Praying Medic's Blog, page 107

Beware the Evil Eye – Rob Coscia

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My guest blogger today is Rob Coscia

I’ve been reading the Gospel of Mark over and over for a long time, but recently, I was struck by something Jesus said in Chapter 7, like I’d never read it before: “And He said, ‘What comes out of a man, that defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of men, comes…an evil eye.” (Mark 7.20-21).

There’s a whole bunch of nasty things listed there that come out of a dark heart, but I got stuck on “evil eye”, mostly because it sounds like something from a Mel Brooks movie. Most other versions translate “evil eye” as “envy”, but the word “covet” is already there in the list. Literally, the words translates to “diseased vision” or “wicked sight”.

What hit me most about this is that it’s not just an evil thought like “deceit” or a destructive state like “pride”. This is more. It’s a mindset, a philosophy of life. It’s seeing as the enemy sees, instead of as God does. It’s agreeing with darkness. It looks for everything wrong in others, for how hard everything will be, how unfair life is. It judges people and circumstances by what has gone wrong in the past, and isolates you to keep you from getting hurt again. It boils life down to a principle that can be measured and controlled, instead of letting it grow in relationship that is living and unpredictable.

What’s my point? Well, as Mel Brooks said, “You got to be brave. If you feel something, you’ve really got to risk it” (Then again, he also said “Spaceballs: the flame thrower! The kids love this one”). Ask God to change the way you see life. Ask Him to transform your heart to be like His. Jesus called the religious leaders blind, because they chose to only see fear and darkness. That’s not you. You are bold, adventurous, joyful, compassionate, merciful, peaceful, powerful, and positive.

“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asked him.

The blind man said, “Rabbi, I want to see.”

“Go,” said Jesus, “your faith has healed you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road.

(Mark 10)

Podcast 019: Alan Champkins – From Witch Doctor to New Creation

To open in a new window click this link: podcast 019

This is the testimony of Alan Champkins, a man who gave his life to Jesus as a child, but who followed a path that would ultimately lead him to be one of the only white men ever trained as a Zulu witch doctor. Allan takes us from his days in boarding school, where he suffered rejection, to his college days that were spent partying. He retraces his search for meaning as he explored the New Age, Buddhism and other belief systems. He finds himself working as a tour guide where he meets a Sangoma—a Zulu witch doctor, who says the spirits have chosen him to be trained as an herbalist. At the completion of this training, he is informed that he is also to be trained as a Sangoma. Listen as he describes how God unfolded a plan to deliver him from this life and show him the one thing he had been looking for all along.

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Allan prepares for his Sangoma graduation ceremony

Listen or Subscribe:

Resources 

Curry Blake’s Divine Healing Technician series can be found here.

Past Episodes

The Curse Transformed Into a Blessing – Cheriann Riley

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Cheriann Riley is back with another encouraging look at life as a child of God.

For the longest time, decades literally, the same curse was spoken over me, and by many types of authority figures and leadership people.

Very simply put, they told me that I didn’t fit.

You don’t fit, you’re not what we’re looking for, you really need to change this about you, this part of you is bad or evil, you don’t have any leadership qualities, you’re lazy, you’re ugly, these quirks in your personality disgust us, you really just need to change this about who you are, you really need to change this about your appearance, you really need to change this about what you believe, sorry, but you’re a woman, and the list went on and on. All the reasons why I didn’t fit the cookie cutter they thought I should.

But all along, at the same time, Dad was in each of those situations and he was telling me, but I made you to NOT fit on purpose. I made you to misfit. I’ve created you for something bigger than man and their cookie cutter limited imaginations. And one day, you will see about you what I see about you, you’ll see who you REALLY are, and you will be GLAD that you do not fit. You will rejoice that you misfit.

At the time, I didn’t hear anything but the curse. But as I have spent time with Dad, he showed me where he was in EACH situation and showed me where he was turning every curse into a literal blessing for me.

He didn’t give me a blessing instead of, he TRANSFORMED the curse itself into a blessing. The enemy was trying to attack me, Dad transformed it into some of the most powerful prophetic words I have ever received.

Now I understand when I start to get a lot of similar attacks or curses, I start to look for the blessing in it Dad has for me. When the enemy tells me repeatedly that I can’t, Dad is there telling me together, we CAN. The enemy is merely pointing to my next upgrade from Dad. Cause he cannot help but do so.

So what have been some of the greatest curses and words spoken against you? Maybe it is time to have a few convos with Dad and hear the blessing he has for you over you and your life.

