“We have come into an intimate experience with God’s love, and we trust in the love he has for us.” — 1 John 4:16 TPT
“Jesus loves you more than you will know.” — Paul Simon, of Simon and Garfunkel
Welcome to Your Awakening!
I sat in my car at a red light on the corner of Bluemound and Northland Avenue in Appleton, Wisconsin on a sunny August afternoon when Jesus unmistakably spoke these words in my heart:
“Daniel, don’t you know I created you to love you?”
The relief that flooded through my being at hearing these words was palpable. This simple encounter with Jesus charted a new course in my life as my very purpose for existence had now been defined by love. I went from wondering if I was a lab rat in some cosmic experiment, that sometimes seemed cruel, to being introduced to the idea that I am secure in God’s love.
If we only knew…
Somehow I grasped in that moment that what Jesus had just spoken to me would inevitably result in eventual freedom from all my mistaken toxic ideas of God, and the nature of reality, that had long perplexed and tormented me. One word from Jesus can do that. The truth is, for too long, I had judged myself unworthy of God’s love. At the time, I didn’t love me and I wasn’t in the habit of letting God love me either.
Just one week before, I carpooled in a van with the leadership team from church heading home from the 2009 Vineyard church conference in Duluth, Minnesota. On the drive home, I worked up the nerve to ask them all to pray for me to understand grace. It was particularly hard for me to admit I didn’t understand grace because I was one of the worship leaders!
Jesus had now answered my prayer… at a stop light! I came to learn firsthand that God always responds to humility. As the Scriptures say, “God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.” (1 Peter 5:5)
At this point in my life, my wife and I had been married for eight years, yet we had no children. My profound lack of understanding of grace and the true nature of God had robbed me of the courage to bring children into the world. I knew I needed to impart a healthy spirituality to my children that, at the time, I knew I didn’t possess. Within one week after hearing Jesus’ words, my wife and I learned that we were expecting our first child. We named her Elisabeth Grace.
During that season and following, I received many more revelations and supernatural downloads regarding the grace of God. In time, I came to experience even more, the One whom John introduced in his Gospel as, “full of grace and truth”. God is better than I think he is. He loves me more than I know. I saw that his love is committed to making sure that I would come to know how loved I am.
Jesus is far more worthy of our attention and affection than any of us imagine. The significance of the person of Jesus Christ cannot be overstated. He is the center of the universe in ways beyond any of us can fathom. Jesus incarnation reveals the true nature of the One he called “Father” or “Abba”. Jesus is the fullest revelation and expression of who God is. Jesus is what God has to say about himself.
“The Son radiates God’s own glory and expresses the very character of God.” — Hebrews 1:3 NLT
Love is the glory and character of God! Grace has everything to do with love!
I had the honor of interviewing a naval aviator named Tony Woody who became spiritually awakened after a close brush with death when his plane nearly crashed at the age of twenty four. Two days after his “near death experience” he witnessed what he described as an undeniable miracle. He watched a television special about a severely handicapped man who could barely talk or function yet could somehow play the piano like a savant. Right before bed that night Tony expressed how grateful he was for the miracle he observed in that man’s life and prayed this simple prayer:
“Lord, it sure would be nice if you would do something like that for me someday.”
He promptly fell asleep and his “someday” happened that very night and changed his life forever. Tony woke in the middle of the night to the glory of God filling his room. He said this about his experience:
“I was taken to the throne room of creation and beheld a liquid molten golden white living light of the lotus flower flame of God’s immortal love unfolding and pouring out into the whole universe. This blasted through me filling me up with love, leaving me dumbfounded.”
“I had no idea love could be like this. I clearly knew I was in the Presence of my Creator. You can’t not know that when you are there. Everything of God’s essence was blasting through me making me One with it. And then I said three words, “Oh, my Goodness.” The instant I said, “Goodness”, Divine Goodness exploded within me… on an infinite scale.”
