The Progression of Healing

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In my journey to discover healing by the power of God, I have gone through a progression. First I wasn’t sure how often God wanted to heal, and I was one of those “If it be your will” Christians. I loved God, but I wasn’t really sure how much He wanted us to be healed. This is largely due to a very poor understanding of God’s nature and will to heal.

As I learned and grew in God’s love, I discovered that healing is simply a manifestation of that love. I also gained a deeper understanding of what Jesus accomplished on the cross, I realized that it is ALWAYS God’s will to heal in every situation. In fact, not-healing is not even an option God has allowed Himself, as Jesus has already purchased one time for all humanity for all eternity every healing need that would ever come upon us. God can’t say “no” to something he already said “yes” to 2000 years ago. I also began to grow in faith for healing and started stepping out and praying for the sick in public and at church.

I operated at this level for around five years, believing that God wanted to heal and expecting God to do something, but rarely met with results. Eventually I came to a new level of understanding, and began to have people test out their healing at the time I prayed for them. As I did this I started to see more people receive instantaneous healing, where before I only went away hoping that people would eventually get healed. I also became more persistent, praying again if there were no results the first time, and even again after that. What I observed happening was that my PERSISTENCE in prayer in those few minutes with that person began to bear fruit. I gained greater revelation on how the enemy hinders healing and actively prevents the healing God releases from manifesting in peoples’ bodies in those moments of prayer.

As I continued to grow, God began to push me into another level of healing, namely resurrection from the dead. While to date I have yet to resurrect anyone, I began to gain more understanding of God’s desire for life that is SO strong that He even resurrects the dead. As I grew in this revelation of resurrection, I realized something: God is so interested in resurrecting the dead that the Bible says He will resurrect the dead and give them brand new bodies!! When I realized this it made me do a mental double-take. If God is going to resurrect all the dead, why do we have to die?

This took me on a journey over the past few years that showed me that God is far more interested in keeping us alive than He is in waiting until we die and then resurrecting us. After all, death is a work of the enemy, not God. Adam and Eve were immortal until that fateful day that “when you eat of it you will surely die.” They did not die at that moment, and they and their descendants even lived into the nine-hundreds, but they all eventually died. We, nowadays, live under a better covenant yet live only a fraction of the length of time they did. In our minds, someone reaching one-hundred is a big deal. In their day it was like someone reaching adulthood, with their mid-life crisis another four hundred years away.

Now, Jesus has reversed all of the laws and curses against us that cause us to grow sick and die. He has given us the authority and power to resurrect the dead and heal every sickness and disease. The Church is rapidly reaching a greater place of health in regards to healing, but the logical end to all healing is life, not death, and we are very unhealthy as the Body in regards to resurrection and abundant life. When more healing takes place in a body than decay, someone becomes healthy. When death in a body wins over life, sickness and disease and ultimately death manifest. In essence, long life is simply a process by which there is more healing taking place in our bodies over a span of time than decay, and God’s life-giving power is more active than the death in this world. After all, greater is He who is in me than he who is in the world.

I look forward to a day when we step beyond healing, beyond resurrection, and simply step into our birthright, where we can live and not die and enjoy not only the creation, but enjoy stewarding the life of Christ into that creation, releasing it from that same bondage to decay that we have been released from. The Church is slowly waking up. It begins with healing, then resurrection, but when enough people have been healed and resurrected, we will eventually understand what God’s will is: that we can live and not die.

If you want to learn more about God’s desire for us to live in resurrection power and abundant life, check out my book Faith To Raise The Dead:

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Build Bridges, Not Walls

Yesterday, I was at a very difficult Senate Committee Hearing in Salem, Oregon and gave testimony at the hearing. There are some well-meaning Senators who have proposed a Healthcare-related bill that directly infringes on some of our medical and human rights. As an RN, a U.S. citizen and Oregon resident, as well as someone who understands the impact of this bill, I felt it was my duty to be there. Honestly, it really was a difficult time for me personally, as I have very strong beliefs about this bill, and some of the interactions I witnessed were very upsetting and disappointing.

I had the opportunity to speak with the main sponsor of the bill at the end, a woman who I vehemently disagree with and will only probably ever agree with if she changes her mind. It was apparent throughout the hearing that this woman was VERY upset, hurt, and angry, and in many ways during the hearing was responding accordingly. The Lord put it on my heart to apologize to her on behalf of those who support my side of this medical cause who have written her hate mail and have been extremely hateful to her. At first I liked the idea, then watching her conduct in the natural realm I tossed the idea, but then I decided that she did indeed need to hear what I had to say, and that she needed my apology.

When I apologized to her, what I witnessed was somewhat surprising to me. As I apologized to this woman on behalf of other people, tears literally began forming in her eyes. I told her that I believed her heart was in the right place regardless of whether we agreed or not, and I honored her in that moment. Before we parted company a minute later, she even verbally honored me for my service in the medical field and let me know that her husband does what I do as well, and that she understands my job is difficult. What I felt transpiring in the invisible realm around us was that God was building a bridge in that moment, and beginning to heal her heart and the division between our groups with opposing belief systems.

You see, it is easy to malign others who disagree or even outright oppose us. It can be easy to turn that person into a villain in our minds, and forget that he or she too has dreams, hopes, fears, and emotions. He or she also has a heart that can be wounded by our words.

At the end of the day, we need to remember what 2 Corinthians 5:19b says, “And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.” That IS our message, our mission. It doesn’t matter whether I agree with that senator or not. It changes nothing about what God has empowered all of us here on earth to do. In any and every situation, we are the ones who open up hearts, who build bridges instead of walls, and who reconcile.

I do not know the long-term impact of that conversation we had on that woman’s life, but I do know this: If we ever meet again, she will be favorably disposed to me personally. Whatever message it is that I carry the next time around, she will be open to hearing me even if she won’t listen to a single other person because I have built a bridge. I also strongly believe that my words began to bring healing into a heart that is filled with pain and probably has been hurt many times by many other people long before this particular Senate bill. It is impossible to go wrong when we release love on other people. After all, love never fails.

Jesus was very clear in the book of Matthew that if we have anything against our brother that WE are to go and leave our offering before God and go make things right with our brother. It is not time to wait until someone else gets a heart change and their change isn’t actually necessary to begin to reconcile. What DOES need to happen is WE need to ask God to give us a glimpse of His heart for them. When we get a revelation, even for a few moments, of God’s heart for another person, it is extremely difficult to not let that revelation influence the way we view them. It is for this reason, I believe, that Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5:16, “So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.” When we view another from God’s view it changes us, and the love that will overflow out of us will change them.

