Craig Power – a born again experience

(A TRUE STORY OF A BORN AGAIN EXPERIENCE)

WRITTEN BY CRAIG. L. POWER

Introduction

This is an actual letter written to a close friend of mine (Andy), whom I had worked with for two years in Darwin. I originally wrote this letter to explain the awesome life changing experience that I had. I think that this information is more important than how much money you have in the bank, how successful you are in life or how many friends you have. If I call this person a friend (Andy) and not tell him about this encounter, then I don’t think I can call myself a friend to this friend.

If you get uncomfortable at the mention of Jesus, think that He was nothing more than a fable or just some wise man or Prophet that lived two thousand years ago, then this story is for you. This, If you think that way, will totally destroy that

Image of the Lord Jesus and replace it with a living revelation of the Man that was and is God of yours and mine salvation.

To know Him is the most powerful thing you ever do and to miss out the opportunity while your still on planet earth to meet Him and know Him will be the biggest regret you will ever face.

Fasten your seat belt, read and enjoy.

A letter to friend.

Hi Andy,

Here is the letter that I promised you. Well a lot of things have changed in both Becky and my life since we saw you last. What I’m about to tell you may or may not shock you, because I don’t know what your opinions of me were. I know that we both liked each other, if we didn’t I wouldn’t be writing to you now. It seemed to me that we both had a lot in common in the way we saw a lot of things like music and life in general. I don’t ever remember arguing with you. Do you remember a friend I use to have in Darwin, his name was Shane and he played guitar in a band in Darwin. Well I told him what I’m about to tell you and he doesn’t want to have anything to do with me any more. So some people get pretty angry or offended about this subject and I know when someone would try and talk to me about it, I would either leave or threaten to do something to them if they didn’t shut-up. I had never heard it quite like I’m about to tell you now. If something is true, it will effect you and if it is a lie, you have to make it effect you. So I’m not I’m not going to make effect you, I will just tell it as it happened and we will see if it doesn’t effect the way you might think about things now. I do hope you will read and enjoy it, for all of it is true. I couldn’t have made this up even if I tried; no matter how many drugs I take. Just remember this is Craig Power talking, not some religious nut, because I still hate religion. This is also very bold for me to write this letter to you because I may loose a friend whom I value very much but I hope I won’t. I also hope this may add to the fullness of your life. Anyway here goes!

The saving of my wife.

Late 1996.

Becky was out selling some raffle tickets in our street and came home asking me if she could go to church with this lady (Jo), she met across the road.

I said, “OK”. Thinking church only went for an hour, coming from a Catholic upbringing. Then each Sunday afternoon at about 5:00pm, Becky went to church and always came home at about 10:30pm, just when the Sunday night movie was ending. I would say to Becky, “What sort of church goes for three hours and what do you do there?” Becky would say”, Oh we had a band at church and we were dancing and having some fun”.

I would say to her”, What do you mean dancing and having fun? You don’t have fun in church, you have to sit there and be quiet, because it’s boring!”

Becky answered, “not this church, we enjoy God “.

So I would think, “I’m happy for Becky at least she is enjoying herself but all the time I would be thinking she might be involved in some cult”. I just had to let her go, as she seemed to be happy and wasn’t doing anything weird like sitting under pyramids or chanting while holding onto a hunk of crystal. As for me it was life as normal. Friday night, suck down half a slab of beer and smoke some heads, while I bashed the strings off my guitar. Saturday and Sunday try to recover from the binge. Then work all week so I can do it all over again. Around and around we go until we die, oh well. Then I started to get the revelation; I was actually looking forward to something I was going to regret, (in regards to drinking).

A divine drawing.

April 1997

One day I was in the toilet, and Becky left a book there called A Divine Revelations of Hell, so I just opened it up at any page and read a bit of it, just because it was there. Now this book is about a woman (Mary Baxter) who (supposably) had visitations from Jesus, who for forty nights, Jesus took her by the spirit down into Hell. He wanted to show her what hell is really like and to write a book about what she had seen, to warn people about the realty of Hell. Here is page 63.

Jesus said, “We are now about to enter a tunnel which will take us into the belly of Hell. Hell is shaped like a human body lying in the centre of the earth. The body is lying on her back, with both arms and both legs stretched out. As I have a body of believers, so hell has a body of sin and death. As the Christ-body is built up daily, so the hell-body is also built up daily.”

On our way to the tunnel, we walked on past the flaming pits with cries and moans of the damned ringing in our ears. Many called out to Jesus as we went by. Others tried to climb out of the pits of fire in order to reach Him, but could not. Too late, too late, my heart cried.

I don’t know what page I really read but it is all really scary if your not saved.

I came out of the toilet a bit disturbed and said to Becky, “Hell can’t be like this, where is Bon Scott and Jim Hendrix and all the people who know how to have a good time, I don’t want to go to this place, if it is like this”. How can I know if it is real or not? I mean 100% know, I don’t mean being told, I wanted to 100 percent know and if you can know hell is real plus you must be able to know if God Himself is real. I didn’t want to wait until I’m dead to meet God if He is real. I wanted to meet Him while I’m still alive. Some how I knew that if I wait until I die, it might be too late.

Becky said, “Only Jesus can help you”.

I said, “But I have been Baptised, had my First Holy Communion and Confirmation in the Catholic Church. Isn’t that enough to stop me from going to hell?

Becky said, “It’s not religion that stops you from going to hell but a relationship with Jesus and excepting what He did on the cross”.

So in an effort to find out the truth I went to the RAAF Chaplain to ask his view about it all. I was not too keen on going to Becky’s church because I thought it might be a cult, like the Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses or something crazy like that.

I went into the Chaplains office and he said,” Come in. Are you after a chaplain loan?”

I said, ” No. I am looking for God”.

He looked at me in amazement and said, ” You better sit down and we will have a little talk”.

