Shortcuts and Long Delays

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I have never been known for my extreme patience. When it comes to most things, especially spiritual things, I am all about the shortcut. I don’t see any reason why we should make it a goal to take things as slowly and painfully as possible if we can speed up our spiritual growth. From a perspective of spiritual power and effectiveness in healing and other ministry, I feel that there are so many hurting people that we need to learn how to effectively accelerate our growth. To this end, I have written multiple chapters on the subject in my latest book, The Gamer’s Guide to the Kingdom of God.

In spite of my preference for the fast-track, there are some things that simply don’t have any shortcuts–one in particular is relationship with God. There is something about spending time with God, whether Father, Jesus, or Holy Spirit, that cannot be accelerated. It’s an ongoing, daily living-life that has no turbo-charge button and no special shortcut to take to speed things up. Even if there were, the speeding up would be the equivalent of slowing down, because when it comes to relationship with God, the journey IS the destination.

There is an awakening in the Body of Christ in this time to the mystical realms–of oneness with Christ Jesus, being fully consumed by his passion and his love. This is not a process that can be accelerated, in the same way that one cannot quickly throw a pot. The process of firing that pot is equally painstaking and slow, as the temperature must be just right or the pot will fire incorrectly and be ruined. Turning our heart of affection towards Jesus is a daily, even hourly event. As we turn our hearts toward Jesus in love, there is a communion that takes place with Him where we encounter His love, and a sensation of that love wells up within us, often causing outward visible signs of that inner, invisible working.

The deepest spiritual growth is not in who is the most spiritually powerful, who can work the most miracles, or who can heal the greatest number of people. It is not in delivering accurate words of knowledge and prophecy, nor in the ability to cast out demons or combat principalities and powers of darkness. Love is the preeminent law of the universe, and this love can only be cultivated fully through the Being of Perfect Love, Jesus Christ. As we engage in oneness with Him in our hearts, we attune ourselves to the frequencies of the universe–the stars, plants, animals, the elements, and even the heart of humanity. The love of Jesus is what truly transforms us into His image and likeness, so that we, too, can release light, life, and love into the world and in so doing to transform it. Spiritual power is of some value, and to be effective in the Kingdom we must operate in spiritual power, but nothing can compare or compete with the all-encompassing love that is Jesus, in whom we live and move and have our being. No, there are no shortcuts to attain to this goal, and short cuts do make for long delays. The good news is that relationship with Jesus, the mystical union of our hearts with His, is but a moment away, a moment to turn inward and turn our hearts heavenward. Let us be a people who remember the journey is the destination, and as we remember, let our hearts once more entwine with His.

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4 Steps to Healing

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I recently prayed for a friend who had chronic lung issues which were being exacerbated by the smoke from the fires in Oregon and Washington. Instead of doing what I might normally do, which is to pray for healing for the lungs, I decided to take a different approach, one that I think many people will find helpful when praying for healing–I did some inner healing, belief-modification, deliverance, and THEN prayed for healing. It worked like a charm — healed in a jiffy!

For the sake of truth-in-advertising I should mention that the session took over two hours between all the praying and deliverance and such, but the actual part where we did the healing took only a few minutes! Why is this? Simple. Almost all healing does not originate from a physical problem.

What? How so? Certainly there are times when someone gets in a car accident and has a broken leg or eats something poisonous and gets sick. Yeah, that happens but they are the minority of the injuries, sickness, and disease that we deal with in life. As an RN myself, I see tons of sick and injured people at work on a daily basis, but many of those problems didn’t start with a physical problem. Rather, they began with emotional and spiritual problems and erroneous subconscious beliefs.

You see, this world is far more complex than we often remember, and there are levels of reality, each of which has an influence on the others. However, there are higher realms and lower realms in this reality, and in order from highest to lowest they are: spirit realm, soul realm, physical/body realm. The spirit realm is the domain of God and is the “location” where heaven exists. Our spirits naturally interact in this realm and they give feedback to our soul, which acts as the interface between our spirit and our body. Our soul is the seat of the mind, will, and the emotions, so when we have inaccurate beliefs or emotional trauma or injuries, there is a kink in the flow of life-energy from heaven through our spirit into our soul and down to the physical body. These kinks create their own negative energy signature that can influence or even directly cause disease in the body. In order to remove these kinks and free up the flow we have to update the wrong beliefs and heal the heart-wounds. As we do this, our soul stops releasing the negative energy because it is no longer PRODUCING it, and our bodies receive an uninterrupted flow now that our internal blockages that prevent healing are gone.

