Angels of Humility: A Novel (41 page)

The ground was vibrating with the glory of God. If she concentrated on it to the exclusion of the other things, she could hear its sweet voice sing out to her, a rapturous swell of music proclaiming God’s eternal, indestructible love. She was amazed to watch the notes float by on their staffs and to smell and taste their sweet fragrance—music sweeter than any earthly rose.

She closed her eyes to concentrate on all the new sounds. She was aware of a melody welling up inside her in response to the music-saturated atmosphere. “The Lord is good and His mercy endures forever…”
⁴
She sang the phrase again and again, in awe as she watched the multitude of living golden notes praising intensely around her.

With all time restraints and other earthly rules and restrictions lifted, she might have stayed for an earthly year frolicking and rejoicing in the fountain of life, had her attention not been drawn to the light illuminating it from behind. She was fixated on the brilliance. As she walked through the fountain, her excitement heightened and she began to run, faster than she had ever run before. Whatever was on the other side of the fountain was glowing brilliantly, illuminating the red, which was a more intense color than she has ever seen. The closer she came to the fountain’s end, the brighter the light became. She burst out of the fountain and came face-to-face with her loving Savior, waiting with outstretched arms. She was not aware that she looked just like Him in His glory. His blood has demolished her sin and washed away all earthly remnants; she was as white as snow and glowing with heavenly glory.

When she saw His glorious presence, His dazzling purity, and His unspeakable holiness, she intuitively fell prostrate before Him.
He is Light and Life itself
. She lay her hands on His beautiful nail-scarred feet and felt an
overwhelming love like she’d never felt before, like warm oil pouring over her. It was a love that cannot be experienced on earth; human hearts and bodies lack the capacity to endure love this intense—it is reserved for the new bodies of eternity’s elect.

She felt secure and refreshed; she laughed and cried at the same time, which no longer seemed a contradiction. Pleasant emotions bombarded her; being in His presence, actually touching Him, was like being in the fountain multiplied by a thousand. Each experience absorbed into her being, and with each one she felt more alive and energetic.

She didn’t know if she’d been at His feet for two minutes or two weeks, and she wasn’t concerned either way. Jesus reached down, gently lifting her to her feet, and swept her up into a cheek-to-cheek embrace that left her feet dangling off the floor.

Immediately, with lightening speed, she knew Jesus’ thoughts,
Welcome home, Sarah. Welcome to Your heavenly home. We were thinking of you when We planned it
.

She clung to Him as tightly as she could and absorbed wave after wave of His love for her.
Never let me go, please never let me go
, she thought as tears of joy rolled down her cheeks.

He finally set her back on her feet, but kept His right arm securely around her waist. He held out His left hand. “Shall we?” His gentle voice asked. Gazing into His eyes of love, she could not find her voice, but intuitively stepped onto His lovely nail scarred feet, and they danced and danced and danced engulfed in the heavenly music.

Joel and Malta beamed as they watched the beautiful, devoted bride enjoying the first dance with her bridegroom King. The angels waited behind a golden altar holding a huge leather book, richly tooled, with her name in gold calligraphy. The dance concluded in front of the altar.

“Now, My precious Sarah, before you enter into your Heavenly reward that I have prepared for you, we must evaluate your life on earth.” She could barely take her eyes off of Him. Finally she forced herself to look at Joel and Malta, who were beaming at her and anticipating the great joy that was ahead. Joel opened the book almost to the very back.

What about those first 71 years I lived just for myself? Look at all the wasted pages
. Jesus immediately answered her thoughts. He gave her a wink and nodded to Malta, who flipped backward through the pages. Each golden-edged page was crimson, the same color as the fountain. Sarah gasped and threw herself at the Lord’s feet in gratitude and adoration.

“As far as the east is from the west, that’s how far I removed your transgressions from you.
⁵
Over her sobbing, Jesus’ gentle voice continued. “Sarah, I knew you wouldn’t come into the kingdom until you were 71. I knew that before We created the world. On the day you were born, I rejoiced and counted off each day until Pastor Hall visited you. While it was hurtful to watch you make choices that were not in your best interest or Mine, I still rejoiced over you each day because I looked beyond your present to your future. You see, I knew that once you heard the Truth you would accept it and that you would give your whole self to it. You did more for My Kingdom in 18 months than many people who are saved 71 years! I celebrated your future even while you were still My enemy living in the kingdom of darkness.”

