Monthly Archives: August 2013

As I’m away from home a fair bit, and don’t always keep up with the news, I subscribe to a fantastic little magazine called ‘The Week’, which is effectively a summary of the last week’s events from around the world.

Last week’s had this amazing little piece in, from the Daily Telegraph, and article by Sean Thomas (www.telegraph.co.uk), as good and well-read newspaper as any (well, almost!)….

‘Atheists are smarter than those who believe in God. At any rate, a couple of surveys suggest they tend to have higher IQs. (Paul: is that because many Christians kiss their brains goodbye at the door of the church??!). But when it comes to who lives a healthier and more fulfilled life, says Sean Thomas, the advantages are all on the side of religious folk. There is now a vast body of research showing that belief confers remarkable health benefits: in 2006, researchers at the University of Texas found that the more often people went to church, the longer they tended to live; a Duke University study found churchgoers tend to have lower blood pressure and stronger immune systems. Other recent studies show that believers recover faster from surgery than their heathen peers, and have better outcomes from breast cancer and coronary disease, even after adjusting for the fact that they tend to smoke and drink less, and take fewer drugs. They enjoy better mental health, too, as a UCLA study of college students has found. To top it all, believers are nicer: they give more to charity than atheists, “who, according to the very latest survey, are the meanest of all”. Atheists smarter? I don’t think so.’

Pretty amazing, eh, to have something SO positive about us in a mainstream British national newspaper??

Earlier today, I re-posted a comment from Rick Joyner, who many of you will know is a highly respected prophetic voice the world over. The more I’ve thought about his words, the more excited I’ve become, as it really does truly seem that this really COULD be the season in world history where Romans 5:20 REALLY comes into practical reality, as opposed to a reassuring promise for tough times….

End times? (Never mentioned in the Bible, though ‘Last Days’ are….)? Could Syria be the cataclysmic catalyst of evil being set loose – pitting Iran, Syria, Russia, and China, and maybe others, against the rest of the world? Who knows….? It is flipping serious stuff though: will we be ‘raptured’ or will we go through the tribulation?

I asked that question 26 years ago, to a group of 5 pastors in Guangzhou, China. They laughed – not at me, but at the western obsession with ‘rapture’, all 5 of them, and countless others I met on various forays into China, in revival – then – for 40 years, so 70 now, all those years ago, asked me, ‘If we in China are not experiencing the tribulation, then what ARE we going through?’ All of them had been beaten, tortured, imprisoned, sent to labour camps in Siberia, hassled regularly in the middle of the night by secret police. Samuel, one of the pastors, had been in a coal mine, 2,000 feet underground, for 22 years: another, George, had had to stand every day, in the human cesspit, in the excrement of 10,000 men, up to his neck – 18 hours a day for 18 years….(‘It was my private garden where I walked and talked with Jesus every day’ and then he’d sing his favourite hymn to you – the Rose Garden – chorus ‘and he walks with me and he talks with me, and tells me I am his own, and the joys we share as we tarry there, none other has ever known’…. Is that rapture? Yep, rapturous, in the sublime relationship with God that hurtles forward when the going gets far more than tough, but not of the sort that sees nice, middle class christians swept off their feet just as the chemical warfare begins….

Part of the problem is that in the west, we’ve never had to live with persecution or trouble. I’m so grateful to God that He’s ALLOWED me the privilege of going to places where there has been persecution, torture, and death. It’s made ME make choices I’d never have made if I’d stayed at home. Someone – an American – said of some of his ‘brothers and sisters in the church there, that they are ‘a thousand miles wide (‘have a nice day’) and an inch deep. True of so many western countries.

When I asked those amazing Chinese pastors what it will take for us, in the west, to see God do what He’s been doing there for 7,8 or more decades – their answer was unanimous: ‘We pray every day that God will BLESS the western world with the precious gift of persecution’ – and they said that, having said a few minutes BEFORE I asked that question (my earlier question had been ‘What do you say to people you pray for for healing who don’t get healed?’) – they looked at me as though I was from another planet. ‘That NEVER happens! What do you mean, God doesn’t answer prayer? It’s not possible for God NOT to answer prayer. We NEVER have a prayer not answered’…..

