We Labor With All of His Strength

While talking with a friend the other night and doing some prayer-counseling, we got completely off-topic and began to discuss something I think people often mistake and/or misunderstand—the issue of co-laboring with God to do Kingdom work on the earth. There is this concern that some people have that if we say we are healing the sick or performing miracles than we are taking credit or stealing glory from God, which then bleeds into this false-humility thing where the moment God does something through us we start denying any involvement and weirdly start repeating an “It’s only Jesus, not me” mantra that comes off quite disingenuously. In reality, co-laboring is as it sounds—a partnering together with one another.

The Apostle Paul seemed to be acquainted with this issue to at least a small degree, and I think he did a good job of expressing how this works in Colossians 1:28-29 where he said, “He [Jesus] is the one we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ. To this end I strenuously contend with all the energy Christ so powerfully works in me.” Another way it is translated is “I labor with all of His strength.” Partnering with God is all about us stepping out in faith to do the works He commanded us to do, but relying on His power, grace, and strength to complete that work, not our own.

I think we need to get a few facts clear. First, if we do not pray for the sick, the sick do not get healed. Second, if we do pray for the sick and they get healed, it was because we prayed for them. And third, when they get healed it was not because of any power we possess outside of the Spirit of God within us, but was the power of God flowing through us to make that healing occur. Thus, it is accurate when healing or performing miracles to say that both “I healed so and so” and “God healed so and so.” It would be most accurate to say “God healed so and so through me” or “God and I healed so and so,” but a lot of people seem to really struggle with this issue as though it weren’t true that our involvement played a huge part.

Signs, wonders, miracles, healings, and the like rarely happen without us, and they also don’t happen without Him. If we claim it had nothing to do with us then we aren’t being humble because it isn’t true—we are displaying false humility. If we act like we did it all on our own then we are displaying pride. Neither is healthy and both are lies, but in the bid to avoid pride, we tend toward false humility, as though one error is better than the other. Both are equally false.

The Bible has much to say about us growing up to become mature sons and daughters of God who are faithful with all that God has given us and who know how to rightly use the power and authority God has granted us (I cover the subject of power and authority as mature sons in my book Faith To Raise The Dead). When Jesus walked the earth doing ministry, He sent his disciples out in pairs (Matthew 10, Luke 10), giving them both power and authority to perform the works He had commanded them to do. When they came back excited about it, Jesus didn’t even tell them they were wrong—He simply told them there was a higher benefit they should be pleased about over and above performing miracles and casting out demons.

In the same way that Jesus reminded the disciples there is a higher benefit and gave them a mental reset after they performed wonders in His name, I think we need our own mental re-set. God is looking for those who will be faithful to co-labor with Him! God is looking for those who grow into maturity and can rightly discern what God is doing in a situation and co-labor with him in it! God is looking . . . for you!

I believe it is time we stopped living in fear that we are going to upset someone. There is far less risk of us stealing God’s glory (which has always been His anyway, and it’s not like Satan has succeeded in his attempts yet either) than there is of us living small because we are afraid we will either offend God by partnering with Him or offend people with religious mindsets when they see us doing it. We have been given the divine commission to do the good works that, get this, God has already prepared in advance for us to do!! That doesn’t sound like someone who is concerned about glory at all!! Let’s develop right mindsets about how this works so we can continue to labor to an even greater degree with all of God’s mighty power and strength to the glory of Jesus Christ!

If I’m Already Saved Then Why Do I Still Have Emotional Problems?

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One of the major weaknesses of the Church as a whole is its lack of focus on emotional health. In fact, the Church often ends up on weirdly unhealthy ends of the spectrum. One example is attributing all mental illness to demons and ignoring other legitimate organic causes. While much mental illness can and does have a demonic component, it is rarely the only cause, and attempting to cast demons out of someone who already has mental health issues without dealing with anything else can cause more trauma all on its own. Another example is when Christians tell a victim of spousal abuse that they cannot divorce and leave their abuser because “adultery” and “God hates divorce.” One end of the spectrum focuses entirely on one spiritual component to the detriment of other causes, while the other focuses on physical circumstances and ignores all other aspects of a given situation. Both are unhealthy, and both need to change. And yet, there is still a third camp that is so ridiculous I’m not quite sure where it lands—the “You’re saved, so everything is all better now” group. And when things actually aren’t better in spite of being told they are, people start to ask sensible questions like, “If I’m Already Saved Then Why Do I Still Have Emotional Problems?”

One of the first wrong answers we tend to tell people is “Maybe you aren’t really saved.” This then leads us to say the “sinner’s prayer” over and over (I still can’t find anything remotely resembling that in Scripture) as though telling God we are sinners regularly will somehow help us live in freedom in Christ (Hint: it doesn’t). When that doesn’t work, we usually tell the person they have someone they haven’t forgiven, and that God can’t forgive us if we don’t forgive other people. Then we soul-search to try to find that one person we haven’t forgiven that is causing such afflictions in our life. Oftentimes we still can’t figure out who that person we are being told must exist is, so we pray a catch-all prayer (again) to forgive anyone and everyone we might possibly have considered the potential of whether or not to have unforgiveness against . . . and yet things still don’t change.

So if it isn’t because we aren’t saved and we have already forgiven everyone, what causes the emotional problems? Didn’t all of that get taken care of in Christ? After all, Isaiah 53:4-5 says, “Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed (NKJV). If Jesus bore our griefs and sorrows, all of our emotional issues, then we’re good, right?

Wrong.

Sure, it would be nice to think that “because Jesus” that we will never experience any kind of emotional problem. I would absolutely LOVE that. But it doesn’t work that way.

