Encountering the One Who Has Chosen Us

“It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you” (John 15:16a).

Brandon called me a day before the prayer group began. He was shy and nervous about signing up to come because he’d never “done anything like this before.” I reassured him there were no pre-requisites for the group. We were all learning how to pray and he was most welcome. When he came, I recognized him from church.

As we began our first discussion, a man who had newly encountered Jesus shared his testimony of being freed from habitual sin and made new through Jesus at a retreat. Something struck Brandon’s heart. At the end of the night, Brandon approached the man who shared and opened up about his own struggles with sin and feeling unwanted.

I overheard their conversation as I was cleaning up. I recently had been trained in a type of prayer ministry that leads people to meet Jesus through meditation. Prompted by the Holy Spirit, I knew this type of prayer could benefit Brandon. I asked to pray with him and gathered the other participants when he agreed.

Brandon, with a tear-stained face, hung his head as we began. He was visibly distraught. I invited him to enter into a moment where he felt loved and in a safe place to ask Jesus whatever he wanted to ask Him.

Boldly, Brandon asked Jesus, “Do you want me?”

The minute the words came out of Brandon’s mouth, Jesus responded in the silence of his heart. None of us could hear it, but we could see Brandon change. He raised his head, he took a deep breath in, and he cried out in joy, “He said yes. He said yes. He said He wants me!”

Boldly, Brandon asked Jesus, “Do you want me?”

There is something so powerful about hearing Jesus speak to our hearts. He always knows the right words to say. They usually aren’t complicated, but simple, and hit our hearts in a way that others can’t.

Brandon encountered Jesus in this prayer experience, and though we didn’t know exactly what happened, his countenance changed, and before us sat a new Brandon. The once tearful man who hung his head while he shared timidly now radiated with joy, smiling from ear to ear.

We spent several minutes praying with Brandon, rebuking lies and claiming truths about his identity in Jesus. He professed out loud: “I declare and believe that I am a beloved son of the Father. I am loved and chosen and precious in his sight” (Is. 43:4 & 1 Pet. 2:4).

It’s hard to explain in words what we witnessed. If you’ve seen The Chosen you might refer to this as a Mary Magdalene moment. In the first episode of the series, we see Mary Magdalene living her life weighed down in great distress. Then, she encounters Jesus…At the end of the episode, a man who had seen her in her previous, distressed state questions her, wondering how she changed. She replies simply, “I don’t understand it myself. But here is what I can tell you: I was one way. And now I am completely different. And the thing that happened in between…was Him.”

Brandon is a changed man because he heard the truth that Jesus chose him and loves him.

The following week Brandon came back to the prayer group and shared his testimony of encountering Jesus and hearing precisely what his heart needed. He was stronger at resisting temptation. In the following weeks when he fell into sin, he was able to return to his loving God, ask forgiveness, and be strengthened again, knowing that he was, in fact, chosen and precious to the Father. My husband saw Brandon the following week at church and he knew just from looking at him that he was a changed man. He held himself confidently, he smiled, made eye contact and simply looked happier. This is the life-changing power of Jesus!