Just to remind you, this is Rick’s word:  The greatest ingathering of new believers that the world has ever seen will soon be upon us. We are far from ready for this. Our upcoming Harvest Conf. Sept.26-29 may be the most important conference we have ever hosted. I was told would result in such a radical change in our ministry and purpose that it would be the last conference we would host, and the beginning of a whole new paradigm for our gatherings. We are in the times of the greatest crisis but also the greatest opportunity. If we seize the opportunity it will turn out better than we ever dreamed.

I don’t WANT to be raptured: I want to be HERE when God turns up with such an excess of grace that that greatest ingathering of new believers is part of my experience, and I’m on the front line rejoicing in the words of a God who keeps his promises! Grace WILL abound all the more – 2 Corinthians 1:20, Titus 1:2 – I so long to see Satan totally and utterly destroyed, I want to be there when the opportunity to stand on his neck and crush him underfoot comes along….

SEIZE THE DAY, BOYS, SEIZE THE DAY…. Robin Williams, in ‘The Dead Poet’s Society’ – Rick Joyner, in his word, above…. SEIZE THE OPPORTUNITY. I’m so brassed off  (I’m being polite there!) with people who talk a good faith, who spout the namby-pamby ‘prophecies’, the people who don’t want to ‘go’ because of spiders/snakes/food/ toilets/ guerillas bullets/hardship/persecution…. I’m so angry at how the enemy has deluded the church for so many generations that so many are just nice middle-class social clubs….

Come on, Rick Joyner, I’m with you…a WHOLE NEW PARADIGM… Wow!!!!! Yes please, Lord!!!!

When my dad died, at 41 years old, in 1965, understandably as family – mum, my sister Vivien, and me – it was a massively devastating event. I was 12 years old: my sister ‘celebrated'(hmm!) her ‘coming of age’ 18th birthday – and was diagnosed with what had killed my dad, thrombosis – on the day of dad’s funeral. Some birthday that was….

My dad was a wonderful bloke. I’ve said before that, to this day, 45 years on (September 30th, 5.09 pm), that I miss him as much now as ever. Why do I remember the date and time so clearly? I’d just got home from school, ben in the house maybe 3-4 minutes, and I heard dad die. In some respects, the day he died, part of each of us ‘died’ too, especially mum, as you can well imagine.

Why am I writing this? Well, today, I’ve just been to ‘visit’ the container that has arrived in Ireland now, from the United States. I’m so glad that my dear mate Alan came with me, as it was a strange experience really…. it’s almost 4 1/2 years since I saw any of the stuff: and to be honest, it brought right back home, in moments, in the time we were at the storage company, all of the pain, stress, hurt, loss, of the last 4-5 years.

Although there’s not really a large quantity, it’s going to take time to unpack it, as my little house here doesn’t have any storage space – except a corrugated tin, rotting garage, that is too damp even to stores damp stuff in! I think I just needed to see it, and Alan, as a true friend, was there with me. It was a strange 90 minutes….

When dad died, we were part of a church in Eastbourne, East Sussex, that had some amazing people in it. Four in particular I will NEVER forget, and be eternally – literally – grateful to, people who, when the shit hit the fan, were ‘there’, immediately. Leslie & Shirley Edgell, Roy Lanning, and Norman Barber. Les & Shirley were amazing: within about 30 minutes of dad going to be with Jesus, they were at our house, and seemed to then be part of our lives forever. Roy was the leader of a boys group called ‘Covenanters’ (I doubt it still exists, as I’ve just googled it and found nothing), Norman was the Sunday School Superintendent.

Les & Shirley were there for all of us, for the next 20-30 years. Les went home to be with Jesus a few years ago, Shirley is the only one left ‘living’ of those people, and is still a close family friend, especially to my sister, who lives reasonably close to her.

For me, as pre-teen, Roy instantly stepped into the void that dad had left, and without any need for conversation or discussion, took on the ‘role’ as my ‘spiritual’ dad. Roy died a couple of years ago, was still regularly in touch, and a supporter of the ministry God has called me to, right up to the end. Norman took on the role of my ‘practical’ dad: taking me to things like the Farnborough Air Show, England rugby internationals at Twickenham, museums in London, and so much more. He died many years ago now, but I’ll never forget what he, Roy, and the Edgells, invested in me. For 4-5 years after dad died, I was under child psychologists – today I guess it would be given a name, what I went through, and I know that I can’t have been easy to be around (maybe I’m STILL not…!!).