Everyone has emotional junk. And while some of it can and often does get automagically fixed upon salvation, sometimes it takes a bit more work. Not only that, but what about new emotional wounds that happen after one gets saved? I prayed the “sinner’s prayer” when I was three years old (no, I wasn’t too young and yes, I do remember it). I’ve always loved Jesus. And he’s always been kind to me. But if all of my emotional baggage went away at that age, then I’ve still had over thirty years of new “stuff” that I’ve picked up over time. Putting down my dog last December still hits me at times. Getting kicked out of my church about 14 years ago just because I got married and the church couldn’t control me was hard for a number of years. If someone thinks that my wife and I have never had a major argument, then clearly he or she has never been married. And that doesn’t include family system issues from childhood, kids being mean on the playground in elementary school, and much more.

The good news is that while everything doesn’t simply vanish upon salvation, Jesus did pay the price for 100% of our emotional healing. It’s just that it usually takes our active involvement to apply what He did to the brokenness in our hearts. Jesus is the most amazing healer out there. He is gentle, kind, loving, and He has all the power needed to restore even the most shattered of hearts. When we feel like Humpty Dumpty, like nothing will be able to put us back together again, Jesus can. We may have to go through a process. We may need to systematically apply His grace to specific problems through prayer until everything is whole. And that process often isn’t fun, but it is good.

Should we expect that God will heal hearts upon salvation? Yes. And let us continue to pray and believe for that to occur. But if it doesn’t, we aren’t deficient, we haven’t failed to get saved, and we haven’t failed to believe God’s promises. In most cases, the Church has failed to accurately teach us how to apprehend true freedom in Christ. But the good news? We’re learning. We’re better than we used to be. And wholeness is always attainable. In Christ. From Christ. Because of Christ.

If you are looking for some resources to help you on your own inner healing journey, I recommend the following:

My coauthored book Broken To Whole

Praying Medic’s book Emotional Healing in Three Easy Steps

Karol Truman’s book Feelings Buried Alive Never Die

Dan Duval’s books Prayers that Shake Heaven and Earth and Advanced Prayers that Shake Heaven and Earth

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Faith By Any Other Name

As I was standing in the medication room waiting for another nurse to finish removing patient medications, we began to chat briefly about how the night had been going well. I even dared to say the “Q” word—Quiet. The other nurse immediately said “Yeah, I’m kind of superstitious. I don’t say that kind of stuff, and we should probably knock on wood, so that nothing bad happens.” As a nurse, there are certain taboo words—those which shall not be uttered, with the word “Quiet” being the primary one. One is also expected to not state that things are easy/going well, that nothing bad has happened this shift, or any other form of positive statement identifying good things—all for fear that something bad will then suddenly occur.

I categorically reject that belief. I say positive things to intentionally release life with the power of my words and intentions to shift the atmosphere at the hospital toward healing, peace, and life. In fact, I go one step further—I intentionally use the word “quiet” to provoke other nurses’ reactions, and I do it for a reason. Tonight I did it because it opened up a conversation with that nurse about how we can use positive affirmations and intentions to encourage a positive and healthy unit. As a whole, I do it to educate staff on the power of faith—and faith by any other name is just as effective.

Not everyone is Christian, and many people who might respect the religious beliefs of others reject ideas when certain buzzwords are used. Sometimes words like “faith” are rejected but other words slide under the radar—things like “positive affirmation” or “positive intention.” In fact, my coworker doesn’t realize I was preaching gospel truths to her using non-religious language—that God has given us creative power to change our world. She stated she was superstitious, which means that she has spiritual beliefs that influence her decisions. I chose to prophesy a different script—a lifegiving version where she could take a stand against death, loss, and destruction by choosing to speak life over the hospital unit. I just didn’t use Christianese to do it, and I didn’t need to. Faith by any other name is still effective.

Some might say I water down the gospel when I do that, but I disagree. I am making a message hearable and teaching someone how to effectively release the creative power of God to bring life to badly injured people in a way that bypasses personal prejudices and anti-religion sentiments. I have some friends who run dream-interpretation training and mentoring (http://www.nowinterpretthis.org/) and part of their training is the intentional use of nonreligious language to communicate heaven’s truths in ways that bypass people’s mental blocks over certain buzzwords.

Imagine if I had said to that nurse, “You know, instead of being afraid of the word ‘quiet,’ perfect love casts out fear and you can prophesy in faith for the shalom of God that passes understanding to rest on this unit and become a tabernacle for the Holy One of Israel,” I would have lost her completely. Instead, I pointed out that she could use positive affirmations to bring calm and quiet to the unit without being afraid that verbalizing those intentions would bring the opposite. In fact, that very statement is echoed in Matthew 7:11, saying “If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” If we ask for peace and quiet on a hospital unit, God isn’t going to give us patient falls, organ failures, and code blue emergencies.

Sometimes the right thing to do in a situation is to speak the gospel using clear and direct language, speaking of Jesus who died on the cross and of the power and authority He has given us to transform this world. But other times we need to use nonreligious language that bypasses inner resistance and communicates the same scriptural truths in a way that is hearable. Because faith by any other name is just as effective.

Pursuit Leads To Power

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I grew up in the Episcopal Church (my dad is an Episcopal priest), and was introduced to the Charismatic as a whole when I was about 20 years old and in college. Early on, I began a wild pursuit of the miraculous, and during this time I heard lots of different opinions about how to walk in signs, wonders, and miracles, and I want to share with you all some observations and lessons I have learned over the past decade and a half since.

