COHEIR: HOW TO CLAIM YOUR INHERITANCE IN CHRIST

DIEGO PINEDA

Light Edge Publishing

Toronto

Copyright

Coheir: How to Claim your Inheritance in Christ

Copyright © 2014 by Diego Pineda. All rights reserved.

http://www.coheirs.org

Light Edge Publishing is a division of Light Edge Productions, Inc., Toronto, Canada. http://www.lightedge.tv

Unless otherwise noticed, Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked (AMP) taken from the Amplified® Bible, Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.” (www.Lockman.org)

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked (KJV) are taken from the Holy Bible, King James Version. The KJV is public domain.

Scripture quotations marked HCSB are taken from the Holman Christian Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2009 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission.

Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

Table of Contents

THANKS

THE INHERITANCE: CLAIM IT OR LOSE IT

WHAT’S INCLUDED

BENEFIT 1: UNLIMITED POWER

BENEFIT 2: DIVINE AUTHORITY

BENEFIT 3: A NEW NATURE

BENEFIT 4: THE BODY OF CHRIST

HOW TO CLAIM IT

IT’S ALL ABOUT RELATIONSHIP

INTIMACY WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT

WASTING YOUR INHERITANCE

SIN & RELIGION: THE INHERITANCE ROBBERS

INHERIT THE KINGDOM

REVIVAL: THE CORPORATE INHERITANCE

NOW WHAT? THE NEXT STEPS

Thanks

Thank you, sweet Holy Spirit for inspiring me every day. You are such an amazing teacher!

Thanks to my gorgeous wife, Diana, for rooting for me since day one. You are the best!

I only have deep gratitude and love for the friends who read the manuscript and gave me valuable insight, especially Mark Manfredi for pointing my weaknesses in love, and Jo Dunbar, for your magnificent editing skills.

To my good friends Dwayne, Joe, and Crissie, may you experience the fullness of the Father’s love and live as true heirs of the Kingdom.

The Inheritance: Claim it or lose it

“…but you received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father!” The Spirit Himself testifies together with our spirit that we are God’s children, and if children, also heirs—heirs of God and coheirs with Christ—seeing that we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.”

Romans 8:15-17 (HCSB)

In July 2000, a curious headline appeared in South American newspapers: “Police seek a man who inherited 6 million dollars but doesn’t know it.”

Below is an excerpt of the article, translated from the Argentinean newspaper, Clarin: (1)

Chilean Tomás Martínez, 67, disappeared from the places he used to visit: the markets of Santa Cruz de la Sierra, where he did odd jobs; the pubs of Nueva Feria, where he would get drunk with the coins he received; the bridges of the Bolivian city, where he slept. Through detectives and lawyers, his relatives and dozens of “friends” seek him—as well as the police. He thinks it’s because of the hot checks he signed in 1977, when his downfall began. But he’s wrong: he inherited six million dollars, and he doesn’t know it.

This gift from Heaven came on behalf of his ex-wife, Inés Gajardo Olivares. They got married 40 years ago and separated after a few months, but the divorce was never processed. Neither of them had any children. While they lived together, in Santiago de Chile, they were a middle class couple. She died of solitude in 1997, but a few years before she had inherited a fortune….

Three weeks ago, his two brothers hired two attorneys, who assigned the task to find him to the private detective, Julio Alfredo Murillo Valdés, an ex-cop from Bolivia who formed a special search team with other ex-policemen.

The description of Tomás Martínez was published in the newspapers: 165 cm tall, chubby, gray hair, a burn near the left ear, a mole on his chin, white skin with acne marks, big nose; thick and reddish.

Since then, more than 200 people said they have seen him, or know about his death. According to some, he lives in Brazil. According to others, Peru. Some say he died in a street fight and ended up in a mass grave. Nothing could be proved.

The street vendors and the beggars who knew him in Santa Cruz de la Sierra only agreed in that “the Chilean” is addicted to alcohol and cocaine.

Last week, the detective came to the bar that the beggar visits often in Nueva Feria, a popular food and clothing market. He missed him by an inch: while the detective asked for him, Martínez sneaked out. He not only ignores that he is rich: he doesn’t know he can now return to Chile, where the charges for check fraud have expired.

From the many stories I have read about unclaimed inheritances, Tomas’ story has to be one of the saddest of all. It’s not just that a regular guy with a good and comfortable life is missing on a few years of wealth, but that a man who has nothing, and is living in misery, has lost the chance of transforming his life for his lack of knowledge.

On a spiritual level, Tomas’s story can serve as an analogy for the life of many Christians. Like Tomas, we are heirs to some great wealth:

In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory.

Ephesians 1:11

While Tomas’s inheritance was six million dollars, ours includes eternal life, mansions in a city with streets of gold and all sorts of things we cannot even fathom.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in Heaven for you.

1 Peter 1:3-4

This book is about our inheritance in Christ, which the Bible tells us is not just for Heaven, but to enjoy in this life as well. As Bill Johnson says, our inheritance is beyond human comprehension, but “to put the richness of that gift into the eternal future is to sell short the power of the cross in the present.” (2)

The fact is that our inheritance involves the finished work of Christ at the cross. Derek Prince, beautifully portrays this truth:

Jesus was punished that we might be forgiven.

Jesus was wounded that we might be healed.

Jesus was made sin with our sinfulness that we might become righteous in his righteousness.

Jesus died our death that we might share his life.

Jesus became poor with our poverty that we might become rich with his riches.

Jesus bore our shame that we might share his glory.

Jesus endured our rejection that we might have his acceptance as children of God.

Jesus became a curse that we might receive a blessing. (3)

What a great inheritance! Now, you must realize that like the beggar, we must claim it or lose it.

When we received Jesus and believed in his name, we became children of God (John 1:12). As children, we become heirs of God and coheirs with Christ. Legally, then, we are entitled to Christ’s inheritance.

However, in our daily experience, this was only the beginning of the process of acquiring our inheritance. Derek Prince says that the Christian life could be described as a progression from the legal to the experiential. “Step by step, in faith, we must appropriate in experience all that is already ours by legal right through our faith in Christ.” (4)

Just as the Israelites were given the land of Canaan as an inheritance, we have been given all the promises of God in Christ. And just as the Israelites had to cross the Jordan and battle their enemies so they could take possession of the land, we must fight the good fight of faith to take possession of the fullness of our inheritance in Christ.

Most sermons and writings I have found on the topic of the inheritance of the saints, focus on the rewards that await the redeemed in Heaven. But the truth is that there is more to our inherited riches than the ones stored up in Heaven. Until we acquire possession of them, we get to enjoy the fullness of Christ on this earth, which we explore in the following chapters.

THE DOWN PAYMENT OF OUR INHERITANCE

That [Spirit] is the guarantee of our inheritance [the firstfruits, the pledge and foretaste, the down payment on our heritage], in anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring [complete] possession of it—to the praise of His glory.

Ephesians 1:14 (AMP)

The Greek word for “guarantee” in Ephesians 1:14 can also be translated as “earnest, pledge, or down payment.” The Holy Spirit is the down payment of our inheritance. And what is a down payment? It’s a part of the full price paid at the time of purchase or delivery with the balance to be paid later. That means that we can begin to enjoy all the riches of Heaven through the Holy Spirit right now, just as you move into a house without paying the full price, but only a down payment on the total price.

Sadly, many Christians live like Tomas, the beggar; ignoring that they have received an inheritance and that’s what Paul is so adamantly praying for:

For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints.

Ephesians 1:15-18

I love the words he uses to describe this inheritance. It’s not just the petty little will of your great grand aunt leaving you her collection of cookbooks. He says “the riches of his glorious inheritance.” That must be awesome! I join him in praying that today you too will receive a revelation of this inheritance by the Holy Spirit.

Personally, the journey of discovering my inheritance in Christ has taken many years, and it was only recently that the Spirit gave me a glimpse of the glorious riches in Heaven. The Lord often speaks to me through mental pictures; vivid scenes that play in my mind while I worship him. In one of these “visions,” a modern and heavy vault door (like a bank vault but made of gold) opened before me. As I stepped through the door, the inside of the vault actually opened to the outside, as if the door was placed up in the sky. Some distance away was a huge mountain of gold and precious stones, piercing through the clouds. I looked down but could not see the bottom, only clouds. The same when I looked up. So I jumped, thinking I would reach the ground easily, but I just went through the clouds and kept free falling for what seemed like hours, all the while the mountain of riches still in front of me—never ending, never reaching the bottom.

Whether this is a real mountain or not is irrelevant. What the picture was telling me is that the riches of his glorious inheritance are beyond human comprehension. Although we cannot fathom the depths of the riches of God, we can receive a revelation of our down payment.

So let’s take a look at what’s included. The benefits if you will, in the down payment of this inheritance. Although there is more to our inheritance, there are four benefits I will focus on in this book: the power of God, his delegated divine authority, the fruit of the Spirit, and the body of Christ.

KEY IDEAS

• We are heirs of God and coheirs with Christ

• Our inheritance in Christ is not just for Heaven, but to enjoy in this life as well

• The Holy Spirit is the down payment of our inheritance

• The inheritance includes all that Jesus obtained for us through his sacrifice

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. In what areas of your spiritual life and your Christian walk, do you identify with Tomas the beggar?

2. Read again Derek Prince’s poem and write down those things that Jesus earned for you but that you feel you haven’t claimed yet.

3. If you inherited 6 million dollars, what would you do, how far would you go to claim that inheritance? Would you do the same to claim your inheritance in Christ?

PRACTICE

Pray this prayer based on Ephesians 1:17-18: “Father of glory, give me the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation so I can know you better. Enlighten the eyes of my hearts that I may know what is the hope to which you have called me, and what are the riches of your glorious inheritance. Amen!”

NOTES

1. Clarin. Buscan a hombre que heredó US $6.000.000 y no lo sabe. Published on July 23, 2000. http://edant.clarin.com/diario/2000/07/23/s-04201.htm (Last accessed February 19, 2014).

2. Bill Johnson. Dreaming with God: Secrets to Redesigning Your World through God’s Creative Flow.” (Shippensburg, Pa: Destiny Image, 2006), 170.

3. Derek Prince. Blessing or Curse: You Can Choose. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2006), 206.

4. Ibid, 226.

Benefit 1: Unlimited Power

“Unless we share in Jesus’ ministry of healing the sick and casting out evil spirits, our preaching about the Kingdom of God being here among us is simply an empty promise.”

Francis MacNutt (1)

My favorite superhero is Spider Man. The reason is that he’s the only normal guy—with regular real life problems—among all the powerful characters in the comic world. Superman is an indestructible alien, whose major issues are kryptonite rocks and a lame love relationship with Louise Lane. Batman is a rich brat who has all the technology and resources at his feet and rarely loses his temper. Peter Parker (Spiderman), on the other hand, struggles to keep his job, get good grades at school and find time to pursue his love interest. He can’t pay his rent most of the time, and even has doubts about his superhero call. In other words, he’s one of us. A human being. Except that has some pretty cool powers such as great physical strength, and web-shooting wrists!

There’s a scene in the first movie when Peter Parker is discovering his new powers. He climbs up the wall of a building and then practices shooting his webs. As he grows in his understanding of the power he has, the better he gets at using them and helping people in trouble.

Something similar happens when we come to realize the great power that has been bestowed upon us. The same power that conquered the grave and raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you and me. Ephesians 1:19-23 says that we must have a revelation of “what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the Heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.”

The immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe is not just a power to save us from Hell and take us into Heaven, but it encompasses all that Christ accomplished at the cross.

For [the Servant of God] grew up before Him like a tender plant, and like a root out of dry ground; He has no form or comeliness [royal, kingly pomp], that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected and forsaken by men, a Man of sorrows and pains, and acquainted with grief and sickness; and like One from Whom men hide their faces He was despised, and we did not appreciate His worth or have any esteem for Him. Surely He has borne our griefs (sicknesses, weaknesses, and distresses) and carried our sorrows and pains [of punishment], yet we [ignorantly] considered Him stricken, smitten, and afflicted by God [as if with leprosy]. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our guilt and iniquities; the chastisement [needful to obtain] peace and well-being for us was upon Him, and with the stripes [that wounded] Him we are healed and made whole.

Isaiah 53:2-5 (AMP)

At the cross, Jesus paid the price for our salvation, our healing, our freedom and even our provision. Many times it’s easy to believe that he saved us, but we find it difficult to believe that he is willing and able to heal all of our diseases. Actually, the Greek word for salvation used across the New Testament is the verb sozo, which means three things: to save, to heal and to deliver. For Believers, these three should always go together, despite the many church traditions that have understood sozo to mean only the salvation of the soul.

That same power that Jesus exercised to bring about sozo is at work within us, as part of our inheritance.

Now to Him Who, by (in consequence of) the [action of His] power that is at work within us, is able to [carry out His purpose and] do superabundantly, far over and above all that we [dare] ask or think [infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, hopes, or dreams]

Ephesians 3:20 (AMP)

What is more exciting about this bestowed power is the fact that Jesus himself promised that we would do even greater works than his.

Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father.

John 14:12

Now, what was Jesus referring to when he said greater works? Here are some other verses in the same book, the gospel of John, that clarify this verse:

Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.

John 3:1-2

For the works that the Father has given me to accomplish, the very works that I am doing, bear witness about me that the Father has sent me.

John 5:36

If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me; but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.

John 10:37-38

Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

John 20:30-31

In these verses, the words ‘works’ and ‘signs’ are used interchangeably and they are referring to the miracles of Jesus. The traditions of the Jews called for the Messiah to perform miraculous works to prove his divinity. John points to seven miracles or signs:

• Turning water into wine (John 2:1-11)

• Healing the centurion’s servant (John 4:46-54)

• Healing the paralytic at Bethesda (John 5:1-18)

• Feeding the 5,000 people (John 6:1-15)

• Walking on water (John 6:16-21)

• Healing the man born blind (John 9:1-41)

• Raising Lazarus from the dead (John 11:1-44)

The message couldn’t be clearer. John wrote about the signs that Jesus performed so we would believe in Him and to prove he was the fulfillment of the prophesied Messiah. When we believe in Jesus, we will do those same miracles and even greater things. That’s so amazing.

HEALING POWER

I became a Christian at age nine, but only now in my early thirties have I been challenged to have an unwavering faith with regards to healing. I spent my teenage years in church involved in youth programs and worship music, and although we talked about the power of God, we didn’t practice it much. The times I remember that we prayed for the sick were when the pastor would say from the pulpit that sister so-and-so was hospitalized with cancer and that we should pray for her. The laying on of hands on the sick every service? Not really.

It’s not that we had a doctrinal bias like cessationism (a doctrine that teaches that the gifts of the Spirit are not present in the church, but ceased once the last of the New Testament apostles died and/or the canon of the Bible was completed). No, we just thought those gifts were reserved for great evangelists like Benny Hinn or T.L Osborn (who actually came to our church once), so I went about my Christian life for many years without exercising the healing power I have in Christ.

You may say, “there are some people with more anointing for healing than me, so I’ll let them do it” but we are all commanded by Jesus to preach the good news and to heal the sick. It is true that some have a greater measure of the healing gift, just as some have a greater gift of evangelism. Nonetheless, we are all called to evangelize, even if we are not all Billy Grahams.

Smith Wigglesworth said that there is nothing impossible with God, but that all the impossibility is with us when we measure God by the limitations of our unbelief. (2)

As my wife and I have been increasing in our faith for healing, we have seen many miracles, not only in others, but also in our own lives. For a long time, my wife suffered from a sharp pain in her left knee that would accentuate after walking or standing for a long time. We prayed for the pain to go away but the root of the pain was that her left leg was about an inch shorter than the right leg. One day at a Friday night prayer group, a friend was sharing the testimony of how God had made her shorter leg grow, which obviously stirred our faith. My wife didn’t say anything in that moment but after a while, I just asked the group to pray for her leg to grow as well. She sat on a chair with her legs stretched, so we could see them, and there it was: one shorter than the other. As we prayed, we felt the electrifying presence of the Holy Spirit in the room. We prayed and then we checked the legs. Nothing happened, so we prayed again. This went for about 20 minutes, until my wife felt a pull in her leg while nobody was holding it. We checked again and the legs were the same length! We got our miracle!

So, why aren’t all the people we pray for healed? There may be several reasons:

Inner healing must come first. Sometimes the root of the sickness is unforgiveness or bitterness and we must deal with that before healing can be manifested.

On one occasion, some men brought a paralytic to Jesus. He said first, “your sins are forgiven.” and then said “rise up and walk.” (Luke 5:17-26) He dealt with inner healing fist, then the physical.

A vivid example of this happened to me, although it wasn’t until much later that I realized what had happened. In 2006, I began having a very strong neck pain. An MRI showed that two discs in my spine were pinching a nerve. None of the medicines that the doctors gave me worked and the physical therapy made the pain worse. Surgery was too risky, so they ruled that out.

When my family doctor saw how miserable I felt with a pain that never left me, she prescribed a drug that people with diabetes take to anesthetize nerve endings. I began with 50 mg per day and went up to 250 mg. The drug calmed the pain, but had some nasty side effects, like a mild pain in my joints and a lethargy that clouded my thinking.

I begged the Lord to take the pain away and asked everybody I could to pray for healing. The pain remained for two whole years, until one day, it suddenly stopped and never came back.

I gave God the glory for the healing and went on with my life. Two more years passed until the Holy Spirit brought the whole issue back to my attention—in pretty odd circumstances—and showed me why the healing of my neck took so long.

While preparing a message on healing, I reflected on the time of my ailment and realized that I had carried an offense, a grudge, against the pastor of the church I attended back then. He had said something in one of his sermons that I didn’t agree with, and my attitude toward him became critical and judgmental. This was about the time that my neck pain started. I carried this grudge in my heart for two years, until the Holy Spirit finally got through to me and I repented. The time of my repentance from this sin coincided with my healing. I cannot prove that they were related, but I’m convinced that the resentment I harbored against the pastor (and it could have been anybody else for that matter, not just a minister) was a hindrance to my healing.

Deliverance must come first. Sometimes the cause is a spirit of infirmity or some sort of demonic possession or oppression and deliverance has to come first. There can be a curse or some occult root that must be renounced. I’ll cover this in more depth in a later chapter.

Perseverance is needed. Sometimes we must persevere in prayer for a while before we see the breakthrough. This doesn’t imply that God is limited or that longer prayers are required for healing to happen. God can heal anyone instantly, no matter the condition. The fact is that he partners with humans to carry out his will on earth—he has put his immeasurable power in jars of clay—and we are the ones who limit God with our unbelief or lack of perseverance. We are not questioning energy itself when we say that a 25-watt bulb can’t illuminate a stadium. We are merely pointing out the limitations of the tool that releases the energy. As Dutch Sheets says, the power source is not the problem. (3) We have to keep praying to release more power. Have you read Revelation 5:8, where it says that in Heaven are golden bowls full of incense which are the prayers of the saints? Now look at these verses:

And another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer, and he was given much incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar before the throne, and the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, rose before God from the hand of the angel. Then the angel took the censer and filled it with fire from the altar and threw it on the earth, and there were peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning, and an earthquake.

Revelation 8:3-5

Sometimes we need to pray until the bowl is filled and it tips over and is mixed with the fire from the altar—and the supernatural power of God is released!

Faith must increase first. There is an old video clip of reverend A.A. Allen in the God’s Generals series by Roberts Liardon, (4) in which Allen is praying for the sick. They bring a man on a stretcher who has cancer in the stomach and hasn’t eaten anything for weeks. The guy looks like he’s about to die and the wife is crying while telling of his illness. The preacher interviews her, asking for details again and again, while he repeats the facts to the congregation and says that the man will be healed.

He keeps talking with the wife and addressing the audience for more than ten minutes. The first time I saw this, I began growing impatient. Why wouldn’t he just pray for him? The poor man is suffering, dying of hunger (this was in the 50s, so I guess it was harder to keep him alive with tubes), and they’re just talking about him.

Finally, the preacher prays for him and commands him to stand in the name of Jesus. The man jumps of the stretcher and begins to talk! Then they bring food and he eats it all. The wife and the crowd wait to see if his stomach is going to reject the food as before, but the man smiles and says the food is great. That was a happy ending, but why all the preliminaries and the exhaustive interview?

What I believe he was doing was increasing the faith of the congregation, prepping the audience, so to speak, for the miracle to take place.

Sometimes there is an environment of unbelief that hinders the manifestation of the healing. Even Jesus experienced this in Nazareth.

And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them. And he marveled because of their unbelief.

Mark 6:5-6

On one occasion, Smith Wigglesworth was asked to pray for a young woman who was about to die. (4) When he got to the house and entered the room, the first thing he did was kick out the mother and the relatives out of the room so he could pray by himself. He said he heard the Holy Spirit saying that the relatives were filled with unbelief and it would be better for them not to be there. Jesus did the same when resurrecting Jairus’ daughter; he asked all the relatives and mourners to leave before “waking her up.”

I don’t suggest we kick people out of a service or prayer meeting, but it may be necessary to build up faith first. One way to do this is by sharing testimonies of healing—especially of people with the same condition as the one being prayed for. Randy Clark does this in a masterful way. On a ministry trip to Brazil, I heard him sharing testimony after testimony, building the faith of the people and stirring up their hearts to believe. Then he would give out words of knowledge and release the power. In that atmosphere of faith, supernatural miracles abounded.

Other reasons why not everyone gets healed may include unhealthy habits and/or not wanting to be healed. However, these reasons are not laws, simply principles, so no one should feel ashamed or guilty if there is no immediate improvement after prayer.

Take the lack of faith, for example. Jesus healed people with all levels of faith, from great faith like the Roman centurion or blind Bartimaeus, to those with no faith, like the father of the demon possessed boy who basically told Jesus, “help my unbelief.” We cannot put God in a box and give conclusive answers to questions like why all are not healed. Simply put, He’s sovereign and in the end it’s just a mystery we must live with. The basic answer is that we don’t know all the reasoning or the timing of God. The Bible says that we know in part and prophesy in part, but one day we will understand (1 Corinthians 13:9).

I’ve prayed for many people and have seen deaf ears opened, cancers healed, headaches and hernias disappear. And I’ve also seen the disappointed faces of people leaving without feeling better. The fact is that I don’t heal anybody; the Holy Spirit does, and the more we are intimate with him, the more of his glory we will carry, and the greater anointing will be released. Would you allow Him to use you today?

Our job is to preach, not to convert people. The Holy Spirit does that.

Our job is to pray, not to heal. The Holy Spirit does that. Are you ready to partner with him?

Even though we cannot know all the reasons why some people don’t get healed, this is no excuse to be complacent. I have decided to be sensitive to the Spirit and keep pressing in—as far as possible—until I get to the root of a disease that seems unresponsive to prayer.

Think about it this way. If someone comes for counseling because of an emotional problem, the counselor won’t give up if the person is not totally restored after the first session. On the contrary, they would probably meet regularly for months until inner healing and breakthrough happens. Shouldn’t it be the same with physical healing? Why should we give up so easily?

POWER TO CREATE WEALTH

The work of the cross not only includes healing, but also his provision. Financial provision is not all there is to the gospel (as some TV evangelists would seem to imply) but it is part of the package.

For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.

2 Corinthians 8:9

Jesus experienced all the abundance of Heaven, both in virtue and eternal possessions, but became a man and entered a state of human poverty. Through this act of incarnation, he was able to die on our behalf so we could experience all the abundance of Heaven for ourselves. Certainly therefore our inheritance includes all the riches in glory and the abundance described in the Bible—think about the New Jerusalem with it streets of gold and gates made or pearls (Revelation 21:21). There is no lack or poverty in Heaven, but riches and abundance.

The question is whether those riches are for us to receive here and now. This issue has brought a lot of division in the church, but I believe the debate can be settled once we define some terms, such as prosperity.

Prosperity is not defined by comparing ourselves to the richest people in the world or by a multi-million dollar net worth. In North America, prosperity is defined in a whole other level than in Africa or South East Asia. What is considered poverty in one part of the world would be wealth in another.

Prosperity means to have enough to fulfill God’s call on your life plus something extra to share with others. Poverty is to have less than what you need to do God’s will for your life. “When poverty and abundance are interpreted in this way,” Derek Prince writes in his book Blessing or Curse, “it follows that there is no absolute standard that can be applied to all Christians. The standard for each believer must be determined in relation to the will of God for his or her life.” (5)

Some Christians have been called to administer riches and sow into the kingdom, while others have been called to abandon all and live among the poor for the sake of the gospel.

The one-size-fits-all prosperity gospel has left this particular nuance out most of the time. In Deuteronomy 8:17-18, God says that he is the one who gives his people the ability to create wealth, and in the New Testament, Jesus tells us that this ability may not be the same in every person. The parables of the talents that we see repeatedly throughout the gospels indicate that the servants received different amounts of talents (or treasure) from their master, each according to his ability or skill—one received five, other two, and another only one.

Just look at your own history with money and you’ll notice whether this is a natural gift in you. If so, then you may be called to be a giver and a steward of the kingdom, but if your history is plagued with financial lack and poverty, know that this may not be so.

Deuteronomy 28 (where God lists the blessings and curses related to obeying or disobeying his voice) makes something very clear: prosperity is a blessing and poverty is a curse. Read the following verses and you’ll see that there is no other reasonable conclusion.

If you fully obey the Lord your God and carefully keep all his commands that I am giving you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the world. You will experience all these blessings if you obey the Lord your God:

The Lord will guarantee a blessing on everything you do and will fill your storehouses with grain. The Lord your God will bless you in the land he is giving you.

