Trip Sept. 23 rd – Oct. 4th 2006 – Our team from our church traveled with Randy Clark and a large Global Awakening team (209 people) to Forteleza & Santarem, Brazil. Forteleza is the 5th largest city in Brazil, located on the Atlantic Ocean in the north. We conducted pastors & leaders meetings during the day, and held gospel crusade meetings at night. We saw many come to Christ and receive healing in these meetings, but perhaps the most dramatic conversion testimony was given by one of our church leaders, David, on this trip.
David and some others went out into the streets of Forteleza to share Christ and pray for people as they had needs. As David and a married couple were praying for a crippled man, a young woman who was a prostitute came up to them asking to know more about Jesus. It turns out that she had slept the night before in a park, thrown out on the streets, and was asking God to help her. When she saw them ministering to the crippled man, she knew that they could help her. She approached them, and they began to share Christ with her, explaining to her that God would provide and that she didn’t need to live like this anymore. She gave her life to Jesus, with tears streaming down her face. As soon as they were done praying for her, she went and found her close friend who also was a prostitute. After sharing with her, she also gave her life to Jesus, and both young women were radiant and full of hope after this encounter. David and the others were able to connect the young women with a church near by that was part of the meetings that we were holding in the city. In another meeting that Pastor Bob led in Forteleza, we saw the Holy Spirit fall in power on the youth. There were about 25 that gave there lives to Christ, and about 15 that rededicated their lives to God (pictured at right). One young man gave his life to Christ after the general altar call, and as soon as he did, he was filled with the Holy Spirit and then his right eye that was blind opened completely. Wow, what a miracle! The pastor was so excited; he had the young man testify that night and the next as to what God had done. Praise God for new life and healing in Christ! We left Fortleza by plane to Santarem, which is a city located on the Amazon on the edge of the rain forest. Santarem is a poorer city, and has more witchcraft and spiritism in the area. Despite this, there is an exploding group of churches there that are believing God for their region. Once again, we saw many saved, healed and delivered in this city. The pastors and leaders meetings were explosive, with the Holy Spirit touching the people in powerful ways as they freshly committed themselves to the work of the Kingdom.
Trip Aug. 23 rd – Sept. 6th, 2005
In 2003 I made two missions trips with
Randy Clark and teams from Global Awakening Ministries, so this was my 3rd trip with a team from Global (at right, Randy interviews man who was healed). It was an amazing trip, with our team ministering to over 40,000 people during the trip, and seeing over 5000 physically healed, and about 1000 coming to Christ in the meetings. There were so many healed in the meetings, it was hard at times to keep up with what God was doing!
There was one meeting in which 7 deaf people completely received their hearing, 2 of those were deaf from birth! There were over 50 deaf people healed on the trip, and about 20 blind received sight. One night, a boy age 5, who had not walked for 3 years, suddenly began to walk during the worship! His mother brought him up on stage and the large crowd just shouted for joy! I preached & ministered in 2 churches, one church on a Thursday night then again on a Sunday night. One of those nights in Fiera, out of 300 people attending, there were about 60 people who had received some type of healing in their body. I had a word of knowledge about someone who had a damaged right knee from an accident. A visiting pastor responded, saying that his right knee had been badly damaged in a car accident and that he had little mobility in the knee.
As I prayed for him, you could feel the knee jerk, he fell backwards shouting that the pain was gone and he could now move the knee with complete mobility! We ministered for over 6 hours that night, the people simply didn't want to leave, they were so hungry for God and to receive from Him. Another night, I prayed for a woman who had a tumor in her breast, after praying for her for a few minutes, she said that the tumor was gone, it had disappeared. For two weeks, it was story after story of these types of healings occurring with the entire team. Jesus said in Mark 16 "that those who would believe on His name, they would lay hands on the sick, and they would recover." What an awesome privilege to be used by God to bring healing & deliverance to others! One night, I prayed for five different people during the altar ministry time to receive Christ, each one just seemed to be "ripe", after witnessing God moving in the meetings in such power. Pastor Bob
Brazil Trip June 2nd – 12th, 2003
Thanks for your support of the ministry trip to Brazil in June. These were some of the most powerful meetings I have ever been a part of anywhere in the world. Over 200 hundred accepted Christ, and over 1500 hundred were healed during the meetings! I had a word of knowledge one night that God was going to heal someone who had been in a motorcycle accident and was suffering from a damaged right knee. Several minutes later, a young man came up to the platform, and excitedly began to testify how he had just been healed of that very condition as he listened to the word as it was given! He began to show the crowd how he could move his knee, which he couldn't before, and then jumped off the platform running down the isle showing everyone what God had done!
Here is a testimony from one of the team members, Gary Oates, as a woman, seven months pregnant, came for prayer. She was blind in her right eye, caused by the disease Leptospirose (a disease caused by rats). There is no known cure for it. The doctor said she and the baby would both die. We began to pray that sight would be restored in her blind eye as a sign of God healing the disease. As we prayed, I asked her if she felt anything happening. She said she felt heat throughout her body…like it was on fire. I immediately took my thumb off of her eye and asked her to open it. When she did, she could see! She began to cry and fell over on me. I put my head down on her head and was crying almost as hard as she was. It was a very emotional moment for both of us. Her mother was crying and jumping up and down rejoicing over what God just did. We then prayed for her baby, that it would live and not die.
