A Prophetic Stream
There are just a few outbreaks of Holy Spirit revival in Britain in the twentieth century which are generally recognised by revival historians: Wales in 1904-5; the relatively local revival in 1921 in Lowestoft, where we lived for 25 years; and of course the powerful revival that took place in the Hebrides off the coast of Scotland under the ministry Duncan Campbell in 1949, just a year before I was born.
There were other moves also which are less frequently mentioned in the revival history books: the move of God associated with the Jeffries brothers in the 1920’s; and the outpouring associated with the ministry of Martyn Lloyd-Jones in Aberavon in South Wales in the 1930’s, to mention but two.
But the 50’s and 60’s were times of barrenness until the start of the Charismatic Movement in the late 1960’s. There was then a powerful wave in the mid 90’s which began in Toronto and greatly impacted Great Britain, and which is now generally referred to as ‘The Father’s Blessing’. After a few years, the churches of these islands tended for the most part to lose sight of this outpouring in an effort to programme church-planting and evangelism. However, recently, following the example of many North American churches like Bethel, IHOP and others, God’s people here have been rediscovering the River of God, and there is an increasing sense that the best is yet to come.
In the meanwhile, there has been a stream of prophecy about revival coming to Britain, which has fostered this sense of expectation, and helped create a hunger among the churches for more of God.
I want to represent some of these words, which continue to have a key influence of me, the more so now that we live in Wales, which is the very hearth of revival fire in Great Britain, and where a deep-seated longing to see a fresh outpouring of God continues to be carried and expressed by the people of God.
These prophetic visions and words are not presented in chronological order, but rather in the order in which they impacted me, so this is more a personal overview than a comprehensive collection of key words about revival coming to the British Isles.
Julie Meyer
But I’ll start with the most recent, which was a prophecy from the Voice of the Apostles conference held by the Revival Alliance network in Lancaster, Pennsylvania in the third week of October 2012, just two weeks before I started working on this. It was spontaneously sung during a worship time by Julie Meyer, one of the worship leaders of IHOP, the International House of Prayer in Kansas City, Missouri, where she has been involved in ministry since its inception in 1999.
Here's a transcript of the prophecy:
Even today I can see the Bridegroom Jesus, and he’s got his eyes on Europe... Even this morning I can see the bridegroom dancing... He’s making his plans... His eyes are on Europe ... He’s going to dance all over the land, he’s going to set the captives free ... And it’s going to start in Britain. The Lord says, ‘Keep your eyes on Britain’ ... There’s something greater coming to Great Britain, something greater than John Wesley ... The Bridegroom, he’s going to dance all over the land ... And that which John Wesley started - you’re part of the great, great storyline, Britain. And it’s not over. It’s getting bigger, it’s bigger ... You’re not left out, Europe ... I’ll make you a sign and a wonder ... for the nations are mine, and Europe is mine ... So keep your eyes on Britain, it’s going to start in Britain like a wildfire, like a wildfire ... It’s unstoppable, it’s unstoppable because I’m God, and I choose you .
Behold the bridegroom cometh ...
You can see the video recording of this powerful prophetic declaration at the following link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMBNwejTGd8
This is simply the most recent of a stream of prophecies that I have been aware of, which have come from significant and internationally known and well-respected prophetic ministries. And while there have been several increasingly powerful moves of the Holy Spirit in Britain since the early days of the Charismatic Movement in the late 1960’s, there’s a still an overwhelming sense that the greatest is yet to come. The prophecies fuel that expectation, and create faith and a growing hunger to see it happen.
Jean Darnall (1967)
I first became aware of this stream of prophecy several years before I was converted myself, when as a teenager I was attending Thornbury Baptist Church, in what was then Gloucestershire, with my family. I remember going with the youth group to a convention held at Pip n Jay’s Anglican church in Bristol (St Phillip and St Jacob’s) at which Jean Darnell was the speaker. Darnell had been discipled by Aimee Semple McPherson, and was a minister in the Foursquare Gospel movement that McPherson had founded. Darnell had at that time just received the third of three identical visions concerning revival coming to Great Britain, the third of which she had received just a short while before she visited Bristol while staying at the manse of St Mary’s Church at Poole in Dorset. The meeting at Pip n Jay’s must have been one of the first occasions when she shared the vision. She described to the congregation there what she had seen.
This is the gist of what we heard Jean Darnall share with us:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnDzcpUTkOs
Smith Wigglesworth (1947)
During
the next few decades there will be two distinct moves of the Holy
Spirit across the Church in Great Britain. The first move will affect
every church that is open to receive it and will be characterised by a
restoration of the baptism and gifts of the Holy Spirit.
The second move of the Holy Spirit will result in people leaving historic churches and planting new churches.
In the duration of each of these moves, the people who are involved will say, ‘This is the great revival.’ But the Lord says, ‘No, neither is this the great revival, but both are steps towards it.’
When the new church phase is on the wane, there will be evidenced in the churches something that has not been seen before: a coming together of those with an emphasis on the Word and those with an emphasis on the Spirit. When the Word and the Spirit come together, there will be the biggest movement of the Holy Spirit that the nation, and indeed, the world, has ever seen. It will mark the beginning of a revival that will eclipse anything that has been witnessed within these shores, even the Wesleyan and the Welsh revivals of former years. The outpouring of God’s Spirit will flow over from the United Kingdom to the mainland of Europe, and from there, will begin a missionary move to the ends of the earth.”
More insight from Wigglesworth concerning this prophetic revelation was later given by someone who was disciple by him. This was the American evangelist Lester Sumrall, ‘the father of Christian television’, who died in 1996, just at the time that the Father’s Blessing outpouring was happening in both the USA and great Britain, and here in Wales.