The Lord will give you prosperity in the land he swore to your ancestors to give you, blessing you with many children, numerous livestock, and abundant crops. The Lord will send rain at the proper time from his rich treasury in the Heavens and will bless all the work you do. You will lend to many nations, but you will never need to borrow from them. If you listen to these commands of the Lord your God that I am giving you today, and if you carefully obey them, the Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you will always be on top and never at the bottom.

But if you refuse to listen to the Lord your God and do not obey all the commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these curses will come and overwhelm you:

You will plant much but harvest little, for locusts will eat your crops. You will plant vineyards and care for them, but you will not drink the wine or eat the grapes, for worms will destroy the vines. You will grow olive trees throughout your land, but you will never use the olive oil, for the fruit will drop before it ripens. You will have sons and daughters, but you will lose them, for they will be led away into captivity. Swarms of insects will destroy your trees and crops.

The foreigners living among you will become stronger and stronger, while you become weaker and weaker. They will lend money to you, but you will not lend to them. They will be the head, and you will be the tail!

Deuteronomy 28:1-2, 8, 11-13, 15, 38-44 (NLT)

If such blessings were available in the old covenant, how much more blessing will come in the new covenant through the perfect sacrifice of Jesus, who became a curse for us so that we don’t have to carry the curses of poverty from the old covenant?

Yes, our inheritance includes the abundant provision and blessings of God. There may some times when it doesn’t seem like it, but those are mere seasons of testing. Derek Prince points out that we must recognize that “faith to appropriate God’s abundance is certain to be tested. There may be periods when we have to content ourselves with the barest sufficiency. Such periods, however, should be temporary. Once our motives have been purified and our faith has stood the test, God will release His abundance in the measure that He can trust us to use for His glory.” (6)

Psalm 37:25 says: “I have been young, and now am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging for bread.”

The Bible says that the righteous will not beg for bread. Who are the righteous? They are the ones who believe God; who put their faith in Jesus. Do you believe in God’s Word? Do you believe he will supply all your needs?

Jesus taught that God is a good father who knows and takes care of the needs of his children.

Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your Heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

Matthew 6:31-33

Also, in Ephesians 4, Paul is talking about an offering the church is giving to other churches in need, and he concludes by saying this in verse 19: “And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.”

God supplies our needs not according to our riches (or perceived lack thereof), but according to His riches. Is God rich? You bet He is! He won’t only supply our needs in finances, but also in mercy, love, joy, peace, grace. He has promised to give us all that and he never lies.

I’ve seen God’s faithfulness again and again with His supernatural provision. One of the most amazing examples was one April when I realized I had to pay almost $4,000 in taxes to the government and I had only about a thousand in my business bank account. Knowing that God would take care of it, I didn’t worry, but just prayed about it. Whilst I prayed, God gave me an idea that did not make any sense. At that time I had an online business where I sold e-books and courses for writers and I usually made between $1,000 and $1,500 per month from sales. Now, I had only 2 weeks to get the $3,000 for my taxes because they were due on April 15th but God told me to send an email to my list of subscribers saying that for 96 hours, everything on my website would be 50% off. Think about it. If I usually made $1,500 per month at full price, how was I going to make $3,000 in half the time at half the price? Well, it didn’t take two weeks, because in just three days I sold $4,000. God did it, over and above.

GIFTS OF POWER

Although so far I’ve focused on one particular spiritual gift—healing—1 Corinthians 12 lists nine gifts of the Spirit:

To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.

1 Corinthians 12:7-11

These gifts, which are part of our inheritance, are distributed by the Holy Spirit as he wills, when needed for the common good. Think about them as your “super hero” powers, so you can save the day through the grace endowments of God. Here’s a run down of the nine gifts.

Word of wisdom: This supernatural wisdom may come upon a believer so she can act according to the will of God—it may be in the form of a new perspective on things, foreign to the natural mind or the usual mental process of the person. Words of wisdom provide direction on what to do and say, how to solve a problem, or how to respond to a difficult question.

You may find yourself saying something so profound and timely, that it even surprises you. It’s a did-I-just-say-that? moment, because it came not from your mind but from the Spirit, imparting Heavenly wisdom through your lips.

A word of wisdom is a word of clarity. When this gift is manifested, you may see a situation clearly (as God sees it) and not through the distorted view of the enemy or even the limitations of your brain.

This gift is not limited to counseling and preaching, but it’s manifested in every area of our lives, because God is the source of all wisdom. The Holy Spirit moves outside of the church as well, distributing his gifts freely.

The word of wisdom sometimes comes as a business strategy or a creative solution. I experienced this when I was praying about an online business I had been trying to sell—unsuccessfully—for the two previous years. As I rested in the presence of God, asking him what to do, the name of a person came to mind. This was a colleague who had a similar business and who had partnered with me in some joint ventures before. I’d never told him that my business was for sale, but as I thought about it, I realized he was the perfect person to take over this business. I had not thought about him before in that respect, but clarity came through the Holy Spirit. The result was that I offered him the business and he bought it.

Next time you don’t know what to do in any given situation, grab hold of this free gift—simply ask.

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.

James 1:5

Word of knowledge: Knowledge is different from wisdom, in the sense that this is a functional, working knowledge. Instead of a general perspective or insight, what a word of knowledge provides is information.

Randy Clark says that a word of knowledge is “a supernatural revelation of information that is given by the Holy Spirit. It is not something that the person who receives the word knew from their own natural senses.” (7) In a sense, the Spirit will reveal to you things you shouldn’t know, such as a physical condition (sickness), a secret of the heart, or facts about a person’s life (names, family situations, even addresses).

The purpose of the words of knowledge vary, depending on the context where they are given, but they always highlight God’s care and concern for a person, and His willingness to intervene. A word of knowledge in regards to healing usually comes to build faith in both the person who needs the healing and the one praying. God highlights a condition, so the person will know that God loves her and wants to heal her at that moment.

I learned this working of the gift watching Randy Clark minister. In his healing services, Randy will call out certain pains and afflictions that the Holy Spirit reveals to him, and the people who have those conditions stand up. Randy then prays for them and asks them to wave their hands if they feel 80% or more better. Thousands of people across the world had waved their hands during Randy’s services, testifying of God’s healing power. Randy has written a great booklet called “Words of Knowledge” in which he describes the different ways in which one can receive a word of knowledge for healing. He writes: you can feel it (like a brief pain in your body), you can read it (literally seeing the words spelled out on the air or over the person), you can see it, as in a mental picture; you can think it (receiving an impression in your mind), you can say it without thinking, you can dream it, and you can have an experience that is actually a revelation of a word of knowledge. (8)

I could write a whole book with examples of words of knowledge that I, or others have seen or received, but that’s not the purpose of this book. Let me share just one, which is simple but powerful. One Sunday morning before a service in which I was to preach about healing, I asked the Lord to give some words of knowledge for people He wanted to heal. I had this mental picture of someone pouring hot water on a container and burning one of his fingers by accident. At the end of my message, I called out all the words of knowledge I had received, including the crazy one about “someone who burned a finger with hot water.” A young guy on the front row said, “That’s me,” and came forward. He looked surprised and kept saying, “This is so weird.” He had burned his finger the night before and had an excruciating pain even then. The Lord healed him right then and all the pain was gone. “I can’t believe it, the pain is gone!” he yelled.

Words of knowledge are not just for healing but can be given to testify to unbelievers that there is a God who cares for them. We saw this during our “treasure hunts” where a group prays for clues (words of knowledge) that are written on a map (a piece of paper) and then they go out to the streets to find the clues. The strangers we meet are surprised when the clues in the maps have their names, physical descriptions, and prayer needs in amazing detail.

Faith: Faith means to be persuaded, to come to trust. Although it’s the same word for faith everywhere else in the New Testament (indicating our saving faith and so on), as part of the gifts of the Spirit, it has a special manifestation. The spiritual gift of faith is a supernatural ability to believe God without a doubt; to oppose unbelief, and to trust the Lord in the midst of impossible circumstances. Foremost though, this faith is a supernatural inner conviction that propels you to speak and act in such a way that allows all of the other gifts to flow with power and authority.

This is the faith that energizes you with a boldness that defies your insecurities and propels you to take risks with God. It literally energizes you. I’ve felt the electricity flow through my body as the gift of faith is released and my heart is persuaded that the person I’m praying for will be healed, the blessing I’m declaring will result in financial provision, and the bizarre word of knowledge I’ve spoken is true.

I heard Bill Johnson say once that faith is spelled “R-I-S-K.” It certainly is when we are talking about the gift of faith. I’m sure you’ve heard the expression, “a leap of faith.” That’s exactly what we’ve been talking about here—faith to raise the dead, quit your job to follow the call of God, and even command the storm to cease.

Gifts of healings: Although I’ve covered the power to heal already in this chapter, let me point out one more thing. Note that both words are plural (gifts of healings), suggesting that different people may be gifted regarding different kinds of healing. The Bible doesn’t provide more details, but in my experience, some people see more breakthroughs with certain conditions than with others.

My wife, Diana, for example, was healed of an acute long-lasting knee pain, and in turn she seems to have a special anointing to pray for hurting knees—almost every knee she has prayed for has been healed. One of those healings included a woman in her fifties, who had a pain in her right knee for seven years after a car accident. She couldn’t bend or rotate the knee, but after Diana prayed, all the pain left and the woman said her knee felt great. In my case, the most common breakthrough I’ve seen is for deaf ears.

Working of miracles: The gifts of healings and the working of miracles are closely related. Whenever we see a physical condition such as a tumor disappear, it is nothing short of a miracle. Many times, we pray for the sick and a healing process begins, in which the person is progressively healed in a matter of days or weeks. On other occasions, the healing is immediate. The Greek for working of miracles implies that the Holy Spirit releases his energy through us to perform great deeds in the name of Jesus. We exercise power through God’s ability. What is God’s first demonstration of power in the Bible? His creative power, when he created the Heavens and Earth and all that is in them. That same creative power is at work within us and can work in a similar way when we declare things that aren’t as if they were, in the powerful name of Jesus. Heidi Baker and others in Africa have reported that food is multiplied when they feed the multitudes, just as when Jesus multiplied the bread to feed more than five thousand people. Things that are impossible for modern science become possible through the working of miracles. Seeing this with your own eyes is an amazing experience.

One night in Brazil, a teenager with a tremor in his hands came forth for prayer. He told me that a genetic disease that ran through his family caused this involuntary tremor. I could see his hands shaking. I broke the generational disease, asked the Holy Spirit to re-write his DNA to fix the problem, and then I commanded the tremor to stop. His hands seemed steadier, so I asked him how he felt. He said it was about 80% better. I prayed again, this time blessing him and declaring the goodness of God upon his life. The Holy Spirit fell upon him and he fell to the floor. I continued ministering while he was lying on the ground. After a couple of minutes I asked him how he felt. He said his fingers were not trembling anymore and that he only felt the tremor on a small spot in the center of his hand. He closed and opened his hands in amazement, saying that every time he opened his hands, his fingers used to shake terribly, but not anymore.

Did God actually re-write his DNA? I don’t know. All I know is that the permanent symptom of his genetic condition vanished in a matter of minutes.

Prophecy: The main meaning of the word prophecy is divinely empowered forth-telling (asserting the mind of God) or foretelling (prediction). However, there are many uses of the word prophet in the Bible, which refer to different realms of the prophetic. It’s important to differentiate here between the gift of prophecy and the office of the prophet. In Ephesians 4, when Paul talks about the five-fold ministry of apostles, prophets, evangelists, teachers and pastors, he is referring to the gifts (service) given by the Lord Jesus to the church. The prophet in the Ephesians passage is what we call “the office of the prophet.”

Even in 1 Corinthians 12, Paul makes the distinction between the different endowments given by each person of the trinity.

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service [see Ephesians 4:11-12], but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities [see Romans 12:3-8], but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone.

1 Corinthians 12:4-6

While the gift of prophecy is for every believer—Paul even says that we should eagerly desire to prophecy—the ministry (service) of Prophet is a definitive call of God. This ministry or office comes with a divine authority and includes the functions of providing direction and correction. The spiritual gift of prophecy available to everyone however is not to be used to provide direction, correction or judgment in the style of an Old Testament Prophet. Paul says very clearly that the gift of prophecy is for the building up of the church.

On the other hand, the one who prophesies speaks to people for their upbuilding and encouragement and consolation. The one who speaks in a tongue builds up himself, but the one who prophesies builds up the church.

1 Corinthians 14:3-4

Discerning of spirits: This gift goes beyond discerning what is right from wrong. It recognizes the hidden motives and the demonic forces behind a person or group of persons. Literally, it means a thorough judgment, that is, discernment (conclusion) which distinguishes “look-alikes,” or things that appear to be the same (Vine’s Biblical Dictionary).

There will be occasions when people appear to have good intentions—in their words and their demeanor—but the Spirit shows you what is in their hearts. Take for instance the time when Simon the sorcerer offered money to Peter and John so he could have the power of the Holy Spirit. Here’s what Peter said to him:

But Peter replied, “May your money be destroyed with you for thinking God’s gift can be bought! You can have no part in this, for your heart is not right with God. Repent of your wickedness and pray to the Lord. Perhaps he will forgive your evil thoughts, for I can see that you are full of bitter jealousy and are held captive by sin.”

Acts 8:20-23

At first it would seem that Peter overreacted. After all, this was a pagan man just recently converted, and all he knew was that you buy power. You could say that he was simply misguided or ignorant and just needed correction. But Peter discerned that Simon’s heart was “not right with God” and that he was full of “bitter jealousy.”

Various kinds of tongues: Through the book of Acts we see that one of the most common evidences of the baptism of the Holy Spirit was speaking in other tongues. This might be human languages that the person has never learned—as it was the case in Pentecost when the believers shared the gospel with the foreigners in Jerusalem in their own languages—or angelic tongues (see 1 Corinthians 13:1).

It is common to refer to the practice of this gift as “praying in the Spirit,” which points to the fact that it is the Holy Spirit praying through us. I will expound later in the chapter on the purpose of this gift.

Interpretation of tongues: More than a “word-for-word” rendering, this interpretation, provides the gist of a message, the equivalent meaning.

My first exposure to this gift was many years ago during a pastors’ conference (I was there as part of the worship team). One of the pastors was praying in tongues, and later a lady came to him and said, “How do you know the language of the gypsies?”

He was baffled and said he didn’t. She explained that she was a missionary to these people and that he had been praying, “Jesus I love you,” in their language.

Since then, I’ve seen the manifestation of this gift in many forms, and it’s always pretty amazing. One common occurrence in a church in Texas was for someone in the congregation to start speaking in tongues and for the pastor at the front to interpret.

The interpretation of tongues is necessary when spoken during a service, but also in our personal prayers. In fact, Paul says that if we have the gift of tongues, we should pray for the interpretation.

Therefore, one who speaks in a tongue should pray for the power to interpret. For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays but my mind is unfruitful. What am I to do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will pray with my mind also; I will sing praise with my spirit, but I will sing with my mind also.

1 Corinthians 14:13-15

Sadly, most Christians I know are content with praying with their spirit and leaving their mind out of it. Something I’ve done and that you can try as well is to ask the Holy Spirit to give you the interpretation of your own tongues as you pray. Then start speaking in tongues and let your mind listen—the interpretation will begin to flow in your thoughts.

This is a good practice for when you are in a public meeting and someone begins to pray in tongues. Then you can be the interpreter for the common good.

DESIRE THE GIFTS

After listing the spiritual gifts and explaining how they work in the body of Christ, Paul says we must be hungry to have them.

But earnestly desire and zealously cultivate the greatest and best gifts and graces (the higher gifts and the choicest graces).

1 Corinthians 12:31 (AMP)

Eagerly pursue and seek to acquire [this] love [make it your aim, your great quest]; and earnestly desire and cultivate the spiritual endowments (gifts), especially that you may prophesy (interpret the divine will and purpose in inspired preaching and teaching).

1 Corinthians 14:1 (AMP)

The original word for desire implies that you are almost bubbling over (boiling) because you are burning with zeal. This desire means to be deeply committed to something, to be earnest, to set one’s heart on, to be completely intent upon something. (9)

Although the church in Corinth had been abusing some of the spiritual gifts (especially tongues), and Paul had to bring correction and even guidelines on how to prophesy in church meetings, the core message of the last few chapters of 1 Corinthians is that Christians can and should desire to have these gifts.

This earnest and zealous desire is not a selfish thirst for power as can be the mindset of earthly power, but an expression of a heart compelled by love. In the midst of his discourse about the gifts, Paul writes one of the most famous passages about the nature of love—1 Corinthians 13. Prophecy, tongues and faith are of no profit unless they are motivated by love. But once our motivation is right, we can and must pursue the gifts.

Let love be your highest goal! But you should also desire the special abilities the Spirit gives—especially the ability to prophesy.

1 Corinthians 14:1 (NLT)

Let me give you five reasons why we must desire the gifts of the Spirit.

1. To imitate Christ, who had all the gifts.

Romans 8:29 says that God predestined us to be conformed to the image of Christ. Our calling is to imitate Christ, both in character and in deeds.

Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.

1 Corinthians 11:1

The Holy Spirit came upon Jesus and rested on him. Luke 4:14 says that Jesus went into Galilee under the power of the Spirit. We can read the gospels and pinpoint almost every of the gifts activated in Jesus’ ministry.

In Matthew 22:15-22, the Pharisees try to entangle Jesus in his words and asked him whether it was lawful to pay taxes to Caesar. The famous response, “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s,” is an amazing display of the wisdom of the Spirit (word of wisdom).

John 4 tells us about Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman, in which he had information supernaturally revealed about her intimate life (word of knowledge): “Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet…” (John 4:16-19)

Of course, faith, healing and miracles were a daily occurrence in the life of Jesus. From cleansing lepers to walking on water, Jesus lived a miraculous life. And he promised we can do greater things!

Jesus prophesied the destruction of Jerusalem and discerned the spirits at work in the religious leaders and the demonized. After teaching, healing and casting out demons all day, he used to go to desolate places to pray all night—surely praying in tongues or whatever the language of Heaven is.

We should earnestly desire to be like Jesus, including the display of the amazing gifts of the Spirit.

2. For the common good, to build up each other and the church.

The gifts of power are not to make us rich and famous, but “to each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” (1 Corinthians 12: 7)

I remember a lady in Honduras who came to the medical brigade we were conducting one day during a medical missions trip in 2010. She was complaining of back and neck pain and you could see from her demeanor and her words that she was suffering from depression. It turns out that her husband, a leader in the church, had an affair a few months before. Although he was back at home with her, she felt she could not trust him and all this burdened her greatly. We prayed for her for a moment, but since we didn’t have much time then, we asked her to come to the church service we would have that night. We ministered that night and the presence of the Holy Spirit was wonderful. The lady was there and God touched her in such a way that she fell to the floor and felt the fire of God going through her body, healing her from all her pain and producing joy and peace in her life. She talked to us after the service and her face looked radiant—totally different from her depression that afternoon. She said that she wanted to serve the Lord with her husband and that she would be preaching the gospel with him, wherever the Lord called them to. That was a total transformation in just a few hours, and all possible for the operation of the gifts in the church.

3. To make an impact in the world, like the early church moving in signs and wonders.

And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

Acts 2:42-47

The church in the book of Acts was meant to be the “baby church.” The contemporary church should be an adult church, mature and walking in even greater power than the early believers. We know that’s not the case but that the ideal for revival is still the church in Acts. I believe, however, that God is preparing his bride for the last days, to be that powerful witness to the world, fully operating in all the gifts of the Spirit.

The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former, says the LORD of hosts.

Haggai 2:9

4. To build ourselves in the faith.

When you partnership with the Spirit in the distribution of his gifts, your faith grows as you see the Lord working through you.

But there is a deeper level of growth that is not always evident at the time. Take for example the gift of tongues. Paul says that the one who speaks in a tongue builds up himself (1 Corinthians 14:4). Jude makes the same connection: “But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit” (Jude 20).

How does this happen?

Romans 8:26 says that the Spirit intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. The word ‘groanings’ here may not be the same as tongues, but the message of the verse is that the Spirit prays on our behalf. So, when we don’t know how to pray, we pray in tongues, letting the Spirit take control and intercede for us, because he knows both our needs and the will of God. As one of the functions of the Spirit is to transform us into Christ’s image from one degree of glory to another, I believe his intercession for us involves this process of transformation.

And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

2 Corinthians 3:18

In other words, he is building us up from glory to glory, like living stones, into an edifice that resembles Christ. He will bridge the gap between what we are in our present reality and the plans and purposes of God for our lives in such a way that the perfect will of God will be fulfilled.

Picture yourself as a student taking a final exam before getting your degree. You don’t know all the answers to the test, so you ask the teacher (the Holy Spirit) to help you. He may ask you to open the textbook (the Bible) and he would explain how to answer the test. Or he may actually take the test and jot the answers you were missing (praying in tongues).

Of course, praying in the Spirit goes beyond your personal build up, for the Spirit will also use tongues to edify the church (when the gift of interpretation is operating) or to intercede for others who are in need and for whom you otherwise would never pray. This happened to me in 1999.

One particular week that year, I noticed that every time I prayed in tongues, the word “pristina” would come out of my mouth. Whether praying by myself at night, or ministering to others at the church, this was a new word in my prayer language that I’ve never used before—I actually pay attention to the sounds and the words.

After a few days of this, I asked the Lord what “pristina” meant. As I sat at the table reading the newspaper on Saturday morning, I read about how Serbia had invaded the small country of Kosovo, and about NATO’s bombings over the Serbian army. (10) There was a map in the newspaper depicting the area of the bombings. To my surprise, I discovered that the capital city of Kosovo is Pristina. I believe the Holy Spirit was interceding through me for the Christians who were in danger in Pristina.

Praying in the Spirit is also part of the armor of God in Ephesians 6: “In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication.” (Ephesians 6:16-18)

5. To bring glory to God.

All we do in life must bring glory to our God and King, but especially the display of power. The manifestation of the gifts of the Spirit is not supposed to shine the light on us—although we might be tempted to feel very powerful ourselves.

The Biblical analogy of earthen vessels carrying a treasure is a humbling picture: “But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.” (2 Corinthians 4:7)

Yes, we cannot do miracles or healings by ourselves. Our own words would not express much wisdom or knowledge if not for the grace of God. In fact, even the event of salvation, our coming to Christ, is divinely initiated.

Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed. You know that when you were pagans you were led astray to mute idols, however you were led. Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says “Jesus is accursed!” and no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except in the Holy Spirit.

1 Corinthians 12:1-3

So it is that the recognition of Jesus as Lord is a result of the grace endowments of the Holy Spirit. This acknowledgment of his authority is an expression of worship birthed in the Spirit.

Once we recognize the work of the Lord in our lives, we’ll give glory to his name and will earnestly desire to demonstrate his power, so more glory will be brought to his name—not only in our grateful hearts, amazed that God would use us in such a way, but also in those who receive the miracle and those who witness the miracle.

Let it be with us as it was when Jesus healed a paralytic: “…he then said to the paralytic—”Rise, pick up your bed and go home.” And he rose and went home. When the crowds saw it, they were afraid, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to men.” (Matthew 9:6-8)

The power of God is part of our inheritance in Christ. Let us take hold of that truth and do the works Jesus did and even greater (John 14:12). Claim the power in your inheritance!

KEY IDEAS

• At the cross, Jesus paid the price for our salvation, our healing, and our freedom (sozo)

• Jesus himself promised that we would do even greater works than his

• We may not know all the reasons why not everyone we pray for is healed, but we should press in, nonetheless

• Prosperity means to have enough to fulfill God’s call on your life plus something extra to share with others

• We must fervently desire the gifts of the Holy Spirit

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. Do you wholeheartedly believe that salvation, spiritual freedom, physical healing, and financial provision, are part of your inheritance in Christ?

2. If you answered ‘no’ to any of the above, it may be because of your past experiences with disease, lack or oppression. Remember that your faith must not rely on your experience but on the Word of God.

3. Jesus said that we would do greater works (miracles, signs and wonders) than He did. How would your church and your city be impacted if every Christian believed and lived out this promise?

PRACTICE

Put in practice the gift of healing. Ask the Holy Spirit to baptize and anoint you with gifts of healing. Begin by praying for someone in your family or church who may be sick by declaring their healing in the name of Jesus. If you don’t see a healing immediately, don’t be discouraged, but keep praying for more people until you see the breakthrough.

NOTES

1. Francis MacNutt. The Healing Reawakening: Reclaiming Our Lost Inheritance. (Grand Rapids, MI: Chosen Books, 2006), 56.

2. Smith Wigglesworth. “Have Faith in God” (December 9, 1922) in Smith Wigglesworth: The Complete Collection of His Life Teachings, Compiled by Roberts Liardon (New Kensignton, PA: Whitaker House, 1996), 285.

3. Dutch Sheets. Intercessory Prayer: How God can use your prayers to move Heaven and earth (Ventura, CA: Regal, 1996), 220.

4. Roberts Liardon. Gods’ Generals: Why They Succeeded and Why Some Failed. (New Kensignton, PA: Whitaker House Publishers, 1996). DVD.

