Who Could Do That Besides the Holy Spirit?!

Hi! In this blog post, I’m going to tell you a little bit about a Holy Spirit scavenger hunt that I did on Christmas break in January this year. We were able to do it with some of our mission partners and friends, and it was amazing. Here I’ll tell you more!

Back in Mexico, our Intake team was led on a scavenger hunt. This consisted of, first and foremost, praying for all those we might encounter. Then, we split into teams which were each given a list of things to find and a time limit of a couple hours. This list consisted of finding different places that we would take a picture in front of, but also a time to offer to pray with anyone there. Some things to find were a tortilleria, curtains with flowers on them, dogs, and a horse—but it was a full list of this kind of stuff. You would be surprised at how many people we encountered and prayed for on our way to finding these things.

Fast forward a couple of months and we are in Missouri on our Christmas break. It is New Year’s day, and we decided to have a scavenger hunt with our friends and mission partners. So we made a list of items to find, split into three teams of five or six, and then went off in our cars.

Rewinding a bit now, there is something similar to scavenger hunting that a lot of our missionary friends have done. It is called “treasure hunting.” Treasure hunting is when you pray for God to reveal different characteristics about a person or even someone’s name. Simple things such as red shirt, cowboy hat, bike, or the name Jack. If you don’t get a specific place to look, you can usually just head to Walmart or some other place that you feel like going. There, you will hopefully find the person, explain in a non-creepy way that you were looking for them, and offer to pray with them.

So, one of our FMC friends went treasure hunting one day. When she was praying, she had gotten the name “Amber.” She looked and looked but could not find anyone named Amber. When she got home, she was a little bit discouraged and told her husband what had happened.

The next day, our friend’s husband was at Home Depot getting some stuff with another missionary friend. They were in the checkout line, when our friend’s husband saw that one of the cashiers had “Amber” on her nametag. Very excited, he shouted, “AMBER! MY WIFE WAS LOOKING FOR YOU!!!” Afterwards, they explained the whole situation to the cashier woman and were able to pray with her.

Other things on our list were: a customer at Walmart, someone walking their dog, a business with Christmas lights, a baby, a nursing home, someone who is ill, and many other similar things.

Once again, we all headed out in our specific teams. I was on a team with my older sister, Autumn, and some of our friends. We were not sure if we would be able to make some of the further away stops, like the nursing home.

After a few stops, we decided to go to our friend, Mr. Jon’s house. He recently had some health issues (so we could count that as an ill person), and we knew he would have on (or could put on, *wink wink*) a cross necklace, which was also on the list.

While there, we jokingly asked him if he knew anyone named Amber. He said that yes, he had a niece named Amber. We were surprised and excited, but he continued. He told us that his niece had gotten in a terrible accident many years ago. She had been driving to work in a blizzard and had gotten out to help someone whose car had slid to the side of the road. But on her way to the car, she was run over at least two times. She was seriously injured and was rushed to the hospital. Since then, for at least ten years, she had been in a nursing home making a slow recovery.

When we asked where the nursing home was, he said it was just 10 or 15 minutes away! So, we asked if he would take us there, and he said “Yes.” He hadn’t visited her in a while and was glad to do so. We went and met her and were able to pray with her. She had been very lonely and suffering from a little bit of dementia and even had a dent in her head from the accident. It was a beautiful encounter and she seemed glad to have visitors.

This all being said, who could do that besides the Holy Spirit?! Seriously! I could truly see God’s hand at work that day. We were able to return home, and share that story with the other groups. They also had some amazing glory stories from their time. We then ended in a prayer for everybody we had encountered.