It came home to me as we stood at the container, trying to work out if there was anywhere other than the storage company, that I could store everything, as it costs £20 a time to go and get a few boxes out, but we couldn’t think of anywhere, or anyone…

So what about the title of this maudlin blog? About 30 years ago, Les and Shirley sent me a card, just to be in touch, and the title was what was written on the front of the card. It was one of the few things that came back to the house with me today: at the time I got it from them, life was tough (a lot of the last 40 years HAS been tough), and I framed it.

And it’s mad me think again: about my four Christian friend ‘giants’ who helped to shape my life, and made me wonder – do I do that for other people? Without them, probably by the time I was 17-18, I’d have topped myself. And it made me wonder about church today, most people significantly interested only in their own lives (perhaps understandably… though it ain’t God’s way…). ARE there people who’d do for others what they did for me? Would I? Much older friends of mum and dad, many who were proxy ‘aunt and uncle’ to me, are all with Jesus now, and many of them, right up to their deaths, prayed for me, mum, and my sister, every day. I MISS their prayers.

And so to the ‘motto’ on the card. In a generation where we fight for the best of education, however expensive it is, and rejoice with those who got their good ‘A’ level and GCSE results, what does God look for? None of it. He looks for battle wounds, sacrifice, scars.

I’m so glad my little framed card made it safely back across the Atlantic. And it made me even more grateful for Leslie, Shirley, Roy, and Norman, and Alan & Barbara, for friends who are closer than a brother.

From the book ‘Abba Calling’, by Charles Slagle

Exhausted Seeker,

I enjoy your company more than you know. Not many of my children keep me laughing the way you do. You may enjoy my company whenever you wish. Anywhere, any night or day, any moment!

Nothing about you ever bores me. Not one bit. Your voice, your manner, your compassionate heart – everything about you I find intriguing, unique, and delightful. I find nothing more boring than the religious lie that you must strive to earn My acceptance!

I just want to remind you that I AM here if ever you need a shoulder to cry on. And you needn’t shout across ever-expanding light-years of ever-expanding cosmos to reach Me. Why reach for what you already have? Bask in the serenity of My Presence. Stop analysing past conversations and fretting about possible conflicts. I have you covered!

Whatever else you may forget, never forget this: I love you too much to lose you. I AM thinking of you. Let’s enjoy one another.

Everlastingly yours,

Dad

From the wonderful book, Abba Calling, letters from the Father’s Heart – http://www.amazon.co.uk/Abba-Calling-Hearing-Everyday-ebook/dp/B0089LOIAA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1377466104&sr=8-1&keywords=abba+calling

In the blog I wrote on August 18th, I talked about driving endless miles north of Mexico City,with ‘interesting'(!) directions of how to find the house of a lady, Alejandrina, who had been sent home by the hospital she was in, to die.

Alejandrina has had cancer for a VERY long time, was expected not to live long some months ago, and a couple of weeks before I met her, she had been in a coma. Though she had come out of the coma, she couldn’t speak, as I recall, and her family were told to take her home as there was nothing more anyone could do for her. So it was in her home – or that of one of her daughters, that we met, she was surrounded by a good number of her family – husband, daughters, grandchildren, son-in-law… Her personal doctor is Jois, younger son of my Mexico City family, who was the one who’d asked if we’d go to pray for her, as medically, and humanly, this was it…. a few days, maybe a week to live.

I’d be dishonest if I said that there were ‘no’ doubts, or reservations, going to such a situation: but it’s a very strange dynamic: utter, total belief that God can – and will – do the impossible, yet your mind – and the enemy – telling you it’s a lose-lose situation, and ‘who the heck do you think you are that you can change this situation’ thoughts powering into your mind.

I prayed, BenComments 0ny prayed: as I reported in that previous blog, one of the daughters gave her life to Jesus, and was healed, which in itself would have made the visit worthwhile…. we prayed for many of the family. And then, Alejandrina….

I just had a message on Facebook this evening, from Benny: Jacobo Benjamin Osorio

After what seemed a long couple of days, since leaving the Osorio’s house in Mexico City at 8 pm on Monday evening, I finally got home here about 9.30 am this morning. I’m so grateful that I was able to be upgraded on both legs of the flight, Mexico – Toronto (4 1/2 hours), and Toronto – London (7 hours), I actually slept again on a plane, so maybe the 30 year history of not being able to sleep on planes is – just that – history! It was great, too, as I already mentioned, that I was able to keep my legs horizontal after all the wonderful skill and treatment of Dr Jois Osorio: he told me to rest them as much as possible at 6 pm Monday, a wee bit impossible when you’ve got big airports to get through. The lovely thing is, today, is that, having had a long journey home, I can actually WALK, which normally, for a couple of days after a trip, I can’t.

