Habakkuk 1:5 Behold ye among the heathen, and regard, and wonder marvelously: for I will work a work in your days, which ye will not believe though, it be told you.
Around 1978 I was pastoring a new church in Cleveland Ohio when I received a request to go to the city Yellow Knife in North West Territories to hold evangelistic meetings. North West Territories is a remote part of northern Canada and Yellow Knife was a very small and cold city. At the time there were 30,000 people living in this area and 10,000 of them were in Yellow Knife, which housed the government. At this time the Government would try to recruit young people from Canada by offering one year contracts to live and work there with double wages and all expenses paid for travel, plus a one month paid vacation.
I was traveling with a new young minister from Toronto Canada. I had known him and his family when I pastored the church in Toronto. This young minister was from the northwest territories and his brother in law lived there. He was very talented in music and the invitation came from his relative because of the burden to win souls in Yellow Knife.
As we arrived in Yellow Knife, the first thing I noticed was how cold it was. It was 58 degrees below zero with the wind chill. God knows that I am not a cold person…but only for Jesus! The Northern lights were just breathtakingly beautiful. Also, the trees were very short because of how high Yellow Knife is on the globe. Every thing is frozen. Lakes are solid and snow covered mostly everything. The house we were staying in had heat (Thank God) and it was there that we were inviting people to come for the meetings.
The first night of the meetings, 12 “Long Haired Hippies” showed up. To start the meeting I had my fellow minister open with prayer and follow with playing music. Right from the beginning the guitar went out of tune and his voice went off key, and became so bad that after a few minutes I just had to stop him singing. Then to be the “Savior” of this rocky start I stood up to preach. It was horrible! As I started to speak, I could hardly talk. What came out of my mouth was something I can hardly explain. My mind went blank. My words did not make any sense, even to me. After a few minutes I just stopped. Embarrassed, I closed the meeting and told every one that we would be there again tomorrow night.
The other minister and I went to our room. All we could do was CRY! Father what happened? We prayed and cried for over 2 hours. I could never remember in all my ministry, not being able to put a few words together. There was no grace. It was the most terrible feeling in the world. Why was I here? Was I out of His Will? All these questions were going through my mind. And the worst of all was that “GOD WAS SILENT”.
The next night we came to the meeting by faith not knowing if anyone would come after our terrible showing for the Lord, but to our surprise all 12 “Hippies” were there waiting on us. As I stood up to open in prayer, a young girl raised her hand and shouted, “Can I say something!” I was glad they were there and wanted this night to be a success, so I said, “Sure”. She stood up and said, “last night when the minister started to sing and play music, he was bad!….but then you stood up to preach….and you were worst!…I went home and got in bed and slept, but, In my sleep JESUS CAME TO ME AND TOLD ME MY SINS WERE FORGIVEN!…i AM SAVED!
The most amazing miracle was that, one after another, each “Hippie” stood up and said, JESUS came to them in a dream and forgave their sins and they were SAVED AND BORN AGAIN. Hallelujah! What could I say. I just started praising God! It was the most amazing thing I have ever experienced. I explained to them now that they were “BORN AGAIN” and that they needed to take Water Baptism. So. we arranged for them to meet us at the YWCA swimming pool the next evening. These 12 “Hippies” had never heard anything about Salvation or Water Baptism. The had never had any teaching on the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, but each and every one of them as they came out of the water received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in new tongues. It was so GLORIOUS! I could only praise God!
What a wonderful God we have. He already knew what He wanted to do for these lovely souls in Yellow Knife. And I believe He has plans for us also in these last days. Are you and I ready to receive what He has for us?…He is a Great and Mighty God!
During this year in 2020…..What marvelous thing does He have planned for you?
GOD SURELY WORKS IN MYSTERIOUS WAYS!…..WITH GOD NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE!
His Servant
Tom Dant