Pastor John Ramirez on the Manifestation of God's Power in the Church Today
About this episode
Pastor John Ramirez — surgeon, bi-vocational pastor of Trendy Christian Center in Forest Hill, Louisiana, and founder of the Louisiana Outpouring conference — joins Philip Cameron for a bold, Spirit-filled conversation about why the Church must move beyond words into the manifest power of God. Ramirez draws a striking parallel between Jesus and the seven other men in His day who claimed to be the Messiah: "The thing that separated Jesus from the rest was He raised the dead, He healed the sick, He cast out demons — it was the manifestation of His ministry that changed how people saw Him." He argues that a church without supernatural demonstration is a church that cannot hold the next generation, and that the answer to cultural darkness is not accommodation but a brighter light — echoing the principle that the darker the night, the more visible even a single match becomes. The conversation turns prophetic as Ramirez describes an imminent, worldwide move of God so vast that "the buildings will not be big enough" and congregations will spill into parking lots and street corners. He also issues a direct challenge to pastors: stop trying to be loved by the world and start facilitating encounters with the Holy Spirit. Pastors are invited to the Louisiana Outpouring conference, June 8–10, 2023, at louisianoutpouring.com and tccministries.com.
Part of our Revival collection of conversations.
What's Discussed
Pastor John Ramirez, a practicing surgeon and pastor of Trendy Christian Center in Forest Hill, Louisiana, shares why the Church must prioritize the supernatural manifestation of the Holy Spirit over cultural relevance. Drawing on James 1 and the example of Jesus — who was distinguished from seven other self-proclaimed messiahs of His era by raising the dead, healing the sick, and casting out demons — Ramirez argues that demonstration, not just declaration, is what transforms lives. He warns that churches trying to befriend the world end up imprisoned by it, and calls believers to be "uncancelable" — rooted in a voice that no social media ban can silence. He closes with a prophetic declaration that a coming move of God will overflow every building, and invites pastors to the Louisiana Outpouring conference, June 8–10, 2023.
- Bi-Vocational Calling as Surgeon and Pastor
- Equipping the Body Through Word and Power
- Holy Spirit Encounters That Draw Congregations
- Manifestation of Jesus vs. False Messiahs
- Darkness, Light, and the Church's True Role
- Louisiana Outpouring: 20 Years of Revival
- Woke Church vs. True Awakening
- Prophetic Word: Buildings Won't Hold the Harvest
Scripture in this episode
Episode Transcript
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Intro
Philip:Welcome to Daily Faith, my dear friend. I'm so glad you're with us. We have got a great program for you. We believe that God is the inspirer of all inspirers, and I believe God's gonna have a word from the power from the lips of our guest today, and through this program into your life, because God is moving in these last days.
Philip:Don't look at the storms. Don't look at the waves. I come from a fishing town in the northeast corner of Scotland, and boy, we know storms out in the North Sea. Trust me. But you can get all caught up in the waves. The waves are always going up and down. That's what waves do, that's the nature of a wave. But more importantly than the nature of the wave is the tide. It's the tide that counts, not the wave. Waves are transient, waves come and go, but a tide moves — is moved actually by the moon. The whole earth is pulled by the gravitational pull of the moon. A tide is much more powerful than a wave.
Philip:So whatever your waves are right now, whatever this stuff is going on in your life, let me tell you something — he can speak peace in your storm. But way more importantly, the tide is coming back into your life. God is about to turn the tide and he's gonna give you the victory in your circumstance.
Philip:We are just so excited to have our guest today, and we're gonna get to him. But before he comes, I want to give you an update on what we're doing in Ukraine. As many of you know, we've got a ministry for 33 years in Romania, beginning in Romania. I adopted a boy from there, and I ended up going to Moldova, where a young girl is put on the street from the orphanage at 16. Traffickers get them, and every girl you'll see on this video I'm about to show you is worth three hundred thousand dollars every year in the hands of the trafficker. And we have an amazing place called Vatra Village that we've built in Chisinau, Moldova, where these kids, instead of going on the street, we take them to us and we say, if you are born, God has a plan. You're not a mistake.
