Sunday, April 24, 1994

(There was not a meeting on Saturday because the Church had their picnic scheduled.)

I did not attend sunday morning because I was at my own Church. But I came Sunday evening. The worship was more powerful that evening than it had been before. There was a prophesy and a couple of prophetic songs. During the worship the Lord whispered to me that he was clothing me with the garments of praise. I literally felt a robe of praise swishing around my arms and legs. It was so much fun that I kept waving my arms and feeling the garment of praise swirling around them. It was so wonderful to worship the Lord in song. I did not want that part of the service to end. It actually did last longer than usual, but eventually we were asked to sit down.

(The format of the meetings is about 1/2 hour to 45 minutes of praise followed by brief greetings and instructions followed by 2 or 3 testamonies. Then they start praying for people.)

That evening I was asked to give my testamony. I was the 2nd of three testamonies. I shared a little about how God meet me at home in the privacy of my own prayer room with the same power that He has been showing at the altar. After I finished sharing, they called up Murray, who is the one I've been having all of the email coorespondence with so he could share his side of the story. But they had some of the team that went to Toronto pray over me while Murray was sharing, so I did not get to hear his testamony. There's sort of a funny story about me getting prayed over --

When I first came on Tuesday evening, one of the staff named Peter gave his testamony from Toronto. I could just sense God's anointing all over him and found myself praying that God would allow him to be the one who prayed for me. Of course, he never got anywhere near me -- but the Lord met me powerfully anyhow. Then on Wednesday night, when I was down on the floor, Peter came and prayed for the people laying on both sides of me but totally skipped me. Oh well, I figured it was the Lord's way of saying that I was to look to Him and not to the human vessels that He works through. Ok, no problem. I stopped wanted anyone specific to prayer for me and just looked to the Lord to receive from Him. Well, you'll never guess who ended up praying for me after I gave my testamony... Yep, Peter. The funny thing is that it did not even cross my mind about having wanted him to pray for me until after I'd already been down for a while and God whispered in my ear that He'd answered my prayer to have Peter pray for me. Ah! God has such a sense of Humor!

Anyhow, it did not take very long from when they started praying for me until God's presense came all over me and I found that I could not stay on my feet. As I started falling, someone was behind me and caught me. They put me the ground and God's peace surrounded me. They kept praying for me for a little after I was down. I don't remember much of what they prayed except that at one point someone prayed that the Lord would fill me with His joy. The next thing I knew, I was laughing out loud. I felt so full and overflowing. It was as if rivers of joy were coming out of my belly. (For some reason they hadn't prayed for the 1st person to give his testamony and Murray was still giving his.) So I knew I was the only one down on the floor and I was making a lot of noise laughing. I really did not want to disrupt the service or make a spectical of myself in any manner, but I simply could not stop the laughing. Soon people in the congregation were laughing too. After a little while, the prayer team left me, but I could not stop laughing. It was sort of like the Lord was reaching down and tickling my tummy. I could sense His presense really strongly and felt wonderfully close to the Lord and happy beyond measure.

(Gosh, I'm starting to feel the same joy just reliving the experience as I write to you about it. Isn't God wonderful!).

Three children came and sat by me and prayed for me after the prayer team left. They were so sweet. They prayed the Lord would "increase the joy" and "more Lord!" and "Jesus, please bless her real good..." I didn't think it was possible, since I was already so full of joy, but God really did increase my joy as they prayed for me. I found myself laughing even more and even louder. Then the girls surrounding me would smile with delight and start lauging themselves. They were such a blessing to me. I'm so glad that they came over and prayed for me. I would guess that the youngest was about 5 and the oldest was about 8. Sometimes I think that the prayers of children are even more powerful than the prayers of adults because they have such a pure faith.

They started praying for other people and from time to time I'd feel the joy and laughter get even stronger. I'd squeeze my eyes open for a second and find someone praying over me. After a while (-- its sort of hard to keep very percise track of time --) I felt a peace wash over me.

Then my body began shaking again. Sometimes it would be just my arms and sometimes it would be all of me. At one point I think I was flopping around like a fish out of water. I remember asking the Lord what He was doing with all of this shaking. He did not give me much of an answer -- that it had something to do with His power flowing through my body and He reminded me that I'd given Him permission to do whatever He wanted to with my body. So I just sort of relaxed into it and prayed that He would be Lord of all that happened to me.

