I will say that it was confusing but I got it so does that mean that I am
confused

smiling wow  Phil that is neat.

Lelia


----- Original Message -----
From: "Phil Scovell" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2004 1:28 PM
Subject: Easy Come; Easy Go


> Here is a true story which just happened to me in the last two weeks.
>
> Easy Come; Easy Go
>
>
>                          By Phil Scovell
>
>
>
>
>      After setting up a website relative to the ministry to which
> the Lord had called me, and experiencing some results, it seemed
> prudent to expand.  I briefly prayed about advertising
> commercially on a local Christian radio station.  It seemed to me
> that it was a logical way to progress and the best way to appeal
> to a wide audience.  After checking on the advertising rates, I
> called friends and family and asked them to pray that the Lord
> would provide the money.  I needed 3,000 dollars.
>
>      One day, some friends called, let's call them Sam and Gloria,
> and said they were coming over.  When they got here, I was handed
> a check for 3,000 dollars which was the exact amount I needed.
> Praise God!  What a blessing this was and what a wonderful answer
> to prayer.  Especially since my wife and I were so financially
> broke at the time, too.  I called friends and family and told them
> the good news and they rejoiced with me.  After all, this had to
> be of the Lord.  Right?  Immediately, the next day, things began
> to happen to make me reconsider.
>
>      The money was given to me on a Friday.  Over the weekend, a
> number of things occurred to bring discouragement to my life.  I
> found them all quite puzzling and spiritually mysterious but bless
> God, He had answered prayer and things were about to change;
> weren't they?  Yet, I felt something was wrong.  As the week
> progressed, things actually grew worse in several different ways.
> I do not want to belabor all the things which occurred which
> attempted to confuse me because that part of this testimony is
> not important.  Besides, most people probably wouldn't believe it
> even if I did explain it in detail.  It is what happened to the
> money itself that is nothing short of amazing.
>
>      When Sam and his Wife, Gloria, came and gave me a check for
> the money, Gloria said she had a vision during her time in prayer
> two weeks earlier.  She saw packets of sealed seeds with paper
> money attached to each packet raining down from the sky.  The
> packets had no writing on them.  She knew what these items were,
> of course, because the Holy Spirit explained it during the vision.
> Since the packets of seed had no writing, she asked the Lord who
> it all was for.  The Lord said, "Phil."  She was then instructed
> to give the money to me.
>
>      Gloria set this, as it were, on the back burner and waited
> for further confirmation.  She decided, after a period of time, to
> ask her husband's opinion.  He already felt they should give the
> money to me.  Since they were in agreement, therefore, they did
> what the Lord had led them to do.
>
>      The first time I recognized something was wrong, was the
> moment they handed me the check.  I even stood with the check in
> my hand, thanking them for what they had done, but in my spirit,
> I felt something wasn't right.  Each day following the day I
> received the financial gift, different events occurred one by one
> which caused me to focus on the money.
>
>      As I walked through the kitchen the following Thursday, just
> six days after receiving the gift, I stopped dead in my tracks,
> turned, and placing both my hands on the counter top, I prayed.
> "Lord?  I need to know what is wrong and I need to know right
> now."  Suddenly, I knew.
>
>      The Lord said, "It's the money."
>
>      I said, "What about the money?"  He made it very clear He
> wanted me to return it.  No, He didn't explain why at first but I
> soon learned.
>
>      As I continued questioning the Lord about the whole
> situation, I asked Him how to best go about returning the money
> without offending the people that had given it to me.  The Lord
> showed me several things.  First, He reminded me of at least three
> things which were checks in my spirit, or notifications, if you
> will, of something that was wrong or that He wanted me to
> consider.  After identifying those three things that caused me to
> reconsider keeping the gift, the Lord revealed what was really
> happening.
>
>      The Lord said that I was attempting to market, as it were, my
> own ministry.  You see, I am no longer in business but in ministry
> and it isn't even mine; its His.  Since 1973, I have been self
> employed.  I have done radio commercials to market my business,
> printed fliers, mass mailed, set up websites, and used other
> marketing tools to advertise.  Now the Lord was telling me that I
> was trying to get the word out about what He had called me to do
> as if I were still in business.  He wanted me to return the money
> and let Him promote what He alone had started.  In this way, the
> Holy Spirit explained, I would not have to work at marketing the
> ministry, worry about people finding me, or even be concerned
> about the money needed for support.  His message was simple: I
> was attempting to advertise the ministry on my terms instead of
> His.  Understanding what He was telling me, I made contact with
> Sam and his wife and made arrangements to return the money.  Now,
> here is the amazing part.
>
>      When I explained to them why I was returning their money and
