Tag Archives: faith

Extra Baskets Left Over #1

*1 But seriously, how Wonderful was Jesus to heal all those people, insuring so many did not die before their time. Hezekiah without faith would have died 15 years before his time.

Satan wants God’s elect to be in pain, and time constraint with sickness and then an early death. The goal is to have all that effort and time, which could have been spent in ministry, family, faith and miracles, to be choked and stopped. Medicine is often expensive, time consuming and painful, and often does not work. Satan loves this. But Mr. Wonderful has saved us, bore our sickness and defeated Satan. Faith in Him brings life, health and extra time to spend on ministry, with family and expanding His kingdom.

Jesus, the true Mr. Wonderful, has commanded us to be like Him, through faith and the baptism of the same Spirit He ministered under. Therefore, all who follow Him will also be Mr. and Mrs. Wonderful.

*2 When one first becomes a Christian a frequent experience can be a focus on what not to do in our obedience, or negative. We came from the world and need to change directions for many behaviors. This is a natural focus based on the circumstances. And yet, we still focus on faith and power to receive the full gospel promises, such as healing and miracles. If taught correctly we learned all the basics of faith and began to work on all of it.

However, Paul says a doctrine for mature people is about receiving all the free good things that God has given us (1 Corinth. 2).

Therefore, as one matures, the focus is on more positive behaviors. It is about taking off all limitations for what God is able to do in us through faith. We do not want God to accuse us for making His arm short. Also, we take off all limitations for what we can do with faith. We realize that moving mountains is the starting point of our ability and not the end. We focus on wielding God’s power as our own. We focus on more power, more healing, more miracles, more purity, and more fruitfulness in all that we touch. We focus on binding and unlocking things on earth, as we see fit. We focus on casting out devils and expanding the kingdom of God. We focus on asking for the biggest types of prayers we can think and receive them.

*3 “Jesus replied to them, “Go and report to John what you hear and see: The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, those with leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor are told the good news,

and blessed is the one who isn’t offended by me.”
Matthew 11:4-6 CSB

Let us not be offended by Jesus healing people, and causing them to have great joy. Let us not be offended by Jesus healing all who came to Him. Let us not be offended by Jesus healing every single person who asked. Let us not be offended by Jesus raising the dead back to life, and causing their mothers to have great joy. Let us not be offended by Jesus preaching good news to the lowly.

Let us not be offended that Jesus healed, healed, healed and healed some more, rather than preaching the gospel more, or talking about sin or hell.

Jesus would not have said this, if there was not an issue of people being offended by Him healing so much.

He is not warning about being offended at His doctrine of sin or hell, but offended at Him freely giving so much good things to people with faith. This lines up with Paul’s definition in 1 Corinthians 2 that a message of wisdom for mature people is a message about freely receiving all the good things from God, and not a message about us sacrificing or giving. Immature and unspiritual people are offended at God freely giving good things. They are offended because they lack the intellectual aptitude and spiritual strength to freely receive healing, forgiveness, wealth and blessings for themselves. They then spend their time hindering God’s true children from receiving God good things out of spite and rebellion.

*4 The Bible would not condemn a pastor who heals the sick and casts out demons for not emptying out a hospital, any more than condemning Jesus for not healing all the sick in His hometown.

*5 The context of Paul saying a person is cursed if they reject the gospel he preaches (Galatians 1), is Paul defining the gospel (Galatians 3) as Jesus becoming our curse so that we inherit the blessing of Abraham. This blessing means the baptism of the Spirit and regular miracles. If someone rejects the baptism of the Spirit and miracles for us to experience now and regularly, then Galatians 1 would condemn them as cursed for preaching a different gospel.

It is traditionalist who use Paul’s doctrine of “preach another gospel and you are cursed,” to make it about justification by faith alone in grace, or to bash the health and wealth gospel. You cannot make this passage mean whatever you want it to mean. The context is not narrowly about forgiveness, nor is it about bashing miracles and speaking in tongues. Abraham was justified because He believed God would do miracles of healing, prosperity, fame, favor and excessive fruitfulness for him. Paul boils this down to “the Spirit and miracles,” and calls this the gospel that brought justification. Likewise, we are true children of Abraham and partakers of the same gospel (declared righteous by God) if we believe Jesus substituted our curses for the blessing of the Spirit (in context, Paul means the gospel of the baptism of the Spirit and miracles (Gala 3:5)).

