It was deeply unsettling when I first began to hear the Father’s call to come out of man’s religious system – a system I was deeply devoted to – a system I’d ministered within for many years as a performing songwriter. That same year I first heard Him call me, Warner Brothers released “The Matrix” which inspired a lot of discussion on a forum I frequented called “New Wineskins”. Thereafter members often talked about being “red-pilled” by the Holy Spirit concerning the churches they attended and how having their eyes opened, couldn’t remain and left to join Jesus “outside the camp” (Hebrews 13:13).

My own experience I likened to Jesus healing the blind man by rubbing mud in his eyes and instructing him to wash. Metaphorically, it’s like forcing someone to look at the filth of this world together with the word of God. Death and life – filth and truth – side by side – mixture – until finally comes the day we see the difference and cry out “Give me Jesus! Give me Truth!”

With half a lifetime spent in man’s church, I had much to unlearn. Not just the self serving doctrines of men, but selfish ways within me that had to be exposed and washed clean. It can be a long and difficult process that for some, leaves them longing for the comforts of the church world they once knew. Oh I always had questions, but feared answering them; like a church with 1000 members that never baptized anyone. Was anybody ever saved through their many programs, or was that church just a Christian country club with a revolving door of membership? Questions that if I ever answered, would expose the impotence of man’s church and my own disillusion with it. Quietly suffering – my church experience was a far cry from “I am come that they might have life, and they might have it more abundantly” (John 10:10).

In Proverbs, it is written: Where there is no vision, the people perish … Proverbs 29:18 KJV

It was the Spring of 2000 that the Spirit gave me a vision, the hope of which has sustained me these many years.

Suddenly I was standing in the middle of a vast rolling wheat field. How I got there, I had no idea. It was as if one moment I was a stalk of wheat and the next I was a man. As the vision continued to unfold, I thought to myself I need to look for others and began to look around for a building where I might find a phone to call someone to come pick me up. Turning completely around I didn’t see ANY evidence of buildings or other men in sight. So I stood there, waiting.

Soon I saw the heads of the wheat swirl and sway with the wind where I knew instinctively to walk in the direction of the wind. With each step I felt lighter so I trotted. Feeling lighter still until finally I ran with the wind. I felt light as a feather and leapt, taking flight with the wind. That ended the vision.

As often as I’ve thought about it, I take the vision to simply mean that there is freedom and power to accomplish the impossible by running and soaring with the Spirit.

More recently, I’ve given thought to the wheat field itself, from which I suddenly sprouted to manhood.

… The field is vast. Who planted it?

… Will others suddenly “pop” up like I did, run and soar with the wind?

Fields of grain, wheat and tares, white and ripe for the harvest, laborers who sew and reap working side by side, Jesus often spoke of these as spiritual metaphors. Often I’ve though of myself as soil for the seed of Christ and hoped that it would take root and produce a harvest for the Lord within me. Still I was shook up by the wheat field vision, because in the one moment, I was unaware of my surroundings – like sleeping without dreaming. In the next I was a man – standing on my own 2 feet – suddenly aware of my new life and fully conscious. Among the questions that occurred to me in rapid succession were “what happened – where am I – how did I get here”. Questions I can imagine Lazarus asking – for surely what I experienced in the vision was like emerging from the tomb.

Shortly before His own death and burial, Jesus said: “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. (John 12:23-25 ESV)

Elsewhere Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Mat 16:24-25 ESV

Death to self is required if you want Jesus life. Where suddenly I sprang to manhood in the midst of a vast wheat field, means I was spiritually dead and the seed of Christ sprang to life within me. I am but one of a great multitude the Lord has planted. With only the Spirit to point the way and no sign of man anywhere, I take to mean the work of salvation is entirely the work of God. As for my responsibility? Go with the Spirit, testify and encourage others to the same.

Still, men will play their vain religious games where as dead men, they can’t help but do dead things. Wholly disconnected from the head, who is Christ and Life, man’s church is tomb-like. Like the image painted by Revelation 3:20, Christ is shut out of man’s church. It’s truly mind-boggling to consider our many religious works in the light of Christ who said “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few” (Matthew 9:37 ESV). So much religious busy-work, but few laborers for the harvest? The disparity prompts me to ask whether the works of men are of any value to the Lord of the Harvest? Or are man’s religious works for himself?

It may be that the reluctance of men to die to self is what gave rise to man’s religious system – a system devised to make men comfortable in their unregenerate state and give a false sense of confidence through the appearance of holiness, righteousness and group conformity – a system that claims “going to church” for an hour a week is all that God requires of us.

I’m reminded of a funny memory that perfectly captures the inane futility of man’s religious system. Once while taking a drive with Karen, we passed by a church with a sign-board that read “Feeling empty? Stop in for a fill up”. Both of us laughed and said the minister would probably soil himself if ever someone actually stopped in and said “I’m here for a fill up”. Jesus is not a commodity to be dispensed by the gallon and churches are not gas stations on the road of life.

The encouragement I take from the Lord’s wheat field vision vision is, there is a great spiritual work of God in Christ that is far beyond our sight. He planted the vast wheat field I saw in the vision, He tends to it, and He will bring in His Harvest. What’s truly humbling to consider is our only responsibility in God’s harvest is to die. I can’t help but chuckle about that – death – it is both the easiest and hardest thing I’ve ever done. I hope for the sake of Christ that I die well. And often if I should encounter any resistance to staying dead.