Sumrall recorded:
"... Shutting his eyes again, he said, 'I see the greatest revival in the history of mankind coming to Planet earth, maybe as never before. And I see every form of disease healed. I see whole hospitals emptied with no one there. Even the doctors are running down the streets shouting.' "He told me that there would be untold numbers of uncountable multitudes that would be saved. No man will say 'so many, so many,' because nobody will be able to count those who come to Jesus. No disease will be able to stand before God's people... 'It will be a worldwide situation, not local,' he said, 'a worldwide thrust of God's power and God's anointing upon mankind.' "Then he opened his eyes and looked at me and said, 'I will not see it, but you shall see it. The Lord says that I must go on to my reward, but that you will see the mighty works that He will do upon the earth in the last days.' "... The idea that I would get to see this revival was almost overwhelming. And in the last decade or so, I believe we have seen this revival begin to sweep the earth. We have seen amazing moves of God in Africa... Recently, I was in China and met with the underground church. I was told there are at least forty-five million Full Gospel Christians in China. I discovered a depth of prayer and integrity there that I have not felt anywhere else in the world... So I believe we are seeing Wigglesworth's prophecy begin to be fulfilled. We are seeing the first stages of it."
Ginny Burgin (1997)
The Father’s Blessing powerfully overwhelmed the churches in Britain in 1994, and for some years totally changed the way people did church. In the church I was leading in Lowestoft at the time, we were powerfully impacted, and joy and laughter featured frequently. I was sometimes so overcome as to be unable to stand to preach. Many lives were radically changed as the Holy Spirit overwhelmed us over and over again. We saw broken relationships restored, and many come to a new freedom of intimacy with the Father, and we sought to give away what we received by running regular Saturday night ‘Wellspring’ meetings to which people would come from miles around. However, by 1997 many churches, including our own, were feeling the need to be more earnest about outreach, and the result was that many lost sight of the outpouring of the life of God.
Then, just before the tragic death of Diana, Princess of Wales, a previously little known prophet in Yorkshire received a prophetic vision which suddenly took on significance when the funeral of Diana saw vast areas outside the Royal Palaces and elsewhere covered with the flowers of mourning.
Here is the word that Ginny Burgin later shared at Walkley Baptist Church in Sheffield on 31st August 1997, the morning after the death of Diana. The first part of the prophecy was initially given on 18th May 1997, some three months before Diana’s death:
Dyfrig Griffiths, Moriah Chapel (2004)
Some years later, Hazel and I were feeling strongly led to Wales from East Anglia, where we had spent all our married life up to that point. We were developing friendship with the small group of people who were the nucleus of a Newfrontiers church plant in Cardiff, especially with Morgan and Belinda Hopkins who were then leading it. On a visit from Lowestoft to Cardiff which coincided with the centenary celebrations of the outbreak of the 1904 revival at Loughor, the four of us decided to drive to Moriah Chapel to see the place for the first time. We arrived there just as the chapel was being prepared for a special service to be broadcast on television that evening. Even though he was busy with the preparations, Dyfrig Griffiths - then an elder at Moriah - kindly agreed to show us around. It proved to be a deeply moving experience, made all the more so given what had happened there exactly 100 years before, to the day.
Dyfrig explained that in the weeks that followed the outpouring of the Spirit under the ministry of Evan Roberts, the chapel was filled to overflowing with hundreds and hundreds of people, with many being unable to get into the building. Today, he explained in response to my question, just a handful of mainly older people worship there.
Then a few moments later, in the main chapel, Dyfrig paused and prophesied. He filled up as he did so. This is the gist of what he said:
‘You know, the tide in the estuary here is the second highest in the world, rising and falling some forty-five feet. Just as this make it the second highest tidal range in the whole world, so the revival which was experienced here in 1904-5 will prove to be the second highest that there will have been. For an even greater move of God is yet to come to this land which will fill the chapels once again.’
In the following year, we moved to Cardiff, where we have been ever since. The words of Dyfrig continue to echo in my heart as we desire and seek for a fresh and even greater move of God in this land that there has ever been before. And continually we are encouraged by the prophetic.
Keith Hazell (2006)
When we first moved to Cardiff to take on the new church plant there was a stream of prophecy concerning what God was going to do in and through the new work. There were many memorable prophecies, but one in particular remains with me, because there was a dimension to is concerning what God was purposing to do in South Wales as a while, in which Hope Church would play a part. The prophecy came through our good friend Keith Hazell, a mature and greatly respected Canadian prophet who has done much work in recent days among the Newfrontiers family of churches.
Keith spoke in particular about the work in the Valleys. One phrase in particular stood out:
‘The Valleys shall ring with the sound of praise!’
This is how part of his prophecy went:
I believe God speaks to you that there is life going to flow into the valleys of Wales. This is against what men think, but this is what God thinks. The valleys shall … the valleys shall ring with the sound of praise. God just says this is going to effectively change a lot of people’s thinking; some attitudes are going to be changed, because God’s going to do this.
Right through the twentieth century, the life of the church in the Valleys has been marked by dispiriting decline. Many of the blogs I have written about the area’s spiritual history feature photographs and references to chapels that have been closed, converted to other uses, or vandalised and demolished. But Keith’s word encourages the hope that soon some of those that survive will once more ring with the sound of heavens songs. It was that prophecy which confirmed in me the desire to experience ‘heaven’s song being sung on the earth’ - something we were often caught up into at Hope as heaven touched earth when we came into His presence together.
Charles Parham & William Seymour (1909)
A short while after coming to Cardiff to lead a Newfrontiers church plant which we called Hope Church Cardiff we were introduced to the ministry and teaching of Bill Johnson. His books made such an impact that I had to go and hear him, and so it was in the autumn of 2007 that I accompanied my good friend Pete Carter to Bethel Church in Redding, California. There were several other visits subsequently to a church that has had a deep and powerful impact on my life.
