiring you out when you shouldn’t be tired at all. It’s no wonder this world travels at a much slower speed than America. There is a saying here, “There is no ‘hurry’ in Africa”, and I can see why. Hakuna Matata. How insane our high speed intensity must seem to them!

The heavy pace of two services a day like I did in Buchanan City is over. Tomorrow we hope to meet with the Vice President of Liberia and perhaps the Speaker of the House. Our hope of meeting the President seems slim, but we should be addressing their congress later on this week.

I’m not sure that it matters that much to me. After all, they are just people like anyone else, and as politicians, I would imagine they are more interested in what American money and resources I can bring to Liberia, rather than what they can do to help promote a Holy Ghost revival here. The goal for me would be rather to touch something in them personally that would spark a revival in their hearts.

The pastors that came to the Buchanan meetings are still energized. I heard one pastor excitedly relate how people were instantly healed, and another about the clear revelation of how to bring revival to their country. Unlike in other countries, they are taking action by establishing the Revivalfire Movement of Liberia organization. I suppose that makes me a bishop over 20+ churches here. Not what I was expecting, but in Africa, you gotta go with the flow. It’s too hot to do otherwise.

Liberia is the only other country besides the United States that has been founded on the Gospel. You can see the effects of that, not only in the names of the stores and the signs and references to Christianity, but in the theological fabric of the churches themselves. There has been a strong foundation here, but as in everywhere else, they have slid into a mediocrity of “church as usual”.

But they are not happy with that. They know what real revival is, and they know what it is not. They recognize that the bland messages coming out of America of an all-embracive grace is powerless without righteousness. They believe in the fear of God and understand what the lack of that does to erode the strength of their foundations. They want change, and change does not come without repentance.

I am assuming that the two churches that I will be visiting this week are of the same spirit as the pastors in Buchanan. If so, we should have another exciting week. Perhaps this will be the beginning of a new phase in my life, and maybe, just maybe, the ignition of a fire that will burn across Africa.

Great moves of God are born out of great faith, and great faith is born out of great hope. I believe they have both.

Read Full Post »

Buchanan City

What a service!

Today was day 3 of a revival conference we held in Buchanan City in Liberia. Each day, we held a service in the morning and in the evening.

At first I thought this was going to be a bomb. Here we are in a shabby area of town in a shell of a building that serves as a church. It is not much to look at, but it is typical for here in Africa. I have not ministered in many churches here that were anything like the fine buildings that we have in the West. Here, you work with what you got, and you are thankful for it. It may not look like much, but this is how God births His great moves.

We were told they were expecting 200 people, but there isn’t even room here for 100 chairs, and there’s only about twenty-five people to sit in them.  Oh well. Typical African numbers.

But they kept coming.  By the second day, the place was filling up and the level of excitement continued to rise. The services were exhilarating. Since I did not have to use a translator, I could get the message out twice as fast and with more freedom.

As I sailed into the messages, the people sailed with me. It was as if they had been waiting for this message for a long time and finally someone was delivering it over the pulpit. There were times when they were not only with me step by step, but were ahead of me, sometimes yelling out a scripture before I could get it out of my mouth. We were on fire!

But this final service this evening was the crowning service for the whole series.

Whenever I preach, I do my best to empty myself out and let God lead me in the direction He wants to go. If I try to prepare my message, I always fall flat, but when I let God take me where He wants to go, it is always great.

It’s very much like a surfer catching a wave. You can feel the swelling begin and you jump on your board and ride with it. Sometimes it will take you to places you would never have dreamed about before. Many is the time when the Lord supernaturally revealed something to me as it was coming out of my mouth. When you are flowing in the Spirit riding that wave, anything can happen … and does.

This was one of those nights. For the sixth and final service, I needed to talk about the necessity of having a vision in order for revival to be birthed. I could feel the swelling start to come when the Lord started to show me what the secret to having a vision was. All of a sudden, the whole concept of a vision came together through the passages in 1 Samuel chapter 14, Isaiah chapter 58, and culminating with Joel chapter 2. (No, I’m not going to tell you. You got to come hear it for yourself.)

