Ezekiel 37 – ” The Vision of Dry Bones …
At Training Camp this passage was prophesied over us, we were told that we would see the dead rise. This is The World Race, of course this stuff happens. You hear about teams praying over people and seeing limbs grow back and miraculous healings happen. You hear about teams doing the impossible according to man’s standard but completely possible in God’s power. Hearing this I am sure everyone felt as stirred as I did, “God show up, use us this 11 months … do the miraculous because with your Spirit we can do just as Jesus did. We can heal, we can bring life, all power under heaven is given to us … we have authority in bringing the Kingdom to earth!� It’s powerful at Training Camp to think about all the things you are going to be a part of for the Kingdom … and then you get on the field, and things don’t look quite like you pictured.
You go to Africa and preach and go door to door and talk and talk and talk … You want to see something happen but you feel that all you have are words and they are falling on deaf ears and when they are heard who knows what they are actually hearing with the language barrier. You go to Asia and you teach English, all day every day it seems … what’s the point? How is speaking English going to bring the Kingdom to earth? “Hello, how are you? I am fine, thank you and you?� What is a simple greeting going to do in the Kingdom? Day after day, month after month, you wait for God to bring the miracle that you get to be a part of … this is The World Race, I should be doing more than medial task after medial task! I should be setting this nation on fire for Jesus with miracles! Then God provides an opportunity for the miracle you’ve been waiting for … the dead shall rise!
It was Sunday evening, I was in my own world, zoning out and listening to my IPOD. Then I heard it, there was screaming, lots of screaming. For a moment I thought, it’s nothing, they saw an elephant again or something … but I couldn’t keep lying down. I went to the door and saw Daniel (one of the YWAM missionaries with us) running down the path, and I saw everyone following and then by the time I got outside I saw Kayla holding a baby, “what happened?� She told me they weren’t sure, something about a girl being stuck in the water. So we went down the path about 100 feet to a pond where the scene was just chaos. There were locals and some of the World Race and YWAM missionaries in the water bobbing up and down, diving down below the surface only to reemerge breathless and more frantic. Time was ticking by and the water was murky and deep. They gathered trees to try and sweep the bottom, they cast out a large fishing net but all that came up with it was a large thorn bush that was cutting up the people as they tried desperately to find the little girl who was under the water somewhere. It was twenty five minutes or so of searching, with each failed attempt to locate the girl you could hear the mother wailing in desperation for the child that was losing hope with each passing minute. You could hear the father’s helpless cries and screams from the water as he felt there was nothing he could do for his daughter who had been swallowed by the pond. You could see the silent tears that ran down the face of her sister who had been swimming with her … the sister who had been rescued by her younger sister moments before the younger sister ended up getting overtaken by the deep water.
We cried out, “Lord, bring this child to the surface! Help us find this girl� I stood idly by, praying for God to show up. “God you said we would see the dead raised, God show up!� We prayed and we prayed, and then it happened, a local came up with the little girl’s naked lifeless body, he brought her to the edge and passed her to Daniel who began running with her towards the field. A local then took hold of the girl, he held her by the ankles over his back and he began running around the field with her, shaking her, running her, willing for the life to come back to her. She had been underwater nearly 30 minutes; the only way she would live is with the hand of God bringing her back to us.
Several of us circled up and prayed for life to come back into her, “Again… God YOU SAID we would see the dead raised, YOU SAID!� I pleaded with Him, I cried out to Him with everything I had … “Lord, this is why we’re here; we are here to pray for this little girl to come back to life! Show this community you are the ALMIGHTY and ALL POWERFUL Lord… that you are the Lord who brings LIFE!� We petitioned God as Daniel tried CPR and as the locals continued to run her around. It was seriously the most spiritually draining thing I have gone through on the Race, and possibly in my whole life. I have never been so close to death before and especially the death of a little girl who was only 10 or 11 years old, my stomach was turned inside out from the whole scene.
We finished praying and proceeded towards the mob of people that had gathered around the family’s house, the family was so distraught … and it felt like we couldn’t do anything to change what had happened. Later that night there was a viewing at the grandfather’s house, they kept putting baby powder on her face and they kept giving offerings, offerings to their different spirits … they were trying to buy her a better life next time. They believe in reincarnation here and the whole scene was just heartbreaking.
The next morning the funeral proceedings began, they had one final viewing that morning and we were invited to pray over the little girl. They know who we pray to so it was a blessing that they let us be a part of this process in that way. Later that afternoon they put her body in a box that looked like it had shiny gift wrap on it, God was getting a beautiful gift. The monks and the family loaded up on the trailer that carried them to the temple where she was buried. They continued to give offerings to their different spirits throughout the day, and when we arrived they went through their burial ritual of walking the casket around the grave several times before placing it into the ground. After the body was put in the grave and the grave was covered in cement, I knew that this little girl wouldn’t be raised from the dead, at least not physically.
My heart sunk … but then I slowly began having a peace that God had taken this little girl to be with Him in heaven. Our contact here has done amazing things for the children and youth of this community. Though the parents and the older people here may not believe in Jesus yet, many of the children and youth here know who God is, and they know about His son Jesus who died on the Cross. These children here know about God because of our contact’s heart for this community! So though she may not have been raised from the dead, physically, I trust that she is alive and with Christ right now, she is in a far better place!
Sunday and Monday were definitely the most trying days for me on the Race and they are right up there with the hardest days in my life … I will never forget what I saw that Sunday, but I will also never forget what happened that Monday, when not only did we pray for Sri-Po at her house, but we prayed for her at the grave site, and we were even asked to write something for her in the cement, so this community will now always see scripture at her gravesite … I may never understand the way God works, but I have to trust that He has a purpose and a plan for this community, even in death.
