Vision

Two big things happened this past weekend.

On Friday night at Prayer and Praise, I received my first vision. I've gotten images from God before, fuzzy pictures that pop into my head, but those are different - it's a combination of seeing a grainy image and having an understanding of what I'm seeing downloaded into me. Those are awesome, and have really blessed me and others during prayer, but this...this was something else. It was a straight-up vision, a cinematic view of a scene that played out in high-def color. It was awesome, to say the least. The music was playing but between songs, developing into a kind of jam-session that really set the tone (music can really reach my heart in a significant way and help me open myself to spiritual things), and a woman got up and began to sing an improvised song, and with that soundtrack, the movie began to roll in my mind.

So this was it: I saw a man standing in a vast, dry desert, barren and colorless. He held out his hands in desperation and a torrent of water came from the sky and swirled around him, a vividly clear blue cyclone that spread in a circle around him and brought life and renewal to the land. The area around him became lush with green plants and grass and trees. The man danced and rejoiced in this new circle for awhile, but then found himself at the edge, staring out across the still-dead desert outside his little blissful oasis. After a moment, with determination, he took a step, moving into the desert again, and as he did a new rush of water flowed from the sky and invigorated the ground before him, expanding the circle with each step.

This may have various meanings, but for me it was pretty straight-forward. Last year, God met me where I was and brought me out of the directionless plight I was in and changed my life, bringing me to the places and people I needed to be around and pouring His blessings and favor upon me. And it's been an incredible experience. It's been over nine months since this all started, and it's time to update my perspective - I need to venture into areas outside of my comfort zone, to use the gifts and blessings bestowed by God to encourage others, to lead people to the Lord, to grow as a Christian on assignment and not just in training. I had already received words about this, and I feel like I'm ready; I'm really in a place where nothing seems too daunting. The other day I was driving to work and prayed the entire time for evangelistic opportunities, imagining how I would share the Gospel with someone, and I realized afterwards: this is what I'm fantasizing about and yearning for? The chance to tell someone about Jesus, someone who would really listen and receive Christ? God really has changed me; it was definitely an uplifting realization.

Another aspect of this story that might be taken for granted by some is that I got up and shared it with the congregation. I had never felt comfortable when speaking in public, and it's still something I'm working on, but   I'm feeling better and better about it. And my thinking was that if God gave me something this cool, it's not probably not just for me, and if I don't share it, who know when He'll entrust me with another one? So I did, and as it turned out, it fit in with a theme of prophetic words and images that other people shared. I love when God uses multiple people to encourage each other simultaneously by realizing that the words they've been given make sense together, and that they were, in fact, hearing from the Lord.