If anyone had any concern that the Have Another Drink conference this week would get off to a slow start, those fears were quickly squelched. Not five minutes into the week-long festivities, you could see the main speakers stumbling toward the front of the auditorium in a drunken stupor! Darrel Stott, John Scotland, Peter Jackson and Georgian Banov spent most of the morning session in a pile at the foot of the front row. About 1,500 worshippers flooded into the main sanctuary for the 10:30 a.m. meeting. As TACF celebrated its 43^rd month of renewal, the festivities got off to a resounding start. Worship leader Jeremy Sinnott kicked off the morning with several of the renewal favorites as well as some new ‘drinking songs’ like Intoxicated by Chris Roe – a fitting theme for the conference. It was clear that worship, as usual, was going to be a highlight of the conference.

Ian Ross led the meeting in his typical fashion as he plodded along in a daze, trying to put together his thoughts enough to get his welcoming message across. "John asked that we give thought to uh…..something….." was about all the thought he could muster. "I’m so drunk, Janice (his wife) and I got the wrong teeth in this morning!" Trying to collect his thoughts wasn’t working too well as Banov, Scotland and Stott were praying for him from their more-or-less prostrate position on the floor in front of him. It was clear from the first session that this was not going to be an average conference at TACF.

Before Darrel Stott came up to speak, John Scotland, from Liverpool, England, was introduced. When asked what his thoughts were on what he expected of the week, he immediately grabbed the microphone and yelled "OOOOOOHHHH" a few times before wobbling off to the side for prayer. We’re still checking, but we think he may have actually said something in the five minutes he spent on the stage, but we’re not too sure yet!

Darrel Stott, from Seattle, Washington, was an Assemblies of God pastor who innocently took a trip, paid for by his father, to Toronto in early ’95 and has never been the same. The intriguing part about Darrel was that although he was in a drunken daze, babbling aimlessly and sounding a lot like George of the Jungle in his sleep, between all of this, he would preach like a Southern Baptist Minister. He would come out with fiery charges to the audience, reminding them of the calling and the power that God is ready to anoint them with, but then returning to his dizzy state of babbling while holding on to the glass podium for dear life. A truly fascinating sight to watch, but the display also reminded us that although what God is doing on the outside may look funny, what He is doing on the inside is quite powerful. He also made a serious comment to the general audience: "If you’re pretending to be drunk, knock it off," a good point to make to start the conference off right and a reminder to those who may have come to take advantage of a rather – shall we say – ‘loose’ week.

The afternoon meeting picked up right where the morning meeting left off. Georgian Banov, a worship leader/speaker originally from Bulgaria but who now lives in New Orleans, spoke passionately about the freedom that we have to worship Jesus and how precious that freedom is. Banov grew up in Bulgaria before he fled with a few friends to the USA as teenagers. He displayed his sincere appreciation for the freedom that God gave him to us by singing along to a song called River of Joy from his latest album, More. As he jumped around the stage while singing, it was clear that this man knew what David meant when he said, "worship with all of your might." He recalled his years in Bulgaria where he and other children were taught that the communist government was god, and that they were to worship it and nothing else. The children were shown on Television to the world while doing this so that everyone could see how mighty the communists were. While there, he started a band with some friends and they quickly became the No. 1 attraction in the city, since there was no No. 2! They were eventually arrested for their influence on their generation and later he fled to America where he was saved through the Jesus movement in the late '60s.

Peter Jackson rounded out the day with a message on Saul and David – why we need to be like David, a worshipper, and not like Saul, who built his own kingdom. He spent the first ten minutes in a competition with the now usual pile of bodies in front of the stage who were continually praying for him as he tried to speak. At one point he jokingly asked the ushers (what ushers!) if they could remove the peanut gallery! He closed the meeting with a call to those who needed to rededicate their lives to Christ – to become a worshipper again and not to fall into the trap that Saul became caught in.

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There was no registration fee for the conference this week, which always delights a jovial drinker! About 1,500 people showed up for Wednesday morning's session with John Scotland, from Liverpool, England. John had to be one of the week’s most hilarious people to watch as he stumbled around the platform for an hour with a complete set of props, including about ten bottles and two florescent yardsticks for his "sermon." He would walk around the stage pretending to use the yardsticks as fishing poles and said, "I’m going fishing…to catch some spirits." He then walked around, cast his line out over the crowd, and snapped it back as if he had caught something and said, "I caught a Spirit of Religion." The crowd cheered him on.

Georgian led the afternoon worship session with reckless abandon as he literally jumped and ran around the platform for over an hour. The worship was intense as he led the crowd into some of the most exciting and free worship that I had ever seen before. The joy in his heart was evident as he talked about what a privilege it is to be able to worship Jesus freely without fear of a communist government correcting you. He led several of his own songs from his album More and some long spaces of spontaneous music including a variation on the Troggs classic Wild Thing – which was converted to, "Great things, you have done great things."

Darrel Stott was up again on Wednesday evening for another session of "Hula Hula Hula’ing" and that old style southern preaching combination he was now quite famous for among conference attendees. Before he spoke, Darrel called up his wife, Debbie, who talked about the effects Renewal was having on children and young adults. She testified of a family in their church whose three children were saved through the prayers of their mother, and now all of them are actively attending the church. Darrel and Debbie’s son, D.J., then prayed for his generation as the Spirit led him to cry "Freedom" over the congregation for about one minute straight at the top of his lungs.

"What a week we’re having, and we’re just getting started," said Darrel as he bounced around the stage, trying to gain his composure enough to deliver his message. "This place is charged with faith tonight!" The crowd let out a wild cheer. Darrel’s unique style of preaching once again suddenly reversed as he delivered a hard word of conviction about a pastor who was involved in immorality and needed to repent. He also encouraged the anonymous pastor that he was a wonderful man and God loved him. It was well delivered with sensitivity and love, but what a contrast from one minute to the next. He then went right back into the swing of things by saying, "This is going to be a good night because there’s enough God in this room to blow up any church."

The first two days of the conference likely exceeded anyone’s expectations of what God was going to do this week. Watching the speakers in a pile at the foot of the stage was enough to drive out any religious spirits in the place, and any deeply religious people for that matter!

Have Another Drink '97 Conference:

Have Another Drink
Sparks Memories of
Where it all Began

This being the first Have Another Drink conference at TACF , most of the staff and church family really didn’t know what to expect. From the point of view of someone who was at the first meetings at TACF with Randy Clark in January of 1994, it would have to be said that these two events were strikingly similar; the common themes throughout both: disorder and joy. The speakers for the week or evening were in a pile at the foot of the stage and would have immense amounts of trouble even making it to the stage to speak. Worship team members would one-by-one fall over from the presence of God, and the joy in people’s hearts was evident as the Holy Spirit poured out His presence to bring healing and restoration. This was going to be another one of those moments that would be burned into our memories forever.