The Power of Intercessory Prayer & the Story of Hawthorne Assembly of God

A Minnesota Viking Pastor in a Green Bay Packer Congregation 

“Pastor, where’s your faith?” Those words of Johnny Johnson stopped me in my tracks. Along with Walt Moss, we were walking the ten acre parcel of land situated next to highway 53 that would make an excellent site for a new church building. The lot, situated at a highpoint along a major thoroughfare, was elongated running north to south and sloped considerably eastward down toward the highway. As we surveyed the property we were envisioning where best we could locate the church and the parking lot. “Pastor, where’s your faith?” The words kept echoing in my heart. Where would we get the money to build? And how would we fill the new building with people? 

Our plans were to construct a sanctuary that would seat about four times as many people as we were currently averaging in attendance (40-50 people in the old church versus 170-200in the new building). We desperately needed to do something for a different facility, but what? A couple of years prior (about 1999) we had purchased three acres of land directly across the county road from the old church and had tentative plans to build there. But Johnny had done some checking around and discovered that the owner of the ten acre parcel that we were now investigating was willing to sell. So when Johnny challenged me by asking where my faith was, I wanted to say something like, “Why would we now want to purchase a ten acre piece of property along a major (and very busy) northern Wisconsin four lane highway when we had a perfectly good bought-and-paid-for three acre parcel along a county road where perhaps not more than a couple hundred cars passed by daily?” I have yet to be delivered from a spirit of sarcasm. :>) 

We bought the 10 acre tract of land in 2001 and eventually sold the three acre site. We hired an architect in 2002, in the spring of 2003 we broke ground for our new building, and on Sunday, September 11, 2005 we dedicated the new sanctuary. Even though this is the story of how the Lord encouraged myself and our little group of worshippers to step out in faith and build a new place of worship, its primary purpose is to reveal the role that intercessory prayer played in all aspects of that journey of faith. I fervently believe that the power of intercessory prayer can change the lives of individuals, the lives of congregations, and even the direction and health of cities and entire nations. But I want to strongly emphasize at the outset of this story that even though I was an intercessor, the move of God that occurred in the hearts of our congregation was the culmination of years of praying by many current and former saints at Hawthorne Assembly of God. 

During my time at Hawthorne I often remarked that it seemed that the prayer bowls were full and God had decided that “the appointed time had come” (Psalm 102:13).  My family and I had come to pastor this little rural congregation in the fall of 1996. Hawthorne is situated about 20 miles south and east of Superior, Wisconsin. There was a post office, a town hall, the township garage, an apartment building/laundromat, a few houses, our little church, and no bar! Statistics from 2008 show a population of 1056 residents, but the person who came up with that must have included the deer and the squirrels. 

I had done pulpit fill-ins at Hawthorne a number of times over the preceding couple of years, and when Pastor Ken Wheeler decided to step down, they asked us if we would be interested in pastoring this church. We immediately said, “Yes!” Even though we lived about 25 miles away in the city of Duluth, our hearts were in the country. It seemed that our ministry was more suited to pastoring rural churches than those in the city (see the story of Elgin on this same blog). But at first glance our pastoring at Hawthorne didn’t seem like a fit – they were in the country, we were in the city; they hunted deer, I used to hunt ducks, they lived in Wisconsin, I lived in Minnesota. And even more amazing in their selection of us to pastor the church was the fact that they were ardent Green Bay Packer fans, and I was a zealot for the Minnesota Vikings. More than once they asked me, “How many Super Bowls have you guys won?” whereupon I did my best Charlton Hesston/Moses imitation and cried out to God to cover their land with frogs. But over my 11 years at Hawthorne I honestly enjoyed the kidding and ribbing that went back and forth between us. In fact, if the truth be known, when our teams played each other in the great border battles, I halfway wanted the Packers to win because I knew how disappointed the kids in the church would be if they lost. But only halfway. 

“A River will Flow out of this Place!” 

My family and I never went to Hawthorne with intentions to build a new church. I just wanted to preach and love a group of people. Both my wife and I worked full-time outside the church, so with our secular employment and ministerial duties our time was pretty well taken up. When I pastored at Elgin, North Dakota we had gone through a remodeling project and I knew how much time and energy that involved. I could only imagine what it would take to construct a new facility. But God had other plans and the seeds for what He wanted to do were birthed through prayer. 