Aside from the delight of the upgrade, the other side of long haul flying, with connections, afflicted me once more, in that only one of my bags made it back to London! So, hoping it’s not lost for good, I’m waiting to hear from Air Canada as soon as possible!

There’s probably some of you thinking, ‘Why does someone who prays for healing need medical treatment?’. Hmm.. I’m not exempt from illness, pain, whatever: and, truth is, I’m hopeless at praying for myself. Sunday night, the pastors of the church in Ecatapec, Benny, and Danny Ortiz, all prayed for me: I know that had an effect. And I also know that God IS healing these knees of mine, as the Orthopaedic physiotherapist specialist in Belfast, said I shouldn’t even be able to stand on them. Left leg, no cartilage at all, ruptured ACL, meniscus scuppered… right leg, cartilage in pieces floating around at the back of my knee in pieces, and lovely roughed up bones to grate against each other!   So, why be in pain while you’re waiting for God to move? – especially when there are spirit filled doctors who can assist with your needs, and make life somewhat easier in the waiting time?

If some of you are wondering why my knees are so bad, a quick explanation. 9 years ago, in Cali, Colombia, I was crossing a 6 lane road, at a red traffic light. I was half way across as a tax, doing about 70 mph (110 kph) clearly WASN’T going to stop, so I ran, and as I shot my right leg out in front of me, something ‘popped’, and I collapsed in a heap on the pavement (sidewalk for Americans!), zipped my mouth up so I didn’t scream, and then, typical male, thought I didn’t need treatment, I’d walk it off…. huh! As it got worse, 3 years ago, in Romania, with a bunch of friends, I turned a corner, my body and feet turned, but my left knee didn’t. People 20 feet away heard ripping and tearing, and once more, I zipped up my mouth so as not to scream in public!

End product? Both legs ‘diagnosed’ with osteoarthritis: the surgeon wants to replace both knees with titanium ones, but I don’t feel it’s my time yet, to become Lee Majors (was that his name?), the Six Million Dollar man!So the fact that for 9 years I’ve kept going, even with pretty high pain levels, fortunately I do have a high pain threshold, but after a long trip/flights, they do immobilise me for a couple of days. But not today…!

I’ve said this many times, too: would I exchange the pain of two crocked knees for not seeing God do what he’s just done in Mexico, and a few weeks ago, in Colombia, and in 2 weeks’ time in Australia? Not on your life!!! My desire is to keep on going and going and going until I drop…. if it happens to be somewhere foreign, and I kick the bucket, take me out into the Pacific, if it’s Colombia or Mexico, in a small boat, and push me over the side! Save a lot of expense!

So, what a marvellous, marvellous trip it was! Paty, Daniel Ortiz’s wife, put this on Facebook today: “Thanks for opening your heart! We thank God for your life, You are a tremendous blessing! We love you Paul!” There are so many invitations to go back, which blows me away: I’m still insecure enough, even after 30 years, not to expect that! I’ll never forget hearing Gerald Coates say: ‘My name is Gerald Coates. I’ve preached everywhere – once!’, and on another occasion, ‘My name is Gerald Coates. I’m told that in your preaching ‘life’, you preach everywhere twice, once on the way up, and once on the way down. It’s good to be back!’

So Mexico is looking food for a starter to 2014: perhaps the whole of February. If I’m there for a month, I might even get to preach at some of Benny’s other ‘network’ churches, in Cancun, Playa del Carmen, and Acapulco! I’d only go for the ministry, you understand, I’m sure…. 🙂

Thank you for your prayers these past 2 weeks: they have been answered a myriad times, I’m such a fortunate bloke to be the one who gets to ‘go’, which is why I love, so much, taking other people with me.

Danny and Benny, God willing, will be in Colombia in November….

And now, to do what the doctor ordered properly, and rest these many-times-jabbed knees over the last few days: and hey, there’s a cricket test match on, England – Australia, what a lovely coincidence!!

