August 26, another SONny Sunday!

Is this really happening? Is God really moving mightily on the streets of Augusta? YES He is! Wow! I'm still in awe of His faithfulness, even though I shouldn't be, it is after all, His character to draw people to His AMAZING GRACE!

We had a big crowd, just like last Sunday, with many of the same people, and a whole buncha new people. I have just so fallen in love with down-town Augusta. As Jose' (found out that's how you really spell our worship leaders name -Hosea is the incorrect spelling but it would take me a week to find all of his incorrectly spelled references, so from hence-forth, I will spell his name correctly....unless I forget) was playing the praise music, we had a soft breeze blow in. We were supposed to have scattered showers, and it seems like God scattered them somewhere else. :) We set up for breakfast and began our fellowshipping with the people who started to come to A Church Without Walls.

Remember "D" who got evicted and we prayed for him last Sunday night? Well, as you would expect, God totally came through for him and he's no longer evicted! Yay God!

And remember Danny, drunk out of his mind until God moved with power within him? Well he came today too! And he seemed coherent and even remembered me and Frank. How cool is that?

"Lucifer" came again. I'm going to start referring to him as "L" from now on because as we have gotten to know him, "Lucifer" just doesn't seem to fit him at all. We actually do know his real name, but I don't want to give it and be exploitive. :) So if you want to know his real name, you'll have to come down-town on Sundays at 9 a.m. and meet him!

Frank preached on "Are You Free?" It was a deliverance type message. He talked about how sometimes we have given Satan a place in our lives through our choices to fall into sin. He gave an illustration of how when we sin, Satan sees that as a landing strip all lit up and he comes in and lands in our territory, then he takes hold of us and before you know it, we have addictions, or eating disorders, or sickness, or fears, or bad thoughts, etc....

After his message he asked if anyone wanted prayer for things they struggle with, whether it's drugs, alcohol, sex, porn, a spirit of poverty, and a bunch more. Before we knew it, we had a fella come straight up to us and said he really wanted to be set free from drug addiction. I was blown away as he certainly did not look like a man who had a drug addiction. He was very clean and well dressed. He shared with us that he had been "clean" for 15 years, but he had recently allowed some friends to do drugs in front of him, and the smells that permeated his nose rekindled that desire for them again. Just hanging around friends that were doing the drugs was all that was needed to light up that landing strip and the devil just zoomed in like a Bowing 747 and landed right there, gaining a foothold that ultimately resulted in a strong hold.

He also revealed that he had known better, but the pull was just too strong, and he was really mad at himself for falling into that snare. So Frank Peterson, Samantha, and I were praying for him and boy I'll tell ya what....Peterson just went at the devil like a pro. I kept looking over at Pam (his wife), who was sitting across the way with their children and I was like, wow, Pam should totally come over and see her husband charge hell with a super soaker. Then, out of the blue, Peterson starts speaking life into "J" and before we knew it, Peterson was prophesying over him. He was telling him that God had a plan for him and that he sees God using him to minister to others on the street, others just like himself that had been trapped by drugs, and he sees God using "J" to lead people to Christ and get clean. Amazing.

Meanwhile, one of the little ladies came up to the microphone and wanted to testify. She is a sweet little black lady, and if you know anything about sweet little black ladies, they DRESS UP for church, even if it is on park benches. So here she is all decked out in a pretty yellow dress, a yellow hat, yellow shoes, pantyhose, the whole nine yards, and she tells our church that last week she came forward for prayer over her heart trouble. I think Samantha was part of praying for her, and probably Peterson. Maybe even Steve, but we were so overwhelmed with praying for people it's hard for me to remember. Anyway, she went to the doctors this week for her testing on her heart and they said her heart was absolutely fine, she had been totally healed of her heart problems! Isn't God AMAZING! He's still healing people! Whoooo-hooooo!

Then the young man that had come at the end last week had come for the service today. He also got up and testified that God had healed his feet and that he was still walking in that healing! He was able to work all week at his job completely pain free! Whoooo-hoooo!

Then a lady came up, a new lady, and she asked for prayer for healing and for reconciliation with her family. Her husband kicked her out and she was on the streets living under the bridge, but one of our "members" had taken her in for the weekend. (Actually, it was "D" who took her in) She was absolutely receptive and excited about what we prayed for her for, and she left there expecting God to do something!

And this was amazing too, at the end of the service I was talking to that lady about getting her a larger print Bible than the ones we have available, and my sister, Jenny, came up to me and said, "You need to come over here and talk to this lady." So I said, "Just a sec," then Jenny slides a 20 dollar bill into my hand and says, "When you get done come over here and see this lady, this is from her." So I finished up with "G" and went over and spoke to her. She said she drives by here every Sunday on her way to church and was encouraged to see God moving and developing a church service for that area of town, and that she wanted to bless us. I thanked her for that generous gift and then she said she had to go to her church. She was so beautiful though that I kinda wonder if she wasn't an angel! LOL!

So speaking of Bibles, we had a box of them sitting by the food table and we have some that are kind of paper backish, not very good quality, that we let people borrow for the church service if they want to follow along, and then return when they are done using them. And then we have some "good" Bibles available for anyone that wants to take one home. So the "good" Bibles with the nice covers were sitting in the box when some of the people started to come up and look at them. They were so hungry for the Word that there was a line! And you will never guess who was over there helping the people pick out Bibles.....yep......"L"!! He sure was! We had them all still in shrink wrap so he was showing them how to look on the back to find out how big (or small) the print was going to be on the inside.

You should have seen how excited these people were to be able to get a brand new Bible with a nice cover, like it was a very valuable thing to them. Samantha and I were just beside ourselves watching the whole thing. Then we talked to several of them who have "aged" eye sight (happens to the best of us) and can't read small print. So I went looking for larger print Bibles Monday. I can't wait to give them to the people who are expecting 'em. God is so cool! I'm so excited!!

We had an awesome service though, praying for people, ministering to their needs. It was exciting. We were also able to go to the store and buy some personal hygiene items, some undergarments, etc for someone who (desperately) needed them.

It was a good Lord's Day.


(Hopefully Sam has pictures to give me to post....my camera was out of batteries, and she's a camera pro, so her pics will be better! LOL)