When 500 People Get Saved at a Rave with Luke LeFevre and Daniel MacLeod

February 04, 2021

Jennie Allen

Bible teacher, founder of IF:Gathering

You guys are going to love my guests today! A lot of you already know them if you were a part of IF:2020. You are NOT going to want to miss IF:2021 - it's coming up March 5th and 6th. But these two guests were with us a year ago at IF:2020, and it was a crazy idea I had maybe two weeks before the event. I heard this story about these guys in Nashville and how their obedience was bringing so many people to Christ. So I wanted to close out IF:2020 with them! If you don't know, it's an event for hundreds of thousands of women, and these are college-aged boys. But they came up and brought the house down! The crowd would not sit down! So they're back! We're going to start by telling a little bit of the story that I heard that brought you to the IF:Gathering stage for people that haven't heard. Tell everybody what your recollection is of that day and the story that brought y'all here.

Daniel: To be completely honest, I had no idea what IF:Gathering was or what we were getting into at all. I got there and I was inspired to see so many women passionately pursuing Jesus and the gospel. That was incredible. However, we were there to share about a rave that Luke and I had put together in Nashville where we got to preach the gospel. Hundreds came to know the Lord that day. If you don't know what a rave is, it's a big party.

It's not a Christian event!

Daniel: No not at all. But we were dreaming about how we could reach our generation with the gospel. When we arrived at IF:Gathering, I was totally inspired and we got to share our story! 

What happened in the room and why everybody gave you a standing ovation was because they saw two guys who were younger and in a season of life we all remember, where many of us came to trust Christ. Watching your faith reminded us and put back into us that desire to live with radical faith that God can change lives. Let's get into the nuances of that story because it is so good and I don't want anybody to miss it. Luke, talk about how two guys end up sharing the gospel at a rave.

Luke: It all started when I was getting coffee with some high school students that my friend and I help mentor here in Nashville and they were like, "have you guys heard about these raves that are getting thrown around town?" And they were really burdened by them. Everyone from the high schools in Nashville were all going to them. If you don't know what a rave is, basically it's a party with electronic dance music and everybody goes and gets drunk and high. They'll leave with people and sleep around - it's very dark. It just promotes this culture of rebellion and kids are sneaking out of the house to get there and their parents don't know they're there. These two high school guys who were throwing them - with their parents money. Their parents wanted them to start a business, so that's the business they started - throwing raves. So these high school students are telling me about this and something was so stirred in my spirit. I sensed the Holy Spirit longing for the lives of those kids. He wanted those kids. I just felt the Holy Spirit say, "I'm going to open the door for you to preach the gospel at this rave." I had no idea on earth how this would happen, but I loved it! And I wanted to see it happen! I shared it with Daniel and he was like, "oh yeah. We're doing this." I was kinda hesitant - like I just had the idea and I wasn't 100% sure we should. But he was insistent. So we had some students that knew where these guys lived. We showed up at their house and trusted God would show us a way for us to preach at the rave. That's basically where it started.

Daniel: Yeah we pull up to this guy's house and we had been praying and were about to go to the front door and knock. Then we got a text and someone had sent us their numbers! So we didn't end up going to their door, but we text them as we're sitting outside their house and say, "hey, my name is Luke and I'd love to connect." He said, "is it about my party organization?" And I said, "Yes!" Then he said, "are you wanting to partner?' And I said, "absolutely." Then within an hour and a half, we have a meeting with them. We sit them down and are just kind of feeling them out - they looked up to us big time because we were college students. So I shared my personal testimony from high school: when I was in high school the Lord gave me a lot of influence in my school and I told them, "you can use your influence for yourself or you can use it for others." We made a business proposition to them: if we bring 50 people to your rave, can we preach the gospel there? Will you give us 5 minutes? These 50 people that we brought were a group that Luke and I were really invested into and we had trained as evangelists. The boys obviously didn't know that. The rave boys were all in! They actually said, "we've been looking for a purpose for our raves. It's almost like God sent you!" I know they were pulled by the business proposition, but it was a divine appointment! God had us go meet them, talk to them, and also speak into their lives. We started meeting with them and Luke called our friend Kenny who is the CEO of a large venue in Nashville called "Rocket Town." Luke told him we were going to do these raves and if there was any chance we could use the venue for free so we can have more leverage to preach the gospel longer at the end of the rave? He gave it to us for free. This is an amazing venue. We presented the idea to those guys and they were super pumped. They gave us 20 minutes at the end of the rave. Then we get a call from Kenny and he tells us someone else wants the venue on the exact same day - it was this company called Crave, which stands for Christian Rave. And they actually travel around the country and preach the gospel at the end of their raves. Kenny is like, "I think you guys should partner." So now we have a partner who already knows how to set up raves, draw people, and preach the gospel." 

