Category Archives: Angels, Miracles and the spirit world

He said it 3 times

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God doesn’t waste His breath. He just expects, like a good Father, that if He says something, we’ll do it. But on rare occasions, He’s said something three times. So, probably, whatever He said was important. One of those places is in Daniel chapter 8, the chapter I’m making the next video on currently. But let’s start off with what’s probably the most famous example of the Lord saying something three times.

After His resurrection, Jesus was with His disciples beside the Sea of Galilee. They’d just finished a fish supper that Jesus had prepared for them and it says in John 21:15-17, “So after they had dined, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me?’ He said to Him, ‘Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my lambs’ . He said to him a second time, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me?’ He said to Him, ‘Yes, Lord, You know that I love You.’ He said to him, ‘Feed My sheep’. He said to him the third time, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me?’  Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, ‘Do you love me?’ And he said to Him, ‘Lord, You know all things. You know that I love You.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed My sheep’”.

That’s an amazing passage in Scripture. Jesus told Peter three times, “Feed My sheep.” It must have been important to the Lord that He did something that emphatic and insistent. Feeding His sheep, teaching, instructing, nourishing and guiding the Lord’s sheep, His flock of believers is obviously just as important as it gets in God’s eyes.

And strangely, another time in the Bible it says that Peter was told something three times from God, in no uncertain terms. In Acts chapter 10 Peter was in Joppa in northern Israel. Peter was the head of the growing group of believers who spread Jesus’ message and truth, after He’d ascended to heaven years before. Peter was on a house top, in prayer, when in a vision he saw a sheet let down from heaven with all kinds of “unclean” animals. The Laws of Moses gave strict rules for the Jews as to what animals were “clean” to eat, permissible, and which ones weren’t.

So Peter sees this sheet coming down with these “unclean” animals and then he hears God’s voice, “Arise, Peter! Kill and eat!”  Peter, being a righteous Jew replied, “Not so Lord, for I’ve never eaten anything that’s unclean.” And the voice said to him, “What God has cleansed, you do not call common.” (Acts 10:13-15)

It says, “This happened three times” (Acts 10:16) and then the sheet was let back up to heaven. It sounds like Peter was arguing with God but this seemed so contrary to everything Peter thought was righteous. Then it says that immediately there was a knock at the door downstairs at the house Peter was at. And the Lord told Peter that there were three men there who’d come to see him and that Peter should go with them, “doubting nothing”. (Acts 10:20)

“What’s the big deal with that?” you might say. The big deal is that these men at the door were Romans, “Gentiles”. The Jews weren’t supposed to have anything to do with Gentiles and certainly not go to their house. But Peter went, as the Lord had so firmly told him. The result? Peter preached to a big gathering of Gentiles,  telling them about Jesus and they all experienced the infilling of the Holy Spirit, just as the first disciples had in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter 2.

Nowadays it’s easy for us to not appreciate all this. But it was a very, very big deal at that time. Basically this event was when the Lord opened the door clearly to non-Jews to receive all the blessing and provision of His promises, breaking down the wall between the Jews and the Gentiles, making it possibly for anyone through Jesus to receive salvation through Him. But God had to tell Peter plainly and emphatically, three times, that this was of Him and that Peter should go and flow with it, “doubting nothing.”

In Daniel chapter 8 something similar also happened. In a vision, Daniel was by the river Ulai, in what’s now modern Iran, and the angel Gabriel was commanded to explain what Daniel had just seen, a goat and a ram clashing in battle and the goat conquering the ram. But there was more to it, much more, and Daniel tells us he just didn’t understand it. But the angel Gabriel then tells Daniel three times in two verses that “at the time of the end shall be the vision”. (Daniel 8:17-19)

Daniel chapter 8 is a somewhat difficult chapter to understand or even to teach. Prophecy teachers through the years have had some huge debates about parts of it and I’ve been in some of those debates. Some say that it’s all already been fulfilled. But then we can go back to the words of Gabriel, spoken three times to Daniel, “at the time of the end shall be the vision.” At the time of the end. And we’re not there yet. But we may be getting real close.

[Since completing this blog post, I’ve also completed the full video on Daniel chapter 8. That video in English can be seen here.]

When God says something three times, it’s important. Whether it’s to feed the flock of God, or to not call unclean what God has cleansed, or that the prophecies of God are going to have a future, endtime fulfillment, God thought those were important enough to say it three times. Lord help us to get the point, to believe it and act upon it.

 

Red lights and the Sabbath

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I was out for a walk. I think it was a Tuesday. I had so much to do that it was really weighing on me. In Nehemiah it says “the people had a mind to work.” (Nehemiah 4:6)  I guess I’m like that sometimes. I have so many things that I feel I need to do and they all seem to be within God’s will and the way He is leading.

But sometimes I don’t take a break. Or I have to make a conscious effort to do so. Also, I am not one who is really feeling bound in a legal sense to “keep the Sabbath”. Paul said “One man esteems one day above the other, another esteems ever day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.” (Romans 14:5)

So I don’t have a real big thing about not working on Sundays. And I had worked the rest of the afternoon Sunday after I got back from church. But I wasn’t feeling really good. I just couldn’t understand why. I was thinking about all I had to do as I was walking down the sidewalk towards the park.

