The Touch

What I am about to tell you is something that can't be seen or proven. It can't be measured, and it can't be given any kind of weight in the natural. There is nothing to see or hear and nothing to taste or smell. This is something that happened to me personally. You can believe it or not, but all I can tell you is that it actually happens.
It was at the March retreat in '99 that this began to happen to me.
I didn't say anything about it until the June retreat of 2000. Even then I only told two or three people, and each one privately. I was being very careful, with what I had come to believe, was something very special in my relationship with the Lord. There was no way that I wanted to offend or cause the Lord to stop this manifestation by my telling it out of season. In fact this manifestation had become so special to me that I had come to believe it was The Holy Spirits' way of showing me that he was with me in what I was doing.
Most people who come to the ranch for the first time and worship with us have never experienced anything like it before. The first thing we do before going into worship is to invite and welcome the Holy Ghost to come. Then we begin to worship, with all of our hearts. By this I mean, with all of our hearts, all of our souls, and with all of our strength. We worship boldly and with a purpose. And we expect the Holy Spirit to come and to manifest His presence. When we have worshiped the Lord like this, the Holy Spirit has always come and made His presence known to us. There is no use in asking the Holy Spirit to come and to welcome Him, if you don't really believe that He will show up.
You have to understand that these times of worship and being in the presence of the Holy Spirit bring many manifestations that go beyond what most of us see taking place in a regular church service. It was in a setting like this when I first began to have this particular experience.
It happened as I was standing at my keyboard and playing. I was in deep, High worship with my eyes closed, when I felt someone's hand on my back. Since I was standing in the corner with my back to the window, I instantly thought some one must really want my attention to have crowded around behind me like this. So of course, I looked. To my surprise no one was there! But I could still feel the touch on my back. I continued to play, but I looked around behind myself several times. No one was there. I also looked around the room to see if anyone else was having a similar experience. Everyone was worshiping and being caught up in the Spirit as usually takes place in these meetings. I didn't know what to make of it right then. All these thoughts were going through my head, but I was still playing and we were now in Prophetic Worship. The anointing was so very strong and tangible in the room right then.
After a while, I became aware that I couldn't feel it anymore. My head was going a hundred miles an hour. I was caught up in what the Holy Spirit was doing in the meeting itself, and yet trying to think through what I had just felt. Was it a muscle spasm? Had I somehow felt the drapes on the window behind me? I had stood there at this same spot for fourteen years during retreats and never felt anything like this before. What was it? And yet I knew….
Well, as the meeting progressed, I became more and more engrossed in what the Holy Spirit was doing right then. I am always amazed at what happens in the meetings when the Holy Spirit begins to manifest Himself. So I just put this in my mental "I'll wait and think about it later file" and went on with things. Many things happened in that afternoon meeting, but I continued to Wonder afterwards what had happened to me.
We usually have a morning, afternoon and evening meeting at the retreats and now it was time for the evening session. Everyone was excited because of what the Lord had been doing in the previous meetings. We had seen healings, heard prophecies for the body as well as for individuals, other gifts of the Spirit had been manifested, and we were all looking forward to worshiping the Lord again.
Because of all of the other activity throughout the afternoon I didn't have time to bring out my "I'll think about it later File". As we began to worship I was not even conscious of what had happened to me earlier. We had a tremendous time of worship and it led us right into a time of praying for one another. While I had my hands on someone and praying for them, someone put their hand on me. This is not uncommon when several people are praying for each other. The only thing was, when I turned to glance at who was agreeing in prayer with me, no one was there. Yet I could still feel the hand on my back. In fact, it was in exactly the same spot as before. This time we were in the middle of the room with nothing else around or close to us.
Now I don't think of myself as being spiritually dense, but this was incredible to me. It felt exactly like a hand being laid on me. But I still just kept it to myself and Wondered. This happened one more time, a couple of meetings later, before the retreat was over. It was several months later at the next retreat that I felt it again. And even though it surprised me again, I began to understand something. It was always when we were in a meeting where the Holy Spirit was manifesting Himself that it would happen. I came to know that it was when I was in the midst of His anointing and doing His works that it would come. It doesn't happen often, but when it does He always takes me by surprise. It's as if He puts His hand there from time to time, always in that same spot, just to let me know that it's Him. That He is with me.
I know many other people have manifestations that the Lord gives to them, and I always appreciate it when they share them with me.
This is why I have decided to tell this particular story. My prayer is that it will bless and encourage you to believe even more in the supernatural workings of our Lord.
I don't have any doubt as to whose hand it is anymore. But it is the feeling of a hand being put firmly on my back just the way a father would do to a son. It is one of the Signs the Holy Spirit has chosen to encourage me with. It comes as He chooses, and I always Wonder at this expression of Himself. I've simply come to call this experience "The Touch".

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