Jesus lifted Sarah off the floor, and they stood together again in front of the book with His strong arms supporting her.

The page was like a movie, and she saw Pastor Hall knocking on her door.

“I can’t believe that’s me! I’m so emaciated. I was on my way to Hell—I was going to kill myself!” When Pastor Hall spoke the Scripture, she saw that it is alive. The Holy Spirit was convicting her, and she saw Joel and Malta standing behind her.

“Were you with me all the time?” she asked, looking lovingly at them. They glance at each other and smiled. “Sarah, we were never more than a prayer away.”

The Lord continued to turn pages, commenting on Sarah’s prayer walking. He showed her each house and all the residents.

“Sarah, in this house, Sam Wagner was ready to leave his wife, Lisa, for another woman. Your prayers enabled Me to soften his heart. He soon cut off the illicit relationship. Pastor Koch is going to visit them in six months and lead them to salvation. They’re going to have a baby 13 months after
that. Joshua David will have a strong healing anointing. He will travel the world holding crusades and draw hundreds of thousands of people to Me.”

Malta turned the next page. “This is the home of Jason Miller. Jason became a Christian on June 17, 1960. He has battled a pornography addiction for over 10 years. It was destroying his life and his marriage. And worst of all, the condemnation he constantly felt kept him from being able to receive My love for him. Your prayers, added with others’, drove away the spirit of Addiction that controlled his life, and the anxiety and constant shame he felt left, too. He feels like a new man, like he has a brand new start on life.

“Nancy Trost lives next door to the Millers; she had several large cancerous uterine tumors. She was terrified to be operated on. I healed her while she slept. When she woke up and the tumors were gone, she found her childhood Bible and started reading it again.

“The Snyder family lives in this white bungalow.”

“I remember when I was first prayer walking, for several weeks I felt led to loiter there and pray extra long,” said Sarah. She looked at Jesus with a curious smile.

He smiled back, motioning to the page, “Look at this precious little toddler, Mitchell. What do you see?”

“I don’t know what You mean, Lord,” replied Sarah. “He looks happy and healthy to me.”

“He is now. He was born healthy, but at 2 months of age, because of a generational curse, he was developing Dystonia, a rare neurological disorder. If you hadn’t prayed, Mitchell would have eventually been unable to walk, sit, or eat. The wonderful part is that you were obedient and prayed extra hard. I was able to heal him before his mother had to go through the anguish of even hearing the diagnosis.”

“Oh Lord, You are so good; look at all the people You healed, physically and emotionally.” A question popped into her mind, but she refrained from asking it. Then she remembered that He knew her thoughts, and she looked at Him for the answer.

“Well Sarah, My beautiful one,” He said, taking her chin in His hand and turning it toward His face. “It was My perfect will for you to be healed of your Parkinson’s. It was My perfect plan for Pastor Paul to become the chaplain and receive an increase in the anointing. He was going to lay hands on you on June 12 at the jail, in his office, and I was going to heal you so you could stay a little longer and minister to the inmates. Paul’s disobedience affected the lives of many, many people in a negative way. You were one of them. Unfortunately, people’s sins have consequences, and not just for them only.”

With a mischievous twinkle in His eye He said, “Now Sarah, you’ve been dead for less than an hour; the staff at the Manor doesn’t even know you’re gone. If you’d like I can easily—”

“No, no, a thousand times no,” she shrieked, throwing her arms around Him. “Now that I’ve seen Your beauty face-to-face, I never want to leave You, ever, ever. Returning to earth, even in perfect health, would seem like dying a thousand deaths to me.”

Thirty pages of explanation later, Sarah was beaming at the way the Lord had used her to touch every person on her prayer walk route. “Over half of your neighbors who didn’t know Me will get saved because of your prayers. Also you averted a commercial airline disaster with 237 people
and
seven dogs on board.” Jesus and Malta smiled at Joel.

“An airline disaster? But I just—it was such a simple prayer!”

