The Face of Jesus and Crown of Thorns Dream

Shortly before the end of 2010, I had the only dream in which I saw our Lord's face.

I saw a modest room that was dimly lit and a man on his knees by his bedside with his eyes closed praying. Then I saw the Lord Jesus standing by the window near that man with a very sad expression on his face. He looked just as He must have looked during His earthly ministry, very similar to the famous "Prince of Peace" painting.

I was an observer in this dream and only the Lord acknowledged my presence. He did not say anything to me, only motioned towards the praying man and placed a crown of thorns on his head and stood by him, though the praying man did not see Him. I did not hear what the man was praying for, but I had a sense that He was distressed. I did not immediately fully understand this dream, though I knew that the crown of thorns was the symbol of our Lord's suffering, but when the news of increased persecution of Christians by terrorist group called ISIS emerged in 2011, then I was reminded again of this dream.

Now, I understand that through this dream the Lord was telling me that the time was coming in which Christians would share in His suffering for His name's sake and that it could not be stopped. Just as I shared in the previous post, I believe the Lord is calling us all to remember those Christians and their persecutors in our prayers. I will be coming up to date here with more of some significant prophetic dreams that the Lord gave me over the years as well as any new ones I might have, perhaps it would encourage you to pay attention to your dreams as well and help you interpret them. God bless!

Author's Note: The photo used here is of the painting "Prince of Peace" by Akiane Kramarik who grew up in an atheists family and saw the face of Jesus in dreams and visions, and later painted it. It is the only painting of Jesus' face that other children who saw Him in visions confirm is the closest to what they saw as well.You can see more art by her by clicking on her name in the credit i gave above.

One Minute a Day Prayer Challenge

Last Sunday, I was rather shocked by what the pastor of a church I attend had said during his sermon. Don't get me wrong. It was a great message and I really love this pastor. He is sincerely trying to help more than 5,000 people who attend his church to grow spiritually. Most of all he is a godly and humble man, but apparently he did not know that Christians are still being crucified for their faith today because after explaining what a horrible death a crucifixion really is, he commented, "Thank God nobody is being killed this way anymore."

Well, he was wrong. And in case you did not follow the news, Islamic fanatics who control big parts of Iraq and Syria called ISIS are doing this very thing to Christians in the Middle East. They crucify them or behead them if they choose not to renounce their faith in Jesus and that includes children. It is a sheer horror and I find it troubling that so many Christians in the West do not know about it or choose not to talk about it in their churches. I thought, there should be more awareness, more prayer for our persecuted brothers and sisters. And not only for them, but also for all the Muslim people who are being persecuted in like manner if they will not accept the fanatical Islamic ideology groups such as ISIS promote.

We might not be able to physically stop this senseless violence and we certainly cannot know each person who suffers there everyday by name, but our God knows them all and knows what they are going through. The least we all could do is to pray for them and it is not really a small thing. Prayer is the most powerful weapon in our disposal. It is a weapon that can change destinies of entire nations. Behind all world events that are right now unfolding is an underlying spiritual reality and spiritual battle is going on.

Satan enslaves various groups of people with various ideologies, both religious and secular, in order to kill, steal and destroy. He knows that he is already defeated by God, knows that he will eventually end up in the lake of fire, so the only way he can get back at Him is to try to drag to hell with himself as many people as he possibly can because he knows that God cares about them. That is why it is so important for us to pray and ask God to intervene on the behalf of those who are being killed for His name's sake all day long as well as for their tormentors. Yes, pray for these deceived and misguided ISIS men and women.

Remember that our warfare is not against flesh and blood. They are also victims of the evil one. When they kill Christians, they go to heaven, but when the oppressors die themselves, they go straight to hell and instead of the promised 70 virgins they get hundreds of demons to torment them forever! They are the greatest losers in all of this because while thinking that they are serving God, they really are serving the devil.

We must pray for their repentance, pray that God will revel the Truth to them and set them free. So, what I am asking you today is to commit to take just one minute ( or more if you can) out of your day everyday in order to pray daily for those who are being persecuted and killed for their faith in Jesus around the world as well as for those who are persecuting and killing them.

Now this is spiritual warfare, so first ask God to cover you and your family by the precious blood of Jesus, then spend 5 Minutes praying for God's presence and comfort upon all those who are suffering for Him today wherever they might be. From the Middle East to North Korea and Africa. Then pray that those who persecute them would be convicted by the Holy Spirit of their wrongdoing that their sins be heavy upon them until they repent. Remember that the apostle Paul was also such a religious fanatic at one time, if he could be saved, so can they.

Finally, if you are reading this and it is you who are being thus persecuted, remember that you are not alone. We might not know each other by name, but because we follow Jesus we are part of His body and members of heavenly family and kingdom. I am praying for you and many others will be praying as well. Stand fast in your faith. And if you are the one who persecutes, you will probably hate me right now, but I love you because God loves you. My God, the God of the Bible taught me to love my enemies and to pray for those who hate me. True God is Love and He does not ask us to kill for him, but He already sent His son to die for you. If you ask Jesus right now to forgive you for your sins, He will forgive you. No matter what you have done and you will go to heaven when you die because of His love for you, if you will choose to live and die for Him. Furthermore, He will give you freedom from those sinful desires that you are struggling with and will set you free from them. You don't have to kill anyone to be forgiven. You just need to repent. After you do, get hold of the Bible online, read the New testament and learn how to live for God. God bless you all.

John Paul Jackson's Memorial

In case some of you did not follow brother John Paul on Facebook, I thought it would be good for me to share with you the link to the Daystar TV page where you will be able to watch it. I still cannot believe he is gone from this earth and agree with brother Anthony Pappalardo, who commented on my previous post about the untimely passing of JPJ, that he might have been just to eager to get back to the work of ministry after his recovery from cancer thus weakening his body instead of giving it enough time to fully restore itself.

I also remembered a dream I had about JPJ shortly after he won the battle with cancer. It was the only dream I ever had of him. In this dream, I saw him in the library type of building there were many books and it was well lit, but the floor was slippery. He walked with a slight limp, but insisted that he is doing just fine and could even run if he wanted to. I proceeded to warn him not to do it and feared he could slip on that floor, but he ran anyway. That was the end of dream. Not too long after, on July 10, 2014, I read his medical update on Facebook in which he was giving God glory for his recovery and saying that he has faith that he will be able to return to his running routine soon. He really loved this type of exercise and he used to run most days of the week for as much as 10 miles before he got sick.

I left a comment on that warning him against running and said that walking had the same health benefits, but would not weaken the body like running does. I have no idea if he ever read all those comments personally, but I did pray for him often and now I believe too that this could have had weakened him. Again, he will be every much missed. May we all learn from his example both from all the wisdom he had and from the mistakes he had made. Here is the link to brother JPJ's memorial site: http://www.daystar.com/watch/live-stream/ It will be aired on Monday, March 9th at 11 am to 12 pm CST.