5. Derek Prince. Blessing or Curse: You Can Choose. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2006), 62.

6. Ibid.

7. Randy Clark. Ministry Team Training Manual (Mechanisburg, PA: Apostolic Network of Global Awakening, 2011).

8. Randy Clark. Words of Knowledge (Mechanisburg, PA: Apostolic Network of Global Awakening, 2011).

9. HELPS Word Studies. 2206 zēlóō. In BibleApps.com. http://bibleapps.com/greek/2206.htm (Last accessed February 20, 2014)

10. For general information about this event, see the Wikipedia entry on “NATO bombing of Yugoslavia” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_bombing_of_Yugoslavia (Last accessed February 20, 2014)

Benefit 2: Divine Authority

Divine callings, proven character and a supernatural lifestyle are the three primary marks of a person with true spiritual authority.

Kris Vallotton (1)

Power and authority are intimately related. The New Testament Greek word for authority, exousia, is sometimes translated as ‘power.’ Exousia is the right to exercise power and the ability or strength with which a believer is endued.

Before ascending to Heaven, Jesus said to his disciples: “All authority in Heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” (Matthew 28:18-19)

What was it that Jesus commanded them? In Matthew 10, Jesus commanded his disciples to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, and cast out demons. With this commandment, the Lord was granting them authority—the right to exercise the power of the Holy Spirit through the use of Jesus’ name—over sickness, death, and demons.

What I like so much about Jesus’ teaching style is that he first demonstrated, then taught, and then asked his followers to do the same. The gospel of Matthew provides a crash course in the authority and power of Jesus in just two chapters. Starting on chapter 7, Matthew shows that Jesus had authority to:

Teach: “And when Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes.” (Matthew 7:28-29)

Heal leprosy: “And Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I will; be clean.” And immediately his leprosy was cleansed.”(Matthew 8:3)

Heal all diseases and cast out demons: “That evening they brought to him many who were oppressed by demons, and he cast out the spirits with a word and healed all who were sick.” (Matthew 8:16)

Subject nature: “Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. And the men marveled, saying, “What sort of man is this, that even winds and sea obey him?”” (Matthew 8:26b-27)

Forgive sins: “But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he then said to the paralytic—”Rise, pick up your bed and go home.”” (Matthew 9:6)

Our inheritance includes the power and authority over the natural realm (disease, elements of nature) and the supernatural realm (demons).

Paul explains why we have this authority with a picture that should amaze anyone who reads it. Ephesians 2:6-7 says that God “raised us up with [Christ] and seated us with him in the Heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”

In the physical realm, you may be seated on a chair reading this book, but as child of God, in the spiritual realm, you are seated with Christ in the Heavenly places. Thanks to Christ’s death and resurrection, the power of God works through us, giving us the authority over spiritual forces, sickness, poverty (and eventually over nations). That thought should be enough to make you jump off your seat with joy. This authority seat goes far beyond the authority given to any current president or past emperor—it goes beyond this world! It is an authority manifested in the powerful name of Jesus. There is so much power in that name that we don’t have to scream and perform to obtain results! We just have to say it.

One time a lady came to me asking prayer for her teenage son, who didn’t want to speak to me. He was embarrassed because he had some sort of throat infection that not only hurt but also made his voice sound funny when he talked. I prayed for his throat and he was healed immediately, recovering his normal voice. Nothing fancy or elaborate, but just a simple prayer in the name of Jesus. Then the mother said she wanted prayer for her fibromyalgia. Her whole body hurt; even the feeling of the clothes on her body caused her pain. She said that this had been going on for many years and even during the service she was in pain. I prayed for her for less than a minute and all the pain left! She beamed with happiness and hugged me, praising God. There is so much power in the name of Jesus!

One of the arguments held by those who don’t believe in the ministry of healing is that God is not our servant, so we shouldn’t tell him what to do (or at least expect him to answer every time we command healing over somebody). This argument simply shows a lack of understanding of what true delegated authority means. The fact that I pray for the sick and command pain and sickness to leave—which by the way is the Biblical way to pray if we follow the model in Acts— doesn’t mean that I’m bossing God around, giving him orders on who to heal and when to do it. On the contrary, I’m only doing what he commanded me to do, using the authority that he has given me.

“The authority anyone carries does not belong to that person,” says Neal Lozano. “Rather, it belongs to the one who gave it. You and I are God’s representatives. It is our relationship with Him that enables us to exercise authority. A policeman carries the authority of the police force. He carries the badge and wears the uniform, which indicates he represents those who entrusted it to him. If he did not have these symbols indicating he was under authority, his words and actions would not carry the same weight.” (2)

Just as an ambassador or consul exercises authority in a foreign country and makes autonomous decisions (like denying visas), we exercise our authority as ambassadors from Heaven (see 2 Corinthians 5:20) here on Earth. Jesus made this point very clear when he told his disciples:

“Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in Heaven. Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in Heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” (Matthew 18:18-20)

No one would suggest that the ambassador is bossing his own government around or that he treats the president of his nation as his servant, because of his actions. The ambassador acts under the authority of his nation, and we act under the authority of the Kingdom of Heaven. When we exercise our authority as ambassadors of The Kingdom, we are not diminishing God, but bringing glory to his name.

This has been God’s plan all along; to bring glory to his name, by delegating his authority to us. God chose an amazing way to ridicule Satan and his fallen angels. He chose regular humans—sinners, actually—who the enemy had ravaged and enslaved for many centuries, and placed them in a role of authority above angels and demons, “so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the Heavenly places.” (Ephesians 3:10)

Satan never figured out the plans of God until it was too late and now, seeing what authority the Lord has given to the church, he tries to keep us from walking in that revelation. Overwhelmed by the sickness of a friend, the pile of unpaid bills, the news of rising crime in the city and a myriad of circumstances, we give in to hopelessness and despair instead of focusing on the reality of our position in Christ. In the midst of the fog of life, we forget that we are seated with Christ in Heaven, that we rule far above every circumstance and that we have the authority to declare victory and to call things that are not, as if they were.

The perspective of one seated in Heaven is such as the little boy who peers down the window of an airplane as it takes off the airport. Buildings and cars seem to shrink as the aircraft gains altitude, and all that seemed so big when on the ground, is now only the size of a toy. That’s how our earthly problems should appear to us, when we consider the size of our God, and the realm on which we stand in Christ.

Try it right now. Compare your problem with the Almighty God. Is it too big a problem for Him? I can assure you it is not. If you doubt it, I suggest you read the Psalms.

King David, the author of most of the Psalms, had the perspective of one seated in heavenly places, even though he lived a thousand years before Christ and had no chance to read the book of Ephesians. As a worshipper, David trained his soul to focus on God, to sing of his attributes and his works. He knew the greatness of the power of his God. Psalm 136 is a great example of this:

Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.

Give thanks to the God of gods, for his steadfast love endures forever.

Give thanks to the Lord of lords, for his steadfast love endures forever; to him who alone does great wonders for his steadfast love endures forever; to him who by understanding made the Heavens, for his steadfast love endures forever;

Psalm 136:1-5

David begins exalting God for who he is, his nature of goodness and love. Then he goes on to praise him for his wonders as a Creator. Later in that Psalm he recounts how God brought Israel out of Egypt, and closes with the provision of God for all his children. David exalted the Lord over every situation and need and that is the secret for us: worship focuses our mind toward God and away from our problems—it gives us the real perspective of things, because the realm of God’s promises is more real than the physical reality. Only a worshiper with the right perspective of his authority in God could do what David did when he faced Goliath. In the natural it seemed like a lost battle but David knew better.

And David said to the men who stood by him, “What shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?” (1 Samuel 17:26)

In the earthly reality, the army of Israel was nothing but a bunch of cowards afraid of confronting the giant Goliath. In the heavenly reality, Israel was the army of the living God and only David could see it that way.

Then David said to the Philistine, “You come to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the LORD will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you down and cut off your head. And I will give the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air and to the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, and that all this assembly may know that the LORD saves not with sword and spear. For the battle is the LORD’s, and he will give you into our hand.

1 Samuel 17:45-47

Others in the Bible, such as Joshua and Caleb, lived with the same revelation that David had regarding the power and authority of God. While ten of the twelve spies sent out by Moses to scout the land of Canaan came with the report of cowards, Joshua and Caleb focused on the size of God instead of the size of their enemies.

But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.” Then the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.

Numbers 13:30-33

These “grasshopper spies” did not enter the promised land. They lost their inheritance, because they ignored the power of God that was at work on their behalf.

Today, the situation is not much different. Many Christians are ignorant of their precious inheritance and are like the beggar Tomas, who ignored that his crime had been forgiven and that he could go back home to Chile. He had to hear this truth but never got a chance, or perhaps someone told him but he never believed it. The scariest thing of all is that we may know that we have the authority to heal the sick and cast out demons, but we can decide to live as if we didn’t. As Jesus showed his disciples, this authority must be exercised through faith and the spoken word. In Jesus’ name be healed! In Jesus’ name be free!

This authority, however, is not to be used lightly. We must understand that we have received a delegated authority that stems from God and not from us. It is important to understand this because a wrong understanding of the limits of our authority will bring disappointment and harm. The authority and power of God at work within us is not a magical wand to be used to fulfill our wishes and desires, to manipulate people or situations, or even to tamper with the weather at will. Think about the seven sons of Sceva mentioned in the book of Acts, who tried to cast out demons “by the Jesus whom Paul preaches” (Acts 19:11-17). They didn’t know the Lord, had not submitted to His authority, but tried to use the name of Jesus. This is what happened to them:

But the evil spirit answered them, ”Jesus I know, and Paul I recognize, but who are you?” And the man in whom was the evil spirit leaped on them, mastered all of them and overpowered them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded.

Acts 19:15-16

Paul tells us that we must know the perfect will of God (Romans 12:1), and John said that we’ll receive everything we ask according to His will (1 John 5:14-15). Because the authority comes from God, He is the one who ultimately decides what is done. We all live with the mystery of unanswered prayers, especially in the area of healing. Not everyone we pray for gets healed, even though we are exercising the authority Jesus gave us.

One of the most revealing passages in the gospels is John 5:19: “So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise.” Later in the book, I will expound on Jesus’ lifestyle of surrender to the Holy Spirit and the will of the Father, but suffice it to say now that Jesus did not use his power of his own accord. What a lesson!

Perhaps the reason we fail to see breakthrough in many circumstances is because we are not aware of what the Father is doing, and we just rush to pray and command without Heaven’s backup—like soldiers raiding the enemy camp without explicit orders and tactics from their commanders.

Some Christians may disagree, saying that we shouldn’t make it so complicated, that we have the authority and that’s that—no need to worry about timing or methods. But, as experienced spiritual warriors would tell you, unless the Holy Spirit releases you confront the powers of darkness directly in a given situation, you would be better waiting upon the Lord.

Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

James 4:7

Submission comes before the victory. One way in which we submit to the Lord is through obedience to his Word. Keeping God’s commandments and meditating on Scripture is the first step toward walking like Jesus did. If Jesus only did what he saw the Father doing and said what he heard the Father speak, we’ll do well in learning from his words and his actions—as recorded in the Bible, of course.

“Jesus carried the authority of the Father, and now we carry the authority of the Son,” Neal Lozano says. “We gain more authority as we bring more areas of our lives under his authority. The more you have surrendered, the more you can be an instrument.” (3)

WIELDING THE SWORD OF THE SPIRIT

It is interesting to note that in Paul’s analogy of the armor of God, the Word is called the sword of the Spirit (Ephesians 6:17). All the authority given to us is channeled through his revealed word.

One pastor I know used to ask his congregation, “Did you bring your sword today?” referring to the Bible. This was of course an allusion to Ephesians 6.

From that Scripture, one could easily assume that the leather-bounded book with Jesus’ words in red is actually a lethal weapon. If you think about it though, first century Christians did not have a personal pocket-size Bible or otherwise. They usually listened to the rabbis in the synagogues read the word of God—the Torah, the prophets. Although the long rolls the rabbis read from resemble a sword even more than our modern Bibles, this was not Paul’s idea of the sword of the Spirit.

Isn’t the Bible the Word of God? Yes! Why then am I saying that the Bible is not the sword of the Spirit? Because just as a sword is harmless in its sheath, the written words in the Bible do not have any power until spoken.

Have you noticed that in Genesis 1, when the earth was still formless and void, nothing happened even though the “Spirit of God was hovering over the waters” (Gen. 1:2)? It wasn’t until God spoke that things began to change. He said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. That’s how he created the Heavens, the earth, and all that is in them.

When the apostle John said, “In the beginning was the Word,” he used the Greek logos for “word.” But in Ephesians 6:17, the word used is rhema, which means breath, or spoken word. The sword of the Spirit is the rhema of God.

Of the returning Christ (the logos himself), the apostle John also wrote, “Out of his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations.” (Rev. 19:15) Some people believe that an actual sword will come out of Christ’s mouth, but in the context of the Bible, it makes more sense to think that he will strike his enemies with the same power that created the universe—his spoken word.

In fact, Jesus gave us an example as to how to use his Word like a sword. After fasting 40 days in the wilderness, the devil came to tempt Jesus. How did he defeat the devil? By speaking the word. “It is written,” he said at each temptation. And the devil had to flee from him. Interestingly, one of Jesus’ answers attest to our understanding of the sword of the Spirit. “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word (rhema) that comes from the mouth of God.’” (Mat. 4:4)

Did you notice that it says “every word that comes from the mouth of God?” It is not just any word that comes out of our mind, no matter how clever, positive, or well intentioned. It is the Holy Spirit-inspired word coming out of your mouth that will have any power. If you speak words that God has not spoken first, you can’t expect to win your spiritual battles, heal the sick or perform miracles. You must speak the words God puts in your mouth:

“As for me, this is my covenant with them,” says the LORD. “My Spirit, who is on you, and my words that I have put in your mouth will not depart from your mouth, or from the mouths of your children, or from the mouths of their descendants from this time on and forever,” says the LORD.

Isaiah 59:21

Once you understand that God has made your mouth like a sharp sword (Isaiah 49:2), you will speak the Scriptures not only to tell stories but to transform the world around you. Perhaps that’s why people said that Jesus’ teaching was different than the teaching of the scribes, because he taught with authority. Why? He knew the power of the rhema words.

LIVING AS IF IT WERE TRUE

What would it look like to walk every day as if it really were true—and it is—that we are seated with Christ in Heavenly places? How would it change your behavior, attitudes and vision if you woke up every day with that assured knowledge that you are royalty, bestowed with power and authority?

It would look, of course, like Jesus’ walk on this earth. The real challenge is to walk in this manner not when everything looks rosy and comfy, but when the going gets tough and the obstacles seem insurmountable. Just like when Jesus went to Lazarus’ tomb.

Now, imagine yourself in this situation: one of your closest friends died and everybody around you is mourning. Not only that, but you have just escaped death at the hands of your enemies. The faith level is fairly low and even your apprentices have no clue of what they are doing there. If we are honest, our reaction in this scenario would likely have been rather depressing, but here’s what Jesus did.

“Jesus was still angry as he arrived at the tomb, a cave with a stone rolled across its entrance. “Roll the stone aside,” Jesus told them.

But Martha, the dead man’s sister, protested, “Lord, he has been dead for four days. The smell will be terrible.”

Jesus responded, “Didn’t I tell you that you would see God’s glory if you believe?” So they rolled the stone aside. Then Jesus looked up to Heaven and said, “Father, thank you for hearing me. You always hear me, but I said it out loud for the sake of all these people standing here, so that they will believe you sent me.” Then Jesus shouted, “Lazarus, come out!” And the dead man came out, his hands and feet bound in grave clothes, his face wrapped in a head cloth. Jesus told them, “Unwrap him and let him go!””

John 11:38-44

That’s just awesome! Not just for the fact that Lazarus came out of the tomb, but for the tenacity displayed by Jesus. He gave thanks to the Father, knowing that his prayers were always heard—no pleading, no arm twisting, no religious mumble, just thanks.

This is how you pray when you are seated in Heavenly places: You turn to your left and speak to the Father sitting right beside you. Am I implying that we are actually at the right hand of the Father? Isn’t that the place of Christ?

Exactly!

Pay attention to what Scripture says:

And He raised us up together with Him and made us sit down together [giving us joint seating with Him] in the heavenly sphere [by virtue of our being] in Christ Jesus (the Messiah, the Anointed One).

Ephesians 2:6 (AMP) [emphasis mine]

It says that we are seated with Christ in Christ. The reason we are with him is by the virtue of our being in him. Thus, because Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father, we are too, as we are in Christ.

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

Colossians 3:1-4

In these verses we see the connection. Paul tells us that we have been raised with Christ, who is seated at the right hand of God, and then tells us that our lives are hidden with Christ.

This realization of your place changes everything. A dead man already decomposing may be in front of you, and you give thanks, and then raise the dead. That’s what it looks like to live as if it were true, praying with confidence and displaying the power of God even in a cemetery.

You must pray, walk, and speak with the authority that has been given to you. The full measure of Christ’s authority has not been manifested yet, not until the final judgment prophesied in Revelation, but until then, we are heirs of the kingdom (James 2:5) and we go forth expanding his kingdom in the name and authority of the King of kings.

Charles Spurgeon said it well: “You may walk the broad acres of this round globe, and never look upon a single spot that is not yours. You may cast your eye to the remotest star, or send your thoughts beyond into the untraversed leagues of space, but look where you will, as all is Christ’s, so all is yours. You have not come of age, so you do not possess it yet, but the day shall come when Christ shall come to this earth, and take possession of it, and then his saints shall reign with him. The meek shall inherit the earth, and delight themselves with the abundance of peace.” (4)

KEY IDEAS

• Biblical authority is the right to exercise power and the strength with which a believer is endued

• Healing the sick and raising the dead is a commandment from Jesus

• Our inheritance includes the power and authority over the natural realm (disease, elements of nature) and the supernatural realm (demons).

• Worship gives us the right perspective of our authority and position in Christ by focusing our eyes in the greatness of God

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. Picture yourself seated with Christ in the heavenly realm. How does this picture affect how you speak and react to the world around you?

2. How often do you take authority over the enemy or adversity in the name of Jesus? What areas in your life need to surrender to His name?

3. Jesus said that we would do greater works (miracles, signs and wonders) than He did. How would your church and your city be impacted if every Christian believed and lived out this promise?

PRACTICE

Schedule a daily time for worshipping and contemplating the greatness of God. Ask the Holy Spirit to use these times to increase your awareness of your spiritual standing in Christ.

NOTES

1. Kris Vallotton. How Heaven Invades Earth: Transform the World Around You

(Ventura, CA: Regal, 2013), 52.

2. Neal Lozano. Unbound: A Practical Guide to Deliverance (Grand Rapids, MI: Chosen Books, 2010), 98.

3. Ibid, 100.

4. Charles Spurgeon. The Joint Heirs and Their Divine Portion: A Sermon (No. 402) Delivered on July the 28th, 1861. http://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0402.htm (Last accessed February 20, 2014)

Benefit 3: A New Nature

To become like Jesus we need to experience and display the fruits of the Spirit until we love people with Jesus’ own love, see reality as Jesus sees it and reflect all the other traits of Jesus’ character, such as joy, peace and patience. To help us do this, Jesus empowers us with the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Francis MacNutt (1)

The Spirit is not just interested in flashing manifestations of power during charismatic revival meetings, but he also wants to mold our character and transform us into the image of Christ. Have you ever experienced his presence so strongly that you can’t even pray? That’s when he’s changing you.

RT Kendall says that “the anointing must be the totality of all that the Spirit is and is able to do. We must want to exemplify the personality of Jesus as much as to demonstrate his power.” (2)

I have learned that the Spirit cares about my marriage as much as He cares about the world. One morning when I was about to pray for many of the petitions we had with the intercessory group at the church, I felt the Holy Spirit telling me not to pray that morning. “Why not?” I said. “Do you remember that last night your wife said she wanted to take a walk with you?” he said. “Hum, yeah.” “Go and do it.” And so I did.

Guatemalan Pastor Cash Luna says, “Many people desire to be used by the Lord to transform others, but few want to be transformed by Him. We can only be transformed in His presence. God pours out his Spirit on us, expecting that we will carry his anointing wherever we go. He gives us his Spirit not because we are holy, but so we can become holy. Without His presence it’s impossible to reach holiness.” (3)

The Bible calls us saints (that means, we are set apart for God), but sanctification is a process we must go through. The Holy Spirit wants to change us from the inside out and we must be willing to spend time in his presence, so he can tell us what he wants us to change and fix in our lives. The good news is that he’s already given us the power to do it.

By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvelous glory and excellence.

2 Peter 1:3 (NLT) [emphasis mine]

He has given us everything we need to be holy like he is holy. There is no excuse for those who have come to know Christ to keep on sinning—other than their own free will. The fact, however, that we have received the tools to live a godly life doesn’t make us walk in them automatically, just as owning a chainsaw doesn’t make trees fall. We have to access the tools, learn how they work, and use them. This is the path we must walk through.

The first step down the path to a godly life is to know the promises of God.

And because of his glory and excellence, he has given us great and precious promises. These are the promises that enable you to share his divine nature and escape the world’s corruption caused by human desires.

2 Peter 1:4 NLT

In Ephesians, Paul talks about this corruption. This is how he describes the horrific situation of humanity without Christ:

And you [He made alive], when you were dead (slain) by [your] trespasses and sins in which at one time you walked [habitually]. You were following the course and fashion of this world [were under the sway of the tendency of this present age], following the prince of the power of the air. [You were obedient to and under the control of] the [demon] spirit that still constantly works in the sons of disobedience [the careless, the rebellious, and the unbelieving, who go against the purposes of God]. Among these we as well as you once lived and conducted ourselves in the passions of our flesh [our behavior governed by our corrupt and sensual nature], obeying the impulses of the flesh and the thoughts of the mind [our cravings dictated by our senses and our dark imaginings]. We were then by nature children of [God’s] wrath and heirs of [His] indignation, like the rest of mankind.

Ephesians 2:1-3 (AMP)

The spiritual reality of our non-Christian family and friends is that of a generation enslaved to:

• The world

• The devil

• The passions of the flesh

• The thoughts of a dark mind

Worst of all, this generation’s inheritance is the wrath of God! What a contrast with the glorious inheritance of the saints:

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Ephesians 2:8-10

Paul says here that we have been created for good works. This doesn’t just mean giving money to charity or volunteering for the Salvation Army (which is great, of course), but notice that it says “we should walk in them.” He is talking about a lifestyle.

Let us not be like Tomas, the rich homeless, who didn’t know about his inheritance and kept on living like a beggar, enslaved by his addictions.

Our inheritance includes the power to live a holy and righteous life. Our down payment, the Holy Spirit, transforms us from glory to glory into the image of Christ and His presence in us is manifested with the fruit of the Spirit.

When we come to Christ, we are adopted as sons in the kingdom of Heaven and become heirs of this great and eternal kingdom. What then happens with all the desires of the flesh and the mind we had before knowing Christ? Do we get rid of them automatically and never have them again? Sometimes, this is just the case. I know some drug addicts and alcoholics that lost the desire to consume drugs and to drink immediately after their conversion—even when before that they couldn’t let a day go by without a joint or a drink! I also know of others though who must go through the detoxification process and resist the temptation, even years after becoming Christians.

An awesome thing happens when we are born again. In a merciful act of God, he transfers us from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of life, from death to life. Just as a newborn baby has little to do with his own birth, we are passive participants in the process of the new birth.

However, according to the Bible, there is another process in the life of a Christian—sanctification—that requires our active participation so we may become more like Christ. Paul talks about this process in Romans 12 when he urges believers to renew their minds (remember than in Ephesians we read that the main way that the enemy holds people captive is in their minds). Renewal means to adjust the moral and spiritual vision and thinking to the mind of God. In other words, we are to start thinking like God thinks.

When we do this, we see sin and the desires of the flesh for what they really are—hideous and destructive things that only lead to death. We must then seek to exhibit the fruit of the Spirit in our lives:

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Galatians 5:22-24

Note that he talks about “the fruit” (singular) of the Spirit, and not the fruits (plural). A fruit is the natural product of a seed, the final result of something that grows and matures with time. Jesus said that if we want to follow him, we must be like a seed that dies:

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

John 12:24

The fruit of the Spirit is the natural product of his work in our lives, the result of our sanctification process. While the gifts of the Spirit are free and distributed as the Spirit desires, the fruit of the Spirit is the result of intimacy and obedience. In John 15, Jesus gives the analogy of the vine and says that those branches that remain grafted into the vine will bear much fruit—that is, those believers who abide in Christ, who remain connected to the Spirit of God, where his life flows through them, making fruit possible.

This is a vital key to live a holy life, as described by this amazing verse:

No one who abides in Him [who lives and remains in communion with and in obedience to Him--deliberately, knowingly, and habitually] commits (practices) sin. No one who [habitually] sins has either seen or known Him [recognized, perceived, or understood Him, or has had an experiential acquaintance with Him].

1 John 3:6 (AMP)

When we abide in Christ, we so want to please him, it becomes impossible to practice sin. May you slip? May you have a fit of anger? Perhaps. I know I still do. But conviction grabs hold of me, knowing that I have grieved the Holy Spirit and in repentance I come back to the throne of grace. The fruit of the Spirit is not obtained through mere discipline, but through grace, which flows from our intimate time with the Lord. We spend time with him not to be accepted, but to be more like him. Borrowing an analogy from Randy Clark, it’s like a horse that needs to learn how to gallop. The trainer ties him to another horse with an elegant and beautiful gallop, so they would walk together and eventually the untrained horse learns from his companion.

