History Makers

reality.

PREFACE

On the pages of the book you hold in your hands, we share how the united prayer from yesterday and today can shape the future. In plain words, we describe the lessons we have learned together. For example, we explain some of the spiritual breakthroughs we witnessed on the Kettle Tour of 2001 and during subsequent events. We are not the same as we were before God began to unfold this exciting chapter in our lives, and with this book we hope to plant a seed of change in each reader as well.

This book not only tells a story but also allows you to participate, starting with the prayers at the end of each chapter. We have drawn these prayers mostly from Scripture and note the texts in footnotes. For a fuller understanding, you may want to read the verses as well as the prayers.

We have cowritten this book to give you a larger picture as to how we all can become history makers. For ease of reading, we mostly write in the first person. When Dutch is speaking, his name appears in parentheses after the first pronoun (I, my, etc.) in the section. When the voice shifts to Will, his name appears in parentheses after the first pronoun in the section.

In addition to telling our own story, we have tapped documents that vividly reveal not only historical facts but also the flavor of the times. In particular, we quote the United States Work Project Administration’s body of papers called Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers’ Project. These volumes were assembled during the presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Dispatched across the United States to record the stories of former slaves who were still alive at the time, interviewers were specifically assigned to record the accounts in the exact words of these African Americans as a way to retain their genuineness. As a result of and out of respect for the people who lived during the time of slavery, these stories appear here in the authentic parlance.

Chapter 1

KETTLE PRAYERS

And all these, having gained approval through their faith, did not receive what was promised, because God had provided something better for us, so that apart from us they would not be made perfect.

HEBREWS 11:39-40

When God told me (Dutch) to agree in prayer with a dead man, He had my attention! No, I do not believe in communicating with the dead—so please, before you toss this book in the trash or file it under Heresies, read on.

While ministering at my alma mater, Christ for the Nations Institute, in Dallas, Texas, I was publicly praying that everything God had purposed for the Bible school would be accomplished. At that moment, I clearly heard the Lord respond to me, I need you to agree in prayer with the founder of the school, Gordon Lindsey.

My first thought was, I can’t do that, God. He’s been dead for 30 years. The Lord clearly answered me again, But his prayers are not dead; they’re still alive in heaven. And there are things he asked Me for which I promised to give him—things I want to release into the school now. But I cannot do them until this present generation comes into agreement with his prayers. I need the synergy of the ages.¹

The spiritual-revelation meter in my mind again read tilt. What in the world is the synergy of the ages? I wondered, while simultaneously trying to lead an entire student body in prayer, listen for God’s direction and process information that made little or no sense to me.

GOD’S SHOCK AND AWE

I am not completely surprised when blindsided by God in this way. In fact, I get a little nervous and quite skeptical when I listen to spiritual leaders who seem to infer that they have the ways and words of God all figured out, and that He never surprises or shocks them. The Bible is filled with examples of God’s surprising people with actions, teachings and instructions, both in the Old Testament and the New. I mean, really:

• Strike rocks to get water? (See Exod. 17:6.)

• Wash mud from eyes to heal blindness? (See John 9:6-7.)

• Give to get? (See Luke 6:38.)

• Die to live? (See Luke 9:24.)

• Rejoice when persecuted? (See 1 Pet. 4:13.)

• Walk with Jesus on the water? (See Matt. 14:25-29.)

Yes, God can be shocking, and He often uses the unusual to get our attention. Actually, when we measure our experiences by the ways of God in Scripture, we should be the most disconcerted when He is not challenging our cerebral limits. Frankly, if our God fits a little too neatly into our theological or intellectual box, then we’re probably making Him far too human and, in the process, greatly limiting Him in our lives and circumstances—not to mention living pretty boring lives. One thing without dispute is that when Christ showed up on the scene, He blew away just about every paradigm the people had had about God and spiritual matters.

And He enjoyed doing it!

