The Tulsa Experiment

When we evangelized the "traditional" way, we had a very difficult time getting a continual flow of lost and hurting people to keep coming to a church that we had held a revival at, after we left.  The reason of course was because the "system" was broken.  You cannot combat decades of misconception and drifting from the cause and indoctrination against truths, with 5 to 12 nights of preaching different.  And even when we could get something really going, it generally didn't last very long after we left.  I slowly began to realize that many churches do not have a culture for reaching, winning and discipling the masses.  The second part to that is that each church was not near as interested in growing God's kingdom as they were just growing their church.  When we "got off the field", we founded HMA.  We did it with the intent and purpose of trying a whole different kind of experiment.

The point and purpose of HMA was to take one area and create an opposite culture.  A culture of Bible believing, very conservative churches and interject or find and promote, a strand of outreach, soul winning, discipleship and continual growth for The Kingdom, growing in and out and around them to the point that it began to take root and change the mindset of the churches.  A change that would take us from, pressure from our peers and pressure from the Pastors to, pressure from our conscience and pressure from the Holy Ghost and pressure from the Hoy Scriptures.

This picture is of Rev. Jimmy Radcliffe and a man named Darrel.  Darrel is a new symbol of that new culture.  My family and many, many others have worked long and hard in our chosen area of experiment.  Together, hundreds of people, in and out of a half dozen or more churches, with the cooperation of hundreds of people locally and the prayers and finances of thousands of people around the globe, have begun to create the right Biblical atmosphere by the grace of God.

Let me attempt to tell the story.  HMA started in downtown Tulsa almost 10 years ago now.  Darrel became homeless shortly after that for the first time.  He attended our services, ate our meals, prayed at our altars and got rides in our vans.  Ministers such as Earl Wayne Krumsiek and Art Hartman dealt with him in the very beginning.  Service were held in at least 6 different churches during the time that we have worked of and on with Darrel.  He has done better and worse over the years but had gradually done much better.  He recently took a very dark turn for the worse.

Darrel ended up living full time a park by the river, just out on the ground.  A traveling tent revival came by and Brother Radcliffe was maintaining and watching the tent during the day and met Darrel. Brother Jimmy and Rev. Davy Boggs, whose tent meeting it was, prayed with Darrel, talked him out of his alcohol and gave him some water.  Darrel came to tent meeting at lease a couple nights in a row and prayed at the altar.  As Brother Jimmy continued to try to work with him, it became apparent that he would need more than what they would be able to give him before they moved on.  He contacted me and asked if he could bring Darrel by my office.  When he did, something amazing happened.

He already knew the other guys that we were working with in our program.  When I came down to meet him, he exclaimed, "Pastor Todd!"  And gave me a big hug.  "I have missed you and your services."  He said.  We have tried to stay up with him for the last couple of weeks.  We are again in the process of getting him in contact with a man that can give him a job and also with an adult rehabilitation facility where he can live for free for the first 6 months that is run by an intense bunch of Christian men.

Here is the point.  Darrel and many like him, will probably never make it just because one church happens to cross their path one time and bring them to one controlled event.  But Darrel has a good chance of making it because in the greater Tulsa area, he has now been touched by the ministries of Darrel Toliver, Earl Wayne Krumsiek, Matthew Castleberry, Leon Rich, Derek Rich, Robbie Reed, Doug Hash, Ronnie Thompson, Harold Byler, Kurt Beauford, Phil Moreino, Jimmy Ferrel, Tommy Ferrel and many, many more.  He has been to church at HMA Outreach, Bethany Outreach, Bethany Holiness Church, Hilldale Holiness Church, Hale Pentecostal Church, South Mission Free Holiness Church, City Reach tent revival and possibly even Sapulpa Camp Meeting and Hope Tabernacle.  He has eaten food, worn clothes, received counseling and prayer and work and help that was paid for by donors from Shawnee, OK, Tatum, TX, Hampton, VA, Arbuckle, CA, Toledo, OH, Bay Minette, AL, Pensacola, FL, Caldwell, ID, Douglas, GA and on and on and on...

This experiment has a loooonnngggggggg way to go.  But Darrel is proof that it is working.  I am NOT taking credit for this, merely pointing it out because I probably have the more complete vantage point.  God bless everyone involved in the Tulsa, OK HMA, Bethany Holiness Church and her fellowshipping churches and City Reach (The Rev. Davy Boggs Family) and all similar experiments and the spreading of the teachings of such experiments, around the country and even now around the world.  You that are not involved...You can get involved, or you can do it yourself.  Right where you are at.  Trust me, if it can be done here, it can be done anywhere!!!  ;)

Get involved by checking us out at HolinessMissionsToAmerica.com    You can learn, study, contact us or donate.


Your humble servant,
Rev. D. Todd Sloggett