“These were all emotions coming from God’s heart, expressing to me what God felt about me, for me. And I was so precious to God… my best analogy about how precious all of us are to God as an individual is this:
“Imagine it’s the end of the life of the entire history of the universe. And I was being loved, held, and cradled by every mother, in every galaxy, in every time that ever existed, all at once.”
“And… that analogy actually stinks.”
“It doesn’t come close… at all… and it never will. I can talk like that for billions and billions and billions of years nonstop twenty four seven and I still won’t be able to scratch the surface of the truth of God’s love and what it’s like… but, that’s the best I can do.”
Jesus Christ, whom the Scriptures reveal as the Creator and sustainer of all things, whose Spirit fills all things everywhere, loves you more than you think he does! As much as you think Jesus loves you, you’re wrong… he loves you more! Let me say it again:
Jesus loves you more than you think he does!
This will always be true. This will never not be true. Jesus, the incarnation of the Love of the Father, came to reveal the Father’s love for each and every one of us. He is Immanuel — “God with us”— and, as the Scriptures reveal:
“God is love… in whom we live and move and have our being.”
Our role, as “created to be loved” beings, is simply this: to believe God’s love, and to receive God’s love. This is God’s desire and prayer for you:
“I pray that… you will be empowered to discover what every holy one experiences—the great magnitude of the astonishing love of Christ in all its dimensions. How deeply intimate and far-reaching is his love! How enduring and inclusive it is! Endless love beyond measurement that transcends our understanding—this extravagant love pours into you until you are filled to overflowing with the fullness of God!” — Ephesians 3:18-19 TPT
We are in the midst of an Awakening. We are all waking up to Jesus Christ’s astonishing, intimate, endless love. This love is intensely personal. You are created to be loved. You have been defined by love. You are defined by love. You will always be defined by love.
“I created you to love you” —Jesus
Could it be that your life is designed by a Master Architect of Love whose intentions can be trusted? Could it be that Jesus, the Good Shepherd and Overseer of your soul, has been, and is right now, actively and carefully leading and guiding you toward a richer and fuller experience of his astonishing, intimate, endless love?
As we will explore, Jesus’ love has established you in union with God. This is what it means to be a mystic. True mysticism is the communion of this union with God. Now is the time for you to enjoy your friendship and union with God. As God puts it in the good book, “Now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation.” This means, as the Lord Jesus has personally told me, “Your wholeness dwells in the now.”
Of course this book is not the “end all be all” of capturing what it is to be a mystic. Instead, I intend to focus on the main point of it all:
Intimacy
Intimacy is a feeling of being close, emotionally connected, understood, and supported. Intimacy is deeply knowing someone and also feeling deeply known yourself. Every human heart craves intimacy because we are created in the image and likeness, with the Divine blueprint, of an infinitely intimate Being. You were made for intimacy.
I See You
I like to break down the word intimacy as, “into-me-you-see.” If you have watched the movie Avatar, you will recall these three simple words that were infused with such profound weight and meaning: “I see you.”
One of God’s names is El Roi, “the God who sees me.” God sees you. Jesus sees you. Take a moment right now and envision Jesus looking directly into your eyes and hear him say:
“I see you.”
What does this do for you? Do you believe that you are seen, fully known, and fully loved?
Say out loud right now:
“I am seen. I am known. I am loved.”
Say it again.
Spend some time receiving what the Lord wants to reveal to you right now. This is a sacred moment.
Perhaps you had difficulty believing those words. Know that Jesus has taken care of any barriers to experiencing deep intimacy with Him. You are seen in all of your most faithless, darkest, shameful areas of your heart and you are loved. It is this kind of love that truly heals all of our faithlessness, darkness, and most of all, shame. In truth, it is within Christ’s love that you find all the healing you will ever need. His love covers ALL the multitude of your sin. His mercy triumphs over all judgment. Jesus’ love brings you right into His perfect peace as he says to you:
“My peace, I give, to you.” — Jesus
Do you receive his peace? Yes, your response matters.