*6 If demons do not scream with terror and the saints shout in joy for being healed, then your pastor’s righteousness does not exceed that of the Jewish leaders. If your church does not have regular miracles and healing, then it is not a biblical church; rather than a gathering of saints, its likely a gathering of demons. As Benny Hinn once said, “A pastor who does not cast out demons, is likely influenced by one.”

*7 If you look at yourself and don’t see a righteous soul, with the very righteousness of God, then you are without God and without hope.

If you look at your soul and don’t see God’s power and authority to cast out sickness and move mountains then you are without God and are still a mere human.

Update: Had people remind me that “our righteousness is like filthy rags.” The only way for this to be true, for you in the present, is if you are still unsaved. Our unrighteousness or filthy rags were already credited to Christ, buried with Him and in God’s mind they are no more listed on our record sheet. If your record still has unrighteousness on it, you are still destined for hell. Either Jesus already removed your unrighteousness and exchanged it with His righteousness, or you are still unsaved. When Jesus helped widows and orphans and honored God above all, these righteous acts are now listed on my data sheet (God’s mind) as if I did them. They were credited to my account, by grace, apart from the law.

I have the righteousness of God. When I look inward, this is what I see. When I look inward I see a perfect record and it is perfect; it is perfection; it is blameless; I see a perfect soul. Indeed, when I look inward, I see God’s righteousness blazing like the midday sun. I see light, light and more light shining. How can this be some might ask? I see what God’s sees and decrees. God has made my soul perfect. Who am I to disagree with my Creator?

God did not credit Jesus’ righteousness to Himself, but to me. The bible denies pantheism. Thus, they are now part of “my” righteousness. We do not lose sight they are freely given from God as a gift, but the fact remains they are now seen as “my righteousness.” This is how God sees me, and so this is how I see me. Faith is a mental assent to the truths that God has revealed. If you do not see yourself as 100% pure and with God’s righteousness as your own, you do not agree with God’s word and are still an unbeliever.

However, imputed righteousness makes us (according to Romans 5) reign and rule in life as kings. Jesus is not merely a substitute for unrighteousness for righteousness, but also the curse of the law for the blessings of Abraham. This blessing means constant miracles and healing now. If you cannot believe God will do these good things for you, then you are not a child of Abraham, and neither has God declared you righteous in His sight. God declared Abraham righteous in His sight, when Abraham believed God would do all the great favors, blessings, healing, prosperity and blessings God promised. What if Abraham said, “I believe you can make me famous, but I do not believe I will have a child.” God would not have declared him righteous if he did that. The promises were a whole packaged deal. Abraham had to assent to all of it as true, or none of it. The same with the substitutionary atonement of Jesus. You cannot have confidence God has declared you righteous if you only assent to some of Jesus’ substitution, but reject parts like healing, prosperity and fruitfulness. You cannot assent I am Oshea Davis, while denying I have a head. If you confirm this, I can say that you do not know me. It is a packaged deal.

*8 “Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked them: “Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened?”
-Mark 8:17 NIV

Think about it. Jesus is rebuking them because they do not think in terms of the multiplication of material substance by faith. They feared a lack of food. And Jesus reminded them of the feeding of thousands by multiplying food in faith. When you have faith you don’t fear the lack of material substance because you should have faith to multiply it. This was Jesus’ rebuke. Jesus would rebuke us today for the same. We need to think in terms of faith and power.

*9 We have only 2 options. Either we blame God or we can blame our unbelief. Most choose to blame God and throw Him under the bus; they often disguise their disrespect under phrases such as “the will of God.” However for those who act like Christians and repent and correct their short comings in faith will find what they are looking for; they will see God single them out and praise them for their faith. He will say ” your faith saved you,” and “the mountain obeyed you,” and “I will give you more than you asked.”

God is not a liar. He says He will heal and give miracles if we believe. If there is a liar and unfaithfulness it is a man, not God. You cannot respect God without respecting His Word as true and by extension, His promises as the same. If He said it, He will do it.

*10 The friends of the paralyzed man brought him to Jesus for a miracle healing. It wasn’t his family but his friends who cared so much for him. Behold their zeal and love.

They did not bring him to a doctor but to God for a healing. They had to carry a heavy body through crowds and then up a house and lower him through a roof. This was not easy. Jesus publicly praised and admired them. God approved of their zeal and hard effort to bring their friend to get a miracle from God.

