Last time we discovered that God’s Holy Spirit was part of the Creation of our world. He brought light in a place of desolation, bringing hope and joy to all.
Today we will see that the Holy Spirit also made it possible for us to be created: “The Spirit of God has made me, the breath of the Almighty gives me life.” (Job 33:4, NIV) Not only was He part of the Creation, He is the One who made us. In other words: He knows us intimately!
Jesus confirms this: “The Spirit gives life.” (John 6:63a, NIV) If He gives life, it means that He can bring anyone of us back to real living! This too is confirmed in the Scriptures: “Whoever believes in me (Jesus), as the Scriptures has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” (John 7:38, NIV) What does it mean? The Bible explains it in the next verse: “By this He (Jesus) meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.” (John 7:39, NIV)
Truly the Holy Spirit can cause us to truly live. Bye-bye darkness. I am free! Also when invited, He will never leave us or forsake us: “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you. The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?” (Heb 13:5b-6, NIV)
If we live in fear, we are missing someone very important in our lives: God’s Holy Spirit. Through Him, all fear evaporates into nothingness. After all, a life filled with fear is no life at all: “The Spirit you received does not make you salves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by Him we cry, “‘Abba, Father.’ The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.” (Rom 8:15-16).
We will no longer have fear, for we realize that we have been adopted as sons and daughter of the Most High, and we will never be forsaken again. Wow! What a promise! The Holy Spirit will be there for us all the time!
The following testimony illustrates this very nicely: KIDNAPPED AT KNIFEPOINT YET MIRACULOUSLY FREED.
“Over the years, I’ve really struggled a lot with fear. I’m a sensitive person and things in the past have just hit me really hard. Eighteen years ago I had breast cancer and that was hard. Another time, we were in a near plane crash. Another time, our little granddaughter was diagnosed with a childhood cancer called neuroblastoma when she was three years old. As of 2012 she’s l0 years old and doing very well, but it was very hard to see her lose her hair and go through so much trauma. Fear is a tool of the enemy, and the devil really does use it to try to tie us up and render us ineffective and distract us from what God’s calling us to do. That’s why I’m completely trusting God to help me to overcome this fear (Which He is doing, thank you Lord!). I cannot do this by myself; it is something that God has to help me with.
Sometimes to come against fears, to get victory over it, we have to confront them and that can be really scary; especially when they are brought to your doorstep like it was mine. About four months ago (as of early 2012) I really had to confront this fear. A fearful situation came into our lives that was totally unexpected.
We woke up at 4:00 in the morning to people yelling in our bedroom. I opened my eyes and someone was standing over me, on my side of the bed; a man totally dressed in black, except you could see his eyes, and he had a knife in his hand. I just couldn’t believe it. I closed my eyes and I thought I was having a nightmare, and I opened them again and he was still there, and I was utterly terrified. He pulled out some duct tape and he was working with it while holding the knife. He was trying to tie my ankles up and my wrists, and it was dawning on me that he was going to take me away.
The thought of having to leave my husband was terrifying and putting duct tape around my ankles and getting me ready to go out of the house was tortuous. I started kicking the man and my husband said, “Stop, Honey; he’s got a knife to your neck”! I didn’t even realize it, so I calmed down. There was another man dressed the same way with a knife over my husband. My husband had a very peaceful demeanor through this, and I’m so thankful that he didn’t blow up or get angry and set them off any more. They were constantly yelling and swearing at us through this whole ordeal. I found myself getting pulled and yanked out of our house into my own vehicle. He started putting duct tape over my eyes and my mouth, wrists and ankles and commanding me to lay down on the back seat. To feel so vulnerable and helpless and to be under someone’s control like that was just … HELL.
He pulled out of the driveway in the dark, away from my husband, our home, my safety place. I mean, it was awful. I didn’t have a clue where we were going, what he was going to do to me, or how long this would last. He was driving with his left hand and had his right hand over the back of his seat with the knife in his hand, and he kept demanding that I lay down in the back seat, and if I sat up he’d kill me, and I believed that he would. He had the knife right to my neck.
