Across the States and back to Toronto

Week Monday 09 April to 15 April

Despite our resolve to not use Greyhound, we headed off again on Monday morning to San Francisco. We had booked a flight to take us across the States to avoid the long trips on the bus. The prospect of no cost transport outweighed the prospect possible discomfort that such a trip would bring. We had just over a week still left on our bus pass! As it worked out, the trip to San Francisco was very pleasant and took us 8 hours.

New Oakland Bridge under construction San Francisco

Then after a short walk from the Bus station to the subway, we took the train to the airport. Our flight took us to Richmond, Virginia to meet up with some family members before heading back to Toronto.

James and Helena met up with us at the airport early Tuesday morning, and over that day we had a wonderful time of relating with them and with Marilyn, a sister to Karen’s sister-in-law.

Marilyn, Helena, Karen, Rod and James

After a restful night in a country motel, waking to the song of birds in the trees outside our window, we set off again to catch the Greyhound up across the border and into Canada, arriving there early Thursday morning (6.00 am) after another night on the bus. After having breakfast in a little café, we wandered around Toronto’s Chinatown, filling in the hours until we could finally go to our hotel in downtown Toronto, to rest. We had booked into the same “hotel” where we had previously stayed in January, very basic and rundown, but cheap compared to other accommodation in Toronto, which we found considerably more expensive than the USA. The cost of food here appears to be much higher also.

Our stay in Toronto has been a good refreshing and catch up time, and preliminary planning in preparation for the next part of the journey – the UK. We took advantage of the one-day passes that the Toronto transit offers and spent some time travelling trains, buses and streetcars.

Beside Lake Ontario. Toronto Island in the background.

The one day pass on Sunday gave us the ability to travel the considerable distance from downtown Toronto to Catch the Fire service and back again. Lovely to be back in the refreshing environment of worship, and also to our delight make contact with two friends we had made in the earlier conference we had attended there.

Spokane and back to Redding

Week Monday 02 April to 08 April
We left Redding for Spokane around 11.30 pm on the Greyhound and headed towards Portland in the dark, so missed on some of the wonderful scenery. As we were approaching Portland, there was heavy rain. When we started heading inland to Spokane, rain ceased and we saw the wonderful scenery bordering the Columbia River.

Dam on Columbia River

 

More windmills

Upon arriving in Spokane, made our way to the motel by bus, and rested after our 16-17 hour journey. The next morning we were greeted by snow, apparently quite rare at this time of the year. It continued to snow in the afternoon.

Snow outside motel in morning

Kelly's Car, coated in about an hour

 

Our niece, Kelly, came with her two children Jalen and Derek, and took us around to her place and we had  lovely day with them, her sister Jenel, and two of her children, Rachel and Nichole. We met up with Rick, Jenel's husband, later in the day.

Relations

 The following day, back on the bus, this time for over 20 hours via Seattle and the long haul back to Redding. It was this last trip that made the prospect of flying back to the east coast rather than greyhounding for another week, look very attractive! For a start, the bus was an hour late starting, which meant food or toilet stops were reduced, and we ended up at what was supposed to be our tea break running from one bus to transfer to another, only just getting there in time. Stomach cramp, discomfort from lengthy periods of sitting, overpowering fumes from an over-full chemical toilet at the back of the bus where the only available seats remained,  topped off by the fact that the air vents weren’t working! (Preparation for wilder adventures ahead??)

We did, however, see some wonderful scenary - a lake snowed over in the mountains.

Lake largely covered in snow

Spent the weekend at Redding. Went to the Friday night service, and saw in small measure the glory cloud that we had heard about. This occurred during an intense time of worship, and we saw it first-hand and now know its reality.

Sporty Fiat 500

On Saturday, we went to the healing rooms, and were just taken aback by the huge number of people who had come for prayer, the huge number of volunteers, the sensitivity and efficiency in which it was administered. We spent extra time there, having coffee in the “HeBrews” cafe and then went to one of the classes that they hold for those who have been prayed for. We were really impressed by the heart of those who tutored. There was such a consistent heartbeat, believing in the goodness of God, believing that His heart is for people to be healed.
Went to the early Sunday morning service, and even though we arrived well before the service started, the only seats we could find were the “BleaChairs”, very narrow, hard plastic tiered seats on the back wall. The people are so keen to get to church that they must come real early. There was also not much room left in the car park when we arrived. On leaving we saw the cars backed up possibly over half a mile up the road, waiting to come into the second service!

Traffic congestion getting to church!!

And it kept going and going!

