ENCOUNTERS WITH THE LIVING GOD

By Susan Stoppenbrink

Each chapter reveals riveting accounts of miraculous encounters with God. With each encounter, the living God uniquely and supernaturally responded to the cries of a woman who in desperate situations called out to the Savior who loved her. Susan experienced life being legally blind from birth, incurring numerous eye surgeries and suffered through a series of abuse-filled situations, many brought about by unwise choices. This later culminated in her suffering the disabling effects of multiple sclerosis. In her deep desire to know God and His healing grace, she cried out to Him for help. He answered her with many miraculous encounters. Through them, the Lord revealed to her His true character, her broken understanding and finally after much healing of her body, her emotions and her spiritual life, she received many rich insights that are woven through each chapter. The pages of this journey will bring hope to all who have suffered devastating illness and/or abuse at the hand of others. It is told from the perspective of one whose life reflects the healing and grace that expresses compassion, empathy, and hope to all who seek the love that heals.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Nov 7, 2019
• ISBN: 9781645694670

Book preview

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Encounters with the

Living God

Susan Stoppenbrink

ISBN 978-1-64569-466-3 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64569-467-0 (digital)

Copyright © 2019 by Susan Stoppenbrink

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Section 1

Chapter 1

Section 2

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Section 3

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Section 4

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Section 5

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Section 6

Chapter 25

Endorsement

Pastor Susan Stoppenbrink has expressed a vulnerability and teachability in her relationship with God that is rare and precious in a world of many facades and illusions.

In her book, Encounters with the Living God she expounds upon her wrong understanding of God and His ways and how each trial became a triumph when she learned the true essence of her Loving Savior!

The reader will experience a sense of engagement and identification at her candid reflections of a once bruised life that slowly transformed her into a woman of excellence.

The exuberance she exemplifies in her daily walk with God, will shine through the pages of this book and bring healing and comfort to the lives of many.

I highly recommend this book as an enlightening read that will impact each reader and bring hope to those that have lost their way, that they, too, can find redemption and healing in Messiah, Yeshua, amen!

Pastor Lorraine D. Coconato,

M. Div, ORU, Doctorate of Ministry, PCU.

Leaves of Healing Tabernacle

Chatsworth, CA.

Foreword

My friendship and close association with Susan Stoppenbrink has been a journey like no other. Not by chance, but through the Lord’s plan, we met. At the time, Susan, a very unassuming, soft-spoken young woman, reached out to me in a conversation that has continued for nearly fifty years. While our life stories are interwoven, as many miles separated us, and as we each traversed the path laid out, our friendship has thrived. We shared the love and lessons God was teaching us along the way. I could count on Susan to support me in every way possible and I, her. Our hearts have intertwined as sisters in Christ as our individual journeys taught us shared lessons.

Susan is someone who follows hard after God. In fact, if I were to ask for a life to be played out before me in order to see the Lord’s grace work and do wonders, it would have been hers. Even though she has had multiple struggles and challenges throughout her life, she sustained a lasting trust in God, His faithful and abiding love for her, and His lovingly relentless plan to walk out all He purposed for her life. It gives me great joy knowing that the words she has written will soothe and comfort those who read them. The story written here has been lived, resulting in a life that has been tested and refined. I was there. I witnessed it. And now I invite you to see what the Lord has done! in the life of this devoted woman of God, as she brings heart-healing hope and comforting refreshment to all of us. What a blessing this eternal friendship is to me!

Colleen St. Onge

Introduction

This morning, the Lord spoke to me saying, Tell them who I Am.

Like so many, I had a preconceived idea of who God is. I learned from those whose understanding was severely limited at best and nonexistent much of the time. When I did begin to know Him, in my enthusiasm, I shared my very limited idea of who He is and because of my past inconsistent life of walking in the way He showed me to walk, I exhibited more of the brokenness of my life than the new life I had in my Redeemer. Although the goodness and kindness of the Lord never left me as I struggled through so many years prior to receiving healing for my deep wounds that confused my ability to choose well, I invalidated my testimony of even the limited testimony I had to those who matter the most to me and whose lives had been entrusted into my care—my own children.

