Spirit-led Healing

I was asked by a friend whether we should always wait for the Holy Spirit to show us who He wants to heal before praying with a stranger. This is one of the most common questions people have about healing.

Being led by the Holy Spirit is always our goal, and we need to cooperate with Him in every healing or deliverance encounter. While it's true that He will sometimes highlight certain people for healing that we are not aware of, it is not necessary to always wait for Him to highlight people for healing. The question of whether we should wait for Him to show us certain individuals arises when we are uncertain about whether it is God's will to heal all people or only certain ones.

It is difficult to pray with faith when we are uncertain about God's will for healing. We can know with certainty His will toward healing by looking at the New Testament. The gospels give us a clear understanding of the Father's will through the ministry of Jesus who healed multitudes of people of every kind of disease and demonic oppression:

"When evening had come, they brought to Him many who were demon-possessed. And He cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all who were sick." (Matthew 8:16)

Jesus never refused to heal anyone who came to him, in fact, it is likely that He spent entire days doing nothing but healing people until He was exhausted. The will of God for healing was further revealed when Jesus commissioned His disciples to heal the sick and cast out demons making no exceptions about who was to be healed:

"Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give." (Matthew 10:8)

We see the disciples doing this exact thing in the book of Acts after Jesus ascended into heaven:

“Also a multitude gathered from the surrounding cities to Jerusalem, bringing sick people and those who were tormented by unclean spirits, and they were all healed." (Acts 5:16)

The scriptures give no indication that there were any exceptions to healing in the ministry of Jesus or the disciples. If it is the will of God to heal all who are sick and demonized, then being Spirit-led is not an issue of who can be healed, but how they should be healed.

Looking at the model Jesus gave us, we see that with one person, He told them to arise and walk. For another it was a touch that healed their blindness. For someone else it was a little mud in their eye and with another, He told their friend to go home because they were already healed. Jesus used different methods for healing each person based on what the will of the Father was for their unique situation. This is what He meant when He said, "The son only does what He sees the Father doing." (John 5:19)

Being led by the Spirit has to do with the particular method God wants us to use to heal each person. Sometimes it will be a touch, sometimes a command, sometimes we'll ask them to get up from their wheelchair and attempt to walk. Just as Jesus was led to do certain things to release a miracle, we must learn to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in how He wants us to bring healing to each person we encounter.

No More Wheelchair

How Far Will God Go to Stop Suffering?

I was reflecting last night on a story that was shared at The Gathering that illustrated the lengths to which God will go to stop suffering and evil. Before I share that story, let me highlight some of the beliefs people have about this issue

Many people believe that God is indifferent to the pain and suffering that we go through. After all, if God is all-powerful and if He opposes evil and suffering, then why does He allow them to happen?

It seems only logical that if He allows them to happen He must approve of them, and if God approves of suffering and evil then He cannot be good. This reasoning about the nature of God developed as a response to teaching from the church that God is in control of everything and that everything that happens is His will, including suffering and evil.

The idea that suffering and evil are the will of God is an ancient philosophy that was given new life during the Protestant reformation. Drawing on a few passages from scripture like Romans chapter nine, men like John Calvin developed a view of God that has Him in control of everything. Romans nine states that God has predestined some to be saved and others to be objects of wrath. This chapter essentially teaches that all the outcomes of life are predetermined by God and we cannot change any of them. This teaching completely ignores the fact than man has a responsibility to exercise his free will.

Is God in Control of Everything?
I've thought about this question for years and here's how I finally settled it:

The bible views life from two perspectives; ours and God's. Most of the passages of scripture view life from man's perspective and teach that we have choices to make. (If we can make choices then God cannot be controlling us, and He cannot be in control of everything.) When the Bible says, "I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life," it is obviously speaking from man's perspective. Romans nine, which sees God in control of our choices views life from His perspective.

The view that God is in control is a valid perspective to live from, but only under one condition: It is a valid if you happen to be God, and if you happen to know all these things. While I can accept the fact that God's perspective is valid for Him, I can only view life from that perspective if I happen to be God. Since I'm not God and I don't know who has been predestined to be saved or healed, I must operate from the perspective that I have free will and I must make choices.

