Do What Jesus Did: A Real-Life Field Guide to Healing the Sick, Routing Demons and Changing Lives Forever

by Robby Dawkins

God’s gift to us is ability; our gift to God is availability.

By the Spirit we have been given the grace to walk in a level of authority and love that would truly transform the world. One definition of grace that I appreciate is “the power of God, to do the will of God.” Living like that is what it means to be Jesus’ disciples. It’s by the Spirit that we can know Him today, walking with Him and doing the things He did.

Somehow our “religion” has made it too easy for us to forget the radically inclusive, table-turning, paradigm-shifting Christ of the Bible, and instead, subtly buy in to the lie that Christianity is a little bit boring, a little bit old-fashioned and not quite true in the parts that count.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

We are not going to move this world by criticism of it nor conformity to it, but by the combustion within it of lives ignited by the Spirit of God.

We get so focused on what we see as the end goal that we forget the

Lord, from whom all good things come.

When Jesus calls us the temple of God and promises that streams of living water will flow from those who come to Him (just as He told the woman at the well), I believe He is referring to this same river described both in Ezekiel and Revelation. I believe this represents the living waters of the Spirit of God that dwell within us when Jesus becomes enthroned in our lives.

The presence of God is associated with the throne of God and His Kingdom reign.

When Jesus told His disciples, “the kingdom of God is within you,” I believe He was making another reference to the streams of living water that will flow from our lives

Because Jesus made it possible, the good news is that what used to be available only to kings and priests is now available to all of us.

it’s the presence of God that touches people’s hearts and transforms their lives.

When I pray for people, first and foremost I ask, “Lord, let Your presence come.” I have learned to wait on this presence—to give it room—and to expect that His presence will move mountains of hopelessness, discouragement, anger and unbelief in people’s lives.

The authority we carry is in the presence of the K...

We can rest in knowing that the Kingdom of God is within us, and as we seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and as we follow, we begin to encounter deeper and deeper levels of His presence.

George Ladd describes the Kingdom of God as “the sovereign rule of God, manifested in the person and work of Christ, creating a people over whom he reigns, and issuing in a realm or realms in which the power of his reign is realized.”

The proclamation and demonstration of the Kingdom of God was the central aspect of Christ’s ministry of reconciliation. It’s not simply a message of words. It’s not simply a message of kind acts.

The Gospel is the proclaimed restoration of unity with a humble God who not only died to cleanse us from sins but rose again in power to live out His life through us and restore righteousness on the earth.

The Good News of the Kingdom doesn’t just stop short with us as individuals. It’s also about healing us in relationship to our world, its lands and its peoples. It’s about the restoration of families, the building up of communities, the care of our environment, the redemption of cities and the glory of nations to be restored as God’s unique expression and celebration of Himself on earth.

Not only does He accept the outcasts, honor them and call them each by name—but in fact He calls us His plan of hope for the world.

In going out to minister to people by doing the things Jesus did, always remember that if you don’t feel as though you’re getting through, or if you feel that other approaches are failing, look people right in the eyes with the message that Jesus loves them. It seems so simple, but it’s extremely powerful.

It’s not necessarily the prophecy or signs and wonders that break through to someone, although those things often accompany our prayers and can be used to open a heart to the Gospel. Our real weapon against the enemy, however, is God’s love.

Satan is the accuser, and we don’t want to stand in agreement with him.

Our battle is not against flesh and blood—it’s not about convincing people that they’re bad or should be ashamed of themselves. Our battle is never against people, but against the powers of darkness. Nothing is stronger in disarming the kingdom of darkness than love.

Love is the thing Satan can’t stand. Love is the weapon of mass destruction. Satan is the one who heaps shame on us—he’s the accuser, and in our approach to people, we should never agree with what the accuser says about them. Satan is the one whispering in people’s ears, “God is repulsed by you.” God is saying, “I love you—I’m crazy about you! Come home to Me.” Sometimes the Church gets this backward and communicates shame or judgment—as if talking about love and acceptance would soft-coat the truth or water it down.

Love is power and passion that take action to set people free.

We need to lay down our need to defend or prove ourselves, and instead look to the Father for direction.

Spirit-led evangelism forces us into a place of dependency on God to do the impossible, even working through us. Our boldness comes not from

confidence in ourselves, but from believing Him and declaring the things that only He...

Our goal is to know God and walk with Him, doing the things He did, proclaiming and demonstrating the Kingdom of God through His love and reconciling people back to right relationship with Him. As we work with Him, we learn about His heart and His nature.

The treasure is in the risk. We are

willing to die for Jesus, but are we willing to look foolish for Him?

For God to use you, you have to be willing to be interrupted and available.

God isn’t necessarily looking for qualified people; He’s looking for available people whom He can use.

Sometimes working for the Kingdom starts as a discipline in us, but it needs to become a passion.

His promptings are often light as a feather that lands on your arm; it would be easy to brush it off and ignore it.

The Father helps us have His heart for people and His eyes to see the world. He will teach us to respond to His voice and to fine-tune our hearing. If we take the risk and go for something 100 percent of the time, we’ll probably get it right about 80 percent of the time, yet we need to pursue God encounters like a hunter pursues its prey. When we truly encounter God’s presence, other things that once seemed significant just fade away.

We fail to recognize that our daily life is filled with opportunities for taking risks—for stepping out and trusting that God is with us and is more than able to meet the needs of the people around us, through us.

It’s not about the miracles; it’s not about the healing. The goodness and beauty of the Kingdom is about the King. The Kingdom of God is about the revelation of its King and the reconciliation of the King with His people.

Taking risks is the very definition of living by faith; we live not by our past experiences or by what we see, but by what we believe and what God’s Word says is true about us—that we’ll actually do what Jesus did.

One of the biggest reasons we fail to step into Jesus’ transferable ministry is that we mistakenly believe we have to be the source for God’s miracles.

Sometimes we feel as if we have to do things a certain way, and our preconceived notions of how God will use us can get in the way.

We worry that what we’re sensing is just our imagination, but who said God can’t use our imagination? He invented it. He’s a creative and imaginative God. It’s a huge part of how we are like Him and how we connect with Him.

We have a tendency to say, “God, if You’ll anoint me, I’ll go.” God says, “If you’ll go, I’ll anoint you.”

We aren’t the main act—God is.

“Even if people weren’t being healed, would you keep going for it? Would you still keep pursuing these things?”

Simply knowing that God is with us and acting on that knowledge is enough to bring a huge amount of transformation that would

be impossible any other way.

Faith is always mixed with perseverance, and it p...