One night the police stopped and they said, what's going on here? They were sure that we were selling drugs or smoking pot or whatever. And said, we're talking about Jesus. They laughed and laughed and laughed all the way back into their police car. Wow. They couldn't believe this whole thing. And so that was the beginnings of things. God promises in Joel 2.28 to pour out His Spirit on all humanity. Welcome to Global Outpouring.
Where we contend for that promise outpouring, We equip for that outpouring, So that we may engage in that very outpouring. I'm Philip Buss. And I'm Sharon Buss. Welcome to the podcast today. We have with us a very special guest, Dan Reiter from Community Christian Fellowship in Matatuck, New York on Long Island. And he has had some amazing conversations and he has had some amazing experiences in the things of God and experiencing the outpouring right here on Long Island.
We're so glad that you've joined us today. Thank you so much for tuning in. Before we get started, we just want to encourage you, if you haven't already done so, to go to our website, globaloutpouring.net and be sure that you have subscribed to our email list. We want to be able to communicate with you and keep in touch with you, let you know what we're doing. We have a prayer meeting that you can join with every day on the telephone so that you can help us contend for the outpouring.
And we have equipping things that are going on all the time. The next thing that's coming up is our School of the Supernatural Translation by Faith with Dr. Bruce Allen and his wife Reshma and Michael Van Vleimen and his wife, Cordana.
We're going to be learning about the things that God is preparing for his saints as we move deeper into the hour that we're living in so that we can know the scriptural basis of translation, just like Philip did in the New Testament in the Book of Acts where God took him to a place and he ministered to the Ethiopian eunuch and when his job there was done, he was gone. And he found himself elsewhere.
It's perfectly scriptural and that is what we are learning and also learning to discern what's the real thing and what's the false thing. So we encourage you to see the events we have coming up on our website and join in if you are able. So Dan, it's such a pleasure to be with you today and have this opportunity to share some of the things that God has done in your life. Thanks for joining us. Sure, no thank you very much. So tell us a little bit about your upbringing.
Were you raised in a Christian home? I was raised, my parents were Lutheran and so I was brought up in a Lutheran church. They had to bribe me to go to Sunday school. But I finally did do that and we had a very wonderful pastor looking back. But what you learned of the Lord was, it was so-so. You were never brought to a point to make a decision. And so I knew the things.
I've heard Bible stories, things of this nature, good sermons, I looked back at maybe some of them that I could remember some things. And had I been awakened to the Lord and to his spirit, I would have heard it very differently. But I was young so that was a story. And so I was brought up in a Lutheran church. However, my mother was Jewish. But she had converted to Christianity, she met the Lord. And that all happened through my older sister. She started at a young age going to a Baptist church.
She got some word in her. Oh, yes. So what happened, she became born again. And of course, my mother was very worried about her. Would actually follow her to church. Oh, wow. Oh, my. And became born again. She met the Lord and asked the Lord to her life. Wow. And so that was the influences on my life. My father was a very quiet man, big man. And worked underwater all his life. He was a captain of fishing boats, things of that nature.
And I'd always find my father in the morning, looking at scripture or something like that, a devotional. And all I knew, that was an important thing. Because if dad took time for it, it was important. He didn't talk about it so much. Wow. But I could just tell as a kid, this is an important thing. So how did you come to know Jesus? Well, really the way that I came to know Jesus was simply on television, whenever Billy Graham seemed to come on. I would listen, I understood what he was saying.
And I must have gone forward to the television at least 16 or 17 times. Wow. Didn't wanna miss a chance. Right. Yeah. But again, the understanding and the kind of follow-up teaching you would get, I wasn't getting. But as a kid, that's what I did. So the Lord was real to me, but not as a relationship, but I believed in his reality. Yeah. And I believe that he died on the cross for my sin as much as I understood what that all was. Yeah. So that's how I came to the Lord. How old were you?
