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EXPERIENCES IN THE SPIRIT WORLD SERIES LIVING IN AN OPEN VISION We will cover a series on the
experiences in the spirit realm. What we will be doing is to dwell more on
the deep things in the spirit but on the experiential side. It is something
that you find it hard to define but we will attempt to do so. The majority of
the people do not know what it is like to really be in the depths of the
spirit. If we have an idea of what the spirit realm is like it is possible to
get motivated by it. So our purpose is to share some experiences from the
spirit realm that could make you desire to spend more time with God in order
to want to move into that realm. II Cor. 12:1-4 I must boast; there is nothing to be gained by it, but I will go on to
visions and revelations of the Lord. I know a man in Christ who fourteen
years ago was caught up to the third heaven - whether in the body or out of
the body I do not know, God knows. And I know that this man was caught up
into Now Paul was educated and he would not
be short of words as far as the average man is concerned. So you could
imagine the impact of what he is saying. This is not an ordinary man who
lacks the vocabulary. Paul was brought up at Gamaliel's
feet. He is one of the most highly educated people in his days. And for him
to make a statement that he has been in the spirit realm, and that when he
came back he could not describe what it was like, imagine the impact of that.
It was just like a Noble prize scientist who is on the top echelon of
intellectual ability coming back from the spirit realm and say I could
describe atoms, molecules but I can't describe what is there. It would have
the same impact. Paul was above the ordinary in every thing that he pursued
in God. So there is a spirit realm, which is quite hard to comprehend, and we
want to talk about something in that area that could motivate us deeper into
that realm. Gal. 5:16-19 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and do not gratify the desires of the
flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires
of he Spirit are against the flesh; for these are opposed to each other to
prevent you from doing what you would. But if you are led by the Spirit you
are not under the law. Verse 25 If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. There are different levels of being in
the Spirit. A person can call him or herself Spirit filled but yet lives in
the flesh. There are different levels of being in the Spirit and there are
also things to do in order to keep being in the Spirit. The vast majority of
the Let me just give you a few tips here.
If you ever worry about anything on this earth, you have just moved out of the
Spirit. Do you know that Jesus never worries? He himself said in Matt. 6 look
at the birds of the air and the grass in the field. They put their trust
entirely in the hands of the heavenly Father. Jesus rebuked, exhorted and
told the disciples they must not worry. Most of us know Matt. 6:33 which
says, "Seek ye first the The other conditions are mentioned
prior to verse 33. You have to read first from verse 25 - 33. And those are
the other conditions. If for a moment you worry about your needs you have
just stepped out from the realm of the Spirit to the realm of the flesh. This
is Jesus himself speaking in Matt. 6. So that’s just one of the small points
I am talking about. It looks like major point but that’s only a small point.
Being in the Spirit, living in the Spirit and maintaining in the realm of the
Spirit is not as easy as people make it. A lot of
people go in and out of the kingdom all the time. They say I am abiding in
the vine. But most of the time they are pulling away from the vine and then
coming on again. Then they ask Jesus, Jesus why do I not have fruit. You say
that if I abide in the vine I will bear much fruit. Jesus says you are
abiding some of the time. Most of the time you are running around. Those
little time that you have with Jesus, He would quickly channel all the
nutrition to you so that you could bear fruit. And just as you got a few
droplets you pulled off and you went aside again. No wonder it takes a long
time to bear fruit. Now some of those things that we are going
to talk about are from the experience. Sometime back in the prayer series we
mentioned that there was a time I prayed 48 hours in tongues just to see what
it was like. And I just briefly mentioned that after that it was like living
in an open vision, where it looks like if you were looking out at people and
if a demon came across the room you also see the demon there. Usually some
people would see it through the discerning of spirit. And they see it in the
flash or for a while and then the vision disappeared and they are back to
their natural sight. But living in an open vision is to see
all the time. I am not talking about a short vision that lasts for about 5
minutes. I am talking about living in an open vision; living in all 4
dimensions all the time. Most of the time we live in this 3 dimension. This was what it was like. It was very
strange to live in that realm. And it didn’t just suddenly go off. See we have barely touched the fringe of
what God wants. When I saw the benefits of praying in tongues for 8 hours, it
stirred my desire to see what happens if you go further. That was when I went
for 2 days without sleep and for 48 hours I just went on in tongues. And you
would have to have a big jar of water. You will get pretty thirsty in the
natural. But at the end of those 48 hours something snapped. It was like a veil
was opened. It was like moving back into the Garden of Eden where if God
comes you see God. You look out into the sky you could actually see where the
thrones of the demons are. And you could actually see angels flying up and
down. It was like living in an open vision. But it slowly began to fade and I
realized it has to be maintained. There is a certain realm that is there. Words Are Pictures In The Spirit World One characteristic of the spirit realm
is that every word is a picture. Part of the observations is that while in
that realm whatever words that is spoken form an object. And after that the
Lord began to show me what heaven is like. See what I was experiencing is
what heaven was like. Like when I said the word chair, a chair would
appear. Literally in the spirit you see a chair being formed in front of you.
