The Destitute Woman

My wife said to me, “I had a dream about you crossing the road. A bus was coming, and you put out your hand so it would stop.”

I took the dream to be a warning from God, because we live on a very busy street. It is sometimes tempting to want to race across the street in order to catch the bus to work in the morning. But at what cost? So I decided to take it a bit slower, and be more careful, on account of the dream.

Several days went by. I kissed my wife and said goodbye. I headed out the door. The bus was coming! I was tempted to want to race across the street, but remembered the dream. Rather than trying to race across the street, I simply put out my hand towards the bus, as if to say, “Hey, do you think you could please stop?” But the bus driver just ignored my plea and whizzed by me.

Gone!

I crossed the street and waited. It would be another 5 or 10 minutes before the next bus would arrive. I decided to race ahead a few stops for the sake of exercise. I ran a total of three stops. Then, the bus came. I met three people on the bus — all from India — and there was an immediate opening to talk with them.

We talked for about 5 minutes. I mentioned to them that I had eaten Indian food the night before. One of them asked if I had been to India. I said, “Yes.” In fact, I had been there many years before as part of an evangelistic outreach.

I gave three evangelistic tracts (small pamphlets that I was carrying) to the people from India, and told them I was a Christian. They gladly received them.

The three Indians and I went down to take the subway. The doors opened, but directly in front of me was a barred subway door. It caught me off guard. I had never seen a barred subway door before.

Suddenly, the warning sound sounded to signal the closing of the subway doors. On the spur of the moment, I had to quickly choose which door to enter. Would it be the one to the left of the barred subway door, or the one to the right? I choose the right.

The three Indians made a dash to the left. We were now in separate cars. I lost them! That had not been my intention!

There were no seats available on the subway, so I kept walking down the aisle. I eventually got to the end of the car, and there were still none. The subway stopped at the next stop, and I quickly exited, only to quickly rush back into the next car, to see if I could find a seat.

I wanted a seat. I wanted to be able to sit down and do some work on my laptop, as it would be a 23-minute ride. Finally, I found one. There was just one seat, but why was no-one sitting there? When I sat down, the foul smell of urine invaded my space. Was I sitting on it, or was it coming from the derelict-looking man to my left, who was standing near the door? I didn’t know.

A clear plastic barricade separated me from the man standing to my left, so I could not tell if the smell was coming from the man, or from the seat I was sitting on. I decided that at this point, what did it really matter? I kept sitting and enjoyed the ride.

I got off the subway, and was preparing to go up the steps. I wanted to take the stairs for the sake of exercise. But as I approached them, the Lord suddenly spoke to me.

In the faintest but clearest of whispers, he told me to take the escalator, which was to the left.

It threw me for a loop. The escalator? Really?

I quickly disregarded the voice because I was walking fast and wanted to get going. That was a good enough reason to disobey the voice of the Lord, was it not? I was in a hurry! Thus, I took the stairs.

It was not to my advantage to take the escalator, I thought. Yet I began to feel like I had made a mistake, every step I took! I continued walking up the stairs, but only made it to the 11th step.

The Holy Spirit, who lives inside each believer in Jesus, began to get slightly grieved. I could feel it. The slight grief was almost as slight as his voice when he had told me to take the escalator, but was just as clear. All I had to do was listen.

My problem was that I was just a little bit too rushed for what the Lord wanted. This whole episode was to get me to slow down, but I didn’t quite realize it. That was the only goal at this stage of the journey. The journey had two stages, and I didn’t realize I was only at part one. Part two was less than 40 steps away.

There I stood on the 11th step, wondering, “Should I go back down or not?” It was a decision I had to make. Was I going to be obedient or not, to the voice of the Lord?

I wondered, “But maybe it’s not the Lord.”

I wondered again, “But maybe it is the Lord.”

Although I was half-way up the stairs, and there were only 10 more steps to go, I chose to walk back down, because that is what faith does.

Faith obeys.

