Jobless—but not God-less
I was in the middle of my first year of teaching and living in rural Missouri when the Holy Spirit directed me to move to St. Louis at the end of the school year. My parents were preparing to move from their home there to another state, and I knew that somehow I needed to retain my connection with that city. Therefore, I had to move to St. Louis myself. The Lord had plans for me in that region.
I was three years old in the Lord and knew enough to seek God before I made such a huge, life-changing decision. As I drove from my parents’ home in St. Louis County that Sunday in January back to my rented quarters in the small town where I taught, I asked God to give me time to really seek Him. That meant I needed a snow day, but no snow was in the forecast. With stars twinkling, I prayed and prayed and prayed all the way home. A song I knew had these lyrics:
Reign, Lord, reign! Reign Master Jesus, reign.
Rain Your Spirit in my heart; reign Master Jesus, reign.
I changed it to “Snow, Lord, snow! Snow Master Jesus, snow,” and so on. I was twenty minutes from home on a windy back road about eight o’clock in the evening, and there in my headlights appeared the first few flakes.
Ten to 12 inches later, I had my snow day. In fact, I had a week. And then a second week. And by the beginning of the second week, I started repenting for praying so effectively—but I had my answer. St. Louis, here I come!
During the move and the first year back in the area, God taught me much of what I still lean on concerning hearing from Him for both direction and finances. Here are six of the things I learned:
Listen to Him as you go, and take the “Holy Ghost dare”—step out in obedience to the promptings you get. I needed an apartment and was heading to look at one when I felt a nudge to take an earlier exit off the highway. I obeyed and traveled that road for a couple of miles, saw nothing, and decided to turn around. I pulled off and was going to go back to my original destination when I heard Him say, “Pursue those houses.” I did, and soon saw a large sign—”Greenmar Terrace Apartments”. Following the signs, I found the complex, fell in love with it, and signed the lease for quite a bit less a month than I would pay at the place I was initially considering. As it turned out, the complex to which I was led was also much closer to the district where I was eventually hired.
Don’t claim every job you see. I made the mistake of “naming and claiming” a teaching position in nearly every district in the region. Whenever I passed a school or heard of a different district, I claimed a job there. One day, while claiming yet another teaching position, I heard the Lord say so sweetly to me, “Do you think you’re going to have the energy to teach in all those different classrooms and districts you’re claiming?” He showed me that, yes, I was right to claim a job; but then I needed to let Him lead me as I made myself available to potential districts.
Don’t give up. I continued to put out applications and resumes and followed up with as many as I could. I also subbed in a district fairly close to me. I did what I could to show myself friendly on all the job sites and to do the best job I could as a sub.
Get a backup job. This may not apply to all of you, but I obtained a “stop-gap” job at a clothing store in addition to my subbing assignments so I could make ends meet.
Tithe. Finances were tight, but I had learned to tithe. I would take my sub money and retail store checks and give exactly ten percent of the gross—the amount before taxes. Things were so tight that sometimes I had to write out IOUs to God and put them on my refrigerator until the next paycheck when I could pay Him back. Nobody had pounded this doctrine into my head; my first “church” had been a dorm room Bible study where we never took up offerings, and none of the churches in the small town where I taught my first year were a fit for me, so I didn’t stay long enough in one place to hear a tithing message. I simply saw it in the Bible, so I did it. (If you are terrified of tithing, start with a smaller percentage. Then as you get used to it, and you see that you’re not going to die, kick up the percentage over time until you are at ten percent. Once there, keep on giving. It will change your life.)
Use Scripture. Let the Holy Spirit give you Scripture to use as your lifeline and weapon of warfare as you pray. In November my first year back in St. Louis, I took a sub job for a teacher on maternity leave. That six weeks turned into the rest of the year as the new mom decided to stay home with her baby. I was thrilled, but I was only being paid as a sub and still had to work my second job. I pestered the principal several times about giving me a contract with full pay, but he became increasingly irritated with me. I knew I needed to back off. Instead, I prayed, and as I did so persistently, I received the Scripture that became my personal battering ram. It was Proverbs 3:27: “Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it.” I declared during my prayer time that my principal would not withhold good from me to whom it was due when it was in his power to do it, and I thanked God without ceasing that He would back up His Word on my behalf. Then, on Valentine’s Day, after teaching in that class since before Thanksgiving, my principal handed me a full-time teaching contract.
