Our spiritual experiences always begin with a spiritual storm. According to church history, throughout all the generations the Spirit of God has blown like a mighty wind to move people to repent of their sins, to believe in the Lord Jesus for their regeneration, to give up the world in order to follow the Lord, and to be desperate in heart and burning in spirit to serve the Lord. Have you not had this kind of experience? Have you not sensed the wind of God blowing upon you? Have you not been touched by the Spirit of God? Have you not sensed, at least once in your life, that a certain power—the stormy wind from God—was moving upon you, causing you to hate sin, to have a different attitude toward the world, or to change your view concerning your life? If you have never had such experiences, you need to look to the Lord and pray for His wind from the north to blow upon you.
A certain promising young man, who was a strong member of a political party, experienced this wind from the north at the time of his conversion. One day he went into an idol temple and saw a Bible on the table which was used for the offering. He walked up to the Bible and read a few verses. Suddenly, the Holy Spirit blew upon him, and he was convicted of his sins. As the wind of the Spirit continued to blow upon him, he began to repent of his sins and to make a thorough confession, crying bitterly as he prostrated himself and even rolled on the floor. He was saved through the blowing of a mighty wind from the north.
God’s visitation always begins with the blowing of the wind of God upon our being. Did you not experience a storm, the blowing of the Spirit of God, when you were saved? Perhaps you were a young student caring for nothing but simply going to school, studying, and playing. Then one day a storm came to you. A stormy wind blew upon you and turned you upside down. This caused you to consider the meaning of human life, and you began to ask yourself about where you came from and where you were going. This was the result of the blowing of a stormy wind. I believe that every saved person experienced such a storm at the time of conversion.
I cannot forget the storm I experienced on the day I was saved. As a young man under the age of twenty, I was full of ambition, and I was studying hard, pursuing the knowledge of the world in order to have a good future. But one day I heard about an evangelistic meeting, and I decided to attend. In that meeting as I listened to a strong gospel message, a stormy wind blew upon me and turned me upside down.
A storm comes to us from the Lord not only at the time of our conversion but also after we have been saved. Whether we are young or old, we all experience the stormy wind. For example, certain ones among us in the church life formerly were missionaries or Christian workers. One day a storm came to them from the north and turned everything upside down. This caused them to seek the Lord desperately and eventually to come into the church life.
Actually, a stormy wind blows upon us at every turn in our spiritual life. This stormy wind is God Himself blowing upon us to bring a storm into our life, into our work, and into our church. It is truly a grace to have storms coming to us from God. As we are following the Lord, we will experience storm after storm. I cannot say how many storms have come to me, but I can testify that every storm is worth recalling. Every storm has become a pleasant remembrance. I believe that when we are in eternity, we will recall the storms that we experienced.
Whenever God visits us and revives us, His Spirit blows upon us like a mighty wind. We need to experience the Spirit in this way—the more, the better and the stronger, the better. I have the deep longing that in these days the Spirit of God would blow strongly upon us like a mighty wind.