Ask the Lord today who He would have you build a bridge with. Who do you need to reconcile with? If you ask Him to show you His heart for them, He will most certainly be faithful to do it.

For Lack of Knowledge

My grandfather died a few weeks ago, and those who are connected with me on Mewe.com, Facebook, and other social media know that I went to the funeral in Virginia two weekends ago. What most do NOT know is the divine encounter God set me up with a few days prior, and what it showed me about the health level of the Church from a spiritual perspective.

Two days before the funeral, I borrowed my dad’s truck and drove up to Pennsylvania to look at the contents of a storage facility we will be clearing out later this year. I had brought a few books with me on the flight to Virginia, and I brought one book up north, “How To Raise The Dead” by Tyler Johnson. I spent the drive up listening to messages on Immortality and Abundant Life from WOW Ministries in Sri Lanka, and my faith was flying high–a fantastic drive for me!

I was blessed to have a 3+ hour lunch with my good friend Will, much like the old days when we lived nearby (I love you man!). I enjoyed the time with him thoroughly, but what I didn’t know is that God was keeping me from driving 3.5 hours back to my parents’ place in Virginia until much later that evening

I ended lunch around dinnertime and started the drive back to VA when my wife called from Portland to tell me that our friend “Jenna” called her. Jenna lives in Myerstown, PA, right down the road from where we used to live before moving to Portland, Oregon. Jenna is a mighty woman of God who has been a wonderful support to my wife and me over the years, and she has a heart of gold.

When Jenna called she had just found out her son’s friend had died the day before from either a clot or hemorrhage in the brain; she was 25 and engaged to be married. My wife called and instructed me to call Jenna back. She was blown away to discover I was less than an hour away from her instead of on the other side of the USA where she thought I was. She wanted to raise this woman from the dead, but needed some help and encouragement. I plugged her address into the GPS and met her an hour later at her house to pray, talk, and walk her through the process.

My philosophy on resurrection (and actually most Kingdom-related things) is this: If I do nothing, nothing will change and there is no hope. If I do something, there is the chance nothing may still happen, but there is now hope where before there was none. After all, let’s face it: how many people do YOU know who will plan to resurrect you if you die? If you can count more than one person, you are a minority. If more than five, consider yourself both extremely rare AND blessed.

My advice to Jenna was in keeping with my philosophy, and as she was nervous I had her sit down and write a script of what she wanted to say before making that phone call. We started with condolences, but quickly moved to the part where we tell them we want to pray for resurrection, what we want from them (access to the body), and then ask for their assistance. Mind you, this was done very respectfully and not at all as callous as this might sound on paper, but words on the page don’t convey the same heart as if one was there in person.

Jenna called, and asked in the most kind, heartfelt, and loving way possible, and the family was even looking at pictures of their daughter and Jenna’s son, so there was favor at the time of the phone call. What the family said was that they “felt peace” about the whole thing and felt that was God telling them to let her go. And that was that–resurrection over.

While blessed that God was releasing measure upon measure of His grace in the midst of this life-shattering event, I was deeply grieved in my heart. Hosea 4:6a says “my people are destroyed from lack of knowledge” (NIV), and in this case it could not have been more true. This woman, only 25 years old, had a man who was preparing to marry her, a career, life, possibly children and grandchildren in her future, and a family of parents and siblings who loved her dearly, but in a freak moment, her life ended. Yet when the only people they knew who had any hope at all extended a hand to offer that hope, it was graciously-yet-firmly refused.

As I think about it now, as I write this, I am in tears. I have been accused before of lacking compassion for the dead and the dying in regards to my beliefs about death and resurrection, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. I may at times have difficulty putting myself in others’ shoes, but it pains me even now to know that this woman could be alive right now, today, if her family knew what Jenna and I know. Jesus said it best to the Samaritan woman at the well in John 4:10: “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

If only they had known the gift of God that was available to them. If only they understood that God’s resurrection power is alive and well today, and that Jesus still raises the dead even today, even now, they might have reached out their hands to take hold of the hope Jenna offered them. If only they had known that God sent me across the USA, then three hours north of my destination, to meet with Jenna, complete with a book on the very subject of need sitting with me, full of faith and ready to go, and who kept me from driving home for hours after I had originally planned to leave, they might have relented and she probably would have been raised. People truly do perish for a lack of knowledge.

When I say that God revealed to me the state of the health of the Church, I am sad to say that it was bittersweet. I am encouraged that God is moving and at work among His people, but it does upset me at times to know that many are living with grief and problems that simply don’t need to be there. I am reminded, through this event, that part of my job, our job, as believers, is to extend the Abundant Life that Jesus promised us in John 10:10 to all who are in need, and that the first place it must start is the Church. We as the Body of Christ must reach a place of health in our mindsets and beliefs where we understand that when God says in Revelation 20:4 that “He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away,” that God meant what He said.

This isn’t a far-off heaven-when-you-die reality for a day yet to come. We are called NOW to burn as bright flaming beacons of light amidst a world that is filled with broken, hurting, and even dying people, and to destroy the power of death in action, placing it under Christ’s feet. The Old Order of things passed away over 2000 years ago on a splintery wooden cross on a hill in Israel when the Savior of this world gave up his spirit and died in his body so that we might never have to, and that the power and authority to extend the life he purchased us would flow in us and through us to dry the tears of this world. I will not stop proclaiming the Gospel of Life and Immortality that Jesus purchased for us, so that the Church may be revived into fullness, and through it the world might live again.

God Doesn’t Kill But He Takes People Home??

In the past week I have been to a funeral, attempted to resurrect someone from the dead (but failed to get permission to access the body), and have had numerous conversations with others who just had family members pass away. In all of this it is impossible for me to not think about what Jesus purchased for us that he stated over and over again in the gospels, especially in the book of John. “Whoever believes in me . . . will never die.”

I had a conversation this evening with a family member where I recounted the failed resurrection attempt. His response? “The Lord knows His timing and call some to be with him sooner than we might think.”

My response? “I don’t think God kills people.” You see, I have a hard time believing that God does kill people, especially when the person in question was twenty-five, died of a brain aneurysm, and left a grieving fiancée, family, friends, and a great deal of unlived-life behind. Really?? We think that “God’s timing” involves killing a young woman?

