The Power Came Down

0:00:00 – (Steve Gray): I know I probably say it all the time and other people say it about their podcast. You cannot miss our next podcast, A More Faith More Life. But guess what? You cannot miss the next podcast, More Faith, More Life. I’m going to describe how totally broken man me walked into the church of in that Smithton church and was struck by the lightnings of God. How revival fire came down. I’m going to describe it in as much detail as I can.

0:00:25 – (Steve Gray): So I’ll wait. Can’t wait to see you then on the next More Faith, More Life podcast.

0:00:30 – (Steve Gray): You were made for more than the status quo. I’m Pastor Steve Gray and this is the More Faith More Life podcast. This podcast is for Christians with an ambitious heart who want to be more for their family, do more with their career, and see more of God’s promises in their life. I’ve spent many years as a worship artist, minister, nonprofit leader, bold truth speaker, and most importantly, father and spouse.

0:00:55 – (Steve Gray): When I was in my early 40s, I was craving more—more from God and more from life. I’d done everything I was supposed to do. My life was good, but it wasn’t good enough. So I spent the following years diving into the Word of God and searching for the biblical principles that would bring me closer to God and help my purpose and life flourish. That’s what I want to share with you. In every episode you’ll get practice tools based on real life experiences that you can put into action to redefine your faith and ultimately your life.

0:01:29 – (Steve Gray): So if you’re ready to do more, subscribe to More Faith, More Life and hear an unfiltered Biblical truth every week. It’s time to be and experience more.

0:01:40 – (Steve Gray): Hello everyone and welcome to another More Faith, More Life podcast. I’m Steve Gray along with Kathy, my wife and we’re here to talk about. Exciting things are happening in our country and around the world in the spirit realm. It’s long overdue, but you are alive in one of the most historical times in the life, at least in our country and one of the most historical times in the world, I think in.

0:02:07 – (Kathy Gray): The history of mankind, honestly.

0:02:10 – (Steve Gray): I agree. And I think the years, the last few years, all the way probably from COVID which was historical, unfortunately, all the way to the spiritual things and that are happening now. If Jesus doesn’t return and history continues on another hundred, let’s just say 100 years, these will be the years that you’re alive right now in historical times. So these will be things that are written about and written about and written about COVID is going to continue to be written about because first, that it happened, first the amazing thing that the whole world wore a mask and the whole world shut down.

0:02:48 – (Steve Gray): That’s going to seem strange in history, isn’t it, to read about it, like what horrible what you know, and how quickly it happened.

0:02:57 – (Kathy Gray): So let’s bear that in mind.

0:02:59 – (Steve Gray): Yeah. And you know, I think it’s funny, for a while they made Hollywood wear masks and still do the shows, but I don’t see any of them. I don’t. They don’t think they show any of them as reruns. I don’t see those. But anyway, it’s a very historical time from there to the downside to the war in Israel, to the war in Ukraine, to nations rising up and of course now the election of President Trump, the way he won so big and the shift that is taking place in America right now.

0:03:35 – (Steve Gray): So we’re here though to talk about revival and some other things that are so important. I just said to you right before we started, Kathy, I said, stories are important. People love stories, but stories change things. And Jesus told. We don’t say stories, we call them parables. But he was telling stories under a parable that had a lesson in it. Right, so what are we going to talk about today?

0:03:58 – (Kathy Gray): Yes. Well, last week we talked about leading right up to the point where you had gone away to check out revival. God had been working on you and God had been working on our men and our congregation. But God really worked on you. And he told you to come on home and have a revival. And you said, what? What? And he finally said, I didn’t tell you to be the revival, I told you to have a revival. And you were so beaten down, you’d gotten some hope.

0:04:29 – (Kathy Gray): But when you came back in to our church service that one Sunday night and we were standing there all worshiping the Lord, and I was wondering, where’s my husband? He’s a little late.

0:04:42 – (Steve Gray): Yeah. And so, Kathy, you’ve been working leading up to this. You’re working on a legacy.

0:04:47 – (Kathy Gray): Yes, I am.

0:04:47 – (Steve Gray): Which is stories.

