The Lord wants us to be released in the power of the Spirit, but that can come only as we continually say yes to the wooing of God’s Spirit—even when it makes us feel very uncomfortable (as it often does). It is through
this process that God removes doubt and unbelief from our hearts through the cleansing flow of His convicting Spirit and healing presence. There are simply no shortcuts to His presence, and the surest path to holiness, purity,and power is found in the powerhouse combination of prayer with fasting.
In 1986, Bonnie (my wife) received a prophecy from the Lord, which she wrote down and with my encouragement took to the elders of the church we were serving at that time in Florida. I was one of the elders, and so was Brother
Derek Prince. I was ministering in Washington, D.C., and observing a fast when Bonnie received the prophecy. Meanwhile, the Lord appeared to me every night for seven days, and during that time He also gave me a prophecy about the local church in Florida.
When I compared notes with Bonnie, we discovered that the core message of the two prophecies matched word for word! The Lord told both of us that He wanted the local church body to pray and fast for 21 days. I received an additional word that we were to gather together as a body from 5:00 a.m. until 7:00 a.m. every day, and the Lord said, “If you do not do
this, I will depart and you will not even notice that I have gone.”
I had already witnessed many situations in which the Lord’s presence had left a congregation, but the people were still “going through the exercises,” although their life was gone. We were on the verge of that as a
congregation. All the elders examined Bonnie’s letter and agreed that it was a true prophetic word along with my added word from the Lord about the early morning gathering. We subsequently called the church body to a 21-
day fast4 and asked that as many people as possible meet together for corporate prayer each morning from 5:00 to 7:00 a.m.
I had an out-of-town ministry commitment and so did Derek Prince; yet,even though the two of us had to leave, the church was supposed to start the fast on the following Monday. On the first day of the fast, a total of five people out of a 600-member congregation showed up for the corporate gathering. On the next day, only two people showed up. One of the two people there that morning was a man with a strong prophetic gifting—he always traveled with me when I ministered in Africa. This man began to weep that morning when the Spirit of God came on him. He spoke to the church during the regular Wednesday night service the next day, and said,
“The Lord told me, ‘I am here, where are My people?’”
I flew back home that same night, but I didn’t find out until about midnight what had happened. After this man spoke to the people, the Spirit of the Lord began to fall upon the children first. Then He descended on a number of adults as well. I knew something unusual was afoot when my little four-year-old daughter, Serah, came into my bedroom at about 4
o’clock in the morning and shook my shoulder. She said, “Daddy, wake up!
It’s time to go to church.” Now little Serah loved her sleep, but here she was at my bedside fully awake, and ready to go to church. We found out that many of the parents in the church congregation were being wakened by
their children.
Bonnie told me that the day before I got home, she had been awakened by a loud knock on the door— at 4:00 a.m. When she got up and answered the door, nobody was there. She gathered up our children and went to the church building, and when she opened the door, the glory of the Lord was so strong that she fell on the floor right there! When God’s glory came down, all the children had simultaneous visions. Whenever the Lord walked in, we would all know He was there, and everyone could see the same thing. One hundred and fifty people turned up, then 200 people turned out.
We were engulfed in a spirit of revival, and it was an awesome thing to behold. People started repenting of sins—men who were thought to be examples of holiness began to weep uncontrollably and repent of their compulsive involvement in pornography and addiction.
One of the most remarkable characteristics of this visitation was our sense of the literal presence of God hovering over us when the Lord walked into those meetings. All I could do was just weep in a kind of “holy terror” because He was there in such breathtaking holiness and glory. I didn’t even want to lift up my head because I could so strongly sense the holiness of God in that place. God’s presence stayed with us week after week, and we were in true revival—even as early as 1986! Derek Prince shared that in his 40 years of ministry at that time, he had never experienced this level of
God’s anointing or tangible presence. It was one of the most glorious experiences we had ever experienced corporately.
If this was so powerful, then why didn’t the church world hear about it like it heard about God’s visitation in Toronto, Ontario, and Pensacola, Florida, in the mid-1990’s? The answer is that we did not know how to steward the presence of God. The Holy Spirit didn’t ask us “how to come” to us. He sovereignly chose to reveal Himself as the Spirit of repentance,
and He called us as a people to repent.