An hour later , as services began to end, they were on their feet raising and waving their hands up to God, shouting out praises and glorifying His name. They kept going and going and going. I finally just stood there behind the pulpit and let them run it out.

I waited for them to settle back down, and then I called for them to come while the Oil was flowing. If they needed healing, this was the time to come and be healed. Thirty or forty people came to the altar.

As I went down the line, praying over each one’s specific ailments, it didn’t take long to realize that every person that I prayed over had gotten healed. And for one lady, the Spirit came down and washed over us before I could even lay hands on her. She was healed before I could begin to pray!

I have done around a thousand services over the last 14 years. They are not always this anointed, but there has been a lot that were. When the Spirit of God is flowing that heavily, it leaves you completely drained, as if a river had just run through you. You float on the wash of that current as you head back to the hotel. It is such a wonderful feeling that nothing can compare with it.

This is what revival looks like. This is the planting of the seeds of revival that will take root in these people and grow into this next great harvest.

I am the sower. Others will cultivate, and others still will reap. But I am here at the beginning of what I believe will be the greatest revival of all time.  It doesn’t look like much now. Just some shabby buildings and small crowds in depressed areas of town, but this is the soil from which God brings forth His mighty moves. These are the foolish things of the world, the weak and despised, and the ones that are desperate for God.

He was here tonight. In all His splendor. That’s all I need to know.

 

Brother Dale

 

Read Full Post »

Services in Uganda

I know everyone’s been expecting some exciting stories of what we are doing here in Uganda, but after three days of services, I don’t know what to write.

After visiting the Ladies of Hope in several of the villages around Mbarara, we had a service in the village where we chased out of the witchdoctors.

For such a small village, the place was packed. As we entered into the services, we watched a young man leading the kids in wild dancing and singing about Jesus. They were having so much fun that you couldn’t help laughing as you clapped along with them. And it struck me – these were the kids that were slated for death to be butchered on a Satanic altar.

But now they were dancing.

Yeah, did that get you? This was one of those moments that gets caught in your throat and you catch a glimpse into something deeper than our daily, comfortable lives. Something horrible was destroyed and something wonderful was restored to the Life of Jesus.

Then we went to a series of churches in small villages north of Kampala. It was the same program for us – Cindy with the women, me with the men, and then a service in the evening. Then move on to the next church.

I have done close to 1,000 services in 14 years, so after a while, they all seem the same. It’s not the message that I preach that is memorable – it’s the anointing of the Holy Spirit. I’m thinking that this should be standard for everyone, but the truth is, they haven’t experienced it anymore than we have in America. So when the evening service starts lighting up with the Spirit, it leaves them jumping up and down excited!

In one of the afternoon sessions with the men, I heard something new for me. A young man stood up and said that they had heard the false prophets telling them about how God was going to pour out all kinds of blessings all over them – and they believed it! – but now they realized that they actually had to do something! Revival was not free and there was a price to pay for it. For me to hear that is such a great relief. They get it. There’s hope.

You never know what will happen in a service, which person will be affected, and what fruit will come forth. Sometimes you never hear about it, but sometimes the Lord will allow you to catch a glimpse of what He is doing. I got one of those the other day when Noah told me about a young man who attended one of our services several years ago and was inspired to take the gospel out to his people and start a church. He now pastors a church of 700 people. He has been trying to find us so we would come and see what God has done.

What was it that lit that young pastor up? What is causing the celebration in the village of orphans? What creates such a fire that spreads in so many directions that we can’t begin to keep track of it? It’s not the words of the message. It’s not a great speaking eloquence. It’s certainly not my personality!

It’s Him. The Holy Spirit. He moves with invisible power, filling the air and igniting hearts. He takes them and fills them with vision and sends them forth, holding up the torch that was lit in that service, and shining Light into the world.

So yeah, a thousand services later, they all seem the same and there’s not much to say. It’s the anointing that makes the difference. That’s what changes the monotonous into the miraculous.

Brother Dale

Read Full Post »