At that point, I remembered God. I did. I remembered to call out to God. I remembered He was there. I prayed in the Spirit. I remembered that praying in tongues will bring me to a place where my spirit is talking to God’s Spirit without my mind getting involved, and I just called on God. The next thing I remember after I prayed, I remembered to plead the blood of Jesus over my body. In the Bible it talks about the blood over the doorposts being protection, and I realized I needed God’s protection. And as I brought God into the picture, the next thing I remember is that Proverbs 3:5 and 6 came to my mind. Then some other verses came to mind reminding me that God is my refuge. I surrendered totally to God and His Word as the Holy Spirit brought key scriptures to my mind. The supernatural peace of God came into me. The situation hadn’t changed, but I remembered God. The fear factor was lessening as the God factor was going up; and the realization that God was greater than this fear. And if He can help me through that, He can help anyone through anything.
It wasn’t too long after that, and he stopped and pulled me out and pulled me into what I thought was a forest. And I remember thinking: ‘I am NOT going to be one of those people who are never heard from again, In Jesus’ Name’!
DUCT TAPED TO A POLE
There was a pole, and he started to use the duct tape on my knees, and he was tying me to this pole. He said, “There’s somebody behind you and if you try to escape, he’ll kill you”. I did not believe there was anyone behind me. I just did not sense it.
I could hear him leaving, and I just waited a little while, not very long – like maybe 15 seconds. Then I wiggled out of the duct tape on my wrists and pulled it off of my eyes and mouth, and I realized I was in a cornfield, and the corn was like 8’ tall, and I looked around and there was nobody behind me, It was still dark, and there was nobody around. I looked down and the tape was around my knees, and I pushed it apart and honestly, it was a miracle. The duct tape that was holding me to the pole ripped as I just put a slight pressure on it!
I broke away from there, and ran to the road. I thought in my heart: It’s important which way I go – straight, left, or right. I paused and felt God leading me to go straight. Little did I know that the man had run out of duct tape, and he had run down the road to my vehicle to get more, and he was coming back and if I had turned left, I would have run right into him!
No one prepares themselves for this kind of situation, and I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know whether to keep running or find a place, like I ended up doing, to hide. I just didn’t know what to do. But the thing that I remember is that I never felt so alone in my life. I have never had a time in my life where nobody knew where I was. It was like … nobody.
It was dark – I was in my pajamas – I was barefooted … duct tape hanging all over me. I just started running. Through the fields and hiding for awhile and praying — then I would run some more.
At one point, when I stopped and wondered what to do, I noticed a line of trucks by this trucking business. There were all these white cabs lined up, except there was only one red one. The parking lights were on and the motor was running and I knew somebody was in there and I ran. I was so relieved to see that the gate that should have maybe been locked, to hold those trucks in there, was open. And I ran in there and ran to the truck and pounded on the door and no answer. But then pretty soon I opened the door on the driver’s side and called in there, and a man was in there and he had been sleeping, and he helped me.
In Proverbs 3:6 where it says that: If we acknowledge Him in all our ways He will direct our path. HE DID! He directed me to go straight. If I would have gone left, I do not know what would have happened.
FORGIVENESS IS A CHOICE – NOT A FEELING
The two men who kidnapped me were caught soon thereafter and sent to prison, along with a third person who had masterminded my abduction. Because forgiveness is a choice and not a feeling, I have chosen to forgive these men before God. And therefore God has miraculously removed bitterness and resentment from me and He has freed me. I have found that forgiveness opens the door for emotional healing. I am sad that they have brought the penalty and consequences of this on themselves. I am sorry that they have ruined their lives by the decisions and actions they’ve made. There are a lot of people who are going through things spiritually that I went through physically. They are bound up. They are being held hostage. The devil does that; he doesn’t play fair; he hates us all, and God is there to rescue us all. I can testify He is there at the most hardest times we can imagine. He’s not just there for me; He’s there for everyone. This is why Jesus died, so that we can be free. We are born to be free. We are born to be free in our spirits. We’re born to be who God created us to be. And all of this stuff that comes at us; it is attempts by the devil to try to get us away from the original intent God had for us, and that is to be in relationship with Him and to just function in a way that is pleasing to Him. He wants to be the Lord of our lives. And believe me, He is worthy and He is able.” Written by Kathi Byker Precious Testimonies Evangelist Ministries
Rob Chaffart
(To access the entire “The Witness” devotional series, please click here.)