Jonathan Brenneman's Blog, page 16

God’s Invisible Spirit

[image error]I’ve experienced such a wonderful awareness of God’s presence in the last few months that I have no words to describe it. I’ve often found myself weeping because I’m so aware of God’s love and I feel it like a river flowing out of me. At one point a few weeks ago (while I was still visiting the United States) this awareness of God’s love grew so great that left me weeping and wailing loudly at the end of the church meeting, then I felt such a holy awe that I just stayed there for a while after and didn’t want to speak. Words cannot express such glory.

Maybe others wondered why I was wailing so loudly, but there was no guilt or condemnation in it. I had just taken communion before and it was so wonderful to take communion and know that there was nothing weighing on my conscience, only unbroken fellowship with God and unspeakable joy. Sometimes we don’t fully understand how we are responding to God’s presence, or why we are laughing or crying, but we know it’s Him.

Sometimes I try to communicate the glory I know by sharing testimonies of healing, and the healing and miracles all come out of fellowship with God. Scriptural truths can lead a person into this awareness of God’s glory and love, and today I’m sharing one such truth that the Holy Spirit has recently been highlighting to me. If you know me well you’ll recognize that it’s a different angle on something I talk about often.

God Is Invisible But He Is Seen In A Body

This phrase keeps going through my thoughts, as if God is highlighting it to me. “God is Spirit! God is Spirit!”

John 4:23-24 (NIV) Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

Jesus was talking with the woman at the well. She was talking about natural things, like where is the proper place to worship God. Jesus told her that God is Spirit and the worship he seeks is in Spirit and in truth.

God is invisible because he is a Spirit, but the nature of a spirit is manifest in a body.

John 1:18 (NIV) No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.

Colossians 1:15 (NIV) The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.

Jesus, as the first sinless man since the fall of Adam, revealed the nature of the invisible God. The personality of the invisible Spirit of God became manifest through a body. We saw that God is totally good! He is pure light, and there is no darkness in Him! There is no sickness in Him! There is no evil in Him! His nature is pure love and a fierce compassion constantly moves His heart.

You Can’t See God’s Kingdom Unless You Are Born Of The Spirit

John 3:1-10 (NIV) Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.” Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.

“How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”

Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

 “How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.

 “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things?

Too many Christians try to see God in the same way that people who aren’t even born again get their picture of God. They evaluate God’s goodness through their experiences, including their disappointments.

Parents have compassion for their sick children and yet feel as if God’s compassion is less. God’s goodness is a doctrine that we hold to fiercely, but many get such a twisted and disappointing perception of what “God’s goodness” looks like that the resulting conception of God’s nature has little power to produce any joy. In fact, it leaves us depressed!

I can’t tell you how many atheists I’ve heard argue “God can’t be real, because if He was real and if He was good he wouldn’t have allowed such-and-such a thing to happen to me.” Many who make this argument once considered themselves Christians, but decided that they no longer believed in God after a painful experience.

In the passage above Jesus talks about being able to see God’s kingdom and understand heavenly things. The working of God’s kingdom and the nature of heavenly things can only be understood by the Spirit. When I share the gospel I speak of what I know and what I experience. I know the life of God flowing through me, and I know it’s because Jesus died for me, carrying my sin and sickness on himself to set me free. I know it’s because He rose again so I could have new life. These things are mysteries and they can only be fully understood with the spirit. I can’t fully explain with words how the gospel works, but I can proclaim its truth and I know it does work.

Jesus said that nobody can even see God’s kingdom unless he is born again. If people who haven’t been born again of God’s Spirit can’t see God’s kingdom, we who have been born of God’s spirit certainly should not be trying to see God through the things that atheists or unbelievers look at. An atheist looks at earthly things and concludes that God doesn’t exist. Too many religious people look at those same earthly things and try to rationalize God’s goodness to fit into those things, but the truth is that God is a Spirit and he can’t be seen through earthly things.

God Wants To Be Seen Through You!

1 John 4:12 (NIV) No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

Nobody has ever seen God, but those who have been born of the Spirit can see Him, not through earthly things but because they have received God’s spirit. God’s nature is love. When we give ourselves over to this Spirit whose nature is love, the nature of God’s invisible Spirit is manifest through us.

God’s spirit found a body in Christ so God’s nature could be revealed. Christ ascended and scripture says we are the body of Christ. God’s invisible Spirit now dwells in the body of every person who belongs to Christ, because God purposes to reveal the nature of that Spirit through our bodies. The nature and personality of God’s invisible Spirit become visible through our communion with that Spirit.

Next week we’ll go on to talk more about communing with God’s Spirit.

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You And Your Family Shall Be Saved Part 3-God Softens Hard Hearts

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Grandma and Grandpa

Today we finish the series on the Holy Spirit’s work in my mom’s family. Part 1 was the story of how my grandparents became hard-hearted because of the religious hypocrisy they encountered. Part 2 includes how my mom gave her life to Jesus and my grandmother and many uncles also turned to Christ. Again, I’m writing in the first person, as my mom speaking. As mom is telling the story to me, she calls her mother “Grandma,” her father “Grandpa” and my dad “Pop.”

Getting Connected

We had stopped going to church, but Burt started going to the Lutheran church again after the crusade. I, Grandma, Noel, Danny, and Art followed.

Burt was also going to a Saturday night meeting called “Maranatha Cave.” It was full of young people speaking in tongues, raising their hands in worship, and filled with the Holy Spirit. When I visited a man prayed for me. He looked like an angel glowing, and my body shook all over.

Grandma was baptized in the Holy Spirit in the ’70s at a Catholic Charismatic prayer group. She soon started attending Advent Christian Church, which broke away from its denomination over the baptism in the Holy Spirit. She soon persuaded Grandpa to go with her. He liked it and said it reminded him of his mother’s church.