Philip:They've been told all their life, no one wants you, your mother doesn't want you, your father doesn't want you, you're garbage, you're trash, you'll never be anything, nothing plus nothing will always be nothing. And we say to them, no, no, God has a purpose for your life. If you survived the orphanage, you're special, you're powerful, you have authority in your life. And the crazy thing is these orphans are becoming sons and daughters. And when Russia invaded Ukraine, these amazing kids that we've invested so much time and energy into became missionaries, part of the ministry. When a girl or a boy comes to us with that orphan spirit that they've had, we get them out to give stuff away. We've learned if you give, you break the orphan spirit, and they go out and they feed widows, they feed families. It's a non-stop ministry.
Philip:So when Ukraine was invaded by Russia, 490,000 people ran to Moldova alone, 10 million altogether. 490,000 came to Moldova, and the first night it happened, our kids drove to the border with pre-cooked food. And the mothers — the men had to stay behind and fight. You imagine, if you're living in a street and a tank shows up at the bottom of your street and starts shelling every house systematically up the street — that's what happened. And these moms were given two or three minutes to grab their babies and grab a couple of things, passports, anything to prove who they were, and they ran. And we met them at the border and wept with them and prayed with them and fed them.
Philip:And it's been a whole year of giving away. We have given away tens of thousands of meals, thousands of blankets, Bibles. And we have had a home in Ukraine for six years, and we took our kids out of the house in Ukraine in Odessa and we moved them to Chisinau for safety. And something's happened in the last few weeks that has made us have to rethink the whole thing in Ukraine. And I'm going to show you this video to give you an idea of what we're talking about. Watch this.
When God challenged us to open a home in Odessa years ago, we looked for many months to find a place big enough to make a difference in young girls' lives. We finally found the perfect place that can house 24 girls. We signed a long-term lease with the owner, and it has just ended. At the moment we are able to house the Ukrainian girls in Moldova, but as the war drags on there is pressure to have those who escaped the Russian invasion to return to Ukraine.
Moldova simply cannot afford the cost of maintaining so many refugees, and they have returned to Ukraine. Many have left for Europe and the USA and will never return. Our girls wait every day to return to their homeland. If their home is sold, there will be nowhere for them to go.
In the natural it seems impossible. We have already strained every sinew in our ministry this year to care for thousands of destitute lives. We are about to send at least two containers packed with warm clothes to help lost souls survive the brutal winter. But what about the young lives we already committed to protecting? Where would they go?
Can you imagine handing them a bus ticket to Odessa and telling them, you are on your own, we have nowhere for you to go, your home has been sold? How would they survive in a country stuck in the no man's land of war? We are going to believe God to buy this special place. We will continue our work in Ukraine and trust him for protection.
As the days ahead unfold, we will be right there in the middle of tragic events, with a place of refuge for young girls to find rest in a home provided by loving hearts. If God moves, the home we need is already waiting. We just need you. Will you pray? Will you give? I'm certain everyone who could wouldn't even hesitate to help this miracle take place. That is how this huge door of opportunity could open. We can minister to these dear souls for years to come and be a beacon of hope in a bleak battlefield of despair.
Philip:The house we've leased for six years — the lease is done and the owner wants to move and sell. And we're in a situation right now to believe God, by this month, to buy that home from him so that when these kids go back to Ukraine they'll have a place to stay. When the Lord spoke this to me, I'll be honest with you, it took me a week and a half, two weeks, to even talk about it, because I kept praying and saying, Lord, how do I ask people to help me buy a house in a war zone? It doesn't make sense. And he says, neither does me dying on a cross make sense. There's a risk in redemption. That's the risk of redemption.
Philip:And he challenged me. He said, would you give $2,000 of your own money? Would you give $2,000 to save 24 girls from trafficking or from Russian soldiers? Of course I would. He says, well, find 99 more people to do exactly that and you'll have the amount you need. And that's what we've been asking. We're asking you to care for us. We're halfway there right now. The house costs $150,000. We need furniture and a van. We're buying a used van so that if the Russians come close to Odessa, our girls and the house parent can go back to our home in Moldova and escape, so we will have time to do that.
Philip:So whatever you can help us with, please be a part of it. Whatever gift you give, please make sure that you mark it for Odessa or new house. We put it in a separate account and you will be a part of a real miracle that I believe God's working on as we speak. You can contact me at The Orphan's Hands, PO Box 25, Clinton, Tennessee, PO Box 25, Clinton, Tennessee, 37716. You can also contact us through dailyfaith.tv. All the programs we've done are on dailyfaith.tv — that's the base for all our programs, dailyfaith.tv. There's a giving page there. You can also dial 833-DAILY-FAITH, and if you punch out Daily Faith on your keypad on your phone, you'll get to us.
