Halloween

First off, Happy Halloween. Today is our wedding anniversary: 11 years! Woo hoo! The Huckateam is still going strong. Thank you, Jesus! I am so grateful for my Kellyboy!

Second off, what better topic for our Halloween blog than the topic that has been on my mind for the past few days... You guessed it: demon possession.

I don't know exactly where I stand on the issues surrounding demon possession, driving out demons, etc. But I can tell you that I came to Zambia already believing that demon possession is real. After working with the soup kitchen downtown for awhile in Bellingham, I would even say that I had probably already seen some cases of demon possession. I had even thought at times that maybe I should pray over certain people so that they would be released, but I didn't have the guts.

In scripture Jesus was always driving out demons. No big, crazy show about it but he would just tell demons to get on their way and people would be restored, and they would go on to be devoted followers of their savior. I think that's awesome and that Christ-followers should be battling it out with evil spirits just like Jesus and his first disciples did.

Which brings me to Thursday at Chainama Mental Hospital. We had a couple of guests join our usual group and they came prepared to do some battle. We started off with singing praise to our God as usual; but, things were getting a lot noisier. Some of the women I felt were behaving a bit wild just to get attention, but I truly believe that there were at least two women there that were demon-possessed. Our two guests prayed over one of these women really powerfully. She was lying flat on the ground on her stomach and was speaking to them as they prayed and it was sketch. Honestly, I had no idea what to do with myself and figured the best thing was to just keep on praising God and praying. Kelly was doing the same.

Anyway, I won't go into all the details but I believe those people really did set that woman free from a demon. She seemed fine afterward except really tired. Please pray for that woman to commit herself to the Lord so that the Holy Spirit will take up residence in her instead of some other new tenant!

Also please pray for Kelly and I as we reflect on our experiences and see how God would have us serve him. I believe that Kelly and I are already praying boldly for him to work. But should our approach to people who are struggling be even more bold? Pray that the Holy Spirit would give us eyes to see reality and give us understanding of what God's will is for us. I don't want to walk into Chainama each week and pray for the women and walk out again leaving women in bondage to evil! Not when we could've released them because of the mighty power of our Lord Jesus Christ!

Seriously people, I want your prayers about this please. And I want your comments. Tell us what are your own experiences or thoughts on this. Feel free to pass along good resources for us to read as well.

And let me just say, that if you are not a follower of Christ and you are reading this, I ask you to please consider Jesus. Bob Dylan said it best... You've got to serve somebody.