Well – sad, sad day today, in that in two and a half hours’ time, we’ll be heading for the airport – Cali to Bogota, Bogota to London, London to Belfast City… 🙁 – yes, I love being from the UK, I love being in my house, sometimes in the solitude of my own company watching football, cricket, or rugby – but I’d sacrifice home to stay here…. and, who knows, maybe one day, that’ll be God’s plan for a year /few years / rest of my life, that I live in this amazing city, under its ‘cielo abierto’ – open heaven…. what a way to go, though!! Amazing meetings yesterday, perhaps it’d be true to say that God left the best display of his glory til the end….
Davy and Adrian, at my dear, dear friends Hernan and Aida’s church, Nuevo Nacer, New Birth, a gorgeous couple with such big hearts, and so generous, yet so, so poor: a lady in the church with chronic kidney problems, she couldn’t pass urine, Davy prayed for her, and in the middle of the prayer, she got up and went to the bathroom – and emptied the ‘pot’!! A 14 month old boy, born with a severe head deformity, his face ‘scrunched’ up (perhaps because of a bad forceps delivery?), left eye looking at about 45 degrees from straight….after prayer, Davy and Adrian saw him a few minutes lter and the eyes were straight, the head re-shaped to normal…. a man with scoliosis 10 years, couldn’t bend other than the ‘spine bend’ – perfectly straight, able to touch his toes…
Andrew and I were at Restoration Christian Community (Communidad Cristiana Restauracion) – a new church to me, but with a lovely pastor and wife – Francisco & Elena Sierra… God turned up big time, and even before the service began, a lovely lady, Fabiola, one of the church leaders, came to greet us: she took my hands, and it was like an electric shock passed though her… her words – ‘the presence of the Lord is so strong in you, the anointing on you so powerful’ and quite lot more, totally blew me out of the water. I always ask God for a fresh anointing for each meeting, always ask for an infillin of more of his presence. It seems God answers prayer…. she couldn’t let go, it was like she was holding onto 240 volt electricity cable (in a 110v country!!). Tears poured down her face, and you coud see God visibly moving all over her…. some start to a meeting!
The worship was lovely: though we were under a pretty tight time restraint as the church only rent it until noon, and have to be out by 11.30, so the hall can be put back in its right place. Andrew spoke every well, sharing powerful testimonies of miracles he’d seen on the trip…. I started off in Colossians 1:15ff – and – if you preach, or do public speaking, you’ll know what I mean by this! – sometimes, you speak, and think to yourelf, ‘That was decidedly average/ordinary….even not particularly good’. Other times, you speak, and you think, ‘I really felt pretty good about that one!’. And yet other times, you think, ‘Wow, God took over my mouth, and I was flying today!!’. That’s not boasting – cos normally it’s the middle one…. but yesterday, I know God got me ‘on a roll’… A dear elderly lady, walking stick, still needed the help of her great grand-daughter and a yuong friend, to help her walk. She drew my attention a lot while speaking.
As time was tight, I did a different approach to the healing ministry, like in Tulua last week. I picked on a number of illnesses / infirmities/ diseases, and asked people who had them, to stand, for the guys with me – Andrew, Laura – Johan the translator’s wife – and of course, the ever lovely, ever present Wilmar – to go round and lay hands on them, while the people sitting around them I asked to do the same. Diabetes, gastritis, asthma, osteoarthritis and other bone infirmaties, cataracts/myopia/macular degeneration, and so on…. We estimated conservatively that, on a show of hands, at least 70% were instantly healed and KNEW it, others experiencing heat/tingling, etc – things that demonstrate that God is moving….
The elderly lady came over to me when I sat down – I’d actually experienced my own minor miracle preaching and directing the ministry, in that I’d been standing for 2 hours, which I couldn’t have done before this trip, and the help of the doctor, Henry Ramirez, and even more, the daily love and care visits to plunge needles into my muscles (!! – muscle relaxant – brilliant!) of long-time friend nurse, Maria Elena Bagui. My knees hurt once I’d stopped, but because of the muscle relaxant, recovered fast. The lady made her way over more easily than she’d walked into the church: and she knelt down on the raised area that our chairs were on…. she immediately told me that she couldn’t do that – kneel down – for years, and that while I was preaching, she felt God flowing through her, and healing her….her osteoarthritis had gone!! Thank you, Jesus!! I’ve not often, if ever, had someone come and tell me that they were healed during the preach….
Andrew’s Facebook post from yesterday:
- Today we were at a church called “Church of Christian Restoration”. The Pastor is Francisco (beside Paul). Having prayed for a lot of people, we prayed for individuals. One of the people I prayed for was Victor. That’s the 2 of us in the second pic. He looks like a fairly fit 30 something, but he had stomach cancer. When I put my hand on his abdomen, I could feel it to be distended and hard. We prayed with him for some time, and I could physically feel “movement” in the abdomen as we prayed. I also felt there were spiritual issues to be resolved. After we dealt with these, I could see that Victor was feeling physically drained. However, I could also clearly detect that the distension in his abdomen had gone. The cancer had gone. I could still sense there were spiritual issues being dealt with however. I told him to stay put in the seat, and not to let anyone move him until he was ready. Victor sat in this seat for 45 mins. During this time he also went to the bathroom 3 times, to be physically sick. This was all sorts of things that did not belong on his body being ejected, and moreover rejected from his body, including his cancer!