These visits coincided with the dissemination of a number of books honouring the Azuza Street Revival of 1906, which I bought in the Bethel bookstore. One of these drew my attention to yet another key prophecy regarding a coming revival.
The book described how, in 1909, Charles Parham, the father of the American Pentecostal movement, and William Seymour, the leader of the Azusa Street Revival, both received approximately the same prophetic revelation without knowing it. One of them was on the East coast at the time (Parham), and the other (Seymour) was on the West coast. They had not been in communication with each other beforehand.
They both said in 1909 referring to the Azusa outpouring that what happened at Pentecost in Acts Chapter 2 was like the former rain. The Pentecostal outpouring they had been experiencing from 1906 onward in Azuza Street was like the latter rain. They both said that in about 100 years time there would come an even greater revival which would be like the former rain and the latter rain coming together. They also said that it wouldn’t just be a relatively local outpouring like Azusa, but it would be all over the world.
Tommy Welchel, who as a young man knew many of those who lived through the season of revival at Azuza Street, reported what he know about Seymour’s prophecy to Sid Roth.
Here is a transcript of that interview:
Sid: Now William Seymour prophesied about the next revival that will come, tell me about that.
Tommy: He prophesied that in about a hundred years, he did this in 1909, that there would be a ...
Sid: So about a hundred years would be 2009?
Tommy: Yes that would be about right, before or after ...
Sid: About, OK.
Tommy: He said another revival like unto Azuza Street only greater would coma again, only this time it wouldn't be in one place, it would be all over the world.
Here is a clip of Tommy Welchel speaking with Randy Clark about the 1909 prophecy:
Wakey, Wakey (2008)
I believe around this time things began to shift. It was certainly a time when once again the church I was leading was experiencing fresh Holy Spirit encounters, and breakthroughs with healing.
It was about this time that Beni Johnson reported an interesting prophetic encounter that a young Welsh girl, a BSSM student at Bethel, had while visiting Moriah Chapel, Evan Roberts’ home church.
Beni writes of this:
Before she moved here, she had a major encounter with God. She was woken in the middle of the night because the presence of God was so strong in her room. She could see a visible cloud in her room, and she waited on God to see what He was saying. Then God said to her, 'I want you to go to Moriah Chapel and say 'Wakey, wakey.' She thought 'You want me to do what?? I'm sorry God, but I'm not doing that!' Then He said to her again, 'I want you to go to Moriah Chaple and say 'Wakey, wakey!'' At that point, she knew that if she didnlt do it, she would regret it for the rest of her life. The next day when she got to the chapel, there were a lot of people outside. She said normally the chapel was empty. She asked God why there were so many people there, and He said to her 'Because I had to tell you twice.' She stood outside of the chapel and whispered 'Wakey, wakey' because she did not want anyone to hear her. God then said to her 'is that how much you want revival in Wales?' She then stood there that day and yelled at the top of her lungs: 'WAKEY, WAKEY!!!'
Nothing happened for about five minutes, so she turned around to cross the road and go over to a shop. As she turned around, she felt the ground begin to shake and heard this huge yawn. She looked back at the chapel, and a huge angel stepped out. All she could see was his feet because he was that large. She asked him who he was, and he turned to her and said 'I am the angel from the 1904 revival and you just woke me up.' She asked him why he had been asleep. The angel answered and said 'Because no one has been calling out for revival any more.' She then asked him if he was the angel that was going to bring the next revival. He told her no because the next revival would bring in many more souls for the kingdom.Since the angel has been woken, he has been seen by many others around Wales.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CeICsMbgR3A
Tonbridge (2009)
2009 was a bit of a crisis year for us. In spite of seeing God doing amazing things among us at Hope Church, we were struggling to keep going because another much bigger church nearby had joined the Newfrontiers family, with the effect of somewhat overshadowing our small church plant. I was despondent and struggling to keep going. A week’s retreat at Ffald-y-brenin had provided a wonderful experience of reassurance of God’s love for me and of his hand being on our situation, but the whole experience continued to be deeply challenging, and ultimately we would close the church plant down at the start of 2010.
In November 2009, I was driving alone to Tonbridge in Kent where Kris Vallotton of Bethel was speaking at a conference organised by North Kent Community Church. I was struggling with huge questions. Why were things going the way they were? What was God doing? Shouldn’t all we were experiencing in our meetings of the presence of God, and the healings we were beginning to see happen be resulting in growth and blessing rather than this?
As I drove out of Cardiff it started to rain very, very heavily. It came down so hard I had to slow right down as the wipers, going full-pelt, could scarcely clear the rainwater from the car’s windscreen. Then it eased off, and I drove on. A few minutes later I could see this huge black cloud looming in the rear-view mirror, and then the rain came down again, as heavily as before for a few minutes. This went on all the way along the M4 towards London as the rain tracked east in the same direction that I was driving. It was a very striking experience, which made me feel as if the rain-cloud was chasing me all the way, and sometimes overtaking me with a deluge.
Later that evening, in the first worship time of the conference, I was engaging with God and amusing on the experience I had had in the car that afternoon, enquiring of God about it. Suddenly I sensed God saying to me very clearly ‘I am pursuing you, and I want to overwhelm you with my love’. It was extraordinarily powerful moment.
Later, I was to feel that there was more to it than a personal affirmation from God to me, and that while he wanted me to encounter his love in a deeply powerful way, he was also wanting to overwhelm the nation with a fresh experience of his love and power. I later shared this with the conference.
Over the next few days while we listened to Kris, it continued to rain heavily. Right across the nation there was a heavy deluge which went on for days. Rivers began to burst their banks, and there was extensive flooding in many places.