I couldn’t chance disobeying the Lord. If he was speaking to me, there had to be a reason. It would not take long to walk back down the stairs and take the escalator.

By this time, any time advantage of taking the escalator was completely lost. I was now about 2 minutes behind schedule. Surely, it was not a scheduling thing with the Lord. I could even run up the stairs quicker than the crowd was able to move up that escalator! It was not a particularly long flight of stairs. The issue was not time. Surely, the Lord had another reason.

He did.

Obedience.

Everything I was doing at this point in time was merely a lesson in, or test of, my obedience. That was the entire issue. If I could not be obedient to the Spirit of God at this point in time, I was going to miss the next opportunity. The next opportunity would occur less than 40 steps away.

I walked back down the steps, and took the escalator. Nothing dramatic happened, and I did not meet anyone along the way, either. Soon, I was at the top of the escalator — the same place I would have been about 2 minutes earlier had I simply kept walking up the stairs.

Our heavenly Father is a good father. His goal is not condemnation but training in righteousness. I was being trained by the Holy Spirit, so that in less than 40 steps, I would not miss out on what God was doing.

The turnstiles were not far in the distance. Those were the turnstiles at Bloor and Yonge station by which a person can then exit either left towards Bloor street east, or right, towards Bloor street west. I veered to the left, and was about to exit the turnstile, in order to proceed towards Bloor street east, when the Lord suddenly spoke to me again, this time telling me to stop!

It was just a few feet before actually passing through the turnstile that he spoke to me, and he did not want me passing through it! Would I stop this time, precisely on queue, before I could even exit the turnstile? That was the question. That’s what the training and the testing was all about. That’s what the training and testing downstairs had been all about. It had been all about doing it right — right now, right this very second! Right now, right this very second, I stopped. I could not get away from the fact that God was speaking to me again. I perceived it clearly.

Thankfully, I stopped on queue, before exiting the turnstile. Two seconds later, and it would have been too late, and I would have had to pay another subway fare in order to get back inside. Had I escaped the turnstile, my incentive and motivation for coming back inside would have also been jeopardized at that point in time. So now was the time to stop — not in two seconds.

A Clear Voice

The voice was very distinct. It was not audible. It was spirit-to-spirit. The Lord can certainly speak audibly, but he did not do it in that way. He bypassed my physical ears and spoke directly to my spirit. For the Lord communicates very clearly. He can say it as clear as any man or woman, or he is not the Lord. Cannot the Lord, who created the mouth, speak? Does not the Lord, who created the heart, have feelings and emotions? I was hearing him, and he was speaking to me. The voice was clear.

He said there was a woman on the floor I was to speak to. But I didn’t know which one it was. I looked up and noticed two women. Normally, there were many people on that floor, but the subway had come and gone and the people had mostly cleared out. There were only two women in sight. I looked and saw one coming in my direction. Could this be the one that God wanted me to speak to? She was moving rather quickly and I decided to let her go. Good decision. She was about to exit the turnstile, and the Lord had told me to stop before the turnstile. She was not the one the Lord had in mind.

The second woman was sitting on the bench in the distance. She was about ten steps back, near the top of the stairs, from where I had just come. She had a cell phone in her hand, but I didn’t initially see it. She was distraught.

This woman was occupied with some concern.

I walked up to her, and pulled out my one remaining evangelistic tract —I had only taken four with me that morning, and I had given the other three to the three Indians. Even while she was still on the phone (I now noticed she was on the phone, engaged in some sort of arduous, soul-gripping, conversation), I said to her, “I would like to give this to you.” Then, I added, “I’m a Christian.”

It’s not that I wanted to interrupt her phone call, but I didn’t really notice she was on the phone at the beginning and almost blindly went up to her to give her the tract. She had been essentially clutching her phone, holding it by her side, in distress, as I approached her. I simply gave her the tract, then added, “I’m a Christian.” It was a word she needed to hear. I sometimes don’t add that part in. In fact, I usually don’t mention that, unless I feel a clear leading from the Lord. In this case, I did. There was liberty to tell her I was a Christian. She needed to hear it. It was all part of the plan — the Lord’s plan, that is.