Unfortunately, we did not understand that repentance is a word of blessing. The only reason we are able to genuinely repent before God is because the Holy Spirit gives us the grace to repent.
Week after week, the Spirit of God would descend on us in His heavy, weighty glory and lead us to our knees in continual repentance. Meanwhile,some of the leaders began to feel uncomfortable about it all. They were (and are) good brothers who dearly love God, but they began to feel so uncomfortable with the way the Holy Spirit kept “hovering” over us that
they wanted to “move on.” The problem was that the Spirit of God didn’t want to “move” anywhere. They said, “That’s enough repentance. Let’s go into joy,” so in the end we left the Holy Spirit behind to party when God
wanted to complete a deeper work of repentance in us and perhaps in the nation as a whole.
We often think God should be satisfied with our repentance or obedience in a particular area, when His focus isn’t on us at all! Sometimes
He is satisfied with our repentance on “Day 1,” and He wants to work repentance in our families, churches, cities, or nation in “Days 2 through
21.” But then we get impatient. We want to have a celebration party before there’s anything to celebrate about! We left God’s place of grace so we could “move into joy,” but as we left Him behind, very slowly the hovering presence of the Spirit began to fade away too, along with His anointing.
All of us who witnessed that remarkable visitation were profoundly affected by it for years to come. I can still recall the wonderful presence of God that came down in those meetings, and I learned that we not only need
to learn how to “bring down the glory,” but we should also learn how to “steward the glory” with honor, respect, and obedience so He will stay with us.
God gave John the Baptist one “yardstick” to pick out the Messiah from the crowd of humanity. He said, “Upon whom you see the Spirit descending, and remaining on Him, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit” (Jn. 1:33b). During the Charismatic movement, we learned how to honor God and see the Holy Spirit descend upon us in a concentrated wayfrom time to time, but we didn’t know how to encourage His presence to remain among us.
I believe that a lifestyle of disciplined fasting and prayer (individually and corporately) is one of the elements required of a people who enjoy the abiding or lingering presence and glory of God. We need to learn this lesson because, believe me, when you get touched by the glory of God, there is nothing on earth to compare with it! I believe I would do anything, I would
walk a thousand miles on my knees to be around the glory of God. The key to overcoming the two great causes of casualties in the ministry is the intimacy borne out of hunger and personal surrender through prayer and fasting.
Endnotes
1. See Heb. 11:6.
2. See 2 Tim. 3:5.
3. See Esther 4:14.
4. The Lord did not necessarily expect each person to observe 21 days of continuous fasting, although some had the grace to do so. The church members were to take turns fasting as the Lord gave them grace so that throughout the 21-day fast, one or more believers were ministering in God’s presence in an unbroken chain of 24-hour prayer, fasting, praise, and worship.
- Mahesh Chavda ( The Hidden Power Of Prayer and Fasting)
JESUS SAVES TV
this process that God removes doubt and unbelief from our hearts through the cleansing flow of His convicting Spirit and healing presence. There are simply no shortcuts to His presence, and the surest path to holiness, purity,and power is found in the powerhouse combination of prayer with fasting.
In 1986, Bonnie (my wife) received a prophecy from the Lord, which she wrote down and with my encouragement took to the elders of the church we were serving at that time in Florida. I was one of the elders, and so was Brother
Derek Prince. I was ministering in Washington, D.C., and observing a fast when Bonnie received the prophecy. Meanwhile, the Lord appeared to me every night for seven days, and during that time He also gave me a prophecy about the local church in Florida.
When I compared notes with Bonnie, we discovered that the core message of the two prophecies matched word for word! The Lord told both of us that He wanted the local church body to pray and fast for 21 days. I received an additional word that we were to gather together as a body from 5:00 a.m. until 7:00 a.m. every day, and the Lord said, “If you do not do
this, I will depart and you will not even notice that I have gone.”
I had already witnessed many situations in which the Lord’s presence had left a congregation, but the people were still “going through the exercises,” although their life was gone. We were on the verge of that as a
congregation. All the elders examined Bonnie’s letter and agreed that it was a true prophetic word along with my added word from the Lord about the early morning gathering. We subsequently called the church body to a 21-
day fast4 and asked that as many people as possible meet together for corporate prayer each morning from 5:00 to 7:00 a.m.