BEARING FRUIT

One of the houses we moved in during our first summer on Vancouver Island had a few fruit trees in the backyard. There were plenty of apples when we moved in. The following summer, however, not a single apple came out. We are not much into gardening, since my wife and I grew up in urban settings with few gardens. It’s not like we had to tend the tree for it to bear fruit (as far as I know), but it just didn’t produce anything that year.

How peculiar that one year the tree produced hundreds of apples, but the following year absolutely nothing. It is sometimes so with our Christian walk. Perhaps looking at the past we may see the fruit of the Spirit manifested in some seasons of our lives and not in others.

Maybe in those seasons in our lives our behavior was not as holy as we would have liked because we were not abiding in Christ. Since you are grafted to Jesus and belong to Him, your attitude towards the things of the flesh is different: “And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” (Galatians 5:24)

How does one go about crucifying one’s flesh? What does that even mean? Having lived in a country with a strong Roman Catholic tradition, I remember the self-flogging rituals where fanatics would flog and cut themselves supposedly for the love of Christ. Thank God, that’s not what we are to do according to the Bible. We are to crucify the passions and desires of the flesh, not the flesh itself. Okay, that’s good, but how exactly?

The theme of the flesh and the Spirit in the book of Galatians is also discussed in Romans 7 and 8, where Paul talks about living and walking in the Spirit. In Romans 7, he talks about the sin that lives in his body and how he battles to live out a godly life when his flesh drives him to sin. In other words, he recognizes that the flesh is strong in him.

For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

Romans 7:18-20

The grim scenario here suddenly changes when Christ comes into the picture:

Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

Romans 7:24-25

And so, in chapter 8, Paul unravels the secret to live a holy life, not subjected to the flesh.

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Romans 8:5-8

For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.

Romans 8:13-14

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

Romans 8:26-27

All these verses reveal an amazing pattern: we must renew our minds and let the Spirit take full control of our lives.

Ephesians 4:23 insists on this topic when it tells believers to “be renewed in the spirit of your minds.” According to Vine’s Dictionary, the renewal here mentioned is not that of the mind itself in its powers of memory, judgment and perception, but the spirit of the mind, which, under the controlling power of the Holy Spirit, directs its focus toward God so we may enjoy of fellowship with the Father and the Son.

SURRENDER CONTROL

If we are to see the fruit of the Spirit manifested in our lives, we must surrender unconditionally to the will of the Spirit. That’s what Jesus did during his earthly ministry—he never used his own power or will to do anything. See how Luke tells us that Jesus set out in his ministry: “THEN JESUS, full of and controlled by the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led in [by] the [Holy] Spirit.” (Luke 4:1 AMP)

Notice the three phrases in this verse. Jesus was:

• Full of the Holy Spirit

• Controlled by the Holy Spirit

• Led in by the Holy Spirit

That doesn’t sound like someone who has much power over his own will.

Then in verse 14, Luke says that after he was tempted, “Jesus went back full of and under the power of the [Holy] Spirit into Galilee.”

It is interesting to note that the process of being filled with power required 40 days of temptation and fasting in the wilderness. Many men of God through history have spoken about a breakthrough in their ministry only after an intense period of prayer and fasting.

For now, note that Jesus then goes to Nazareth and declares the purpose for which He has been empowered by the Holy Spirit:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

Luke 4:18-19

This power, this Spirit, is part of our inheritance in Christ. We must surrender all that defines us, following the example of Christ—having His same attitude—if we are to live in the fullness of this inheritance.

You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being.

Ephesians 2:5-7 (NLT)

The Greek word that the New Living Translation (NLT) translates as slave is doúlos, which refers to someone who belongs to another—a bond-slave, without any ownership rights of their own. If we are to follow the example of Christ, then we will have the attitude of slaves, but slaves to the Spirit.

Isn’t it a paradox then that the Bible says that Christ has set us free and that where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom, but at the same time we are called to become slaves? Certainly that is what the New Testament teaches. But there are two things we must consider:

1. Spiritual freedom is not defined by the absence of bonds, but by that to which our spirit is bound to—instead of being servants of sin and the devil, we become servants of God.

2. This act of service to God—this surrendering—is an act of love flowing from our free will, when we choose to give our lives to the one who gave it all for us.

I like the way Stephen De Silva puts it: “surrendering our will to God does not kill it; it requires us to exercise our will every day and every moment in a specific direction. It means choosing to be led by the Spirit.” In the end, this surrendering leads to better results. “True submission,” De Silva says, “boils up to giving up our distorted, limited versions of reality so we can receive and live in His version. And because His version is the real one, it’s the only one in which we can be fully real, fully ourselves.” (4)

Jesus was helplessly surrendered to the Holy Spirit, and this to the point of saying that He only did what he saw the Father do and only said what He heard the Father speak (John 5:19).

I’ve often wondered whether Jesus, as a human walking this earth, had a TV-screen-like spiritual device where he saw and heard the Father in Heaven, so he could imitate him. Who knows, the Holy Spirit could have arranged something like that. It is also possible that during his long times of prayer, Jesus received detailed instructions of what to say and do the next day. Or perhaps, like us now, he just felt the nudging, or the sweet voice of the Spirit living within him.

In any case, I’ve asked the Holy Spirit to teach me how to live like this—to know what the Father is saying and doing, and in this process he’s taught me a few things.

One is the realization of my open access to the throne of the Father (Hebrews 4:16). Thanks to the work of Christ, I can come to an audience with the King at any moment by turning my affections toward him. The secret then is to learn to tap into this spiritual reality and make it part of our daily life.

With all the distractions of life, of course, it’s easy to disconnect our souls and minds from the throne, so we end up paying attention to other voices, and not to God. That’s why Peter exhorted the believers to be sober-minded, because the worries of the world intoxicate our minds in such a way that they muffle the voice of the Spirit. We must take control of our minds and thoughts so we can surrender them to the Holy Spirit.

So, step one, is to be sober minded. When you feel overwhelmed by a million thoughts, step back and get sober.

The next step is to walk with a constant awareness of his presence. This can be hard specially when you must work or study. I’ve tried placing reminders of his presence like regular alarms on my phone, so it would chirp every now and then with a message popping out saying “his presence.” This, however, proved unpractical and disruptive. The best way that I’ve found to walk with a constant awareness of God’s presence, is to develop the habit to pray in the Spirit throughout the day. It takes a while to develop a new habit, but keep plugging at it and you’ll see the results.

Praying in tongues has two purposes. One, it obviously makes you aware of Him, as you are activating a gift of the Spirit. Two, you are surrendering your prayers, because he is now praying for and through you.

Along with the habit of praying in tongues, you can increasingly become aware of God’s presence with a lifestyle of gratitude. According to the Psalms, we enter God’s presence with two things: thanksgiving and praise.

Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! Give thanks to him; bless his name! For the LORD is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.

Psalm 100:4-5

One time, I was walking home back from the grocery store, complaining to God about the business debts that had been accumulating for the past few weeks, when I looked up and saw the new car we’d just bought parked in front of the house we’ve just moved in three months earlier. My spirit felt convicted about focusing on my lack instead of my blessings, so I switched from complaining to thanksgiving. As I began thanking God for his blessings, I felt the presence of the Holy Spirit come upon me, turning my sadness into joy. I continued thanking God for his presence and his love and songs of worship began flowing from deep inside my soul. The Spirit was with me all the time, but my thoughts were elsewhere. Only when I began to offer thanks and praise, I became aware of his manifest presence. You can never thank God too much.

For a long time, I wondered why most people at church and prayer meetings always began their prayers with thanksgiving. Couldn’t they be more original in their prayers? As I began to understand the power of thanksgiving—and the fact that this is the most appropriate way to enter his presence—I became more intentional in my expressions of gratitude toward the Lord.

In fact, this is how Jesus began many of his prayers:

And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me.

John 11:41b

Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated. So also the fish, as much as they wanted.

John 6:11

In that same hour he rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of Heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.

Luke 10:21

Next, for any significant decision or action you have to take during the day, consult him. No need to ask whether to use the restroom or not—that one’s obvious—but do pray before committing to do a favor for an acquaintance, volunteer for yet another event at church, or spending your money. This may sound extreme to some, but believe me, it’s a good exercise to learn to surrender to the Spirit. The Bible promises that if you ask, He will answer. So ask the Lord what he is doing in any given situation, and He will tell you.

KNOWING VERSUS DOING

There is a clear-cut message throughout the New Testament of bridging the gap between knowledge and behavior. Paul urges the churches in Asia to walk in a manner worthy of the call of God, and prays that the believers would have a revelation from the Spirit, so their knowledge would increase—their minds be renewed—and then they would “walk out” this knowledge.

Although it is by the Spirit that we gain revelation and understanding (1 Corinthians 2:10-12) of the riches of God’s grace and glory, there’s still a responsibility in the believer to put aside everything that is of this world, to empty his or her soul as to be filled with this new knowledge.

This is part of the process of surrendering. Not only do we surrender our will, but also all that used to define our lives in this world. Paul was a zealous Jew, someone who followed the Law like no one else and who had a lot to boast about. Nonetheless, he surrendered it all.

But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ.

Philippians 3:7-8

My wife learned this the hard way. A successful single woman with a well-paid executive position in a telecommunications company in Colombia, she felt like the spoiled child of God who received all she asked from her Heavenly Father. A nice condo, a good car, a great job, a handsome fiancé (me!) - she had all she could have asked for. Then we got married and moved to the United States so I could attend graduate school. All the things her identity relied on—the job, the car, the respect—were removed and she became the stay-at-home wife of a broke student in a new country with a foreign language and culture.

It took her a few years to accept her new reality and redefine her identity according to the truth of the Word of God. It was a hard process for both of us, but when she finally let go of the past, a true dependency on God emerged, along with a renewed purpose and vision.

In fact, in Philippians 3, Paul seems to define maturity in terms of leaving behind whatever we might have gained in this world and setting our eyes on Christ:

Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained.

Philippians 3:13-16 [emphasis mine]

The love of Christ compels us so that we may not live our lives for ourselves but for him who gave his life for us. The call is then laid before us:

IF THEN you have been raised with Christ [to a new life, thus sharing His resurrection from the dead], aim at and seek the [rich, eternal treasures] that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. And set your minds and keep them set on what is above (the higher things), not on the things that are on the earth. For [as far as this world is concerned] you have died, and your [new, real] life is hidden with Christ in God.

Colossians 3:1-3 (AMP)

We must set our minds on the prize that we will receive in Heaven and which Peter says is an imperishable, undefiled, and unfading inheritance (1 Peter 1:3-5). Those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.

Paul goes so far as to say that those who set their minds on earthly things are enemies of God: “For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in Heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.” (Philippians 3:18-20)

“But how much is too much?” people may ask. After all, we have to think about work, kids, school, and all those earthly everyday things. We shouldn’t be too mystical, as if walking on air, and thinking about the Spirit all the time, right? Even Jesus was a very down-to-earth person, caring for others, attending parties, paying taxes, hiking, fishing, you name it.

Yes, of course, we can—and ought to—do fun and regular life stuff. That’s not what the Bible defines as earthly things. We’re going to look at what they are below, and we’ll see that they can be so damaging to our inheritance, that we must actually die to them every day. Setting our minds on the things above means taking our focus away from ourselves, our problems, weaknesses and circumstances—in other words, quit looking inward—and make a conscious and active decision to fix your eyes on Jesus (Hebrews 12:2). This intentional act requires that we posses a deep revelation of his character and his love toward us as well as a true hope on his promises for our lives.

When we set our eyes on Jesus, we decide to expose the lies of the enemy for what they are, refusing to participate in pity parties or dwell in offenses. It is then, when the devil tries to snare our souls, that we turn our gaze away from the situations at hand, and look up at Christ, high and lifted up in glory, as the apostle John saw him while in exile on the island of Patmos.

Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength.

Revelation 1:12-16

When we let his glorious light shine upon us, all other things fade away and seem insignificant, but when we sit and think about our fears, consider our shortcomings and allow complaints and regrets to clog our brain, we are showing the symptoms of a mind set on the things below. Thoughts such as “nobody understands me,” “that person is always blessed but I’m not,” or “God never speaks to me,” are like fingers pointing inward, away from Christ—until you feel that it’s the entire world against you. Nothing but a trap of the devil!

The reason we cannot look at ourselves is very simple: we have died and our lives are hidden with Christ in God. Actually, if you were to stare at a heavenly mirror, you wouldn’t be able to see anything but Christ, because you are hidden with him in God!

Paul is saying in Colossians 3:3 that our real life is being kept secret with Christ in Heaven. One day, it will be revealed completely when we are glorified. In the meantime, we must set our minds on that reality, putting to death everything that concerns this earthly reality.

Kathryn Kuhlman said that before every service, she would walk behind the stage, praying, emptying herself and letting the Spirit take control. “Kathryn Kuhlman has died a thousand times,” she said. And so did the apostle Paul, who died every day (1 Corinthians 15:31).

After exhorting the Colossians to set their mind on the things above, Paul admonishes them to kill the earthly stuff and put on the fruit of the Spirit.

According to Paul, the process of exchanging a life of sin for a holy life should be as simple as changing clothes.

But now put away and rid yourselves [completely] of all these things: anger, rage, bad feeling toward others, curses and slander, and foulmouthed abuse and shameful utterances from your lips! Do not lie to one another, for you have stripped off the old (unregenerate) self with its evil practices, and have clothed yourselves with the new [spiritual self], which is [ever in the process of being] renewed and remolded into [fuller and more perfect knowledge upon] knowledge after the image (the likeness) of Him Who created it.

Colossians 3:8-10 (AMP)

In fact, all the instances in the epistles where we are exhorted to walk in the Spirit, are followed by practical advice on sins to be abandoned and fruit to abound in.

The night is far gone and the day is almost here. Let us then drop (fling away) the works and deeds of darkness and put on the [full] armor of light. Let us live and conduct ourselves honorably and becomingly as in the [open light of] day, not in reveling (carousing) and drunkenness, not in immorality and debauchery (sensuality and licentiousness), not in quarreling and jealousy. But clothe yourself with the Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah), and make no provision for [indulging] the flesh [put a stop to thinking about the evil cravings of your physical nature] to [gratify its] desires (lusts).

Romans 13:12-14 (AMP)

WHEN THE DEVIL MAKES YOU DO IT

For us to enjoy the fullness of our inheritance in Christ, we must die to the desires of the flesh by walking in the Spirit. Sometimes though, no matter how much we try to kick out the anxiety and the fear of men, we keep falling into destructive emotional patterns. We’ve prayed for peace, read books on how to think positively, taken courses on nice Christian living, maybe even visited a professional counselor, to no avail. Let me suggest that the reason you’ve seen no breakthrough in that area of your life may be due to the influence of an evil spirit. Just as we carry on with some of the desires of the flesh and the mind when we come to Christ, we bring along a residue of evil spirits that gained a foothold in our lives either through a curse running through our family line (such as when your ancestors—or yourself—were involved in the occult), sinful habits, self-inflicted curses, among others.

Deliverance is necessary for the full manifestation of the fruit—the desires of the flesh are the opposite of the fruit and we need to be free from these spirits. A spirit of depression, for example, will hinder the manifestation of joy in your life.

Many Christians feel uncomfortable when you tell them they may be demonized, but it is a reality we must face so we can be free. Some people say that a Christian who is full of the Holy Spirit cannot have an evil spirit. At first, it sounds like a reasonable argument. How can a demon inhabit a place where the Holy Spirit dwells? Still, we know that Spirit-filled Christians harbor sinful desires and commit serious sins. As Neal Lozano says: “Talk of evil spirits can bring up fears such as ‘Do I have a spirit?’ We picture a foul little demon hiding in us in a secret place. Frightening! Gross! That is partially true, but the truth is the spirit is no fouler than the sin it hides behind. The sin we have accommodated, the thought pattern that offends the One who made us, the despair we carry and have grown used to, the lust we secretly feed, the unforgiveness and bitterness we nurse—these are the expressions of the influence of evil spirits. This is what they look like, but they don’t look so bad to us because they are our demons. They are invited guests, our companions.” (5)

While the center of our spirit and heart may be filled with the Holy Spirit, there may be some areas we have not yet surrendered to his power and where we have opened the door to the influence of evil spirits. Derek Prince provides the analogy of a city where righteous people govern from the City Hall, but where wicked men commit crimes in certain parts of town. (6)

As we read on Luke 4, Jesus came to teach, heal, and free us from the influence of evil spirits. Even when we are Spirit-filled Christians we need to receive both teaching and healing. There is no Biblical basis to say that Christians need teaching and healing but not deliverance. Is there, however, a clear Biblical basis to show that Christians must be delivered from evil spirits?

Let me quote an expert on the subject, Francis MacNutt: “Can Christians be demonized—have some part of their being infested with evil spirits? It is difficult to answer this question scripturally because there were no Christians until after the death of Jesus, or perhaps until Pentecost. So the only books of the Bible that might deal with Christians being demonized are Acts and the epistles, which do not deal much with deliverance. Yet we have the example of Judas (John 13:27) and Ananias and Sapphira. But even if Scripture does not lead to an inevitable conclusion that Christians can be demonized, experience leads me to believe that many people who have trusted Christ as their Savior do suffer from an inner demonic presence while they are trying hard to live a Christian life.” (7)

This is my experience as well.

Once during a mission trip to Brazil with Randy Clark and his ministry Global Awakening, a team member with a powerful deliverance ministry received a word of knowledge and asked me whether I suffered from depression or sadness. I said no, but immediately a memory crossed my mind. A few months before, while I was going through a difficult time in my marriage, I had said aloud, “I’ve lost all the joy in my life.” Since then, I hadn’t laughed with real joy.

My friend guided me to renounce this self-imposed curse upon my life and peace came over me. Then he said, “Do you have anger problems?” Well, now it was getting interesting! Although I’ve always been a calm person by nature, for years I had struggled with fits of anger every time I felt frustrated about something. No violence or anything like that, but an irrational bubble that burst inside of me, out of proportion to whatever happened that bothered me in the first place.

So, I honestly said yes. He guided me again to renounce the spirit of anger and rage, closed every door to the spirit in my mind and my heart and then commanded the spirit in the name of Jesus to leave through my mouth. One of the weirdest things I’ve ever experienced in my life happened next. I had this sensation of something moving up my stomach, through my chest and opening my mouth against my will—retching and coughing followed for about two or three minutes. I could not control it or stop it. When it was over, I felt different, lighter.

More shocking than lying on the floor and coughing uncontrollably was the realization that I needed deliverance. A strong mature Christian leader! All the theology about Christians and demonization that I had until that day was turned upside down. That day, God was teaching me more about what the Bible means with “setting the captives free” (Luke 4).

Just a few hours after this experience, I began a new dimension of my ministry. For the year before, I had been on a wild journey learning about the healing ministry, praying for the sick and seeing great miracles by the power of God. That night in Brazil though, I was thrown into a journey against the forces of evil and landed into a deliverance ministry that would continue to increase in the next few months.

As the Global Awakening team ministered that night to the hundreds of people lined up for prayer, a man came complaining of pain in his whole body and depression. As he explained this, I felt the Holy Spirit prompting me to ask him if he had been involved in the occult. Through the interpreter, he said that he had only been a Christian for six months and that before that he was involved in Macumba (an underground religion of African origins led by mediums and which involves animal sacrifices, spirit offerings, ritual dances and trances—in short, witchcraft). Based on the pointers my friend had given me after my own deliverance that afternoon, I guided him to renounce to the spirits of witchcraft and depression, as well as any curses derived from his involvement in the occult. The interpreter said she felt he also had problems with unforgiveness, so I told him to speak forgiveness over every person he needed to forgive. He began saying “I forgive…” and mentioned the names of several people. When I thought he was done, he just kept saying names and more names!

Once he released forgiveness and repented of his own sins, he said that all the pain had moved down to his toes. Shifting pain is always a good indication that there is an evil spirit behind the condition. I commanded the spirits to leave his body in the name of Jesus and less than a minute later, he bent forward coughing and retching, spitting a thick white phlegm on the floor of the church. This went on for some time and then we prayed for the baptism of the Holy Spirit. It is very important for a person to be filled with the Holy Spirit after receiving deliverance—otherwise the evil spirit can come back.

When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, and finding none it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house swept and put in order. Then it goes and brings seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there. And the last state of that person is worse than the first.

Luke 11:24-26

This was my first time ministering deliverance and although the retching was far from pleasant, it was nothing like the images most people have of casting out a demon—the Hollywood version of deliverance epitomized in The Exorcist, where a priest struggles with a fully possessed girl.

Most cases of demonization are subtle, only manifesting when the particular sin or emotion related to the evil spirit is present. In my case, for example, the spirit of anger manifested only when I got angry—making my reaction blow out of proportion. I guess that’s why the Bible warns:

Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil.

Ephesians 4:26-27

The Amplified version renders verse 27 like this: “Leave no [such] room or foothold for the devil [give no opportunity to him].” Such footholds are opportunities for evil spirits to come and influence us. For the most part, our own spirit and the Holy Spirit in us are much stronger than the evil spirit (be it a spirit of anger, anxiety, fear, pride or other), and it can only manifest when we give it room.

In the cases of full possession, the level of infestation is so great that the person’s own spirit has lost control. Such was the case of the Gerasene in the Bible, who lived among the tombs and no one could bind him. When Jesus asked the unclean spirit his name, he said, “My name is Legion, for we are many.” (Mark 5:9)

These cases are uncommon and often result from satanic ritual abuse or other form of involvement in the occult. However, many people, including newborn Christians, may still need deliverance from the influence of evil spirits. They can be sitting at church every week, teaching Sunday school or leading worship, yet they need to be free from the claws of the enemy in some area of their lives. Two of the seven gospel accounts of Jesus casting out demons (Mark 1:21-28; Luke 13:10-17) involved people who were attending the synagogue—which means they looked normal to everybody there or they wouldn’t have been allowed in. Only when the person with the unclean spirit came into close proximity with Jesus, did the demon manifest.

This is a common occurrence in meetings where the presence of God is very strong—the demons cannot stand it and begin to manifest, either with loud noises or bodily contortions. That’s why we must exercise discernment when we see different manifestations during a church service or charismatic event—it can be either a genuine response to the power of the Holy Spirit, an expression of the flesh caught up in the emotions of the moment, or a demonic manifestation.

Now that you know how the enemy can be robbing part of your inheritance, ask the Holy Spirit to reveal to you the places where evil spirits have gained access to your life. It can be through your response to a traumatic event in the past (hatred, fear, shame, guilt), it can be the atmosphere you lived—or live—in (bad friends, dirty forms of entertainment), or sin (a willful sinful habit or family sin). Once you discover the entry point, repent of the sinful behavior, renounce the influence of the particular evil spirit, forgive those who hurt you, and command the evil spirits to leave you in the name of Jesus. If you want to know more about this topic, I recommend you read the book Unbound: A Practical Guide to Deliverance (from Evil Spirits) by Neal Lozano.

Since that night in Brazil, I have seen many people delivered by simply renouncing and closing the doors that the spirits used to enter them. Peace and joy, which are part of the fruit of the Holy Spirit, are almost always immediately evident in those who are delivered from evil spirits. Many times, physical ailments are healed at the same time of the deliverance. No wonder the enemy wants us to be ignorant about the ministry of deliverance!

I want to close this chapter with a quote from Neal Lozano: “Deliverance in its broadest sense is a word for salvation. It is the power of God destroying the works of the devil in our lives so we may receive the inheritance we have in Christ: the kingdom of God. Deliverance from evil spirits removes the obstacles so we may receive, in Christ, the Father’s blessing.” (8)

KEY IDEAS

• Our inheritance includes the power to live a holy and righteous life

• Sanctification is a lifetime process

• The Holy Spirit wants to change us from the inside out and for that to happen, we must spend time in his presence

• If we are to see the fruit of the Spirit manifested in our lives, we must surrender unconditionally to the will of the Spirit

• Deliverance is necessary for the full manifestation of the fruit

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. What would you say is the manifestation of the fruit of the Spirit in your life? Are there areas where you would like to see more of that fruit?

2. What is holding you back from surrendering unconditionally to the will of the Holy Spirit? What can you do today to solve that?

3. Beside the tips offered in this chapter (praying in tongues, giving thanks), how can you be more aware of God’s presence every day?

PRACTICE

Holiness is not the result of discipline or determination, but the result of the Holy Spirit’s transformation of our lives. Set apart some time this week to be in His presence and pray that He transforms you to the image of Christ. The more time you spend with Him, the more of His glory will rest and remain on you.

NOTES

1. Francis MacNutt. The Healing Reawakening: Reclaiming Our Lost Inheritance. (Grand Rapids, MI: Chosen Books, 2006), 211.

2. R.T. Kendall. Sensitivity Of The Holy Spirit: Learning to stay in the flow of God’s direction (Lake Mary, FL: Charisma House, 2002), 28.

3. Cash Luna. En honor al Espíritu Santo: ¡No es algo, es alguien! [In honor of the Holy Spirit: It’s not something, it’s someone!](Miami, FL: Editorial Vida, 2010), 28. Quote translated from Spanish.

4. Stephen K. De Silva. Money and the Prosperous Soul: Tipping the Scales of Favor and Blessing (Grand Rapids, MI: Chosen Books, 2010), 121.

5. Neal Lozano. Unbound: A Practical Guide to Deliverance (Grand Rapids, MI: Chosen Books, 2010), 41.

6. Cited in Francis MacNutt, Deliverance from Evil Spirits: A Practical Manual. (Grand Rapids, MI: Chosen Books, 2009), 73.

