ENCOUNTERING JESUS

[Albert Finch]

God will always come in our greatest time of need!

We will learn from the Emmaus Road experience that at our point of greatest need, we will encounter God. We desperately need to prepare ourselves for a new encounter with God.

It was only after Moses stood before the burning bush of His divine presence and Isaiah stood before God's glory in the temple that they were set apart and commissioned for His purpose.
We need to pray for such a glory encounter that we too would be set apart to disciple His people. Our goal in prayer is to encounter Jesus and know Him more. It is not to just receive His blessing but to experience Him in a greater way.

When we come face-to-face with the Lord in prayer, it is to come face-to-face with the goodness and glory of God! Oh, to be a friend of God like Abraham and Moses were! Out of their intimate friendship with the Lord, they had a face-to-face encounter with Him (see Genesis 17:1; Exodus 33:11).

WHY WE NEED TO ENCOUNTER GOD

• An encounter with God will bring a renewed commitment to His CALLING and PURPOSE for our life. God-encounters will revive us in our faith.

• The power of God is in the encounter with His presence (see Acts 1:8).

• An encounter with God comes so we can have what we need in revelation and power to set the captives free!

• We need a supernatural encounter with God because quite often an encounter with God's presence precedes our assignment. His manifest presence comes upon us in these experiences to empower us for the impossible.

• God reveals different aspects of His glory and nature to us so we are drawn into deeper friendship and communion with Him. This will help keep us hungry and pressing in for all the fullness of God, not just for our satisfaction, but ultimately so that He can work through us and cause others to know Him and be saved.

• An encounter with Heaven is an encounter with the Lord Jesus Christ!

• A true encounter with God will leave you hungry for more and provide the power for you to be changed.

• Without a true encounter with Jesus, all we will have is dead works, no passion, and religious form.

• The result and purpose of an encounter with God will be to "know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God" (see Ephesians 3:19).

• We must pray for His power from a place of intimacy and worship. The overflow of our intimacy is key to flowing in the anointing.

• A supernatural faith encounter with God will give us revelation to advance in God's PURPOSE for our life.

KEYS TO ENCOUNTERING HIS PRESENCE

1. Prevailing, contending prayer! "You will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with all your heart" (Jeremiah 29:13). I won't let You go!

2. Our thoughts must remain on Him. God conscious practice of His presence. "One thing have I asked of the Lord, and that will I seek, inquire for, and insistently require: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold and gaze upon the beauty, the sweet attractiveness and the delightful loveliness of the Lord, and to meditate, consider, and inquire in His temple" (Psalm 27:4 AMP).

3. "Thou dost keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee..." (Isaiah 26:3 RSV). We must learn to keep our thoughts on Him to encounter His presence.

4. The deeper we go in worship, the greater the encounter.

To be intimately acquainted with Him through intimacy is key to knowledge. We cannot know God without experiencing Him. We experience Him through His Word and prayer.

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[Petra Hattingh]

This is the prayer of my heart on a daily basis!

Amen!