|
March 10, 2020 During interecessory prayer this morning a sister shared this with us. It was very powerful, and convicting to me personally. I share it with you. The Weeping Room January 25, 2004 Jennifer Miller One day as I was in prayer the Lord began to open up my eyes to a spiritual encounter. I saw myself being taken up to heaven. Before me I saw a huge house with many rooms. I knew instantly that this was the 'Father's House'. I could feel the love of the father drawing me in, so I began to run as fast as I could to enter the house. As I entered, the Lord walked with me through many rooms, each one packed with spiritual meaning. He quietly invited me to follow Him into the most beautiful room in the whole house- the intimacy room. It was absolutely extravagant and beautiful. Upon entering the room, I was overwhelmed with love and wanted to stay there forever. In the Spirit I could hear other people (other believers) in all the different rooms of the house. Some were studying books in the library; others were becoming intoxicated in the spiritual wine cellar. I was somewhat surprised that everyone wasn't in the intimacy room since it was the most beautiful room in the whole house. As I was admiring this intimacy chamber, I noticed a little wooden hatch door on the floor adjacent to the bed. It seemed really odd to me, because it wasn't fancy and hardly seemed to fit with the rest of the room. I asked the Lord why it was there, and He told me that it led down to another room in the house. I asked Him why He would put this door so close to the most beautiful thing in the whole room, the bed. He responded, "I keep it here, because down there is where I spend most of my time". Instantly my curiosity was stirred so I asked what was down there. He said it was called the "Weeping Room". Although it hardly sounded like a room I wanted to be in, there was a cry in my heart that said that if that is where the Lord spends His time, then that is where I want to go. I asked Him if I could go down there with Him, and He responded "Very few will choose to go down there, it's not extravagant like this room, it's lonely, it's not comfortable, and you have to get very low to fit through the door." I told Him that I didn't care what the conditions would be like; I just really wanted to be wherever He was. So we opened the little hatch door and began to slowly climb down a dark staircase until we came upon the tiny room. I had to get on my knees to fit through the door because it was so small. As we entered the room it was very simple. All it consisted of was a small wooden chair. One of the walls had a small window in it. The Lord took His seat on the chair and turned His face to look out the window. Instantly I became aware of why this room was called the weeping room. As you looked out the window-you could see and hear every single cry coming from people on the earth. You could see every single act of injustice all at the same time. Every starving child crying out to God, every woman being raped, every moan of the rejected. You could hear every prayer, every cry all at the same time. The Lord sat in His chair and watched and heard it all. At once I was overwhelmed with intercession and began to weep. I wept for hours. I wept for those who were hurting, but even more was undone by this beautiful King who would choose to spend His time in this place; This King who paid such attention to every cry and who was so full of compassion. As I sat and wept with the Lord, I began to 'feel' His heart-and all my selfish ambition began to fade away. While we were in that place I noticed that there was another door in the weeping room. I asked the Lord what was behind that door and He told me that was where the 'Strategy Room' was. As He said those words, instantly in my spirit I knew in that room divine strategy for end-time revival was available. Although the door was still closed, I recognized that Wisdom and Revelation were in there. Heavenly blueprints were laid out to see the fulfillment of His kingdom coming to earth from that room. It was like the hidden room that everybody searches for. Everyone longs to have divine strategy. I immediately asked if I could go in there and the Lord soberly told me that I didn't 'fit through the door'. I instantly understood that I had to spend time in the weeping room. As I began to really apprehend the heart of God for the poor and the broken, then issues of my soulish nature would be stripped away until I would become small enough to fit through the door. At that moment everything became clear. This was the only way to access divine strategy. From the place of intimacy God invites us in to a deeper level- He beckons us into the weeping room-a place where we choose to see what He sees and feel what He feels. And as we spend time getting the heart of God, things of our flesh begin to be stripped away until we are small enough to fit through the door that leads to the strategy room. Healing-How To Encourage Healing - Part 2 March 5, 2020 5:44 Today I was with a brother in the Lord and we got an opportunity to minister to a wonderful group of people. On the spur of the moment