Praying Medic's Blog, page 104

Podcast 029: Cindy Carpenter – How to Heal the Sick

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My guest today is my friend Cindy Carpenter, who teaches a school for divine healing.

Topics covered in this episode:

What does a life of miracles look like?
Can anyone heal the sick?
The surest way to convince people that God exists
A healing class where everyone was healed
The most common reason why people do not receive healing
Is unforgiveness a barrier to healing?
Do I need to pray for hundreds of people before I can see the sick healed?
We pray for a caller with a vision problem
A testimony of healing of blindness
How Christians see God and His will for healing

Resources

Life Fellowship Ministries

Five Keys to Overcoming Depression

Listen or Subscribe

Past Episodes

Listen to my live show Thursday nights on 1100KFNX

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Emotional Healing: Fragments and Alters

Editor’s note: National Suicide prevention week is September 6th-12th. The body of Christ is making great strides in our war against the cause of suicide. If you’re looking for one more weapon to have in your tool belt, this is an excerpt from my newest book Emotional Healing in 3 Easy Steps.

It’s been said that time heals all wounds, but the truth is that time doesn’t heal emotional wounds. Rather than being healed over time, emotional trauma can plague us our entire life. Emotional trauma creates a wound in our soul much like a flying piece of metal can cause a wound to our skin. Although our skin has a way to heal the wounds it receives, our soul doesn’t have the ability to heal itself.

Emotional trauma has the potential to affect the entire soul, but God designed a way to limit the damage of emotional trauma by allowing the soul to create what are known as fragments. A fragment is a part of the soul that contains the memories and emotions of a traumatic event. It’s like a part of our personality that’s been frozen in time. Fragments prevent the wounded parts of the soul from becoming the dominant influence over the core of the soul. In effect, the fragmenting of the soul compartmentalizes the wounds and minimizes the damage that can be done to the rest of the soul.

Fragments usually only have awareness of a single event or a string of repeated events and their related emotions. The fragment normally lies dormant in the soul until an event occurs that is reminiscent of the one that caused the fragment to be created. When one of these events happens, the fragment can be triggered and it may take control of the soul. When this happens, the person responds the way they would at the age they were when the fragment was created. If the fragment was formed as a toddler, the person may crawl on the floor or try to hide behind furniture. If the fragment was created as a teenager, the person may act like a rebellious 13-year-old. The emotions they display are not appropriate for the current situation. Instead, they are the emotions that were experienced at the time the fragment was created.

A soul fragment will assume control when they perceive there is a threat to the individual. The actions of a soul fragment are usually an overreaction to the situation because they have less understanding of what is normal and acceptable behavior when compared to the core of the personality. When the threat goes away the core of the soul regains control, the fragment once again becomes dormant.

I know a woman who has a terrible fear of going into basements. When I asked why she had this fear, she said it was because she had been molested by her uncles in a basement when she was a child. At the time she was molested, a part of her soul was wounded which created a fragment dominated by fear. Today, whenever she thinks about going into a basement, the fragment is triggered and she feels fear.

A similar but different part of the soul that is created by trauma is known as an alter. Like a fragment, an alter retains memories and emotions of specific events, but unlike fragments, alters can have unique personalities of their own that are distinctly different from the core of the personality. A person with many alters is usually diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder, or what was once called Multiple Personality Disorder. A severely traumatized person can have hundreds, or even thousands of alters.

When an alter is triggered by an event, the individual’s will and emotions come under the control of the alter. The person behaves in correspondence to the personality of the alter, while the core of the personality is rendered ineffective. The core personality sometimes feels like an observer to what is happening to them, instead of the participant. Some describe it as like having someone drive their car while they watch from the rear seat. Sometimes the core personality is completely unaware of what’s happening to them—a condition known as dissociation. When the event passes and the core assumes control again, it’s not unusual for them to have no idea what they said or did during the episode.

The goal of emotional healing is to heal the fragments and alters and to reintegrate them into the soul, preventing future episodes of painful emotions and disassociation.

For more information, check out my book Emotional Healing in 3 Easy Steps by clicking on the link or by clicking on the image below.

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The Kingdom of God in Singapore

This is a series of testimonies of healing, deliverance and people being baptized in the The Holy Spirit during Torben Søndergaard‘s visit to the streets and shopping malls of Singapore. In addition to seeing people healed and set free, many new believers were trained to do these things too. This is one way in which the kingdom of God is advanced. Torben’s website is thelastreformation.com.

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Podcast 028: Michael King – Gemstones From Heaven

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This is an interview with my friend Michael King about the manifestation of gemstones from heaven. Michael is the author of the first book ever written on this subject.

