Our Guest Dale Fife
Sid: We want everyone everywhere to get unstuck, unstuck? Well, what do you mean by that Sid? Well, I’m glad you asked. You see everyone that’s a true believer is caught in some point in their life in a move of God’s Spirit but history records that most people that get caught in a move of God’s Spirit at least to come to the Lord get stuck. And then they see something new that happens and they say “Well, that’s not God because that’s not the way God operates with me.” I mean as if we have the audacity to think we know everything of God. Even the gospels state that if everything that Yeshua, Jesus, did was recorded in books there wouldn’t be enough books to contain it. Well it’s time to get unstuck, why? Because the word of God says the best wine is for last. Do you remember the wedding supper of Cana? The Master of the Feast said to the Bridegroom you have saved the best wine for last.” Wines a type of the Holy Spirit, the best move of the Holy Spirit is last.” And the Messiah said “That when you have a new wine, a new outpouring of God’s Spirit, you need a new wineskin.” And I’m looking at what we call church is the new wine skin and I’m saying we need a new wine skin to contain the best that is reserved for last. But you know what is even more important than the new wine skin in the church? The new wine skin in us and that’s why I have on the telephone Dr. Dale Fife. One of our supporters said “Sid I just got a hold of his book and it is doing more for my intimacy with God than anything that I’ve seen before you got to read it.” So I got a hold of this book it’s called “The Secret Place” subtitled “Passionately Pursuing His Presence.” And the moment I opened this book Dr. Dale Fife says “He believes angels accompanies every one of these books.” The moment I opened this book the presence of God came on me and that was God saying “Hey, there’s something in here Sid that you have to learn and your Mishpochah must learn.” So on January 1st 1999 a pastor that accomplished a lot for God that was involved as a Pastor in a Methodist Church and then he got involved in something real radical with 3 different denominations came together and it was interracial and interdenominational and three churches came together and God really moved and he started something called the barn which young people that were not even acceptable in most churches became acceptable. So he knew the Spirit of God, he knew about the moves of God’s Spirit but Dale there was a desperation inside of you tell me about it.
Dale: It’s a joy to be with you Sid I firmly agree with you that we need to embrace what God is doing in the present moment. And after 30 years of ministry in a more traditional setting sometimes I pastured a small church outside Johnstown, PA in a coal mining community, from there into a larger denominational church, and then a community church. And an inner city church and a barn ministry and then on to Connecticut where I’m pasturing now but in my heart of hearts the long that has continually pressed me into God is a desire for intimacy with Him. And after 30 some years of ministry I just was so hungry for God and so destructed, stuck on the normal responsibility of ministry, the administrative things. And on the first day of 1999 I went into my study at home locked the door, I said “God I’m locking myself in in with You.” Took the phone off the hock and sat down in my what I call now my prayer chair. And I opened my journal I have an 8½ x 11 hardbound journal and I took a pen and I sat there in God’s presence and I said “God I desperately need to draw closer to You, how can I minister to your people if I have no intimacy with You?” And…
Sid: By the way anyone that saw you minister and knew what you did that is the last thing they think you’d be praying. They would say “Ha, I wish I had the same intimacy with God that Pastor Dale has.”
Dale: Well I think that’s true in God’s grace and His gifts are without repentance and the anointing of God comes upon us not for our benefit but for the benefit of those we minister to. And many times we’ll say “Well, Lord we need to be anointed.” And I remember one particular day God said “Listen, I’ll anoint you when the time comes for you to minister and that’s when you’ll need it because My anointing is not for you it’s for those you minister to.” And so God was gracing me in ministry and there were many powerful moments in my life but there was such a longing in my heart for a deeper relationship with God than I’ve never known.
Sid: You know Dale that’s what’s going on inside of heart right now and that’s what’s going on inside of most of our listeners right now there’s this longing. And there is this how do we get from point… I’m a real logical thinker.
Dale: Hmm, hmm.