The goal of becoming financially secure is often tested; and some believers are tested in this more than others are. Although I don’t understand why that is, my prayer is that you will gain new strength as you endeavor to follow and obey God concerning finances and employment. Don’t give up! He will come through for you.
Dorothy
Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen. Ephesians 3:20-21
Tomorrow: Scriptures I’ve used when trusting God for finances
Read MoreI am going to McDonald’s
A little over a year ago, a godly Bible teacher, Charles Capps, passed into Heaven. He was well-known for his teachings on the power of the tongue and the importance of believing and speaking the Word of God.
The Lord used Brother Capps in a very unusual way at a critical moment in my life, in a very tense situation long ago—and he wasn’t even there!
When I was born again, I jumped in with both feet. In my twenties, I frequently went out to the streets, along with other young Christians, to witness—sharing the Gospel and praying with the lost. The joy and freedom of expressing the good news with someone who was hungry for Jesus motivated my friends and me to continue going back, weekend after weekend.
As the church I attended grew to mega-church proportions, we were blessed to sit under the teaching of some of the finest Bible teachers in the country. One of those teachers was Charles Capps. At the same time that we were hosting a growing number of national speakers, just about everything else we did in that church was becoming more and more structured and organized. This included the weekend street-preaching jaunts.
Interest in this personal evangelism had spread in the church I was attending, and leadership was put in charge of this radical group of teens, twenties, and thirties for the sake of safety, oversight, and training for those who were new to one-on-one evangelism.
One weekend evening in my late twenties, we were ready to “hit the streets”. Small teams were assigned for the evening’s adventure, and two newer believers, a young man and woman, were assigned to accompany me.
When we arrived downtown, we met under the Gateway Arch and prayed together as a large group. We then made arrangements to meet back at McDonald’s—housed on a riverboat and anchored opposite the south leg of the Arch on the Mississippi River.
My little group took off together and each of us shared with various individuals as we walked along the cobblestone road that ran parallel to the river. Toward the end of the evening, we climbed up the wide set of steps that arced toward the south leg of the Arch and began sharing the gospel with a young woman we met near the top.
She was receptive to the message, and as I was about to ask her if she would like to pray with us, I noticed that my two companions had ditched me in favor of McDonald’s—an obvious Big Mac attack. Let ‘em go, I thought; this lady wants to receive Jesus.
But just as I was about to pray with her, her eyes nearly bugged out of her head, and backing away quickly, she just took off. Huh? I was wondering, perplexed. And as I turned around, I understood why that young woman had skedaddled so abruptly.
I found myself surrounded by six to eight young men, circling closely in on me. But before I had time to get frightened, something very unusual happened.
Suddenly, I was at my church. Oh, yeah, my body was still standing on the steps going up to the south leg of the Arch and I was still surrounded by six to eight strange young men, but in my spirit I was at church. I was at a meeting in which Charles Capps was speaking, and I could see and hear everything with crystal clarity. There he was, standing behind the pulpit preaching, and I could see the scalp on his head through his familiar crew cut—that’s just how vivid this “vision” was. And he was preaching a message about Jesus in a boat in the middle of a storm.
With my body still standing on the steps leading to the south leg of the Arch, Brother Capps was preaching in his Arkansas twang, “Jesus said, ‘Let us go to the other side of the lake’ and my brother, sister, if Jesus said, ‘Let us go to the other side of the lake,’ then nothing—no devil, no storm, no wind, no waves—nothing could stop Him from goin’ to the other side of the lake.”
And with that, there I was, back at the Arch, surrounded by this group of men. I noticed Riverboat McDonald’s, and I said out loud and with great authority, “I am going to McDonald’s.”
I don’t have a clue what those guys thought when I said this, but I passed through the midst of them without so much as a finger touching my body. As I stepped out of the circle and down the steps, the Holy Ghost spoke very clearly to my heart, “Walk, don’t run. Hold your head high, and don’t look back.”