Isaiah wrote that we will be kept in perfect peace as we trust God (Isaiah 26:3). In the Hebrew, “perfect peace” is “shalom shalom”. This speaks of our absolute completeness and wholeness. The apostle Paul declares:
“So you also are complete through your union with Christ.” (Colossians 2:10 NLT)
You are complete. You are whole. Today is the day of your salvation. Your wholeness dwells in this now moment. We need to ponder this. It would be a mistake to miss the significance and profundity of this moment. Don’t you think?
You are complete in your union, your Oneness, with Christ. Say it with me: “I am complete through my union with Christ.”
It is life-giving to speak the words of God over ourselves, building ourselves up in this most holy faith… in his most holy faith.
A life changing moment happened for me when I read what Paul wrote about Christ Jesus when he said, “Everything was created through him and for him.” (Colossians 1:16 NLT)
I saw myself in that verse. I was made by Jesus and for Jesus, to be loved by Jesus and to be one with Jesus. I saw quite clearly that my life would never have purpose or meaning apart from connection with, and relationship to, my Creator, this God who created me for himself… Jesus Christ. This is the purpose and meaning of life! I found meaning and purpose in belonging to Jesus. I am his and he is mine. He is my Beloved… and I am his.
WE are ONE.
Jesus, in John 14:20, confirms his purpose of establishing us all in Divine Oneness:
“On that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you are in Me, and I in you.” (John 14:20 NASB)
Oneness, restored union, has always been the pinnacle of Jesus’ message and mission. To restore all of humanity into the intimacy he created us for. And Jesus will never give up. He will never relent in his pursuit of us. He is the Good Shepherd who searches for every lost sheep until he finds them.
Let’s make it personal. He will never give up his pursuit of you until he finds you. His love never gives up on you. His love never fails you. He will never give up on you!
Encountering Jesus
This is a book filled with encounters with Jesus. In the pages that follow you will read many stories of extraordinary people who have encountered Jesus Christ in a remarkable way. I want to emphasize the truth that there is no such thing as an ordinary person and there is never an unremarkable encounter with Jesus Christ.
This is not a book about the mystics of the past, but of the seemingly ordinary mystics you might meet anywhere around the world. Nearly every one of these accounts are from people with whom I’ve had conversations with on my podcast. Some people might think the kind of encounters with Jesus described in this book are rare. In truth, I have found that the more you simply talk with people about encountering Jesus, the more stories surface.
I once had a conversation with a brother who sought an encounter with Jesus. He wanted to see Jesus for himself. Holy Spirit led him to his encounter outside a shop in Europe while on a missionary trip. He saw a man who looked at him and smiled. The man’s face had been marred by disease. He noticed that many of his teeth were missing or rotting. In spite of his off-putting physical appearance, he unmistakably saw Jesus in this man’s face and knew that God had just answered his prayer. Jesus revealed to this brother that he lives in us and most often associates himself with the humble of the world, with those who are often overlooked or even despised by society.
Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!” — Matthew 25:40 NLT
I once asked Paul Young, author of The Shack, about his most powerful encounter with Jesus. He told me of a time he visited a man on death row. He encountered Jesus in this condemned man when he sang Amazing Grace.
I think it would be most helpful to embrace the idea that we encounter Jesus in the face of every other human being. We need to start here. To be truly awakened is to act upon this truth and treat the Jesus in others with kindness, love, and respect as you would King Jesus himself. May we honor and celebrate each and every unique expression of Jesus in the people we meet and interact with on a daily basis.
I want to emphasize this from the outset in order to spare you from the obsession and trap of trying only to experience Jesus in some mystical way, as if Jesus must make a long harrowing journey from a distant heaven to visit us (Or whatever it is that we imagine). May we never forget that we interact with Jesus daily. We pass him on the street or in a store or within our own family day after day. But… he is even closer than that.
Remember this vital truth: Christ is in you!
“Christ in you, the hope of glory…When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory.” — Colossians 1:27; 3:4 NASB
If you want to see Jesus, look in the mirror. Why would we think that Jesus is out there somewhere… but what does the Scripture say?
“His purpose was for the nations to seek after God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him—though he is not far from any one of us.” (Acts 17:27 NLT)
God is not far from any one of us because God is within us. He is closer than your very breath. Closer than the beating of your heart. Christ is at your very core. He is your life. He is your light. He is your love.