On Sunday afternoon, our hosts invited 20 or so friends over for a barbeque. Wow! We were so mightily blessed by this, and some of these ones had prophetic words over us. They did not know us, but their words were so accurate and encouraging. We even met a man, Rick Larson, about whom we had heard Bill Johnson testify, who had been miraculously healed of stage 4 oesophageal cancer. He has since been mightily used by the Lord in healing. His testimony can be viewed on http://www.ibethel.tv/watch/969/esophageal-cancer-healed/2011/01/31
Other testimonies from Bethel can be found at http://www.ibethel.tv/channel/5/testimonies

Redding

Week Monday 26 March to 01 April
The trip from Las Vegas to Redding we decided to break by spending a night at Bakersfield en route, so although we left early Monday morning, it was Tuesday afternoon before we finally made it to the home of our hosts in Redding.  We had organised to stay in a family home of one of the members of Bethel Church. This was a lovely welcoming family, Daryl, Patty, Ali and Ezra. There was little happening at Bethel because their BSSM students were away, and our visit coincided with their in-house family conference, (with guest speaker Jack Hayford) and the school break.

We did have a little look around the amazing complex, and went to their Friday night, and Sunday services. There was an amazing sense of God's presence, especially during the worship times.

Alabaster House - 24/7 Prayer Chapel

Inside the Sanctuary

Main Entrance

Hired a car for the weekend so had freedom to attend their services. Also visited a couple of the sights of the city, the Shasta Dam and the Sundial bridge. Since it was raining much of the time in the first few days, we were not able to get the snow coated Shasta peak in our photo of the dam.

The Shasta Dam from the tourist centre

Shasta Dam and Lake

Sundial Bridge Redding

Rod on Sundial Bridge

Because not much happening at Bethel in the coming week, decided to head up to Spokane during the week and return to Bethel for the weekend.

San Antonio and Las Vegas

Week Monday 19 March to 25 March
It was a relief to finally arrive in San Antonio around 10 at night after over 30 hours on Greyhound. We were greeted by a friendly receptionist, fresh hot coffee, and given the key to a large comfortable room. Although the  motel was right next to the motorway, we slept soundly. Next day we made contact with a relative we hadn’t met – Celyne and her 2 young sons Owen(5) and Jaydon(3).

Celyne, with Owen (underneath) and Jaydon (on top)

Her husband had suffered a brain injury from explosives when on service in Iraq. It brought home again to us something of the price many Americans pay due to their nation’s involvement in their efforts to keep peace in the Middle East. We had a lovely time over a meal with Celyne while the 2 boys slept, then Rod played lego with the boys at our motel.
We didn’t see the sights (this time?) but have heard that San Antonio is very beautiful, and has some interesting historical places such as the Alamo (of Davy Crockett fame)
One more night in San Antonio, then back onto our Greyhound again. The trip from San Antonio to Las Vegas was a 33.5 hour trip. We are finding that these longer trips are tolerable due to the many even short stops when we can stretch our legs. We have also found that we can have reasonable and short sleeps and on arrival don’t feel overly exhausted. If we leave midday/afternoon, then spend the night on the bus, it seems to be better than early starts. Having smaller bags has helped, and we have often been able to secure reasonably low cost motels within walking distance of the bus stations.

Contrast in the landscape was notable. Travelling from Florida to San Antonio, most of the way was over wetlands. There were massive bridges over waterways. It was very flat, with a significant portion of the ground beside the road clearly wet, so as we passed through New Orleans we could see why there was a significant amount of damage from Katrina a few years ago. A lot of the land is very low lying, so any small changes in sea level would mean heaps of water coming in. We saw some of the damaged homes close to the motorway as we passed by.

From San Antonio to Las Vegas, the bus took us many miles through countryside. The scenery was in sharp contrast to the miles and miles of concrete that we had seen in most of our earlier travels. We are becoming really aware of how vast this nation is, and how much flat land that they actually have. Not only are the coastal areas flat, but much of what we saw of the interior was flat.

Flat land in Texas as far as the eye could see

Much of Texas we saw was green, although very little in the way of grass. There were massive wind farms where there must have been literally hundreds and hundreds of windmills, and we saw the odd oil pump at work.

Windmills, Windmills, Windmills

Oil Well at work

On this leg of the journey our bus was held up at Amarillo while a plain clothes police officer quietly searched nearly everyone’s bags – but not ours- initially we became aware that something was up when we overheard him ask a man right behind us if he was carrying any guns. When he continued to go from person to person, we thought oh no! we are on a bus with a whole lot of criminals! But then it became apparent that this was just a spot check.

Entering Arizona and Nevada we saw more of the real desert lands.

Town in the middle of nowhere!

Not quite sure what they are eating

Amazingly, only a short distance out of the desert and we were introduced to snow again at the Flagstaff busstop where we stopped for lunch.

