I Lost My Heart In San Francisco

Sorry it has been over a week since my last blog entry. Things have been really busy here on Capitol Hill. Anyone following the news is aware of all that's on the table. There's just a general sense of confusion and disorder right now. We were blessed to have Dutch Sheets drop in on our company of intercessors on Monday. He had flown in to DC from Colorado Springs for the sole purpose of praying. God had revealed a few things to him concerning the President, and he came to pray. He didn't come to meet with anyone. He wasn't in town to speak at a conference. He came by himself just to pray what God had shown him. When Lou heard he was in town, he asked him to stop by the JHOP. Now what makes a man like this think that he can get divine information and that he can somehow come here and shift something? I'll write more about this later. Right now I want to focus on our team that went to San Francisco. They've returned in the last few days, and God has enflamed their hearts to return by the end of the year for a long term stay. I asked my good friend Trevor to write something that expressed his heart concerning this trip. Following is a piece he has written.

Trevor Bartholemew Raffeo:
I lost my heart in San Francisco. The moment we arrived my eyes were opened to the brokenness around me. We did 21 days of night watch prayer in the heart of San Francisco. And my heart was shattered thinking about when was the last time God had an incense rising before Him of worship and undefiled love when a city comes alive with perversion idol worship. During our time in San Francicsco the Lord began to ask us to bear the cross that He bore for the sake of those who were dying in the streets and losing their souls because of a bondage that they can not get free from. We began to enter into the sufferings of Christ over His heart for the homosexual community and how He longs to free their souls, call them as sons and daughters and draw them out of many waters (Psalm 18). One of our last days of night watch, right in front of our eyes we were faced with everything we had been praying for. A 22 year old young man walked in. He had just given his life to the Lord and then found out that he had AIDS. It was manifesting on his skin and he was terrified of dying. All we could do was offer him our tears, our prayers and cry out to God. That night we had no great faith or extravagent prayers, all we had were our desperate cries to a merciful Daddy. This young man is only one of thousands and thousands who are broken and dying and all they are looking for is love. We began to hear of stories in which young men and women would get AIDS on purpose because they knew that they would be taken care of by the government. People are literally dying for love and all I could ask myself was “Would I die for love; would I die for them?” My heart has truly been lost in San Francisco.

A Question About Our Clock

It would seem that there are many more people out there reading this little blog than I realized. There seems to be a question about this mysterious clock that has come up (see below). To answer the question: Yes, it is an atomic clock. The resetting of the clock was not a terribly stange occurance in and of itself. Perhaps I should have clarified that I wasn't suggesting that the finger of God was spinning our little clock hands around. The real question here is "how does God speak?" You can choose to walk through life with the opinion that God doesn't speak anymore, or you can choose to believe that He does speak in a multitude of ways. He may give you a thundering voice from above or he may give you a compassionate word from a complete stranger. Both of them and everything in between are all windows that we can choose to look through- windows that can bring direction, confirmation and adjustment. Ken Gire discusses this in his book "Windows of the Soul." I believe God gives us many opportunities to hear and respond to his voice.

So what about that clock? As I said, resetting itself isn't terribly exciting. But, you see, it's the timing of the whole thing that was significant to us. It's not like we were sitting around waiting for a time discrepancy to adjust, and then quickly begin praying for Isaiah 40:3. No, a group of young people that have sacrificed their lives in prayer for our nation were in the middle of a 5-hour prayer meeting. They were crying out and weeping for God to bring revival to our nation. Then the clock reset itself to the right time of 4:03 as they were praying for the Spirit of Elijah to come. God is all about timing. That's why none of His words fall to the ground. They accomplish everything He sends them to do. Earlier this year as Kim and I were in the heat of deciding whether or not to move to DC, we were faced with making a final decision one day as we talked on our cell phones. I asked her, "Do you really think we can do it?" She giggled and said "Yes. The license plate on the car in from of me right now literally says 'GO DC'." Now one person will dismiss something like that and another will take it very seriously. I happen to believe that the overall problem is not that God isn't speaking. Rather, the problem tends to be that we aren't listening.

Time Flies

OK. This is kind of a weird one, but here goes.