I had an out-of-town ministry commitment and so did Derek Prince; yet,even though the two of us had to leave, the church was supposed to start the fast on the following Monday. On the first day of the fast, a total of five people out of a 600-member congregation showed up for the corporate gathering. On the next day, only two people showed up. One of the two people there that morning was a man with a strong prophetic gifting—he always traveled with me when I ministered in Africa. This man began to weep that morning when the Spirit of God came on him. He spoke to the church during the regular Wednesday night service the next day, and said,
“The Lord told me, ‘I am here, where are My people?’”
I flew back home that same night, but I didn’t find out until about midnight what had happened. After this man spoke to the people, the Spirit of the Lord began to fall upon the children first. Then He descended on a number of adults as well. I knew something unusual was afoot when my little four-year-old daughter, Serah, came into my bedroom at about 4
o’clock in the morning and shook my shoulder. She said, “Daddy, wake up!
It’s time to go to church.” Now little Serah loved her sleep, but here she was at my bedside fully awake, and ready to go to church. We found out that many of the parents in the church congregation were being wakened by
their children.
Bonnie told me that the day before I got home, she had been awakened by a loud knock on the door— at 4:00 a.m. When she got up and answered the door, nobody was there. She gathered up our children and went to the church building, and when she opened the door, the glory of the Lord was so strong that she fell on the floor right there! When God’s glory came down, all the children had simultaneous visions. Whenever the Lord walked in, we would all know He was there, and everyone could see the same thing. One hundred and fifty people turned up, then 200 people turned out.
We were engulfed in a spirit of revival, and it was an awesome thing to behold. People started repenting of sins—men who were thought to be examples of holiness began to weep uncontrollably and repent of their compulsive involvement in pornography and addiction.
One of the most remarkable characteristics of this visitation was our sense of the literal presence of God hovering over us when the Lord walked into those meetings. All I could do was just weep in a kind of “holy terror” because He was there in such breathtaking holiness and glory. I didn’t even want to lift up my head because I could so strongly sense the holiness of God in that place. God’s presence stayed with us week after week, and we were in true revival—even as early as 1986! Derek Prince shared that in his 40 years of ministry at that time, he had never experienced this level of
God’s anointing or tangible presence. It was one of the most glorious experiences we had ever experienced corporately.
If this was so powerful, then why didn’t the church world hear about it like it heard about God’s visitation in Toronto, Ontario, and Pensacola, Florida, in the mid-1990’s? The answer is that we did not know how to steward the presence of God. The Holy Spirit didn’t ask us “how to come” to us. He sovereignly chose to reveal Himself as the Spirit of repentance,
and He called us as a people to repent.
Unfortunately, we did not understand that repentance is a word of blessing. The only reason we are able to genuinely repent before God is because the Holy Spirit gives us the grace to repent.
Week after week, the Spirit of God would descend on us in His heavy, weighty glory and lead us to our knees in continual repentance. Meanwhile,some of the leaders began to feel uncomfortable about it all. They were (and are) good brothers who dearly love God, but they began to feel so uncomfortable with the way the Holy Spirit kept “hovering” over us that
they wanted to “move on.” The problem was that the Spirit of God didn’t want to “move” anywhere. They said, “That’s enough repentance. Let’s go into joy,” so in the end we left the Holy Spirit behind to party when God
wanted to complete a deeper work of repentance in us and perhaps in the nation as a whole.
We often think God should be satisfied with our repentance or obedience in a particular area, when His focus isn’t on us at all! Sometimes
He is satisfied with our repentance on “Day 1,” and He wants to work repentance in our families, churches, cities, or nation in “Days 2 through
21.” But then we get impatient. We want to have a celebration party before there’s anything to celebrate about! We left God’s place of grace so we could “move into joy,” but as we left Him behind, very slowly the hovering presence of the Spirit began to fade away too, along with His anointing.
All of us who witnessed that remarkable visitation were profoundly affected by it for years to come. I can still recall the wonderful presence of God that came down in those meetings, and I learned that we not only need
to learn how to “bring down the glory,” but we should also learn how to “steward the glory” with honor, respect, and obedience so He will stay with us.