There is another thing that needs to happen though. Whenever we have an area of weakness in our souls, whether through emotional hurts or wrong beliefs, demons find a way to gain access to inhabit a part of our soul. When they inhabit those weak places they will remain there until they leave of their own choice or until they are forcefully ejected. After dealing with the access points, as mentioned above, casting out demons usually becomes pretty simple. Once the demons are gone, there are literally NO hindrances to healing, which is why it tends to become easy to get people healed after doing the above three steps. While I will not promise it is always that straightforward, I encourage anyone who wants to be effective in healing to seriously consider this model: inner healing, correcting mindsets, deliverance, then healing.

One aspect of inner healing that can be overlooked at times is the issue of fragments. These are fractured parts of our soul that hold onto the memory and pain of traumatic events. While I did not address any fragmented parts during this healing session with my friend, addressing and healing/integrating fractured parts of ourselves offers a huge benefit toward inner healing. The truth is that everyone has them; most people just don’t know about them. This is a very deep subject all on its own, so for more details, consider reading my coauthored book Broken to Whole: Inner Healing for the Fragmented Soul. I and my coauthors go in-depth on this subject to provide the tools and resources needed to gain total freedom and wholeness.

Again, no two prayer-times are exactly alike and the above items can be rearranged as the situation calls for, but if you are sure to cover those issues it is highly unlikely that there will be much difficulty when it comes time to do the healing part of things. At that point the only thing that might hold you back is your own faith, but when all the hindrances are out of the way, it really doesn’t take much of that either! One final word to note, for any of you who have chronic conditions that you have prayed and prayed and prayed for healing but have never been healed of, if you have never covered my 4 Steps then I encourage you to find some hope to keep moving forward and give it another try, but this time following my steps first. I would be surprised if you don’t see a significant difference when it comes time to be healed!

If you are finding it difficult to deal with emotional problems and/or aren’t getting good results, you can also try flower and gemstone essences. Freedom Flowers is geared toward providing high-quality flower essences and divine gem essences that help resolve stress and other emotional issues. Check them out!

Court Case: Alignments with Death

As many followers of this blog know, I believe the Gospel of Jesus Christ includes physical immortality, as evidenced by many scriptures that speak toward that end as well as things Jesus himself directly stated to his disciples. With that said, I am not discussing immortality in this post so much as I am sharing a heavenly experience I had earlier this month that I engaged specifically to deal with matters of life and death in the spirit realm. It is my hope that this post encourages you in your own pursuit of all things spiritual and godly.

I went up into the spirit back into the Courts of Heaven where I had been led previously by an angel to disavow attachments I had made to Death and to put myself in the custody of the Spirit of Life, Holy Spirit. The court case began with someone presiding over the case, although I did not quite understand who. I was clear, however, that this was a human, not an angel or other being presiding over the court.

I took my seat on the right side, and Death was located at a table to my left. There was no jury, as this was essentially a custody hearing and I was seeking to change custodians. I was invited to speak and explain why I was seeking this court hearing. I explained that I did not understand when I was younger that I did not have to die, and so I made many statements and held beliefs and engaged in actions that aligned myself with death and I placed myself in its care. I went on to say that I now understand that I do not have to die and I want to be released from Death’s custody.

Death then stood up and had a chance to speak. When I looked at Death I saw this thin, spectre-like being that was a sort of smoky black with ill-defined features. It stood up before the judge in a hissing voice and began to accuse me, stating that I had chosen it and that I was its rightful property. After it gave a short speech, it sat back down.

Next, I saw a man holding a scroll approach the judge’s bench–it was Jesus. He unfurled this scroll before the judge and they had a short conversation which I could not hear. I couldn’t read the scroll but I understood that it was basically a writ stating that I had been fully bought and covered by Jesus’ blood, and that as a result Death had no rightful hold over me. This was all the evidence that was needed, and after the judge saw that, he called me up to the witness stand to testify. This was my opportunity to declare and decree in the heavens what my intentions were for the future.

