The conference I am speaking at this week turns out to be a youth conference. As I will be here for five days, I felt that it would be a good thing for them to know a little of my background, so yesterday I began the week by sharing my testimony.
Unfortunately I misunderstood what I was told about the program. I thought I was being given two hours to preach, and whilst I knew I wouldn’t take that long I thought that would give me liberty to expand a bit and then do an altar call. Wrong! The whole program was two hours, and when I reached one hour my interpreter whispered that we needed to wind up. Oooops! I had covered the salvation aspect of my testimony, but would have liked to also share some of what God has done in my life in the 49 years since. And no opportunity for an altar call. I will be much more careful of my timing for the rest of the week.
I did have prophetic words for a couple of people, one of whom was a little girl of about six or seven, who was part of the praise and worship team. This kid could dance! but she wasn’t just dancing, she was worshipping. The Holy Spirit was all over her. I would not normally prophesy over a child that young, but this just had to be spoken – God is anointing her as an intercessor and worshipper, and as she grows in Him that anointing will grow, and she will be used to release others into intercession and worship. What I didn’t say is that she is called as a prophet – I won’t release that to a child, because it is too easy for them to run with wrong ideas, but if I get a chance I will share it with the pastor and urge him to make sure that she has mature prophetic ministries around her to mentor her.
This conference runs through till Friday. I don’t know if I will be doing anything on Saturday, but I will be preaching at David’s church on Sunday. Next week we are going up to the north of Uganda. It was going to be travel on Monday (all day), minister Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, then travel back on Friday, but now that has changed to travel Thursday, minister Friday, Saturday and Sunday, travel back on Monday. One of the things I find challenging here is the speed at which things can change, and the lack of communication and notice of what is happening. For instance, it was yesterday morning before I actually knew what I was doing yesterday. I praise God for Normie Styles, the pastor under whom I served my “ministry apprenticeship” all those years ago, who was prone as I walked into church on a Sunday morning to say, “You’re preaching today, Lynn!” He trained me to be “instant in season, out of season” – something I most definitely need here in Africa.