People demonstrate much time and hard work to get to the doctors, but only show 0.4% of the same time and hard work to get a miracle from God. God approves of faith that is not lazy but seeks Him until they get healed. He likes this.

Going to church is not working hard with faith. Corporate spirituality is not a necessary connection to faith. Hearing God’s word day and night, meditating on these and speaking these promises in faith does have a necessary connection to faith. There was a crowd but only the touch of faith received and others who were pressed up against Jesus did not. The work of faith is to believe you are healed with no fear that you will not get healed.

*11 When you must explain why certain actions to women and children are bad, it means you live in a society that does not even have a small Christian knowledge left in it.

When this is the case, you must address ethics from the presuppositional level, or you run the risk of talking over each other’s heads with irrelevance.

Christian ethics, or ethics that apply to reality, is God’s commandments. These are only known through God’s revelation, which is the scripture. They are only imparted to the mind by God, and not empiricism. There is no other foundation for ethics.

If we go by observation, we are only talking about descriptive premises (of metaphysics) of transient moments. To take this and conclude with “ethics” is always a category error, and would thrust such knowledge into skepticism. It is always a fallacy to make an “is” into an “ought.” But skepticism denies the law of contradiction and so it is false. Thus, it is false to say we get ethics from empiricism and observations. Blue is fast and 5 is a tree. This is no less a category error than saying we can observe ethics.

Christianity is the only place that the things needed for intelligence converge. Christianity is the only place that allows one to understand what an ethic is.

*12 God is the foundation of learning, not the limitations of man. Man-centered people judge reality by its limitations. As wicked as it may seem, they even judge God by their limitations.

Faith, however, judges what they are capable of doing by the ability of God.

*13 “And Abraham’s faith did not weaken,
even though, at about 100 years of age,
he figured his body was as good as dead—and so was Sarah’s womb.”
Romans 4:19.

What weakens faith according to this passage? Doubt. Where does the doubt come from? The scripture tells us from considering the 5 senses and our observation is the source of doubt. When we are dumb enough to think like atheists and presuppose knowledge comes from what we see, feel, and tough, then doubt comes in, and doubt weakens faith.

*14 Jesus didn’t say preaching is the Logical proof of God’s kingdom breaking in, but demons being cast out by the power of the Spirit is proof of His kingdom.

God’s Kingdom is Power.

If you want to testify about kingdom power, you will need kingdom power to do so.

See Luke 11:20

*15 I Have the Power of God

6 But Peter said, “I do not possess silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you: In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene—walk!” 7 And seizing him by the right hand, he raised him up; and immediately his feet and his ankles were strengthened. 8 And leaping up, he stood upright and began to walk; and he entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God.
Acts 3:6-8 LSB

It was God’s power that healed the man, but Peter does not play today’s religious games. Peter did not use flowery “Christ-centered” this and “God’s glory” that. “I am nothing, and so I beg you God that you might heal this man if it is your will. Not what I have, but Your power.” (LOL. How are people so blind as to think such a prayer honors God and is a sign of humility, is wall punching hilarious.)

God’s power healed the man, but Peter says, “what I do have, I give you.” He commanded the man to walk, then grabbed him and help the lame man up. And so, Peter had no issue claiming to have the power and authority of God; claiming to use it as he wants. Because the bible denies pantheism, then on the relative level, Peter is correct. He owned the power and authority of God to use at his disposal.

Yes, Peter did say “in Jesus’ name,” and this is part of our authority as believers. That is, we can use it when “we” want to. God gave this power and authority to us, not Himself. Peter possessed this power, and he was free to use it how he wanted. We are the same who are part of Jesus today. We have the same power, Spirit and authority. But it will take faith to use it.

*16 I Cast Down Troubles

Troubles will be formed against you, but they will not prosper against you, because you have defeated the world. Your faith in Jesus gives you participation in His victory.

Jesus did not command Himself to command the mountain to move; no, He commanded me to command the mountain to move. Jesus gave me His authority and righteousness. Jesus did not command me to pray and ask Him to move the mountain; no, He told me to command the mountain to move.. Most do the opposite and beg Jesus.

This is my inheritance and accountability to command troubles to get out of my way. How are weapons formed against me put down? By my command and words.