Many times the Spirit of the Lord would anoint our Sunday morning services and Wednesday night prayer meetings and begin to plant in our hearts His vision for the congregation. I vividly remember two such services – one on a Wednesday night and one on a Sunday morning – where the Lord greatly impressed upon our hearts His love for that portion of Douglas County. The Wednesday night prayer meeting took place sometime in 1997 or 1998. As we joined hands to pray together for the last few minutes of the service, the Holy Spirit gave me a great unction and I began to prophetically pray that “a river would flow out of this place!” You could strongly sense the wonderful presence of the Lord in that 30 x 40 foot little white church. 

The Sunday morning service took place sometime in the spring of 2001. As I was worshiped the Lord during the song service, I began to think back to the previous day when I had watched a program about the great Johnstown, Pennsylvania flood of 1889 and the devastation that followed and how that flood had changed the landscape and affected lives for a generation to come. So on Sunday when I went to the pulpit for a time of prayer before the sermon, God began to mightily flow through my heart again in prophetic prayer. I briefly mentioned the facts of the Johnstown flood, but then, through the unction of the Holy Spirit, I mentioned that another flood was coming and that God was going to flow in a mighty and dramatic way through this portion of Wisconsin. 

The very next day it rained buckets in the Hawthorne and Lake Nebagamon area (if I remember correctly about 9 inches in some places) and water was seen where water hadn’t been seen before! When I recently asked one of the people in the church if she remembered that, Annie said, “I shared your question with Lois and Andy. Both of them and myself were wondering if you were thinking about the time the creek flooded and went right through somebody’s house and rushed into the lake. It was the spring of 2001…lots of rain and spring melt. It was a mess everywhere. I have never seen such a thing, probably never will again...” 

I believe that the physical outpouring of rain that day was a confirmation from the Lord that He would one day be pouring out His mighty Holy Spirit in that area and that outpouring would dramatically altar the spiritual landscape for a generation to come! 

A Little R&R at Mayo 

A building committee was formed early in 2002 and after a couple months of discussion we hired an architect. Sometime in 2002 I attended a Saturday service at Central Assembly of God in Superior, Wisconsin where Reverend George Wood (now our General Superintendent) was speaking. I can’t remember what Pastor Wood spoke about (sorry George :>), but I do remember how the Holy Sprit began to quicken to my heart the plans for our new church. I sat in the back of the church and sketched out a rough drawing of the floor plan. The hymn, “Be Thou My Vision” was sung sometime during the service and I could strongly sense the presence of the Lord in that place. Even though it changed somewhat and eventually became a little smaller than my first sketch, the building that stands today closely resembles that initial draft. I still have that drawing. 

When we met with our architect, Ximena Christianson, we shared our basic desire for a building with her. On one end of the spectrum we could simply construct a quonset style building. Not much to look at, but cheap and practical. On the other end of the spectrum we could put up Douglas County’s version of the Sistine Chapel. We all agreed that we leaned toward the quonset end of the spectrum. We wanted the new church to be nice, but we also wanted it to be very practical and a building that wouldn’t bury our congregation under a mountain of debt. Our philosophy was that the church building is not the goal – it is simply a tool (albeit a very expensive tool) to reach the goal of furthering the kingdom of God. A church building is essentially a “grain bin.” When the farmer harvests the grain he needs a place to store that commodity before it is sent out to be processed and eventually feed a hungry and dying world. The physical church building is in all practicality that “divine grain bin” where souls are brought in from the harvest and then trained and built up so that they in turn can go out to feed a hungry world! Again, the building is NOT the goal; it is a tool to reach that goal. During those 12 months from the spring of 2002 to the spring of 2003 we hammered out the plans for the new building and finally settled on a 7700 square foot floor plan (a 60 x 120 foot structure with a “bump-out” on the north end where a portion of the platform would be located). We planned to break ground later that spring of 2003 and begin construction. 