I felt it was a confirmation of what I had heard God speak to me about his desire to overwhelm us in the British Isles with his love, and a promise of a revival outpouring which was about to happen. Even though our outward circumstances in the context of our own church-plant seemed to contradict it, I sensed that God was about to bring an amazing degree of blessing to the British Isles.
Arthur Burt & Bob Jones (1930 / 2009)
In the meanwhile, there still plenty of prophetic encouragement concerning a fresh move of God’s Spirit in these nations that make u Great Britain, including Wales!
Another concerns the unlikely conjunction of Arthur Burt, who lives in Penmaenmawr in North Wales, and the American prophet Bob Jones.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CcmD1zhFaw&feature=relmfu
Westminster Conference (2011)
At the very beginning of September 2011 Hazel and I were privileged to be able to attend the first Revival Alliance conference in Westminster in London. I subsequently wrote a full account of the conference and what I felt to be its significance on my blogpage. It can be read at:
http://daibach-welldigger.blogspot.co.uk/2011/09/revival-alliance-meetings-in.html
There had been plenty of prophetic encouragement beforehand to the organisers of this conference that God was giving the churches of Britain a second opportunity to experience an outpouring of his grace and love with a view to reaching the nation. At the conference, Bill Johnson, who was one of the speakers, said, on the second day of the gathering:
There are just a few outbreaks of Holy Spirit revival in Britain in the twentieth century which are generally recognised by revival historians: Wales in 1904-5; the relatively local revival in 1921 in Lowestoft, where we lived for 25 years; and of course the powerful revival that took place in the Hebrides off the coast of Scotland under the ministry Duncan Campbell in 1949, just a year before I was born.
There were other moves also which are less frequently mentioned in the revival history books: the move of God associated with the Jeffries brothers in the 1920’s; and the outpouring associated with the ministry of Martyn Lloyd-Jones in Aberavon in South Wales in the 1930’s, to mention but two.
But the 50’s and 60’s were times of barrenness until the start of the Charismatic Movement in the late 1960’s. There was then a powerful wave in the mid 90’s which began in Toronto and greatly impacted Great Britain, and which is now generally referred to as ‘The Father’s Blessing’. After a few years, the churches of these islands tended for the most part to lose sight of this outpouring in an effort to programme church-planting and evangelism. However, recently, following the example of many North American churches like Bethel, IHOP and others, God’s people here have been rediscovering the River of God, and there is an increasing sense that the best is yet to come.
In the meanwhile, there has been a stream of prophecy about revival coming to Britain, which has fostered this sense of expectation, and helped create a hunger among the churches for more of God.
I want to represent some of these words, which continue to have a key influence of me, the more so now that we live in Wales, which is the very hearth of revival fire in Great Britain, and where a deep-seated longing to see a fresh outpouring of God continues to be carried and expressed by the people of God.
These prophetic visions and words are not presented in chronological order, but rather in the order in which they impacted me, so this is more a personal overview than a comprehensive collection of key words about revival coming to the British Isles.
Julie Meyer
But I’ll start with the most recent, which was a prophecy from the Voice of the Apostles conference held by the Revival Alliance network in Lancaster, Pennsylvania in the third week of October 2012, just two weeks before I started working on this. It was spontaneously sung during a worship time by Julie Meyer, one of the worship leaders of IHOP, the International House of Prayer in Kansas City, Missouri, where she has been involved in ministry since its inception in 1999.
Here's a transcript of the prophecy:
Even today I can see the Bridegroom Jesus, and he’s got his eyes on Europe... Even this morning I can see the bridegroom dancing... He’s making his plans... His eyes are on Europe ... He’s going to dance all over the land, he’s going to set the captives free ... And it’s going to start in Britain. The Lord says, ‘Keep your eyes on Britain’ ... There’s something greater coming to Great Britain, something greater than John Wesley ... The Bridegroom, he’s going to dance all over the land ... And that which John Wesley started - you’re part of the great, great storyline, Britain. And it’s not over. It’s getting bigger, it’s bigger ... You’re not left out, Europe ... I’ll make you a sign and a wonder ... for the nations are mine, and Europe is mine ... So keep your eyes on Britain, it’s going to start in Britain like a wildfire, like a wildfire ... It’s unstoppable, it’s unstoppable because I’m God, and I choose you .
Behold the bridegroom cometh ...
You can see the video recording of this powerful prophetic declaration at the following link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMBNwejTGd8
This is simply the most recent of a stream of prophecies that I have been aware of, which have come from significant and internationally known and well-respected prophetic ministries. And while there have been several increasingly powerful moves of the Holy Spirit in Britain since the early days of the Charismatic Movement in the late 1960’s, there’s a still an overwhelming sense that the greatest is yet to come. The prophecies fuel that expectation, and create faith and a growing hunger to see it happen.
Jean Darnall (1967)
I first became aware of this stream of prophecy several years before I was converted myself, when as a teenager I was attending Thornbury Baptist Church, in what was then Gloucestershire, with my family. I remember going with the youth group to a convention held at Pip n Jay’s Anglican church in Bristol (St Phillip and St Jacob’s) at which Jean Darnell was the speaker. Darnell had been discipled by Aimee Semple McPherson, and was a minister in the Foursquare Gospel movement that McPherson had founded. Darnell had at that time just received the third of three identical visions concerning revival coming to Great Britain, the third of which she had received just a short while before she visited Bristol while staying at the manse of St Mary’s Church at Poole in Dorset. The meeting at Pip n Jay’s must have been one of the first occasions when she shared the vision. She described to the congregation there what she had seen.