First, I would often get advice from people about how to operate in miracles. They included a lot of random, often contradictory, at times unscriptural, and occasionally downright nonsensical suggestions:

1. Pray to walk in healing, signs, wonders, and miracles
2. Pray to know God
3. Believe in faith that I already have it
4. Praise God for the fact that I already walk in it all even if I don’t really, as an act of faith that I will at some point
5. Stop praying for miracles because I need to get to know God instead
6. Spend time with Jesus, because that’s what the disciples did that set them apart
7. Seek God’s face instead of His hand
8. Go witness/evangelize to people because signs, wonders, and miracles are the work of the Evangelist.
9. Only some people can do miracles, so if I am an Apostle then it will happen, but otherwise it’s just not God’s will for my life.
10. In the Old Testament it was Prophets who operated in signs, wonders, and miracles, so Prophets should be the ones operating in them today.
11. Get filled with the Holy Spirit because Acts 1 says that’s how I will be filled with power.
12. Since I have already been baptized in the Holy Spirit I am good and have all I need, especially since the Bible says I have already been given everything pertaining to life and godliness.
13. Stop being so focused on miracles, as they will lead you astray, and get back to the Word.
14. Get in the Word because reading the Bible will give me an impartation for the miraculous.
15. Pray in tongues
16. Praise in tongues (in this context, they just meant meant “do tongues to music”)

I’m sure there were more, but I hope you see the problem here. That’s over a dozen different things that one should or shouldn’t do to walk in miracles—and while some of the suggestions above are really good, half the time they contradict one another or just make no sense. Understandably, this left me awfully confused about which of the different things I should be doing to walk in miracles, and 15 years later I still greatly desire to do more miracles in spite of having seen some cool healings, signs, wonders, and miracles already.

It took me a number of years to wade through all of the well-intentioned theological double-speak because I was so new to the prophetic and the power of the Holy Spirit, but I eventually figured out some things. One of the things that really strikes me as incredibly illogical are the people who say things like “Just follow Jesus and it will happen” or “Seek His face and not his Hand. Seek the giver and not the gift.” The Bible doesn’t actually agree.

In fact, in Matthew 7:7-11 it says, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!”

Think about that. The Bible (and not just any part but Jesus personally) literally instructs us to ask for things we desire, and that if we do, we will receive them. Anyone who tells you to stop seeking after the miraculous, kindly and gently ignore their advice.

The other one that really gets me is “Don’t focus on that stuff (the miraculous) because it will draw you away from God if you focus on it too much.” I’m sorry, but Jesus spent multiple years going around teaching his disciples to heal and do signs, wonders, and miracles, and suddenly when I want to do the same things Jesus did, it’s a problem that I focus on it and want to walk in it?? Jesus certainly didn’t agree with that line of thinking. In John 14 Jesus said that we should believe in him, and if we can’t take him at his own word, then we should believe on the *evidence* of the miracles that he did. As followers of Jesus, we are supposed to walk in miracles.

My friend Steve once pointed out on social media that while Mark 16 does say that “these signs will follow those who believe,” it’s not meant to be a passive thing but something that brings action. Think of it this way. Let’s assume for a minute that the Holy Spirit dwells within each one of us (which He does), and that because of that we can all operate in the miraculous (which we can). If I were to assume that because I’m a nurse that all of my patients will improve but I never actually do any interventions to help them get better, it would be absurd to expect positive results. Likewise, if we assume we can walk in miracles but never exert any effort to actually do so, it would be improbable to expect that we will see any occur.

I’m not saying one has to purposefully enter dangerous situations or go evangelize on random city streets for hours each day for miracles to occur (although both theoretically could yield some results). What I am saying is that if we never step out to pray for anything to occur, why are we expecting to sit on our laurels and have miracles just fall in our laps? Passivity has never been the way of the Kingdom of God. John 11:12 says, “And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.” If we want to see miracles happen, we need to actually do some miracle-ing. Not-praying for them, not-expecting them to happen, not-seeking them, not-talking about them, not-doing-anything-related-to-them is a highly unreliable way to experience the power of God, whereas if we do the opposite of all of those things, we will see God move.

The Christian life is all about partnership with God. When God wants to do things, He partners with us. In the same vein, miracles shouldn’t only be a passive thing we wait to have occur to us. Certainly there are times God will do things in times and ways we don’t expect, but as a whole we should be actively engaging the supernatural instead of waiting for it to happen to us.

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Whatever Touches The Flesh Will Become Holy

In the midst of this entire disease issue, I have been using the time to finish writing my newest book The Gospel of Life and Immortality which I am now revising and hope to publish later this year. While doing some scriptural study, I was reminded of a very interesting parallel between the Old and New Testaments addressing how we manage those who are sick and “unclean” versus healthy and “clean,” and I want to explore the implications of what that means for us today—specifically the idea stated in Exodus 22:27, that “Whatever touches . . . the flesh will become holy.”

Leviticus 11:311-35 says, “Of all those that move along the ground, these are unclean for you. Whoever touches them when they are dead will be unclean till evening. When one of them dies and falls on something, that article, whatever its use, will be unclean, whether it is made of wood, cloth, hide or sackcloth. Put it in water; it will be unclean till evening, and then it will be clean. If one of them falls into a clay pot, everything in it will be unclean, and you must break the pot. Any food you are allowed to eat that has come into contact with water from any such pot is unclean, and any liquid that is drunk from such a pot is unclean. Anything that one of their carcasses falls on becomes unclean; an oven or cooking pot must be broken up. They are unclean, and you are to regard them as unclean.”

This passage is one of many that explains how things that are unclean make almost everything else they come in contact with unclean. If you read Levitical Law from an infection-control perspective it is actually incredibly pragmatic and would help a large group of people living closely together maintain better health and sanitation. However, the underlying thing it points to is that unclean things make clean things dirty. If we look elsewhere in the Old Testament we see an interesting contrast when dealing with sin offerings. Exodus 22:24b-27 says:

The Lord said to Moses, “Say to Aaron and his sons: ‘These are the regulations for the sin offering: The sin offering is to be slaughtered before the Lord in the place the burnt offering is slaughtered; it is most holy. The priest who offers it shall eat it; it is to be eaten in the sanctuary area, in the courtyard of the tent of meeting. Whatever touches any of the flesh will become holy, and if any of the blood is spattered on a garment, you must wash it in the sanctuary area.