Are Tongues From The Devil?

I was soon attending both the Lutheran church and the Saturday night Maranatha cave meetings. I was also involved in a Lutheran organization called “Ongoing Ambassadors For Christ.” We sang in nursing homes and went door-to-door witnessing.

I asked for prayer to be baptized in the Holy Spirit at the Maranatha Cave, but there were no manifestations. They taught me to receive it by faith, regardless of manifestations.

When the Lutheran pastor heard I was going to Maranatha Cave, he was concerned and looked worried. He asked “Is this Charismatic? Do they speak in tongues? Please, stay away from this. I’ve seen churches split over this, and anything that makes churches split and causes so much division can’t be from God. I’m really concerned about you.” 

His concern was genuine and loving, but I thought “Oh my! I hope he’s not sinning against the Holy Spirit!” His words confused me and I wasn’t sure what to think.

The next week I went on a youth retreat with the Maranatha Cave. They gave an invitation to receive prayer and said “Some people here have prayed for the baptism of the Holy Spirit but haven’t received tongues.” Then a girl named Karen Brown stood up and said “The Lord is saying: someone here has been told that the Baptism in the Holy Spirit and tongues are from the devil, and you’re afraid to get prayed for. You need to know that the same Jesus who saved you is the Jesus who baptizes you with the Holy Spirit and gives you the gift of tongues. Don’t be afraid!”

She was speaking right to me! I went up to receive prayer and I received the gift of tongues. That same weekend I was water baptized in a cold mountain stream. The water was so cold that I was jumping when I came out. When people saw me on film they said “Look! She’s full of the Holy Spirit!” Maybe they were joking, but the truth was that I was really cold.

My brother Danny also gave his life to Christ. I think it may have been when he was in a Christian school. Burt used to talk to Paul about Jesus, but Paul said “Burt, you always have your fling. This is just another passing trend.” Burt’s Jesus “fling” never did pass, and Paul eventually ended up turning to Christ.

“God, If You Really Want To Thrill Me…”

Grandma continued to drag Grandpa along to church. He knew how to go through the motions, but his heart was hard. He continued to struggle in secret with alcoholism. Grandpa was so cynical and critical towards Christianity that it seemed impossible he would ever give his life to Jesus. Yet I prayed “God if you ever want to thrill me, let me see my father give his life to you.” 

On New Years Eve of 1981, in my sophomore year while I was dating pop, Grandpa asked me “Are you going to church tonight?” 

“Yes.”

“Good girl.” 

I thought “This is new! What happened?”

Grandpa wanted the whole family to go to church that night. At the end of the service, the speaker asked “Does anybody have something to share? A testimony?” Grandpa raised his hand.

I couldn’t believe it! Grandpa was very shy, and he stuttered and mumbled when he spoke. It was unusual for him to speak in public.

The speaker was wearing thick coke-bottle glasses and he was looking around but didn’t notice my dad’s hand in the back. I prayed “God, please let him see my dad’s hand.” He saw it immediately and said “Paul Clocksin, you have something to share?”

Grandpa stood up and said “I just want to make a public confession that I’ve recommitted my life to Christ.” 

I was shocked! I said to Pop “Pinch me! Is this real?” Then I remembered how I’d prayed “God if you ever want to thrill me, let me see my father give his life to you.” 

I hadn’t known that Grandpa ever gave his life to the Lord before that. It was only later that I learned how my father had asked God to save him at a young age but later became embittered against the church.

Grandpa immediately stopped smoking cigars and drinking when he rededicated his life to Christ.

 Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed the testimonies of salvation in this three part series. If you have unsaved family members or friends whose hearts have been hardened against God, may these testimonies encourage your faith. Do it again, God!

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You And Your Family Shall Be Saved Part 2-Jesus People!

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My mom with some of her brothers

Last week we started the story of redemption on my mom’s side of the family. I shared how my grandparents gave their lives to Christ when they were young, but their hearts became hard when they saw the hypocrisy of many Christians around them. We left off in 1945, the year of my Grandparents’ wedding. Today we continue, jumping forward to the early ’60s. I’m writing in the first person as my mom speaking. She calls her parent’s “Grandma” and “Grandpa” when she tells us about them.

Scripture says that there’s a “veil” that covers the minds of unbelievers to keep them from seeing Christ. It’s interesting hearing my mom’s experience of how that veil was removed because it reminds me so much of my experience when it felt like heaven opened over me and joy and peace descended on me.

The Lutheran Church

Grandma rededicated her life to the Lord in the early ’60s, not long before Pugly Bear died on New Year’s Eve, 1963. She told me that if she hadn’t turned to Christ, she would have never been able to handle his death. (Pugly Bear was my mom’s younger brother who died in a tragic accident as a toddler.)

Grandma felt bad that Pugly Bear died without having been baptized, so she took all us kids to the Lutheran church to be baptized.

Grandpa dropped us kids off with Grandma at the church and then he picked us up after. Grandma tried to get him to stay, but the pastor’s jokes about drunks really turned him off. Alcoholism was a secret struggle and a point of pain for Grandpa.

Grandma bought a set of Bible story books from a traveling salesman when I was 5 or 6 years old, so I started reading the Bible and Bible stories at a young age.

Leighton Ford And The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association

Grandma and Grandpa listened to Billy Graham and George Beverly Shea on the radio every Sunday night. Grandpa loved hearing George Beverly Shea sing. The Shea’s were family friends. Grandpa had gone to school with some of George’s younger brothers, and George’s parents gave Grandma and Grandpa linoleum for their kitchen as a wedding present. Grandpa was really cynical about church, but he liked Billy Graham. He also watched “This Is The Life,” a TV program by the Lutheran Layman’s League. It featured dramatized stories of struggling people turning to Christ.

