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Godfrey Birtill speaks to Thurrock
 On the Friday night of the 24-7 Week of Prayer for Christian Unity at Grays Baptist Church (23 January), singer-songwriter and ‘God’s Troubadour’ Godfrey Birtill led a session worship and prayer. Some 80 people turned out from across Thurrock’s fellowships. As well as singing some of his better-known songs, Godfrey allowed his music to merge with times of prayer, declaration and the prophetic, and spoke into Thurrock with great poignancy, confirming many prayers and words already prayed and spoke, and taking us into deeper places. Jesus was glorified every step of the way. Here’s a selection of things that Godfrey said over the evening.
• When we sing, the Lord throws the enemy into confusion” – Godfrey encouraged everyone to praise God as that proclaims victory and causes the enemy to retreat.
• “My church needs deliverance from its constant self-focus and needs deliverance from the mindset of ‘good meetings’.”
• Declare to the ‘city’ of Thurrock – “this is your God”.
• Godfrey said there was a “Holy Spirit agenda tonight… something will be broken in Thurrock tonight. He (God) beautifies the damaged.”
• We prayed for Thurrock’s children – the damaged, the bullies, those affected by violence. But they can become ‘violent worshippers’ – there’s “a place for ‘wild children’ in God.”
• Renew the ‘mental ray’ – we prayed for deliverance to the mentally ill and minds polluted by the internet.
• God likes to use a place that has a curse-name, like Thurrock, meaning ‘place of dirty water’.
• Thurrock will flow – not be stagnant or a pond. There will be “leaves for the healing of the nations”. Godfrey prophetically sang “Thurrock, Thurrock, Thurrock, hear the word of the Lord”. Can Thurrock be changed and transformed? Yes it can!
• Jesus wants to set the body, his church, free from fear. “Be a carrier of ‘the touch’.” There is a fear of God moving. At the Transfiguration, Jesus told the fearful disciples, “Get up – do not be afraid” – he touched them and his perfect love cast out all fear. Fear is like ‘dirty water’, which needs to be flushed out. Godfrey then sang repeatedly, “Flushing out, flushing out, flushing out Thurrock”. People won’t be drawn to people with religion, but to people with joy, to people who are free.
• Thurrock has been blocked – remove the blockage – “spring up a well”. Who’s been throwing rubble in your well? We sang into our wells, and Godfrey sang, “Spring up oh well of Thurrock”.
• Godfrey called for the ‘young radicals’, those who can “walk through the walls”. “The empire is so dead,” he declared – many ministries started out with good intentions but soon walls were built up around them and those in ministry became emperors. However, a new thing is coming – a movement of ordinary people like Jesus. His Kingdom is growing – there’s transformation in lives, the land and the church.
• “There is the sound of marching in the trees.” (He didn’t know that Baal Perazim – the Lord who breaks through like water – is a word over Thurrock – 2 Samuel 5.)
• Godfrey told a story about when he tried to DJ and found when you put the stylus on the label it makes a sound like “Fo-wah”. Apparently, this sounds like the word for “get out” in another language. He connected this to Thurrock’s position on the Thames Gateway and our responsibility concerning what comes in and what goes out. ‘Dirty water’ indicates a blockage – so declare “Fo-wah” into the land to remove the blockage. So we all shouted “Fo-wah, fo-wah, fo-wah”!
• We sang “The Die Has Been Cast”, based on a declaration written by a missionary not long before he was martyred (Godfrey did not know, but the song and that very same piece of writing played a part in the 24-7). “Heaven will be full of people who don’t deserve to be there.” Go over the wall and do things like you’ve never done them before.
• “Awake sleepy-headed church!” (Godfrey didn’t know about eh word over Thurrock to “awaken the sleeping giant of intercession”.) “God is doing a new thing” (Isaiah 43:18-20) – be ready, ready, ready to work in the streets, because people are attracted to joy. (The word ‘ready’ was all around the 24-7.)
• “God’s doing some wild stuff to free us up.”
Other songs Godfrey sang:
Uplifted Are The Gates Of Brass
Lord Turn Your Footsteps Towards These Ruins
Raise Up, Raise Up The Standard
Just One Touch From The King Changes Everything
Are You Ready, Ready, Ready?
Sesame Street – with the word ‘sesame’ changed to ‘Thurrock’!
See www.godfreyb.com for info about Godfrey’s tours or to buy his albums. Transformation Thurrock has invited him back to Thurrock for a future event and he’s accepted.
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Tim Harrold, 12/02/2009 |
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| | | John Gorham | 02/03/2009 13:11 | A really encouraging article. I only wish I was there. But what I can say is that FHC and other churches in the Thurrock area are starting to wake up to the call of the father, becoming less and less inward minded. And becoming passionate in worship and compassionate toward the lost. The church is moving into exciting times, are we Ready Ready Ready,
I pray so.
John FHC
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