Jose Maria came into the little church where we are staying on Sunday night to join our prayer service. He came all by himself, and sat all alone in the back. Chad sat next to him as the service began and did not leave his side the whole night. We were inviting people to come up and to recieve prayer. At the end, he came up and explained to us that he suffers from horrible nightmares. He dreams every night that a creature like a dog comes and attacks him and bites him and overpowers him. So all of us men gathered around him and prayed for him. Chad really felt led to go with him to his house and to bless the house and to cast out any evil presences that might exist in his home. So Chad, Chris Telfer, and I walked him home after the service. He lived a mile away from the church down a completely dark and lonely road. As the four of us walked with our flashlights, literally thousands of spider eyes could be seen watching us along the road. Scorpions scurried across our path several times, and the tree branches loomed overhead as if trying to capture us. The walk alone to his home would be enough to give me nightmares.
We entered his lonely home by stepping over a barbed wire fence and stooping through the low doorway. It was completely dark inside except for our little headlamps. He showed us his living room, which was piled high with trash and wood, and his bedroom, which was piled high with trash and wood as well. My jaw dropped to the floor. How could one man live like this. We was completely alone, he described to us that he left his family when he was 18 when he accepted Christ. His family rejected his faith and rejected him. Since then, the old man stayed alone, never marrying, and never having anyone to share his life with.
Chad, Chris and I began praying over the entire house, blessing it in the name of Jesus Christ, covering it. There was truly a dark presence there that was being lifted. I dont want to scare anyone away with talk of demons and whatnot, but I felt an overwhelming presence when we first stepped into the home. I felt a spirit of loneliness and depression saturating the walls. As we prayed, Chad got a vision of a demon tearing out of the house, breaking through the walls as he fled. God gave me a vision of three angels coming to protect Jose for the rest of the night. We left him as we continued to pray that God would protect him.
The next day, Jose returned to the church bright and early to see us again. We asked him if he had any bad dreams. He told us that he dreamed that the dog came to attack him again, but as the dog came up to bite him, he grabbed him by the jaws, ripped his face open, and killed the dog�« Chad, Jake, Kelly, and I talked with him for the next several hours, pouring love into him. We all shared our favorite bible verses with him so that he could read them on his own. We told him that we are his family and his friends. It was clear that he was touched because he began to weep as he cried out to God, Give me a new heart�« He began to allow God to come in and heal all the pain and suffering he had in his life.
Our hearts reached out to him, we wanted to do more. So after he ate lunch with us, we decided to all go to his house and clean it up for him. It was amazing. We went to his house and began to throw away all of his trash, pick up all his clutter and organize it. As we picked up old trash, we uncovered ant colonies living on his table, snakes, tarantulas, wasp nests, bats, just about everything creepy was living inside of his home. It was sad to see the way this man had lived for so many years. We bought him lanterns, as all he had before was one pathetic flashlight that offered no light. He had lived in darkness allmost all of his life. But God had a plan for him. He sent us to him to bring light into his world. He felt loved for probably the first time since his childhood as well. This man that probably had never been hugged for the last 50 years received over 100 hugs on Monday. He was overwhelmed with love. It was beautiful�«
We concluded everthing by having a praise and worship session in his home. For the last day we were sweeping the house clean, now we wanted to fill it back up. We praised God with our lips and with our song. We filled that house with love and joy. And we welcomed home a new member to the family�«
�« symbolizes an exclamation point. The computer here does not have normal punctuation, sorry to all who were confused by my lack of proper grammer.