My brother Burt was a big bully. He used to imitate Billy Graham’s voice. I was never sure if he was mocking Billy or just trying to be funny. However, books such as “The Power Of Positive Thinking” by Norman Vincent Peale sparked his interest in Christianity. He soon gave his life to Christ.

Leighton Ford, an associate minister with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, preached in Rochester in 1972. I was 12 years old. I went with my brothers Burt, Art, and Noel. I went down with Art and Noel when they gave the call to come for salvation. To us it was the “thing you’re supposed to do.” I think Burt had already given his life to Christ before the crusade, but I’m not sure.

The crusade worker prayed with me and gave me a “decision card” that I could sign and date. I prayed but I didn’t sign it, because grandma had always told me “Never sign something unless you’re sure, and be careful to read the fine print.” I knew the Bible stories. I prayed and read the Bible, but I also thought “How do I know there’s really a God? Prove it. How do I know that Islam isn’t the right religion, or Hare Krishna, or that the world evolved and there is no Creator?” It was the time of the hippie movement, and these questions were becoming common in that era.

After Burt gave his life to Christ he would throw his fists up in the air and shout “Joy! I’ve got joy!” He and Art were always giving out gospel tracts and had loads of Jesus paraphernalia like Christian button pins.

God Is Real!

Later that summer I was in the side yard with a neighbor, trying to hit a ball. I felt so frustrated because I was missing every time. Then someone came up and said there was a phone call for me. I thought “For me? Who could it be? I never get phone calls.”

It was the counselor from the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. She asked how I was doing, talked a little, and then prayed a blessing over me.

I went outside and something had changed. Everything was different. It seemed like the sun was brighter and the grass was greener. I hit the ball every time.

When I left to eat I thought “Your real, God! I can feel you. Now i know.”

“Don’t Put It Off!”

A year later I decided to scrape all the wallpaper in my bedroom and paint the room. I was listening to Kathryn Kuhlman on the radio. She was a little eccentric and she started “This is Kathryn Kuuuulman…and have you been waiting for me?”

As Kathryn talked about salvation she said “Don’t put it off! Don’t put it off ’till tomorrow! Tomorrow may be too late…” I thought “Yes. Why put it off? Why should I wait to commit my life to Jesus?” I got down off the ladder and opened my Bible to Psalm 40:1-2 “I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand.” I prayed, got the old decision card out of my dresser, and signed and dated it “July 11th, 1973.” It was my father’s birthday.

To be  continued…

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You And Your Family Shall Be Saved Part 1-Turned Off By Religious Hypocrisy

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                            Grandma And Grandpa When They Were Young

Since I was little my parents have shared stories of the Holy Spirit’s work in their lives and families. I’m visiting them right now, so I took advantage of the opportunity to interview my mom and hear again the story of how she, her parents, and her brothers dedicated their lives to Christ.

My mom wasn’t quite sure of some details but she shared as accurately as she could remember. This first part of the story starts with how my grandparents dedicated their lives to Christ at a young age but then got turned off by religious hypocrisy. In part two I’ll share how my mom and several other family members were saved, and in part three how my grandfather rededicated his life to Jesus.

Grandma Girdy

My grandfather’s mother, great-grandma Girdy, was a missionary in Africa as a single woman. She spoke at least four languages and was the first female to be ordained as a Wesleyan minister. She returned to the US with an African child whom she had adopted. The gossip quickly spread that the child was hers biologically, born out of wedlock.

The Wesleyan church then sent her to a small town in Montana that had more bars than churches. She planted a church and even got up on the roof to nail on the shingles when they built a place of worship. There that she met and married a cowboy, Ellis Clocksin. He became my great-grandfather when my grandpa was born in 1923.

Ellis was studying to become a minister as well, but he caught pneumonia and died when my Grandpa Paul was three years old. As a child Grandpa went from one family to another. At the time he felt this was because nobody like him, but he later realized that it was because nobody could afford to take care of him but everybody shared the burden after his father’s death. The great depression was soon upon them. Many people were going hungry. Mother’s made a “sugar tit” by wrapping a little bit of sugar in a cloth for their babies to suck on to stop their crying from hunger.

Grandpa started his career as an electrician at the age of 12, when he wired his first barn. By the time he was 14 he knew how to wire a house.

Beat Up In Jail On The Way To New York

The Depression and extreme poverty soon forced great-grandma Girdy to move to western New York State with Grandpa’s two older sisters. She got a job at a Christian college. The plan was for them to move first and then Grandpa would come after them. Grandpa was 14.

Grandpa followed, hitchhiking from Montana to New York. One night he sought shelter by asking a jailor if he could stay the night in an empty cell.

The jailor helped him out, but when his shift changed he forgot to mention the hitchhiking boy to the next person. A drunk got thrown into the same cell with him and started beating him up. Grandpa cried for help but the jailor didn’t realize he was only a guest and wouldn’t let him go.

Meanwhile, great-grandma Girdy in New York felt that something was wrong. She told Grandpa’s sister Marjory “You go to bed. I’m praying for your brud.” (Brother) She prayed all night, not realizing that Grandpa was getting beat up in a jail cell that very night.

Grandpa prayed in desperation “God, if you get me out of this, I’ll give you my life.” When the other jailor returned he explained the situation. Grandpa was finally released and soon made it to New York.

In New York

Grandpa began attending school at the junior College. He was dirt poor, and the Christian kids made fun of his clothes.

This school had an “18-inch rule.” There had to be 18 inches between boys and girls at all times. They had a measuring stick to enforce compliance. Holding hands was certainly a no-no!