God gave John the Baptist one “yardstick” to pick out the Messiah from the crowd of humanity. He said, “Upon whom you see the Spirit descending, and remaining on Him, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit” (Jn. 1:33b). During the Charismatic movement, we learned how to honor God and see the Holy Spirit descend upon us in a concentrated wayfrom time to time, but we didn’t know how to encourage His presence to remain among us.
I believe that a lifestyle of disciplined fasting and prayer (individually and corporately) is one of the elements required of a people who enjoy the abiding or lingering presence and glory of God. We need to learn this lesson because, believe me, when you get touched by the glory of God, there is nothing on earth to compare with it! I believe I would do anything, I would
walk a thousand miles on my knees to be around the glory of God. The key to overcoming the two great causes of casualties in the ministry is the intimacy borne out of hunger and personal surrender through prayer and fasting.
Endnotes
1. See Heb. 11:6.
2. See 2 Tim. 3:5.
3. See Esther 4:14.
4. The Lord did not necessarily expect each person to observe 21 days of continuous fasting, although some had the grace to do so. The church members were to take turns fasting as the Lord gave them grace so that throughout the 21-day fast, one or more believers were ministering in God’s presence in an unbroken chain of 24-hour prayer, fasting, praise, and worship.
- Mahesh Chavda ( The Hidden Power Of Prayer and Fasting)
JESUS SAVES TV
The Lord wants us to be released in the power of the Spirit, but that can come only as we continually say yes to the wooing of God’s Spirit—even when it makes us feel very uncomfortable (as it often does). It is through
this process that God removes doubt and unbelief from our hearts through the cleansing flow of His convicting Spirit and healing presence. There are simply no shortcuts to His presence, and the surest path to holiness, purity,and power is found in the powerhouse combination of prayer with fasting.
In 1986, Bonnie (my wife) received a prophecy from the Lord, which she wrote down and with my encouragement took to the elders of the church we were serving at that time in Florida. I was one of the elders, and so was Brother
Derek Prince. I was ministering in Washington, D.C., and observing a fast when Bonnie received the prophecy. Meanwhile, the Lord appeared to me every night for seven days, and during that time He also gave me a prophecy about the local church in Florida.
When I compared notes with Bonnie, we discovered that the core message of the two prophecies matched word for word! The Lord told both of us that He wanted the local church body to pray and fast for 21 days. I received an additional word that we were to gather together as a body from 5:00 a.m. until 7:00 a.m. every day, and the Lord said, “If you do not do
this, I will depart and you will not even notice that I have gone.”
I had already witnessed many situations in which the Lord’s presence had left a congregation, but the people were still “going through the exercises,” although their life was gone. We were on the verge of that as a
congregation. All the elders examined Bonnie’s letter and agreed that it was a true prophetic word along with my added word from the Lord about the early morning gathering. We subsequently called the church body to a 21-
day fast4 and asked that as many people as possible meet together for corporate prayer each morning from 5:00 to 7:00 a.m.
I had an out-of-town ministry commitment and so did Derek Prince; yet,even though the two of us had to leave, the church was supposed to start the fast on the following Monday. On the first day of the fast, a total of five people out of a 600-member congregation showed up for the corporate gathering. On the next day, only two people showed up. One of the two people there that morning was a man with a strong prophetic gifting—he always traveled with me when I ministered in Africa. This man began to weep that morning when the Spirit of God came on him. He spoke to the church during the regular Wednesday night service the next day, and said,
“The Lord told me, ‘I am here, where are My people?’”
I flew back home that same night, but I didn’t find out until about midnight what had happened. After this man spoke to the people, the Spirit of the Lord began to fall upon the children first. Then He descended on a number of adults as well. I knew something unusual was afoot when my little four-year-old daughter, Serah, came into my bedroom at about 4
o’clock in the morning and shook my shoulder. She said, “Daddy, wake up!
It’s time to go to church.” Now little Serah loved her sleep, but here she was at my bedside fully awake, and ready to go to church. We found out that many of the parents in the church congregation were being wakened by
their children.
Bonnie told me that the day before I got home, she had been awakened by a loud knock on the door— at 4:00 a.m. When she got up and answered the door, nobody was there. She gathered up our children and went to the church building, and when she opened the door, the glory of the Lord was so strong that she fell on the floor right there! When God’s glory came down, all the children had simultaneous visions. Whenever the Lord walked in, we would all know He was there, and everyone could see the same thing. One hundred and fifty people turned up, then 200 people turned out.
