Happy Thursday Family of God! We hope you are doing well!
It’s crazy to think that it’s been nearly a month since I last wrote one of these…and boy has A LOT happened since then.
More than likely, you are well aware of the situation that transpired as our daughter Azalea Yovale was born-and what we have been doing in response. What you may not know is the interesting overlap between her life story and with the prophetic story unfolding over America.
This testimony went viral online and was seen over 130,000 times on Facebook, so I think it really encouraged people. I’ve copied and pasted it below.
“About 4 months ago, after she was suddenly awoken in the middle of the night, the name “Azalea” came to Sofiya like a flood. She’s never known anyone named Azalea, but she immediately felt VERY strongly that this was the name we were supposed to give our unborn daughter.
After she discovered the meaning in Hebrew- “The Lord has set apart”, she was even more convinced that it was the Holy Spirit who told her the name.
Truth be told though, at first I didn’t really like the name, so initially I resisted.
Then one night I randomly opened my 2000-page study bible (The Founders Bible) to this 
exact passage, and I felt like it was a confirmation. I had no idea the name was even in the Bible.
“Now in the eighteenth year of (Josiah’s) reign, when he had purged the land and the house, he sent Shaphan the son of Azaliah, and Maaseiah an official of the city, and Joah the son of Joahaz the recorder, to repair the house of the Lord his God.”
2 Chronicles 34:8
I had a strong sense from the Lord as I read this that He was saying that our daughter would somehow be used by Him to “repair” things that were broken within the body of Christ. But…I didn’t really understand what He meant by that.
Then, a few weeks later, while in Ft Lauderdale ministering at Spring Break, I was fascinated to discover via listening to Way FM- that over 400 national leaders (including the President), were planning a national reading of the scriptures in late April.
Interestingly, this also happened in the reign of King Josiah..
“The king went up to the house of the Lord and all the men of Judah, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the priests, the Levites and all the people, from the greatest to the least; and he read in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant which was found in the house of the Lord.”
2 Chronicles 34:30
Our 
National Bible reading began on Sunday 4/19 at 9am. Azalea was born at 6:24pm on Tuesday 4/21. What is wild is that as she was coming out- President Trump was reading his portion of the Word, which contained this famous verse:
“and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
2 Chronicles 7:14
Then, the entire time we were in the hospital, the Bible was continually being read everyday from 9am-9pm. Revelation 22 was completed just as I returned to our room after Azalea was placed in the morgue on Saturday evening.
What I saw during those 4 days was incredible. God truly did a “repair job” of radical faith and unity within a segment of the body of Christ (I don’t know of any other time that so many people were all praying and believing for resurrection at the same time).
I also saw a dramatic “repairing” of many believers perceptions of their own problems through the lens of seeing how our family was navigating through this situation. We thank God for that.
Also interesting was that in King Josiah’s day, there was a national rededication that took place after the public reading of the scripture:
“Then the king stood in his place and made a covenant before the Lord to walk after the Lord, and to keep His commandments and His testimonies and His statutes with all his heart on and with all his soul, to perform the words of the covenant written in this book.”
2 Chronicles 34:31
Amazingly, our nation is also about to be rededicated to God in just a few days- on May 17th in DC.
Rededicate 250: A National Jubilee of Prayer, Praise & Thanksgiving – Freedom 250
What does all this mean?
Well…I’m not really sure. But, somehow or another our baby has seemingly been caught up into a prophetic story that is unfolding over America…that is still far from over.”
Interesting right???
Another thing that fascinates me about this entire ordeal is that two weeks BEFORE Sofiya gave birth, the woman who runs the Sarasota Memorial Hospital Morgue (who is an on-fire believer) saw me at Siesta Beach preaching the Gospel and was left with a very strong impression. Her name is Emily, and this is me with her:
In fact, the impression was so strong, that when she was called up to our room to assess Azalea’s body to determine if it was safe for us to keep her, she immediately recognized me and told me that she loves our ministry. The even crazier thing is that she lives in Punta Gorda and hadn’t been to Siesta in years. But, she had family in town that she wanted to show the beach to that Sunday, and she just happened to see us while she was there.
The day she came up to our hospital room, right after I told her that I was praying for Azalea to be resurrected, she immediately laid hands on her and began praying for the same thing. She also told me that she would allow me to keep her as long as I wanted. MASSIVE favor!
