Insights into the Heart of a Warrior

This is part of a message that I sent to a friend tonight in regards to my heart and belief system on many issues that are sensitive subjects for many people.  I wanted to post it here because I believe it will speak to a lot of people, encourage, empower, and equip you to get aggressive and to pursue wholeheartedly the destiny and inheritance that God has for each of you—and also because it will probably help you understand me a bit better

Enjoy.
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I have witnessed amazing miracles through the power of God and I know that it is never God’s will for any to perish (2 Peter 3:9)—and unfortunately right now there are people perishing.  It is my firm opinion that this is not God’s fault, but the fault of Christians everywhere who are not operating in their God-given authority and demonstrating His power and dominion over a very-real devil who does nothing but steal, kill, and destroy.  The deficiency is never on God’s end.

Jesus made it clear when He talked to His disciples that it was their responsibility if there were sick people in a city that they were in (Luke 10:8-9)…and the message that I unashamedly speak is that it is time for the Bride of Christ to make herself ready (Rev. 19:7) and contend for and step into the power and destiny that God has for each of us.

This is why I say that it is always God’s will to heal, right now.  It is the model that Jesus gave–never did He turn anyone away and say things that are said in our churches: “It’s just not My will right now” — “It’s not My timing” — “It’s just a thorn in your flesh…My grace is sufficient for you” — “I’m trying to teach you something through this” — “You are bringing Me greater glory by suffering through this” — and the list goes on..but that’s the majority of them.  He simply never said or did it.

There’s a whole lot of verses throughout the Gospels and I’ve just recently started compiling them (only up to Matthew 12 so far) and I’ve already come up with 5 where it says “…and He (or the disciples) healed them ALL”.

(Matthew 4:23-24)

(Matthew 8:16)

(Matthew 9:35)

(Matthew 10:1)

(Matthew 12:15)

This is our model…and I’m not saying that we’re there yet…but I certainly have seen a whole lot more breakthrough by gritting my teeth and not backing off.  I’ve found that if we don’t back down and just keep praying and commanding the healing and exercising the authority God has given to each of us, that the devil WILL back down eventually.

With the things I have seen and the things I’ve learned through experience and revelation and reading the Word, I can’t help but speak about it—just today in church there was a girl behind us that we prayed for whose jaw visibly would lock and get stuck when she’d open her mouth and it had transcended into a degenerative issue for the last 8 years…and after praying twice it was completely healed.

She was so amazed and so were we but it wasn’t the kind of amazement where we didn’t expect it to happen…we knew it HAD to happen…I wasn’t asking the pain and the problem to go, I was telling it to go and I would not stop until it was gone.  And it went–and now her jaw doesn’t lock at all.  It was so amazing, especially because we had seen it locking just moments earlier.

In praying with a lady just yesterday, while most people who prayed for her spent 5 or 10 minutes with her, we spent almost an hour and a half because it just wasn’t completed yet—and I don’t see anywhere that Jesus told us to leave people only partially healed.  So we stuck it out and we saw her again today and she said she’s feeling amazing with no more pain or problems…so what would have happened if we had stopped?  I don’t know.  What I do know is that I’ve met a whole lot of people who have received some short 2 minute prayers and have left still pretty busted up.  I don’t see it in the life of Christ or anywhere in the New Testament and I refuse to bow to that.

He told us to set the captives free and opening the door just a little bit so they can get their leg out the door doesn’t set them free.  This ministry of healing and deliverance is a lot of responsibility and it takes perseverance to get the kind of results that are our inheritance.

Obviously our ideal situation would be that everybody we prayed for is healed and stays healed and that it only takes a second or two..and this is what we press in for and go after.  I do not believe it is God’s will for us to have to spend hours praying for people to get the job done. My point is that it has seemed to take a perseverance in the long haul to get to a place where the short, concise prayers are a lot more effective.  Almost as if the devil knows you won’t back down so he just leaves a lot faster.

We’ve had it start happening recently where we’ve not even had to pray we’ve just laid hands on people who have been healed instantly—and that’s something we’ve been praying for and going after for about 3 years now…and very aggressively.

I am extremely intense about this stuff because I have found that the devil will not take people seriously if they aren’t serious with him.  Too many people tolerate his working in their lives and it is that tolerance, in my opinion, that kills so many Christians with sickness and disease.

In studying guys like John G. Lake and Smith Wigglesworth…I have found that they were not calm, complacent, and in many cases even very nice.  Church folk frequently got offended with how intense and gruff they were…but they also got some of the most amazing results in the healing ministry in the last 200 years.

I suppose my question then becomes what would you rather have—nice Christians praying for people and the people end up dying or some gruff, authoritative, intense Christians who don’t back down in the face of seemingly impossible circumstances and even go so far as to drag bodies out of caskets in the middle of funerals and command life into them until they come back to life?

I certainly have never done that…but Wigglesworth did several different times and saw many people come back from the dead.

I have a hard time believing that when Jesus was spitting on people’s tongues and putting mud in their eyes that there weren’t some Pharisees or other well-intentioned believers nearby who were offended at His methods.  I’ve kneed people in the stomach at the suggestion of the Holy Spirit and seen people healed.

I don’t understand it other than to say that there is no formula.  There is no pat answer.  We seem to want there to be an easy answer to everything and the only easy answer that I have been able to offer people is this:  DO NOT BACK DOWN.

The devil has limited resources…only 1/3 of heaven fell with him so we’re up 2 to 1 (plus obviously we have the Creator of the Universe living inside us…so that’s a trump card every time too).  I have found in my experience that if we dig in and look at the healing and deliverance ministry as it is—open acts of warfare against the powers of darkness—you learn to take it a lot more seriously and understand that your enemy is not a patsy.  He has been around a long time and he knows the human tendency to give up.

I have found that if we do not give up, he gets worn out and will back off…and it even seems like you can establish a reputation amongst his ranks…look at the seven sons of Sceva and what the demon said…”Jesus I know, and Paul I know also, but who are you?”  (Acts 19:13-16)

So to me, that shows that there is something that the demonic realm can recognize in the spirit realm in terms of our authority and reputation…how else could the demon say that he knew who Jesus and Paul were but then essentially made fun of and beat the tar out of Sceva’s sons?  I think that story in itself shows very clearly what has happened to many believers.  Sceva’s sons were trying a formula based on what they heard Paul saying…”In the name of the Jesus that Paul preaches…come out of him!”

Because they had no history with casting out demons and no reputation in hell, the demon laughed at them and overpowered them.  This is a very real, and unfortunately very common occurrence in the church today.

This is war.  Our mission statement is to love God, love others, and set the captives free.  I’ve seen too many people die who have not had to…and I’ve been witness to far too much powerless Christianity.

This life is the life that Christ paid for…divine health is our inheritance, as well as to be the head and not the tail…above and not beneath…the lender and not the borrower.  It should not be that those in the Old Covenant had superior blessings and encounters with God.

And so we press forward…aggressively taking ground and OCCUPYING.  The object of warfare is never victory–the object is occupation of new ground.  Most of this can be linked back to the Exodus from Egypt into the Promised Land and how, even after the Israelites entered the Promised Land, there were still giants to kick out.

It was in the Promised Land that God taught Israel how to co-labor with God and fight from victory, not for it.

We are no different.  All things are ours in Christ—but there is still a thief who does not like to play by the rules and it is our job to enforce the victory of Calvary over the works of darkness.