Karen and a young Mexican we met

We arrived in downtown Las Vegas at 8.20 pm, amongst all the glitz and glamour, with the nightlife just beginning to kick in. The shortest way to our motel was through the Fremont Street area (mall), the centre of the activities in downtown Las Vegas – this was quite an experience, making our way through the crowd with our bags.

Fremont St Experience Las Vegas

The dome over Fremont St

4x4 Stretch Limo

Rod with Donald Trump

Karen outside the Excalibur

We had specifically come to Las Vegas to visit some friends, so on Friday, we set out with a  bus pass to visit Mrs Childers, with whom Karen had stayed some 30 years ago. She was delighted to see us,  and to meet Rod and give her approval of him! and to show us photos of all her family – we had a lovely time reminiscing and catching up with one another.

Mrs Childers and Karen

Karen and Philip

The bus passes were a great way to get around, so we were able to do some exploring besides connect with several other dear friends over a buffet in one of the casinos, then later over the most wickedly fattening but delicious desserts in another.

Philip and Megan

Not dieting today!

Lakeland Week 2

Week Monday 12 March to 18 March

The main focus for the week was the Catch the Fire Revival meetings on Thursday, Friday and Saturday night. Originally they were going to be the full conference, but because some unexpected things happened for some of the speakers, John and Carol Arnott took three evening meetings. These were held at the Ignited Church (where the revival with Todd Bentley first broke out) within walking distance from the motel that we were staying at.

Young Recruit!

The young recruit very much reminded us of Jesse Kelly many years ago!
John Arnott spoke at the first two night meetings, gave a brief history of the Toronto outpouring, on Thursday night, and preached on the Kingdom on Friday night. We had quite a few healings on both nights, including at least the beginnings of 2 especially outstanding miracles on Friday night. - a young woman in great pain in a wheelchair from a car accident 7 years ago, who, after continued prayer (that seems to be the key) had absolutely no pain. The second was a man who had flown over specifically for the meetings from Ireland –he had stage 4 cancer of the pancreas and liver and was originally in a lot of pain. He was first prayed for on Friday morning during a "soaking" time held in the chapel and run by Roger Webb, who himself has an absolutely amazing testimony (can see Roger Webb’s testimony on Youtube www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TrLt7uSdhA  ).
This meeting was an extra bonus for us that that had been added for those who could/wanted to attend. We, along with 20 or so other people attended this soaking time, and the Presence of God after Roger Webb had shared briefly his testimony, was incredible!! Out of the meetings this week, this would have to be the highlight for us, very encouraging, to pursue God and His Presence. (Can watch the other meetings at Ignited through either live streaming, or in their archives if you're interested - www.ustream.tv/user/ignitedmedia .Unfortunately the soaking time was not videoed),
Originally we had planned to leave on the Sunday morning at around 9 am for a 33 hour bus trip to San Antonio, but when doing the final packing early on Sunday morning decided to take a later trip (around 4 pm) and arrive later at San Antonio. This would allow us to go back to the Ignited Church for the morning service, and it was well worth it!
What was also amazing was the contact with people that opened up because of it. Two elderly ladies really blessed us.

Corra

The first, Corra, on taking us back to the motel, took us on a guided tour of the Carpenter’s Church  where revival broke out in the early 90’s with Rodney Howard-Browne. We were absolutely taken aback by the size of the complex. Not only was there a massive 10,500 seat main auditorium, a massive carpark area to cater for the numbers of people, there was a Christian School complex, a day care centre, a large prayer tower, and an accommodation centre, all sitting in  a lovely setting on the side of a lake. It was very well laid out, and looked wonderful. Corro, back at that time had cancer, but she had been sovereignly healed by the Lord at that church. The thing that grieved us was that the complex, apart from the accommodation centre (which has been converted into a retirement home) is standing there unused. Apparently, the complex was built during the revival, and when the revival subsided, the church could not maintain the commitments and had to move out. It reformed as the smaller Ignited Church. We prayed with Corro, agreeing to a renewal of vision for the complex.
We have posted some pictures of the complex.

Unused Carpenter's Church Auditorium

The Prayer Tower

Lakeside Setting

Accommodation Centre - currently used

The other elderly, but very sprightly lady, Violet, insisted on blessing us by giving us a ride in the afternoon to the Greyhound Bus Station. We had a precious time with her on the way.

So out we set for the first leg of our long journey west, not knowing the adventures in store..

Eight hours later, we were shunted off our bus at around midnight, to wait for an hour and a half at a place called Tallahassee, and still half asleep, looked for a place to sit amongst the crowd.  God had set up an appointment with a young man who was struggling in his Christian walk. It was a real joy to be a source of encouragement to him.