They called it the “Holy Spirit Woodstock.” It has been 50 years since the 1967 Woodstock gathering. On Oct.6-9, 2017,  57 tents were set up on the National Mall, for day and night, 24/7, worship and prayer, to see what God will do in our nation, if we ask. We worshipped, we prayed, we cried out. We repented, we reconciled, we celebrated. We did this simply because we love God and believe that He is good. And He has good things in store for our lives, our families, our cities and our nation. The best is YET to come!

This weekend was significant because “it was also the 20th anniversary of Promise Keepers; an event where a million Christian men had gathered on the Mall to pray for revival in America. This weekend gathering also happened during the Feast of Tabernacles when all of Israel was gathering to their nation’s capital in tents! Succat Hallel in Jerusalem was doing a tent gathering in Israel during the same dates.” You can read the entire Awaken The Dawn story and more about how God aligned this historic weekend and vision here.

Once I had heard about this event through Facebook, and again at Morningstar’s Wild Love 2017 conference, I knew that I had to go. I was able to find a flight up to DC a few weeks before and even found a wonderful (and cheap) hostel to stay at, that was minutes away from the Mall. I traveled by myself, but met up with my two friends from Charleston, Karen and Erin. They both bought tickets a few days before the trip and two female beds opened up at the hostel as they were on the phone with them. The Lord provided a nice weekend trip for under $300 each! There was so much favor given to us all weekend! The whole 48-72 hours that I was in DC was amazing and I will try to “give you the highlights”. Thank you to friends and family back home who were praying for this event and also for “coming alongside me” via Facebook Live videos.

These were some testimonies that were reported by the ATD founder, David Bradshaw, on the night of 10/8/17:

• Over 750 people were sent out to do outreach in the city, and in one group, they offered Jesus to 19 people and those 19 people made a decision to pray and accept a personal relationship with Jesus!
• At Dupont Circle, a man had bad vision and a team prayed for his eyes. After the first time, his vision increased by 50%. The second time they prayed, he said it was up to 90%. The 3rd time, he was 100% healed and could see perfectly!
• A man who had had brain surgery years ago and because of it, he had limited muscle movement. He hadn’t been able to do a push-up in over 30 years. After prayer he did several reps!
• On 14th street, a woman was selling ice-cream out of a food truck. She led 53 people to Jesus from her truck (in addition to selling them ice-cream)!
• A Muslim family was visiting the Mall from another country and they told one of the ATD volunteers, “This is the most beautiful and real expression of worship we have ever seen. What is going on?” (and they stuck around for awhile).

A few personal testimonies that impacted me over the weekend:

• A bunch of people at our hostel where also here for ATD and people were sharing their experiences with God and praying for new friends they just met at breakfast.
• Our 2 lovely roommates were from Argentina and the 4-5 of us that were experiencing ATD got to spend an hour and a half with them just sharing what God has done in our lives, speak prophetically over their lives and pray with them. Seeds were planted because they have traveled a lot and met a lot of people, but we spoke beautiful words into their lives.
• It was encouraging to see just about every denomination at this event, where people were truly united because of Christ! People were so friendly and hospitable and there was an atmosphere of peace, love and genuineness. I asked a friend who lives and works in DC if this was normal for the culture of DC and she said “No.”
• We caught up with old friends from Camp St. Christopher (Elaina who lives in PA and Bethany and TJ Fleming who now live in DC) and it was wonderful to reconnect!
• At one point during worship, the words were something like “God blowing like a mighty wind” (honestly, I was pretty lost in worship to be reading words off a screen) but a huge wind kicked up and many people felt this swirling wind around them (the wind was blowing around each person) and then it would stop. And start up again at various intervals during corporate worship. It was amazing!
• Strangers were asking for forgiveness from strangers. Reconciliation happened between blacks and whites as we cried out for forgiveness on racial tensions and issues and white privilege. (Dr. Alveda King and Cindy Jacobs led this portion of one of the gatherings and it was so powerful!)
• We met a bunch of amazing people, but Karen, Erin and I felt like “long term friendships” were going to be made with our new friends, Julie and Lauretta.
• A woman tripped in front of us in the line for the food trucks and she was crying and said she twisted her knee. The few of us around her prayed for her knee and after the first time she was able to sit up. The second time she was assisted to her feet. We prayed a third time and I asked her if it was 100%, she said “well, you should pray again.” I told her it was “no problem.” After the 4th time, she walked away pain free!
• Lots of words were spoken over my life about “writing.” I wouldn’t consider myself a “writer”, nor do I know what I will write about, but I’m claiming it as a future promise over my life and am trying to discipline myself to write everyday (even if it’s just personal journaling).
• Karen, Erin and I were traveling on the subway at night. We were the only ones in the subway train car. I was talking with them about a dear friend who has breast cancer and needs healing and felt led to pray in the car right then and there. Right after we prayed, the subway car started shaking up and down (as if we were going over rocks or bumps in the road). Our ride had been smooth up until this point and there was a literal shaking after that prayer for about 10-15 seconds. We believe our friend will be healed/is in process of being healed.
• Karen, Erin and I missed our flight (the last flight out, home) and our check-in attendant, pulled some strings and waived the change-of-flight fee (saved us around $80 each) and then hands us a hotel coupon and tells us to pick the cheapest one. We were told for 3 people it was $69 (which split 3 ways was cheaper than our hostel!) and so we joked it was going to be a run-down motel (at this point, we truly didn’t care) and we pull up to the swanky, Westin Hotel (which should have been around $220/night) and we were able to take hot showers, get some sleep and even grab some complimentary Starbucks coffee! It turned out to be such a blessing!
• THEN, the next morning at the airport, we thought we saw Randy Clark  in the airport. We had seen about 20 doppelgangers all weekend from home, who we thought were at the event, but in fact they were just their look-alikes. So we assumed it was just a guy that looked like him. So we go to the bathroom, so that we have to pass by his section to double check and his personal assistant walks right up to Karen and confirms that it is the Randy Clark. So we go over and introduce ourselves and because he looked tired (he said he was coming back from a crusade in Brazil), we asked him “What is some advice you could give us?” and he replied, “just keep loving God, keep listening to Him and keep loving others.” (Essentially, we were just commissioned by Randy Clark!)

• We get to board the plane and although I booked my seats a few months ahead, my seat buddies were Karen and Erin! We thought that was hilarious and we know it means we will be working together at some point and I’m thankful for my relationship with these women!

**I am so grateful for the opportunity to go on a somewhat last minute trip like this. Massive kudos goes out to my hero of a husband, David, who single-handedly made sure our girls were well taken care of, fed and showered while I was gone. I am so thankful that he encouraged me to go.  Also thank you to Granny and Gramps who helped out when David had to be at work. I don’t know what I would do without you! I think that God and I still need to process the work He did in me at this event, but for now, I was glad to be a part of the definite shift that happened in DC.

People were asking, “can we do this next year?!” Oh yeah! The vision for 2018 is to have all 50 state capitals having 24/7 worship and prayer and this time they want to be in partnership with state universities to run it. Get ready Columbia, SC, we are coming for you next year—the whole family! Join Tent America to find out more info.