Spring 2005
The Appearing of Christ
Nancilee Restivo

In January of 1999, the Lord gave me a series of visions, which lasted over a period of two weeks. What I saw and heard completely changed my life.

The vision that affected me the most began by my seeing myself standing in a doorway, watching Jesus as He ministered to a crowd of people. I watched as He reached out to touch someone, and they would be instantly healed. Then He would speak a word of encouragement to another, put His arms around one who felt unloved, or turn to cast a demon out of someone who was being tormented.

Suddenly, something changed. I was there too, with Jesus, but we looked like a double negative, the two of us together, one superimposed on top of the other. We literally moved as one entity.

“The one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him.” I Corinthians 6:17

When Jesus stretched out His hand, my hand moved with Him, perfectly as one. When Jesus spoke, the words flowed from my mouth. When He took a step, it was with my foot, and when He looked at a person, it was through my eyes.

Then I knew. It was, “Christ in me, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). Only He was not hiding in me. I was hiding in Him.

“For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” Colossians 3:3

I watched Jesus as an onlooker, curious and full of awe, anxious to see each move He made. It was thrilling to be so up close and personal, watching Him do the same wonders that He did when He walked this earth.

I became very aware that the people were not looking at me. They were looking at Jesus. He was “manifesting” Himself in fullness for all to see, in all His power and glory. The people knew that they were looking at Jesus, and they were totally caught up with the wonder of Him.

I suddenly understood that I was living during a time when the “only” acceptable focus must be on Jesus, wholly, completely, and without distraction. “Nothing” was about me, or about anything that I could do. It was only about my being an “empty vessel” that Jesus could fill “with the fullness of Himself.” A vessel He could live in, and through whom He could do as He pleases, in anyway that He desired. This understanding filled me with overflowing joy.

“That you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.” Ephesians 3:19b NAS

At the end of my vision the Lord beautifully and sovereignly led me to the following verse to confirm what I was experiencing.

“Always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.” II Corinthians 4:10-11

Many theologians have turned this portion of Scripture into something palatable to the natural mind, easy to understand and explain. But, the Lord is about to do something “exceedingly, abundantly, beyond” all that we have understood in the past, or are able to grasp with our natural mind.

Consider the meaning of the word “manifested,” according to Thayer’s Greek Lexicon.

“To make manifest, or visible, or known, what has been hidden or unknown, to manifest, whether by words, or deeds, or in any other way.

a) to make actual and visible, realized
b) to make known by teaching
c) to become manifest, to be made known
d) used of a person; to expose to view, to make manifest, to show oneself, to appear.”

This is exactly what happened with Jesus in my vision. He was making Himself visible, manifest, known, and plainly recognized. He was appearing to those around Him, and they saw Him.

This is exactly what Jesus is about to do through those of us who belong wholly to Him.

I do not fully understand how the Lord will do this, but one thing I do know, people will know that Jesus is manifesting Himself in their midst, and He will captivate their total attention.

THE KEY

In the above verse, (II Corinthians 4:10), there is a reference to the “dying of Jesus.” This not only refers to His death on the cross, but also to the death in which He died daily to His own will and to His own life. He did nothing of His own initiative. Jesus had one motivation; to “display” or manifest His Father’s will and purpose on earth.

The connection to us is made when we are told that we are “constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus sake” (verse 11). It is the only way that the life of Jesus can be fully “manifested” in our mortal flesh. Each time our flesh dies to some area of self, Jesus is able to take full dominion in that area. The more we die, the more He is able to live through us.

Before Jesus can come forth in this kind of power and display, we must be willing to get completely out of the way. With a sincere heart we must echo the cry of John the Baptist when he said, “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30).

Only to the degree that we willingly die to every area of self, only to that degree, will the Lord Jesus have the freedom to fully manifest Himself through human flesh.

He is saying, “Follow Me,” and then, “Walk you in it.”