> explained all the details which when along with it, Gloria said,
> "This is amazing.  Last night the Lord spoke to me when I was
> praying and said, "The Money is coming back."  She questioned how
> this could be but the Lord just confirmed what He had said.  She
> wrote down what the Lord said in a computer file and saved it,
> because He said some other things related to the whole picture and
> she wanted to make note of it.
>
>      Thursday afternoon, when I had decided to return the money,
> due to all the Lord had shown me, I felt the Lord telling me other
> things concerning the actual money itself.  I asked the Lord,
> "What about the vision?  You even told them the money was for me
> and used my name in the vision."  The Holy Spirit then revealed to
> me that this was true; He, in fact, had told them to give me the
> money and confirmed it with a vision.  So, I said, "Then why did
> you tell them to give me the money if I am supposed to give it
> back?"
>
>      The Lord said, "It was a test for them and for you.  They
> obeyed by giving you the money as I told them so they passed the
> test.  Now it is your turn to see if you will obey."
>
> It was at that moment in time I knew I was going to do exactly
> what He had said.  No, it wasn't hard to tell them I was giving
> their money back.  Instead, I felt a sense a feeling of honor that
> the God of the universe would go to such elaborate means to test
> me.  First, he gave me the money.  Secondly, He allowed all sorts
> of things to happen which were things designed to distract me from
> hearing His voice.  Third, I stopped, in the midst of all the
> clutter going on around me, and prayed and heard His voice.
> Finally, I obeyed.
>
>      Once the decision was made, and the donors were told, I felt
> something else in my spirit that was amazingly unusual to me.  I
> felt that the Lord had just given me money to plant as seeds into
> the ministry He had called me to serve Him in.  Gloria then told
> me that the Lord told her that they had obeyed and given the
> money.  I had obeyed and the money was returned.  Now the seeds
> were planted.  Somehow, the Lord wanted me to plant financial seed
> while at the same time I had no money to do so.  He gave me money,
> which belonged to someone else, to use as seed money to plant for
> a future harvest.  By returning the money, He became responsible
> to make those seeds grow and I had to do nothing but obey.
> Additionally, the donors were blessed in a similar manner.
>
>      This is not the end of this story for two reasons.  First,
> when the Lord expands the ministry I am in now, I will have to add
> to this story to report on God's greatness.  Secondly, on Thursday
> afternoon, when I prayed in my kitchen and heard the Lord telling
> me what to do about returning the money, I had forgotten that our
> tax preparer was coming over that evening for us to sign the
> papers concerning our income tax return.  three hours after the
> Lord revealed His truth to me about the money, we were seated at
> our dining room table listening to the CPA explain all he had
> done.  When he said, "between your state and federal taxes,
> therefore, you are getting back 5,000 dollars," I nearly fell off
> my chair.  If Sam and Gloria had not given me the 3,000 the week
> before, and if I had not heard the voice of the Lord about
> returning it, I would have taken my own money, spent it, and never
> once realized why my investment in radio commercials proved
> fruitless.
>
>      Finally, Gloria told me the next day something else the Lord
> told her concerning the money.  She just was asking the Lord in
> the thoughts of her prayer time, why I gave the money back when
> He, the Lord, had not only given her a vision but also even said
> they were to give the money to me.  The Lord told her that the
> money was seed.  She and her husband, therefore, had planted the
> seed but gotten the money back.  He then asked her where the money
> was now and she said, "being returned."  He then told her, the
> seed is now planted.
>
>      I don't know if you really followed all of this but if not,
> go back and read it all again.  The bottom line is this.  God
> wanted to test me as well as Sam and Gloria.  God knew I needed
> money that I did not have.  He knew, if I got my income tax back,
> I would think, with that much money, I could spend 3,000 dollars
> on radio commercials.  He did not want me to do that so He devised
> an intricate test to see if I could hear him through an onslaught
> of clutter.  A vision was given in order to confirm Sam and Gloria
> would do the will of the Lord.  They gave.  Then I was tested to
> see if I would obey by giving it back.  I did.  When I did, the
> Lord confirmed the return of the money before I returned it.  He
> also told me, and Gloria, that the money was seed and the seed was
> now planted.  So, as I sat in my living room considering all this,
> I suddenly realized, I am going to reap a harvest which was the
> outcome of using somebody else's money for a brief period of time.
> Why the exchange you ask?  As I have said, first, it was a test
> but there is more to it than that.  There was a harvest the Lord
> wanted some people to experience.  He made a way so both parties
> could receive confirmation of the will of the Lord and then
> promised a blessing as a result.  As they say, "Easy Come; easy
> go," but with God, "All things are possible."
>
> I Flew Kites With Jesus
> www.SafePlaceFellowship.com
>