This is the gist of what we heard Jean Darnall share with us:
What
I saw was the British Isles, as in a bird's eye view. A kind of haze
was over the whole, like a green fog. And then little pinpricks of light
began to appear from the top of Scotland to Land's End. Then the Lord
seemed to draw me closer to these lights, and I saw that they were fires
that were burning. They were multiplying from the top of Scotland to
Land's End. Then I saw lightning come and strike those fires, the
brightest spots particularly, and there was a kind of explosion, and
rivers of fire flowed down. Again, the sense of direction was from the
top of Scotland to Land's End. But some of those rivers of fire didn't
stop there. They went right across the Channel and didn't stop there.
They went right across the Channel and spread out into the Continent.
A fuller version of the entire series of visions can be found at the following link:
In
addition, there is a recently recorded interview with Jean Darnall
broadcast on Revelation TV in the spring of this year (2012) in which
she talks in depth about this key vision.
The
meeting in Pip ‘n’ Jay’s, Bristol in 1967 was the first time I had ever
heard prophecy shared, and I guess I didn’t really understand that that
was what I was hearing at the time, as a sixteen year-old.
Nevertheless, the vision of Great Britain covered with pinpricks of
light remained with me thereafter, even though it would still be some
five years before I myself finally surrendered my life to the Lord.
Pip 'n' Jay's
It
was many years after my conversion that I became aware of the fact that
the great healing evangelist Smith Wigglesworth had received a
prophetic revelation concerning a mighty revival in Britain. He received
it just before he died in 1947, some twenty years before Jean Darnell
received her three visions. It was a word which began to be latched onto
among the leaders of Newfrontiers churches in Britain, among others,
during the 1980’s, at a time when there was a growing expectation of a
fresh move of God.
This is what Wigglesworth had recorded just before he died:
The second move of the Holy Spirit will result in people leaving historic churches and planting new churches.
In the duration of each of these moves, the people who are involved will say, ‘This is the great revival.’ But the Lord says, ‘No, neither is this the great revival, but both are steps towards it.’
When the new church phase is on the wane, there will be evidenced in the churches something that has not been seen before: a coming together of those with an emphasis on the Word and those with an emphasis on the Spirit. When the Word and the Spirit come together, there will be the biggest movement of the Holy Spirit that the nation, and indeed, the world, has ever seen. It will mark the beginning of a revival that will eclipse anything that has been witnessed within these shores, even the Wesleyan and the Welsh revivals of former years. The outpouring of God’s Spirit will flow over from the United Kingdom to the mainland of Europe, and from there, will begin a missionary move to the ends of the earth.”
More insight from Wigglesworth concerning this prophetic revelation was later given by someone who was disciple by him. This was the American evangelist Lester Sumrall, ‘the father of Christian television’, who died in 1996, just at the time that the Father’s Blessing outpouring was happening in both the USA and great Britain, and here in Wales.
Lester Sumrall and his wife
Sumrall recorded:
"... Shutting his eyes again, he said, 'I see the greatest revival in the history of mankind coming to Planet earth, maybe as never before. And I see every form of disease healed. I see whole hospitals emptied with no one there. Even the doctors are running down the streets shouting.' "He told me that there would be untold numbers of uncountable multitudes that would be saved. No man will say 'so many, so many,' because nobody will be able to count those who come to Jesus. No disease will be able to stand before God's people... 'It will be a worldwide situation, not local,' he said, 'a worldwide thrust of God's power and God's anointing upon mankind.' "Then he opened his eyes and looked at me and said, 'I will not see it, but you shall see it. The Lord says that I must go on to my reward, but that you will see the mighty works that He will do upon the earth in the last days.' "... The idea that I would get to see this revival was almost overwhelming. And in the last decade or so, I believe we have seen this revival begin to sweep the earth. We have seen amazing moves of God in Africa... Recently, I was in China and met with the underground church. I was told there are at least forty-five million Full Gospel Christians in China. I discovered a depth of prayer and integrity there that I have not felt anywhere else in the world... So I believe we are seeing Wigglesworth's prophecy begin to be fulfilled. We are seeing the first stages of it."
Ginny Burgin (1997)
The Father’s Blessing powerfully overwhelmed the churches in Britain in 1994, and for some years totally changed the way people did church. In the church I was leading in Lowestoft at the time, we were powerfully impacted, and joy and laughter featured frequently. I was sometimes so overcome as to be unable to stand to preach. Many lives were radically changed as the Holy Spirit overwhelmed us over and over again. We saw broken relationships restored, and many come to a new freedom of intimacy with the Father, and we sought to give away what we received by running regular Saturday night ‘Wellspring’ meetings to which people would come from miles around. However, by 1997 many churches, including our own, were feeling the need to be more earnest about outreach, and the result was that many lost sight of the outpouring of the life of God.
Then, just before the tragic death of Diana, Princess of Wales, a previously little known prophet in Yorkshire received a prophetic vision which suddenly took on significance when the funeral of Diana saw vast areas outside the Royal Palaces and elsewhere covered with the flowers of mourning.
Here is the word that Ginny Burgin later shared at Walkley Baptist Church in Sheffield on 31st August 1997, the morning after the death of Diana. The first part of the prophecy was initially given on 18th May 1997, some three months before Diana’s death:
“I am at work in the heart and the spirit of the people of this nation.
I am doing a work which, at the moment is very, very unseen. But it is
happening quicker than you think. Things are happening much more quickly
than you think. And as a sign, this shall be a sign, that there will be
a day very soon when the whole nation will mourn. And the whole nation
will put flowers in their cities.”
“When
that day happens the sign is this: the speed at which the heart and
spirit of the people of this nation can be affected, that is the speed
at which I will work among this nation. Do not think that what you see
and hear are small, insignificant happenings. Do not despise the day of
small things. For I tell you, when you see this sign, I am on the move,
says the Lord. And I am on the move in the cities of this nation and
where flowers are laid, my spirit will be moving faster than those
flowers are removed.”
