Sometimes we think of prayer as figuring out the best strategy to get something from God. After all, He has everything, and we have less. But have you ever stopped to think about what God is wanting? And what could you give Him? There are things we give to one another in relationships without a single word being spoken. It should be the same with God. Gratefulness truly makes a huge difference in what we receive from God because wholeness and gratitude go hand in hand. Ask yourself, is God getting what He wants out of your life? Are you meeting the unspoken request He has of you?
What motivates you? The high side or the low side? John the Baptist sang the funeral song, and Jesus sang the wedding song, but still the people didn't move. What does it take for you to go deeper with God? Do you need to be yelled and told to repent like John the Baptist, or does the love and celebration of a wedding with Jesus move you? We may not realize it, but it is our choice whether we operate from the low side or the high side.
What makes the final decision in your life? Whose words are you believing? Your parents, your friends, or your own opinions? For God's Word to truly be your final authority, His Word must take over every area of your thinking. His ways are truly higher than our ways. God is looking for sell out. Those who will sell everything, change their way of thinking completely, to gain the treasure found in the field.
A call to intercession. Could what happened to Charlie Kirk have been stopped? Why does it seem as if evil and witches have more power than most Christians? Could it be God has made the execution of HIs will on earth depend on the will of man? "Upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven." -Matthew 16:18-19. So God has given us the power and authority, but are we using it? When we bind, we have the power to limit Satan's power on the earth.
While the devil was tempting Jesus in the wilderness, he offered to give Jesus all the kingdoms of this world. Did the enemy have possession of all the kingdoms of the world when Jesus physically walked the earth? And how much control over the world does the devil have now?
Deliverance is a spiritual house cleaning. We are responsible for 3 areas. 1. Personally. 2. Getting witchcraft out of your family. 3. Purging the Land of Evil. God means for witchcraft to be destroyed and completely removed from your life. And it's not just evil that gets us in trouble. It is when we try to mix good and evil together. Comprise or agreement with the enemy at any level leaves an open door for the enemy. In Acts 19 they destroyed all the witchcraft books and objects by fire. Even objects from witchcraft must be removed. God wants and is willing to set you completely free, but witchcraft has to be completely cut out of your life. Jennifer Guetta's website: www.awestruckbyglory.com
Who do you place your soul next to? Soul ties either bring bondage or joy. Healthy soul ties should have a peaceful and settling influence on you. Jonathan loved David as himself, and their souls were knit together. It is so important to understand how God set it up. We are to love God more than we love ourselves, and we are to love those God has placed in our lives the same as we love ourselves. If God is not included in your relationship or you love another person more or less than you love yourself, it will become unhealthy. Loving God with your heart, soul, and mind creates an emotional intimacy that fills every other relationship in your life, but loving something witchy or dark will bring in emotional destruction. It is a necessity to have the Lord wrap the whole thing together because it is impossible to stand and endure in life without His great love.
Are you hooked on a feeling? Soul ties are meant to be good, healthy, and from God, but when the enemy uses them for his purposes, they must be broken. When we have agreed with the enemy in any area, we must acknowledge the agreement, repent, and renounce until the soul tie is broken. Never before have we had visual simulation in the way we do today. TV, movies, and videos can open you up to a soul tie, causing you to relate deeply to something that isn't of God. Horror movies especially mix fear with fascination. The enemy is working to make it so that you are not a threat to his kingdom. But don't fall for his schemes. Don't train yourself with fear. Train yourself to overcome fear with the Name of Jesus.
There are things, as believers, that ought not be in our lives. Many times, we settle for crumbs when God has promised us bread. Jesus loosed a woman from an infirmity she had had for 18 years. In Jesus' words, what was happening to her should never have been. It is those demonic things that should have never been that God calls us to defeat. Our assignment is to take back territory that remains in the hands of the enemy so we can see the fullness of God's will in our time.
Discernment is a gift that few seem to have. It is also a stewardship. Without the Fear of the Lord, your discernment will not be clean. Being adamant or sloppy will not get you to the heart of the Lord. Discernment is truly a gift that must be treated as Holy unto the Lord. When we are seeking knowledge or insight into a situation that is hidden, our own agenda or desires apart from God will not get us to the right conclusion. We should always be testing what we are hearing and holding ourselves accountable to God if we miss it. Having a pure heart that wants what God wants sets you on the path to seeing correctly.