Luke: Yeah there were so many pieces where the Lord brought together all these things. It all started with a step of faith and we had no idea what was going to happen, but we took the first step. We told the guys, "you don't have to spend $5k-$10k on a venue, and the deal is you have to use that on advertising and get as many kids as you can here." We got to the night of the rave and it was probably 1,000+ kids that showed up and packed out this venue. We took the end of the gathering and preached the gospel to these kids. The idea that we were about to preach the gospel to a bunch of drunk, high kids that have been partying for 1-2 hours was really intimidating. Like, what is going to happen? I was never scared, but I just didn't know what was going to happen. Am I going to get up here and get cussed off the stage? Who knows! I've never preached at a rave before! The running joke between Daniel and I when we were at IF was whether it's more intimidating to preach at a rave or 100,000 women. We were getting ready for the rave and I was in my bedroom praying and the Lord brought to mind the story of Elijah on Mount Carmel when he's confronting the prophets of Baal. He cries out to God and he says, "Lord, let it be known that I have done this at your word. You are going to answer by fire because I have done this at your word. This was not my idea. I was following the leading of the Holy Spirit." I was praying that in my room and just telling God that I had no idea what to think or what was going to happen. The Holy Spirit spoke to me so clearly the story of David and Goliath. He said, "Luke, Goliath mocked David until the moment his head fell from his shoulders. But his head fell. You get up there and you will get mocked and the enemy will try to stir it up and they'll try to get you off stage, but you preach the gospel. And the enemy's head will fall." I just remember getting up there and the first thing I started with was, "God sent me here tonight." The first thing some kid yells from the crowd is, "get the F off the stage!" He started cussing me out. I felt the presence of the Lord reminding me, "the enemy's head is going to fall. It's coming down on this thing." A key part of this was we had so many people fasting and praying with us - we had our parents, our friends, people from everywhere, my aunts and uncles, were rallying people to pray. It wasn't something we just went to haphazardly. We went into that night and we both had been fasting and praying and interceding. We got up there to share the gospel and we didn't sugar coat it. We told them following Jesus means repentance, turning from the way you've been walking 180 degrees and walking the other way. The kids left and kids who didn't want to hear, but there were about 400 of them when we gave the call of giving their life to Christ that responded to the gospel. We knew we needed to be able to follow up with these kids, because preaching the gospel and then leaving - there was no discipleship in that. It would just be the seed that falls on hard soil.

Daniel: So right out of that, I mentioned briefly I had shared my testimony with the rave boys, and my testimony centered a lot around a gathering we had in high school called WilCo United. It stands for Williamson County United - which is the county we live in here in Tennessee. It was uniting all the high schools together for a worship night and just to encounter God and the gospel was preached. That event went on from 2016-2018 and then it died for a year. The thing that burdened me so much about these raves is I had seen in this same county, thousands of high school students coming to know the Lord, but I leave and come back and see all these raves. That broke my heart. I felt like the Lord said, "launch WilCo United out of the rave." Right out of that, we planned a follow up text that sends a 12-step discipleship videos that myself, Luke, and a guy named Adam put together. Just because we can't catch them all aside from the 50 people we invited to evangelize. This was on a Saturday, and we said this next Friday, we're going to have WilCo United. A lot of them knew what it was because they were from that same county and had remembered it! A lot of them had been to it before and had just fallen away. So we started it back up and about 500 high school students showed up to that event. It was a calling to go deeper into a relationship with the Lord. It was really powerful. From that night, about 250 high school students responded to the gospel that night out of the rave. 

Everybody listening right now is just thinking that's incredible. We're all craving for God to move in this generation. We feel like it's getting darker and darker. I just want everybody to hear, he is! I know this because I've spent more time with Daniel and Luke and they just follow God. I know them and that is their heart. They want to please and follow God. He gives them the steps and they obey and it's not full of total clarity, but they step in anyway. Then all the sudden they have what they need! That's what it has been like for me and my husband and for so many other believers following Jesus alongside us. I want to talk about how we have overcomplicated our faith. We're talking about simple faith this week and really this whole season is about doing things well and being obedient. What do you see in our generation and how we're overcomplicating it? 

