Children and Supernatural Ministry, Part 2
Photo by Jeremy McKnight on Unsplash
Supernatural Ministry Among Methodist Children in Scotland
Harry Sprange (Children in Revival: 300 Years of God’s Work in Scotland) gives many stories of Presbyterian children in revival, but he also includes a number of stories of Methodist children experiencing supernatural ministry and ministering supernaturally. The name most prominently associated with the revival along the coasts of Buchan and Banfshire is that of James Turner, a fishcurer from Peterhead. Born in 1818 he was converted after months of inner struggle in 1840 and joined the Wesleyans. On March 12th 1854 he felt the power of the Holy Spirit come on him so powerfully that “I could not keep from weeping” and four others “fell to the floor insensible.” He began to witness, visit the sick and preach open-air.
James Wilson, a fifteen-year-old, was sent around the village with a bell to announce a meeting on the night of February 4, 1859. Wilson testified that “the power came, for, after James Turner had prayed and another man had prayed a few words, all in a moment the house was filled. I, for one, was struck down to the earth….and I cried, ‘Lord, save me!’ for about fifteen or twenty minutes at the top of my voice. The children, as in all the other villages were affected, and did not tire of praying and singing hymns. One day in the school, while devotional exercises were going on, cases of striking down commenced and spread very rapidly. One man who was sent for reported that when he arrived the whole school was prostrated at one time—some twenty pupils.
In 1860 Duncan Matheson was working in the Methodist Church in Cullen and a newspaper article notes, “Here also, cases of prostration have occurred, chiefly among young men and girls, and one case of a young man having seen visions is spoken of.” For some reason this part of the Scottish coast continued to witness pulses of revival, under the ministry of John Mangles in the Methodist churches in 1869-70.
The year 1871, began with a descent of the Holy Ghost upon the people of Findochty. One thing especially that took Christians by surprise was the dance. It was never dreamed of and at first seemed to many very unseemly. Its first appearance was among the children, and then among persons more advanced in life, and perhaps stranger still many advanced in the Christian life also came under its power, in many cases irresistible power. The persons thus engaged showed symptoms of the greatest joy, and their very appearance showed them to be under the influence of the Holy Spirit. Some trace of this continued for a century.
Supernatural Ministry Among Methodist Children in India
Methodist Minnie Abrams went to Bombay, India, as a missionary in 1887 where she joined Pandita Ramabai’s then world-famous Mukti Mission. The mission included a school and home for young widows and orphaned girls. One night at the school one of the girls claimed to be baptized with the Holy Spirit and with fire. Visible tongues of fire appeared on the girl and someone ran to get a pail of water and was about to douse her with it, when they discovered it was not physical fire. That same phenomenon of visible tongues of fire began to occur elsewhere in India, and Minnie wrote her popular book Baptism of the Holy Ghost and Fire in 1906 to urge Christians to pray for the fullness of the Spirit to purify and empower them for mission.
Later that month Ramabai was teaching when the Holy Spirit fell and everyone in the room began praying and weeping aloud. Soon many more were repenting, singing, dancing, and all regular school activities were suspended. Some experienced visions and supernatural dreams. Many experienced the baptism in the Holy Spirit accompanied by speaking in tongues. Eddie Hyatt (2000 Years of Charismatic Christianity) writes that as visiting Methodist missionary Albert Norton witnessed those being baptized in the Spirit and speaking in tongues, he was amazed to hear so many speaking fluent English, a language they neither spoke nor understood, rather than one of the many languages of India. Norton suggested this possible explanation: “I have an idea that it is in mercy to us poor missionaries from Europe and America who, as a class, seem to be Doubting Thomases, in regard to gifts and workings of the Spirit, and not receiving the power of the Holy Spirit as we ought.”
Luther Oconer (“Methodism in Asia and the Pacific,” T & T Clark Companion to Methodism ) also notes that in 1905, the Methodist work in India experienced a “Jubilee Revival” which began among Bengali girls and boys in Asansol in north India and it was accompanied by speaking in tongues. This was an outgrowth of the Great Indian Revival of 1905-1907.
Methodist Children and Supernatural Ministry Today
Today when we talk about Children’s Ministry in the church, we usually mean ministry to children. We don’t often mean teaching children to minister under the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit or experience supernatural ministry by the Holy Spirit. Unfortunately, we don’t expect them to do what Peter promised on the Day of Pentecost. Several years ago my wife and I were teaching in the Methodist Churches of Barbados on Ash Wednesday and a thousand children from the nearby Methodist Church schools walked down the streets in their classes to James Street Methodist Church in Bridgeport for a mid-day service. I spoke to them about how Jesus is a true superhero who still does miracles today. Then it was “show and tell” time. I walked out in the crowd to try to find twelve to fifteen kids who were in some kind of pain and who would be willing to come up front to be prayed for. I was not sure if any of them would respond to a white American asking them to do something they had never done before and to do it up in front of a thousand of their friends.