0:04:48 – (Kathy Gray): Should have said that.

0:04:49 – (Steve Gray): That’s okay. Where she’s telling stories or having me tell stories.

0:04:52 – (Kathy Gray): Right.

0:04:53 – (Steve Gray): Because they’re so important. And it’s not that I’m important, it’s not that you might not have your own stories, but the last years from when what we’re about to tell you happened up to today have, have been full of stories and legacy and a life changing situation. So. So to back up, we’re in a town ministering for 12 years of a. In a town of 532 people. We ended up there because our house in another town was hit by a tornado and we didn’t have a place to go. We. Well, we were trying to think, do we buy a house where. And housing is short and all that because like I think around 500 people lost their homes in that tornado. It was a massive tornado. And we were, we were. We didn’t lose a home because we were renting, but we had move. It was condemned.

0:05:40 – (Steve Gray): That led us to this little town of 532 people, which we didn’t care because we were still traveling through that. God began to speak and a church was dead. Church was there, closed for four years. No people, no money, no nothing. And it was in a town of 532 people. Are you kidding me? And God said, I’ll tell you what I would do. I would raise the dead. And so we said, well, then let’s try to open this church and try to survive in this town so small.

0:06:08 – (Steve Gray): Twelve years goes by, the small town politics, small town churches, some. The way people act sometimes just I thought, have I given my life 12 years to this when we could have gone somewhere else, you know. And it just, you know, the church was going well in the town. It was packed on Sunday mornings for a country church of 150 people or whatever it was. But I wasn’t. I said, I don’t know if I want to give my life to this. So downhill I went, I began to search and said, if I’ve got to find the real thing here.

0:06:45 – (Steve Gray): And I began my search. So as you were saying, so I went to Pensacola. God started hope. And I called you and said, okay, I’ll come back, but I’m not starting over if God doesn’t do something different. And the real thing, kind of like Bible, Christianity, book of Acts, you know, I’m not starting over because I walked out two weeks before, didn’t I?

0:07:09 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:07:09 – (Steve Gray): I said, you know, I’ve been here 12 years. I’m like the woman with the issue of blood, and still I’m no better. And that’s what she said or they said about her. And I. And I walked out. And you didn’t know if I was coming back or not, but I came back with some hope. Okay? So I pulled in the parking lot and I could hear the music going, and I felt zero. Nothing. Nothing, you know, like I’m going to walk in there with nothing.

0:07:36 – (Steve Gray): So I walk in the first door, I go to the second door and it’s the door leading into the sanctuary, where it’s at the back. So when I walk in, everybody’s going to see me, right? And again, I felt nothing. I had a tie on that day because I would wear church ties in. So I just remember cinching up that tie, you know, zero feeling. I opened the door, and as you know, I. I saw you. You were the first person I saw because you were sort of up front, and I saw you.

0:08:05 – (Steve Gray): I couldn’t think what to do because I felt nothing. So I thought, well, go give your wife a hug. You know, everybody’s looking at you. You’ve been gone for two weeks, and they’re all smiling real big and everything. They don’t know what I’ve been through. But. So I started walking toward you, and I got a couple of steps away and I reached out to give you a hug. And that’s when history was made. What happened in the next twinkling of an eye, a flash, you’ve heard that was what I’ve described as like a lightning bolt from heaven.

0:08:39 – (Steve Gray): Now, I want to describe lightning a little bit to you. I mean, you probably know, and these people probably know, but just let’s review it. Lightning is very interesting because lightning actually goes up, but. Yeah, it goes up. Okay. Yeah, but it sort of doesn’t go up at first. What happens is. And I’m no scientist, but what happens is whatever. It’s an invisible thing, ions or power or whatever do come down.

0:09:06 – (Steve Gray): It’s invisible. Something invisible comes down. But as it comes down, whether it be a tree or the land or a barn or even a person, then electricity, the power actually then shoots up. So it looks like it’s coming down, but it’s actually going up. Yeah, lightning goes up, but. But it’s triggered by something invisible coming down. Scientists, you all smart people that paid attention in science class when I was dozing off, you could explain it much, much better than I did.