But a wrench was thrown into our plans – I became very sick. I had been battling an illness for almost 20 years and in 2002 it became progressively worse. In the fall of 2002 I seemed to get better, but after the New Year things got worse again. I had to cancel my involvement in the combined Good Friday service with other churches in the Hawthorne area and on Sunday I was too sick to go to the Easter Sunday breakfast and service. I quickly scrambled to find someone to fill in for me. On Monday I asked my wife to take me to the emergency room and they immediately put me into the hospital. That Wednesday quite a few of the church members came up to the hospital for a prayer meeting. When I came down the hall to the waiting room dragging my IV pole with me, they were saddened to see their pastor looking so gaunt. But they anointed me with oil and we had a good old fashioned prayer meeting right there in the hospital. But my health continued to falter and that following weekend I was transported to St. Mary’s hospital in Rochester, Minnesota. Both my family physician and the surgeon at Mayo matter-of-factly told me how sick I was. The 3 hour operation took instead about 7 hours. When I was taken out of recovery the doctor told my wife that if I contracted any sort of infection I probably wouldn’t make it. But people were praying! And after about 3 weeks in Rochester I was able to go home. However, when I went home I was thrust right into the middle of a building project. It seemed that when I was taking a month’s worth of R&R in the hospital, the dear saints at Hawthorne just decided to forge ahead, pastor or no pastor! 

They did experience a little bit of a bumpy road during the time they were essentially shepherdless, but they just kept going. That was a great tribute to their faith and leadership abilities. When I went back for the first Sunday service after my stay in the hospital I sat on a pew in the very back of the sanctuary. As Sunday School ended the kids came up from the basement and gathered around me and just stared – they couldn’t believe how skinny their pastor had become! And when I went to the building site I couldn’t believe my eyes – the land had been cleared and thousands of yards of fill had been trucked in (all largely due to the generosity of just one family). I resolutely believe that at times the Lord arranges circumstances to bring us to our knees in earnest intercession and intense seasons of prayer. He knows our weakness in prayer and how prone we are to wander when it comes to this “praying thing.” He knows that when desperate prayer is needed something desperate needs to be done to bring people to their knees. So perhaps in His wisdom He simply arranged the circumstances of my illness during the time of this building project so that a multitude of people would be on their knees praying! 

The beginning of June I went out to the old church for a meeting about the finances, but first I stopped out to the worksite. It was beehive of activity – the footings were being poured! Jim Whelan, our worship leader, had me stand about where the pulpit would eventually be situated and he took my picture. It was an exciting time. But how were we going to pay for everything? Between what we had in our building fund and what we could borrow we had a little over half of what we needed. But where would the rest come from? We kept praying…. 

Our Capital Campaign could be summed up with one word…PRAY! 

As I now look back at the whole process I see that (from the world’s point of view) we did things a little backwards. We started building first…and then wondered, “OK, how are we gonna pay for this?” I don’t want to leave you with the impression that we didn’t plan and discuss and pray about where the money was going to come from. We took the vision that God had given us very seriously. We talked to lots of people and asked for lots of wisdom. We talked to our district superintendent, to pastors who had gone through building projects, and obviously, people in the congregation. In fact our building committee meetings were open to anyone that wanted to attend! I know it sounds a little scary, but we wanted everyone involved. It worked out well because the building project was not driven from the top down – instead everyone bought into it and everyone was excited about what God was doing! We talked to our banker and other leaders in our denomination. 

And we had one of our denomination’s capital campaign representative’s visit with our building committee. But when I met with him at the local restaurant prior to meeting with the building committee and he told me that his department's fee was approximately $8,000.00, I immediately knew we would be going another direction. Why spend thousands of dollars for someone to come in to convince people to give when our people were already sacrificing so much. It wasn’t quite the Moses/Tabernacle thing where the people were bringing more than enough and Moses actually had to ask the people to stop giving (Exodus 36:5). But it was a blessing to see how the people were giving so abundantly and willingly. We did send out about 200 very nicely printed brochures about how we wanted to build a new church and how people could contribute if they wanted to. We sent them to anyone connected with the church. As a direct result of that mailing we received not more than $2,000. I guess you could get discouraged over that, but I told our treasurer that even if very little money came in as a result of the mailing, its primary purpose was to ask people to pray…people praying was MORE IMPORTANT than people giving! 

We wanted every aspect of the building process to be saturated with prayer. From beginning to end we prayed and asked for intercessor’s to lift up our venture in prayer! We were amazed at how God provided for the new church structure. People gave of their finances, gave of their material goods, and gave of themselves. Workers just “seemed” to show up when they were needed. An individual that had never been to our church, motivated by all the activity he saw at the construction site as he drove through on highway 53, decided to send a check to help with the building project. Often during the project we prayed, “Lord release the funds that are needed.” And He did! And time and again the unexpected money came for unexpected expenses from some pretty unexpected sources. Close to the end of the building project we had a long list of items that needed to be finished before the final inspection. Lois Moss reminded me of the way that God miraculously provided. She wrote in a letter, “Do you remember when we had a list of things that needed to be finished up before the last inspection? Someone made an estimate that it would cost $5,000. Then we had a meeting, and that very night I had a check in my purse that was given to the church in honor of a former member for $5,000! Awesome! God is so good!” 

