Who Is George Otis?
Last year, my path crossed with George Otis, jr. Now, we are walking together.
George has been a hero of mine since 2001, when he came out with his first Transformations video. George has a calling on his life like no one else. He researches the mighty deeds of God around the globe. When he hears that God is doing something powerful to transform a city or a nation, he goes there to research it and get it on film, so the rest of us can appreciate the powerful moves of God taking place. Otherwise, they would be ignored and forgotten. In short, he announces the kingdom of God as a living reality. More and more people are realizing that there is more to the Gospel of the Kingdom than going to heaven after you die.
Since 2001, George has produced many videos (which can be obtained at his website, www.sentinelgroup.org). But my favorite is still his first one, with its portrayal of the transformation of Almolonga, Guatemala.
The story is easily told. A group of Christians led by a daring young pastor convened prayer to confront the demon Mashimon, which controlled the townspeople—who worshiped him at the local altar, with its mannikin-idol. After achieving the victory by praying together in the name of Jesus, virtually the entire town became Christians. Churches sprang up everywhere. Drunkenness and crime were erased from the community so that the sheriff (poor man) had nothing to do! The town was completely transformed. Even the soil in the surrounding fields became unaccountably fertile. George shows pictures of carrots as big as your forearm, huge cauliflowers and piles of produce filling trucks headed off to market. (I’m saying to myself, If only I could grow vegetables like that in my garden.)
You might think that this story is unusual. Yet George has many other stories of transformation by the power of God, all meticulously researched and told on film through interviews, video clips by locals, and news articles. Another of my favorites is “Let the Seas Resound,” the story of the Revival of Fiji. Seeing is believing.That’s why these videos are so important. They encourage faith in the kingdom of God, which can even transform the Creation itself. George also conducts tours of these transformed communities, so that people can absorb the atmosphere and get to know the people interviewed in his films.
These stories of God’s transforming power today have been an important encouragement to my own calling as a writer. In fact, I like to think of myself as a “historical George Otis.” Just as George researches the mighty deeds of God around the world today, God has led me to research the transformational power of God among the nations in the past—God’s track record in transforming nations.
My own research has been a wonderful adventure of following the leadings of the Holy Spirit. Two years ago, I sensed the Holy Spirit saying to me, “I want you to go to South Dakota and interview Norma Blacksmith at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.” I had met Norma during a ministry trip years before. I had no idea why I should interview her at that time—but the Holy Spirit was clear about this. So I went, and I got my interview. It was Norma who then spoke about me to George Otis, and that was how I got reconnected to George—whom I had also met years before.
As George and I got to talking, it became clear that God was up to something at Pine Ridge. In fact, George had been working on a Transformations video to record God’s mighty deeds at this difficult location. Pine Ridge is the South Dakota home of the Oglala people, a band of the Lakota nation. In their glory days, they boasted leaders like Red Cloud, Crazy Horse and Black Elk. Today, Pine Ridge is one of the poorest reservations in the country; and the average age of an Oglala person is 28. The place is rife with drunkenness, violence and drug gangs.
But hold on! God is on the move at Pine Ridge. George’s new video, “The Gates of Whiteclay” tells the story of the transformation of the alcohol town at the southern border of the Rez, a result of prayer—the prayers of Norma Blacksmith, Oglala intercessor. And God has raised up George Otis to film the manifest power of God to transform a community, so that other Native communities might have hope for a similar transformation. If God can transform Pine Ridge, He can transform anything. “The light shines brightest in the darkness.”
Let it be said that the transformation, so powerful in the community of Whiteclay, is just now at the beginning stages of spreading north into Pine Ridge itself. Both George and I are privileged to “get in on the ground floor” of something that promises to advance and spread like a mustard “tree” that starts out small but, because it contains the power of God, it is destined to be “the greatest tree in the garden.” As Jesus described His Kingdom.
The work that George is doing is extremely significant. I believe that all his other videos are preparation for this present work among the First Nations. He is completely remodeling his website to make room for the testimonies about the power of God among the Oglala. Go to TheSentinelGroup.org, then click on The Moving Cloud. This site will be up and running by spring of 2025. If you have a heart to see God moving in power, I recommend that you become a Sentinel Group member, if you really want to stay on top of what God is doing in the coming Great Awakening. God has made it very clear to me that the next Great Awakening will not take place apart from the First Nations on this continent.
Also, in 2025, George plans a great many premieres of his Whiteclay film, all across the continent—in major cities and on many Indian reservations. You will want to view this film!
Simultaneous with George’s film, God led me to produce a second edition of my book, The Forgotten Awakening, originally published in 2011. This website features this freshly edited volume, redesigned to reflect what God is doing today. It was very clear: I was to put the life-story of Norma Blacksmith as a Postscript to the narrative of the early outreaches of God to the tribes of the Columbia Plateau. In The Forgotten Awakening, God wanted me to show that the First Nations, beloved of God, are about to experience the Gospel of the Kingdom like never before. The early visions and prophecies of Jesus experienced by several tribal leaders during the eighteenth century (described in The Forgotten Awakening) were just an appetizer, announcing an end-time uprising of Kingdom citizens among the First Nations of this continent.
As I wrote in my Second Edition of this book, Billy Graham’s prophetic word is about to be fulfilled:
You as Indians are a sleeping giant. The original Americans, you are now awakening. Just around the corner you may become a spiritual superpower in this country that could change not only America but the world.