Topics covered: 

How it all began
Gemstone parties
Valuing the miraculous
The gift of gemstones
Raining gemstones
The significance of certain stones
Answered prayers for gemstones
An attitude of gratitude
What do we do with gemstones?
What does it all mean?
How do gemstones change our perspective of God?

Resources

Michael’s website

 Gemstones From Heaven

Listen or Subscribe

Past Episodes

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A Vision of Hope – Rebecca Clayton

This is an excerpt from Rebecca Clayton’s book When the Lion Roars

Thursday 15th January 2009 –  Conference Day Two

On Thursday morning I woke at around 6 am and felt like God wanted me to get up and pray. It is unusual for me to wake early, and especially after a late night. I delayed because I was tired, and kept drifting back to sleep. When I did get up I called my family at home to talk with them for a few minutes. My youngest daughter Eliza wanted to talk to me. She was still only five years old, and so completely unaware of what she was saying that the next few minutes broke me.

“Did you have a nice day at school yesterday?” I asked.

“Yes, Mummy. We made clay. I made your face with a big smile on, because you are always happy when you are at Dudley.”

Something inside of me snapped. After I put the phone down I fell to my knees in my hotel room in tears, and asked God’s forgiveness. I had come to see my children as a burden—a difficulty in life to be managed. I told Him that I didn’t want to be someone who was only happy when I was away from home. I wanted to be able to enjoy my children. Then I asked Him something very important, although I didn’t realise its significance at the time. I asked Him to show me my children the way He sees them. What happened next was so beautiful that it has stayed crystal-clear in my mind ever since.

The Vision

As I knelt in the hotel room on that Thursday morning, I saw a vision. I was in a large area of beautiful wild grassland, just beneath the brow of a hill. As I looked, over the brow of that hill came my three children, dressed as the Kings and Queens of Narnia in the series of books by C.S Lewis.  Amazed, I asked the Lord what this meant, and He said,

“When the Lion of Judah roars, the land will be restored.”

I knew without a doubt that I had just heard God, in the clearest way I could ever remember. I was enormously encouraged, but I still didn’t understand or anticipate what was to come in the next three days of the conference.

Revival Fires Church encourages those who attend to express themselves freely in worship, and there is space at the front for those who wish to dance—or in my case, jump up and down. I began to experience real freedom in the worship, in a way I never had before. I was gradually becoming less and less aware of my surroundings and more and more aware of Jesus.

In the first session that day I suddenly found myself (in my mind’s eye) running towards a cliff and jumping off into water below. It was dark and I just lay there floating and looking at the stars above me. I became aware that someone was floating next to me—Jesus. No words were spoken, but I felt a deep sense of peace. As the speakers shared, they began mentioning the Narnia series of books by C.S Lewis. They also began mentioning “The Lion of Judah” over and over and over again. Now I know that this phrase does crop up, it being one of the names by which we know Jesus, but this was more than usual and I knew that God was speaking to me. In the worship time on that Thursday morning, the leader of the church invited us all to shout out what it was we wanted back from the enemy. In a room full of 500 people, with a band playing, there is no way he heard me shout, “I want my SON back!” So what happened next, I believe was truly God speaking.

Trevor came to the front of the church and said, “God is restoring family relationships this morning.”  I fell to my knees in tears, knowing, perhaps for the first time, that God really was on my side.

Romans 10:17 says, “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.”

So when Holy Spirit speaks something to you, and not just what you want, but when the Spirit speaks, you know that you know it’s going to happen.

Surrender

Later on that day there were two events which I believe were significant. The first was a moment during worship when I began to thank God for all that He had done in my life up to that point, and I told Him that I knew that He could heal my children, but even if He chose not to, I would still worship and love Him the rest of my days. In a similar way to Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, who declared their faith in defiance of King Nebuchadnezzar I said, “My God is able to rescue me, but even if He does not, I will still worship Him”

The second was during one of the teaching sessions, when the speaker took up a symbolic offering. I forget the point being made, but we were invited to bring the highest value thing we had with us at the time and lay it before God at the front of the room. This was not an offering of money and the intention was that we collect the item later. As the speaker explained the idea I thought for a moment of what I could lay before God – perhaps the new silver bracelet my husband had given me for Christmas? Then I remembered that before I left the house I had slipped a recent photograph of my children in my bag. I took it forward and offered my children to God. When the time came to collect our offerings – I left mine in place. It was a conscious act of surrender to His will for their lives

Rebecca’s book can be purchased on Amazon by clicking on the title When the Lion Roars or on the image below.

 

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Podcast 027: Praying Medic Live With Jesse Birkey

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My good friend Jesse Birkey joins me for a discussion about living a life of miracles.