Red ball in yard-smallI finally just shot a quick prayer up to the Lord to please help me and give me some hint or nudge as to what was wrong. Immediately my attention was drawn to a bright red lawn ornament in a yard I was passing. It was the only thing red in the whole scene I could see.

I didn’t get it. So I “thought” to the Lord, “What does that mean?” Again immediately He turned my attention a different direction and down at the end of the street was a bright red stop sign.Stop-Sign-Front

“Stop.”

“Oh. I get it. You want me to stop. You don’t want me to keep putting my shoulder to the bolder, to take up my cross, to lay down my life and to keep sacrificing and getting things done for You. You want me to take a day off. It doesn’t matter if a bunch of stuff doesn’t get done today. I can do it tomorrow. Maybe I could have even just taken the day off on Sunday like You were talking about on the mountain with Moses. OK, I get it. Yes sir; good idea.”

 

And this has happened before. I’m one of those who don’t believe we are still under the Laws of Moses. If you want some real controversy, start getting into that subject. This may mean I’m an Antinominalist. But I’ll need to do some more theology reading before I’m sure about that.

But what I’ve found is that there are all kinds of good reasons and wisdom in the Old Testament law. Yes, I eat pig. But I sure want to know it’s been overseen by government regulations or I might get trichinosis. Pig was considered unclean in the Mosaic Law and there were oodles of requirements and commandments which all had a huge amount of wisdom and reason to them. So many of them were quite scientific as well, even though back at that time they might not have had the knowledge that we do now.

I’ve learned though experience that “if you don’t make an offering, sometimes God takes a collection”. If I don’t just take a day off once a week, I end up really getting run down and tired in the next few days. When the Communists took over Russia, they tried to institute a 10 day working week, instead of 7, just to get more labor out of everyone. But it didn’t work. We just seem to have some kind of inward clock that says we need to knock it off after around 7 days. Even if we are no longer under the binding legalism of the Mosaic Law, we ignore its wisdom at our peril.

Well, thank the Lord for the operation of His Holy Spirit. On that walk, the Spirit was there to answer my prayer and even use the only red things that I could see, first the lawn ornament and then the stop sign, to get through to me that it was time for a day off.

If you’re feeling you are no longer under the law of Moses and you’re a “free man” now, you’d still better watch out if you ignore the wisdom and will of God. You’re safest if you are operating with the directions of the Holy Spirit. Then you may still be able to be guided by the Lord. And that’s really what it’s all about. “If you be led of the Spirit, then are you not under the Law.” (Galatians 5:18)

Miracles Per Hour

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Miracles Per Hour-flattenedI was thinking tonight about the idea of “miracles per hour”. I’d just told one of the teachers at school about what happened to me last week. I wrote up that and posted it here under the title “God’s Little Miracles.” So she said, “Wow, you were really lucky.” That’s often how people look at such things when they don’t have a life based on faith in God.

But it got me thinking about what happened last week. It wasn’t luck, it was a miracle. And I thought about how I’ve been in places where the “miracles per hour” were pretty high. But in other places and at other times, there really didn’t seem to be very many miracles happening at all.

And I sort of envisioned some place in the heavenlies where the “Angels’ Regional Command Center” is, or even the local command. It’s pretty clear from the Bible that there are different ranks and orders of angels and I can only assume they must have organization and communications of all kinds. And I assume angels must even be able to measure quite a lot of things that we hardly even have names for. Do you think they have some gauge somewhere that measures “miracles per hour”? Do they determine between “miracles that were recognized” and the ones that went unrecognized?

Let’s face it, there are oodles of miracles every day that we don’t recognize or that don’t appear to us as miracles. I drive 30 miles a day on one of the busiest highways in the US. Every day I get home safely, I know it’s because of the protection of the angels of God. All the things that don’t happen every day, the crazy drivers we don’t encounter, the germs that don’t take root in our bodies, so many things are part of God’s supernatural protect which we don’t usually acknowledge or even think about.flat tire picture-flattened

But at other times in my life, I’ve been in situations where there was a pretty high “miracles per hour” reading. And that’s fascinating to me. Why are some  times and places seemingly more spiritual than others?  I spent the summer of 1971 witnessing daily on the streets of Berkley, California and it was one of the most spiritual times, full of miracles, that I’ve ever experienced. The “miracles per hour” were really high and the friends I worked with back then just almost took it for granted that miracles would happen that day. The spiritual world just seemed much closer and more real, regularly manifesting itself, both the good spirits of God and the evil spirits of Satan. So many people were coming to crises and life-changing experiences at that time and for those of us who were working for the Lord, it was a very busy time. And I think the angels and their local and regional commanders were really busy, really working overtime, if that’s the right way to express it, because there were lots of spiritual manifestations back then. Another time like that for me was eastern Europe in the 1990’s.