0:09:38 – (Steve Gray): But. So I walk in, and afterwards, all I could describe it is I was struck by the hand of God, the lightning of God. And what happened then? Something came down invisible. And then it was like electricity. And I shot up, didn’t I? I jumped, I leaped, I turned, I leaped. I wish I could describe it better, what it was. It was a shot of tremendous life. Life. Just tremendous life. I. I sometimes wonder when people, you know, they say they died and went to heaven or whatever, and they came back and they didn’t want to come back or. But the tremendous love and all that.

0:10:20 – (Steve Gray): It was more than that, though. It was tremendous. But it was more than love. It wasn’t love. It was life. Life changing. And it was jolting. And that’s why it felt like lightning. Like I think I’ve been struck by God’s lightning. And it was just jolting me. And up I went from being so down in the dumps so much in the valley of the shadow of death, so hopeless. I was so hopeless for a little bit of time, but I got just enough hope to come home.

0:10:50 – (Steve Gray): And I felt nothing. But when that moment happened, I can feel it in my bones. And if I pray and really get into the things of God deep, I can sort of reenact the feeling a little bit. But still it was so overwhelming that it made me leap like lightning. So lightning came. Whatever came down from heaven struck me. And then I leaped up like a lightning bolt, full of life and joy. Everything. Everything.

0:11:22 – (Kathy Gray): And you know, when I was watching you and you came in looking one way and your body posture kind of a dejected bent kind of pulling in, and you really kind of looked lifeless. You had no emotion showing on your face. And then when you reached towards me, you were like. We were very close to each other, maybe three feet apart probably. And when you reached to me, that. That was when that lightning went up from you and I.

0:11:53 – (Kathy Gray): And you start. You raised your hands like this and your entire body posture changed. You were like straightened up, and your countenance…

0:12:03 – (Steve Gray): I. I can remember my face. I can remember my face changing. Yes, my face, I mean. And what I need to explain this to. God does different things in different ways with different people. So we don’t want to put it in. This is how it happens. But with me, there was no effort from me at all. I did nothing. I didn’t think about doing anything. I didn’t plan on. I. I put no effort into it. Now let’s back up. I put two weeks, two years searching, then two weeks down. Like I said, in the valley of the shadow of death, I had nothing left.

0:12:45 – (Steve Gray): And that’s interesting too, Kathy, because I think sometimes we’re so full of ourselves, there’s no room for any more of God. But I was totally empty. I hadn’t eaten. I didn’t speak to people. I had no sense of direction at all. Just a little bit of hope that I started thinking a little bit more like a pastor. So I wasn’t thinking like God’s when I left. I thought God was finished with me. I told that last week. I think when I came back, I wasn’t sure God Was finished with me, but that there was nothing else. But one of the things I remember is my face lit up.

0:13:21 – (Steve Gray): Yes, I can. I couldn’t see myself. I couldn’t see myself, but I could feel myself, my face.

0:13:28 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah, well, I can witness to that.

0:13:31 – (Steve Gray): I know my arms went out totally different. And I know I jumped. And I know all the people, 150 people were watching me. So see this change? And I leaped and came down and there was some other move. I don’t know what we do. If you struck by lightning, what would a person do but God’s lightning? But I. I put no effort into it except all the effort of my whole life. Everything about me was putting effort into finding God.

0:13:55 – (Steve Gray): Up to that moment. And when the moment came, no warning. I can almost feel it now. No warning, no nothing. And all of a sudden, an explosion of something happened. And up to that time, too. I want to relate this to people who are going through tough times. Up to that time, I. My brain, my heart, my brain, my spirit was full of chatter. Chatter, chatter, chatter, chatter. Every time I thought about myself, I thought about you, loser.

0:14:30 – (Steve Gray): Every time I think about maybe what some other people have said or done about me, that hurt me, you know, or didn’t help me at least. And that. And all of a sudden I try to. I try to think about them. And all of a sudden I couldn’t all of a sudden think about, no, you’re not so hot either, you know, And I couldn’t, you know, and then I start, you know, I feel like I’ve failed in every way. I mean, I’ve. I.