The Reality of Free Will
God could have made us in such a way that we would always do His perfect will. In such a world everyone would always do what was just, right and fair. If that were the case, there would be no evil or suffering. But if we always did what was right, we would not have the ability to choose to do evil. And without the ability to choose between good and evil, we would be nothing more than robots, devoid of free will.

We would also not have the capacity to love, because love is a choice. In order for us to be able to choose to love, we must be able to choose not to love. We must be able to choose to hate and to hurt others. Suffering and evil are permitted, not because God wants them, but because their very existence gives us the freedom to love others.

God wants us to have the freedom to make choices; whether for good or for evil. Evil is a necessary consequence of allowing us to have free will, and allowing us to have free will is God's top priority. But the fact that He allows evil and suffering to exists does not mean He is not actively opposing them. It's just that He cannot force people to refrain from doing evil without removing their free will.

God will never over-ride a person's free will, so He won't force an abusive father to stop beating his son. If He did, he would remove their ability to choose and negate their free will. So He must oppose evil and suffering in another way. Rather than directly negating the free will of those who want to do violence, He opposes them by recruiting  people who are willing use their free will to accomplish His divine purpose.

How God Opposes Suffering Through Us
We've been given the ability to partner with God as He enforces His will in the earth. By bringing healing to those who suffer illness and injury, deliverance to those who are tormented by demons and by interceding for those who suffer violence, we are God's hands that do  the work that accomplishes His will. If we refuse to partner with God, we are to blame for the continuation of suffering and violence. God opposes tyranny, injustice, abuse and violence through us when we submit our will to accomplishing His work.

At The Gathering a man told me of an experience he had one night after drifting off to sleep. He was taken in the spirit to a place in the heavens where he met about six other people. Gauging by how they were dressed, he had to assume the others had come from different time periods spanning thousands of years, including one person who looked as if he had come from the future. They had all been brought there to interceded for a boy who was being beaten by his father. The group spent time praying for the boy and when their prayer time was done, they departed. The man who had this experience found himself back in his bed.

To answer the question I asked at the beginning of this message: "How far will God go to stop evil?" He is so interested in stopping evil that He'll find people scatted over different time periods in history and bring them together in one place in eternity to pray in agreement for one boy to be spared the beatings of  an abusive father. That's how much He loves each one of us.

5 Bulging Discs Healed

This woman testified of her healing at Voice of the Apostles in Atlanta.

Your Identity in Christ

Pink Glasswing Butterfly by KloverKane

When Jesus walked the streets of Galilee, His acts of healing created division among those who watched Him. Some rejoiced at the miracles they witnessed, while others criticized Him. The same attitudes exist today. Healing, deliverance and miracles are ways in which the kingdom of God is made manifest through us. When we bring the kingdom of God to earth, we invite criticism, because wherever the kingdom goes, it destroys belief systems that are opposed it.

The greatest criticism of healing during the first century came from religious leaders. They had followers who admired their shallow spirituality. The miracles of Jesus drew people away from them and turned their hearts back to God. The kingdoms these men had built were beginning to crumble. Their response was to criticize the new thing God was doing. Little has changed today. Most of the criticism of healing today comes from religious leaders who are building their own kingdoms.

To have success in healing, you must deal with the issue of what people think of you. If you have fear of what others think of you, it may prevent you from realizing your full potential. You must learn to put aside the criticism of co-workers, church leaders, family and friends. Jesus wasn’t popular with religious leaders or his family. He was despised by many people, but the sick loved Him like crazy because to them, He was the fragrance of life. And I believe that kind of life is worth pursuing.

When I became interested in healing, I noticed something in the gospels that I’d never spent much time thinking about. Jesus healed a lot of people. If you don’t think healing is for today or you don’t think it’s your calling, it’s easy to overlook just how many people He healed. As I studied His life, I realized that there wasn’t much else He did that could be called “ministry.” He taught in the synagogues and preached the kingdom as people followed Him. But He spent an enormous amount of time healing the sick. The more I studied His life, the more I knew there was something missing from mine.

The Bible reveals many things about us. When we read it we tend to identify with someone. I might see the heart of King David and identify with him. You might see yourself in Deborah or Ruth. Some identify with the apostle Paul. We all see someone whose life is similar to our own. But almost no one looks at Jesus and says, “I can see myself in Him.”