The quick reply to my response was, “Well, the Lord doesn’t kill people, He just takes them home.” I’m afraid that in my quickness to use common sense I left behind my religious mindset that would have made that response make any sense at all. Can someone please explain to me how the Lord “took” this woman home via brain-aneurysm-death, yet He didn’t kill her? I’ll admit, I’m a bit confused at that reasoning.

We have for far too long given ourselves over in religious circles to thought-processes that make no sense in order to explain tragedies that elude easy explanation. Worse still, we attribute those tragedies to the God of Light and Love as though somehow God is perpetrating these literal crimes against humanity. Instead of acknowledging what the Bible clearly states in John 10:10–namely that there is a thief loose in the world who kills and destroys, and who is nothing at all like God, we make up these pious-sounding arguments that (stunningly) people somehow actually believe.

I think it would be far more authentic if we started questioning random acts of darkness instead of simply attributing them to God for lack of better understanding. I will be the first to tell you that there are lots of passages in scripture that I don’t understand and have no explanation for. I cannot explain all of the verses that say that God killed hundreds of thousands of people, because God didn’t do that since it’s not in His nature. I can’t explain a good number of Old Testament verses for that reason, but I CAN understand with impunity that Jesus and God are the same, and that Jesus revealed himself to be the one who GIVES life, not the one who takes it away.

We have for too long relied on Job’s limited and inaccurate view of God as one who gives AND takes away instead of relying on the perfect revelation of God found in Jesus Christ. It’s time we moved on from the spoiled rancid last-year’s milk of the old way of God-kills thinking and try chewing on the meat of the God who raises the dead, heals the sick, and give hope where there was previously no hope. Instead of living a powerless gospel that saves no one at all but relies on death to get them to heaven, I’m believing in the Jesus who promised abundant life, and who said “whoever lives and believes in me WILL NEVER DIE.” You get the same choice–choose wisely.

Personal Responsibility For Healing

Many of us have heard horror stories of things that happened in the “prayer lines” — those times when someone failed to get healed, was viciously accused by the prayer-leader of not having faith, and how that person left crying, angry, or otherwise. Sad to say but those stories are often true and do actually happen. While the prayer leader may have been well-intentioned it is safe to say that the effects of their words and actions were not just ineffective but actually detrimental. I suggest there is a much better way to operate in this setting or situation, but this way carries over into all aspects of life — it is the Way of Personal Responsibility.

In any prayer situation with others it is safe to say that usually one party (the supplicant) approaches the other (prayer leader) for prayer. The supplicant obviously has a need that they don’t feel is adequately addressed without the assistance of others, which is the reason they sought help. Common sense also dictates that if the supplicant were able to solve the need on their own that they would not have sought help, which tells us that they are in a place of lack. Presumably the prayer leader is in a place of plenty in that area of need, or at least is in less lack, and so the supplicant requests prayer intending the blessing to go from the place of higher influence to lower influence. And so the prayer occurs.

When the prayer occurs there is one vitally important detail the prayer leader must be aware of — that they are responsible for providing the solution. Certainly God is the one ultimately responsible, but on an earthly level God has given us responsibility to bring heaven to earth and so it is the job of the prayer leader to do just that. What this means is that ALL failure in the situation, if blame MUST be apportioned, goes to the prayer leader. Why? Because the supplicant never had it to begin with or they wouldn’t have sought prayer. Thus, any lack of heaven’s breakthrough in the situation is the responsibility of the prayer leader to address, solve, and resolve the matter.

I find it quite sensible to take this approach for a few reasons. First, if one looks at the bible verses where someone was healed by their own faith they directly approached Jesus and usually had a solution in mind but just needed Jesus to give them an extra boost in prayer. There is not a single time Jesus said to someone “your faith has made you well” where they had no pre-formed notion of how this wholeness might occur. When he didn’t say it one can assume their faith did NOT make them well, and therefore most of the time it was not the supplicant’s faith that brought the solution, and anyone else would be wise to adopt a similar mindset.

Second, I have named this the Way of Personal Responsibility for a reason. I have little to no control at all over the lives of others. I cannot make them believe things a certain way, speak, act, or think a certain way, and as such I am the only person whose beliefs, thoughts, and actions I control. If as prayer leader I believe Heaven needs to come to Earth I cannot depend on any other person to provide enough God-power in the situation, as I am the one who is being sought for just that very thing. Therefore it is my responsibility to provide it and I never know when I will be called on for that task. I might be healing someone in a grocery store or a coworker, and it might be nowhere near a highly-anointed church prayer-line where people are getting blessed left and right. If someone needs a touch from heaven I can only count on myself to carry it. Thus I must choose actions that line up with that belief and when all is said and done I can know that I did my all.

By corollary it also means that if in that situation as prayer leader I FAIL to provide the touch from heaven under no circumstances may I begin blaming the other person and at NO point EVER do I tell that person the nine reasons why they failed to be prepared enough for me to pray for them. Obviously they were unprepared or they wouldn’t need prayer in the first place.

It is time that we each individually take a step up in our personal spiritual responsibility. People blame others for heaven failing to manifest as a cover for their own feelings of inadequacy, fear, disappointment, and shame. Blame-passing over why prayers were not answered is not fruitless but rather is poisonous. If heaven is going to manifest it begins with a look at one’s own self not at anyone else in the visual range, and as I and everyone else do this more and more I firmly believe we will see a shift in not just the way we approach prayer with others but the end results as well.

His Expansive Grace

My latest blog post titled “God Still Loves Satan” has apparently ruffled a few feathers, as evidenced by some of the comments both on this blog and on Facebook, not to mention conversations I have had with others in-person. As I am not one to shy away from feather-ruffling (hint: I do it on purpose), I thought I might follow up my last post with a Bonus Edition, interrupting my biweekly posting schedule to speak a little about God and the expansive nature of His grace.

This might seem to some like an old, overly-worn and somewhat boring topic. After all, aren’t there enough of those greasy-grace preachers around? Who needs one more blog post? Be that as it may, I suggest you better bust out your biggest container of Dawn soap because the grace is about to get a WHOLE LOT GREASIER!!

Jesus is love. God is Love. Holy Spirit is love. Love covers over a multitude of sins. Love never fails. And what can separate us from the love that is in Christ Jesus? Death can’t. No, really, it can’t. For all who call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Colossians 1:19-20 says “For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.” God is reconciling ALL to him without exception. Again, I repeat God is reconciling all to him without exception. And as much as people might not like it that includes Lucifer, who fell from grace and became the Adversary, the Satan.