7. Francis MacNutt. Deliverance from Evil Spirits: A Practical Manual. (Grand Rapids, MI: Chosen Books, 2009), 77.

8. Neal Lozano. Unbound. Kindle location 123.

Benefit 4: The Body of Christ

And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

Ephesians 1:22-23

A dear pastor I know likes to say that the church is not Heaven, it’s just the church. By this he means that the church is not perfect because it’s made up of people still in the process of sanctification—and not quite there yet.

You may go to any church in the world and ask people about their past life and present struggles and you will soon discover they are not all nice shiny people. As the hymn goes, God’s grace is so amazing because it saved a wretch like me. Thank God for the blood of Christ that cleanses us from all sin.

Even greater is this grace that God chose the church to fulfill his eternal plans on the earth, “so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places.” (Ephesians 3:10)

In the ongoing ancient rebellion of satan and his fallen angels against God, the church entered the scene as an unexpected player to usurp the devil’s tyranny over creation. It is imperative that we grab hold of the full revelation of the church’s role in God’s kingdom, so we can fulfill our calling.

What is the kingdom of God? One way to understand the concept of ‘kingdom’ is to define it as a place where the will of a king is done. That’s how Jesus seemed to define it in his prayer to the Father: “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.” (Matthew 6:10)

As we preach the gospel and more people do the will of God—which is for them to believe in His son, Jesus—we are in fact extending the kingdom of God. Reading the Scriptures, I find it fascinating how our interaction in the kingdom is so multifaceted. We are servants and heirs, knights and princes, priests and kings.

The apostle Peter coined an interesting title for us the believers—a royal priesthood. We are priests before God, ministering to him and interceding for others; but we are also kings and queens, seated with Christ in heavenly places. At the same time, we are servants of one another as members of one body, the church.

The church was God’s idea, not an invention of man, and it’s God’s tool of choice to extend His kingdom. In His infinite wisdom, the Lord came up with a way to unite all his adopted sons into one body that would become the eyes, hands and feet of Christ. Just as a human body has internal and external functions, the body of Christ functions in both directions. Internally, the church is a place of fellowship and edification, while externally, it advances the kingdom as it works in unity.

Let’s look at these two functions in the context of our inheritance.

THE JOY OF FELLOWSHIP & GROWING PAINS

King David wrote thousands of years ago: “I was glad when they said to me, “Let us go to the house of the Lord.” (Psalm 122:1) He found joy in the fellowship of a people who worshipped God together. And so should we.

One of the greatest things about our inheritance is that we get to enjoy it as a community and not just as individuals. If you remember Tomas’ story, he missed the fellowship of his brothers (who were looking for him) and lived alone in the streets, without the love of his family.

I am the first to recognize that many Christians have been hurt and rejected by their local church leaders and members. The religious spirit is a nasty viper that crawls between the aisles of church buildings around the world, and bites those who fall from grace. We will talk more about the religious spirit later in the book, but for now, we must recognize that it is one of the main causes of people being turned off and hurt by the church. Once we recognize that the problem is not the church itself, but a satanic intruder that masks and distorts the identity of the body of Christ, we can look at it with God’s eyes, in its original design and intent.

The blueprints of a house or building provide a picture of what it will look like when it is finished, but from the blueprint to the actual finished house, there is a lot of work. It doesn’t always look pretty in the process, in fact, it can be quite messy. Just as we don’t look at a house being framed and dismiss it as useless because you can’t live there, we can’t dismiss the church for its imperfections.

The church is now the body of Christ on earth but it’s in the process of becoming the bride of Christ on the new earth. We are looking forward to the wedding feast of the lamb were we will join Christ for eternity and dwell in the places that he has prepared for us (John 14). Rejoicing and expectancy precede any wedding and so it is with the wedding of the lamb.

Then I heard again what sounded like the shout of a vast crowd or the roar of mighty ocean waves or the crash of loud thunder: “Praise the Lord! For the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigns. Let us be glad and rejoice, and let us give honor to him. For the time has come for the wedding feast of the Lamb, and his bride has prepared herself. She has been given the finest of pure white linen to wear.”

For the fine linen represents the good deeds of God’s holy people.

And the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding feast of the Lamb.” And he added, “These are true words that come from God.””

Revelation 19:6-9 (NLT)

Note that the passage says that “his bride has prepared herself.” If in the process of preparing the wedding, the bride forgets the outcome of it all (being joined with her beloved) and allows the details of the preparation to overwhelm her, the joy will be lost. Just imagine the bride choosing her dress, trying on the make up and the hair style, going through the list of guests, thinking about the flowers, the rehearsals, the food, the family and a hundred things more. What happens if she focuses solely on the hard work and forgets all about her groom and the life ahead with him? She will get discouraged and moody. She will probably snap at the hairdresser, and break a flower vase or two. It won’t look good for her or those around her. Under the stress and tiredness, she will hurt other people with her words and actions, and her dress will end up stained and wrinkled.

This can happen to the church, if we don’t focus on the bridegroom, on Christ himself. In its present state, the body of Christ is a work in progress (in the sense that each of us are a work in progress), building itself up to reach the stature of the fullness of Christ. The best thing is that He has given us all what wee need to attain it. The Bible says that:

[Christ] gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.

Ephesians 4:11-16

Yes, there are growing pains as we mature in the faith, but again, we must focus on the groom.

The most important part of this body is the head, Christ himself.

Christ is, after all, the heir of all things. We are fellow heirs.

And if we are [His] children, then we are [His] heirs also: heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ [sharing His inheritance with Him]; only we must share His suffering if we are to share His glory.

Romans 8:17 (AMP)

Whatever he got, we get, and whatever he is, we will be. In fact, the Bible says that we have been predestined to be like Christ. What an amazing thought!

For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.

Romans 8:29

We are to be transformed from glory to glory so we can bring him glory—not only through our worship and holy conduct, but through the preaching of the gospel, bringing others into the kingdom so they will bring him more glory. Then one day, we will be glorified and be like Him.

That’s our destiny as fellow heirs—to be like Christ, the Heir of all things.

Let’s behold the Heir, then, and how he is revealed in the Scriptures, so we can leap with joy at the sight of our amazing groom.

A journey through the gospel of John provides a landscape rich in imagery of the character and glory of Jesus.

• Jesus is the Word by which the world came to be (John 1:1)

• Jesus is God (John 1:1)

• Jesus is the life and the light of men (John 1:4)

• Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away sin (John 1:29)

• Jesus is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit (John 1:33)

• Jesus is the Messiah (the actual meaning of Christ) (John 1:41)

• Jesus is a teacher (rabbi), the son of God and the King of Israel (John 1:49)

• Jesus is the savior of those who believe (John 3:17)

• Jesus is the bridegroom (John 3:29)

• Jesus is the source of eternal life (John 3:36)

• Jesus is the giver of living water (John 4:14)

• Jesus is a prophet (John 4:19, 44)

• Jesus is the Healer (John 4:50)

• Jesus reveals God as a Father (John 5:19)

• Jesus is the giver of life (John 5:21)

• Jesus has the authority to execute judgment (John 5:27)

• Jesus is the bread of life (John 6:35)

• Jesus is the one who raises others from the dead (John 6:44)

• Jesus is the one whose words are spirit and life (John 6:63)

• Jesus is the Holy One of God (John 6:69)

• Jesus is the light of the world (John 8:12)

• Jesus is the son who sets us free from sin (John 8:34-36)

• Jesus came from God to tell men the truth he heard from God (John 8:40)

• Jesus is the I am (John 8:58)

• Jesus is the door of the sheep (John 10:7)

• Jesus is the door to salvation, eternal life and life in abundance (John 10:9-10)

• Jesus is the good shepherd (John 10:11)

• Jesus is one with the Father (John 10:30)

• Jesus is the resurrection and the life (John 11:25)

• Jesus is the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6)

• Jesus is the way to the Father (John 14:6)

• Jesus is the exact representation of the Father (John 14:7)

• Jesus is the true vine (John 15:1)

• Jesus has overcome the world (John 16:33)

This is just one book of the Bible, and Christ is in every single one of them. Perhaps as a shadow and with figures in the Old Testament, but always there. So it seems a bit daunting to behold at so much majesty and greatness and try to summarize what the Bible reveals about Jesus Christ.

Perhaps the best way to grasp the revelation of Christ in the gospels is that the Lord Jesus is the exact representation of the Father, and thus He is Love (1 John 4:8). When we look at his face, we are looking at the face of love (there is so much love in his eyes!).

His bride is in love with the author of love and so she must grow in maturity until she loves like he loves, loving the brokenhearted and the poor, preaching the good news of salvation and displaying God’s power (motivated by love and compassion). The church is called to love the world and to love one another, because that’s how people will recognize that we are His disciples.

By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

John 13:15

According to John 14:6, our final destiny, where we are headed, is the Father: “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Our inheritance is love, and in the meantime, our down payment includes a place, a body, where we can love and be loved, where we can practice being in the Father’s house.

THE POWER OF UNITY

Hidden within the popular story of the Tower of Babel is one of God’s most outstanding statements:

And the LORD said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.

Genesis 11:6

This is God speaking.

This is God saying that when people speak the same language nothing will be impossible for them. It’s then evident that if the church speaks the language of faith in unison, there is nothing it cannot accomplish.

The unity expressed when God said that the rebellious builders were “one people” is not just a numeric concept. If it were so, the Hebrew would be yachid—but instead the word used in this verse is echad, which is also used to say that a man and a woman become one flesh (Genesis 2:24) and that God is one (Deuteronomy 6:4).

Paul had this type of unity in mind when he commended the Philippians to live in harmony, “being of the same mind and one in purpose, having the same love, being in full accord and of one harmonious mind and intention.” (Philippians 2:2)

The reason we must maintain the unity of the Spirit is the call of God to the church:

There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

Ephesians 4:4-6

God’s desire for our unity should be enough for us to comply and keep the bond of peace with one another, but even then, in a practical sense, unity is a powerful spiritual weapon that can blow up any strategy from the kingdom of darkness. That’s why the spirits of division work overtime in the church.

Two incidents in a local church I attended when I lived on the West Coast serve as a live demonstration of the power of unity. One involved a brain tumor and the other a liver transplant.

When one of the ladies in the congregation was diagnosed with brain cancer, the church rallied for a marathon of corporate intercession. Doctors removed a tumor the size of a tennis ball from her brain, giving little hope of total recovery and almost sure that the cancerous cells would grow again. The agreement in prayer was so awesome that the presence of God during the intercession times felt like a revival meeting.

One of the prayers the church as a body had agreed on was to declare every single cancerous cell in her brain to die. Not surprisingly—at least for those who believed—the oncologist came back saying that there was no cancer in what they extracted. The baffled surgeon contradicted the lab results saying he had been doing this for decades and that he knew for a fact that what he’d extracted and seen with his eyes was a cancerous tumor.

What the surgeon didn’t realize was the blow of united prayer over the cancer in this woman’s body. More than two years later, she is still healthy and well.

The second incident involved the miraculous availability of a liver for another woman in the church who had been suffering with her own liver for more than six years. With the prospect of a risky transplant and the uncertainty of a matching donor, the church got together to pray through the night as the 9-hour surgery happened. Many petitions were made as people around the world prayed for this transplant, but one in particular was randomly (or should I say Spirit-led) said over and over again: “perfect match.”

The transplant was a success and the initial recovery mind-boggling. The medical team said her rapid recovery was unheard of, spending less than 48 hours in ICU, and sitting and laughing 24 hours after the surgery. The technician doing the MRI said he’d never seen such a perfect match, because the new liver fit her body perfectly. After a few days, however, blood clots in the arteries caused the new liver to fail. The doctors said that unless she had another transplant, she wouldn’t last more than three days.

It had taken years to find a match for the first liver and now they had only a few days to find a second one. The body of Christ got together to pray again, the Spirit of God showing up with a glorious presence, and downloading prophetic words and scriptures to be spoken over the situation. In less than 12 hours, a new liver was available and she underwent a second successful transplant.

The early church in Jerusalem discovered this principle before us, of course, although at first they seemed shocked that it worked. In Acts 12 an angel freed Peter from prison, whilst many were gathered praying for his release. When he came and knocked on the door of the house, they couldn’t believe God had answered to their prayer!

Dutch Sheets refers to this type of prayer when he says that one of the ways the word intercession is translated is “strike the mark,” as in Job 36:32: “He covers his hands with the lightning and commands it to strike the mark.”

“When God releases his light,” writes Dutch Sheets, “causing it to flash forth from His presence like lightning, its striking the desired target is likened to intercession.” (1)

It wouldn’t be far-fetched to say that unity releases the lightning of God that strikes the mark. It is a powerful weapon indeed!

Our inheritance is lived out in the fellowship of the church and the exercise of the gifts. We need one another to live in the fullness of God. The church is part of our inheritance, so we must enjoy it.

KEY IDEAS

• The church was God’s idea, not an invention of man, and it’s God’s tool of choice to extend His kingdom

• Internally, the church is a place of fellowship and edification, while externally, it advances the kingdom as it works in unity

• Our inheritance is lived out in the fellowship of the church and the exercise of the gifts

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. What is your attitude towards the local and global church? Are you a critic/judge or are you a servant?

2.What would be the impact in your city and nation if the body of Christ kept the unity in the Spirit?

3. It is said that the true spiritual state of a church is not measured with how many attend the Sunday service, but how many attend the Tuesday night prayer meeting. What do you think about this statement?

PRACTICE

With the blessing of your leaders, start an intercession group in your church or join an existing one. Encourage others to pray together constantly in the church, the houses and the streets.

NOTE

1. Dutch Sheets. Intercessory Prayer: How God can use your prayers to move Heaven and earth (Ventura, CA: Regal, 1996), 191.

It’s All About Relationship

“Our first calling is to fellowship with God. Our first and greatest loss from the Fall was our intimacy with Him. The very first thing that is meant to be restored by redemption is our intimacy with God. If there is any way that we can measure true Christian maturity, or the degree to which redemption has worked in our lives, it would be by how close we are to Him.”

Rick Joyner (1)

For in Him the whole fullness of Deity (the Godhead) continues to dwell in bodily form [giving complete expression of the divine nature]. And you are in Him, made full and having come to fullness of life [in Christ you too are filled with the Godhead--Father, Son and Holy Spirit--and reach full spiritual stature].

Colossians 2:9-10 (AMP)

How is it that the Trinity comes to fill us, to live in us? Just thinking about the greatness of God and the smallness of our human body, this is impossible. Yet the truth of this is that his fullness is not like a liquid filling a container, although it sometimes feels that way when we are in His presence. Rather, this fullness is in our spirit as we are joined with him and become partakers of his divine nature.

This is exactly what Jesus prayed in John 17:20-23: “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.”

Just as the Father and Jesus are one—thus all the fullness of God dwells in Christ—we are made one with the Godhead through him filling us. We are not gods, nor do we become god, like some cults teach, but we are made one with God. Let me explain.

The concept of God filling us is hard to understand if we keep thinking in terms of God being contained inside of us. The right way to think about this is in terms of relationship.

The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are three separate persons with individual personalities and identities, but only one true God. The harmony and love between them is so perfect, so pure, that there is no way to separate them. Their purpose and will are one and the same, as are their divine attributes of omnipresence, omnipotence, and omniscience. The mystery of the trinity is understood in the picture of a family—various members but only one family.

Enter the redeemed. Thanks to Christ’s work on the cross, and the sanctification process through the Holy Spirit, we are adopted into this family and made one with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We may not share the attributes of divinity, but we share the communion and fellowship that they have enjoyed since eternity.

The love and purity of the fellowship between the members of the Godhead is so amazingly good, that they decided to share it, hence the creation of the world and the human race. Adam and Eve were created to become part of this wonderful fellowship that had already been going on in Heaven: “Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness…” (Genesis 1:26)

In Hebrew, ‘image’ involves the concept of a shadow, a phantom or illusion. Dutch Sheets says of this use of ‘image’ in Genesis 1:

“An illusion is something you think you see, but on closer observation you discover that your eyes have tricked you. When the rest of creation saw Adam, they must have done a double take, probably thinking something along these lines: For a moment I thought it was God, but it’s only Adam.” (2)

The description of the Garden of Eden and the workings of God with his new human partners is a delightful picture of the fullness of life we are meant to experience. At the center of this perfect creation was God’s daily communion with Adam and Eve, as the Lord walked in the garden in the cool of the day. So, since the beginning of creation, it was all about relationship, about being one with God.

When sin marred the purity of this relationship, and actually made it impossible without the shedding of blood, Christ had to come and shed his blood in our place, not merely to save us from judgment, but ultimately, to restore our relationship with God. As we enter into this relationship, we are made one with God, we are made full in Christ.

The Greek word in Colossians 2:10, for ‘full’ means to accomplish, complete, fulfill. The word can be translated as satisfy or finish a task. When Paul says that we have been filled in Christ, he is declaring that the purpose of God is completed, fulfilled, satisfied and finished. Note that at the cross, Jesus said, “It is finished,” referring to his receiving the wrath of God in our place. This wrath completely satisfied, opened the way for humanity to access the throne of God with full confidence, just as in the beginning of creation.

Dr. Michael Brown described the meaning behind the words of Jesus on the cross: “Yes, the divine mission has been accomplished! Jesus has done it! Every sin has been paid for, every evil deed judged, and the full and total price of our redemption purchased at the cross. That is the power of the blood of Jesus. That is the glory of the son of God. That is the depth of the Father’s love—and it was all for you and for me so that forever we could be with Him and even share in his nature.” (3)

The purpose of God since the beginning of history was to have a personal relationship with humanity, and now in Christ this purpose is fulfilled. What an amazing privilege to be made part of the divine fellowship!

GOD AS THE INITIATOR

The Bible is full of declarations of God’s desire of relationship with humanity. God’s choosing of Israel, for instance, was more than an utilitarian decision—they weren’t just a whip to castigate the wicked nations of Canaan. He created Israel for his glory, to have an intimate relationship of love with them. Isaiah 43 is a beautiful love poem where God declares his love for his people:

But now thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. For I am the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. I give Egypt as your ransom, Cush and Seba in exchange for you.

Because you are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you, I give men in return for you, peoples in exchange for your life.

Isaiah 43:1-4

But the heart of the Father wasn’t content with one nation, so he extended the joy of his fellowship to the foreigners, even in the old covenant:

“And the foreigners who join themselves to the LORD, to minister to him, to love the name of the LORD, and to be his servants, everyone who keeps the Sabbath and does not profane it, and holds fast my covenant—these I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.”

The Lord GOD, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, declares, “I will gather yet others to him besides those already gathered.”

Isaiah 56:6-8

The new covenant in Christ opens up the door for every human to be joined to the divine fellowship, not just Israelites and the foreigners joined to them. Through Christ, God reconciles the world to himself, not counting their sins:

Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.

2 Corinthians 5:20

Reconciliation denotes a change from enmity to friendship. We are no longer enemies but friends. So great is God’s love for us and so deep his desire to commune with us, that He has ingrained in our souls the same thirst for relationship and belonging. Indeed, every person feels the need to belong. That’s why societies create clubs, associations, teams and even gangs. Belonging to a group brings value to a person, no matter if the value is positive or negative in the eyes of others. Just belonging to a group makes a person feel important. Testimony to this is that many college students across North America have gone through humiliating and sometimes cruel initiation rituals to become part of a fraternity or sorority. It’s a sad irony that these fraternities recognize the need for a price to be paid before one can enjoy fellowship. In the case of the divine fellowship with humanity, it was Christ who paid the price for us to enjoy friendship with God.

Yet the fact that Christ made it possible for us to be reconciled with God doesn’t immediately make us intimate with him; that’s only the beginning of a relationship cultivated and cherished. The verse in Revelation we often use for evangelism is actually an appeal from Christ to the church:

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.

Revelation 3:20

The picture of Christ dining with us is a picture of communion. This is not a call for intimacy made to unbelievers but to the church of —justified, saved believers that still needed to open their lives to a close relationship with Christ, where they could hear his voice and share their lives with him.

It is interesting that the apostle Paul was deeply concerned for the church at Laodicea (the same church addressed in the verse in Revelation above), wanting them to grow in an intimate knowledge of Christ:

For I want you to know how great is my solicitude for you [how severe an inward struggle I am engaged in for you] and for those [believers] at Laodicea, and for all who [like yourselves] have never seen my face and known me personally. [For my concern is] that their hearts may be braced (comforted, cheered, and encouraged) as they are knit together in love, that they may come to have all the abounding wealth and blessings of assured conviction of understanding, and that they may become progressively more intimately acquainted with and may know more definitely and accurately and thoroughly that mystic secret of God, [which is] Christ (the Anointed One).

Colossians 2:1-2 (AMP)

The highest call for the redeemed is not to obey the Ten Commandments, but to love the one who gave the commandments. Jesus told his disciples: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” (John 14:15). So love comes before obedience, not the other way around. Obedience is a result of our love for him, not a way to show God that we love him.

It has always been and always will be about relationship.

In the last verse of 2 Corinthians (13:14), Paul is wishing farewell to his readers, but at the same time delivering a theological nugget that defines our relationship with each person of the holy trinity: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”

The grace (charis) of the Lord Jesus Christ—refers to the unmerited favor bestowed upon us from our Lord and Savior. It is something we receive and must be thankful for.

The love (agape) of God—talks about God the Father’s attitude toward us, his affection and benevolence that distill from his divine nature. Agape love is a deliberate choice made without assignable cause. In other words, it has nothing to do with us, but everything with who God is. Just like grace, this love we receive not for our merits, but because of the Father’s goodness.

The fellowship (koinonia) of the Holy Spirit—implies deep communion, partnership, and participation. According to Vine’s Biblical Dictionary, koinonia “denotes the share which one has in anything, a participation, fellowship recognized and enjoyed.” In contrast with charis and agape, where we are passive receivers, koinonia requires our active participation.

This fellowship with the Holy Spirit is the topic of the next chapter.

KEY IDEAS

• We become one with God as we have relationship with Him

• The Bible is full of declarations of God’s desire of relationship with humanity

• Jesus calls us his friends

• Our highest calling is to love God and be loved by Him

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. How does the knowledge that you were created to have a relationship with God affect your daily life?

2. What does it mean to be one with God?

3. If tonight Jesus were to knock on the door of your house to have dinner with you, what would your conversation be like? What would you say to Him?

4. Make an appointment with Jesus and have that conversation tonight.

PRACTICE

Read out loud Isaiah 43:1-4.replacing the names of Jacob and Israel for your own name. Spend some time meditating in these verses and let the Holy Spirit guide you in worship, thanking God for His great love.

NOTES

1. Rick Joyner. Epic Battles of the Last Days. (Fort Mill, SC: MorningStar Publications, 2010), Kindle location 93.

2. Dutch Sheets. Intercessory Prayer: How God can use your prayers to move Heaven and earth (Ventura, CA: Regal, 1996), 26.

3. Michael L. Brown. Hyper-Grace: Exposing the Dangers of the Modern Grace Message (Lake Mary, FL: Charisma House, 2014). Kindle location 4472.

Intimacy with the Holy Spirit

Try to picture the lives of the apostles before they met Jesus. Think about Simon Peter and his brother, Andrew.

They would wake up early in the morning, get on their boat and fish until they caught a good amount of fish. Then they would come to shore, drag the nets and separate the fish. Simon would untangle the nets and stretch them on the beach, while his brother carried the fish to their homes. Probably, they would eat some of the fish and go to bed exhausted. Just to wake up the next morning and do it all over again.

Boring.

The Bible tells us that on a few occasions, they were fishing all night. That was their idea of partying!

As much as people today enjoy fishing as a sport, it was probably not so for these Galileans in the first century. Surely, it wasn’t their profession of choice—at least not the first on the list. The greatest aspiration for a Jewish young man in that day would be to become a disciple or apprentice of a teacher of the law, a Pharisee or Sadducee, and be recognized as someone important and righteous. But only a few were selected based on their knowledge of the law and other social norms. The rough Simon didn’t make the cut. That is, until Jesus came along.

Simon and the other fishermen (along with the rest of the disciples) were the followers of the rabbi Jesus. Nothing could have prepared them for the adventures ahead when they said ‘yes’ to his call. One minute, they saw a lame man walking, the next a blind man’s eyes were open. Bread multiplied, crowds followed them. They were now recognized and admired, as those who walked with Jesus. Simon and Andrew went from a predictable life of nets and scales, to a thrilling life of signs and wonders, where no one could be sure what would happen the next day. Would they have to run from an angry mob if Jesus healed again during the Sabbath? Would they witness a demon-possessed man being set free and a herd of swine drown into the sea?

Jesus revolutionized their lives. They were living a dream. They were walking with the Son of God. Life could not get better than that.

Then one day, Jesus drops the bomb on them. He’s leaving. His enemies are going to kill him. “Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.” (John 16:7)

It was to their advantage? I can just hear the disciples protesting. How could it be to their advantage that Jesus left them? That would mean returning to their old lives; their fish-stinking lives where every day is the same as the previous and no one cares for them. They still didn’t know the Helper—the Holy Spirit—whom Jesus was talking about. All they knew is that their master and Lord was saying good-bye.

So, why was it to their advantage? Jesus explained this in John 14:16-17: “And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.”

The disciples knew the Holy Spirit without realizing it, because the fullness of the Spirit dwelt in Jesus. That’s why I believe Jesus said that the Spirit “dwells with you,” because the Spirit was in Jesus himself, who dwelt with them. But once Jesus departed, He would send the Spirit to live inside them.

