The craziest day EVER!
There is an unseen world that co-exists with ours. It’s called the spiritual realm. Before moving to Haiti I really never gave it much thought. I had heard of voodoo of course, but I thought it was make believe, hocus pocus stuff. I didn’t think people really practiced it, and I especially didn’t think anyone actually believed any of that stuff was real.
Fast forward four + years.
Voodoo is real, and it is nothing like the movies; people die, animals are sacrificed, alliances are made between this world and theirs and people can be possessed by evil spirits.
We have a new pastor (my good friend Patris) at Mission of Hope church and things are changing drastically in a good way. We have a prayer service every week day at noon, a 3 hour worship service every Tuesday night, a 6 hour prayer and worship service every Saturday starting at 6:00am, and Sunday morning service is standing room only now. The spirit is moving in a huge way.
The past four days have been especially spiritually saturated. The first two days of November are national holidays and important days on the voodoo calendar, All Souls Day and All Saints Day otherwise known as the Day of the Dead. The cemeteries are a flurry of activity during these two days as many Haitians will visit the graves of loved ones to participate in voodoo ceremonies; making offerings to the spirits and taking part in ritualistic dances. In response many churches hold activities at the same time. Our spiritual weekend started with the service on Saturday morning, then Sunday service followed by an additional 2 days of prayer and worship services focusing on breaking the alliances made between families and spirits.
When the church holds services of this kind, especially when they have a specific focus like this one, it is quite common to see someone in the church become possessed and begin wandering through the church. They always make their way to the front (on their own, or led by someone else) and then eventually drop to the ground where they writhe on the ground in very strange and unnatural ways before they are carried out of the sanctuary to be prayed for. I’ve seen this a number of times now and although it’s not as shocking as it used to be it still kind of freaks me out.
Today was a whole other level of crazy. There weren’t just one or two people wandering then dropping, no, there were almost 50 of them!! It was crazy, everywhere you looked someone was falling and then jerking around on the ground. There was a whole team of men carrying people from the church to the kindergarten yard where another team of people were casting out the spirits. It was intense. I was blown away when I saw Nicole (one of the Hope House kids) in the thick of it all praying her beautiful little heart out.
I was very clearly reminded today that we are in the middle of a war zone. Much of the fighting we never see, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t happening. The Holy Spirit is moving in our area, and doing amazing things in and through our church. Satan is fighting back as hard as he can but he is losing ground everyday!
Peace, love and a fight worth fighting.
Rachel
p.s. Many of you know there is a hurricane headed directly for us. We are expecting to be hit Friday or Saturday and it looks like it is going to be pretty intense. Please keep Haiti in your prayers at this time, especially the hundreds of thousands of families living in make shift tents.
Fast forward four + years.
Voodoo is real, and it is nothing like the movies; people die, animals are sacrificed, alliances are made between this world and theirs and people can be possessed by evil spirits.
We have a new pastor (my good friend Patris) at Mission of Hope church and things are changing drastically in a good way. We have a prayer service every week day at noon, a 3 hour worship service every Tuesday night, a 6 hour prayer and worship service every Saturday starting at 6:00am, and Sunday morning service is standing room only now. The spirit is moving in a huge way.
The past four days have been especially spiritually saturated. The first two days of November are national holidays and important days on the voodoo calendar, All Souls Day and All Saints Day otherwise known as the Day of the Dead. The cemeteries are a flurry of activity during these two days as many Haitians will visit the graves of loved ones to participate in voodoo ceremonies; making offerings to the spirits and taking part in ritualistic dances. In response many churches hold activities at the same time. Our spiritual weekend started with the service on Saturday morning, then Sunday service followed by an additional 2 days of prayer and worship services focusing on breaking the alliances made between families and spirits.
When the church holds services of this kind, especially when they have a specific focus like this one, it is quite common to see someone in the church become possessed and begin wandering through the church. They always make their way to the front (on their own, or led by someone else) and then eventually drop to the ground where they writhe on the ground in very strange and unnatural ways before they are carried out of the sanctuary to be prayed for. I’ve seen this a number of times now and although it’s not as shocking as it used to be it still kind of freaks me out.
Today was a whole other level of crazy. There weren’t just one or two people wandering then dropping, no, there were almost 50 of them!! It was crazy, everywhere you looked someone was falling and then jerking around on the ground. There was a whole team of men carrying people from the church to the kindergarten yard where another team of people were casting out the spirits. It was intense. I was blown away when I saw Nicole (one of the Hope House kids) in the thick of it all praying her beautiful little heart out.
I was very clearly reminded today that we are in the middle of a war zone. Much of the fighting we never see, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t happening. The Holy Spirit is moving in our area, and doing amazing things in and through our church. Satan is fighting back as hard as he can but he is losing ground everyday!
Peace, love and a fight worth fighting.
Rachel
p.s. Many of you know there is a hurricane headed directly for us. We are expecting to be hit Friday or Saturday and it looks like it is going to be pretty intense. Please keep Haiti in your prayers at this time, especially the hundreds of thousands of families living in make shift tents.
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