“For
I am bringing the power of my Spirit to bear on the cities of this
nation. And this nation, as fast as that mourning went through the
nation, joy will go through this nation. And I tell you,” says the Lord,
“that you will know the miraculous entering your lives. I tell you that
you will see changes in areas where you never expected to see changes.
You will see relatives who you never expected to see, coming into the
kingdom of God. You will know areas in your life where you've battled
and battled and never overcome – you will overcome in a day” says the
Lord. “ For I am at work in this nation and I will bring this nation to
it's knees before me and they will know the joy of their salvation in
the mighty risen Lord Jesus. Therefore, rejoice. And do not let that
spirit of mourning pervade your own spirit. Do not let that spirit of
mourning grasp at your heart. For you have joy inexpressible in your
hearts. Therefore let the rivers of living water flow from within you
and know that you will have many opportunities from this point to speak
of my grace, to speak of my love, to see in action my Spirit at work.
Know that I will be with you in that and you will see the miraculous.”
Says the Lord.
I
was in a meeting of Newfrontiers leaders when this word was later
shared again. It left a profound sense that there was to be a yet
greater move of God than the one we had been experiencing since the
spring of 1994, when The Father’s Blessing hit. I believe that is a
prophecy yet to be fulfilled.
Some years later, Hazel and I were feeling strongly led to Wales from East Anglia, where we had spent all our married life up to that point. We were developing friendship with the small group of people who were the nucleus of a Newfrontiers church plant in Cardiff, especially with Morgan and Belinda Hopkins who were then leading it. On a visit from Lowestoft to Cardiff which coincided with the centenary celebrations of the outbreak of the 1904 revival at Loughor, the four of us decided to drive to Moriah Chapel to see the place for the first time. We arrived there just as the chapel was being prepared for a special service to be broadcast on television that evening. Even though he was busy with the preparations, Dyfrig Griffiths - then an elder at Moriah - kindly agreed to show us around. It proved to be a deeply moving experience, made all the more so given what had happened there exactly 100 years before, to the day.
Dyfrig explained that in the weeks that followed the outpouring of the Spirit under the ministry of Evan Roberts, the chapel was filled to overflowing with hundreds and hundreds of people, with many being unable to get into the building. Today, he explained in response to my question, just a handful of mainly older people worship there.
Then a few moments later, in the main chapel, Dyfrig paused and prophesied. He filled up as he did so. This is the gist of what he said:
‘You know, the tide in the estuary here is the second highest in the world, rising and falling some forty-five feet. Just as this make it the second highest tidal range in the whole world, so the revival which was experienced here in 1904-5 will prove to be the second highest that there will have been. For an even greater move of God is yet to come to this land which will fill the chapels once again.’
In the following year, we moved to Cardiff, where we have been ever since. The words of Dyfrig continue to echo in my heart as we desire and seek for a fresh and even greater move of God in this land that there has ever been before. And continually we are encouraged by the prophetic.
Keith Hazell (2006)
When we first moved to Cardiff to take on the new church plant there was a stream of prophecy concerning what God was going to do in and through the new work. There were many memorable prophecies, but one in particular remains with me, because there was a dimension to is concerning what God was purposing to do in South Wales as a while, in which Hope Church would play a part. The prophecy came through our good friend Keith Hazell, a mature and greatly respected Canadian prophet who has done much work in recent days among the Newfrontiers family of churches.
Keith spoke in particular about the work in the Valleys. One phrase in particular stood out:
‘The Valleys shall ring with the sound of praise!’
This is how part of his prophecy went:
I believe God speaks to you that there is life going to flow into the valleys of Wales. This is against what men think, but this is what God thinks. The valleys shall … the valleys shall ring with the sound of praise. God just says this is going to effectively change a lot of people’s thinking; some attitudes are going to be changed, because God’s going to do this.
Right through the twentieth century, the life of the church in the Valleys has been marked by dispiriting decline. Many of the blogs I have written about the area’s spiritual history feature photographs and references to chapels that have been closed, converted to other uses, or vandalised and demolished. But Keith’s word encourages the hope that soon some of those that survive will once more ring with the sound of heavens songs. It was that prophecy which confirmed in me the desire to experience ‘heaven’s song being sung on the earth’ - something we were often caught up into at Hope as heaven touched earth when we came into His presence together.
Charles Parham & William Seymour (1909)
A short while after coming to Cardiff to lead a Newfrontiers church plant which we called Hope Church Cardiff we were introduced to the ministry and teaching of Bill Johnson. His books made such an impact that I had to go and hear him, and so it was in the autumn of 2007 that I accompanied my good friend Pete Carter to Bethel Church in Redding, California. There were several other visits subsequently to a church that has had a deep and powerful impact on my life.
These visits coincided with the dissemination of a number of books honouring the Azuza Street Revival of 1906, which I bought in the Bethel bookstore. One of these drew my attention to yet another key prophecy regarding a coming revival.
The book described how, in 1909, Charles Parham, the father of the American Pentecostal movement, and William Seymour, the leader of the Azusa Street Revival, both received approximately the same prophetic revelation without knowing it. One of them was on the East coast at the time (Parham), and the other (Seymour) was on the West coast. They had not been in communication with each other beforehand.
Parham
They both said in 1909 referring to the Azusa outpouring that what happened at Pentecost in Acts Chapter 2 was like the former rain. The Pentecostal outpouring they had been experiencing from 1906 onward in Azuza Street was like the latter rain. They both said that in about 100 years time there would come an even greater revival which would be like the former rain and the latter rain coming together. They also said that it wouldn’t just be a relatively local outpouring like Azusa, but it would be all over the world.
Seymour
Tommy Welchel, who as a young man knew many of those who lived through the season of revival at Azuza Street, reported what he know about Seymour’s prophecy to Sid Roth.
Here is a transcript of that interview:
Sid: Now William Seymour prophesied about the next revival that will come, tell me about that.