So when God, within 30 seconds, completely stretched my theology, faith and understanding out of shape, I wasn’t terribly surprised. Nor was I when those 30 seconds eventually led to my

• carrying a 200-year-old, previously slave-owned, cast-iron kettle across the United States, using it as an altar of intercession;

• washing feet in this kettle, burning letters in it and using it to symbolize the bowls of intercession in Revelation 8;

• adopting two young African-American men as spiritual sons, (one of whom, Will Ford, actually became more like a natural son to me);

• realizing that African-American slaves are my ancestors;

• being adopted into the Crow tribe of native America;

• cowriting, with my African-American son, a book about all of the above.

Our Theology Is Stretched

Our (Dutch and Will’s) God is a mind-stretching, paradigm-shifting, life-altering God! Is yours? We believe that will be your experience as you read this book. As we explain the aforementioned statements and events—the synergy of the ages, cast-iron prayer kettles, racial connections and amazing prayer journeys—as well as many other fascinating stories and Scriptures, our prayer is that your understanding of God, prayer, healing history and the shaping of the future will expand. You really can be a history maker!

Of course, we are still on our learning journey as well, and we are forever reminded that our understanding and revelation, limited as they are, most often begins from our place of ignorance and hopeless dependence on Him. Having said that, however, it is obvious to us that we have been on a God-ordained journey filled with holy encounters, divine appointments and Spirit-inspired lessons on prayer and the healing of a nation. And we are very excited about sharing all of this with you. Let’s begin by introducing the prayer kettle.

THE KETTLE

The first time I (Will) heard Dutch speak was at a conference in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He shared about the abovementioned time when he spoke at Christ for the Nations, agreed in prayer with past generations and learned about the synergy of the ages. He said, Not only can we agree in prayer with the person next to us, but we can also agree with the prayers of generations behind us. The prayers of Abraham and the other patriarchs are still alive before God’s throne. The same is true of the prayers of those who make up the godly heritage in this nation.

I wept the entire time he spoke. I was reminded of a cast-iron kettle that has been passed down in my family for generations. It is believed to be more than 200 years old. Christian slaves on my father’s side of the family in Lake Providence, Louisiana, used the kettle for cooking and for washing clothes. But I have also learned that they used the kettle for prayer. I’ll explain about this usage shortly.

My Uncle Willie

A very wicked slave owner, who beat his slaves for any minor offense, owned my ancestors. For example, a story has been passed down about my great-uncle, Willie, who went fishing without permission. The master decided to use Uncle Willie as an example. When Willie returned from fishing, he was tied to a tree. His face, chest and stomach were pressed up against the tree, and his arms and legs were tied together around the other side of it. The slave master then beat Willie with a shredded leather strap that had pieces of rocks, glass and iron attached to it. These, of course, tore away the skin as Willie was beaten. When his beating was finally over, his back bled profusely. Family members placed lard on a sheet to keep the sheet from sticking to his skin and wrapped it around his body. In spite of their efforts, Willie bled to death because of the inhumane treatment of his master.

This same slave master would also beat my ancestors for praying. Slaves were not allowed to pray on his plantation. He assumed they were praying for freedom—and he didn’t want them even to consider the possibility or hope of this. Ironically, he wanted his slaves to be Christians, feeling this made them more committed to him and better workers. Part of this was because of what he taught them. He and other slave masters would pervert the gospel and teach, If you slaves want to go to Heaven, you better obey your master. That is what this Bible says. While we now know that is not what Scripture teaches, it was easy to tell slaves that back then, since it was against the law for slaves to read, and against the law for anyone to teach them (see Col. 3:22).²

If the slave master heard them praying, he beat them; but they prayed anyway. Here is where the kettle comes into the story. In spite of the danger, they would sneak into a barn late at night while everyone else was asleep, making sure their prayer meeting was never seen or heard. As they carefully opened the door, they eased into the barn carrying this black cast-iron kettle. Once inside, they turned the kettle upside down so the opening was on the dirt floor of the barn; then they placed four rocks under the rim of the kettle to prop it up and create an opening. They laid on the ground around the kettle, with their mouths close to the opening. The kettle muffled their voices as they prayed through the night.