I want to draw special attention to the last sentence (v27) that says “Whatever touches any of the flesh will become holy.” What we need to note here is that sin offerings remove and/or cover over sin. While something might normally be unclean, if anything touches the flesh of a sin sacrifice, the item becomes holy. This is a foreshadowing of the New Testament gift we receive in Christ which he demonstrated with the lepers, where those who come in contact with Jesus are made clean, well, and whole. We see this in Matthew 8:1-3 (also in Mark 1:40-42 and Luke 5:12-13) where it says:

When Jesus came down from the mountainside, large crowds followed him. A man with leprosy came and knelt before him and said, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”
Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” Immediately he was cleansed of his leprosy.

In this verse, the unclean man comes to the clean man seeking to be cleansed—but there is more to it than that. Jesus was our sin offering as well, and we see that in this passage when Jesus touched the man, his flesh touched the leper’s, the unclean man became clean. The Old Covenant lived under the law where unclean things dirtied everything else around them, but the New Covenant reality is that clean things cleanse everything around them. Whatever touches the flesh will become holy, clean, well, and put in right standing and alignment.

I realize that there are many different opinions floating around the church world these days having to do with sickness and disease, but I think it is important that we refocus on the truth that is presented to us in the Bible. Romans 6:33 tells us that the payment we receive for sin is death. Sickness is just a manifestation of death at work in our bodies. Jesus as the blood sacrifice once for all sin has already touched our lives and He has declared us clean, whole, righteous, and pure with no sin or blemish or stain upon us. The gift of righteousness we receive in Christ Jesus brings us life that destroys the power of sickness that seeks to work death in our bodies. While the Old Covenant reality is that sickness would make the healthy sick, the new way of Christ is that wherever we go, it is our job to destroy sickness and make the sick healthy and whole again.

I think it is time the Body of Christ reframes our perspective and realigns again with who Christ has declared us to be: clean-makers, righteous ones who destroy sin, and that whatever touches our flesh becomes clean. In a world where a six-foot distance separating humans from one another, we need to be reminded that we carry within us the power of Christ to destroy disease. The world has cowed many in the Church into bowing to the power of disease when in fact the opposite needs to occur: disease bowing to the power of Christ in us, the Church. As we go about our daily lives, I encourage each one of us to truly consider where we stand in our own hearts on this matter. Do we actually expect the things we touch to become clean? Or are we constantly on the alert to keep everything outside of us from defiling us? I believe that as we each become more aware of the reality that in Christ we can cleanse the world around us of sickness and disease we will actually experience it regularly—and this is what God has already purchased for us in Christ! May we all step into a greater understanding of the power to redeem, heal, and restore that Jesus has bestowed upon us all!

Deal with Coronavirus According To The Grace You Live In

These days, the COVID-19 Coronavirus is all over the news. Literally. I’m not sure it’s possible to watch any other news, actually, because if it isn’t Corona, I’m not even sure anyone is reporting on it even if we would be better served by not having 24/7 fear-and-panic updates. However, this entire process has gotten me doing a good bit of pondering as I have some very divergent thoughts and stances on things, all of which come crashing together when dealing with what many are choosing to call a pandemic. I have friends whom I love and highly respect who have canceled their ministry engagements and are telling their social media spheres to stay home. I have other friends whom I also love and respect telling people to not be bound by fear and to not change their life activities and spiritual practices based on disease. After reading tons of dueling social media posts from other believers and tossing in a few of my own (guilty as charged), I’ve taken a brief mental sit-back to really evaluate why I make the decisions I make, what I think others should do and why, and how we can individually review what the “right” choices are when so many different voices in both the Church and the world are saying so many different things. I’m going to look at some of my own conflicting views, and then bring it back to my conclusion that each person needs to deal with the coronavirus according to the grace you live in.

As a nurse, I recognize that diseases are very real and both can and do kill people. I also do not want to see a single person die due to lack of healthcare availability, and this strain of virus seems to be more tenacious than other coronavirus strains and seems to have a more deadly tinge to it. If avoiding public places, engaging in “social distancing”, and generally helping prevent the spread of disease by reducing out-of-home activities can help keep people alive, it’s honestly a really wise, helpful, and kind thing to do. Mind you, people die from the flu and even coronavirus every year, and while the actual numbers on coronavirus death ratios are, from what I can gather, massively inflated due to a lack of accurate initial diagnosis and insufficient testing, the fact is that for each individual that dies from this virus, that is someone’s mother, father, brother, daughter, friend who is no longer alive on the earth. I’m not certain this is quite the health emergency it is being made out to be, but I’m also not entirely certain it isn’t. And many people, even if a statistically small number comparative to the whole, are dying from this disease, and each death matters. Longer-term, if it is the health emergency some claim, than many more will die, hospitals will be overrun, and even more will die, which is a terrible potential outcome, whether it comes to pass or not. So with all of that in mind, where is my inner conflict?

