Why North Omaha?
While the journey of these North Omaha pastors began some years ago, it took a significant turn in April 2006 when they attended a Pastors’ Retreat where Wes Adams and Rhonda Hughey were speaking on presence-based revival and transformation. The Lord spoke to the leaders from N. Omaha clearly about the issue of prayer, repentance and transformation of their community. They heard the instruction of the Lord in 2 Chron. 7:14 and desperation gripped their hearts. They recognized their hearts had grown sick from hope deferred. That recognition contributed to their desperation.
They felt challenged by the transformational vision of what God wanted to do. But the devastated condition of their community, in spite of all their ministry for many years, seemed an insurmountable and unmovable mountain of impossibility. After years of ministry no long-lasting fruit was evident from all their individual labor. The reality was that their community was worsening on their watch!
The response of these pastors was immediate,.Thursday evening some of them went home from the leaders’ retreat and began to repent to their families for their spiritual neglect and failure. Then on Sunday morning they repented to their congregations, and to their surprise the Lord came and began to minister to them in powerful ways!
Following a subsequent consultation with the Fusion Ministries team, the Lord confirmed to them to take a fresh look at their community and what He desired to do among them to bring healing and transformation. They set their hearts on the Lord and took responsibility for the “village” of N. Omaha. It’s fair to say that these leaders, their families and their congregations, even the community itself, will never be the same!
What followed was a year of repentance. Leaders continued to repent to the Lord for their lack of stewardship of their village. Leaders began repenting to one another and reconciling their hearts over wrong attitudes, offenses, etc. This repentance carried over into their congregations; and as it continued the Lord began to draw near to them. Soon the presence of the Lord increased in their services. People were getting physically healed of serious maladies and some financial miracles began occurring, etc.
During this early stage, an amazing thing happened. As the Fusion Ministries team began to walk alongside the leaders in N. Omaha, the Lord began to knit our hearts together. We realized that the Lord had called us to become partners in His Kingdom purposes for N. Omaha! On a foundation of friendship and submitting to each other, the Lord began to rest on us, speaking to us, directing us, encouraging us. We had no clear plan of action but we agreed to pursue the Lord together and see where we ended up!
In January 2007 the N. Omaha leaders decided to participate in the “Divine Experiment” that God had suddenly given Fusion . Without much information (because the Lord had so recently spoken to us about this), they abandoned themselves to a 21-day fast, a time of consecration and separation from the spirit of the world. They turned off their cell phones, stopped most regular church activities, added early morning, daily prayer meetings, turned off their televisions, stopped non-essential shopping and indulging in entertainment and other forms of idolatry. They fasted food and many other things to make themselves irresistible to God’s presence!
Much to our surprise, the Lord’s response to them was immediate and powerful. Within the first couple of days, dramatic breakthroughs were occurring and powerful testimonies were being shared. The Lord was doing much more than we expected. (See the January Participant Testimonies on: www.thedivineexperiment.com). We realized the Lord wanted to draw near to His people once they returned to Him with all their heart.
N. Omaha pastors and congregations participated in the Divine Experiment again in March and the Lord continued to move and take them deeper into His heart.
When it was suggested that the community was prepared for the actual transformation process and that the Fijian Healing the Land team was open to coming to lead them through that process, the leaders responded again with an immediate “yes” and with abandoned hearts to whatever the Lord wanted to do among them.
At every point and decision, the Lord’s will and the fullness of His Kingdom purposes was their objective. No matter how challenging this process sounded, they never compromised or held back. They never insisted on their own way or tried to protect their own ways and “culture”. They desperately wanted God to come to their village!
Thus we said “yes” together to the most incredible journey of our lives! The first transformation process in a Western World community was scheduled for Omaha, July 2007... As God promised in 2 Chron. 7:14, when His people who are called by His name humble themselves and pray and turn from their wicked ways, He will HEAR their cry! He will FORGIVE their sin! And He will HEAL their land! God has begun responding to their response as He promised.
