God's Presence

This blog is written by special guest writer Dustin Thomas. We have been talking about working together and when he sent me this I knew it needed to get posted.

Eph 2:4-6 
But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,

Over the last few weeks, the Lord has constantly been giving me the same vision during my prayer time. It begins with Jesus, when He first arrives at the gates of Heaven. He’s arriving in his crucified state: holes through His hands and feet, a bloody crown of thorns adorned on his head, scars upon scars on his back, a spear wound in his side. He’s dressed in bloody rags. He can barely stand, let alone walk.

He swings open the gates, and instead of seeing a giant, magnificent city in the clouds, instead, it opens into a giant cathedral. Huge ceilings, stained-glass windows with light pouring through. He finds Himself at the start of a long corridor with a red carpet beneath his feet. On each side of the corridor are rows of angels. In the distance He sees two thrones. In one, He sees the Father. The other throne, to the right, is empty. He knows that that throne is His, it’s where He belongs, but how can He get there in this broken state? He inches on hands and knees toward the throne. Every time he crawls past a set of angels, they bow and sing “Hallelujah! The Messiah has arrived!”

The closer He gets to God, the stronger He becomes. Suddenly, He’s able to stand. He’s still walking slowly, but He can stand under His own power. With every step, He can feel his strength returning. He looks down at His hands and notices that the holes that were once there are now gone! He looks at His feet. Those holes are gone, too! Now He is walking with great strength. The rags He once wore have become a beautiful robe. The thorny crown is now made of a shimmering gold. He steps up to the throne, and without a word, takes His rightful seat at the right hand of the Father.

For a while, I thought this was just a cool vision meant only for me, but during my prayer time recently, I received this vision with the message “I want to do this with everybody.”

What was it that caused Jesus’ wounds to heal and caused Him to regain his strength? It was God’s glory. With every step, Jesus drew closer and closer to God’s presence. That’s what healed Him. What makes this even better is that God didn’t reserve this for Jesus only. He wants to heal all of us the same way, whether they be physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual wounds.

I can only speak from my own experiences. At one point in time, I was angry, depressed, arrogant, vain, perverted, and dealing with body dysmorphic disorder all at the same time. I always believed in God, and for the longest time I thought that was sufficient enough to get what I wanted from Him. That was my mentality: what could I get from God? What should I do in order to get Him to do something for me? Sort of a “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” kind of thing.

I thought all I needed was to say that I believed in God and everything was going to go my way. I had a very shallow understanding of my Creator. Why was I so angry and depressed all the time? Why did I let such unimportant things bother me as much as they did? Why was I expending so much energy on things that will never truly satisfy me? The answer to all of these questions was because I didn’t have a true relationship with my Father in Heaven. The moment I submitted to His authority was the moment I felt the weight of every burden lift from me. The unforgiveness I was harboring in my heart from past relationships was just gone. The anger I felt because life wasn’t going the way I thought it should go disappeared. 

All wounds, regardless of the type, were healed when I sat alone and said to God “I’m leaving this up to You. I can’t handle all of this on my own. I give you my heart.” That’s where my heart has been ever since that day, it belongs to God. I love my wife more than I can even explain, but she will always remain number two in my life behind God, and I will remain number two in hers, and that’s the way it should be.

The closer I moved into God’s holy presence, the more freedom I received. Don’t misunderstand me, I’ve had the enemy throw more opposition at me every time I reach a new level with God. The enemy realizes that the more you grow in your relationship with God, the less his old tricks will continue to work, so he has to devise a new game plan to come at you with. But if we continue to walk down that corridor, and we continue to strive after God, the enemy can’t touch us.

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