(Lakeland, Florida) When Ella Schnacky of JWLKRS Worship returned from Southeastern University, her voice carried the kind of awe that only comes from witnessing something you can’t quite put into words. What began as a scheduled conference at Southeastern University quickly turned into something no one had planned — and no one wanted to end.
[Photo Credit: Ella Schnacky] Ella Schnacky, JWLKRS Worship
Here is Ella’s full account of has been unfolding at SEU:
“Honestly, it is so crazy, the move of God that's happening and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. It started off with a conference, so me and my sister, we went to the conference, and on the last day, Jennie Allen spoke at the morning session, and when she was speaking, I think she had a message planned, but she ended up speaking about something else that the Holy Spirit was prompting on her heart, and how it is so evident that the end times are here, and there's an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, there's a move, there's a revival happening, and she was talking about how God wants to use us, and it was so crazy, because she said, but the enemy, he wants to stop that from happening, and so what he does is he puts certain things in our lives that will hold us back from walking, and what God wants us to do in these days, and so she gave us a moment to think about what those things were in our lives that the enemy was using against us, and she said, I want to do something different.
[Photo Credit: Ella Schnacky] ELLA SCHNACKY FROM JWLKERS WORSHIP at SEU
I want you guys to all shout out loud, as loud as you can, the things that God has just brought up to your mind, and so as she did that, it was crazy. Thousands of students just started shouting one after the other, the things that were holding them back, and some of it was super, super heavy, and we had people screaming that the enemy's putting suicide in their mind, the enemy's holding them bondage or captive with (online content), we had people yelling out pride, we had people yelling out addiction, and for me personally, I always thought I was pretty free, but the Lord highlighted that I had a fear of man, and so in that moment, I remember literally yelling out, and I just, as loud as I could, I was like, you know, I'm going to go for it, and I just yelled out, fear of man, and it was so crazy.
The Holy Spirit just fell on me, and my sister right next to me, in such a unique way, we literally, we had uncontrollably ended up sobbing, we literally could not control it, the tears just kept coming, because I think God showed us how broken people were, and how desperate we were for a move of God, and it was so crazy, because in that moment when I felt like the Holy Spirit had just washed over me, I literally, like I've had perfect vision my whole entire life, but when I tell you, my eyesight got even clearer, physically, it was the craziest thing, and I felt like God showed me a new way of seeing things, and I stopped seeing men, and people as superior, or somebody I need to be afraid of, but people who are on the same level in me, Jesus, just as much as I do, and so that movement started to happen, students were yelling out everything that was holding them back, just unashamed, and it was so cool, because as one student would say something, another student would say next, and nobody was afraid anymore, because they realized we're all in this together, and so that kept going for 15 minutes, and then the worship team started playing, and as the worship team was going, we all felt it, there was just something different that was happening in that room.
It was unprecedented, and I remember the pastor came up, Jonathan, and he just, he spoke it out, and he said, 'something's different in here, we don't know what's going on, but we're not going to quench the spirit, we're going to see where he leads us, we weren't planning to do this, but we're just going to let the Holy Spirit move, and see where He takes us next,' and so we ended up all just worshiping for hours in that room.
The session was supposed to end at 12, and it kept going until the next session, which started I believe at 7, and then at 7, the worship kept going, they did another message, and we went back into worship after that, at this point it was probably around 10 o'clock, and it was just so crazy to see how these students were worshiping, because before, we had that outpouring of the Holy Spirit in such a unique way, I mean, students were still worshiping, don't get me wrong, their hands were lifted, they were on their knees, but after they gained that freedom, and shouted out those things that the enemy was using against them, there was a different freedom that everybody was walking in, and you had people just laying flat on their faces on the floor, unashamed to be in the presence of God.