Why would God do this? Why would he reconcile Lucifer, the one who has caused massive and almost immeasurable damage to those on this planet? Because God is not only more loving and merciful but he is ALSO more just that either you or I. I had a conversation this past week where someone said to me “if God is going to let the being who made all of mankind fall into sin back into heaven then I don’t want to be there.” That statement is one I have heard many people say over time, and it is indicative of their inability to forgive and to release someone from their judgments. It is in no way indicative of how God SHOULD be. In reality, to think that God would somehow forgive humans, of whom all have sinned and fallen short, but somehow not want to forgive other beings he created is not only absurd, but completely irrational. To not like or forgive Satan doesn’t in any way change God’s nature of love, grace, and mercy. To go a step further, to suggest that there is a sin out there that is somehow uncoverable or unforgivable or unfixable by Jesus’ blood is beyond ridiculous. If you believe anything at all about the saving power of Jesus and his redemption of us all through the cross, then you know it is while we were still SINNERS that Christ died. And how is Satan any different from us in that regard. For ALL have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

What that statement actually says is that there is someone out there who has sinned so horribly that that person believes Jesus SHOULD not forgive them, as the Bible is quite clear that God’s power is limitless and it has never been an issue that God cannot forgive them. And who is it, I ask, that gets to decide who God should and Gould not forgive?

There are many out there whose sense of Justice is threatened by this concept of God-forgiving-satan. But I have to ask, what could possibly be so threatening about a God who is far more loving than we are? Is it that we yearn for some sort of payment in life for wrongdoing to satisfy an inner need? Is it that we cannot imagine being in heaven with the truly wicked? I will say this — he who is forgiven much loves much. Is it possible that those with this strong need for justice simply haven’t been forgiven for enough to appreciate the depths of God’s grace? Is it that they need to dive even more deeply into the arms of His grace to find mercy and grace to help in time of need?

The reality is that while each and every single one of us was a sinner and sentenced to death under the Law, Jesus who knew and committed no sin became sin for us and in our place died our deaths. How are we so arrogant to think that we get to dictate whom God may and may not extend His grace to when we are just as guilty under the law and requiring of that same grace ourselves? The fact is that without God’s grace each of us would eventually go into a place of utter and abject darkness in the spiritual realms and suffer with our own inner darkness for eternity. Those who don’t know God have said many times “How could a loving God sentence people to hell for eternity?” The truth is that He doesn’t, and they inherently know it is true in their hearts, for God has written the Law on their hearts and ours. God forgave our sins and it is His and His right only to decide who He chooses to forgive or not forgive, and He has already stated in Scripture that He has come to save all, to rescue all, and to restore all.

I will not apologize not ever back down for sharing, writing, or preaching a gospel of Limitless Grace and Limitless Love at the hand of a Limitless God. And for those who are now furiously searching the scriptures to find a way to disprove me I will save you time. There is not a single verse anywhere that says God will not save Lucifer. And while there is no verse that directly mentions Lucifer’s name and states outright “Yea verily shalt Lucifer be savedeth,” there are a number of verses that talk about God saving all. And it is impossible to prove that God meant humans only, as it was proven otherwise by the verse quoted above in Colossians.

I will never understand why people feel threatened that God is more loving than they are. I will never understand why they feel limitless grace somehow threatens the belief in a God of Justice. My only guess is that those who ardently seek justice are holding onto a need for someone or something to be punished. My recommendation is that if that is you, lay down that need, for the same measure you use will be measured to you. If you must have someone else, even a fallen angel, pay for their sins that Jesus already paid for, be certain that you are willing to undergo the same judgment. Be certain that you understand what you are saying is that Jesus’ blood was NOT sufficient to cover all. And be certain that you understand your gospel, then, is weak, sick, and lacking in power to save. I, for one, will choose to believe the better report of the One who is All-powerful as whose name is Mighty To Save.

Kingdom Training Schools: A Vision of Things to Come

In the Old Testament there were prophets that ran together in groups. Some surmise that these were ‘schools’ of Prophets, and maybe they were. Jesus himself taught his disciples in a group that one might call a ‘school’, and rightly so. For Jesus both did AND taught with authority, and his disciples were with him most everywhere he went. But the one thing I think that is sometimes overlooked in the busy process of learning to be disciples is that Jesus actually TAUGHT.

Over the span of his three year ministerial-seminary-with-internship, Jesus sent his students on multiple learning-intensives involving self-study. The first time he sent his twelve out, and then later on he sent out seventy-two. Presumably the first twelve actually worked with some of the others in the group of seventy two on that second intensive course, taking those who were the slowest and most shy and helping them branch out into the experience of the course material as any good Teaching Assistant ought to do.

In addition to these learning intensives, Jesus offered a scholarship program for his ministerial training, having sufficient funds in the Trust that he assigned his TA with the highest marks in Accounting manage the accounts (Unfortunately this particular student kept a second set of books, but that’s somewhat beside the point). Jesus did not turn his students away on account of a lack of money because he saw to it (as did his Father) that all of their needs were met.

In the midst of reviewing this training school that Jesus ran, one could pay attention primarily to the didactic learning that took place, focusing on such scripture passages as the Sermon on the Mount, the many parables he told, and his monologue at the Last Supper just before they entered their Senior Immersion. And in truth, that is what much of the Church seems to have focused on in our Seminaries and Colleges and with our Masters and Doctorates in Divinity and Theology. But if we do that we miss out on a key theme running throughout the Gospels – Jesus both did AND taught.

One thing that no one can deny is that the teaching Jesus did included a lot of demonstration and hands-on learning. Jesus was big on having his students experience the things he spoke about, not just sit there and listen to him prattle on about grand ideas with no actual fruit to show for them. Jesus was actively involved in pushing his students into experiences with God that stretched their understanding of who God is and what God is like, and also what God would do in and through them.

When Jesus went up on the Mount of Transfiguration, he took some students with him to experience the Glory. When he went to raise Jairus’ daughter and Lazarus, he had students with him then as well. Jesus was very clear that the Gospel of the Kingdom involved manifestation of things Heavenly into the Earth-realm. For this reason the Lord’s Prayer contains a prayer of command – “Come, your Kingdom, and BE DONE, your will, on Earth as it is in Heaven!” Jesus expected of his students that his teaching would not just alter their minds but would cause literal physical substance to manifest at their command.