The air turned electric as the kids started jumping out of their pews, raising their hands, and calling out, “Pick me, sir! Pick me!” So, I picked about twelve kids and when I got back up front, I found that perhaps twenty came anyway. Then I sent my wife into the crowd to find twelve to fifteen who would be willing to lay hands on their fellow kids and pray for their healing. None of them had ever done this before so I anticipated it would take some coaxing to get twelve to fifteen. But again, the air was electric (electrified by the Spirit, no doubt) and she soon had her 12-15. When she got back up front there were about twenty who had followed her as well. I simply told the ones who would be praying to ask their friends where they were hurting, lay hands on that spot, command the pain to leave, and ask Jesus to heal them. Then with a portable microphone I went around and asked those who had been prayed for what had been hurting them and how they were now. The testimonies were amazing. In most cases the pain was gone. Where it was not gone all the way I had the kids pray for them again and then interviewed them again. The pain was gone from arms, legs, backs, heads–all over their bodies–all this from untrained kids who had never done this before, but who believed Jesus would heal because I told them so. They had not yet learned all the reasons we adults have learned about why it might not work.
Dr. Louis Davis was a United Methodist pastor in my Supernatural Ministry DMin focus group at United Theological Seminary. His church did not have any kind of team to pray for people at the end of their worship services, so he did his project on training ten- and-eleven-year-old children to hear from God and pray for adults. The kids would be the church’s first prayer team. The first Sunday the kids were going to pray in the service they got a case of “cold feet.” Pastor Davis took them into the sanctuary to give them a pep talk, and there happened to be a man sitting in there who had arrived early. Pastor Davis asked if he would be willing to allow the kids to listen to God and pray for him to get over the butterflies in their stomachs and he agreed. He testified afterwards that he had never before felt such power flowing through his body as he did when they prayed for him. After the completion of the project the youth and adults wanted to receive the same training the kids had received. One other thing happened as well: several weeks after the project was over one of the kids stood up in the middle of the worship service and said, “I have a word from the Lord for the church.” Pastor Davis said, “Well, then give it.” The child proceeded to tell the congregation what the Spirit was saying to them and then led the church in prayer. Pastor Davis had changed the culture of his church to be open to receiving supernatural ministry from kids.
United Methodists Barbie and Rush Hunt began a Healing Room ministry in Madisonville, KY, under the auspices of the International Healing Rooms started by John G. Lake and continued under Cal Pierce. After they had run the healing rooms for a while using adults, Barbie developed a special Healing Room Kids component where one afternoon a week the kids are totally in charge of the praying in the individual healing rooms. If you go there on that afternoon the staff will explain that it will be kids who pray for you. The testimonies of healings and words of knowledge received from these kids is remarkable. Barbie has developed a whole Healing Room Kids curriculum with manuals and DVDs that can be used to train kids to pray supernaturally. They even have an online Healing Room Kids Leadership Academy (www.mainstreetprayer.org).
Then there is my own United Methodist granddaughter Leila. In her first two years her parents would often find gold dust on her head when she woke up in the morning. When she was three, she walked up to a lady in church sitting by herself and looking rather depressed. She did not know the lady, but said to her: “I know your mommy left you, but your Daddy loves you.” The lady burst into tears. She had been abandoned by her mother and was feeling very alone and down. Leila had spoken a prophetic word into her life.
When she was in second grade her parents came to their annual parent/teacher conference. The teacher told them that there was a day when the class was particularly rowdy. She told everyone to get in their seats and that they were not to get out. She walked to the board, and as she began to write she held her lower back and said, “Oh, my back hurts.” Upon hearing that, Leila got up out of her seat, went up to the teacher and laid her hand on her back and prayed “Be healed in the name of Jesus.” Then she went back to her seat. The teacher reported, “I should have scolded her, but my back was no longer hurting!”
When Leila was 11 they were ministering in the Chicago area and during the time of ministry after the worship and message, Leila went up to a lady seeking prayer and asked her, “Can I pray for you?” She consented, and Leila told her, “Well, you see that lady standing right there? There’s a big angel standing right behind her and she is going to fall right here so we need to move over a bit.” Just then, the lady did fall over onto that spot. The lady turned to Leila and said, “Please pray for me!”
Leila’s parents have started a new game with Leila that they call “Where’s Jesus?” They have told her that when she sees Jesus appear next to someone she should go over to that person and do what Jesus is doing. Sometimes she will see Jesus kneel next to the person—and she will do that. Sometimes she will see Jesus lay hands on the person—and she will do that. Sometimes she will see Jesus lay prostrate on the ground next to the person—and she will do that. Most of the time when she does this the person will fall over under the power of God.
Leila is now 17, a worship dancer and worship leader. She still sees Jesus appear next to people during ministry times and she prays for them with supernatural results.
My DMin students searched mainline and evangelical children’s curriculum publishers in vain to try to find resources to train children to pray for the sick or hear from God.. There are writers like Becky Fischer and Jennifer Toledo who produce curriculum on training children to do supernatural ministry, and ibethel.org has curriculum available to help with this. Whether the Next Methodism will allow room for and encourage children and youth to do supernatural ministry, as they were allowed to do by early Methodists, and like some are doing today, remains to be seen.
Frank Billman. Pastor of Pine Creek Valley United Methodist Church, Gaines, PA. Mentor for the DMin in Supernatural Ministry at United Theological Seminary, Dayton, OH. Author of The Supernatural Thread in Methodism: Signs and Wonders Among Methodists Then and Now: Revised and Updated. Scholar in Residence for the Methodist Church of Barbados.