You had students dancing unashamed, when you read in the scripture that David danced before the Lord, it was the epitome of that, it's exactly what I imagined David would have danced like before the Lord, with how these students were dancing, we had people waving flags in the air, you had people surrounded in circles, just prayer going on, and so at the end of the night, after the last session was done, the pastor came back up on stage and he said, we're not stopping this, and we can't see in this room, so he sent everybody to Bush Chapel on SU campus, and the service, we all got there, it started at 12, and it genuinely has been going ever since then, and then after, so on, so we went through the entire night, basically, so 12 that night, it went through the entire night, and then they set off 415, we're going to end it for two hours, we want you guys to go get everything that you need, go shower, get food, and then come back here, because at 7, we're opening it up to the public, and we're going to keep this going, and so since 7pm on, I want to say Thursday, so since 7pm on Thursday, they've been going non-stop, no, yeah, 7pm on Thursday."
How did this experience change Ella and her sister?
"When we got to your Bush Chapel, like, it honestly brings me to tears, because I just think about, like, the freedom that I was able to walk in, and like, it's like, we're all in this together, like, when one person chooses to walk in freedom, there really is a chain effect, and I understand, like, our life, I've already known that our life was only for one reason and one purpose, but I feel like God has shown me on a deeper level why I should really only care about this one thing, why I should not let any other thoughts hold me back from what He is trying to do in this day and age, and that He is coming, and it was so cool, because even at Bush Chapel, like, I'm not even going to lie, I'm going to be honest, I, for the longest time, I would see people waving their flags during worship, and I would always be like, that's, I mean, that's cool, that's good for them, but like, I don't know, it's not me, it's like, I don't know, I'm good with raising my hands, and at Bush Chapel, I was praying, God, I want some, I want to do a flag so bad, you don't understand, and this person came up to me, handed me a flag, and said, I feel like God told me that she wanted to do this, and as I started to wave this flag in the air, like, in a different form of worship, like, God just showed me, this is what it's about, and it just was so beautiful, like, people, in the Bible, it says to use your bodies as an instrument to worship the Lord, and I understood finally what it meant to use your entire body, your everything you do, like, the way that you live, as an instrument to worship the Lord.
Me and my sister were talking about it, but we aren't the same, I don't know how to explain it, if you haven't experienced it yourself, you can't really explain it to people, I even said to my sister on the way home, I felt like the Lord was telling me, don't get discouraged when people don't understand it, and almost in the sense of like, if you imagine you have a favorite movie, and you want to talk to somebody about that movie, so you go up to somebody, you're talking to this person, and you're like, oh my gosh, I love this movie so much, and they look at you like you're crazy, like, wait, I haven't ever watched that movie, you wouldn't look at them and be, like, discouraged because they haven't watched the movie, you'd be excited, because you're like, wow, they can experience something that I've experienced, that I've loved so much, and so I felt like God was showing me that, and saying, don't be discouraged when they don't understand, don't let it stop you, but be encouraged, because you can introduce them to something new, a new way, a true freedom that you've experienced this weekend.
What's next for Ella?
"Honestly, He's been putting, like, high school revivals on my heart, and I just, I know when I was in high school, I lived in that false sense of freedom, I thought I was walking in true freedom, and I understand what it is like now to actually have that, and so something that God's put on my heart is the high schoolers, and I just, I want them to experience what I've experienced at 21, while they are still in high school, because I can't, like, God, I can't even imagine what God could do in high school if they would actually understand what it's about at such a young age, and so that's what God's putting on my heart, even just bringing this back home to my hometown, like, what's so unique about this, and what we don't see very often, is a lot of times when we go to events or when we go to certain, like, church functions, there's a structure to things, and right now what we're seeing is the Holy Spirit just moving, and there's no plan except for allowing the Spirit to move without a structure, and I do believe God is a God of order, but it's coming in with excellence, but laying down our agenda, and so that's something I want to bring back to my community, because I see the power in letting the Holy Spirit move instead of an agenda that I feel like maybe clenches the Spirit."
