A is for Africa and Awesome

The January 2010 World Racers are currently in Africa, where God seems so alive and active; it’s not that He isn’t so in other parts of the world, but there’s something about being this particular continent that’s open and available to His power and love.  

Ministry in Africa is incredible. This past week has been crazy. Something happens every single day where you feel like you’re living in New Testament times. . . As we’re going from house to house sharing about Christ, we are seeing people come to faith in Christ every day. . . praying for miraculous healings. . . against evil things in the spiritual world. . . for mountains to move!. . .Stephen is a seventeen year old orphan from the eastern part of Kenya. His parents owned a store there when he was a child. However, when he was eight, a group of raiders came into the store, stole all the goods, and murdered his parents. His uncle was the only one who could take him in . . . but . . . just recently died of tuberculosis. . . I found out that he’d jumped on the back of a truck and traveled around seventeen hours to Kitale. He’d spent the previous night on the street and some random (or not so random) kid on the street told him about a school that might take him in, the school where we were working. . . He only has the clothes he’s wearing and a school ID from where he went while his uncle was alive. He said if he’s not allowed to attend, he’ll likely live on the streets. Stephen’s faith is amazing though. He knows the Lord and the truth that Lord has huge plans for him. He was [the one] telling me those things, not the other way around. . . I prayed for him and that the Lord would provide. It’s not a sure thing yet, but it looks as though the school is going to allow him in. Praise God!. . . Yes, ministry in Africa is incredible. I pray for more. I pray the Lord would continue to use us in incredible ways. We’re seeing the Bible come alive, and we want nothing less than to see his kingdom come, his will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

Just today my friend Tyler was able to pray for a woman for her sight to be restored, and when she pulled her hands away, her eyesight improved. He also had about twenty-five kids following him around to every single house that he went and mothers handing him their crying babies. Granted, he kind of looks like Jesus, but that kind of stuff doesn’t happen elsewhere.

 Yesterday eight of us went into the “slums,” as the people here call it. . . We met with the pastor before we were sent out two by two and had a brief orientation type of talk concerning the area in which we were heading into. Each pair of two had an interpreter with them. Haley and I were paired up together and went into the community with the pastor.

During the orientation, I began to feel the presence of the Holy Spirit coming upon me. I could feel an anointing. We all could. I can’t explain the confidence I felt. I do know that I’ve only felt that way a few times in my life.
Here was the plan for the day. The pastor wanted us all to go door to door preaching the Gospel, praying for the adults and children, and healing every disease as well as any physical need there was. . .
After visiting with the three men, I prayed that when these people saw us, they would see God as well. Before I could say Amen, I heard a woman say “Yesu.” [Swahili for “Jesus”]  When I looked up, she was looking at me.

Priscilla was healed completely.  We prayed again for Evelyn. We prayed for many other things for them as well. The last home we visited last week, the brother and his sister who had never heard of the name of Jesus….she was the only one who visited the church on the following Sunday. We prayed for her daughter and we found out that the daughter was healed the same day we prayed for her. Caroline’s husband was healed in the hospital as well.