Christianne's Spiritual Journal

Fire

Having a stranger pinpoint the struggles and the desires of the calling in my life was an interesting and ethereal experience. I just woke up on the couch and Mariah’s dad walks in the living room and sits on the couch across from me. Good morning. Before we began talking, the first thing he said to me was, “I don’t believe I’ve heard your testimony yet. I believe you and I, we have a lot in common.” And I lay there thinking to myself, you don’t know a thing about me.. how can you say that? Then he says, “Rebellion and fighting God.” Huh?

This man loves the Lord. He talks a lot and often goes off track our conversations with war stories and international issues, but he has a heart for Jesus which is refreshing. He is what they would call a Charismatic—he definitely believes in the gifts of prophecy, speaking in tongues, miracles and healing. He professes to having the gift of prophecy, which is not my job to judge. However, I do have to say that I come from a background in which these gifts are not thought of as being prevalent among modern-day Christians, if not existent at all.. I believe that these special gifts can be utilized by God if He so desires, however I don’t believe that there is much need for these gifts in the current day and age. I believe these gifts were necessary during the early church times in order to further the Gospel in its baby stages, but as of right now (or at least in America) I believe it’s not a norm because it is unnecessary. I believe in countries that don’t receive the Gospel as often (Africa or South America), these gifts can be used for the very same purpose it served the early church: for the strengthening of a beginning church and for furthering the Gospel message. Anyway, I explain my beliefs on the these issues because it’s an interesting experience conversing with a believer who believes that he has the gift of prophecy, when I don’t really follow along with its significance to the church body today or its prevalence. Not only that, but this man says multiple times, “The Holy Spirit told me..” or “The Spirit is leading me to tell you..” and “I remember God was telling me..” and I found it really fascinating, if anything.

I believe that as a Christian, the Holy Spirit is within me to guide and show me the way. I’m not saying that I don’t have the Spirit at all compared to this man. Jesus promised a Counselor, and He is here with me. I know it. But to see a man like this, completely in the Spirit, speaking of the end times and telling me about prophetic visions he has received, pausing every now and then in our conversation because he senses the presence of God upon him at that moment, etc. is both fascinating and difficult at the same time, because my natural reaction is to believe that this man is demonstrating general stereotypical beliefs about Charismatic Christians, over-exaggerating his Christianity; but the other side of me wants to genuinely believe that the Spirit is truly strong upon him. It’s just so hard to be comfortable with however, because of my theological background and where I stand on it.

Regardless of this theological wall that kind of blocked me off from him a bit (my thought was to take everything he was saying with a grain of salt), I did recognize that this man had much wisdom and insight in his walk with the Lord, and I decided I was going to listen to his words despite all of the “Holy Spirit” references that I felt a bit uncomfortable with. At one point, he actually paused our conversation saying, “Excuse me a moment. I feel the Spirit is speaking to me,” and he actually went out the front door, and disappeared for about five minutes. Up until that point, he had been saying that God told him to speak to me specifically, because he had sensed something special about me the moment I walked into the home. He said he had been praying about our conversation since the time I visited. So when he left, I just muttered a quick prayer: “God, I feel kind of freaked out and confused. I don’t know much about your Spirit in this way, but help me to be receptive to whatever he’s trying to tell me, and help him to speak clearly to me if it is your Spirit. Help him.” 

And so this man walks back in and sits beside me on the couch, carrying with him a circular piece of wood with a picture on it. He keeps it to himself and tells me, “This is something Brother Underwood gave me right before he died. When I was a new believer, he asked me to look at this picture and to tell him what I saw. Now I felt compelled to get this and bring it to you. I feel that the Spirit wanted me to show this to you, and I felt I should ask you the same question he asked me.” He gave me the picture and said, “What do you see when you look at this picture?”

So I took this wooden slab and looked at the picture. Now I don’t have much experience with the Spirit (or so I think) but when I looked at the picture, my eyes started to well-up with tears. I absolutely hate crying in front of people, especially in front of strangers, but this picture just moved me in a way that I couldn’t understand. Now I don’t know if this was the Spirit speaking to me through this man, or if I was just being an emotional female for some reason, but I knew that when I saw this picture, my heart just broke under it.