0:14:53 – (Steve Gray): I just felt like it wasn’t just in as a pastor, and maybe I shouldn’t be a pastor anymore. Well, then just go get another job. But because, you know, I have a degree in music. I could teach music again or whatever, but I felt like the chatter was on every area. You know, you’re bad. You failed. You’re not going to make it. There’s no hope for you. I mean, and I know people relate to that chatter. And the reason I’m telling you this. And instead of letting the chatter overcome me, I tried fighting my way out of it.

0:15:26 – (Steve Gray): I didn’t just expect God to make everything right. I thought, I need to seek his face with all my heart. And I did. And it got a little bit better because of human effort. Because God says, seek my face, so that means human effort. There’s scriptures in the Bible that say, make every effort. Okay, so I made every effort. But I have to admit, it was not Good enough. But my every effort, I think, played into God knew at that point. I don’t have to wonder what he’s going to do.

0:15:57 – (Steve Gray): I don’t have to wonder if I’m going to hit him with a lightning bolt or whatever. Whatever it was, I’m going to touch him. Like Paul was struck on the road to Damascus. Very similar. When I read it, I feel similar. But anyway, he. There was no sign that Paul was going to become anything different. But God knew if I hit this guy with something, he’ll go for it. Somehow he knew that. Somehow. I think God knew. I don’t have to explain. I don’t have to warn him. I don’t have to say, get ready, get set, you know, get in the starting block because the gun’s going to go off and you’re going to start running. He knew if I get this guy, he’s going to go for it.

0:16:40 – (Steve Gray): Now the interesting thing, one thing I just want to mention about the chatter.

0:16:43 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:16:43 – (Steve Gray): When I leaped in the air, when I came down, I noticed how quiet it was. God didn’t speak, I didn’t speak. The devil didn’t speak. There was complete silence. And so the change. And so I noticed that right away. That’s why I want to encourage people that are just full of. The chatter is driving you crazy. You know, it’s just too much. You have no peace at all. Seek God, put human effort into finding God even more to a greater level and get that to where that chatter.

0:17:17 – (Steve Gray): God does something. There’s so many interesting parts about this. First of all, I want to. I want to bring up what the people did. So I leap and I jump up and down and I’m walking and leaping and praising God a little bit. It wasn’t overly like. I didn’t go all the way around the building. It was in a little spot. And it wasn’t like me at all to do it.

0:17:36 – (Kathy Gray): You were kind of rotating a lot.

0:17:38 – (Steve Gray): I know. And I do remember that.

0:17:40 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah, you were. I was kind of almost never been, like, ever, ever.

0:17:44 – (Steve Gray): It. If I was told to do it, even by God, I might have not done it.

0:17:48 – (Kathy Gray): I know. This was entirely miraculous. I have to tell you.

0:17:51 – (Steve Gray): I didn’t even think. I wasn’t thinking. But you’re living. Yeah. The church responded in what seemed like an unusual way. If you hadn’t been in church the week before, you wouldn’t understand it.

0:18:02 – (Kathy Gray): That’s right.

0:18:02 – (Steve Gray): But the entire congregation, it’s amazing.

0:18:06 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:18:06 – (Steve Gray): Except for me. Kicked off their shoes and ran to the front. And that’s because the week before you said, what would you do if God came down and made this whole? And they said we would kick off our shoes because it would be holy ground. I didn’t know you preached that. So I didn’t know I’m the only one that kept his shoes on. Everybody else kicked their shoes on. All those people rushed to the front.

0:18:30 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:18:30 – (Steve Gray): And I think they kind of began. The music’s still going. The music didn’t stop.

0:18:35 – (Kathy Gray): We were copying our pastor.

0:18:37 – (Steve Gray): And there’s a lot of jumping up.

0:18:39 – (Kathy Gray): And down and a lot of jumping up and down. And in that old wooden floor that had seen, you know, 100 years or more of intercession, the floorboards were creaking, we were bouncing.

0:18:52 – (Steve Gray): Well, the floorboard is the same floor that was there since 1859. And if you went under the church, it didn’t have any braces. You know how the floor was held up?

0:19:00 – (Kathy Gray): No, I never went by stones.