He asked me, “What if any religious background have you had in the past?”

I said, “I was a Catholic, but I have not been to church except for baptisms and weddings for the last 20 years, but my wife goes to the Christian Outreach Centre church. What are they like?”

The Chaplain answered, ” Oh, they think they know when the end of world is coming, but nobody knows that. So you should stay right away from them and go back to your old faith In the Catholic Church. I know a priest in your area. Would you like me to ask him if he can come around and meet you?”

I Said, “That would be great, I’m really keen to find God real soon. I feel like I’m in a hurry or there’s not much time left or whatever”.

He said, “OK settle down, I will ring him today and see if he can come around before the weekend, to talk to you”.

About two and half weeks went by and no priest had come around and I was getting a bit anxious. Because when I get determined about something, I really get determined.

So I said to Becky, “Can you ask your pastor to come around and see me? If he has the time”.

So she rang him up and he came around the next day. He sat in the same seat for three hours and did not move. He just talked calmly about Mary, the saints and a few other things I was interested in, like Heaven and Hell and where God is now and all that kind of stuff.

He said, ” Mary and the Saints are not to be prayed to, because they only did as they were told and when they died they got their reward and went to heaven. You should pray to the same source they prayed to. Don’t pray to them. Pray to Jesus. They did and look where it got them.

I said, ” That makes sense, no wonder my prayers weren’t getting answered and saying all those repetitious Hail Mary’s were so boring when I was a Catholic”. Why should anyone pray to Mary for the forgiveness of sins? Jesus is the only one who said He died for our sins. He didn’t go through all the pain of crucifixion and say to the Father, “now all the earth can pray to the woman who gave birth to me”. So I will pray to Jesus from now on.

Jim said one thing to me that got my interests up and running.

He said, ” God comes to our church, I don’t care if you believe or not, you will feel the presence of God in our church”.

I said, “Who comes to your church”.

Just wanting to hear it again.

He said, “God comes to our church!”

I said, ” Does He now. When is your next service? I have got to see or feel this”.

You see I am the type of guy who will take a man on his word just to see if he is what he says he is and it can’t hurt just to have a look.

I will go and See for myself.

17 April 1997

Thursday night was the next service. So Becky and I went to the C.O.C church with the lady across the road (Jo). I walked into this building which didn’t look anything like a church and sat down in the front row. Then all these people, about 6, came up to me to make feel welcome, I was shocked and just talked and smiled at them. Also I’m not very good at meeting people for the first time. I also noticed that most of them had Bible’s and some of them were nice with gold leafing around the edges. I remembered that Catholics didn’t bring Bible’s to church just these prayer books only priests and people who thought they were high up read the Bible, because it was too hard to understand for the normal person. I also noticed a sound desk, microphone stands, drums, electric guitars and big speaker boxes, also there was no big statues, alters, stained glass windows or Crucifixes around at all. Also most of the people were happy to be there. No conversations like, “I hope church doesn’t take long

or I don’t feel like being here. They were where they wanted to be, at church in the presence of God.

The music started and the Pastor (Jim) said, “all right everybody come up the front and get into the presence of the Holy Spirit”.

So everyone moved up to the front and started clapping, singing, dancing and waving their arms around to the music. Sort of like you use to see on Countdown. I got up and stood there just checking them out, but something was in this place and it made me smile uncontrollably and I felt the need to clap my hands now and again. Now I have never heard any of this music before and I thought to myself, “If this is God I like it so much I love it”. I must admit I didn’t wave my arms around or dance, the best I could do was clap and close my eyes and think of Jesus. Now I knew a lot about Jesus, about how he died and the miracles He performed and how He was born in Bethlehem and all that, but I DIDN’T KNOW HIM! There’s a big difference between knowing about someone famous and actually knowing them. Anyway, Pastor (Jim), was lining people up and praying for people and then he would place his hands on them and some would fall backwards, as if they had just been stunned. I had seen a movie called A

leap of Faith with Steve Martin. The movie just mocked God. There was something in me that was crying out for more in life. I now know that feeling was my own spirit, calling out to God. I watched Jim for a while and he was right up the other end of the church, so I closed my eyes and thought to myself, “Nobody here will care about me I’m just a newcomer”. As soon as I thought that, some one tapped me on the shoulder. I opened my eyes and it was Jim.

I thought, “How did he get here so quick? Just a few seconds ago he was 15 meters away?”

Jim looked into my eyes and said, “Do you want to have a go?”

I said. “What do you have to do? Do you have to believe? Because I believe”.

Jim said, “I’m just going release the anointing of the Holy Ghost over you, you don’t have to fall down if you don’t feel like it. Most people only fall down because they don’t have to worry about standing up while the Holy Ghost is working on them.”

So he prayed for me and laid his hands on me and I fell down with somebody behind me to catch me. Now I have to be honest, I did fall down under my own strength because I thought, “if I lie down I might receive something from God, plus I didn’t want to stand out like a sore thumb. Whether God did something to me or not I don’t know, but I believe He did, ever so gently by His spirit.

The next couple of days I lived with thoughts of, “gee these people really know how to worship God. Instead of what I was use to in the Catholic church with a set programs day in day out, each service the same with sit down, kneel down, stand-up, sit down and so on. Wondering why God does not show up at church and why church is so boring. This church was full of energy and excitement. The best thing was God really did visit this church. Only because the people’s hearts were hungry to meet and be in His presence. What I mean by Presence of God is that there was no burning bushes or great bolts of lightning flashing around the place, just a knowing, a peaceful, calm and delightful presence, that can only come from God being around you. Do you ever remember being at a State of Origin or a concert or some other gathering of people where the atmosphere is just electric? Well that’s what the human spirit can release when it is aroused, by just being expectant. When you leave that place it won’t change your life, it just gives you something else to get excited about. Coming in contact with the living God will change your life, for the better and that feeling won’t leave you.

