Are muslims easy or difficult to reach?

http://joel2generation.podomatic.com/entry/2010-09-25T05_09_39-07_00

Ministering to a mother's grief

The team approached two ladies on a bus bench and asked if there was anyway we could bless them or pray for them. They were hesitant. I would be too if a whole bunch of strangers came up to me! One of the team members then had a word about them carrying pain from one of their sons who was in his twenties. One of the ladies immediately said that she had lost a son to violence who had past away in his twenties. The memory of this caused her to tear up. One of the other team members had been through a similar life event and was able to minister peace and comfort to her. She received the comfort of the Lord. The Lord wanted to bring peace to this past heartache and encourage this dear sister. He is good. 

Decision made for Christ

A gentleman waiting for a ride was highlighted to one of our team members. 15 minutes later, the team member approached the man and started talking with him. The team member received a word of knowledge that the Lord had been after him many times in his life and that the man had been running from the Lord time and time again, but this moment was the time when the Lord was going to call him into salvation. The team member then spoke this word to the gentleman and he confirmed that many times in his life he had felt the Lord reaching out to him, but he never responded. After about 15 minutes of sharing the gospel, the team member invited the man into a salvation relationship with Jesus. The man said something to the extent of, "Yes, I want the transformation and freedom you speak of. I want salvation. I don't want to run from Jesus anymore." The team member then lead this man through a salvation prayer to give his life to Jesus.   

Back Healed after 15 years

Our team saw a man coming out of a quicki mart and felt lead to approach him. One of the team members then received a word of knowledge about him having lower back problems. The team member asked, "Do you have pain in your lower back by any chance?" The man then said, "Yeah, how did you know, I've had it for 15 years." After the team prayed for him he told us that all pain went away. We asked him to do something that he couldn't do before and he told us he hasn't been able to bend backwards. He then attempted to bend backwards and he bent so far back that his head came about a foot and half from touching the ground. One of the team members had to reach out and catch his head so tat it didn't hit the ground. The man was in shock!!

Call testimony

Art Outreach:  We joined with Bethel Church and did a prophetic art outreach.  God sent us to two teenage girls living in a foster care home. 

When I first saw the group I saw beach balls flying in every direction it seemed chaotic so I turned and began to pray over people in another direction.   A few minutes later my prophetic partner came to me and pointed out a girl sitting under a tree.  All the beach balls gathered together.  We drew our prophetic portrait and approached her.  She was very sweet and open.  Toby drew a large tree with strong roots and abundant fruit coming from the tree.  I drew three colorful  beach balls.  She had life and energy and she was strong enough to weather the storms and still produce fruit from the Holy Spirit.  She was delighted with the portraits and grateful we approached her.  Her friend was sitting on the other side of the tree and had heard us.  She was shy but still made herself visible.  I immediately saw a beautiful and colorful bird.  The Holy Spirit told me to give the bird eyes so she would see where she was going.  I asked her if she knew what that meant.  She said yes, she was going to go home and be with her mom.  I asked her if her home was filled with love and she said, "Yes".  We wanted to pray for them but their group leader was approaching with the other girls.  I felt anger, hostility and mean girls coming to us.  Toby said we needed to leave.  Both girls smiled like sweet angels.  I believe God wanted them to know He was blessing them.  Both girls have a destiny with the Holy Spirit.  Suzanne Weythman

Testimonies

While our group was ministering in the park, one member felt lead to approach a man reading the newspaper on a bench.  When he approached the man and began to talk, he realized that the man only spoke Spanish.  It was clearly a divine appointment, because that same team member who approached had been feeling lead to practice Spanish that week.  He was able to communicate with the man and found out that he was a believer.  The man was discouraged because his sons were into drugs and on the streets.  The team ministered to him.  One team member shared his experience with his own son being involved with drugs, but God turned the situation around.  As the dialogue progressed, another member from the team noticed that his left eye was abnormal, and a member from the team received a clue earlier about a left eye.  The team prayed for healing, and although we didn't see anything change in his eyesight, the man was very encouraged and about in tears.  Who knows...maybe he got healed later that day and we just weren't there to see it? :)