And we can see that this is true from what Jesus taught. The first time he multiplied the loaves among thousands of people they multiplied at Jesus’ hands. The next time they multiplied while in the DISCIPLES’ hands. Jesus was demonstrating to them that they, too, could manifest the Kingdom in power. And when they later were discussing the matter of not having enough bread, he rebuked them for completely missing the point of his object lesson. Jesus wasn’t just interested in starting a religion – he was transforming people to become vessels of Glory that would release that glory in tangible form. When a temple tax was required, a coin was taken from a fish’s mouth. When a lake proved too far to go around, Jesus began walking on it, and when he came upon his disciples in a boat, he teleported them to the far side. Yes, Jesus was as interested in teaching through experiences to manifest the supernatural realm in the earth as he was chatting about spiritual sounding ideas.

Knowing that Jesus taught this way, I find it no surprise that so many ‘Schools of the Supernatural’ are springing into being around the U.S. and probably around the world. But having been in one of them myself and having observed smatterings of the curriculum of others, I wonder how much is actually being taught in these schools compared to what Jesus taught his students. From where I sit, it appears that we are busy learning to finger paint in Kindergarten compared to the Masters-level thesis-writing that Jesus had his students doing.

I feel very strongly and have for years that God is trying to take us into a new level of Kingdom experience. God is trying to graduate us from Kindergarten, through first and second grade, and even skip us up a few grades into Middle School. I believe and feel in my spirit that there is a wealth of abundance of learning and experience to be had and to be caught if we would avail ourselves of Heaven’s Curriculum. As we look at stepping into a new grade and new levels, the questions I have are the same ones I always ask: What does it look like? and How do we get there?

I had a vision a while ago where I was a part of a school that seemed like it was in an old city with streets made of stone – one I perceive to be located somewhere in Europe based on its feel. We were in an old house that had a yard in the back and the place was filled with students. We didn’t have a set curriculum, per se, but we did have some things we were actively pressing into and practicing. Worship with music was certainly part of the plan, but it wasn’t by any means the main venue of each day. Meals were communal and each part of the house had a training purpose. There was a ‘playground’ out back that had a set of dividing walls, each with a picture painted on it. The goal of the pictures was to stand in front of one of them and then practice teleporting to one of the OTHER pictures. The different pictures (painted by one of those present in the vision) served as focal points for the teleportation. One of the walls in the dining area was full of items which had been attached to the wall by faith – plates, spoons, etc. Another wall next to it was available for people to try and walk up it. Food was prayed over and it would be expected that God would either provide the food in some fashion or other (whether it was delivered by someone, bought with faith-found money, multiplied in front of us, or otherwise appearing from Heaven), or we would fast. Mind you, fasting was not mandatory, but it was just the way we did things. No one in the vision felt like they had any major sickness, and while lean times might have been the order of the day, it was a time of intensive spiritual training for things to come.

Looking back at that vision now, I don’t yet see many of the pieces that God showed me in that vision, but what I do have is the revelation — that it is possible to actively LEARN to engage and perform the supernatural by faith, and that we as the Body need to learn how to do this and activate our gifts of prophecy, healing, miraculous powers, and the like.

Imagine a scene where one of these higher-level Miracle schools is in action. Think of a storefront church building that’s grown too big to be a home church but isn’t large enough to be a mega-church yet. If a passer-by looked through the window when the school was in action, what might they see? What one might see are not only the things Jesus did – walking on water, raising the dead and cursing fig trees, but much more.

Maybe the meeting would start with worship. Perhaps it would start with testimonies. The attention would focus on Christ. It would start with focusing on Him, as the King of Kings is the central figure of every gift and empowerment of the Spirit. From there the school would break up into practice teams. Each team might discuss a certain miraculous power and what the Bible says about it, what God has been showing them in personal revelation, and comparing and discussing to reach a deeper understanding. These revelations and new truths could be added as curriculum material for the future and for the other practice teams to use later. The teams would each then transition into a learning lab where faith is put into action.

In one of the learning labs, viewers might see kiddie-pools full of water and students with their pant legs rolled up, shoes off, stepping onto the water to see if it holds. If they break through the surface and it doesn’t hold their weight, they stop, spend a moment re-centering and refocusing on what God has told them – things like “I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.” and ‘Jesus said I would do GREATER works than these”. After spending moments or minutes they would try again.

Over in another corner one might see people practicing with multiplying food by faith. In yet another corner one might see a group with flashlights and searching everywhere – their hands and arms, the ground, their pockets. Every now and again one might pick something up, motioning and shouting excitedly. It appears it might be a gemstone by the way it glints in the light. Did that just appear? And where did that sparkly dust come from on that woman’s hands? Miracles of apportation in action.

On one wall there would be a series of paintings – possibly ones that were painted during the worship time. There is tape on the floor in front of each picture that is in the shape of a person-sized box. Students are just standing there staring at the pictures and sometimes closing their eyes. It rapidly becomes clear what this lab is about when one student translocates himself from one picture to another!

Heading around back one might see a group tending a small garden plot – but with no tools other than their mouths. Speaking to the plants, the group is telling them to grow whole, healthy, and for all weeds to remain ungerminated in their seeds. Worms and ladybugs would be welcomed to the plot and all harmful insects would be rebuked and sent elsewhere. Leaf blight and dry fungus could not flourish, and the fruit of such a plot would certainly be large in size and plentiful in number.

A field trip might take the class to a local funeral home where families receive back their dead by the power of God, or to a hospital cancer unit where tumors fall off in front of one’s eyes. Or even to a burn unit, where skin grows back on a victim’s arms and legs in seconds at the utterance of the name of Jesus.

And with so much faith in the air, certainly in a place like this there would be no sickness, no disease, no disability. And with the faith to see gemstones appear, there could be no lack either, for whatever need arises would be met with faith equal to the task, and the solution would manifest before the eyes of the one in need.

Why all the focus on the miraculous? The gift of Miraculous Powers (note that it’s plural, not singular) is possibly one of the most neglected gifts of the Spirit at this juncture in history. Much is known about faith already – the Word of Faith movement saw to that. Asuza Street brought with it, among other things, a revival of tongues and interpretation. Entire volumes have been written on discernment and casting out of demons since the days of Derek Prince. The Healing movement has flourished mightily since the days of John Wimber. The Latter Rain movement brought a resurgence of prophets and the gift of prophecy, word of knowledge, and word of wisdom. Of all of these, the gift of miraculous powers stands alone without understanding, yet if the Church were honest with herself, Jesus spent possibly more of his time doing miracles than anything else. Of Jesus’ own confession, Capurneum was a place where he did many miracles, and the Book of John states that more miracles were performed by Jesus than could fit in all the books in the world.