It all has come down to this.

Sunday 20th April 1997

I attended the Sunday morning meeting. Jim was leading the meeting, I watched everybody while standing up at front row of the church. I wasn’t singing because I didn’t know any of the words to the songs, but I enjoyed the music. The only thing I knew to do was clap my hands and smile. We worshipped for about one hour and then Jim preached for about fifty minutes, while we all sat down and listened. Then Jim said, ” Who here has not given their life to Jesus and invited Him to become their own personal saviour”.

I thought, “I have never heard of this before. Is this all you have to do? Could it be this easy?”

I stood up straight away and said to Becky, “I’m going up, this sounds too good to true”.

“Are you really!” said Becky excitedly.

She was excited because she had been praying for me to get saved ever since she had been saved herself. Plus Jim and Jo had been praying for God to save me, but I didn’t know about it.

I went and stood up in front of Jim with this small Aboriginal bloke standing next to me.

Jim said, “Close your eyes and think of Jesus and say this prayer after me”.

“Father, I stand here a sinner,

I repent of my sins and turn away from my sins,

I believe that your Son, Jesus, died for me and gave His life for me at Calvary.

Please wash me and cleanse me in the blood of Jesus.

The Blood that was shed for our sins at Calvary.

Lord Jesus, come into my heart and help me to live for you.

I ask you this in Jesus’ name.

Amen”.

I stood there with a warm feeling on the inside of me with a small adrenaline rush.

Then Jim said, ” Father I ask you through the Power of the Holy Spirit to seal Craig into your Kingdom”.

Then he placed his hands on my lower chest and I felt a comfortable burning sensation in my heart and let out all the air that was in my lungs, fell backwards breathing like I was going to have a baby. This time I fell back by the power of God. I laid there, no voices, no angles, no visions, just a feeling of being released from something I knew nothing about. I also had one tear in each eye and I feeling I knew something I didn’t know before, if you can understand that.

See what had happened was I had been born again. Which means, through my own free choice I had been born by the Spirit of God. God’s own Holy Spirit had come to live with my spirit. See we are all born of the flesh, but we did not have a choice to be born. Now, I had been born of the spirit by my own free choice, big difference. If you are born once you die twice and if your are born twice you die once, simple. After the service Jim said, “We will be having a baptism service at Dave’s (one of the church leaders) pool”. I went up to Jim and said, “I would like to get baptised today?”

Jim said, “I think I would like to take it slow with you Craig”.

I answered, “No! I have been talking to and looking for this God all my life. I would like to get baptised today!

Jim looked into my eyes and said, ” All right, just go to Dave’s place at 12:30pm”.

So Becky, James (our son) and I went to Dave’s place and I got a fully submerged

Baptism in his backyard pool. It wasn’t just a sprinkling of water on my head, like you see babies getting. They told me that Baptism represents that you are buried with Christ while you are under the water, and you rise to a new life when you come out of the water, representing the resurrection of Jesus. It has a very powerful effect in the spirit world. Because the spirits that hang around you see your loyalty and association with the Death, Burial and Resurrection of Jesus. These spirits hate you. They also hate you having anything to do with Jesus, because they want you to go to hell with them. Just mention Jesus around some people and they look at like you are weird but if curse and mock Him it seems to be no big deal. Believe it or not the spirit world does exist and it is more real than this world, because it is eternal and this world is not. One thing for certain, “you can put your life on it”, your going to die one day and your spirit (the real you) is going to leave your body and go to one of two places, Heaven or Hell. You decide whether it is true or not. You know deep down inside, that there is more to life than getting a job that you enjoy and having your own house filled with fine people and things. Look at some of the most successful people lives. They end up killing themselves, when you thought they had it all together. You have got to ask yourself. What is life all about? Anyway, one thing I was angry about was my religious upbringing and that nobody ever told me that Jesus said, “I am telling you the truth: no one can see the Kingdom of God without being born again.” (John 3:3) Now we all know that Jesus never told a lie. So if He said you have to be born again, then get going and get born again. Nobody in their right mind wants to die and go to hell, there is enough hell here on earth without living an eternity of it. So please open your mind to this information. Whenever you get alone cry out from your heart and ask for God to show that he is real and He will, believe me. Also ask yourself has Craig lost his mind or can this be the real thing, I can only write this stuff because it is true and it will literally, not may, save your life.

The next few days I was looking at life in a whole new way. Instead of looking at people from the outside I was looking into their eyes. I was not judging people and slandering them because they looked different to me, the design of my thinking processors had changed, but there was no real major change in me as yet.

I did not think anybody or anything would ever change the way I was, but God was doing a work in me. I was such a pig in my old life and I didn’t even care about anybody but myself. I didn’t start wearing black pants and a white shirt with a tie and ride a bike around so I could annoy people about God. If reading this is annoying you then don’t read it, simple. I will not force this on anyone; I just need to tell it because I don’t want you to miss out. Simply because I care about you, that’s all. It is very important information. Again you decide whether I’m fair dinkum or not. LOOK, I DON’T CARE IF YOU NEVER SET FOOT INSIDE A CHURCH, ALL I AM CONCERNED ABOUT IS THIS. DO YOU KNOW HIM? DO YOU WANT TO KNOW HIM?

First HE cleans then He fills.

Sunday 27 April 1997

The Sunday night meeting Neil Meyers (the head of world C.O.C. church) was visiting our church. After preaching his message, he then asked the congregation if anybody would like to be baptised in the Holy Spirit.

I asked Jo, “What does that mean?”

Jo said, “Oh, it’s when the Holy Spirit comes down and fills your Spirit with Himself, then you are filled with power and talk in tongues to God”.

I said, “I’m going to get some of this”. And I went up and stood in front of Neil.

