Joan Simmons remembers clearly the first time she encountered the ministry of internationally renowned preacher Bill Hamon.

In the mid-1990s she heard how a close friend was transformed by his Biblical messages; a few years later she decided to check him out herself.

“I took a team of people from our church — at that time, St Paul AME — with me to Bishop Hamon’s Intercession Conference in 2001 and after that event my whole mindset shifted,” she said. “The whole group from Bermuda came back home different.

“We began to think and see things differently from the word of God and after that event we continued going back to his conferences every year.”

The founder of Christian International, will be on the island this week to speak at a series of events organised by Koinonia Training Centre and Evening Light Pentecostal Church.

The conference begins Wednesday at 7pm, when Bishop Hamon will talk about spiritual warfare and share his insights on what God’s purpose is for the church.

“Everyone has their work to do,” he said. “It’s not just up to the preachers in the pulpit. In some cases your ministry may be your family, but we are all called to something.

“We will be looking at what God has done over the course of history, what he is doing presently and what he wants to do through His church.

“I want people in Bermuda to leave with a vision of not only what they can do within the church but also their nation; to make Bermuda the best it can be. A nation needs to be righteous in government, business and all aspects of society.”

As a youngster, Bishop Hamon was a “country boy” who spent his time working on his family’s 300-acre farm in Boswell, Oklahoma. He was 16 when he heard God call him to a life of ministry.

Three years later he started pastoring.

A decade after that he and his wife, Evelyn, and their three young children moved to Texas where he started teaching at a Bible college in San Antonio.

In 1967, he established the Christian International School of Theology which has since been established in churches around the globe.

Three years ago Charisma Magazine named Bishop Hamon as one of the 40 most influential people to have changed the world.

“This is now my 64th year in ministry,” he said. “My wife and I worked together and ministered side by side for 59 years until she went on to be with the Lord. We have three children — my eldest son is the president of our college, my second son and his wife pastor another church and my daughter is my office manager and right hand associate. I also have 11 grandchildren and 17 great grandchildren.”

Mrs Simmons said the Bishop’s upcoming visit was a rare opportunity for people in Bermuda to gain access to his teachings.

“Bishop Hamon is internationally renown and we felt it was time for him to come to Bermuda,” she said.

“The same thing he is teaching around the world is what we are teaching at the Koinonia Training Centre, a school founded by my husband, Reverend Conway Simmons, and I in 2014. We run Koinonia in close connection with Christian International Ministries and thought it would be great to have the person whose material we are using actually get to come here and teach others.”

Register for the conference, which runs Wednesday to Saturday at Evening Light Pentecostal Church, here: www.christianinternational.com/citytours/. Tickets cost $25. For more information call 504-2334.