Jesus knew the greatness of our inheritance, the power and communion of the Holy Spirit, and he must have been very excited for his beloved disciples—for they would experience the intimate fellowship of the Helper and do even greater works than those that Jesus did.

You see, Jesus lived out the inheritance of the saints to the fullest. Not only was he conceived by the Holy Spirit, but during his ministry, he did nothing except through the power of the Spirit. He knew that these men would never be the same after being baptized with the Holy Spirit and that their adventures were just beginning.

In the night before his death, Jesus prepared his disciples for the moment in which they would be sealed with the Holy Spirit, the guarantee of the inheritance of the saints. It was only on the day of Pentecost, when the mighty rushing wind came through the upper room and the tongues of fire rested on them, that the whole revelation of Jesus’ words sank in.

Like the disciples in that room, we must renew our minds to comprehend the richness of our inheritance, being baptized in the Holy Spirit, and then walk in holiness and unity to be able to enjoy it. The key to opening the safe with this inheritance is the fellowship with the Holy Spirit, living an intimate relationship with him. And what is most wonderful about this is that He is the initiator, he desires to begin this relationship.

Just as the police were pursuing Tomas the beggar, to tell him about his inheritance, the Holy Spirit is pursuing us to give us the fullness of our inheritance in Christ. Although it may be hard to believe, you ought not to think only how much you long for him, but also how much He longs for you. That’s why the Scriptures teach that the Spirit who dwells in us yearns for us jealously. As we mentioned in the previous chapter, Paul defines our relationship with the Holy Spirit, with the Greek word koinonia. In The Message, 2 Corinthians 13:14 reads like this:

“The amazing grace of the Master, Jesus Christ, the extravagant love of God, the intimate friendship of the Holy Spirit, be with all of you.”

Intimate friendship is a great rendering of koinonia—but also a challenging one. How many believers can say that they have an intimate friendship with the Holy Spirit? Many churches even deny that the gifts of the Spirit are for today!

We can draw an analogy from our human friendships to grade our level of intimacy with the Holy Spirit. For instance, you may say that someone is your best friend if:

• You know things about your friend that not everyone else knows—intimate things.

• You spend time together and enjoy it—you enjoy your friend’s presence and seek it as much as you can, even if it is just to “hang out.”

• You share memories and experiences.

• You tell secrets to each other.

• You trust each other.

• Your friend tells you things about his or her family—like the things his father is doing.

• It’s obvious to other people that you are friends, because you are seen together constantly.

• You talk about your friend to others.

• You adopt behaviors and sayings of your friend.

• You can be real, vulnerable—be yourself without fear, without the need to pretend.

All of the above should be true of our relationship with God.

In John 15, Jesus told his disciples that he would no longer call them servants but friends, because servants don’t know what their master does.

You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. These things I command you, so that you will love one another.

John 15:14-17

In Jesus’ own words in John 15, we are his friends if we obey his commands, have intimacy with him and enjoy his presence, receive revelation of the Father’s will, bear fruit, our prayers are answered, and we reflect his character of love.

We can see many examples of people in the Bible having an intimate friendship with God. Think about Adam, who walked with God in the Garden during the cool of the day, or Abraham, who was indeed called a friend of God. There’s Moses, who spoke to God face to face (not in a literal sense), David, who worshipped God with unashamed passion, and John; the beloved apostle, who leaned on Jesus’ lap.

What all these men had in common is very simple: they spent time with God.

SPENDING TIME WITH GOD

Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.

Luke 19:38-42

In this episode of Jesus’ life, he said that Mary had chosen the best part, the best activity; sitting at his feet. Some people say that we need both Marys and Marthas or nothing would get done without hard-working Marthas, but the point of the story is that at that moment their calling was to sit at Jesus’ feet. They could do stuff at the house all the time—nwhenever they wanted—but Jesus was visiting and when the King is present we must sit at his feet, spend time with him. That’s what intimacy is all about.

Isaiah 43:7 says that we were created for his glory, not just to do stuff, but to have relationship to worship him—just like Adam did in the Garden. Look at these other examples:

Moses spent 40 days on the mountain even though he had a people to lead (a lot of work!). It was more important to spend time with the Lord, the source of his strength, to do the work later.

The book of Samuel says that David was a man after God’s heart. I think that is because he spent a lot of time worshiping God, in intimacy, and he knew what to say that please God. Just as parents “melt” when their children say the right words that touch their hearts, David knew how to melt the heart of God.

When we put our relationship with God first, we will hear from him about the things he wants us to do. He’ll tell us the desires of his heart, which then will become the desires of our heart. Just like Jesus only did what he saw the Father do, we have to sit at His feet and listen to his voice before we go out to serve him and work in the kingdom.

In my teenage years I was very involved in the local church in the worship team, the youth, the missions team, radio ministry, evangelism, home groups, everything, and I was feeling burned out after a while. This is not the way to go. Instead we must find our calling, develop our gift. Jesus knew what his mission was. He came to die, to save humanity and restore its relationship with the Father. You see, it’s all about relationship. Now we have access to the throne of grace thanks to the work of Christ.

Jesus was focused on that mission. Think about this: Jesus’ ministry was about three and a half years, so, what did he do the rest of his life, for 30 years? Did he waste his time? Not at all. He completed his task. On the cross he said “It is finished!” That was his purpose and he had accomplished it.

I believe we all have a purpose, and finding that purpose implies spending time with the Lord, letting ourselves go in his presence and the Holy Spirit fill us, control us and lead us.

We may try to be like Martha and do things here and there, busy all the time in the work of the church even though we are members of a body with distinct functions. We have to set our minds in the things of the Spirit and then focus on what He tells us to do. But our first responsibility is to minister to God, and then he’ll show us how and when to minister to others.

This is seen in the parable of the servant, who must first serve his master his food and later he can come and sit to eat at the master’s table. The servant worked all day in the field and around the house, but when his master came home, he had to minister to him. This talks about offering worship to God and humbling ourselves before him. Then the servant hears the invitation of the master to have communion with him. (Luke 17:7-10)

Jesus said that Mary chose the “good part,” which means good and profitable, useful and beneficial. Spending time at Jesus’ feet was not a waste of time, or simply something enjoyable, but it was something useful and beneficial. There is a renewal in our spirit, a fresh anointing that comes only from intimacy with the Lord. His presence transforms us and results in something profitable.

The results of this Mary-like behavior are better than a lot of work in the ministry void of anointing. Although the anointing flows out of our intimacy with God, our motivation mustn’t be the pursuit of this. Rather our desire must be simply to love on him.

I’ve heard ministers say that you must pay a price to receive the anointing, referring to all the time one must spend in the presence of God. What a sad concept. Seeking the face of God is not a price but a pleasure; worshipping the Lord a privilege, not a sacrifice. We seek his face because we love him, not because it is a prerequisite to receive the anointing. This privilege of his shared presence and communion is part of our inheritance.

The LORD is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot.

The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.

I bless the LORD who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me.

I have set the LORD always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken.

Therefore my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure.

For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your holy one see corruption.

You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

Psalm 16:5-11

David is referring to the Lord as his beautiful inheritance and being in His presence as a pleasant and joyful experience. The same thing happened to Mary, sitting at the feet of Jesus.

It is so true what James Goll says: “God created us for intimate relationship with Him, and we will never be satisfied with anything less.” (1)

When we experience the glorious presence of God, our longings and desires turn to Him and we want more and more and more of his presence. We want the fullness of his glorious riches and power in us—the release of our inheritance. This release, however, takes some time, and that’s why we must learn to do what the Bible calls “wait upon the Lord.”

WAITING UPON THE LORD

Psalm 37 draws an interesting relationship between waiting upon the Lord and receiving an inheritance. Dutch Sheets says that “waiting upon the Lord brings with it the ability to possess our inheritance. “Inherit” is the word yaresh, also translated “possess,” and means “legally an heir; military invasion in order to seize.” Those who wait upon the Lord inherit and possess—worship and warfare! It’s like David waiting upon the Lord, longing for Him, worshiping Him, writing songs to Him, and the next minute rising up, grabbing a lion by the mane and ripping his head off!” (2)

If the waiting upon the Lord precedes victory—and the possession of our inheritance—we must pursue a lifestyle of waiting.

What does it mean to wait? Let us look closely at Psalm 37:

Fret not yourself because of evildoers; be not envious of wrongdoers!

For they will soon fade like the grass and wither like the green herb.

Trust in the LORD, and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.

Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart.

Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him, and he will act.

He will bring forth your righteousness as the light, and your justice as the noonday.

Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him; fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way, over the man who carries out evil devices!

Refrain from anger, and forsake wrath! Fret not yourself; it tends only to evil.

For the evildoers shall be cut off, but those who wait for the LORD shall inherit the land.

In just a little while, the wicked will be no more; though you look carefully at his place, he will not be there.

But the meek shall inherit the land and delight themselves in abundant peace.

Psalm 37:1-11

The psalmist uses different words in the Hebrew that are translated as “wait” in English. One of them is chuwl—trust, stay, tarry, wait carefully and patiently. This waiting by being still brings glory to God because deliverance and victory will be shown to come from Him and not form our own efforts and shrewdness. That’s why verse 5 says “trust in him, and he will act.” Right before, though, we’re called to “delight ourselves in the Lord.” Again, this is the part that Mary chose and that we all must choose, to taste the goodness of the presence of God.

The second word for wait is qavah, which is not a patient stillness, but an eager expectation—the straining of the mind in a certain direction with an expectant attitude; a forward look with assurance.

Dutch Sheets summarizes the different Hebrew meanings of the word “wait” like this: “Silently waiting with a strong, calm trust, longing for His presence and eagerly expecting Him—for you know He’ll show up—anticipating and then experiencing the oneness that results as your hearts become entwined.” (3)

James Goll describes how most of us today have lost the patience to wait upon the Lord. “We want everything right now. Somewhere along the way we have developed a very short spiritual attention spans. We rush into our “time with God,” rattle off our list of requests, then rush off again. It’s rather like shopping for the bare necessities to get by and never realizing that God has prepared a banquet for us and is waiting for us to sit down and enjoy it! We must learn to take the time to get to know Him as He knows us.” (4)

As I write this, the Holy Spirit is teaching me how to wait on Him. Just this morning, he woke me up at 3 am and led me out of my bed and into my “prayer cave” (which is actually under a coffee table covered with a bed sheet). Usually, it doesn’t take long for me to sense the strong presence of the sweet Holy Spirit, but this particular time, that didn’t happen until an hour and a half later. Thinking about the quote above from James Goll, and the words spoken by the Spirit into my heart the days and weeks before, I hung in there until He showed up with His manifest presence, the weight of His glory.

Just a few days before this I had woken up meditating on the verse in Psalms, “Be still and know that I am God.” A firm conviction came to my mind that I had to slow down in whatever I was doing—my whole life had to squeak to a halt and look heavenward.

Why do I have to be still to know Him? You see, God cannot make Himself known to us in the midst of our hectic life because He is a God of stillness and meditation.

This word for “know” is the same one used to describe an intimate relationship between a man and his wife. “Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain.” (Genesis 4:1) Obviously, I am not implying that our intimacy with God has some sort of sexual or romantic connotation. What is implied here is a spiritual union. Just as a man and a woman become one—spiritually—in the intimate act of sex, we are to become one with God in our intimate moments with Him—that is, through prayer and meditation.

The saints and mystics of old practiced what is known as contemplative prayer. It was a process of calming one’s own spirit, stilling the emotions and focusing the thoughts. This kind of prayer needs no words, as your soul is melted before the Lord and all your being expresses your love for Him in a language beyond words.

“Never for a moment allow yourself to become convinced that waiting on God is a waste of time,” James Goll writes in his book Wasted on Jesus. “Waiting on God is not time wasted, it is time gained. Waiting on God is a wise and profitable investment that, in time, will reap abundant dividends in your life.” (5)

A PRACTICAL APPROACH TO INTIMACY

Many Christians struggle with prayer. Not in the sense of saying grace or agreeing with a corporate prayer on a Sunday morning service but with a regular, satisfying, and deep prayer life. They may have experienced some great moments in the presence of God, but they’re just that—moments to be remembered just like that great vacation we took to Hawaii a few years ago.

You may be in that situation. You know there is more, yet every attempt you have made to get deeper in prayer hasn’t stuck for more than a few days. “Life gets in the way, you know,” you may say. “I just don’t have much time to pray as I’d want to…”

Let me be honest with you (and please forgive my bluntness). I’ve heard all of those excuses before—and they won’t make a difference. They are the same excuses you can make for not exercising, for not eating healthy food, for not going with your spouse on a date. Hence you are placing intimacy with the Holy Spirit on the same level as losing weight.

We tend to judge others by their actions and ourselves by our intentions. We may say something on these lines: “Lord, you know I really want to spend more time in prayer, and although I just can’t find the time, you know my heart.” Then off we go feeling better that the Lord knows our heart and he is gracious enough to understand that there are other things more important than him. Oops.

I’m not trying to bring condemnation on you for this. God still loves you with an eternal love and his grace and his favors are still flowing down to you. I do want you to understand though that you are missing out on living out your inheritance by refusing to deal with those things that rob your communion and intimacy with the Holy Spirit.

One reason many believers struggle with prayer is that they see it as a duty, a “must-do” that is not supposed to be enjoyed but to be strived for. So let’s debunk that idea.

Top five reasons to pursue intimacy with God:

1. You love Him and delight yourself in his presence

2. You are transformed from glory to glory into the likeness of Christ

3. You are empowered (anointed) for the work of the ministry

4. You are strengthened to endure the trials of this fallen world

5. You can bring Heaven down to earth

If none of the above seem desirable to you, please repent. Seriously. Knowing that prayer is one key to unlock the treasure chest where the riches of our glorious inheritance in Christ are hidden, should excite us in such a way as to make prayer a priority in our lives.

E.M. Bounds says, “God’s man is made in the [prayer] closet. His life and his most profound convictions are born in the secret communion with God.” (6) A clear picture emerges here, as we see that the release of God’s power and character in our lives are channeled through our communion with him. The opposite is also true, however. If we don’t have a prayer closet where we constantly communicate with God, then some other influences will shape our lives and convictions—either our work colleagues, our friends or family, or worse, the secular media.

So, how do we go about developing a prayer lifestyle? Below are some pointers to help you.

QUIT STRIVING

If you come from a traditional religious background, you may have developed a performance-based mentality. With this frame of mind, all your relationships, including your relationship with God, are defined by what you can do to please the other person and earn his trust, than it is about enjoying the relationship. It is basically relationship legalism. Either consciously or not, you may be approaching prayer from the wrong angle. Perhaps you don’t feel worthy enough to come before God or your prayers are merely confessions of past and present sins that still burden your heart. Perhaps you are just trying to find the right words to say, but everything you say sounds so shallow, not like the pastor’s prayers. Perhaps God just seems to be a million miles away and you cry out for him to have mercy and at least listen to your requests. There may be a thousand reasons for this—such as an authoritative parent or leader, but the reality is that you are striving to enter the presence of God.

As a father myself, I see no reason for my children to strive to come before my presence. They can come whenever they want, and even if I’m busy I will make time for them or ask them to wait a little, but they’ll never have to beg for me to listen to them, nor have to repent again and again for past misbehavior. True, there are some bestial parents out there, but our heavenly Father is not one of them. He is the best father you could ever have.

Let me describe how the Holy Spirit made this so real to me.

One Sunday evening as I was worshipping during a church service, I had a vision where I was standing in the outer courts of the ancient temple in Jerusalem, feeling out of place as I saw people coming and going around me. A bright light shone from the entrance to the Temple. As I looked up the stairs, I saw Jesus motioning for me to come to him. When I walked to his side, he put an arm around my shoulders and led me inside the temple, all the way inside the Holy of Holies. I was amazed at seeing the Ark of the Covenant with the golden cherubim, but Jesus pointed to the back wall behind the ark. As I looked, the wall tore open from top to bottom like a curtain and the brilliance of a white sun shone into the room, from the outside. Jesus told me to step into the light and I came into the throne room of God. My first thought was to lie down on my face before the throne, but then I saw the Father opening his arms and asking me to run to him. After a long embrace of love, I opened my eyes and there was Christ at the right hand of the Father. The Father told me to remember that thanks to Jesus, I have access to his throne 24/7. In any circumstance of life, through tribulations, or simply when praying for others, I could just look up to the throne and ask for direction.

As this vision faded on my mind, I remembered the verse that says:

Let us then fearlessly and confidently and boldly draw near to the throne of grace (the throne of God’s unmerited favor to us sinners), that we may receive mercy [for our failures] and find grace to help in good time for every need [appropriate help and well-timed help, coming just when we need it].

Hebrews 4:16 (AMP)

Smith Wigglesworth put it this way: “The moment you look up and are in a place of affection with Jesus, the heavens are opened.” (7)

For those who struggle with the concept of a loving Father, I suggest to set their eyes on Jesus for a moment. Jesus came to reveal the heart of the Father; that He is good and compassionate, and that He has good plans for us. Jesus said that whoever had seen him, had seen the Father (John 14:9). Read the gospels and see Jesus through the Scriptures—it will give you a perfect image of how the Father is. Jesus went about healing all the sick and ultimately gave his life in exchange for our redemption.

The key to quit striving in your prayer life is a deeper revelation of God’s goodness and his extravagant love. Banning Liebscher says that “the revelation of His extravagant love will propel you deeper into God’s heart because you will long to be with Him.” (8)

As we read, meditate and walk out God’s word and experience his blessings, we come to know for a fact that God is good all the time, and we can declare that every good and perfect gift is from above, from the Father of lights (James 1:17).

This knowledge of God’s goodness is more than intellectual knowledge, but it’s a conviction that runs deep into your soul and spirit. The certainty of God’s goodness must take hold of your life in such a way that you breathe the air with the gratitude of his gift of life to you. Once the revelation that God is always good permeates every part of your existence, your prayer life will jump to incredible heights.

When we know that God is good, we expect our prayers to be answered, and our faith and trust increase all the time.

When we know that God is good, we can live in freedom, not afraid of an angry judge ready to punish us for every mistake we make, but expecting a loving Father to listen to our heart desires.

When we know that God is good, we rest in the fact that he knows better than us, and that even in the midst of trials, everything will turn out for our good.

The importance of the revelation of God’s goodness is made clear in the famous passage in Exodus 33, when Moses asks the Lord to show him His glory.

Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” And he said, “I will make my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The Lord.’ And ‘I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”

Exodus 33:18-19

I find it fascinating that God’s answer for a request to see his glory is to offer a taste of his goodness. The glory of God is exhibited in his acts, which reveal his nature—that he is strong and loving, that he is mighty and good. When we recognize God’s power and goodness (our inheritance!), he receives glory.

It’s not unusual for churches and individual Christians to pray fervently for God to reveal his glory. Yet God has been showing his goodness all the time. As King David wrote:

Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagles.

Psalm 103: 2-5

Go ahead and count your blessings, do not forget them. Taste and see that God is good. Now enjoy his presence and waste yourself in intimate prayer.

GO DEEPER

I’ve gone through different periods of depths in my prayer life, sometimes coming back to the surface instead of probing toward more of God’s presence. My early 20s were a time of falling in love with God and what he was doing in my hometown in Colombia. I was on fire for God and had a delightful prayer life. That all changed when I moved to Texas to attend graduate school. All of a sudden I was consumed by other interests and gradually my prayer life waned to a few words here and there. Although I was still involved in church and read my Bible, I hardly spent more than five minutes in prayer a day. I adopted the careless attitude of many in the church when confronted with our lack of “closet time,” which is to say that I was simply “praying without ceasing” throughout the day.

This attitude, which I had, and have also heard others profess, would consider a casual “oh my God” an actual prayer, as if counted for some sort of brownie point contest. Okay, I may be exaggerating, but the idea here is that you don’t need to have a set time for prayer if you simply talk to God during the day.

This kind of purposeless prayer was obviously not what Paul had in mind when he told the Thessalonians to pray without ceasing (1 Thessalonians 5:17). On the contrary, this passage can also be translated as “pray perseveringly.” Persevering is an intense and purposeful action that implies time spent in deep prayer, and this is what I mean when I say that we must go deeper. We have to go from communion to intimacy, otherwise our relationship with God will be shallow at best.

Many a scholar and preacher has drawn analogies from the Song of Solomon, comparing the relationship between Solomon and his bride, with Christ and the church, or Christ and every believer.

The analogy between husband and wife is appropriate in more than one sense and it helps us understand how to walk in intimacy with the Holy Spirit. Just as it would be no good for me to systematically study the qualities of my wife without having communion with her, I cannot know the Holy Spirit without an intimate relationship with him. In the same way that I spend time with my wife, listen and talk to her, I do it with the Spirit, and I can go as deep as I want—or not. I could simply talk to my wife here and there during the day, saying good morning and make small talk about our day, and nothing else but hat would be quite a shallow relationship—one which sadly many couples have.

A marriage that goes deeper has more than casual chances of small talk. They go on dates without the kids, and plan special events and celebrations. More importantly, they go into their bedroom, close the door, and share an intimate relationship. That’s depth.

In the words of Cash Luna, “you can have communion with [the Holy Spirit] while you drive, work or stand in line at the bank. You can talk to Him throughout the day. However, intimacy implies being alone with Him in a place with no interruptions. In that place, He will manifest and show you what He has for your life.” (9)

FIND YOUR CLOSET

Just as the marriage bed is the usual place for intimacy between husband and wife, the “closet” is the place of intimacy with the Holy Spirit. This expression comes from the King James translation of Matthew 6:6: “But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret.”

The closet here was a chamber on the ground-floor of an Oriental house, generally used for storage or privacy—it was a spot for retirement.

This is why the Amplified Bible translates the verse as “go into your [most] private room.”

Although in those days Jews would normally pray only in a temple, Jesus began a shift in the paradigm of how to relate to God. When he spoke to the Samaritan woman by the well, he told her that days would come when people would not worship in a specific place like Jerusalem or the mountain in Samaria, but when the “true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth.” (John 4:23)

In fact, Paul explains how much this paradigm changed when the Holy Spirit came to reside in the believers.

Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?

1 Corinthians 6:19

We are His Temple, so wherever we are, he’ll be there. That’s why when we enter the secret chamber, the prayer closet, he enters there with us.

It is interesting to note that in the Jewish tradition, men use a prayer shawl, or talith, which means ‘little tent’. They cover their head with the shawl to form a tent in which they can pray to God.

Jesus was not teaching here that one must only pray in a closet or secret room. The gospels tell us that Jesus would go to desolate places, or to a mountain and pray to his Father. The idea is to find a private place, free of distractions that would become a meeting place between you and the Lord.

I’ve had many prayer closets during the years, as I moved from one place to another, but personally, I tend to choose confined spaces with little or no light, where I can lay on the floor—not a bed or a sofa because I could fall asleep. Other people prefer a bright room and a chair where they can converse with the Lord while drinking a coffee. Sometimes I like to have worship (or soaking music as I call it) in the background, to create an atmosphere that honors God. I know some people who like to walk in the woods while they pray, while others pray in their cars. I don’t think there are set rules, but whatever works for you. The benefit of having a regular place where you pray and nothing else, is that your mind and body will be in the mood of prayer every time you enter the place—just as your stomach knows when you enter the kitchen.

A few years after having experienced the blessing of a physical closet or secret place, the Spirit led me to a new realm, where I wasn’t confined to the boundaries of the material. I learned to use my imagination—the eyes of the soul—to create a meeting place for God and I.

You can actually submit your imagination to the Holy Spirit, who will fill it with a myriad of pictures. I’ve sat on the top of a mountain with Jesus, way above the clouds, and walked with Him through a forest of tall trees. In these places in my imagination, I can see Him face to face and ask questions, hear his answers and feel his embrace.

It all starts with a, “Holy Spirit, where do you want to meet today?” and a scene pops up into your mind. You just enter in and let Him guide you. The awesome part is that although at first it seems that the mental visions are the product of your imagination, you’ll find yourself immersed in places you’ve never thought about before, and often, you’ll be surprised and even moved to the core, with what the Spirit shows you.

If you don’t have a prayer closet yet, find one as soon as possible. Make it your own and treasure it for the divine moments you will experience there with the Creator of the universe.

LISTEN

I must confess to feeling a little ticked off when people say that God is mute or that he is not speaking to them. It’s a common theme in books and movies, an idea perpetuated by spiritually deaf people who blame God for their lack of hearing.

God is always speaking—one way or another, God is speaking to you right now.

Francis Schaffer wrote a Christian classic in the 1970s, He is There and He is Not Silent, demonstrating that Christianity is the only logical belief if our world, knowledge and morals are to make any sense. This is the argument first presented by Paul in the book of Romans:

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made.

Romans 1:19-20

Creation speaks to us about the greatness of God, but he uses other ways to tell us about his love:

Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.

Hebrews 1:1-2

Yes, the heir of all things is speaking today through his written Word, and through the testimony of the Holy Spirit, that we are coheirs with him. The problem resides in the hearer who has not trained his soul to discern and listen the still voice of God. Here are some things you can do:

• Silence all other voices and distractions—worries, entertainment (watching a disturbing movie when you are seeking God’s direction is not a good idea—images will keep popping in your mind, distracting you).

• Read the Scriptures

• Listen to sermons and biblical teaching

• Speak to your spiritual leaders and friends

• Pray without saying anything—just wait in his presence

I heard a great anecdote about Mother Teresa a while ago. A visitor asked Mother Teresa how she prayed. “I mostly listen,” she said. A little skeptical, the visitor said, “And what does God say?”