Great-grandma Girdy discovered that another staff member was having an adulterous affair and she reported it. Instead of disciplining the staff member who was out of order, they demoted great-grandma Girdy to working in the laundry room, where she was blinded in one eye by lye. She was an ordained minister, but the had the student’s preach and limited her to doing laundry.

My Grandmother (Bonnie) was from a rich family in Upstate New York. She was attending the college and renting a room from Grandpa’s mom. Grandma had given her life to Christ when she was eight years old at a Baptist church. However, the hypocrisy and double standard at the Christian college wounded her faith. Grandpa was also hurt by his experience with Christians in New York, and a deep root of bitterness formed.

When he got out of school Grandpa started working an electrician job in Poughkeepsie, NY, and then went on to New York City. The letters my mom read show that Grandpa’s mother and sisters were really worried about him when it was in NYC, and seem to imply that he got in with the wrong crowd and started drinking when he was there. Grandpa was a closet alcoholic for many years.

When he returned from New York City Grandpa Paul and Grandma Bonnie started going together and were married in the living room two days before Christmas in 1945. Their first son was born soon after.

Grandma’s parents were big-hearted people who were always helping others, and they welcomed their new son-in-law. Grandpa had lacked a solid father figure for so long, so I’m sure it did him a lot of good when his father in law took him under his wing.

To be continued…

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What Kind Of Love

[image error]I’ve been really busy for the last few weeks, visiting my family in Pennsylvania, doing construction work, and speaking to various groups. I miss my wife and daughter so much and I look forward to returning home to Brazil. Yet I’ve also really enjoyed meeting so many friends in the US, some of whom I’d only known through Facebook until now.

In the little time to relax that I’ve had, I’ve been doing some reading. Right now I’m enjoying Mountains of Spices by Hannah Hurnard, the sequel to the classic Hind’s Feet On High Places.” I also read some of my mom’s poetry and I asked her if she’d like to share this piece today.

Scripture says “Keep yourself in God’s love.” This admonition doesn’t imply that God ever stops loving us, or that God only loves us when we behave well. Rather, it reminds us to keep ourselves in a constant awareness of God’s love. Receiving God’s love for us produces the fruit of God’s love flowing through us. We love because God first loved us. This poem is a great reminder of God’s steadfast love, faithfulness, and patience.

What Kind Of Love (By Arnolda Brenneman)

What kind of love is this?

That He gives us His name …

To heal the sick,

Comfort the troubled,

Give hope to the hopeless,

And we use it as a curse word.

That He calls us but we don’t listen;

He draws us but we resist Him;

That He tells us the truth,

Yet we don’t believe it;

And opens wide His arms,

But we don’t come.

That He created the universe,

But we don’t give Him credit

For His own art; saying

That it randomly evolved.

Yet He esteems us, telling

Us we are worth His while.

We fail Him again and again,

But He doesn’t give up on us;

We grieve His heart but

He continues to forgive us.

We don’t give Him the time of day,

While He patiently waits for us.

Though we be stricken

With our own wrongs,

He does not condemn us;

And though we may reject Him,

He does not reject us;

Nor does His heart grow cold.

Though we are faithless,

He stays committed to us.

Though stuck in our sin,

And or lost in our way;

He’s there for us night and day

And His love does not grow dim. …

Oh my, what kind of love is this?

Arnolda Brenneman © 2014

If you liked this post, you may also enjoy the poem In My Garden.

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I’m One With Him Who Made The Blind To See

Fellowship And Unity With Christ

I was recently listening to a Jesus Culture song called “God of miracles.” The lyrics start “The One who made the blind to see, is moving here in front of me.” However, the words that kept going through my head after listening to it were “I’m one with Him who made the blind to see…” The Holy Spirit was highlighting this truth to me, and I felt power flowing through me as I thought about this truth.

1 Corinthians 6:17 (NIV) But whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit.

The Corinthians had a lot of issues with immorality in the church. Yet notice how Paul emphasized that they were “sanctified in Christ Jesus.” If you ever get a chance, look up the word “in Christ” and read every instance of this phrase in the Bible. God has called us to walk in Christ and to experience unity with God through fellowship with Christ. It’s only the free gift of righteousness that enables us to walk in fellowship with Christ and thus bear the fruit of righteousness.

1 Cor. 1:2 (NRSV) To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours:

1 Cor. 1:9 (NIV) God is faithful, who has called you into fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord

One With Christ The Healer

 

As the thought continued to run through my mind “I’m one with Him who made the blind to see…” I met a guy with a brace on his back. I thought he must have a hernia, but he said it was back pain. Since I am in fellowship with Christ I love what He loves. Since I’m one with Him I do what he does. I laid my hands on the guy and spoke life. I only felt slight current of power flowing physically, but in my heart I knew what was happeing. The beauty of Jesus and his compassion overwhelmed my soul. Thank you God for making me one with Christ the healer!

Within a short time, all the pain was gone!

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Stuart Morrison’s Story

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I really enjoyed interviewing Shawn Hurley and sharing his story three weeks ago, so I decided to share another story today. Stuart Morrison is a friend from South Africa. He always has fresh reports of what God is doing, including people healed of HIV, mental illness, cancer, and a whole host of other issues. God set him free from guilt and condemnation and brought him into joy unspeakable and full of glory! May his story encourage you!

Stuart, Tell Us About How Jesus Set You Free

I grew up in a Christian family. We went to church three times a week. I was born again when I was twelve years old. It was a genuine experience, but to me, Christianity was about not sinning. From the age of 12 to 27 I tried to live a moral life, jumping through all the hoops. However, I had no peace, joy, confidence in Christ, or genuine relationship with God. Yes I prayed, but I felt like God was far away.