It is like in heaven you ask God, "I would like extra rooms to my
mansion." In an instant it is there. I back this up with scripture. When
in Gen. 1 God said let there be light. Instantly it came. Some theologians
and scientists tried to say that in the 6 days Creation account, each day was
1 million years long. They are trying to take the bible and fit it into 20th
century theory of the evolution of the earth. In the Hebrew the word day in Genesis
1 is the same Hebrew word as the word day mentioned in Exodus,
mentioned Leviticus, mentioned in Numbers, mentioned in Deuteronomy,
mentioned in Joshua, mentioned in Samuel. So it is the same word day.
If God had wanted the 6 days to be 6 million years, He would have used some
different Hebrew words. He wouldn’t use the same word day as belonging
to the 24 hours day to mean 6 million years. Why do we find it hard to understand is
people ask, "How can God build the whole world in 24 hours human
day." They don’t believe in God's power. They don’t realize the size of
God. Think about it. Men have not seen the limits of the universe. Up to
today the bigger the telescope is, the bigger they find the universe is. They
have not even seen the borderline of the universe. Now in the spirit realm it was a small
measure of it. What you say becomes. I was astounded at that. And what you
think becomes. When you are thinking of something there is a creative force
that is released. And when you began to move and experience the spirit realm
you realize that the thoughts and the words that flow forth from our life
have tremendous creative force. And while I fellowship with people,
every time they say a word I saw a picture. It is just like when people talk
to us, we grasp their words and understanding the meaning of the words. And
with an effort we visualize what they say. But most of the times we are more
or less just get the feeling of the word. But in the spirit realm the picture is
the word and the word is the picture. It is just like a person sharing with
me about something in their past. While he is sharing I begin to see the
picture of what he is sharing. I begin to see some of those things actually occurring.
It is just like if I were having a conversation with our brother, "How
are you? You had a good day." "Busy day but meaningful." The
moment he said, "Busy day and meaningful." I begin to see a road.
If he keeps talking then the scene starts coming up. I am just giving you an
example of what that spirit realm is like. That's why it is dangerous. If you
move more into that sooner or later you can start picking up the person's
name. When the Lord appeared to me He told me
about 3 signs. Only one is operating. The first sign is just calling people
wherever they are seated. The second sign is when the anointing comes I will
be able to pick up everything from that person's life. God will not do it to
everybody. Let me tell you what the spirit realm is like: its
impossible to lie in the spirit realm. You could just see right into a
person. That is a glimpse of what Jesus is like. You could never lie to
Jesus. He could see you right through in your heart. Now these are things of the Spirit that
Jesus was moving in all the time. But I am illustrating what that realm is
like. And there is a timing to move into that. I don’t move into that much.