“He mostly listens,” Mother Teresa said.

This is a kind of prayer that comes from the heart - our spirit worships the Lord without words, melting inside, yearning and reaching for the lover of our soul, Jesus. You know how it is, when you know what you want to express but can’t find the words. The Holy Spirit living in you knows what your heart desires even before you say a word. Only one thing is necessary to prepare your heart to listen to God - turn your affections toward him.

In fairness, at times the conflicting voices and the circumstances make it hard to listen clearly. Just like in Acts 27, where Paul and his companions were about to perish in the middle of a storm at sea.

When neither sun nor stars appeared for many days, and no small tempest lay on us, all hope of our being saved was at last abandoned. Since they had been without food for a long time, Paul stood up among them and said, “Men, you should have listened to me and not have set sail from Crete and incurred this injury and loss. Yet now I urge you to take heart, for there will be no loss of life among you, but only of the ship. For this very night there stood before me an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I worship, and he said, ‘Do not be afraid, Paul; you must stand before Caesar. And behold, God has granted you all those who sail with you.’ So take heart, men, for I have faith in God that it will be exactly as I have been told. But we must run aground on some island.

Acts 27:20-26

In these extreme circumstances, Paul received an angelic visitation to restore his lost hope and reveal God’s new plan (run aground on an island). An angel may visit you these days as well, but probably God will show himself to you in different ways; with a dream, a vision, a sermon, a phone call from a friend, a book or merely a nudge in your heart.

There will also be times when the Lord will be silent about certain things in your life, such as when you ask specific questions about a particular circumstance but He knows it is better for you not to know the whole picture of your future. Still, the Lord will speak, saying those familiar words of “trust me” and “wait” and “do not fear” even if he does not send us an angel to reveal our future like he did with Paul. Sometimes, God ignores your whining and tells you something you do not expect to hear. Remember Gideon (Judges 6) hiding in the winepress when the Angel of the Lord appeared to him. Gideon asks why Israel is being oppressed, why the Lord has not helped them, why this and why that. But the Angel of the Lord doesn’t even respond to his whys—he ignores the whining and says, “Go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian; do not I send you?” (Judges 6:14)

God is always speaking, even if it’s not what we want to hear. We may want to hear a detailed answer about what job to take, who to marry, how to deal with our teenage son, when to enter the ministry and a thousand things more. As I joked with my wife one time about a business idea she had—it would be nice if God would send and angel with a business plan from Heaven, ready for implementation. Instead of downloading a manual with instructions for our every need, the Holy Spirit whispers a sweet “trust and wait, be still and I will act.”

So as you learn to listen, you must learn to wait on God’s promises, because his timing is different from ours. When things don’t seem to be working on your life, all the more important is to find refuge in the secret place with the Holy Spirit and wait for him to speak. This is essential for walking in our inheritance as one of the Holy Spirit’s tasks is to declare to us the riches of our inheritance in Christ.

[The Spirit] will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

John 16:14

In his book, Dreaming with God, Bill Johnson says about this verse: “There is an amazing transfer of resources taking place in this statement. Follow this: All belongs to the Father; the Father gives everything to the Son; the Son gives everything to us through the Holy Spirit, who transfers the resources of Heaven into our account through the declaration. This is why hearing from God is so vital. He transfers Jesus’ inheritance into our account every time He speaks. Every declared promise is a transfer of heavenly resources that enable us to fulfill the purpose of our commission.” (10)

This connection between listening to the Lord and obtaining his promises (the inheritance) is laid out in Isaiah 30, where God warns Israel not to go down to Egypt and follow their own plans, instead of God’s plans. The Lord rebukes Israel for not seeking his direction but instead trusting on the riches of Egypt. For that reason, the people of Israel were under a curse—ashamed, persecuted, disgraced.

For thus said the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel,” In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.” But you were unwilling,…. Therefore the LORD waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the LORD is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him. For a people shall dwell in Zion, in Jerusalem; you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. As soon as he hears it, he answers you. And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left.”

Isaiah 30:15, 18-21 [emphasis mine]

How amazing that even under the old covenant, God would tell his people that if they called to him, he would answer and that they would hear a voice behind them, telling them where to go. The prerequisites for hearing this voice though were rest, quietness and trust.

In our day and age, the practice of rest and quietness is a hard thing to come by. Even as we go on vacation or seek solitude in a quiet place, our minds are so overwhelmed with information that it’s almost impossible to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit. That’s why Peter admonishes us to be sober-minded (1 Peter 1:13), because our minds are so intoxicated with a million worries, a ton of useless information, and a myriad of confusing voices around us. When you learn to quiet all those voices, to be sober-minded, and focused on God, you will hear the still small voice that Elijah heard when he was hiding in the cave (1 Kings 19:12). Elijah heard the strong wind, the earthquake and the fire, but he knew the Lord was not in them. When the low whisper came instead, he recognized the voice of the Lord and came out of the cave.

James Goll says that “the closer we get to the Lord, the gentler His voice becomes. The more we learn how to listen, the easier it becomes to hear Him speak.” (11)

So true. As I’ve practiced intimacy with the Holy Spirit, it has become natural to hear his voice. I tell him every day to speak to me, that I need to hear his voice. Silence would be a slow death. I’m so grateful that he always speaks!

BE TEACHABLE

As you come into daily fellowship with the Holy Spirit, ask him to teach and reveal his personality to you. This is what I did when I began my journey with the sweet Holy Spirit. Each morning I would come and say, “Holy Spirit, teach me something about you today.”

One day he took me through the Bible to show me how unpredictable he can be. I saw how in Ezekiel, we see the Spirit of God taking the poor prophet by his hair and lifting him up into the air to take him somewhere else. In Acts, one second we see the deacon Phillip preaching to the eunuch in the desert road, the next he disappears and ends up preaching in Samaria! The lessons he’s taught me are all amazing. He has taught me in no uncertain terms that he is the boss and he does as he pleases—there is no way we should be telling him what to do; he must have his way. I’ve also learned that he delights in excellence, obedience, gentleness and stillness. The most radical lesson I learned about the Holy Spirit however is that he’s very sensitive and easily grieved, like a turtledove (more on that in a later chapter).

The Holy Spirit is the greatest teacher you could ever have. You don’t need to go to a class at a certain time, but you have access to him 24/7. Because the cares of this world distract us from his attention, we must train our mind and soul to walk in a constant awareness of the presence of the Holy Spirit. Only then we can be really teachable.

Make a conscious effort to tap into his presence throughout your daily routine, to listen to his leading, to see through the Spirit’s eyes what the Father is doing in any given situation. Turn your affections toward him as often as you can so the Spirit can teach you the riches of your glorious inheritance.

THE TRIUNE GOD

After all this emphasis in the communion with the Holy Spirit, the natural question is, what about the Father and Jesus? Aren’t we supposed to have intimate fellowship with them too?

Of course we do! The beauty of the divine trinity is that they are always together as one. Jesus said that the Holy Spirit would reveal the words of the Son and the will of the Father.

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.

John 14:26

When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All the Father has is mine; therefore I said he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

John 16: 13-15

While Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father in Heaven, the Holy Spirit remains on earth as our comforter and helper. Since he is one with the Father and the Son, the Spirit cannot help but talk to us about them, reveal their grace and love toward us, and facilitate our communion with them. In this way, the Holy Spirit is like a good friend that takes you home and introduces you to his family. As you enter into your prayer closet you’ll find that soon the Holy Spirit will arrange what some call “throne room encounters”. Either in a vision or simply in a deep sense of the weighty glory of God upon you, the Father and the Son will meet you in the secret place. Your own spirit will approach the throne of God and behold the beauty of His majesty.

Remember that the Holy Spirit is the promise of the Father for all those who believe in and receive Jesus Christ. The Father and the Son come to live in us through the Holy Spirit—so being in communion with the Spirit is being in communion with the triune God.

In fact, the Bible teaches that the Spirit prays to the Father on our behalf. “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches the hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.” (Romans 8: 26-27)

Because the Holy Spirit searches our heart and knows what we need (our weaknesses), he will take care of every detail in our lives. In times of loneliness and rejection, he will heal us with a revelation of the love of the Father, pushing us gently toward God, so we may fall into the Father’s embrace. “Come,” the Spirit says, “and see how deep is his love for you.” In the midst of trials and tribulations, the Spirit will show you the Lamb of God who was slain, carrying your sin, and who knows what you’re going through. “Leave your burden at the feet of the cross,” says the Holy Spirit.

As you grow in intimacy with God, your experiences with the triune God will become deeper and more significant. There is no end to what the most creative being in the universe can teach and reveal to you. One of the most beautiful visions I’ve seen is one where I was playing with Jesus—not as child, but as an adult totally in love with his King and Savior. In the vision, which came as a series of scenes flashing in my mind, I saw myself wrestling with Jesus, playing basketball, laughing hard as we told jokes and sharing a drink of water in a hot summer afternoon. In the final scene, we lay on the grass looking at the stars until I fell asleep by his side. When I woke up, he wasn’t there any more, but his peace and joy filled my heart—both in the vision and in the physical world.

That’s what spiritual intimacy is all about, true friendship with God. What a great inheritance!

KEY IDEAS

• The key to opening the safe with this inheritance is the fellowship with the Holy Spirit, living an intimate relationship (friendship) with him

• Intimacy requires spending time with the Holy Spirit, waiting on Him and learning to be still in His presence

• A revelation of the goodness of God will bring you closer to Him

• Finding a prayer closet is an important piece in our journey of intimacy with God

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. Read again the list of qualities of a best friend. Which of these do you need to work on in your relationship with the Holy Spirit?

2. Do you have a deep conviction (not just intellectual) that God is good? How is this conviction reflected in your relationship with the Father?

3. What changes in your daily routine can you implement TODAY so you can spend more time with God?

4. When was the last time you heard God’s voice? What do you need to do to hear his voice more often?

PRACTICE

Silence and stillness are a vital way to hear God’s voice. This week, set apart between 30 and 60 minutes every day to practice being still before the Lord. Find a place with no distractions, put on some worship music (instrumental is better if words distract you) and focus your mind and affections on Him. Don’t say anything, just wait in His presence. It may be hard at the beginning, but if you keep at it, you’ll find a wonderful reward.

NOTES

1. James Goll. https://twitter.com/JamesGoll/status/249346666333892608 (Last accessed February 20, 2014).

2. Dutch Sheets. Intercessory Prayer: How God can use your prayers to move Heaven and earth (Ventura, CA: Regal, 1996), 153.

3. Ibid.

4. Jim Goll. Wasted on Jesus: Reaching for the Lover of Your Soul (Shippenburg, PA: Destiny Image, 2000), 3.

5. Ibid, 24.

6. E.M. Bounds. Power through Prayer. http://www.revival-library.org/catalogues/miscellanies/prayer/boundspower.html (Last accessed February 20, 2014)

7. Smith Wigglesworth. The Complete Collection of His Life Teachings, Compiled by Roberts Liardon (New Kensignton, PA: Whitaker House, 1996).

8. Banning Liebscher. Jesus Culture: Living a Life that Transforms the World (Shippenburg, PA: Destiny Image, 2009), 120.

9. En honor al Espíritu Santo: ¡No es algo, es alguien! [In honor of the Holy Spirit: It’s not something, it’s someone!](Miami, FL: Editorial Vida, 2010), 48. Quote translated from Spanish

10. Bill Johnson. Dreaming with God: Secrets to Redesigning Your World through God’s Creative Flow.” (Shippensburg, Pa: Destiny Image, 2006), 136.

11. James W. Goll. The Lost Art of Practicing His Presence (Shippenburg, PA: Destiny Image, 2006), 112.

Sin & Religion: The Inheritance Robbers

In the 2010 movie, The Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, a young boy in danger of being executed is saved at the last minute by the King of Persia, and brought into the palace to live as a prince. The life of this boy would have ended tragically and prematurely were it not for the intervention of the king, but the king’s compassion did not stop at saving the orphan’s life. He adopted the orphan and made him an heir of the empire—with all the riches, authority and rights that came with being a prince.

Our story is not much different. Before coming to Christ, we were under the power of the devil and our inheritance was the wrath of God (Ephesians 2:1-3). While hell-bound and with no hope to save ourselves, God rescued us and adopted us as sons and daughters:

In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.

Ephesians 1:5-6

Not only are we forgiven and saved from eternal damnation, but we are given an inheritance:

May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.

Colossians 1:11-13

However, qualifying for an inheritance is not the same as receiving or enjoying the inheritance.

Now that we have all this knowledge and revelation of God’s inheritance for us, we must walk it out because just like Tomas, we otherwise waste our inheritance.

RT Kendall says there are two kinds of faith: saving faith (justification) and persistent faith (sanctification). Saving faith qualifies you to be an heir, but you only come to obtain your inheritance through persistent faith. (1)

We can waste our inheritance in two ways: by living in legalism or living in sin.

We can see this illustrated in the parable of the prodigal son, where the younger brother wasted his inheritance in the desires of the flesh and ended up in the pig’s pen. Note that the issue here is not about losing our salvation. The prodigal son was still a son even in the lowest point of his degradation because his position with his father had not changed, but he wasted his inheritance. On the other hand, the older brother was living “under the law,” trying to serve his father to gain his favor. From his comment to his father—”you have never given me a goat to celebrate with my friends”—we know that he was not enjoying his inheritance. Then the father said, “Son, all that I have is yours.”

Let’s look more closely at these inheritance robbers.

ROBBER #1: INDULGING IN THE DESIRES OF THE FLESH

The church of Corinth in the time of the New Testament was a church full of power and active in the gifts of the Spirit. There were, however, cases of sexual immorality that prompted the apostle Paul to write to speak correction and exhort them to live a life of holiness. In fact, in chapter six, he makes a clear distinction between the unrighteous and the saints, and says that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

1 Corinthians 6:9-11

The problem here was not that the church of Corinth was full of unrighteous people, but that these saints were acting like the unrighteous (particularly a man in Corinth who had his father’s wife and others who were using prostitutes). Paul tells his readers that they used to be unrighteous but God had now justified (declared righteous) them in Christ. As such, they were called to live in a manner consistent with their status as justified saints.

In the next few chapters, Paul urges them to abstain from sexual immorality and gives them instructions regarding food offered to idols. Here’s where the often-quoted verse comes from: “All things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful.” (1 Corinthians 6:12). Matthew Henry notes that since the laws of Corinth did not condemn prostitution, some believers made the case that it was permitted for them to have sex with prostitutes. (2) That was, of course, faulty logic.

For a church that seemed to be prospering and in charismatic revival, Paul was very concerned about their behavior and their adoption of worldly cultural practices around them. Why? Was he worried about their eternal destiny or about something else?

Let’s see what he says a few chapters later:

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.

1 Corinthians 9:24-27

What is the prize Paul is talking about? Is it eternal life (salvation)? Or is it eternal rewards and earthly blessings? Could it be both?

The question of whether a Christian can lose his or her salvation has been debated for centuries and is not an easy one to answer definitely because of the verses defending each position.

There are three basic positions regarding this issue.

1. Once Save Always Saved. This position states that your eternal salvation is secured once you have been born again, no matter how you conduct your life or your relationship with God. The common sense approach to this position is, “If your works did not earn you your salvation, why would they make you lose it?” In other words, if salvation is by faith, you should not maintain it by works, otherwise the sacrifice of Christ would not have been sufficient.

Here are some scriptures supporting the Once Saved Always Saved position:

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written,

“For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:28-39

but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.

John 10:26-29

2. The Perseverance of the Saints. This position states that a true Christian would not lose his or her salvation and that those who rebel and go into apostasy, were never really saved. The verses supporting this position are the same as the ones for the first position, plus others like these:

They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.

1 John 2:19

No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him.

1 John 3:6

3. Salvation can be lost. This position states that a true believer can reject Christ’s grace and forfeit his or her salvation. Here are the verses for this position:

And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under Heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.

Colossians 1:21-23

For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. What the true proverb says has happened to them: “The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.

2 Peter 2:20-22

For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? For we know him who said, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.” It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”

Hebrews 10:26-31

It is not my intent in this chapter to convince you of a particular position. The Scriptures must always speak for themselves and in that sense you must deal with those that contradict your position, instead of ignoring or re-interpreting them to fit a particular doctrine. For instance, those who hold to the Once Saved Always Saved position must either ignore or explain away the verses cited above in support of the second and third positions—and whole books have been devoted to this.

Returning to the problem of indulging in the flesh, let me quote a respected Bible scholar, Dr. Michael Brown: “How then do we sort things out? It’s really very simple. God’s promises are to believers—to those who want to follow the Lord and whose lives belong to Him—not to rebels who have chosen sin and rejected His Lordship. Put another way, there is not a single promise anywhere in the Bible that God will bless us with eternal life if we ultimately reject Him and choose rebellion, and we give people false assurance when we make that claim.” (3)

Dr. Brown explains that the promises of God’s keeping power (the ones cited by the Always Saved position) are for Jesus’ sheep, not for those who reject his voice. That would make it possible for positions 2 or 3 to be true, but not position 1.

The passage that defines the whole issue for me is this one:

If we have died with him, we will also live with him;

if we endure, we will also reign with him;

if we deny him, he also will deny us;

if we are faithless, he remains faithful—for he cannot deny himself.

2 Timothy 2:12-13

Paul is writing here to believers, giving instructions to Timothy, who is a pastor in Ephesus, and says that if we are faithless—meaning if we fall into temptation and sin—he remains faithful. In other words, sin in itself will not affect our eternal security because Jesus paid the price for our sins and we are justified in Christ.

When we look at the prodigal son, it is very clear that he was living in sin, wasting his inheritance, and that his father was still waiting for him. When he returned, repentant, his father took him back and restored him completely. Although the son was faithless, the father was faithful.

However, Paul says in 2 Timothy, if we deny Christ, he will also deny us. This is a willing and conscious rejection of the grace of Christ. This apostasy, this denial may then lead the person to a licentious life of sin, of profaning the blood of Christ and mocking the cross, but those are the actions that follow the denial of the faith.

I grew up hearing the stories of the martyrs who would rather die and be tortured than denying Christ—and even heard the preachers saying that in the last days, those who remained on earth during the tribulation would be forced to deny Christ or die. Whether the eschatological details are accurate or not, there is a biblical and historical basis for not denying Christ and I believe eternal salvation is at stake here.

One could argue that if the prodigal son had not repented and gone back home, he was, in effect, denying his Father. Obviously, denying implies more than saying you don’t know or believe in the Lord, otherwise Peter’s denial of Jesus would have meant eternal judgment. The Greek for deny means not to accept, to reject, or to refuse something offered. In this case, denying the Lord is refusing his grace. It is the same refusal of those who do not believe in Christ and on whom the wrath of God is destined for (John 3:36), only worse, because their rejection comes after having experienced the grace of the Lord (Hebrews 10:26).

Most Christians have no intentions of denying Christ or falling into apostasy, but may still tolerate hidden sin or unrighteous habits to creep into their daily lives. So what is at stake when we sin? Many things indeed, as the consequences of sin are death in every sense, but in the case of our being coheirs with Christ, our sin grieves the Holy Spirit, the down payment of our inheritance.

Paul warns us not to “grieve the Holy Spirit, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” (Ephesians 4:30) When you grieve someone you are causing them pain or sorrow. What a dreadful thought, that we may cause pain or grief to the Holy Spirit!

The best book on this topic, as far as I know, is The Sensitivity of the Spirit by R.T. Kendall. He explains:

“The word ‘sensitivity’ has two meanings. In essence, one meaning is “the capacity of being easily hurt.” The other meaning is “the capacity of being aware of the needs and emotions of others.” The sensitivity of the Holy Spirit refers to both meanings. We may not think these qualities are not very attractive in his personality, but like it or not, the Holy Spirit is like a turtledove and flutters away where peace does not prevail. However, the Holy Spirit is equally sensitive to our feelings. He is a gentleman.” (4)

RT Kendall says that grieving the Spirit refers to actions of ours that hinder the Spirit from being himself, from being what he could be in us. We only have to look at the context of the verse in Ephesians 4 to find what those actions are:

Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

Ephesians 4:29-32

When we shout at our spouse or children, when we hold a grudge against our neighbour, when we tell crude jokes, when we make hasty decisions without consulting the Spirit—we are grieving the Holy Spirit.

Paul even goes further by saying that some of these things that grieve the Holy Spirit will actually cause a person to lose his inheritance.

But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.

Ephesians 5: 3-5

When Jesus told the people that adultery was not only a physical action, but that even having lustful desires for someone is adultery of the heart, he was raising the bar for what means to be sexually pure in the eyes of God. Here Paul is saying that even these sexual sins must not even be named, that “it is shameful even to speak of these things” (Ephesians 5:12). He would probably have included in his list watching certain movies if he were writing today!

Walking in intimate fellowship with the Holy Spirit involves avoiding his departure. Just as we learn what kind of things our spouses or friends dislike and avoid them, we must be sensitive to the Holy Spirit and control both our tongues and our actions. Let’s adjust to Him and his ways. It’s not easy, but it is worth it.

Some time ago, I heard Bill Johnson teaching about the Holy Spirit as a dove. If a dove were to rest upon your shoulder, how would you walk so the dove would not flutter away? I confess that it felt like a heavy burden on me as I became aware of the many ways I was (and still am) grieving the precious Holy Spirit, but I was then reminded of the grace of Jesus and the love of the Father, always there, unconditionally. They restore me to the perfect fellowship with the Spirit.

R.T. Kendall says: “A healthy fear of grieving the Spirit should not lead you to being afraid to enjoy life to the full, to laugh uproariously with friends or to make common sense decisions. God is not unreasonable. His commands are never burdensome.” (5)

The Holy Spirit is a person—and a very sensitive one—so treat him as such. His first name is “Holy” because that’s what defines his personality. He will help you to walk in holiness and transform you into the image of Christ, so you will abound in power and bear fruit. All he asks from you is that you’d be his friend.

HOW SIN CAN WASTE EACH BENEFIT OF OUR INHERITANCE

Unlimited Power. Sin saps the anointing. Think about Samson and the consequences of his sin—the Lord departed from him and all his supernatural strength left his body.

Divine Authority. Sin steals confidence before God, as guilt and shame are a heavy burden over the person. In this state, there is no confidence to walk in divine authority—on the contrary, sin opens the door for the enemy to usurp our authority.

A New Nature. Sin usually leads to more sin and later to worse sin, enslaving the person to the old sinful nature and cutting the fellowship with the Holy Spirit, without whom we can’t be transformed into the image of Christ.

The Body of Christ. Sin affects the whole body of Christ, hurting family and friends and bringing reproach to the church in the eyes of the world, especially when leaders are involved.

ROBBER #2: LEGALISM

Before you read this section, try to read the book of Galatians in its entirety and, if possible, in one sitting. This would provide a larger picture of the topic of legalism and the inheritance of the saints.

Paul wrote his epistle to the Galatians in response to the events that happened after he left there. It seems that wherever Paul went to preach the gospel to the Gentiles, a group of “Judaizers” followed him, teaching new Christians that they needed to follow the law of Moses—in addition to believing in Christ—to be saved. The Galatians received the message of the Judaizers and began following the Mosaic law.

In a passionate and adamant way, Paul writes that by the works of the law no one can be justified, but only through faith in Jesus Christ.

Beginning in chapter 3, Paul makes an analogy between the law/faith with a child who is to receive an inheritance.

Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed. So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.

Galatians 3:23-26

I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything, but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.

Galatians 4:1-7

In that same chapter, Paul is warning the church of Galatia about the dangers of going back to the law after having believed the gospel of justification by faith in Jesus Christ.

Galatians 5:4 says: “You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.”

This “fallen away from grace” means that they had lost their inheritance, the richness of the grace of Christ, by accepting a different gospel, the one preached by the Judaizers back then that said that Christians had to keep the law in order to be saved. This is an example of the effects of a religious spirit at work.

THE RELIGIOUS SPIRIT

Rick Joyner defines the religious spirit as “a demon which seeks to substitute religious activity for the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives.” (6)

Not every one will agree that an actual demon is behind the religious attitudes of people in the church. In a sense, the religious spirit is a spirit of pride and rebellion that rejects the grace of God for a form of self-righteousness, like the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. To them, Jesus told the parable of the two sons—the one commonly known as the parable of the prodigal son.

The younger son represents the sinners—the tax collectors and the prostitutes in the audience—while the elder brother represents the religious authorities.

In his powerful little book, The Prodigal God, Timothy Keller explains that both sons were lost. Both sons rebelled to the father’s authority—one by living in licentiousness, the other by being ‘very good.’

“Careful obedience to God’s law may serve as a strategy for rebelling against God,” Keller says. “You can avoid Jesus as Savior by keeping all the moral laws. If you do that, then you have ‘rights’. God owes you answered prayers, and a good life, and a ticket to Heaven when you die. You don’t need a Savior who pardons you by free grace, for you are your own savior.” (7)

The elder brother in the parable epitomizes the religious spirit, which refuses to enter to the feast of the Father, and show mercy to the repentant brother. Keller lists several traits of the elder-brother spirit:

• Anger and resentment when things don’t go well because they believe God owes them a good life.

• Joyless, fear-based obedience—their good deeds come out of fear, not joy and love.

• Lack of assurance of the Father’s love—they are always trying to perform to gain favor, but there is no intimacy or delight in the Father’s presence, they have a dry prayer life.