Tommy: He prophesied that in about a hundred years, he did this in 1909, that there would be a ...
Sid: So about a hundred years would be 2009?
Tommy: Yes that would be about right, before or after ...
Sid: About, OK.
Tommy: He said another revival like unto Azuza Street only greater would coma again, only this time it wouldn't be in one place, it would be all over the world.
Welchel
Here is a clip of Tommy Welchel speaking with Randy Clark about the 1909 prophecy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzhKIViD0RU
And here is a clip of Wes Hall referring recently to Seymour's 1909 prophecy at a meeting at IHOP in Kansas City:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f40zUT26UGk&feature=youtu.be
And here is a clip of Wes Hall referring recently to Seymour's 1909 prophecy at a meeting at IHOP in Kansas City:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f40zUT26UGk&feature=youtu.be
Wakey, Wakey (2008)
I believe around this time things began to shift. It was certainly a time when once again the church I was leading was experiencing fresh Holy Spirit encounters, and breakthroughs with healing.
It was about this time that Beni Johnson reported an interesting prophetic encounter that a young Welsh girl, a BSSM student at Bethel, had while visiting Moriah Chapel, Evan Roberts’ home church.
Beni writes of this:
Before she moved here, she had a major encounter with God. She was woken in the middle of the night because the presence of God was so strong in her room. She could see a visible cloud in her room, and she waited on God to see what He was saying. Then God said to her, 'I want you to go to Moriah Chapel and say 'Wakey, wakey.' She thought 'You want me to do what?? I'm sorry God, but I'm not doing that!' Then He said to her again, 'I want you to go to Moriah Chaple and say 'Wakey, wakey!'' At that point, she knew that if she didnlt do it, she would regret it for the rest of her life. The next day when she got to the chapel, there were a lot of people outside. She said normally the chapel was empty. She asked God why there were so many people there, and He said to her 'Because I had to tell you twice.' She stood outside of the chapel and whispered 'Wakey, wakey' because she did not want anyone to hear her. God then said to her 'is that how much you want revival in Wales?' She then stood there that day and yelled at the top of her lungs: 'WAKEY, WAKEY!!!'
Nothing happened for about five minutes, so she turned around to cross the road and go over to a shop. As she turned around, she felt the ground begin to shake and heard this huge yawn. She looked back at the chapel, and a huge angel stepped out. All she could see was his feet because he was that large. She asked him who he was, and he turned to her and said 'I am the angel from the 1904 revival and you just woke me up.' She asked him why he had been asleep. The angel answered and said 'Because no one has been calling out for revival any more.' She then asked him if he was the angel that was going to bring the next revival. He told her no because the next revival would bring in many more souls for the kingdom.Since the angel has been woken, he has been seen by many others around Wales.
Here’s a video clip from Youtube of Beni telling the story at Bethel:
Tonbridge (2009)
2009 was a bit of a crisis year for us. In spite of seeing God doing amazing things among us at Hope Church, we were struggling to keep going because another much bigger church nearby had joined the Newfrontiers family, with the effect of somewhat overshadowing our small church plant. I was despondent and struggling to keep going. A week’s retreat at Ffald-y-brenin had provided a wonderful experience of reassurance of God’s love for me and of his hand being on our situation, but the whole experience continued to be deeply challenging, and ultimately we would close the church plant down at the start of 2010.
In November 2009, I was driving alone to Tonbridge in Kent where Kris Vallotton of Bethel was speaking at a conference organised by North Kent Community Church. I was struggling with huge questions. Why were things going the way they were? What was God doing? Shouldn’t all we were experiencing in our meetings of the presence of God, and the healings we were beginning to see happen be resulting in growth and blessing rather than this?
As I drove out of Cardiff it started to rain very, very heavily. It came down so hard I had to slow right down as the wipers, going full-pelt, could scarcely clear the rainwater from the car’s windscreen. Then it eased off, and I drove on. A few minutes later I could see this huge black cloud looming in the rear-view mirror, and then the rain came down again, as heavily as before for a few minutes. This went on all the way along the M4 towards London as the rain tracked east in the same direction that I was driving. It was a very striking experience, which made me feel as if the rain-cloud was chasing me all the way, and sometimes overtaking me with a deluge.
Later that evening, in the first worship time of the conference, I was engaging with God and amusing on the experience I had had in the car that afternoon, enquiring of God about it. Suddenly I sensed God saying to me very clearly ‘I am pursuing you, and I want to overwhelm you with my love’. It was extraordinarily powerful moment.
Later, I was to feel that there was more to it than a personal affirmation from God to me, and that while he wanted me to encounter his love in a deeply powerful way, he was also wanting to overwhelm the nation with a fresh experience of his love and power. I later shared this with the conference.
Over the next few days while we listened to Kris, it continued to rain heavily. Right across the nation there was a heavy deluge which went on for days. Rivers began to burst their banks, and there was extensive flooding in many places.
I felt it was a confirmation of what I had heard God speak to me about his desire to overwhelm us in the British Isles with his love, and a promise of a revival outpouring which was about to happen. Even though our outward circumstances in the context of our own church-plant seemed to contradict it, I sensed that God was about to bring an amazing degree of blessing to the British Isles.
Arthur Burt & Bob Jones (1930 / 2009)
In the meanwhile, there still plenty of prophetic encouragement concerning a fresh move of God’s Spirit in these nations that make u Great Britain, including Wales!
Another concerns the unlikely conjunction of Arthur Burt, who lives in Penmaenmawr in North Wales, and the American prophet Bob Jones.
Kathie Walters, another prophet, describes the connection between them thus:
Several
years ago I was in Wales. I was doing an Elijah list conference. After
the conference I went to North Wales, to visit an old friend, Arthur
Burt. Arthur has been in the ministry for about 85 years. He was part of
a tremendous revival years ago around the 1930's.
