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Category: revival
An Unfolding Revival: PINE RIDGE
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I want to update you on some recent and remarkable developments on the Oglala Sioux Indian Reservation at Pine Ridge. If you are not familiar with this reservation, it is located in South Dakota about 1.5 hours east of Mount Rushmore. As the site of the infamous Wounded Knee massacre, and home to Native luminaries such as Red Cloud, Black Elk, and Crazy Horse, it is one of the most influential Indian homelands in America.
Another purpose of this communiqué is to alert you to an imminent gathering that could alter the spiritual status quo throughout Pine Ridge, and indeed the entire Sioux Nation. Genuine revival is at the door, and we need all the prayer support that can be mustered on short notice.
Before I get into the details, allow me to offer a bit of backstory in case you have not been following our saga these past two years.
In early 2015, Pine Ridge was wracked by an epidemic of youth suicides. Many, many perished, with a significant number taking their lives in collective death pacts. As the momentum built, fear and grief hung over the reservation like a heavy, wet blanket.
Suspecting this was a spiritual assault on the next generation, a group of Native intercessors invited me to Pine Ridge to discuss the principles and power of transforming revival.
Recent insider accounts confirm the Evil One was indeed behind this carnage. Working through a handful of perverse medicine men, he launched a scheme in which vulnerable young people were drawn into sweat lodges and “prophesied to.” Several were told: “The spirits have shown me there will be 25 more suicides — and you will be one of them.” Sadly, these words proved to be curses, and those who heard them simply lost their will to live.
By June 2015, however, a spiritual counteroffensive was under way. Led by Norma Blacksmith and a small band of Native and non-Native partners, the power of the Holy Spirit was unleashed to break the bands of death. And as the suicides abated, many traumatized families (including prominent traditionalists) opened up to the love of God.
When I arrived to share the principles of transforming revival, the team on Pine Ridge could not have been any more receptive. They were eager to not just hear the word of the Lord, but to heed it. Not surprisingly, healings, deliverances, and conversions picked up across the reservation. It was clear the conditions were ripe for a significant breakthrough.
Earlier this month, I returned to Pine Ridge with Walo Ani, a dear friend and colleague from Papua New Guinea. Having walked with Walo for years, I knew his understanding of tribal culture and his extensive firsthand experience with transforming revival would be incredibly helpful. I was not disappointed.
PUBLIC REPENTANCE
Wade McHargue, one of our hosts, and a man of extraordinary faith and courage, offered this brief report on October 8, 2016:
“Thank you for praying for George Otis’ and Walo Ani’s visit. It was a powerful time. The presence of God was very tangible and the Holy Spirit spoke clearly through His servants. The week culminated with a unity service with five churches represented… It was deeply moving to see many come forward to repent publically, and to make reconciliation and intercession. It was unlike anything I’ve seen since being here.”
SUPERNATURAL SIGNS
Ten days later, on October 18, Wade added these details:
“I believe we can say safely that we just witnessed an indisputable act of God here… the fruit of years of fasting and prayer, and a specific outgrowth of the time George Otis and Walo spent with us.
I’ve written before of the two principal medicine men here — Jerome LeBeaux and Rick Two Dogs. Jerome is the one connected to the killing of Todd Little Bull in August.
Jerome’s Sun Dance at Thunder Valley is the biggest on the Reservation attracting 500 or so people each year (with connections as far as Europe). The Sun Dance tree (or pole) bearing flesh offerings and tobacco ties is the central focus, and remains up year-round. Never, I repeat never, has anyone heard of anything like what happened here last week. A violent wind pulled that tree out of the ground and threw it down!!
Those trees are buried 7 feet into the ground… Everyone who heard about what happened knows it is supernatural.
Norma Blacksmith prayed specifically for this pole to be pulled down, and as I drove Walo Ani by it (the site is visible from the road) he also prayed for this to happen. Within days, it was laying on the ground. God did it!!!”
It is important to understand that God is moving in an unprecedented way on Pine Ridge. And He has been announcing His intentions to local intercessors beforehand so there will be no doubt about who is behind these mighty deeds.
Harrison No Neck, a key leader from the Kyle area, had four recurring dreams around the time God uprooted the Sun Dance pole. In the dreams, he is taken by an angel to the various Sun Dance altars on the Reservation. The angel then says, “This is what the Lord God is about to do…” and proceeds to smite the ground until it caves in and the Sun Dance tree falls.
Dramatic stuff… especially when it actually happens!
But this is not ALL that God is doing. As we have taught for many years, genuine transforming revival moves on multiple fronts. And this is what has been happening on Pine Ridge over the last few weeks.
Another promise of God was that He would deliver entire families from bondage and deception. It is EXTREMELY RARE for families or clans raised in Indian traditional religion to come to Christ wholesale, but this is exactly what has been happening! One high profile family, disturbed by the hypocrisy of medicine men and impressed by the power of the Living God, noted traditional Lakota ceremonies are often done in the dark while followers of Jesus do things in the light.
DRAMATIC HEALINGS
A few weeks ago, Wade McHargue was sharing with a Native man, Kelly Cedarface, who had been resuscitated by electric shock paddles after trying to hang himself.
“[Kelly] was afflicted in his back and had just found out about a tumor on his kidney. Seeing he was using a cane, I asked about his pain. When he told me it was a 9 on a scale of 10, I laid hands on him began to pray. I wish you could have seen the expression on his face as the power of God entered his body and instantly removed all pain. Priceless! He just looked at me with these stunned eyes, and together we gave glory to God.”
This is just one of numerous examples of God’s healing power being released in recent days. And word is getting out! Convinced the followers of Jesus have real power, traditional Lakota are opening their hearts and homes to the Gospel.
CLOSURE OF ALCOHOL SHOPS
Two days ago, an excited Norma Blacksmith phoned me to share yet another sign that transforming revival is at hand. After decades of anguish, political wrangling, and intense intercession, notorious alcohol vendors in the unincorporated village of White Clay, gateway to the Pine Ridge reservation, are finally being shut down!
This is earthshaking news, and it took Norma several moments to form the joyous words.
An absolutely vile place, White Clay has become a hot bed of drug deals, human trafficking, and deadly fights. But worst of all, its alcohol trade has played a leading role in countless traffic fatalities, domestic tragedies, alcohol poisonings, and suicides across the reservation. An estimated 80 percent of Pine Ridge households are impacted.
How bad has it been? Consider the fact that White Clay’s four alcohol outlets sell more beer per capita than any town in America — nearly 4.5 million cans in a community with only a dozen full-time residents! Numerous TV reports and documentary films have highlighted the scourge, but until now, to no avail.
Thanks be to our GREAT GOD for His mighty and loving intervention! This will change things.
GATHERING OF THE SEVEN COUNCIL FIRES
Recognizing that God is moving in their midst, several Native leaders have summoned pastors and intercessors from the various bands and reservations that make up the Sioux Nation. This collective, known as the Seven Council Fires, is located primarily within the Dakotas.
On Saturday, October 29, these leaders will gather, in potentially historic fashion, to further humble themselves, repent, and call upon God to fulfill His purposes among the Sioux people — on Pine Ridge and beyond.
Here, in their own words, is the case at hand:
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ:
I am writing you with the thought of transforming revival the Lord wants for the Seven Council Fire Nation and beyond. The past couple of days I have been learning from George Otis Jr. and Walo Ani about the transformation of entire tribes and how to heal the land.
I believe our next step is to unite God’s called spiritual leaders (followers of Jesus) from within the Seven Council Fires people to prepare a council meeting and ask the Lord to visit our Tribes and heal the land.
I believe our next step is to unite God’s called spiritual leaders (followers of Jesus) from within the Seven Council Fires people to prepare a council meeting and ask the Lord to visit our Tribes and heal the land.
The strategy was placed in our hands. Now I believe we must carry the ball the rest of the way. I will be working together with you all to see sweeping revival that will change the fabric of our society to God’s honor.
I cannot properly relate the urgency of this gathering… We have many other commitments, I understand that. But this is concerning a visitation. We can no longer move forward with religious activity and no visitation from God.
The battle has begun!!! Hokahey!!! In Jesus’ mighty name!!!
— Joe Donnell, Joseph Cross and others
This important meeting will be led by Jerome Slides Off and take place near Eagle Butte, South Dakota. Jerome and others have requested urgent prayer covering for this time, and I believe all of us who champion the cause of revival should rally to this call.
To help guide your prayer time, I have included the following requests:
- Pray that God will protect this gathering from well-meaning but formulaic outsiders who would seek to inject personal agendas and other distractions into the proceedings. There is a real risk of this, and I believe God wants to keep these Native leaders focused on the fundamentals of humility, repentance, and prayer that have given rise to every genuine revival in history. God has brought them to this point, and the enemy realizes something historic is afoot.
- Pray that the Presence of God will be so strong at the Seven Council Fires gathering that no one will dare lift themselves up or speak against another.
- Pray that God will give clear instructions to those gathered… even if those instructions are simply to wait on him.
- Pray for traditional families who are considering turning to Christ — especially the Little Bull family whose son Todd was killed for exposing Jerome LeBeaux’s deceptive practices. They have already indicated they want to follow Jesus, but they need courage in the face of serious threats — and they have known nothing else but Lakota traditional religion.
- Pray for ongoing FBI investigations on Pine Ridge related to Todd Little Bull’s assassination, and another brazen and brutal murder that took place recently outside a basketball game. Several Natives close to these cases have reported waking up in the night to see Jerome LeBeaux standing over them… and then vanishing. The enemy’s power is real, but it cannot stand against the authority of Jesus. Pray that justice will be served, and served swiftly.
- Pray that God will give Wade McHargue and Harrison No Neck an opportunity to proclaim the Gospel to Jerome LeBeaux. Both are sensing they should do this, and to warn Him of the consequences of rejecting it.
- Pray for the many new believers on Pine Ridge that they might grow in their walk with Jesus, becoming grounded in the faith through knowledge of the Word, fellowship with the saints, and the fearless witness of God’s goodness. Pray especially for Norma Blacksmith’s son George, her grandson George Jr., and granddaughter Johaunna Brewer — all of whom have a strong call of God upon their lives.
The Sentinel Group has filmed several powerful testimonies on Pine Ridge and will be making these available for viewing in the weeks ahead.
George Otis, Jr.
Added to BLOGS INDEX 1: REVIVALS (2016)
More about Walo Ani:
21st-century revivals in the South Pacific
GENERAL BLOGS INDEX
BLOGS INDEX 1: REVIVALS (BRIEFER THAN REVIVALS INDEX)
BLOGS INDEX 2: MISSION (INTERNATIONAL STORIES)
BLOGS INDEX 3: MIRACLES (SUPERNATURAL EVENTS)
BLOGS INDEX 4: DEVOTIONAL (INCLUDING TESTIMONIES)
BLOGS INDEX 5: CHURCH (CHRISTIANITY IN ACTION)
BLOGS INDEX 6: CHAPTERS (BLOGS FROM BOOKS)
BLOGS INDEX 7: IMAGES (PHOTOS AND ALBUMS)
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Story-tellers of Good News
Story-tellers of good news ~ Results in healed families, freedom, love, less violence and addiction, redemption, hope, divine favour, grace, they pray and God moves.
