A Wide Open Door

there's a heavy anointing i felt every night a heavy anointing while you're standing i will turn your attention to the word of the lord first corinthians chapter 16 the executive board and the ministry leaders are behind me tonight they felt like we needed a little representation and i feel it's important because there are a thousand preachers here tonight that could do a great job i mean didn't brother walter do an outstanding job and if you weren't in texas or virginia you probably never heard him preach so he's one of a thousand here tonight but he did an outstanding exceptional job and there are a hundred leaders who could cast vision but you've selected me and i believe god honors the work of the church so i don't claim to be the only person who could do whatever's supposed to be done many people could do whatever god wants but since you put me in this place i do believe there's some spiritual significance that i represent you i present represent all these men and the general board and so god honors what we decided to do and i do believe god has given me a

message matthew 18 whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven where two or three of you will agree and where two or three are gathered in my name so we agree we're gathered and god is gonna do some binding of things that need to be bound is god is going to do some loosing of things that need to be loose and he's going to use you and me to get the job done so i do believe i have a word from the lord for us tonight first corinthians 16 8-9 first corinthians 16 8-9 the apostle paul wrote but i will tarry at ephesus until pentecost for a great door and effectual is open unto me and there are many adversaries you may be seated i don't have to state that the last two years have been unprecedented years of crisis confusion and contention the apostle paul said there are many adversaries i think we can be apostolic enough to say that's still true today crisis confusion contention there's polarization in society and to be honest there's polarization in church i've traveled across our

fellowship this past year and a half and pastors tell me some in the church say you've got to wear masks or we're not coming to church others say if you tell us to wear masks we're not coming to church some say get up and preach that everybody needs the vaccine to be saved others say get up and preach don't take the vaccine it's the mark of the beast what do you do in a time like this i'll tell you what to do you heard it the other night the church needs to be the church and we need to let god be god we're for all reasonable measures but at the end of the day our salvation it's not in politics our salvation is not in social action we believe in exerting positive influence in society but when it comes to it what we've got to do is exactly what brother walter said we must preach jesus christ and him crucified and as i've traveled across our fellowship i've asked pastors small and large churches what's going on and some have described the struggles and we have had churches adversely affected especially churches in rented facilities

that they were no longer able to use them church churches with a lot of working-class people and immigrants who suddenly had no jobs and had to go other places where there they could find jobs but it's amazing to me that almost every pastor has told me so our finances have stayed the same or in most cases they've told me our finances have increased i believe it's the hand of god it's the blessing of god and some have said well attendance is somewhat down because of of all that's going on it's building back up but it's not quite where it was but but we've got lots of people online and we believe they're coming back because they're paying ties and they've said a few that we expected to be faithful have disappeared but they said a lot of people that are unfaithful have suddenly become strong in faith and we're teaching bible studies we're baptizing new people they're receiving the holy ghost people are watching online that we've never encountered before they're coming to church or they're contacting us 21:29 from another part of the world and we're connecting them in the midst of pandemic in

the midst of confusion and chaos god's hand of blessing is definitely upon the united pentecostal church international and i believe in great measure that's because of unity we are working together and so notice for a great door and effectual is open unto me i looked at the christian standard bible it says a wide door for effective ministry has opened for me i looked at the new living translation it says there is a wide open door for a great work here and that touched my heart when i saw that a wide open door and that's what i want to preach to you tonight if we will remain united and if we will respond in faith it's not a door that's simply cracked open it's not something we're gonna squeeze through this pandemic is not something we're gonna barely survive and we're gonna squeeze through we're gonna crawl through but it's a wide open door i'm saying let's kick the door open tonight i feel a spirit it's not time to be conservative in our methods it's time to be strong in our doctrine but it's time to get wild in what god wants to do it's

