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My journey into the prophetic realm, part 12

While listening to Pastor Thomas’ sermon on Sunday, December 1, 1985, I suddenly saw that we were about to see a partial repeat of the patterns of 1981. The situation itself was new, but the patterns were old. I discerned that Pastor Thomas was playing my earlier role at Las Cruces and that he would be leaving the church on December 30, even as I had left Las Cruces on the same date in 1981.

I called for a special discernment meeting the next evening, where we might confirm this view. Not only was it confirmed, but we also were given further revelation. One saw fire trucks outside the church, as if to put out a fire. Another said, “The fire is hitting just the first two rows of the church.” Another saw the pastor trapped in the basement, unable to escape.

We saw the firetruck as the desire of men to put out the fire of the Holy Spirit. In other words, someone was opposing the move of the Holy Spirit, and we knew it was the pastor.

Two weeks later, on December 16, at our Monday evening we began to discuss church government at our men’s meeting. We established that we ought to know our callings. One of the main purposes of church government was to train and develop the members in their own callings. These discussions continued for a few weeks.

The Question of Prophets

About the same time, Bob Schuelke took me to lunch again and asked me a strange question: “Do you believe in prophets?” Of course I did! Prophets are listed among the fivefold ministry in Ephesians 4:11. If Bob had been a Baptist or Presbyterian, I would have understood his skepticism, but I thought that everyone who came from a Charismatic background would have believed that prophets are part of normal church life.

At the time, I assumed he was questioning Chuck, who openly claimed to be a prophet. But the question was about prophets in general.

In our discussion, he asked me about Pastor Thomas, and I told him that he was planning to leave the Golden Rule church on December 30.

“Did he tell you that?” Bob asked.

“No, the Lord told us,” I said.

I could see the wheels turning in his head, as he reached for his small notebook from his shirt pocket. I could see that he wanted to write down this information for future use. Apparently, he thought that I was prophesying, and that he intended to use this as a litmus test to know whether or not I was a prophet. He did not seem to understand that we all should hear the word of the Lord and speak what we hear. All may prophesy, but not all who prophesy are prophets.

For example, Caiaphas prophesied as the high priest, though he was not even a believer (John 11:51). Another interesting example is Balaam, the classic false prophet, whose prophecies about Israel are recorded as part of Scripture (Numbers 23, 24). These are examples of the sovereignty of God and how He can use even His enemies and false prophets to prophesy His word. God was not limited by Caiaphas’ unbelief nor by Balaam’s greed.

Prophecy Fulfilled

Sunday morning, December 29, Pastor Thomas did something very strange. It was not his practice to take communion every time we met, but this day he called the two elders to the front of the church to pass out the bread and juice for the communion. Then he called me to the front, then others, and soon more than half of the church was standing in the front.

I wondered what was happening. After all, it only took two to pass out the bread and juice. It was an awkward moment. After the service, people asked me, “What was that? What’s going on?” I did not know until evening.

A man named Bill Jarvis had been coming to our fellowships for the past few months. He was a disciple of Bill Britton and was well schooled on the Tabernacle of Moses. I recognized that he had some valuable teachings that we needed to learn, so I asked him to teach for me on Sunday evening, December 29. His revelation for the evening was “Crossing the River,” a reference to Joshua leading the Israelites across the Jordan River into the Promised Land.

Toward the end of his teaching, he raised his hands and began to pray. Many in the audience did the same. Suddenly, the Holy Spirit fell upon us in a mighty way for perhaps fifteen minutes. But then I noticed coldness on my back and realized that Pastor Thomas and his wife were seated behind me. When fire of God subsided, the meeting ended, and I turned around to find that the pastor and his wife were gone.

In talking to the other people afterward, I discovered that the fire of God had hit only the two front rows of the church. My wife and I were in the second row. The pastor and his wife were in the third row. We felt it; they did not—nor did anyone sitting in the third row or further back. In fact, those behind us came up to us and asked us what was going on.

So the word from four weeks earlier came to pass that the fire was to hit just the first two rows of the church.

But meanwhile, those who had just experienced this small move of the Spirit were excited. Then they noticed that I was more sober. “What’s wrong?” they asked. “The pastor left early,” I said. I reminded them of the word which we had received four weeks earlier. “This is the fulfillment of what we discerned a few weeks ago.”

Suddenly, everyone realized how serious this was. We recalled our discernment that the pastor was going to leave the church on December 30, which was the next day. So three of us resolved to pray and fast for the pastor the next day.

The following evening the men’s group met as usual, where we continued discussing church government. I thought the discussion went quite well, and I did not notice how agitated the pastor was becoming. Suddenly, he stood up, turned to our host, and said, “All I want is the communion table, because that was my mother’s!” He then stormed out of the room and the door slammed shut.

We were all surprised, stunned, and speechless. Bob Schuelke was seated by the door across from me. His eyes got wide, and his jaw hit the floor. He then blurted out, “Now I KNOW you’re a prophet!” More properly, he should have said, “Now I know that you were prophesying when you told me that he would leave on December 30.” It was indeed a prophetic word, proven by actual events, but I was not the only one who contributed to this prophetic word.

The Communion Problem

As I pondered the situation, I asked the Lord, “What is the problem here?” I then heard Him reply, “1 Corinthians 11:30.” I looked it up. It was part of Paul’s teaching on communion.

²⁷ For this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep.

My heart sank as I remembered the strange communion service, and I realized that the pastor had already intended to leave the church. He wanted to partake of communion with the church one last time before leaving. That was a sentimental gesture, but it was inappropriate. Communion means fellowship. It is a covenant with Jesus and with each other that indicates unity.

I understood the word of the Lord to mean that Pastor Thomas would die for taking communion unworthily. And then suddenly I remembered that he was the second pastor that I had seen die in battle on July 9, 1984. Up until that moment, God had caused me to forget who that was. But suddenly it was the appointed time to remember the revelation.

By the time cycles that the Net of Prayer had been seeing at the time, we knew that the pastor’s death was scheduled for April 12, 1986. I did not fully understand grace periods at the time, but I see now that God had given him a grace period in which to repent. Repentance can cancel even a death sentence. Even partial repentance can reduce the sentence to mere sickness, as Paul suggested in 1 Corinthians 11:30.

Death to Life

The following day, December 31, some of us had lunch with Pastor Thomas, where we gave the church back to him. We did not want to take his church. If we had allowed him to leave, word would have gone out that a group had stolen his church from him. We told him that it was best if we leave instead of him. He appreciated this.

A week earlier, we had made arrangements to have a prayer meeting and a time of fellowship on New Year’s Eve. We decided to go to the meeting, even though we had agreed to leave the church earlier in the day. While I was waiting for my wife to finish doing her hair, I was still grieving over the situation. I had already seen one pastor die, and there was nothing I could do about it. Would I just have to wait and watch the second pastor die as well?

I again prayed and asked the Lord, “Is there nothing that we can do?”

The Lord said, “He needs someone with the anointing to raise the dead.”

YES!! That was the answer I needed to hear! I knew exactly who had that anointing. It was Pastor Joe Mac, whom I had anointed earlier on November 10. God had already prepared the solution ahead of time.

I went to the New Year’s prayer meeting with a joyful heart.