Ministering at the Park

Our group went out at 12pm.  Before we went out, we asked God for clues to point us to those He wanted us to minister to.  As we entered into a park where there were many homeless men and women, a team member noticed a clue for a blue bicycle we had.  We found a man sitting next to a blue bicycle.  The team talked to the man and he opened up about dealing with drug addiction and going through a program to help him.  He allowed us to pray over him and prophecy over him.  He was encouraged and thanked us.  A few minutes after that encounter, a member felt lead to approach a man that was not on our list.  We later found out that the man by the bike that we had previously ministered to was watching the bike for this man we later approached.

BREAKTHROUGH SALVATION

"Just before the 3rd outreach team went out, a spirit of travail came on us for the lost to get saved right after we had been praying at the 30 ft. cross re: abortion.  Then Che Ahn from Harvest Rock Church came up to pray on the main stage and prophesied that from this day forward there would be a major harvest of souls from the homosexual and bi-sexual community.  We went out about and hour later and one of the teams led a b-sexual young man to Christ. Even before he surrendered to Jesus he said "I know I am not what I am right now - I am not really a bisexual). He had seen his brother die when he was five years old because of an accident caused by his drunken step-father.  But then he realized that God loved and cared for his pain and a fatherless boy came home.  Wow! It was so beautiful to watch him melt in the compassion of Lord."

Training during first session

--
Blessings,

dina

Ephesians 2:8-10 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast. 10For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Some other encouraging reports

Leader Encouraged
We found a man who fit one of our clues and prayed for him and  
encouraged him. he was a small group leader who was thinking that his  
small group was in the process of becoming a church. he was with a  
group of 4-5 people from his group and we prayed for them, prophesied  
over them and encouraged them.


Prayed for Group
Next we saw a young man in a 'plain white t-shirt' walking quickly on  
the other side of the street. We waited for the stop light and  
crossed over to try and catch up with him. he and his friends went  
into macy's and we caught up to them in the men's department.  
Initially he refused prayer and asked us to pray for the friends he  
was with. so we prayed for many of them and blessed them. Then the  
white t-shirt guy confessed that he really did want prayer for his  
family. the group was visibly lighter and more full of joy by the  
time we left. The clerks who were watching were visibly touched by what was  
happening as well. they got really full of joy.

Outreach Prep

IT'S ON US! WE HAVE CROSSED OVER INTO HARVEST!

Just a few minutes ago I received a text from Lou Engle (see below) showing how the Spirit of God has fallen on a team of young people who are still in Sacramento from Kansas City and around the country. They are now in a travail for the lost like we have not seen before in these past years. I believe it is the beginning of the revival harvest that we have been crying out for. This is the same travail that fell on us at the end of our outreach that resulted in a young broken man getting saved.

Kent Larson

"Kent, thanks so much for doing the outreach. We are with 50 kids right now that are in travail like I have never seen. They've seen people getting saved over the last week. It's on us" From Lou

reflecting on the outreach - the power of the testimony

a number of people we approached were not interested initially in our offer of prayer for their healing.  this seemed to be the case with many who had conditions we could see (cane, crutches, casts, wheelchair).  However, if somehow we could get a testimony shared of their condition being healed (either earlier in the day or at some other time), then we got to pray for them.  The testimony helped them overcome their initial skepticism and released faith - at least enough faith to let us pray.

one man I remember had just limped out of a Psychic/Palm Reader shop walking with a cane.  I didn't think he'd let us pray (because of the shop he had just emerged from), but we asked anyway.  He thanked us for our concern but wasn't interested.  Then I quickly recounted a couple of testimonies of scoliosis being healed (one that was dramatic and instantaneous), and then he let us pray.  God began to move and in the exact spot in his spine where the scoliosis was the worst, he began to feel the Holy Spirit's power!  At the end of our prayer, he agreed with us IN JESUS' Name (which I heard him utter).