She responded with tears, “So am I,” and frantically went back to her phone call, sobbing.

The woman was in need, but I didn’t know what the issue was. The tears were flowing, but she kept looking up, as if looking up to God, towards heaven, with tears running down her face. I told her what had happened, how the Lord had spoken to me, and she immediately fell down on her knees by the bench, worshipping God and raising her hands to the Lord, as she looked towards heaven. She alternated between looking up towards heaven, and looking down towards the ground, holding both hands together, weeping. She kept weeping and I told her I would help her.

For a good long while, maybe one or two minutes, she remained kneeling by the seat, weeping, and saying, “Thank you, Jesus! Thank you, Lord!” in French.

What was going on? What was the issue? I didn’t know. But I did know the Lord had sent me there. That much was obvious.

As it turns out, she was from Ottawa (about a five or six hour drive away). She had been living in a women’s shelter for about four months in Toronto. She had no husband, and two daughters back in Ottawa. She had come to Toronto to look for a job. She was in desperate need.

She had not seen her daughters since coming to Toronto. They were on their own, and one of them was finishing her year at university, but was under high stress, and ended up being rushed to the hospital. Clearly, this was a very stressful situation for the mother, and it was just then and there, while sitting on that bench at Bloor station, that she found out. Yes, at that very instant, when the Lord had spoken to me, she found out that her daughter was in the hospital. It really was a desperate situation for this poor woman. The Lord really felt for her, so he interrupted me.

With her daughter far away, finishing up in university, without anyone to care for her, and now in hospital, and the mother not having a penny to her name, being forced to live in a woman’s shelter, this is why the Lord stopped me that day.

You see, God’s got a heart. His heart is a very soft one. He is inclined towards the poor, distressed, outcast, widow, and orphan. In the Bible, we read,

“Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” (James 1:27)

The voice was inescapable. I had to do something. I had to care for this woman, at least in a small way, in order to help her out in her distress. And she really was in distress.

She kept crying. I prayed with her and reassured her that God knew her name and the name of her daughter.

“Take courage,” I said. “God is in control. He cares for you and your family.” We said a prayer. The woman was being comforted, and that was God’s will. The Lord deeply cared for this woman, and her two daughters.

The story of the good Samaritan flashed in my mind. What did the good Samaritan do? He took the man and brought him to a place where he would be taken care of. And God had given me some extra money so I could do the same.

I took her to a bank machine and withdrew enough money to pay for her return bus fare to Ottawa, with enough extra to cover any miscellaneous expenses along the way.

Within a short while, she was on her way. Later, she called me, to tell me that she was able to see her daughter, and return to Toronto. I was glad. Still, I wished I could have been able to do even more. But I figured, I did what I could, and the Lord will help her in her other pursuits.

God Speaks Today

This incident was quite amazing, and demonstrates the heart of God for people. He cares for them. It also demonstrates that God is willing to speak today, in a very personal way. This has been all but missed by many churches, many of which teach that God does not even speak today. Of course, he does. Any thought that God could not speak just as well, or as easily, as any human being, is preposterous. What God is it, anyway, that Christians serve? There are some who believe that he only speaks through his word, the Bible. Of course, the Bible is important, but is not the only means by which God speaks. God can even speak through dreams and visions, which is what it says in the Bible.

In fact, in the Bible, speaking of the last days, God says,

“It will happen afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; and your sons and your daughters will prophesy. Your old men will dream dreams. Your young men will see visions. And also on the servants and on the handmaids in those days, I will pour out my Spirit.” (Joel 2:28-29)

God speaking through dreams and visions applies certainly for today, because we are still in the days that this passage speaks of. If then God can speak through dreams and visions, and even directly spirit-to-spirit, of what value is the word of God, the Bible?

