Kristin Fields Chadwick

I’m gonna say it. 

I think my testimony will be called, “You can’t make this shit up.”

I know, that’s offensive to some of you. It was to me, too. And that’s okay. But really…Holy Spirit is wild and so very liberating. 

When I first started learning about the Holy Spirit, the wildest things were happening. I had driven up to a retreat (WE REVEL) where I witnessed healing happen left and right: healing of hearts and healing of physical ailments, which totally blew my mind that this was real.  I was witnessing women of faith stop and listen and then speak things to people so specifically to people to encourage them.  I watched people give gifts to other people they had never met and witness their reaction to receiving such a personalized handwritten note.  

Then… this was where it got personal for me.  I was listening to one of the speakers at the retreat as I sat on their living room floor. I instantly found my ears perked up as she said, “Become aware of the things which you can’t stand. Sometimes the enemy will put his thumb on something that he knows is actually a provision from God to prevent you from fully walking in your destiny.” 

My first thought was a peacock.  I hated peacocks; I truly found them annoying. We have a local zoo which they roam freely in and squawk and display their feathers in a “look at me” fashion.  Each time we visited and saw them my gut reaction was, “They are so vain.”  Well, at the retreat, I wrote down in my journal- “Oh! Like the peacock!” Later on that day, I was sitting down to decorate my journal I had received with different varieties of scrapbook paper, and I noticed a giant piece of paper with a peacock. I thought to myself, “Huh. That’s funny,” and stuck it in my journal.  Again, we gathered up to hear a speaker and she handed out a prayer which printed on the paper was…a peacock.  Now my eyes became more attune to what the Holy Spirit was saying.  My faith was beginning to build. I had hoped He would speak to me, but I was so cautious. I didn’t want to get burned and feel silly and humiliated by even thinking He was directly talking to me. 

Fast forward to the evening at the retreat where we talk about the Holy Spirit.  They were handing out scarves as a gift- which is powerfully significant- (you should really go to a REVEL retreat)…The leader stops and says, “I feel like Holy Spirit has another scarf for someone that is different than this one I am handing out.”  Another woman attending stands up immediately and says, “I have one I am supposed to give away. Hold on, it’s in my suitcase.”  She runs to her luggage and comes bounding back in the room with joy and describes how she packed and unpacked the scarf multiple times and finally put it in her suitcase.  It was a peacock scarf! I stood up, shaking…and said “Oh it’s definitely mine!”  I was stunned. I was hopeful. I was instantly like a little child in wonder. 

I arrived at the retreat with the burning question, “Who is the Holy Spirit?” And through using nudges and words which might have been insignificant to others started a path of asking more of who is He and who am I? The next day I wrote down for the first time- I am His Peacock, displaying the colors He has created me to be.  I stepped into a place I’d never gone. I started to see how I had hid my beauty, covered up, and been ashamed of my feminity. The enemy no longer had the tightest grip on who I am called to be.  It was now a time of discovery and relationship and intimacy of asking questions with the Holy Spirit. 

He is so full of wonder and mystery.  He is infinite. He is intentionally with me. He is whispering to the deep places of my heart and yours. 

^{The Peacock Scarf and Journal}