Saturday, 2 April—Heaven on earth ... and No orphans here

Today our team split up for the first time, and headed out into different regions …I am with a group visiting orphanages near Lake Victoria in Kenya (more specifics to follow, of course) … anyway today after a very bumpy ride, we reached the top of a mountain area and looked down on the green valleys and fields below … it was so incredibly beautiful … one of those scenes that simply can’t be captured, reminiscent of landscapes in the movie Cry, the Beloved Country, or some similar film. We drove up to the orphanage and all the children ran out to meet us, assembled and began singing a welcome song to greet us. Can you imagine the moment? The whole scene was breathtaking and really quite indescribable. Later we met to begin our presentation, but we found there was much more music in store. The students sang several songs of worship and praise to God, and we were blown away and totally at a loss … in the face of such beauty how could we even think of following it up with a normal lesson? … Then our leader stood up, thanked them for their music, and asked them if they could sing one more song. They sang and sang, and then something happened that had to be seen to be believed. God’s presence filled the room and touched down so strongly that the children dropped to the floor and the singing transformed into beautiful angelic tongues. As the tongues began to morph into singing once again, our leader brought in her keyboard and began to accompany the children on some of the songs. Then through the keyboard she eased a transition into the lesson, which happened quite spontaneously and was basically bringing the children into an experience of heaven. This was the perfect follow up, it seemed, as we began to share our experiences of heaven, and some of the group explained God’s vision for Africa they saw in heaven. Once again, almost impossible to capture the moment, but I hope you can at least catch a whiff of it by these few words. Then we broke up into a ministry time, which, as is our custom here, involves prophetic prayer over every child in the place. I was partnered with Tyson, a friend from New Joy Church, but it was hard for us to give prophetic words to all the children in our group with only one translator. He had the translator, so I just prayed soaking prayers over the children near me, occasionally speaking out the Father’s heart in English … and as I was praying I noticed some of the students responding, despite the language barrier, to the soaking prayers, at times even physically, the power there was quite evident. Quickly, however, we combined groups, and found ourselves in a larger building with another member of our team, Elaina. Tyson was all set to begin praying prophetically over the children, but then I asked the translator to ask the children if any of them were sick or in pain or had any physical problems. Four children raised their hands, so I thought I would pray for them for healing first and then join Tyson in the prophetic prayer ministry time. However, when the translator asked for all the students who needed prayer for physical healing to come over to one side, 30 children came over! Elaina and I set to work talking to the children and asking what their needs were. At the beginning Elaina prayed prophetically over the children and I prayed for their healing. The first child we prayed for had a headache, and was completely healed. Then I looked at the rest of the group … it seemed so large and the sun was beginning to set, I knew we would never have enough time to pray for all of them, so I asked, “Who else has come over for prayer because of a bad headache?” Then the boy who had his headache healed prayed for another boy with a headache and he received healing as well. Then the two of them prayed for the next boy with a headache, and he got healed as well, and so on with the other conditions … once a child received healing, they began to pray in Jesus’ name for the other children with the same condition. And every child that received prayer was completely healed, a significant portion of which we never even prayed for! Sorry I have to head to bed now, but this is just a taste of our adventures at the moment!

Friday, 1 April—Last dance in Palissa ... and Angels at the Kenyan border

We split up into groups ... healing of relationships, hearing from God class (pictured), pastors meeting, making commitments to love their wives, marriage ceremony, graduation, prophetic words over the graduating class, drove for 7 hours ... security out of Uganda, into Kenya .. Angels were clearly all around us, I could feel their presence as we went into customs ... later Pastor Mark told us that he was praying to God for safe passage for us and heard God say: "If you could see the amount of angels watching over your group right now, you would fall down to your knees in awe"!

Thursday, 31 March—Working the Palissa school curcuit ... Up on a stage and out on a limb

"From school to school ... Lord Jesus is cool!" - The now famous "Sha Na Na Na Na" Song!