he invited me to go with him to a place that he was ministering. He led the meeting and spent a good amount of time teaching them about their identity in Christ. He emphasized that they were free from the guilt and shame that had followed them due to their past. I could almost feel the affect that this encouragement had upon them. They asked questions about a variety of things and he gave them sound answers from the Word of God. He did a great job. His encouragement helped to set up a receptive atmosphere for healing. God gave both of us words of knowledge, some that were pretty specific, including the name of a person, that reinforced the tender care of God. The fact that we did not know anyone, and were not aware of their particular circumstances, encouraged them to come forward for healing, since it was obvious that these words of knowledge applied specifically to them. A good number of the people who came forward were healed of what God’s word of knowledge had revealed. We glorify God for the love gift of healing that He displayed to his sons and daughters. I am sharing this in line with the title of this writing about encouraging healing. Sometimes God wants to minister to people in a very personal and specific way. Since people, especially Christians fight feelings of worthlessness and the feeling of not being good enough for God to heal them. They are self-accusing, and of course, have the constant accusations of the accuser of the brethren (the devil) ringing in their ears. The gift of the Spirit, a word of knowledge can provide a breakthrough for them. For examples of the word of knowledge in scripture think about Jesus telling the woman at the well that she had five husbands and was living with another man now. When Jesus looked up in the tree, and saw Zaccheus, the tax collector, and called him by name and told him that he had to eat at his house. When Jesus told Nathanael that he saw him under the tree before Philip brought him to Jesus. All of these instances show the personal nature of God’s ministry to people. Sometimes we use a scatter gun approach to ministry, and hope that some of the things we say will find a target. God can focus in on one person and give you exactly the words or information that will lead to a breakthrough. For those who believe that God has called them to be used in healing, it would be helpful to study and be open to this particular gift of the Spirit. Only God can distribute the gifts, but if he is going to use you consistently in healing, this gift will almost certainly be joined with the gifts of healing, another gift of the Spirit. One of the sisters that we prayed with experienced some relief but confessed to us that she had this infirmity for 20 years and was struggling to receive. We reminded her of two facts. First off all that God had given us two very specific words of knowledge that pertained to a physical, and spiritual condition that was happening to her. Second, that if duration of sickness was a hindrance to God, then Jesus did not acknowledge that it had any affect on the power of God to heal. In John 9 Jesus healed a man who was blind since birth. In Acts 3 Peter healed a man at the gate of the temple who had been in that condition since he was born. In John 5, Jesus healed a man at the Pool of Bethesda who was ill for 38 years! Sometimes when people have suffered from a disease long enough, sickness becomes their lifestyle and is ‘normal’ to them. We told her that if God wanted her to stay sick, why would he give us a word of knowledge specific to her? She admitted that this showed that God wanted to heal her. I suggested to her that she needed to study what the Bible said about healing. Our beliefs about God’s will concerning healing can not be centered around our experiences of healing. Let me use an analogy. There are people who end up in hell. Why don’t you similarly doubt that it is God’s will to save them, since their experience is that Christ salvation did not work for them? Paul writes, ‘Let God be true, though every man a liar’. If no one got saved, would it make what God said about saving people be less true. Why don’t people apply the same standard to healing? By the way, the Greek word for salvation, Sozo, means to save, to make whole is used in Mark 5:29 for healing of the woman with the internal bleeding, and for saved in Luke 18:42 for the healing of the blind man, Bartimaeus. Pir definition of the word saved has been shaped by people who no longer believe that it is God’s will to heal people today. The word of God certainly contradicts that, especially when the Greek word for saved is applied to physical healing in the New Testament. My beliefs about healing need to come from and line up with the word of God and what Jesus said, rather than what I have been taught theologically. Let’s believe God, and press in to experience all that Jesus died on the cross to make available to us. Healing-How to Encourage Healing March 2, 2020 3:48 p.m. I was engaged in a discussion on why people are not healed. So that you understand my position, I was completely healed of asthma and epilepsy as a child. This was not mind over