When
I came back to the U.S. I called Bob Jones to see if he had any word
for Wales. He said, "No, but I have a word for an old man in Wales and
you were just in his house." "That must be Arthur Burt," I said as that
was the only older man whose house I had been in. Bob didn’t know who
Arthur Burt was at that time.
"What's the word?" I asked.
"Tell him, he will see the word," Bob said.
"He will see what word?" I asked.
Bob
said " I don’t know, you will have to ask him what word he received. He
received it years ago. It was given to a group of people and they are
all dead now except for him.
But tell him he will see it."
Bob Jones
So of course I called Arthur Burt in Wales. Had a conversation like this:
"Arthur, this is Kathie Walters. Did you receive a word years ago among a group of people and you are waiting to see it?"
"Yes, we did receive a word."
I said, "What was the word?"
Arthur replied, "They are all dead now, the people in that group. I am the only one left."
"Yes, I know Arthur; what was the word?" I asked again.
"I can hear it now like it was then. I keep it in my pocket, you know," Arthur said.
.
This
is the word that he read to me over the phone: remember that the
promise to Arthur was that he would see this revival before he died. He
is now 97 years old (2009).
‘There
shall come a breath, and the breath shall bring the wind, and the wind
shall bring the rain, and the rain shall bring the floods and floods and
floods, and the floods shall bring the torrents and torrents and
torrents.
So
shall they be saved like falling leaves from the mighty oaks swept by a
hurricane in a great forest. Arms and legs shall come down from heaven
and there shall be no ebb.’
Arthur Burt himself describes the origin of this prophecy thus, in his own book ‘There Shall Be No Ebb’ :
I
was expelled from the Church of England in 1934 for embracing the
Pentecostal revelation, the baptism of the Spirit, speaking with other
tongues. Right after that, a prophecy came.
I remember it as if it was last night. I walked over to a piano and
looked at the open Bible, it was open there at this Word:
“For
the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak,
and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely
come....”
At the meeting that night, not a Church of England meeting, but a Pentecostal meeting, the Spirit of God fell upon a young man and he prophesied. I think it’s about the only prophecy I can remember word-for-word in my entire life. It’s like a scar inside of me!
“It shall come as a breath…
And the breath shall bring the wind…
And the wind shall bring the rain.
And there shall be floods and floods and floods…
And torrents and torrents and torrents.
Souls shall be saved like falling leaves from mighty oaks swept by a hurricane.
Arms and legs shall come down from heaven…
… And there shall be no ebb.”
I remember that, “Souls shall be saved like falling leaves from mighty oaks swept by a hurricane.” There was another part about “the rich and the poor embracing each other in the streets of New York.” But the final thing was...“And there shall be no ebb.” No ebb!
Here is a clip of Arthur Burt talking about his friendship with Smith Wigglesworth
Westminster Conference (2011)
At the very beginning of September 2011 Hazel and I were privileged to be able to attend the first Revival Alliance conference in Westminster in London. I subsequently wrote a full account of the conference and what I felt to be its significance on my blogpage. It can be read at:
http://daibach-welldigger.blogspot.co.uk/2011/09/revival-alliance-meetings-in.html
There had been plenty of prophetic encouragement beforehand to the organisers of this conference that God was giving the churches of Britain a second opportunity to experience an outpouring of his grace and love with a view to reaching the nation. At the conference, Bill Johnson, who was one of the speakers, said, on the second day of the gathering:
There’s
something about September 1st, I believe you can write it down. I
believe that you can write it in your journal, that: “Everything changed
September 1st, 2011”.
Now you have to understand that a Kingdom perspective sees the oak tree in an acorn…
I feel like it’s a prophetic word over this country. September 1st everything’s different.
Bill Johnson
Christen Forster, one of the organisers of the conference, later wrote of what Bill shared:
Bill’s
prophetic word in September was a declaration of the start of the new
day, the new wave, the new season. The wells don’t need unblocking any
more, the water is flowing, we just need to carry their life and
refreshment into the dry places. And every week I hear stories that
confirm that word.
It
does seem to me that something shifted at that time. I was definitely a
time of leaving the past behind and a moment when we were encouraged
and released into moving on into the new things God is doing in Wales.
The Bells (2012)
‘The bells are ringing again in England and the UK ... as a prophetic sign to call the people of the UK to worship, and to call them to their purpose... The UK is coming into what it was really meant to take over... [account of plans to ring bells to usher in the Olympics] ... It’s a breakthrough season for you (people from the UK) .. and those seeds for revival that have been planted in the UK and thought dead are going to be resurrected... and you will have your breakthrough ... July 27th is going to be an impacting, impacting day.’
A recording of this can be seen on Youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=it3acc9XwAk
The ‘All the bells’ website dedicated to artist Martin Creed’s initiative to promote the ringing of bells in the UK to herald the London Olympics:
http://www.allthebells.com/
A clip of the bell ringing which took place in the UK at 8.12am on 27th July 2012, the day the Olympics started in London:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/olympics/london-2012-festival/9431580/London-2012-Martin-Creeds-Work-No.-1197-All-the-Bells-St-John-at-Hackney.html
Conclusion
There’s an increasing sense in Wales as well as elsewhere in the UK that a new dimension of the kingdom of God is gradually breaking out. Many churches have recently been experiencing a greater measure of the presence of God, and there’s a new sense of the possibility of breakthrough in the sharing of God’s love with others, especially outside the context of ‘meetings’. We are living in exciting times, and it seems to me quite possible that we are experiencing the step by step beginning of a season of the fulfilment of many of the prophecies concerning revival that have been coming through ever since the great revivals in Wales and at Azuza Street at the start of the last century.
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