Philip:This is an opportunity. I believe that we can put our footprint in a country at war. If Ukraine wins and Russia doesn't get to Odessa, the need will be horrendous. This nation — the other day they bombed and missile-attacked their infrastructure, the electricity and their heating systems. The plan of Putin is to decimate Ukraine and let winter do what his soldiers can't. If he freezes the people to death, if he kills electricity, if he kills water supply, if he takes care of all that stuff, he'll either force the people to run and leave the country so he can possess it with less of a fight, or if they stay without any heating, without any water, they are doomed.
Philip:And we have three containers — God has allowed us to get 15,000 coats from all over America that are on their way to care for these people this wintertime. So please be a part of this, because God, I believe, is close to those of a broken and contrite spirit. And I'll tell you what, these folk are broken by the circumstance of their life.
Philip:I am so excited to have my guest with me. As I said, he's a surgeon, he's also a pastor. It tells you a great deal about a man when you say, how do I address you — do I call you doctor or pastor? And he said to me, pastor is the higher calling, and I just think that speaks so much about a man's heart. He is a surgeon, he's a pastor of a great church in Forest Hill, Louisiana, and I'm so honored to have him on Daily Faith. Pastor David, welcome. Thank you for taking time out of a crazy schedule. God bless you.
Bi-Vocational Calling as Surgeon and Pastor
Pastor David Smith:Praise God. It's an honor to be here.
Philip:Hopefully in the middle of a busy day in surgery — you've just come out of surgery, I'm sure you've got other things lined up this afternoon, and it never stops. We appreciate you taking the time. God is telling us, give the folks around watching what God has called you to do, because you have a really unique ministry. You're bi-vocational. Tell us what God's calling you to, ministry-wise, in these days.
Pastor David Smith:Well, it's an unusual calling, but it's normal for me because that's what he created me to do. When I was going into pastoring — not that I would volunteer to do such a thing, but we have to be obedient — I thought that obviously medicine should go by the wayside because it does not make natural sense. And I was thinking, well, I need to leave this, and the Lord said, well, I didn't tell you to leave the medicine either. So there you go. What happens is, with the call comes an extraordinary grace to perform. So there's a measure of grace, a measure of faith to be able to do it. We obviously have a supernatural God who does amazing supernatural things. I found out that I'm really doing what I'm called to do, so I'm extremely fulfilled and happy.
Pastor David Smith:And people — it sometimes makes some people uncomfortable because it doesn't make sense to them. Well, you know, I love everybody, that's their problem. But I'm just being obedient, period. I don't know how it all happened.
Philip:I do the same thing. I came to America in the '60s with my father, and in my mid-30s I had been quite successful on Christian television. I'd sold a book that sold 300,000 copies, and my dad called me and said, I want you to go to Romania. I said, where is that? And he comes from the gymnast — he said there are orphans there. I said, look, that's not my thing, I have nothing to do with orphans, you know. And he had a melanoma cut from his back and the wound burst, there was a terrible mess, and he called me one night. He said, well, if you won't go with me, I'll go by myself, and if I die on the way, it's your fault. And that's how I ended up getting caught up in this thing 33 years ago.
Philip:And the grace, as you said, it's such a tremendous word. He gives you grace, and people will come and say, how do you do what you do? And I just can't see doing anything else, because when that's your calling, it's who you are, it's what you are in the Lord.
Philip:That's right. Amazing. Tell us about the church. You have a great church in Louisiana. What's God doing through the ministry there?
Pastor David Smith:Well, one of the main things in the church is to equip the body of Christ. One of the things that the Lord has put in my heart is to be strong on the word. We must have the word, but we must have the manifestation. Absolutely — talking about the word, it's awesome, it's amazing, but the letter by itself does not lead to anything. You have to be able to have the word and then be doers of the word, like he speaks in the Book of James. And you know, that's really important.
Equipping the Body Through Word and Power
Pastor David Smith:So our services — we have a very geographically diverse congregation. They come from an hour to two hours away, some three hours, some five hours, that come at a time. And they wouldn't drive that far, but they know they drive that far because they know they're gonna have an encounter. A minister that was visiting our church a few months ago said, I know what you guys do. I said, what do we do? He said, you're facilitating encounters with the presence. Yeah. Well, that's exactly right.
