So here’s what happened in the hospital Emergency Room night before last: A powerful, breakout move of the Holy Spirit!! It was like a revival, a Spirit-filled home fellowship group on steroids – except we didn’t know a single person in there before the Holy Spirit broke out and touched about everybody in the place! And there were lots of people looking on and listening in from a distance, because it got joyously loud!
It started about an hour after we got there, when Cheryl Ford and I were sitting in the ER Lobby, waiting for my turn to see a doctor (right leg calf injury). Ironically, Cheri had tripped on a speed bump outside the ER before she entered, and she was injured, too. We hadn’t really noticed the people sitting near us, but in retrospect, here were some of them that got caught up with us in God’s “Holy Ghost Party”: an African American couple in their 40’s, a young unmarried Caucasian couple with a precious young toddler, a young Hispanic woman, a man from Cambodia with a splitting headache, and a big burly biker guy with shaved head and tattoos everywhere. We all had on masks, no one was talking or engaging others in any way.
Then, it happened. I noticed that the African American woman (I’ll call her Sugar) was wearing a Jesus-slogans billboard shirt that honored the Lord in a hundred ways. I said, “I really like your shirt.” She thanked me, and I said, “So you’re a Christian…”. She said, “O, yes. He’s so good to me!” I said, “Praise the Lord!!” Then her husband (I’ll call him John) joined in the conversation, and he clearly loved and served the Lord, too. I asked him, “Are you a pastor?” He said, “Yes, I am”, explaining that he was being mentored by leaders in his Pentecostal church movement. I said, “I’m a pastor, too!” Then Cheri jumped in the conversation, and the four of us were engulfed by the powerful and joyous presence of Jesus – you know, the “two or three gathered in His name” thing started happening!
I’m not exactly sure how the Holy Spirit made the leap from the four of us to everyone around us, but He did! He decided to jump out of the creeds and the four-walls confinements of church buildings (where we so often want to keep Him), and to manifest His joyous and loving presence in the marketplace, in a very unlikely setting, where people rarely talk as they quietly and sometimes anxiously wait their turn to be seen.
So, He did that, He spilled out and over lots of people! Easter Sunday had passed, but It was like Jesus, the Risen Christ, was among us saying, “I refuse to be stuffed back in that Tomb for another year until Easter rolls around again! No, I’m RISEN, I’m ALIVE! And this is where I belong – out here where people are hurting, where they need to know I love them!!”
In the next two-plus hours, Jesus touched lives, manifesting His love and power and glory. There were hugs, tears, jubilation, laying on of hands, praying for each others’ needs, sharing the Gospel message, challenging to surrender all and follow Jesus. The belligerent biker had calmed down and humbly listened to our witness, and was visibly touched as we gathered around him and prayed for him in one accord. The previously shy Cambodian man, once silently writhing in pain, head in his hands, was caught up in the Spirit, laughing and rejoicing, and he, too, placed his hand on one as we prayed for healing. The young father, not yet married to his fiancé, not a believer, had his arguments against Christ refuted, his resistance clearly weakened, was now considering becoming the man of God his wife-to-be and beautiful child needs and deserves. Money for a wedding was an issue. I offered to do the wedding free, and the young Hispanic woman, obviously a competent professional person, chimed in and offered to be their wedding planner for free! The young mother’s face told us how she was feeling about all of this: “yes, Yes, YES!!!”
I could go on…and on about lots more that God did, but I need to finish. Just a few more little blessings! 1) It was John and Sugar’s 20th wedding anniversary. God moved someone’s heart to give them a hundred dollar bill to celebrate. They were overjoyed!
2) Two security guards were watching and listening intently (as were lots of others), obviously fascinated by what they were witnessing. Even though things got exuberant, with shouts of praise and hallelujahs, with people standing together and praying aloud for one another, not once did they try to interfere. They seemed to enjoy every moment! (There is something irresistible about the joy of the Lord!)
3) Once the Holy Spirit was freely moving and His infectious joy started spreading, the precious little toddler girl started clapping her little hands, and she kept on clapping with an incredibly beautiful smile on her face.
4) One last thing: The biker was wearing a dark gothic-like shirt with the kind of reddish gothic font that is hard to read. As Cheri ministered to this guy in depth for quite some time, she found herself trying to figure out what word or message the unusual lettering was meant to convey. She asked him what his shirt said, but he didn’t know. She brought the question to the rest of us, and as we all tried to figure it out, there it was. Cheri saw it, and when she pointed it out to the rest of us, we all saw it, too. Wanna know what the word was? Here it is: “SALVATION”… Goosebumps! Glory!
HALLELUJAH!!! 
COME, HOLY SPIRIT!!! DO IT AGAIN, AND AGAIN, AND AGAIN….AND AGAIN!!!!