This morning I was blessed to attend a local Prayer Breakfast. It was the 2nd Annual Sheriff Lowell S. Griffin Prayer Breakfast.
My good friends, Mike and Sheila Franklin, invited me to be a guest at their table. Sheila is the former Fletcher Town Council member on whose campaign for re-election I had worked diligently.
She has since stepped down from her Council seat because she won our District seat on the Henderson County Board of Commissioners. Mike was recently appointed to take my seat on the Fletcher Planning and Zoning Board.
Also at our table were Bill and Jay, who are two other current members of the Board of County Commissioners; John, the Henderson County Manager; Charlotte, a woman whose business handles bio-hazardous waste (needles, dangerous drugs, etc.) for the Sheriff’s Department; and Dr. Jennifer, who was re-elected to the Hendersonville City Council. Interesting discussions ensued at our table before and after the slate of speakers.
The event was sold out and the large auditorium at the Blue Ridge Community College held 400 people around the circular tables for eight. After Pastor Craver welcomed the attendees, he offered a prayer of blessing for the food. He then dismissed us to go to the hall to have an abundance of eggs—for which the Sheriff made a special note of gratitude, given the recent, deliberate slaughter of millions of chickens.
The 11-member Mt. Moriah Praise Band played several praise songs before the various pastors spoke and again in the middle. It seemed that all or nearly all of the pastors who spoke were members of the Sheriff’s Chaplain Team.
The first was Pastor Robert Cuevas. (His wife, Leslie, introduced me to her husband. Leslie and I had served together on the Planning and Zoning Board.) Robert’s assignment was a Prayer for Revival.
He gave some history on the Azuza Street Revival which spread across the nation beginning in 1906 and lasting until ca. 1915. The Azusa Revival was led by William Seymour, an African-American preacher.
QUOTE: The Azusa Street Revival was a Pentecostal gathering that occurred in Los Angeles, California, in April 1906. Most of today’s Pentecostal denominations point to the Azusa Street Revival as the catalyst of the worldwide growth of the Charismatic movement, as they believe the Holy Spirit was once again poured out in a “new Pentecost.”
The Azusa Street Revival had its roots in Kansas. A preacher named Charles Parham was one of the early proponents of the Pentecostal movement in the United States and the first to suggest that speaking in tongues was the inevitable evidence of being baptized in the Holy Spirit.
Parham started a Bible school in Topeka, Kansas. One of his students was an African-American preacher named William Joseph Seymour. END QUOTE Source.
That much I knew. But what stunned me was Pastor Cuevas’ statement that actually the roots of the Azusa Street Revival go back before Kansas to a little town in Henderson County, NC, called Fletcher! (I intend to look into that further.)
He also mentioned the recent revival “outbreaks” one which occurred at (Francis) Asbury University in Kentucky in February of 2023. Here is an article from RNS (Religious News Service).
Pastor Cuevas then mentioned how one of the players on the Ohio State football team brought the revival to the Buckeye campus. I remember seeing some news clips about that. We don’t know of any direct connection, but it is a fact that the Buckeyes went on to win the College Football Championship this past season… just sayin’. 😊
- Pastor Cuevas then led the 400 in a prayer for revival in our nation. Other pastors/chaplains kept their messages much shorter and prayed in turn for:
- Prayer for America and North Carolina (especially in view of the tragedies and devastation we have seen in the counties of Western North Carolina due to Hurricane Hellene).
- Prayer for Henderson County (and thanking God for how he has blessed many through the trials and tribulations wrought by HH).
- Prayer for First Responders (ditto)
- Prayer for those affected by childhood cancer. One of Sheriff Griffin’s deputies’ family lost their four-year-old son, Jax, to cancer recently. The Sheriff also made it clear that after the costs of the event are covered, that all funds will go to a childhood cancer research organization to be chosen by Jax’s parents. Not a dime would go into any political campaign or private pockets, assured the sheriff.
- Closing Prayer by the Sheriff’s pastor.
In the midst of those prayers listed above, Sheriff Griffin, gave what many described as a sermon, thanking God (the God of the Bible), and humbly making sure every attendee understood that while it is the “Sheriff’s Prayer Breakfast,” that all the work of organizing it was done by his Chaplains and many other volunteers.
The Sheriff himself has undergone much tribulation in recent years with his wife being stricken by cancer, and likewise another family member. But we all gave glory to God this morning as his pastor reported that both had received really good news from their medical providers in the past few days.
Sheriff Griffin also remarked how it was so gratifying to see not only all the churches working together in ministering basic needs to all the people suffering from HH.
There were several tables of folks from the Henderson County communities of Gerton and Bat Cave, which along with Chimney Rock, were greatly devastated by HH, with many deaths and utter destruction of their communities.
The Sheriff noted that not only the churches, but all kinds of groups and individuals came together, exhibiting the two basic commandments of loving God and loving our neighbor. Being a Baptist, Lowell Griffin, even ended his “sermon” with what in essence was an altar call. 😊
One might have thought this was a Christian Bible-believing church gathering. I saw no evidence of anyone but Christians in attendance. No Buddhist, Hindu, Shinto, Muslim, Jew, animist, New Age, or any other non-Christian persons spoke. Moreover, all who did lead prayers ended them “in Jesus’ name.”
To me, that is a refreshing change from some of the “people of faith” type events I have seen nationally in recent years. (Faith in what? Faith in whom?) Are we finally on the path back to America becoming even more of a Christian nation than it was many decades (well over a century) ago? I sure hope and pray for that eventuality!
Before the gathering began, I was able to chat with Sheriff Lowell a few minutes. And after the adjournment, I had the opportunity to commend him for his wonderful talk, which struck all the right notes of gratitude to God, humility of self, our county’s demonstrable unity of Christian faith, and encouragement to the attendees.
Moreover, I promised to pray for his wife’s healing (although she had been indirectly in my daily prayers, but now she will be mentioned by name in my prayers for a season). I am proud and grateful to Father that we have a man of outstanding moral, Christian character as our county’s chief law enforcement officer.
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