time to kick open the door it's time to push the door it's time to march through the door there is not only a door there is a wide open door for the united pentecostal church international and for god's people everywhere a wide open door i feel it in the holy ghost paul said i have many adversaries i have many opponents but his focus was not on the adversity his focus was on the opportunity he said everywhere i look here in ephesus i've got opponents and we might say it's time to move on time to go back to corinth time to go where i'm wanted and needed but he says i've got a lot of opponents but i need to stay here longer because there's a wide open door i believe if we remain focused if we'll remain united if we'll refuse to be distracted by issues inside or outside god has given the apostolic movement a wide open door for evangelism revival and growth there was a witness of the spirit tuesday night of an open door for north american missions if you are here you know what i'm talking about my wife and i

sat on that front rope just broken weeping and wondering i was thinking the only way i can justify being general superintendent is if i can help these home missionaries start churches otherwise i need to get out of here and go start a church and then last night if you were here for the global mission service again we're just weeping and broken seeing the young adults streaming down here and maybe even some not so young adults and teenagers just coming down here and falling on their face before god kneeling and falling flat and saying i will give myself to missions i will give myself to the will of god i will give myself to soul winning that lets me know there is a wide open door we've got young people and young adults that are ready to take the territory for the gospel of jesus christ we've got the finances now we're getting the men and women there's nothing to stop us from marching through the wide open door for revival evangelism and growth let's go beyond let's go beyond let's walk through the open door children's ministry if i'm right they had five receive the

holy ghost in the booth area that's supposed to be for selling things that's supposed to be for advertising things but children get the holy ghost and i think what was it 32 in the service today hey this is general conference this is for preachers we're trying to promote support children's ministry but we had children that needed the holy ghost so today 37 children were baptized with the holy spirit with the initial sign of speaking in other tongues that ought to tell you something there's a wide open door so because of the wide open door at ephesus paul decided to keep working there he said i'm going to work till pentecost maybe that was a date on the counter maybe it's convenient marker everybody knew but you know it is highly symbolic and for the apostle paul i'm sure this symbolism didn't escape him so maybe he was saying i'm going to stay here till may but maybe he's also saying i just feel like if i stay till pentecost i'll get the breakthrough that i'm waiting on maybe if i just keep staying here till pentecost i'll walk through that door and i'll reap the

harvest just like the first pentecost i think acceptable to say that paul had in mind not only the calendar but also the symbolic reality that if i keep working hard if i march through the open door god is going to give us a pentecostal outpouring and so i proclaim i'm telling the united pentecostal church international and i tell anybody else that is willing to listen you might be online maybe you're not part of the upci so what doesn't matter to me if you want to claim the promise of pentecost you're welcome to it i'm here to tell you we need to keep working until pentecost we need to keep working until there's a pentecostal outpouring stay in your city stay at mid adversity stay amid coven stay amid political and social unrest keep on working until pentecost keep on working until the answer comes if you read nehemiah nehemiah came back to jerusalem to rebuild the city the wall that had been destroyed by the enemies you read chapter four as he began rebuilding the wall the enemies used every tactic imaginable to discourage him i'm not going to take the time to go through

the text but if you just read nehemiah 4 they ridiculed the jews weakness you're too weak to do anything then they ridicule their worship you think if you just sacrifice something that that'll get the job done you know i can just hear the critics say so you're jumping around you're dancing you think that makes any difference you're screaming and yelling and you're making a lot of noise what difference is that going to make and so they ridiculed you're too weak to do the job you think your little puny worship is going to make a difference and they used every tactic they could they said and you don't even know how to do it worst of all you don't even know how to get the job done you are taking heaps of burnt rubble and you think you can build a wall you're taking burnt stones to build a wall why even if a fox ran over it you'd crumble you can't even get the job done and nehemiah if you read it carefully he prayed he didn't intact he didn't make snarky comments back to them on social media he didn't he went to god