matter. I had these diseases with the attendant symptoms. Asthma left me through the laying on of hands by Oral Roberts, and epilepsy left through the persistent prayers of my mother. This is one of the basis for my faith in God’s willingness to heal. More importantly, the Bible is the basis for my faith in God’s willingness to heal. First of all, healing is a part of both the Old Covenant and New Covenant. David could say confidently in Psalm 103:1-3 that God’s benefits include forgiving all of our sins and healing all of our diseases. In the New Testament the ministry of Jesus secures the fact that it is God’s will to heal. Jesus states repeatedly in John chapter 5:19 and other verses, that he came to do the will and the works of the Father. When it says that Jesus was moved with compassion, and healed the sick, it is clear that he was moved with the Father’s compassion. He says that he sees what the Father is doing and he does likewise. If you took healing out of the ministry of Jesus, you would be taking away a significant part of what he did. In fact, you would be taking away a major part of why he came. Acts 10:38 states that Jesus went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed of the devil for God was with him. In John 3:8 it says that Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil. I refuse to believe that God had compassion and healed the people of Jesus day, but no longer shows his compassion in that manner in our day. In the New Testament healing is apparent, and not just through the apostles. Stephen was a deacon who passed out food to widows (Act 6). Philip was a fellow deacon who was used of God mightily in Samaria to preach the gospel and heal and deliver people from demonic oppression. Ananias, who is just referred to as a disciple, was sent by God to heal Saul (Paul) of the blindness that came upon him when he saw Jesus on the road to Damascus. I site these examples in order to dispel the error that God only healed through the apostles after the ministry of Jesus. On top of this, is states in I Corinthians 12:9 that God has given gifts of healing to the church as a ministry tool. I want to finish this part of what I am writing to state that healing is God’s will and that the reason that some people do not receive it is that they have never been taught what the Bible says on this subject. They have never studied it for themselves. When is the last time that you heard a sermon on healing? The dear saint that I was talking with who wondered why some people are not healed confessed that she had not heard a sermon on healing. If no one taught you that it was possible to be saved, how could you be saved. Faith truly comes by hearing the Word of God (Romans 10:17). Faith must be based upon God’s Word. If you do not know what he has promised, how can you exercise faith to receive it? In the next part of this I will write about the role of faith in healing and what happens if you do not have enough faith to be healed. Hearing God’s Voice, and the Gifts of the Spirit Part 3 - February 13, 2020 God wants to use little old you! I have written in the previous two parts about the Gifts of the Holy Spirit. I want am writing this to encourage all believers to “Pursue love and earnestly desire spiritual gifts”. Why are the gifts of the Spirit so necessary. It is the means by which God expresses Himself in the church and to the world. In the church today we suffer from ‘low expectations syndrome’. We read the Bible and want to get excited because the Christian life that is portrayed in it is an adventure with God. It is not hype, but it is filled with joy, awe and wonder. You can just imagine the Christians in the Early Church waking up every morning and wondering, ‘What is God going to do today?’” It wasn’t exclusively about the spectacular healing and miracles that happened. It was that they lived a supernatural lifestyle in Him. I mean the average, rank and file believer. Let me give you an example. When Saul of Tarsus (Paul) got converted on the Damascus rode, he saw Jesus and was struck blind. The people with Him led him into the city and he sat in a house, not eating anything for three days, processing what had happened to him. The very Jesus whose followers he had been running from city to city persecute, appeared to him. His whole life and belief system was turned upside down. The implications must have been overwhelming to him. Meanwhile, God speaks to Ananias, just a regular disciple. He tells him in a vision that he needs to use him to do something for Him. Ananias does not act like it is strange to hear the voice of God speaking to Him. We don’t know if the voice was external and audible, or whether it was on the inside. The point is that He recognized that it was God speaking to Him. Then God shows him somethings that, if you had to categorize it according to the gifts of the Spirit, would be a word of Knowledge (I Corinthians 12:7-9. God tells Him that there is a man name Saul, who is from Tarsus is sitting in the house of Judas, on Straight Street, . He says that Saul is praying, and has been shown that a man named Ananias is going to come to him to lay