By the time I was 27 I was suicidal, taking medication for severe depression. I’d become Bulemic and I was so paranoid that I couldn’t walk to the car by myself because I was afraid someone would kill me. I had pain from head to toe and for about two years spent most of my spare time sleeping. I had lost all my desire to live and was just trying to make it to the end of each day so I could go back to sleep. I’d been out of church for five years and I was reading about other religions like Buddhism because I didn’t see Jesus as the as the answer to my situation and thought there must be something else.

The reason I didn’t see Jesus as the answer was because what I knew of Christianity hadn’t worked for me. Finally, I cried out “God, if you are real, I need you now!”

In that moment I heard God say “Stuart I love you.” I couldn’t believe it! I felt an incredible, tangible love overwhelm me. I was ashamed of myself, embarrassed, and had no theology for such an experience. All of the symptoms, including bulimia, panic attacks, and physical pain, fell off. I physically felt them lift off of me and the darkness left me.

I went back to church again but I started to feel like the love and joy I’d felt was coming and going now. I was back on a spiritual roller coaster of peaks and valleys.

The biggest breakthrough after that was when I realized I was free from the law. I’d became disturbed and unstable when I went back to church because they were preaching the law.

I started listening to Joseph Prince in 2006 and 2007, and then Rob Rufus in 2009. I came to understand the free gift of righteousness by faith and that God had made me perfect, holy, and blameless in His sight. These truths produced an unexplainable ecstasy and bliss, and I’ve experienced that joy and peace every single day of my life since then! Sometimes I feel like I’m going to disappear!

How Did You Start Ministering Healing To People?

When I realized I was free from the law and righteous, I realized God talks all the time! Before then guilt and condemnation had hindered my fellowship with the Father because I was ashamed. Now, I felt led to pray for people. I didn’t even know it was healing or believe in healing.

I was praying for six months and people started saying “You prayed for me and I was healed. I had back pain and now it’s gone.” I didn’t even believe it!

People convinced me I had a “spiritual gift.” I started reading Smith Wigglesworth’s sermons and trying to learn more about healing. Sometimes I got really radical results and saw great miracles, and then I was frustrated because I couldn’t even get a headache healed. That wasn’t very consistent! As I prayed about this God said to study what Jesus did at the cross.

I found Curry Blake’s Divine Healing Technician (DHT) training and that laid a really good foundation for healing ministry and understanding what Jesus did to redeem our bodies. I had started to get into studying “spiritual gifts”, “special anointings,” “mantles,” “generational curses,” “spiritual roots of diseases” and other such things on my quest to be a more effective healing minister, but something didn’t sit right. I thought I was going mad as if I was the only person who didn’t believe these things, and I lost opportunities to speak. Then in 2009 I started listening to Dan Mohler and Andrew Wommack and I realized there were other people teaching a simple gospel! I started getting a lot more consistent results when I stopped making things complicated.

I believe the main reason for powerlessness in the church is Old Covenant mindsets. Miracles are popular, but when I started preaching that we are free from the law there was a whole new level of opposition and many doors closed for me. Today I’m sharing in churches every week where they are open to the New Covenant. God has also opened up doors for me in other nations and I am loving this incredible opportunity to share the GOOD NEWS with different people.

What Can We Learn From Stuart’s Story?

Here are my thoughts on some of the main lessons in Stuart’s story.

God loves you! Stuart’s story has something in common with Shawn Hurley’s story that we shared last week, with my story, and with many others. We had a powerful and tangible experience with God’s love! God’s love is what transforms you. 1 John 4:10 (NRSV) says  “In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.”

 

Receive the free gift of righteousness! If we try to establish our own righteousness by jumping through the hoops and always trying to be good enough, we will live in guilt and condemnation. Guilt and condemnation are deadly and they certainly don’t make you more like Jesus! God’s free gift of righteousness means we are righteous because of what Jesus has done, before we’ve “gotten our lives straight.” We just have to say “God, I want your righteousness. I want to be right. Thank you that Jesus carried my sin so I could be righteous.” Then we receive it by faith.Living in God’s righteousness puts us in constant fellowship with God, and that is what transforms us. Stuart didn’t realize how much God was speaking until he knew he could approach God unashamed because Jesus had made him perfect, holy, blameless, and righteous. You must receive the free gift of righteousness if you are going to exercise dominion in life! (Romans 5:17)

 

The gospel is simple. Doing the works of Jesus should be as simple for us as it was for Jesus.  The Bible says everyone who so much as touched Jesus was healed. Of all those thousands of people, there was nobody who Jesus laid his hands on and then said “It isn’t working this time. I think you may have some unforgiveness or a generational curse that might be blocking this healing.”In our conversation after the interview Stuart said “I think a lot of us,  when we get started ministering healing, try to learn a lot of stuff so we can be more effective. But as we grow we learn that those things actually distract us from the gospel. There’s no formula. It’s all about fellowship with God and growing in knowing him.”

I can totally relate to this statement! When I first started ministering healing I read as many books as I could, learned about potential “blocks” to healing, and learned the “spiritual roots” of many specific diseases. When I stopped all the complicated stuff in healing the sick, I started seeing twice the results and being a lot more consistent. If you’re not seeing the results you want, the answer is growing in the knowledge of Jesus (2 Peter 3:18) and in faith, manifesting God’s glory to a greater degree, not learning some new spiritual secret to help you get a breakthrough. If everyone who touched Jesus was healed, when we grow up in all things into the full measure of the stature of Christ (Eph. 4:11-15), filled with the fullness of God (Eph. 3:18-19), everyone who so much as touches us will be healed! We have room to grow, so let’s grow!

Thanks for reading again guys!