and then in one of the most masterful understatements of scripture laconic terse concise to the point uh a brilliant literary statement after hearing all the comments his number one retort on facebook or whatever they had back then here's it right here it is in nehemiah 4 6. so he prayed and then here's the next statement so we built the wall there's your best answer to the critics they say you're too weak they say your worship is ridiculous they say you don't know what to do you don't know how to do it all you have is burnt rubble all you have is burnt stone all you have is 16 year old kids that are fighting your society you think you can build a church on a 16 year old kid that's headed for prison so we built the wall so we built a church in virginia so we built the church in indiana so we built the church in malawi so we built the church in liberia so we're gonna walk through the open door i almost if i was to add anything i would add the word what so what we built the wall so

what we baptize people in jesus name so what we prayed them through to the holy ghost oh i feel the holy ghost right now we have a wide open door do not be discouraged do not be defeated do not be depressed do not use halfway measures don't try to just get by it's time to build the church of course that wasn't the end they came back in nehemiah 6. again i don't have time to go through it but if you study carefully they started with a demand to meet reasonable let's talk we got differences of opinion so let's have a conference nehemiah didn't do it so five times they asked him it was a distraction they were trying to just pull him away from the real work to endless talk that would accomplish nothing and so they tried distraction that didn't work to begin to threaten him we're going to report you to the king you're a rebel you're violating the emperor's commands and so they tried to use intimidation then notice they use false prophecy when that didn't work they tried to be super spiritual and they brought in some false prophets and then

when that didn't work they said we're going to write a letter of accusation they tried false accusations if you look at it they tried every possible tactic now don't raise your hand but if you're a pastor have you ever had distractions in the last year and a half like four or five distractions have you ever had intimidation the past year and a half have you ever had some false prophets have you ever had some false accusations and again what did nehemiah do chapter six he went to god in prayer but then the next statement it's very simple a masterpiece you should study this in english literature but it's not just a literary device it's the truth so after all of those distractions 33:52 threats intimidations false prophecy false accusations he prayed he continued the work nehemiah 6 15 says so the wall was finished so the wall was finished so we had general conference 2021 so we had revival so we planted new churches so we opened a new mission field in the midst of a pandemic did we retreat did we give up did we pull missionaries back from a dozen countries no we

opened my yoke hey we're going to open a new country so we finish the wall don't be distracted don't be intimidated i believe in being reasonable i believe in talking to our saints candidly honestly sincerely as i said i believe in reasonable cooperation when when medical necessity and social situations i believe in in talking in the right way and being biblical and spiritual but at the end of the day do not allow polarization do not allow disunity and if you didn't vote for me or some of the other people elected it doesn't matter but we unite around one another we unite around the vision we reunite around the decisions of the body do i make mistakes yes do i say some things that you might disagree with i'm sure that's the case i try to do my best but i can't claim perfection but i am trying to lead us together and if you have input please give it to me email me text me facebook me call me call my secretary call brother stan gleason you know call our new assistant superintendent brother john tell them what you think and do all of that

but at the end of the day just keep moving forward together we're not going to be sidetracked we're not going to be distracted we're not going to be polarized we see what happens in society where there's disunity where political parties can't even agree on the basic things because what's most important to them is polarization but what's most important to us is jesus christ and him crucified what's most important to us it's with one mind and one accord what's most important to us is to work until pentecost to pray until pentecost to keep moving forward until there's an outpouring of the holy spirit so again i say we have a wide open door don't allow polarization or disunity to stop you from your work keep working until pentecost if you come on down in first corinthians 16 paul's closing commands in verse 13 through 14 i'm going to read from the niv be on guard there is a time we apostolics are very conservative if there's any hint of compromise doctrinally speaking if there's any hint of compromise in the life of holiness we're going to be on guard in fact if you want to kill

something a program or anything you can think of if you can convince people it's a compromise of our doctrine it's dead on arrival if you can convince people it's uh the the nose of the camel in the tent as far as just destroying our holiness you can forget about it the vast majority of our ministers are going to vote against it every single time and that's good be on guard we don't want sin or doctrinal compromise to pollute the revival because we'll lose the purity of the move of the spirit so it's right to say be on guard he says stand firm in the faith don't back up don't give up don't fall down don't turn to the left i'll also say don't turn to the right just keep moving straight ahead in the will of god stand firm in the faith i don't have to spell it out you know what i believe you can read the books be on guard stand firm in the faith be courageous be strong there's a time you have to fight there's a time you must be courageous the enemy is ferocious there's time you have to be