his hands on him, so that he can receive his sight. After protesting that Saul is a wicked dude who persecuted Christians, God reassures him that Saul is called to be His chosen vessel. Ananias complies and obeys God. He goes to Judas house. he greets Saul and tells him that Jesus sent Him to pray for him to receive his sight. Saul get’s healed. On top of that Ananias baptizes Saul in water and lays hands on Saul and receives the Holy Spirit. Then Ananias leaves and goes back to whatever he was involved in before God spoke to him. This was normal to him. He did not act like having a vision was weird. He understood that it was one of the ways that God used to communicate to His people. How is it that this is a natural occurrence in the New Testament Church but not in the 21st Century Church. I know of churches where people move to a small degree in this type of activity. There aren’t many. Most of modern Christianity has become so intellectual and rational that it is difficult for Christians to interact with a God that moves this way. Some have dismissed it out of hand saying that God doesn’t move in this manner among His people anymore. Others make it sound like it is so sporadic that you shouldn’t really expect that God will move in that manner frequently at all. In biblical terms, both of these would be referred to as ‘unbelief’. Today, it is just normal Christianity. Two things that are absolutely true. The first truth is that God’s kingdom is spiritual. By that I do not mean that it doesn’t express itself tangibly. I mean that God is a Spirit and manifest Himself to us in the physical world. That sounds so ‘new ageish doesn’t it?” But it isn’t. The gifts of the Spirit are one means by which God manifests His presence and His power to us. For what purpose? If it is in healing people it is simply because He loves people and cares about their suffering. How many times does in say in the gospel that Jesus was moved with compassion and healed the sick. Did he stop moving with compassion after the Early Church?. The second thing is that it confirms the word of the gospel about Jesus lordship over all things. In Mark 16:20, it says that the disciples went and preached the Word everywhere, the Lord worked with them, confirming the Word by the signs that accompanied it.” Unless there is a scripture that clearly states that miracles, healing, deliverance from demons and the gifts of the Spirit were confined to the Apostolic Age (and there isn’t). God still does the same works in and through the Church today. The problem is that He has to find Christians to believe that, who do not suffer from ‘low expectations syndrome.’ What is the fruit of this? People glorified God and people believed. I will write more about this in another post. Hearing God’s Voice, and the Gifts of the Spirt from a learners perspective. Part 2 February 8, 2020 Why The Gifts of the Spirit Don’t Flow As They Should 1.Sometimes I get in the way. I try to hard to move with the Holy Spirit, as if I am trying to exert something. An analogy that helps me is to think of the fact that I am like a straw or a pipe in God’s process of healing people or giving them a word from the Lord. When I go to a malt shop, for instance, and order a really great chocolate malt, my focus is to get the malt from the cup into my mouth. The malt is important, the straw is just a tool that I can use to get the malt into my mouth. However, I can drink the malt without the straw. Sometimes we forget that we are just a straw. A second analogy is that of a pipe bringing water. The water is in a reservoir. The thirsty person is in their home. The person could go directly to the reservoir to get the water. The pipe is a convenience, a tool to get water to the person. They could get the water without the pipe. When we forget that we are just like pipes, it hinders the flow of the Holy Spirit. We get in the way. We are to surrender to the Holy Spirit, and in simple obedience do what He directs. Let the water flow. 2. Another reason that we do not see the flow of the Spirit that we say that we desire the Holy Sprit to move. But do we really want that. To use an analogy many of us who are leaders want to be faucets, rather than pipes. The Holy Spirit is the one controls the faucet. I am just a pipe. There are many instances, even in Spirit-filled churches where the leaders act as faucets. At the extreme, they are afraid that the pipes will go crazy or spring a leak and water will flow all over the place and create a mess. Here is something to ponder. When God sent forth the Holy Spirit He sent Him to fill earthen vessels. Some vessels can be ‘leaky’. Many are contaminated by hurt, pain, rejection etc. None are perfect. Yet He poured out His Spirit on the day of Pentecost on saints who were imperfect (think about Peter) No matter how leaky his saints have been, the Father has never withdrawn the Holy Spirit. Even in the instance in the Bible of the Corinthian church, which was certainly ‘leaky’ where the gifts of the Spirit were concerned, God did not direct them through Paul to ‘turn the faucet off.’ Some churches have done that because though the Holy Spirit is perfect, the human beings that he has purposed to use, are not. God is willing to gently correct his imperfect vessels and still keep the water flowing. This is messy and if you want to have complete control then you will default to a ‘turn the faucet off’ position, where the Holy Spirit is concerned. Be prepared to become dry. 3. A lack of teaching and demonstration of the gifts of the Spirit. The starting point of the process should be clear teaching on the Holy Spirit and how His gifts operate. This should include practical suggestions from those who are moving in the Spirit themselves on how to correctly, accurately and righteously flow in the Spirit. To blame people who are willing to step out with God but have received no instruction on how to do it, is almost cruel. It is like a father yelling at his son for not correctly mowing the lawn, when he has never instructed him in how to do it with proper technique. In I Corinthians 14:20-40 Paul gives instruction on how the gifts are suppose to operate in the local assembly of saints. So that the leaders of the Corinthian church understand the intent of his correction and to make sure that they do not ‘turn the faucet off’, at the end of his instruction he tells them not to forbid speaking in tongues (which they were utilizing incorrectly). To the Thessalonians, another church which was tempted to turn off the faucet in another area, he writes, “Do not quench the Spirit; do not despise prophetic utterances. But examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good; abstain from every form of evil” (I Thessalonians 5:19-21). If he wanted them to avoid the messiness of growing and learning how to move with the Holy Spirit, he would have simply told them not to speak in tongues or prophesy at all. This would have eliminated the ‘problem’. 4. You must encourage people to step out. I apologize for using multiple analogies in what I write, but let me use another one. If you never want to get into a car accident then what you need to do is the following. First, go to the car that is in your driveway. Put the key in the ignition. Then turn on the engine. Sit there...and never put the car in drive! This seems rather silly doesn’t it. Dare I say that God does not want His people to be gathered together like a bunch of parked cars. Instead He wants us to move forward with gentle guidance and correction so that there are very few accidents. As a pastor I want to create ‘safe drivers’ who move in the Holy Spirit, but I don’t want a congregation of people who are petrified to drive. Frankly, most Spirit-filled Christians, even those who have been filled with the Spirit for years, are Parked cars. They are so petrified to step out as the Lord nudges them during praise and worship. I fear the inactivity of the saints in this area more than I fear their stepping out and then having to give constructive guidance. Most Christians are so afraid of becoming ‘reckless drivers’ that they won’t pull the car out of the driveway. One of the things that I can do as a pastor is to create relationships with people. I need to model stepping out in this area myself and entertain the possibility that I ‘prophesy in part’ (I Corinthians 13:9). I want to help develop people who walk in humility so that they will ask, ‘do you think that that word was from the Lord?’ I want to develop people who are mature enough to take gentle correction. If I get a word of knowledge for someone I ask them, ‘is that accurate’ or ‘does that bear witness with you.’ I do not expect to be perfect in moving with the Holy Spirit. Sometimes I hear incorrectly what He is speaking. But nothing is more exciting than moving with Him and watching Him use His power to touch people, heal them and change their lives. Hearing God’s Voice, and the Gifts of the Spirit from a learners perspective. Part 1 February 7, 2020 I am writing this from the perspective of someone who is still growing in the gifts of the Holy Spirit, though I have been saved since 1974. I am such a slow learner. I just want to offer some observations and suggestions from one who has been a traveler down this ‘Holy Spirit Road’ and is still learning. Hearing God’s voice First of all we need to hear God’s voice. The first and most important requirement for accurately hearing His voice is to fall in love with His Word. When I was in school my English teachers would talk about an authors ‘voice’ when we talk about the distinction between one author’s style and another. Jack London’s ‘voice’ is different than Maya Angelou’s. In the Bible I become familiar with God’s voice (as well as His character and nature). Many times He speaks to us in the still small voice. What He says many times sounds identical to scriptures that we have read. it is just more personalized and specific to you and what you are currently going through. Jesus said ‘My sheep hear my voice and they follow Me (John 10:27). It is normal for Christians to hear the still small voice. In Acts 9 there is the story about a certain disciple named Ananias who heard God voice. In a vision God tells him that he is to go to Straight Street to the house of Judas and meet a