Well, the Bible is God’s love letter to the world. It provides the framework, guidelines, and boundaries, by which God operates. Since God spoke through dreams and visions in the Bible, we know that this is one of the means by which he speaks. However, some people have taken this too far. Some people have taken a dream or a vision, and made it say something God has not said. Yes, it is possible, as it were, to “make God say” things he did not even say. But this is equally true for those people who believe that God only speaks through his word, the Bible. You see, it’s easy to bend God’s word, even if you are using only the Bible. The key is to read it in context.

What does the Bible actually teach? The Bible teaches that God has a voice. He’s personal and knowable. Many people, including many Christians, just don’t understand this. However, in John chapter 10, Jesus said,

“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:27).

The voice of God is not his word. It never is. Even as my voice is not the same as the text message I sent to my wife. As her husband, she expects me to speak with her, as well. And God, as our Lord and Savior, also speaks in a variety of ways, but always consistent with his word, the Bible. So it’s not that the Bible is the only way God speaks. However, it does provide us with the guidelines and boundaries by which God speaks. He will never speak to us outside of the parameters which he has established in his word, the Bible. One of those parameters is that he is actually willing to speak to us through dreams and visions.

One needs to be careful not to limit God. God even spoke by way of a donkey, once! God literally put the words in the donkey’s mouth, and spoke them out to a rebellious man named Balaam. If God can do that, then of course, he can speak by way of a dream or a vision. There is great controversy surrounding this in some of the churches today, because they are afraid to embrace the idea that they would have to start interpreting dreams and visions. It seems like such an arduous task. The fact is, it is arduous, but that is life. God has given us guidelines in the Bible on how to interpret dreams and visions, but a segment of Christian believers wants nothing to do with it.

I would also like to point out that living your life by dreams and visions is not normative. God may certainly give them, but it’s not something we should be looking to in order to learn how to live our lives. God will give them as needed. And some may receive them rather infrequently, say once a year, but others may receive them more.

The issue is, there has not been a lot of good teaching on this for the last 30 years or more. So one side rejects all dreams and visions, or God speaking personally as he did with me, regarding this woman, who was in desperate need. I mean, how else would I have known to help this poor woman? I certainly could not have read it in the Bible that morning. This is a classic case ― where someone has an important personal need, where God may intervene. But those people who teach that God doesn’t do this today, I guess they would just rather leave this woman stranded. But my Bible says to help widows in their distress. And this woman, who had no one to help her, was in great distress. If the Lord had not spoken directly to me about her, I would have passed right by her. And that would have been a travesty.

But why did God even stop me? I mean, there are a lot of people that have needs. Yes, but this woman was a daughter of the living God. She was crying out to him in her distress. But again, you might say, “There are many people, even many believers, who have urgent needs. Why is God not sending people to them?”

My first response is, “How do you know?” And second, I was walking by her that day on my way to work. It was convenient and appropriate for God to stop me as I was passing by. Furthermore, how many people who could help would God like to speak with, who are just not listening, because of a theology that says, “God doesn’t do these things today”?

Great care is needed when interpreting dreams or visions or even God speaking to you personally spirit-to-spirit, as he did to me that day. By the same token, great care is also needed in simply interpreting the Bible. Regardless of what you think about these things, there are also those who abuse the Bible, and those who abuse dreams and visions, saying things and teachings things that are not in accordance with the word of God.

Dreams and visions, or God speaking today personally, like he did with me, is not equivalent to Scripture and does not add to Scripture. Scripture provides the boundaries by which God operates. And nothing adds to that. And since it does provide the boundaries, therefore God can and does still speak personally to people today, apart from his word, but never apart from the context of his word. Just ask the many people who have had dreams of Jesus, who have come to faith in him, because he spoke to them in a dream. This has happened many times, and there are many testimonies of this happening.

By the way, it was by way of a supernatural encounter that Paul, who was an apostle, also became a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ.

God still speaks today, even as he did long ago.