The Process is as Important as the Project 

Before the project began we had a meeting with Reverend Arden Adamson, the Superintendent for the Wisconsin/Northern Michigan District of the Assemblies of God. The primary thing that he mentioned during that meeting was this: "The process is as important as the project itself." In other words, at each step along the way, whether it was obtaining permits from the county, or putting in the driveway with the proper culvert dimensions, or following building codes, or keeping an exact accounting of all the finances, we would be a witness to people both inside and outside of the church. They would be watching how we did things! We always tried to remember those words of wisdom, and prayed earnestly over the project with that in mind. And so when the driveway and culvert were installed, the county wanted to use pictures of it to show other residences and businesses within the county how to properly install their driveway. And when we asked the county board for permission to install about 4 RV hookups on the property for one year for the MAPS workers, they gave us permission to install 8 hookups for two years. We accounted for every penny given to the project – and our treasurer (Maxine Petite) did a wonderful job of making sure bills were paid on time and that the financial ledgers were accurate. Everything was done above board and with a full accounting to the people who gave so faithfully and sacrificially. 

Angels Disguised as MAPS RVers 

Our congregation was small enough to qualify for help from our denomination’s ministry called MAPS RV Volunteers. MAPS is an acronym for Mission America Placement Service. I had initially contacted them in January of 2003 and, after filling out the proper paperwork and obtaining our building permit, our building project was approved so that RV volunteers from around the United States could come to help build our church. The RVers were men and women either retired or semi-retired who voluntarily traveled around the US to various church projects and spent anywhere from a few days to a few months helping with construction and remodeling projects. Our only financial obligation was to pay the organization $1.00 per hour worked. However we certainly wanted to be a blessing to them and show our appreciation so we took up love offerings and provided them with meals. We did not have any other construction company lined up to put up our building – we were utterly going by faith and totally dependant on the assistance of MAPS. The director of MAPS just told me to call him about a week before we poured the slab. I never asked him, but I just assumed that in the meantime he would be lining up workers so that once he got a call from me that we were ready to go, he had a list of people all set to call and send to northern Wisconsin. I called the director and said, “We are pouring the slab next weekend!” There was sort of a pause, and then I heard him say, “Ok, let me make some calls.” My heart skipped a beat. I had the sinking feeling that there wasn’t a master list of “OK you RVers head to Wisconsin.” But God certainly had a master list! He had everything under control and was lining up RVers to travel our way and help build our church. 

At the end of July in 2003 the concrete slab was cured enough for the walls to go up. So we did what came naturally – we decided to have a prayer meeting at the work site. Jim Whelan played his guitar and we sang some songs and prayed. The hymn “By My Spirit” became our theme song. And that’s when the first RVer arrived. The director of MAPS had called Jim Carson and asked him to head up the project in Hawthorne. I think there was a little trepidation on Jim’s part, but we are forever grateful that he took a step of faith to head our way. Shortly after that I received a call from Norm and Mary Brooks. I didn’t recognize the phone number when it came up on my cell phone and normally I would have just let it go to voicemail. But for some reason I decided to answer it, and was so very glad I did. They were heading west across the upper peninsula of Michigan and were just about at a juncture where they could either head south to a MAPS project in southern Wisconsin or continue heading west to our project. Not wanting to sound too selfish, I immediately replied, “KEEP GOING WEST!” 

When the time came that we needed an electrician, Ken and Linda Rock just “happened’ to be available. (If you need a good electrician that can tell some great jokes – call him!). Over those next few months of 2003 and throughout the spring, summer and fall of 2004 we were graced to have so many MAPS workers come to help build our church. Some stayed a few days, and some a few months. All stay forever in our hearts. The church at Hawthorne is forever indebted to the labor of Jim and Rose Carson, G. Thomas and Carolyn Amrozowicz, Norman and Mary Brooks, Melvin and Betty Bollinger, Lee and Sandra Cook, Bob and Bonnie Erickson, Hillard and Norma Green, Jim and Jean Hodge, Thomas and Shirley Kennedy, Fred and Helen Kranz, John and Juanita Noble, Sr., Ken and Linda Rock, Loren and Eloise Schmalz, Harold and Romelle Stefan, and Arnold and Delores Wagaman, Jr. (If I have failed to mention anyone, my deepest apologies and please let me know their names). Our church literally saved tens of thousands of dollars in constructions costs through their ministry. A plaque was placed in the entryway of the new church with each of their names on it to honor their labor of love. 