Once in a while I move into that but most of the time it is on a personal
level. But there is a timing for every anointing and
every gift before you move into that. Sometimes when people are on the
telephone line with me and I happen more on a one to one basis, I need to
hear like what William Branham said, "You need to get that person's
spirit." Once you get that person's spirit the whole thing comes out. One sister was sharing with me in That's what I am talking about in the spirit
realm every word you say comes out in a picture. The spirit realm is 100%
picture and vision. Then we understand in Acts 2 what the bible is talking
about when it says that young man shall see visions and old man shall dream
dreams and they shall prophesy. All these are ways of God working through
pictures. I find it strange because in the natural world we work with words,
we work with logic. But in the spirit world it is like every thought is real,
every word is real. And you cannot differentiate words and reality. Word is
reality. In the natural world sometimes you tell
the mountain to move. Then only slowly the mountain moves; sometimes it may
take a few months, sometimes a few years. It seems like a delayed process in
this natural world. But in the spirit world what is said comes to pass
instantly. What is conceived in the mind immediately it comes to pass. I don’t fully understand why the spirit realm is so
different form the natural. What causes the delay? Why when you reach to the
natural realm there is a delay even though what you say comes to pass
instantly in the spirit world. We know that what we say in the end does come
to pass, but the process of it coming to pass can be quite long. But yet in the spirit world it was
tremendous. And every time somebody said a word when I was in that realm I
saw a picture. Why doesn’t God let you live in that realm? It can drive you
crazy. Let me explain what its like. It's not easy to live in that realm all
the time because everywhere you keep seeing pictures. It's very hard to
differentiate between what is real and what is spirit. No wonder God doesn’t let
it happen al the time otherwise you cannot live a natural life. If a person
starts talking to me and I began to see a picture, that picture is as real as
that person. Then as the person is talking I see a dog coming and I think
it’s a real dog. But its not; it’s a visualized dog. It's impossible to live
a natural life in that realm. Which is why God doesn’t
permit it all the time. Otherwise we cannot be human any more. When you are in an open vision all the
time you look out of the window you are not sure which is of the physical
world and which is not of the physical world. When you are driving a car then
suddenly you see the highway disappears in front of you and you see something
else and you can't drive. You can't even walk normally. As you walk suddenly
there could be this vision of a valley as you turn to the next road. As you
turn you fall into the drain in the natural. In that realm it is literally
impossible to separate the natural from spiritual. In other words the
spiritual becomes as real as the natural. Slowly as I faded off in that condition
I was a bit dazed. All you want to do is to just sit down on a chair like a
prophet and just prophesy. And it's
very difficult to pay attention to logical conversation. For example you know
what its like when you talk to people and they are
not listening to you. When you are in the spirit realm you will be giving
that same impression. While someone is talking about his house, or where they
are from, you are not paying attention to what they are saying. You are
paying attention to the pictures that keep coming out. That’s the spirit realm; that is one of
the first observation I have noticed in the spirit realm. And I know that is
what heaven is like. In heaven what you need the moment you say it, the
moment you believe it, the moment you ask from God, instantly it is there. Lets say in your heavenly mansion that you are staying and
you have a nice landscape garden. And you say, "How nice if I could have
just that river of water here flowing." Instantly it comes. We will be
very careful with our words in that realm. That’s what that realm is like
regarding words. What about thoughts? It makes you uncomfortable in the natural
when you move into that realm. What people think you can sort of see the
picture coming out of them. And if a person is demon possessed you could
straightaway tell it. There is no way the demon can hide. In fact the demon
looks at you eyeball to eyeball. In regard to thought life when I
experience that I understood what Jesus experienced when He knows the
thoughts of the people around him. They couldn't hide. Let me give some
examples here in the gospel of Lk. 6:6 On another Sabbath, when He entered the
synagogue and taught, a man was there whose right
hand was withered. And the scribes and the Pharisees watched Him, to see
whether he would heal on a Sabbath, so that they might find an accusation
against him. But He knew their thoughts. Now in the spirit world when you become
very strong in that you cannot avoid the pictures. Like if I read chapter 6:6
as I read it when the anointing or that realm is there I would began to see
Jesus walking into the synagogue. The words produce the pictures and the
words are the pictures. It's almost like in Kenneth Hagin's
book I Believe In Visions. In his first vision he said that he was
given a scroll. He read the prophecy from the scroll. Every time he read one
line he would see the action come. When he prophesies famine he sees the
famine. When he prophesied war he saw the war. That’s what the spirit realm
is like. How did Jesus know their thoughts? Hatred, jealousy or anything negative
produce darkness in the spirit world. There was in
John Osteen's book when he spoke about the authority of a believer. And he
spoke about how this witch doctor among the Eskimos had the ability to travel
out of his body and sort of have astral traveling. And this witch doctor
wanted to do a curse against the preacher who came to the Eskimo community.