There was about six or seven other people in line to get the Holy Spirit and I think we were all wondering what was about to happen.

Neil came up to me first and asked me to put my arms up in the air, he prayed and then placed his hands on my chest and I collapsed backwards from the forced of the spirit.

It was very powerful. When I hit the floor, my arms went straight out to the sides of my body, like I was crucified. My breathing was very deep; I was taking big lung fulls of air, like something else was breathing for me. Neil was down at my side still praying for me, while Jim was talking in tongues into my right ear.

I was thinking to myself, ” What is going on? What language is Jim speaking in?”

All the while I kept doing this heavy breathing.

Then an inner voice said to me, “Do you really want this?”

I answered, “I don’t even know what I’m going to get.”

The inner voice said again, “Do really want this?”

I answered, “Yes!”

This was all happening without a word being said out of my mouth.

The inner voice said, “Well you better say something”.

I thought to myself, “What will I say? I Know what I will say, what I really want, that is for Jesus to save me when I die”.

So I tried saying Jesus save me, instead of saying Jesus Save me I Screamed in some weird language or gibberish. I was screaming at the top of my voice, “Shida Marka Rarma Suka Warda”, or something that, like I was on fire or something. There was also a great rush of power or awareness or something words can not explain speeding through my body. I was also in a state of shock, because in did not know why I was screaming some language I have never spoken before. After a while stood up on my feet and felt like I had just taken every drug know to man, I was off my face man! I ran around the church smiling, laughing and crying and I thought, “I would like to thank Jesus for His Spirit”.

So I got down on both knees, raised my arms towards heaven and began to say, “Jesus is Lord”. All I got out was Jesus! And suddenly I got thrown down to the ground, like some one had picked me up and thrown me down. Then I felt all His love being poured into my body and fill my whole being. All at the same time I was crying uncontrollably saying, “I love you Jesus, I love you Jesus”, over and over again, while I could feel all this junk, sin or evil or whatever you want to call it being ripped out of me from my back, it seamed. I have got to say, ” This was the most powerful, wonderful and exciting day, moment, event or encounter I have ever had in my whole life, up to this date. Thank you Jesus”.

After all that I went up to Neil and asked, “Excuse me for my ignorance, but was I suppose to scream like that?”

Neil answered, “Yes, some just talk, some whisper and some scream. You screamed.”

I said, “Well that’s a relief, I thought it might have been demonic or something”.

Neil said, “No it’s just the spirit and the power that’s in the spirit. Some people think it is demonic but it’s just God. People know more about demons than they know about God, movies and music have got a lot to do with it”.

Thank you God for your Holy Spirit, the most powerful Spirit in the universe.

I Thank you for placing inside of me the same Spirit that rose Jesus from the dead, and that same Spirit will never leave me nor forsake me, even until the end of the world.

Will you obey?

Monday 28th April.

At home Becky and myself were listening to a worship tape. On this tape was a song that I could understand and could finally sing along to at church. As I was listening to the tape, I was thinking of my guitar and pondering about selling it. This guitar a

(Fender Stratacaster Elite) is a collector item worth in excess of three thousand dollars, and is also in my will to be left our son James.

While thinking this, a small quiet voice within me said, “Give your guitar away”.

I replied, “I could sell it and get out of debt”.

The voice replied, “Give your guitar away”.

I answered, “OK. Who to then?”

Then a face of one the guitarist at church, (Graham) popped up in my mind.

I answered, “All right, you want it you got it”.

I said to Becky, ” I am going to give my guitar away”.

She answered, ” Why don’t you sell it?”

I answered, ” The Holy Spirit just told me to give it away and He showed me to give it to Graham”.

Becky just smiled and agreed. I went straight into the bedroom and started packing up all my guitar gear and thought, “I might as well give him the lot, there is no point keeping an amplifier with no guitar”.

Laying up my treasure.

Tuesday 29th April.

At the Tuesday night prayer meeting I took all my guitar gear to church to give to Graham. He was on the stage (altar) tuning his guitar. I walk up and put my gear next to him and said, ” hey! You want a guitar? There you go”.

I pointed to the guitar and walked back to my seat in the front row. Graham just looked at the guitar as if he could not believe it.

When the service had started, Jim walked up to me with a microphone and said, ” God must done something for you by now? Do you want to tell us what He has done?”

I was handed the microphone and I said, “Yes, God spoke to me last night”.

All the eyes of the people of the church were on me, and my eyes were starting to well up with tears. This was harder than I thought it was going to be as this guitar meant a lot to me for it had been with me for about fifteen years. I finished telling the people that God told me to give it away and more or less that I was just being obedient, at the end of it, my heart lead me to say, “Praise the Lord.” I could feel God all around me but I didn’t think much of it, I thought it was just normal, par for the course. I know that your probably thinking, “you idiot don’t give you guitar away, ask him for some money or something”. No, it is just stuff; if you were to die in the next five minutes your most prize possession would just be that, just stuff. If you read the book of Act’s, every converted Jew that received the Holy Spirit ended up sharing all their possessions with all the other Christians. So what I had done was no different to what the very first Christians did two thousand years ago. Which is proof that God is the same, today and forever. And still requires the same obedience of those who serve Him today.

Why did God want me to give my guitar away? I don’t know, He is God and I’m not. I just did what He told me to do and didn’t think of it too much. I believe that He just wanted to test my heart and see if I loved stuff more than Him. I can live without a guitar but I can’t live without God. Where your treasure is, there is also your heart. Does that mean that everything I own, anybody can just come up and have it? No, my possessions are my possessions and I don’t just give things away for the sake of it. I only give them away if I’m being lead to, or the persons needs are greater than my own. No body comes up and tells me to do it, I hear for myself in my heart to do it.

The blessing of obeying.

Wednesday 30th April.