I was, well, I would tell you that I went forward ever since I was 12 years old. And finally it dawned on me, probably around 17 years old, that I needed to ask Jesus into my life and that he came to save me from my own sin and to bring me into a relationship through himself with the Father. Beautiful. And I began to understand that. However, it was still something wasn't grabbing my life. It was a belief. It was something like a tack on to my life.
Yeah. You know, I understood it, but it wasn't, it didn't consume me. You know, it wasn't really in my heart. So that was a story up until around 17, 18 years old. And then through a bunch of different circumstances, how would I say this to you? But I ended up in a rock and roll band. Tell us about it. And I loved it. I'll make no bones about it. I loved every bit about it. I sang and there were three other fellows, you know, guitars and drums, et cetera, kind of a typical band.
But over time we started to, we had gotten quite good and quite well known. And so that really started to consume my life. And as I say, I loved it. We're in recording studios. We're doing this, doing that, playing a lot of jobs. And after a while you find yourself eating, sleeping, drinking the music. You know, it consumes you and you love it. And so there was a time and I think I was maybe 20 years old then. There was a fellow who said he'd like to meet with me. And I said, sure.
And I met with this fellow, his name was Greg. And he was kind of a little strange, had long hair like all of us did back then. But he looked a little strange and he talked a little strange. And he says, I hear that you pray before you guys go on stage. I said, yeah, we've always done that. We pray together. That was always my idea. And the other fellas do what's fine with. And so Greg says, you know, I met the Lord while I was at college. And he said, you know, the Lord has just filled me.
And he started talking to me as if he had had breakfast with Jesus. And kind of came to tell me about it. And I was very enthralled by what he said. And then he kind of laughed at the end of our conversation. He said, you know, they call us Jesus freaks. And you know, that appealed to me. Somehow that appealed to me. I liked that. Don't ask me what grabbed me about that, but it just made everything about the Lord so current. So real for right now. And so we played a job that night.
And I can remember this like it were yesterday. I had come home and I think we got home about, I got home maybe two or three in the morning. That was usually when you got back. And I would go down, I'd gotten to bed and I would always lay there. And every set that we played would go through my head before I could go to sleep. I would hear every mistake. I would hear this, I would hear that. So all the songs played and finally was over and I'm ready to go to sleep.
And I just said this little prayer. I said, Lord, I don't know what that guy Greg has, but whatever he has, I want it. And all I can tell you, all of a sudden, something started like at my forehead. It went down to my feet. And I was laying in bed laughing my head off. And I really, I was just laughing and laughing and something was happening to me and I kind of knew it, but it was pleasant.
And I slept well that night and it was, and I woke up and it was like, there were birds singing, but I'd never heard them before till it was you, until I'd met Jesus. And so things change, needless to say. And so it wasn't long after that, the Lord started asking me, and I could hear this in my heart. Do you love me or do you love the band? And I said, Lord, you know, I love you. And I said, you're gonna be so proud of me.
I said, you know, if we cut that record and I meet, you know, X, Y and Z, I'm gonna have the opportunity to witness to them. And that didn't go very far. And so, you know, things continued. And a second time, same thing happened. I came out with the same lame answer looking back. And then somewhere as I had read in Job, and this is my paraphrase, but if the Lord speaks to you three times, the third time, you better listen. So basically the Lord spoke a third time.
And what I said, I said, Lord, I couldn't leave even if I wanted to. I'm just too steeped into this. And I love it so much. And I said, if you want me out though, if you arrange it so I come out of it, I'll certainly do it, I'll follow. And all of a sudden, the group started to fall apart. And we were on the midst of a recording contract and a few other things, you know, that look like the opportunities that, you know, everybody would wish for.
And things started and I recognized what was happening. And so I just took this step out. And a friend who was in another band came, he asked me, he said, what on earth did you do? Why'd you leave music? And I said, well, come over the house Saturday night and I'll tell you. And so I shared with him what happened to me. And he asked Jesus into his life. Glory to God. Praise God. And he said to me, he said, can I bring some friends over next Saturday? I said, yeah.