strong and he says do everything with love don't forget that be as strong as you want but it better be in love if you're going to preach strong it better be in love if you're going to preach hell which we do need to do that more than we do probably it needs to be with tears in your eyes if you can't do it with tears in your eyes maybe you shouldn't be preaching on that if you're gonna preach judgment of god maybe you shouldn't do that until you've gone to the altar and you've wept and you have love and compassion and your the judgment is not to condemn the judgment is to redeem the judgment is to restore we've got to have a strong message but it's got to be in love don't let the devil or adverse circumstances destroy your faith and don't let the opponents destroy your love so paul says i got to keep working here there are many adversaries but there's a wide open door but then he says now remember do everything in love so when you face those opponents it's the simplest thing in the world to fight on

their level whether it's inside the church or outside the church but don't be lured in coming down off the wall to fight carnal battles in a carnal way yes be firm but keep working stay focused on your mission keep building the church and whatever you respond let it be in love i believe we have a wide open door keep working until pentecost as i was thinking about the pandemic i prayed and i do believe the lord gives us each of us words we all need to hear from god at times like this and i remember brother wilford two years ago preaching from fear to faith little did we know that right after that we would face a pandemic unprecedented in our lifetimes and the best thing you could do is move from fear to faith and last year in the midst of the crisis all i could say is and my message was but we see jesus we see the pandemic but we see jesus we see death and destruction we believe in healing when healing comes we testify to the miracle but when healing doesn't come we just keep going because we see jesus

and so i believe the lord speaks to us as i was praying for god to give me a message and my mind went back and my study went back to the classic statement in pentecost of joel you know it well joel 2 25 says this and i will restore to you the years that the locusts hath eaten the cankerworm and the caterpillar and the palmer worm my great army which i sent among you now i know that had a historical reference and we could talk about all that but on the day of pentecost acts chapter 2 the apostle peter took joel chapter 2 and he said you know there is an application in these last days well if the apostle peter could apply this chapter to the first century and say that's the last days i think i'm pretty safe to apply it to the 21st century and say these are the last days so if you are struggling and i think all of us are in some measure in some way because of all the chaos and the confusion and if you're struggling your church has been affected your family's been affected if it

if everybody here is there's been affected by death or disease or hardship or financial struggle or just confusion or questions or attack i remember bishop golder saying years ago everybody has doubts everybody has fears preachers general board members we all have fears and doubts but this is what he said don't believe your doubts and don't doubt your beliefs you're gonna have doubts but when that comes don't just give up and say i must be a horrible sinner i have doubts just don't believe those doubts just rebuke them in jesus name and what brought you here don't doubt your beliefs faith in jesus christ is what brought you here repentance from sin is what brought you here baptism in jesus name is what brought you here the baptism of the holy ghost is what brought you here the pursuit of holiness the gifts of the spirit worship and spirit and truth that's why we're here don't believe your doubts and don't doubt your beliefs and you can get through it and so we're at this place where all of us have had these struggles and i believe there is a restoration i believe this is a

principle of god's word whatever the locust has eaten in your church or in your family or in your life or in your mind if you need to pray god restore the years and we don't have years to wait so lord could you do it right now could you do it this week could you do it this month could you do it by the end of this year could you do it before pentecost because i'm going to keep working until pentecost so you got to do the work of restoration before pentecost claim i'm telling you if i can speak as a general superintendent i believe god said to me there is a work of restoration tell the people there is a work of restoration whatever that's been stolen whatever has been lost whatever's been eaten whatever has been destroyed you claim it back you believe it back you preach it back when you preach or when you don't know what else to do keep preaching it when you don't know what else to do do what you know to do keep praying keep believing keep worshiping keep preaching you can preach your way out of a