My Top 20 Tips on Writing and Self-Editing

If you happen to be a blogger or a published author, and especially if you have aspirations of writing your first book, I have  a message just for you. I’ve come up with a list of 20 things you might want to consider while writing your next viral blog post or best-seller.

Editing is a touchy subject, and there are differences of opinion on how to best convey ideas in writing. There are for example, some obvious style differences between how a writer in London and one in New York would write the same story. But there are some concepts that most authors and editors agree upon. Here are a few that I’ve found to be helpful:

1) As much as possible, try to write in clear, concise chunks of thought. In general, it’s best to write the shortest sentences possible. Try to avoid writing long, run-on sentences. If you carefully analyze most long sentences, you can usually re-write them as a couple of shorter sentences that convey the same idea more clearly.

2) Keep related sentences together in the same paragraph and keep paragraphs as short as possible. When transitioning to a new subject or thought, begin a new paragraph.

3) Read through your draft periodically and re-organize paragraphs as needed to make the flow of thought as smooth as possible. Don’t be afraid to do some large-scale reorganizing and re-writing if it’s called for.

4) Learn the proper use of commas. It’s a simple, little mark, but its improper use can drive people crazy. One of the worst, book reviews, I’ve ever received, came from a reader, who was ticked-off, at my improper use, of commas. Go here if, you need help.

5) Learn two spell better. Spell-chick can be a useful tool, but it isn’t food-proof and it will mist some obviously misspelled worlds. If you want to be a successful writer, strive to improve your spelling. (The first sentence above passed spell-check with flying colors. I counted five misspelled words. How many did you catch?)

6) Learn to write with proper grammar. As dangerous as it is to rely on spell-check for spelling errors, it’s even more dangerous to rely on it to check your grammar. Your reputation and credibility as a writer will largely depend upon your spelling skills and your use of grammar. In particular, learn the proper use of its and it’s; the proper use of your, and you’re; and the proper use of their, they’re and there.

7) Minimize the use of bolding, and the use of underlining as much as possible. Their unnecessary use makes your writing harder to read. There are fewer things that require emphasis than most of us are willing to admit. When emphasis is needed, consider using italics, but don’t over-do it.

8) Use sub-headings when introducing a new section within a chapter or blog post and keep them relevant. Good sub-headings help readers follow where you’re going. If a chapter or blog post is short, or if it only focuses on one subject, you may not need them.

9) Always use a serif font in a book’s text body. (Examples of serif fonts are Times New Roman and Garamond.) It’s probably the best option for your blog as well. Serif fonts have a little line at the end of the letter. They’re much easier to read than non-serif fonts, such as Arial. (I use Garamond in all my books.)

10) Always use the same font size within the body of a book or blog post. Changing font sizes tends to annoy readers, and causes display problems with e-books. Find a font size that works well and stick with it. (Twelve-point Garamond or Times is a good option, if you’re not sure.) The exceptions to this rule are chapter headings and sub-headings. For chapter headings, I use the same font that I use for the body of the book, but a size that is two or three points larger. For sub-headings, I use the bold version of the same font I use for the text.

11) When placing a quote within a sentence, it’s generally safest to use a comma immediately before the quote. The comma will usually follow a word like “said” or “replied.”

Example: Jack said, “I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

12) The punctuation for a quote nearly always goes inside the ending quotation mark.

13) When using quotes, always use double quotes. The exception is when a quote appears inside another quote. In this case, the outer quote gets double quotes, while the inner one gets single quotes. If there are multiple quotes within other quotes, the use of single and double quotes alternates.

Example: The author’s final argument was less convincing: “When Brown writes of ‘interpreting the matter through a “secular” lens,’ he opens himself to the same criticism he made earlier in his own paper.”

14) Many writers struggle with the proper use of semi-colons, hyphens, dashes, and em dashes. I had trouble with them while writing my first 2 books, but I’ve gotten much better with practice. I now rely heavily on the em dash, ( — ) which is a very long dash that has a lot of flexibility in how it can be used. It can replace semi-colons and even parenthesis in some cases. It’s my go-to punctuation for long sentences that contain several clauses. (If you use a PC, you can create an em dash by holding down the alt key while typing 0151 on the numeric keypad.) I use this guide for punctuation when I need help. The tabs along the top of the page provide quick access to the use of all forms of punctuation.

