One of the most eerie sounds, and yet, one of the most amazing profoundly gripping sounds my wife and I used to hear regularly in Western Sahara was when we were present in a desert wedding and heard the women celebrating the bridal couple or the announcement of a wedding. It was also a sound that the women would make when reports of victory from the battlefield came in and also, when there was a loss or funeral.

In English we call it ululating. A Saharawi woman once described to me how the sound was made, because neither my wife nor I could imitate the sound and even some of their own people could never make it properly. If you go on the Internet you can see quite amateur attempts at reproducing this sound, which in some way detract from its beauty and impact when you hear ‘the real thing’.

I cannot wait to hear the Saharawi welcoming the King of Kings one day in Heaven! It will be a glorious moment!

Anyway, I digress! We were instructed by the Sahara womenfolk that you have to twist your whole tongue to the left (or right) in a ‘U’ shape in the mouth, and then trill it up and down to correctly make the sound. When it is done properly it is quite outstanding and, once you are familiar with it, it is also one of the most astoundingly beautiful, hauntingly stirring and triumphant of sounds.

Now why do I spend four paragraphs talking about this in the context of a move of God? Well, there we were at a prayer meeting in Fintona, having heard a sermon, after an extensive prayer time, and, as we closed the meeting and personal response was made in prayer to the sermon and word given, several people had fallen over quite spontaneously, and one genteel young woman beside us hit the deck loudly, and, within a minute was producing a perfect ululating sound on the floor—like those we had heard frequently during our eleven years in the Sahara.

A week later I queried the woman who had been making the sound and what had been happening to her that she had fallen and also what was going on with this outburst. She had never heard of ululating, nor heard it before, nor ever learned how to do it (of course). She told me how she had been aware of the Spirit of God enveloping her and touching her deeply inside in the very pit of her stomach, and that it was so strong she fell over first and then the power of God rose up through her into this sound (that she did not even know she was making). And which was so beautiful to our ears!

When I told her that it was made often in celebration and in moments of victory in North Africa (and other places), she was further touched by the significance of her experience and of the LORD’s hand upon her.

She, like many others who have been impacted by the Holy Spirit in meetings in Fintona, talked of an incredible intimacy with the LORD in the encounter, followed by a sense of the LORD’s calling her out to new degrees of service and a memory of incredible awe of the LORD God visiting her in this way. She was tearful even reflecting on it with us days later!

Others have also reported and testified to me about the awe-inspiring presence of God they have encountered, the depth in God they have never experienced before that has shaken them to the core as they momentarily glimpsed His immeasurable power or were impacted by His holiness.

One man this morning told me he had not experienced the presence of God for years like he had last Thursday when we met for prayer and then was part of that group who could not leave the place of prayer—until long after the meeting was over.

There have been many lives changed, addictions overthrown and outstanding healings taking place in these meetings, and we shall touch on these more in future posts. Next time I want to talk a little bit about what is happening in Fermanagh.