April 26, 2024
John Riggs, in back, stands with the Cowboy Kids of Double HH Ranch in Jerusalem. Rebecca Hampton, who owns the ranch, can be seen to the left of Riggs. DOUBLE HH Ranch/SpecialFAIRMOUNT — John Riggs, whose focus is revival, is spending a few days in Georgia. In fact, he preached at the Cowboy Church in Jerusalem on the Double HH Ranch on Oct. 17. Rebecca Hampton, who owns the ranch, and the Cowboy Kids were on hand to welcome Riggs when he arrived.
Hampton dedicated her ranch to the Lord as a place of hope and healing. She is the driving force behind the Cowboy Church in Jerusalem, the one-room schoolhouse operated there, and the horse therapy that takes place on the ranch.
Hampton was thrilled that Riggs chose to come to her ranch and her cowboy church. And, he was excited to be there because he is calling his venture “The Ride: 40-day call to revival.” His mission is revival and calling the nation back to its roots.
Hampton commented, “Pray for John and his riders. He is a powerful man of God.”
Riggs is an ordained Southern Baptist minister and pastor of Texoma Cowboy Church in Wichita Falls, TX. He led his church to engage in a 40-day corporate fast and is now on a 40-day horseback ride from Texas to Washington, D C. He has become a circuit-riding preacher who hopes to stimulate revival in communities where he holds forth the Word of God along the way.
John Riggs and some of his cowboys navigate a highway on the way to Washington. JOHN RIGGS/SpecialThe “preaching cowboy” is affiliated with the American Fellowship of Cowboy Churches. He has four men and six horses riding with him, but that changes along the way. There are two riders and they swap out the six horses so as not to exhaust any one horse.
Riggs has an entourage of cowboys riding with him and plans to travel about 25-30 miles a day and preach in a church every night along the 1,000-mile journey.
The cowboy preacher and his band of brothers left Texarkana on horseback early on the morning of Sept. 29 and plan to arrive in the nation’s capital Nov. 7, the eve of Election Day. All along the way additional riders will join the entourage. Riggs hopes to have 200 riders join him by the time he reaches Washington.
When Riggs arrives in Washington, he will preach at the Washington Mall. His message is “Revival for the Church."
Riggs’ route will eventually have taken him through Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia before reaching his final destination.
The traveling horsemen will visit with members of Congress when they reach Washington, but Riggs believes genuine transformation will occur in churches and communities along the way where the Gospel is proclaimed.
“Pray for John and his riders. He is a powerful man of God,” Rebecca Hampton, left, said of Riggs. DOUBLE HH Ranch/Special[/caption] The Texas Baptist Standard reported Riggs saying, “We need a true spiritual awakening in this country. We don’t know if that will happen, but we do know it’s God’s plan for churches to be revived and renewed.”
However, Sara Johnson, writing for the USA Today Network, stated, "The pastor of a cowboy church riding his horse down a Wichita Falls street may not garner any attention, but trotting up Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington D.C. may turn a few heads.”
Johnson reported Riggs exclaiming, “Revival begins with self-examination of our spiritual lives as Christians, resulting in seeing our great need of repentance, confession of sin, submission to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, walking in obedience, and being filled with the Holy Spirit to fulfill the work and commission to which we have been called.
“We must repent and return to God first as the Church before we see any turning of our nation. America has lost her way. Judgment begins at the house of the Lord and Jesus Christ is our only hope.”
Riggs is attempting something extraordinary to call the nation to revival. Because of the state of the church in America and the moral and spiritual condition of the nation it is time, perhaps past time, for every true believer to attempt something extraordinary for the cause of Christ.
