Received from a servant of God who trained with The Elijah Challenge and who prefers to remain unidentified
“We are 12 days into another 35-day teaching tour in India. We started in Bangalore, then went to Kanyakumari in the state of Tamilnadu. We are now in Trivandrum in Kerala and will go from here to the Punjab — seven teaching locations in all.
INDIA REPORT, DAY 5:
Oh My Gosh! 34 hours of planes and airports to get here! in a trip that long, you finally arrive about as witless as Dorothy falling out of the sky, and, within just a couple of days, it becomes clear both spiritually and culturally, “Toto, I don’t think this is Kansas any more!”
Everything — the air thick with dust, the totally chaotic traffic, the pyrotechnic colors of silken sarees and lights, the sea of car horns and voices, the intensity of smells and flavors — everything is jarringly different. I heard someone say so accurately once that you don’t visit India; India assaults you.
What amazes me beyond all else is that the spiritual gifts God has imparted into simply seem to explode so that, in both frequency and power, they flow in ministry
Yesterday finishing a two-day workshop in Bangalore, a 19-year-old girl careened into a violent demonic manifestation because she and the demon apparently saw the presence of Jesus in my eyes.
At first, her eyes, staring into mine, would suddenly grow wide with terror, her body stiffen and shrink backward. Then as she wilted to the floor, she began to writhe like a snake across the concrete floor, flail her arms and legs, moan and scream, extend her tongue out to unnatural length, try to bang her head on the floor, her eyes rolled back so that only the whites showed at all. For 20 to 30 minutes each time, she would fight us, and then, once again drawn in part by the vision of Jesus in my eyes, Priscilla would emerge without the dominating spirit — only to repeat the process three times over a two-hour stretch.
At the end, Priscilla ate lunch with great joy and rose up with others who were healed of various illnesses and pain in our meeting. Each stood and described their experiences and what they had learned to the assembled group. The pastors and parents present grasped the truth we were teaching, even in a condensed two-day format, and left empowered and encouraged.
Today we climb into a train for a 12-hour journey to the absolute southernmost tip of India to reach our second teaching destination. I’ll be 35 days in seven different locations. Debbie, Joshua Raleigh and Robert Dominique are with me for the first two weeks. Debbie is so good, so powerful and full of grace. Robert and Joshua are having a blast and may adopt one another by trip’s end.
Pray for those we teach, that they will be quick to exercise the truths they have learned so that it becomes part of who they are and can be forever. History has shown us that wherever people hear and understand and then step out and practice, miracles abound and churches explode with those eager to know a God who would rather love than be lived, would rather serve than be served.
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INDIA REPORT, DAY 9:
It’s a powerful and sometimes overwhelming truth that the demonic realm lies just barely below the surface everywhere we go in here. In America, the Kingdom of Darkness conceals itself behind the day-to-day frenzy of life and the convenient unbelief of religious leaders too timid to confront it. But here — whoa! — it seems to erupt at the slightest provocation.
Yesterday, at the end of four hours teaching, a young woman came to me and asked for prayer. She wanted to conceive and bear a child, a common prayer request. “Do you have any children now?” I asked. “No,” she said. “I’ve had three die within the first three days of life and at least two more were miscarried.” Whoa! Her request took on a much more serious note and I wondered again at the measure of hardship and grief that so many people carry under the mask of an outwardly calm and even graceful demeanor.
With permission to place my hand on her lower abdomen, I had barely touched her when she visibly broke into a sweat and her breathing grew rapid and shallow. As I began to speak, suddenly I could smell the nauseating presence of a spirit of death. My prayers turned to commanding, and, with the first command, her body writhed in an intense muscle spasm that rose up from her lower abdomen, robbed her of breath, and sent her into a dry heave. Over and over for several intense and physically strenuous moments, she writhed and heaved, spitting bile into a plastic bucket. At times, she would turn her head, placing her face into my shoulder and almost go unconscious, but other than very soft groaning between clenched teeth, she endured the whole thing without apparent fear and in almost complete silence.
Then it passed, the thing apparently leaving her or — we’ll find out today — hiding behind a smokescreen of seeming peace. She sat for several moments to recover what had obviously been painful and exhausting, but then she agreed readily to come back today for assurance and blessing.
Here’s the truth: violent deliverance is the most physically exhausting activity I’ve ever experienced. To have that follow four hours of teaching left me so drained that I’m not sure I’ll even recognize the young lady today. But I’ll find her.
Yesterday was a day of teaching, not ministry. Today is ministry, and we’re expecting perhaps unprecedented levels of demonic manifestation. We’ve trained about 150 people here now and have enthusiastic and heartfelt support from the pastors.
Pray for us. Keep praying for us and for all of our families as well. It is an endlessly intense and powerful work that God is doing here.
INDIA REPORT: DAY 10
If you read yesterday’s report, you’ll understand when I say that we weren’t disappointed.
On Day Three of our teaching here, we encourage all of our students to bring anyone who is sick or in need. The students from Days One and Two then minister to the sick and oppressed under our direction, and we see many, many people healed and delivered.