Here you are wearing that colorful blouse and remembering to pray for the women in India. Not only have many of them gotten saved, but they are teaching their children what the missionaries are teaching them.

The next page was the Wednesday prayer meeting. The stinging emotions were gone and Sarah laughed as she watched Joel and Malta holding her up as she walked to the microphone. “Oh, Lord. I was terrified, but the worst one was at the Elk’s club.” Malta quickly flipped to that page. Sarah was surprised to see Joel and Malta holding her up again. “You two were really on the job. It seems funny now, but it sure wasn’t then.”

“Every time you obeyed Me, especially when you were scared, it was like sweet incense coming up before My throne. From the incense came your little frightened voice, and do you know what it said?” Sarah nodded no.

“It said, ‘I love You, Lord. I love You more than I love my reputation. I love You more than my rank, position, standing in the community, or my status. I love You, Jesus, most of all.’ Sacrificial obedience is the sincerest form of worship.”
⁶
A tear trickled down His cheek and Sarah gently wiped it away.

“Sarah,” said the Lord, “not only did your prayers bring about many wonderful events, but your prayers were responsible for thwarting many of the enemy’s plans.” Sarah watched herself praying while she read a magazine. Her prayers stopped a drunken husband from beating his wife and child, averted two auto accidents, and kept the spirit of Suicide away from a former satanist who was still being severely harassed.

Malta turned another page, “Here you are praying in tongues while you drove to the grocery store.” Sarah saw a man with an oxygen mask on his face and hooked up to tubes in the back of a speeding ambulance.

“Lord, is he? He looks dead.”

“Well, he did die several times on that ride, but he’s fine now. This is Micah Burris, a pastor in Pennsylvania. He almost took himself out way too early through stress, workaholism, unhealthy diet, and no exercise. He repeatedly ignored My conviction and his wife’s pleas. After his heart attack, I healed his damaged cardiovascular system. The doctors said it was a miracle.

“He’s a totally changed man. He spends time with Me each day and has learned to cast his cares on Me. He also makes family time a priority. He’s setting appropriate boundaries and learning to delegate. He eats healthy food and exercises regularly and has lost 54½ pounds. He’s so excited that he’s writing a book that will help thousands of pastors learn the same things. I have so many good things planned for him. Now he won’t get here for 23 years, 2 months, 5 days, 6 hours, and 45 seconds—right on schedule.”

He flipped the next page. On it, Sarah was praying as she was pushing her cart down the produce aisle. “Your prayers helped conceal an underground church in Albania, saving them from persecution and saving the pastor from prison. Now look here; revival broke out among the villagers of a small Polynesian island. Now here your prayers enabled Me to release finances to pay the rent on the medical building where missionaries were
healing physical and spiritual wounds in Uganda. That all happened while you grocery shopped.”

Sarah collapsed into His side and buried her face in His robe. Tears poured down her cheeks. “Lord, I’ve never seen any of these people. I’ve never been any of these places.”

“You didn’t have to; you just had to pray.”

“Oh, Lord, if I’d known it was so easy, I’d have prayed so much more!”

“Not one has ever stood here, Sarah, that didn’t say the same thing.”

She couldn’t speak; she was too overwhelmed.

The Lord gently held and comforted her while this reality set in; then He turned her back toward the book, “Look at the next page. Here you are at Reverend Templeton’s grave. I invited you into the fellowship of My sufferings when I asked that you sell your land. You accepted My invitation.

“Most who profess Christianity want the mountaintops, but they don’t want the valleys; they yearn for the power of My anointing, but they won’t enter the wilderness voluntarily. They long for a deeper relationship with Me, but they won’t take up their cross and die daily. Because they refuse those experiences, they never mature; they remain self-focused. Tested integrity is what I desire. You, Sarah, persevered with right choices. You endured isolation and hostility for My sake. I watched you love Me by making the hard decisions.”

“How could I not love You, Lord? You saved me and showed me such great mercy when I deserved Hell.”

“Here’s another time you had to push through your fears. Here’s the first day of visiting inmates at the jail. Your obedience just makes Me smile. You were so scared that your sweat glands were working overtime, but you obeyed anyway because you knew it was My will.”