We visited two schools and an orphanage, sharing the gospel and singing and playing with the kids. At the first school Zana shared the gospel (pictured above) and the children responded, some in tears by the end. Then Bishop Simon spoke, and explained the true source of the witch doctor's power, and how God's power was greater than Satan's. So together we acted this out prophetically by 'stomping' on Satan and his power over our lives ... such a beautiful and powerful moment! Then we prayed prayers of blessing over the students ... although we didn't have translators for most of this time, many students were visibly touched by our prayers. The next stop was an orphanage, located in an open area where it was a little more developed. I shared the gospel and asked which students would like to receive Jesus. Many hands went up. We prayed a prayer of salvation together and then went into a ministry time, beginning with those who were sick. God healed everyone, at least that I saw slash got a chance to pray for. Then, as in the school before, the students all formed lines behind each of us, and we prayed prophetically over them. Last school—Zana preached, and led the group through a long prayer ... the Spirit was totally evident among the children there ... formed lines and prayed, identity, one boy said "I want to be a doctor." Then we noticed adults, teachers in the lines as well ... many came to receive prayer from Andy because they were impressed by how he was looking after his daughter Dani. An old man came forward then and said he wanted to become a Christian, so we prayed for him. He said he wanted to become a Christian because of Andy and his daughter. He wanted to be reconciled to his family as well. Back at the conference, a crusade was going on. When came back, we had some food, and Justin and Thom spoke. Thom's word of knowledge seemed crazy at first ... he called out a man to come forward, and then said he worked with plants? Turned out to be right though, everything he said! Prayed for someone with spirit of infirmity, moving back and forth, meanwhile someone tugged on my shirt asking for healing in their back. Healed right away. Then back to the spirit of infirmity, bound and prayed the Father's heart over her.

Wednesday, 30 March, Palissa, Uganda—Disappearance of inanimate objects ... First ministry stint ... and Remarkable weather

“All the stuff that happened today was normal, for Africa. That it all happened in one day, though, is pretty crazy.” - Pastor Mark Tubbs

Many of our group awoke to religious chanting of some sort, though I heard nothing after the rain. After a brief continental breakfast, with fried eggs specifically requested by myself, we were off as the rain began to fall once again. We worshiped on the bus—Anne Tubbs on keyboard and Eunice leading us in prophetic singing. After a time we arrived at the city of Kampala, where Justin got his ipod stolen ... some kid just grabbed it out of the window as Pastor Steve was trying to take a picture! After that I went on a shopping spree with the insurance money because the airline had lost my luggage. Then we drove to Palissa, where we would minister for the next two days.

On the first day we began ministering at a conference held in a village church. It was truly off the beaten path, in fact, the roads were practically blocked off, as maintenance crews had been meaning to fill in some of the ditches on the sides, but never finished the job, simply dropping huge piles of dirt right in the middle of the road, thus forcing all travelers into the very ditches they were trying to fix. This made travel on these roads basically impossible unless you were walking or biking, though you might barely make it through with four wheel drive. Of course, none of this applied to us and our bus. I have lost count of the number of times we got stuck in the mud and had to struggle, sometimes for up to an our, to get ourselves free. By the end of our time in Palissa, I was quite weary of 'partnering with the bus', as I put it, as inevitably such a partnership ended with all of the guys caked in mud, which, coupled with the fact that we were all asked to dress in nice Sunday clothes to attend these meetings, caused our chivalrous task to soon lose its luster.
Anyway, first day: Our contact for HIM in all of Africa is Bishop Simon. He was our guide for the trip, but we were also joined by Pastor Fred, who was head of the HIM churches in Uganda. On the way there, we discovered quite an amazing story connected with the HIM presence in Uganda. Pastor Fred sold all he had to start a church in Uganda. After facing some initial opposition, the pastor received the word "Harvest International Ministries" from God, as well as a detailed image of Pastor Mark Tubbs! Pastor Fred had never heard of HIM and never met Pastor Mark, but he looked up the organization online, and walked many many miles until he found Bishop Simon. The two connected, and this trip is one of the fruits of that connection, as we find ourselves breaking new ground—the first HIM team ever into Uganda. We were surprised to learn, however, that Bishop Simon and Pastor Fred had already planted 25 churches there! We praised God for the work he was doing and how the way had already been prepared for us.

Needless to say, with such giants in the faith to introduce us, the welcome we received at the church conference seemed almost royal. (It was also the first time any foreign visitors had been in thie areas since 1980!) Singing, dancing, and lots of introductions. Pastor Mark was asked to speak, but before he did, our group spoke prophetic words over the assembly, highlighting one person and prophesying over them. There were several good and specific words, but the moment that sticks out most to me in my mind was when Mina prophesied over some men there ... I say men because at least two stood up, although the word was somewhat specific ... part of it went something like this: "I see you in a dark room asking if God can see you, you want God to show himself to you ... he sees you and has heard your cry, and he is going to do it." After a couple of men stood up she began to speak more of God's heart for them, but the men were not able to hear all of what she had to say, because part way through the translator was so touched by her words that he broke down in tears ... evidently what Mina was speaking fit with what he was going through in his life as well!