The picture was of Jesus, standing outside a door, knocking. There was a hole in the front of the door to see who was knocking, and it looked like Jesus was speaking through the huge peephole. He was patiently waiting outside for the door to be opened. A simple picture, but it spoke to me on a different level.

1) I know I love the Lord and that I trust Him with my life. Despite this, I still feel that I talk to him through that little 4x6 peephole; I want to converse with him and talk with him, following Christ on the other side of the door, but I don’t really want all of Jesus enough to open up the door for good. My mentality is, not yet. That door keeps me from fully embracing Christ and experiencing the fullness of who He is. I didn’t think I was still afraid, but the fact that I cried just shows me I’m still holding off from Him.

2) This picture showed me how long-suffering Christ is. I am the most impatient person in the world. If I was Jesus, I would have dipped a long time ago, or busted down that rickety, old door myself. But Jesus does neither. He stands out there, patiently waiting. He doesn’t force me to make a decision then and there. When I do talk to Him through the peephole, he doesn’t try to convince me to open the door—he just listens to me. He doesn’t nag me. He waits.

3) I saw this as a picture of what Christ wants to do in my life. I know that once I completely and fully sell-out my life to the Lord, He will use me. It’s not a matter of if He will use me, but how and when He will use me. I’m afraid of the extent to which I will be used, although I know this is a high calling. So seeing Jesus standing outside that door was like Jesus telling me, I’m waiting for you to let me use you. I’m knocking. Open up and see what plans I have for you. It will be a great adventure. It’s like I want to wait just a little bit longer before having to be responsible.

I started bawling while I looked at that picture in front of him. Despite the huge theological barrier between us, this strange, talkative, Holy-Spirit man was used to speak to me about my relationship with Christ. This guy who just excused himself from the room because he said the Holy Spirit was speaking to him? What?  I really don’t know the extent to which God can do strange coincidences and “Only God could have done this!” moments, but I do know I experienced one today. While I was crying, he put his hand on my cheek and said, “You are precious to God. You have a fire within you, a fire that burns for Christ. He has placed this fire within you before you were conceived. There are spiritual gifts and spiritual ranks, and I see that God has given you to being a prophetess. This is why he has given you this boldness and fire, rebellion.” 

Fire. The moment he said that word, I knew something supernatural was happening. I know this sounds stupid, but I have been thinking about the word fire a lot. Lately I’ve been having a strange drawing to this word, and I wrote about it in my past entry, as well. I love what it stands for, and I love how it is used in synonym for passion, strength and power. I don’t know if it was a coincidence or not, but this man used the word fire quite a bit in his “prophecy” over me.. and I don’t know if that was confirmation from God about the things I have been contemplating. Fire. 

The thing I found strange though, was that he said these characteristics about me and these words without really knowing my story.. I never told him what I wanted to do with my major, or any personal stories, or any goals in my life. I don’t know if I come off that strong personality-wise, but I’m pretty sure I don’t come off as rebellious or passionate or warrior about anything right away. If it really was the Holy Spirit who was telling him about me before I did, then that’s a trip. I just found it really interesting (for lack of a better word) that he would tack on these characteristics and strengths and possible futures in my life without knowing me. 

There are just some things I won’t understand, but this was a conversation that I won’t be quick to forget.. I realize there are a lot of things about the Spirit that I don’t know about. I know that He works in mysterious ways and can speak through others to teach me things, but it’s still really weird when it happens. I’m so accustomed to just living by faith, that when sight occurs it’s a little bit unsettling.

I guess I’ll just take this as an encouragement to stay the course and to pursue Christ, to let Him in and to fulfill the calling on my life. I was made to honor Him with my life, and apparently these things I will fulfill with the “warrior’s spirit” within me. 

Lord, I don’t know your ways and you surprise me sometimes. It scares me, what you want to do in my life. I can’t bring myself to open the door that separates you and I, but help me to break down that door to you. Thank you for sending me this man to speak to me in his strange way, because by it you have sent me peace and encouragement that I have been waiting for, for the last month. Help me to be more receptive to your will in my life. Help me to think of the future, for what you want me to become. Help me to step back and look at the plans you have for me. And please, please help me to love you more. 

Mahal na mahal kita.

All the praise and glory and honor to Christ, my King. I’m only a servant to Him.