At about six o’clock in the morning I was woken up by my whole being, being filled with the voice of Jesus. I was sound asleep not even thinking about what I did last night at church or even knew the power of the spoken word by Jesus to ones-self.

His voice literally sent a true awareness of life and power through my whole body. In reply, I just started crying uncontrollably and Becky tried to wake me thinking I was having a nightmare or dream or something.

She said, “Wake-up Craig Wake-up Craig”, while shaking my shoulders.

I tried to reply to her but I was crying too hard to even talk I got some blurted words out and said, ” I’m awake I’m awake, God just spoke to me”.

After several what’s and repeating the same thing, Becky just rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, while I got out of bed and walked around the house crying loudly and saying to the Lord, “I don’t want any of this, I just want you Lord”.

I thought getting saved and inviting Jesus into your heart was great, then getting baptised in the Holy Spirit awe inspiring, but the Voice of the Lord is the ultimate, precious, powerful and a experience every-one should experience. During that morning for one and a half hours I knew how the earth was made, I was crying for souls and I knew Jesus was coming and soon. He made me say things out of my mouth like, “Man, they look at a building and think it’s made of concrete and steel. Them fools! It’s not made out of concrete and steel it’s made out of love.” That was the same thing He told or revealed to me that the earth was made out of, love. The world thinks that love is just some weak emotion but it is the most power force there is. Why did Jesus say, ” Love your enemies?” If you ever hear God ask or tell you to give anything away, do it straight away because you never know what or how God will bless and show you how much He loves you. So what did God say to you to make you cry so hard?

He said, “And everyone shall see what greatness will come to my loyal servant of God and when I say greatness you better be ready for it”. When God speaks to you like this, it ruins your whole day man. I was a mess all day, I’m just glad I didn’t have to go to work that day.

Seek and be delivered.

Wednesday 7th May

On Wednesdays at 10:30 am our church has a combined churches meeting where we pray together for revival and salvation of our city. So I asked my boss at Air Traffic Control RAAF Base Townsville. “Can I have a couple of hours off work so I could go to church? As there will be a pastor visiting our church who had just came back from America”. My boss didn’t seem to mind, so I went.

I arrived at church in the middle of a song and went straight up to the front and began to worship. No sooner had I started to praise God out of my heart, when I fell to the floor and started to scream blood-curdling cries. It felt like someone had just hit me in stomach with a SledgeHammer. Then the visiting pastor started to read out loud the first chapter of the book of Luke. I just started screaming louder and harder, I had a sense that there was someone else or something inside of me and it was getting pushed out of me. The only bit of self-awareness I had at all was in the back of my mind and it felt like I was being put aside for a while. All the time there was a battle going on inside of me and I had no control over it what so ever. I knew it was God doing something in me but that was all I knew. I screamed for about 5 to 10 minutes then I just lied there exhausted. I was wondering what was going on, the service just kept going on as if nothing was wrong. After the service I picked

myself up, got in my car and drove back to work, feeling like I had no energy left at all. Back at work a few people asked me where I had been and I told them that I had been to church and I felt like I had just drank a whole carton of beer. They just looked at me like I was a weirdo or something. Later on that day Becky rang me at work, to see if I could bring home some sugar satchels from the coffee club at work. So I went to the kitchen while there was no one around and grabbed a hand full of sugar satchels, then went to put them in my car. Just as I was about to open my car I heard a voice, the same voice that told me to give my guitar away, (the Holy Spirit). He said, “You are not going to take them are you?” I said, “They are only sugar satchels”. I didn’t hear anything after that; I just had a bad feeling inside. I turned around and went to the officer who ran the coffee club and asked her if I could buy these sugar satchels off of her. She said, “How many have you got there?”

I said, ” About a dozen or so”.

She said, ” Oh you can have them Craig, I don’t think we will miss them”.

I jumped in the air and said, “Oh thank you so much, you have just redeemed me!”

She just smiled and said, “Oh aren’t you sweet”.

On the way home from work I heard a voice say, ” you are going to die on the way home today”. I thought, ” Oh great, I will go to be with Lord”. Then I thought, ” I don’t think Becky and James will be too happy about that”. Then I spoke, ” I know who you are. Satan be Gone!” And the thought left me and peace entered. I didn’t even say in Jesus name Satan be gone. So where did this spirit (demon) come from that was in you? Maybe it can from the occult that I had been involved in, by the means of tarot card reading. That was the only form of occult I had any thing to with, other than the demonic music I listened to and reading the stars in the papers. To tell the truth I didn’t even know there was anything in me like that. These spirits are so deceptive. I’m just glad that they are gone, and I believe that there was more than one of them in me as well.

A sword in your hand.

Sunday 11th May

This Sunday morning service is very special to me and to all whom attended this service. The presence of the Lord was so great and powerful. Jim was leading, as always, and said to the congregation, “The Lord is here right now and He wants to hand you His sword. So all of you come up the front right now, bow your head, get down on one knee, hold your hand out and receive a sword from the Lord.”

I watched Jim as he got down on one knee, to show us what to do. Then he got up with his right arm straight up in the air, fist clenched, like he was holding a sword and his eyes full of tears, he said, “His presence is so powerful, what are waiting for? All of you, come up here now!” As soon as I got up to walk up to the altar, I could feel His presence, it was so heavy, convicting and precious, straight away I started crying and I only took about seven steps and I could take no more. I got down on one knee, put my arm out and then I felt my hand being filled and I heard a still quiet voice, say sternly with great authority, “I have made you strong now! Get up and make room so other people can receive their sword”. I got up straight away crying, holding my hand that had been filled close to my heart saying, ” Thank you so much Jesus, thank you so much”. I must explain, I did not see anything; I could just feel it. My heart and my faith go out to receive from Jesus. God deals with your hea

rt, you bless God with your heart and you open up to Him with your heart so He can come and live inside your heart. Our hearts are an eternal dwelling place for Jesus. If someone lives with you long enough, you will adopt their ways and start acting like them. Jesus wants to live in your heart eternally. All believers will act like Him, if they live and think from their hearts and obey all the prompting given by the Holy Spirit. Jesus gives us the power to start living, the way we are meant to live, through the power of His Holy Spirit. There is no greater power or gift to man. Amen.