Luke: When faith comes down to it, what I see in the word, is that faith is a decision. It's a choice to take God at his word. There's so many times where we see it as a feeling. There's a lot of times where I don't feel like I have faith, but that's where true faith comes in. It's choosing to believe God despite how you feel and your circumstances. That's when you have true faith. In our generation, we have trivialized unbelief in a lot of ways. The Bible takes unbelief very seriously. In Hebrews it says, "Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God." God doesn't think unbelief is cute. God comes to Moses and tells him he's going to lead his people out of Egypt, Moses starts making all these excuses. God doesn't say, "you're right Moses. You have a speech impediment and this must be really hard for you." He looks at him and says, "Moses, who made your tongue? I didn't ask you if you could, I asked you if you would. Would you say yes? I didn't ask you if you can, I just asked you if you would say yes." Gabriel appears to Zacharias in the New Testament and says, "you're going to have a son and he's going to lead many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God." Zacharias says, "how can this be?" Gabriel doesn't look at him and say, "you know what? You're old, your wife is old, we get it. It must be difficult for you." No, he says, "I am Gabriel who stands in the presence of God. Because of this you'll be mute until the day this occurs." God doesn't think it's cute to walk in unbelief. I'll say this about faith: there's only two times we have a record of in the Bible that God is marveling at something. Both are in regards to faith. The first is in regards to the Centurion - where he says, "Jesus, you don't even need to come to my house to heal my servant. Just say the words and he'll be healed." Jesus marvels and he says, "I have not found great faith even in Israel." The second time is in regard to faith but the opposite. He's going to Nazareth and it says, "he marveled because of their unbelief." It specifically says, "Jesus could do no mighty works in Nazareth because of their unbelief." It's so mind-boggling to me because God is omnipotent and powerful and nothing that God is limited in, except in how he chooses to limit himself. It doesn't say he couldn't do any works at all there, it just says he could do no mighty works. I wonder how many times for us we say, Jesus we've seen you move, we've seen you do things, I have no doubt that I've seen you work, but the mighty works have been few and far between. I pray all the time, "I refuse to live a life where the mighty works are scarce. I want to live a life where I believe you for the mighty works." We wait to feel it, but I don't see that in the word. I see people going, "God said it. I believe it and I'm acting upon it." That's how we've overcomplicated it. It's really just a decision.

Daniel: I believe the verse, "you have not because you ask not" which is James 4:2. I believe that we simply have to ask the Lord. We have to ask specific prayers. Because specific prayers get specific answers. Some people think faith is so far off and they don't know if they can get there. You might be listening and thinking, "I don't think I couldn't do anything like that. I just need to get through this day." Faith isn't as far as off as you think it is. You just have to choose to believe. God is who he says he is! Even simple things like spending time with the Lord and praying to him, that is an act of faith! If I'm going to take intentional time out of my day to spend time with him, that's faith! Because by doing that I'm saying I believe the living God of the universe exists and he longs to be with me. That's a very practical way to walk out faith. The reality is intimacy with Jesus is the oil to faith. You become what you behold. When you draw near to him, he draws near to you, and you begin to hear his voice. He begins to speak and prick your heart and draw you out and call you onto the water like Peter. If we know one thing, the Lord does not just keep us where we're at when we start spending time with him. He begins to expand our faith. I believe we have to not overcomplicate faith, believe his word, spend specific prayer, and spend time with him. Those are the beginning stages to a growing faith. 

One thing I encourage people to do - because some people are listening and they're saying, "I do that, but my faith feels flat and it feels like God's not moving in my life." There's a big component here that you all display and that's risk. You have to risk for the glory of God. I think when we step out on the water - you can believe God way easier in the boat than on the water. I want to honor you guys in taking that step, because I'm sure it took overcoming some fear and having those moments where you go, "am I crazy?" That's what I pray for this generation - that we wouldn't be afraid to step out on the water and have the hard conversations and say the awkward thing and reach out to the person you think would never be open to Christ. If we don't start having those conversations, people aren't going to be saved! We're all sitting around wringing our hands because it feels like the world is getting darker and people are leaving the church. But the people I know in y'alls generation are radical. There's something purifying about it getting darker - you guys are not half-hearted about it. You know your mission and you're living it. Are y'all discouraged about your generation?

