I am a child of the 60s; a son of the Jesus Movement. I have the scars of that era, as well as the wonderful memories of light that broke in various degrees into that darkness. I remember the dramatic encounters people of all walks of life had with the Real Presence. When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord will raise up a standard against him. (Isaiah 59:19) I knew many who were terribly addicted (mostly heroin), who came to Jesus and were set free from their enslavement to drugs and/or alcohol. This powerful encounter with the Holy Spirit came to be referred to as the thirty-second cure. The enemy had come against our generation like a flood with racism, rage, political confusion, rebellion, lust, occultism, and sexual confusion. All this was under the diabolical spell woven by the seduction of dark and evil forms of rock & roll, which had taken millions captive. There was not enough time, money, expertise, or endurance for a long drawn-out process of progressive recovery. We needed a powerful infusion of Heaven. There was simply no other hope. Does any of this sound familiar?
What we had then was the seed form of what has come to fruition now in its far more virulent outgrowth. We didn’t need more education, though good education has its place. We couldn’t wait for more and better therapies, though that helped a bit when you could get it or afford it. That was true then, and is even more so now. I say this with all due respect to hard working counselors, therapists, medical healthcare professionals, and brain researchers. And they would agree with me: we simply cannot help most people to full recovery. We may be able to help some function, but complete healing? We need miracles!
The thirty-second cure was the nickname for the intrusion of Heaven into our hell. It was the standard God promised to raise up when the enemy came in like a flood. If the 60s and early 70s were the seeds pushed back by the Jesus Movement, then what is coming to save us now from the full-grown poisonous plants? I will tell you. It is the final great outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon all flesh that will ripen the harvest for the end of this age and the coming of the Lord.
We have a tendency (due I think to our TV and movie watching), to believe the story of life moves to one great final climactic event. And until that finish, there seems no hope. But that is not the way to see what is really happening. There are pre-outpourings infused with hope, smaller in size but no less wonderful. These smaller events fortify us as we anticipate the great Event to come. Ask the Lord for rain during the time of the latter rain. (Zech. 10:1) This is the time to begin to ask, and obey this directive. Ask for this rain to begin now, which will expand into the full latter rain. Let me give you a description of what I am talking about. I know this story from first hand conversations…
Keith was raised in a godly home. But like so many, he went his own way, made insane choices, and broke his parents’ hearts. He was hooked on drugs, and eventually ended up in prison. When his parents would contact him, Keith responded with words of cursing, hatred, and blasphemy. He continued to drive the knife ever deeper of torturous cruelty every time his parents would make contact. Yet his parents did not give up loving him, and continued to reach out to him on a regular basis. They prayed without ceasing. Through many tears and much sorrow, they never gave up hope for their son.
Keith tells what happened hours after cursing his father (not for the first time) on the jail phone. As he sat on his cell bunk surrounded by gray windowless dead walls that mirrored his gray windowless dead future, he slumped into a posture of exhausted despair and said, “God, I can’t do this. If you are there and you can hear me, please…” A wind began to blow. In a windowless cell, a wind began to blow! Keith says that it blew so hard, it pinned him to the wall. And as it continued to blow, it entered into him, and began cleansing him from the inside out. He not only experienced the inrushing of the Holy Presence of God, but after a deep awareness of this cleansing power, he began worshipping God in a language he did not know. He has never looked back, or even been tempted to look back to his former life. He had no follow-up counseling, no ongoing therapies, no twelve-step programs. Keith has had no relapses or falls, or hold-on-by-your-fingernails trying to resist temptations. Other battles, yes. But that stuff, no. Remember the thirty-second cure? This…is that.
Why not this sort of miracle every time? Well…it could be. I have learned through my own struggles and from others like Keith, God does not pour such grace upon half-hearted casual inquirers. He does not pour water upon hard ground, where it will simply run off into a ditch. He pours water upon thirsty ground, broken ground, where it will seep deeply into our hearts in order to cleanse and transform us from the inside out. And only He sees the deep heart ready to receive from Him.
How thirsty are you? How broken up is your fallow ground? Can you hear the sound of coming showers? Are you crying out for the full outpouring? Are you believing for the thirty-second cure now, today? Break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the Lord until he comes and rains righteousness upon you. (Hosea 10:12) He will come to us like the rain, like the latter and former rain upon the earth. (Hosea 6:3)