The people we strongly identify with become our role models. Ironically, we aren’t called to become like the apostles or prophets. God’s plan is for each of us to be conformed into the image of Christ. If we never identify with Jesus, we have a big problem. God wants us to become like Him and that means He must become our role model. But many of us have used a pastor or one of the disciples as a role model instead. If we are to be transformed into His image, we must begin to identify with Him. He must become our model in everything we do. We must allow Him to live His life through us.

The first message Jesus preached was, “Repent! For the kingdom of Heaven is at hand” (see Matt. 4:17). The message of repentance has become well-known, even among those who are not religious. But its true meaning has become distorted over the years. The word repent, which is used in most English bible translations, comes from the Latin translation of scripture. It implies a change of action in an attempt to gain favor with someone. The Greek word used in this passage is the word metanoia, which comes from two words; one refers to a change; the other refers to the mind. The instruction of Jesus was not for people to change their behavior to gain favor with God. He wanted them to change their way of thinking, because the kingdom of God had arrived.

Jesus changed the emphasis and tone of the spiritual conversation. Rather than focus on keeping the law by our own strength of will, He emphasized the love that the Father has for us. He taught and demonstrated through His life and death that the Father loves us more than we can ever comprehend. The good news of the gospel is that God is in love with you. It is only when the heart is gripped by the affection of the Father that our outward behavior begins to change in a real way.

When I became a Christian, I listened to preachers who drilled into my head the idea that God saw me as a worthless sinner. I was taught that He really didn’t like me very much, but He decided to save me, despite my wretchedness. I accepted this view of myself and after a while the word “sinner” became my identity. After years of living a powerless, defeated life, God said He didn’t see me that way. He said that my true identity was a beloved and cherished son – not a worthless sinner.

The more you accept God’s love for you personally – the more your identity as His child will be established. And the more your identity as His child is established, (and your false identity is removed) the greater the power of His kingdom will become manifest through you. Manifesting the miraculous power of God is a matter of understanding and accepting your identity in Christ.

Through many different dreams, God began to show me things that I would do which seemed impossible. He showed me how I would affect people’s lives around the globe. His plans for me were so much greater than the ones I had for myself. Rather than a life of mediocrity, He showed me the inheritance we have as heirs of His kingdom. As sons of God, we have truly been given exceedingly great promises.

Many of us are afraid of becoming prideful. In an attempt to remain humble, we prefer to see ourselves as less than how God sees us. When we see ourselves this way, we destroy the work He wants to do in and through us. True humility isn’t thinking less of yourself. It’s thinking of yourself exactly the way God thinks of you; not more and not less.

The key to operating in the power of God is knowing your identity in Christ and knowing how He wants to work in you. You must shed the false identities you’ve accepted from man and receive the identity
given to you by God.

This is an excerpt from my book Divine Healing Made Simple. 

Can People Lose Their Healing?

This is part of an interview I did with S.J. Heald for Heaven Connect. The entire interview can be found here.

SJH:
Can people lose their healing? If so, why?

Praying Medic:
There are two situations that allow symptoms to return after we are healed. In many cases the return of symptoms after healing is evidence that a little more warfare needs to be done. I had a chance a couple of years ago to help my sister in law obtain healing for an occluded artery in her leg. She had poor circulation in her leg for years and her foot was always cold and numb. Her doctor considered placing a stent in the artery to keep it open. One day, I asked if she wanted to be healed and she said “yes’.” I commanded the artery to be open and the circulation to return. She didn’t feel anything different until the next morning, when she woke up with a warm foot that had normal sensation and circulation. Later that day, her foot became cold and numb and she thought she had lost her healing. With a worried heart she asked me what happened. This is a classic case of  how sometimes our symptoms will return after we are healed.

I sat her down and explained that healing and sickness are a battle between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of darkness. I told her that God wants us to be healed and the enemy wants us to be sick. She immediately understood. I explained that the enemy brought the symptoms back to convince her she wasn’t healed and that we needed to do some more warfare. I commanded her leg to be healed again and in a few minutes the circulation returned. I told her that all she needed to do was to resist the enemy’s tactics if it happened again. With a smile of understanding she confidently maintained her healing and she’s had normal circulation since that day.