We were engulfed in a spirit of revival, and it was an awesome thing to behold. People started repenting of sins—men who were thought to be examples of holiness began to weep uncontrollably and repent of their compulsive involvement in pornography and addiction.
One of the most remarkable characteristics of this visitation was our sense of the literal presence of God hovering over us when the Lord walked into those meetings. All I could do was just weep in a kind of “holy terror” because He was there in such breathtaking holiness and glory. I didn’t even want to lift up my head because I could so strongly sense the holiness of God in that place. God’s presence stayed with us week after week, and we were in true revival—even as early as 1986! Derek Prince shared that in his 40 years of ministry at that time, he had never experienced this level of
God’s anointing or tangible presence. It was one of the most glorious experiences we had ever experienced corporately.
If this was so powerful, then why didn’t the church world hear about it like it heard about God’s visitation in Toronto, Ontario, and Pensacola, Florida, in the mid-1990’s? The answer is that we did not know how to steward the presence of God. The Holy Spirit didn’t ask us “how to come” to us. He sovereignly chose to reveal Himself as the Spirit of repentance,
and He called us as a people to repent.
Unfortunately, we did not understand that repentance is a word of blessing. The only reason we are able to genuinely repent before God is because the Holy Spirit gives us the grace to repent.
Week after week, the Spirit of God would descend on us in His heavy, weighty glory and lead us to our knees in continual repentance. Meanwhile,some of the leaders began to feel uncomfortable about it all. They were (and are) good brothers who dearly love God, but they began to feel so uncomfortable with the way the Holy Spirit kept “hovering” over us that
they wanted to “move on.” The problem was that the Spirit of God didn’t want to “move” anywhere. They said, “That’s enough repentance. Let’s go into joy,” so in the end we left the Holy Spirit behind to party when God
wanted to complete a deeper work of repentance in us and perhaps in the nation as a whole.
We often think God should be satisfied with our repentance or obedience in a particular area, when His focus isn’t on us at all! Sometimes
He is satisfied with our repentance on “Day 1,” and He wants to work repentance in our families, churches, cities, or nation in “Days 2 through
21.” But then we get impatient. We want to have a celebration party before there’s anything to celebrate about! We left God’s place of grace so we could “move into joy,” but as we left Him behind, very slowly the hovering presence of the Spirit began to fade away too, along with His anointing.
All of us who witnessed that remarkable visitation were profoundly affected by it for years to come. I can still recall the wonderful presence of God that came down in those meetings, and I learned that we not only need
to learn how to “bring down the glory,” but we should also learn how to “steward the glory” with honor, respect, and obedience so He will stay with us.
God gave John the Baptist one “yardstick” to pick out the Messiah from the crowd of humanity. He said, “Upon whom you see the Spirit descending, and remaining on Him, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit” (Jn. 1:33b). During the Charismatic movement, we learned how to honor God and see the Holy Spirit descend upon us in a concentrated wayfrom time to time, but we didn’t know how to encourage His presence to remain among us.
I believe that a lifestyle of disciplined fasting and prayer (individually and corporately) is one of the elements required of a people who enjoy the abiding or lingering presence and glory of God. We need to learn this lesson because, believe me, when you get touched by the glory of God, there is nothing on earth to compare with it! I believe I would do anything, I would
walk a thousand miles on my knees to be around the glory of God. The key to overcoming the two great causes of casualties in the ministry is the intimacy borne out of hunger and personal surrender through prayer and fasting.
Endnotes
1. See Heb. 11:6.
2. See 2 Tim. 3:5.
3. See Esther 4:14.
4. The Lord did not necessarily expect each person to observe 21 days of continuous fasting, although some had the grace to do so. The church members were to take turns fasting as the Lord gave them grace so that throughout the 21-day fast, one or more believers were ministering in God’s presence in an unbroken chain of 24-hour prayer, fasting, praise, and worship.
- Mahesh Chavda ( The Hidden Power Of Prayer and Fasting)
JESUS SAVES TV
English
Arabic
French
Spanish
Portuguese
Deutsch
Turkish
Dutch
Russian
Romaian
Portuguese (Brazil)
Greek
हिन्दी