Share to inform and inspire others.
West Africa: Dramatic transformation among Muslim peoples.
“Dramatic transformation is the key to rapid multiplication of churches among Muslims,” says Jerry Trousdale of missions organization CityTeam International.
He relates the story how one time their West African ministry partners were having their midday prayers, when they suddenly were surrounded by Muslim leaders. The team had been seeing breathtaking breakthroughs among highly resistant Muslim peoples, so they had anticipated opposition. They had reason to be fearful, but kept praying. Surprisingly, the Muslims just stood around them observing the proceedings and making no signs of hostile intentions.
“We beg you: could you please send us the story-tellers?”
When the Christian leaders finished praying, the group approached and turned out to be a delegation of Muslim civic leaders from a distant region. They had come with their imam and with a request. They said: “We have not come to harm you, but we beg you – could you please send us the story-tellers?” They meant the Christian workers who were making disciples by telling stories. The Muslim leaders from this community had observed other communities in their area that had become Christian, and they had noticed a dramatic change in people’s lives. They wanted the same thing in their community!
After some rearranging of schedules and responsibilities, the ministry was able to send out a team of storytellers to the distant village. Nobody imagined at the time that events like these would be repeated again and again, and that even entire mosques would come to faith in Christ. “When Muslims observe the types of dramatic transformation that only the gospel can bring in individuals, families and whole communities, they are often jealous to experience the same,” explains Trousdale.
MARKS OF TRANSFORMATION
What does transformation look like among Muslim-background believers? These are some of the most common changes seen among Muslims who accept Christ:
1. Healed families.
In families where women and children have been treated almost as slaves, wife beating becomes no longer acceptable, and love begins to heal broken marriages. Children are given permission to attend schools and are treated with new appreciation. Fighting between parents and children diminishes. Polygamy is no longer the choice of Christian men, and prostitution dies out.
2. A Spirit of Freedom.
When people discover freedom, it affects everything in their lives. They find release from fatalism, they are willing to try new things, and they expect God to bless their lives.
3. A Spirit of Love.
Many Muslim people report that God puts love in their hearts for the first time. In many cases, they have a new passion for fellow Muslims who are still in the mosque.
4. Diminished violence.
There have been instances in which, upon becoming Christians, former Muslims refuse to participate in ongoing ethnic warfare. In one case, when the Christian men were called to account for why they no longer ‘supported the tribe’, they shared the message of Jesus. This caused tribal elders to rethink their reasons for fighting, and the fighting stopped. Today, the two men who stood up for their conviction, are church planters.
5. Less addiction.
The levels of addiction to alcohol, khat, and other things that consume people’s lives are greatly diminished as these people receive prayer for deliverance.
6. Redemption and hope.
Historically, when lost people become obedient disciples of Jesus, they typically exchange fatalism for optimism, have new energy and initiative, and become more productive people. In addition, they abandon expensive addictions, and they see the blessings for God on their family situation.
7. Evidences of Divine favour.
Many new Christians share with joy how, after they became followers of Jesus, and during a time of prolonged drought, the Lord caused it to rain on their farms or on the pasture where their livestock was, but not on their neighbors’ land. And it became so obvious that the Muslim neighbors came to them to find out why these Christians had such favor. Farmers in every region that City Team International workers have interviewed report that, since they have become Christians, they have begun praying over their fields and have ceased using Muslim or spiritist blessings on their land, and their harvests have dramatically increased.
8. Grace in persecution.
Many new Christians in Muslim areas face harsh persecution. But these believers, though persecuted in cruel ways, have been transformed so deeply that they find the courage to speak a blessing on their persecutors. This forgiveness in the face of persecution can, over time, be the way that God gets into a persecutor’s heart to transform it as well. Numerous Muslims who formerly persecuted the Muslim-background Christians in their areas have come to faith as a result of those whom they persecuted responding with grace and kindness to the evil things done to them.
9. Freedom from demonic oppression.
Many Muslims have experienced years of torment from demonic powers. But when they repent of sins and receive Jesus as Lord, those spirits are successfully cast out. These deliverances are very tangible witnesses of the power of the gospel in Muslim families.
10. The power of individual prayer.
Common people discover that they can pray and God moves. Even the Muslims see this and thank God for the changes in the communities, as many who used to disturb them are now peaceful Christians.
Source: Jerry Trousdale
Joel News International 872.
GENERAL BLOGS INDEX
BLOGS INDEX 1: REVIVALS (BRIEFER THAN REVIVALS INDEX)
BLOGS INDEX 2: MISSION (INTERNATIONAL STORIES)
BLOGS INDEX 3: DEVOTIONAL (INCLUDING TESTIMONIES)
BLOGS INDEX 4: CHAPTERS (BLOGS FROM BOOKS)
BLOGS INDEX 5: IMAGES (PHOTOS & ALBUMS)
Revival in the Middle East
THE GREAT UNDERGROUND REVIVAL IN THE MIDDLE EAST
By J. D. King, author, speaker and director of the World Revival Network.
Many Middle-Eastern Christians publicly acknowledge the fact that dreams actively facilitated them coming into a saving knowledge of Jesus. For example, Nabeel Qureshi is a former devout Muslim. He became a believer in part through a visionary experience. When recounting his conversion he writes,
“I asked God to reveal himself to me in truth, through dreams and visions. All those things, combined with actually reading the Bible, are what drove me forward to the point of accepting Christ.”
When asked about his conversion to Christianity from Islam, Pastor Naeem Fazal of Mosaic Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, mentioned several things that impacted him. He pointed out things like friendship with a knowledgeable Christian as well as reading the Bible. However, it was a particular supernatural encounter that brought him into a moment of crisis. Having a visionary experience one night, Fazal had an encounter that forever shifted the course of his life.
“It looked like a figure made up with light—solid, yet transparent. It was an experience like no other. The peace I felt from this presence was so powerful, so aggressive … and [He] introduced Himself to me and said, ‘I’m Jesus; your life is not your own.’ The next morning my life changed forever.”
Fazal acknowledges that he is not unique in this experience. He notes that “the majority of the [Muslim] conversion stories I hear seem to involve dreams and visions inspired by the Holy Spirit in which Christ is supernaturally revealed.”
Joel Rosenberg’s Insights Into The Middle-Eastern Revival
More Muslims have committed to follow Christ in the last 10 years than in the last 15 centuries of Islam. In spite of great difficulty and turmoil, Christianity is unquestionably expanding throughout the Islamic world. God is up to something amazing in a region that many have thought was unreachable.
Joel Rosenberg, an Evangelical researcher, author, and resident of Israel has documented the recent upsurge of Christianity in the Middle-East. Through first-hand reconnaissance, coupled with reports from Arabic nationals, Rosenberg demonstrates that Christianity is rising rapidly in the world of Islam.
Admittedly some of the following statistics have shifted in the aftermath of the Isis and other violent demonstrations against Christians. Those who follow Jesus have been slaughtered and have experienced severe persecution in this region. Nevertheless, Joel Rosenberg’s observations provide a window into many amazing developments.
Some of the particulars can certainly be debated, but in many of the Mediterranean nations, Christianity is making extraordinary inroads. Though the subsequent conversion figures are impossible to confirm, even in their imprecision, they provide a snapshot of what’s transpiring in the Middle East.
Sudan
A number of reports suggest that increasing numbers of Christ-followers are emerging in the brutal, war-torn nation of Sudan. Here, in the Nile river valley – along the Islamic strongholds of Northern Africa – It is being noted that
“One million Sudanese have turned to Christ since the year 2000—not in spite of persecution, war, and genocide, but because of them…the estimated total number of believers in the country is more than 5.5 million.”
Many are convinced that the great brutalities that this nation has encountered are becoming a catalyst for the expansion and growth of Christianity. Rather than inhibiting the Church, the war is actually propelling it.
Pakistan
Pakistan is typically not identified as a nation experiencing a move of God, but apparently they’re beginning to see one spark within their contentious borders.Christianity’s Middle-Eastern expansion is particularly evident in this unexpected place. Rosenberg acknowledges that,
“Senior Pakistani Christian leaders tell me there is a ‘conversion explosion’ going on in their country.There are now an estimated 2.5 million to 3 million born-again Pakistani believers worshiping Jesus Christ. Whole towns and villages along the Afghan-Pakistani border are…converting to Christianity.”
This Islamic country is not alone, many others in this region are having similar things take place.
Egypt
Reliable reports suggest that there is also a great revival erupting in the land of Egypt. Rosenberg declares that, “Ministry leaders in Egypt estimate there are more than 2.5 million followers of Jesus Christ in their country. Many of these are Muslim converts.”
Undoubtedly, the severe persecutions and disruptions related to the “Arab Spring” have affected the lives of Christians throughout this nation, but the faithful have remained strong. Martyrdom invites outsiders to examine the claims of those willing to die for Jesus. It is believed that many amazing things are taking place in Egypt.
Iran
Surprisingly, the contentious nation of Iran is also beginning to encounter the rising flames of awakening. Violent Islamic Fundamentalism has not been able to impede the advancement of the Gospel in this fierce Persian nation. Reflecting on this reality, Rosenberg writes,
“At the time of the Islamic Revolution in 1979, there were only about five hundred known Muslim converts to Jesus inside the country. By 2000, a survey of Christian demographic trends reported that there were two hundred twenty thousand Christians inside Iran, of which between four and twenty thousand were Muslim converts. And according to Iranian Christian leaders I interviewed, the number of Christ-followers inside their country shot dramatically higher between 2000 and 2008.”
Yes, you read that right. Christianity went from 500 people to 220,000 in 21 years. Contrary to what many Americans think, Christianity is quietly advancing behind the scenes in some of the most unlikely places around the globe.
Saudi Arabia
Reports continue to come in. A strikingly similar stirring is also taking place in Saudi Arabia – unquestionably the epicenter of world Islam. One wouldn’t expect the growth of Christianity in Mecca, but it is happening. Summarizing some of what he has heard, Joel Rosenberg reports that “Arab Christian leaders estimated there were more than one hundred thousand Saudi Muslim background believers in 2005, and they believe the numbers are even higher today.”[6] Saudi Arabia is being quickened by the Spirit of the Lord. It seems to be positioned to experience significant growth in the decades to come.
Iraq
Christianity is also quietly advancing in the turbulent nation of Iraq. Again, it needs to be noted that these numbers precede the vicious emergence of Isis and the aftermath of the Arab Spring. Multitudes of Christians have been martyred since these figures were originally reported. Yet, even the fact that Muslims felt compelled to quell its advancement suggests that Christianity’s influence has been growing.
