From Kristin. Easter 2006

This is an email Kristin sent to me and with her permission I am posting here.

4.17.2006 3:31PM
Who would have thought that yesterday, on Easter, I’d journey to Heaven?
It’s true. For minutes that you can count on less than a full hand, I experienced Heaven.
I was driving home from work when I started thinking about God, so I put in the Student Impact Alive worship CD, which I haven’t listened to in months, and started worshiping.
I made it about half way through the CD before I remembered "Revelation 19" was the last song. I skipped ahead. "Revelation 19" was one of those songs that helped to define Impact for my class. It was the song everyone got chills from and consequently begged for it never to be over. So simple were the verses, so easy was the melody, so beautiful were the three parts separated and how perfectly they came back together. The song was especially meaningful to me because I finally started reading Revelations on Friday, Good Friday. For years, I have pretended that book didn’t exist. I’ve been scared of it. I’m not afraid to say that, I never have been. Plenty of people know my feelings on it. I simply refused to open it under all circumstances. However, the more I read, the more I read the words to the song I knew so well. Though I still have not gotten to chapter 19, the more I kept reading words like these... "Hallelujah, salvation and glory, honor and power onto the Lord our God. For the Lord our God is Almighty. The Lord our God is omnipotent. The Lord our God, he is wonderful!" (Praise and glory and wisdom and thanks and honor and power and strength be to our God for ever and ever. Rev: 7:12)
I had already worshiped to the song once and was filled with a few tears and smiles and goose bumps, but I hit play again and after 15 seconds I was no longer in my car. I have no idea how fast I was going or what cars were around me, how many times the road curved or how I made it to Lake Cook Road traveling West on 94 but I know this…I was in Heaven.
I was there and words will fail to describe the true feeling and sight of being there. I know this though; I never stopped worshiping. My lips kept moving, song poured out of my mouth. I was in a white space. The floors were white. The boundaries of space that were not walls were white. Everyone around me who I could not see but could feel was there, was wearing white. She was wearing white too. Laurie was wearing white. She was standing there to my right, facing the same direction I was, and she looked beautiful. Her hair was down, still dirty blonde, still cascading below her shoulders. Her robe was white, long sleeved with a high neckline. When I saw her, she smiled through her words. We were worshiping together, perfectly in tune and harmony and God smiled. Though I couldn’t see him, he sat above us on a pedestal overlooking the crowd, I could feel that he was looking down and smiling. Knowing that one he had made me happy by reuniting us and two because we were praising him in awe. Laur reached over with her left arm and hugged me for a brief second but the words never ceased from our lips and the tears in my eyes began to well from pure joy. I had my God right in front of me and my sister right next to me. I couldn’t forget though that we were not alone. We were two out of a crowd gathered before God singing praise. I looked at Laur and she reassured me, through communication not of Earth, that "This is what it’s like. This is what joy is. This is what I, we, love to do for our God. This is Heaven and we are lucky that we get to call this our own." And eternity suddenly felt like an endless amount of wonderful tomorrows that I could get excited about. I couldn’t stop crying from joy but I couldn’t get the words to cease from my lips. In God’s presence, I wouldn’t help but worship him with everything that I was and everything that I had. I looked at her again, and she said she was proud. She was proud of Me, of the things I was doing with my life and the leaps I’ve taken before God. She was proud of the way I was loving people. More then that she was excited…for the plans God had for me. They are big and she told me I could handle it.
For those few moments, I felt a peace I have never felt.
For those few moments, I felt a presence I have never felt.
For those few moments, I saw a vision that I cannot describe with words but is clear in my eyes and resonates within my ears.
For those few moments, I saw a glimpse of God and a picture of Laurie.
When the song was over, I snapped quickly back into reality, rushing my fingers forward to turn off the radio. My heart was beating swiftly. The tears streamed down my face. "My God, what is going on with us?!" My breath and soul cried out.
He is consistently showing me miracles that I never expected from this lifetime. In talking to Liz on Friday, I spoke and said that God hadn’t been miraculous in a few weeks. He had been there, teaching me, guiding me, asking things of me but nothing extremely intense. I told her I was learning the true faith piece. Faith is easy when God performs miracles but faith comes when the miracles stop and you simply have to keep believing. I was getting comfortable with that logic and God showed up again!
For Good Friday, I read all four gospel accounts of the crucifixion.
For Easter, I read all the resurrections.
Mark 16:15-18 says:
He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and then they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well".
He did not qualify certain people. He did not say you will have one and not the other. All who believe shall have these gifts and be able to use them. I’m developing something. I can’t explain it and I can’t yet point to it but something is happening in me that is so real. I’m developing a gift…what will it be? What will it be used for?