What is clear at this point is that it IS possible to actively learn and engage in order to perform the supernatural by faith. The Church as a whole are expected by Jesus to learn how to do this and activate the gifts of prophecy, healing, miraculous powers, and the like far more than before.
In my own life and those of personal friends I can list miracles we have experienced: apportation of objects including gemstones, feathers, and oil; translocation in time and space; spirit travel on earth and in heaven; gravity defying miracles; multiplication of objects (including food); levitation; mind-reading; weather control; and raising the dead. I know that all these things and more can be caught and/or taught, and I also know that God is releasing greater revelation, authority, and understanding to the Body at this time to walk in these things in a much greater measure.

There is an ever-present danger that must be addressed to balance out the pursuit of the Miracle realms. It is possible to find a group of people who have a high level of operation in various miracles, anointings, and giftings, and some who have a lot of faith in these many areas, and to do so in order to create a school like that I have described above. This actually might be an idea that would advance the school’s supernatural journey rapidly, but at the same time there is a risk. Quantity of miracles without depth of character is a pitfall that has ruined people before, and without care will do it again. “Where there is no guidance the people fall, but in abundance of counselors there is victory.” Psalms 11:14. Without a multitude of counselors who can see areas of weakness – both of the individual and the group, it is almost guaranteed to fail before it has even started. These counselors are not present to be fault-finding or blame-seeking, but rather to serve as an early warning system for problems so that they never grow too big. As it says in Proverbs 16:18, “Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.” It is best to avoid destruction, and while pride is not the only character flaw that causes problems, the entire issue is avoided by means of vigilance.

An additional problem in developing this type of school is the money. While one might locate the right teachers and group facilitators, it is impossible to make promises that students will learn this or that, guarantees that can be made in public schools, but not in Kingdom schools. That said, is it ethical to charge tuition with no guarantees? Additionally, these things can be taught, but they can’t be bought. This is a difficult thing, but the vision still remains within me. I do believe we are reaching a time where schools such as this will develop into supernatural communities, and those currently in existence will increase and expand, exemplifying a new wave of power-packed supernatural encounters such as most people have only dreamed.

I envision communities of people where teleporting, flying, and manifesting money and resources by faith is a daily occurrence. Where rescuing children from sex trade is simply a matter of teleporting into the holding area and teleporting thirty people back out with you. Where there is no real lack among them because it can be created at will based on the needs present. Clothes, shoes, money, whatever one has need of is available because those in these Haven communities know how to manifest the abundance out of heaven into the earth so that there is no needy among them. I envision properties that are portals of heaven into earth like nothing we have yet seen. Moravian Falls, Redding, Prayer Mountain in Korea, none of those hold a candle to what I see possible when the right people come together in one heart and one mind seeking after the supernatural workings of God to manifest life with love and demonstrations of the Spirits’ power.

When I think of all the human struggles and issues that could rise up and the difficulty that having a cohesive group living in one accord like that would pose, I say to myself ‘It would take a miracle’, but I can’t let go of the idea in my spirit that God really WANTS us to live in that kind of realm of the flow of the Spirit. Until then, I will continue to press forward into the goodness of my Father, knowing that He is building in us all a blueprint of the things that He is doing, and knowing that as I follow the portion of that blueprint God is laying on my heart and piecing my page together with others God is calling and preparing, that together we will be able to construct a spiritual city in the earth whose Architect and Chief Builder is God.

Translocation: Shifting Space and Time

A while back I was spending time with my good friend Hope. We were having a fun time discussing the supernatural, God, etc., which is pretty common for us. A topic we have regularly touched on is supernatural physical transportation. This has many names, but among the most common are ‘translocation’ and ‘teleportation’. Oftentimes the word used has little to do with any notable difference, but is just a matter of who is using the terminology.

For those who are unfamiliar with this concept, it appears it at least two notable places in the Bible. The most oft-quoted Bible-passage where this phenomenon occurred is in Acts 8:39-40 when Philip was taken up by the Spirit from the presence of the Ethiopian eunich and moved to Azotus, some distance away. The other obvious instance of physical transportation found in scripture is in John 6:21 when Jesus stepped in the boat with his disciples when he was walking on water and they were immediately on the far short. This phenomenon can be placed within the purview of the ‘gift of miraculous powers’ in 1 Corinthians 12.

God has shared a few details about translocation with me from time to time, and one of the concepts He showed me is that this is to be a team-process, not just an individual one. What I was shown about this concept of team-transport is that it isn’t going to be something that one person learns and then shows or instructs everyone else, but that a team of people was going to work together to bring the revelation and experience about. He didn’t specify who this team was, as I am sure it is a much more global event and many of the ‘team members’ would never know each other. In spite of this fact, the interplay between people and the sharing of revelation and experiences from one person to another causes everyone together to achieve more than one can alone. With that said, I already knew that Grace was a part of my local ‘chapter’.

Long before I even knew her, the Lord told Hope that she would one day be teaching people how to physically transport themselves from place to place supernaturally. I have felt a desire for this as well – both to do it myself and to teach others. On a natural level it seems imminently practical. With the price of gas rising over the past number of years and no real stabilization in the world’s commercial markets, we can only assume this trend will continue. The way I see it, why pay hefty gas prices when I could simply skip most of the travel-portion of a trip and arrive at my destination with a full tank of gas? Additionally, it is a prudent use of resources, far better for the environment, reduces wear on your vehicle, and saves time. Or at least that’s what I had thought until I started to learn more by discussion, revelation, and experience. What I thought, while true, is only part of the picture.

To back up a while before this conversation with Hope, my wife and I had a couple of experiences of being transported while driving together. The two most recent ones happened while driving back from a home-group that usually meets two hours north of us. The first time we translocated home from one of those get-togethers we observed that we skipped 22 exits on the highway and arrived home approximately 15 minutes early. The second of the two events happened during a snowstorm – it had started snowing on the drive up, and by the time we were ready to leave and driving back, the roads were much more snow-covered. A number of cars had already been escorted into the ditch, so we drove at half speed. We spent one hour of the trip at normal speed and one at half speed and arrived home in the normal 2 hours. What SHOULD have happened is that our two-hour trip should have taken three hours, but instead we traveled the same distance at half the speed and arrived in the same amount of time, traveling the entire physical distance.

I learned something from those two experiences which I have never heard anyone else share, and that is there are at least TWO different ways someone can get transported. One is by alteration of space and the other is alteration of time. As I said above, my thoughts about the benefits of physical transport are true but aren’t the whole truth, and that’s because I had discounted the option of traveling with a time-alteration. The benefits I had listed only apply if there is a space-alteration. And there are other differences too.

