Even though in May this year we already had our annual House of Prayer seminar in the middle of October we felt from the Lord that we should organize another one full day seminar here in Skopje. We were thinking whom to invite to be the speaker and Igor remembered his friend for a long time from States Dan Babcock, who is currently living in Albania with his family. After Dan prayed about this opportunity he felt YES from God and decided to come and teach in this seminar that we decided to call “Teach Us To Pray – Prayer and Prophetic Seminar”. The seminar was held on Saturday the 15th of November at the local Evangelical church that we attend. We had 105 people from all over Macedonia registered for the seminar, but I think we went even a little bit above this number, which was three times more people than what we expected. The church was packed and unfortunately some people had to stand during the first session, but the presence of the Holy Spirit was so strong from the very beginning as we started to worship our Jesus! One thing that Macedonians know how to do is to sing and they are not shy to sing out loud! How I love that 🙂 So you can imagine how powerful the worship was!
Dan was teaching about the meaning of the altar before God and the sacrifice that each one of us need to bring and make. Dan emphasized the importance of keeping clean conscience and heart before God. It was really good and deep teaching followed with a time of being in God’s presence allowing everyone present to talk with God making sure our hearts were clean before our God! It was amazing time just going from worship to prayer and then to teaching and then back again to worshiping or praying. He was also teaching about the importance of setting aside a time of studying the Word of God and the significance of getting a new, fresh revelation of Jesus and that He can be found on every single page in the Bible. Also during the day he was really challenging all of us to keep focusing on God and not to focus on the speaker or the worship team, but on Jesus.
Dan challenged people during the whole day that each one of us needs to connect with God personally, to seek Him, and wait to receive from God a revelation of His heart, healing, word, etc. During the whole day Dan was always taking time to get the people involved by asking them for feedback, what they have experienced, what God spoke to them, what they felt, did they received healing… Few testified that their back or neck got healed and we heard a testimonies how some got a new, fresh revelation of Jesus as we were waiting upon Him.
We can definitely say and testify that there was a freedom in the spirit! It was amazing to see how God was orchestrating the whole seminar. We are so thankful to God that he really heard our prayers that we had been praying for the seminar during our Friday night House of Prayer worship meetings. We prayed that people would encounter Jesus, that there would be a freedom in the Spirit, freedom in the worship, people would get emotionally and physically healed, singing a new song to Jesus, the churches to be challenged to go deeper with God and in prayer, joy in his presence. We can totally say that all of these came through in the seminar and even though with Igor we were very busy during this day and also leading the worship, we still could see how God was working and how this all was worth it!
Weekly MakHOP schedule:
As a House of Prayer – Skopje, Macedonia we continue with our regular weekly Monday & Friday night worship & intercession sets. As you maybe remember we started our Monday night worship & intercession sets on October with a specific prayer focus; to pray for the salvation of the Albanians (Muslims 30% of the population) and churches to be born among them. We have between 10 to 18 people coming every Monday and every time has been very unique, different and we have really felt the presence of God. On the ends of every Monday night worship & intercession we take time to share testimonies as a way of encouragement of what God is doing among the Albanians. We will continue with this same prayer focus also next year, exalting the name of Jesus in this land and among the people group of Albanians.
Our Friday night Worship & Intercession has seen some changes as well since we moved it to another location, so that we could be more in the center of the city and in this way hopefully get more participants.
Ministry Prayer Points:
- Building and developing bigger and stronger House of Prayer team.
- Our own building for the House of Prayer ministry.
- Wisdom in adding regular teaching sessions as part of Friday night worship sets.
Feedback from some of the people who attended the seminar:
~ “It was a blessing to hear of a prayer movement mounting in the Balkans and in Albania. The atmosphere of the gathering was charged with positive expectation. Finally, all the talk about might actually become a reality.”
~ “This seminar helped me to overcome one period of being stagnant in my faith. I liked the fact that there was active and longer time of praying. I’ve learned new things about how to organize a prayer meeting and that in order to actively get people involved we need to teach them and inspire them to know Jesus more and more so that desire for prayer will be born in them too.”
~ “The speaker was amazing, the topics crucial for this time for Macedonia and a great reminder that we need to wake up and start praying daily for revival in Macedonia. I liked very much the spontaneous prophetic worship and the fact that the speaker involved also the people present. I would like there to be more regularly this kind of seminars.”
~ “Sincerely I didn’t want to go to yet another seminar but I felt that Jesus was calling me to come. I guess God wanted to bless all of us through this seminar. I received healing for my soul, my desire and zeal for God got bigger. My spirit became more stronger and God renew my straight.”
~ “There was special anointing and presence of the Spirit. Before I came on the seminar I had pain in my neck and my low back but the pain disappear during the seminar. I would like to see more healing gatherings like this one in the future. The seminar was a blessing from God.”
~ “Great seminar and great spiritual experience for me. God spoke to me and I’ve experience the Holy Spirit in a very powerful way.”
~ “It was really nice seminar. The speaker reminded me on some things that I have forgotten to practice them. I enjoyed it.”
~ “I liked the seminar a lot. After very busy period, studying, exams I needed something like this. I was touched by God and received confirmation from God about some things that I’ve been praying. You should do another seminar soon.”
~ “I would like to see more this kind of powerful seminars. In my hometown I miss worshipping together with more people and fellowship and no where before I have felt such a power in united voices. I enjoyed in every moment. Very powerful that is how I can describe it. Praying together was helpful to me. I felt the presence of the Holy Spirit very powerfully. Fiery preacher!“
~ “Strong presence of the Holy Spirit.”
~ “I was encouraged by the fact how much God can bless, heal and serve the people when they surrender to him completely.”
~ “I went through a hard period this last month so I needed something like this. All of a sudden I was overwhelmed with the peace of God and I received freedom, freedom in worship, freedom in praying and singing in tongues…wonderful…”
~ “It was wonderful seminar. I have never felt so full with God. When we prayed for the nations I heard a voice saying to me; I will raise a nation. I said; God is this you or? And again I heard the same voice…and I was just singing and worshiping God.”
~ “During the time of prayer I felt that God was healing me from my hard past and emptiness. I received freedom and I don’t have anymore burden on my heart.”
~ “I felt God’s power and glory. I came to this seminar with pain in my neck, something I had for some period of time. When the teacher mentioned that there is someone with pain in the neck that God wants to heal, I prayed and I was expecting to see what God will do. I felt fire at first and then the pain was totally gone. I was able to focus on the rest of the seminar when before that the pain was always taking my attention away.”
~ “I have seen this kind of seminars only online, on youtube!”
~ “The following 3 statements really impacted us: What will make a change in the Balkans is a move of the Holy Spirit. Somebody has to repair the altar, be a sacrifice, crucify the flesh and pray. We have to enforce the victory of the cross; it will not be forced upon us.”
