I Died Today
Sunday, July 26th, 2009I had a vision.
My pulse quickened any my heart was racing. I was a hairs breath away from falling into oblivion, one step from certain death. I dare not look down though my eye were ever drawn to the deep dark recesses of the murky misty unknown that lie in wait for me at the bottom of the crevasse that lay before me. My feet were flush with the edge of the precipice as another bead of sweat raced down my soaked brow. I have been here before, and if I don’t conquer this, I will be here again. An image appeared before me, hovering out in the middle of the gap. At first, the image was more like a dream arrayed in the colors of a rainbow and less in form. But as concentrated my attention on the form, I began to see it was man and this man was smiling at me. A part of me wanted to believe he was laughing at my plight, but the rest of me, most of me knew better. The form took shape as a man in a long white flowing robe with a fluid brown-black hair and a neatly trimmed beard. Somehow I knew in my heart that I was staring at the King of Kings, Jesus the Christ. Inside me there was a resonating that I could not explain to join him and be with him and walk with him and dance with him and run with him, but Jesus was floating in mid-air some distance from me too far to jump. As if Jesus knew my inner desire, He motioned to me and said, “Trust me and come.” Immediately, I felt fear for although I could not see the bottom, I knew it was a long way down and that if I left the safety of the ledge I would surely die. I have been here before, and if I don’t conquer this, I will be here again.
I have had this vision before and I have seen myself on this cliff before. Oh, I have convinced myself several times that I have conquered this cliff when in reality I had run from it. Instead of conquering my fears, I turned running from them. I have even convinced myself that I have not run from the edge and even had false teaching about what was supposed to happen at the edge and tried to run with it. But in the end, all those paths brought me back to the edge of the cliff standing there sweating with a single choice to make. Do I really trust in Jesus or do I not trust in Jesus? Many of us as Christians will answer that question with a quick yes, but how many of us really mean it. I mean really mean it. When the chips are down or we just get told that we have terminal cancer and there is no one else but Jesus to heal us. How many of us really believe what we preach? For a long time, I would have to say that I did not completely trust Jesus and was a hypocrite and I bet many of you reading this are too, but if you are keep reading because there is hope for you just like there was me.
To begin with, I was saved. I got saved back on July 12, 1992 in a little church in upstate New York. I was spirit filled. I got filled with God’s Holy Spirit in my living room in November of 1998 and learned really what that meant in June of 2005. In all that time, I have done my best to follow what Jesus wanted me to do as long as it did not interfere with certain plans that I had for my life. At first, I didn’t realize that was what I was doing, then I went through period that I did know that was what I was doing. Then God stripped me of everything and had me start all over again and I thought that I was doing pretty good until the last couple of weeks.
I have been working a bunch of overtime at work and that causes an extra amount of stress on your time. What that amounts to is less time to do what you like to do and want you want to do. I did not cut Jesus out, but obviously everything but work was scaled back and I found myself feeling like I was out on a limb that was being sawed off. I found myself feeling a heavy burden and the need for a savior and feeling like I didn’t have one. Now I know that the enemy is a liar and do not get me wrong. But you need to understand the series of events to understand how my eyes were opened.
One thing leads to another and I find myself last night having three dreams in a row. To understand why this is important, you have to know that I have had enough dreams from God and not from God that I know the difference of when God is trying to tell me something and when it is a normal dream and the three last night were from God. However, I was having difficulty understanding what the message from God was in them. Each dream had the same theme in that I was receiving a blessing (twice an inheritance and once a large sum of money) and in each time there was people or things hindering or preventing me from receiving it. I woke up and this puzzled me.
I went to church this morning and attended the spiritual warfare class and received some insight. The instructor Dan was speaking about spirits that find a way in to hinder you from being able to receive from God. He listed off several different types of hindering spirits and how they can get into your life. I realize sitting there the meaning of the dreams. God was wanting to bring blessings to me both in the forms of inheritances and donation types from people I don’t know but I have let the enemy entice my flesh into hindering my spirit and it had become a blocker to the blessings. I had asked God just recently how come the temptations to sin seem so much stronger then my ability to resist them. The truth is that my flesh desires the temptations and the sin and I had let my flesh get in the way and God was unable to move and bring the blessings to me.
I wanted to have Dan pray for me, but time had run out and we had to get to church service. I realize now that was because God was not done dealing with me. As I was standing at my post as an usher, God was bringing things to my remembrance. He reminded me of the vision at the beginning of this post and how many times I had ducked and dodged and ran from conquering the cliff. He showed me the truth and how I have let my flesh get in the way and he showed me how I can overcome. You see, I had been incorrectly taught that if I jumped off the cliff that I would meet Jesus in the air and all I had to do was to trust him. That is not right. If I step off of the cliff, I will die, and my flesh will go into the ravine. But my spirit will be lifted high up with Jesus in the air and this is what Jesus wants. God opened my eyes to the following Scripture.
20 I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.
- Galatians 2:20
In order for me to move on in Christ and the next level of the blessings and the glory of what God and Jesus has in store for me and my family, I had to die to my flesh. I had to die to myself. I had to die completely to all things that pertained to the wanton desires of the flesh and seek only the things of God.
After service, I went to Dan and explained all that I had explained here and told him, “Pat has to die today.” He knew what I meant and we prayed together. We renounced the devil and his power over me and my family and ministry and every hold he has ever had over me and fully announced my allegiance and total commitment to God, completely and totally sold out for Jesus with no holds barred and nothing held back from this day forward.
As I stood there staring at Jesus with his arms opened wide and the smile on his face, I took a deep breath and stepped off of the cliff. I felt myself falling and floating at the same time. I felt myself dying and living at the same time. I felt myself full of joy as I took the hand of the King of Kings. I looked back for a moment to see my flesh falling into the deep and then back on Jesus never to take my eyes off of him again. No more running. No more hiding. No more being scared. No more fear. Only love and power and mercy and grace forever and ever amen!
