JOEL 2 GENERATION

A few nights ago, Isaac of Ninevah, Tenacious B and I headed out together and met a group of Syrian muslim men who worked downtown. As Isaac pointed out in his blog post, we saw the Lord speak prophetically very clearly over a number of their lives. We were able to demonstrate the difference between the way God the Father speaks and heals, and the way their islamic seers and healers operate. They had quite a bit of exposure to these types of people. Sometimes the so-called 'prophetic words' that their islamic mystics will give are accurate but don't instill hope and produce faith. The vast majority of the time muslims have to pay these people for their 'supernatural services'. In sharp contrast, we explained that since God gives us His gifts freely, we use them freely. We also prophesied hope, potential and God's purposes and future ministry plans over these men. I saw one of these men had been a noted athlete in his youth, which he confirmed. I told him...

I didn't know how much of what we saw in the other country would transfer back home, but it seems like we received an increase of some kind. Last night, we were downtown and got into a conversation with some guys. It quickly became a supernatural conversation. I prophesied to one guy that he was a great secret keeper and that he liked esoteric things most people didn't like. He nodded in agreement. For another man, I told him that he carried a healing gift and that people recovered from illnesses after a couple of days after he had been near them. He also confirmed that this was true. For one of the other guys with us, I told him that he had a teacher in his family and that he too had a teaching gift of some sort. He told us that his relative was an Islamic preacher. I also told another that he had a heart for justice, which was on as well. As we're talking, another older man comes up and the guys testify about what just happened. He turns to me and says, "We...

On the plane home, we tried to minister to the stewardess who sat in the jump seat next to ours. Most of our words were way off except I saw her home being diagonally situated to an old stone church in her home country. DJ also got the name of her future husband, which, incidentally, turned out to be the name of her ex-boyfriend, too! As I was writing all of these testimonies down, I realized a few things. First, I hope no one gets the idea that we think we were somehow responsible for all of the things that happened. There is a hiddeness about our King and He has a love for participation. When He co-labors with us, we are the ones who people see. If He’s ok with that, I am, too. Many would have others say, “It wasn’t me, it was Jesus.” Theologically, that’s accurate. Religiously, it sounds good, but biblically, it’s not what He told us to say when doing signs and wonders. He said to tell people the Kingdom of God has come near. People get so hung up on what someone says aft...

As we were walking around the airport, we felt like we were on a roll of some sort and looked for more opportunities to do the stuff. For one lady, I got a word about her being a great babysitter, which turned out to be on. But the last encounter we had was by far our best at the airport. For this one guy selling candy, I got the words that he didn't use an alarm clock, that his dad and brother worked together but he didn't work with them, and that he was the fastest runner among his friends when he was younger playing soccer. I also told him that he enjoyed reading – especially history and that he did his reading in his bed before going to sleep. The crazy thing was that it was ALL right. He clarified that he liked political history the best, though, but close enough. DJ also got a word for his back and some heart words for the lady working with him. Both were really blessed. What was the fruit of all of these words? We may never know this side of heaven, but each of ...

On our way out of the country, we were able to pray again for Yusif’s wrist and see some great stuff at the airport. Since we had arrived early to our gate, we decided to sit down in one of the coffee shops and just see what the Lord had planned. As we were sitting there, DJ and I both got a word about a pain in the left side of the neck. We asked our waiter to ask around and he did. It turned out that one of the guys in the kitchen named Mustafa had this pain. (Oddly enough, he told us later that he only had a pain there every now and then, but not at that time.) He sat down with us (it wasn’t too busy) and we started prophesying over him. I told him that he wanted a big family and that someone in his family was a leader. He agreed with the first word and told us that his uncle was an imam (an Islamic preacher). I also told him that he was up for a promotion of some sort. I then proceeded to get crazy with destiny words about his future wife: light colored hair, beautiful, a...

The next morning we were back at the Souq. As we were getting some hot chocolate from one of the vendors, I got a word about some pain in his back. I asked him and he denied having any pain, but it opened the door for DJ to give his accurate word about the man’s right ankle. As DJ prayed for his ankle, I got a word about this guy being very friendly and having many different friends all around the area. Both he and the guy standing behind him confirmed it. I don’t know what it meant for these guys to hear something true about one of them from some stranger, but it’s encouraging to me to get words right—even if they are slightly broad.