And he brought about 10 people over the next Saturday. He said, Ted, tell them what you told me, you know, why you left the music. And so I told a story, all 10 of them came to the Lord. And this started going on the whole summer. And it ended up that first fellow who came over, who ended up a close friend, a fellow that I really loved, his name was Ed Hanson. Ed and a fellow, Greg, who had witnessed me originally.
By the end of the summer, the three of us were on the front stoop of my folks' house where there was a big, big lawn in the front. And there were about 200 young people that would come just to hear us speak about the Lord. Wow. And it was just happening naturally. Something was going on. We didn't know what. Wow. I think that was the beauty of it, looking back. Yeah. We did not know. We were just reliant on the Lord. Whatever he showed us, whatever we sensed he was telling us.
That's what we did. I'm sure we made many, many errors and mistakes, but gosh, the Lord was so gracious and loving and merciful to say the least. And so not only did so many young people, but three Catholic priests were coming. Wow. And they were enjoying it. I can still remember the one fellow from the Polish Catholic Church. He wore one of these big, I don't know, things on his head. And we said, this has gotta stop. And so we took his hat off one night and put an engineer's hat on him.
And he loved it. He wore it all the time. And it was just a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful time. And so that's how things began, at least out here on Eastern Long Island. Wow. And again, we did not know what was happening, but started reading in Time Magazine and Newsweek Magazine at the time about this thing called the Jesus Movement or the Jesus Revolution all over the country. But that's how it started, at least out here on Eastern Long Island.
But then we had friends who went out to California and they said, you're never gonna guess what we found out here. We found Jesus. Oh, glory to God. And they said, we ended up at some place called Calvary Chapel, this guy Chuck Smith. And so we realized this was going on all over the place. Something was happening coast to coast. But again, it wasn't defined, it wasn't understood by any of us, but it was happening and we all knew it. And the one thing we knew, Jesus was real.
We knew Jesus was real. We didn't understand doctrine and all the things that happened that end up dividing everybody. But we understood Jesus. And we knew he loved us. I can still remember a kid, he was on this wall doing back flips. And I went by my car and I said, what are you doing? He said, I'm flipping out for Jesus. Oh, I love it. And you know, it was just, this is what people were saying, talking about. And the people in town were talking about what's going on.
One night the police stopped and they said, what's going on here? They were sure that we were selling drugs or smoking pot or whatever. And he said, we're talking about Jesus. They laughed and laughed and laughed all the way back into their police car. Wow. They couldn't believe this whole thing. And so that was the beginnings of things. Yeah. How long did that last? That lasted, well, in a crazy way, it's still going on.
Amen. You know, it's maybe died down a little bit, because it's a generation that started back then. And now we're all a little bit older. They're back to heck, I'm a lot older. And so, but I see something happening with another generation that everybody's considered lost. And lost generations are good because we're sin abounds, grace abounds much more. Amen. Yes, amen. So I'm sure that something is stirring again.
And, but the meantime, you know, the Lord was always teaching us, always moving us. And, you know, just to go on from where I kind of ended there just a second ago, I had gone on to graduate school in Tallahassee, Florida, Florida State. While I was at Florida State, somehow, it's a long story, so I'm not gonna tell you the whole thing, but I ended up in music again. But this time singing about the Lord in a group called the Burning Bush. And Florida State, there were 22,000 students.
Wow. And so we somehow, when we played around campus and around the town of Tallahassee, we seemed to bring together all the different groups. They all came to hear us. Wonderful. Campus Crusade, which was a giant group, the local charismatic people, and then the university people, the more scholarly I would call it. But they all used to come. And so my last year of graduate school, there was a friend who used to call me bro.
And he said, what would you think about running a Jesus people party in the student elections? Oh, wow. And I said, well, what would be the point of that? He said we could witness to 22,000 people face to face. Oh, what a great idea. I said, you know, John, sounds pretty good to me. And he was looking for me for kind of my okay for whatever reason, I don't know.