I got up to the stand and I stated that I now believe that I am not destined to die, but to live forever. I acknowledged that while I once believed I had to die when I was younger, I have since learned the truth and have come to accept that reality. I stated that I no longer consider myself under custody to death and place myself in custody of the Spirit of Life, and I broke agreement with every belief, mindset, and understanding that I had previously held that said I would get sick or had to die. I renounced every statement I had made or that anyone else has made that has cursed me to be sick or die in any way, or that I have agreed with about the hold that death has over me and others. I stated that I am no longer allowed to die, but if for any reason I ever were to die, that I would resurrect immediately unless the Lord wanted to show me something in the heavens first, but that any time I were to ever die that I would always, always come back to life. Having completed my decree, the judge banged the gavel once and basically declared that my custody had changed hands.

Before the case was dismissed, the being who was serving as my counsel, who I could not clearly see but believe was Holy Spirit, petitioned the judge for a transfer of property from Death to me. The counsel basically explained that Death had stolen from me and as a result that I was entitled to seven-fold the amount stolen from me. The judge instantly granted this, and assigned a bailiff of the court to go carry out this decree, then ended the case.

With the court case over, Death stalked out of the room, but he was actually hobbling now, as though life force had been taken from him and he was now weaker. A man who was glowing in golden light approached me, and introduced himself as Isaac. I understood that he was Abraham’s son. As I could not see him clearly, he dimmed the light emanating from him, and while I could not see him clearly I could see that his hair was brown, that his face was somewhat rounded in shape, and that he was shorter than me. He explained that he had a few things to share with me. First, he told me that while I was not at that point yet, as I continued down this path of immortality that at a certain point my cells themselves would literally undergo a transformation. I had a vision of what he was saying as he was speaking, and it showed me where my cells literally transformed from normal cells into vibrant, golden-glowing cells that emanated life-energy and had no speck of sickness or disease in them.

He then escorted me to a garden, which he said was my garden in heaven. It was spacious and beautiful, with much lush greenery that was landscaped quite beautifully, with a gazebo in the part of the garden that I saw. We turned, and Isaac showed me a young tree, approximately five to six feet tall, that had two or three pieces of oblong, pear-like fruit on them. “This is a tree of life. Take a bite of the fruit.” He said. I picked one and took a bite. It was juicy, and as I ate it I could feel a message being sent to my cells to dump toxins and other garbage they had been holding, and I could feel my intestines beginning to church slightly. At his instruction I took two more big bites, then he told me to plant the core in the ground, which I did a short distance from the other one in an empty space. I understood that a new tree was going to grow from it, and that because life in heaven is so abundant that even the fruit wasn’t going to decay but rather would remain intact underground yet still have the tree grow out of it. From there, Isaac took me to a mountain which he said was my mountain–my property. Stored inside were a great many things, but he took me to a room that was filled with scrolls and other writings.

The room was jam-packed, but everything was in disorder. Random scrolls and rolls of paper were piled on things and papers were spilling out of filing cabinets, as well as various piles on the table and other surfaces. He explained that there was a lot of revelation present in me, but that because everything was so cluttered that there was revelation I had received that I haven’t even realized because it is hidden under the piles of disorganization. He instructed me to work on “cleaning up” so that everything would become more organized. I had a vision of a small, half-sheet-sized piece of glowing golden paper that was sitting on the floor somewhere, and that while I could see this paper in the vision, that it was hidden under other things and that as I cleaned, I would find it. I took this to mean that I needed to clean up how I have my computer files of all the prophetic words, dreams, and other revelation that God has given me so that it is more accessible. From there the experience ended.

I hope this gives you not only a glimpse of some of the things that are possible in the spirit realm, but a picture of what a case in the Courts of Heaven might look like. There are many courts and the cases do look different depending on the subject matter, but I encourage you to test the waters and try it out for yourself!

The Influence of Demons

Demons can be nasty critters–and unfortunately for us they sometimes hang out inside of us and wait for opportune moments to flare up, like a bad case of gout. Or allergies. Or . . . you get the point. I have been “saved” and following Jesus for over 28 years, and yet, somehow, I still find demons flaring up from inside me at the most inopportune times, often completely unnoticed by me. Tonight is not one of those times, as I was able to recognize it for what it was and deal with it.