0:19:02 – (Steve Gray): Flat rock. Flat rock. Flat rock. Flat rock. And they stacked it up and built the foundation and all over underneath the church were these stacks of flat rock that were about this big and that thick. And they built. And so when you jumped up and down, it was on those rocks.

0:19:18 – (Kathy Gray): And well, I’ll tell you what, we became known as the only church that can really bounce. Bounce the floor. We bounced every time we were in there. Yeah, it was wonderful.

0:19:28 – (Steve Gray): Now, trying to explain, trying to comprehend, trying to process, you know, you think if it’s a God thing, you understand it all, you know, I got it. I’m God’s man of faith and power, you know. Wow. And in Pensacola, like there were hundreds of pastors there praying and seeking revival. And I didn’t. I just sought him. I didn’t care if I preached again. I wanted to live again. And so now I have to process this in front of the people.

0:19:57 – (Steve Gray): And if you’ll remember, and the people remember, a person who gets struck by lightning or has a stroke or something, their speech can sound fine and then all of a sudden it drifts away or they mumble or whatever. And I would start talking and then I just stopped. I couldn’t get any words out. I wanted to, but I couldn’t. I knew what my brain wanted to say, but my body wouldn’t speak. That went on for off and on. It got less over the two week Spanish.

0:20:20 – (Steve Gray): I didn’t know what happened. I didn’t say, this is it, we’re in revival, which many pastors have done. I didn’t know. I got a little teary Eyed too, because I said, I almost get that way now. I remember saying, I don’t know what this is. All I know is hundreds of pastors are crying out to be a revival and lead revivals and have revival in their church. And I just want you to know, whatever’s happened to me, I didn’t earn it and I didn’t deserve it.

0:20:52 – (Steve Gray): I don’t know what this thing is, and it’s a little hard. I said. And then I laughed and said, you know, I know God’s perfect, but I wonder if just for a second, he shot from heaven and missed and accidentally hit me. And then I described it, saying it felt like God had put his royal robe, like the prodigal son, the father put his robe on him, that God had put his royal robe on me. And rather than feel like, wow, this is so great. I’ve never had anything happen like this in my life.

0:21:22 – (Steve Gray): It was so heavy that it was like, I cannot believe this has happened to me. And so I didn’t know what to do. I prayed for some people, as you remember, was new to us in our church is some people came up for prayer because we didn’t know what to do and they didn’t know what to do. But there was such a move, like, pray for me. Somebody did, and I just reached out and it was like their legs had been cut off and they just went plop, straight down the whole family.

0:21:49 – (Steve Gray): That’s new.

0:21:50 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:21:51 – (Steve Gray): I don’t know what this thing is. I think I prayed for a couple other people and that happened to him, but that was about it. And we sang some songs and I think I sang that night, too.

0:22:01 – (Kathy Gray): I. I think.

0:22:01 – (Steve Gray): Pretty sure I went to the.

0:22:03 – (Kathy Gray): Maybe you did. Yeah, pretty sure that. Yes.

0:22:06 – (Steve Gray): And I hadn’t sung in our church like that in years.

0:22:09 – (Kathy Gray): Well, you had lost your song.

0:22:11 – (Steve Gray): Yeah.

0:22:11 – (Kathy Gray): And that’s really scary for a wife, you know, who’s been working with her husband, you know, side by side, serving Jesus. And then all of a sudden you lost your song.

0:22:23 – (Steve Gray): Yeah. And I don’t want several years. I don’t want people to think that I just like to go to the piano and sang. You know, I had done recordings, I’d know. I’d done professional recordings before and been offered different record. I think by that time I’d been offered that recording contract. Yeah. Which I didn’t do. But. So not singing and not worshiping and not leading. You know, I played piano and sang in church, but I wasn’t what I was.

0:22:52 – (Steve Gray): So that night I went up. I Think I sang a couple of simple songs.

0:22:55 – (Kathy Gray): You did.