man from Tarsus named Saul, who is praying and who has seen in a vision that you, Ananias are coming to him. When you get there you are to lay hands on him in order to restore his sight. Ananias protests because Saul is a violent persecutor of the saints. God sends him anyway. Ananias heals Saul, baptizing him in water and lays hands on him so that he can be filled with the Holy Spirit. Could you and I hear God’s voice as clearly as he did? If we did would we know it and have the faith to act on it. he is just called a disciple. He is not an apostle, prophet, pastor or elder. He is not some super saint. He is just a regular, ‘run of the mill’ saint who is a willing vessel that God knows that He can communicate with, and that will obey Him. If this ‘run of the mill saint’ in the New Testament moved like this...what about us. Roman 8:14 says, “As many as are lead by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. David also heard God’s voice. In Psalm 91 (verses 14-16),at the end of the psalm he quotes the direct words that God spoke personally about what He would do for the one who sets his love on Him. He also heard God’s voice, sort of eavesdropping into a conversation from the Father to the Son when God said, “The Lord said unto my Lord, "Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool” (Psalm 110:1 God wants us to hear his voice in the normal flow of things. Shaving, driving eating and working. 2. Hearing His voice and moving in the gifts of the Spirit I have experienced the gifts of the Spirit in the congregation of the saints. During worship, I am fully involved. I listen to the music and the exhortation of the worship leader. At the same time I am actively listening to the still small voice of God. I am letting Him know that I am open to being used by Him in the gifts of the Spirit. Sometimes he nudges me with the beginning of a prophetic word, or a word of knowledge about someone he wants to heal. Many times I am trying to discern whether it is His voice or just my desire to be used. This use to become a stumbling block to step out. I overcame it by realizing that He loves people, and wants them to get ministered to by His power, and not my cleverness or human intellect. I also turn the doubts that Satan plants in my mind around. He will speak to me and say, ‘what if they don’t get healed?’ The Holy Spirit will counter that with faith that says, ‘But what if they do?’ That emboldens me to step out. Let me share with you a few instances of what happened when I have stepped out. By the way, I am a pretty average guy. I am not special and God does not use me because I bring something to the table for Him. I think of myself as being like the fish and bread in the little boys lunch, that is completely insufficient to feed a multitude…until Jesus blesses it, breaks it in pieces, and them gives it out. I was sitting in a church once and had an impression of something like a big stones under one of my feet that made it uncomfortable to walk. I sat there during worship for a while, wrestling with God on whether I should speak out about it. After being nudged by God repeatedly, I finally approached the pastor and said that I thought that I had a word of knowledge. He gave me the microphone and I shared it with the congregation. It applied to one of the ladies there. The pastor and the elders prayed for her and she was healed. The next day I was sitting on the stairs in front of my house, wondering if God had any purpose for my life and doubting that he could use me. Suddenly a minivan pulls up in front of my house. It was the lady who was healed the day before. She had to show me the sandals that she was wearing. She said that she had not been able to wear them for a long time because of that feeling of a stone on the bottom of her feet. She glorified God for healing her. When she pulled away it encouraged me greatly. God can use anyone who is willing and obedient to Him. God wants us to move in the gifts of the Spirit in the normal flow of life. I was principal of an elementary school and on a particular day we were doing training and all of us were eating in the cafeteria. One of the teachers accidentally cut her finger open. It began bleeding profusely. Before I could catch myself, I reached out and grabbed her finger, and commanded it to stop bleeding in Jesus name. She gasped because it instantly stopped bleeding. She was amazed, even though she was a Christian. I was amazed to. Not that God could do that. It was child’s play for Him. It was the fact that it happened in the normal flow of life. No worship music in the background, no spiritual atmosphere to encourage faith. Healing a bleeding paper cut on a Kindergarten teachers finger. Few miracles in the New Testament happen in a church. Most happen as people are just doing business, hanging out, or traveling from place to place. It should be normal for Christians to experience the power and presence of God. Why don’t they? Here are a few reasons why. The dream of the new wines. Originally posted on June 4, 2019 4:00 a.m. I had a dream and in it. I saw a group of people, that I would find out later in the dream that they