“Before 2003, senior Iraqi Christian leaders tell me, there were only about four to six hundred known born-again followers of Jesus Christ in the entire country, despite an estimated seven hundred fifty thousand nominal Christians in historic Iraqi churches. By the end of 2008, Iraqi Christian leaders estimated that there were more than seventy thousand born-again Iraqi believers.”
As many are aware, the expansion of Christianity has been greatly hindered more recently in Iraq. Don’t be mistaken, this martyrdom and brutality will ultimately give way to more Christians in the land once known as Babylon.
Algeria
The whole Islamic world is currently shaking. We have already discussed some of the amazing advancements that are taking place in several of Arabic nations. These are where the greatest signs of revival are evident. Nevertheless, on a lesser level, other Islamic nations are also experiencing a tremendous stirring within their borders. One of these is Algeria. Rosenberg recounts the recent upsurge in Algeria, noting that:
“more than eighty thousand Muslims have become followers of Christ in recent years…The surge of Christianity has become so alarming to Islamic clerics that in March of 2006, Algerian officials passed a law banning Muslims from becoming Christians or even learning about Christianity, and forbidding Christians from meeting together without a license from the government.”
Algeria is beginning to come alive with the gospel like much of Northern Africa.
Jordan
Another ancient Middle-Eastern locale where Christianity is beginning to take root is along the borders the eastern bank of the Jordan River. The Islamic land of Jordan is also experiencing the grace and wonder of Jesus. Reflecting on what is transpiring in this nation, Rosenberg noted the following:
“God has been reviving the Jordanian Church in the last four decades, and particularly in the past few years. Conservative estimates say the number of believers in the country is now between five and ten thousand. The head of one major Jordanian ministry, however, believes there may be as many as fifty thousand believers in the country.”
Jordan is also experiencing the salvation of Jesus Christ.
Other Islamic Nations
Almost every Islamic nation has been experiencing a significant upsurge of Christianity over the last twenty years. Though the numbers aren’t equally high, all are experiencing the impact on some level. Here are some of the other reports.
While in the nation of Morocco it has been claimed that “between 20,000 and 40,000 Muslims have become Christ-followers.” Rosenberg suggests that, “The number of Afghan believers is now between 20,000 and 30,000.” In Kazakhstan “there are more than fifteen thousand Kazakh Christians, and more than one hundred thousand Christians of all ethnicities.” Reflecting on Lebanon, Rosenberg suggests that, “there are about ten thousand truly born-again followers of Jesus Christ today.” Reports suggest there were no Muslim background Christians in Syria fifty years ago, but today “there are between four and five thousand born-again believers in the country.”
Rosenberg’s figures suggest that there are over 13 million Christians in Islamic countries and a majority of them are from a Muslim background.
Other Observers
There are other evidences of a notable transformation taking place. For example, Journalist George Thomas notes that,
“A Christian revival is touching the northernmost reaches of Africa. In a region once hostile to the gospel, now tens of thousands of Muslims are following Jesus. As the sun sets over the Mediterranean Sea, Muslims across Northern Africa are converting to faith in Jesus Christ in record numbers… What experts say is that there is a profound move of God in the predominantly Muslim nations of Mauritania, Western Sahara, Morocco, Algeria, Libya, and Tunisia.”
Tino Qahoush, a researcher and filmmaker, has been traveling to various parts of this region to document the Christian revival that has been taking place. Reflecting on what he observed, he noted the following,
“What God is doing in North Africa, all the way from actually Mauritanian to Libya is unprecedented in the history of missions. I have the privilege of recording testimonies and listening to firsthand stories of men and women, of all ages.”
Jayson Casper, a journalist with Christianity Today, also pointed out some astounding growth that’s taking place in the Arabian Peninsula. He writes,
“Today the Pew Research Center numbers Christians in the Arabian Peninsula at 2.3 million – more Christians than nearly 100 countries can claim. The Gulf Christian Fellowship, an umbrella group, estimates 3.5 million…United Arab Emirates Christian population…[is] 13 percent, according to Pew. Among other Gulf states, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Qatar each about 14 percent Christian, while Oman is about 6 percent. Even Saudi Arabia, home to Islam’s holiest cities (Mecca and Medina), is 4 percent Christian…”
One of the best examples of the expansion of Christianity within Muslim lands is through the work of Heidi and Roland Baker. Along with their church plants and trained workers from Iris Ministries, the Bakers have made an extraordinary impact on the brutal nation of Mozambique. The province that they currently operate in was entirely Muslim before their arrival, but a little over ten years later those figures have changed drastically. Kelly Head from Christ For The Nations writes,
“The Bakers are now based full-time in Pemba, Mozambique, in an area where Heidi says was once called a ‘graveyard to missionaries.’ But recently the government announced publicly that it’s no longer a Muslim providence; now it’s a Christian providence.”
The abrupt changes to the once Muslim Africa are something even the Islamic clerics are beginning to acknowledge. In December 2001, Sheikh Ahmad al Qataani, the president of The Companions Lighthouse for the Science of Islamic Law in Libya, appeared on a live interview on Al-Jazeera satellite television. He declared the following:
“Islam used to represent, as you previously mentioned, Africa’s main religion and there were 30 African languages that used to be written in Arabic script. The number of Muslims in Africa has diminished to 316 million, half of whom are Arabs in North Africa. So in the section of Africa that we are talking about, the non Arab section, the number of Muslims does not exceed 150 million people. When we realize that the entire population of Africa is one billion people, we see that the number of Muslims has diminished greatly from what it was in the beginning of the last century…As to how that happened, well, there are now 1.5 million churches whose congregations account for 46 million people. In every hour, 667 Muslims convert to Christianity. Everyday, 16,000 Muslims convert to Christianity. Ever year, 6 million Muslims convert to Christianity. These numbers are very large indeed.”
It is obvious from these and other reports that Christianity is advancing.
Revival Blogs Links:
See also Revivals Index
See also Revival Blogs
See also Blogs Index 1: Revivals
GENERAL BLOGS INDEX
BLOGS INDEX 1: REVIVALS (BRIEFER THAN REVIVALS INDEX)
BLOGS INDEX 2: MISSION (INTERNATIONAL STORIES)
BLOGS INDEX 3: MIRACLES (SUPERNATURAL EVENTS)
BLOGS INDEX 4: DEVOTIONAL (INCLUDING TESTIMONIES)
BLOGS INDEX 5: CHURCH (CHRISTIANITY IN ACTION)
BLOGS INDEX 6: CHAPTERS (BLOGS FROM BOOKS)
BLOGS INDEX 7: IMAGES (PHOTOS AND ALBUMS)
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Pentecost on Pentecost Island
Pentecost Island, Vanuatu
Pentecost Island in Vanuatu in the South Pacific
See also Pentecost on Pentecost and in the South Pacific
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100 years ago a wife of the highest-ranking Paramount Chief died soon after native missionaries brought the Gospel to Pentecost Island. After her body was wrapped in burial calico the calico began moving. Quickly they unwrapped the body and she sat up. She had seen Jesus and told them all to leave their bad heathen ways and follow the good Christian way. Then she lay down and died again. They did what she said and moved from pagan villages to Christian villages on land offered by a Christian Chief who was the grandfather of Pastor Rolanson, our host.
Some of the signs of revival we saw there included a whole mountain ‘on fire’ (with nothing burned) during revival meetings at their Bible College, witchcraft items revealed then removed and destroyed by prayer teams, everyone prayed for in ‘custom’ villages healed, and angels filling a village church with songs in the night in a small village where the worship had been strong, lasting for many hours. Everyone prayed for in that village was healed and all unbelievers repented during the worship and many were baptized.
I talk about some of these things in this recent podcast:
2-minute video prayer for Vanuatu after category-5 cyclone flattened villages at Easter 2020 – recorded by grandson Dante. Now rebuilding and still evangelizing. If you would like to help you can give via my PayPal: Geoffrey Waugh, PayPal – geoffwaugh2@gmail.com
Photo Report – Mission teams in Vanuatu 2003-2010
Photo Report – Grant Shaw on Mission in Vanuatu 2006
Photo Report – Joel Shaw and team on Mission in Vanuatu 2013
Photo Report – Andrew and others on Mission in Vanuatu 2012-2015
Photo Report – Pentecost on Pentecost Island 2003-2016
Book: Pentecost on Pentecost & in the South Pacific
Pentecost on Pentecost and in the South Pacific – Blog
Pentecost on Pentecost & in the South Pacific PDF
South Pacific Revivals – Blog
South Pacific Revivals – PDF
More free PDF books are on the Main Page
Part of this account is information from my book South Pacific Revivals (in paperback, ebook, and PDF).
French explorer Bougainville saw and named this 60 kilometres long, narrow island on the Day of Pentecost, 1764. Captain Cook sailed past it in 1774.
Martyr for the Gospel
Tomas Tumtum had been an indentured worker on cane farms in Queensland, Australia. He was converted there and returned around 1901 to his village on South Pentecost Island. He came with his friend, Lulkon, a new young disciple from a neighbouring island. They arrived when the village was taboo because a baby had died a few days earlier, so no one was allowed near the village. Ancient tradition dictated that anyone breaking taboo must be killed, so they were going to kill Tomas, but his friend Lulkon asked Tomas to tell them to kill him instead, so that Tomas could live and evangelize his own people. Just before he was clubbed to death at a sacred Mele palm tree, Lulkon read John 3:16, then closed his eyes and prayed for them.
Tomas became the pioneer of the church in South Pentecost, establishing many Churches of Christ in the villages there, initially along the west coast of South Pentecost.
Law student (now lawyer and pastor) Jerry from Fiji at sacred Mele palm tree, site of martyr’s death which opened the way for the gospel in South Pentecost 100 years ago.
The church on Pentecost Island was strongly evangelical, founded by native leaders converted by the Churches of Christ mission in Queensland. Many of the leaders on Pentecost Island became filled with the Spirit in a series of indigenous revivals from the 1980s.
Revival Background
Pastor Wilson Bebe led many revival meetings in South Pentecost in the 1980s and 1990s. He was a strong evangelist and revival leader. Prayer meetings multiplied during revivals.
Pastor Lewis Wari completed studies at the Bible College at Banmatmat and began preaching at revival meetings in the villages of South Pentecost in the 1980s. Revival spread in 1980-1981 with many people weeping, repenting, being reconciled and some people being healed. Lewis had strong revelations and words of knowledge for people. He also faced opposition from traditional churches, a cautious reaction common to revivals everywhere.
Pastor Lewis spoke at meetings in March 1995 at Panlimsi village on the west coast, near Pangi. The Country Women’s Fellowship (CWF) met there for a week to learn to use sewing machines and Lewis preached at the night crusade meetings. On the Friday night, 31 March 1995, the Spirit of God moved in a very strong way. Many people were crying and repenting and were filled with the Spirit.
Pastor Rolanson had just finished his studies at the Bible College and was the young pastor at Panlimsi (near Pangi) then. He led teams from his church in revival meetings with Pastor Lewis. God moved in a strong way at Ranwas village on the east coast with many people crying and repenting. The teams led revival meetings in many village churches in South Pentecost.