Pastor, I Have Some Bad News… 

People worked hard. Really hard. Kids, teenagers, and adults all pitched in. Even though the work at times was difficult, I enjoyed those days at the worksite. And I got to know the sheep in a much more personal way. Many people put in long hours during the week and on Saturdays to get the building done. I took some days off from work to help out and was also at the worksite most Saturdays. The building committee was fantastic to work with. We obviously had some disagreements over things; it would be unrealistic to think there wouldn’t be differences of opinions. But very rarely (if at all) did we have any major disagreements. We met weekly, prayed over our decisions, ironed out any lingering details, and just kept going. 

Toward the end of the project I was informed that the color that we had selected for the chairs wasn’t going over so well with some people. I frankly was a little miffed and asked to have a meeting with the building committee. But when we met that evening, God met us in a wonderful way. Instead of there being a nit-picking tension over chair color, people began talking about the big picture and how the Lord had led us so far. Their love for the Lord and their servant’s hearts really shone through in an amazing way. So instead of the chair-color meeting turning into something that would have soured the whole project, it proved to be a highlight of the building project. 

But nevertheless there were occasions when things did get a little stressful. It was a very windy Thursday that the crane was brought out to the worksite to install the roof trusses. Sometime that morning the project manager called me at my secular job and asked if we had builder’s risk insurance. “Yes,” I said in a shaky voice, “Was there a problem?” I immediately envisioned that the crane had toppled over. “No, no problem,” he said, “The crane operator just wanted to know…” There were a handful of times when a snap decision had to be made without consulting with the committee, but I always made sure we discussed it at the next meeting and went over my reasons as to why the decision was made. 

And a few times it did get more than a little discouraging. One of the lowest moments was a dreary, drizzly mid October day when we were going to install all seven of the exterior doors. But the manufacturer made a mistake with the frames and as a result not a single one fit properly. By the end of the day we had installed only three of the doors. And when I got in my truck to head home for the day, I was greeted by chunks of foam rubber. My dog had decided that he couldn’t wait for supper and so he commenced to chew up the truck seat. 

We sold the old church (we got more for it than I ever imagined we would) and in about October of 2003 we rented the town hall to hold church services. Our goal was to hold our first service in the fellowship hall of the new building in about mid-January of 2004. On the Friday before our very first Sunday service I received a call from Steve, our church board secretary. That morning he had met with the building inspector at the church to see if everything was ok for officially gaining occupancy to our new building. He was given a list of at least a dozen items (if I remember correctly) that HAD to be corrected before the Sunday service. Some things could be taken care of easily (like moving the stack of sheetrock away from the kitchen area), but a couple could not (the in-floor heat was working ok, but the air exchange had not been hooked up yet). 

My heart sank and that night I spent some extra time in prayer. I was halfway hoping that God would send an armada of angels to supernaturally take care of everything on that list. 

Before I Continue… 

I am a firm believer in the power of tears…and so was King David and so is King Jesus and so were the “pray-ers” at Hawthorne. There is a verse in Psalm 56:8 that says this, “Thou hast taken account of my wanderings; put my tears in Thy bottle; are {they} not in Thy book? And in Hebrews 5:7 this verse is recorded, “In the days of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety.” The conditions were made ripe to build a new church for Hawthorne Assembly of God through untold hours of intercession and untold buckets of tears! On Saturday of dedication weekend our banker came to visit the church. She noticed that there was a box of Kleenex at the end of each row of chairs in the sanctuary and a few by the platform. Joye asked our treasurer Maxine what they were for. I can’t remember her exact reply, but it was something like “we were a crying bunch of people!” Tears are a sure sign of tenderness and revival in a person’s heart, and boxes of Kleenex in the church sanctuary are an indication that God has been moving in the hearts of the people! Perhaps George Barna, in his surveys of American church health, should use the “Kleenex-Factor” to determine a congregation’s spiritual temperature. In other words, a church’s spirituality would be measured by the amount of money spent per member on boxes of Kleenex throughout the year. 