Keller summarizes it this way: “Elder brothers have an undercurrent of anger toward life circumstances, hold grudges long and bitterly, look down at people of other races, religions, and lifestyles, experience life as a joyless, crushing drudgery, have little intimacy and joy in their prayer lives, and have a deep insecurity that makes them overly sensitive to criticism and rejection yet fierce and merciless in condemning others.” (8)

What is most striking to me are the words at the end of the parable:

But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, but he answered his father, ‘Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!’ And he said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.

Luke 15:28-31

Indeed, all was his. At the beginning of the story, Jesus said that the father divided his property between the two sons, but the elder brother was acting as if he didn’t own it; expecting the Father to give him something that was already his. That’s why legalism causes us to waste our inheritance, because it makes us insecure and fearful, separating us from the love of God, always seeking to perform in order to obtain things we already have access to.

What makes all this even worse is that legalism repels intimacy. At its core, legalism is religion without relationship.

James Goll says: “The second layer of leaves that hide us from the love of God and keep us from intimacy with Him is the religious masquerade, concealing deep-seated hurts from the past. Religious people wear masks quite well, pretending all is well with their souls while holding the Lord, the very Lover of their lives, at arm’s length. Pretenders we become, masquerading in the parade of hypocritical churchianity.” (9)

As I’ve shown before, Christianity is all about relationship with the trinity. Intimacy leads to a life of power and holiness, but legalism reduces Christianity to a burdensome religion that fears the presence of God instead of longing for it.

HOW LEGALISM CAN WASTE EACH BENEFIT OF OUR INHERITANCE

Unlimited Power. A legalistic person will never depend on God’s power to live out the Christian life, but instead will depend on human efforts, man-made programs, and religious traditions

Divine Authority. The religious spirit impedes the flow of true divine authority because it is closely connected to the spirit of control (which is the same as witchcraft). This spirit of control seeks to dominate others through commandments, rules and coercion, instead of allowing the Spirit of God to transform them.

A New Nature. In regards to holiness, legalism emphasizes human effort instead of the grace and the power of the Holy Spirit. It focuses on external behaviors, never tackling the internal roots, naturally leading to failure in changing a person.

The Body of Christ. The fruit of a religious spirit is division, gossip and condemnation within the church—just the opposite of what the Lord intends for his body.

REPENTANCE

If you have fallen into any of these two extremes, it’s not too late to repent, that is, to change your mind and your actions and enjoy your inheritance. If, as the prodigal son, you have slipped away, go back to the arms of your loving Father. On the other hand, if, like the older brother, you have been striving under the religious spirit, ask the Lord for forgiveness and enter the feast that the father has prepared, and embrace his unmerited favor. Don’t waste your inheritance!

KEY IDEAS

• God rescued us and adopted us as sons and daughters

• Qualifying for an inheritance is not the same as receiving or enjoying the inheritance—sin and religion can rob you from enjoying it

• Our sin grieves the Holy Spirit and hinders our communion with Him—and without intimacy, we can’t receive our inheritance

• The religious spirit substitutes religious activity for the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives

• Legalism is religion without relationship

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. What attitude or behaviour in your life may be grieving the Holy Spirit?

2. What is your attitude towards sinners, compassion or judgment?

3. Which of the two brothers resembles more your own journey? Why?

4. Is there something you need to repent of before you can enjoy your inheritance?

PRACTICE

Get together with some friends in your church or small group and plan an outreach event to serve and show the Father’s love to people who are commonly rejected by the religious people (prostitutes, homosexuals, addicts, etc.)

NOTES

1. R.T. Kendall. In a message given at Church in the City in Chicago, IL, 2010.

2. Matthew Henry. Commentary on 1 Corinthians 6. http://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/mhc/1Cr/1Cr_006.cfm?a=1068012 (Last accessed February 20, 2014)

3. Michael L. Brown. Hyper-Grace: Exposing the Dangers of the Modern Grace Message (Lake Mary, FL: Charisma House, 2014). Kindle location 4571.

4. R.T. Kendall. Sensitivity Of The Holy Spirit: Learning to stay in the flow of God’s direction (Lake Mary, FL: Charisma House, 2002), 25.

5. Ibid, 13.

6. Rick Joyner. Epic Battles of the Last Days. (Fort Mill, SC: MorningStar Publications, 2010), Kindle location 1740.

7. Timothy Keller. The Prodigal God (New York, NY: Penguin Group, 2008), Kindle location 362.

8. Ibid, Kindle location 641.

9. James W Goll. The Lifestyle of a Prophet: A 21-Day Journey to Embracing Your Calling (Bloomington, MN: Chosen Books, 2013), 39.

Revival: The Corporate Inheritance

“Unity is a more important issue to the Lord than most believers realize. If the Lord can find just a few who are willing to lay down their lives, plans, agendas, and ministries for their brothers and sisters, He will transform cities and regions.”

Paul Keith Davis (1)

So far we’ve talked about our individual inheritance as believers in Christ, but there is also a corporate inheritance for the Body of Christ: revival.

One day the Holy Spirit asked me a shocking question: “What if I decide to bring revival to this city in a different way? Would that be okay with you?”

It’s not as if He had to ask. As we’ve seen, the Holy Spirit is the boss and he does as He pleases. But being the kind and sensitive person that He is, He said this for my own benefit, to teach me something.

“What do you mean?” I said.

He just answered with a word impressed on my heart—transformation.

Just a few minutes before, some in the group that had gathered to pray at the park in downtown, were talking about the changes in the city, especially that park. When the church began to pray there more than a decade before, it was a dark place, thick with trees and drug addicts. Now, the city had renovated it with wide-open spaces, hiking trails, a band shell for concerts, a large playground and beach access. It had become one of the most peaceful and beautiful places in the city.

God had been transforming the city and the hearts of the people in a subtle way, not obvious for its manifestations but for its fruit. What the Holy Spirit was telling me that summer evening was that he may decide to answer our prayer for revival in a way that we didn’t expect. That is, without all the flashy manifestations we were used to, such as people crying, laughing, being slain in the spirit and all the wonderful things He did at the Toronto Blessing, for example, but through a gradual change of heart, to an openness to the gospel unheard of before. That way God takes all the glory.

I knew then that I had seen that type of revival many years ago in Colombia, where we had hundreds of conversions every service, gang members disbanding and starting bible studies, and passionate young people preaching the gospel. We didn’t see signs and wonders on a daily basis, but nobody could deny that revival was in our midst.

The truth is that God is sovereign and creative and the work of the Holy Spirit is unpredictable most of the time. Many times we say, “Holy Spirit, move during this service as you please” but deep inside we still have an expectation of how we would like the Spirit to move. We may pray for him to have his way, but when we don’t see the manifestations we have trained ourselves to expect during a charismatic gathering, we assume that the meeting wasn’t successful or anointed.

This happened to me once when I was leading worship at a prayer meeting. Just before the meeting I sensed that the Spirit wanted to do something special, so at the start I prayed, “Holy Spirit, come have your way among us.” However, as the minutes passed I felt that I was struggling with the songs I had chosen and people weren’t connecting—why were they not crying under the anointing, where was the cloud of glory? Then I realized that I actually was expecting the Spirit to move in a certain way despite my initial prayer for Him to have his way. I had to repent right then and there. Indeed, he had other plans, much better than what I had imagined, for by the end of the night, everyone in the room had received a prophetic word.

DEFINING REVIVAL

Of all the possible definitions of ‘revival’ I would stick with one: revival is the church of the book of Acts all over again.

The early church had two characteristics that made it powerfully effective in its mission of discipling the nations and living in constant revival: unity and a full understanding of its inheritance in Christ Jesus.

The apostles and new believers walked in the revelation of the mighty power of God that lived within them. Having walked with Jesus for more than three years and witnessed the signs and wonders made through the Holy Spirit, they knew first hand the explosive potential of the promise spoken by their Lord: you will do even greater things than I did, because I go to the Father.

Greater things than the ones Jesus did!

If it is mind blowing to us, who know only about a handful of Jesus’ deeds during his earthly ministry (scholars say that the gospels recount only about 30 days out of three-and-a-half years of ministry) how much more to those who walked, ate, slept and lived adventures with the incarnate God.

Greater things! A promise for each one of them and all those who believed! That meant that the power that raised Jesus from the dead would be multiplied exponentially, as each believer would represent Jesus, empowered by the Holy Spirit. With such an amazing power source available to the church, what could possibly stop it from establishing the kingdom of Heaven in the earth?

HOW THE CHURCH LOST ITS INHERITANCE

I’ve heard some people say that the early church was supposed to be only the shadow of what was to come. If the “baby church” was so powerful, how much more powerful should the “mature church” be after two millennia?

From the state of our world today and the sad condition of many in the church, we all know that the church did not live up to its potential—at least not the church that came after the apostles. What happened along the way? When did the church lose the knowledge of its individual and corporate inheritance?

Let me take you on a swift trip back in time and explore some of the events that led the church away from the Holy Spirit and its transforming power. The following section is mostly based on the masterful research done by Francis MacNutt from Christian Healing Ministries. If you want to dig deeper into the history of the church and the ministry of healing, you must read his book, The Healing Reawakening: Reclaiming Our Lost Inheritance. (2)

Genesis tells us that when God finished creating the universe, the earth and all that is in them, he saw his creation and said it was very good. Actually, before the Fall (that is, when Adam and Eve sinned), there was no disease or death in the world. When Adam and Eve sinned, the ground was cursed and it began to produce thorns and thistles. They died spiritually and then began to die physically. This meant that decay and disease were now part of the once-perfect world in the Garden of Eden. Adam surrendered the authority he had over creation to the devil, giving the enemy full access to ravage the world with murder, destruction and disease.

But Genesis also tells us that God had a plan to redeem humanity and restore its relationship with Him—all this through Jesus Christ.

The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.

1 John 3:8

Jesus came to earth to take the curse upon himself and restore things to the way they were before the Fall of men. He didn’t restore it all at once, but he began a process that we can call, “establishing the Kingdom.”

Peter summarized the ministry of Jesus in Acts 10:38: “how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.”

In Matthew 10, Jesus commanded his disciples to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, and cast out demons.

And proclaim as you go, saying, ‘The kingdom of Heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without paying; give without pay.

Matthew 10:7-8

And that’s what the disciples did.

Peter and John went to the temple one day, healed a lame man and this miracle turned Jerusalem upside down, adding 3,000 people to the church. Healing proved the truth of the message of the gospel. Because of this, they were beaten and warned not to preach Christ anymore. This is the prayer the believers made afterwards:

And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness, while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.

Acts 4:29-31

So we see the Holy Spirit empowering the early church and conducting miracles and healings. These workings of the Spirit continued through the following 300 years, while the church was persecuted by the Roman Empire, and Christians relied on the manifestations of the gifts of the Spirit to show the supremacy of the gospel over the Roman and Greek gods. It was common to have public face-offs between pagans and Christians, not unlike the one Elijah had with the prophets of Baal in 1 Kings 18.

An interesting fact about the early church is the close connection between water baptism and the baptism of the Holy Spirit. It was expected that they would happen at about the same time. If you read about the Fathers of the church, you will see that after being baptized in water, believers also received the Spirit and prophesied or spoke in tongues. This was a common occurrence. The new believers, empowered by the Spirit would go about praying for the sick and casting out demons.

Everything seemed to be working great (despite persecution) until the year 312 AD. In the midst of a battle, emperor Constantine had a dream in which he saw a cross and heard a voice that said “in this sign you shall conquer.” He was in fact victorious and months later he ended the persecution against Christianity and he himself converted. With Constantine’s conversion, Christianity became the ruling religion in the empire and many pagans professed to be Christians so they could hold important positions in government and to gain political and social support. They were not truly converted, but mixed their pagan traditions with the gospel. Obviously, these new converts would not seek the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Now there was no need to prove anything, no need to perform miracles for the sake of the truth, and thus less prayer for the sick. The new changes to the official religion included baptism of infants, and of course, no one expected the babies to speak in tongues and prophecy.

The new converts brought their Greek philosophy with them and the teaching that the body was the prison of the soul, that the body was evil. With this in mind, some began to teach that since the body was evil, and one must get rid of it, why would anybody pray for healing?

Other doctrines came forth saying that God tested his people with sickness to form their character. That’s a lie from the pit of hell. If a father today were to test his children by exposing them to sickness, we would consider that child abuse. Even today, some Christians have been taught this lie that didn’t come from the Bible or the early church, but from the Greek philosophies that mixed with the Roman church more than 1,600 years ago. Add to that the fact that in the Middle Ages people did not have personal Bibles to read, but only heard the priests read a few passages from the Scriptures (in Latin). No spontaneous prayers were common, but only those written in the liturgy, the books used by the priests to conduct services and it’s easy to see how the work of the Spirit was watered down.

The Protestant Reformation brought a harder blow to the ministry of healing and the manifestation of the Spirit. Martin Luther and John Calvin were pivotal in bringing back the fervor for the Scriptures and the truth of salvation by grace, but they failed regarding the work of the Spirit. Since some Catholic saints were still reported to perform occasional miracles, the Catholic church stated that these miracles proved they were the true church. The reformers then had no option but to say that these were satanic counterfeits and John Calvin came with the doctrine of cessationism—which says that miracles ceased when the last apostle died. This is a doctrine that’s still taught in many evangelical denominations, but that originated as a reaction to the anti-reform, not from the Bible or the church fathers.

Later came the time known as The Enlightenment, and philosophers and theologians even began denying that Jesus performed any miracles. Liberal theologians spiritualized every miracle in the gospels, or said they were myths.

The 19th century saw the sparks of a rebirth of the visitation of the Spirit and the healing ministry with preachers like Jonathan Edwards and George Withfield, but the opposition from the mainline churches was so fierce, that even the Great Awakening, as this period of church history is known, died after a few years.

In 1901, God used a humble black man, William Seymour, to bring back the fire of the Holy Spirit at Azuza Street in Los Angeles. Out of his makeshift church, the Pentecostal movement exploded with the gifts of the Spirit, in such a way that the theologians and traditional denominations couldn’t stop it.

It has been a long journey for the church to reclaim the power and authority of her inheritance, but now the time is ripe for every believer, every saint, to take hold of them through intimacy with the Holy Spirit. The time is ripe to walk in divine authority and in the power of the Holy Spirit, both inside and outside the church.

Kris Vallotton says that the greatest miracles; the most powerful expressions of the Kingdom, are destined to happen in the worst places on the planet, and not inside the walls of a building. So let us claim our lot in God’s inheritance for our own lives but let’s also move as the body of Christ to claim the nations for our king.

SPIRITUAL WARFARE & INHERITING THE NATIONS

I will tell of the decree: The Lord said to me, “You are my Son; today I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.

Psalms 2:7-9

In the Messianic Psalm above, Jesus is promised the nations as his heritage. Since we are coheirs with Christ, we can ask the Lord for the nations. Yes, there will be a time at the end of times, when every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Still, our mandate is to disciple nations and to extend the kingdom of God so people start confessing the Lordship of Christ in their lives. However, there is opposition from the kingdom of darkness and we must know how to crush the enemy who wants to rob our inheritance as a church.

The text of Ephesians 6 about principalities and dominions is not only well known, but well debated.

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

Ephesians 6:12

There’s always the temptation to take extreme positions and argue one way or the other about the importance (or not) of engaging in territorial spiritual warfare, especially because it is not totally clear that the early church did so.

During my moves to different cities in various countries throughout the years, I’ve been acutely aware of the principalities enslaving the people in those cities. For instance, the city where I grew up is under a spirit of lust and women dress in a way that I have not seen anywhere in the world, very sensual and lustful. The divorce rates, cases of adultery, teen pregnancy and pornography are outrageous, and even people who visited the city for only a few days have told me that they were sexually tempted like never before in their lives. Sadly, the rampant sexual sin was not contained in the secular circles, but was well entrenched in the local church. Too many sad stories that I’d rather not tell.

Another city where the principality was made obvious to me was the beautiful city of Vancouver, ruled by a spirit of addiction. You have only to walk downtown at any time of the day to see hundreds of people smoking tobacco, coming in and out of liquor stores, and even smoking marihuana in the middle of the day at the bus stop. There’s addiction to work, video games, hockey and whatever you can think of. Again, Christians in the church didn’t seem to be immune.

Although looking back I could tell what the main spirit was over each city I lived in, it wasn’t until my days in Vancouver that I kept thinking about this issue over and over again—especially because the spirit of addiction had hit someone in our family.

My heart ached seeing this and I began to ponder and ask the Lord how to break the power of these principalities, especially among the young people who seemed more vulnerable to these spirits than the adults. Extrapolating from my knowledge of personal deliverance, it was obvious to me that there was a legal right for the principality to be there, whether it was a curse from generations past, the shedding of blood or some other historical event involving the authorities of the city.

In many cases, the key to break some of these curses is a prophetic act guided by the Holy Spirit or an act of reconciliation, such as when the mayor or president publicly asks for forgiveness to a minority group that was abused or discriminated in the past. Unless God orchestrated this in some way however, I felt it was not my place (or at least not the time) to engage in spiritual standoff against such principality. Still, I kept mulling about it, asking the Lord how to transform a city, and meditating on the Word. If the time for this demonic spirit to leave the city had not arrived yet, at least I could learn how to shield my life and my family from its influence and then teach the church how to do the same. That way we could shine in the darkness and be the salt of the earth without losing our flavor.

There are a few clues in the context of our verse above:

Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints

Ephesians 6:13-18 [emphasis mine]

Without a doubt, these verses make it clear that the armor is vitally important in this battle—which consists of standing firm and praying in the Spirit. Apparently, there is not much offensive warfare in this battle on the part of the believer, although a closer look may reveal otherwise. Much has been said and written about the armor of God elsewhere and how it is an analogy using the actual armor of a Roman soldier in the first century. For that reason, I won’t go over each piece of the soldier’s armor. More than the actual physical object (the belt or the breastplate), my interest is the spiritual aspects of the armor—truth, righteousness, gospel of peace, faith, salvation, and the word of God.

I’ve heard some people declare that they are putting on the armor of God as they recite the passage in Ephesians 6 and imagine some sort of spiritual armor being placed on their inner being as they pray. I’m not saying that this is wrong or that it doesn’t happen that way (it’s a nice picture but not one we get from the actual passage in the Scriptures), but it just seems counter intuitive for someone to say “I put on the belt of truth” and expect that the armor would stick when his life is full of lies.

In one sense we are being told to put on Jesus:

• He is the truth (John 14:6)

• He is our righteousness (Jeremiah 23:6)

• He is the message of the gospel and He is our Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6)

• He is the author and finisher or our faith (Hebrews 12:2)

• He is the one in whose name we find salvation (Acts 4:12)

• He is the Word (John 1:1)

As we are in Christ, we can claim all these things over our lives and they will be true in our standing with God, but as we saw in the chapter about A New Nature, we must go through a sanctification process to become like Jesus in character. To the measure that we are sanctified and begin to manifest the fruit of the Spirit is that we are actually putting on the armor of God.

As Christians we fail to put on the belt of truth not when we forget to repeat Ephesians 6:14 out loud in the morning, but when we speak lies to our neighbor or believe the lies of the enemy—satan is the father of lies (John 8:44) and we align with him when we lie.

There is Biblical evidence that having sin in your life opens the door for an evil spirit to torment or influence you. Let’s look at the demons react to Jesus in the story of the Gadarene:

And when from a distance he saw Jesus, he ran and fell on his knees before Him in homage, And crying out with a loud voice, he said, What have You to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? [What is there in common between us?] I solemnly implore you by God, do not begin to torment me! For Jesus was commanding, Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!

Mark 5:6-8 (AMP)

Here, the Amplified Bible explains that the demons asked Jesus: “What is there in common between us?” Because there was nothing in Jesus’ soul or mind in common with these spirits, that is, there was no lie, hatred or deceit, they had no right to torment him, but he could actually torment them! (See verse 8)

I believe that in the same way, truth and righteousness are essential parts of the armor because it won’t allow the enemy to claim that we have something in common with him. By discerning the strong man in an area, we can both examine ourselves and teach our youth to be mindful not to open the door to the enemy in that area. Knowing that temptations in that area (lust, addiction, etc.) are stronger in the city, we can prepare ourselves to stand firm, by:

• living in truth and righteousness,

• breaking the power of satan around us by preaching the gospel (thus cutting off the opportunity of others to influence us and instead we influence them)

• Taking up the shield of faith, so when the attacks come, we won’t waiver

• Covering our mind with the helmet of salvation, fully convinced of our identity in Christ

• Declaring the Word of God to cast out the demonic attacks

• And praying in the Spirit, because he intercedes for us

Just as we would confront a lie by speaking the truth, we can battle principalities by doing the opposite of what they represent. Blake Healy says it well: “Principalities can only stay where they have a place to land. While casting down a principality will remove it form its place, it is much more profitable and powerful to change the spiritual ecosystem that attracted it in the first place. If there is a spirit of poverty over your city, be generous. If there is a spirit of anger, release peace. If there is a spirit of homosexuality, release identity in Christ. If there is a spirit of fear, release love. It is possible to cast down a principality through prayer, but it is impossible for a principality to remain in a culture that has made no room for it.” (3)

A CALL TO ACTION

In the age of fast food and instant gratification, there is not much patience in the body of Christ to submit to the Lord daily, attain holiness (sanctification), and extend the kingdom one person at a time. It would all be easier if the glory of God just fell down like in the Welsh Revival, where bars and brothels were closed for business and sinners repented spontaneously before the Lord.

Of course, there is nothing wrong with praying for such a wave of revival (on the contrary, we should press into it), but the truth is that the Holy Spirit is still on the earth, moving and transforming lives, cities and nations. We just have to let him out by destroying any stronghold of unbelief.

Let’s then get ready and live out the fullness of this great inheritance so our Lord Jesus Christ may receive his full reward!

I will close this book not with a new and original call to action, but with one made more than 150 years ago, by the great preacher, Charles Spurgeon:

“God has given Christ the heathen for his inheritance, and the uttermost ends of the earth for his possession, and we are co-heirs with him. Brethren, let us advance to take the property. Say not, “There are giants in the land,” ye are strong enough to smite them.

As Jonathan of old, with his armor, climbed up the steep place in the cleft of the rock and began to mow down his enemies, so, believer, alone or with your friend, as God has called you, climb up, for verily the possession is yours, and you may take it. All that the Church wants today is courage and devotion. Let but the Church know her rights and claim them, let her cease to assimilate herself to the sons of earth, let her cease from her accursed fornication with the state, and she shall become the pure, chaste bride of Christ. Let her, then, as Christ’s queen, claim the earth as hers, and send her heralds forth from sea to sea to bid all men bow before him, and confess him to be their King. God’s power will be with her heralds, God’s might shall be with her armies, and the earth shall soon submit, and Christ shall reign for ever and ever. “Say to the North, give up, and to the South, keep not back; bring my sons from afar, and my daughters from the ends of the earth.” Say it, Christians, say it this morning; say it by your prayer, your deeds, your constant energy, say it by your benefactions, demand the earth for Christ, demand it for yourselves, for ye are “joint heirs with Christ.” I pray you take the possession now.” (4)

KEY IDEAS

• To disciple the nations and live in constant revival we need unity and a full understanding of our inheritance in Christ Jesus

• Whenever the church stopped honoring the Holy Spirit, miracles and healings ceased to be the norm of the Christian walk

• Before engaging in spiritual warfare, we must walk in integrity of character and thinking

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. What characteristics of the church in the book of Acts are missing in the church today? Which are we living out as we should?

2. After reading the historical account of how the church lost its inheritance, do you recognize any beliefs you held (or still hold) that are not Biblical but based on human traditions?

3. What is the dominion or principality of darkness over your city? How can you shield your family and your church against their influence?

PRACTICE

Seek the Lord for His divine strategy to transform and disciple your neighborhood, your city, and your nation. Do not rest until you discovered your God-given purpose and destiny for this time. Be a revivalist, imitating Jesus in character and in power. Go change the world!

NOTES

1. Paul Keith Davis. Engaging the Revelatory Realm of Heaven (Sippensburg, PA: Destiny Image, 2009), Kindle location 156.

2. Francis MacNutt. The Healing Reawakening: Reclaiming Our Lost Inheritance (Grand Rapids, MI: Chosen Books, 2006).

3. Blake Healy. The Veil (Atlanta, GA: The Veil, 2012), Kindle location 690.

4. Charles Spurgeon. The Joint Heirs and Their Divine Portion: A Sermon (No. 402) Delivered on July the 28th, 1861. http://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0402.htm (Last accessed February 20, 2014)

Now What? The next Steps

After reading this book you may feel excited and inspired to claim your inheritance in Christ and live your life to the fullest, knowing that all the resources from Heaven are at your disposal to fulfill your God-given destiny.

But how do you start? How do you apply this to your daily life? How can you change the world?

I’m glad you asked because we have some tools and resources to help you in this journey.

Just go to the link below to access them.

www.coheirs.org/now-what/

Also, join our community of on-fire saints at www.Facebook.com/Coheirs

Table of Contents

1

2

3

4

http://edant.clarin.com/diario/2000/07/23/s-04201.htm

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_bombing_of_Yugoslavia

1

2

3

4

http://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0402.htm

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

1

1

2

3

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

http://www.revival-library.org/catalogues/miscellanies/prayer/boundspower.html

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

http://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/mhc/1Cr/1Cr_006.cfm?a=1068012

1

2

3

4