As he walked away, we saw that he was walking NORMALLY.  We were probably as shocked as he was!  The power of the testimony seemed to be the key to entire encounter!

There were several others who initially either declined us or were very hesitant to receive prayer UNTIL they heard a quick testimony.

reflecting on the outreach - demonstration 1st, talk 2nd

in all of our training, we emphasized that we wanted the people we met to encounter something of God's Kingdom 1st, before we spoke to them the Gospel verbally.  Whereas BOTH approaches are Biblical (sometimes Jesus preached 1st, and then demonstrated miraculously and other times the demonstration came 1st), I believe that in America we find ourselves needing to demonstrate the Kingdom supernaturally BEFORE we try to talk about Christ.

This happened on the streets on Saturday over and over again.  An accurate word of knowledge, a physical healing, meaningful prophetic ministry or even an encounter with God's love.  I am reminded of one Arab muslim man who witnessed the healing of a friend of his AND THEN I was able to speak boldly about the Jesus who just came in a miraculous demonstration.  He gladly took the Arabic New Testament I offered him and I spoke about Christ's Deity openly (which isn't always easy with muslims).  He told me he would cherish the gift I came him (the NT) and would study it carefully.  I know that without the demonstration of a healing miracle, I would have never been able to speak as clearly about Christ without an argument.  No debates, no arguments about muhammad and the quran - Jesus was all we talked about!

All afternoon, Kingdom encounters came 1st and then we spoke more about the Gospel message.  I heard from other teams and heard exactly the same types of stories. Several people gave their lives to Christ.

I believe we have a serious credibility problem in minds of many unbelievers and yet, when the Kingdom comes in power, our credibility is often instantly restored and they are asking us about the Jesus who just healed them.

reflecting on the outreach - equipping youth

hard to know how many people were involved in the 3 outreaches (maybe 200).  many who came said they wanted to see their first miracle on the streets - and they did!  I was particularly moved by the teenage guy from our Vineyard Church who was skeptical about all the healings he had heard about and joined our team to see one.  He basically said, "show me the money" - after God used him to bring healing to 3 people.  I asked him how he knew it was real and he told me that when the man who was healed asked, "Did you do magic on me or something"? he was convinced!

That was powerful - a youth from a Charismatic Church who himself was a skeptic UNTIL he saw people healed.  Guess who was on EVERY outreach?  He was hooked!  Can't wait to see what happens as he returns to our Church believing that God heals and wants to use him to release His Kingdom.

Also had others see healing flow through their hands for the first time on the streets as they saw a whole new approach to reaching out.

Mother healed and has faith encouraged

Our last miracles from 4pm outreach - A mother and her daughters were sitting on a bench. The mother had a cane, so we stopped of course. She had had a hip replacement that hadn't healed well. First we prayed for a neck problem which was healed. then we prayed for the hip which was also much better after prayer. She didn't stand up to fully check it out, but was moving her leg up and down without pain. They were strong believers and very encouraged!

woman healed who then invited us to minister in her Church

More of our miracles from the 4pm outreach - We see a woman in a wheelchair. She had suffered from a stroke. We got a word of knowledge for her neck. The Lord began to touch her as we prayed. At the end, a chronic pain in her foot was healed. She didn't want to try walking. We did ask. Another word of knowledge came for her friend - a wrist condition in her left wrist. She had carpal tunnel and then all the pain left after prayer.

One of these women was a leader in her Church and asked us to come and minister!

God touches man with scoliosis after walking out of a psychic

3rd Outreach - crazy yet again! Took a team of 8, including some who wanted to see their first miracle - my favorite type of team member!