As he came out of his body trying to do harm, he went near the believers
meeting and saw a bright light. As he came near he saw that the light came
from the people themselves. When that witch doctor went back into his body he
wanted to be a believer. And the Christians didn’t know that there was a
light on their life. When Jesus said that you are the light
of this earth He meant it literally in the spirit world. You could recognize
a believer just by looking at them. That is how the angels know us. That’s
how demons know whether you are of God or not of God. There is a light that
flows from our life. When someone has a wrong thought there
is darkness in them. In the spirit realm when I look at people's faces or
minds, sometimes some of them have little black dots in their heart. Some of
them have little black dots in their mind. Some of them have a cloud. I say
God is this all the time there. And those represent thoughts, motives and
intentions. The more evil a person is the darker their inner parts are. I am
not talking about the natural body. I am talking about the soul. You could
look into a person's soul. And what Jesus experienced here was
quite easy to see in the spirit realm. For these kind
of people when they were looking at Jesus with hate, there would have been a
darkness and a cloud about them. It would be very observable from the spirit
realm. We don’t exactly read a person's thought but the moment that person
open their mouth and say any word that would become like a channel that you
could see into that person's mind. As I said its
very easy to express the spirit realm. It would be just like a person is
talking about anything all you see is not that person. You cannot read that
person's mind. But one clue from that person is enough to tell you all that
is on his mind. It is just like a forensic expert or a criminologist. They
could go to a place where a crime has been committed. The average human being
would say we couldn't tell what the crime is since every thing is burned. We
can't tell how the crime was committed. But the forensic experts take a few
samples here and a few samples there and examine them under a microscope.
They come back and say this person died at about midnight. This person died
in this manner. They are able to draw some conclusions just from those small
samples. In the same way you know a person within 5
minutes under normal conversation. Sometimes it takes us quite a while to
know a person. In the spirit world you cannot actually read a person's
thought. But if that person were to open his mouth and say just one word,
that one word becomes a revelation of the entire person's life. That’s how
powerful the spirit realm is like. The moment a person open the mouth and say
anything you see the mind. In the spiritual realm, you are observing a
person's soul. The moment their soul open for an utterance their mind is
revealed. So in a sense it is not reading the mind. But it is reading the words that comes out from the soul. That’s what the spirit
realm is like in terms of the thoughts and in terms of the words. Logic Breaks Down In the Spirit World The other aspect of the spirit world is
that it is very illogical. Logic breaks down in the spirit world. We all like
to be logical. We all like to think line upon line. And we are all
comfortable with that. In the spirit realm even logic cannot reach.
Understand what Paul said in II Cor. 12 he says inexpressible word which he
cannot utter. Paul was a very logical man. We are not doing away with logic.