Video of pastors sharing the story
Video of pastors sharing the story
What are the keys of the N. Omaha story?
It’s important to consider both the context and the process of the N. Omaha testimony. First, we are talking about a remnant of leaders and congregations – 7 to be exact. We are NOT claiming that all the churches in N. Omaha are involved presently in this process. Neither is anybody claiming transformation of the whole community at this stage!
What we believe is happening is the Lord has put a stake in the ground and given the beginning of a real breakthrough of revival and transformation in the community because of the obedience of this remnant of believers. Certainly this is not the whole of ministry processes going on in the community. What has and is occurring is the process focused on presence-based transformation.
It is tempting to look at this breaking through with its encouraging signs and fruit and just want to “pick the fruit”, or to find out what has happened and try to replicate it. We must be very clear regarding this – we can’t look at the transformation process and try to just do that in our communities. The journey of the N. Omaha story started 14 months ago! Don’t forget they spent over a year preparing themselves through humility and repentance, changing of mindsets, reconciling, praying and fasting, restoring broken covenants. If we want to see the fruit of THAT, then we must follow THAT process and prepare ourselves.There are no shortcuts to Transformation!
Each of these leaders had some things in common before April that made their hearts ripe for the transformation message:
-Desperation for their community which was filled with violence, bloodshed, immorality, poverty, broken families, hopelessness, etc.
-The cumulative effect of years of failures from past ministry attempts to fix the community on their own and through their individual efforts or programs. This contributed to their desperation
-They had the heartbeat of the city. They were already in touch with its pain, its history. They had a burden but were without direction forward.
-They each wanted the community to be transformed but understood none of them could do it by themselves. Brokenness and humility was already present in their hearts. They had been in the wilderness for a long time.
-Their mindsets were not focused on hope from another event or program. Their hope was in a Person, and seeking wholeheartedly His Kingdom as a lifestyle, a journey and a process.
Principles Identified During the Preparation Process:
After watching “up close” these leaders work together for over a year, several critical transformational principles are evident! This list is a brief summary of some of the more important principles:
1.Humility of the leaders. They live out a lifestyle of humility before the Lord and before each other, before their congregations and other leaders in the community. In their humility they work together closely with ministry “partners” such as Fusion Ministries who they recognize carry particular revelation and ability to serve them in their transformation journey. They submitted to the word of the Lord when they heard it because they realized they have never been this way before.
2.Willingness to quickly repent. They live out a lifestyle of repentance. One of their mottos is “we refuse to be offended”. They work through disagreements, community ministry, with open hearts. Pride never gains a foothold among them, so the Lord is able to stay close to them.
3.Absolute dependence on the leading of the Lord. Another key motto for them is: “we don’t know where we are going”.
4.Desperation for their devastated community. These are leaders whose hearts are literally breaking over the ravaging effect of the enemy on their families, friends, congregations and community. They have hearts of compassion and enter into the role of intercession with a desperate cry for justice and mercy and breaking in of God’s power.
5.Willing to respond quickly, not procrastinate. If God is moving and speaking they will respond immediately.
6.New corporate identity. Their new corporate identity as leaders and congregations, along with the identification of their “village” gave them confidence and validation that God would lead them to success.
7.Repentance begins with the household of God. The conviction that what is going on in the streets won’t change until they get it right INSIDE the church
8.Kingdom culture. They didn’t gather a large group of leaders and find the lowest common denominator for unity. They intentionally kept the group small, until a Kingdom value system and culture was established.
9.No quick fix. They understood the amount of work to be done inside and they had patience with God’s process, they didn’t rush ahead.
10.Adjusting priorities. They adjusted their calendars to make meeting weekly and praying for the Kingdom to come to their village their highest ministry priority.
11.Presence-based unity. The Lord’s presence in their weekly prayer meetings motivated them to be together.
12.Kingdom camaraderie. These leaders moved from being pastors to brothers to friends. They no longer relate to each other according to ministerial titles and positions.