First of all, we got a prophetic indication to approach a couple who we felt needed prayer. They asked for prayer for their marriage. God just really touched them. They knew the Lord and we prophesied over them.
Next we see a man with a cane walking out of a Psychic/Palm Reader. He had scoliosis. Initially he didn't want prayer, but after a testimony we shared about a healing, he let us pray. God began to touch him. He felt tingling in the EXACT place where he had scoliosis. It was getting better. He prayed with us IN JESUS' Name (which was a bit of a shock after leaving the psychic). he walked away without limping from before.

More to come....

Praying for the sick in public!

Prayed for homeless couple, gave them water, money for food, a shirt and prophesied their destiny

Prophesied over this young man, called out his destiny

Prayed prophesied over j.

Pain left from cyst

Found the man with hat prophesied over him and his home group

Lower back

Prayed for a grandmother (she was with her two grandchildren) in a wheelchair for healing. The pain in her lower back left and, while she didn't get out of the chair, she was totally blessed.

Another back healed & the Father's Love

2 young ladies were sitting on a brick wall eating lunch. After a word knowledge and laying hands on one who had pain in her back for two years (since the birth of her child), the pain in her back left and her back loosened up. Also was able to release the father's love to both of them. Tears were shed and they both came awayblesses saying that this event had "made their day".

Nigerian's knee healed & Algerian muslim man hears the Gospel

A Nigerian taxi driver took us up on our offer of a miracle.  His knee was all wrapped up.  We prayed for him and he said it felt better.  We asked if he could test it out - he began running down the street!  He came back - totally healed.  This opened door to speak to Arab man from Algeria and we gave him an Arabic New Testament and I shared the Gospel with him in Arabic. He had seen a miracle and now it was time to communicate Jesus' message.

Others were able to minister to another taxi driver who needed inner healing and forgiveness and his dream interpreted.

What a difference it makes to minister the Gospel after everyone sees a miracle!                     

Found the lady with leopard print, she received prayer, chronic pain leaves in husband's back

Praying for the sick in public!

Pain left a boy's foot

Pain left a boy's foot and some of an arch came back. :)

Back Healed and eyes touched

We saw a back healed, a neck healed, and someone's eyes were partially cleared up.

Healing!

Man with lower back pain he had for years was totally, instantly healed!

Here we go again!

Healed toe!

Found the treasure with red short hair

Healing

Pain in knee. Left knee totally healed after having 10 years of pain he was able to move his leg in ways he hadn't before.

God's ministers to the ministers too

One of our group saw 70 percent healing in his left foot.  This was after he personally saw 3 left feet healed during our first address.

Praying again!

Taxi cab driver from India comes back for prayer after refusing us at first

Taxi cab driver came back and was completely the open to prayer which was the opposite of when we first talked to him. We just asked for strength to fill him.

Found the treasure with short red hair!

unbelieving believers see a miracle

A group from The Call walks by but were not a part of our outreach. We tell them about the miracles we've just seen and then one girl in their group tells us she had a knee injury. Painful. 

You could tell that they weren't a Church that was particularly interested in healing.  The girl looked to her pastor to see if it was OK and and they let us pray.

But, Jesus destroys pain and she was completely healed! Then she looked back at her pastor to see if it was OK to that she was healed.  He was! They were so stoked and said that they will share it publicly in Church this week.

We were all hooting and hollering!

Found the person with flip flops!

One miracle led to another one

Another miracle! One of the hispanic group that was healed, came back and brought another man with foot pain and we see the 3rd foot healed in a span of like 10 minutes.

We then imparted a gift of healing to the woman who brought him so she can "go and heal the sick" too!  Gave a her quick training on how to do that.  We trust she'll go for it.

after being healed, man asks, "What, is this magic or something"?

2 more miracles - we approach a group and ask if anyone needed a miracle.  One man said he had pain in his foot.  We prayed and this hispanic man's foot is healed. Another man in their group also saw his foot healed and then asks "what, is this magic or something?" We said "No it is Jesus!"  Then we prophesied over 2 girls in their group and imparted gifts of healing to them. We also did some training to teach them how to pray for the sick.

