The Holy Spirit is always working and moving in people’s lives, drawing us to God and a relationship with Jesus Christ.

Dr. Os Guinness says there is a word for this process. It is called transcendence when the supernatural briefly touches our lives.

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, transcendence refers to an experience that is “beyond the limits of all possible experience and knowledge.” It is derived from the Latin word, scandere, which describes the process of “climbing so high that you cross some boundary.”

Transcendence describes the moments when God reaches down and touches us. It is a spiritual experience meant to catch our attention.

In an interview with, “The Stetzer ChurchLeaders Podcast“, Dr. Guinness says, “People have experiences that are incredibly profound. And what they do is two things. They puncture whatever they believe to that point, and they point forward to something which, if true, would make all the difference. So the signals of transcendence turn them into seekers.”

“These signals of transcendence open us to a whole world of the supernatural and transcendent, which is absolutely essential. Because it’s the power which truly overcomes the powers of our secular culture,” Dr. Guinness continued.

According to Dr. Guinness, God is continually bringing us transcendent moments. It can be through dreams and visions being experienced by Muslims in the Middle East, or it can be the story of how an alcoholic encountered Jesus on the beaches of Maui.

Aaron Palmer was officially in Hawaii for the wedding of a good friend, but it became one continual drinking binge. After drinking all night, he decided one morning to catch a glimpse of the sun rising over the Pacific Ocean.

With a bottle of vodka, he walked down to the beach, where there was a mother and a young boy fishing. Talking to the boy’s mother, he found out her son was dying of cancer and the Make-a-Wish foundation had granted him his final wish of fishing on the ocean.

When Palmer asked if he could talk to her son, she said yes.

“As the two converse, something happens,” Jon Seidl writes in his article for CBN. “He [Palmer} hears deep wisdom, truth, love, and courage spill out of the boy’s mouth. He sees genuine happiness. He doesn’t remember exactly what was said, but it changed him. It challenged him. The boy talked about Jesus, about life, about his outlook on dying. The man was in awe.”

“After their roughly 30-minute conversation, the man walked away convicted. He knew what awaited him if he kept going the direction he was headed. Destruction. So much destruction. Just like he had seen play out in front of him as a child. He wanted to – he needed to – change,” Seidl continues.

Because of this transcendent moment. Palmer returned to the mainland US. Quit drinking. Found God and saw his life transformed.

The young boy he talked to was Ethan Hallmark. He died of cancer in 2014 at 13 years of age.