MANIFESTATION OF SPIRITUAL GIFTS.
One particular manifestation of a spiritual gift in Krempe took me by surprise. I went to an evening prayer meeting with my father. It was held at a local residence. It was what we called a “cottage” prayer meeting, held in a home rather than in the meeting hall. All of the members began to share their prayer needs, as usual. Some requested prayer for healing from illnesses and injuries, others for the salvation of unsaved loved ones, and others for God’s provision for financial needs. Then we all began to pray at once, some in German, others in tongues. And yes, some with perhaps an element of faithless anxiety.
As the meeting progressed, the Holy Spirit came upon me in a way like never before or since. At first I wasn’t sure it was the Holy Spirit at all. I thought I might be dying. It was like an electrical charge had penetrated my body and surged from my hands up to my shoulders. As I continued to pray, the Lord fastened my eyes on a woman across the room who had requested prayer for an illness. No one was praying with her.
I instantly knew that this visitation of the Holy Spirit was not for me but for her. No one had to tell me that if I laid my hands on her she would be healed. That is the kind of knowledge one automatically knows under the influence of the Spirit.
Now, my problem was in the natural. My father would not allow me to lay hands on that woman. He saw me as the son who always had a mind of his own. This kind of action would be presumptuous – one step short of rebellion – in his mind. I knew that. If I stepped out of line and did what the Holy Spirit seemed to be telling me to do, I ran the risk of incurring my father’s wrath, which could be greater and
of more consequence than my mother’s.
So a debate raged in my mind. But not for long. I remembered how I had moved the ship in the Glückstadt harbor. On this night, the Holy Spirit was giving me orders, and my job was to obey, simply obey, leaving the outcome to God.
But I was still afraid of my father. I ducked behind furniture and began to work my way around the room on my hands and knees. With each movement of my arms the super charge running through my hands made me buck and tremble like a man with palsy. As I reached the place behind the woman, I rose up and placed both hands on her shoulders. She screamed and was jettisoned from the chair to the floor. Peeking over the back of her chair, my eyes met the eyes of my father.
“Reinhard, what did you do to her!?”
“Father, the Spirit told me to lay my hands on her.”
Before he could recover from his surprise she leaped from the floor. “Brother Bonnke, Reinhard laid his hands on me, and it was like a bolt of electricity shot through me from top to bottom. I am healed! I am healed! Praise God, I am healed!” She leaped and praised God, dancing around the room with joy.
I looked now at my father and rose from my knees. I could see that there would be no punishment for what I had done. But he seemed stunned and somewhat undone. Now that I am older, I think perhaps he wondered why the Holy Spirit would overlook the faithful pastor of the Pentecostal church in Krempe and move with a dramatic spiritual gift through the least of his children.
Indeed, I think the apostle Paul might have given him the best answer: … and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught things that are
…The world’s rejects are God’s elects.
- Evangelists Reinhard Bonnke (Living A Life Of Fire)