Saturday night’s camp meeting began with the New York Staff Band and Eastern Territorial Songsters. Commissioners Todd and Carol Bassett, the former national leaders who guided the meeting, acknowledged, “We’ve [already] been invited into the Presence of our King.”

Andrew Garcia, a member of the New York Staff Band, then gave his testimony as a member of the Hands On mission team that had just returned from India.

“We found out that in some places, the name of Jesus is very dangerous,” he said.

Continuing the international theme, Commissioner Kay Rader spoke of a recent trip back to Korea, where she and her husband had served as missionaries for 22 years. They returned for the 100th anniversary celebration of the first revival in Korea, which began in its capital, Pyongyang, now the capital of North Korea. The call that day was for 100,000 missionaries by 2030.

In Korean, the crowd chanted, “We can do it!”

The commissioner also reminded the congregation to pray for the 23 Korean medical missionaries currently being held hostage by the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Captain Young Sung Kim, in a moving moment, spoke of the “longing spirit” of his Korean brothers and sisters for God. He sang the first verse of “Fill Me Now” in Korean, then invited the congregation to join him in English.

Just before General Paul Rader came to the pulpit, Territorial Arts Ministries (TAM) member Amber Medin recited Psalm 46, followed by a moving rendition of “City of God” by the New York Staff Band.

General Rader’s message that night focused on the “positive outlook” that Christians should have.

“The Christian Gospel is not about what we cannot do but, by God’s grace, what we can do.”

The General said that we need to avail ourselves of God’s power so that we can take on causes such as modern slavery; 27 million people, he said, more than all the African slaves brought to the United States, are in slavery today.

“You have no idea what God may empower you to do if you make yourself available to him,” the General said.

Once again, many came to the altar for a new infusion of that power.