Yes, while this book relates encounters that seem as if Jesus visits us from a distant heaven, the truth is that he is always with you and in you. Jesus told us the truth when he said, “the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21). To find the King of heaven, we need look no farther than within our very own being. Jesus has personally said to me, “I am intrinsic to you. You are intrinsic to me.” This is a rich truth I encourage you to explore with him.
If I didn’t emphasize these points right from the start, I feel that this book would be a lie. It might leave someone with the wrong impression that in some way belittles or negates the real relationship that many have with Jesus even though, in this lifetime, they may never “see him face to face” in some fantastical vision like the ways described in this book.
As you read the following accounts of people encountering Jesus in the visions and encounters, I want to encourage you to guard against envy. Please don’t think, “Why them and not me?” Holy Spirit reveals that we are part of the same body, so if something happens to any one of us, in some mysterious way, it happens to all of us.
“Whatever happens to one member happens to all. If one suffers, everyone suffers. If one is honored, everyone rejoices.” — 1 Corinthians 12:26 TPT
Is it possible for us to enter into another’s encounter and vicariously enjoy their experience as our own with joy and gratitude? I believe this is the mature response. We will all soon enough realize the truth of our Mystic Oneness with our brothers and sisters in Christ. To envy or regard one another with jealousy is to subtly deny our Oneness.
In my own experience, as I have honored another brother or sister’s encounter with Jesus or experience of God, not only will I enter into their experience, like being immersed in a good novel, I will also often then have a similar encounter of my own. Do you want to encounter Jesus yourself?
Me too!
Ask and keep on asking and it will be given to you; seek and keep on seeking and you will find; knock and keep on knocking and the door will be opened to you.” — Jesus, Matthew 7:7 Amp
Ask, seek, and knock with perseverance and you are guaranteed to receive what you seek. Persistence is the key in our pursuit of God for, “God rewards those who diligently seek him.” (Hebrews 11:6) Our persistence creates within us the capacity to receive and house the many revelations and gifts, and most of all—Presence, that God is not just willing, but eager to reveal to us and freely give us. As Jesus said, it is our Father’s good pleasure to give us the kingdom. He has already done so by giving us the King!
“For God so loved the world that he gave us his only begotten Son.” (John 3:16) “Unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given, and the government will rest on his shoulders.” (Isaiah 9:6)
God gave me a dream about the Awakening breaking out all over the world. In my dream I saw the earth from a distance and a person represented by a flame, lit up with the glory of God and the love of Jesus, on board a plane that flew across the Atlantic. As they landed in a city in Europe, I watched as the flame spread. The city awakened.
America then filled my vision. My gaze focused on the Midwest and the Eastern part of the country. The flames sparked up and spread everywhere with some regions glowing with more intensity than others. I became aware that this was happening everywhere!
“I have come to set the earth on fire. And how I long for every heart to be already ablaze with this fiery passion for God!” — Jesus, Luke 12:49 TPT
This is the fire that Jesus longs to see kindled on the earth! This is what heaven has been working toward all this time! The “kingdom” is any and every one who possesses an intimate relationship with the King.
The kingdom of God is advancing. The leaven of Christ’s kingdom of love is permeating the dough of this earth. The Rock, who is Christ, is replacing all the kingdoms of this earth and will become a mountain that fills the whole earth. The Scriptures are true. Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end!
New Wineskins for New Wine
This book will no doubt be an encouraging companion to you on your journey toward a closer relationship with Jesus as you read about many people’s encounters with Jesus. In the coming chapters we will explore many encounters with Jesus, visions, and dreams from God. There will likely be something or another along the way that’s going to stretch your faith. How flexible are you? Jesus explained our need for flexibility in this way:
“No one puts new wine into old wineskins. For the wine would burst the wineskins, and the wine and the skins would both be lost. New wine calls for new wineskins.” — Mark 2:22 NLT
New wineskins will stretch as the wine ages so they won’t burst and the precious wine won’t be lost. What is this “new wine”? 🍷 I believe this speaks of revelation from and of God, his love, his grace, and so much more. This is the revealing of “Christ in you” which is the spirit of prophecy. What is God highlighting in this Great Awakening? What are the various man made dogmas of his church that Jesus is correcting in this Re-formation? Revelation will come to you by the gift of the Anointing that teaches each and every one of us. What is this Anointing? It is the Spirit of Truth who leads us into all truth. The Scriptures reveal that you, as a believer, have this Anointing.