Two nights later, as I was testifying before the church about her healing, I saw her and her mother in the audience waving at me. I asked them to come up and tell what happened. She said she went back to the doctor and he said she was healed. It was a miracle! They had papers from the doctor verifying the healing! The crowd began to shout and cheer as the faith level in the church rose to a new high. Yeah God! Hebrews 13:8 says that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever! He is still healing people today by the power of the Holy Spirit, through humble people that will just take Him at His word. There were several times during the trip to Brazil in June that I just began to weep as I saw God heal and set people free as we ministered over them. One lady, after I prayed with her and she was healed, just sobbed and sobbed, thanking the Lord for healing her and thanking me for praying for her. It touched me deeply and I was humbled by what had happened, but was overjoyed to see the freedom on her face!
Manaus, Brazil Trip Aug. 24th – Sept. 2nd, 2003 - I left the hot, humid weather of Manaus, Brazil, which is located just south of the equator, and arrived back in hot, sunny Tucson just a week ago! Our days were busy, ministering in long morning meetings and even longer evening meetings that went until midnight or later each night! However, despite being hot and tired, it was a joy and a privilege to minister to the people of Brazil. Manaus is a city of nearly 2 million, the largest city in the Amazon region, with a desperate need for the power of Jesus Christ to bring transformation. Many of the people are involved in Macumba and Spiritism, forms of witchcraft, which have held those involved in darkness. However, there is a large and growing church in Manaus, and many are coming to Christ and are getting free from the chains of bondage.
I had the opportunity to minister in three churches while there, and in each church, saw God save, heal and deliver the oppressed. There were 69 of us on the Global Awakening team, and the statistics for the trip are as follows: called into ministry 146, rededication's 26, salvation's 1297, emotional/inner healings and deliverance's 346 and physical healings 2314! In the large meetings held nightly, there were thousands in attendance, and the salvations and healings that occurred were incredible. There were many nights that people were healed just as we worshipped, with no one praying for them! For example, there were four people healed of cancerous tumors during the worship, and they testified later what God had done for them. One night, a couple of team members were praying with a woman who had a large cancerous tumor in her abdomen, Jesus instantly healed her and the tumor was literally expelled from her body!
I was asked by Randy Clark to take a team to one of the smaller churches in Manaus to minister. We had a great time, testified of healings we had seen take place that week, and watched God heal more through the service. There were about 200 people in the meeting that night, and 39 people said that they were healed of various physical ailments during the meeting. I prayed with one woman who had been in an auto accident 4 months prior, and she could barely move her right leg or bend her right knee. After I prayed for a few minutes, I asked her if she could bend her knee, she tried, and got this intense look of pain on her face. The translator told me she was in a lot of pain, and there was no improvement. So, I began to pray some more. I asked God to allow His love and compassion to flow through me to her, just then I sensed His power touch her. So I asked her to try and bend her knee again, this time, she could bend it and felt no pain! She jumped up, her eyes were filled with joy and excitement, and begin to walk all around the room with no pain and with near perfect mobility of her leg and knee, yea God!
Another team member and I prayed for and watched God heal a young woman born deaf and mute. Here is Violet's account of the healing: Bob and I were given the opportunity to pray for a teenage girl who had been born deaf-mute. Her doctor was with her. Along with an interpreter we began to ask her questions before prayer. We asked if there was any Macumba, or unforgiveness from her past to her present. Then we prayed. I stuck my fingers in her ears and drew them out saying "Be healed in the name of Jesus". I clicked my fingers behind her on each side and she smiled. We asked more questions and discovered that her mother left her when she was young. She was an unwanted pregnancy and her mother gave her to her grandmother to raise. We prayed against rejection and abandonment, and had her forgive her mother. Then we began praying once again for the physical healing. The anointing increased and she could hear better. She responded by trying to sound out single words. We tested her to see how much healing she had received by having the interpreter go up the stairs behind her and call out her name. She began saying her name loud and she turned around and responded! The doctor was overjoyed and came later that evening and told us the grandmother was totally amazed at what God had done! Another team member prayed for a young man with scoliosis, she said that as she was praying for him, she could feel the bones in his back begin to move. She lifted his shirt, and watched as God moved the backbone into perfect alignment!
The healings were awesome to watch, but just as powerful were seeing the hundreds accept Jesus as Savior! One night I gave an alter call in one of the smaller churches that we ministered in, there were probably between 600-700 people in the meeting, and 65 people responded to accept Christ and rededicate their lives to Him - roughly 10% of the people in attendance! The Lord reminded me while in Manaus that the fields are truly white for harvest and that we are truly approaching the time spoke of in Amos 9 when the plowman would overtake the reaper. In many nations, so many are coming to Christ, there aren't enough trained leaders to disciple them all, so new believers are quickly being trained and released to shepherd over the multitudes coming into the Kingdom! We live in exciting times! Pastor Bob