“But in that coming day no weapon turned against you will succeed. You will silence every voice raised up to accuse you. These benefits are enjoyed by the servants of the Lord; their vindication will come from me. I, the Lord, have spoken!”
Isaiah 54:17 NLT

“I have told you these things, so that in Me you may have [perfect] peace and confidence. In the world you have tribulation and trials and distress and frustration; but be of good cheer [take courage; be confident, certain, undaunted]! For I have overcome the world. [I have deprived it of power to harm you and have conquered it for you.]”
John 16:33 (AMP)

“Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done. If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.””
Matthew 21:21-22 NIV

*17 In my experience, no matter how farfetched a heresy may seem, it almost always limits God. The only exception is if the doctrine directly takes glory that belongs to God and assigns it to man. Because God’s infinity, is well, infinite, and His sovereignty is direct and absolute, there is no bigger way to describe God and His ability than what the bible teaches. Take for example the Mormons teaching on us becoming a god and owning a planet. Despite what it might look like, this is a slap in the face of God by limiting Him. Only one planet? You got to be kidding me! Make it at least 100,000 planets, and then maybe the insult won’t be so bad.

God will not give up His praise, and we will never be worshiped as God, but God has highly exalted and glorified man in the gospel (1 Corinth 2:7, 3:22). In the next life there is no limit for good things God will give us. No man has seen or even considered how big it is. One planet. You might as well slap God in the face and be direct with your insults rather than play games like that. Reality, and even time itself has been given to me in Christ, and you want to limit it to one small planet. Only a brain the size of a pea could think so small.

The lesson here is that all liberal theology, whether it is cessationism, free will, one planet, evolution, directly attacks God by limiting Him and by limiting who we are in Christ and limiting what we are able to accomplish in Him.

The Power of the Lord was with Jesus

“The power of the Lord was with Jesus to heal the sick.” (Luke 5:17 NIV)

It was not Jesus’ power, but the power came from God, or more precisely the Father in the anointing of the Spirit. Jesus was baptized in the Spirit to begin His ministry. We know the Spirit’s baptism on Jesus was for “power” because Jesus said He drove out demons by the Spirit of God, not His. He did not drive them out by His name, but by the power of Spirit. We see again in our original verse that the “power of God” was with Jesus to heal. It was not Jesus’ power, but the Spirit’s power. Jesus came as a man, born under the law, and even ministered God’s power as a saint does, by the power of the Spirit. Jesus says in John 14:10 that “it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.” Jesus did not use “Jesus” power and authority, but ministered the works of the Father through power of the Spirit.

Thus, after His resurrection Jesus commanded the disciples, not to minister or spread the news, but to wait in Jerusalem until they were baptized in the Spirit for “power.” It was the same baptism of power He had. It is like that of Elijah and Elisha and the passing of the mantle of power. Elisha received a double portion and Jesus in a similar way said anyone who believes in Him will do greater miracles (double portion). As a human, Jesus received the mantel of power by the baptism of the Spirit; He did the Father’s works by the Spirit. He was the forerunner. He showed us how to do it. He then ascended to heaven and handed the mantle of power to us, for us to complete the works of the Father. We are baptized in the same Spirit to do the same works of the Father, except for the work redemption. We are baptized in the same power of the Spirit to do even greater works, not because we are greater in ourselves, but because Jesus now sits on His throne and in authority directs us to expand His kingdom.

This is why it is dumb to say, “Well, that was Jesus, and this is us and so we can’t do what He did.”

Consider how generous He is with His power! He likes it when we ask for more of His Spirit and power. Ask!

Once a Prince of Heaven, Always a Prince of Heaven

“For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things like we are, yet without sin. 16 Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”
Hebrews 4:-5-16

The immediate context of approaching God’s throne of grace for help is that Jesus can sympathize with our weakness and struggle against sin. This verse should be used to approach God boldly for all types of asking and help, but it is important to remember the immediate context. In our struggle to fight sin we are told Jesus sympathizes with us and commands us to boldly approach God’s throne for help.

This is important because when we do sin, or if we are still fighting a besetting sin, one major battle Satan will fight us on is boldly approaching God for help. When we fight sin, approaching God boldly is the #1 thing we need to do. Why. Only God can help. And Satan wants to hinder you from going to the only one who wants and can help you.

The temptation is from shame. You feel ashamed and so you do not want to approach God’s majestic throne with boldness, and yet, this is the most important thing for you to do. We must remember that our faith is based on God’s revelation not “feelings.” We must repent and by faith know we are forgiven.

