Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” John 4: 10 (ESV)
Like the Samaritan woman at the well, God often calls us to come away with Him to be refreshed with living water. Some of the most profound encounters and divine assignments were unveiled in the secret place (one-on-one) conversations between God and man. These were encounters of spiritual intimacy, refreshing and strengthening from the source of living water.
God invited Moses to a secret place encounter with His tangible presence on Mount Sinai. He supernaturally empowered Moses to fast for 40 days and 40 nights and, in the process, enabled him to receive and teach the Ten Commandments to God’s people (Exodus 34: 1-3; 27-35).
Elijah was afraid for His life and prayed that he would die, but an angel was sent to feed him in the wilderness, and two meals strengthened him for the next 40 days and 40 nights of his journey. A secret place encounter with God took him from despair to specific direction; enlightening him that he was not alone; God had reserved 7,000 others in Israel who had never bowed their knee to the false God Baal; and leading him to his assistant and successor, Elisha (1 Kings 19).
The Holy Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness, where He fasted 40 days and 40 nights. This secret place encounter with His Father empowered Him to obey God under pressure, to use God’s Word to overcome the devil and his temptations and prepared Him to start His ministry (Matthew 4).
Young Mary was alone when God sent the angel Gabriel to tell her that she had been chosen to carry and give birth to Jesus, the Son of God and Saviour of the world (Luke 1: 35)! She pondered what was likely an incomprehensible message from the secret place encounter in her heart, reminding herself that she was not alone; Holy Spirit was with her. She was young enough to simply believe.
Zechariah was astonished and overcome by the mind-blowing promise Angel Gabriel gave him in his secret place encounter. He and Elizabeth were too old for childbearing; it was too unbelievable for his ‘mature mind’ to simply believe. God gave him a time out to silently meditate with His Creator. The angel Gabriel said to Him, “And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their appointed time” (Luke 1:20).
Our most important tasks will likely be given to us in the secret place. There is always an appointed time for the unveiling of what transpires in the secret place encounters.
When you encounter the divine, you cannot keep it to yourself. You may not tell the story of your encounter, but your story will tell itself through your transformation and the impact you will have on others because of that encounter. Moses didn’t need to tell the people he had a divine encounter, his radiant shining face did, and they were afraid to come near him.
Every single one of us will experience a time, place, and incident where only God can go with us where we need to go. Often, we go into this place weak and, therefore, PERFECTLY positioned for divine strength from living water. It is a place of conception that deposits a seed of purpose, empowers us for His calling, and marks us for His glory.
In the secret place, God gives us a unique cake recipe baked in that secret place’s oven. When we later gather with others around His presence, it feels like we’re icing the cake. Those who have been in a secret place with Him bring their cake to this gathering to ice, share, and taste the different flavours. Hebrews 10: 24-25 says, “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”
As we taste the sweetness of the secret place and are refreshed by the living water, we suddenly realize we’re on a beautiful journey that starts from a place of discipline to go into the secret place and progresses to a desire to be in the secret place, then to pure delight that causes us to linger with Him in the secret place, and ultimately dwell in Him and literally see our destiny manifested and His Name glorified through us.
The secret to strength in weakness is found in the living waters of the secret place!
Prayer
Heavenly Father, I need Your help to become disciplined in my commitment to daily time with You in our secret place. My soul and spirit long for You, but my flesh is sometimes weak. Help me to put You first each day that I may drink living water, find myself in the center of Your will and be strengthened for whatever lies ahead, bring refreshing to those around me, and lead the lost to the source of living water, in Jesus’ Name, Amen.