Then they try to come back.

Friday 15th May 1997

This night Becky and I invited some people around to watch some Christian videos. We had a good time and as usual when a bunch of Christians get together it’s always late, because with God there is so much to talk about. That’s why we need all eternity to discuss the things of God. Well we said goodbye at about 1AM and went to bed. About 3AM I was woken up by the awareness that our bedroom was full of evil spirits. I just knew they were evil spirits because I was full fear and I could sense there was about seven of them. They were moving around the bedroom and one of them was under the bed pushing the mattress up and down. I could hear some of them breathing and sort of growling around both our heads. I did not know what to, as I had never been in a room full of demons before. All that I knew to do was to pull the blankets up to my eyes and to keep saying over and over again, “fill me with your Spirit Lord fill me with your Spirit”. They seemed to go away and I went back to sleep.

In the morning I was confused and unsure whether any of what happened really took place. I went and talked to a few people to tell them what had happened and to ask for some advice. The main thing they told me was that if I don’t get strong in the Lord these things will keep coming back and hassling me. So I went straight home and prayed for about half an hour, which for me at that time was a long time to pray. I asked God to strengthen me and found some scriptures to back it up. I latter found a scripture which explained exactly what had happened, it’s in Luke 11:24-26 and I quote, “When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes, he finds it swept and put in order. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first”. So the unclean spirit that had left me at Church had gone out to dry places in the spirit world to find some rest, but it found none.

So it must have came back and found that my spirit had been cleaned and put in order, so it went out to get seven more spirits more stronger and eviler than itself, to move back into me. When it came back with it’s mates, they couldn’t move back into me, because I was asking the Lord to fill me with His spirit, so there was no room, the unclean spirits couldn’t come back in, as the Holy Spirit had filled me.

So the next night, knowing that the Lord was with me. Plus I had the revelation of the power in the Name and the Blood of Jesus; I was prepared for all out war. I spent a good half an hour walking up and down the hallway, speaking out things like, ” If you think I’m going to be hiding under the sheets tonight, your got another thing coming. I bind you in the Name of Jesus If you come anywhere near my Family or me; the Wrath of God will fall on you. I plead the Blood of Jesus over myself, my wife, my Son and this house”.

Before I went to bed I asked the Lord to protect us and let them make a sound if they try to come back. Early that morning Becky and I were both half asleep and we opened our eyes to the sound of what we believe to be the Demon saying, “shit”, in loud surprised voice.

If there is more, I want it!

Sunday 17th May 1997

I heard a lot of talk about the coming of revival. (The outpouring of the power of God). I was very anxious for this revival and I wanted it to be poured out, right there and then. I was also felt every time I put my arms up to worship, jolts of electricity bursting through my hands and all through my body. Every time this would happen I would yell out, ” Oh yes Jesus, More Jesus!” These jolts became more frequent and more powerful, but I still wanted more. So the next time I yelled out, “Come on Jesus, Give me more now! Come on I can take it!” I had no concept of who God was or how to respect God. I was just being arrogant and thought I was some hot shot. I thought I could be filled with the power of God on simple request. God could have killed me, if He wanted to, for talking to Him like that. He didn’t kill me though. He did throw me to the floor and hold me there for some time. I think He did it just to shut me up and to let me Know He was God and I was not. Jim (two weeks later) was to tell me that I had a proud and arrogant Spirit around me and we prayed against it.

At the Sunday night service as soon as the worship began, I started shaking all over. I mean every muscle and every bone was shaking. I could not shake like this even if I tried. It had to be from God. As soon as I stopped shaking I started to dance, but I had no control over the dance. I danced with my eyes shut until I punched a speaker box and then I fell over a little girl who was on the floor. This made me feel as if I had just made a fool out of myself and I felt extremely embarrassed and repentant for what I had done in the morning service and also for the little girl. So I sat down with my head down on my lap. Then I began to pray fervently in tongues until I was screaming it out. I then began to feel a real need to ask for forgiveness from God.

So I got down on my hands and knees, with the palms of my hands covering my eyes and my elbows pressed tight into my knees. I began to say to the Lord, ” Forgive me Jesus. I humble myself in your presence. I am sorry to have talked to you in the way that I did. Who do I think I am? Please forgive me!” Then I felt a power come into me (that’s the only way I can describe it). This power made me lift my head up; suck air in through my nose like my lungs had no limit to how much air they could take in. With every inhalation I began to sit upright on my knees, once upright I kept inhaling this air, until I felt my arms being pulled to the side by some external source, (angles maybe). Then I would feel this almighty pain go right through me, to the core of my body. Then I would scream like I have never screamed before until I could take no more. At the height of the pain, something would throw or pull me off this spiritual cross that I knew I was getting nailed to. The first time my head slammed into the floor because I got pulled off so violently. This scared me and I started to breathe really heavy as I scrambled back to the position I was at originally, on my elbows and knees. All I could say was, ” Oh no, oh no”. Then it would start all over again. I had no control over it; I was just there for the ride. This all happened about five or six times. (I was not counting but I know it was a lot).