We do not fix a sin by sinning more. The command is for us to approach God with confidence, with our heads held high, and ask for help. Because we are asking for help in a sin, some see God is angry and does not want to help. They think a correct application of “the fear of God” is keeping them from boldly approaching. Yet, our passage says Jesus sympathizes with us and will help us if we ask Him. Because it is a command, then to not boldly approach God for help is “not fearing him.” Any sin qualifies for “not fearing God,” because it is a violation of God’s command. God has intelligently thought of everything, and His command is simple. If you are struggling with sin, repent, but do not stop there; you must also boldly approach God asking for help and you will receive help.

You do not have permission to sit in the corner of your room in self-pity and whine and then approach God like a beggar for help. It is good to have godly sorrow for one’s own sin, but that does not excuse you from disregarding your identity in Christ when you approach God. A beggar is the definition of an outsider, but you have been redefined as an insider. You are always a prince of heaven, therefore, when you enter God’s throne room you always enter in as a prince, with your head held high. It is similar to the line from the popular book Narnia, “once a king or queen of Narnia, always a king or queen of Narnia.” You have a new definition, given by God himself. It is final and permanent. Therefore, when you approach God, you always approach Him as a child of God, a royal prince of heaven, especially if you need help fighting sin. Let nothing hinder you from approaching God in confidence to receive His help.

Stupid Cessationism Argument #2

Jackie: “Person “x” says they believe in faith for miracles but their spouse died of cancer, and (etc). Thus, healing on the demand of faith is not true.”

Oshea: My math teacher made a few adding and division mistakes in class, therefore, addition and subtraction is not always correct. LOL!! If you think your argument is any less stupid, then you are delusional. Also for your examples to be taken as a truth claim, you would need to provide proof that empiricism as an epistemology yields truth and induction/observation, despite being irrational leads to valid conclusions. But scripture both rejects empiricism and induction for a method to know truth. Therefore, I also reject empiricism and induction/observation. If you make an argument that uses them I will not proceed further with you until you can prove they yield truth. This burden of proof is on you to make. They are your presuppositions, not mine.

—

This type of critique is very damming to the opponent because it shows their extreme level of disrespect and arrogance toward God. No one ever thinks to themselves, because my math teacher made an adding mistake therefore, 2 + 2 = 4, is not always correct. I have never meet people who apply this type of irrational logic with sincerity in life (even if some people might act this way it is not common in my experience). However, when it comes to God they will attack His word with it, as if their life depends on it. They would not dare apply this stupidity to themselves, their teachers, or workers, but they will slap God with it. Such attacks are an autobiographical description for the type of person they are and who they view God.

When there is an adding mistake we assume the mistake is with the person and not math itself. However, God’s promises are no less exact, faithful, immutable and unyielding as math is. Thus, when there is a mistake in receiving a healing, we assume it is with the person and not God’s promise to do what He said He would do when we believe.

Going to Church is Now A Red Flag

“You happily put up with whatever anyone tells you, even if they preach a different Jesus than the one we preach, or a different kind of Spirit than the one you received, or a different kind of gospel than the one you believed.”
-2 Corinthians 11:4

” After all, you think you are so wise, but you enjoy putting up with fools! 20 You put up with it when someone enslaves you, takes everything you have, takes advantage of you, takes control of everything, and slaps you in the face.”
-2 Corinthians 11:19 – 20

Since almost all churches are very bad, then it is a red flag when people congregate. We should look suspiciously at congregants and not trust them until they prove faithful and offer good excuses for their attendance in a local church. Congregation is a blemish in the spiritual curriculum of any believer today.

It’s a sin to allow spiritual abuse!

It is a sin to tolerate a different gospel, a different spirit and a different Jesus.

Apostle rebukes Corinthians for tolerating false teachers and their spiritual aggressions. It is a sin to tolerate another gospel. It is a sin to tolerate a different Christ. It is a sin to tolerate a diverse spirit. It’s a sin to allow your fake pastor to turn you into a slave. It’s sin to allow your fake pastor to use your money. It’s a sin to allow your false pastor to implant limiting doctrines in you. It’s a sin to allow your fake pastor to slap your face.

QUEST. “Which is better, congregating in a Cessationist Reformed church or congregating in an Arminian Pentecostal church? “

ANS. Best is to boycott false religion.

Gabriel Arauto

——————————–

Gabriel is correct.