Toe pain healed 100 percent

Family was blessed just to be asked if they needed a miracle. Prayed for an indian man with muscular distrofy there was no way to tell if it was healed but we're just believing for it

we get policeman's blessing at two women are being healed!

We started talking to two Hispanic women. In broken Spanish, we were able to discover that they had pain.  They let us pray.  One of them saw pain left her legs. I asked several times and she confirmed it was gone.

The other woman had pain in her shoulder and it felt better (most of the pain left) and she felt peace.  I asked her in Spanish if she was feeling "la paz" and she said yes!

Funny thing happened when a policeman was walking up to their car which obviously needed money in the meter and I asked him not to give them a parking ticket.  He said, "I would never do that when people are telling others about Jesus Christ"!!

God is good

God is good

Deaf ear opens

75% in left ear 30% deaf in right ear. Both opened up and completely healed.

-Ahab Alhindi

VCC Laguna Niguel youth ready for outreach

The "Call of Hope Outreach" began today when we arrived in Sacramento. While at lunch, I got a word of knowledge for a guy's neck. He let me pray - the pain decreased! Another word of knowledge for an ear problem. It was for the girlfriend of the guy who HAD the neck problem. I had him lay his hand on her and I prayed. It wasn't hurting at that time so we couldn't check for improvement. Then, a friend of theirs requested prayer - we got to pray and prophesy over him. Not a bad start.

Sent from my iPad

WHY ARE WE DOING OUTREACH AT THECALL SACRAMENTO?

Why are we doing Outreach at theCall Sacramento?

Over the past few months there has been a increasing conviction that has come upon me, that it is essential to lift of Jesus over California and America in 3 ways at theCall Sacramento Solemn Assembly.  Extravagant WORSHIP, Repentant PRAYER and Compassionate OUTREACH. Phrases like, “We must cross the river and take the land...”, “the streams must come together...”, “We need to go fishing where the river turns red...”, etc have been rising in my spirit.

The summons from God’s heart to mercy and justice trumpeted through Lou Engle and and many others over the past 20 years in America to “Gather to Me my consecrated ones, who have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice . . . call upon Me in the day of trouble and I will deliver you” —Psalm 50:5,15 has activated massive gatherings and movement and won major and minor battles over our nation.  Many of us have prayed, fasted and pursued revival as our only hope for America.  I believe that our prayers have been heard and that in spite of the growing crisis politically, morally and socially in our nation and the western world, God is beginning to move in justice and mercy and in kingdom in breaking.

Last year at a gathering where Lou told and memorialized the prophetic history of theCall after 10 years we were praying one evening and I cried out the Jesus Prayer over California “Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on us your beloved!” and to our surprise there was a strong outpouring and endorsement in the Spirit. I believe that God intends to have Mercy on California again and pour out a revival that will help the church rise up and the nation stand in the great crisis coming. Like Jonah I believe that many of us will be surprised and some will be offended at how God pours out mercy on a “wicked city & land”. Therefore I believe we must go out from theCall this year and proclaim the summons and invite the lost and slumbering to come!

Three reasons for the Call of HOPE Outreach.

• INVITATION —  We need to go to the highways and the byways to trumpet the Call

Then he said to his servants, "The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy.
Therefore go into the highways, and as many as you find, invite to the wedding.'
So those servants went out into the highways and gathered together all whom they found,
both bad and good. And the wedding hall was filled with guests.  (Matthew 22:8-10)

"Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message that I tell you."
...Then God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God relented from the disaster
that He had said He would bring upon them, and He did not do it.”  (Jonah 3:2&10)

• RELEASE — A key prophetic scripture was released to Lou and others of us that promises three things in Sacramento and our nation – RELEASE of the prisoners, RETURN to the fortress of hope and the ROUSING of the warriors to go out and execute justice. If we don’t go out how will the “prisoners of hope” be called from the city?