Sid: My biggest asset is my greatest liability “How do I get from point A to point B I know where I’m at but I am totally dissatisfied where I’m at. I’ve got to get greater intimacy God “How do I do it?” And I’ve been crying out for it, but tell me what happened that day January 1st 1999.
Dale: Well even as you express your heart Sid it reminds me of a vision the Lord gave me one day of a priest ministering the Old Testament Tabernacle and his responsibility was to carry the ashes from the altar out of the Tabernacle. Day after day he would come in and he would be close to the presence of God but not in the presence of God. And a longing developed in his heart after all of those years of just carrying ashes of firewood that he came to the point where he was desperate where he said “I need to get into the Holy of Holies.” So I think that’s a perfect description of where I was on that day and as I sat in my study I prayed this prayer “Lord Jesus I just long for intimacy with You.” And something came deep out of my Spirit unpremeditated just a longing. And I believe it’s the cry of every human being alive today that cry for intimacy with God. And I said this prayer I said “God I want to be like Enoch, I want to walk with You.”
Sid: Now that wasn’t premeditated I mean it just came out of your spirit?
Dale: It did, it wasn’t like I said “Well, I’m going to go and pray this prayer.” It just was birthed it’s almost like the cry of my life. “God I want to be like Enoch, I want to walk with You and be Your friend.” In that moment that I prayed that prayer I heard the voice of the Spirit say to me “Son, I’m going to come and answer your prayer and I’m going to walk with you like I walked with Enoch, I long for you to be My friend.” And that prayer and that moment literally changed my life because God became to come day after day after day in such a powerful way into my study at home as I would sit in His presence. I remember one particular day Sid that I went into my study at 8:00 in the morning and sat in God’s presence seeing and hearing, seeing vision and hearing what God was saying to me for 9 hours without interruption. The presence of God was so powerful in the room.
Sid: Now you can’t do that without God’s grace without the presence of God there.
Dale: No, tears were streaming down my face, the glory of God so present that I could hardly see to write in my journal what God was saying to me. And in fact one particular day my wife was so concerned because I had been locked in my study for so long she actually snuck out the front door walked around the house and peaked in the window to see if I was still on the earth she thought I had gone home like Enoch did. (Chuckle) Another woman a powerful intercessor walked into our home one day and I was on one of what I call now my Enoch walks with God. She walked into the house and she to my wife “What is going on in this place, God’s presence is so powerful in this house I can’t… what is happening?” And my wife began to explain what was going on.” And she said “I can sense the presence and the glory of God in this house.” It was just amazing what was going on and it was actually you had mentioned to your listeners about the book “The Secret Place.” I never started out to write a book, I started out to see God and in those days of powerful intimacy it was about 2 weeks into this experience when I had almost filled the journal with the prophetic revelation of what God was saying to me. And one day I said to the Lord I said “Father, You were showing me so many things surely there for more than just me.” And the voice of the Spirit said “They are son, and I want you to write them in a book and they’re for My church and for My people.” And so I said “Why me, who am I just I’m hidden back here in the trees in my study and I kind of felt like Moses God pick somebody else to do this.” And I even said “Well Lord how will I even get a book published?” And the Lord said “Son you obey Me and I’ll take care of the rest.” And so I really didn’t intend to write a book, in fact when this book was published it is 95% straight out of my journal as I wrote it in God’s presence.
Sid: But you know refresh my memory because I spoke to you a while ago and you said something about you really believe an angel accompanies every book that’s someone gets.
Dale: I believe that because in the book and if you know the listeners will read they’ll understand that there was a point in my journey with the Lord that the Lord gave me a powerful vision and in that vision He said “I will release an angel to carry this word to my people.”
Sid: Well some people that a lot of us are familiar with Tommy Tenney, Dr. Kingsley Fletcher, Mark Chironna, I mean Mark says “Get ready for an incredible journey into the presence of the Living God within these pages you’ll experience a depth of prophetic revelation and insight that will provoke you to respond to God’s invitation to intimacy.”