I did as I was instructed, and walked, step by step, down that wide, curving stairway. Boom, boom, boom, my steps pounded decisively as I marched to the street below.
“Oooh, baby! You got fries with that shake?” they called out after me, along with other unmentionable “compliments”.
I never looked back. When I got to the street, I crossed it with my head held high. Boom, boom, boom, my marching feet blasted as I stomped across the gangplank bridge to McDonald’s. Walking tall and in the authority of Christ, I reached the threshold. Never before had the Golden Arches looked so good.
I opened the door and stepped into the wonderfully lit, French fry-soaked atmosphere. There, seated inside, were my two young team members and everyone else. “Hi, Dorothy! What took you so long? We’ve got a seat for you!”
And as the reality of what just happened dawned on me, my knees turned to Jello and buckled beneath me—and then I got up and ordered some fries.
Brother Capps returned to that church years later and I had the opportunity to share my story with him. He didn’t say a word; he just smiled, nodded his head, and then walked away.
May the help you need be made abundantly plain by the Holy Spirit in your time of trouble. The Lord is faithful.
Dorothy
God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Psalm 46:1b
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“Ever thought you might be martyred???”
God has rescued me from dangerous situations more than a few times. I’ll be sharing three of these harrowing experiences in the next three entries.
Part of my purpose in sharing these events is to focus on one thing I’ve learned by trial and error—no two methods of deliverance will be exactly alike. Trust me—I’ve tried to use the method you’ll read about in the following account as my go-to “deliverance-from-danger” formula, but God wasn’t having it. More on that tomorrow.
Here’s the main thing I’ve learned. When you are confronted with impending trouble or disaster, you must lean heavily upon the Spirit of God. He always has a way of escape for you; your job is to stay hooked up with Him in childlike trust to find out what—if anything—He wants you to do. When you are facing sudden danger, you must let Him lead.
Tale One: Deliverance from a creepy guy in a corduroy shirt
Many years ago, I was handing out tracts with a group of friends outside of Busch Stadium, home to the St. Louis Cardinals. In front of the Stan “the Man” Musial statue, my friend Cat and I were attempting to share the gospel with a scraggly young man. He stood, facing us, his back to the curb, with something obviously hidden under his maroon corduroy shirt. A strange look came over his face as he leaned in toward us and snarled, “Have you ever considered that you might be martyred for your faith?”
Without a thought, up from my insides Scripture thundered. I spoke the words I heard: “At the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.” Philippians 2:11 and 12 just rocketed up from my spirit and flowed out of my mouth! The sword of the Spirit was in operation.
But the next thing that happened left Cat and me with dropped jaws. The man, leaning into us and threatening one minute, collapsed backward the next, falling onto the hood of the car parked behind him at the curb. Just then, some of the guys in our group approached us and asked if we wanted them to take over. Cat and I, who were punching each other in the thighs, both in shock, both thinking—that really happened?—left the fallen man to the guys.
Tale Two tomorrow.
Until then,
Dorothy
…the word of God … performs its work in you who believe. 1 Thessalonians 2:13b
Read MoreTrouble averted
I don’t have unusual leadings from the Holy Spirit on a daily basis. In fact, I don’t seek for spectacular leadings; but I do endeavor to be available if He wants to drop something into my spirit as I go about my day. I know that He truly does lead us; His leading is meant to be part of a normal Christian life; and I do my best to be consistent in the Word and prayer so that I’ll be ready and available to receive an assignment from the Lord when He decides to share something.
A few years ago I was taking my customary daily walk around the neighborhood. I have a habit of quietly praying in the Spirit as I go, praying for my neighborhood or whatever else the Lord may drop in my heart.
On this one particular morning, as I passed by a house just three doors down from mine, it felt as if I was punched in the stomach. It didn’t hurt, but it was a deep punch, nonetheless. A quiet groan came up from within me, Trouble! There’s trouble in this home. And so I prayed, listening for any further leads from the Holy Spirit. I didn’t stop my walk to knock on their door; I kept going. I didn’t know the aging biker couple who lived there; all I knew was that trouble had come to their home and that God wanted me to cover it in prayer.