If the slave master heard them praying, he beat them; but they prayed anyway.

Revelation 5:8 speaks of bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints before the throne of God. Revelation 8:3-5 says that at some future point, no doubt when God determines the time is right, He adds His incense and fire to these prayers and throws them to Earth in the form of judgments and power. My family’s kettle literally became a bowl of intercession.

One of my family members, who was present in these prayer meetings, passed down the following information along with the kettle:

These slaves were not praying for their freedom at all. They didn’t think they would see freedom in their time, so they prayed for the freedom of their children and their children’s children.

That absolutely amazes me. They risked their lives to pray for the freedom of their children and the ensuing generations!

The Next Generation

One day, freedom did come. While many of those who prayed did not live to see freedom, their prayers were answered for the next generation. The young girl who passed down these stories attended these prayer meetings until slavery was abolished. As a teenager, she was set free from slavery. Can you imagine being the one who freedom fell upon, having for many years listened to others pray for your freedom? I believe this teenaged girl (unfortunately, no one alive today knows her name) saw fit to pass down this kettle because she knew that not only was she standing on the sacrifice of others’ devotion to Christ, but so also was everyone in our family born after her. She was careful to preserve and pass on both the kettle and its history. She passed it to her daughter, Harriet Locket, who passed it to Nora Locket, who passed it to William Ford, Sr., who passed it to William Ford, Jr., who gave it to me, William Ford III.

As Dutch spoke about agreeing with past generations and the synergy of the ages, he pointed out that many promises made to Abraham and other biblical patriarchs were not fulfilled within their lifetimes. The individuals were helping God make history, but the history they were making would not be complete without the work of future generations. Hebrews 11:39-40 speaks of these heroes of faith: "And all these, having gained approval through their faith, did not receive what was promised, because God had provided something better for us, so that apart from us they would not be made perfect" (emphasis added).

I know this seems to be contradictory: God made these leaders a promise, yet they did not receive the fulfillment. Again, the explanation is simply that God sees the generations as being much more connected than we do. He may promise a person something and do it through his or her grandchildren, for in His mind, doing it through a person’s descendants is doing it for or through him or her. And He doesn’t always choose to announce His future timing in advance!

I have begun to see that I am the recipient of answered prayers from centuries ago! This is humbling. But more than that I also have come to realize that the benefits aren’t supposed to end with me. I have become part of an amazing historical chain—a generational connection—through which benefits are passed on, but so is the calling. I’m reaching back to possess, but I’m also pressing on to propagate and perpetuate the process for today and for the future. I’m connecting with history, and through the connection I’m making history. I’m a recipient, but hopefully I also become a resource. I’m the answer to yesterday’s prayers, but I’m also a question: Will I move the chain forward? This is what Isaac and Jacob did. They connected with Abraham’s promises to and from God, reaped the benefits and accepted the responsibility of moving the entire process into the future.

As I began to meditate on these concepts, I thought about the passion God has given me for revival and the heart He has given me for young people. It dawned on me that I could agree with the prayers made underneath my family’s kettle by those who had gone before me. I thought, Lord, I can agree with the prayers of my ancestors for the freedom of both today’s generation and future generations in America! God was showing me in a new way that He is powerful yesterday, today and forever.

Our Spiritual Bloodline

Here is another amazing revelation: As Christians, because we share the same spiritual bloodline of Christ, we also share the same family history and heritage. I’m not a biological Jew, but I am a son of Abraham (see Gal. 3:7). What an amazing and perspective-altering revelation! No matter what race you are, if you’re a believer, then my ancestors and this prayer kettle are a part of your heritage as well as mine. And my ancestors’ prayers were for you as well as for me!

African Americans, Native Americans, Asians, Caucasians and all others from the household of faith from long