Hey everyone! So I didn’t get to finish telling my story of what happened to me a couple nights ago in my last blog so here it is. It still is something that I’m processing, but it’s brings me a lot of excitement and anticipation for what lies ahead.
So in my last blog I stated that we left Huaticocha to be reunited with the rest of my squad in Quito. We got in around 8:30pm and had dinner with the squad at the Inca Link house where some of the teams had been staying during their month in Ecuador. After dinner and catching up on stories, we had a worship session with some open communion, as we wanted to praise God one last time with our contacts in Ecuador. It was really good for my soul as I love to sing worship songs and I really felt the Lord’s presence.
Afterwards we resumed talking with squadmates that we hadn’t seen for the past 3 weeks and hearing about what the Lord did during their time in Ecuador. I was talking with two other guys just catching up when two women that I had never met before came up to me and motioned for me to come over. At first I didn’t respond because I was in the middle of a conversation, but they kept motioning towards me and the guys said I should go over; so away I went.
One of the women, Andrea, said that the Spirit was really moving in their hearts to encourage me, speak life into me, pray over me, and prophecy over me. At first I just assumed that they were going around to several people and asking if they could pray and lay hands on them. It was a nice gesture and I’m never going to say no to prayer so I allowed them to pray over me. But I soon realized that the Spirit was telling them to pray and speak directly to me and it made what they said all the more personal and exciting.
They said during the worship time, they saw the Lord’s Spirit on me and they felt the Lord directing them to speak into me the things He was revealing to them. They began by asking me what I would like prayer for. I told them that for the last week or so I had been praying for more oneness with the Spirit so continued prayer in that would be nice. They prayed for a little bit and then began to speak about thoughts and desires and prayers that I’d been speaking the last couple weeks that no one save for my teammates would have known. They said I had been asking God for a lot. (Maybe that’s bad, I don’t really know, but what can I say…I want more of God.) They said one of the things I had been asking for was to see Him more in the supernatural. This was true as for the last several months I’ve really desired to experience the supernatural more, especially in terms of healing and visions/revelation. They told me that the Spirit of healing was in me and that my hands will experience miracles in the coming months. But they also said I needed to know how to pray for healing as it’s so much more than just laying hands on someone and praying for healing. There’s so much more going on in the spiritual realm and I need to be aware of that. It was really encouraging as during the past several weeks we had prayed over several people/families for healing and we never saw anything. And this was something that I had really desired to experience during my time on the Race. So to hear that the Spirit of healing was in me was crazy awesome!
As they were praying over my hands I just felt a peace over my whole body as the Spirit was descending down. And actually my hands started to feel heavy as I held them out in front of me. The Spirit was just resting on my hands during the whole conversation so I just continued to hold them out even after they had finished praying for them.
They also told me to continue to find times to spend with the Lord in worship by myself in my room as I really connect with the Lord during those times and experience His presence. At first I thought they were referring to my room back home in the States, which made a little sense since I have spent time in my room worshiping by myself. But it still kind of seemed weird for her to bring that up, as I wouldn’t be in the States for another 10 months. But a couple hours later, as I was talking with my team about my night, I realized that for the past couple weeks I’ve listened to worship music on my iPod before going to bed and spent time talking with Him before falling asleep! It was just another example of the Spirit really giving them these revelations, as not even my teammates knew that I was doing that.
Andrea then told me that I had been praying that the Lord would open my eyes to see Him. This was true also and I allowed her to pray over my eyes so that I would be able to see God more. As she was praying, I was also asking the Spirit to fall down and open my eyes. For a while I’ve desired to see visions from the Lord and receive revelation from Him. But even as she was praying, nothing new seemed to happen that I hadn’t experienced before. Nothing vivid really appeared.
After she got done, she told me that God had already opened my eyes to see Him. She said that God has already been revealing Himself to me; I just fail to recognize the times He does. She says I often second-guess the times when God does reveal things to me because I’m not sure if they’re of me or of God. She told me I need to be more confident in recognizing the Spirit being inside me and working in me and that I need to pray for discernment to recognize the times He is revealing Himself.
There’s a lot more things or emotions I could write down, but for the sake of time I won’t go into all of them. I just felt the Spirit. And that’s a good feeling to have; it’s great feeling my Father’s presence. The whole time I was just amazed at how incredible of a moment this was and how blessed and grateful I was for what God did and said through Andrea and Mabe. I pray that God will keep me in humility and that I’ll continually recognize that what was said and prophesized over me was completely by God’s grace and not anything that I’ve done to deserve it.
Here’s a summary of all that was spoken over me. I write this so that you can pray for boldness and confidence in the work that Christ set for me. Pray against any insecurity or doubt that I may have about the Lord actually performing these things through me. I truly feel this was of the Spirit and I want to trust and be confident in His power.
· You are a leader and have the ability to influence people. People look at you and are drawn to act and speak like you do. It’s a unique gift, but one that I must take care in constantly setting a godly example.
· You notice people. You are aware as to what God is doing in other peoples’ lives and what struggles people are going through. God’s going to use that to speak to other people.
· Your hands will see healing. Need to recognize how to pray for healing and speak with the authority of Christ and the power that He’s given me.
· My words can bind my body, mind, and soul to focus on and worship Christ.
· My eyes can see the Lord. Need to pray for discernment in recognizing the Lord’s presence.
· You will be a foundation for your team. Invest in them, love them, encourage them, and be the brother in Christ that they need. Recognize the authority Christ has given me.
· God’s got big plans for you. Pursue Him and allow for His work to be done through/in me.
Thanks for all your prayers and support. Sorry for the long blog, but God really did/showed a lot to me that night. Continually pray for a oneness with the Spirit as it is the way the Christian life is meant to be lived. I’m so excited to see what lies ahead.
