Mail Deliverers for God
The next session I attended was about prophecy or, to put it another way, speaking into people’s lives. I don’t know about you, but I’ve often been wakened in the night with an urgency to pray for someone. Sometimes I’ve been lead to pray for someone for days or weeks. One such time was many years ago. Back in junior high school, there was a girl with whom I was alternately best friends with and worst enemies. We were probably enemies more often than friends but I think I also spent more sleep-overs in her home than in anyone else’s—I wasn’t a very popular kid. Our animosity grew so great that, in frustration, the principal gave us each the strap and, in her parents’ frustration, they withdrew her from the school. Sad legacy I have, eh?
More than 25 years after any contact with this family, this girl’s mother came to mind and wouldn’t leave me. I prayed for her daily, with urgent passion, for over a month and then the urgency passed and I stopped. I had felt pressured to phone her at that time but I didn’t have the courage. “How ridiculous!” I thought, though I did pray. A year later I saw her at a funeral and went to talk to her. I had to find out what had happened a year before. Turns out she had been so sick she nearly died. Wow!
There have been other times when God’s shown me a need I could not have known about any other way, I prayed and He answered. It’s been really cool.
This is the sort of thing that was discussed at the conference--about giving a word to others. God’s thoughts are for us and His thoughts for us are thoughts of love. The speaker compared the gifts of the Holy Spirit as a toolbox. We can reach into that toolbox and pull out the tool we need for the moment as the Holy Spirit urges. It takes risk to use one of these tools. It is risky to pray for someone’s leg to become longer (an example and story given the first night) or to speak into a person’s life and give them words from God. But when the leg is lengthened before our very eyes, when the words we speak to someone turns out to be exactly what they needed to hear, our faith is reinforced. “I got lucky!” we might declare. But then it happens again and again and our faith grows and as we reach into the toolbox, we might choose more selectively, choosing the tool with which we’ve become familiar.
But of all the gifts from the Holy Spirit, is there one that will help unpack the others? In 1 Corinthians 14, Paul said to eagerly desire all the gifts but especially the gift of prophecy. I always thought prophecy was foretelling the future but apparently not. Basically, a prophet is a mail deliverer from God. It is used to encourage, comfort and strengthen others. Often we don’t even know when we’re prophesying. He compared it to pulling on a little thread. You don’t know if it’s short or if it’s the beginning of the whole sweater.
God has placed each of us sovereignly where we can touch the most lives. Try to see in the people around you what God sees. What He sees is a great invitation. Don’t look for what isn’t there. God has plans for them (Jeremiah 29) and that’s what he wants to call forward. We need to get outside ourselves, look at others and ask, “Lord, what do you see that you love and how can I say that so this person will know its from you?”
And so we got to practice this. He gave a certain criterion of people he wanted to stand (I can’t remember what it was). He had three assistants who are experienced in speaking God’s word over people and so he asked each of them to pick one person from those standing as someone they felt called to speak over. The three came to the front and the others sat down. He selected one of the three and asked all of us to look at her. Was God saying or showing anything to us for or about that person? Those who put up their hands were asked to form a line down an aisle and one by one we were asked to give that word or picture (no more than a sentence or two, please) to the woman. Afterwards, she was asked how the words she received fit—and much of it did!
Those who had stood up before and then told to sit down were now asked to stand again and find a place in the room to stand so others could come to speak over them. As they stood, we in the audience were to look at them and choose one we thought God might want us to speak to. As I moved towards the one I had chosen, I saw another, kind of in the way, who had no one gathered around while the one I had chosen had several so, after checking with the Holy Spirit, I decided to stick with him—a complete stranger. Three others joined me.
It was amazing! There were so many things God showed me that I was able to speak. After I had done so, he opened up and began to share a few things—one being an anger he wished he didn’t have. He held his abdomen as though the anger was lodged in there and refused to budge and so I put my hand on his and called the anger out. I’ve never done anything like this before. He started heaving. You could actually see the anger leaving. Afterwards, he said it was like God did the Heimlich Maneouvre on him. After lunch, the speaker asked if any of those who had been prayed for would like to share what happened and the man I (and three others) had prayed for went forward. He said it was as if we had “read his mail” and then he talked about what God had done for him. Wow! What a confirmation!
