Years ago I was working with a youth group and it was so fulfilling for me, it was prior to my getting married and I just thought I was going to be on that fast track of continuing what I was already doing which was preaching and having the healing gift and prophecy, so I was at one of our services and I had this full blown vision and I shared it with everybody. I’ll never forget it: we were represented as a child that’s holding onto Jesus around the waist and we’re on a seashore, and it’s very rough waters and they’re crashing on the sand and as Jesus takes a step, each one of us is completely following in tandem behind his footprints, like walking just as he stepped and it’s like we’re holding on for dear life”. Anyway, I’ll never forget it. So I shared it and then it obviously ruffled some feathers, so when I went to some kind of meeting that we had and the youth pastor was like, “you are not the prophet of this church”, and I’m like, “I never said I was”, he goes into a lecture, “look we’ve given you the troubled kids I get it, we don’t have space and room for you so you stay out in the hallway, and I know you’ve done a great job ministering to these teenagers, they’ve come full circle”, as he perturbedly crossed his arms. And I’m like well that’s not me, it’s what we’re doing in this established atmosphere, to get them pumped up for Jesus and to live for something other than street life, drugs and stuff like that. He was like, again we need you to go on sabbatical to just focus on your new marriage because that had happened, and take six months and you do what you should do as a wife, to learn your role in your new home. I responded, “you just don’t want me to work with the kids, that’s what this is, it’s influence on them that you cannot control and I get it, I’ll abide by the orders but I’m not going to worry about losing contact with them ’cause I’ll be back in six months, I’ll see you then.

So my husband and I at the time, ran a triathlon camp which was in the backyard of this church because we used their parking lot, it was huge and this is about two months into my exodus. I see the pastor walking out and he can’t look at me, he’s looking down and I’m thinking, “Oh no, what did I do now, I’m getting in some kind of trouble”. Yet he literally said, “I need a leader to go to El Salvador and will pay for you if you’d be willing to go”. I said, “sign me up”. I didn’t even have to ask any questions, it’s like, are you kidding me, I’ve been whisked away from doing the thing that made my heart-beat and now I had the opportunity to go on a foreign land with all these kids that I love and have sewn into? Heck yeah sign me up. This was just the beginning: before we were on foreign soil, the interesting thing about it was, we were held up by a delayed plane flight, so we all had to meet before we were going to set sail. We had two days and I said to him, “this could be a really great time to have a foot washing because it’s such a humbling experience I’ve done it one time in my life, and I really feel like the Lord is saying that”. Again I was reminded, “I am not the prophet of the church”, and I was like “OK, dang”. So we’re all posted up you know, chillin and hanging, and it would have been ample opportunity to do so but we didn’t, nonetheless I’ve shared stories about El Salvador, how miraculous it was, we saw miracle after miracle after miracle after miracle when in fact, I’ll share this one really quick.

So as it turns out we were 10 days in and I was getting in trouble for praying for miracles so I was exhausted and I actually didn’t have anything in me left to pray because leadership on my team was like, “silence just don’t speak”, which you know I was like, I’m gonna comply out of sheer oppression. So we’re sitting there and fifty people have gone forward and the Lords like, “I want you to pray”, and I’m like. “well I don’t feel like praying”. And the Lord’s like, “what do you want”? And I’m like, “you know what I want, I want all these people to just drop like flies”. Well everybody in the room fell to the ground, one fell swoop and I have the youth pastor standing over in the corner holding somebody up and he’s scowling at me, “you did this”! But I am talking to Holy Spirit, “I did not expect you to do this”! I mean this was literally, it left my lips as I prayed this thing and I commanded everybody to drop like flies. I just didn’t know at that moment that I had been obedient the whole time, I didn’t stumble and I didn’t cower to man, I was being honoring because that was the position of the pastors on this trip but at that point they had said you can’t speak so, not being able to speak among them I spoke to the Lord and he heard me. He answered my request as frivolous as it was, He still knows my personality and I needed that as proof for me to say, “OK I know that I am at least here and we witnessed all these things and we’re not gonna be able to contain it when we go back on American soil”.

When we arrived back home and I was reprimanded again and told that I cannot speak of all the miracles that we saw, I felt OK because you’re not gonna silence these kids because they had witnessed so many miracles, signs and wonders throughout our time period there and, lo and behold wouldn’t you know, the other pastor’s daughter had a dream that we should have had a foot washing before we went on our trip. So everybody gathered at the church, I wasn’t there, I had no idea that this was even going on. I get a call from one of the other leaders and he asked, “where are you”, and I’m like, “where are you”? He informs me that the other pastor’s daughter had a vision that we should have had a foot washing before we left on our trip, and that I should be here. But I didn’t know about it. He scrambled, “aren’t you upset, they’re doing this without you here and in spite of you”. In laughter I said, “but God’s the one that’s getting what He wants, God’s doing it and maybe it needs to happen in my absence because technically I’m back on sabbatical, but it’s OK because God’s moving in these kids lives and that can’t be stolen because they are witnessing each other hear from him and that’s all that matters, it’s an extension of what we lived together in El Salvador and I was there and I brought a lot of it with me and I get to relish in the fact that God still called me to partake in it”. So be encouraged, other people might not like you around, but if God says you’re supposed to be there, just obey Him.