15) Titles of books, magazines, movies, etc. are best written in title case, which capitalizes all the words except the shortest ones (such as in, or, the, of, ect.). A title is usually italicized, and the use of bolding or underlining isn’t necessary. When in doubt, you can check the capitalization of a title here.

16) When introducing a new subject that readers may not be familiar with, it’s a good practice to italicize the first mention of it and explain what the term means, but it’s not necessary to italicize it afterward.

17) It’s a good practice to standardize Bible references. How you do that is a matter of preference, but it’s a good idea to choose a method you like and use it consistently. Some people use standard abbreviations, while others write out the entire book name. Here’s an article that has plenty of tips on this and related topics.

18) The most overused punctuation mark is the exclamation mark! I think of it as a kind of literary hot sauce! A little can be good, but it’s easy to over-do it!

19) While it’s tempting to use Capitalization Tricks to draw attention to Certain Words, it’s best to avoid getting drawn into this Trend. Learn the standard rules for capitalization and stick to them. I picked up a lot of bad writing habits from bloggers that I followed and had to painfully unlearn them when I began writing books.

20) Finally, resist the urge to use ALL CAPS to draw attention to certain words. It looks unprofessional and the main message it conveys is that you’re an inexperienced writer. Write well and you won’t need to employ such tactics. Strong writing speaks for itself.

Podcast 018: Progressive Revelation – J.D. King

To open in a new window click this link: podcast 018

Today I’m speaking with my friend J.D. King about progressive revelation—the idea that God’s character and plans are revealed progressively to us over time, and that newer revelation provides a fuller, richer understanding of Him.

Listen or Subscribe:

Resources Mentioned

J.D. King’s blog can be found here.

The article J.D. wrote on progressive revelation can be found here.

If you’d like to connect with Richard Murray, who has some excellent teaching on this subject, you can find his Facebook page here.

The book I referred to about the man who died and went to heaven, Placebo, by Howard  Pittman can be found here.

Past Episodes

Canaan’s Healing Birthday Party

If you’d like to join in praying for Canaan’s healing today, I know her family would appreciate it.

Should We Love the Sinner and Hate the Sin?

 

total word count: 1128

I’ve often heard church leaders say, “We need to love the sinner and hate the sin.” This phrase has been repeated so often it’s become a mantra that many of us recite without considering where it came from or what it actually means.

It’s not easy to determine exactly where this saying originated . It’s not found anywhere in the Bible (as far as I can tell). In modern times, it’s been attributed to Mahatma Ghandi, but its origin seems to go further back. It appears to be based on something St. Augustine wrote: “cum dilectione hominum et odio vitiorum,” which translates to “with love for mankind and hatred of sins.” The modern translation “love the sinner, hate the sin” would have us focus our hatred upon the sins of others, which is ironic, because Augustine wasn’t referring to the sins of others when he penned these words. He was lamenting his own sins, which he describes in Confessions.

Jesus taught often about how we ought to view sin: “If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off… If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out.” Who can forget His admonition to remove the log from our own eye before helping our neighbor remove the splinter from his? When He was asked how we should view the sins of others, He would inevitably steer the conversation back to the sins of the person asking the question. He allowed little, if any room for us to comment on the sins of others, except that we ought to continually forgive them. If He had left us with a quote on this subject it may have sounded something like, “Love the sinner and hate your own sin.”

And yet, we have embedded in our culture this idea that we’re allowed—even encouraged—to hate the sins of others. I think there are a couple of reasons why we might feel this way. Here’s a situation that illustrates one of them:

When I post a message on social media asking believers to show love toward someone who has been deemed a sinner, I often receive inquiries from friends asking if I endorse their sinful behavior. It’s common to assume that if someone feels an individual is worth loving, it must also be an endorsement of their lifestyle. And if you don’t want people thinking you’re endorsing sinful behavior, you might be tempted to withdraw your support of these people. Fear of what others think of us is one reason why we sometimes hesitate to do what we know is right. Jesus had an interesting prescription for this kind of fear.

In the mind of a religious person, you either hang out with those who are righteous, or you prefer the company of sinners and no self-respecting scribe or pharisee would have been caught dead in the company of an adulterer. The group you associate with is supposed to reveal your true spirituality, and religious people prefer the company of those who—at least outwardly—have their behavior under control. Yet Jesus preferred the company of sinners and because He associated with them, He was accused of endorsing their sins. He could have responded to such  fear by keeping them at a distance, but He knew His mission was too important to be hindered by what religious people thought of Him. He befriended those were called sinners and defended them against those would have killed them—a decision that ultimately cost Him His life. (This is as clear a demonstration as you’ll find of what it looks like to show love to sinners.)

