GBI Antiokhia Church Restoration Story
This is just a glimpse of the amazing story of how God began to pour out His Spirit in a mighty way at GBI Antiokhia (Antioch Church). This has been named the Restoration Movement because the entire Church was transformed in a very short space of time and continues to be renewed and restored on a daily basis.
Early in March 2002, Pastor Kitty Hamilton, from the United States of America led a seminar, Healing of the Mind, at GBI Antiokhia and as she taught on the topics of restoration, self-image and inner healing from Acts 3:19-21 on March 14th through to March 17th a mighty hunger was birthed within the pastors of the Church for a release of the Holy Spirit in their midst. They came to the realization that Jesus Christ promised to restore GBI Antiokhia and ultimately the Church of Christ to a state where His presence could be gloriously manifested and where the people of God would be greatly refreshed. They acknowledged that any move of God would not be the result of man-made programs or human opinions but would happen only in the timing of God and in His way.
This was the beginning of an amazing journey of supernatural release and an incredible outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
The following day, on Monday the 18th March 2002, the senior pastor and his wife made an agreement with God believing that the Church would be restored to a position of glory and that He would have His way in our midst. Along with another pastor from Surabaya, they prayed, using oil to anoint various items as the Holy Spirit led them, including the Church building and all its contents, in order that God might sanctify His Church completely.
Several days later, on Thursday 21st March 2002, deep in prayer, all of the Church pastors joined together to sanctify the Holy Room (auditorium) of the Church, including the platform, all its equipment and the seats. Then on Friday 22nd March 2002 the pastor, his wife and all Church staff made a unified commitment to pay the price to allow the Holy Spirit to move freely and committed themselves to a greater fasting and praying effort and longer prayer taking place from 06:30 - 12:30 each Saturday morning. Since then the presence and power of God has fallen with great intensity each time fasting and prayer has taken place.
Thursday 28th March 2002 was a day of great revelation. Two major prayer meetings were held and great manifestation of the Holy Spirit took place. A word was spoken in tongues at this time and interpreted as following:
- Everyone that comes to Him will be accepted without discrimination.
- The truth must be established in His Church without any compromise.
- The restoration process must be started from within the Worship team.
- Members of the Worship team must establish holy lifestyles so that they can be victorious in all forms of spiritual warfare.
Thursday night is our combined cell meeting for all Church members and on the 4th April 2002 the presence of God fell with great force and He instructed the entire Church body to live in complete holiness - especially the worship team. The purpose for this was to begin the restoration process by ensuring that the people were looking to His face and not to His blessings.
A third prayer and fasting meeting was held the following day - Friday the 5th April 2002. On this occasion God started visiting all of the members of the prayer team. A renewal broke out in praise and worship and the entire prayer team was filled with holy laughter. Immediately we proclaimed the victory of Christ over all sins, weakness, illnesses, diseases, poverty and many other curses.
Friday 12th April 2002 was a momentous occasion when we held the fourth prayer and fasting meeting. Six people who had shown incredible devotion and faithfulness in prayer and fasting meetings before the restoration were exalted to become pioneer members of the Church. God made it clear that He expected them to increase their commitment toward taking care of and ensuring unity, obedience and faithfulness within the Church more than any of the other congregation members. That same evening, from 22:00 through to 04:30 the next morning, effective fervent prayer was offered up and three important revelations were birthed during this time:
- God said to the people of the Church that they must accept the movement of the Spirit into which He was leading us. He did not force or coerce but simply said that a deep longing and hunger for Him was required.
- He (God) asked the people to surrender their life and talents completely to Him.
- Many people in attendance experienced very real supernatural visitations and some were asked by God to make commitments in certain areas of their life.
The following week, in the combined cell meeting on the 17th April 2002, God gave guidance to the people who were prepared to serve Jesus Christ willingly and seriously with their whole heart. He made it clear that all of the things that we do in God will not be useless and that we will receive the prize according to those things that we do here on earth. He told us to be glad for those who hear and understand about paying the price for God.
19th April 2002 marked the fifth prayer and fasting meeting. During this time of consecration God taught us many things concerning longing - that we must have a desire to look upon His face and that this needs to be the highest priority in our life. It was again clearly stated that we must not focus only on His blessing. We also learnt about the need to understand the principle of sowing and reaping in our deeds and behaviour and also in our ministry and giving.
On Saturday 20th April 2002 God reminded us that the spiritual warfare had begun and through a powerful vision the pastor had received, God advised us of several things which needed to be attended to with great vigilance and watchfulness during this restoration:
- Do not allow any ties or spiritual bondages to create strongholds in our midst.
- Do not fear the devil because the power of the blood of Jesus is far greater than anything else.
- Do not fear barriers and challenges because Jesus Christ (Emmanuel) will be with you.
- Do not allow mediocrity or weak Christianity to creep in so that we are no longer useful as a tool of spiritual warfare and thus allowing the enemy to destroy both us and other people.
- Do not fear the war in the spiritual realms because God is on our side and no-one can stand against us.
- God will smooth down all roads and streets for us so that we can go and win souls for Him.
Since the time of this account many many lives have been radically transformed as a result of the ongoing spiritual rain that is taking place at GBI Antiokhia. The powerful manifestation of the Holy Spirit has continued to intensify and increase each week as the hunger deepens and the people develop a closer relationship with Him. There are really no words to express the glorious thrill of standing in the presence of the Most High God.
Throughout 2008 we are continung to experience a powerful and awesome manifestation of the Holy Spirit and new branches are being planted in cities throughout Indonesia at an unprecedented rate. Glory be to God!
We conclude with the statement that when Jesus Christ is given freedom to operate as the Head of His Church He will continue to restore more and more of His Churches so that the entire body of Christ will be ready for the great harvest in front of us - and especially the great harvest in the coming end time.