While we were still at Abu George's, I realized that the first lady I had prayed for didn’t get much by way of prophecy, so she came back for more prayer (I firmly believe physical healing goes hand in hand with inner healing and this is all part of the prophetic gift. Well, that’s what I think.) This lady, Hanan, needed some healing for her carpal tunnel (a word I had gotten before) so I prayed for her healing and for some pain in her shoulders. I got the impression that she needed to forgive someone at work and she said that there was a guy there who kept pressuring her boss to make her work more. I told her that she should bless him instead of curse him. It then came out that she had been to some witchdoctor and he had told her all about herself, given her a talisman, and told her how to curse this guy. I first told her that she should burn the talisman. She got really excited and explained that that morning she had prayed at the church this prayer: “If I should get rid o...

After our visit to the church, we went to a little market to get blessed by a native Aramaic speaker. As he was praying for us, DJ got a word about his shoulder and we prayed for his healing. He was very willing to both bless us and to receive from us. It was awesome. We thanked him and left. As we were walking to the car, Abu George came running out and invited us to his home to pray for his granddaughter. Here’s the scene: DJ, me, our Bedouin host, and our local, Muslim tour guide going into the house of an Orthodox family to pray for the little girl. When we got to his house, they were just finishing lunch and invited us to sit down. I looked around at the room, leaned over to DJ, and said, “Looks like a great place to have a healing meeting.” And we did. Abu George and his family were wide open for the Kingdom. We started off by praying for his granddaughter, and then, as we were praying for her, we started getting words for the other people in the room. One by one, we ...

That afternoon, we met up with the brother of a friend who wanted to show us his country. He works as a translator in the city, so this really worked out well for me since I don’t know much Arabic and DJ couldn’t translate everything all the time. Anyway, the first place he took us to was an ancient city that arose around an ancient Christian site of a female saint for whom God split a mountain so she could escape persecutors. Even to this day, there is a canyon where the rocks were split and a convent on the same site. Moreover, at this site, many people come to ask the saint to pray for them to receive healing. In fact, on the wall in the hallway going into the convent/church/reliquary, there is a recent (5 months) testimony of a man who swallowed some nails and came for prayer. After an open vision of two saints and Elijah, he went back to the doctor who did another x-ray and couldn’t find the nails. Part of the testimony includes the before and after x-rays, the business car...

On the street the following day, I gave a wrong word to a man selling tea and coffee, but then got the impression that he had lost a really good friend and had never really found another one. He started to tear up and we prayed and declared that God would bring him another.

That afternoon, Yusif brought his sister, his mom, and his father an hour’s drive to receive prayer from us in the GZAB (see other posts if you don’t know what this means). I got a word for a shoulder, an eye, and a wrist. The shoulder was for the sister, but the eye was Yusif’s as was the wrist. He told me that he couldn’t put any pressure on it. I prayed for it and told him to do some pushups—which he did with NO PAIN. (Interesting note here: Yusif told us the last day we were there that the pain had come back when he had gone to pray at the mosque. Coincidence?) I also prayed for his eye while DJ prayed for his sister’s shoulder and the father’s knees. During this time, I also got a word for the mother that she had many Christian neighbors and that she had carried out the “when you did it to the least of these, you’ve done it to Me” lifestyle. She told us that most of their neighbors were Christians and she was really compassionate to the poor. She then felt the presence of...

We then wandered around the city and stumbled along some people in different stores. One man had had childhood polio and we prayed for him. I told him that I saw a dove on his shoulder and that God had was giving him a lot of peace. The next guys we encountered in a gold shop. I prophesied that one of these guys was very active in his church in a leadership role and he said that he was in charge of the social activities. I also told him that it was important for him to read the book of Revelation and he told me that he was involved in a Bible study already. I also told him that I felt like the Lord was leading him to love other people regardless of religion, but especially Muslims, in a unique way. He received it well.

The next morning, we got up, ate breakfast, and headed for an ancient Christian holy site. When we got there, I got a word for a right ankle so I asked the policeman sitting on the bench if it was his. It wasn’t. So, we got our tickets and went down to the little worship room set up in this place. As I was sitting there, I saw an angel to the right of the altar, just standing there. DJ and I had come to this place in hopes of receiving an impartation. The angel told me that he didn’t see too many people come for that reason. He also told me that the Lord had used this saint (we were in his house) because he had a good sense of humor. All three of us tried to feel something were I saw this angel. It was neat to see the excitement on our host’s face when I told him that there was an angel in the corner. We, then, went back up to the little store and DJ got a word for the guy there for his neck and, as it turned out, he also had a bad, right ankle. Our next stop was a mystic’s ...

