How He Loves Us

“We’ve just been singing a song about how much God loves us and I feel like I am supposed to tell you that. . . ”I had gone into Country Mart after one of our worship and prayer meetings at RHOP and noticed a woman holding her neck with one hand while pushing her grocery cart with the other, visibly wincing in chronic pain. Now, I’d like to say that I acted just like Jesus and went immediately over to minister to her, full of power and love and anointing to heal, but the truth is I acted more like Jonah, ducking my head and heading for Tarsus—er, the chip aisle, arguing with the Holy Spirit. “Lorrrd…..can I pleeease just get my chips? I mean, I’ve been praying for people for the past TWO HOURS and since I prayed for everyone in Coweta, that means I already prayed for her annnyway….” But He wouldn't relent and since I’ve been “in the belly of a whale” more times than I care to admit, I decided to take the risk of feeling foolish and “put feet to my prayers” as Lou Engle often says. Sometimes God will use us as part of His answer.On that particular night, we’d sung “How He Loves Us” so many times that I had been tempted to slide a new chord chart over onto the worship leader’s music stand as a “hint”—but thought better of it, and remembered that the reason we need to sing the same thing over and over is not because God didn’t hear us the first time, but because WE didn’t hear us the first time. And if ever I would need to remember singing about how much He loves me, it would be in those coming months that would be full of change and transition and uncertainty. Sigh. But I digress…I watched the woman walk out with her groceries and had to leave my bag of chips with the cashier to go out after her. “I’ll be right back, I promise!” I ran out to find the woman about to get into her car, still holding her neck. “Excuse me, Ma’am? I couldn't help but notice you are in a lot of pain. Can I pray for you?” She hesitated, taken aback and then nodded weakly. I prayed a simple prayer asking God to heal her body and nothing seemed to happen except that I felt like a nut ball and almost wished a whale would come swallow me up, but I felt led to ask her name and she said, “Angela”. I smiled, “You know, Angela means messenger and I feel like I am supposed to be your messenger tonight. I’ve just come from a prayer meeting where we’ve been singing about how much God loves us and I feel like God wants you to know that—that He loves you and your life has value.” She began to weep then, and told me how she had contemplated suicide that week and had asked God to show Himself real to her. As we talked about His love for her, she suddenly started twisting her neck from side to side and looked at me incredulously, “My neck! It doesn’t hurt!” Then she stopped and stared at me for a second and asked, “What church do you go to???”Many people think the prophetic has to be some spooky-spiritual thing where we tell people things about their past or future that we couldn't possibly know and while that may happen occasionally, Revelation 19: 10 says that “the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” I didn’t need to see a vision or have a giant scroll unroll from the sky to tell this woman God loved her. I simply shared with her the testimony of what Jesus had already done in my heart that night—told me how much He loves me.A couple weeks ago, I took a picture of the sun breaking through the clouds. It gave me a burst of hope and since He has sent me “pictures of His love” many times, I decided to print it and share it. The woman I gave it to held it to her chest and with tears streaming down her face said, “you have no idea what this means to me…I’m gonna hang this on my mirror so I can see it every day and remember that breakthrough is coming…”Another young mother recently told me that she had kept a text message with a verse and encouraging word I had sent on her phone two years ago and kept reading it over and over again during tough times. She had been ill at the time and recently divorced with two young boys, one with special needs. She has since graduated and has a new job that she loves. “I literally don’t think I would have made it through nursing school if it hadn't been for that word of encouragement you sent me…thank you so much.”One definition of prophesy is “to speak as a mediator between God and humankind or in God’s stead.” Why not send a verse or a picture to someone today to “prophesy” life over them? You are God’s messenger. Would you please consider partnering with us in this work of prayer and missions by making a tax-deductible donation to our ministry? We have several specific needs right now such as 1) Savannah's tuition to Forerunner Christian Academy; 2) A fence that is in need of repair; 3) a Mac laptop so I can continue to send out newsletters while I am in Kansas City. You can donate here by clicking on the button below, or mail donations to: Frontier Missions, Vanessa VanCleave, P.O. Box 374, Coweta, OK 74429. Thanks so much!