I’ve been coming here to Mexico City for 17 years: my friendship with the Osorio family just gets stronger and more lovely. Benny & I hugged at the end of the meeting last night, both of us in tears, just loving our friendship, and recognising that God has done something this trip to strengthen our relationship, and, in the churches, unleashed aHis Presence and power unlike either of us have seen in the past years.

It has been just like Colombia: Cali especially, of course! – so, so amazing in terms of miracles, healings, and salvation. Relationships with people like Danny & Paty Ortiz, Enrique & Norma Cardenas, and so many more, have become strong friendships, which will grow and grow. New friendships with Richard & Veci Vasconcelos, Federico & Esperanza, are so precious.

This astonishing city of 32 million+ people – that’s not counting places like Ecatapec, where I was last night, is seeing a new level of God moving, I believe. I so want to be part of it, and so February, three – maybe four – weeks, is very much in mind now.

Again, the story is – the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk. Who’d not WANT to see God do that? I know I can’t ever do anything else with my life, especially retire! The journey home, which begins with me leaving this house at 8.30 tonight, won’t end until about 10.30 Wednesday morning in Northern Ireland. I’d have to say my knees aren’t looking forward to it, and I’m not overjoyed at the thought of the journey home. But would I swap the journey to miss what’s happened? Never, in a million years!

Another long day yesterday, back at 0015 Monday morning, the day having started with being picked up to go a church at 8.30 am Sunday. When I got home, I was utterly wiped out, spiritually, mentally, and physically, I started to write the blog, but just couldn’t stay awake.

A ‘Mundo de Fe’ church, in Oriente, was the reason for the ‘early’ start, the lovely Pastor Richard (Ricardo) Vasconcelos and his lovely, English speaking daughter, Brenda. It’s a long way away from where my ‘home’ is! It’s quite a big church, when everyone’s there about 550, but there probably 450 there this morning, as it was the last day of the Mexican school holidays, so people were on holiday. It’s a marvellous place – they meet in a huge, open-sided tent on a football field, one of the church people described it as a tabernacle… great worship time, followed by yours truly, then the ministry….

And that’s where God of Wonders comes in….astonishing morning (and evening, but I’ll get to that!), we reckoned about I prayed for about 250 people, after I’d finished speaking. A young man in a wheelchair, Abraham, sat right in the middle of the aisle the whole service, so right in my line of vision. He was clearly extremely disabled, and I made a point of going to him first in the ministry time. He was brain damaged before birth, now 30, and he’d never walked a step in his life. I talked to him for a while, despite the hordes waiting to be prayed for, and asked him did he want to walk. Some don’t: Abraham, bless him, did, so I asked him to get up and do it…. he did, a few steps, a short rest in his wheelchair, and the up again. His legs had never,ever been straight, so walking with buckled knees on unused muscles and bones was hard work…. he walked about a dozen steps in all, and shouted into the microphone for the whole church to hear that he’d never taken one step before, let alone more…. he’ll be doing it again today, I’m sure…

Hector was totally deaf in his right ear: he heard. His son, born deaf, also Hector, began to hear for the first time – with him, it was wonderful, as a young lady, Claire, who I later learned was the youth pastor, had asked me to pray for her for the gifts of healings and miracles, which of course thrilled me to bits, so when Hector Jr wanted prayer, I got her involved, she was the one who prayed first – a pretty wonderful start in a new ministry alongside her existing one! A few minutes later, I prayed with Claire for a lady with what I understood to be an exploded vertebrae, chronic pain: as we prayed, I felt her spine moving, Claire felt intense heat, and the vertebrae went back into place, and all the lady’s pain went….

Another, with scoliosis, felt her spine straighten, and her pain go. Three people with osteoarthritis in their knees were all healed: one knelt down for the first time in years. I LOVE it when God heals knees! I’d stood to preach, obviously, and first two of the three hour ministry time, I stood, so by the end of the day, my knees really didn’t want to walk anymore, but I decided, in pretty severe pain myself, that if the cost of God healing them was to miss out on what happened yesterday, I’d keep my knees just as they are. That doesn’t mean I’ve given up hope on God healing them (I’ve said before, that when I’m preaching and praying, I really don’t ‘feel’ them – though after 2 hours yesterday I was grateful when someone offered a chair to sit and pray for the last hour!), but I’m willing to pay that price to see God keep doing these amazing things if that’s what it costs.

