We were at the edge of the Hill in front of the 7 Eleven, when I started thinking, 'what if prayers are like water,' and I pictured God's glory and the prayers of the saints on Pigeon Hill pouring down the Hill like a waterfall into the rest of the city. I prayed for revival on Pigeon Hill.
Fast forward to 2010, a Monday night, beginning of October. A small band faithfulof warrior saints is in the basement of the Pourhouse cafe on Kirkwood. The bunker, the "Prayer Room," is a tiny cement walled room, exposed piping on the ceiling, but it's new carpet and new green paint are signs of a hope for something to come, something great. That night it was only myself, Sarah, Colleen, and Kenyon, but in the Kingdom of God, one quickly learns that Holy Spirit is what makes something big, and He is not tame. He decided to speak passionately that night. It started with Kenyon's heart moved to pray for the Hill. Immediately, I was moved to pray for Halloween night. The two of us were touched with the fire of God, and I began weeping. After Sarah brought the two hours to a close she said, "man, I think we definitely need to get a prayer walk going on Halloween night! That was it intense, it came out of nowhere!"
The day before Halloween, Sarah's words rang in my head. On October 31 after church, I called Kenyon. I tried calling several other brothers and sisters, but they were all busy. I wasn't deterred, instead I had a peace that it was going to be exactly how God wanted it to be. Kenyon picked me up at around 6pm in the "vanimal" -- Salvation Army's great big 12 passenger van. :)
We prayed once in the van before hitting the streets. There weren't a lot of people out trick-or-treating, just a few here and there. I ran into two of my violin students from Fairview dressed as GIJoes. As we walked and prayed, one of the first prayers that I felt very strongly in my heart was for the elderly women of faith in the community needing encouragement. Eventually, we made our way to the 7Eleven. Kenyon seemed very purposeful in walking in to talk to the cashier. She was a middle aged, heavy set woman, tired looking. We asked her what we could pray for, and she gave the answer that is very typical of strangers being asked for prayer requests, "Oh, nothing, I'm good. Just pray for me in general." So we walk out and begin praying for her. I felt led to pray that she would know that she is beautiful, and that God sees her as beautiful. Kenyon asked, "Do you think that prayer is from you, or from God?"
"Well, at this point, it's hard for me to tell the difference! God, I think."
"Because it really struck a chord in me, and I'm wondering if we should go back and tell her. Well, Father I just pray that if you want us to speak to her again, lead us back to her before we go back home."
So we continue on. Eventually we turn a corner, and almost immediately I sense that something is powerfully different in the spiritual realm, as if I had crossed a threshold. It felt like a powerful force was emanating from the house to our right, and I felt it most strongly in the back of my head, almost like a pressure. "Woah, Kenyon, do you feel that?"
"Feel what? No."
"This is so weird. I feel something so powerful. This place is so different from the rest of the Hill. I don't know what it is. Can we stop to pray?"
As we walk to the end of the block, I peer into the window of the house. In the window is a display of a sizeable collection of angel figurines. We stop on the top of two little steps, and turn around to face the house. My suspicions were of New Age practices. Not knowing what else to think, I start praying against witchcraft. The force I feel in my head, never lessons as I pray.
"I don't know," I say. So we turn around and continue on. Directly in front of us are two men sitting on a stoop. I recognize one of them as a homeless guy I had prayed with before at Renovo, and we exchange warm greetings. We chat a little, and find that he was supposed to be in New Orleans that day to work, but it fell through, and now he feels down on his luck. Both of them are open to prayer at the end of our conversation. His friend is very silent the whole time, and shakes his head when we ask him if he has any specific prayer requests. As I gaze on him, I feel led to ask him, "You have family, don't you?" He nods. "You have a daughter, don't you?" He nods. "Okay, we're going to pray for your daughter." Kenyon then asks him something to the effect of whether he sees her often or not. He replied that she is in Indianapolis and that he hasn't seen her in awhile. I ask Kenyon to open us in prayer. When I start praying over this man and his daughter, I pray without inhibition. I don't remember exactly what I prayed, except that I said that she misses him, and I prayed for deeper love in their relationship. As we made our farewells, I noticed his face was changed. His eyes were shining and in his silence he looked rather shocked. Having no idea how this really effected him, I just hoped that God had really touched him.
