I am starting a series on mantles.
I will use myself as an example, because, I will be able to disclose material about these mantles that I would not know about another’s. It is important to understand the circumstances surrounding the receiving of the mantle, how long it has been worn, how they have changed the life of the one wearing it, etc. All that I have received have been useful, all have been needed. There are five.
MANTLE # 1 – FROM JESUS
(28 years ago)
My husband and I had been asked to accompany a friend (she was the head of a Kansas City ministry) to Spokane, Washington. She had been exceedingly busy with ministry and therefore unable to be absent long enough to travel the great distance from Kansas City, MO to Washington. Her maiden name was Lake and she knew that some of her relatives had moved out to Spokane years ago. She wanted to visit the grave of John G. Lake. She not only admired him, but her father looked like he could have been his twin. She, being in ministry so many years, knew more about mantles than we (my husband and I) did. Because her name was Lake, she wanted to ask for John G. Lake’s mantle, if the Lord wished her to have it. Often mantles are passed down in families. All the dots seemed to line up (with her maiden name being Lake and John G Lake looking like her father), that if the Lord so willed, she could request and receive that mantle.
She wanted prayer companionship and (perhaps – if the Lord so agreed) witnesses to the Lord’s will in the matter.
We flew out to Spokane and spent the weekend, visiting the grave site several times. Bob Jones had told us of a pastor in the area that became ill and therefore went to the pastors of the area asking for prayers for healing. Finally, the last pastor said: “None of us have the power. There is more power in that (meaning J. G. Lake’s) grave than in any of us. Therefore, in the driving rain, “as sick as a dog”, he went to the cemetery and lay face down on John G. Lake’s grave and came up healed. Evidently, there was “something about that grave”.
I remembered Bob Jones telling me that it was “hard for prophets to die”. When I asked why he said: “Because they have so much life in their bones.” Were John G. Lake’s bones still so full of Life that they could heal?
When we arrived at the grave site in Spokane, we were surprised that power was, indeed, coming from that grave. I thought of the story in the Bible.
2 Kings 13:20-21 “Elisha died, and they buried him. Now the bands of the Moabites would invade the land in the spring of the year.
21 – As they were burying a man, behold, they saw a marauding band; and they cast the man into the grave of Elisha. And when the man touched the bones of Elisha he revived and stood up on his feet.”
Could this be the same? This was far beyond my spiritual understanding. I had been a minister’s wife in the denominational church. Unusual experiences did not occur as far as I knew. Others might experience amazing occurrences, but those never happened to me. But I could pray for a friend to experience such a blessing, if that was the Lord’s will.
The night before praying for our friend to receive the mantle, the Lord kept me up. He was wrestling with me all night. He said that the mantle was meant for me. Finally, in the early hours of the predawn I said this to Him:
“I have come here with our friend for her to receive that mantle. You have picked the wrong person if you think I will undercut my friend in order to receive that mantle myself. No, please give the mantle to her.”
Even though I had not slept, I felt that what happened had to have been a test of character, or something of that sort. I felt good about rejecting the mantle.
After rising we took our recording equipment, camera and ourselves out to the John G. Lake site. We turned on the recorder and with Albert on one side and me on the other side of our friend, we began to pray out loud. On the tape, planes could be heard passing over at times, the birds were loud and the wind was blowing… (all recorded on tape).
We prayed out loud for quite some time asking that our friend receive the mantle if it was meant for her. We were about to go when lo and behold, two angels came up from the grave site holding between them a multicolored cloak with long sleeves. On the tape I say: “Wait a minute, wait a minute, I see something.”
The angels paused momentarily above the grave and then swished – passed me with the cloak. They passed me on my right side and seemed to be gone.
“Where is it?” our friend asked, “Did they put it on me?”
I didn’t know. This experience was way beyond “my pay grade”, I felt. I said that I did not see them deposit the mantle but I supposed that they did. After all, where would it be, if not on the person that wished it?
We returned home to Kansas City and to the work to which the Lord had called us in that great city.
I never gave it another thought.
Little did I know that there was more to this story… much more. (Continued in the Teaching Archives.) June 2018 Teaching Archives – A Surprise Gift
