A Fool for Christ: Jacqui's Faith Journey- Part 5
Hi friends! This is the final part of Jacqui’s faith journey that will be shared. I am so thankful that she has given us a glimpse into some of the things that the Lord has done in and through her. Jacqui, thank you for sharing part of your journey so that we may be spurred on as well. I always loved how you referred to one of your friends as one of the stars in your life. You are that to me and so many others. Now on to part 5 of Jacqui’s journey. Enjoy!
Over the years, I would somehow talk one of my dear friends, Tracy, into going to Russia with me for these conferences. Even though she had a fear of the cold, almost a cryophobia, she would still come with me in the dead of winter. We would have so much fun, loved each other so much, and were a good balance for one another. She was incredible. If anyone wanted someone who was an academic, looked to what the Word said, and did not get too “woo, woo” about a situation, she was the person to go to. What I mean by “woo, woo” is getting a little bit too focused on the demonic realm and the supernatural. I love my charismatics, but that was just not her approach. Yet we still know that we live in the midst of it.
I think what happened next speaks to divine appointments and realizing that wherever we’re at is not an accident for time and place. While I did not focus heavily on the supernatural realm in the natural, it was always something that I was open to and considered. One day, my friend called me crying. She told me that she had the most horrific dream and needed to talk and pray with me about it. I told her to tell me what it was, but she replied, “No. I don’t even want to say it unless we’re on church grounds.”
We decided to meet in the parking lot of Calvary Chapel, about 20 miles away, in about an hour and a half. Now this was not what you would typically think of when you imagine some type of holy ground. The church was in the midst of modern America with a coffee shop and bookstore nearby. Yet somehow being there and sitting in the car while staring at the front of the church allowed her to feel safer. We prayed, and then she began to tell me about her dream.
There was a man. He was bald and had big eyes with huge circles. His eyes didn’t seem to fit his face. It was almost like his face was a mask and he was in a disguise. He was medium statured and wore clothes that were not modern but not old. It was something similar to a collared shirt with a heavy coat, but not like a North Face jacket. He was someone you could not place, yet the authority that he came in with did not go along with his appearance. He was a horrific looking man because he was not dead but not alive.
I’ll try to make this as gentle as possible, but in the dream he was devouring people. I’ll let your imagination wander and not deeply describe what she saw in the dream. His intent was destroyer. The image she had was so vivid that it was like a photograph. It was as if it was intentional that it was on her mind, as if she was seeing things that she shouldn’t really be seeing. It was as if a veil had been lifted.
Although she couldn’t understand what the dream meant, the sense of doom that it left her with was very profound. As we prayed I had a strong sense that there was something more to it. I said, “Tracy, I don’t think this is just any ordinary nightmare. I think this is a warning for us for something that’s going to happen because I have no interpretation. We need to remember this and file this away because I think it’s going to be handy.” We made that decision and left that there.
Eight months later, Tracy and I found ourselves once again in Russia in the middle of winter. We were traveling to St. Petersburg to a home church with some young Russian women that we were taking with us and our translator. Some very precious cargo I would say. We were standing in this old and beautiful train station that morning. It’s everything we probably think of when seeing a Bourne movie. It was very Prague, very Eastern Europe. The train station was filled with families, women, children, and men. It was packed with people.
I was getting a coffee and trying to keep an eye on our group when suddenly I had this sense of nausea and doom. I can’t even explain it. It was like the lights went down, even though they didn’t go down. There was a sense that I was almost in a different mode. I wondered, “What is happening?”
I looked over from the coffee bar and I saw a man that looked neither here nor there, neither alive nor dead. There was something very odd about him. He was walking very boldly but was nondescript. I immediately knew it was something I had to pay attention to. Then, in that moment, Tracy’s dream from months ago came to my mind. It was like a revelation.
I stood there and instinctively looked over at her. Tracy was sitting on a bench a few yards away with this look on her face. She was nearly in tears. I mouthed to her, “Is that him?” She said “Yes.” He was an exact match for the man she saw in her dream.
In that moment we quickly grabbed our group together. There were some mighty warrior women with us. We were in triage mode, there was no time to explain what was going on. Everyone just clicked in with the Spirit. We began to pray for God’s divine intervention, for His power, for Him to conquer whatever evil was coming in and whatever intent that man had. There was nothing that we could do other than petition God.
When we opened our eyes, we saw the man was surrounded by Russian guards carrying machine guns. They grabbed him and took him out of the train station. To this day, I don't know what that was all about. On this side of heaven, I may never know if that man was a spiritual being or an earthly being up to something evil. Regardless, it really impacted me. It was a reminder to listen to God and to be open to the supernatural in the natural.
I would say my life is very ordinary, but those kinds of experiences have helped me live in an extraordinarily aware way. All things have become new, old things have passed away. We have the Holy Spirit in us. We have the living God in us. As we live, think, walk, and become more aware, God will trust us with more and more. I think the key to it is that while we can be in these situations, we don’t carry it. God doesn’t want us to hold on to it. That’s not our burden to carry and it’s not our identity. We did what God asked us to do in the moment. We listened and responded and now we need to move along with our day. We don’t let the darkness of this world and the spiritual realm get us down. We live in that awareness but are not fearful.
Circling back to that idea that we began with of being a fool for the Lord, I would just say let me be more foolish. Let me be more foolish for Him. There are different translations of the Bible that I love, such as NASB and New King James, but I have a secret. Once in a while, I have been ministered to and encouraged by the Message version of scripture. So here it is, the Message version of 1 Corinthians 4, where Paul writes:
It seems to me that God has put us who bear his Message on stage in a theater in which no one wants to buy a ticket. We’re something everyone stands around and stares at, like an accident in the street. We’re the Messiah’s misfits. You might be sure of yourselves, but we live in the midst of frailties and uncertainties. You might be well-thought-of by others, but we’re mostly kicked around. Much of the time we don’t have enough to eat, we wear patched and threadbare clothes, we get doors slammed in our faces, and we pick up odd jobs anywhere we can to eke out a living. When they call us names, we say, “God bless you.” … 1 Corinthians 4: 9-13 (MSG)
That to me is the most exciting life. That’s the one that I’m interested in. We can always read it again, in ESV, NIV, but boy we’re actors in the theater that no one wants to buy tickets to. We think about the Renaissance and the imagery about the fool and folklore. The person may look like the lowest, but often in Shakespearean times, and even Punch and Judy, the fool is the one that tells us the unbearable truth. The hard truth. So, Paul’s analogy in 1 Corinthians 4 gives me great courage.
As I age, I want to not only be wiser but also a bigger fool for Christ. That would be my hope. In whatever place I’m at, I want to enjoy seeing people have those light bulbs come on. That Jesus is real. That He loves them very much. That salvation is like it was for me when I surrendered, a moment away. That the transformed mind, that’s not conformed to the world, can happen in a second. To this day, if I was to say what is my calling, it would be to help people understand Jesus better. That’s the thing that makes my heart beat.
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