Philip:When we came to America, our family were alcoholics in Scotland, and we got saved and baptized in the Holy Ghost. We got baptized in the Holy Ghost and didn't even know what the Holy Ghost was, what speaking in tongues was. We thought we were the only people in the world that spoke in tongues. It was crazy. And God began to give us these praise songs, and we came to America in the '60s and '70s, and it was exactly the same thing. People are drawn to the manifestation of truth. You can talk about a chair all day, but a chair will never give you rest until you actually see the real chair and you get to sit on the chair. And we could talk about what God can do, we can speak a great tale, but until people feel the sense and the anointing of the Holy Ghost, then it's just words.
Philip:Jesus — I was reading the other day — when Jesus was on earth, there were seven different men that claimed to be the Messiah. Seven different men. The thing that separated Jesus from the rest was he raised the dead, he healed the sick, he cast out demons. It was the manifestation of his ministry that changed how people saw him. And we're living in a day today where, unless the church has manifestation and allows God to move in his power, people will turn away and say, well, this is not for me today.
Holy Spirit Encounters That Draw Congregations
Philip:That's exactly right. Tell me, what do you see? We're living in tumultuous moments right now. It seems that evil is doing its utmost to destroy this country. What do you see prophetically? What is God working out within the body and within this nation as a whole at the moment?
Pastor David Smith:Well, this is what I see — the darker the night, the brighter the light. Hallelujah. The darker the night, the brighter the light. In a perfectly dark night you could see a match several miles away, just a little match. So there's a light, there's the light of Christ. God is light, and when God created the world he looked around and the first thing he said was, let there be light — in other words, let there be me. And he came.
Manifestation of Jesus vs. False Messiahs
Pastor David Smith:My dad used to say, when they sell a diamond they put it on a black velvet background because of the contrast of the two things. And I think the church has been trying to be loved by the world instead of being the aggravation of the world. We've tried to make the world love us, and you have all these churches that are trying to please mankind. And the truth is, people are drawn to the manifestation of the truth.
Pastor David Smith:As I said earlier, we've got these kids in Moldova and they come to us and they've never had any expectation put upon them. They just come, they've been ignored and abused all their life, and the moment they come to us, when you put expectation on them, you call something from within them to begin to rise up. And I think the church has lost that divine call of stirring ourselves and awakening to what God has called us to do. And you have a whole church that's just kind of wishy-washy, going along with whatever the most recent fad is. And God's looking for people that are anointed of the Holy Ghost, because one of the songs we wrote says, by the anointing Jesus breaks the yoke, by the Holy Ghost and power, just as the prophet spoke. This is the day of latter rain. And we can look back, we can look forward, but this is our day to allow the Holy Ghost to manifest and move in our midst.
Darkness, Light, and the Church's True Role
Philip:Tell us about the Louisiana Outpouring, what God's doing through that.
Pastor David Smith:Oh, that started about over 20 years ago. I had a touch from God and God revolutionized my life. And the first thing that happened is the Lord touched me, my wife, and my family. My home became a place of just prayer and worship, and we were mightily touched. And to make a long story short, the touch was so powerful and we didn't know honestly what to do. So I decided, well, I need to share this. Well, where do I even start? And so the Lord laid on our hearts just to gather pastors, because they are really the shepherds, and to come together and just have a time of prayer, intercession, ministering the word, and impartation.
Louisiana Outpouring: 20 Years of Revival
Pastor David Smith:And so God began to move. Little did I have any idea that we would be here 20 years later, but here we are. Generations have come through. God has mightily touched people who have been sent out to different parts and regions of the world. So again, there are many conferences, which is great, but ours really is centered on not just the word but the impartation — receiving, getting equipped, equipping the leaders to do what God called them to do. And that's the most important thing. At the end of the day, the move of God is gonna be manifested at the local church, and the local church is the one that interfaces with the communities.
Woke Church vs. True Awakening
Pastor David Smith:And we're expecting a humongous move of God not only in the United States but worldwide. And in the midst of, like you were talking about earlier, this great darkness and opposition and wildness — churches are trying to be woke, but we don't need a woke-ning, we need an awakening. It's different. The Bible says do not conform to them, let them conform to you. And the prophet Elijah, when he heard the abundance of rain, he ran down and outran the chariots of Ahab. So he outran it, meaning that is the representative of the church. The rain of God is coming into a dry, barren land of unbelief, of doubt, of trying to imitate the world.