I suspected there may be a lot of demonic manifestation in this place because it had already shown itself once or twice and the whole church seemed to accept it simply as a matter of course. At one point, for example, the pastor is walking me through the church on a teaching break time and tells me, “Demons! Deliverance! That’s what we need! See this?” He says and points to two little women sitting a few feet away. “These two have demons, and we can’t get rid of them!” I was shocked, but the two little ladies looked up and grinned and nodded their heads in the bobble-headed back and forth that in India means, “Yes! Yes!”
Whoa!
So yesterday, we ministered to perhaps 50 people. At least 45 of them broke out into demonic manifestations. Understand this: the most we’ve seen before (with only one exception) was maybe six or eight. The noise here was deafening — howling, screaming, wretching, vomiting, moaning! Everywhere we turned, there were pockets of eight or ten believers loudly commanding spiritual presences, “Get out! Get out! In Jesus’ name, get out!” Seven or eight uproars at a time, one of them at least extending well over two hours.
You would have been amazed at Debbie. From one group to another, she would simply wade into the fray, command the demoniac to look at her and order the presence to leave. She was incredible.
As far as I know everyone who was ministered to spiritually was set free. I was disappointed that some but not all were healed. At the same time, I balance that statement by saying the noise and tumult in the church was such that it’s a wonder anyone was healed at all.
The pastor was thrilled. The people were empowered and trained. The church, full of people eager to walk in authority and make a difference for the kingdom, will prosper. The head pastor told us over dinner last night that, in 33 years of hosting workshops and retreats and seminars, this was hands down the most illuminating, the most powerful, the most practical.”
INDIA REPORT, DAY 17 —
Pastor Benny is a handsome Indian man, black as ebony, tall, muscular with piercing black eyes and a booming voice that contrasts sharply with his gentle quiet nature. His wife Axsa is lighter-skinned with an open friendly face, her nature restrained only by the stigma that, after 16 years of marriage, she and Benny are still childless. In this culture, that’s huge –especially for pastors. People are reluctant to place their confidence in a pastor who doesn’t walk in the evident favor of God; healthy children seem to be the minimal baseline in judging that status. Axsa carries the weight of that judgment.
On top of that, denominational leaders assigned Benny two years ago to pastor a church far removed from the closest road, requiring the faithful to traverse a narrow dirt path a half-mile, wading through dense and verdant jungle to attend services.
And, last but not least, when Benny and Axsa first arrived, the church building was literally falling down. Walls were crumbling, roof had caved in, and the five or six members who existed within a larger Hindu community were hopeful the new pastor could restore some hope and meaning.
Benny, hit hard by his poor situation, struggled emotionally but, certain of his calling, carried his woes to the Father who had called him. Two years ago, God answered, giving the young pastor a vision. “Do not fear. People will come from a foreign country and teach in this church. Get ready for them. They will teach you how to restore this church body.”
“It was almost unimaginable,” he told me. “Foreigners come here to teach in big churches, city churches, wealthy churches, not broken down places you have to hike to in the jungle.” Nonetheless, Benny believed. The church body, for what it was, prayed for the prophesied “foreigners” consistently. Funds to rebuild the church came in from unexpected sources, and Benny and Axsa attacked that restoration expectantly.
The decision for us to teach there was made without any knowledge of Benny’s vision or prophetic message…and the entire three days was a love fest. On Day One, I paused after two hours plus of teaching and said, “Let’s take a 15-minute chai break.” “No! No!” The congregation responded, looking at me as if I had insulted them. “We are not tired. Keep teaching. Keep teaching!” Whoa!
On Day Three, our day of healing and deliverance, the 45 students of Days One and Two (including six pastors and the local bishop) performed with vigor and confidence. They ministered healing and deliverance to a dozen newcomers who had arrived that morning looking for the promised deliverance from pain or oppression or both. One woman, who had hobbled painfully down the long dirt path to church, saw her hips and feet healed from arthritic pain entirely. All others came into freedom from pain and a renewed sense of peace; issues such as diabetes and the ability to conceive obviously can not be declared as successfully addressed immediately. Three demonic manifestations ended with the demons expelled and the believers restored.
With all newcomers served, the student’s enthusiasm overflowed, and they turned to each other, addressing aches and pains and rebuking spirits of poverty, rejection, childlessness, false religion, generational issues, etc., etc. Even the bishop, present throughout, sat and had the congregants cancel demonic assignments over him, command angels to protect and defend him, and then blessed him, calling forth wisdom, boldness, prosperity and grace. Finally, we closed with three noisy hours of food, laughter, photos (“snaps”), hugs and tears of joy. I’ve never been kissed by so many men in all my life. This was a place of unadulterated joy.
We flew today to the opposite end of India to teach in four more locations before coming home. With any encouragement at all, Pastor Benny’s church is going to grow and prosper. Pray for a child for Benny and Axsa as well as a woman named Lena and four others in their congregation. Keep praying.”
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