Most of us have no problem showing love to people who are full of good works, but extending that same love to people we see as sinful isn’t as easy. It isn’t in our nature to show love toward people who do things we despise. This is particularly true if their sins have wounded us, personally. The most difficult thing in the world is showing kindness to those who treat us like dirt. It’s our nature to treat them the same way they treat us—with hatred and disdain. If we’re able to muster up a bit of self-control, we might be able to treat them with indifference, but seldom are we able to show them love. And yet, we have the command from Jesus to love them. To love them as we would love our own child or spouse.

No believer wants to be disobedient to this command. But when when we look at them, we sometimes see more of their sinful behavior than we do the person God loves and that makes it hard for us to love them. When our actions are not loving, and someone points this out to us, we can excuse our behavior by saying, “It’s not them that I hate. I actually love the sinner—it’s their sin that I hate.” But the truth is, more often than not, it is the sinner we hate. I’m not suggesting that it’s easy to show unconditional love toward people who do things we detest or to those who abuse us. Without the empowerment of God it’s impossible. But since we have the empowerment of God working in us through His Spirit, and since Jesus demonstrated how to love these people unconditionally and He asked us to do likewise, we are without excuse. Recently, the Lord showed me how this divine empowerment works.

If you’ve read any of my stories where I’ve prayed with drug addicts or alcoholics, you’ll remember that I don’t have a strong natural affection for these people. Yet, when God wants me to pray with them for healing or when He wants me to give them a prophetic word (acts of unconditional love) He’ll allow me to feel in my soul an intense compassion and love for them that I would never have felt on my own. (Jesse Birkey shares similar stories.) When God’s love and compassion are made manifest in the soul of man, the sins of others become irrelevant. We no longer see the sinner or their sins. In that moment, the only thing we see is a lost child who is having their heart transformed by the overwhelming love of their heavenly Father. And it is this love that we display toward sinners that leads them to repentance.

We have a choice to make. We can continue excusing our unloving treatment of sinners by telling ourselves it’s really their sin that we hate, or we can permit God to let us feel His love for them, which empowers us to love them the way He does.

“As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

 Related:

Is Love Enough?

Seeing in the Spirit Made Simple $0.99

My latest book Seeing in the Spirit Made Simple will be available on Kindle and other e-book outlets for $0.99 this weekend (June 26th-28th.) So if you’ve been waiting for it to go on sale, now’s your chance. If you know anyone who might want to take advantage of the sale, please consider sharing this with them.

* Sale prices at e-book outlets do not immediately reflect the changes an author makes in pricing. A delay in price availability may be occur at some retailers. 

To purchase the ebook, click an icon:

 

Look At Us – Ben Nelson

total word count: 1330

My guest blogger today is Benjamin Nelson, author of the book Encounters With Jesus.

From before I can remember, my papa and I would go down to the temple at the hour of prayer. He wouldn’t close his shop for the day. He put a note on the door and left everything just as it was. Then he stopped at home to get me. Mama and the girls would stay at home getting dinner ready.

“Men are made for prayer,” my papa would tell me, when I asked him why my sister didn’t have to come.

Before the praying started, the rabbi would say a few words, to guide our petitions. Mostly I didn’t know what he was saying, and didn’t much care. But I still remember one talk.

The rabbi read from the scrolls containing the Psalms. The Psalms were always my favorite readings. That day he read from one of Solomon’s psalms.

He will have compassion on the poor and needy, And the lives of the needy he will save. Psalm 72:13

Then he told us that any man who gave to the poor was doing the Almighty’s work. He continued by telling us that when we put alms in the hand of the poor, it is as if we are putting our money directly into the hand of the Lord Himself.

He reminded us of the proverb:

One who is gracious to a poor man lends to the LORD, And He will repay him for his good deed. – Proverbs 19:17

The next day when papa came to get me, I remember asking him for a penny.

“My little Gideon, what will you do with a penny today?”

“Papa, I want to give it to the lame man who sits near the temple gates. He’s there every day, and Rabbi Yosef says if we give to the poor we lend to the Lord.”

“Well then, that’s just fine, Gidi, we’ll both give the Lord a loan today.”

He went back into his room where his coin purse hung on a hook on the wall.

“Here you go Gidi my boy, you can carry them both, one for you and one for me.”