We need to have an understanding of the difference between God's protection and becoming a martyr. Is it true that God protects at times, but at other times allows believers to be martyred? It is not that simple. As a believer, situations will arise that will try to take your life prematurely, but God always promises a way of escape. Being a martyr is a choice between you and heaven, but many do not know we have a choice. Jesus said, "No one can take my life from me. I sacrifice it voluntarily." God's promise of protection and deliverance stands. He does not want our life and purpose on this earth stolen. But when the time comes, and our purpose on earth has been completed, we have the choice to lay it down willingly. (Our apologies for the quality. This is an older recording from before we were releasing teaching online.)
Arrogance causes us not to ask God, even though it is God's nature to give. When we try to handle everything in our own ability and intellect, we close ourselves down from receiving. James 1 tells us to ask God for wisdom. God will never twist things on you, and He will give wisdom unconditionally if you ask. Our carnal mind demands to be in control, to know everything before we trust God to do anything outside of our comfort zone, but Proverbs tells us to "lean not on our own understanding." It's not our own, earthly understanding that will help us. Our wisdom has limits, but God's Spirit has none. Could it be there is no limitations with God but our ask?
Nehemiah received an assignment from God, and the enemy sent people to attack what God had commissioned before they even started building. The enemy tries to come and beat all the good out of what God has given you to accomplish. He wants to burn you so bad that you never think about doing ministry again. But we cannot allow the enemy to scorch the goodness of what God has given us. Even harsh reality can be overcome by commanding and forbidding. Truly, the joy of the Lord is our strength.
Protect everything good in your life. There is an attack that comes like a plant being exposed to too much sun. Everything becomes scorched at once. The devil will even try to steal the good memories and feelings from your past. This is warfare. It is like putting your hand on a hot stove. The enemy will try to keep you numb, but keep your joy. Fight for your joy, and the goodness of God will quickly return.
You have to give God something to work with to win in spiritual warfare. Think of the boy who gave Jesus his lunch. Jesus adds to and multiplies what we give Him, but the devil subtracts and divides. Many times, we are so consumed with what we need from God that it never once crosses our mind what God wants from us. Could it be that giving something you already have is the key to what you are asking God for? There are no excuses with God when He is offering us everything in return.
Do you know how to use what God has given you so you don't end up powerless? A promise from God is something God does, but authority from God is something we do with what God has given us. Authority is us taking the Word of God and doing something with it. God intends us to use the sword, which is the Word of God, to defeat the enemy. This is how we move from ignorance and powerlessness to growing in our God given authority.
There are different arenas in which we can choose to do spiritual warfare. There is civilian (agricultural), courtroom, and battlefield warfare. God truly wants prayer to be preventative in our lives. We can have things theologically that we don't yet have experientially. Intercession is meant to bring what we have theologically into reality. Jesus and His 12 never experienced sickness, tragedy, or loss. They were always on the offensive, solving other people's problems, healing the sick, and casting out demons. God desires for us to live in a place of security and safety so we can go out and fight other people's battles, rather than being stuck fighting our own.
With Rebekah and Isaac and the blessing about to be passed down to the wrong son, there might be a better course of action for Rebekah to have taken, but at the very least, she acted on the Word of God that had been given to her. No action would have been the worst thing she could have done.
Can we trust Jesus, pray, and do nothing? We all know that action out of the flesh causes problems, but does a Word from God provoke action in us? A group discussion on the theology of Rebekah and Jacob and the "ethics" of what they did to Isaac and Esau to yank the wheel of history toward the Word God had spoken at Esau and Jacob's birth.
In certain situations, the Bible commands us to be shrewd. Rebekah with Jacob is a timeless example. The Bible commands us to be shrewd towards evil, in emergencies, and when something is about to go down wrong. If you want to have success against evil, you will need to become shrewd. You must have the ability to outthink your enemy. Christianity is not a competition about who has the best ethics. It is about furthering the kingdom of God in the face of evil.