We just need to understand the different realms of the body, the mind, and
the spirit so that we don’t confuse those realms. The spirit realm is not a
realm of logic; it’s a realm of reception. Logic is perception. The spirit
realm is a reception. It is like a channel of wisdom from God flowing into
you all the time. Every thing you know in the spirit realm has to come from
God and not from yourself. But in our natural realm we know the effort that
we make in trying to understand a revelation from God. Yet when you enter
into the spiritual realm it feels like you are plucked into God's wisdom and
every thing you know is God's knowledge imparted to you. You are just a receiver of the flow of
God's wisdom and knowledge. In the book of I Cor. 2:12-14 Now we have received not the spirit of the
world, but the Spirit which is from God, hat we might understand the gifts
bestowed on us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom
but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who possess
the Spirit. The unspiritual man does not receive the gifts of the Spirit of
God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because
they are spiritually discerned. Now understand the value of what I am
talking about here. It is not that we are against intellectualism. We have always
encouraged people to pursue study and the depths of knowledge as much as they
can. A lot of people study and gain knowledge because they want a better
career. Let me tell you I studied and tried to get knowledge because it’s a
hobby. Incidentally if you get knowledge and everything in the process of
time you get a better career you treat that as a bonus. We all must have a
childlike inquisitiveness that must not be murdered. From a child we are all
hungry to know the world around us. But somewhere along the line as we grow
into teenage life and adult life we treat study just for career. We must get
back our childlike inquisitiveness, the hunger and the thirst to know and to
understand. I found in my experience of the spirit
realm that the moment I switch to logic the visions
become less. The moment I switch off logic the visions become more. That’s
the reason I am giving you this point. If you understand both sides like
right now as I move strongly into the logical area, the visualizing part
diminishes. And if I want to minister in the spirit I must let go the logical
part of my being. If I don’t let go I cannot minister in the spirit. Which is why now you can understand for a minister to minister
both in the spirit and in the teaching side is very difficult to mix both.
Because to go into one is to diametrically oppose the other. And it takes
quite a balance to get into both. I have chosen to try to get into both
realms so that when it comes to teaching we are logical and perceptive. Right
now if I am talking about the logical realm the vision just disappeared. But
if the anointing is there and I want to move into that spirit realm I have to
voluntarily choose to give up that logical part of myself and just open to
the spirit of receiving. It is not really a passive state. Passiveness of
mind is not what God wants. It is what the devil wants. It is still active
but it is active in worship and in tuning to God. It’s a totally different
realm. If you observe how people minister one
to one, you could observe whether they are using the logical part or the
spiritual part. I could minister in
the logical part and say you must get this verse into you. Once you move in
the spirit realm you know that there is another realm. And the other realm is
different. And if I want to see something in that person's life I must
voluntarily give up the logic part and move into that spirit realm. Then only
I will be able to get into that. There has to be an internal letting go. You see I am an experimenter in the
spirit realm. Once I experience it I want to know what makes it come and what
makes it go off. How do I maintain it? How do I flow into it? Most of the
time in our overnight prayer meeting I wouldn't lead that long in worship.
But because this subject we are talking about
require a certain amount of prayer, a certain amount of worship, we will need
a longer time of worship to help us enter into this spiritual realm. There is
a certain level of anointing that is required before we can move into
different things. It is very difficult to move in the spirit to move into
healing if we don’t have enough depth of worship. Some people may just take
it in a natural way. Some train people by saying, "When you look at
someone try to get a picture." Sometimes they try and end up getting
something from their own soul and it is not of the spirit. It is their own soul trying to conceive something. That's not
moving in the spirit at all. I know what it is like when you try to see
something with your own soul. In the end there is no anointing and there is
sort of a pressure that is there. But the realm of the spirit is a rest.