When God gives an assignment such as this, your job is to first of all, pray. Let Him use you by His Spirit to cover what He’s shown you. In this case, I didn’t feel led to go talk to them that day; so when I completed my walk, I left my prayer for them in the Lord’s capable hands.
Not more than five days later as I was returning home from an errand, I saw a news crew parked on my quiet street. I took my time turning into my driveway, rubber necking at the interview occurring between a Fox 2 News reporter and my neighbor in the front yard of his house—the house of trouble for which I had prayed just four or five days earlier.
That evening on TV there he was—my neighbor with his long gray hair, leather vest, and biker tats—standing in the yard three doors down from me. And he talked of trouble—averted.
His son lives with his grandson in rural Missouri. The then five year-old boy’s mother had been barred from seeing him due to her history with substance abuse. The two “men” were batching it together in their lakeside home when one morning, while the father was preoccupied in another part of the house, the boy’s mother walked in and grabbed the little boy.
Waiting outside in the car was her druggie boyfriend, and as soon as the little boy was deposited into the vehicle, they tore out of there.
When my neighbor’s son realized his five year-old was missing, he frantically called neighbors and friends in the area. No one had seen his child.
After that, he reported the missing boy to the local sheriff and conveyed his suspicions about the child’s mother. An Amber alert was issued along with a description of the vehicle that might have been used in the abduction.
And what do you know? About three days after I was directed to pray about the trouble that had come to my neighbor’s house, an officer saw a vehicle weaving erratically down a two-lane rural highway in Oklahoma. He flashed his lights, and to his surprise, the car screeched to a stop and two people leaped out, disappearing into the woods. He was about to pursue them when he noticed a little passenger in the back seat—my neighbor’s five year-old grandson!
He recognized the boy from the Amber alert, and the process to return him—unharmed—to his father, my neighbor’s son, proceeded quickly and with great joy.
A little less than a year ago I ran into my biker neighbor while he was doing landscaping in the front yard where he’d been interviewed by Fox 2 a year or so before. It was time to tell him about the Holy Ghost head’s up that led me to pray about the trouble that had come to his family. I could tell he wasn’t sure what to make of it all, but his gruff exterior softened as he told me of the fear he, his wife, and their son had lived through before his grandson was rescued. I let him know that God obviously loved all of them quite a bit to have a stranger—me—pray for them in the middle of their trouble. And God answered those prayers—his little grandson was safely reunited with them.
May all of us grow in sensitivity, willingness, and availability to be alert for the promptings of the Holy Spirit as He leads us to pray for those who may not know how to pray for themselves.
It’s a huge part of our calling.
Dorothy
Read MoreIs it just me or the Holy Ghost?
And let the peace (soul harmony which comes) from Christ rule (act as umpire continually) in your hearts [deciding and settling with finality all questions that arise in your minds, in that peaceful state] to which as [members of Christ’s] one body you were also called [to live]. And be thankful (appreciative), [giving praise to God always]. Colossians 3:15, Amplified Bible
Typically, the main way the Holy Spirit leads His people is via the inward witness—that sense of peace or lack thereof concerning a decision they are making. Some people describe it as a “green light/red light” that they pay attention to inside of themselves. Others call it a “hunch”; some call it a “red flag” or a “check” when the guidance leads them away from an event or decision. You probably have followed these subtle signals, yourself, likely giving it little thought. For folks who spend time in the Word of God, this form of direction is generally very reliable.
Prioritize the Word of God in your life, and the Discerner will direct you by His Spirit.
However, people who insist on receiving more dramatic guidance from God place themselves in a vulnerable and potentially deceivable position, in my opinion. That’s because the Bible is “a more sure word of prophecy” (see 2 Peter 1:19, KJV), “to which you do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star arises in your hearts” (ibid, NASB). Prioritize the Word of God in your life, and the Discerner will direct you by His Spirit.
That said, at times the Holy Spirit may use more “tangible” methods to direct you. He may show you something; He may speak words to your heart; He may even direct you by giving you a “feeling” of something. If you receive His direction via any of these methods, it doesn’t mean you’re a more “spiritual” or “sanctified” person; it simply means that the Holy Spirit has information He wants you to pray about or act upon. The more willing you are to follow through with His leading—whether subtle promptings or more spectacular guidance—the more sensitive you become to His guidance.