Some diseases and painful conditions are spiritual in nature and the return of the symptoms indicates a return of the spirit and a need to find out why it returned. The bible gives examples of people who had physical symptoms with spiritual causes (see Luke 13:10-13 as an example.) In such cases the spirit must be removed before the symptoms will leave. But when a spirit of pain or sickness returns, it’s often because it has a home in the person (See Luke 11: 21-26.) The key to preventing the return of the spirit and a return of the symptoms it causes is to remove the demonic home.

Demonic homes are created by things we believe about God, about ourselves or about others that are not true, or by sinful behaviors and attitudes that we allow in our hearts. These things give spirits opportunities to exert their influence over us. If you believe for example, that God the Father cannot be trusted, because your father abused or neglected you, the mistrust you have in your heart toward God the Father will allow an orphan spirit to influence your thinking. It will continually remind you that God the Father is like the abusive Father of your childhood and that He can't be trusted. Many people live their entire lives under the influence of such spirits. Evil spirits only have influence over us to the degree that we permit them, and most of what we allow them to do to us is permitted because of what we believe. A slightly different way in which spirits can affect us is through sinful attitudes we have. Allow me to illustrate with one of my own experiences:

I had been seeking permanent healing for chronic neck pain for a long time. I received prayer a number of times and the pain would always leave temporarily, only to return a few days later. One day, a woman praying for me asked if I had anger toward anyone. God showed me in a vision, a person I had been angry with for a long time. I knew that I needed to let go of the anger I had toward them. When I released the anger to God, the pain in my neck immediately left and never returned.

I allowed a demonic home to be created by my anger. When people prayed for my healing, the spirit would leave but it always returned because its home was still there. Identifying wrong views, attitudes and behaviors and renewing our mind to the truth about them (repenting) removes demonic homes. Once this is done, and the spirit no longer has a home, it can be removed and the symptoms usually will not return.

A Simple Approach to Prophetic Ministry - Brian Fenimore

Brian Fenimore teaches a simple and powerful approach to prophetic ministry.

 

My Friend's Healing Testimony

I was blessed (and honored) to share an evening with a new friend named Tom who suffered from multiple sclerosis for many years. Five weeks after his wedding, he was having a normal day when he noticed his foot felt like pins and needles. A few days later the disease had spread to a point where it nearly incapacitated him. The onset was so rapid that his neurologist gave him little hope for survival. The disease progressed and He was confined to a wheelchair for many years.

All those years while he was in a wheelchair, God used him powerfully to release healing and miracles for others. He learned about healing and miracles from John Wimber and was one of the original members of the first Vineyard church in Phoenix. He went from one healing service to another and saw hundreds of people healed of every kind of disease. Yet each night he went home and wondered, "Lord, what about my healing?"

The Lord reminded him often, saying, "It's not about you."

During this man's time of sickness, God did an amazing work in his heart and healed him of the inner wounds he had received as a child. During this time, the Lord shaped and molded his identity. One day after a particularly awesome time of worship he confessed, "Lord, I love you so much that even if you never heal me... I will still love you more than anything."

That part of his story really struck me. I wonder how many of us who are waiting for our healing could honestly say the same thing. Is our passion for God greater than our desire to be healed? Is it about us, or is it really about Him?

One day he was sitting in a prayer meeting with a group of guys when they decided to pray for the body of Christ separately. They all went to different parts of the building. He was sitting in his chair praying for the church, when suddenly things got a little crazy. He began to feel something like electricity zapping him in the head and he felt something like warm, liquid honey being poured over him. The next thing you know, he was up running through the streets of town completely healed.

In a vision, God showed him a dam with a reservoir behind it. He saw water dripping ever so slowly into the reservoir. Every drop of water that fell brought the water level a little higher until finally, the dam broke. This is how the Lord portrayed his healing. "Every prayer ever prayed for you was like a drop of water in the reservoir. Each one made a difference. Not one prayer was wasted. Now I want you to thank everyone who ever prayed for you."

My new friend has a truly amazing testimony. I've never seen anyone who is so enamored with God. His enthusiasm is off the charts. But it wasn't always that way. He's been through hard times, just like you probably have.