Revival spark in 2002
Graduation photos here of Jay, Simon, Calvin (with Kata and Samuel), Romulo and Pam – now all strong Christian lawyers and leaders.
Port Vila, the capital of Vanuatu, has the Law School of the University of the South Pacific. The Port Vila law students Christian Fellowship experienced a strong move of God from Easter 2002, with many converted and filled with the Spirit.
I hosted a team of 11 of the law students in Brisbane for a month in November 2002. They had their own 5 a.m. prayer meeting each day and then they helped lead the 6 a.m. daily prayer group at Kenmore Baptist Church. They spoke, sang, and did items at many different churches, praying for people personally at each one.
In May 2003 a team from the University of the South Pacific law school Christian Fellowship (CF) joined me on Pentecost Island in Vanuatu for a weekend of outreach meetings on South Pentecost. The national Vanuatu Churches of Christ Bible College stands near the site of the native Christian martyrdom there.
God opened a wide door on Pentecost Island (1 Corinthians 16:8-9). The weekend with the CF team brought new unity among the competing village churches. The Sunday night service went from 6-11 p.m., although we ‘closed’ it three times after 10 p.m., with a closing prayer, then later a closing song, and then later a closing announcement. People just kept coming for prayer and singing.
Another team of four students from the law school CF returned to South Pentecost in June 2003 for 12 days of meetings in many villages. Again, the Spirit of God moved strongly. Leaders repented publicly of divisions and criticisms. Then youth began repenting of backsliding or unbelief. A great-granddaughter of the pioneer Tomas Tumtum gave her life to God in the village near his grave at the Bible College.
We held evening rallies in four villages of South Pentecost each evening from 6 p.m. for 12 days, with teaching sessions on the Holy Spirit every morning in the main village church for a week. The team experienced a strong leading of the Spirit in the worship, drama, action songs with Pacific dance movements, and preaching and praying for people.
Mathias (in photo), a young man who repented deeply with over 15 minutes of tearful sobbing, became the main worship leader in revival meetings. When he was leading and speaking at a revival meeting at the national Bible College, a huge supernatural fire blazed in the hills directly opposite the Bible College chapel in 2005, but no bush was burned. They told us it was supernatural fire, with no smoke and nothing physical being consumed.
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Pentecost Island Bible College
By 2004, the Churches of Christ national Bible College on Pentecost Island became a centre for revival teaching. Pastor Lewis Wari and his wife Marilyn hosted these gatherings at the Bible College, and later on Lewis spoke at many island churches as the President of the Churches of Christ. Lewis had been a leader in strong revival movements on South Pentecost as a young pastor from 1988, with many village revivals.
Don and Helen Hill (in photo), friends from Brisbane, participated in some visits. Don repaired the electrical wiring at the Bible College and supplied needed portable generators and lawnmowers. Helen recorded the revival teaching sessions on DVD for international use by our friends in many nations who have also experienced revival.
Leaders’ seminars and youth conventions at the Bible College focused on God and revival. The college hosted regular courses and seminars on revival for a month at a time. Each day began with prayer together from 6 a.m. The early morning prayer meetings began even earlier, from 4.30 a.m., in the youth convention in December 2004, as God’s Spirit moved on the youth leaders in that area.
Morning sessions continued from 8 a.m. to noon, with teaching and ministry. As the Spirit moved on the group, they continued to repent and seek God for further anointing and imparting of the Spirit in their lives. Afternoon sessions featured sharing and testimonies of what God is doing. Each evening became a revival meeting at the Bible College with worship, sharing, preaching, and powerful times of ministry to everyone seeking prayer.
Every weekend the teams from the college led revival meetings in village churches. Many of these village revival meetings went late as the Spirit moved on the people with deep repentance, reconciliation, forgiveness, and prayer for healing and empowering.
Another law student team from Port Vila, led by Seini Puamau, Vice President of the Christian Fellowship [now a judge in Fiji], had a strong impact at the High School on South Pentecost Island with big responses at all meetings. Almost the whole residential school of 300 responded for prayer at the final service on Sunday night October 17, 2004, after a powerful testimony from Joanna Kenilorea. The High School principal, Silas Buli, has prayed with some of his staff for many years from 4 a.m. each morning, praying for the school and nation. Silas became a Member of Parliament for South Pentecost in 2016.
The church arranged for more revival teaching at their national Bible College for church leaders. Teams from the college held mission meetings simultaneously in seven different villages. Every village saw strong responses, including a team that held their meeting in the ‘nakamal’, the chief’s meeting house of their village. The first person to respond for prayer in the nakamal was a man from the ‘custom’ traditional village called Bunlap.
Those Bible College sessions seemed like preparation for further revival. Every session led into ministry. Repentance went deep. Prayer began early in the mornings, and went late into the nights.
Village evangelism teams from South Pentecost continue to witness in the villages, and also visit other islands. Six people from these teams came to Brisbane and were then part of 15 from Pentecost Island on mission with me in the Solomon Islands in 2006.
Revival meetings on Pentecost
Grant Shaw joined me on Pentecost Island in Vanuatu in September-October 2006. Grant grew up with missionary parents in China, saw many persecutions and miracles, and had his dad recounting miraculous answers to prayer as a daily routine. They often needed to pray for miracles, and miracles happened often. From 14 years of age Grant participated in mission teams travelling internationally in Asia. Then he attended a youth camp at Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship which has seen revival since 1994. He worked there as an associate youth pastor for 18 months before studying at Bible College in Brisbane and then being a youth pastor in a large Brisbane church. So he is used to revival – all his life! In Vanuatu he had clear words of knowledge, and saw people healed daily in meetings and in the villages. That inspired and challenged everyone.
Raised from the dead
In Port Vila the capital, on our way to Pentecost Island in 2006 with Grant Shaw we attended the Sunday service at the Upper Room church. At sharing time in the service, Leah Waqa, a nurse, told how she had been on duty that week when parents brought in their young daughter who had been badly hit in a car accident, and showed no signs of life – the monitor registered zero – no pulse. Leah felt unusual boldness, so commanded the girl to live, and prayed for her for an hour. After an hour the monitor started beeping and the girl recovered.
South Pentecost
Our revival mission trip on South Pentecost Island was based in the village of Panlimsi near Pangi on the southwest coast. Mathias was then the young pastor there. The Spirit moved strongly in all the meetings. Repentance. Reconciliations. Confessions. Anointing. Healings every day. The healings included Pastor Rolanson’s young son Ralph, partially deaf from birth, able to hear clearly after Grant prayed for him. Rolanson leads evangelism teams, and helped to lead this mission.
South Pentecost attracts tourists with its land diving – men jumping from high bamboo towers with vines attached to their ankles. Grant prayed for a jumper who had hurt his neck, and the neck crackled back into place. An elderly man no longer needed his walking stick to come up the hill to the meetings. Grant prayed for a son of the paramount chief of South Pentecost from Bunlap, a ‘custom’ village. He was healed from a painful leg and later he invited the team to come to his village to pray for the sick. No white people had been invited there to minister previously.
The revival team, including the two of us from Australia, trekked for a week into mountain villages. We literally obeyed Luke 10 – most going with no extra shirt, no sandals, and no money. The trek began with a five-hour climb across the island mountain range to the village of Ranwas on the eastern side. Mathias led worship, and strong moves of the Spirit touched everyone. We prayed for people many times in each meeting. At one point I spat on the dirt floor, making mud to show what Jesus did once. Marilyn Wari, wife of the President of the Churches of Christ, then jumped up asking for prayer for her eyes, using the mud. Later she testified that the Lord told her to do that, and then she found she could read her small pocket Bible without glasses. So she read to us all. Meetings continued like that each night.
We then trekked through the ‘custom’ heathen village where the paramount chief lived, and prayed for more sick people. Some had pain leave immediately, and people there became more open to the gospel.
The village storekeeper was the first man to ask for prayer there. He wanted us to put a curse on someone who had stolen from him! Instead, I was led to pray that the Lord would convict the culprit. We heard later that the culprit returned the stolen goods.
Then the team trekked for seven hours to Ponra, a remote village further north.
Glory in a remote village
Revival meetings erupted at Ponra. The Spirit just took over. Visions. Revelations. Reconciliations. Healings. People drunk in the Spirit. Many resting on the floor getting blessed in various ways. When they heard about Marilyn’s healing through ‘mud on the eyes’ at Ranwas, some of them wanted mud packs also! Children often slept on the floor in the long revival meetings.
One of the girls in the team had a vision of the village children there paddling in a pure sea, crystal clear. They were like that – so pure. Not polluted by TV, DVDs, videos, movies, magazines, and worldliness. Their lives were so clean and holy. Just pure love for the Lord, especially among the young. Youth often lead in revival.
The sound of angels singing filled the air about 3 a.m. It sounded as though the village church was packed. The harmonies in high descant declared “For You are great and You do wondrous things. You are God alone” and then harmonies, without words until words again for “I will praise You O Lord my God with all my heart, and I will glorify Your name for evermore” with long, long harmonies on “forever more”. Just worship. Pure, awesome and majestic.
The team stayed two extra days there – everyone received prayer, and many people surrendered to the Lord both morning and night. Everyone repented, including us, as the Spirit moved on everyone.
Grant’s legs, cut and sore from the long trek, saved the team from another long trek back across the island. The villagers arranged a boat ride back around the island from the east to the west for the team’s return. Revival meetings continued back at the host village, Panlimsi, led mainly in worship by Mathias, with Pastor Rolanson organising things. Also at two other villages the Spirit moved powerfully as the team ministered, with much reconciliation and dancing in worship.
Pastor Rolanson, in the host village, heard angels singing there also. At first, he too thought it was the church full of people but the harmonies were more wonderful than we can sing. Repentance and healings continued in the meetings and in the villages.
Vanuatu Team visits the Solomon Islands
During November 2006, a team of 22 from South Pentecost flew to Honiara in the Solomon Islands and joined Grant and Jesse Padayache and me there for revival meetings in the city and in the mountain villages where revival was spreading. God miraculously provided accommodation in a Christian hostel. Sporting teams had cancelled their booking, so the whole place was available for us. The team visited many town churches and mountain villages, praying with and for hundreds of people. Many reported healings and anointing by God’s Spirit.
Grant and I had the marvellous opportunity to speak one night at the United Church’s national Christian Youth Convention on Choisel Island in the western Solomons. God poured out his Spirit on about 1,000 youths. Many were healed and filled with the Spirit. Many of them saw revival movements in their own islands when they returned home in their outboard canoes.
Weekend with Anglicans
Most of our mission work has been with the Churches of Christ villages but we also visit ‘custom’ pagan villages and other denominations.