He was just a good friend, a little bit younger than I was, but a good friend, another student, an undergraduate student, but we both knew the Lord. And so we went to all of the groups on campus and presented this idea. And we formed a party. Wow. Called the Jesus people party. That's great. And our aim was, and everybody took hold of this. We're going in not to win anything. We don't wanna win. We wanna witness. And we wanna witness to every student on campus. This is great.
And everybody agreed. And we actually did it. And here's the funny thing. We tied, every position tied for first place. Wow. Which meant there had to be a runoff election. Oh, wow. So one more chance to follow up on our witnessing. And then the miracle of miracles happened. The election came and we lost. Every one of us lost. Wow. And we were so pleased. We rejoiced. Because no one wanted to, you know, be in the student politics. But it was a wonderful opportunity.
But you know, that's how it was a vibrancy. Yeah. You know what I mean? Two guys could have an idea. You share it with a few more. And the next thing, you know, you're witnessing the 22,000. Glory to God. I didn't like that. And it was just because we were too dumb to make it complicated. We're just lifted up to the Lord in prayer. Yeah. And would go ahead, take the chance. And the Lord would either open doors or shut doors. Wow. That's the way we worked. That's fantastic.
And that was the beauty of the times. So over the years, we've learned how to complicate a little bit more. So it's taking a while. But I think we're coming to a point where we've overly complicated ourselves. Perhaps divided ourselves too much. And, but I think there is a move to towards unity. I believe so. You know, but our unity is in Christ. It's no place else.
And even a small group like we are here in Matatuckabee, if you call, ask us a lot of questions, you're going to find out we all have a lot of very different opinions. And a lot of different thoughts. But on the other side of it, do we love each other? In Christ, we really do. Yeah. You know, and we're not going to let opinions or our own tastes or anything else separate us from what God has really joined. And not only joined marriage, but he's joined brothers and sisters, the body of Christ.
Beautiful. Yeah. So. Well, we've noticed that being with you in your congregation, that it's very much a New Testament style church. Can you give us a little bit of how you came to that vision? Well, in the beginning, we just wanted to do what the Lord wanted. And so we looked at the Book of Acts, how did they meet? And that was the beginning of it. And then lo and behold, we had met a few people along the way, one fellow named Lance Lambert. Lance was in England at the time.
And of course, as we knew him, and you probably know this, he lived in Jerusalem for the most of his, a good part of his life. Yes. And another fellow, another gentleman, Stephen Kahn. Stephen translated, wrote all of Watchman's books. And Stephen was just a dear brother. In fact, he married my wife and I. Wow. Just a lovely, lovely man. Very humble Chinese gentleman. Just went to be with the Lord recently, he was at 106 years old. Wow. And he preached right up until the end.
Glory to God. And just a dear brother. But they brought us this understanding of the church. You know, all of a sudden, the church was more than a Sunday meeting. It was the corporate man that God always wanted. Yes. For his son. Yes. And it just, at least for me, it started to change my walk in the Lord and everything else. And so we started to see the church as something precious to the Lord. And we saw it a place of unity, we saw principles, not so much, what would I say?
It was an organism and not an organization. Amen. That's good. Something living. Exactly, that was one of the first principles that we began to understand, that it's organic within itself. And it'll grow if it's nourished correctly. Yes. And so we realized in the Book of Acts that they really didn't have a pastor. It was plurality of leadership. And it started to make a lot of sense to us because one man, you're gonna just get what one man really sees.
And a lot of times, one of the greatest things happened as we tried to bring this into being, we would go before the Lord with everything. We'd say, Lord, how do you want us to do this? Yeah. So we have five or six men praying. Five or six men hear the Lord differently. So now what do we do? Divide into six denominations or what? Or do we keep going before the Lord till we have a unanimity? And then we found out that that's important. It saves us from going down a lot of wrong roads.
Yeah. And so that was a tremendous help. When we met, we were taught somehow, and Lance and Stephen had a lot to do with this. I think looking back, but just put the Lord's table in the midst. Yeah. Let the Holy Spirit lead you. Yes. You don't need someone to lead you through something. Let the Lord lead you. It's easier said than done because every once in a while, you get somebody come into the fellowship and they see a perceived void and they wanna take over right away.