trial you can preach your way into victory just preach it into existence teach it preach it pray it worship it believe it restoration but actually that wasn't the main part of the message i felt god giving me joel 2 28 and 29 and this is the actual part that the apostle peter appropriated for the day of pentecost he said it shall come to pass afterward so after what after the restoration of getting back what was taken from you that i will pour out my spirit upon all flesh and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy your old men shall dream dreams your young men shall see visions and also upon the servants upon the handmaids in those days will i pour out of my spirit now notice the comprehensive nature of the revival the inclusivity of the revival the diversity of the revival now don't just take the world's buzzwords and follow their train of logic of division and disunity and pitting race 46:17 against race don't let them take away good words but this is saying the young and the old this is a multi-generational revival this is saying the servants and the handmaidens

this is a revival that sweeps across every socio-economic status people try to abide the rich versus the poor and the middle class the black the white the english speaking the spanish speaking don't go for that stuff the church is the church we do want to be inclusive we do want to be diverse but we want it to be by the outpouring of the holy spirit we're one church by one spirit you're baptized into one body it's not an english-speaking spirit it's not a spanish-speaking spirit it's not a black person spirit it's not a white person spirit it's the holy spirit and it causes you to speak in tongues i don't care if you're black or white or english or spanish you will speak in tongues as the spirit gives utterance it's for the men it's for the women notice he said all flesh and when the apostle peter preached that he didn't even understand himself he thought subconsciously all jewish flesh but god had to give him a vision three times in acts 10 to say no when i said all flesh i did not mean for you to edit that and say all jewish

flesh i meant for you to say all flesh our church should be representative of what god is trying to do in our community there is a revival of the holy ghost for your whole community for your whole nation for all flesh so notice carefully first the restoration then afterward the mighty outpouring of the holy spirit so what that tells me there have been times during cove but we'd just be satisfied to get back to where we were as if there was no covet if we could fast forward back to february of 2020 or january february will be satisfied but according to this passage no we should not be satisfied or you might say well i just would like to be where i would have been without covet i was projecting five percent growth i was projecting new building i was projecting this so if if you could just take away cover and just let me stay on the track of where i was supposed to be no he's not saying be satisfied to go back to where you were before kobet he's not saying be satisfied to go where you would have been if there

had been no such thing as cobot i don't say god sent it but god allowed it and that means god has a plan to go through it and what the devil means for evil god means for good so we're gonna leverage kovid to go where we've never been before we're gonna step on koben and use it as a stepping stone we're gonna tape those heaps of burnt stones that are burnt by covet and we're gonna use those burnt stones to build a wall i'm saying we're gonna go beyond don't stop with where you used to be don't stop with where you wanted to be but go where you've never been before go beyond into the will of god god has a revival that takes us where we've never been before i'm saying there's a wide open door think about it the wide open door doesn't leave you where you are the wide open door takes you where you've never been before it's time to step through the door after restoration a mighty outpouring of the holy spirit now we've seen this i'll just be brief but who would have thought just take finances and finances

are the least but they're miserable and they show unity and they show blessing who would have thought in the year of covet one year it hit us and the next year we're trying to recover who would have thought we would have a record christmas for christ offering for north american missions churches of over 6 million who would have thought one record is amazing but to save our children a record offering of 2.47 million dollars and the mother's memorial record of 4.3 million dollars and the move the mission for youth ministry and advantages around the world of 6.77 million dollars and global missions also a record year and the largest single offering of 1.3 million dollars who would have thought that every ministry would break every record in the year of colvin like i said in some ways finances are the least of it but it's an objective way of god saying you'll be satisfied to go back where you were two years ago no you're satisfied to go back to your projections without coving no you need to shatter every record you need to go through the open door god's already showed us he's already