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What To Do When You Minister Healing The First Time And It “Doesn’t Work”

[image error]I recently prayed for a friend who was in pain and facing surgery. I’d prayed for her several times before. Sometimes when you’ve ministered to someone before and they are still having trouble it can feel discouraging. The person you minister to often feels discouraged as well. Today I’d like to share my experience with those situations to encourage other’s who have ministered healing so someone and the person was still dealing with pain or problems after you’ve ministered.

Don’t Let It Stress You, Keep Encouraging People, And Keep Going!

I’ve ministered to many people multiple times who didn’t feel anything the first few times I prayed. Yet I continued to be cheerful and ask if I could pray for them again.

Sometimes they said things like “You know, I had a surgery and there’s a metal rod in my leg.” Or “You know, I don’t have any cartilage in that joint…” I just responded by saying “Oh, that’s no problem. God heals that all the time. It’s not hard for Him.” Or I told them a few testimonies of things that happened recently and said “I’m not giving up! There’s always more happening. I’m growing in Christ and in manifesting His glory to a greater degree.”

So many of those people ended up getting healed. In most cases, I didn’t do anything different. I just did the same thing again. “In Jesus’ name, be whole, restored, free from pain now. I release God’s peace and glory in your body.”

When you minister healing a lot sometimes you start to feel like “this person is easy to get healed” or “that person is a really hard cookie!” Don’t let your mind play tricks on you, and don’t fall into that trap! As soon as we start thinking like that, we get our focus off of Jesus.

When I started ministering healing I sometimes thought “That person I ministered to had so much unbelief. That’s why it was hard to get them healed…” Then I realized that Jesus never told anybody that he couldn’t heal them because of their unbelief.  Everyone who touched him was healed.

I used to share testimonies and encourage people to try to get them to have faith so they could be healed. Now when I encourage people, I’m not really focusing on if I can get them to believe or not. I’m just releasing God’s life with my words. I tell people “You don’t have to try to believe or do anything when I pray for you.” When I tell someone “Don’t worry. This is no problem for God…” they may or may not believe it, but what matters is that I believe it and I’m speaking it.

When someone didn’t feel any improvement the first time, or the first few times I ministered, I used to think there might be some “hindrance” to healing that I needed to uncover or some magical new method that would get the breakthrough for that condition. I read and studied everything I could. But it soon became clear that wasn’t the answer. I couldn’t imagine Jesus touching someone, praying really hard, and then saying “Hmm, it still hurts? Are you sure you don’t have any unforgiveness against anybody in your past that might be blocking your healing?” 

Now, looking back, I can’t even count how many people didn’t feel much different after the first few times I ministered to them but they finally ended up getting healed and experiencing a supernatural touch from God. I’d been sharing testimonies and prayed for certain people several times over the course of a year or more before they got free from pain.

Guess how they got healed? In almost all of the cases, I didn’t minister to them much differently than I had the first time. I didn’t discover a “hidden key” to their healing.  I kept persevering, rejoicing in the Lord, sharing testimonies, and ministering to people.

Some of the best advice I can give you when you’ve ministered a few times and not seen the results you want is “Don’t let it stress you!” Don’t try to figure it all out, and don’t put the responsibility on the person you were ministering to. Just keep releasing God’s life, rejoicing in the Lord, and persevering.

I know that can be hard with some situations that have more fear attached to them. How can you not be stressed by a life and death situation? That’s why we need to continue to be built up in Christ and strengthened in our innermost beings by the power of the Holy Spirit. We get so focused on what the Holy Spirit is doing that the things which used to stress us don’t stress us anymore.

As soon as we start analyzing every little thing and trying to “break the devil’s power,” we are out of a position of faith in God. Sometimes we make faith about overcoming a problem rather than about seeing and knowing Jesus, and when we do that we get out of a place of real faith.  Don’t let your focus turn to the problem.

When you take this attitude, you’ll experience a lot more people coming back later and telling you that they didn’t feel much when you ministered to them but from that moment on their problem went away. You’ll hear that they suddenly started to get stronger, or that even though they didn’t notice much difference at the moment, the pain was gone by the end of the day.

The Powerful Force Of God’s Goodness!

When you keep stepping out to minister healing and seeing more and more happen, you soon begin to feel a powerful force of God’s goodness surrounding you. Wonderful things are going to happen all around you, and it doesn’t matter what you haven’t seen happen yet. 

When I first started ministering healing, I felt really frustrated trying to get myself healed. But as I kept ministering to others, I soon started getting healed when I wasn’t even trying to. It was the force of God’s goodness around me as I continued to minister to people and rejoice in the Lord. God’s glory just started soaking into my body.

Some of you have read the story of how my sister’s eyes were instantly healed. I was sharing a testimony, not of a blind lady whose sight was totally restored, but a blind lady who had a slight improvement in vision, felt God’s power, yet was still legally blind after we ministered. What if I had gotten my mind wrapped up in “Why wasn’t she totally healed?” I wouldn’t have shared the testimony and my sister wouldn’t have been instantly healed from wearing glasses.

Once I ministered to a man with MS. I like to get other people to participate, so I asked his wife to lay hands on him with me as well. He didn’t feel different after we prayed for him. Yet his wife found that she was healed of a bum hip once she got up after ministering to him! We didn’t even pray for her! But God’s goodness soaked into her, and it was the first time in her life that she’d experienced God’s touch in such a way!

One person I like to follow on social media is John Mellor, because he is always posting wonderful testimonies of the amazing healings God is doing. You can follow him on Facebook here. He has even been featured on Australian national news. One thing I’ve noticed about many of his testimonies is that some of the people with serious conditions came to his meetings several times and had progressive improvement each time.  Others were healed of one thing once and of something else another time, or came several times and eventually had a supernatural experience with Jesus the healer. For example, Artyem was in a wheelchair because his head was bashed causing near paralysis. He said his dying wish was to go to one of John Mellor’s meetings, and he had to be carried up the steps. Artyem received prayer multiple times without much clear physical improvement. Yet when John hugged him as they were leaving, he stood up, walked down the stairs normally, and refused to use his wheelchair!