For instance, the benefits of space alteration are very useful if we need to get from one location to another. We can arrive faster, or even instantaneously, if we transport in space. We save time that way, and if we are using a vehicle we gain the other benefits I listed above. There are other possible benefits as well. For example, let’s say we need to travel across a body of water that is otherwise impassable – say from the Mainland US to Hawaii. The amount of faith required to drive ON the water for that distance, not to mention the amount of gas it would take and/or to faith the gas tank full, the length of time one would have to be driving, and any other hazards of driving a car across a vast ocean all come into play. Given that option, translocating and cutting all of the watery parts out of the equation is a much better plan. Think of it as a type of space-bending where you fold space and drive across the smaller distance. The water would be in the folded-over part and land on both of the shorter pieces. That was how I have conceptualized it in the past, and while it is an overly simplistic explanation, it adequately addresses the basic concept.

Time alteration is equally beneficial and it has some unexpected applications. Some of these applications were obvious to me at first, but others didn’t come to light until Hope and I got together and talked months after the two transport events. The main benefit of altering time is that you travel the whole distance but do it in less time. If you are late, trying to avoid rush-hour traffic, on a long trip, etc., altering the flow of time around your vehicle is a fantastic way to travel. While you don’t get the gas savings, you save a bunch of time that can be ‘spent’ at your destination.

For instance, if I woke up late one day for a plane flight, and the flight was supposed to take off in five minutes, no amount of physical transportation is going to help me. Even if I was instantly transported to the baggage check area with my baggage, and then transported to the security line and then spirited away to the terminal and walked onto the plane, it would take more than five minutes. I probably wouldn’t be dressed and ready to LEAVE in five minutes, and besides, even if I was ready to leave immediately, the security checkpoint would make me late for sure. This is where time alteration becomes handy. If I alter the flow of time around me, I can take my good old time getting up, dressed, and making my way to the airport. I can leisurely check my bags and move through security, then saunter confidently onto the plane, all with three minutes to spare before takeoff is scheduled.

What makes this particular aspect of translocation is that the benefits are not limited to travel. As I said before, this method is useful even if there is NO trip to be taken. Using time alteration properly, it is possible to complete two hours-worth of yard-work in fifteen minutes. If I were particularly tired at work, I could take a LONG nap on my ten-minute morning break and wake well-rested and ready for the rest of my day. These are only two examples, but the variety of applications are immense.

As we looked at the benefits of each type of translocation, Hope and I realized that there are times when one method of travel is more useful than the other. In other words, each has its own strengths and weaknesses, and it is important to be aware of them if this is to become a common practice. As mentioned before, no amount of time alteration will move the Pacific Ocean out of the way. But if we bend space, it disappears and we can travel easily. If there is ever some sort of impassable object in the way – whether a dead end with a road on the other side, a river with a bridge out, or a mountain with no roads leading across it, physical transport is an imperative. It comes with the fuel-savings benefit and because the trip crossed a smaller amount of distance, it also takes less time.

Time alteration is useful when there is business to be conducted while en route. For example, the amount of prayer, conversation, etc. that can happen in a six-hour car trip with a friend is substantial. But what if you were able to have the span of time INSIDE the car that covered about six hours, but your actual experience external to the car was only about forty-five? You would arrive at your destination far sooner than planned, but you would have been able to engage in all of the prayer, communion, revelation, etc. due to the length of time you were able to spend talking and sharing with each other? If you had been transported physically, you would have lost the benefits of that trip together. Time alteration is also useful when there is no trip to be had, and when you just want or need to get something done faster.

When Hope and I were discussing all this, something else very cool happened. There are times when the best way to learn things you don’t know is to teach someone else. The reason for this is that at times when you are explaining something to someone else you may say something really profound which turns out to be new revelation. The fun part is that you heard it for the first time when you heard it come out of our own mouth. In fact, it may have been so good that you stopped talking just to process whatever you just said. Knowing that this happens it is possible to take advantage of the revelation-on-the-go method of teaching and start trying to teach people how to do this stuff, knowing full-well that I would learn on the way. Hope and I discussing this topic had this very effect, and we uncovered additional understanding.

We discovered that when physically traveling, there is no actual bending of space taking place. If we were doing that, there would be an alteration of physical structures which is obviously not happening. Entire buildings would be crushed in the bending-process, which means that bending isn’t what happens. While it makes explanation easy to our limited minds, what is happening is that our EXPERIENCE of space is being altered, not the space itself. The same is true with time. Time as a whole is not altered, but our experience of it is. When my wife and I drove home in that snowstorm, there was a jeep in front of us most of the trip. While it is possible that jeep was an angelic vehicle, it is equally possible it was just a jeep with normal human passengers. If it were the latter, they most likely did NOT experience the time-change that we did, and therefore their trip took the whole three hours while ours only took two. The only reason this is possible is that our experience of time and that of the vehicle we were in was altered, but nothing else. A way to conceptualize this is if you think of moving through time while traveling a distance, then stepping sideways outside of the flow of time while still traveling the distance. When you step back into time, you step back in where you stepped out, and thus the experience that little or no time has passed. If we spent an hour on our trip at normal speed, an hour at slow speed, and then one hour’s worth of time where we stepped out of the stream of time entirely but were still traveling, that explains how we were able to travel three hours-worth of distance in two hours’ time.

Where this idea starts to mess with my brain is when I look at other possibilities. What would happen if at the end of the trip that jeep and we ended at the same destination? If we compared watches, would theirs be an hour after ours? Or would they too get brought into our time-alteration experience as well? How is it possible for two vehicles to travel the same distance within view of each other, but have one arrive an hour sooner than the other? I have no answers to these questions at this time, but these are the sorts of questions that get my mental gears moving.

I’m the type who likes to understand the hows and the whys of things, and like to really grasp not just THAT they’re happening, but like to understand them in-depth. I honestly believe that we are stepping into a time where this sort of thing is necessary to learn, and believe that God WANTS us to learn how to do it at will. The only way I know how to learn something that no one else seems to know how to do either is to ask, seek, and knock for the revelation and the experience, and to evaluate my experiences and those of others. I hope and pray that the information we have uncovered with be helpful in your journeys through time and space, and I ask that anyone who has learned or uncovered anything on the subject either through revelation or experience share it with me as well as anyone else who is hungry and seeking. I believe that as we learn, grow, and share together, our Team-Travel experience will be more enriched, but I also believe this will accelerate growth in this area.

