RW Shambach

When you are young you never think death will ever touch your life. In the back of your mind you think, either the rapture will come, or you will be the one to beat it.

This week another great man of God has been promoted to heaven. RW Shambach who will always be known in Pentecostal circles as the tent revival preacher passed away on Tuesday January 17, 2012. He was a man of great faith, power and encouragement.

I will never forget the first time I heard Bro. Shambach preach on radio. It was 1977 on an AM station in Rossville Georgia (just south of Chattanooga). I was a 16 year-old Baptist kid who had just accepted the call to preach. His preaching literally made the hair stand up on my head! I actually thought I was listening to an African-American pastor because I never heard a white guy preach like that! I would later learn this was the anointing of the Holy Ghost; and his passion, faith and fire made me want to move in the Spirit like him.

He spent the majority of his ministry working in inner city crusades and outreaches. And of course, he traveled to over 80 nations of the world telling people, “…you don’t have any trouble, all you need is faith in God!”

My heart is grieved as we have seen many great men of God promoted in the last couple of years. The condition in the flesh driven American church causes a cry to come up in my heart for a genuine move of the Holy Spirit, so that these people’s race will not have been in vain. It also makes me want to persevere and finish this race that has been set before us till I can hear the master say, “well done good and faithful servant”.

Are you going to finish this race with a stronger faith than which you started?