Lily            My parents were Jesus Movement hippies when I was born in Paia, Maui. My father lived in a commune, and my mother would invite hitchhikers to come home and live with her. I always felt a call of God on my life and remember writing worship songs from the age of 5. When I was six, the famous hippie evangelist Lonnie Frisbee (who helped to start both the Calvary Chapel and Vineyard movements) was speaking at our church, which doubled as a Christian commune. That was when I responded to give my life to the Lord.

            Later, at the age of 15, Lonnie was at a home group meeting I attended. I remember him calling me out specifically with a word of knowledge and I was baptized with the Holy Spirit. I fell to the floor shaking. I was the only one in the room that this happened to, and I didn’t know what hit me. I had never been around this type of thing in my teenage years. I was not expecting it, and I remember crying a lot. When the power of God hits you, you don’t care about anything else in that moment.
            As a teenager, I remember leading worship for a short while at my youth group. As a teenager, I served as youth director for Christian Surfers International. I was even arrested once for protesting at an abortion clinic with some friends, and I remember preaching to my high school speech classes. But a lot of this was just religious activity. Ironically, I fell away from the Lord when I was 17 and I soon ended up pregnant with our first daughter, who John would later adopt. I really lacked a sense of respect and value for myself. I believe the Lord allowed this to happen to keep me from falling further away from Him. At that time I moved to Alaska, and I soon reached a very low point in my life where I became extremely depressed. It was then that I recommitted my life to the Lord.
            Soon after this period of time, I met John, and the Lord was restoring my sense of value and worth. He also restored a very sweet, childlike relationship that I always remembered having with Him. Since then, my main focus has been on raising a family, which I consider to be my main ministry. Our children were already prophesying and seeing angels at very early ages. The Lord had given me creative ministry avenues outside the family as well. I had a women’s massage business where I would often lay hands on my clients and prophesy over them – most of them unbelievers – as I was giving them a massage. Some of them were brought to tears as the presence of the Lord surrounded them. Over the years as we began to get the message of grace and the finished work of the cross, it was like a whole new chapter of the glory of God invading our lives. Years of performance were stripped away - even in the raising of our children and ministry. To this day, the Lord continues to reveal His goodness, and the gospel message has infused our daily lives and natural existence with His wonderful presence.

 

Lily Crowder, 11/28/2008