I can still remember how cool the copper felt in my tiny hand. From that day on we never went to the temple without two coppers for the lame man there. Papa told me he had been there as long as he had lived in the city.

I’m twenty now, and my papa and I still close up shop for the hour of prayer every day. I’m married and have a boy of my own, but I still work in my father’s shop. It won’t be long before my little Josiah starts working with us too. We still grab a few coins to give the beggar as we head out of the shop.

One day, as we neared the temple there were some men standing over our beggar. We thought of him as our beggar, since we had given him money for more than fifteen years. We rarely stopped as we walked by. We just tossed our coins into the hat that sat before him.

I’m not sure I had ever seen his eyes. His eyes are always on the dust of the path. It may have been shame that kept his eyes from meeting ours, or perhaps he simply found people more generous without the tacit confrontation of his gaze. In any case, we never stopped there, but dropped our coins and kept moving.

These two men were standing right there and talking with him. As we approached I heard the beggar repeat the words I had heard a thousand times.

“Do you have a coin for this cripple.”

The words were so familiar to me. They were a part of me, like our meal time prayers, or my sister’s giggles. I think it was those words that kept the memory of Rabbi Yosef’s message about giving to the poor so fresh in my mind.

One of the men gave a sort of shrug as if to say, we have no coin to share, but then the other reached out his hand, not as though he was going to give something, but as if he was going to pull him up out of his cot.

At this point our lame friend didn’t see what was going on, because he was still looking down.

As this stranger reached his hand out, I heard him say:

“Look at us!”

The crippled man raised his head, tentatively at first, but once he got a look at this man’s eyes, he began to look—I don’t know how to say it—with his whole face. The eyes I’d never seen, and the face I knew only by profile, now looked directly at this man—he sounded like a Galilean—with his outstretched hand.

“I do not possess silver and gold,”

At this, the lame man’s gaze wavered with an edge of disappointment.

“But what I do have I give to you: In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene–walk!”

His hand hung there for what seemed like minutes, until finally the lame man grabbed it and they both pulled, the Galilean pulled up and the lame man held on with both hands. Then he was on his feet.

As I stood staring, it started to dawn on me how impossible this was. I may have never seen this man’s eyes, but his feet and legs sat out there in the dust and grime of the temple courts every day. They were shriveled and useless. The man had to be forty years old, and he had never used those legs for anything.

And now he was standing just a few steps away from me.

He bent over at the waist and reached down with his hands and felt his legs. I could see that they were no longer the tiny twigs that lay beside him yesterday. These were legs with flesh and muscle.

He took a cautious step or two—feeling for his balance—testing his new legs, getting a feel for this unfamiliar sensation. Then he was walking, then leaping, then walking and running and leaping, all the while shouting praises to the Almighty, and praises to Jesus that Nazarene who was crucified just a couple months back over on skull hill.

The crowd was growing now, and the beggar—everyone knew him—was leaping and shouting praises—and shaking everyone’s hands.

The one who had lifted the lame man off his bed called for silence, and a hush came over the crowd. We all wanted to hear what this man had to say.

I later learned this was Peter, one of Jesus’s disciples. He began to preach to us about how God the Father had sent Jesus, His servant, and how we had crucified the Lord’s holy and righteous Son. This fisherman began to open our eyes to the words of the prophets and of Moses himself, and show us how in our ignorance we had killed the very Son of God.

As he preached the temple priests saw the ruckus and called the temple guards, who arrested Peter and his companion John, but not before Peter led thousands of us to faith in Jesus.

That was the day the Lord fulfilled His promise to me. For years I had lent Him my pennies, and today, He paid me my interest. He gave me an inheritance far beyond the value of copper, silver or gold. He gave me new life.

~~~

To read the original story, see Acts 3:1-4:4.

About the Author

Ben Nelson writes stories about New Testament encounters with Jesus and His disciples from a first person perspective. His blog, which contains many more stories like this one can be found here: Another Red Letter Day

If you enjoyed reading this story you might like Ben’s book, Encounters with Jesus; a collection of forty stories told in similar fashion. It’s available in paperback or Kindle.

Podcast 017: Being a Church Drop-Out

If you received this in an e-mail or to open in another window click this link: podcast 017

Today, my wife and I discuss the ups and downs of life as church drop-outs. We talk about the recent  trend of mature believers leaving church and the reasons why some people are no longer attending regular church services.

Listen or Subscribe:

Resources Mentioned

Divine Healing Made Simple

Past Episodes