As you move into it you just rest. Like right now if I want to move in the
spirit, I don’t force God and say God I must get something. When you do that
you cannot get it. The realm of the spirit is such that when you choose to
move into that you rest in God and you seek after God and try to tune
yourself to God. If God doesn't show anything you cannot get anything. As you
surrender more and more into that realm it can be quite frequent. That is the second thing I found that
the realm is. After that 48 hours of prayer in the
Spirit I found myself in the spirit realm. But while I was still strong in
the spirit realm there were times when I suddenly got weak even before the
spirit realm faded off. That happens when my mind begins to switch gear into
the logical side trying to get back into my intellectual ability, but over at
the spirit realm the visions slowly faded off. Then I understood what Jesus
says that the moment you doubt the spirit realm is paralyzed. Remember Jesus
say in Mk. 11 If you say it to the mountain and if you do not doubt in your
heart. I began to understand that doubt is the intellectual mind trying in
its natural state to understand the spirit realm. Trying to explain it
without waiting for God to explain it. It is not just the devil putting doubt in
our mind; doubt is also actually a working of the mind. Which is why the more
educated a person the greater ability they have to be skeptical and doubtful.
But you go to a village of simple hearted villagers and you tell something
about God they believe it, they received it and they get a miracle. But the
more educated we are the greater our ability to be skeptical. Why is it so? It is because we are much
more able to explain things away. We got more information and more arguments
that a person in the village who doesn't have much schooling cannot explain
away. They will straight away say this is God. But the intellectual man will
say this phenomenon can naturally occur through unseen radiation. They have
more logic, more arguments, are more skeptical, and have more doubts. And I began to understand what doubt
does. How it works. And it turns you away from the spirit realm. Which is
exactly what Paul say in I Cor. You look at the
spirit realm and say this is foolishness. But one day when we all get into
heaven you don’t try to use logic. The bible says the gate into heaven is a
huge pearly gate. Your logic says pearls come from oysters. The size of the
oyster must be big to get such a huge pearl.
You can't because anything can happen in the spirit realm. Notice in the book of Exodus when God
spoke to Moses and said, "What is that you have in your hand?"
Moses threw that stick down and it turned into a snake. How do we naturally
explain a stick turning into a live snake? If Charles Darwin saw that he
would have fainted. He would say, "How can a piece of stick evolve into
a snake within seconds?" That itself defies logic. Any hunter will tell
you to catch the snake by the neck. God said, "Catch the snake by the
tail." Moses is quite an experienced shepherd and he may have
encountered real snakes before. That would be the first time in his life to
catch the snake by the tail. If he ever talks to God he would have said,
"God I am going to do it just because you said it." It is the most
unreasonable command. Think about the scientists that say
they have found an explanation of how the Israelites crossed the There are a lot of things that you
cannot explain with logic. Jesus multiplies the 5 loaves and 2 fish. You
cannot explain this event because there is that spirit realm that we are
dealing with. And here is the blessings if we are willing to move into that
realm voluntarily and seek to yield you will be able to see greater
miracles. Jesus didn’t have to think logically
when we talk about 5 loaves and 2 fish. When you start learning how to yield
that logical realm to God and just go in that spirit realm, you will tap into
the realm of blessings and miracles. The logical mind cannot tap into the
power of God. It is only the spiritual mind that can tap into the power of
God. That was the second major difference I found. Yet what is the use of the logical
mind? Our mind can be renewed so that the logical mind can be trained after
we accept the things of God. Paul says in I Cor. 2:7 But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed
before the ages for our glorification.
Who is it that teaches to argue? When people say, "Where is
God. Prove to me there is God." Then you say, "Prove to me where
there is no God." Who teaches all these the Holy
Spirit who trains us that any argument can also be pulled apart through
logic. In the end you come right down that you must believe God by faith. Whenever we want to go higher realm we
don’t talk logic with God. You only talk worship with God. And may God give each one of us a hunger as
we pray tonight. See there is value in praying. Just one
experimentation of those 48 hours of prayer was enough to change my
understanding of the spirit world. Just one spiritual experience in your life
brought into the natural realm to be understood with the scriptures could
change your entire life in God. Which is why I mentioned
that I understood that worry was also a part of the logical mind thinking.
If you don’t have the logical mind you cannot worry. Worry depends on logic. All worries are
based on arguments. May God help us to
move into that great realm of the spirit which is available for all of us.
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