given an object lesson he's already proved it a couple years ago the florida district said we're going to plant 50 works in two years they planted 52 works in two years this year north texas district said we're going to plant a hundred works and they raised 262 000 on the spot i believe they're going to plant a hundred works i don't have the exact statistics but you're counting brother sis trunk hundreds of new works pledged we're gonna do that brother howe we don't even know the true results but you've got hundreds of young men and women and out of that who made a commitment out of that are gonna come home missionaries out of that are gonna come global missionaries we don't know the results but we're going to have hundreds of new churches and hundreds of new missionaries and thousands of new conversions because of what happened in this conference god is showing us as plainly as possible that he's going to take us through the open door so we've got to take that back to every local church let me just share for a couple minutes if you had to tell me my

greatest if you had if i had to my greatest trial well there are lots of trials it'd be hard to evaluate some short summer long but if if i had to tell you the time where i had the greatest danger of that moment will be 14 years ago when i was 50 years old just come back from an overseas missions trip on saturday preached on sunday took the day off monday back to a full schedule tuesday came home for dinner getting ready to go back teacher leadership class sitting home eating dinner with my wife i've told this story or at least some part of it before but suddenly my left hand started moving of its own accord of course that shocked me i turned to my wife i said something's wrong but when i said something's wrong the the lower right side of my face sagged down and my words came off probably wrong she raced to the phone dialing 9-1-1 you know when something like that happens there's been several times in my life of extreme danger like that it is true what they say it's like a slow motion like you remember every

split second and i can remember thinking i'm having a stroke what do you do my wife's doing the only thing we can do call 9-1-1 that's the fastest thing we can do well that's not doing me any good i'm sitting here with one hand going crazy and my face going crazy and i can't talk but i am a missionary kid my parents were the pioneer missionaries to korea when we went there our family of four we're the only united pentecostal people in a country of 40 million people and we had three preachers the first five years there were no cell phones no internet no face time no email it was wait in line all day to make a phone call through cable back to the us and so we're literally on our own and so my parents taught me what to do so while i'm sitting there the only thing i could think to do i put my own hands on my own head and i said these words in the name of jesus when it comes down to that the only thing that matters is jesus christ and him crucified i did not think

of looking for my upci card although i love the upci i didn't even really think about calling whoever the general superintendent or district superintendent or only one thing in the name of jesus when i said those words i started speaking those words clearly so i went and sat down in my chair ems is coming and of course i'm a preacher and so i'm thinking i'm supposed to be teaching that class looks like i'm not going to make it so i told my wife tell johnny my pastoral sister he's got to take the class we're covering chapter so and so he's going to have to take it and so i try to tell her it's on such a subject but when i tried to tell her the subject i couldn't pronounce the words every time i got to a big noun i couldn't say it so i got a piece of paper and i wrote it and i could write it fine i knew the word in my head i could write it and spell it and give it to her but i couldn't say it that's kind of scary so at least i did my

duty there i guess he taught the class i don't really know by that time ems came they loaded me in the ambulance racing to the hospital my wife's following behind and so i'm telling this technician i'm a pastor i've got lots of people playing for me i said no no i have lots of people playing for me they're playing for me she said don't worry i understand stroke so we're kind of joking along on the way to the hospital and i'm thinking i'm a preacher if i can't talk i can't preach if i can't preach i don't have a job if i don't have a job i can't support my family and this coming weekend we're supposed to be doing a capital campaign for our new building and uh i'm so where our goal is three million dollars well i can't if i can't talk i can't raise the money nobody's going to give to a preacher that can't talk nobody's going to want to build a new building of 100 000 square feet on 12 acres of land on the freeway and and take out an 8 million loan and spend 15 million dollars

