I'm not going to lie, going in, I was both excited and a bit nervous- I'm not very good at distinguishing God's voice from my own thoughts. And intercession is all about waiting for God to speak to you and then praying for that specific thing that He told you. So I was a bit apprehensive. I think we all were, though.
My intercession group was really good. There were five of us students plus two leaders, including one of my small group leaders. For the next few weeks, we will be praying for the country of Bhutan, and today, we were specifically praying for the king and queen there. We began by praying praise to God, and welcoming Him to this place, and asking Him to remove any outside distractions and to give us a clean conscience for our time, so that we could focus on Him and what He had to say,
Then we were all silent for awhile while we listen for what God had to say to us.
Once that time was over, we went in a circle and shared what we had received from God. And they all tied together- it was really cool. I won't go into detail about what we all got from God, but if you want to hear more, feel free to ask me sometime! All I'm going to say is I received a few pictures from God that first time. Then we went back to God for clarification on the images that some of us received, the ones that were unclear (like mine. And Keisha's). After this, we began praying.
While we were praying, suddenly the word "Nahum" came into my head. I was pretty sure it was a book of the Bible, so I checked. Sure enough, it is a short book at the end of the Old Testament. So I flipped there. I didn't get a specific chapter and verse, so I just looked over the whole book (it is quire short). At first, I thought it was crazy, because the subject of the book had nothing to do with what we were praying about! But then I saw Nahum 1:15 "Look, there on the mountains, the feet of one who brings good news, who proclaims peace!" And this fit exactly in with what we were praying about and hearing from God.
So the whole intercession experience went really well. I really enjoyed it, and it was so, so cool to see these little pictures or thoughts/feelings coming together, when they seemed so random at first. It was awesome :) We serve a great, amazing God, you know!
Then we went to class, learned a lot, had lunch, and after lunch, we had small group. Near the end of small group, our leaders suggested that each week, we lift one specific person from our group up to God and ask Him if He has anything to say to them through us. So we did so for one girl, who first told us some things that she has been struggling with spiritually. So we prayed, and then sat silently asking God if He wanted to say anything through us. Again, I received an image in mind, this time with an explanation for it. We all shared and then went on to pray for this girl. However, there is another girl in my small group who has been experiencing severe back pain this week. So we decided to pray for her as well. We all laid our hands on her and prayed for healing. After, we asked Ashley if her back was feeling better.
"Not completely. I mean, it feels a little bit better but I'm still in pain," she told us.
One of the things that we have been learning this week is that we need to be persistent with God. In Matthew 7:7, it says "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you shall find; knock and the door will be opened to you." Our speaker this week, Paul, explained that this isn't just a one time thing- it is knock continuously. Don't knock then wait; knock until you get an answer. Maybe I'll talk about that more another time.
So anyway, we decided to pray for Ashley again. And then again. And still her back hurt, but only in one spot now. So a few of us laid our hands directly on that spot and we prayed yet again. Suddenly, Michele, one of my small group leaders, got up and came excitedly over to place her hands on Ashley's back. After she finished off with her prayer, she explained that she had suddenly felt pain in that exact spot.
We turned to Ashley again. "How is your back now?" we asked her. And she moved. She stretched her back. She rolled her shoulders.
The pain was completely gone.
It was so cool!
Tonight we had a "love feast". We basically had the Last Supper. We ate upstairs, in the Upper Room (aka the lounge) on the floor (it was super pretty!). We ate unleavened bread and some other things, people recited poetry and played songs. It was really neat!
So that was today. It was a really good day :)
Blessings,
Katie
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