I shared this story to encourage you not to give up on God. He has not given up on you and He never will. Let Him heal you of all the things you need healing from; both physical and emotional. Fall completely in love with Him and let Him show you the love that He has for you and if necessary, wait patiently for your healing to arrive.

Why Are Some People Not Healed?

This is part of an interview I did with S.J. Heald for Heaven Connect. The entire interview can be found here.

SJH:Some Christians are filled with faith and live a holy life, and yet they are suffering with illness and health problems. Also there are sick children, such as those with terminal illness like cancer. Why are these not healed?

Praying Medic:
This is a delicate issue and unfortunately, it’s one that has been greatly misunderstood. I don’t think it will help anyone if I tip-toe around this subject, so I’d like to give an honest answer that will probably be hard for many people to accept and frankly, will make some people angry.

Much of the disappointment and heartache that comes from failed attempts at healing is due to misconceptions about God and the kingdom of darkness. Many of us believe that God can heal whomever He wants and that if someone is not healed, it must be because God doesn’t want them healed. That's a bit like saying if someone doesn't get saved it's because God doesn't want them to be saved. There's an entire school of theology built around this idea, but the truth is that divine healing simply doesn’t work this way. Actually, there is very little in the kingdom of God that does.

John Wimber was given a vision from God that illustrated the problem we're discussing. This is how he described it in his book Power Healing:

"Suddenly in my minds eye there appeared to be a cloud bank superimposed across the sky. But I had never seen a cloud bank like this one, so I pulled my car over to the side of the road to take a closer look. Then I realized it was not a cloud bank, it was a honeycomb with honey dripping out on to people below. The people were in a variety of postures. Some were reverent; they were weeping and holding their hands out to catch the honey and taste it, even inviting others to take some of their honey. Others acted irritated, wiping the honey off themselves, complaining about the mess. I was awestruck. Not knowing what to think, I prayed, "Lord, what is it?" 

He said, "It's my mercy, John. For some people it's a blessing, but for others it's a hindrance. There is plenty for everyone. Don't ever beg me for healing again. The problem isn't on my end, John. It's down there."

When people have sought prayer for healing repeatedly to no avail, there is a strong temptation to believe that God has a divine purpose for our sickness. It’s just human nature to think this way. This is despite the fact that the bible teaches that God sees both sickness and death as His sworn enemies and despite the fact that there isn’t one passage in the bible that plainly teaches that sickness is used by God for any kind of divine purpose. In order to better understand how healing works, let me draw a comparison with something most of us are more familiar with.

Healing, like salvation is not a sovereign act of God. Rather, it is accomplished when we do what God commissions us to do. Salvation comes as a result of man proclaiming the gospel. The proclamation of the gospel is a task that has been delegated to man as God’s representative and salvation depends upon our obedience. People are saved when men and women preach the gospel faithfully. If people are not saved, it is not because God doesn’t want them to be saved. It is because we’ve failed to proclaim the message we were given. Healing operates in the same way, through God’s representatives – the church.

God sent Jesus into the world to reveal his will concerning healing. Jesus didn't just heal a few people that the Father chose here and there. He healed entire villages of all who were sick and demon possessed. He also raised the dead and he commissioned his disciples to do the same things He did. If we believe that God wants people to become sick and die at a young age– we must explain why He sent His Son into the world to defeat sickness and death and why He commissioned His disciples to carry out the same plan after He ascended into heaven.

The ministry of Jesus sent a clear message to the world that God is opposed to sickness and death. If it is the will of God for man to be sick, no one in history violated the will of God more than Jesus. Just as God desires all men to be saved, He also desires all men to be healed. Jesus gave us, His disciples all the power and authority we'll ever need to deal with sickness and death. Once He gives us authority to do something, He is no longer responsible for doing it – we are. The ball is now in our court and it has been for 2,000 years. It’s up to us to exercise the authority He has given us.