We made history in 2010 by trekking three to four hours to the Anglican village of Point Cross on the southern tip of Pentecost Island, at their invitation. This was the first combined churches meetings ever held there. I taught on the Holy Spirit and transformation in their beautiful cement church, painted white with a majestic spire, visible for kilometres all around. It contains dramatic paintings of Jesus painted on the walls by a Pentecost Island man (see photo). We also met in the chief’s meeting house. At all meetings there we prayed with large numbers of people, including prayer for healings and to be filled with the Spirit. The helpful Member of Parliament there provided us with a free boat trip in his outboard canoe, back to our base village at Pangi and Panlimsi.
Church life has changed in the years I have been visiting Pentecost Island. Now all the churches we work with, including the Anglican youth, have revival-style meetings with revival choruses and personal prayer for those responding.
One of their revival songs has this chorus:
There’s gonna be a great awakening
There’s gonna be a great revival in our land
There’s gonna be a great awakening
And everyone who calls on Jesus
They will be saved.
Adventures with Andrew
Andrew Chee from Hawaii lived to surf. Now he lives to serve God [Photo: Andrew surfing].
See more photos on the Facebook Album
21-year-old Andrew came with me on a three-week mission to Vanuatu in June-July 2012, again in July 2014, then in July 2015 with Ben Gray and Noel Missingham, then in June-July 2016 with Noel and my grandson Dante. A great way to escape winter! We saw God’s blessing and many miracles.
Andrew sensed God telling him to go on the trip, and he booked his flights only one week before we left when flights were full because of school holidays. At first he was wait-listed but the next day a seat became available on all my four flights!
His cousin Grant Shaw came with me to Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands in 2006 when he was 22. See photos on the Facebook Album
Grant founded Kingdom Culture Church on the north side of Brisbane. He encouraged Andrew to join me [Photo: Andrew and Grant].
Grant hit the news in 2012 with a front-page article in the Sunday Mail and guest appearances on TV shows because they take keen young people to nearby shopping malls and pray for the sick and for anyone wanting prayer. Grant’s brother Joel, also a pastor, began doing this kind of outreach some years previously. Joel and Grant saw God heal hundreds of people, especially non-Christians. Many of those prayed for are now keen Christians also. Joel and his wife Candice with four others from their church joined us for mission on Pentecost Island in June 2013, also visiting many village churches.
Grant and Joel’s cousin Andrew loves praying for the sick because he sees God constantly taking away pain and healing people. He has strong faith in God’s Word, such as Mark 16:17-18. Jesus said, “these signs will follow those who believe: In My name they will cast out demons; … they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
We saw all that in Vanuatu, literally. Daily. Both in 2012 and 2014 with Andrew, as well as in 2006 with Grant and 2013 with his brother Joel and his team from Glory City Church in Brisbane – see Photo Reports listed above.
See photos and maps on the Facebook Album. Huge numbers were healed, and leaders challenged and helped.
Port Vila, the capital
Andrew and I flew into Port Vila late on a Friday night and stayed at the Churches of Christ transit house above the church there. Next morning at 6 a.m. we heard young people worshiping in the church with their beautiful island harmonies, so we joined them. They welcomed us and invited us to speak briefly and pray for anyone sick. Andrew had words of knowledge about people with pain who then came out for prayer. Our praying continued for everyone wanting prayer, after the closing prayer. Nice fast start to a mission trip!
That morning we flew for an hour in a very small plane on the windy trip to Pentecost Island – the bumpiest I have had on my dozen visits there. Fortunately we only had time for one bread roll at the airport before leaving, so did not get sick!
![chief-willie--large-msg-1116763487-2[1]](https://renewaljournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/chief-willie-large-msg-1116763487-21.jpg?w=300)
I went to Pentecost Island first in 2003 to see their famous land diving, when men dive from 20-30 meter towers with only vines tied to their ankles. Chief Willie (photo), my host, invited me to return with teams of young people from the Law School Christian Fellowship of the University of the South Pacific. I had met them in 2002 and hosted a month’s mission trip they had with me in Australia in November of that year.
So now I was returning again, with another keen young firebrand for God.
Pentecost Island
Pastor Rolanson met us at the airstrip and we walked 300 meters to the beach to ride for half an hour in the outboard canoe 10k south to Pangi village. There Rolanson’s sons met us to carry our bags along the muddy track half a kilometer inland to their village, Panlimsi.
I stayed there many times, including with Grant in the bush house behind Andrew and Rolanson in this photo. Rolanson, pastor and evangelist, keeps asking us to return to encourage revival, pray for people, and help him train leaders.
We had our first meeting there that Saturday night in the village church, partially lit by a couple of old fluorescent lights when the generator was started, usually after everyone has arrived – to save fuel. So most meetings begin in the dark with torchlight or candles.
Early in the worship Andrew again had words of knowledge about people’s pain so worship included praying for the sick. Their pain left. After we both spoke that night, we prayed for many more.
So began weeknight meetings at Panlimsi. During the day we rested, recovered, washed in the nearby river where water taro grew abundantly, and usually walked back to Pangi to swim in the ocean. Every time we went out into the villages people asked for healing prayer.
So, like Jesus sending out the 12 and 70 (Mark 6:7; Luke 10:1) in pairs, we too went through the towns and villages proclaiming the kingdom of God, healing the sick and casting out spirits. Many illnesses there result from curses or witchcraft. Often we had to break curses, bind afflicting spirits and cast them out in Jesus’ name.
The first time I went there, in 2003, my host Chief Willie asked me to throw out an afflicting spirit giving him a headache, literally. He said that ‘enemies’ had cursed him. So we prayed together, bound and cast out attacking spirits, and he felt fine.
At other times people asked me to help them get rid of strong invading spirits such as one that haunted a house by ‘jumping’ onto the stones on the floor at night. We prayed and it was gone after that. However, that impudent one ‘jumped’ on the stone floor in my bungalow that night, so I had to cast it out in Jesus’ name, and it never returned. Rather weird to hear someone/something ‘jump’ into your dark room at night!
This time we experienced strong witchcraft. On our last day there, when Andrew and I were weary, Andrew was hit by severe aches and headache. That night I saw a strange dull light, like a reddish torchlight, moving horizontally just outside our village hut. We began praying against powerful spirits. God’s Spirit reminded Andrew to bless those who curse you and pray for your enemies. He did. The strange spiritual connection was immediately broken, and pain started easing off. It took a day to recover from that one. “All hail the power of Jesus’ name.”
Every first Sunday of the month the Churches of Christ have a combined service for all their churches in South Pentecost. We shared in one in the packed Panlimsi church. Before the service, Andrew had words of knowledge about pain in a man’s shoulders and the right side of a woman’s face. Both came for prayer as people were gathering in the church. It turned out that the man was the leader of the service and the woman preached that day! Many times, the words of knowledge Andrew received, we discovered later, were for pastors and leaders, and then later we prayed for others.
At that Sunday service I was strongly led to call people out for prayer during communion. That was a first for them. It never happened in communion before. A large number came for prayer and healings were fast and strong.
One night Andrew felt led to wash everyone’s feet. That took the whole service! We put a bucket of water near the door (regularly refilled) and Andrew washed everyone’s feet as they arrived while we worshiped, prayed, spoke and called people out for healing and empowering prayer. One lady, Alice, told us later that while Andrew in obedience washed her feet the Lord healed her legs! Alice was also healed another year while she was bringing a friend to the front for healing prayer! I was led to wash the leaders’ feet that night also [Photo: Andrew washes the chief’s feet]. That happened many times through the years – following Jesus’ example.
Our adventures included another outboard motor canoe trip an hour north for a combined churches youth rally on the beach with a large campfire at the end of the meeting. We joined forces with another mission team from Gladstone (in Queensland, Australia). That night we also prayed for many people after the service. Healings were the fastest and strongest we had seen till then.
Bunlap
The ‘custom’ village of Bunlap on the east coast is famous as the spiritual base for native witchcraft and curses.
I went there in 2006 with Grant on a five-hour trek across to Ranwas village and then via Bunlap on a seven-hour trek to Ponra village where we saw the power of God at every meeting and I heard angels singing in the night, like the church was full, although no people were there.
Grant had prayed for the paramount chief’s son whose groin was healed at Pangi village, so we offered to go to Bunlap and pray for the sick. A couple of days later we heard that the chief had invited us to come and pray – the first white people to ever be invited to pray for people there.
This time Andrew and I were swimming off the jetty near Pangi when one of the chief’s sons from Bunlap and his friends wandered onto the jetty. Two of those young men had pain so Andrew prayed for them and the pain left. The chief’s son told us they would be there when we came to Bunlap the following Saturday to pray for sick people again.
This year we enjoyed the luxury of a four-wheel truck trip across the island through the dense green mountains. We had three nights of meetings at Ranwas village, Friday to Sunday, including the Sunday morning service there. On Saturday we trekked half an hour through the jungle to Bunlap.
People were even more welcoming this time at Bunlap. We prayed for dozens of people, and their pain left. We talked about the kingdom of God and how Jesus saves and heals. Some of the people told us they believed that, and when the chief allowed it they would be part of a church there.
The paramount chief once burned a Bible given to him by a revival team from the Christian villages. Now he is willing for a church to be built on the ground where he burned the Bible. Hallelujah – what a testimony to God’s grace and glory.
For the first time ever, that paramount chief asked for prayer. He wanted healing from head pain. Andrew placed his hands on the sides of the chief’s head and we prayed for him in Jesus’ name. The pain left.
Pastors Willy, Gordon, Rolanson and his son David with Andrew and the paramount chief
Then another chief there prepared lunch for us so the pastors in the team and Andrew and I ate in his house – again the first time ever for white people on mission eating with him there.
Like Jesus’ disciples, we returned to Ranwas church, rejoicing that afflicting spirits were cast out, people were healed in Jesus’ name, some believed in Jesus, and they now plan to have a church there someday. Our host chief told Rolanson he can bring his guitar and have meetings in the chief’s house anytime.
Some Christians at Ranwas were amazed to hear the reports. They have endured witchcraft and curses from Bunlap for a century. Again, during communion on Sunday large numbers came for prayer for healing, and healings were fast and strong. They also had never done that in communion before. At all the meetings Andrew had specific words of knowledge about healings, and pain left quickly. In the beginning of our trip we had to pray for some people two or three times before the pain left, but as the weeks passed and faith rose, healings were much quicker and stronger. By the end of the mission trip people in the congregation were praying for each other in faith and seeing God touch their friends. We really encourage them to keep doing that.
Andrew especially encouraged leaders to pray with him for people’s healings, just as he had learned from leaders in his church. Soon those village leaders and others were praying more strongly in faith. Many of them do that constantly anyway, so we were just encouraging them to believe and take authority in Jesus’ name even more fully.
We returned to Ranwas village, and Bunlap village in 2014, with similar results. The sick were healed. Hearts were opened to faith in Jesus.
In 2014 we also spoke and prayed with many people at the Independence Celebrations held every 24th July for a week. Many responded, and many youth came for prayer during our time there. We slept one night with a local football team and woke up to them singing:
For I was made in His likeness
Created in His image
For I was born to serve the Lord
And I can’t deny Him
And I will always walk beside Him
For I was born to serve the Lord.