At least 75% of the people I prayed with yesterday told me they’d been healed. I ran out of Kleenex very quickly, as their tears of joy overwhelmed them – and me.

The long drive back to meet up with Benny and Daniel Ortiz, meant that there was no break to recharge, as the second meeting of the day was 5 pm! A wonderful church – ‘Centro familiar Restauracion y Vida’ (Family Centre for Restoration and Life’: Daniel & Paty had planted it 3 years before, and then handed it over to the current pastors, Federico & Esperanza. Wonderful band, amazing Spirit-presence, like the morning meeting. It was good to be back with Benny translating – he’d been at his own church in

the morning, a lovely pastor, Laura Enns (leads another church with her husband Cameron, in Chalco de Diaz, Coverrubias – aren’t the place names wonderful??!!)) had translated brilliantly in the morning.

I think everyone in the church was forward for ministry after the preach! An elderly lady with arthritis from head to feet, and a severe pain in her chest, was healed completely. A lovely man, Pablo, who’d had a bone spur on the sole of his foot all of his life (I guess he was in his late 60’s), testified to the church that it had gone, and that he could stand with his feet on the floor for the first time in his life…. more arthritic knees were healed, lots of people with migraines, and headaches there and then, were healed. Benny prayed for a boy who’s sight was extremely poor: he saw perfectly within minutes, as did a man I prayed for, who’d been told he’d be blind soon. A lady with a torn retina saw perfectly. A lovely young lady, I think her name was either Essy (Esther) or Issy, wanted God to give her the gift of healings and miracles. He did: so I got her praying with people with me, and the first person with severe pain in her neck and shoulders, was healed instantly. Others she prayed with were healed, too. Her sister had terrible pain from ovary problems, including cysts: the pain went instantly…..

My memory of them all is dimming already, it’s amazing how quickly they go from your mind when you have loads of others to pray for! – but it seems that the vast majority of people we prayed for, at least 80%, went away totally healed. And again, if you think there’s exaggeration here, any cynics reading the blog(!), remember Benny, Daniel, Richard, and loads of others read this, so there’s accountability there!

I said yesterday that I find it very humbling, and an immense honour, to be invited to churches to preach: it’s something I’m always blown away and blessed by… Richard wants me back to his church, Laura wants me to their church in Chalco, Federico wants me back, Enrique wants me in his church, the only reason I wasn’t there yesterday was that he wasn’t going to be there, and I personally much prefer it when the pastor is ‘in residence’ – his church has three meetings on a Sunday just to get people in, and it’s a large auditorium!

I mentioned earlier in the week that I was going with Benny to pray for a lady who has been sent home by the hospital she was in, to die, as she has cancer pretty much everywhere, along with, it turns out, a pretty severe blood circulation problem. Man alive, even Benny thought it was a long way north to get there! Even though we’ve only just got back (11.30 pm – early night!!), we left at 6 pm with Paty, too,

I have no idea of the name of the city, except that it was way past Ecatapec, which I DO know, as, in 1996, that’s where I ate my first cow’s eye taco…! I’d been under pressure from my Mexican friends to eat one for the whole two weeks, I guess as it had been an amazing evening all those years ago, with a lady getting miraculously healed in the Zona Rosa, part of the city ‘centre’, where we’d been doing some evangelism, and it was late, I gave in when we saw a little taco stall still open, 2.30 am., and I said ‘let’s do it!’. I had to be part of the process, so I donned the taco stall owner’s hat and apron, and chopped the eye up myself with this lethal cleaver, and down it went… it was GROSS, chewy, rubbery, slimy… but I did it! Odd swallowing something that’s looking at you on the way down into your gut….

We got to the lady’s house: Alejandrina: her whole family, it seemed were there. It also seemed that God had begun the healing process before we arrived, but we prayed for her, I had a very clear sense that she’d know she was healed, and that within a short period, even by tomorrow morning, the discolouration in her legs, due to the circulation problems, would have – at least – begun to fade. It seems that there WAS until tonight a spirit of death seriously on this whole family – Yvonne, one of Alejandrina’s daughters, had died 3 years ago with a major kidney disease: lots of other close relatives have died, some very suddenly, in the same period. So I prayed into that, broke its hold on the family, and the fear that goes with it (the spirit of death invariably arrives when cancer is diagnosed anyway). Yvonne’s other daughter, Jessie, has major kidney problems, too – I guess she is about 15: kidney reflux, which means that the urine reverses back up from the kidneys rather than down to the bladder, and (I didn’t specifically ask this!) but guess she has to be catheterised. Of course, with her sister dying so young, the fear was immense. She just looked transformed as we prayed for her (my usual supply of Kleenex for this very situation, came in very handy tonight!). I’m believing, and told her so, that I think she’ll be peeing normally in 48 hours…. God, do it! She’ll come to faith when it happens, of that I’m sure.