The story will follow in a moment, as well as what I did to deal with it, but let me say this first: yes, Christians can have demons. Yes, I know there are probably a bajillion bible verses someone is readying at this moment to throw at me to Bible-bash me into correct theology without actually changing my experiences, but the truth is that I have cast demons out of a number of believers and some non-believers, and I find the “Christians can’t have demons” theology to be, in and of itself, demonic in nature. If the enemy can get you to believe that they’re not actually there when in fact they are, they’ve already won, with no resistance from you whatsoever. If you’re one of those people, don’t feel a need to comment below–although I censor very minimally, I probably won’t approve the comment. Why? Because it’s simply not true. I will probably go into “sound Biblical teaching” at another time to expound on this further, but for now, just suspend all disbelief and hear the story.

Late this evening (it is now the middle of the night as I am typing this) I was driving home from a movie with my wife. We were chatting about a variety of things when I began to go off on this rant about her, my grandchildren, and a couple other things. At one point I could hear her muttering under her breath but I didn’t hear what. Very shortly after that it was like someone turned off a switch and amidst my loud ranting and rambling, I started to purposefully quiet my voice and I said “. . . and I’m not really sure why I even just went off on you like that right now. I am really sorry.” Turns out the muttering under her breath had been my wife praying for me, and the switch that got shut off was demons manifesting through me.

Yes, I was “in control” of my body the entire time, in that I was physically driving a car, etc. but at that moment I wasn’t really in full control of my emotions. Or more accurately, I wasn’t exercising full control over them. There was this anger that was bubbling up from within me that started subtly at first but eventually was full-bore without really any reason for it in the first place other than what might normally be called “venting.” Well, I was venting all right, but only a small portion of what I was venting was my actual feelings. The rest of it was demons riding on and encouraging those feelings to blow them sky-high, and in doing so cause me to emotionally vomit all over my poor wife.

The truth is that I actually love my wife a great deal, and was exceedingly sorry that I had just treated her like that, with really no provocation whatsoever. When she prayed, it was like a veil was pulled away from my awareness and I realized that I was basically spouting the words of demons residing within me, and thus chose to stop spouting. At that point I began to renounce the feelings of anger and the beliefs that I had just been shouting, and verbally separated myself from those thoughts and feelings. Next I began to speak to spirits of anger, rage, and any other spirits that I could think of that were related to the subject matter, as well as to any that were connected to them, whether known or unknown, and whether I had named them or not. In other words, I was trying to get as many as possible out of there. A short time later I began to observe signs within my body that demons were, indeed, leaving. I cannot say how many left versus how many remained, but I was pleased that I at least became aware enough in that moment to cease demonic manifestations and emotionally hurting my wife and choose to do something about it. I have since apologized to her multiple times, and, being the gracious woman that she is, has accepted kindly each time, but it has brought a new level of vigilance in my mind regarding my behavior.

How often are my actions and emotions influenced by demons? How often do I start thinking thoughts that are being whispered in my ear, yet I believe they are my thoughts and I start actively thinking them? How often do I let myself unwittingly become a pawn of the enemy by being unaware in that moment of the spiritual battle raging around me? Probably far more often than I would like to imagine.

God has been reminding me of this issue recently, and I am amazed at how much I have forgotten to wage a spiritual war on a daily basis in my mind, will, and emotions. The soul is the zone of our battlefield, and we fight that war with spiritual weapons. No amount of yelling at my wife is going to change a single thing that love won’t change, and it will only damage in the process, whereas love will heal.

Demons want to use the creative power that God has given us in our words and thoughts to steal, kill, and destroy, and the more unwitting we are about it, the better. If we don’t take every thought captive to Jesus Christ then we invariably will be used by the enemy far more often than we think. We can choose to speak death or life over people, and according to our words it will be done in the earth.

I want to encourage each reader today not to leave from reading this post in fear of how the demons are going to get you, but with a heightened sense of awareness that we are, indeed, in a spiritual battle that is fought in the day-to-day choices we make and the things that we speak. I encourage you to ask God in the coming days, weeks, and months to reveal every place where your actions are being influenced by the demonic realms, as well as help you to exorcise all of the evil spirits that remain within you and to prevent any new ones from coming in. If you know anyone who is able to help you with that, much the better, but don’t forget that angels fight on your side, and you can ask God to release assignments to angels to war on your behalf! Greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world! May you be blessed today and may the Lord reveal to you every scheme of darkness that is set against you, and deliver you from every snare of evil, in Jesus’ name. Amen!

