We shared a video and blog recently about a young lady named Karina with a powerful testimony that we filmed when we were ministering at a conference. She shares how she was touched and filled with the Holy Spirit when we prayed for her and then how we encouraged her to pray for others. All this happened when she was only nine years old.
For over ten years since that Holy Spirit encounter, she has been continuing to actively minister to other people. This is all due to the empowering of the Holy Spirit, and the encouragement we gave her to step out and utilize the gifts of the Spirit and pray for others.
This is a great example as the Scriptures exhorts us to seek to be filled, and then utilize the gifts the Lord releases. Getting filled with the Holy Spirit is important in activating those in the body of Christ to move into the gifts and fulfill being the Priesthood of all Believers. So, it is a blessing to see how much the Holy Spirit can do with just a little youngster when we invite His presence and power into our midst!
Waves of the Holy Spirit
Here are a few highlights from some recent ministry:
We had an awesome time ministering in the Medford area of Oregon recently. We had a visitation of the Holy Spirit’s power and presence! God poured out His Spirit to the point where most everyone got ministered in a significant way, and then when we thought we were finished…I was making some closing comments when some words just came out that I was surprised to hear myself saying, “actually the Holy Spirit is not done.”
Another wave of the Spirit just came flooding in and the pastor’s son got deeply touched and filled along with some others who also received healing! Mercedes also had a word for a woman that day who got healed of hip pain and I prayed with a few young kids who opened their hearts to receive Christ—which made it four people who received Christ that day—as earlier on in the service two had received the Lord also!
We had a powerful time ministering at Iglesia Bajo Sus Alas in the Southern Border region, many testified to receiving healing in numerous ways, and many shared, including the pastor, that they experienced the power of the Holy Spirit moving and filling them in unusually powerful ways! We had Callum (a friend from France) and Patrick (our son) both come up and share testimonies in the meeting and minister with us as we prayed for people there. They both got a lot of positive response from people about how God was using them after sharing and ministering with us! Praise God!
We also had a powerful move of the Holy Spirit as we ministered at Iglesia Esperanza. We had a powerful service where most everyone there was powerfully touched and received ministry from the Holy Spirit in an awesome way! And then we also had another unexpected wave of the Holy Spirit come through right at the end of that service also! Some of those hanging out in the back got powerfully filled with the Holy Spirit in a really awesome way as they began receiving gifts of the Spirit and speaking in tongues!
That last move of the Spirit was so strong that many, including myself, were overcome by the presence of God and ended up on the ground! There was also a healing of serious stomach pain as we prayed over the pastor, and that service had many young people experience the Baptism of the Holy Spirit! It reminded me of some revival outpourings from back in the day!
We also had a powerful time ministering in some different meetings in the San Diego area! We had a meeting that went over six hours with a very powerful outpouring of the Holy Spirit in Chula Vista that included some young people getting filled with the Holy Spirit and some healing taking place. We also had a blessed time sharing in Spring Valley about Lonnie Frisbee and the Jesus People & Vineyard Revivals! I was there and experienced both of those revivals so it’s always fun to share on that and then get to minister on the need to be filled with the Holy Spirit! We do have a few stories in the latest book on Lonnie…
Jesus said we need His power and presence to be effective witnesses, so we are doing our part to impart that truth and tangible reality as we minister!
Divine Appointments
We had a divine appointment with a chef we met while eating. We were talking a bit and ended up sharing the Gospel and prayed for her in an effective way! We also met some young believers while out for a little river adventure with our friends Jeff & Jeanette with whom we got to share about the need to be filled with the Holy Spirit! When some young guys are willing to attentively listen to you share with them for about an hour, especially in this era of distractedness, you know it’s significant!
We were able to make it to a Bon Voyage party for our long-time friends Alan and Marialice Garrett up in the northern part of California that turned into a spontaneous ministry time with them and a few others while seeing them off on their new adventure. My connection to Marialice goes all the way back to a young adult Bible study I used to do in Corona Del Mar that became part of Newport Vineyard.
We also had a very powerful, divinely-orchestrated, prayer and ministry time, for our friend Dave who the Lord touched and ministered to in a very powerful and significant way. While driving back through Northern California we were feeling we should connect with him. After a few confirmations pointing in that direction we decided to make contact. What was wild was that he ended up texting us—sending out a group text as a request for prayer—right at the exact same time we were about to contact him.
We made our way to see him the next day, and it turned into a powerful prayer and ministry time when we got together and prayed for him!
Dave wrote out this testimony afterwards:
Hi everyone, I just have to give God glory and share with you this amazing testimony of what God did/is doing for me. When I texted…for prayer, Bryan and Mercedes just happened to be texting me right at the same time, that they were passing through Salinas the next day and wanted to see if I wanted to get together. We met and God did this crazy deep inner healing that I was completely not expecting. He was setting me free from performance, doubt and fear and who knows what else! He took me back to my childhood and gave me the biggest hug ever in a place of woundedness that I didn't know was there. From there the Holy Spirit continued to move and we all had a glorious Holy Ghost party with very powerful and encouraging words being spoken. Then tonight God met [my wife] in a special way too…now we both feel like were walking on sunshine. Thank you Jesus!!! All glory to YOU!!!!
We praise God for Jesus paying the price on the cross and giving us His Spirit, and meeting and moving in so many situations. It’s a blessing to experience people receiving the grace of Christ and love of the Father and the power of the Holy Spirit! Thank you for helping us be out there to share it with others!
Love and blessings!
Bryan, Mercedes and Patrick Marleaux