As someone who has a healthy distrust for government—any government—I don’t fully believe everything we are being told. It is rare, in my opinion, that we are ever told the whole truth by the government about almost anything, so why would this be any different? There are a number of ways certain people who don’t have our best interests in mind could stand to gain substantially from an emergency such as this. I also think the massive closures across the board of both businesses and religious sites sets a really bad precedent, and I think the USA as a nation is going to find that our response to the coronavirus, even if totally appropriate for the situation, will send the message to people in positions of influence that if someone screams “Emergency!” that Americans will simply lay down and let the government roll over our Constitutionally-mandated freedoms. Individuals have the right to choose not to frequent a business or religious establishment, but I don’t think that from a Constitutional perspective the government should be mandating it, whether at the federal, state, or local level. Furthermore, as a strong proponent of divine healing, raising the dead, and immortality in Christ, I firmly believe that we, the Body of Christ, have been given dominion over sickness and death. I believe that the Church should have no reason whatsoever to fear this virus and that on some level we should be welcoming people into church services for the purpose of divine healing, and even holding coronavirus-specific healing services to see the power of God touch the bodies of those the virus has made sick.

And that right there is the conflict. I both think that self-quarantining from a scientific perspective is actually a really good idea (because scientifically speaking, it works), and that closing down churches and self-quarantining from a faith-perspective is largely a fear response and incredibly unwise on that level. On the other hand, asking to get sick is also unwise, and then the Bible even tells us to submit to human authorities as well.

1 Peter 2:13-17 says, “Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake to every human authority: whether to the emperor, as the supreme authority, or to governors, who are sent by him to punish those who do wrong and to commend those who do right. For it is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish people. Live as free people, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as God’s slaves. Show proper respect to everyone, love the family of believers, fear God, honor the emperor.”

Honestly, part of me wishes that passage wasn’t in there because my don’t-trust-government side doesn’t like that it says to submit to human authorities. On the other hand, I also don’t think God wants us to obey evil either, and the above passage also says to live as God’s slaves, not the government’s slaves. So the lines, as much as it would be nice if they were clear, are actually still somewhat blurry in my mind.

This might still not seem like much of a conflict to some, so let me get back to the spiritual side of things for a minute. It is a fact that Jesus paid for all sin, sickness, and death on the cross over 2,000 years ago. It is a fact that God isn’t the author of disease, nor does Heaven have disease to hand out. Jesus has given us power and authority over sicknesses to heal them, and over demons that cause illnesses in the body to cast them out. In the Old Testament, a disease made a normal person unclean, but in the New Testament Jesus demonstrated that in the presence of a disease, he cleansed the disease and healed the sick of their problems. The New Testament reality is such that there is no good reason why we as the Body should need to hibernate to avoid getting coronavirus or any other disease or illness, as we should be in a position to take authority over every bacteria and virus and see them destroyed in Jesus’ name. That’s a major part of the conflict—we shouldn’t be hiding when we have divine ability to push it all back and destroy it. On the other hand, I am not new to divine healing, and I know that while theoretically that is where the Body of Christ should be at, most of the time that simply isn’t the case. And that’s where I think that each of us need to deal with the Coronavirus according to the grace we live in.

I believe Romans 12:6 offers a principle that we can use to help us decide, individually, what the right answer is for us, and I think we can each use that principle to both guide our own decisions in this as well as to keep us from holding others in judgment for their decisions which may be in conflict with ours. The verse says, “We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your faith . . .” (Romans 12:6). The admonition here is to do what the person is doing in accordance with his or her faith. The way I read this, if someone has a high level of faith for something, he or she will respond to a greater degree in that area than someone with little faith. For me, if I have a high level of faith for divine healing, then it would be fairly reasonable for me to hold a church service, encourage corona-infected people to come, and expect God to show up and heal them—and under the US Constitution, I would be protected by law and therefore not actually disobeying government (a lawyer friend explained this week that legally, the government can suggest/request that churches close voluntarily, but Constitutionally they may not mandate it). If I have a low level of faith for divine healing, then I probably need to bust out some hand sanitizer, don a mask, and maybe stay at home and pray from afar (everyone should wash their hands anyway, regardless of faith level—hygiene never goes out of style). In fact, if I walk in a low level of faith in that area, I am likely to not only come to harm myself, but bring harm to others, and that is the opposite of wisdom.

I think that the more people see the members of the Body of Christ attacking one another during a time when much of the world is panic-driven, it isn’t going to show them the peace that we are supposed to walk in, nor is it going to release peace to them as we bicker amongst ourselves. So here’s my suggestion: Let us each decide the grace we have individually been given, and the grace we are actively walking in, and then live it out. Let us not hold others in judgment for walking in the level of grace they currently walk in, as that is foolishness. Jesus spent his time working with His disciples, and when they questioned what others were doing, regardless of what those people were doing, whether for or against, Jesus left them alone (Matthew 12:30, Mark 9:40). We would do well to take a page out of His book and just keep doing the things that we do in accordance with the measure of faith we operate in. We would also do well to use this as a mirror to reflect upon where our level of faith for divine healing is at. Do we actually believe the promises of God in regards to healing and health? How much do we believe those promises? If we recognize we have room to grow (which we all do), what do we plan to do about it? After all, whether Coronavirus or any other disease or illness, it doesn’t wait for us to get our theology lined up properly before it decides to strike, so now is as good a time as any to identify an area of weakness and do something about it.

In the end, regardless of where each of us are at, please know that your prayers are powerful and that the single most-beneficial thing we can each do is pray, continuously, for all coronavirus sickness to be healed, for near-death situations to be reversed, and even for those who have died to be raised from the dead by the power of Jesus Christ. As we pray, God will answer our prayers and touch people all around the globe with His lifegiving power, with each prayer making it just a little bit more here on earth as it already is in heaven. Blessings to you all, and I pray along with you that this quickly passes.

If you want to learn about how to walk more readily in divine healing, check out Praying Medic’s Book on Divine Healing and his Self-Paced Online Class.

If you want to learn about how to raise the dead, check out my book Faith To Raise The Dead and Tyler Johnson’s book How To Raise The Dead.