As God's ambassadors, it is our job to enforce His will here on earth with regard to healing. If we don’t learn how to conquer sickness and death by releasing healing, people are going to die. Most people have never been trained or equipped to heal the sick, raise the dead or cast out demons, even though these are the most basic things Jesus taught His disciples to do. When healing doesn’t happen, it is not because God wants people to be sick– it is because His ambassadors have failed to use the power and authority they've been given. Many of us try to put the responsibility back on God because we don’t want to admit that we’ve failed to take our responsibilities seriously. This is the reason why I wrote my book on healing. My heart’s greatest desire is to train and equip the saints to do the work God commissioned us to do.

Time to Grow up

A wise man once said "faithful are the wounds of a friend." I need to tell you something that may hurt a little, because I care about you as a friend.

I think it's wise to seek prayer from friends for our problems, whether they're health-related, relational or whether they fall into some other category. Prayer is a powerful thing. But there are problems that cannot be resolved by the prayers of our friends alone.

I have many friends who suffer from chronic aches, pains and illnesses and I have other friends whose relationships have been blown to pieces. When everything seems to be falling apart, there's a temptation to cry out to friends to pray for our problems to be fixed once and for all. Let me reiterate that I am not against prayer, because what I'm about to say next could be misinterpreted as that.

Many of us have not yet learned how to stand against the enemy in our battle against recurring sickness and most of us are responsible for our own recurring relationship problems. Let's take a look at sickness first.

The battle against recurring sickness is something like how we might deal with a criminal who repeatedly breaks into our home. Jesus used this illustration when teaching about how and why demons return to a person after being cast out of them in Luke chapter eleven. (See Luke 11:21-26)

When a burglar breaks into our home, we have a couple of ways in which we can respond. One option is to stand by helplessly and let them take our property and beat us senseless while waiting for the police to show up. An untrained and ill-equipped believer who relies on friends or the anointed "man of God" to pray for them is like a defenseless homeowner at the mercy of a burglar.

Evil spirits are opportunistic, just like burglars. They size up their potential victims and evaluate their defenses. A burglar looks for signs of vulnerability. They look for alarm systems, ease of access, unlocked doors and windows, the absence of a dog, and the likelihood that the homeowner will be armed. They look for homeowners that are the least likely to fight back. Demons do the same thing. They look for points of entry into our lives, through things such as anger, unforgiveness, pride etc.

The first part is allowing the Holy Spirit to remove the things in your life that allow the enemy to have access and influence over you. The second part is to learn how to go on the offensive against intruders when they come around. People who refuse to be trained in spiritual warfare or who never learn how to exercise their authority over the enemy are like homeowners who refuse to secure their homes or fight back against an intruder. They make themselves easy targets for evil spirits and once word gets out in the demonic community that they're an easy target—they can expect to be harassed by even more evil spirits. That's the message Jesus illustrated in His teaching in Luke chapter eleven.

When it comes to healing, many of us are content to let someone else deal with the bad guys. It's easier to find the anointed man of God to pray for us than it is to learn how to withstand the attacks of enemy ourselves. The problem is that Jesus gave every believer the power and authority they need to defeat the enemy, without going to someone else for help. Recurring problems with sickness and disease are the result of us refusing to take our responsibilities seriously.

You can plead with your friends to pray for your healing all you want, but if you never learn to exercise the authority God has given you over sickness, you're never going to remain healed. The spirits that bring  sickness will continue to assault you until you learn to take authority over them yourself.

I have a friend who once asked the Holy Spirit "How do you see cancer?"

The Holy Spirit replied, "I can't see cancer because it's under my feet. I want it to be under your feet."

The enemy is going to continue to beat us up until we learn to put him under our feet once and for all. I'm preaching to myself here as my wife and I don't always do this ourselves, but we're learning.

My wife was recently healed of back pain when she finally understood that the things she thought about herself , about her symptoms, and about God's desire to heal her were allowing the enemy to continue to attack her and keep her in pain.

The first problem was that she couldn't bring herself to believe she was healed as long as she still felt pain. This is a bit of a murky problem because sometimes people feel pain in response to a physical problem, while other times the sensation of pain is due only to the presence of a spirit.  To further complicate things—she had an MRI that showed two herniated discs. You might think that as long as she has herniated discs, she must resign herself to living with the pain, but we know of people who have MRIs showing herniated discs but they had no symptoms of the injury. My wife began to ask, "If some people have herniated discs and don't have pain, why can't I be one of them?"