I challenged them all to live fully this way and the whole team responded in prayer.
2015 Update
I’m just back from a good time in Vanuatu, though tiring – it reminds me I’m approaching 80! Great to have 3 young fellows full of energy and zeal, Andrew Chee (3rd time there, and he was with me in Nepal and Thailand last year), his friend Ben Gray, and my nephew-in-law Noel Missingham – see the Facebook Album. Pastor Rolanson has been the main organizer of my visits to Pentecost Island for over 12 years and I often stay in his village. This time Rolanson came to Vila the first week we were there so we stayed in Vila a week with contacts given to Noel. We joined with a new church group there and had free accommodation as well. The boys loved praying for people in the streets and seeing immediate healings, and we were taken out by church people on 3 days to pray for many, including the Paramount Chief of Port Vila, and for many of his people in his island village.
We had a good week on Pentecost staying with Elder Jackson and wife Annette (who worked in a bank branch there) in their house near the beach at Pangi, as Rolanson stayed on in Vila with government stuff. The team prayed for healings every day and in all the night meetings. Night meetings in four different villages: Panlimsi, Hotwater, Wali and Pangi, were all strong with personal prayers for healings, anointing, empowering and mission. See the Facebook album
It was a time of building them up again. Everyone who was prayed for about their healing reported that the pain had gone – quickly. I left some of the treks into the mountains to the young men this time, and Andrew and Noel returned and prayed for the ‘custom’ paramount chief not only for healings in the village but for his salvation. He indicated that he wanted to give his life to God and open all the ‘custom’ villages to evangelism. Two ‘custom’ chiefs opened their villages for healing prayers and evangelism.
Noel and Andrew pray with the ‘custom’ paramount chief for healing and salvation
We had a few days at Santo Island on our return. Pastor Lewis (who hosted my time teaching at the Bible College in 2004-5) was there in the main office as director of mission. We had a few days to relax on Sunny Santo.
2016 Update
Noel Missingham returned to Pentecost Island many times in 2015-16 including two visits with his family of four young children, hosted by Jackson and Annette at Pangi village. Here is their report in June 2016.
Email from Noel & Judith:
Greetings to our friends and partners,
It has been an exciting time for us over the last few months. Looking back, our word from the Lord was simply ‘come and follow Me,’ so we found ourselves stepping into the mission field on Pentecost Island in Vanuatu.
In being obedient to this word we have seen the Lord do amazing things and it feels like we have just been along for the ride. We have seen the Lord open deaf ears, make the blind see, heal backs, knees, ankles, broken bones and headaches.
The Lord has brought us before people great and small. He has created divine connections with leaders in Vanuatu and has given us ‘standing before kings’. In the small time we have been spending there, we have seen impossible situations made possible, broken relationships restored and enormous favour for the Lord’s work. We have seen people baptised in water and be completely overwhelmed after being touched by the Holy Spirit. We never anticipated the Lord would use us in such a way.
Out of everything we have witnessed so far, we’ve found that nothing quite compares to the miracle of salvation; seeing a repentant heart weeping in the Father’s love. A story that comes to mind is when a man approached us after a service. It had been some time since he last stepped into a church building, but something told him he should go this morning. As he listened from outside, the Lord touched him and he came forward and shared how he had been involved in adultery. Wow, what a scene as he completely broke down and gave the Lord everything and when we are willing to give everything to Jesus, He is willing to take EVERYTHING from us. He makes us clean, puts a robe and ring on us and calls us ‘faithful and beloved’… When the time for church announcements came, this man took the microphone and with tears in his eyes he apologized to the church and individual leaders and people he hurt. The leaders in turn forgave him, and restored him to the place he was formally serving, on the worship team. A son restored!
One of the ‘impossible made possible’ situations has been the restoration of the Banmatmat Bible College. As Noel hiked around the island to take the gospel to distant villages, one of the things he felt was that it could be more effective. While we are seeing divine favour, signs and wonders, healing and salvations and clear open doors, to do it by ourselves or with a small group of people is not as effective as it could be.
We feel the need for multiple teams of people, and strategic planning so that we can really take Pentecost Island, and all the islands of Vanuatu for the Lord, and then go beyond there to other nations. Of course the Lord had a solution already in the pipeline: The Banmatmat Bible College.
The Lord brought Banmatmat to our attention on one of our previous trips. It lies in the south of the island, a remote part only accessible by hiking or boat. It now lies in ruins and disrepair, however in times gone past it was regarded by locals as a paradise, and a valuable source of training and equipping for many pastors serving there and in surrounding islands.
We learned that the people dedicated the land where the college is located to God, a few generations after one of the first Christians was martyred (and eaten) near the site. The Church of Christ college was built on that location in 1964. It lasted up until 2004 when the college closed for various reasons. …
[From Geoff: I was able to teach there many times in 2004-2005, hosted by Pastor Lewis Wari, a revival pioneer, who later became President of the Churches of Christ in Vanuatu. God may have other purposes for this place in the future. Many people have had amazing prophecies about revival in South Pentecost.]
The other thing that the Lord opened up on the last trip was different connections with church leaders around the island (from Anglican, Catholic, Seven Day Adventists and Churches of Christ). These are divine connections with brothers and sisters who know Him and love Him and just want to see the King glorified regardless of denominational boundaries.
In closing out this update letter, we want to personally thank each of you for partnering with us in the work the Lord has us doing in Vanuatu. We pray that our Lord continues to richly bless you as we labour together in his work. Remember we are partnering together!
Team Visit, June-July 2016
We had the privilege of sharing in meetings every night during our visit covering three weekends. The team, for part or all of the time, included Noel, Andrew, Stan (my brother-in-law) and Dante (my grandson).
Again, most meetings and outreach were around Pangi village on the coast (where we slept) and up the ridge at Panlimsi village, in Pastor Rolanson’s church. Again we participated with local people and encouraged them to continue boldly in faith in praying for one another and for mission teams to go out to the villages. At every meeting we had many responding for commitment to God, anointing and healing. This included evangelism meetings in a few different villages along that west coast of South Pentecost.
During the day we mixed with the people in their daily activities, including fishing with outrigger canoes and with nets. So we enjoyed fish cooked on the fire on the beach a few times, just like the resurrected Jesus with his friends on the shore of Galilee.
Noel and Stan accompanied Rolanson and other leaders to Banmatmat to assess future possibilities. No one seems to know what will happen there, or when, but it remains in our prayers along with the possibilities of having a Revival Training Centre on South Pentecost as the Lord opens the way.
Pioneer chief dies at 111
Paramount chief Morris lived to 111. He died in Panlimsi village on 1st July 2016 when we were there so we had the honour of being involved at the graveside and in the combined churches memorial service on Sunday 3 July.
Morris was a young man when a wife of his father, the highest ranking chief on the island, died. After they had wrapped her body for burial the cloths began moving. They unwrapped her and she told them to leave their heathen ways and follow the Christian way (see above in red). So most of them did.
Pastor Rolanson’s father, a Christian chief, gave them land where they relocated among Christian villages. Chief Morris helped to pioneer the Gospel in other villages in south Pentecost Island.
I had the privilege of speaking at the graveside and in the memorial service on the Sunday in July 2016. I sensed the Lord give me a word of comfort and a word of challenge – “Come and Go”:
Come to Me … I will give you rest … My yoke is easy and my burden is light … (Matthew 11:28-20).
Go and make disciples of all nations … I am with you always even to the end of the age (Matthew 28:18-20).
Come to Me … I will give you rest … My yoke is easy and my burden is light … (Matthew 11:28-20).
Go and make disciples of all nations … I am with you always even to the end of the age (Matthew 28:18-20).
Photos: Chief Morris at 111 (June 2016) with his grandson Presley, the burial, and the combined churches memorial service at Panlimsi with the overflow crowd.
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Team Visits, 2017-2018-2019
I returned with grandson Dante and others in June-July, 2017. Stan came with his wife Daphne (my sister) and Emily from Riverlife Baptist joined us. The Riverlife church people sent a keyboard, a guitar, and a large box of reading glasses with us. We often take used and discarded spectacles with us on these trips.
This time we had meetings at Ranwadi High School again and once again prayed with large numbers there among the 300 boarding students. Then we returned south to Pangi and Panlimsi villages for more meetings and visitation with Pastor Rolanson. At a Sunday service, Elder Jackson gave his testimony that his blood readings were normal at the clinic following prayer for diabetes.
We continue to encourage Christians to pray for one another in faith and obedience. I participated when their new MP Silas Bule, formerly principal at Ranwadi, distributed Gideon’s New Testaments to the local school.
Then in 2018, I had a team of seven of us. The six young men with me included Dante and Ben again with Ben’s friends Scott (Andrew Chee’s brother), Blake, Sergie, and Dylan. We stayed in Rolanson’s village at Panlimsi, up the ridge from Pangi on the coast.
Again we prayed with large numbers at their village meetings and during the day. Pain left immediately with healing prayers, people were filled with the Spirit, using spiritual gifts, and we saw rising faith and obedience among them. As we pray with and for them, we encourage them to keep praying for one another – as they do. Faith grows stronger and people are touched powerfully by God in prayers.
Glimpses of my grandson Dante in the first of his many visits to Pentecost Island to speak, sing, and pray, including baptisms (and his original song ‘Still Worth It’, and this link to his biography of me!).
Dylan and Boys Video
Team visit in 2018
Over 3,000 views!
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Then I returned again in September 2019 with Chris and Robert Bullock from Kenmore Churches of Christ for another stay with Rolanson and his family in their village at Panlimsi. Again we had prayer times at their house and many meetings in their local church. Now that I was in my 80s we stayed there without the regular trips to other villages so typical of previous villages. Again we prayed regularly with and for the local people, especially their leaders and chief.
Update 2023
Pastor Rolanson Tor had been our host and the leading evangelist pastor in South Pentecost. Sadly he died of a stroke in August 2023, but he leaves behind a great legacy of evangelism and revival in the power of God’s Spirit.
Ps Rolanson
David Scarlett joined me for two weeks of mission on Pentecost Island in September, originally arranged with Rolanson. It involved meetings each night across four village churches plus morning services and some day sessions such as a morning with the area pastors and a final morning praying for anointing for local leaders.
This time the faith and expectation level at each meeting seemed higher than previously, the worship stronger, and 20-30 or more came for prayer each time, including prayer for healing, empowering, surrender and anointing. That often included anointing with oil for healing or empowering.
David and Geoff stayed at a beautiful tourist bungalow by the beach run by its godly church elder who also attended the many meetings and prayer times together. So this touch of blessing and Spirit-led meetings and prayer combined nicely with South Pacific prayerful relaxation.
We encourage and support revival leaders on Pentecost Island regularly. That includes providing revival books and resources, Bibles, and helping pastors with school fees for their children. We also support mission team ministries.