Be Encouraged!

If you’re ministering healing to others, may this encourage you to simply continue talking about what Jesus is doing and ministering to people. Don’t hesitate to minister to someone again even if they didn’t feel anything the first few times. Never blame the receiver for “not having faith,” don’t get stressed, and don’t complicate things. And of course, I never tell someone not to go to the doctor if they are having issues. We do ask people to get checked again by the doctor if they had a serious illness but no longer have any symptoms! We ask for nothing but we have everything to give.

If you’ve received ministry before and are still dealing with physical issues, may this encourage you as well! We’ve seen so many people who didn’t feel much difference after the first few times they received ministry, but they eventually got healed. God isn’t waiting to heal you! His very presence manifest is healing! It’s just that God has put his spirit in human bodies, and we as the “body of Christ” are learning to walk in and manifest His glory to an increasingly greater degree. God loves you, and you’re a great target for his goodness!

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Give Me A Break(room)

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Today we have a guest post from my friend Holly Cusato, who also blogs about supernatural ministry. I asked her if she’d like to a testimony on Go To Heaven Now. You might also want to check out her blog at the end for more encouraging stories!

Ministering In The Break Room

Each new day offers us “divine appointments” – opportunities to be used by God. It is not every day I rise to the occasion. A million small reasons can stop me in my tracks. I know that fear is Satan’s attempt to keep me from stepping out in faith and asking someone who needs healing if I can pray for them.

God put several “divine appointments” in my path at work recently to pray for “Beth,” who I could tell was in pain. There were several wasted opportunities before I worked up the courage to do anything about it. I’d politely inquire how she was doing – would hear about the pain but also about an upcoming doctor appointment. So I thought, “let the doctors do their job, no need to put myself out there.”

But I kept running into Beth at work, and the last doctor update – that perhaps surgery was the only way forward – sent me into action. So I asked Beth if I could pray for her in the middle of the breakroom at work. She quickly agreed and said she had been healed through prayer before but had lost her healing. My faith for helping bring healing to her body rose exponentially!

Beth was suffering from a twisted spine that caused one leg to be shorter than the other, creating back, shoulder and leg pain throughout. Simply mimicking a healing video I saw online, I asked her to sit in a chair and put out her legs. By putting my thumbs on her ankle bones, we could easily see her left leg was shorter than her right by half of an inch. In Jesus’ name I simply commanded her left leg to grow to be even with her right. We both watched in amazement as it actually happened. I commanded her body back into God’s perfect alignment until my thumbs were perfectly aligned and then saw the tears build in Beth’s eyes.

Next I asked Beth to stand and straighten her arms, and similarly placed my thumbs on her wrist joints to see the alignment and commanded her arms to come back into alignment in Jesus’ name. Once again, perfectly aligned, a tear escaped Beth’s eye and ran down her cheek.

She said her shoulder blades were still in pain so that’s where we targeted our prayers next until the pain left, and there was no more pain in Beth’s body. I had her walk around the breakroom – which she could easily and smoothly do after limping for months. She could move her arms and legs around without feeling any pain. We thanked Jesus in a mighty way, and then decided it was time to get back to work. Amen!

Is it really so simple? Yes. Find any healing story in the Bible (or done by a modern-day minister) and mimic it! What you will notice is that Jesus does not pray to His Father in Heaven when healing the sick – He speaks to the problem in front of Him. It was Curry Blake who I heard say it best: “Don’t speak to God about the problem, speak to the problem about God!”

The numerous healing stories in the Bible were not Jesus showing off his own power or relationship with God – rather each story was meant as an example, a guide for us to follow so we could do the same.

Since Jesus knows that His Father’s will is for the person standing in front of Him to be well, He only has to tell the sickness or disease attacking the person to leave to bring that person back into alignment with God’s will. I will repeat – it is always God’s will for you to be well. It is always God’s will for us to die of old age, peacefully in our beds.

What Christ accomplished on the cross gave me authority over sickness and disease, and it is my responsibility to bring the perfection of heaven into the realities of earth. Being a child of God – accepting Jesus as our savior and inviting the Holy Spirit to become one with our own spirit – gives us everything we need to stand against the enemy.

I stand on the promise that our words, when spoken in Jesus’ name, carry power, that we only have to “say to the mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.” (Matthew 17:20 NKJV)

If you are not yet convinced that you can bring healings to others, I offer the training that got me started – Curry Blake’s Divine Healing Technician Training®. When I first learned of this free resource, I absorbed all eighteen hours of video in a single weekend! By the end, Curry had me convinced I only had to mimic what I saw Jesus do, or mimic the healing videos I saw other ministers do on-line – and God would use me. And He did! Trust me – He will use you too!

About the Author

Holly Cusato lives in Dallas, Texas, and spends her days in the corporate world. After living most of her life as a Christian, it was only in the past few years she learned to serve as a minister of healing through the love and power of Jesus Christ. She shares her stories at My Simple, yet Supernatural Life so that you might realize you have it in you as well. Normal people are making miracles happen.

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Shawn Hurley’s Story

[image error]Guys, I’m so excited about today’s post! I just had a call with my friend Shawn Hurley and asked him to share his story with us. Shawn is a nurse living in New England, and he always has fresh testimonies to share of healing and of God touching people. His story illustrates several powerful truths and I’m sure it will encourage you!

“Shawn, How Did You Get Started Healing The Sick?”

I became a Christian in 1981, but I lived like hell for thirty years. I was addicted to drugs, women, and alcohol; drowning in guilt, shame, and condemnation.

