Why is it so easy for us to look upon someone’s appearance and make a quick judgment about who they are?

I ask the Lord today, “Why is it that when I look upon someone that doesn’t fit my standards that I have a downward glance on them?” He responded saying, “When you raise yourself into the seat of judgment you are always looking downward.”

On our return trip from Moravian Falls, North Carolina, on the way to the airport, I noticed a car filled with less that affluent people. My eyes fixed upon the man in the passenger seat and I remember saying to myself, “Does he know God? Does he have faith at all in you Father?”

Later down the road we stopped and filled our rental car with fuel, and who do you think I saw coming out of the convenient store at the same time I was going in? It was the very man that only a moment earlier I had questioned his faith. The man was dressed in a nice suit, and as he held the door open for my wife and I to exit, I said to him, “You look nice, did you bring the message today?” He chuckled and replied, “No we’re on our way to a funeral.” He went on to tell me that some friends had four month old twins and one of them had died. The man said to me, “When the twin died, the remaining twin rolled over in the crib and gave his brother a kiss. It was a miracle! We all witnessed it!”

I could see how this miracle had brought great comfort to the family at this sad time in their lives. Here I was encountering a man’s heart, when only minutes earlier I was judging if he had any faith at all. In this wonderful moment I encountered the Father’s ever-teaching and guiding hand, an encounter with the divine nature of God.

Two men’s lives were crossing at one point in time, yet I am the man that needed to change, and has been changed forever. While writing about this encounter, it has brought me a sorrowful heart with weeping and tears. I now have a heart that knows God better than before this divine encounter.

When I think about the question I asked the man, “Did you bring the message today?” I can now answer for him “Yes sir I did, you wanted rhema word from the Father and I gave it to you!”

“For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. Mat. 7:22

“For the sorrow that is according to {the will} {of} God produces a repentance without regret, {leading} to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death.” 2 Cor. 7:10

Bro. Bill

I want to share some supernatural manifestations of God we have experienced while living at Durham. Durham is what we call our house due to its location in our town. When God directed us to move from the Dallas area in 2003, we bought my wife’s childhood home and moved into it October 3, 2003
We left behind our home, church, income, friends and a lifestyle in the Dallas area we had flourished in for many years. Upon arriving and inspecting this house, we found it to be in shambles from years of neglect, we could do nothing but cry and feel sorry for ourselves. We sometimes think of the first night we spent in the house, it had 7 window panes broken out, unlevel floors, and a bathroom that we hated to use.

As we sat there in a small upstairs bedroom on a Saturday night, we couldn’t help but stare at the pitiful condition of the room. The people who had rented the house before us bought it had allowed their kids to paint the room in an awful green and blue.

We were sitting side by side in two lawn chairs, with our feet propped up on a milk crate and a 5 gallon bucket, staring at the wall. We couldn’t help but think of what we had left behind, behind back in Egypt. We had all but fallen off the edge of the earth, only our pastors, and family had a clue what we were going through. I knew then, in order to survive in the wilderness, we would have to go to extreme levels of faith.

In my quiet time one morning, Holy Spirit showed me that when Abraham left the familiar land to go fulfill God’s plan, he must first dig a well in each new place he journeyed. Abraham understood that without a reliable source of water, it would be impossible to survive in the harsh land. (Gen. 21:30).
In desperation, I pressed into God and imagined as I prayed to Him that I was digging a well each time I prayed in my secret place. Day after day I would visualize digging a well with every confession and profession of faith.

As with any well being dug, you must dig and dig, not knowing when or if you’re going to strike water. I continued to petition God to give us a well in which to drink, just as He gave unto Abraham. Abraham said in Genesis 21:30, “You shall take these seven ewe lambs from my hand so that it may be a witness to me, that I dug this well.”

The Well Filled Overnight
One morning, in November of 2003, when I walked down the stairs, I walked into the tangible presence of God. It filled the lower story of our one-hundred year old house. I called to my wife Jae, who was still upstairs, and said, “You had better get down here; the presence of God has filled this place!” She came down and joined me in the living room and we just set there in the heavenly presence of God, soaking in this glorious manifestation. I had felt this presence before on several occasions, but this time it was in our home, from our feet to above our heads, over flowing, flooding our entire being was His glorious presence. This holy manifestation remained for an hour or more and then it lifted.

