“God Told Me You Had a Gun”…..Lisa’s Story

Recently, my ladies bible study group has been discussing the many aspects and types of prayer available for us to pray.  I really prefer the words, “talking to Jesus”, over prayer.  It becomes so much more personal to me when I think of prayers being a continuous conversation with Jesus every day.  It enhances my intimacy with Him and my awareness of just how interested He is in every part of my life.  And it isn’t just me speaking all the time…..He gets to talk too!  And most of the time, I write down what He says, and go back and read His words from time to time as a reminder.

We are never more anxious to receive from God than He is willing to provide.  Let’s quit acting like we are bothering God!  Beth Moore said, “Prayer is accepting a royal summons to the throne room of the king for breakfast with your dad.  He says, Come here child, I’ve got something to give you today.   And it’s just what you needed and sought and you are so relieved.”    

We don’t know what the direction will be but we know our father will give it.

When you have this kind of prayer intimacy with God, you will learn to recognize when He is wanting your attention and wants to teach you new avenues of prayer, such as warfare against a very real enemy.

So, I am going to tell you of my experience with “Lisa” a number of years back that I find amazing still, even today.   I have written of this experience before in my blogging, but I have even more revelation to it now and am still just as amazed.

 This is the story:

For weeks every time I grew contemplative or was talking to Jesus,  a picture of a hand gun would materialize in my mind.  If I was walking by a television and a program was on where a gun was being shot, I would jump as if I was the one being shot at.  A picture of a gun on a billboard would seem to be pointed right at me.  

 

The eerie feeling just wouldn’t go away.  

 At first I thought my imagination was working overtime but somehow I knew this was a puzzle I obviously was missing a piece to. I began to live every day in expectancy of finding out what this gun consciousness was about.

At the time I was leading a weekly women’s bible study and doing some lay Christian counseling as a result of reaching out to the community with my bible study. 

His gentle Spirit was teaching me how to totally rely on Him during these times for I felt so insignificant in the enormity of so many problems that women and men face.  I never wanted to do anything without His help and in my own reasoning’s as I felt inadequate within myself.  I felt it was imperative that I set “me” aside and listen to what the Holy Spirit would say in how to handle each one. 

Sometimes, I would be perplexed at what He would have me say to a woman and even more amazed when I would see her set free in areas of her life to move forward.

One particular woman, whom I will call Lisa, was a real challenge.  I learned many things as I counseled with Lisa on a weekly basis.  This middle-aged-woman had many problems and desired the Lord’s healing and direction for her life.  I would just listen to her many issues and offer support and pray for her.  Sometimes I would simply counsel her in the many challenges she faced in her sad life.

The counseling went on for many months with Lisa.  Then the visions of the gun began.  As I prayed and asked God about it I started feeling that the gun issue was somehow connected to Lisa.   

I couldn’t help but start to get nervous when she would come to our meetings carrying a backpack, wondering if the gun was in her backpack and she was going to go crazy and shoot me.   I listened to her intently in our private meetings to see if there would be a mention of guns but there never was. 

I thought about the gun almost continuously for at least 3 months while I spent time with this woman. The feeling really began to shake my faith and I wondered if I was being warned by God to stay away from Lisa.   I noticed every gun shop in any place, in any town, and it seemed like they were on every corner, though that wasn’t the case.    

I continued to pray for the Holy Spirit to reveal to me what this meant.

One night I had a dream that someone was in my front yard with a gun and it was night.  Lisa pulled up in a car and got out and this unknown person shot her and she fell dead on the lawn.  I was horrified but went to her and began to pray earnestly. 

To my amazement she was raised from the dead.  Needless to say, I prayed all the more for Lisa after this dream and wondered where all this would lead. 

Counseling her became a strain on me and I had to fight fear as this revelation became more pronounced.  I has this sense of  awareness and just “knew” that Lisa owned a gun and as I saw her growing more despondent I gave way to much prayer on her behalf (and, truth be told, mine too!)

Then one evening the most astounding revelation happened.  I was teaching at my bible study and was quite tired as the staff took over with passing an offering basket to pay for overhead costs of the study.    I sat on the stairs in front of the group of ladies preparing myself to pray for those who would come after the meeting was dismissed. 

As the offering basket was being passed I looked up just as I saw Lisa drop something into the basket that wasn’t money but something else, but I could not tell what it was.  After the meeting was all over and most of the other women had left Lisa walked over and sat beside me on the steps.

“Did you see what I dropped into the offering basket?” she asked.  I told her I had seen her drop something but didn’t know what it was.  She got up and went over to the offering and took the mysterious object out, walked over to me, took my hand in hers, and dropped a bullet into it. 

I just sat and stared at it with my mouth hanging open.

“This is your bullet isn’t it?” I whispered.

“Yes, it is for my gun,” she replied.

“God told me you had a gun,” I told her.

“I know” she said with resignation.

Lisa then began to tell me her story.  The reason she brought the bullet and gave it as an offering was because of something that had happened the previous Thursday night.

She had felt totally despondent.  She had taken her revolver, and the one bullet she kept for it,  into the closet with plans of taking her life. 

She said as she sat on the floor of the closet she lifted the gun to her head and pulled the trigger.

It would not go off.  She tried for half an hour to get the gun to discharge the bullet, but, mysteriously, it would not. 

She then broke down and cried and Jesus spoke to her heart, revealing that the ladies of the bible study were praying and the prayers had broken the bonds of death that had a deep grip on her.  

She literally could not kill herself because of the power of God and the power of obedient women to pray.  God’s overwhelming love then flooded her as she sat in the closet and broke and wept before the Lord for hours. 

She declared her life was totally turned around at that moment.

As I thought back to that  same Thursday night, I remembered that was the night I had met with our staff to pray for the ladies of the study and I was again overwhelmed with the image of Lisa and a gun.  We all then began to pray in earnest for Lisa, especially, and someone even mentioned a spirit of death over her.   

I remembered feeling a relief as we prayed that night and believed that whatever it was with the gun and Lisa, it was taken care of in the spirit that very night.  The gun awareness seemed to vanish.

I realized when I spoke with Lisa that while we were praying for her, it was the same night and at the same time that she was in the closet trying to pull the trigger. 

I have often wondered if we had not prayed what would have happened to Lisa.

I think back to this time often and use it in teaching obedience when we feel the urgings of God to seek His face on another’s behalf. 

And how to wait and trust when He is revealing something we need to see as we are praying.

I have been talking to Jesus for 45 years now, and I am still learning so much more about the many facets of communicating and obedience in the spirit realm of communication with God!

Do we ever stop learning?  I think not.

As His children He wants to teach us true Kingdom living.  He wants us to know how much He wants to use us, move through us, love through us, and reach others through our obedience and transparencies. 

In our obedience to live in Him and obey when He impresses us to move on what He shows us, we can witness mighty things happen in the here and now.