After thirty years, I was in South Africa with a house church. Nobody knew the guilt and the sinful habits that were controlling my life. I spoke Christianese.

The Christians were talking about the girls who were coming back from working at the brothels. One of the Christians said, “The glory of God on those girls is incredible!”

I thought “Hookers? How could God’s glory be all over them?” 

Then God spoke to me. “It’s never been about you loving me, but about me loving you.” I thought “God, you love me?”

“I’ve never stopped!”

When I got home a woman called my wife and said “I just came out of prayer and God showed me that your husband has the gift of healing.”

She told me about John G. Lake, so I started reading some of John Lake’s sermons. Then I found Dan Mohler and Todd White on You Tube. Todd had a similar background as I did of struggling with addiction. I had been steeped in porn and had lust issues since I was six years old, but I didn’t want the lust and I wanted to get rid of it.

As Dan Mohler talked about God’s free gift of righteousness he said “God sees you as if you’ve never sinned. Believe God loves you, believe that you’re righteous because of what Jesus did.”

I thought “What?” It was so hard to accept this, but I started telling myself that I’m righteous and God loves me. It felt like I was lying to myself, but as I kept telling myself these things it started bringing God’s grace into my life.

I started praying for people for healing like Todd and Dan did. Nobody was getting healed at first. People were laughing, some even making sexual advances. (I wasn’t always in the best neighborhoods.) People weren’t getting healed but the fear of man was leaving and I was starting to love people. Then after about two months, a guy got healed when I ministered to him.

More people started to get healed. At the same time, I was still struggling on and off with porn, but God’s grace was working and flowing more and more in my life. I was at a house church and there was a woman whose back was hunched over, crooked. I commanded her bones to be straight. She suddenly convulsed, her back cracked, and she was straight as a board!

My brother in law was also diagnosed with colon cancer. I prayed, and the large tumor just disappeared! Those were just a few of the initial miracles, but there are so many I could go on and on!

“If You Could Say One Thing To Our Readers About God, What Would It Be?”

I’d say “Don’t judge God’s love based on your failure or equate God’s love with your ability to miss the mark.”

My (Jonathan’s)  Thoughts About Shawn’s Testimony

I love Shawn Hurley’s story because it is a great illustration of some of the core truths I’ve shared with you guys. By the way, Dan Mohler has also been a tremendous encouragement to me. I encourage you to check out Dan Mohler and Todd White on You Tube as well. I have just a few thoughts to summarize some of the lessons in Shawn Hurley’s story.

1) Shawn talked about God’s glory on the hookers and the fact that it was really about God loving him, not him loving God.

 Isaiah 6:3 (NRSV) “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.”

Romans 5:8 (NRSV)  But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.

1 John 4:10 (NRSV)  In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

2. We have to receive God’s righteousness as a free gift before we have changed our behavior, in order to bear the fruit of righteousness.

Even the idea of this offends many people. Check out Falling Out Of Sin And Into Righteousness for another story of a man set free from porn by receiving God’s free gift of righteousness. If you, like Shawn, have something you don’t want in your life, don’t withdraw from God. Keep going back to the Lord and receiving His love. Pray “God, I don’t want this in my life, and you know how frustrated I am with it, but I invite your grace to change me, work in my life, and do what I can’t do by myself.” Just start receiving God’s grace.

3. Receiving the free gift of righteousness, and not self-righteousness, enables us to exercise dominion in life.

One reason many Christians have lacked power is that they’ve tried to attain it through self-righteousness.

Romans 5:17 (NRSV)  If, because of the one man’s trespass, death exercised dominion through that one, much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness exercise dominion in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.

Galatians 3:5 (NRSV) Well then, does God supply you with the Spirit and work miracles among you by your doing the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard?

4. A lot of us were raised with the religious lies that we need to have perfect character before we can operate in God’s power, or even that exercising spiritual gifts makes us more vulnerable to falling into pride and sin.

I wrote my book The Power-And-Love Sandwich refuting this false dichotomy between God’s power and God’s nature. The truth is that walking in God’s power reveals God’s nature to us and gets us participating in God’s nature. This actually transforms us and draws us away from even having a desire for sin anymore. As the book Jesus Has Come In The Flesh explains, the healing ministry, in particular, is diametrically opposed to the spirit of pornography and lust. Seeing God heal people is the opposite of watching porn. It re-sensitizes you and re-wires your brain until lust loses its attractiveness. Don’t wait until you’ve got no more struggles to start healing the sick or exercising spiritual gifts. Start participating in God’s love now by learning to minister with God’s power, and let that love that’s flowing through you transform your character!

5. Don’t ever think “nothing is happening.”

We look not at what is seen, but at what is unseen. Focus on the love and life of God flowing out of your spirit. Shawn was praying for people for two months before he saw someone healed, but that doesn’t mean that nothing was happening! He was learning to exercise faith, getting free from the fear of man, and beginning to love more.Jesus said that rivers of living water would flow from the innermost being of the one who believed in him. Water is a powerful force. When there’s a big reservoir behind it, a little trickle of water quickly opens up a bigger and bigger way until it is gushing through. The life that God puts in us by his grace is a huge reservoir. Just start participating in God’s love and as you continue that little bit that’s coming through will open up a bigger way and remove blockages in your heart until it’s a raging river gushing out!

Contact Shawn

If you like reading testimonies, click here to follow Shawn on Facebook! You can also message him at +1 (USA country code if you’re outside the US) 413-271-0613 for healing ministry.

Thanks Shawn for being open and sharing your story with us. May your testimony bring freedom to many others! We bless what God is doing in and through your life. Keep going and may God’s love continue to possess you and flow through you!

 

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