During all of this I was aware that I was drawing some attention and I could hear Jim say, “Come on everybody just concentrate on the Holy Spirit, not what is going on here”. At hearing this from Jim I thought it was just another thing God does to people, so I didn’t try to fight it, I just let it run it’s course. I thought if anything I deserved it for disrespecting God. Some people tell me I was getting delivered (that maybe), but I know God gave me what I asked for. He could have said, “Can you take the pain that My Son went through on the cross. Well here you go then, have what you asked for and you will know what pain My Son went through for you on the cross”. (I’m only speculating what Gods intentions were) The pain I felt would have lasted each time about three to four seconds and I could not take it without screaming my face off. Jesus hung on His cross for NINE HOURS AND HE DID NOT EVEN GIVE A WHIMPER. No man could have taken the pain that Jesus Suffered without giving at least one scream or complaint. But Jesus did not make one sound. Never has such bravery, such determination and such victory been given to one man. That man’s name is Jesus. And all he wants from us is a little thanks and a little respect that’s all. Lord Jesus I thank you so much for all pain and suffering that you went through for me and the whole world, so that we can all have eternal life with you in Heaven Starting from now. Jesus I pray that I can give you more than just thanks, I pray that I will stay loyal to you until the end of time and for you to give me the strength to remain loyal you. And that the whole world will sing praises to you in one voice, forever and ever. Amen. Jesus makes Rambo look a pregnant Girl Scout.

Behold I give you power.

THURSDAY 29 MAY 1997

Thursday nights were training nights. In the church the older Christians were being taught about the mantle which our church has got over it. (A mantle is a covering or a purpose that a church has got). Our mantle is warfare. I was in the young Christian classes next door learning about water baptism and they showed us bible references on this subject. The class finished early that night and the older Christian class was still going on, so I thought I might as well sit up the back and listen in, seeing that I had to give Jo a ride home in my car. I heard Jim finish talking about the mantle over our church, which I didn’t quite understand but I listened in anyway.

Then Jim said, “come up here and line up all of you who want to receive the mantle”.

Everybody got up and lined up, I still sat down wanting to go up the front but I thought, “I better not, because this must be for the older Christians, plus I haven’t been invited to go up”. So I sat there watching while Jim was laying hands on everybody.

Then the sound technician (Lyle) came over to me and asked, ” What are you doing here? Why aren’t you up the front?”

I answered, “I have not been invited, so I can’t go up”.

Lyle said, ” rubbish, your going up the front, come on I will take you”.

Lyle grabbed my arm and lead me to a free space where there were no people lying down. Lyle drew Jim’s attention and he came over to me. I did the usual by raising my arms, closing my eyes and Jim placed his hands on me and I went down. As I was lying there, I was taking deep breaths of air through my mouth while making sucking sounds, like one would make as if sucking on a orange or something.

I could hear Jim walking around saying, “that’s it, suck the mantle out of the spirit. Deep into your spirit”.

I did not even know what I was doing; my spirit just took over and made me suck this stuff in like there was no tomorrow. After about fifteen minutes lying there, I got up, and Jo and I went home, talking all the way about how excited we were about receiving the mantle.

About three o’clock that night I was woken up by the Holy Spirit.

He said to me, ” say this. Demon get out!”

I thought to my self, “say demon get out. All right I will say demon get out. What can it hurt? Only the demon, if there is one there?”

So I yawned and then said, “demon get out!”

Then all of a sudden all this wind came out of my mouth and I felt like something was leaving me while that something was holding me. During all this I was squeezing Becky’s arm trying to wake her. I wanted to tell her to start reading the bible to me, because I thought it would make this demon leave me like it did at church last month, by making the demon react to the reading of the Word of God. It seamed that I didn’t need Becky to read the bible because this thing was leaving by the power of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Spirit is the best! He always knows what you need and when you need it. When you get saved you come under the protection of God, and the Holy Spirit is the administrator of that protection, all you need to do is believe and receive. If you think God is boring your wrong. Sin is boring, way boring.

Be hungry and see.

Wednesday 9 July 1997

This morning I woke-up and felt like God had left me and was a million miles away. It was a terrible empty feeling and I did not know what do, so I just stood with my arms up and said over and over again, “I love you Jesus, I love you Jesus!” After about five to ten minutes of saying this, I got in car and drove to work. My heart was still crying out for the Lord and then I had a vision.

“I was up in the air above the clouds in a chariot, riding behind Jesus.

I said to Him, “it’s so good to be here with you Lord, there is no more pain”.

The lord turned His head around, looked at me and said, “you go to the east, don’t worry I will make you strong we will never loose”.

So off I turned toward the east with the feeling of an army behind me”.

The only way to describe this vision is that it was in my head, like you imagination only it’s not your imagination.

On the way home I had another vision. “Of what I know to be Heaven. I was standing in front of Jesus, playing the guitar. The lord was listening to me and He looked at me and said, “you’re playing all right now Craig”.

I Said to Him excitedly, “it’s just you and me Lord, just you and me”.

He waved His finger to and fro and said to me, “arh arh! Have a look around now”.

So I looked around and there were hundreds if not thousands of musicians playing before the Lord with all sorts of different instruments I had ever seen before.

The Lord said to me, “I am for everybody and everybody here is for me”.

This vision was also like the first.

The revealing of His nature.