If you would like to help us financially my mission account is:
Geoffrey Waugh, PayPal – geoffwaugh2@gmail.com
Videos:
More Vanuatu mission and revival videos
Pentecost Island, Vanuatu Video
The Bible College & ocean baptisms
Background story:
Revival Meetings in Vanuatu
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See these book blogs also
South Pacific Revivals – Blog
South Pacific Revivals – PDF
Pentecost on Pentecost and in the South Pacific – Blog
Pentecost on Pentecost & in the South Pacific – PDF
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Jesus People Revival
Jesus People Revival
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Video: A short grab – Chuck Smith remembers how a hippy band changed church life in the Jesus Movement.
, a documentary on the JESUS REVOLUTION of the late 60’s and early 70’s, by many considered the greatest spiritual revival in American history. It was a powerful move of the Holy Spirit that was later called the “Jesus Movement”. It birthed Contemporary Christian Music amongst other things. The epicenter was a small church in Southern California, Calvary Chapel. It’s pastor, Chuck Smith, tells us in his own words how his church grew from 25 people to a worldwide movement!
Another Report
Chuck Smith and Lonnie Frisbee conduct a beach service and mass baptism at Corona Del Mar beach.
Right in the middle of the cultural milieu that was the Hippie Movement, where young people were dropping out of mainstream society to seek something deeper but instead found dead ends in free love and drugs, God birthed one of the biggest revivals in modern American history.
Most mainstream churches were just burying their heads in their hands as they lamented the slide of modern culture into all out degradation. However, God was—like so many times in history past—working behind the scenes to give birth to a powerful movement that would lead many to salvation and new life. He raised up actual missionaries right from within the Hippie Movement itself among hippies who were dropping out of society.
Enter Lonnie Frisbee, a man used by God in ways that boggle the mind. Testimony after testimony of those who knew, met, encountered, or had interaction with him tell of lives changed dramatically towards knowing and serving and being filled with God’s Spirit and becoming committed to follow Christ completely through his ministry.
Lonnie baptizing at Corona Del Mar beach.
So vibrant is his memory still, more than a decade after his death, that when a documentary of his life played at the Newport Film Festival a couple of years ago it was the most popular film in the whole festival, selling out with a line around the block shortly upon its opening and outselling a mainstream Hollywood movie which also debuted at that Newport Festival.
Frisbee is also an important study within the discipline and thought of missiology—the study of Christian Mission work and practice throughout the centuries. Much like the famed missionary Hudson Taylor who ventured deep into inland China and learned from the Scriptures and the study of Paul the Apostle that he must adopt the language, style, thought and dress of these Chinese to effectively reach the Chinese so Frisbee’s outreach to the hippies was made all the more effective because of his ability to identify with them by being a hippie himself and knowing the dress and language of the subculture.
And yet just as Taylor was roundly criticized and slandered by the religious community of his day for doing this, but is now seen all these years later as one of the most insightful and biblically illuminated men of his day to understand this.
Preaching at Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa
Likewise Frisbee’s insistence on remaining a hippie to reach the hippies earned him nothing but the same kind of scorn and rejection as well from the religious community. He was not perceived as a missionary to a subculture by tradition-bound holders of the status quo. This, along with his unbending stance on the need for Pentecostal power to be central in all he did, only added to the scorn heaped on him as well.
Lonnie Frisbee
At the same time, he was a man with obvious weaknesses, flaws, and shortcomings, things that he seemed to be constantly dealing and struggling with.
God indeed does choose the weak things of the world to shame the wise. This is what the Word of God itself tells us. It is truly perplexing that we should be so surprised when we actually see it happening right before our eyes.
Here then is a story, not of human might or power, but of God’s Spirit moving upon and through a weak human vessel who simply said “Yes, Lord” to God’s call, and consequently was used by God in ways that boggle the mind. It is not at all unlike the stories that fill the pages of Scripture: one of blessing and grace but also of failings and frailty.
Ultimately though, it is about Christ’s glorious redemptive power. It is the story of the Lord who never leaves nor forsakes His own, even in the face of bitter wrestling with their own human flaws. It is about that unconditional love of Jesus who will not abandon His own in spite of all their weakness and shortcomings.
The Scripture “He chose the foolish things to confound the wise” truly comes to life here as Frisbee, though often overlooked, actually became one of the main players in that awakening that arose seemingly out of nowhere and which later became known as the Jesus People Revival, one of modern America’s biggest revivals.
Calvary Chapel Yorba Linda meeting at Canyon High School Gym which later became known as the Anaheim Vineyard
Some points of interest in
Lonnie Frisbee’s role
in the birth of the
Jesus People Revival
and the Third Wave Revival
Lonnie Frisbee’s role
in the birth of the
Jesus People Revival
and the Third Wave Revival
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Frisbee rededicates his life to Christ in San Francisco and begins to do street evangelism with others in different areas including the Haight Ashbury district where hippies congregate.
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The “Living Room” becomes a Christian coffee house outreach in the middle of the Hippie movement’s epicenter on Haight Ashbury in San Francisco.
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Lonnie joins the House of Acts Christian house in Novato and lives there doing outreaches and living in community.
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Feeling led by the Holy Spirit, Frisbee later hitchhikes down the coast to Southern California where he eventually has a divine appointment with a Pentecostal Foursquare preacher named Chuck Smith.
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Frisbee moves into Chuck Smith’s house for a time but begins bringing home so many wayward youth there that they often had to sleep in the bathtub because there was no place else to put them, and so they decide to launch a community house called the “House of Miracles.”
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The community house begins to grow as does the church it is connected with called Calvary Chapel, of which Chuck Smith is the pastor and where Frisbee is the star evangelist, as well as being the one who is bringing in most of the young people who are now flooding the church, a church Smith spent years trying to get to grow but couldn’t until Frisbee showed up.
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While doing campus evangelism at Newport Harbor High School, a rebellious young Greg Laurie comes out to mock the freak hippie evangelist (Frisbee) and instead is rebuked by Frisbee. Laurie is bowled over by power from on high, is converted and becomes a Christian.
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Greg Laurie spends approximately five years being discipled by Lonnie and copies him in every way, even down to dressing exactly as he does in hippie garb with fringes on his jacket. Laurie later becomes one of the most recognizable evangelists in the nation.
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Mike Macintosh wanders into a meeting Frisbee is doing, freaked out of his mind from Vietnam and drugs and claiming he is missing half of his head. He is converted under the preaching of Frisbee and instantly healed of his unstable and insane mental condition. He later becomes pastor of one of the biggest churches in the country, Horizon Church in San Diego.
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Calvary Chapel, The House of Miracles, and the Blue Top Motel become epicenters of Christian spiritual activity and renewal as the Jesus People movement spreads over the country and into other parts of the world.
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Frisbee spends some time in other movements for a short period of time and then heads to South Africa to do mission work for a season.
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Frisbee later has a divine appointment with a pastor named John Wimber who leads Calvary Chapel Yorba Linda. Wimber invites Frisbee to share his testimony at a Sunday Mothers’ Day service. The Holy Spirit is poured out in radical power as Frisbee ministers and invites the Holy Spirit’s presence into the meeting. Signs and wonders begin to break out in the church that day, including when young people who didn’t believe in tongues begin to speak in tongues as they are overcome by the Spirit.
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Wimber, shocked and overwhelmed by what he calls his “first power encounter,” seeks God if this is from Him. He receives a call from another Calvary Chapel pastor named Tom Stipe in the middle of the night with a word from God: “John, the Lord says this is of Me.” Wimber moves forward with the work of the Spirit and becomes in time an international leader of renewal as signs and wonders follow regularly that Mothers’ Day outpouring and bring forth a full revival.
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Frisbee begins to minister regularly in the back room prayer times after the services at Calvary Chapel Yorba Linda where miracles continue taking place.
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Wimber and Frisbee lead a team to South Africa and Europe where explosive outpourings of the Spirit’s power take place as they minister amongst different churches and settings, drawing marked attention to their ministry and giving it international acclaim.
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Wimber whose notoriety and visibility is growing to where he is becoming a well-recognized Christian leader in his own right is asked to leave the Calvary Chapel movement and aligns his church with Ken Gulliksen’s (another former Calvary Chapel pastor) churches called the Vineyard and goes on to become its main leader. He teaches and does conferences on the importance of healing, power evangelism, and signs and wonders, which are themes that clearly show Frisbee’s influence on the Vineyard as Frisbee is the one who introduced Wimber to his first Power Encounter as evidenced by John Wimber himself in his book Power Evangelism.
Watch Jesus People Revival Video:
YouTube – and other links
Windows Media Version
Quicktime Version
Lonnie Frisbee at Anaheim Vineyard, Mother’s Day 1980 – part 1
Lonnie Frisbee at Anaheim Vineyard, Mother’s Day 1980 – part 2
See also:
1980 – May: Anaheim, North America (John Wimber)
California beach revival attended by 1,000 (July 2020)
The Movie – Jesus Revolution – baptism scene
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Revival Breaks Out in China’s Government Approved Churches
Revival Breaks Out In China’s Government Approved Churches
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CBN News traveled to southern China and obtained exclusive, never-before-seen images, from inside these churches.
When God Shows Up in a Communist Church
It’s Thursday evening in Fujian Province, southeast China. Scores of men and women are dancing, waving flags, blowing shofars, singing and worshipping God.
You might think these images come from a charismatic service in the United States. But they’re not. This is communist, and officially still atheist China.
And what Duan Huilai says is remarkable about this scene is that it’s happening in an officially government-controlled congregation known as Three-Self Church.
Duan and his wife have witnessed this move first-hand. Both are evangelists and have for several years criss-crossed the Chinese countryside documenting the Holy Spirit’s move among Three-Self Churches.
“Dramatic changes are happening,” Duan told CBN News. “God is moving in a powerful way inside these Three-Self Churches.”
“The most amazing thing is that the Lord is raising up God-loving people in these churches — so many brothers and sisters who love God deeply and want to serve Him,” Duan said.
Signs and Wonders Now Allowed
Pastor Duan says what is happening today in Beijing and in other parts of China as it relates to the powerful move of God amongst the Three-Self Churches is quite remarkable considering where the church has been in the last 30 years.
“Every sermon that the pastor preached back then had to be vetted by the government authorities. Young people were never allowed to attend these churches so you’d only see old people, mostly women,” Duan said. “Preaching about the power of the Holy Spirit was forbidden. You couldn’t talk about end times or preach repentance.”
Topics on healings, miracles, signs and wonders were out of the question. Not anymore.
“Nowadays people have accepted these topics,” Duan said.
Two main types of churches exist in China: registered and unregistered. Registered congregations, also known as Three-Self Churches, are government-approved.
Unregistered, sometimes called underground or house churches, operate outside government control, and for decades faced intense persecution. And with that persecution came tremendous growth.
Three-Self Churches on the other hand never experienced that kind of explosive growth. Until now.