A few months later, when I came downstairs in the early morning for quiet time, I opened the door to the living room and again, felt the tangible presence of God, yet even stronger than the time before. It was holy, it was electric, it was heavenly and my body tingled in the glorious presence of God.

I sat down in my “quiet time” chair and suddenly I felt an intense, powerful sword, slowly being pushed down into me, from the top of my head down into my abdomen. As it moved downward through my body I could feel every centimeter of its travel. My body shook as I was compressed under this extreme, penetrating power of God, I could do nothing but surrender to what God was doing in me.

I can’t tell you how long this manifestation lasted but when my wife, Jae came downstairs from her quiet time that morning, the anointing rested upon me and it still lingered in the room. When I laid my left hand on her forehead, she could feel the anointing flow over her head as well. Truly, I had just experienced a divine encounter at the well.

A Well Is a Place of Divine Appointment
In Genesis, chapter 24, Rebekah’s destiny was at the well, she had gone there many times but on this particular day, her life changed forever for she was about to meet her Isaac.

In John 4: 6-7 “Now, Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with [his] journey, sat thus on the well: [and] it was about the sixth hour. There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water: Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink.” The Samarian woman’s life was about to change forever. God doesn’t manifest Himself to us just to give us a thrill but to change us eternally. The effects of our change can impact our family, our city, our region and our nation.

How many divine encounters have we missed due to our busy undisciplined lives in which we don’t come to the well or when we do come, we don’t allow time to sit and wait for Him at His well?

In John 7:27 “Now on the last day, the great {day} of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.”

God will meet you at the well. Come to His well and come often for you never know which day He will be waiting for you there. Come, Come to His well!

Bro. Bill

In the next scene of the vision, I was also marching in the ranks of this great army. Together, we made a thunderous sound as every man marched in cadence. I looked as far ahead as I could and saw Jesus at the front, He was riding on a white horse as He was leading us over the rolling hills apparently into battle.”

After returning home from our trip, I had four dreams which God gave me during the night that showed me our sabbatical was indeed fruitful and that we would never be the same again.

“There is a moment when the words inscribed on a page so precisely reflect the pursuit of human truth that the chasm between us and the Divine is bridged, and we are changed!”

Sometimes as Christians, we can be placed into a position that may seem to be too big for our wisdom, knowledge or abilities to accomplish. It is in these kinds of situations that we have to leave our own self-reliance and turn toward God.

Jesus said in Mat. 6:10, “Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” This verse gives us a model for our lives and especially in any situation which seems to be beyond our own natural abilities or power to achieve.

When asked by church leadership to take on a ministry or project we should approach the throne of God and ask how He wants this ministry or project to be done and then trust Him to reveal it to us. If we allow God to show us what the will of the Father is, then He will put His stamp on it and we will be successful in His eyes.

When my wife and I were asked by our church leadership to begin a new ministry, we knew immediately that we didn’t have a clue how to do it. We didn’t hide it from our pastors that we were clueless in this matter, in fact, we told them we hadn’t even noticed that this ministry was needed. We left the meeting with our pastors and began to ask God to show us His vision for this ministry. We knew we needed His plan to bring about His will and to complete our pastor’s vision. I hate to think about how it would have turned out if we hadn’t started seeking God first.

The vision cast by God showed us the heart of God in this ministry however, God left it up to us in how we would do things to bring His will to pass. If God had to tell us every little detail of what to do, we would be nothing more than dim-witted people.

Moses didn’t know how to build a tabernacle nor had there ever been a tabernacle on earth; Moses needed God to cast him a vision. God said to Moses, “According to all that I am going to show you, {as} the pattern of the tabernacle and the pattern of all its furniture, just so you shall construct {it.}” Ex. 25:9

When you allow God to show you His vision for a ministry or a project, you will find greater enthusiasm, and in times of doubt, discouragement or seemingly ineffectiveness, be sure and remember the given vision and hold fast to His will.

It just so happened that we got stranded in Colorado Springs and held up in a motel along the Interstate. The next day was Easter Sunday and I got up to go look outside at the beautiful snow on the mountains. As I stared at the beauty of the snow I heard Holy Spirit whisper in my right ear, “Jesus Christ whiter than snow” and then I saw a vision of His blood running down the mountain.

God wants to do more so let’s raise our level of expectancy higher than ever and see signs and wonders like never before!

God wants to do more so let’s raise our level of expectancy higher than ever and see signs and wonders like never before!