“As for you, because of the blood of my covenant with you,
I will release your prisoners from the waterless pit.
Return to your fortress, O prisoners of hope;
even now I announce that I will restore twice as much to you.
... I will rouse your sons, O Zion, against your sons, O Greece,
and make you like a warrior's sword.” Zechariah 9:11-13

• UNITY — It is clear that unity in the body of Christ releases authority for revival and harvest.  This has always been a tenat and a passion of the theCall movement (the turning of the hearts of the fathers & the sons – generational unity; the coming together of ethnic groups (red, brown, black and white) - racial unity; jew – gentile unity; denominational unity).
  

I believe that God is raising up a movement of burning hybrids* combining the Nazarite Intercessors, the End-time Preachers, the Power Evangelists, the Renaissance Artists, the Marketplace Prophets & Apostles and the Justice Warriors. The outreach is a prophetic step to activate this union.
*A hybrid is the combination of two or more different things, aimed at achieving a particular objective or goal.

“Behold, how good and how pleasant it is For brethren to dwell together in unity! ...
For there the LORD commanded the blessing-- Life forevermore.”  (Psalm 133:3)

“...that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us,
that the world may believe that You sent Me.” (John 17:21)

So if you have read this and believe it then come join us to take theCall of HOPE to the streets!


Kent W. Larson
Pastor of Prayer
Vineyard Community Church
HOPE (House of Prayer for Everyone)
27632 El Lazo,• Laguna Niguel, CA 92677
wk. 714.425.3738
klarson@vccgn.org • www.vccgn.org

the greatest of these is LOVE

casting a vision for this weekend's outreach during the Call - here are some reflections of our outreach this past weekend in Portland - it's all about LOVE!!!

"the greatest of these is love" - a familiar quote from the Apostle Paul.  a truth we saw again and again on the streets this past weekend.  as we approached people with the single agenda of "loving them", almost nobody refused us.  we didn't have any arguments (and when people tried to start them, we refused to go there).

love can look like a lot of things - we bought some meals for hungry people, we donated to some random charities and even listened intently to some of the most painful stories you could imagine.  but the one thing we longed to do more than anything, was to see the love of God manifesting into the lives of those we prayed for.  many were physically healed which was one of the primary ways Jesus demonstrated His love.  many received prophetic words that accurately described their pasts, presents and even futures.  such prophetic ministry is another way God loves people and brings hope and encouragment to desperate, and often hopeless lives.  sometimes it was just that people would feel His love and weep (some wept so deeply that we began to tear up).

it was our heart NOT to preach and we discovered that those on the streets had not only heard the Gospel message incessantly (which was painfully reminded by some street preachers standing nearby), but they were grateful that we came in "another way".  we weren't "selling" anything.  it was all 'no strings attached'.  however, in the end, it was often them asking us for more.  them wanting to know where we went to Church (many cards were given to let them know where they can come to encounter more).  for us to love meant that an encounter with His Love should precede any verbal message about it.  God's love being demonstrated with power disarmed even the hardest of street drug addicts.  It reminded many prodigals that they were truly welcome to come home whenever they were ready.  they hadn't been forgotten, they weren't outside of the scope of His Love and concern.

and in it all, maybe I was as touched as any of them.  what I saw God do, what I felt as my heart looked into the empty eyes of teens (one of them the age of my own son) caused this father's heart to break.  when some of them couldn't look me in the eyes, I knew it was because of the pain they saw in the eyes of their own parents who were praying for them to come home.  if you are even reading this, PRAY for these prodigals to awaken and return to loving families who don't even know where many of them are or even if they are alive.

to all Facebook users

check out our FB group - "Call of Hope Outreach"

--
Blessings,

dina

Ephesians 2:8-10 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast. 10For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

The Call - Sacramento

Call of Hope Outreach (during The Call - Sacramento)

Saturday, September 4th

12PM, 2PM and 4PM