She also wasn't completely sure at that point that God wanted to heal her. One day she decided to believe that God really did want to heal her and she entertained the idea that perhaps she was already healed. She accepted the fact that it was her beliefs and not God's reluctance to heal her that was the problem. So she chose to believe that she was healed. She also chose to see the pain she was experiencing as a lie from the enemy. Once she got her thinking straightened out, it removed the power the enemy had over her and the pain immediately left.

One of the major lessons we've learned is that the enemy only has the power over us that we allow him to have. Being healed and keeping the symptoms from returning is a battle. Most of the warfare is done on the six inch battlefield between our ears. Now let's take a look at problems with relationships.

Many of us cry out to our friends or to God to have our relationship problems fixed, rather than take an honest look at ourselves and admit that we're the ones responsible for our problems. God is not going to take away the consequences of our bad decisions. As we sow, we shall also reap, and many of us are reaping the consequences of manipulation, co-dependency, selfishness, immaturity and a failure to walk in our God-given identity.

Relationship problems are cyclical. The habits we've developed over our lifetime create the same dynamics (for good or bad) in all our relationships. When the same problems arise repeatedly, instead of  blaming others or crying out to God to fix the other person, we need to look at why we are bearing bad fruit. The fruit of our relationships is determined by the condition of our heart. It is only by changing the way in which we relate to others that the cycle of relationship problems will end. It's a sign of spiritual immaturity to blame others for our problems or to expect someone else to fix them. We must be the one who makes the change.

Most of us have a lot of growing up to do. It's time to take the training wheels off and learn how to live as mature children of God.

Spirit-led Healing

I was asked by a friend whether we should always wait for the Holy Spirit to show us who He wants to heal before praying with a stranger. This is one of the most common questions people have about healing.

Being led by the Holy Spirit is always our goal, and we need to cooperate with Him in every healing or deliverance encounter. 

While it's true that He will sometimes highlight certain people for healing that we are not aware of, it is not necessary to always wait for Him to highlight people for healing. The question of whether we should wait for Him to show us certain individuals arises when we are uncertain about whether it is God's will to heal all people or only certain ones.

It is difficult to pray with faith when we are uncertain about God's will for healing. We can know with certainty His will toward healing by looking at the New Testament. The gospels give us a clear understanding of the Father's will through the ministry of Jesus who healed multitudes of people of every kind of disease and demonic oppression:

"When evening had come, they brought to Him many who were demon-possessed. And He cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all who were sick." (Matthew 8:16)

Jesus never refused to heal anyone who came to him, in fact, it is likely that He spent entire days doing nothing but healing people until He was exhausted. The will of God for healing was further revealed when Jesus commissioned His disciples to heal the sick and cast out demons making no exceptions about who was to be healed:

"Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give." (Matthew 10:8)

We see the disciples doing this exact thing in the book of Acts after Jesus ascended into heaven:

“Also a multitude gathered from the surrounding cities to Jerusalem, bringing sick people and those who were tormented by unclean spirits, and they were all healed." (Acts 5:16)

The scriptures give no indication that there were any exceptions to healing in the ministry of Jesus or the disciples. If it is the will of God to heal all who are sick and demonized, then being Spirit-led is not an issue of who can be healed, but how they should be healed.

Looking at the model Jesus gave us, we see that with one person, He told them to arise and walk. For another it was a touch that healed their blindness. For someone else it was a little mud in their eye and with another, He told their friend to go home because they were already healed. Jesus used different methods for healing each person based on what the will of the Father was for their unique situation. This is what He meant when He said, "The son only does what He sees the Father doing." (John 5:19)

Being led by the Spirit has to do with the particular method God wants us to use to heal each person. Sometimes it will be a touch, sometimes a command, sometimes we'll ask them to get up from their wheelchair and attempt to walk. Just as Jesus was led to do certain things to release a miracle, we must learn to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in how He wants us to bring healing to each person we encounter.

Power, Love & Truth - Steve Harmon

My guest blogger today is Steve Harmon

Two years ago I met a Satanist on Haight/Ashbury in San Francisco where the start of the hippy movement began. God taught me a lot in that experience about how people get set free. It basically works with three components, and it was these three components that Jesus used in His ministry.