Jesus said to his disciples:
“There is so much more I would like to say to you, but it’s more than you can grasp at this moment. But when the truth-giving Spirit comes, he will unveil the reality of every truth within you.” — John 16:12-13 TPT
There is a phrase that Jesus said to Nicodemus that captures my imagination:
“If you don’t believe me when I tell you about earthly things, how can you possibly believe if I tell you about heavenly things.” — John 3:12 NLT
This reminds me of a scene from a Ben Stiller movie, Night at the Museum 2, where he tells a security guard named Brundon, “I’ve seen things you cannot imagine”. Brundon’s response reflects my own wide eyed childlike response to Jesus’ words about “heavenly things”:
“Like what kind of things?”
My imagination is stirred. Isn’t yours? Curiosity is the proper response for any child of God. Jesus is delighted with our childlike response to the Mystery of God. Jesus longs to reveal Himself, to reveal the Father, disclosing all the Mysteries of heaven to those who are willing to receive.
So I ask you… are you willing to be a new wineskin? Jesus obviously isn’t inviting you into deception. We are out of our minds if we think we can sincerely ask God for Holy Spirit and end up with an evil spirit instead. Jesus put it this way:
“Now suppose one of you fathers is asked by his son for a fish; he will not give him a snake instead of a fish, will he? Or if he is asked for an egg, he will not give him a scorpion, will he? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?” (Luke 11:11-13 NASB)
On January 23rd, 2025 at 11:38 a.m. Jesus said to me:
“Which one of your experiences of me was a lie?
Come on!
Let’s extract the precious from the vile!”
None of them, Lord. I asked for a fish.
“Exactly… That is all for now.”
Your Father is Good. In this passage Jesus highlights, draws attention to, and teaches us what the best gift your Heavenly Father can possibly give you, his child. Your Father is Good. Of course He desires to bless you with the best gift imaginable! And what is the best gift he could possibly give you? His Presence! The fullness of God, in you, by God’s Holy Spirit! God gives you himself!
Jesus is your Good Shepherd and has proved his love and trustworthiness when he gave his life for you. He is the Shepherd and Overseer of your soul and you are in his care. Jesus would never dream of throwing his sheep to the wolves. You can trust him. Jesus is inviting you into the wild freedom of life in the Spirit.
“This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It’s adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike “What’s next, Papa?” God’s Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are. We know who he is, and we know who we are: Father and children. And we know we are going to get what’s coming to us—an unbelievable inheritance! We go through exactly what Christ goes through. If we go through the hard times with him, then we’re certainly going to go through the good times with him.” (Romans 8:15-17 MSG)
So, I ask you: Are you ready for the good times?
ACTIVATION:
The Scripture encourages us to “look away from the natural realm and fasten our gaze onto Jesus who birthed faith within us and who leads us forward into faith’s perfection.”
Take some time right now and invite Jesus to reveal himself to you. Do as the Scriptures encourage us to do right now and, “Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace for help at the time of our need.” (Hebrews 4:16 NIV)
Come BOLDLY right now before Jesus’ throne of his favor for you and ask him what he has for you.
Pray with me:
Jesus, I want to experience you. I want to know you. I desire to experience the Father’s heart. Thank you for creating me to love me. I receive Your love. Thank you for giving me your peace. I receive Your peace. Thank you for “seeing” me and desiring a relationship with me. Expand my heart to receive more of you. I ask to be “under the influence” of the intoxicating wine of the love of God my Savior — the astonishing, intimate, endless love of Jesus Christ… What’s next, Papa?