Daniel: No

Luke: Not at all. I am not. When you talk about faith, you have to talk about Abraham. I love the story of Abraham where God promises a son to Abraham when he's 75 years old. It comes at a time when this is highly improbable. This is a highly improbable promise. I'm sure Abraham is going, "this is very unlikely." Then what does God do? He waits 25 years to fulfill the promise. He gives him the promise at a time when it's improbable, but he waits to fulfill it when it is impossible. That's where I believe we're at in our nation right now. I believe there's a promise of God over our nation that there will be revival and awakening. I don't think it's going to look like what we thought it was going to look like. It will be very different. I think God is purifying his church radically right now. I think he is stripping away so many things we have used as a crutch and so many things we didn't even know were there. He's bringing that stuff to the surface. Like when you purify gold and you turn up the heat and all the impurities come out - that's what he's doing. So many people have carried this promise in their heart that God is going to bring another great awakening to America - it seems like for decades. My parents carried that and my grandfather carried that hunger and a belief that God would shake our nation again. So many have thought for decades, "that's highly improbable. That is something I highly doubt would happen." When we see the division within our church, the division within the nation, politically, racially, economic distress - we would look at all that and think it's improbable. Then we arrive at today. I think most of us today are looking at America and saying, "wow, an awakening is darn near impossible." That tells me it's time. When you have a promise from God that was once improbable and is now impossible, I'm looking for God to move. I am not discouraged. I see so many young people that are hungry. I was just on a call with my 16 year old cousin and he's calling me asking, "what do I do? I'm so on fire!" He's preaching to everyone he knows - all these high school kids. He says, "I've gotten rid of my video games and all I'm doing is reading. I'm reading the Bible, books on prayer, I'm just hungry for God!" God is doing something right now. He is starting a fire in a generation. It's ripe and it's time, because when it becomes impossible - that's when God gets the glory. When there's nothing other than the power of God that we can attribute this to, that's when he gets the most glory. That's the day we're in. In the book of Numbers, they're going in to possess the promised land. If God can not find a generation that believes him, he will wait for one that will. I refuse to be a generation that you don't find faith in. I will believe him for whatever he has said. I'm going to be fully persuaded like Abraham - that whatever God promises he will perform. I am so full of faith, more than I've ever been, that God is moving. 

I am too! I could not agree more which is why I just feel like y'alls mama or big sister - I'm probably in the mama category at this point. I do feel like I want to be a part of that. While I'm alive, I want that to happen. I want that to be true. I don't want our generation to get in the way of the zeal I see coming from you guys. Tell everybody listening that might be older, we definitely have a lot of college students that I know are going to reach out to you guys. I think there are a lot of college students - I'm seeing something different in Gen Z than I saw in millennials. It is so powerful. To those that are older, how can we support you and pray for you? Who do you need us to be as y'all run with this torch right now? There's no doubt that there is a movement of God happening around both of your lives.

Daniel: I would say I think we need the older generation more than ever. I believe the greatest awakening is at hand. But in order for it to last, it has to be 3 generations - the Abrahams, the Isaacs, and the Jacobs. I believe in the book of Malachi where it says, "the hearts of the fathers turn to the sons and the sons to the fathers." Right now our generation needs fathers and mothers. They need spiritual moms and dads to come in and disciple them. We need them to give us decades of wisdom that they can give us in seconds, just by spending time with them. We need discipleship really bad. I do agree with you Jennie - this generation is on fire for Jesus. They are burning for Jesus. Some of the strongest people I know. But I truly believe our generation must recognize the reason we're burning so brightly and so on fire is because it's fruit of the older generation's prayers. I believe we need fathers and mothers, but we also need to recognize what we owe to the older generation. We need you guys. I know in my life I can not do any of the things I've done without the wisdom and counsel from elders in my life. We need y'alls prayers. We need your support. I go to a men's group every Thursday and I'm the youngest guy - they're all in their 40s, 50s, 60s, and 70s. I go because just sitting there listening, I can get decades of wisdom. They're also my prayer coverage. I feel covered by them and they're some of my spiritual fathers. We need discipleship so badly. We need prayer. And as the younger generation, we need resources and connections and help! But also the moment to let them fly and run.

