Do I have a gift?

[mcata]

For many years I have always thought I had a special "understanding" of things. It started when I was young and had what I thought was an out of body experience. When I was a teenager, I had a dream that a family member had a baby and knew the correct weight and height, ten minutes after waking up and telling my mom about the dream, my aunt called to say my cousin had the baby, same weight and height that I had dreamed. Over the years, I have always tried to research the paranormal but I have probably managed to suppress my abilities as my spouse is a non believer, the Catholic church does not "allow" such things and work has really had to keep me grounded.

I have noticed that I have been able to "sense" if something is right or wrong. Right before 9/11, I worked across the street in one of the buildings that was demolished, I quit for no reason 2 months prior (my wife wanted to kill me), after then I have managed to resign from three other firms right before they either went completely bankrupt or downsized my role. I also notice that I am good at predicting other small things in general on a daily basis. So my question is: Is this just good timing or is there something else at work? Any advice is appreciated.

Mike

[NightSpirit]

Some members of this forum are not particularly open to this point of view but I want to say some things for you to consider, since you mentioned the Catholic church not being open to the expression of your gift. I am not Catholic but what you say surprises me considering the prevalence of reported miracles and the acknowledgement of the supernatural in the angels, demons and visions within that faith.

I am Christian and have attended Charismatic and Pentecostal churches where the gift you mentioned is openly practiced and encouraged as something to be nurtured. The gifts of the Spirit are listed in I Cor 12:10 and it seems like you have operated mostly in the word of knowledge area in knowing what you could not have known naturally. It was a gift that Jesus displayed often in His ministry as detailed in the Gospels. He told the woman at the well all that she had ever done (John 4), He saw Nathanael under the tree before He met Him (John 1:48-50) and He told Peter the he would deny Him before the (rooster) crowed (Matt 26).

Jesus came as an example of what a man submitted to God can do and He said that we would do all these things and greater things. The Apostles did some of these same things Jesus did and the book of Acts is full of details of similar miracles. I think it is a shame if someone who has a gift feels they are being drawn away from the God of the Bible instead of encouraged to use that gift for what it was intended as explained within I Cor 12 for the profit of all.

If God's people become better at recognizing their gift, there is no end to the good that God could do through someone submitted to Him. How many others could have been led away from working near the Twin Towers just as you were led to quit your job for no good reason, if it was widely accepted that God speaks to people and through people who are open to Him? Not to dismiss the suffering of others but you had to have been filled with a sense of awe and gratitude when you saw the towers fall, knowing you had been supernaturally spared that tragedy.

I know it seems like too much of a responsibility for someone to say they have received a message from God. I think that is the reason some people leave God out of it when exercising their gift. It’s easier and seems more sane to just say you have an intuitive impression. How long would someone be free to live in society if they had started calling up their former co-workers and saying, “God said stay home tomorrow“ or “I felt led to leave that building and maybe you should consider doing the same“? And you have already experienced the resistance that comes from others to doing what is felt to be right even if circumstances don’t seem to agree. So you know it won‘t always be easy and even your own wife may not feel the things you do.

Even in following God, mistakes will be made in the delivery of what He wants to say, and much depends upon the degree to which the gifted person is submitted to God. Every message, even one we think is from God, must be tested against our own spirit because there are other voices meant to confuse and even our own voices speaking within our spirit. We do grow in our gifts, just as David of the Bible had killed both a bear and a lion before he confronted Goliath. Events will occur within our own lives that don't mean anything to anyone but us and are meant to first teach us which leadings and impressions are true before we start exercising our gift in the lives of others.

All that to say, some Christians know we can keep our faith in God and also acknowledge and cultivate our spiritual gifts and that God works within these gifts sometimes in ways that can be matters of life and death, as you already know.