Topics covered:

Jesse’s new TV show Project Afterlife
The investigation of near-death experiences
Jesse’s new book Finding Home
What it takes to raise someone from the dead through prayer
Hearing God’s voice
Giving prophetic words
Spiritual gifts and our comfort zone
The one teaching about God Jesse hates most


Listen or Subscribe

Resources

Jesse’s Website

Past Episodes

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American Sniper: Lessons in Spiritual Warfare

total word count: 1130

This is an except from my latest book American Sniper: Lessons in Spiritual Warfare

The main character of American Sniper is a Texas-born redneck named Chris Kyle. The film opens with a scene of Kyle perched on a rooftop in the city of Fallujah, Iraq. U.S. troops have been told that the city was ordered to be evacuated and any military-aged men they find are assumed to be enemy combatants, until proven otherwise. Kyle is checking out the path of a U.S. military convoy through the scope of his sniper rifle. He sees a man on a rooftop in the distance talking on a cell phone. The man appears to be watching the convoy, which Kyle reports to his command through his headset. The man then disappears from the rooftop and a few moments later, a woman and a young boy exit the doorway of the same building and begin walking toward the convoy. Kyle reports the woman and boy to command, and notes that the woman is not swinging her arms as she walks and that she appears to be carrying something. Kyle watches through the scope as the woman removes something from her cloak and hands it to the boy and he realizes it’s a grenade. He reports what he sees and again gets the green light to shoot, but his marine guard warns him that he’ll be sent to prison for shooting a child if he’s wrong. The film then cuts away and the next 20 minutes are vignettes of Kyle growing up as the son of a religious father who stressed the ever-present threat of evil, the virtues of aggression, and the supremacy of the hunt.

As a child, Chris learned to watch over his younger brother, Jeff. When someone picked on him, Chris came to his defense and in one scene, he gave the bully a beating he wouldn’t forget. As an adult, he spent most of his time riding bulls, drinking beer, chasing pretty girls and getting into fights.  In the same way that Chris drifted from one misadventure to another, many Christians find themselves drifting, spiritually. We go to church on Sunday, read our Bibles, and try to avoid getting into trouble, but inevitably, trouble seems to find us. We wrestle with various problems and seem to make little progress, no matter what measures we try.

The first seven years of my life as a Christian I traveled down a dozen different paths leading nowhere. Though I felt at the time I was a passionate believer, I had very few victories over the enemy. I lost more spiritual battles than I won. And perhaps more importantly, I never felt a great sense of significance; I felt like I was just another believer. In many ways I was drifting spiritually, with no real course or destination in mind, other than getting into heaven when I died.

No child dreams of growing up to be insignificant. We all want to do something great. God doesn’t create us to be ordinary. He’s placed a desire for significance in our hearts—a desire to do something to change the world for the better. It’s apparent early in the film that Chris Kyle knew he was destined to do something extraordinary.

The film cuts away to a scene of Chris and his brother watching TV. They saw the news of the terrorist attacks on the U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. Chris was infuriated that U.S. citizens were being attacked and felt compelled to do something about it. His anger over the attacks compelled him to visit a Navy recruiter’s office. The recruiter suggested he might be interested in the SEAL program and handed him a pamphlet, but Kyle remarked that he wasn’t much of a swimmer. The recruiter took the pamphlet out of his hand and said it wasn’t for most men. Kyle grabbed the pamphlet back and proudly replied “I’m not most men.” He didn’t envision himself in a routine job as a sailor. That would be too safe. He set his aim high and endured the brutality of Navy SEAL training.

A new Christian has very little that they bring to the spiritual battlefield from the world. We learn all kinds of ways to defend ourselves and attack our enemies as we go through life, but the Apostle Paul taught that the weapons of the believer’s warfare are not like the weapons and tactics of the physical world. Spiritual weapons are spiritual in nature and it’s only these weapons that can be used effectively against spiritual strongholds. Because spiritual weapons are so different from the weapons we’re familiar with, they require special training and practice before they can be used effectively. My introduction to spiritual weapons was illustrated by the following dream:

Dream

In the dream, I drove my car to a pawn shop with my children. I took some old things that I owned into the pawn shop and traded them in for a strange type of handgun. My kids waited a long time for me to come out. I left the shop with my new gun, but didn’t want my kids to see it, so I walked around behind my car, then took it out and examined it. The gun had a laser sight built into it. It was wide, with a round bulge that seemed to be for the ammunition, though it wasn’t a revolver and it didn’t have a magazine. I didn’t know how the ammunition was loaded. I began trying to figure out how it worked and decided to aim it across the street at a vacant lot. The gun fired two rounds, which I wouldn’t have known, except that I saw puffs of dust rise from the ground where I pointed the gun. It made no sound and didn’t seem to have a trigger, but seemed to fire by my thoughts. I put it in the trunk of my car and that was the end of the dream.