if the preacher can't preach so i'm just frantically thinking what's going to happen and i felt like the lord spoke to me this is why you live by faith for times like this 57:43 i made it to the hospital and my wife meanwhile called her second son he was a freshman in college and she said your dad's being rushed to the hospital we think you've had a stroke can you please pick up your sister from high school meet us down at the hospital so of course daniel is just shocked because he's never actually even seen me sick in his whole life much less i've never been in the hospital his whole life so he can't add this up it makes no sense and this is what he told us later while he's driving from college god spoke to him this is why you live by faith same god so you might expect to be the same message we get to the hospital and and of course they do all kind of tests they take me overnight they run every test scans everything after one hour all those symptoms disappeared and they've never come back 14

years later one hour so the next morning the first doctor comes in says you've had a stroke and she says you know when you had a stroke now you're fortunate it's it hasn't really affected you and you're going to be okay but you're there they're lasting consequences you're going to be irritable you're going to have hard time controlling your emotions you're going to be depressed you're going to be discouraged and here's a little booklet that tells you of course she gives it to my wife and she says this is how to care for stroke business you're going to have to help him when he's depressed and then she walks out of the room and i'm thinking man that's enough to depress you right there so being the kind of uh kind of person i am i i i respond to adversity in different ways usually with faith but also usually with with a certain kind of gallows humor and so i told my wife look if i've had a stroke we got to get something out of this so i said i want you to sit down we're going to make a list of all

the problem people in the church and you're going to call them one by one you're going to bring them in and i'm going to tell them what i really think about them what they're doing wrong and how they need to straighten up and when they walk out of the room you just say because she's the perfect partner you just say now honey he's had a stroke he's not in charge of his emotions just take that into a consideration so i had a plan if i'm gonna have a stroke let's get some mileage out of this stroke but my plan didn't work the neurologist comes in and he says you know we've run all the scans there is no damage to your brain there's nothing in your heart you don't have any clogging in your arteries you have no signs that you ever had a stroke and you don't even have any risk factors that would lead to a stroke there's nothing all the tests real nothing i said well the first doctor said astro he says no you do not have you did not have a stroke because there are no symptoms there's nothing in

your brain we would see it wherever it was so he said i want you to tell me what happened so i recounted the whole story just like i told you so he's there shaking his head hmm puzzled expression and i finished the whole thing he says now i want you to tell me that one more time step by step go through the whole thing so i go with the whole thing i said what's wrong doctor he said well it's not possible those symptoms cannot happen because the left side indicates there was a stroke on the right side of your brain the lower right face indicates there's a stroke on the left side of your brain the specific speech center that you that enables you to know the word but not to say the word and write the word but you can't say it there's a specific spot in the left brain that's responsible for that so there are three different places in the brain that have to be attacked by a stroke at one time but if there's that kind of a massive stroke we would see the damage and you would have some residual

symptoms you would have some handicap you would have some place on the brain that the scan would show but you have nothing he said now you know what's known as a tia a transgenic scheming attack could be a temporary restriction of a blood vessel that would temporarily cause one symptom of a stroke but by definition that is one small vessel in one small area it couldn't hit three parts of the brain at the same time by definition the tiaa can't do that so that's why i ask you to describe your symptoms that it doesn't add up i say well doctor i said doctor is there any explanation he said well there is one explanation he said it is possible that you had a massive stroke that hit your whole brain and in the middle of the stroke it spontaneously reversed itself and went away but he said since there's no evidence of that i'm just going to write on your chart you had a t.i.a so officially i had a tia but when he said a spontaneous reversal i thought of the exact moment when i laid my hands on my head and i said

in the name of jesus now i'm gonna i'm gonna tell you the rest of the story so that weekend we went ahead with our capital campaign we raised 3.2 million dollars we raised 1.1 million in cash a business has sold his business and gave me a check for one million dollars as a first time not the last time the first time i held a 1 million dollar check in my hand the next year 2008 in our church daughter works at that time not all the daughter works the ones we still had in our outros reaches we had a record attendance of 1167. we had a record of 247 received the holy ghost the most we've ever had in 18 years of my pastorate the year after the stroke in november led us to our greatest financial miracle our greatest attendance our greatest outpouring of the holy ghost so i'm speaking from personal experience