Did you wake up today to lead a mediocre life? You are called to a greater, better and higher plan.
Signs and Wonders
“Truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I go to the Father. Whatever you ask in My name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son; if you ask anything in My name, I will do it.” (John 14:12-14).
Yes, you have read that correctly, Jesus Christ told us we would do greater things than Him! Greater things than God Who took on human flesh and dwelt amongst us! Can we really take that in? Did Jesus mean this literally? How can we interpret that?
Greater than curing lepers, blind people, or deaf people? Even greater than raising the dead? Could it be that Jesus was telling us that we would literally do the works He did, but greater in number since He was ready to ascend to His Father? Do we really believe that when Jesus told us that ‘signs’ would ‘accompany those who believe’, He was talking to us. That He literally meant it when He said ‘in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick and they will recover’ (Mark 16:17-18).
For the past few years I have volunteered with a local charity in my home city of Manchester, England, where different local Christian churches, of different denominations, take it in turns to host homeless asylum seekers every night of the week—giving them a bed for the night, food in the evening and breakfast in the morning before they leave. On Saturday night it was the turn of my Citycentre Catholic church. I was often blessed to be part of the sleepover team, staying over and sharing meals. Simply spending time with these beautiful men was a blessing beyond words. Many of them were Muslim.
Chaos Theory
There were many miracles over the years. One in particular stands out, in a supernatural way. The night started, as usual, when I set off with another volunteer, a good friend of mine, to collect the men. As we rang the bell and entered the building, I was met by a lady who gave me a piece of paper with a name on it. She told me it was the name of a man who had been brought in earlier by the police from the streets in a stupor from taking drugs. Although she assured me that he was okay now after sleeping it off, I wasn’t happy with that and asked to see the man myself. When we met, I looked into his eyes and saw such darkness. I felt instantly repelled, so I told him that, unfortunately, he would be unable to stay with us that night. This was difficult because I knew it meant a night on the streets for him, but it was clearly not the right thing for him to come and stay. I explained that we had been informed he had taken drugs, that there were women at the shelter, and we had the other men to think about too.
We could not babysit one man and neglect the rest. Although he insisted that he would be okay, I told him sadly that it would not be possible for him to stay with us that night because the charity had a zero tolerance policy on drugs. He started shouting and swearing that he would go anyway, but I told him that he would not be let in without us. As he stormed off into the night, a fight broke out in another part of the room with two other men. It was chaos from the word go! Consequently, I had to inform a second man that he couldn’t join us. This also didn’t go down well. I assured him of our prayers, but this was little consolation to a man who was already irate, troubled, and probably intoxicated.
Advising God?
As we walked off together, the other men came to shake my hand, thanking me for not allowing the two men to join us since they had both caused many problems for them each night. They were relieved and so grateful for a night’s peace. As we walked along, we encountered a police van with flashing lights in the middle of the road. A police officer shouted orders for everybody to get back, stretching out his arms to keep people away from a man who lay on the ground unconscious. Another policeman knelt beside him checking his neck for a pulse because he had stopped breathing. I quickly realized that it was the first Muslim man who had stormed off minutes earlier. Immediately, I swooped under the policeman’s arms and knelt down placing my hands on him.
“What do you think you’re doing?” yelled the policeman, but I insisted that I needed to pray for him. Immediately, I called upon the Lord. ‘You breathed life into this world at the beginning of time, breathe life into this man. Jesus, You called Your friend Lazarus from the tomb, please raise this man now’. I hesitated as I thought to myself, “Who do I think I am to advise God with earthly words? This is God I am addressing.” How inadequate my human words were. It was coming from my heart, of course. Then I began to pray using the supernatural gift of The Holy Spirit which I have been blessed with—the gift of praying in tongues (1 Corinthians 12:1-11 & 1 Corinthians 14:1-5).
When My Heart Sunk
Saint Paul tells us that ‘The Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words. And He who searches the hearts of men knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God’ (Romans 8:26-27). I have no idea how long I knelt there praying, but suddenly the policeman checking the pulse exclaimed, “I can feel a pulse!!!”. My heart sang. I felt elated and could not stop thanking Jesus. Moments later, an ambulance arrived. It was such a blessing to see the heart monitor picking up a heartbeat on the screen. Again, I thanked and praised Jesus with total awe and wonder.
I had been totally oblivious to my surroundings since I had acted purely on instinct. I believe that it was God who urged me instantly to this man’s side. As I stood up, I realized that a bigger crowd had gathered. Again I was greeted with handshakes from the asylum seekers, thanking me for being open enough to pray for him.
A few weeks later, I was volunteering again at the night shelter when another Muslim man came up to me with a massive smile on his face, eager to tell me about this man that I had prayed with. He told me that the man had been addicted to drink and drugs ever since he arrived in England three years ago. When he had bumped into him just a few days earlier, he was no longer addicted to drink and drugs so he was no longer sleeping on the streets because he had moved into his own home. I was amazed all over again and praised God. However, The Lord was not finished there. In the midst of this beautiful moment, I was able to perceive a deep pain in this man sitting before me. I was able to share the Gospel with him and we prayed together. We have a God who never stops pouring out blessings.
God, indeed, is great!
We must have faith. Jesus tells us the smallest seeds of faith are enough to move mountains (Mark 11:22-25) and ‘with God all things are possible’ (Matthew 19:26). Our Triune God, The Creator, The Redeemer, and The Sanctifier; Father, Son and Holy Spirit lives inside each baptized Christian believer. We must really believe that and live it. ‘Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and for ever’ (Hebrews 13:8) and His words are ‘Spirit and life’ (John 6:63).