Or when God brings a light someplace, it dispels the darkness, but it also attracts bugs. And once in a while, you get a bug. And you got to, but over the years, we've learned how to deal with this more and more. So we're not worried about being off the wall or anything else. And so it gives chance for testimony. But the beautiful thing that it does, when you have a plurality of leadership, and obviously you can tell we're not big on titles. We're big on function, but we're not big on titles.
Because titles seem to separate. You end up with a clergy and a laity. Right. You know, a division right within. And so we try to stay away from those kinds of things and stay away from the titles. And it's a better way to go. Yes. You know, and we might not all agree on that, I think. Sometimes, you know, especially in recent years. But at the same time, it works towards the building up of the body. Yeah. You know, and when everybody's expected to give something of themselves.
Right. You know, it's- Every joint supplies something. Amen. That's what the church is. Yeah. And that's, again, what we were taught. The church is the place where every joint supplies. Beautiful. Every joint's not supplying. Do you really have the church? Mm-hmm. I don't know. It's true. So- Well, it's kind of like if you have a big picture puzzle and there's some pieces missing. Mm-hmm. You don't have the big picture. Exactly. Everybody has to play their part.
And that comes from every individual becoming responsible to have relationship with God. Amen. You know, if we don't have our very own relationship and learning things from the Lord himself, we're missing what the New Covenant is all about. It's about knowing him. That's right. It's about, yes, it's about erasing all of our sins. And yes, it's about him being our God and we being his people. But it's about getting his word inscribed in our hearts and in our minds and knowing him.
And that's something that comes from relationship with him and spending time with him and talking to him and listening. Exactly. And when everybody's listening, they hear something to share with the body and then we get the big picture. And I think the Lord's longing, and it always has been. I mean, you start to see scripture. It begins with a wedding. It ends with a wedding. You flop open your Bible right to the middle. What do you have? Song of Solomon. You have a wedding. Beautiful.
You know, what does the Lord, what does the Father want for the Son? A bride. Yeah, exactly. And so when everyone's in a relationship with the Lord and relationship with one another, I can't help but believe that the Lord is getting what he wants. Somehow that's translated up into what we call the New Jerusalem. That's the gold. That's the pearl. That's the precious stone. Beautiful. You know, there's something beautiful about that.
So that's what I can tell you about what was called the Jesus Revolution. Okay. That's how it's worked in our lives out here. Beautiful. And God willing, as long as we live, we wanna keep pursuing the Lord. And then after that, I'm sure we'll still pursue in a sense. Amen. Amen. You know, I'm reminded of the move of God that happened in the Hebrides Islands off of Scotland in the late 1940s, early 50s, where there were two older lady intercessors, I think they were in their 80s. You're right.
And they got to praying. And then there was also this group of men that got to praying. And they were praying in a barn, and the ladies were praying in their little house, their little cottage. And at one point, and they were praying about the young people because they had had a revival in their generation. And there had been revivals throughout the generations on those islands. And people would recognize, okay, the young people are drifting, we need a revival.
And they'd pray through and God would give a revival. And this particular time was one of those. And God sent a revival, and all the young people got thoroughly revived, thoroughly transformed. Just a footnote to that, Lance knew the two ladies. Really? Oh wow. Lance knew everybody. Oh wow. Lance knew King Hezekiah. I mean, Lance knew everybody. But, and he was sharing with us how in England, in the Halford House, that was the name of the fellowship that he was part of.
But they began by praying for a couple of years, and that's all they did, they prayed. They turned every meeting into a prayer meeting. Wow. For a move of God, because they were very encouraged by the Hebrides revival, you know, in his generation. Yeah. And so, and he talked about this one night, he said, it was a thick fog, a dreary night, only a few people showed up, and he said, the heavens opened. Oh. And we knew God heard our prayers from all the years.