At one point while all of this shaking was going on, He brought to my mind someone that I needed to forgive. I found that forgiving her -- which had been such a struggle in the past -- was incredibly easy. I found that I could sincerely pray for her as I lay there flopping around. God was doing some sort of deep inner healing in me and releasing me from the pain that came from a friend "dumping" me. (Just an aside -- I ended up talking to her on the phone today and we had a really good conversation. There was none of that churning in my spirit (or inner tension) that I usualy feel when I talk to her. It was like God broke the power of the rejection over me and totally set me free.)

To make a long story a bit shorter, after a while I ended up alternating between resting peacefully, laughing and shaking. From time to time I was aware of the people around me and found myself praying for them. At one point I decided I'd been there long enough and tried to get up, but I was unable to do so. The Lord spoke to me that He was not done with me yet, so I just relaxed into Him and stopped trying. A man not far from me was being delivered and I prayed for him from where I was laying.

Then the Holy Spirit came over me again and I was surrounded with the Lord's presense more strongly than before. Suddendly, sort of like a short vision, Jesus was holding me on His lap. He smiled down at me and ruffled my hair. In the back of my mind I wondered how I could be in His presense and be so totally free from fear. I remember wondering whether this was really happening or if I'd flipped out. Then He assured me that this was really happening. He told me that He wanted to give me as a present to His Father. Was I willing to be a present from Him to the Father? I said, sure Lord. Then He said that any present He gives the Father is intended to be used to God's glory. Would I be willing to be used to His glory? Again, I agreed. Then I felt Jesus picking me up in His arms and walking over to the Father. I never actually saw the Father, but I could sense His presense. Anyhow, Jesus smiled and told the Father that He had a gift for Him and handled me to Him. At this point I could feel myself being transfered from Jesus arms to the Father's arms, though I never actually saw the Father. But I heard Him say, "Yes, I find this gift acceptable." Then He asked me if I would be willing to let Him use me. I said yes. He hold me that I was accepted in the beloved. The next thing I knew, I was back on the floor, resting peacefully. I could still sense God's presense around me, but it was not as much of an intensity as when this "vision" was going on.

After that, there was a release and a few minutes later I could sit up. I looked around the room and several people were still laying around the altar, but many had already gone home. So I looked at my watch. It was about 10:00. (I'd been prayed for aournd 7:30). As soon as I got up, people came over and started talking to me. One of them had a prophesy for me, telling me that God had put a dance anointing on me and also that there was a special anointing on me to carry God's presense with me to others. I already knew about the dance anointing, as I'd received it 4 weeks before -- but this brother was not at the Prayer Conference and would have had no way to know that. And I'd been praying for an anointing to be what I call a "divine presense bearer." So I was really blessed by the word that brother brought to me. As it turns out, the Lord came on me when we were talking and also gave me a word for him, which he said was very accurate.

Then Linda came up and said hi. We hadn't even talked for 2 minutes when someone came up and asked us to pray for a woman. We went over to pray for her and she when down. The expression on her face changed and she seemed to reflect the Glory of the Lord. Then I offered to pray for Linda, since she'd gotten there late an no one had prayed for her yet. I was able to recruit a brother to stand behind and catch her, incase she "fell", but he did not help pray. No one came and joined me as I prayed for Linda. But after a while the Lord came over her and her expression changed and down she went as well. That sort of wow-ed me. Up to then I had always been with others when we prayed for someone and sort of assumed that God's anointing was flowing through them and not necessarily through me. But the Lord allowed this to show me that He would flow through me as well. That was a nice boost for me. Gee, when God blesses, He really blesses!

Then a lady named Patti came up and started talking to me. As we were talking it came out that she is seeking the Lord for a serrious and near crippling foot problem. As we talked, my hands started to tingle so I prayed for her. I did not know exactly what the Lord was doing, so I just invited Him to come and glorify His name in her feet and to bring His healing to her. She said that her feet started tingling really strongly for a while, then it subsided. So we talked a little more and continued praying. It came out that her feet first started bothering her after she did a footwashing ceremony with a prisoner in Jail -- she was heavily involved in a prison ministry. Then I felt led to break any curses over her feet. She followed immediately by forgiving her mother for not showing her the love she needed as a small child. The Lord started bringing up a memory of a terrible incident that happened to her as a young child involving her feet. Then I sort of held her and prayed that the Lord would just hold her in His arms over the next few days and fill her up with all of that love that she needed as a child and did not get. Boy, she was beaming and blessed as the Lord reached down and did inner healing with her. We don't really know whether or not her feet were healed becasue they had not been hurting at the moment when we started praying together. I'm expecting to hear a report from her sometime later this week.