A. Wednesday April 13, Mike Bickle receives a word about Dan. 9 and calling a 21 day fast starting May 7.
B. Thursday April 14, Bob Jones is visited by Gabriel who says, “give the young man Dan. 9 and he will understand.” The Lord then shows Bob that the fast will be confirmed by a comet unpredicted by scientists and it should start on May 7.
C. The comet was not mentioned or predicted by scientists until April 24th. Scientific journals note the ‘sudden nature’ of it.
D. On May 7, about 700 people gather for the Solemn Assembly and the comet unpredicted by scientists happens (Original Ny Times Article 1983)
Storms, Sam. The Beginner’s Guide to Spiritual Gifts (pp. 97-98):
“On Wednesday night, April 13, 1983, senior pastor Mike Bickle sensed the Lord leading him to call a 21-day church-wide fast to pray for God’s purposes in the city. Mike decided the fast was to begin on May 7. The next day, a man named Bob Jones told Mike that God would confirm this revelation by sending a sign in the heavens that could not be the product of human engineering.13 He said: God is going to send a comet in the heavens that as of today no scientist or astronomer anywhere in the world has discovered or predicted. It will come as a complete surprise to them and will prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that God has called this time of prayer and fasting and that He fully intends to bring revival to this city and country.
Stop and catch your breath for a moment and think of the implications of this word. This was a pretty bold statement. This wasn’t the interpretation of someone’s dream, or advice on how to know God’s will, or assurance to a distraught believer that his non-Christian wife would soon come to faith. Here was an unequivocal, unabashed prediction of a comet unknown to the scientific community. There isn’t much chance here for sleight of hand or religious trickery or other well-known tactics of palm readers and psychics. Mike had called for the fast to begin on May 7, 1983. He had informed Bob of this on the morning of April 14. Bob prophesied the appearance of the comet on that same day. I can hear the rumblings of the skeptic: “But what if Bob Jones secretly found out about this comet before he and Mike talked on the fourteenth? He could then easily pass off this information as a prophetic word just to enhance his ministry and magnify his status in the church.” Sure, he could have. But there is one problem.
The comet wasn’t discovered for another 11 days! Comet IRAS-Araki-Alcock was first discovered in data relayed to earth on April 25, by the Infra Red Astronomical Satellite (known as IRAS) and then independently confirmed by two amateur astronomers, a man named Genichi Araki in Japan and another named G.E.D. Alcock in England, who saw it with binoculars from his window.
Although it was not an extremely large comet, it came closer to earth than any comet in more than 200 years, and it remains the second closest encounter in history.14 When May 7 arrived, and the fast was to begin, numerous pastors from other churches in the city were present. Mike had each of them introduce themselves at the beginning of the meeting. But the most exciting moment of that day came when Bob Jones walked in with that day’s edition of The Independence (Missouri) Examiner. News of the comet had finally reached the newspapers.
The headline read: “Comet’s Pass to Give Close View.” The article went on to report: Scientists will have a rare chance next week to study a recently discovered comet that is coming within the “extremely” close range of 3 million miles. … Dr. Gerry Neugebauer, principal U.S. investigator on the international Infrared Astronomical Satellite Project (IRAS) said, “… It was sheer good luck we happened to be looking where the comet was passing.”
In a recent book, author and astronomer Fred Schaff again commented on “the suddenness of this object’s arrival.”15 In virtually every written account of the comet, reference is made to the sudden and unexpected nature of its coming. Phrases such as “newly discovered” and “surprise appearance” are repeatedly used. With such a spectacular start, there were high expectations for the 21-day fast.
But on the final day of the fast, Bob Jones delivered what had to have been a disconcerting word: The Lord spoke to me in a dream last night and said that revival will not begin immediately as we had thought. God will withhold His move upon this city until the appointed time and season. And when it comes it will not be a day late. This was not good news to those who had been fasting, many on water only, for the last 21 days.
But Bob wasn’t finished: God is going to send yet another sign. There will be a three-month drought in the natural over this city, even as there will be a three-month drought in the Spirit. But on August 23, it will rain as a sign to you that in God’s time He will send the rain of the Spirit even as He has promised. The drought began at the end of June and extended into the first week of October, just as Bob said it would. In fact, those three months in 1983 proved to be the second driest summer in Kansas City in more than 100 years!16 But what about August 23? I was hoping you hadn’t forgotten. As of August 22, Kansas City had received only .21 inches of rain for the entire month. Normal rainfall for this same period was 2.36 inches.
The church was scheduled to have a meeting August 23, even though the weather reports insisted that no rain was in sight. People’s nerves were on edge. What if it didn’t rain? It seemed as if everything was on the line: the validity of prophetic ministry, the purpose of the May fast, the credibility of both Mike and Bob. By evening, however, rain clouds had formed. When the heavens burst open and a torrential rain (.32 of an inch in less than an hour) fell upon that small group of believers, they knew that God had spoken. Many ran from the parking lot shouting with joy, drenched from head to foot. The next day, the drought resumed and continued unabated until its appointed time was fulfilled that autumn.
Storms, Sam. The Beginner’s Guide to Spiritual Gifts (p. 101). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
The Key of David 