Sid: I have on the telephone a man that many of you have heard of his name is Pastor Steve Hill, he’s Senior Pastor of Heartland World Ministries in Dallas, Texas. But he’s better known for the Brownsville revival, and we’ll get to that in a moment. When I think of Steve Hill I think of Jeremiah Chapter 20 verse 9 “But His word was in my heart like a burning fire shut up in my bones; I was weary of holding it back and I could not.” Steve when I think of you I see such incredible compassion for the lost; if it’s possible where did that come from?
Steve: I just… that questions comes to my eyes because I shouldn’t be talking to you today, I should have been dead years ago. I was a drug addict, an alcoholic for many many years a main liner for those unfamiliar with that terminology I used needles, stuck heroin, morphine, anything in my veins. I was a mess, and I hit rock bottom when I was 21 years old back in 1975 and a Lutheran minister led me to the Lord.
Sid: But there is a secret hero in your life and it’s got to do with your mom; what are some of your recollections when you were just so stoned you could barely function.
Steve: Well, attention all moms out there don’t ever stop praying because God answers prayer. The greatest experience that I can remember during those difficult days was when I was in a drunken stupor; a drug induced stupor about twenty-five friends of mine were over at the house we were downstairs in my bedroom. We had just robbed a major drug store had a lot of Class A narcotics and we had stuck needles in our arms we had just at a point of overdosing everyone of us. We had taken the needles and thrown them like darts up in the ceiling where blood was dripping from the needles. My mom came in she saw it and she said, “Oh my God,” she went up the stairwell, I got up because I heard her voice and I was so afraid she was going to call the police. I followed her upstairs, she walked past the telephone; went into her bedroom, shut the door and I stood outside the door, I thought it was locked. I waited to hear her pick up the phone, but she didn’t she had a phone in her bedroom. I turned the knob and she was on her face praying to Jesus and saying “Oh God save my son.”
Sid: And you would not be here today if you didn’t have a praying mom.
Steve: No, there’s no doubt in my mind that she was the one who kept knocking at Heaven’s door.
Sid: Okay, age 21 you literally thought you were dying, you went into convulsions, tell me about that.
Steve: I had been doing drugs; I had started drinking and getting high when I was nine years old. For some that may sound a little early, but my father was an alcoholic and I started drinking with my dad and it didn’t take long to go into marijuana and then into the other narcotics. And so by the time I was 21 my body was giving up basically. I had been in jail twelve times for sales of drugs, for drug induced crimes and so my body started going through hot and cold, just convulsions hot and cold sweats. And it was just giving up it was shutting down Sid and I didn’t understand it. I feel like now there was a lot of demon possession involved in that because I had opened myself up to anything that was out there. I used to hitchhike across the United States and as you do that you open yourself up to every cult that’s out there giving out free sandwiches and lemonade. And so I had invited so much into my life and so that was, it was a crisis when Christ came in.
Sid: Your mom thought that you were dying, you thought you were dying; this pastor comes in and what did he tell you to do?
Steve: You know it was amazing he came in and sat at the edge of my bed, my bed was vibrating, my eyeballs were jumping back and forth in their sockets. This is 72 hours of violent convulsions and I’d gone through convulsions before with withdrawals but this was totally different; it was more violent than anything I had experienced. And he said to me “Steve, I can’t help you but I know somebody who can. His name is Jesus and He’s in this room.” And I remember Sid looking around the room for someone else, that’s how ignorant I was of God. And he said, “No, His Spirit is here and He wants to touch you, “Pray with me.” And I said, “I don’t know how to pray.” And then he said those wonderful words he said, “Just say the Name Jesus.” So Sid I began to say the Name Jesus over and over again. As I’m sharing this right now I really feel there is some people that are listening that you are going “My Lord my sons going through the same thing, I’m going through the same thing.” My friend there is power in the Name of Jesus, there’s healing in the Name of Jesus, there’s deliverance in the Name of Jesus. As I began saying His Name the presence of God invaded my room. I knew nothing of religion; nothing of Christianity that there was no hope in the natural, but the power of Christ came into my body within 30 seconds. It was as if I’d never taken an aspirin and never taken or drunk a beer, never smoked pot, my body just went totally limp and Jesus Christ set me free.