Why Desperation Doesn’t Move God—And How You Can

Having been in Charismatic circles for nearly two decades, I have been around long enough to hear a good number of leaders, teachers, and speakers say that “Desperation moves God.” Well, I’m here to tell you that desperation doesn’t move God, but that there is also good news—while it doesn’t, there is something that does.

Why do I say desperation doesn’t move God? Because it doesn’t. But even if we aren’t willing to just take my word for it (which you shouldn’t), a simple look at life situations tells us this is true. How many desperate people in dire situations do you know of where the solution to the problem has not been dropped into their lap? If desperation moved God’s hand, then the most difficult of circumstances would always be solved. Those who live in war-torn areas, have been raped or kidnapped or sex-trafficked, physically attacked, been on their deathbed from a sickness or disease, or any other highly problematic situation would always see divine intervention saving them if our distress was what moved God.

I know a number of people who got pretty distraught around the time their loved one either fell mortally ill, or right after they died—and had asked God to move—and yet still the desired result did not come. If desperation was what it took to get God to move, then I would never walk away from a dead-raising opportunity with the dead not raised. Why? Because if that was all it took, I could easily channel my inner emo and muster up all the hopelessness needed to put me in such a position to receive from God. But more often than not these circumstances become an opportunity to fellowship with the hurting in their suffering instead of seeing God do a miracle. If desperation moved God, things would turn out differently.

In some ways it is probably good that it isn’t what gets God to move. Why? Because despair is an extremely fickle thing. In fact, being desperate is essentially an unstable emotional state and in addition to being highly unreliable, is both undesirable and non-duplicable. It is unreliable in that it is difficult to control when we become desperate, not to mention that it is not a healthy state of mind to be in. As such, it is also undesirable. If it was good for us, and got Kingdom things accomplished, then it would be something we would push ourselves into, and that would be terrible. Can you imagine people intentionally damaging their emotional state in order to get miracles to happen? I’m actually thankful it doesn’t work that way, or that’s what we would see.

Finally, it isn’t able to be duplicated. While sure, I guess we could depress ourselves enough in a given situation to replicate results, desperation doesn’t grow as the fruit of the spirit becomes more evident in our lives, and thus we actually can’t grow more desperate as we become conformed into the image of Christ. If we do, then we have to question if we actually are being conformed more into His image. Given that desperation isn’t something we should aim for to begin with, as it is usually an indication of striving and trying to do things in our own power instead of connecting with and relying on God, it isn’t something Jesus taught his disciples to do. The reason that matters is that Jesus was training his disciples to go and perform miracles. He taught them to heal the sick. He intentionally revealed to them how they could get God to move on their behalf, and desperation was nowhere in his curriculum.

So what does move God?

Faith.

Hebrews 11:6 says, “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.”

Faith is pleasing to God, and when we please God, God rewards us for seeking Him. Desperation is the utmost of doubtful striving because we don’t actually believe we have a solution to the problem. After all, if we thought we did have one, we wouldn’t be so desperate. Faith, on the other hand, not only helps us connect with God, but it releases good things upon us as a result.

The next time you hear someone tell you that desperation is the key to moving God, just remember that it not only won’t, but can’t. But faith both can, and will, and it is through faith that we inherit the promises of God in Christ Jesus. Even better, faith, like a mustard seed, can be cultivated and grown over time with no damaging emotional effects, and we can share it with those around us, bearing even more of the fruit of the Spirit as we are conformed continually into the image of Jesus Christ.

Faith Lessons: Buying and Selling a House

For those who have been following along for a bit, you know that we have packed our house in Portland and are moving to the Houston area of Texas. The process began in the first quarter of last year, but the past ten months have consisted of her making a bunch of declarative statements about what is and is not going to happen in this moving process . . . and I basically shot all of her ideas down over and over again. She stuck to her guns, and as things have moved forward, so far she has had most everything she has been steadfastly declaring pan out the way she has been praying for it to. While I don’t normally look to her for lessons on how to engage faith, I have to say that I have learned a lot from her in the past few months.

I am somewhat Type A, and I don’t like messy change with a bunch of moving parts. I like to administrate problems out of the equation instead of fly by the seat of my pants and make decisions as things come up. Sunshine prefers it the opposite way, which is a struggle for me at times, but this time around I think the lesson has been more about purposefully engaging faith and trusting God to walk us through each step of the process. I once heard someone say that the Bible says “Your word is a lamp unto my feet”, not a 100-yard spotlight down the road, and the lesson applies here.

In this process I have become more acutely aware of how my own fears were playing into my unbelief and even discouraging her in the process. There are times to make decisions out of human wisdom, but there is a difference between being wise and being afraid. If we operate out of fear, we will think that something is wise because it is less risky or causes less fear even if it isn’t the best choice for us. However, when we aren’t operating out of fear we can be free to choose to do something in faith *or* we can choose to do something that we consider wise based on true wisdom instead of being guided by fear.

I’m still not 100% at rest with this move, but that has much to do with the fact that I will miss my local friends, my job and my coworkers whom I enjoy a lot, and we are making a huge life change in faith that things are going to “work out” on the other end. What I am finding, however, is that while my emotions may not always be totally on board with the move, God has been faithful to come through with the solutions we need as we need them. While it would be nice if God showed up early at times, He has met each of our needs every step of the way.