So this guy asked me for a cigarette and I told him I don't smoke. I began a conversation with him. He told me he was an Iraq war vet, in the marines. He's homeless and apart of the "Occupy Oakland" movement. We talked for about 20 minutes then he told me that he had a torn rotator cuff that needs surgery. I asked him if I could pray for it to make it well. He said, "No, no...I'm a Satanist bro". He proceeded to tell me all of his beliefs about God and the world. I just listened to him. I then said, "I'm not like other Christians you've met. I love people and I see value in you. There's love in you. There's a big heart that has been covered and people don't see it, but I see it."

He then told me that he has two daughters living in Oakland and that last week he celebrated his 12 year old daughter's birthday. He gave her a birthday cake which was "hash brownies" (Marijuana laced brownies). She got so excited and was jumping up and down saying  "You're the best dad in the whole world!", and he said he started crying when she said that. I actually started crying myself just because the situation was so messed up, but in that, his daughter showed him a form of love and it moved him so much. Up to this point, I just wanted to hold this big guy because he was starving for love.

He told me that he nearly beat a man to death for raping his daughter's friend. He served 5 years in prison for it. He was pouring out his life to me. I asked him again if I could pray for his shoulder and at this point, he felt more comfortable with me and he said, "Sure". So I laid my hands on his shoulder under the signal light on the corner and started to command the infirmity to leave. I prophesied as well, then I told him to check out his shoulder. When he moved it, the pain started leaving. I prayed again and it was completely gone. He was swinging his arm and couldn't get it to hurt. He was shocked because he also had been a shaman and he would heal people, but could never be healed himself.

From this point, I just laid into him the good news of Jesus in a way he had never heard. He was no longer objecting to it. I told him "God has a plan for your life." He started crying  because his mom used to tell him that when he was once a pastor! His mom told him recently that all the seeds he sowed into people's lives, (ten or fifteen of them) had gotten off drugs and were walking with God now. He cried telling me all that and said, "Now look at me. I'm homeless and an alcoholic?"

I told Him, "The Lord is still saying 'yes' to you," then I asked if I could pray the Holy Spirit on him. He said "yes".

I told him, "When I touch you, you're gonna feel something that cannot be compared to any other drug you've had." I put my hands on him and prayed for fire and love. His eyes were closed and tears were coming down his face.

After I was done, he opened his eyes and said, "That was intense!" We talked more and I just kept pouring the love of God into him. After I was done, God told me to tell him that tonight Jesus was going to visit him in a dream. He said, "Okay!" He told me that 16 years ago was the last time he felt God. I told him "16 years from that day God came and touched you again because He loves you".

On the corner where rebellion against the establishment was birthed in the 60's, God showed up in love and in power to tell a prodigal son to come home.

I didn't engage with him and argue all of his outlandish ideas about Jesus and the Father. I ignored it, changed the subject, and told him about the love that I saw in his heart. I kept hitting that point until he finally softened. He was changed from a hardened Satanist into a sensitive puppy dog. Here's how it worked:

Love brings down the walls. Power brings validity to truth. Truth sets the person free. When I first met the guy and he found out I was a Christian, he immediately put up a wall to me. My goal was to get the truth into him, but I couldn't because of that wall. So what did I need?

Love.

Love brings down the walls. It makes the person realize you're not a threat. Once the wall was down, he let me in and then I could display God's power through the healing. Once the power was shown to him, when I spoke truth, he was more open to believe it because the miracle testified of the truth. Many people have walls up and it's because they've been hurt. Trying to display God's power and speaking truth to them can be difficult. Love should be the thing that begins every encounter.

For some people, you'll have to display love to them for a very long time before you'll have a chance to display God's power or speak truth to them. This is because their walls won't come down easily and until the wall is down and they feel safe with you—there's no way they will receive the truth. At the same time, you can't only work in love and expect that everyone will change. Mother Teresa did a lot of loving throughout her life and yet thousands died in her loving arms, scared, depressed and fearful. When love and truth is shown without the power, you can have a person who believes in the existence of a supernatural God, but they have very shallow faith that is shaky and can waver.

The moral of the story is: you need all three.