That has me all teary because it's humble. I know that's one of the reasons God is moving in and around you. Before we go, I want to hear what you're up to now and what's next for you.

Luke: For me, every time I come to a new season, I come to the Lord and say, 'Lord what are you asking me to do?" That's what I want my life to be - a continuous yes. In this season I felt like God has said, "Luke, right now I want you to begin to call a generation in America to consecration." Consecration is the word I keep hearing. It means two things: 1. A radical call to holiness. 2. The second word for consecration in the Bible means "to fill the hand for war." To get ready. I believe the Lord is calling a generation to rally and believe for a moment of holiness across the United States in our generation. And also for a generation to rise up and commit their lives and say, "in life, in death, with my whole life, I am going to give my life to seeing our nation turn back to God." That's what I believe God has put on my heart for this generation.

Daniel: I believe we'll see America turn back to God. I believe the Lord is asking us, "what do you have faith for?" If you believe that you're going to work at a clothing store, you probably will. If you believe that you're going to own that clothing store, you probably won't settle until you own it. In the same way, Luke is believing America will turn back to God, and why do I think he'll see that? He has the faith for it. For me, I feel like a missionary for the middle Tennessee region and the city. I feel called to equip and train in evangelism. That's what we do. I do a ministry called Fireplace every Friday and we do practical training for evangelism, and then we'll go onto the streets on Broadway and we'll worship and share the gospel in the street or we'll break into groups and disperse in the city. Right now we're trying to get into bars and do worship there. I just feel like a missionary for the city. Also, WilCo United raises up and trains leaders to take ownership of their school and share the gospel there. So they start discipleship groups on their campuses, and then we do a unity gathering twice a quarter to just worship Jesus and preach the gospel and get people plugged into communities from that. So I feel very called to Nashville and this region. That's where I'm at right now. 

I want to hear about the tractor because it's so good. 

Daniel: On Fridays, we go out on Broadway and we share the gospel. But we got this 1952 International Harvester - a big, old, red, retro-looking tractor. We take the tractor to downtown Nashville and we drive it up and down Broadway and we do worship on the tractor. That PA system is so loud, it overpowers all the bars. You'll hear songs like, Nothing But the Blood and Amazing Grace. Then we'll pull up on a crowd and do worship, spoken word, Christian rap, share the gospel, etc. We've just seen so many people come to know the Lord through this tractor! We bought a second tractor and my goal right now is to have 7 vehicles - anything that gets attention - to bring down there. I have not seen a more effective tool for evangelism in my life.

Why pick the tractor? There was some hitch right?

Daniel: Technically it's a farm vehicle, so you don't need a license to drive it. A 16 year old could drive it. You do not need a permit either! So you can take that thing and it doesn't matter where because it's totally legal. It's amazing! 

You guys you can not know how much your faith spurs on ours. Thank you so much for coming on today

BONUS

Hey guys, it's Wednesday night and you're probably listening to this on Thursday morning or in the days to come. We are adding this at the very last minute before we push this life. Luke gave me permission to add this and I just felt like you all would want to know this part of the story. It is unthinkable for these parents but I believe God is going to use it in really powerful ways. I'm going to play the voice message I got from him tonight.

"Hey Jennie, I hope you're doing well. I just wanted to leave you a quick voice memo because we just found out this week that one of the boys who we had done the raves with, Jake Harvey, was driving a couple of notes ago and fell asleep at the wheel, pulled off the road, crashed, and was killed in a car accident. A couple of days ago - on Monday. They are getting ready to have a memorial service for Jake this Saturday and they have asked Daniel and I to come to preach the gospel at the memorial service. There are probably going to be several hundred young people that come who have a lot of influence in this area, and probably some college students where he had started going as well. We're going to be sharing the gospel at that this Saturday. I just wanted to let you know because you have been a part of that whole story and what God has been doing through this. I'm just asking for you to be praying as we head into this Saturday for the Lord to move in a really powerful way."

We are asking you all to pray with us for Jake's family and the gospel to go out. Those boys got to hear the gospel and respond to it because of Daniel and Luke's faithfulness. I just know that this story is meant to drive all of us to greater faith and back to the reason we're alive. And the reason God has saved us, and it's to give it away to as many people as we can. Pray with me for Daniel and Luke as they share the gospel, for all the people that will hear it, and especially for Jake's family as they grieve the loss of their young son. What a powerful thing that they invited the boys to share the gospel in this moment.