Healing on the Streets (HOTS)

We started our prayer meeting with two of our team members, Sue and Maggie, giving their testimony on how God is working in this land and abroad. Sue wrote this “God is doing some extraordinary things with the many asylum seekers who attend a local church in Birmingham.  We are seeing people being transformed by the love of God. Many from a different religious background are coming to faith as they discover the wonder of the Gospel of Jesus and encounter His grace and healing power through prayer.  I run an allotment project, and we often pray for one another there, or even other tenants, and have seen the power of God released there, bringing instant healing on several occasions.  This not only encourages those being healed, but also increases our faith as we put simple trust in Jesus and His word.  God wants to do far more than we can imagine – so we are encouraged to ask for more!” This is from Maggie A team of 6 ladies were invited to take part in a ladies conference in May at a re

  At ST Martins on 4th April during our Healing on the Streets session,  a young man with no English and chronic pain in his upper arm was so astonished to be healed that he shouted in amazement, causing quite a disturbance! Only God could have done such a miracle… As you can see Healing on the Streets on Easter Saturday was encouraging to us all. I think there is no better day to pray for people than the day before we celebrate the resurrected power of our Lord Jesus Christ. He has risen indeed and we can say that many testified and experienced his power on Easter Eve. Here are more stories and prayers on that day:   A girl from Ethiopia – a Christian refugee with much trauma and HIV- She was stunned that we stopped her and offered her a prayer. She realised God spoke to her and hasn’t forgot her. Do you remember N who has been coming to HOTS for more than one and a half years, who lost his wife, became homeless, was to the point of committing suicide and the team helped hi

HOTS March 2015   Every time we go out onto Edgbaston St, before we start distributing leaflets offering prayers for passers-by, we kneel down by the chairs and pray asking for God’s presence and his power to be manifested in that area. On March 7th we experienced his presence like a tangible wave of God’s Spirit. Despite of the business and noisiness of the place there was a sense of awe and reverence in the atmosphere as if every knee had indeed bowed down to Jesus.  In this atmosphere we offered prayers for the following people:   A lady with alcohol and substance abuse problem. Her son had the same problem – After she received prayers she said she felt lighter and in a happier frame of mind. A man who attends church and wanted to be assured of God’s presence in his life. A lady with kidney problems and losing her hair. She was also hurt from an abusive neighbour who was bullying her constantly. ~As she was prayed for we could see her face expression changing and becoming relax

HOTS February 2015 We were greeted with good news in 2015. I never cease to be amazed of God’s faithfulness and unfailing love. Just read these two stories sent to me by email about who God is and what he does. 1. ‘I am the ‘lady with the long-term hip and back pain’ whose leg grew out in the training that day in December 2014 at St Martin in the Bullring. Three weeks on and my grown-out leg means I am so much more comfortable which is wonderful. Not quite pain-free yet but trusting the Lord for my complete healing. I have further news to share with you. Last weekend I was ‘down South’ seeing my family and felt I should go to my ‘sending church’ on the Sunday morning. I’ve kept in touch with them but no-one knew I was coming that day. The priest/leader and the people are always very welcoming and on arrival I shared that I had a testimony I felt Jesus was asking me to share with the church. I didn’t know that it was an evangelistic Carol

St Martin’s Healing on the Streets –  August and September 2014     In September the team experienced God working in a way we haven’t experienced before – not in what God did but how he did it.   We normally hand out leaflets inviting passers-by to come and sit on the chairs to receive prayer. Well, we hardly needed to give out leaflets – folks would come to us and ask: ‘What are you doing?’ We would tell them we were praying for people. They would say ‘I want that, please!   The team did not stop praying for the two hours we were out on Edgbaston St. when it was time to pack things up we had to leave some chairs out because people were still coming for prayer.   During our prayer meeting before we went out to pray we read a story from a book called ‘Outrageous Courage’ by Kris Wallotton and Jason Wallotton (ISBN 978-0-8007-9554-2) The book is a true story about Tracy Evans.  Tracy was a medical worker in South Africa. One day she was driving an ambulance from

In June we did a prayer walk from St Martin’s to Centenary Square. Despite being a wet day it did not rain continuously and we managed to stop several times to pray for the area, for various events and activities happening on that day and for folks as they walked around. Our first stop was at the top of stairs leading to the Bull Ring Shopping Centre from St Martin’s. There we prayed for St Martin’s. Before we left the church we read the passage in Isaiah 2 about the mountain of the Lord. Verse 2 says: “the mountain of the Lord will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills and all nations will stream to it”. As St Martin’s stands right in the heart of Birmingham where many nations stream through it we felt appropriate to dedicate that place as the ‘Mountain of the Lord.’ Our second stop was by the Council House in Victoria Square. There we prayed for our councillors and other employees in the House. We prayed for events happening at tha

Last month we had our Annual Parochial Church Meeting at St Martin’s. All those in charge of church activities are requested to write an annual report about the work. This is what I wrote about HOTS: Healing on the Streets Annual Report 2013 A group of us from St Martin’s and other churches in Birmingham go outside on Edgbaston Street to pray for people each first Saturday of the month.   The ‘Healing on the Streets’ model is a simple way to reach out to the lost and hurting on the streets. It enables us to connect with our community expressing God’s love in the market place. We simply invite people to sit on the chairs so we can pray for them. Over time we build relationships, creating stepping stones for people to come to Jesus and be healed along the way. An account of one of the prayers A lady who is a regular member of the Saturday service since we did Alpha Course in 2013 has been coming to HOTs since then. This is what she said to us:  ‘I went for a check-up and tests and inflam

It was like a spring day when we had our HOTS session at St Martin’s.  We even enjoyed the sun warming our faces at times. The Market place was busy and there were lots of people from all faiths, cultures, social and economic backgrounds.  This is an extract of last March’s HOTS feedback. How weird this is –  I could write this all over again for this year’s feedback .The weather was just like a year ago!!!! The Bible reading for that day in the Church of England lectionary was James 5: 13-end. We read that ‘Elijah was a man just like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain and it didn’t. Again he prayed that it would rain and the heavens gave rain and it produced its crops…’ Two things called my attention in this reading: Elijah was a man like us He prayed for something and it happened and then he prayed exactly for the opposite and it happened too! Why? What is going on here? Without turning this feedback into a sermon, I’d just like to say this to encourage us as we pra

We trust you all had a good Christmas and were able to receive and give many blessings during this time. The passage from Isaiah 2 was very much part of our encouragement as we went out on Edgbaston Street in December. As it was expected the town was crowded with people and there were activities of all kinds to mark the Christmas festivities. We were one of them. However, the verse we had on that day from Isaiah affirmed us we stand in a different position from all others: ‘In the last days the mountain of the Lord’s Temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills and all nations will stream to it… ‘Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord……He will teach us his ways so that we may walk in his paths’ ( Isaiah 2:2-3) The Land on Edgbaston Street were occupied by many and yet we had the sense that we owned the land. We thank God that he establishes his presence amongst his people. Here are some of the effects of God’s presence amongst his pe