Walking into Bagot, I could instantly acknowledge the fact that this little aboriginal community was in major spiritual warfare; I could feel it shoot into my bloodstream at an intense speed. The first thing I thought was, “What is this month going to look like?” then I asked, “Why here, why now?” God answered these questions and revealed more.
Right before my team and I entered Bagot, we sat down with our contacts, Isabel and David and went over the history, culture, and spiritual atmosphere of the community we would be involved with.
This is some of what my team found out:
· Satan makes himself VERY real to the people of Bagot-known as the “rainbow serpent.”
· Many members of the community take intense drugs in an attempt to push away boredom…that is what happens when you have life without purpose.
· There is a high suicide rate among the aboriginal community due to the combination of drugs, alcohol, and spiritual warfare.
· When a young man becomes a man, they are given a demon that will dwell with him for the rest of his life.
· There have been instances where young men have tried to take their lives due to their demon telling them to do so.
· Witchdoctors are common among the aboriginal community and are not taken lightly.
· People will actually listen more to a witchdoctor than a pastor.
· If a person wants to get revenge on someone, then they will search out a witchdoctor and place a curse on that person who “did them wrong.” The curse usually always works…death is a pretty common denominator around the community of Bagot.
· The people living in the community have very little respect for the environment around them; they throw trash in anywhere they see fit.
· The aboriginal kids in the community have little to no respect for their peers-hitting, slapping, and name-calling is the norm.
· Many of the aboriginal homes are filled to the brim with people, which makes it impossible for all to sleep in one house; so some make their beds outside.
· There are more stray dogs lurking around the community than people-something we learned is to say, “Bless you” to the dogs if they happen to start getting out of control.
After this talk, our contacts took my entire team to Bagot in order for us to get a feel of the ministry sight…and feeling we had! The moment we entered Bagot, every single one of us experienced heaviness like nothing we have ever felt before. The whole time we were going through the government owned community, we were shuttled in the church’s van; but we felt nothing close to safe. I literally felt the spiritual warfare all around me and started to feel a little claustrophobic.
As soon as we started to leave the community, we stopped to meet the Pastor of the Bagot Church-Pastor Peter. The moment I got out of the van, the environment slapped me in the face and all I could sense was that the Angels surrounding my group were working overtime-that is how HEAVY it truly was!
We started to pray with the Pastor and the moment my team and I opened our mouths to pray, things started to happen around us. We all faced each other in a circle, closed our eyes, and held hands-our hearts were pounding out of our chests. There was a spirit lingering all around our prayer circle that was not of God, but it was obvious Jesus was present in our midst for I felt completely safe where we were standing. It was as though there was a light shining down on us from above and a shield that surrounded each one of us. The louder our prayers got it became obvious that there was a battle brewing. As soon as one of my team members starting praying over the community, a large group of dogs surrounded us and started barking and growling. For the duration of that prayer, I prayed for protection over my team and myself; and sure enough, the more I prayed the dogs disappeared. (Later that night at feedback, my entire team talked about our experience and learned that we all started to pray at the same time for a hand of protection to come upon us-See God does listen to EVERY prayer!)
Right when the prayer ended we jumped…okay… maybe leaped into the car and went back to the YWAM base we were living at for the duration of our stay.
That was our introduction to Bagot.
The rest of our time in the little aboriginal community was just as interesting…
(To be continued…)