To you, my children, I ask for forgiveness. It is my hope that in reading this collection of my encounters with the living God, you will come to see Him for who He really is.

My heart is swollen with memories of and with continued miracles this selfsame, all-powerful, all-knowing and ever-present God demonstrates to me of His life-changing love that only He perfectly displays.

Deuteronomy instructs us to live out the testimony of who God is and all He has done to teach them to our children and grandchildren. Therefore, I am writing this book as a testimony for those who need to hear about my firsthand encounters with God. These miraculous events did not occur because I am anyone special with a unique calling but because I am simply a child of God who, like so many others, grew up in a dysfunctional home with family that did their best with the brokenness they learned, but left me with a deep need and hunger for authentic love, a love for which I desperately longed.

My painful cries met my Redeemer’s ears not because of any special virtue in me but because of my sincerity in my search for Him, His love, and His virtue. His responses to me were often demonstrated with miracles, not because of my great faith but because of the enormous heart of compassion He holds toward those who seek Him and genuinely want to know Him personally.

In subsequent encounters with the Almighty, I have been compelled to write this book as a testament to the extreme patience and severe justice of a very real God who wants to make Himself known to the people He longs to embrace with His love.

Section 1

Pivotal Life-Changing Encounter

Chapter 1

Choose Now!

The light turned red just as I got to the longest left-turn light in history! I was having one of my negative self-talk dialogues recounting every poor choice I had made when God’s clear and resounding voice broke through my pity party saying, Sing for Me, I called you to sing. My immediate response was to get very flustered and even angry, more at myself for my horrible failure than at God. However, I was upset at Him for saying that to me as it felt more like I was being mocked for how badly I had messed up my life. Not only had I disqualified myself from ministering in His Name, I now had to hear Him call me when I could no longer respond.

At that moment, I became aware of His presence in the car with me, even in the passenger seat next to me. I heard His very stern and even angry-sounding voice speak with a finality that literally caused me to tremble with every fiber of my being. With grave sternness, He commanded, This day, choose now for all eternity. Either I finished the work on the cross for you or I didn’t. Either I am your Savior or I am not. Choose now!

My heart pounding, my breathing labored, and blood rushing into my face, my eyes were pulled like a magnet to the passenger seat of my car. I could literally in my mind’s eye see Him sitting in the seat beside me with such an austere gaze, I knew this moment would determine my eternal destiny. I could barely breathe. As I gazed at the seat next to me, seeing Him awaiting my answer, I literally started weeping uncontrollably. Between my gasping for air and my sobbing cries of repentance, I asked Jesus to forgive me. Yes, yes, yes, I believe that You finished the work on the cross for me! Yes, You are my Savior! I continued to weep as I then turned my prayers into worship. Once and forever, the matter of my qualification to serve Him had been settled. Once and forever, the powerful lie that deceiving accuser had used to keep me from understanding my relationship to the Messiah had been broken, and I was free to live as a forgiven and totally acquitted sinner, free to fully live in the grace that had been purchased for me by the very God of the universe Himself!

God’s Character Revealed

That day, I encountered the severity of both the extreme justice and extreme mercy of God.

This was the first really defining moment in my life. Everything up to this point had been filled with glimpses of the faithfulness of God, but never had I understood the reality of eternity with all its consequences engulfing every organism of my soul and body.

The Lord didn’t just reveal His character to me that day, He continues to reveal Himself to me as I grow in better knowledge and application of His Scripture and experience healthy relationships within His believing community.

His patience, understanding and deep desire to have intimacy and share His purpose with people is unfathomable! He is more absolutely committed to the good of those who come into relationship with Him than we could possibly ever remain faithful to Him. Knowing our sinful human nature, He paid the absolute sacrifice and penalty for all sin, for all time, and all people by choosing to be born both by supernatural Divine intervention and in the womb of a virgin who had never been touched by a man to grow up with every temptation and desire every person would ever encounter. Yet unlike us, He, through the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit, resisted temptation and obeyed every commandment the God of Israel had given to instruct people how to live according to His design. And finally, Jesus paid the ultimate price He had instituted to make atonement for lawbreakers, sinners that we are and did so of His own predetermined plan and according to what He inspired the prophets to foretell. When the very people who experienced the miracles that He performed taunted and jeered at Him, He declared forgiveness for them and all of us who would follow them. The very heart and essence of God is one of extreme and severe love and mercy, along with inscrutable justice. That day, I had a glimpse of the true God He is.