Seeing Myself From an Aerial View

I had a conversation with a friend recently where we discussed the difficulty of seeing ourselves as God sees us. I wish I could say that few of us deal with this problem, but the truth is each one of us struggles with this reality. If we didn’t, we would already be manifesting the “greater works” Jesus promised us and we would look a great deal differently as the Body than we do now. What I am more and more faced with is this idea that God sees me as far more equipped and able than I do, and that I need to change my perspective to align with His.

For example, my friend Praying Medic and I spoke by phone about my recent Gemstones blog posts, and he suggested that I turn them into a short Kindle book on the subject. While I thought it was a cool idea, at first I struggled with the concept. “Who am I to write a book on this manifestation?” I asked myself, looking at my own doubts, difficulties, and insufficiencies. Then, as I thought a bit more, I said to myself “Very few people have MORE experience with this than I do, and even FEWER of them are writers. Why NOT write a book on this?”

I am discovering that the Church is extremely hungry not just for supernatural manifestations of God’s love, but for understanding and activation into these things, and I now believe I have been divinely positioned to release a greater measure of that into the Body of Christ. If I were busy viewing myself as someone who is unworthy or unable, I would be unprepared to help steward this forward by writing a book. The truth is that unless we are able to take a more impartial view of ourselves, we will very rarely come up with an accurate appraisal of our own skills and abilities.

I was recently visiting with family in a dynamic with my older brother where I found myself reviewing my own value and worth from a life-accomplishments perspective and internally trying to see if I “measured up.” I was listing off my accomplishments for my wife and she asked me “Do you feel like you need to prove something?” I thought for a moment and the answer was “Yes, I do feel that way, but there’s no reason why I should need to prove myself to measure up.” The reality is that I don’t need to compete with my brother in any way–we are nothing alike and I honestly don’t want to be like him.

He is an officer in the military with all of the perks and responsibilities, has a Masters Degree, a wife his age with kids, and is a member of the Episcopal Church. On paper he looks super-successful, but there is always a deeper truth behind appearances. He gets moved all around the country and world every few years and lives his family less than 50% of the time due to being deployed in the middle of the ocean somewhere. He is staunchly set in his religious ways and is not open to new ideas or revelation if they don’t align too closely with what he already thinks. He is so used to telling others what to do and having them follow his instructions without questioning that he treats other people that way as well.

On the other hand, I am 31 and still haven’t finished my Bachelors degree, have no kids, married a woman 24 years older than I am, and have no clear religious affiliations to speak of. However, I am a Registered Nurse who will not only be completing my degree soon, but have already been working in my field for years with very good pay with only an Associates Degree. My wife is older than I, but is much better matched for me than anyone in my own age bracket. I have three wonderful step-grandchildren who live with us and who I get to help raise. I have one book that is in the editing process to be published, over ten more ideas on the drawing board, and another two which are also significantly underway. I get to see my wife and family every day and only work 80% of a normal person’s work schedule. From a spiritual perspective, God has placed me on the cutting edge of some areas of supernatural thought and experience, and I relish in the new things that God brings in my path and the opportunity to test out and learn new things. In other words, I am happier being me, and comparing myself to someone else isn’t going to help me become more of who God made me to be. I’m not my brother and I don’t have the talents and inclinations he has, and he doesn’t have mine.

Having a clear picture of how God sees us is best developed by listening to God himself. It can be easy for me to see myself from my own internal view, but if I take time, even just a moment in a situation where I am having difficulty, to ask God what He thinks and feels about me, it is completely different than what I am usually expecting to hear, and over time it helps me have a different image of myself. As I gain a clearer picture of who I am based on how God sees me, my entire life becomes more functional as instead of living from inner dysfunction I begin to live from a place of inner wholeness.

Liberated Living

Many years ago, shortly before we got married, my wife turned me onto Liberated Living, the ministry of John and Beverly Sheasby, a precious couple who teach and minister the love of Jesus, but largely focus on helping people grow in an understanding and experience of God’s grace and love toward us, and our identity as sons and daughters of God. They have a vast number of very helpful teachings on their website, many of which I have listened to over the years, and most of which are completely free!

Check out their website, and feel free donate if you feel blessed by their ministry, but most of all, download the teachings and watch your growth reach a new level! Be blessed everyone!

http://liberatedliving.com/downloads/