Blessings to you all, and I pray this becomes a normal experience for you!

Time Warping

The Time For Figs

Translocating Under The Tuscan Sun

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They’re Not Your Thoughts

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Back in 2010 I spoke to a good friend (let’s call this friend Frank), who was having a tough time emotionally. Frank texted me about 10:30 because he was having some difficulty from a faith-perspective. But the story starts an hour or two earlier. He was at work and a coworker was having some pain. He thought “I should pray for her.” Then he thought. “But why should I? God wouldn’t answer ME.” Later, he saw a blind man at the train station. Same thoughts. These thoughts got him thinking. “Why am I thinking this? Do I really believe that? I mean, why do I believe that God won’t answer me? Is my faith really that shaky? What is wrong with me” He really started spiraling downward emotionally at that point, and was having a really rough time. That was when he texted me.

We texted back and forth a little, I made a suggestion, and that was about it until he called me about an hour later. We talked, and all ended well. But I’ll share with you all what I told him at that time.

There are times you have thoughts. And there are times that the enemy gives you thoughts. The problem comes only when you think that their thoughts are your thoughts. They’re not your thoughts.

You see, the enemy likes to be tricky. They will put thoughts in your head and then when you start thinking about those things they PUT there, they will accuse you (again, making it sound to you like your own thoughts), of thinking those things. Could be as simple as “I don’t have faith.” “God doesn’t love me”, or something more specific, such as thoughts of anger, rape, abuse, violence, stealing, or some other malevolent idea. It really doesn’t matter what the thought is, because it isn’t yours. When they can get you to believe that YOU thought it, then they will accuse you of being a sinner, dirty, evil, etc. And the thing is, it works. They tend to get you to blame yourself for their ideas.

There is another way. In fact, it’s the way that I texted and then later suggested to Frank. But it all hinges on one point: Any thought that begins with an incorrect premise from a Kingdom perspective is an illegal thought. In Frank’s case, the illegal thought was “God won’t do it for me.” He didn’t need to think ANY further than that, because it is a lie. How do you know it’s a lie? Simply, the Bible SAYS it’s a lie. “God is no respecter of persons”. It’s in there somewhere. I could even look it up for you and tell you where, but that would keep you from having to do it yourself ^_^.

I’m not necessarily known for my copious amounts of Bible-reading. But I do know a lot of what it says, and knowing it comes in handy in times like these. If you know what God is saying about you, then you really don’t need to give the lies of the enemy any further thought. When the enemy plants lies in your head, what you need to do is send the liar away, and choose to focus on something that is true (preferably in opposition to the lie). Satan is a liar and the Father of lies (you can look that verse up too!), so we know that it is a normal part of the enemy’s schemes to do this. We know that God is the Father of Heavenly Lights in whom there is no twisting or turning of shadows. We know that God does not change. We know that in Him there is no darkness, but rather He is Light. With all of this said, there is nothing that God is hiding from you. There is nothing He is keeping from you. That was the lie the enemy told Adam and Eve in the Garden. It’s not a new tactic.

Why am I sharing all this? Not to depress you, and there is no condemnation if this has happened to you (Hint: We have all been there at least once, and I multiples upon multiples of times). Simply learn it and be protected for the next time. If you GIVE IN to the lies, the enemy takes it step further. What does this look like? Well, what happened to Frank? He started wallowing in the lie. He gave in to the lie and took it into his heart and let it become truth to him, if only for an hour or two. What then happened was that his heart sank. His emotions gave way to the lie, and he began to sink. He was struggling for a while before it got dealt with, too. This is why it is important to cut it off early. If you feed the lie, it will take root within you and grow.

But even if it DOES take root and grow, God is always more powerful, and will remove the deception. The easiest way is to choose to rule over your emotions at that moment in time. It’s not an easy thing to do, but anyone can do it if they choose. Hear this: It is a conscious choice to rule over the emotions. Everyone is capable of this. You simply have to choose to do so. You are not incapable; you are not bound. You have the freedom to choose to do it. You just might not want to, and it becomes difficult the more you feed the negative emotions. You must choose at that point to focus on the Truth that you didn’t think about earlier. You must repeat that truth to yourself. Even command your emotions to fall in line with the Truth of God. You must choose that regardless of how you feel, your emotions are based in a lie, and therefore will no longer have power over you. It is a thought, an idea. It’s not a feeling. You must overcome those feelings with your thoughts. It’s a pain, I know. But it’s really the only solution that I’m aware of that you can do that will solve it. I know I’m repeating myself, but I’m belaboring this point for a reason. I want you to get it, and I want you to use it ^_^

Well, after Frank called and we talked, I shared all of this with him, and I declared truth over him. It solved the problem right then and there. Because Frank wasn’t able to fix it himself that time (I think partly because he didn’t know what I’m sharing here until I told him), he had to get help. He did, and he’s fine. But because he couldn’t fix it himself, he had to wait a couple hours, all the while sinking deeper, until he could get set free. One of the things I told him was that I used to always call my friend/mentor Diane when I had a problem or spiritual warfare issue. At some point in time, however, I realized that I couldn’t depend on her to fight my battles for me. I had to be strong enough to do it myself. I had to be able to stand firm when no one else was around, no one else was praying, and the only person I could depend on is the Person of the Holy Spirit. If you are stuck in this sort of thing, there ARE other ways to get out of the rut, and they involve other people. But if there isn’t anyone else… what are you going to do? Stay stuck?

The fact is that you are MORE than a conqueror, you are a overcomer, the SAME SPIRIT that raised Jesus from the dead lives IN you, and he has filled you with POWER by this spirit. You are the head, not the tail, above and not beneath, and you have been seated in heavenly places with Christ Jesus, who is far above all principalities and powers, and who disarmed them a long time ago and made a public spectacle and display of them by nailing them to the cross. There’s much more I could say, but you can read it in the Bible just as easily as I can type it out for you to read.

This was a good reminder for me too. I got to share something with Frank that will help him in the future, but it also reminded me of this particular tactic of the enemy, which I am sure will be useful for me as well. Demons are liars. Don’t listen to them, don’t feed their lies. Know what the Father says about you, and live by it. Regardless of your circumstances, they don’t dictate God, and they don’t dictate the reality of His children as a result. If HE says it’s true, then it is, and if HE says it’s a lie, then it is. Be strong in the power of His might, stand firm against the schemes of the enemy. And remember: They’re not your thoughts.

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