Back to the Story… 

Saturday morning I got to the worksite long before anyone else. There was a mountain of work that needed to be done – and it didn’t look like the angels had done anything that night – they hadn’t even moved one piece of sheetrock. But I needed more desperately to spend some time in prayer. After about an hour I could sense the presence of the Lord and I felt like I had broken through into the heavenlies. A few verses from the story of the faith of Abraham came to my mind. That day was an amazing day. And in fact angels did show up – but they were all disguised as Hawthornites! 

We worked long and hard, but a LOT of people just “happened” to show up to help. Brady and Austin Lind, a couple of pretty strong teenagers (hold it, change that to "really strong teenagers"), stopped by for awhile and moved those 4x12 foot pieces of sheetrock in no time. The electrician and I were the last to leave. He had to get the air exchange working before we could go and when I heard it kick in, I was overjoyed! Before each service in the partially completed fellowship hall we had to clean the sheetrock dust off the chairs. But we had some wonderful services and each Sunday people witnessed the progress first hand. 

Dedication Weekend 

At one point during the construction of the building someone mentioned to me that they were wondering what it would take for revival to come to Hawthorne. I gently asked her to look around. "You ARE in the midst of revival!" I replied. We decided to dedicate the new building on the weekend of September 10-11, 2005. There were a few items that still needed to be finished (for instance the floor coverings in the fellowship hall and classrooms) but the building was for the most part done. We had a breakfast at the church that Saturday morning and a concert and time of testimony that Saturday night. Being a logging area, instead of having a ribbon-cutting ceremony we had a “log-cutting ceremony” on the Saturday evening before the concert. On Sunday morning the place was packed. Two of the former pastors, Ken Wheeler and Paul Curtis, spoke briefly and greeted the congregation. There was a skit with “RVer the Robot” played by Gerry Petite (who was inside the robot) and Emily Collins (who was the voice of the robot). Several of the MAPS RVers were in attendance and we made it a point to publicly thank them for their sacrifice. There was special music by several people in the congregation. Arden Adamson, our district superintendent, gave the message. And finally Johnny Johnson and Grant Gonyo led the congregation in a prayer of dedication. Even though it was unseasonably hot that weekend, it was a wonderful time. 

Farewell 

After the dedication of the new facilities we had a season of “growing pains.” But what church doesn’t that wants to move forward with the Lord? Even the first century church had their growing pains (as is recorded in the Book of Acts – read especially chapter 6). At the very outset of the building project new people came in and people were saved and filled with the Holy Spirit and healed and encouraged. At the end of April in 2007 my wife and I resigned the church at Hawthorne. It was a very difficult and heart-wrenching decision, but it seemed that the Lord was leading us on to some other avenue of ministry. Perhaps some will disagree, but it seems as though at times the Lord leads pastors to a congregation for just a season. My primary ministry is in the area of intercessory prayer. It is what the Lord has called me to do. And so it seems as though the Lord took this balding, city dwelling Viking fan and planted he and his wife at Hawthorne Assembly of God for a decade long season to help the congregation through a building project and to help them grow in the realm of prayer. I don’t in anyway want to discount the labor and sacrifice that the people at Hawthorne showed in putting up their new facility. But what was accomplished on that hilltop at 6366 South County Road E was a direct result of intercessory prayer. 

Before God’s kingdom can be advanced, the kingdom of Satan has to be destroyed! And that destruction takes place when we get on our knees and begin interceding. God has not called us to practice “détente.” He has called His church to be a place of prayer for all the nations where the power of Satan can be thwarted and the presence of the Jesus can bring healing to hurting and dying people. The congregation at Hawthorne is now pastored by Gary and Cheryl Bell, a wonderful couple that will lead the church into the next phase. May the Lord richly bless them and the congregation, and may a mighty torrent of God’s blessings flow out of that church to touch hurting people in their portion of Douglas County. 

I close with the lyrics from the song “No Higher Calling” by Lenny LeBlanc & Greg Gulley: 

 Down at Your feet, oh Lord, is the most high place, 

 In Your presence, Lord, I seek Your face, 

 I seek Your face, 

 

 Chorus:

 There is no higher calling, no greater honor 

 Than to bow and kneel before Your throne,

 I’m amazed at Your glory, embraced by Your mercy, 

 Oh Lord, I live to worship You 

 Down at your feet, oh Lord, is the most high place, 

 In Your presence, Lord, we seek Your face, We seek Your face