Tuesday 15 July 1997

On this day I went outside Air Traffic Approach building, to have a smoke on the steps. I don’t recall doing anything special in the way of being spiritual; I was just thinking of God and probably making up songs in my heart for Him, as I sucked on a cigarette. Then all of a sudden I heard a wind blow from the right moving to the left of me and heard a sound of a town, horses and people talking in some language I never heard before. As I watch a scene unrolled like a scroll from right to left. I saw a man lying face down on a curved stone with his hands bound to the stone. Two people were whipping this man, one on either side of him. As each of them whipped him I could hear them cursing him in there own language. I could also see the cords of the whip cut deep to the bone and then drag hunk of flesh away as the whip was being withdrawn. During all this I sat there with my cigarette in my hand wondering what’s going on and thinking to myself, “I know this man, I know this man”. The whipping continued and with each lash of the whip the man would give a cry, not a scream, it was like a teeth clenched growl. I could also sense the pain as if I was watching a really violent movie. Then the view panned around so I was face to face with the man but his head was facing down, then he was lashed once more and as the lash struck his back he quickly raised his head in obvious pain and looked into my eyes. I instantly realised that it was Jesus and He said to me as He looked into my eyes with His pain filled eyes, “That’s for you Craig”. Then the vision vanished and I sat there with tear filled eyes thinking, “I just seen Jesus being whipped and it seemed so personal”. He said, “that’s for you Craig”. For me that is unreal! If God is for you; who can be against you? Thank you Jesus for letting me have fellowship with your suffering. Ever since that day my life has never been the same, when you have a one-on-one encounter with the suffering of our saviour you can’t help but be changed. I am no longer normal; normal to me now is boring. I find it hard to contain my relationship with the lord and when I worship I praise God with all I have got, from now until eternity.

Guidance by an Angel.

One Saturday night I went to lock-up the house and as I shut the front door I said,

” The door that God shuts no man can open”. I thought, “What did I say that for? I’m not God, but I have God living inside me. I better leave it, as it is, other wise I will think too hard about it. I will just leave it alone”. So I just went to bed. During the night I was woken up by the sound of someone trying to turn a locked doorknob near my head. There are no doorknobs in our bedroom; we only have sliding doors. I then sat straight up and thought,

” The enemy are trying to get in and attack me, so I better start pleading the blood over my family and myself”. So I did and then thought,

” That ought to do it I can go back to sleep now”.

Then a voice said to me, “get up and read the bible”.

I just lied there, the voice said to me again “get up and read the Bible now! Quick! Quick! Get up and read the Bible now!”

I said, ” Read the Bible. What am I going to read, it is a big book?”

The voice said, ” Read Isaiah 44 and 45 now! Hurry up don’t diddy daddle. Read Isaiah 44 and 45 now!

So I got up and read Isaiah 44 and 45 and then went back to bed.

The next day after church a friend came around and said here is that book on Angels you wanted and handed me a book called Angels the secret agent of God. The strange thing was is that I told nobody that I was after a book on Angels. So I asked her, “why she gave me a book on Angels?” She said I was on my way out to see you and I heard a voice say to me from behind, ” don’t forget your book on Angels, someone needs it”. So when she came into the room the Holy Spirit lead her to me. I then realised that this is a book from God, that he wants me to read it, so I better read it. I read most of it and it was not saying anything to me until I got to about the last three pages where it said that when Angels talked to most of the people in the Bible they said, ” quick! Quick! Hurry! Hurry! Get up and flee to Egypt and so on.” I then realised that it was an Angel that told me to read the Bible that night and I originally thought it was the Holy Spirit.

Conclusion:

Heaps of things have happened to me since all this and still there is no way to make you believe that it is all-true. If you think I have lost my mind then good. If this is loosing my mind then I don’t want to find it. I want you to find God. If you think I have been brain washed your right. All the junk of living for a lie has been washed away by the truth. Instead of getting to get, I give to get so I can give. The end result of it all is, it’s your life and no one is responsible for it but you. Not even God Himself will force you to except Him; it is your choice. You might say. “What has some Jew from two thousand years ago got to do with my life?” Think of this.

· If Jesus in not the Son of God, then why do people curse His Name? Why don’t they curse Budda or Mohamed or some other false God? Satan makes sure you get it right and curse the only true God so he can accuse you.

· If there is no power in the Cross of Jesus, why does Witchcraft, Satanic music and other demonic practices, turn crosses upside down, burn and mock anything to do with Jesus? Why don’t they slap Budda around and mock him, if budda is God?

· The next time you look at the date on coin or anything else that has the date on it. You should ask yourself, 1999 since what? Answer, Jesus. You say,” but that’s not right the exact time is out by about 3 or 4 years to actual date of his birth”. That’s right, anytime man tries to measure God he will fall short, every time.

· The only thing Jesus left on this earth is His Blood and there is life in the Blood.

· If Jesus was born of virgin but didn’t go to the cross, it would mean nothing. It would be just one of those weird and strange things that no one could explain.

· But if Jesus went to the cross and did die but did not rise to life again, it would mean nothing. People would say. “Well that is the end of that then. I guess HE was not who HE said HE was”.

· Then if Jesus did rise from the dead but didn’t go up to Heaven to be Glorified, it would mean something but you have to go to where Jesus is so you could experience Him. That would be OK for some but not all mankind. Plus it would not require a lot of faith to believe in some guy who has been kicking around on the face of the earth for the last two thousand years and airline tickets to go to Israel would be like gold.

· If Jesus did go to Heaven to be Glorified and was seated at the right hand of God but didn’t send down the Holy Spirit it would mean, you guessed it, nothing. We could not experience Him, we could not go to Israel to see him, plus it’s OK for Jesus HE is Glorified but we would be stuck down here on earth with no power and no ability please or experience God. All we would have would be religion and we all know that religion is boring and lifeless. That is why churches without the Holy Spirit are the way they are, boring and lifeless.

· But now He has been Glorified and He has been Seated at the right hand of the Father in all power and all authority and He has sent down the Holy Spirit for those who believe and want to be filled with Him. Now we can experience Him no matter where we are or where we go. We can have all authority over the entire enemy. We can know and love Him in and through His spirit. Now we can start to kick the Devils butt and know the things that we have never known before like, life and death, sin and righteousness and know where we are going when we die, Heaven, without a doubt in our minds. FANTASTIC!

If you are still reading this now, I hope you are happy not angry. All I ask is that you just open your mind and think about it, that’s all. Please just have a Think.

Hope hear from you, if we don’t we will know what your reaction is and that’s OK. Thanks for reading this; we hope you got something out of it for yourself.

We wish you all the best, love from Craig, Becky & James Power.

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