0:22:56 – (Steve Gray): And then at that point we just stopped and I said, I don’t know what this thing is, but. And that’s so beautiful. I just love that I didn’t grab it and say, here it is. Wow, I’m it. I was speechless in a way. I didn’t know what it was exactly. And I said, I don’t know what this thing is, but whatever it is, and this was a Sunday night, whatever it is, I’m going to come back tomorrow night and find out, try to find out.

0:23:24 – (Steve Gray): So that’s all I said. We left, we went home. I’m staggering around. You are too. Like, we don’t know what to think.

0:23:31 – (Kathy Gray): Presence of God was so thick in our heart. Our house, you know, he followed us home or we moved with him home. And we had a narrow little hallway and we. A small house and we. One time I was going station and you were going down the hall and.

0:23:46 – (Steve Gray): I bumped the wall.

0:23:47 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah, and then I bumped the wall and then we bumped each other.

0:23:51 – (Steve Gray): We’re like, what is this?

0:23:52 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah, we can’t.

0:23:53 – (Steve Gray): This is new to us. This is so new. And so. So I came back. We came back not knowing. I didn’t invite people to church. We didn’t make any phone calls and say, hey, don’t forget church tonight or anything like that. We just showed up. And when we showed up, there was a parking lot full and people were standing inside waiting. At 7 o’ clock on a Monday night. We kind of went through the same kind of service, sang a couple of songs, prayed for some people.

0:24:21 – (Steve Gray): They said I preached a little bit because somebody said I still have notes or whatever from.

0:24:25 – (Kathy Gray): Really?

0:24:26 – (Steve Gray): From kind of.

0:24:27 – (Kathy Gray): Really.

0:24:27 – (Steve Gray): Well, I think even Sunday night I tried to preach. I tried to do some scripture stuff and I’m still trying to. Okay, same thing, though. It’s kind of fumbling around on that Monday night. And as you know, then we ended and we just stopped and I said, same thing. I don’t know what this thing is, but I’m coming back tomorrow night to find out. We went through the whole week like that, just fumbling around, finding our way, worshiping the Lord, trying to share a little bit of God’s word, praying for people who were amazed.

0:24:55 – (Steve Gray): Some were still trying to figure it out, scratching their head, deciding, do I want him to pray for me or not? I don’t know what’s going to happen. Others saying, I want him to pray for me right now. So it was just a mixture of everything going on and it was just within our church. Folks, family we knew in a town that small, in a church that size, you know, everybody, of course. And that went on. And then I came to the weekend, which was like a Thursday maybe it was Thursday.

0:25:19 – (Steve Gray): We might have had church Thursday night. We might have just quit Wednesday. No, no, we did have church Thursday night. That’s right. It was a Thursday night. And I said, look, let’s stop now and let’s come back on Sunday and see if whatever this is is still here Sunday morning. So let’s take a break. So we took a weekend break. Still trying to figure out stuff, you and I enjoying the presence of God at home.

0:25:44 – (Steve Gray): And others were at home, too. And we came back Sunday morning and we walked in. My God. My God, there’s something in this room. Not of me, not of Earth. So we went through the whole week again. Then we went through another week again, and we just kept coming back. It was just our church. And, you know, about fourth, fifth week, I told you, speaking of Methodists, we were talking earlier about Methodists.

0:26:11 – (Steve Gray): A row of Methodists came in. They had heard something going on, and they were hungry for God.

0:26:17 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:26:17 – (Steve Gray): And since we had grown up with some roots in Methodist church, I remember thinking, or maybe I even said to you, I remember thinking, if these Methodists get anything, we’ll know for sure. This might be really. This is God. Now. Everybody else came up to the front when there was a time to receive, you know, do something, a God moment. They didn’t. They stayed in their pew. And they were. I think they’re the only people that stayed in the pew.

0:26:41 – (Steve Gray): But I went to them.

0:26:42 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:26:43 – (Steve Gray): And when I went to them, they’re standing in their pew like good Methodists. Hungry for God, though. And I prayed for them, and good thing there was a place to sit down. Plop, plop. They all just end up kind of falling into the pew. And I said, something is happening here, because I didn’t even know who these people were from there. Then we got to week seven, week seven and eight. Week seven, I think, or eight.

