I have just read in the Scottish News that over £10 million pounds is to be spent on building a new Visitor Centre in the vicinity of the ancient Callanish standing stones on the Isle of Lewis. It is an imaginative scheme designed to attract tourists to the island to visit Callanish.
Just a few miles from Callanish stands a remote church building at Barvas which, in the late nineteen forties, became a Visitor Centre for the Holy Spirit! A revival ensued which had such transforming power that the connected islands of Lewis and Harris were under a blanket of God’s presence for months on end, bringing deep conviction to the islanders and many thousands into the Kingdom of God.
Thirty-five years ago I was privileged to sit in awe, as I listened to Alastair and Katie Campbell describing in hushed voices how the holiness of God swept across the islands, compelling Alistair into a church to prostrate himself before God, deeply convicted of his sin. He was radically born again, filled with the Spirit and nearly forty years later, when Alastair and Katie were telling me their stories, their faces were aglow with the presence and fire of God, as tears of joyful thanksgiving trickled down their faces.
Today there is a steady stream of people who visit the island who are not interested in visiting Callanish, but want to stand in the place where God visited his people. All those who were alive at the time have passed on into glory, but the fruit of what happened in those extraordinary days is felt all over the world. Many hundreds of young people became missionaries who travelled the world, taking with them in their hearts the fruit of the Holy Spirit’s visitation.
The miracle of God’s salvation plan is that every single human being on the planet has a personal Visitor Centre, designed by God to welcome His presence! And the tragedy of mankind is that the majority of the people on the planet have no interest in welcoming God into their Visitor Centre – even though the price of entry was fully paid for by Jesus at Calvary two thousand years ago.
The older I get the more the passion burns within me to teach how the living God will meet the hurting and the broken at their point of need, and to see them enlivened by the presence of the Holy Spirit, as personal revival sweeps through their lives. It’s thrilling to read how revival swept through the islands in the middle of the last century – but it is even more thrilling to see first-hand how the reviving power of God still transforms lives by His presence today.
Our hearts can be thrilled by the spiritual adventures of generations gone by. But it’s only first-hand adventures with God that will touch the lives of today’s generations who have no idea that they have a personal Visitor Centre for the living God in their heart!
To read more about the Lewis Revival please go to the following links:
https://romans1015.com/lewis-revival/
Copyright © Peter Horrobin 2024.
Peter Horrobin is the Founder of Gates of Hope International. To find out more about the work please go to www.gatesofhopeinternational.com or, in its abbreviated ‘Go-High’ form: www.gohi.world
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Hi Peter,
Good to hear a bit more about the Hebridean revival. Wonderful to hear how God used these two ladies. There is great satisfaction when one has a chance to witness. I sense a bit of a stirring within individuals and it will be great when full blown revival breaks out. The very humid weather we have been experiencing equates to very limited sleep at night but lots of dozing during prayer sessions. Thankfully, the Lord understands!
Blessings, margaret.
Jesus led me and a team of intercessors to pray over 4 days on Lewis back in June 2024. We were near Barvas andcalso went out to pray at Callanish! We were asking God to move again across the British Isles, as foreseen by Smith Wiggleswoth in 1947 and Jean Darnell in 1967!
It’s coming!
God bless
Mark Maddock
(Ex-NETS 1 student from Pierrepont!)
Hello Peter,
I was very happy to read about the visitor center. The longing to meet God is inherent in each of us, the longing to have community.
For me, GoHi is a place where this visitor center is being built within us.
Matthew 27:51 tells of the opening of this visitor center.
It is inspiring to read how the holiness of God swept over the islands.
God is preparing his bride in these stormy days and we are making ourselves available for Him to work through us.
Best wishes and God’s blessing