It happened at the end of December 2006. Bill had been taken
into hospital. He was not expected to live. I spent time with him on a Thursday
morning, while he was unconscious. I said my goodbyes to him. But he didn’t
pass away.
The next day, therefore, was Friday – which is usually my
day off. After dinner, we were about to take the children up for their bath
when Debbie said, ‘I think you ought to visit Bill again. I’ll bath the kids.’
I went. Bill’s wife, daughter and son-in-law were present. After a while, they
left, and I had a wonderful time alone with Bill. He had rallied that morning,
and held forth on some favourite topics: faith, politics and cricket. We read
the Prologue to John’s Gospel, which he said he wanted read at his funeral. Not
only did we read it, we turned it into a prayer.
On the Saturday morning, a nurse took Bill’s breakfast
order, but by the time she returned with it, he had slipped away quietly to
glory. I was the last person apart from medical professionals to see him. And I
wouldn’t have been, had it not been for Debbie’s instinct that I should go.
It happened again ten days ago. Ruth had been in hospital.
She kept getting thinner, even when we thought she could lose no more weight.
The hospital didn’t wash her every day, nor did they always check whether she
had eaten her meals. Her family discharged her to home on the Monday. I
couldn’t visit until the Thursday, due to sinusitis. That day, she coped with
five minutes from me.
On the Saturday, someone rang to say she wasn’t good. Debbie
said, ‘You must go today.’ I hadn’t wanted to go that day: it was Ruth’s
husband’s eightieth birthday, and I didn’t want to interrupt the family
celebrations. But go I did. We had ten minutes that afternoon. She was
confused, but I read her some of the great verses at the end of Romans 8. At
half past midnight, so just thirty minutes after her husband’s birthday ended,
she stopped breathing. I take the funeral this Friday. Again, I wouldn’t have
made that final visit were it not for Debbie’s prompting.
It’s a prompting I don’t understand. For someone like me
whose learning
style is that of a theorist, I can’t see how my wife can have such
uncannily accurate instincts. I can understand it to some extent as a spiritual
gift. It is explicable that the Holy Spirit leads her in this particular way.
What cannot be done is to fit it neatly into a category. It doesn’t easily fit
any of the gifts listed in the New Testament. Then I believe those lists are
examples, rather than exhaustively prescriptive. If it is anything, it is a
form of the prophetic word. I am happy to recognise it as being from the Holy
Spirit, because the fruit of it is good and kingdom-like. Further, as a gift I
don’t have, I see it within Paul’s metaphor of the Body of Christ in 1
Corinthians 12.
But at the same time, ‘intuition’ is something we talk about
generally, not just in the church. In addition, of course, we often associate
it more with women than men (which may mean that women are more open to
recognising it). We see it as a way of knowing, or a talent. Could it therefore
be that when used in the service of Christ, intuition is a natural talent
consecrated to God? Does that make it some kind of spiritual gift? If so, it
would not be that dissimilar from some other gifts we recognise in the church. ‘Worship
leaders’ in charismatic churches need a natural talent with music, but they
also need a call from God and the ‘anointing’ of the Holy Spirit. Preachers may
possess and develop natural abilities in public speaking and something akin to speech
writing, but there is a divine ‘more’ that turns these things into a spiritual
gift for the Body of Christ. To stay with that example, some preachers don’t
even realise they have the speaking and composing gifts before they are called.
Therefore, I suggest there is a wide range of gifts we need
to recognise, welcome and encourage. Intuition pressed into Christian service
is one of many.
Technorati Tags: intuition, spiritualgifts, learningstyles, PeterHoney
Big Circumstance 
Dave thank you for posting this, I do understand Debbie’s intuition and am far from a theorist ( that is why I am blogging rather than finishing an MA paper!). We do need a range of gifts within the church, and the grace to listen to one anothers promptings!
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Thanks, Sally. Perhaps the reason I am sympathetic to this is that although I am a theorist, other tests suggest I am right-brained (maybe that’s to do with the fact that I’m left-handed).
I’m slowly learning to listen to the ‘intuition’ myself. I can think of meeting someone soon after arriving in a circuit. This person made an unfortunate joke. Some put it down to not knowing what he was saying. I felt disturbed. Later events proved me right to be wary of him. (I can’t be any more specific in a public forum like this.) In 1 Corinthians 12 terms, I suppose that’s the discernment of spirits. I certainly didn’t apprehend that logically.
This might be another place to give a plug again to Tim Keel‘s book Intuitive Leadership.
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I’m convinced that what your wife did in these instances is an active blessing from God. I don’t know her, obviously, but it could also be a spiritual gift.
I am gifted with what I believe to be ‘intuition’. I don’t think my intuition is the same thing as Debbie telling you to go see Ruth and Bill.
My ‘intuition’ is, I believe, observing many small details in a semi-conscious way and having them all come together as a whole. I always then test this with conscious observation (partly because I grew up in an environment which reviled intuition and so I would never admit to anything but observed phenemena!)
A few weeks ago at 8 pm on Saturday night, I looked down and saw a story where the main characters were called ‘Bill and Lil’.
I thought, ‘Dang, Bill wanted to give his testimony and God wants him to do it tomorrow. Must ring the preacher.’ The preacher was delighted. (By the way, ‘Lil’ was Bill’s deceased wife and the story on my desk came from a 3rd party and had absolutely nothing to do with that couple.)
Bill gave a powerful testimony and then, afterwards he gave a specific sum of money to Dave for our youth work as a thanksgiving offering. God had told Dave that Bill was going to give him exactly that amount of money for our youth work.
I don’t think any of that was intuition. It was all a blessing of God.
Loving Parent God, thank you for blessing Debbie with your instructions and thank you for Dave who followed those instructions and ministered to your son and daughter in need. 🙂 Amen
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Pam,
Thanks for your kind words, prayer and beautiful story.
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Dave, you’re welcome and thank you for posting your story too. (Reminder to self to post more testimonies like this.) When I read your post, I was filled with thanksgiving for what you and Debbie did. God bless you and your family in the New Year.
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Yes, there is something powerful about story and testimony – another thing that theorists like me need to remember. I suppose the piece was about two particular stories and the beginnings of an attempt to reflect on them – to wonder what God was doing, and to a small extent, how.
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