As we begin to leave, I ask Kenyon if we can go back the way we came because, "I want to see if I get that feeling again. I want to experiment to see if it's really something there, or if it's just me." So we head back, and sure enough; just before the step, it hits me. Again, as if I had crossed some sort of threshold.
"Ahhh. There it is again. Woah, it is so strong. This is SO weird Kenyon! What is that?!"
He is staring at the house calmly while I'm flipping out. "That house is special," he said.
"Is it a good feeling or a bad feeling?" I ask."Good," he replies. "It has a warmth."
Now that our curiosity is fully aroused, we draw nearer to the house.
"Maybe we should knock on the door," he suggests.
"Yeah, why not? It's Halloween."Kenyon knocks. We wait for a long time as dogs start barking. Finally the door opens a crack to reveal a plump elderly woman dressed in her night gown and her gray hair in a bun. There is momentary mild chaos as one of the dogs gets through the door and she tries to push them back inside, and we try to explain over the dogs barking wildly that we aren't trick-or-treaters and we don't really know why we knocked on the door. As this is going on, behind us a stout man, well-dressed in all black comes walking through the parking lot towards us. He looks concerned. "Hello, can I help you?" He calls out.
"Oh, is this your house?" I ask.As he replies that yes it is, he arrives on the front porch next to us. The powerful force is stronger in their presence. It's full of light, and now I recognize that these are holy people, and that the powerful force is in fact from God, His Holy Spirit and His angels. The man explains to us that he doesn't celebrate "the devil's holiday" and that he just came from church. We explain that we don't either, and that we were on a prayer walk when we felt really drawn to their house. By this point, the man opens up, and says, "Well when I was over at church, the Holy Spirit told me to go home early. It's still goin' on right now, and normally I stay to talk with people." By this point, Kenyon is super excited, and I am so giddy that I can't stand up, so I sit down on the front porch chair. The man introduces himself as Brother Grey, and his wife as Sister Grey. He asks us what church we go to, and then proceeds to give us a brief sketch of his life story. We find that he has lived there on the Hill his entire life, and that he grew up in the church, went wayward for awhile in his youth, and then came to the Lord, and is now the only committed Christian household he knows of on the Hill. "Yep, people know us, and they know that our home is always open, and sometimes they come in for prayer." He goes on to talk about how it's the Last Days and we have to get ready for the Lord's return, and how the Lord miraculously brought a man over from Nigeria to their church to speak prophetically over the Hill, and that he collected and passed out 80 Bibles single-handedly on the Hill not to long ago. "Brother Ro...something," he fishes around for the name.
"Oh!! Brother Rotimi! You mean Brother Rotimi!" I exclaim.
"Yes, that's the one! The one who got a zip code from the Holy Spirit and it led him all the way from Nigeria to our church!"
"Ohhhh, that was your church! Yep, I went to one of his teachings on healing."
We then found out that we had other mutual acquaintances, including Pastor Harden and Rabbi Hevia.
With great joy, we agreed to go inside to pray together before parting. Inside was full of warmth and glow. It was an incredibly small space, which almost seemed to accentuate the greatness of God in that humble place. Sister Grey appeared from the hallway to join us in the living room. She introduced herself as Caroline. In suppressed ecstatic joy I told her I was so honored to meet her. She sat down in the one chair that could fit in the living room and explained to us that she wasn't able to go to church that night because of physical ailments including pains in her back and ankles. Kenyon asked if we could lay hands on her as we prayed, and she agreed. Brother Grey asked Kenyon to start us off, and we all joined in a concert prayer. Caroline's sweet prayers were more like weeping, and as I prayed for her, I kept getting an image of a beautiful swan. I figured this was a picture of the beauty of her soul.
After the Amen was spoken, Kenyon encouraged them in their ministry, saying that they have great influence in the neighborhood, and that he got an image while we were praying that the angels surrounding their house are like huge offensive linemen in football. Likewise, I shared with Caroline the swan and her beauty.
As we left Brother and Sister Grey's house in overwhelmed joy, we found that we were heading towards the 7Eleven. "Looks like we are going to talk to Kim," Kenyon said. So we told her everything that happened, and Kenyon shared Psalm 139 with her, and we told that she is beautiful and God sees her as beautiful. With that, we felt that our mission was accomplished and went home.
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