What represents the overarching presence of God in my life story?

Overarching—an interesting word, calls for evaluating, culling and eventually a conclusion of mental and emotional consensus. There can be overarching good and overarching bad, but overarching in Webster’s mind must be “dominating or embracing all else.”

Ask a ten-year-old for an overarching experience and his event sorting in most cases can be quickly processed and conclusion made—maybe a trip to Disney or catching a big fish. Move up the accumulated years of life marker: 20, 40, 60, 80 and finally stop at 92 years. Now, ask a question about an overarching experience. The big fish will have been eclipsed over and over though its memory may still linger.

Do I chronicle the 90-year process for the reader? Or, do I go off-script, process the years, and return with a conclusion of the overarching event?

I sense the reader’s fear that the first option follows, so I will quickly compromise, offering a hybrid approach. I will endeavor to reference some of the relevant, accumulated highlights from which “overarching” will then be distilled.

But wait, what is the subject of all these 92 years of experience that I am off-script processing? Look again at the title: “the presence of God” in my life story. So, my goal is to identify and define the event that represents the overarching presence of God in my life.  

Another more careful reading of the title reveals it does not specifically call for an “event.” It calls for the amorphous “what.” That is a bit unfortunate for now the ingredients of the 92 year memory search has to entertain the possibility of something other than the specifics of an event. This fact compounds the needed memory, perception and situational discernment required to pursue to a valid conclusion of overarching.

With all the foregoing dialogue, perhaps I have lapsed back into an old habit with spiritual consequence. A habit which, over the years, I have been laboring to change. It’s a variation of leaning to my own understanding. It involves using my mind, my soul, to the exclusion of my spirit.

The error of the mind-dominant processing of the problem is obvious. I’m endeavoring to make a spiritual assessment with a purely mental tool—what fallacy.

Perhaps there is no need for the off-script processing of 92 years’ worth of material. Perhaps my mind could humble itself sufficiently to ask my spirit the question and listen quietly for the response. Then my mind with its learned eloquence simply reports what it has heard. I’ll try.

Let the reader also pause here to more fully enter into the process….

The answer comes, it was not my born-again experience of October 1973. Nor, was it the answer to the prayers of desperation made during my Cedar Key days. No, it was the year 2017 and the overarching presence of God. God manifested   repeatedly to me through the months from April through October in that year. So, it was more than an event, it was the multiplicity of God interactions over a period of time.

Let me establish some context. In April of 2017, in pride, I was doing chin ups. An apparent wrong execution damaged my left rotator cuff. Not a tear, but a severe strain. This strain would manifest in intense pain. By May this unrelenting pain would morph into acute anxiety. Medicine had no effect. Repentance for the pride was earnestly made—a good first step.

I prayed intently, literally day and night, as I also couldn’t sleep. But during that time I felt God’s love and presence. Ultimately, I was shown and repented of four major areas of sin. Some going back over 60 years. Then came my healing.

God said it was in His timing. During the process He touched me sovereignly several times, keeping me from suicide and keeping the pain within the confines of tolerable.

Not to belabor the point, yes, our healing is definitely paid for by Messiah’s shed blood, but the primary purpose of His coming was not for healing, but as the perfect sacrifice for the forgiveness of our sin—true spiritual healing.  

I would submit that much of physical, mental, and emotional illness results from sin, either personal or generational. Again, in my opinion, many folks seek healing without seeking first the cause of the illness. It’s a fine line between condemnation and conviction, and as with me it was a process over several months. But as I told the Lord, I wouldn’t want to go through it again, but if that was the only way to get to the core of my sin, I would.

One of the four sins I repented of was, as God called it, my veneer of Christianity, I looked very good on the outside, but harbored a subculture of ungodly lust and deception. A second, even more egregious sin, was the contempt I had for my wife, Janelle, going back to before marriage (over 60 years). This was a huge breakthrough in our relationship and in my spiritual growth. She graciously forgave me and repented of her part. Although aspects of the contempt had been previously repented of, I had never seen and owned my actual guilt.

During this same elapse of time God one night embraced me and gave me a small gold crown (King) and another night a tunic and turban (Priest). It took me several days to be able to accept this identity (Revelation 1:6–and He has made us kings and priests to His God and Father). I didn’t know the scriptural basis at the time. But I have walked in a fresh anointing and authority ever since, part of my witness to establish these months as overarching.

I won’t make doctrine from one testimony, but I am distressed that many seek healing without considering there may be a root cause that should be addressed. The affliction may really be the doorway to a much more significant healing than the physical.

Overarching aptly describes my experiencing of God during those months in 2017. To use another word such as watershed or climatic or zenith would not grant the justice this experience deserves as it would imply a height reached from which followed only decline. When in fact the overarching experience was a plateau reached, a new base camp established, for new summits to be pursued and experienced.