We were in the prayer room this afternoon doing an intercession set. We prayed for the usual DC objectives, and ended up doing some pretty intense intercession for California, San Francisco and specifically the homosexual community. It started as prayer to gird up our team out there, but ended up in all-out intercession for God to move in the homosexual community. As the Spirit moved our group became broken for them and the way the Church has responded to them with hate and utter rejection. Every person was on their face weeping as we prayed. The Spirit then led us to pray specifically for the "Spirit of Elijah" to come to the homosexuals. This may seem like a disconnect, but in Malachi it's the Spirit of Elijah that turns the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers. This came after hearing a heart wrenching statistic that revealed approximately 80% of homosexuals were molested by their fathers or other trusted men. As we were praying this, one of our team said "Look at the clock!" We were all kinda surprised to see the clock's hands spinning around really fast. Suddenly, the clock stopped at exactly the correct time which was 4:03 p.m. We were blown away as we were directed to Isaiah 40:3. It's the scripture that prophesies the coming of the Spirit of Elijah! What an amazing confirmation that our prayers are exactly on target. This literally happened as we were praying for the Spirit of Elijah to come. I don't know what you think about that, but it was witnessed by about twenty people. One of our team actually whipped out her camera and caught the whole thing on video. It was extremely motivating to our whole community to continue pressing in for breakthrough. This all happened today which happens to be Yom Kippur- The Day of Atonement on the Jewish calendar. It also coincides with the end of a 40-day fast that many of our young people have been doing for breakthrough in several areas of America. It was this 40-day fast that launched part of our team to San Francisco a month ago.

Could it be that God is confirming that our prayers and fasting have been heard? The convergence of all these things today begs us to believe it's true. We felt like God showed us two things concerning this through the clock. One, that God is speeding up the process in this matter. And two, that He was showing us a window into the future of what's coming. Believe God for a MASSIVE revival to break forth among the homosexual community. It will rock the Church, and it will rock the world. I worship the God of love and compassion.

California Bound

Please pray for Lou this week. He, two of his sons and one of the JHOP team are traveling to San Francisco today. They’ll be spending a few days with the team that we sent there last month. Just a recap, God began to give us major direction to do intercession for California in light of recent prophetic words about impending judgement. We believe, for the time being, that God may have relented. The original plan was to go in, pray and get out. Our team went there in September with the attitude of Joel 2’s “who knows?”. Could it be that God has turned with pity and intends to leave behind a blessing instead? We’re not sure, but suddenly financial blessing has been provided in the last few weeks for the express purpose of establishing a long-term JHOP in California.

The two great giants that taunt the American Church are abortion and homosexuality. She has had no authority over them because she’s just as guilty as anyone in these areas. God gave our group a specific mandate in 2004 that we would challenge these two Goliaths. We believe our expeditionary team in San Francisco have been laying the early groundwork for how we are to combat the spirit behind homosexuality. We have been getting from them incredible reports of how God has given them such a profound love for the homosexual community during their intercession. Clearly, this is the primary missing ingredient with how the Church has responded to these individuals in the past. This kind of love can only come as we identify with Christ at the deepest levels. This will be unlike any battle the Church has ever fought. We are believing God for a massive revival to take place among the homosexuals!

The Harriet Anointing

Sorry it has been a few days since my last entry. Things have been pretty busy this week. Many of you have been asking "What are you guys getting on Harriet Miers?" There has been a lot of mixed feelings about her among christian conservatives. I heard that James Dobson initially endorsed her, but now he has withdrawn his support. Who knows? You really can't go by what the media is saying. You never know what the individual motivations are anyway. Honestly, we hadn't gotten anything specific from the Lord like we had concerning John Roberts. But we felt like that changed a couple days ago. Over the course of one day several people here and outside our group independantly began to connect Harriet Miers with Harriet Tubman and Harriet Beecher Stowe. We felt like we got enough confirmation from multiple sources that this was something God was revealing in our prayer life. So what does all that mean? We're calling for massive prayer and fasting for a "Harriet Anointing" to come upon Ms. Harriet Miers.