“Now there are big revivals happening in the Three-Self Churches,” Dr. Zhao Xiao told CBN News from his offices on the outskirts of China’s capital city.
Communist Encounters Christ
Zhao is one of China’s foremost experts on Christianity. A former Communist Party member and atheist, Zhao converted after reading the Bible.
“If you go to Haidian Church, you’ll find yourself in a more than 100-meter line trying to get inside and worship. In Shenzhen, there is usually an average of 500 people being baptized each Sunday!” he shared.
Decades ago, the Chinese government had a law that said that young men and women below the age of 18 could not attend Three-Self Churches. Zhao says those rules have been loosened in recent years.
“There’s an increasing proportion of them in churches now — more young male believers, professionals, mainstream celebrities, especially in the big cities, that are attending the church unlike the past when it was mainly the elderly who attended.”
Love Camp
Back at the Thursday night meeting in Fujian Province, folks have gathered for a four-day event affectionately called “Love Camp”
“Love Camp aims to help the believer grow in their faith walk and get closer to God,” Sun Rengui told CBN News one evening.
Sun is a pastor and leads the camp. He says the idea came 12 years ago when he says the Holy Spirit one day showed up while he was preaching at the Three-Self Church he pastors here.
“We were in the middle of the service; suddenly everyone at the church felt the Holy Spirit anointing fall. Some couldn’t stand straight, others fell down. Some were dizzy and nauseous. When the worship began, people started crying. After the service, some were being healed. I saw demons being chased away from people’s bodies.”
Pastor Sun says his church had never experienced anything like it.
“We were seeing something unprecedented. We had no theological training in the move of the Holy Spirit. This was completely new for us,” he said.
Word quickly spread.
“We were one of the first churches to experience this in the area. Soon, leaders from other churches came to us and were eager to receive the Holy Spirit. Later they also started witnessing the Holy Spirit’s move as well,” Pastor Sun said.
But it wasn’t without controversy.
“People doubted if this was real. There was even conflict among my church staff,” Sun said. “But as time passed, more people accepted the power of the Holy Spirit.”
Transformed Lives
Twelve years later, Pastor Sun says the impact of the Holy Spirit’s move is seen in the transformed lives of church members.
“Our cell groups are expanding, more people are attending church, and more people are going outside the church walls into society to share the Gospel.”
The church runs two orphanages and two elderly care centers, and twice a year puts on the Love Camp.
“We have four goals in this camp: to evangelize people, strengthen the family, disciple believers and encourage other Three-Self Churches to embrace the power of the Holy Spirit.”
For Pastor Duan and his wife, this is evidence that God is doing something special in the world’s most populous nation.
“I was speaking in Shandong, Henan and Zhejiang recently. Around 8,000 people joined the meeting. Last Christmas, I was speaking at a Three-Self Church in Yuhuan and I was amazed there were 12,000 people,” Duan exclaimed with joy.
They, Dr. Zhao and countless others say they feel honored to play a part in helping more Chinese turn to Jesus Christ.
“The number of Christians in China is growing rapidly. It means Christ is starting to play an active role in China’s society and that’s good in many ways,” Zhao said.
by Duke Taber
Posts on China – from Mission Blogs:
Asia’s Maturing Church (David Wang)
The Spirit told us what to do (Carl Lawrence)
Revival in China (Dennis Balcombe)
House Churches in China (Barbara Nield)
China – New Wave of Revival
Chinese turning to Christianity
Revival breaks out in China’s government approved churches
China: how a mother started a house church movement
China – Life-changing Miracle
China’s next generation: New China, New Church, New World
China: The cross on our shoulders and in our hearts
George Chen – In the Garden: 18 years in prison
Revival Blogs Links:
See also Revivals Index
See also Revival Blogs
See also Blogs Index 1: Revivals
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Thousands Gather for Revival in Egypt
THOUSANDS GATHER FOR REVIVAL IN THE HEART OF EGYPT DESPITE THREATS
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Despite the threat of street unrest, thousands of people went to hear Dr. Michael Youssef preach at Kasr el Dobara Church in Cairo recently, with at least 500 people giving their lives to Christ during the three-day event.
Dr. Youssef, founder of global outreach ministry Leading The Way, was born in Egypt, and returned to the largest evangelical church in Egypt, with the hope of encouraging a spiritual renewal there. During the first evening, a heavy military presence was outside the church bracing themselves for protests in Tahrir Square against the government. However, throughout the weekend, approximately 5,000 people still came to hear Dr. Youssef preach a Gospel message of victory over sin and addiction, with millions more watching live via satellite television.
“Over the last five years, the people of Egypt have seen extreme civil unrest in their country,” Dr. Youssef said. “Since 2011, the nation has endured the bloody uprisings of the Arab Spring and two presidents overthrown. This church-and many more across Egypt-began crying out to God 24 hours a day to bring peace and justice to their nation. In many ways, God answered their prayers. “By God’s grace, I pray this event will fan the flame of spiritual revival that is already occurring in this region.”
“Leading The Way” with Dr. Michael Youssef continues to reach the Muslim world for Christ through 24/7 Biblical programming, personal discipleship, and practical help for persecuted Christians in the region. Many are responding to the Gospel message even in the midst of political upheaval and global crises.
Source: Assist News
Thousands gather for revival in Egypt
See also: Miracles in Garbage City, Cairo, Egypt
See also: Egypt – opening to the gospel amid persecution
See Topics Index
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Many Muslims are Turning to Christ
MANY MUSLIMS ARE TURNING TO CHRIST
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A revival is taking place as Muslims turn to Christ
ISIS has targeted more Muslim-populated areas in Syria. The attacks have left at least 140 dead in Damascus and Homs. The attacks were the deadliest of Syria’s 5-year war. In Damascus, the explosions took place near one of the holiest Shia Muslim shrines. ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attacks.
Dyann Romeijn with Vision Beyond Borders (VBB) said “As ISIS attacks the Christians, they also attack other Muslims. Certain Muslim groups that ISIS doesn’t perceive as radical enough are being persecuted.” The latest attacks took place during ceasefire talks. This is the second time attacks have happened in the last few weeks during the process of ceasefire discussions. The first time, the talks were delayed. But now, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has said a “provisional agreement” has been reached with Russia.
There is both joy for the agreement and grief for a devastating loss in the war-torn nation. Millions of minorities and Syrians have fled from the terror of ISIS, leaving everything behind, including family members. In Lebanon alone, nearly one in every five people is a refugee. Romeijn explains this crisis is different from most others. “One of the things that’s overwhelming that we are seeing in this crisis more than some of the others is that the majority of these families were actually middle class families before ISIS came in.” The people had secure homes and jobs, but the persecution of ISIS drove them away and cost them everything. A VBB worker relayed the story of one man who’d saved up $50,000 for retirement. But, ISIS took it all away and left him with nothing.
Yet despite the grief, Romeijn says God is moving. Because less radical Muslims are being persecuted and fleeing, they are more open to seeing the love of God. Their eyes are being opened to see the truth about Islam and there’s a turning to the Gospel in great numbers. A revival is taking place as Muslims turn to Christ, and VBB wants to seize the moment that God has given.
VBB has printed 20,000 Arabic New Testament Bibles and is giving them to refugees. The Bibles have study notes in order to make it easier for Muslims to understand. Romeijn explains a New Testament is currently more beneficial to the people than an entire Bible because they will likely start at the very beginning of the book. A New Testament will immediately tell the Gospel story, whereas an entire Bible will contain rules Muslims might get caught up in.
But VBB knows they have more to do. “If you just tell Muslim refugees that Jesus loves them and hand them a Bible when they’re starving, they can’t even comprehend. But, we need to meet their physical needs as well.”
VBB is meeting physical needs by providing food, clothing, hygiene kits, and more. When they see genuine interest and care, Muslims want to hear about the Gospel. They’re accepting the Bibles graciously, and Romeijn says more than 1,000 have already been handed out by VBB.
Refugees need your prayers. After all, only God can bring peace. “There are over 6 million that have fled. It’s obvious no one person or organization is going to meet the needs. It’s got to be the Body of Christ.”
There is an ongoing underground revival in the Muslim world. Over the past 20 years more Muslims have found Isa (Jesus) then in all the previous centuries together. See links:
Iran: where Christianity is growing fastest
Iran – fastest growing evangelical population
Iran: How two women brought hope in Tehran’s brutal Evin Prison
The Staggering Rise of the Church in Iran
Jesus and Muslims: Life in the desert
18,000 Muslim leaders led to Christ in West Africa
Jesus appears to Middle Eastern Muslim for a month
Iman hated Christians until Jesus raised him from the dead
Muslim woman returns from the dead to tell about Jesus
‘The Lord reached me right in the mosque’
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Blogs Index 7: Images
Blogs Index 7: Images
General Blogs Index
Blogs Index 1: Revivals (briefer than Revivals Index)
Blogs Index 2: Mission (international stories)
Blogs Index 3: Miracles (supernatural events)
Blogs Index 4: Devotional (including testimonies)
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Videos
10-minute video clip: DO IT AGAIN LORD
LORD WOULD YOU DO IT AGAIN – a prayer that is being answered now
See Revivals Index
Message on Jesus’ Last Promise
Dante’s Group sings at 38 minutes; Geoff Waugh preaches at 48 minutes
Geoff refers to the video ‘Do it again Lord‘
God’s Promise – Blog and Video – I will pour out my Spirit
Seeing God’s Spirit poured out in over 20 countries
Jesus’ Last Promise – Blog and Video – Pentecost
You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you
Mission and Revival Videos
Book Trailers – Videos
Albums
Facebook Albums Index
70 Renewal Journal Facebook Albums arranged in themes:
Bible, Inspiration, Creation, Mission, Books
Artistic Double Book Covers
17 cover photos combing front and back.
Lion of Judah Series
7 charcoal drawings by Rebecca Brogan (Tasmania)
Celebrating Mothers
Photos celebrating mothers
Dance
Worship and praise dance photos
Van Gogh’s Journey with Christ
Van Gogh’s Christian and faith paintings
How to Give a Great Speech
You can apply this to messages and preaching
Cultural Types: The Lewis Model
East-West Comparisons in 25 images
Pentecost Island, Vanuatu Video
The Bible College & ocean baptisms
Background story: Revival Meetings in Vanuatu
Renewal Journals
20 Journals and 4 bound volumes with cover images
Renewal and Revival Books
Over 50 book images and links, also on Books – top bar menu
BLOGS INDEX 1: REVIVALS (BRIEFER THAN REVIVALS INDEX)
BLOGS INDEX 2: MISSION (INTERNATIONAL STORIES)
BLOGS INDEX 3: MIRACLES (SUPERNATURAL EVENTS)
BLOGS INDEX 4: DEVOTIONAL (INCLUDING TESTIMONIES)
Blogs Index 5: Church (Christianity in Action)
BLOGS INDEX 6: CHAPTERS (BLOGS FROM BOOKS)
BLOGS INDEX 7: IMAGES (PHOTOS AND ALBUMS)
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