A thought from Ps Randy Clark
I want to share with you a powerful story that impacted me when I first heard it. It is about tenacious hunger for God.
In the early days of my time within the Vineyard, I remember an afternoon when John Wimber called for me to meet with him in his office. I remember walking in, only to see John leaning back in his chair with a giant smile on his face. I sat across from him, as he looked at me and said, “Randy, who is the most anointed person in all of the Vineyard when it comes to words of knowledge and healing?” I thought for a moment, and responded “Well John, besides yourself, it would be Blaine Cook.” John looked at me and said “Randy, let me tell you something about Blaine.”
He then began to recall to me a dream that the Lord had given him several years earlier. In summary, the dream was about a powerful outbreak of the Spirit that would sweep the Vineyard as a whole, as the church went to the streets and began ministering to the sick. John continued from there to tell me about inviting Blaine into his office and sharing the dream with him. I should also mention, at the time of this dream occurring, Blaine Cook was not someone with a reputation for being used in healing.
However, once John shared this dream, Blaine became ecstatic. Overwhelmed with a desire to see this move of God, he stood up from the desk, and began asking when they would start going out to minister to people in this way. “Whoah! Slow down! It’s not time for that just yet. The people aren’t quite ready,” John said to him. “We’ve still got a lot of work to do!” But Blaine disagreed. The attitude that Blaine held was one of tenacity. Even though he was not seeing a lot of healing yet, he began to ask John to pray for him, so that God would release an anointing for him to go and see people set free according to the dream.
What John told me next shocked me. He said to me, “Randy, I was not expecting anything to happen. I did not think that it was time yet for this dream to be acted on. But Blaine just would not stop asking me to pray for him. So finally, out of frustration, I reached over and smacked my hand on his head and mumbled a prayer just to appease him.” Despite John’s lack of expectation, Blaine believed that something had indeed happened. John told me that after that meeting, Blaine became the hungriest person in the movement when it came to praying for healing.
This man, who started off seeing little of the supernatural, was transformed into an individual with one of the greatest anointings for healing and words of knowledge in the entirety of the Vineyard movement. What remains so impactful for me in this story, is the simple fact that Blaine refused to settle for the status quo. He saw the promise of God for more and chose to run after it with all his heart. And the point John Wimber wanted to impress me with was his statement, “Nobody in the Vineyard went for healing like Blaine did and he became one of the most anointed in the Movement.” Blaine worked a secular job for the county when he began pursuing healing. He would go to the hospitals to pray after work when most didn’t want to go pray. John’s point – the hungriest, most pursuing of God and healing became the most gifted.
In Luke 11, Jesus shares a story of a persistent neighbor who ends up receiving what he’s asking for due to his persistence. I believe that this is the posture of heart in which the Lord desires us to have during this hour. Knock…and keep knocking. Seek…and keep seeking. Ask…and keep asking. Let’s decide together to be a people of relentless pursuit of God: His power, His ways, His miracles, and His presence.