Ahhhhh!!!!! The last few months has all been a blur……
It started back In Nov. when I woke up from a dream that God gave me. I say “a dream God gave me” because If you know anything about me, you know that I don’t ever have dreams and when I do they have all have been from God.
In the dream I was approached by the Rwandan gov. and told that we had to be out of the country again. When told this I went home and shared it with all the other staff, children and family. We assembled in the living room of the house and all began to cry out to God. The strange thing was that our prayers were all focused on the fire and glory of God coming down. We were crying out for an anointing to fall upon us. Then literally a fire came from the sky and began touching us all!
When it came time for us to leave Rwanda we went to Burundi and began to start Sozo Ministries Africa there. We saw such favor of God!!! Miracles were flowing, dead rising, deaf hearing, blind seeing, etc….
The Ministry was growing like wild fire! We contacted the staff in Rwanda to tell them the awesome things that were occurring. To our surprise they shared with us that the same was happening there….
We found out that they had also really grown in number, when we left there were nine kids. Shortly after it went to 20, then 50, before they knew it they found themselves with 200 kids and miracles happing daily.
When we shared this with the people of God in Burundi many of them rose up and said let us go help what God is doing in Rwanda.
After this I woke up, it was about three or four in the morning. I began to weep because I knew what this meant. Forget the outpouring of God; I was upset that we were going to have to leave Rwanda!
After talking to Stella about it we had decided to try to do what Moses did. Astrid on the other hand was somehow rejoicing , feeling it was about time for a change. I wanted to cry out to God and ask him to change his mind, to make another way. I prayed and prayed…shortly after we received word from the minister’s office that the letter for our registration process was ready to pick up.(this was the letter we have been trying to get for the last three years) You can imagine our excitement I’m sure!! I thought to myself “WOW I really did it I changed God’s mind”….
When I arrived at the Minister’s office, to make a long story short… I did not get the letter! To make matters worse I had got in a verbal fight with the assistant of the Minister. I had to leave Kigali once again with no letter or even any for sight of future registration. As I took the two hour drive back home crying and praying the dream I had came back to my memory. I decided it was time to start sharing it with others.
As I began sharing the dream with others it seemed to them that it was highly unlikely to happen. After all we had already been removed from the country ounce and then told in the last hour we could come back. Our friends advised me not to just go off a dream but to seek confirmation first.
This made perfect sense to me, So I began to ask God to confirm if this dream was really from him. I started to read about all the times in the bible that people had dreams and the effects. It was really not so reassuring, as many of the people in the bible upon having a dream would wake up and respond almost immediately to what God had shown or said. Tell me what makes us today any different than the people back then? Does God no longer speak using dreams? Do we not trust that God would speak that way? Or is it us??? Do we really know so little about God and his character or perhaps trust so little in our ability in hearing him if he is to speak to us. Let’s face it we are most of the time looking for the audible voice or flash of lighting. We trust so little in our ability to clearly hear his voice that sometimes I think that God must laugh or get frustrated with us because he might answer right after we pray but then we spend another couple of weeks or longer asking him for confirmation in what he has already said. Out of fear of screwing up and being wrong, I am not saying that having confirmation is wrong.
Or maybe I am! How about, instead of wasting so much of our own time, let’s have such a relationship with God that when ever, and however, he chooses to speak to us we will listen then obey the first time. I can only imagine the amount of time saved and things we can accomplish when this is done.
In my case I began not to ask if the things in the dream would happen but how much time did I have before it would happen… ounce again God answered very quickly! On Jan.8th I was called by the immigration and asked to come in for a meeting. In the meeting it happened just as in my dream! I guess this was the confirmation….Ha Ha… A little late…. Were given seven days to wrap everything up and be out.
On the drive back home I received an exhortation from the Lord. He said “Travis you know me! You know my voice! You have had little problem in the past hearing from me. You did not want to accept my plan for you and your family. Now you see you are paying the price! What could have been done in almost three months you now have only seven days to do! Will you still obey?”
I spent the rest of my drive repenting and telling God that I am his servant and I must obey. Of course as we began to unfold the news to everyone it was very hard to believe. We were of course asked about what was next, you can only guess our answer…. Burundi ….On Jan.12th we sat down with all the kids and staff to pray as I had seen in the dream. It was a pretty awesome time and I could sense that there was something that started stirring in the heavens although it just did not reach the breaking point. It is something that we are going to have to continue to press in on. Also that same day we received a lot of concerning emails from the American Embassy and some friends talking about a travel advisory between Rwanda and Burundi. They were highly advising not to travel between the two countries due to some unrest that was still occurring from the time of the cease fire and peace agreement made between the last militias group and Gov. People would tell me that I should go into Uganda or Tanzania because it was of course safer and easier. I was not concerned about what was safer or easier but with what the Lord had said. On the same day of receiving those disturbing emails we had also got another one that night from someone we had not heard from in a long time. They said they were praying for us and God told them that Isaiah 41:9-17 (paraphrased, “I am with you, don’t be afraid! I am personally on your case! I will do away with those who are against you. I will make you into a threshing sledge, new and with many sharp teeth.”)
So what do we have to worry about…. Right….I thank God for his leading, now if I can just learn to be a bit quicker in my response to his leading!
So here we are now in Burundi! We left Rwanda on the 15th of Jan. with only what would fit on top and inside the car, leaving everything behind for the staff and kids at the Gilead house, Pioneering God’s work yet in another nation. Some may ask why Burundi. Others might even wonder where the hell it is, it sounds more like an ethnic dish than a nation.
Just stay tuned as in the future I will be writing more on why Burundi and the awesome planes that God has for this little place, located right next door to their sister (Rwanda)!!