Interpretation

In the dream, I traded in a bunch of things I had obtained from the world for a new, spiritual weapon. I believe this speaks of acquiring a new way of thinking and living. I had to leave behind the way of thinking I had acquired from the world and learn the way of thinking used in the kingdom of God. I also had to learn how to defend myself and wage an offensive attack differently. I had no idea how my new gun fired. I didn’t yet understand how spiritual weapons operate, though I had obtained one that could be used effectively, once I was trained to use it.

You can read more by clicking the link to American Sniper: Lessons in Spiritual Warfare, or click on the image below.

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My Addiction

total word count: 403

I have a confession to make.

I’m an addict.

Every morning, whether I’m at work or off duty, I go online and surf the Internet in search of the thing I crave.

Yeah, I know… I just came down from one high, but another one is out there waiting for me. And I’m going to find it.

My addiction?

Blogs.

Now I know what you’re going to say.

I could quit if I really wanted to.

But the truth is, I don’t want to.

I have probably 30 friends right now who are blogging regularly—maybe more. I lost count. (If you’re an addict, its good to have friends who support your habit.)

My blogging friends hear God pretty well and they write about their conversations with Him. When I read a blog post written by someone who is tuned in to the frequency of heaven, I learn a little more about what heaven is up to. After reading my friend’s blogs, I always have a better understanding of what God is doing among His people and what He’s saying. And knowing what He’s up to is kind of a big deal to me.

My blogger friends also have, collectively, a few centuries of time walking with God. They distill their experiences and revelation into messages anyone can read. If you read someone’s blog, you glean the benefit of the lessons they’ve learned without needing to suffer their mistakes. The collective wisdom of thousands of saints is available to us through their blogs.

There are a lot of other things I could do with my time. But other than spending time with God Himself, there’s no better way to spend my time than reading the living epistles He is writing through my friends who blog. And honestly, as I read their blogs, and He highlights the things they say that are relevant to me, I’m spending time with Him, too.

Some friends who are gifted writers are not yet blogging. And because they have valuable things to add to the conversation, I’ve asked, and they’ve allowed me to re-post their messages here. I hope they’ll consider starting their own blogs soon. God seems to be extending extraordinary favor to writers right now.

If you’re interested in checking out some of my favorite blogs, you can find them listed in the left hand sidebar under “Blogging Friends.”

But be careful. Blogs can be addictive.

You’ve been warned.

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Podcast 026: Living the Supernatural life

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In this episode of our live radio show, my wife and I discuss how believers can live a supernatural life. If you’d like to listen to our live broadcast, the show airs every Thursday night at 8 PM Arizona time (pacific time in the summer / mountain time in the winter) on 1100 KFNX.

Topics covered in this message:

The life of the average believer compared with the supernatural life
The importance of dreams
Authority for healing
Faith for healing
Power for healing
The identity of the believer
Why any believer can heal the sick and work miracles


Listen or Subscribe

Resources Mentioned

Divine Healing Made Simple

Past Episodes

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Our Right to Feel Pain

total word count: 438

Today’s guest blogger allowed me to share something she wrote, but wishes to remain anonymous.

God has never denied us the right to feel pain when we hurt. He does not demand that we push our feelings under the carpet and not feel them. Even Jesus cried out in His extreme pain and agonized over what he was going through. Jesus suffered emotional (soul) pain even as the Son of God.

It is not un-spiritual to feel pain or acknowledge that it exists in our world. How could God collect our tears in a bottle if we are not to shed any tears ? We do not need to repress our emotions and pretend that they do not exist. That is the cause of many illnesses—to deny our pain, our stress and our emotions and push them deeper—denying their existence.

During His life on earth Jesus healed those who came to Him but remember they first had to admit their need for healing. We will not receive healing for something we will not admit or ask for help with. We can live in denial of our problems but that does not make them go away. That is self deception.

God did not want only the outside of the cup cleansed and looking pretty.He doesn’t just want our “Sunday clothes” on. He wants something deeper. He wants the inside cleansed and purified. This will only happen as we open up to Him and allow Him entrance into those places that we may not even want to look at in ourselves. This can be a painful process. Some of us have years of stuff that we pushed under the carpet even from our childhood. We have wounds that are unseen even to ourselves. We have hurts that are so deep and hidden and we can not reach them.

It is okay to cry out to God to heal and cleanse you in the inmost parts. He wants TRUTH on our inward parts. We can live deceptively without this inward purging. God wants to save us to the uttermost. That includes wholeness in every area. We do not need to be ashamed of our need of Him or our tears. He will walk us through every process.

He loves us so much right where we are. We do not have to perform to get Him to love us more. He already loves us and has done everything for us to bring us to

Himself. He wants to heal every place we hurt. Sometimes healing can result from gaining understanding into the effects of abuse on a life. It is not unspiritual to seek to understand things. We gain compassion as we seek to understand another as well.

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