With each new discovery, He often will take me back to past encounters to reveal a new facet of who He is and was showing me at that time in my life. Thus, the encounters being shared in this book are not just the one-time occurrence but serve as an ongoing parable of sorts to reveal deeper and deeper layers of truth and love found in Him.

My Broken Understanding

This occurred in the mid-1990s following many years of knowing a saving relationship with God, hearing His voice, but also walking in ways that reflected both a very broken internal life script along with times of incredible encounters with God.

To the person who believes that merely raising a hand or responding to an altar call to receive the gift of salvation will suddenly change everything in their lives, let this be an awakening realization. Although the relationship with the God who created us often begins there, it doesn’t all culminate into a changed way of life without a right understanding of the heart and nature of God in His Scriptures.

My childhood experiences caused me to believe many lies about myself that acted as a filter that reinterpreted all other experiences in life. From that shame-based identity, I made many bad choices that resulted in my being the victim of abuse. This continued long after entering a relationship with Jesus as my Savior.

It would be safe to say that I experienced the extreme patience and long-suffering of God through my many bad choices because He knew who He had created me to be, and He knew the extent to which my damaged self-image played a part in my lack of understanding of what He was trying to convey through His wonderful interventions in my life. It is truly because I have maintained an attitude of repentance and quickly turned from my many crooked ways that He was so patient with me up to this point.

My failure as a wife, a mother and as a God-fearing woman had swept me into a sea of despair. My entire life had always had purpose. I had always known I was created to sing, and to sing to bring glory to Jesus the Messiah of Israel. Yet my failure had convinced me that I was no longer qualified to do that.

It was never really about my ability to measure up. It always had been about whether I believed that Jesus had really paid that awful price for me. It was something I didn’t even know that I struggled with until that moment. Unbelief turned to absolute belief in that instant. My life changed for all eternity in that very moment. Although I may have struggled with feelings of regret over my choices that made it hard for me to answer that call, I never doubted that Jesus had paid the price in full for me. He could ask and do whatever He wanted with my life.

That encounter was well over twenty years ago. It followed many years of living my life as a Messiah follower, enjoying rich times of fellowship in prayer, meeting Him in Scripture and serving Him in various churches. Yet my life had been plagued by the miserable consequences of some very poor choices on my part. I had no idea how much the pain and brokenness of childhood experiences would impact my most important adult life choices.

To many of those reading this book who live in a culture where love is defined simply in terms of goose bumps and good feelings, to say I was really loved by God in this encounter would sound bizarre. However, the One who created me and knows me intimately knew that my identity of shame in the very core of my personhood stood as a barrier between the many loving encounters with the God of Love who is love and me. They had not been able to dismantle my internal belief system that was so deeply embedded within my psyche.

Like so many others I have come to know, shame was the parenting tool of choice my mother used to raise me. Did she intend to cause me harm or relegate me to a life of one disastrous trauma after another? No! She simply tried to teach me how to behave in community the only way she herself understood. I never needed overt punishment to correct rebellious attitudes and actions as I was an extremely sensitive child. I always wanted to please those around me. Shame worked very well to keep my behavior within the acceptable guidelines.

Unfortunately, being violated in several ways as a young child by those I trusted and believed loved me provided the seedbed for my feeble attempts to make sense of the world in which I lived. Like so many children who have experienced childhood abuse, I internalized the vile acts as something inherently wrong with me so that I could continue to trust those around me. Because I had oxygen damage to my eyes as an infant, I was only able to see shadows, light, and darkness. This increased my dependence upon others around me, intensifying the very destructive experiences that left me feeling so critical of myself.

Once a shame filter has been established in the core of a person, it adjusts every other experience through the lens or filter resulting in a misinterpretation of the knowledge and experiences that follow. Throughout the first four decades of my life, I tended to gravitate toward people who would treat me the way I viewed myself.

Even my early encounters with the God who created me had been skewed by my preconceived ideas of who I was. Only in extreme need and desire was I able to truly connect with