Sid: I’m speaking to Steve Hill and that is the answer to the question I asked to him who’s forgiven much they love much. And Father’s Day 1995 you were not even supposed to be the speaker at Brownsville Church at Pensacola, Florida, but how did you happen to speak there that day?
Steve: It’s one of the secrets I don’t share with a lot of folks and I’m going to share it with your audience as long as they a..
Sid: Can keep a secret, okay.
Steve: I called John Kilpatrick earlier because John Kilpatrick had, he’s the pastor of the church. He had offered me some money for my work in Russia, I was building a drug rehab center in Russia and I’d contacted him several months earlier and he promised me 5 grand. And so he hadn’t coughed up the money so I thought I would just call him up and see if he had sent it. And we started talking about revival this was around March of ’95 and the next news you know he said, “Steve why don’t you come to the church and I said, “I have no openings because I’m booked solid for the next year and a half. The only opening I have is Father’s Day” and he said, “Will you come on Father’s Day?” And Sid what I thought to myself and forgive me, but I wasn’t being very spiritual, I thought that if I could go to the church on that Father’s Day and it was Saturday night he wanted me to speak. No Sunday night, excuse me that’s Father’s Day night; if I could come to that Sunday night service and then at least I’d get my 5 thousand, they’d take up an offering and I’d get my money.
Sid: I didn’t know that evangelists even thought that way, but thank you for being transparent. Go ahead Steve.
Steve: Confessions of an evangelist. You know God used that to bring me to that church and little did either one of us know that He was about to pour His Spirit out in a way that America had not seen in 100 years.
Sid: History reveals in that sleepy little southern town, how many people approximately made professions of faith?
Steve: Oh, probably 4 to 500,000 people gave their lives to Christ, these were backsliders coming home, brand new people getting saved. Four million people came through the doors of the church, but it was, it was almost as if we were just riding this wave Sid of the presence and power of God. There were people that would come to the church, and I know this programs all about miracles there are people that would come to the church who would never make it inside the church in the parking lot the presence of God would come down so strong they would be stunned. And one lady told me she spent the entire evening in her car because she couldn’t get out of the car. She couldn’t open the doors because of the presence of God in the car. Then she showed up at the revival the next night but she had actually been there the night before.
Sid: Steve I’m interviewing you on your latest book “Operating in the Miraculous.” You’re a man who has seen more people saved, more miracles than almost anyone I know. You’re still a young man you had a miracle in your life, you had an incurable disease you would have been dead if God didn’t heal you. It was Hepatitis; you’ve written these principals in your latest book “Operating in the Miraculous.” But some would say “Well, I understand why Steve Hill can do that, but could I do that? What would your answer be?
Steve: My answer is these signs shall follow them that believe, in My name they shall cast out devils, in My Name they shall heal the sick. My friend that is why I wrote the book “Operating in the Miraculous,” because as a pastor, as an evangelist we see most people lean on the clergy they lean on the men and women of God. And I’m saying “Not according to the Word of God.” According to the Word of God we should all be out there doing the work of the Lord. So I wanted to put a manual, of course our manual manual is the Bible. But I wanted to pull from the word of God principles that would help every man; woman and child begin to operate in the supernatural. And it I want to tell you Sid it is working, people are using it and they are being so surprised of how God is using them.
Sid: Just off the top of your head tell me a few specific comments that people have said after they’ve read your book.
Steve: Oh one individual read it and went out and went to a hospital and had a friend that was in a coma and as you asked me that question my mind just gets filled up with these stories because I love testimonies. They are like gasoline in the automobile okay it keeps it going. She went to the hospital and her friend was in a coma and this friend could not was not going to live she was on life support and they had already called the family in and this individual who read the book went in and sat down next to her. And one of the points in the book is I tell people to develop an atmosphere for miracles. And most hospital rooms are not an atmosphere for miracles they are pretty dull, there pretty drab and you know a lot of wires a lot of hoses a lot of noises but not a whole lot of anticipation for a miracle. So she began singing “I Am the God that healeth thee,” just singing a song and then she started reading scripture over her friend and her eyes popped open. And she said, “What happened, where have I been, what’s going on?” And she said, “Well, you’ve been a coma,” and this friend by the way did not know Jesus, and so my friend this individual was able to lead her to the Lord.”
Sid: Listen, healed, saved,… filled with
Steve: Come on!
Sid: Filled with the Spirit.
Tags: It’s Supernatural, Sid Roth