What else is crazy is that she actually gave birth to a stillborn baby back in January, so she has had a deep and very personal desire to see a stillborn baby get raised ever since. So deep a desire that she has taken about 30 minutes out of her schedule every day to open up the morgue to let me pray over Azalea. Today was day 23.
It is honestly such a perplexing set of circumstances to try and understand. There is no way you can deny that God went ahead of us and prepared a pathway for us to contend for her life post death. So, then the question is- why? Was it to bring about a resurrection, or was it to bring about some other Kingdom benefit that could only come through the process of contending for resurrection? Or both?
That is left to be determined, but I still have MASSIVE faith for A and C.
BIG on my heart in all of this, is that the Lord would do something that proves to millions that He too was raised from the dead. As it says in Romans 10, we cannot be saved unless we first believe that Jesus was raised from the dead.
And on that note, it’s also been very interesting to see how the Lord keeps sovereignly drawing my attention to prophetic scriptures about an end times harvest of souls- like Romans 11, Jeremiah 3, Habakkuk 2 and Revelation 14. He also keeps impressing on me that because we are in this National Rededication moment, a sign and wonder like this would happen at the perfect time for our nation.
Legally, we have until Friday May 22nd to continue on this path, and after that we have to send her to a funeral home. I told the Lord in the beginning that I would walk the path until she rises or until the door closes and I still believe He can and wants to do it. It’s such a blessing that SMH is so close to us too, so it really isn’t much of a time commitment to go there.
It’s also been really great to see the ministry that takes place while I’m there too. Not only is Emily getting ministered to profoundly, but the security guards who escort us in have been touched too. It’s also been such a blessing for me to connect with God in this way and to have that time with Azalea. Even in the state she is in, I feel very connected to her.
Here’s some pictures that were taken of her in the hospital. She is sooo precious.
It has also been such a blessing to get back out on the streets to minister again. I’ve said it before and I’m definitely experiencing it again, but evangelism is a HUGE insulator against discouragement, because it brings your focus right back to the cross, your testimony and to the joy of your salvation.
On that note, this month I will be celebrating 20 years of walking with Jesus! I’m so grateful. Lately I’ve been extra stirred about this as I’ve relistened to my testimony. I share it here in this video:
What is kind of wild is that last Thursday was the 20th anniversary of one of the 5 supernatural experiences that led to my salvation on May 20th, 2006. It was when God led me to Dade City through a vision I suddenly had while driving to Bush Gardens. It’s a long and supernatural story that I share in detail in the interview, but I ultimately arrived at a church where I heard a man from the Gideon’s (the world’s largest publisher and distributor of Bibles) share an hour of testimonies about what has happened to people as they read their Bibles.
After I heard these testimonies, I was convinced that Jesus was the way and that I should seek Him.
On Friday, the very next day after this anniversary, for the first time that I can ever remember, two people came up to me at the outreach and told me that they were from- guess where….The Gideon’s! Can’t make this stuff up! Here they are:
I told them the 2006 story and they were so encouraged.
The rest of the night was great too. We had good traffic, some good interactions with people, and praise God- we had a lot of laborers too.
On Saturday night, we had another great outreach, but I was a little worried in the very beginning because nobody showed up to help for the first 40 minutes. But, after a while, a remnant came out and we got to sow some great seeds. Many children got drawn in and so did this entire group of teens:
Sunday was a great night too. Lots of people were at the beach and many people came for gifts and prayer and maybe a few dozen even made a public profession of faith at the very beginning. That hardly ever happens. That night we also gave out so many gospel tracts, that we had to refill the bins at one point. It was great.
Here’s one cool moment when a Hispanic family came and ministered with us:
Cool to see people get activated! They even said they want to come back and minister with us in the future too.
Other than that, the National Day of Prayer gathering happened last week also, which was great. Here’s a few short clips:
I love that the key verse was from 1 Chronicles 16:24, a verse from the first song sung in the Tabernacle of David.
This weekend should be a great one too. I will be ministering at Bayfront Park early on Friday because we have a birthday party and my son’s graduation to go to that evening, and then Mike and the teams will be filling in on Saturday and Sunday while I’m in DC for the rededication. It should be a trip for the books!
PLEASE if you are able, come and help the team out while I’m gone, it would be such a blessing. And be sure to come by tonight for fellowship and prayer too if you are able.
We love you! See you soon!
C, S, N & AY