Another of Alejandrina’s daughters, Martha, had chronic breathing issues, not helped by a very high blood pressure. She got saved as Benny shared with her, and then – we were all sure, I know – healed.

A revolutionised household: maybe 10 people there tonight, so – as I put in the last post, size doesn’t matter. God’s interested in the ones and twos, and I’d come here for them.

This morning, I had the privilege of being at a pastor’s breakfast, right in the south of the city (extremes today!), hosted by long-time lovely friend Enrique Cardenas, who planted and leads a fantastic church, and they’ve seen God provide quite remarkably for their premises. It’s a fantastic place. A good number of pastors there, listening to Enrique share about a men’s conference that he’s hosting in November. His passion to see men set free from the ‘namby-pamby’ spirit that afflicts so many Christian men, is wonderful – my heart too – and it was great to meet some of the other pastors. Enrique’s wife, Norma, made the most amazing cup-cakes… I could quite easily have smuggled a few out, but didn’t have anything to put them in, or anywhere to hide them!

What is, for me, very humbling, even after 27 years ‘on the road’ around the world, is that pastors actually WANT me to go their churches. This morning, Benny, who has wonderully organised my schedule here this visit, and who is busy both as Senior Pastor of his church, and a lawyer, to help increase the family income, said to me, ‘Next time, you must come for 3-4 weeks, with lots of Sundays, and bring a team, like you do to Cali’…. I’m so blessed by that, and I’m already looking at trying to get that together for February next year.

Tomorrow, I’m at a church – a long way north again! – in the morning, the pastor was there this morning, Richard: Enrique planted the church (I think) 3 years ago, and Richard & his wife lead it: it’s over 600 people, quite amazing in 3 years, but of course, size doesn’t matter… I’m as nervous in front of a handful last night, in a family home like tonight, as I am in front of 600 (it has been 5 figures occasionally in the past!), so it makes no difference to me!

In between times, we went to the ‘dangerous’ market, Tepito, which I just happen to love…. 🙂

A wonderful day…. low key, but EXTREMELY powerful, and very, very worthwhile.

I’ve just got back home – well, my Mexico City home! – and it’s 0055 am…. spent the evening with a small group from my long time friends Alvaro & Vicky Dader Reyes, and their daughter Carina, and 5 other people. Anyone who says it’s crazy to cross the globe to go to small meetings need their motives checked! It was a lovely evening. It’s a worshipping church, and Alvaro led a short time of worship, then Carina, once very shy, especially to speak English, translated for me.

The ministry time at the end was so special. Not this time stories of healings – at least, not healings that were instantly evident, though one young lady, Edith, in a lot of pain with a bladder condition, had the pain go immediately. For her, that was great, of course, but the real test is if she sleeps through the night with no bathroom interruptions….

The real blessing, apart from being with those lovely people, was praying for a lovely lady, Lupita, and her two children, Paola and Danny. When Lupita arrived, her face was drawn, tired, pained. When she told me her story, it was one of an horrendous background, parental, family, and in other ways: never married, once a prostitute, and now a schizophrenic, with no home, no real possessions, and no future, as far as she was concerned. I’m not daft enough to say she was healed of that: of course, time and psychiatrists will tell. What I prayed for was that her past, which haunted her, and which she carried like a ton weight, would terminate tonight, and shared Romans 8:38 with her, where Paul doesn’t refer to past, only present and future, because the past is no longer ours to have any ‘rights’ to, as Jesus wiped it out. Prayed many things for this lovely lady: and, by the end of the evening, her whole visage had changed, and it was so evident that a load had gone from her. I’m longing to her about the reaction of her psychiatrist at her next visit…. prayed for the kids, too, as they are growing up fatherless, and in pretty extreme conditions. The hugs I got from all of them brought tears to my eyes….

So, so worth being there. The customary ‘taco stop’ on the way home made the arrival for bed a bit late, but it was great just to be with the Dader Reyes family….