I anticipate starting a thread on speaking in tongues and Spirit baptism. But I feel a need to liven things up on this site; so instead, I will start a thread on my psychic experiences that arose from my glossolalia experience. If marijuana is a gateway drug to hard drugs, speaking in tongues seems to be a gateway gift to other spiritual gifts. My experience of speaking in tongues at age 16 was by far the highlight of my life. I will describe that experience in a future thread on Spirit baptism, but for now, let me just say that my tongues experience immediately led to my exercise of “the word of knowledge” (1 Cor 12:8). Here are my first 3 resulting premonitions:
(1) My tongues experience was so electrifying that it transformed my mind from a source of academic mediocrity to an awareness that I would be acknowledged as the high school senior with the highest GPA in my province. A few years ago, my psychiatrist cousin reminded me that I had told him I would achieve this goal. When the premier of my province announced this achievement at my high school commencement, it was one of my most thrilling experiences not because of the ego gratification, but because it proved that my Spirit baptism had truly placed me in the center of God’s will.
But “the word of knowledge” is a spiritual gift that can be part of a learning curve and its application is not always easy to grasp. Consider my next 2 premonitions:
(2) At age 19, I was a Winnipeg college student. About 5 years my senior, my friend Dallas was the leader of our church youth group of about 150. I had just been Best Man at his wedding and was now invited to the newlyweds’ post-Christmas dinner. After eating, we played table tennis in their basement. Dallas mentioned that he was going deer hunting in northern Manitoba the next day and I instantly felt a sense of dread. It seemed as if I saw his skeleton and was certain that he would be killed in an accident if he went on this trip. Horrified, I felt compelled to share my premonition with him. He was offended and blamed my so-called premonition on my anti-huntng views. I had no such views, though I’ve never gone hunting myself. What could I do? I had no evidence beyond my certainty. I guess I hoped God would confirm my premonition to Dallas.
A few days later, we had a New Year’s Eve service at our church. What happened when I arrived at the church was straight out of a horror movie. 3 young girls in our youth group approached me, giggling, and said. “You do know that Dallas was killed yesterday in a hunting accident. He was riding a snowmobile with his gun leaning beside him and hit a bump, which caused his rifle to discharge into his shoulder. He bled to death before his hunting buddies got him to a doctor.” Thr girls giggled and one said to the other, “Wow, I guess we sure ruined his day!” It was as if Hell was taunting me for my friendship with Dallas. What was so funny about their youth leader’s death? I charitably assumed that theirs was just a nervous laughter. I later obsessed over what this tragedy meant. Why was I given this premonition if it would be useless to prevent his death? Was his death predestined fate?
(3) In my senior year at Princeton Seminary, I was about to return home for Christmas vacation. My friend Ted had just been accepted in the D. Phil. program in New Testament at Cambridge U. and I also wanted to apply to that doctoral program. So I went to Ted’s dorm room and asked if I could borrow his Cambridge catalogue. As I did, I suddenly “saw” his skeleton and knew that his death was imminent. But what could I do? I didn’t know how he would die. So I tried to put this knowledge out of my mind and flew home for Christmas. When I returned, I learned from Ted’s friend Ken that Ted had been killed in a car accident. Ken was driving him home to Ohio, when Ken’s car slipped on an icy freeway onramp and the car crashed into a pole, killing Ted and breaking Ken’s arm.
I had tried to suppress my premonition. In retrospect, I wondered if God alerted me to Dallas’s and Ted’s fate because He wanted me to intercede for their protection. These premonitions kept coming and were never wrong! Stay tuned for more accounts.
After this experience, my first exercise of “the world of knowledge” was the inner knowing that my future career would be aided by being honored for the highest GPA in my province in my senior year… A few years ago, my psychiatrist cousin reminded me that I had told him I would achieve this goal. What makes this revelation such a gift is the fact that I had previously not done particularly well in high school. When the premier of my province announced this achievement at my high school commencement, it was one of my most thrilling experiences not because of the ego gratification, but because it proved that my Spirit baptism had truly placed me in the center of God’s will.
But “the word of knowledge” is a spiritual gift that can be part of a learning curve and its application is not always easy to grasp. Consider these 2 examples:
(1) At age 19, I was a Winnipeg college student. About 5 years my senior, my friend Dallas was the leader of our church youth group of about 150. I had just been Best Man at his wedding and was now invited to the newlyweds post-Christmas dinner. After eating, we played table tennis in their basement. Dallas mentioned that he was going deer hunting in northern Manitoba the next day and I instantly felt a sense of dread. It seemed as if I saw his skeleton and was certain that he would be killed in an accident if he went on this trip. Horrified, I felt compelled to share my premonition with him. He was offended and blamed my so-called premonition on my anti-huntng views. I had no such views, though I’ve never gone hunting myself. What could I do? I had no evidence beyond my certainty. I guess I hoped God would confirm my premonition to Dallas.
A few days later, we had a New Year’s Eve service at our church. What happened when I arrived at the church was straight out of a horror movie. 3 young girls in our youth group approached me, giggling, and said. You do know that Dallas was killed yesterday in a hunting accident. He was riding a snowmobile with his gun leaning beside him and hit a bump, which caused his rifle to discharge into his shoulder. He bled to death before his hunting buddies got him to a doctor. Thr girls giggled and one said to the other, “Wow, I guess we sure ruined his day!” It was as if Hell was taunting me for my friendship with Dallas. What was so funny about their youth leader’s death? I charitably assumed that their was just a nervous laughter. I later obsessed over what this tragedy meant. Why was I given this premonition if it would be useless to prevent his death? And was his death predestined fate?
(2) In my senior year at Princeton Seminary, I was about to return home for Christmas vacation. My friend Ted had just been accepted in the D. Phil. program in New Testament at Cambridge U. and I also wanted to apply to that doctoral program. So I went to Ted’s dorm room and asked if I could borrow his Cambridge catalogue. As I did, I suddenly “saw” his skeleton and knew that his death was imminent. But what could I do? I didn’t know how he would die. So I tried to put this knowledge out of my mind and flew home for Christmas. When I returned, I learned from Ted’s friend Ken that Ted had been killed in a car accident. Ken was driving him home to Ohio, when Ken’s car slipped on an icy freeway onramp and the car crashed into a pole, killing Ted and breaking Ken’s arm.
I had tried to suppress my premonition. In retrospect, I wondered if God alerted me to Dallas’s and Ken’s fate because He wanted me to intercede for their protection.