were all Christians. One of them was a friend and he came to me and said that he wanted to give me some of this ‘new wine’. At first I was resistant. I believed in Jesus. Why did I need any new wine? I looked at the wine. Some of it was multi-colored and looked different from what I was familiar with. But, he prevailed upon me, until I tried some. It was exhilarating and it immediately strengthened me. This was the first burst of new wine. The kick of this new wine lasted a while and we drank fully and lived in its strength. Some period of time past and the affect of the wine dissipated. In my dream, I sensed that time had passed and that another period of time had come. There was another vintage of new wine and there were people that came around trying to give away the ‘new, new wine’. There were some of the previous drinkers who refused to drink of this second batch. I sensed that to those who did this there was a real dryness. As they stood by their refusal to drink, they were parched! To those who drank, it had the same impact and life renewing properties as the first vintage. A few of the ‘first drinkers’ became the ‘second drinkers’. One strange thing that happened was that there were people during the time of the second and third pouring out of the new wine who wanted a sample, a taste, a sip, before they would commit to taking. To them, what was going on was like a wine and cheese tasting experience. I could tell that those who tried a sample were disappointed. They said that their experience of the wine was only of something that diluted. They could not in the sampling feel the real impact of the wine. They couldn’t even sense its true essence, just a surface, shallow, temporary “buzz”. Finally in the dream there was a third distribution, a third vintage of the wine that was available. Some time had passed and some of those who tasted of the first original were still around. Some of the ‘first tasters’ did not drink from the second batch. They had become so parched over the years that they were hoping that there would be a new vintage out soon. They were not to be disappointed. Every time that the wine maker put out a new vintage, it tasted wonderful to those who were of the previous ‘wine drinking groups’. In the dream, as I drank the wine over time I could tell that there was an energizing that happened. I wish that I could tell you that with each outpouring of wine, the impact was noticeably ‘stronger’. I can only say that the taste was different. Not completely different. I could taste little nuances of the first and second vintages in the third. If I had been a more experienced wine taster with a more discerning palate I could describe it better. I just know that it was different. When I woke up I tried to interpret the dream. I tried to fit it into some historic context, like...the first outpouring symbolized the day if Pentecost, the second, Pentecostal Movement (charismatic, healing revival, etc. The third a present or yet future time. I sensed that this was just my mind trying to fit things into the nice little pigeon holes that I had created in my own mind to compartmentalize the moves of God over time. Another interpretation that I sensed in my spirit was that each outpouring could describe what happened to an individual as they hungered and thirsted for God at various points throughout their own life, sought him and tasted the new wine over and over again. I just knew that whatever the meaning, it should be shared. Milt ‘ |
Personal Testimony Continued, February 7, 2020
I had written back in June about a serious health issue that I went through and how it impaired my life and ministry. This is the update. In May of 2019, I was driving in the car with Peggy, my wife. Suddenly a phone call came. it was my golfing buddy and friend, Bob Meekma. he had heard that I was sick and wanted to connect with me. He said that he was going to pray for me and that God was going to heal me. I cannot explain it, but from that point on my recovery accelerate. Other Christians who are people of faith had been praying for me, but for some reason, when Bob spoke those words it triggered a breakthrough. A few days later, I looked down at my feet and legs. The swelling was gone! I was amazed. Within a week I was able to go up and down my stairs with no effort at all. Soon I was carrying laundry from the upstairs to the basement. In June we visited Peggy's sister and walked around Branson, Missouri. Each day it seemed like I was getting stronger. By the beginning of August I was walking around the State Fair. I was getting all of my strength back. People at church were amazed. The doctor was amazed. He could not believe that I was recovering as quickly as I was. I was able to play golf again. Today I can testify to the goodness and healing power of God. The word of God is true and I know that praying the scriptures and decreeing the promises of God was also a part of the process. I also had loving brothers and sisters who carried me with their prayers. For those of you who had read my initial testimony, I just wanted to give you an update. I am grateful to God for his great goodness to me. |