Wow. And they said, the next thing he knew, they were hearing about people speaking in tongues, things he didn't even know about at the time, all over the world. Wow. And that's when the Jesus revolutions broke out in the United States. Wow. So, those two ladies, this little group from Halford House, that stayed faithful, and other groups. Yes. Certainly you've read Reese Howell, probably a long way. Oh yes, absolutely. Yeah. It's another person that he knew. Really?
Yeah, I tell you, he knew everybody. But anyway, it was just tremendous. But it's been so helpful to us, for God to have put those people in our lives, to help us to grow, and to see, and to have vision. Yes. You know, they opened up the way, and the Lord opened up our hearts, and I'm so thankful, I really am.
Wow. You know, I'm reminded of that wonderful movie that came out a few years ago, called War Room, where there was this intercessor, powerful, powerful little intercessor, and she began to pray, Lord, send me someone to mentor. I want to teach somebody what I know before you take me home. Or maybe, I don't remember exactly the plot, whether it was the Lord that spoke to her, and said, you need to pass this on to somebody before I take you home. I don't remember just which direction it went.
But the point was that she prayed for someone to come into her life, that she could teach the secrets of intercession, to pray, and to change situations, change family situations, change all the things that we pray for, all the things that we intercede for, all the things we contend for. And we're contending, and God has already been moving. He started this revival in Asbury back in February of this year. This is 2023. And there've been other moves already that have sort of started like popcorn.
You know, when you make popcorn, first there's one. And then there's another, and then there's another, and then there's another, and pretty soon it's pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, and the whole thing fills up. And I feel like we're on the verge of that. We've had the first few kernels have popped. And it's time for this to increase in speed and influence throughout America, throughout the world.
It's about the Joel 2.28 move of God that is the outpouring that he has promised that's gonna be like Niagara Falls. And lives are gonna be transformed. People are gonna be changed. What do you see for that? Do you see anything in your walk with the Lord? Is he speaking to you along those lines? I wanna say what I'm seeing is more important than ever before is holding on to the Lord. Yes. And just trusting him for everything that's going to come.
You know, I realize if this generation, if there is an outpouring in it, things are so different now than they've ever been before. True. And if I don't hold on for the Lord, I'm gonna already judge it as it can't happen. So I gotta hold on to the Lord and trust him. Yes. And for my acceptance of however the Lord goes. But yes, do I see, I mean, I see trouble for the world and I see trouble for the nations on the other side of it.
I can't see how God and his mercy will not have one more great outpouring. And not only in the United States. Oh yeah. But all over the world. He said on all flesh. There has to be. Yeah. There has to be. Yeah. You know, before this world is totally judged. It's true. It has to be. It's an amazing harvest. It will be. It will be. Our hearts need to stay soft. Exactly. And that's what I'm trying to say. Yes, yes. Would you pray for our listeners before we close? I would love to.
That would be a great privilege. Lord Jesus, everyone here agrees that you are wonderful. Yes. And Lord, we want, we want more than anything else for that which is wonderful about you, which is absolutely everything. Lord, to be made known to mankind, to every man and woman that we know, every child, young, old people, it doesn't matter. Lord, show your great loving kindness. We ask for a pouring out. Yes. All over the nations. And Lord, begin with our own hearts.
Yes, Lord. Keep them soft and pliable before you. Lord, help us. Help us to see Jesus in everything that we do. Thank you, Father. Precious Holy Spirit. Thank you, Jesus. Get the bride that you want for the son. Yes. Get it from our lives. Yes. This is our prayer together tonight. In Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. If you enjoyed today's podcast, please subscribe, rate, and review this podcast on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Your review helps the podcasting platform suggest this podcast to other listeners who are also looking for a great move of the Holy Spirit. Check out our website at globaloutpouring.org to find out more information, read our blogs, connect with us, and donate. You can also browse our web store for life-changing anointed books. Until next time, this is Sharon Buss. And I'm Philip Buss. God bless you with this overwhelming, loving presence. baskathr fist.com