I haven’t heard about a lot of people who have been directed by “feelings” or “sensations”, possibly because it can get confused with normal human imagination or emotions and written off as “just me”. Let me share an experience that happened to me to illustrate what I mean.
In 1997 as I was driving home one night after a meeting at church, I experienced an unnerving sense of impact to my left temple as if I was about to be struck by gunfire. I found the nearest semi-truck and drove right next to it for cover from flying bullets! Thankfully, as I precariously hugged that truck, I realized that it was the Lord giving me an intercessory assignment for someone. I entered into prayer as I pulled back from the semi, entreating God for safety for myself, my relatives, my friends, my colleagues, and anyone else in danger of impact. The sense lingered, so I continued praying both in the Holy Spirit and with my understanding until it lifted.
When I arrived home I called my friends from a neighboring church, John and Janet, who had joined us for the service earlier that evening. No one answered, so I left a message.
The next day John called and told me that he and Janet were involved in a head-on collision on their way home from the meeting. He was fine and Janet would be released from the hospital that day. John explained that upon impact, Janet, who was not wearing a seatbelt, flew over him and shattered the windshield with the left side of her head! She fractured her wrist upon impact in an attempt to protect herself, but her head was unharmed. In fact, for the next few days as she combed her hair, she pulled out clumps of it, along with fragments of windshield, leaving an unscratched, quarter-sized bald spot on her left temple! Eighteen years later, she and John are alive and well and ministering in the Arctic Circle.
The interesting thing about this leading of the Holy Spirit was that I almost blew it off as “just me”! But I took the risk of praying about nothing on the chance that it really was something vitally important—life and death important.
Have I ever prayed about nothing when I’ve experienced odd feelings? Probably. But ask Janet and John if it was worth it for me to risk praying about “nothing” that night!
I want to encourage you—if you have those odd, random feelings, just pray. Maybe it will be nothing; but maybe your prayer will be the fuel God uses to bring help and deliverance to someone else.
Dorothy
Read MoreBeing led by the Spirit requires putting God’s Word first
Sometimes the Holy Ghost seems to “tackle” you to get you to take a 180 in your life. This has only happened to me twice, once in 1986 just before my mom died, and then nearly thirty years later—just a week and a half ago—as I was preparing for an elective surgery. On both occasions, He used this method to stop me from proceeding with plans that would have ended up harming me in some way (see Double up on the Discerner and Being a prima donna vs. being led by the Spirit).
In fact, after the situation in 1986, I was doubtful I would ever experience the overwhelming oppressive-like feeling again as a guidance technique from the Holy Spirit—and that was just fine with me! I think He only does this sort of thing in extreme cases. Hopefully, I will never need to experience it a third time!
In both of those instances, however, I knew it was important to keep my Bible handy. Hebrews 4:12 states, “ For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” When you are overwhelmed in a decision, whether it’s the rare “Holy Ghost tackle” or the more common human difficulty with determining the best course, you can count on God’s Word to operate as the Discerner. In fact, to neglect the Bible in pursuit of a more personal or “now word” or leading will place you in a vulnerable, easily-deceivable place.
You are called—as a child of God—to be led by His Spirit; but you are also charged to abide in His Word. Counterfeit voices abound; many paths lead to divergent destinies; but only the Word of God will endure forever, and it declares that Jesus alone is the Way, the Truth, and the Life—and He commands you to abide in His Word. As you prioritize that Word over every other spiritual voice, you will grow in discerning the often subtle promptings of the Spirit of God. If a counterfeit arises to deceive you, you will be able to pick it out of the “lineup”—and have it arrested and incarcerated—because you’ve been abiding in the Discerner.
For the next few entries, I will be sharing various situations in which the Holy Spirit has led me. You’ll see that His guidance may differ in the way it plays out, but it is never coercive, manipulative, vainly flattering, or contrary to the Word of God.
Until then,
Dorothy
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. John 1:1
If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed… John 8:31b
I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life. John 8:12b
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