0:27:09 – (Steve Gray): Our daughter Bobby was going to get married to J.D. one of our pastors now. And they wanted to fix the little church up because she’d been planning to get married in a long time, the little church up where everything was happening and. And we. We were coming every night. She wanted to decorate it and have a wedding in there.

0:27:25 – (Kathy Gray): The sanctuary.

0:27:25 – (Steve Gray): Yeah. So I said, all right, let’s do this. Let’s move these services into the gymnasium. We’ll have more room and let’s move the services to the weekend. Now it’s going to be Thursday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. It must have been Wednesday. Thursday. We prayed on Wednesday. Then we had services Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday night, twice on Sunday. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.

0:27:49 – (Kathy Gray): No, I don’t remember Thursday.

0:27:52 – (Steve Gray): Then Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Sunday. That’s only four. We did five services a week. No, we had six services a week. It was Thursday. We did six services a week. And let’s. And I said, let’s move it to the weekend because if we move it to the weekend, people can come and start coming and visit us because, you know, they can’t travel and come. I didn’t know if they would. And the biggest thing is, will our church people give up their Friday and Saturdays to come to this church building and have revive what we were starting to call revival?

0:28:20 – (Steve Gray): They did. They were all there. And suddenly word got out that something’s going on in this country church. About week eight and nine. And then we got a call from Oral Roberts University and the Robert Show.

0:28:34 – (Kathy Gray): Richard Roberts.

0:28:35 – (Steve Gray): Richard Roberts Show. And they said, we hear there’s something that. Tulsa’s four hours away from us. They said, we hear something’s going on in this country church. Would you come and be guests on our program and tell us what’s going on? Well, they had a big program and so we did. I don’t think we prayed for the student body, though. No, that’s a different story. That’ll come later. Yeah, we ended up praying for the whole student body at Oral Roberts University. All. Every one of them took four hours. Pray for all of them.

0:29:05 – (Steve Gray): But that’s when we did chapel service. Okay. Anyway, they broadcast and we told our story and it went around. And the next thing you know, we come back and we start. And people are starting to come from other states. Well, other towns. Let’s just start other towns in Missouri than other states. Then I don’t know what happened next. We went on 700 Club Day star TBN. And once that started, you know, the news got out. People start coming from all over the world and people be coming. They would come from nations we didn’t even know they were coming.

0:29:39 – (Steve Gray): There’d be a bus load of somebody from Korea and a busload of 50 of them would be there. We. What are these people? I didn’t even know you were coming. But we didn’t need to know. All we had to do is make sure that when they came and traveled from Singapore, which is about as far as you can go, that there was something there. That they couldn’t get in their church because that doesn’t mean they had bad churches.

0:30:00 – (Steve Gray): But there had to be something more. There had to be something worth coming from Europe or Tokyo, Japan, New Zealand, Australia. I’m just naming numbers that people came from everywhere. Now we’re having six services. A week later we changed it to five because the Sunday morning service got so long. It was three in the afternoon and we’re just getting done. And so we said we don’t need to come back because all those people left and went back to their jobs, homes and jobs. So we. Now we’re at five.

0:30:30 – (Steve Gray): So we’ll just say five. Anyway, we did five, six and five services a week for three and a half years. That’s a lot of services. And we. If you figure it up, I don’t know how many. Over a thousand. And people came from all over the world. As you know, newspapers came, television stations from all over came. Not. They weren’t that big, just local. Even the St. Louis Post dispatch came, of course, the Kansas City Star, the.

0:30:58 – (Steve Gray): What is it?

0:30:58 – (Kathy Gray): San Francisco Chronicle.

0:31:00 – (Steve Gray): San Francisco Chronicle did a big, big story on us. Wall Street Journal did a story on us. Time magazine came. Newsweek magazine came. And from there I went from the preacher who thought God was finished with him to where of a quarter of a million people went through those doors. In a town of 532 people, there’d be more people in the church, obviously, twice. There’d be twice the size, at least, of the town. Twice. At least.

0:31:29 – (Steve Gray): We had to, at times run a cable we didn’t have. We had cable. We’d plug the cable into a TV cable and run it down the street a block and two blocks away to the Methodist church. And we opened the Methodist Church. And people would watch us on a big screen sitting in the Methodist church.