More than 25 years after any contact with this family, this girl’s mother came to mind and wouldn’t leave me. I prayed for her daily, with urgent passion, for over a month and then the urgency passed and I stopped. I had felt pressured to phone her at that time but I didn’t have the courage. “How ridiculous!” I thought, though I did pray. A year later I saw her at a funeral and went to talk to her. I had to find out what had happened a year before. Turns out she had been so sick she nearly died. Wow!
There have been other times when God’s shown me a need I could not have known about any other way, I prayed and He answered. It’s been really cool.
This is the sort of thing that was discussed at the conference--about giving a word to others. God’s thoughts are for us and His thoughts for us are thoughts of love. The speaker compared the gifts of the Holy Spirit as a toolbox. We can reach into that toolbox and pull out the tool we need for the moment as the Holy Spirit urges. It takes risk to use one of these tools. It is risky to pray for someone’s leg to become longer (an example and story given the first night) or to speak into a person’s life and give them words from God. But when the leg is lengthened before our very eyes, when the words we speak to someone turns out to be exactly what they needed to hear, our faith is reinforced. “I got lucky!” we might declare. But then it happens again and again and our faith grows and as we reach into the toolbox, we might choose more selectively, choosing the tool with which we’ve become familiar.
But of all the gifts from the Holy Spirit, is there one that will help unpack the others? In 1 Corinthians 14, Paul said to eagerly desire all the gifts but especially the gift of prophecy. I always thought prophecy was foretelling the future but apparently not. Basically, a prophet is a mail deliverer from God. It is used to encourage, comfort and strengthen others. Often we don’t even know when we’re prophesying. He compared it to pulling on a little thread. You don’t know if it’s short or if it’s the beginning of the whole sweater.
God has placed each of us sovereignly where we can touch the most lives. Try to see in the people around you what God sees. What He sees is a great invitation. Don’t look for what isn’t there. God has plans for them (Jeremiah 29) and that’s what he wants to call forward. We need to get outside ourselves, look at others and ask, “Lord, what do you see that you love and how can I say that so this person will know its from you?”
And so we got to practice this. He gave a certain criterion of people he wanted to stand (I can’t remember what it was). He had three assistants who are experienced in speaking God’s word over people and so he asked each of them to pick one person from those standing as someone they felt called to speak over. The three came to the front and the others sat down. He selected one of the three and asked all of us to look at her. Was God saying or showing anything to us for or about that person? Those who put up their hands were asked to form a line down an aisle and one by one we were asked to give that word or picture (no more than a sentence or two, please) to the woman. Afterwards, she was asked how the words she received fit—and much of it did!
Those who had stood up before and then told to sit down were now asked to stand again and find a place in the room to stand so others could come to speak over them. As they stood, we in the audience were to look at them and choose one we thought God might want us to speak to. As I moved towards the one I had chosen, I saw another, kind of in the way, who had no one gathered around while the one I had chosen had several so, after checking with the Holy Spirit, I decided to stick with him—a complete stranger. Three others joined me.
It was amazing! There were so many things God showed me that I was able to speak. After I had done so, he opened up and began to share a few things—one being an anger he wished he didn’t have. He held his abdomen as though the anger was lodged in there and refused to budge and so I put my hand on his and called the anger out. I’ve never done anything like this before. He started heaving. You could actually see the anger leaving. Afterwards, he said it was like God did the Heimlich Maneouvre on him. After lunch, the speaker asked if any of those who had been prayed for would like to share what happened and the man I (and three others) had prayed for went forward. He said it was as if we had “read his mail” and then he talked about what God had done for him. Wow! What a confirmation!
posted by Magdaleine at 8:25 PM
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