When I was a young missionary in Kaufbeuren, Germany, I experienced my personal Pentecost. Although I was baptized with water when I was eight years old, I don’t remember experiencing anything special. Sure, it was a momentous occasion and at a young age, I was aware of my desire to serve the Lord, but beside this, it was nothing remarkable. It wasn’t until just over a decade later in a small attic apartment on the other side of the globe when I knelt down in faith with a sincere prayer that I had been visited by the Lord as my answer. The room, although dark at night, seemed to fill with electrifying fire that consumed me. There is nothing on Earth that I can compare this experience with. There was nothing earthly about it. But for five, ten, or maybe fifteen minutes, I felt like every atom of my body was charged with waves of electricity. If I could use any word to describe this, it would be a quickening. I had been baptized with fire and with the Holy Ghost. Over the course of about thirty years up until today, I have experienced a series of miraculous events that the world would describe as little more than supernatural.

John 3:8 The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.

For years and years I did not understand this passage. Yes, I understood it in my brain, but not in my heart. To illustrate this, I will share one experience. In this same town of Kaufbeuren, my companion and I had bought train tickets to another town. As we approached the large and long platform, I received a very distinct and powerful prompting to go and stand on a very specific spot on the platform just an arm’s length from the edge, which dropped off onto the train tracks below. I remember very clearly planting my feet firmly as if this decision was the most important decision of that day. My companion followed behind and then stood on my right side and there we waited shoulder to shoulder for the train to arrive. Then as the train arrived with all its loud mechanical sounds, a girl behind me lost consciousness and she slumped forward, falling down directly between my companion and me. Had we not been standing at that very spot when she fell, she would have fallen farther forward without anything or anyone to break her fall, and she would have been pummeled by the train.

God does not always explain things when He requires something of us. Like the wind that blows where it pleases, so is the Spirit. You cannot predict where the next breeze will come from or when or why, but it’s not until you see its effects around you that you discern its presence, such as when it caresses your face or some leaves blow in the air. Likewise, you don’t know when the Lord will next need to work through you for His purposes, but the difference between feeling a random breeze and the Holy Spirit working in you is the love that you are filled with when it works in you. You also have to be willing to be led without always knowing why, even if it’s somewhere you would rather not go. But if you choose not to be led in small, mundane ways, God will not work His miracles through you, particularly when He needs to accomplish great miracles.