I recently heard a speaker point out that we have the God-given power to alter probabilities. When we engage our faith toward something, we shift the probabilities of certain events occurring in our favor. No one told my wife how we were supposed to find a new house, pack, and then sell our current house. However, months before we did any of this she made some very conscious decisions about what she wanted to see happen. She activated her faith, the time-space continuum shifted (in spite of my fear-based attempts to shift it back), and many things have continued to work out step by step as we go. There has been a lot of warfare along the way, but the lesson here for me has been a reminder that we truly do get to choose a lot of what happens in our lives. I have a choice each day and with every choice I make to partner with God in faith or partner with the enemy in fear. What kind of choices do I want to make, and what kind of person will that transform me into over time? I choose to become a man of great faith, and I am thankful that from time to time God reminds me how to walk that out.

Unmasking the Lie of Premature Death

Raising the dead is an un-touchy subject—in that most people don’t want to touch it. For those of us who aren’t afraid to engage what Jesus commanded us to do, there are a lot of theological roadblocks that often get tossed in our way. A few of the more prevalent ones are “Is it God’s will?”, “Is it the will of the deceased to be raised?”, “Are they unsaved?” (as though we should only raise them if they are, and if they are saved then let them go). All of those have very rationed, biblical answers (all of which end with “be obedient and raise the dead). We’re going to tackle a different one today, unmasking the lie of premature death.

There is a belief out there that says “It’s okay to die, but only if it is not premature.” The other side of that coin is “We are only supposed to raise the dead when it is premature death, and the rest of the time we should let them go.”

What even is premature death?

In theory, premature death is when someone dies before their “appointed time”—so let’s look at that. What does the Bible say about our appointed time to die? Scripturally speaking, the notion that any of us have an appointed time to die comes from Hebrews 9:27-28 which says, “And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.” Now, when read in-context this passage is saying that Jesus died once for us, as us, in place of us to bear all of our sin. However, most people like to quote verses 27 without the second half of the sentence (v27 ends with the word “judgment”) and in so doing entirely skew the meaning. For believers, we did die once, already, through Christ in baptism (Romans 6:1-7 elaborates on this quite clearly). So even if we ignore the context of this passage and just focus on the “appointed time to die”, as a result of Jesus’ sacrifice we no longer have an appointed time to die—as Jesus already took our appointment.

Furthermore, the entire “appointed time to die,” scripturally speaking, has always been in context of the wages of sin being death (Romans 6:23), not that God needs us to die in order to exit the earth. Nevertheless, people still like to believe that we are required to die, and incorrectly use Hebrews 9:27 as their proof-text. The other references that are less-commonly used, those of Ecclesiastes 3:2 and Psalm 90:10, are based on the writers’ observations about the lives of people, much like how a scientist would observe things and then write down what they saw. Those passages are not a prophetic pronouncement about what all humankind is destined for, but simply a recording of observations. In fact, the entire book of Ecclesiastes is written from the context of Solomon sharing his earthly observations and temporal wisdom, not that of a divine seer who has delved into the mysteries of God.

How do we know if someone died prematurely?

Normally, the notion is that someone has had a premature death if they died young. And if you thought “wow, that’s pretty ambiguous,” that’s because it is.

Profoundly ambiguous.

Most people who believe there is a “time to die” apply it to situations in an extremely illogical manner. They pretty consistently say that if someone is young then it wasn’t their time and if they are old (which usually means 65 or older), then it probably was their time to go. This entire idea is illogical in nature, not to mention incredibly arrogant. I mean, who is the person who gets to decide whether it was “someone’s time” or not? It’s pretty arrogant to think that we get to decide when it is other people’s time to die. When Job, in his arrogance, was accusing God of not being just, do you know what God’s response was?

“Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said:
“Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Now prepare yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer Me. “Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements? Surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? To what were its foundations fastened? Or who laid its cornerstone, When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy? (Job 38:1-7)

God did nothing for two whole chapters except throw questions at Job that he was incapable of answering because he was a human with the limited knowledge, power, and capacity that humans have, and not the Almighty Creator-God of the Cosmos. God basically spent His time saying “And who exactly do you think you are??”

Once we start breaking down the “time to die” concept, it is applied in an incredibly arbitrary manner based completely on supposition and not on some sort of knowable information that can be consistently applied. In fact, it is pagan belief systems that believe our life-length is determinable, not Christianity. For example, in Greek mythology, the Fates (or Norns in Norse mythology) determine the length of your life by spinning a string, your “life line”, and when they decide your string gets cut, you die. It is entirely arbitrary based on whatever those god-beings feel like at that time, and if they feel like cutting you off in your twenties, they are fully within their rights and powers to do so. Good thing we don’t belong to their kingdom!

What does the Bible say about death and age?

If we wanted to know what the Bible says about death and age, we would find it says the opposite of most people’s beliefs on the subject. According to 2 Timothy 1:10, God has abolished death in Christ. Abolished it! It is no longer legal. Romans 8 goes into great length to explain that we no longer live under the law of sin and death but rather the law of the spirit of life. As explained above, the OT verses that refer to a “time to die” are not pronouncements of that-which-shall-be, but scientific human observations of what they saw happening around them. In fact, there is a prophecy that is a pronouncement of things to come which states:

“Never again will there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not live out his years; the one who dies at a hundred will be thought a mere child; the one who fails to reach a hundred will be considered accursed. They will build houses and dwell in them; they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit. No longer will they build houses and others live in them, or plant and others eat. For as the days of a tree, so will be the days of my people . . . (Isaiah 65:20-22a)

The prophet Isaiah foresaw a day when death would be extremely uncommon, as people would be living multiples of hundreds of years long at minimum. Furthermore, this falls entirely in line with the teachings of Jesus. There are numerous verses in scripture that speak of this reality of long-life, but that isn’t all. There are many verses where Jesus explained that those who followed him would, in fact, never die (John 6:50, 51, 54, John 8:51, John 10:10, 28, John 11:26). Actually, get this. Do you realize that the most-quoted verse in the entire Bible speaks of this? John 3:16 says, “God loved the world so much that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believed in him would not die but would live forever (emphasis mine).” John 3:16 literally states that we are not supposed to die!!