In the early church, it says at times “many wonders and signs were done by the apostles.”  (Acts 4:23, 5:12, 14:3) It must have been that miracles were almost commonplace and just expected daily, because they were happening so often. The “miracles per hour” meter at the angels’ office was really buzzing. Maybe they have one to register “recognized miracles” too? Miracle car picture-flattenedThose are the ones that not only help people but they’re also recognized by folks here in this world and we’re struck with awe at the power of God and our faith is increased, often dramatically.

But equally, and sadly, it seems our unbelief has almost a power to halt the Lord’s miracle working power. It says of Jesus, “He did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief.”  (Matthew 13:58) Think of it. Jesus Himself was hindered by the unbelief he encountered in some people. But when He was to do some of His greatest miracles, He put everyone out of the room except Peter, James and John, His closest disciples with the greatest faith. (See Luke 8: 51-54) He created an atmosphere of faith around Him. Of course with Jesus the “miracles per hour” were just at the maximum since it was the Lord Himself here on earth in His ministry. But the early apostles carried on the ministry of miracles. And if you know anything of some of the great people of God after that, Saint Patrick for example or St. Francis and many other lesser know people of God, miracles were a regular part of their lives.

So often we’re like the ones of old, “their eyes were closed” (Luke 24:16) and we just don’t recognize and see spiritually what’s happening right in front of us: an astounding act of God. But He’s still very much the God of miracles. And you may find yourself in situations sometimes where the “miracles per hour” at the local angels’ headquarters is really rising. God bless you with faith for, and the eyes to see, miracles.

 

God’s Little Miracles

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arch-angel-by-clay-wrightDo miracles happen? Do angels exist? I’ll tell you what happened to me last night. You decide.

After my evening’s English teaching was finished around 8:30 PM, I was asked to be the last one out of the building and to lock up. But last night, when I set the automatic locking and alarm, it just didn’t work. The door didn’t lock. I was alone outside a building full of expensive equipment, located in the midst of a low income housing project in a high crime part of my city.

I phoned my boss to tell her what had happened.  It went to voice mail. I looked around outside the building to see any familiar face from the school or the students. There was no one around except a tall African-American stranger in his twenty’s, talking on his phone 10 yards away. I asked him if he lived in the housing complex or knew who was in charge. He was friendly but told me he didn’t. I basically was at a loss as to what to do. I felt I couldn’t just drive off and leave all within the building open to anyone who would wander in overnight.

I talked a bit more with the African-American guy, the only person anywhere around. At length he offered to phone the city emergency number. I ended up explaining things to the police. They told me they could notify police that patrolled that part of the city that there was a door opened. But beyond that there was nothing they could do. I was really on my own and it was getting later. I phoned my very elderly parents to tell them why I wasn’t there by now and about what had happened.

As it got later and later, I introduced myself to the guy who was still there and had made the call for me. He said his name was Dontre. I was counseling with him and asked what he thought would be any idea. So he said I could try to go to the housing complex office and see if anyone was there. I was getting desperate and I told him I could try that. Dontre said to walk about 50 yards one direction, then go to the far end of that parking lot, turn right and farther down that way was the office.

I headed out, 50 yards in the dark, left turn and another 70 yards, turn right and I as I walked on, I could see the office up ahead. Then I heard a voice.

“Hi Mark!” No, it wasn’t the audible voice of God. But over on a bench in the dark was one of the teachers who teach in the English school I work at. I nearly dropped my teeth. I went over to her as she was for some reason outside in the very late evening alone, on her cell phone. It turns out she lives there at the housing complex. She knew how to get hold of the maintenance guy in order to find some way to lock the building up.

She and I walked back to the unlocked door. I’d only been gone barely 5 minutes but when we got there, Dontre was no longer anywhere to be seen. He’d been there on his cell phone for around 45 minutes right there before that but then he was gone.

“Mark, is that all?! You call that a miracle?! That was just happenstance, a coincidence!”

Oh, yeah? If you’d seen this in a movie, you’d roll your eyes and say, “Sure, sure; that’s so totally unlikely that he’s going to meet up with a woman teacher from his school out in the parking lot 200 yards away from the building in a high crime part of town late at night!”

For me it was a real act of God and His love and providence. I was in a fix and felt torn between my responsibility to my parents and my responsibility to see that the building was locked up. So that was one heck of a “coincidence” that I’d run into one of the main teachers in the school in the late evening so far away from where I’d been. She was able to take over getting the maintenance crew there to safely lock up the school and I could drive home.

And it’s funny how Dontre just disappeared like that, no? Angels do that. OK, I’m not utterly sure he was an angel. But if not, he sure was used of God at that time to really be a help to me. guardian-angelsEarlier, while he was still around, I was getting on to the fact that the young man I was talking to was possibly not really a normal human being as he looked to be. So I asked Dontre, “What do you think I should do?” He immediately answered, “You should think about your family, always put your family first.”

I am certain that the Lord miraculously led me last night to get out of a difficult and dangerous situation. As for Dontre, it’s like the Bible verse that says, “Don’t forget to show kindness to strangers for by doing so, some have entertained angels without knowing it.” (Hebrews 13.2) And the whole event last night reminds me of another verse about angels. “The angel of the Lord encamps around them that fear God and delivers them.” (Psalm 34:7)