Further confirmation came Wednesday evening as Lou Engle was talking with Dutch Sheets on the phone. He explained the whole Harriet thing that we were getting, and Dutch felt a major confirmation in his spirit. He told Lou to write it up, and he would help mobilize the Body of Christ to start praying that way. What's more exciting is that Lou then got a call from our close Senator friend and ally. He explained that he would be meeting with Ms. Miers on Thursday, and he wanted to know if we were getting anything about her. Lou explained the Harriet thing to him and called for him to prophesy to her who God has called her to be. That's a huge risk for this man, but we believed it could be a divine moment. Then, in our Thursday morning meeting, we got a major download from the Lord that this man's meeting could be a Mordecai/Esther moment. Literally, he could be the one to call her forth into her destiny at this hour. We sent him a couple of urgent text messages detailing our prayers unsure if he would be able to follow through with such a crazy request. I'm excited to say the he called Lou back yesterday afternoon to let him know that he siezed the moment. The message was delivered! Can you believe this? I'm blown away that God gave us this prophetic word on Wednesday, and then provided an avenue to deliver the word to her the next day. God is so amazing. "Surely the Sovereign LORD does nothing without revealing his plan to his servants the prophets." (Amos 3:7)

Mobilize prayer meetings now. Begin to call forth this womans destiny. Declare that she will be that Anointed Harriet. I shared with Lou that when Abraham Lincoln first met Harriet Beecher Stowe he greeted her by saying, "So this is the little woman that started the big war." He said that we need to pray this over Ms. Miers. Pray that she will be the little woman that ends the big holocaust. The Church must contend in this hour. History is not in autopilot. Events change and sway for the praying and fasting Church. We need to go to war on this thing, not recline in curiosity and apathy. Like Esther, pray that Ms. Miers realize her divine moment or be removed so another can.

C'mon!

Smile Miss Lockett

The press were all over Gracie on Monday. We'll be looking for shots in the media. This guys was from Newsweek. He took a ton of pictures of our little activist.

A Curious Trend

So today's the big day- the opening day of the Supreme Court. We've called intercessors from all over to join us in front of the Supreme Court today for a Life Tape siege from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Looks like we'll have a good turnout. Check your news channels to see if you see us. Today will be a circus. Every special interest group will be there today.

So we've noticed an interesting event that seems to take place every time Kim and I have to be somewhere significant or important. We'll get within blocks of our destination, and then BLUGH! One of our children will become unexpectedly ill and throw up in the car forcing us to turn around and go home. I can't tell you how many countless times this has happened. And today was not different. We all got up early to arrive at the Court at 7:30 a.m. When we were about 1/2 mile away, Sam became violently sick with absolutely no warning. He threw up all over himself and the back seat. I went ahead and dropped off Kim and the girls, then came back to the Farm with the boys. I wanted us all to be there holding the line today, but I definitely wanted my girls there. God has really caused Taylor to embrace the cause against abortion and Gracie is miracle baby herself. I have felt for a long time now that God will give them both a powerful message to America.

I'm waiting to make sure Sam's OK, but it has been two hours now and he seems fine. Dare I attempt a return? I'll keep you posted what happens.

The Highs and the Lows

On Saturday our group laid siege at the foremost Planned Parenthood abortion clinic in DC. It's a sobering experience to watch as countless young women file in to murder an unwanted person. Obviously, not every person going in was there for an abortion. But there were clinic escorts that met people with abortion appointments and usher them in as a safety measure. At its peak during the time we were there, there seemed to be young women arriving for appointments about every 5 minutes. It's a big difference going from praying in front of the Supreme Court to praying in front of an abortion clinic. To go from the highest form of law to the lowest form of injustice can be overwhelming. But it's good because it keeps us grounded. It puts a face on this movement. Quite literally. It was heartbreaking to watch these young women (some with their boyfriends, most without) file in. It was even more heartbreaking to watch some of them leave with tears in their eyes. At one point we heard the escorts outside joking with each other about our presence and said, "We're really special! They come here because we do more abortions than anyone else. We're the busiest." I don't mention that out of anger. The statement broke our hearts. We heard a statistic the other day that said that the abortion rate was higher than the birth rate in DC two years ago. Some of our group got to talk with a couple of the escorts later in the afternoon. They seemed so confused but were genuinely looking for truth. They claimed to be athiests, but they kept referring to God as a real person. Apparently, many of the church have told them that they're going to hell and can never be saved or redeemed because of what they're doing. As a result, they basically said that if God can't forgive them, then they're going to go out in style. What has the Church done? We have lashed out in our anger and in our own pitiful self-righteousness. And what has it reaped? Exactly the same. Who are we to say that someone is beyond God's forgiveness? To even suggest that is to completely miss the point of Jesus' sacrifice. We're all sinners and nobody is beyond God's mercy. "God forgive your Church for not representing you. Forgive us for showing anger instead of love. Forgive us for hurting instead of helping."