Then after these words Pastor Mark spoke on God's love and healing, and the move of God that had begun in Uganda. As he began to close his message, indicating that we would move into a prayer time and pray for the sick, a huge wind began to rip through the place, and by the time he called forward anyone who was sick or in need of prayer, the poles that were holding the tarp above us were wrenched from their place, and huge wind began ripping through the assembly, as the rain fell in torrents. The dust blew up, the rain poured down, and they met in our faces. Suddenly we were all covered with mud from the air and our attempt to pray for the sick in the assembly was cut short, for the moment, as we all ran for cover in a tin-roofed brick building nearby. From there we prayed for the sick, tormented, and those in need of blessing. At first, Pastor Mark thought that the rain and wind represented some opposition of the enemy to what we were doing (it certainly seemed a dramatic response to his words), but then later we discovered that this was one of the first rains in this region after a 3-month drought! I saw it as a sign of the Spirit (wind) and the blessing of God's presence (rain), falling in Uganda. Others saw it as the heavens opening to Uganda ... but everyone who there had to admit it seemed quite significant given what Pastor Mark had been saying.

Meanwhile, back in the tent: Pastor Steve, Tyson, and I prayed for a woman with some trouble seeing (it looked like she had cataracts), and also some problems with her stomach. God healed her stomach as we prayed, and she said she was able to see now .. in her words (through a translator), "I can see you now!" Sidenote: the strange thing about this healing was that it still looked like she had cataracts .. her eyes looked the same from when we began praying, but she was insistent that she didn't need any more prayer, though we offered a few times, she said she could see! After that we prayed for a man's leg and when we asked (through the translator) what he was feeling, he just walked out the door! We tried to call after him but the translator told us, "yes, he's been healed!" There were so many there for prayer ... I prayed for a girl who was physically abused by demons every night ... after praying for her and speaking her identity in Christ over her, she left healed. I prayed the father's heart over several people, and a girl received healing in her stomach. While I was praying for this girl, I saw some other members of New Joy church having some difficulties praying for a woman for healing, so I went over to join them. It turned into kind of a tag team thing, though, when some of them left. It was a spirit of infirmity they were dealing with, it seemed. It kept moving around. While this was going on, some shouting and craziness from a woman who was receiving prayer nearby. She had a past steeped heavily in the prophetic but seemed to have some issues with demonization as well, so it was hard for me to discern whether her movements and shouts were prophetic declarations or demonic manifestations, but I noticed one of the women on the HIM team was engaged trying to cast out a spirit. Now if you've been involved in any serious deliverance you know that it is not often wise to cast a spirit out of someone if you don't have any kind of relationship, accountability, or covering with them, as it is possible that you could be exposing them to worse harm (Luke 11.24) ... so I assisted with simply binding the spirit on this woman, and then simply praying the Father's heart over her, simply washing her with his love, and even though we had no translator at that point, the shouting and flailing calmed down. Girl with a headache healed. I then turned my attention to the other woman the New Joy team had been praying for and began to proclaim the Father's heart over her. Soon, however, I found myself unable to minister as the translator broke down under the presence of God, weeping and singing with arms raised in worship. What else happened there? Oh ... deafness in one ear was opened for one, and both ears for another ... more from Mark Tubbs:

"Today a young quadriplegic woman was placed in front of us on a mat. She seemed lifeless and barely alive. As the team prayed strength came into her legs and she was able to sit up straight on her own! Motion came to both legs and one arm. She actually stood with assistance! Most dramatic was the change in her countenance. She does appear malnourished and we are contending for her." (see pictures above)

Tuesday, 29 March—More flying ... Too late to travel ... and Mosquito fear in a random hotel

As the team reflects on our first day of ministry, I think we have to agree that any attempt to capture this trip, either in pictures or in words, seems daunting. If the trip continues with days as eventful as this one, the sheer amount of information to record and the limited time in which to record it will soon squeeze the life out of any would-be chronicler. Nevertheless, one must try. So my apologies if these notes seem rather fragmented at times—it may well be that you end up reading unedited scribble copied directly out of my notebook ... there doesn't seem to be any other way to complete this journal soon enough (I was hoping for the events to be still fresh in our minds, at least)!

So, as it turned out, because of the delay in the flight, we didn't get to our destination in time, and had to spend the night in a hotel in Entebbe. My first African hotel! I wasn't too excited that our room didn't have any mosquito netting, despite the three-inch gap of pure, unscreened night air beneath the doorway. So we barricaded the sucker with luggage and tried to get some sleep. My older roommate Mike slept quite soundly—and loudly! I prayed against his snoring, though, and it stopped. The night was otherwise very hot and muggy, but I felt I needed to sleep under the covers because of the dreaded blood-sucking, malaria-carrying vermin.

It seems that, in general, the only requirement for a hotel room in Africa, at least in the places we've stayed so far, is that it have a bed. Anything else—wastebasket, a shower, hot water, any water for that matter, lights ... all optional. But the mugginess ended when the rain fell at 5 am, and I was finally able to get some sleep, short though it was ... "I bless the rains down in Africa"!!

Monday, 28 March—Flying

Sunday, 27 March—More healing in Canada