We had Salaar sit down on the couch and just receive prayer. We prayed for him for a long time because he said that he had a weak heart. We released the Kingdom and he said he felt something leave the top of his head and a lot of peace. I also sensed that the Lord wanted him to have a vision, so we asked him to imagine his room and tell us what he saw in it. His response was a man in white. Shooba. After seeing all of this, our host (the man who had been healed in our city a year or so ago) wanted some prayer as well. I prophesied that he had hit someone with a rock when he was a kid and still carried shame about it. He told us that it wasn’t a rock, but a bottle and confirmed that he still carried some shame. We asked Jesus to come and minister to his heart and carry that shame away. He, too, felt peace.

Back to the GZAB. . . After the barbershop, we went back to the manager and his friends. As we were sitting there, I just started looking around and started getting words for guys. For the manager, I told him that he looked like his uncle and that really respected and wanted to be like his uncle—even more than his father. He said that I was right. I also told another one of the guys that he dominated a game on the PlayStation 2 and he started laughing because that was true, too. For another one of the guys, Salaar, I told him that he had a gift with children and that he wanted many of them. I also told him that he had a close relationship with his mother and considered her to be one of his good friends. He turned really red and confirmed all of it. Let me take a second here to tell what the Lord told me. I kept asking for words that would freak people out, and He told me, “What difference does it make how freaky the word is if it gets the job done?” Seriously, some people jus...

Back at the GZAB, we sat down with the manager and his friends and just let loose with words of knowledge and prophecy. I prophesied about one guy who wasn’t even there, but I had seen earlier. . . or at least thought I had seen. So, I started reading this guy’s mail about how he was talented, a musician, a good soccer player, really funny, but no one catches his jokes, etc. They were all astounded. But it turned out later, I had a completely different guy in mind, but it didn’t make much of a difference. It helped show some seeds in their minds about a God Who knows them. A little while later, DJ wanted to get a shave, so one of the guys went out with us to show us a good place. Along the walk, I prophesied that he like basketball and was between girlfriends. He confirmed both and went on to tell us that his last girlfriend had passed away rather recently. He also told us that he wanted more courage and bravery—that he wanted to be a new man. DJ and I told him that we knew h...

The hotel was a great place for us because it had two bedrooms and a sitting area. This gave us the place and opportunity to do ministry in the room. It was really an apartment we rented for the time while we were there. After settling in, we headed out to a sheesha place where the men waste their time and money smoking and playing backgammon and chess. At the sheesha bar, DJ and I got some words for some of the guys at a nearby table. So, we went over and a few minutes later, one of them came to our table. He received healing and I gave him some prophetic words as well. I told him that the Lord was going to give him new sight and bless his business. I also felt like the Lord wanted him to know that He was restoring broken dreams. I also got the impression that he had someone close to him that he communicated with regularly, but was in another country (at this time, I thought he was a native to the city, so it wasn’t like I knew he was already from a different area). He confi...

I would like to add a few more details about what happened on our trip to a nearby Middle Eastern country. To say the least, I didn’t know what to expect. As I told DJ before leaving, it was the least prepared I had ever been for an international trip. Anyway, we arrived in the afternoon so that gave us most of the day to do the shooba around town, but it really began with the taxi driver. As we were headed to the capital city, DJ and I both got numerous words for the driver and for our companion with us. I got a word for our host’s ankle and for our driver’s stomach. I asked him if he had had pain in the stomach—on the right side, just below the navel. He excitedly confirmed that though he didn’t have pain there at the time, he had recently had an operation in the exact same spot. I also got a word about a burn, which turned out was for the driver’s sister and another word for an ear pain which was also for the driver’s niece and our host. By the time we arrived to the hotel, t...

Our trip was incredible in many ways, but arguably the most incredible facet was that a Bedouin muslim man traveled with us and witnessed every miracle, every prophetic word, every evangelistic sermon THE ENTIRE TIME WE WERE THERE. This was a man who was healed by the Lord a year and half earlier of migraine headaches when we prayed for him in a different country. He introduced us to his completely veiled aunt, who had a visitation of Jesus when her infant son had died. What did Jesus do? What He always did when He encountered dead people - He raised her son from the dead. He has always followed Jesus, even though the son had no contact with Christians as he was raised in a completely muslim village. Also, Desert Princess, prayed for this aunt to also become a follower of Jesus. Our friend traveled over 20 hours to be with us in the capital city of his country. He lived with us, he ate with us and saw first hand what it looks like for 2 Christian men to release God's Kingdom ...