0:31:46 – (Kathy Gray): They were very kind to us to do that.

0:31:48 – (Steve Gray): They were. And so amazing crowds came. They. They wouldn’t. They’d show up. Well, they’d show up in the middle of the afternoon or more to get. Just to get in the building. They’d line up, just like I said years ago, see people lined up to get in this building. I don’t even know how I came up with that phrase, but they did. And they made a documentary about us. Go inside the Smithton outpouring, which still changes lives.

0:32:14 – (Kathy Gray): Sid Roth.

0:32:14 – (Steve Gray): Sid Roth, Warren Marcus made that documentary about us. And suddenly, then, of course, the guy who, as I was saying that, said, I think God’s finished with me is now launched from local, national and an International ministry that took us clear around the world. And like I said, the quarter of a million people heard about us everywhere. And even to this day, I’m still being contacted by people who say, oh, you’re the guy that pastored the Smith. And outpouring. Tell me the story, or let me see the video, or tell me again what it was like to be struck by the power of God.

0:32:49 – (Steve Gray): And so is historical needed. Needed. The story is needed today. Let’s just leave it at that.

0:32:56 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:32:56 – (Steve Gray): The story is needed today of what can happen in the most unlikely church in the most unlikely place, and maybe the most unlikely people.

0:33:06 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:33:06 – (Steve Gray): You know, and that’s what he did. And now it’s in history books now. And now we don’t look back though, right, Kathy? No, we grab what we can from the past. We don’t. We don’t forget the old way.

0:33:19 – (Kathy Gray): We’re thankful.

0:33:20 – (Steve Gray): Yes.

0:33:20 – (Kathy Gray): God allowed us to do.

0:33:22 – (Steve Gray): And I think every revival has an element of every revival.

0:33:25 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:33:25 – (Steve Gray): And every revival has an element of something fresh and new. Ours was not like Toronto. It wasn’t like Pensacola. And today if you study the history books and they do it right, they’ll say, in those days there was Toronto, Pensacola and Smithton. But we weren’t like Toronto and we were not like Pensacola. We were totally different and totally the same. Same spirit, but God moved it to a different level.

0:33:48 – (Steve Gray): Very intense. It was very intense. People just walked on the property and felt the power of God. People got healed walking on the. Just. Just arriving. They were healed in the parking lot. And then they try to leave. They couldn’t leave the parking lot. They couldn’t drive.

0:34:04 – (Kathy Gray): Hilarious. Yeah.

0:34:05 – (Steve Gray): And they’d fall down. And by the spirit of God in the parking lot at 1 in the morning. Well, we need to wrap it up. We don’t want to just talk and talk and talk about ourselves and the movement and the Smith and Alpine.

0:34:15 – (Kathy Gray): You’re talking about the Holy Spirit. Yeah, because this is the Holy Spirit work.

0:34:20 – (Steve Gray): Because I would say again and again, this is not the work of a man. This is the work of the Holy Spirit.

0:34:25 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:34:26 – (Steve Gray): And we cry out, next time we’re going to take you. Now, after three and a half years, packed services every, every night known around the world, a good thing is happening. Most people say, if it ain’t broken, don’t fix it. And suddenly God spoke and said, I’m going to move this revival from Smithton to another place, another city. And I had to go tell our people who. And people who had moved there to be in Smithton. They moved to Smithton to be in this revival and so they could go every, every service.

0:34:57 – (Steve Gray): Now I have to say, guess what we’re picking up. We’re shutting down, we’re shutting down the revival to move to another city. What a story. There is a book that followed the fire, which you can get on the website https://stevegreyministries.com called  Follow the Fire. That’s the story of moving. And we ended up moving to Kansas City. I’ll tell you, it was rough, strange, and people could not believe I did it, but I did. And we’re going to tell you the story next time. So don’t miss the next and tell your friends about it.

0:35:27 – (Steve Gray): People need stories, amazing stories. Okay, Tell your friends. Subscribe, and be sure and not miss the next podcast of More Faith, More Life. Till next time. Bye-Bye.