HEPTONSTALL, ENGLAND -- We were in search of History and so we thought we would travel to see the oldest existing Methodist Chapel in the world at Heptonstall just above the Calder River Valley. As I got into the car with Pastor Don Tillett, my host, I mentioned to him I felt witchcraft in the air. I didn’t know how true that statement would be until we had finished our day for I was going to learn a lot about the high places of England.

We drove up the road to a beautiful little village called Heptonstall, above Sowerby Bridge. As we walked through the cobbled stone streets, it was like a walk back in time. Along the slanted streets were little apartments built on an incline, each had small doors. It felt like a trip back into the time of Charles Dickens. Heptonstall Methodist Chapel is the oldest Methodist Chapel in the world in continuous use. The society was founded by William Darney in the year of 1742.

As we entered the small parking lot and parked the car, I began to notice there were several cats on the streets. I could sense we were being watched. We went up the cobbled stone streets of the older village of Heptonstall. We finally reached the area of the chapel. Several old gravestones surrounded the building, they were bent in every direction as the years had taken their toll on the old cemetery. We had to walk down a steep grade because the building was situated on the side of a hill overlooking the valley. We tried to enter the church with no success at first, then a woman in black flowing robes walked to the side of the graveyard where the overlook was. One of the ladies there said, "Oh, look, there’s the minister, maybe she can let us in." . As she was staring over the rail I went over to ask her if she could help us enter the chapel. She turned and opened the door to the old building. The door was already open but we couldn’t find the right one on the chapel. As she opened the door, she told us to keep it shut because the cats would come into the building. Don Tillett came to me and said, "Did you notice what she had in her hand, she had a pentagram." Just then I remembered what I had said about witchcraft before we started. I had an awareness that we represented the power of God and as we walked through the old streets of the city, the power of evil that was in that area felt the burglar alarms go off. We were coming to take back ground from the devil and the spirit of that place felt threatened. We didn’t know it at the time but several witches in the area wanted to buy the old city part of Heptonstall and were unsuccessful. A well known British entertainer bought the property. I began to ask questions about the area along the Calder River Valley. Several villages are situated along the river. Sowerby Bridge, Sowerby, Halifax, and Dewsbury, just to mention a few. My host pointed to the high areas all around the valley. In each area there were markers where Druid Witches still practiced witchcraft. The Elim minister mentioned the fact that witches in the area would place curses on certain public buildings and places of worship by tying little pieces of cassette tape around parts of the buildings and pronouncing a curse on all who entered the building. My host first mentioned this practice when he received a memo from Elim headquarters on the subject. Looking through the city of Sowerby Bridge, he had found several public buildings and other buildings where the tape had been placed.

John Wesley tried to preach when he first came into this area at Halifax. He was resisted as the crowd, "mud-bespattered at the town’s market cross." Wesley had visited Heptonstall on 21 occasions, the last being in 1786. In 1764 he may well have preached in an empty shell. Constructing buildings during that day wasn’t the same, quick drying cement was a slow process: a few courses at a time, allowing the work to harden and set. Wesley recommended the design of the building. He had already established chapels built in similar fashions at Yarm, Norwich, and Whitby, England. The shape may have been chosen for acoustic purposes, or to rob the devil of a place to hide. It was a six sided chapel; on the inside of the chapel was an imposing pulpit high and lifted up among the congregation. In the upper gallery and down below all could see the man of God. Wesley only designed the chapel as a preaching house. He had made friends with the vicar at Heptonstall. Wesley and his followers often attended the church of St. Thomas the Martyr. Wesley was welcomed by the curate, Rev. Tobit Sutcliffe. Sutcliffe very often participated in the services in the preaching house. The preaching house would later go through several changes. As it moved into the 19th century it would become a church. It was enlarged to hold 600. As we left the chapel and started back up the cobbled stone road to our car, the women in black appeared once again. We had written our names on the register at the old church. We signed our names and behind them we put revival in England. Behind my name I mentioned the Brownsville Revival.

Don Tillett drove me through the hillsides of the valley. Towns that were perched on hillsides of the valley were very green and beautiful. He pointed to the peeks of some of some of the larger hills and noted that these were the places where Druid Witches still practiced their worship. It was like in the Old Testament, in 6,000 years of history the devil still loves to climb the mountain and claim the land. They had been there long before Christian believers came to the land. The high places in Israel were no different from the high places in England.

On Friday night of that week we would climb the highest peak around in the Calder River Valley right next to Norland Moor to proclaim Jesus as Lord. Once again we were moving in on the devil’s territory. A stone that had been a Druidic altar was the top of the peak. It is called the Ladd Stone (ladd, however, is the Celtic word for ‘kill, the "kill-stone). The name had been given to the Druidic altar for more than a 1,000 years. The Ladd Stone had been a part of England since the time of the Romans. It is still used by regional Druid witches as a meeting place . It is called an altar of unsculptured stone. In 1568 it served as the low gallows where thieves, murderers, and robbers were executed -- from this area all could observe the low valley. This was during the time of Henry VIII -- A pub at the end of the road is still called the last stop, it was here where those who were condemned had their last meal. Called Galley-Pole Hill, the condemned were hung for the entire valley to witness.

Pastor Don Tillett climbed the Norland Moor with a small band of believers to claim the valley below for Jesus. There was a full moon on the moor and unlike Celtic days of old, it would be a celebration of life this night. No more would the condemned be put to death but a symbol of life would be sounded over this place called the Ladd Stone. In a place where Hell, fear, and destruction had been for centuries, the Elim pastor raised his shofar to blow new life into the land. I’m sure there will be those who will meet under the cloud of darkness on this rock again but the sound of the horn signaled this night would celebrate revival in the land and a new day.