So what should our response to all of this be?

Honestly, it’s quite simple. All death is “premature death” because according to scripture, we aren’t supposed to die. John 10:10 says that it is the enemy who brings death, and 1 Corinthians 15:26 also refers to death as God’s enemy. If we truly believe what the Bible says, the only response we can have to death, regardless of age, is one thing:

Raise the dead.

Don’t complicate Jesus’ simple command in Matthew 10:8 and add provisos or conditions such as premature death, if the person wants to come back, or any of the other highly spiritual-sounding but highly religious and extremely disobedient excuses people come up with. If we truly want to do the will of God, then it is time to move past the lie of premature death and simply be obedient to Jesus’ command to raise the dead.

If you are interested in learning more about how to step out in faith and raise the dead, I recommend the following:

Read my book Faith to Raise the Dead and Tyler Johnson’s book How to Raise the Dead, or for a quick-reference guide, grab a copy of Practical Keys to Raise the Dead.
Attend a training with the Dead Raising Teams led by Tyler Johnson of One Glance Ministries.
If unable to attend in person, buy his School of Resurrection audio series, invite some friends over, and have your own virtual DRT training.
Start looking for opportunities to pray to raise the dead. As you put yourself out there, opportunities will open up to you (pets included!).

Understanding Spiritual Laws and Forces: The Paper Airplane Model

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Many people wonder why prayers don’t get answered in the time or way they are asking. Other times, people have listened to a preacher state a single “guaranteed” method to have prayers answered, but when put into practice, they only work a small portion of the time. There are a number of reasons for this, but I think they are best explained through an example I was telling my wife the other day: the example of throwing a paper airplane.

Throwing a paper airplane seems like an incredibly simple process: You fold it, you throw it, done.

Yet, if you think about all the variables and factors that go into how that airplane flies, it is much more complex than it first appears.
In order to throw a paper airplane, there first has to be a paper airplane. The airplane could be made with a variety of sizes and thicknesses of paper, each of which has its own weight. There are a variety of airplane designs that involve folding the paper different ways to arrive at a flying object, and while each is unique in its appearance and design, all of them are still paper airplanes. To add even more variation, while it doesn’t influence the function of the object, the airplane could be a wide range of colors or designs as well.

Once the paper airplane is folded, it is now time to throw it. While this seems straightforward, there are many things that influence how it flies. Aerodynamics of the plane design show their influence here as both lift and drag exert their influences. Then there’s the force used to throw the object, which is gradually slowed by friction in the air but the momentum behind the plane works to counteract that. Gravity is part of drag that works to bring the plane down to the ground, but that doesn’t fully account for the level of atmospheric pressure exerted when at sea level versus a higher elevation, meaning that at different elevations, the pull gravity exerts is different. Furthermore, there are other external factors such as wind speed and direction that will influence the airplane’s flight.

So how does all of this relate to spiritual laws and answered prayers?? First, let’s take the example of the airplane and pretend it is the person. Each person is designed uniquely by God, and each of us are wired to function optimally in certain ways. The reason personality profile tests work is because there are still main “types” of people, but at the end of the day no two people are fully alike. This is exactly like making a paper airplane. Paper size, shape, thickness, and even color are like the differences between people and personalities, but there is more. Each of us have different life encounters which also cause us to have different beliefs and inner wounds. We each have certain areas where we either understand or misunderstand God’s nature, our nature, and that of the world around us. There is the influence that our spirit and soul exert on various aspects of our lives as well. These are like the differences in the paper and folding of the airplane. Those unique perspectives (whether healthy or unhealthy) and subsequent inner soul and spiritual influence, shape who we are and how we interact with the outside world, and, akin to the flight of a paper airplane, they affect how spiritual laws influence us as well.

Now let us bring in external forces: demonic resistance and the curses of others, angelic assistance and the prayers of others, and bloodline blessings and iniquity, all of which influence how, when, and if prayers get answered. There is our faith, the faith of other people praying in that situation as well, as well as our and their doubt and unbelief. There are regional atmospheres influenced in part by angels and demons and other spirit beings but also by the collective consciousness of the people living in that region.

Then there are other spiritual laws such as sowing and reaping, focus, honor, impartation, blessing, and more. All of these various factors act upon us simultaneously, and each one exerts its own influence on how, when, and if our prayers get answered. It is only when we don’t understand that there are multiple factors at play and do things to actively enhance or mitigate their effects that we lose out.

With a paper airplane, we can do something that adds weight (usually a paperclip) to help it fly better/longer, we can increase the force of the throw, move somewhere without wind or turn so we are throwing with the wind current, and stand on a higher elevation so it takes longer to reach the ground. Each of these actions address some of the opposing forces that negatively influence the paper airplane’s flight. Likewise, when we understand the various spiritual laws and spiritual forces at work in our lives, we can make conscious choices that promote the outcomes we desire. Both inner healing and mind renewal decrease the ability of demons to influence us. They also can decrease doubt and help enhance our faith. As we pray to engage the angelic host and bind demonic forces, we will experience a greater measure of spiritual assistance. As we sow with our thoughts, words, and actions over time we will reap the benefits of those choices as well. If we gather in a group with others, we can purposefully extend a targeted influence over a certain situation, problem, etc. that affects our region and that is influenced by regional collective consciousness, shifting the atmosphere our way. All of these are examples of a great number of things that can be done to influence prayers and outcomes in our lives, but it all boils down to a simple concept: At the end of the day, our input decides the output and if we want a different outcome, we need different input.

As we change the input coming through our lives toward heaven, then the output of heaven toward us will alter accordingly.