The day we left, we got to the airport quite early. Because there wasn't anything else to do, we decided to plant ourselves in the middle of a bunch of muslims and see what God would say. Most of this I will leave for Isaac to share, but I would just say that God was so faithful yet again to speak to us and through us to a number of different muslim men and women. We did get alot of words wrong - I can try to package what I just said differently, but basically I'll call a spade a spade - there were times when we would open our mouths and just missed it. Again, some have a major problem with trying to prophesy and getting it wrong (due mostly to a Christian 'urban legend' that states that prophecy can/should never be wrong because they were taught that OT prophets that missed it were killed). In short, a 'false prophet' is completely different than a Christian who is growing in their prophetic gifting. I can say however, that the words that were right were at...

There are several groups of Christians who still speak a form of the language that Jesus spoke, Aramaic. They live in several different Middle Eastern countries. We happen to visit one of their villages and God showed up. In this monastery, we asked the nuns if they would pray for us in Aramaic - but none of them spoke it because they weren't from that village. They directed us to a shopkeeper named Abu George (Father of George) who was an Aramaic speaker and would be able to help us. Little did we know what God had set up. When we got to the shop, we told him that we wanted him to pray for us in Aramaic - he prayed the Lord's prayer (very cool!). While there, the Lord gave me a word of knowledge for him and he let us lay hands on him and pray. I don't remember the actual result/outcome of our prayer, but it must have been something, because the next thing we know, he is inviting us to his house to pray for his mentally handicapped and blind granddaughter. What follow...

The following morning I woke early and went out to find some place to drink tea. I found a small shop and the Lord gave me two words of knowledge for the a man in the shop named Abu Muhammad - back problems and pain in his ribs. Both were accurate. He was also a taxi driver and since we were going to utilize his services later, we delayed our prayer time for his back and ribs. I eventually got to pray for him and the Lord touched him. A neck problem he was having improved dramatically after prayer. While on the way back to the hotel, a word of knowledge came strongly for a lower back problem on the left as I passed a group of muslim men. I approached them, explained what happened. One of the men said it was for him. I prayed for him and the presence of the Lord came upon his back and he felt electricity. I told him I would come back to see him the following morning to check up on him but I couldn't find him again (nor on our final morning). Words of knowledge for strange...

At the end of our first day in this massive Arab muslim city, the Lord opened some doors to minister to the men who worked in our hotel. We had just been in a coffee shop where the Lord gave me some words of knowledge (a left shoulder problem and a lower back problem) and let us pray for a guy. Isaac also prophesied over him. As we got back to our hotel, we were still quite keen to minister and sat on the ground floor with the employees of our hotel. Much of the ministry was Isaac prophesying over these men, including a very unusual 'seer' gift that was in operation. (which he will share about). He suggested I do something that we call "manifest fire" as a demonstration to unbelievers that the Kingdom of God is truly 'at hand'. I had this one muslim guy close his eyes and move his hand over my hand and to stop when he felt intense heat. (note: this isn't done close enough for my own body heat to affect the outcome). Anyway, after a couple of times, ...

These "Kingdom Adventures" posts will be from my perspective (DJ's). Isaac will also blog about our trip together, emphasizing different things that the Lord did. Our adventure began soon after we arrived at the airport and were picked up by a muslim taxi driver named Yusif. we began to get words of knowledge for he and his family. We got a word for his mother - her left leg. Ben also got words for his neice, his sister and him personally. He was interested and wanted to me again. The following night Yusif arrived at our hotel with his parents and his sister who all wanted/needed prayer for healing. He drove an hour from outside the city for ministry! (Sadly, I have Christian friends who won't drive 1/2 hour for a miracle meeting). Over the course of the next two hours, Isaac and I ministered healing, prophetically and were able to preach many things about the Kingdom of God to this muslim family. The father, Abu Khalid, was like an oak tree when we ministered t...

Recently, Isaac of Ninevah and myself headed off on a 3 1/2 day adventure to another middle eastern country. We had no real agenda other than to allow the Holy Spirit to blow us around wherever He wished. All we knew was that we 'might' visit a muslim friend of ours who was healed of migraine headaches when we prayed for him about a year and a 1/2 ago. There was also a Christian woman who has had many visions and experiences with the Lord that we hoped to find. In the next few blog posts, Isaac and I will try to capture some of the miracles we experienced. It never ceases to amaze me how when we 'conscecrate' a few days (or a week) to focus on outreach and ministry, that the Lord ALWAYS shows Himself strong and performs kingdom miracles in His Name. This trip was no different. We didn't see all the sicknesses and/or challenges we faced bow to the Name of Jesus, but we saw a huge number that did. We saw many many healings. We prophesied over dozens of people ...