Pastor David Smith:But if you're trying to set somebody free but you get into the prison cell and you lock the door and throw away the key, you end up in prison yourself. So many, in the quest to relate or be accessible, actually ended up in a place of bondage where they cannot even save themselves. So to make a difference, we cannot be a friend of Christ and a friend of the world at the same time. Jesus was extremely clear on that. Not that in any way we're hateful — we have the love of God. It's love that compels us to stand with the Lord, to make a difference, to be who God has called us to be. The Bible says Christ in us is the hope of glory. So how can we be a friend of the world, take on the world, be like the world? Then there is no difference.
Pastor David Smith:We cannot be so diluted that we become just like darkness. The light must be light. And think about this — darkness is the absence of light. So we cannot turn down the light or it avails nothing. We have to shine more brightly than ever. And it's okay to be misunderstood, because in this cancel culture, we need to be uncancelable. We must not be canceled. What if they took away our internet? What if social media were canceled? We'd still gonna be strong, we'd still gonna spread. How did the message spread when Jesus was preaching in the villages? There was no social media, there was nothing but the word of mouth. And there will be a new wave of word of mouth that cannot be stopped.
Pastor David Smith:So I'm telling you, the word is gonna begin to spread, because from the beginning of time God's given us a voice, God's given us means of communication that cannot be eradicated, that cannot be canceled, that cannot be muffled, that cannot be silenced. And there's a voice crying out in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord. We are the voice in the wilderness, preparing the way of the Lord, and God is coming. Sometimes people look at me like a bunch of cows staring at a new gate, but it does not matter. I keep saying the move of God is coming, God is coming, prepare the way of the Lord, because it is coming. The church has got to prepare itself, or there will not be room enough to receive and contain the harvest of souls.
Prophetic Word: Buildings Won't Hold the Harvest
Pastor David Smith:He is so much — it is about to radically change. The buildings will not be big enough. They're gonna have to start meeting on street corners and in parking lots, and there will be salvations, there will be deliverances. And a gospel that is not gonna cut it — you have to have a radical Christ-centered gospel, the move of the Holy Spirit, manifestation, and the flowing and moving in the gifts. What if someone came to a church — what's disturbing is that somebody that's bound or possessed, or really doesn't matter, something that's not of God, has an influence — the tragedy would be that someone who's possessed or oppressed will come to one of our services and leave the same, because nothing has happened. But when the power of God is there, it confronts the powers of darkness. It creates a confrontation, and something's gonna have to give. And we know that God wins and God overcomes and overwhelms the powers of darkness.
Pastor David Smith:So great is he that is in us, greater than he that is in this world. Hallelujah.
Philip:As you're talking I can feel the Holy Ghost. And I can feel you watching today and you're trying to fight the devil. Let me tell you something — if you're in the jungle and you're out there camping and the lions are coming, you don't throw stones at the lions, you light the fire. You get the flame going, you burn, you get the flame going, and the lions take care of themselves. And we've been chasing lions and throwing stones and trying to do stuff, and it's the manifestation, it's the power of the Holy Ghost made manifest amongst us. And most many churches are Pentecostal or Spirit-filled by name only, but God's looking to do a new thing.
Philip:We're almost out of time and I'm so sorry to say this. You have a conference coming up in June — is that correct? Of 2023, the 8th to the 10th. It's louisianaoutpouring.com. I want every pastor watching today to get in contact with louisianaoutpouring.com, June 8th through 10th of 2023. I want you to make room in your calendar to go there and sit under the spout where the glory comes out, because my dad used to say there's nothing wrong with any one of us that a good dose of the Holy Ghost won't cure. And boy, that is a truth.
Philip:Pastor David Smith, thank you so much for being with us today. Please come back again. Let's talk about this as we get closer to June — would love to talk more about it. We so appreciate what you're doing. And I feel that the Holy Ghost has a word for pastors to come and be a part of this outpouring.
Pastor David Smith:And so it's Trinity Christian Center in Forest Hill, Louisiana, and the website is tccministries.com or louisianaoutpouring.com. Thank you again for being with us today.
Philip:Thank you for watching Daily Faith. We appreciate you. Pray for Ukraine. God bless you.
Topics
john ramirezholy spirit manifestationrevivallouisiana outpouringbi-vocational ministrypropheticchurch awakening