God’s Battle Axe – John G. Lake

I thought of the Ministry of John G. Lake when Covid-19 was raging across the world. I remembered an incident in South Africa where he tried to minister to victims of a deadly plague but was restrained by government officials and scientists who feared that he might contract the deadly virus. He was able to convince them to allow him into the impacted areas after he demonstrated the power of God over the virus having them place it in his palm. Of course, the virus died without causing him any harm. I had the feeling that the world would have appreciated the church of Christ more if we had done something similar during the Covid-19 plague.

Lake, who was known as God’s “Apostle to Africa” was born on March 18, 1870 in Ontario, Canada. Later, his family relocated to Michigan, United States of America. In his teens, he attended a Salvation Army meeting and became convicted of his need for a saviour, and he invited Jesus to become Lord of his life. Lake was severely impacted by sickness over the course of his young life. . He was one of sixteen children and eight of them died. He grew to hate sickness, grief and death that was so much a part of his family life.

Lake felt a call to the ministry, and studied to become a Methodist minister. He took to heart the Methodist teaching on sanctification and sought it passionately. When his studies were done, he changed his mind and decided to go into business instead. He started a newspaper in Illinois, and then moved back to Michigan to begin a career in real estate. It was in Michigan that he met his wife Jennie Stevens.

Sickness still continued to hound the family. His brother was an invalid, one sister had extensive cancer; another sister had bleeding problems, while his wife had tuberculosis and heart disease. In 1899, the family heard about John Alexander Dowie, a popular Pentecostal minister based in Chicago. They took Lake’s brother to the healing rooms in Chicago, and he was instantly healed. Both sisters then went as well, and were also healed. Lake’s wife was equally healed when he mobilised believers to pray for her. This interventions prompted him to return to the word of God. One day, he was led to read Acts 10:38, “You know of Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good, and healing all who were oppressed by the devil; for God was with Him.” He saw outlined clearly for himself that Jesus is the healer and satan is the oppressor of men.

He subsequently became a member of Dowie’s Christian Catholic Church and a branch was opened in Sault Ste Marie, where he was living at the time. He became a deacon in the new church. In 1900 Lake’s wife Jennie was accidently shot by her four year old son. Following Dowie’s teachings, the Lakes refused medical help and depended on prayer. She was eventually healed. The event was so startling that an article was written about it in the Chicago Daily Tribune, which regularly reported on Dowie’s activities.

In 1904, Lake moved to Chicago to work with Dowie. Seeing the power of God, he began to cry out for more of the Holy Spirit. He spent nine months seeking for fuller level of the presence of God. One day, he and another man went to pray for a sick woman. God’s presence fell on and over him like he had never known before. The next six months were marked by conviction, repentance, and heart cleansing. The gifts of the Spirit became magnified, especially discernment and healing. Though Lake was receiving training under John Dowie, he did not always agree with the latter’s way of doing things.

 At one point, Dowie listed his accomplishments and told him, “If you ever develop constructive qualities equal to your critical capacity, you will be a greater man than I am”. From that point, Lake knew that he had to start his own ministry. He felt called to Africa and went there in 1908, after pastoring a church in Indianapolis briefly. Over a period of five years in South Africa, he led more than one million people to the Lord, built 625 churches and raised 1,250 ministers. Following the tragic death of his wife, Lake returned to America in 1912. By this time, the torch had been passed on to one Elias Letwaba and others in Africa and the work went on there.

Upon his arrival in the United States, he met and married Florence Switzer in 1913. At the height of his ministry, the outside world became so drawn to Lake’s understanding of God that they constantly flocked to him. It was his understanding of righteousness that allowed him to take dominion over every situation. To further the supernatural goals, Lake called every believer to the power of Pentecost. Once in doing so he spoke the prophecy:

 “I can see as my spirit discerns the future and reaches out to touch the heart of mankind and the desire of God, that there is coming from heaven a new manifestation of the Holy Spirit in power, and that new manifestation will be in sweetness, in love, in tenderness, and in the power of the Spirit, beyond anything your heart or mine ever saw. The very lightning of God will flash through men’s souls. The sons of God will meet with the sons of darkness and prevail.”

By 1924, Lake was known throughout America as a leading healing evangelist. He had established forty churches throughout the country and Canada, in which there had been so many healings that his congregation nicknamed him “Dr”. Lake. In December of that year, another significant event took place through his ministry. Gordon Lindsay, founder of Christ for the Nations in Dallas, Texas, was converted while hearing Lake preach in Portland. Lindsay attended his services nearly every night and considered Lake to be his mentor. When Lindsay later contracted a deadly ptomaine poisoning, he was totally healed once he was able to get to Lake’s home.

In 1931, the evangelist returned to Spokane at the age of sixty-one. He was now weak and fatigued, almost blind. So he decided to have a ‘talk’ with the Lord. He reminded Him of how shameful it would be if he were to go blind after over one hundred thousand people were healed in his ministry in America alone. By the end of the talk, his vision was completely restored, and remained that way until he went home to be with the Lord on September 15, 1935.

If there was ever a man who walked in the revelation of “God in man”, it was Lake. He was a man of purpose, vision, strength of character. His one goal in life was to bring the fullness of God to every person. He often said that the secret of heaven’s power was not in doing, but in being. He believed that the Spirit-filled believer should enjoy the same type of ministry Jesus did while living on earth, and that this reality could only be accomplished by seeing themselves as God saw them. If we would grasp the reality of our position through Jesus Christ , as Lake did, every nation would ring with the praises of God.

****Materials sourced from Biography of John G. Lake, Henotace.org, https://www.henotace.org; Jesus the Healer, https://www.healingandrevival.com; God’s Generals: Why They Succeeded and Why Some Failed by Roberts Liardon.