If a church does not heal sick (there should be no sick member attending), cast out demons, and teach the absolute sovereignty of God, it does not have the right to assemble. So what if Satan assembles with its demons, you are not allowed to attend. You are forbidden to partake of the fellowship of Satan. Anyone who attends such a church shares in that church’s sin, and commits the sin of not exposing it.

A Christian does not have the right or privilage to assemble at whatever church they want. They are not allowed to assemble at a church that limits God or faith. If your pastor spiritual slaps your miracles down and smacks God’s sovereignty, they are not your friend. You do not have the right to be abused. You are commanded to stand up in courage and expose it. Your are under the command of God, at the very least to leave and boycott. (2 Corinthians 11:19 – 20, 2 Corinthians 11:4, Galatians 1:8)

I Do Care, That Is Why I Gave You My Power.

Jesus was sleeping at the back of the boat with his head on a cushion. The disciples woke him up, shouting, “Teacher, don’t you care that we’re going to drown?”

When Jesus woke up, he rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Silence! Be still!” Suddenly the wind stopped, and there was a great calm. Then he asked them, “Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?”
(Mark 4:28-39 NIV)

Earlier Jesus gave them authority to heal the sick and cast out demons (ch.3). They have been seeing Jesus do miracles, and now they have been doing miracles. This is the context.

I wish to point Jesus’ evaluation of the disciples behavior. He revealed they had “no faith.” Not even a little, they had “no faith.”

Here is what I wish to focus on. The disciples accused Jesus of “not caring” about them. Today, people are sophisticated and so they avoid accusing God of this, and instead say their bad situation was “God’s will.” They use this to show-off and parade how they are “suffering for the glory of God.” They have their reward.

The disciples accused Jesus for “not caring” about them. The emotion that lead to this irreverent accusation was “fear.” The fear was coming from a natural situation. The disciples, many being fishermen, knew from human experience that they were in trouble.

Jesus said their fear and irreverent behavior came from having no faith at all. They did not trust God to help them. You cannot give the option that they should have trusted God and suffered, because Jesus made the storm go away. Thus, the “faith” Jesus was referring to, had to do with trusting God to make the bad situation disappear. Jesus thinks this is the type of faith we ought to have.

But there is one more element to this. It is not merely trusting God to keep them safe, in a general sense; no, there is more to it. Jesus had already anointed them with authority to do miracles. In the pervious chapter Jesus gave them power and His authority. They had already been doing things that would elevate them above some of the Old Testament prophets in raw power. They are doing it with success. They were not helpless. They wanted to blame Jesus for not caring to help them, when Jesus had already given them the faith and authority to command the trouble to go away. Jesus loved them so much and cared for them so much that He put heavenly swords in their hands to expand His kingdom. It is like Zeus freely giving someone his lightning bolt to use. Jesus loved them this much. Thus, when they accused Jesus for not caring, because Jesus did not use a miracle to save them, they were blind to the fact Jesus already gave them the power to do it themselves. They had no faith.

In addition to this is that fact Psalm 91 still stands. Ten thousand will fall at your side and no harm will touch you. Sickness and armies and natural troubles will not touch the one who dwells with the Almighty. Thus, the type of faith we are talking about is not fatalism or Buddhism that says “what will happen will happen by God’s will,” but the type of faith that assents to the promise of God. The promise is that no harm will touch you.

Many do this today. They have no faith, and so they have fear, and the fear leads them to accuse God of neglect or blame His sovereignty. If they are indeed Christians, they already have faith to move mountains, the power of the baptism of the Spirit and the right to wield Jesus’ name. They have the shield of faith in one hand the Spirit in the other. When troubles come they do not even raise their weapons, and when a trouble steamrolls over them, they become fearful and blame God.

No. Troubles of life are to be afraid of you, not the other way around. You wield God’s lightning bolt, and if you ever learned how to use it you will see the gates of hell explode.

Dominion over Time

“And God said, “Let there be lights in the vault of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark sacred times, and days and years, 15 and let them be lights in the vault of the sky to give light on the earth.” And it was so. 16 God made two great lights—the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars.” (Genesis 1:14-16 NIV)

“When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, The moon and the stars, which You have ordained, What is man that You are mindful of him,
And the son of man that You visit him? For You have made him a little lower than the angels, And You have crowned him with glory and honor. You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet.” (Psalm 83-6 NKJV)

The Scripture tells us that God made everything in the beginning by the word of His power. He spoke and then reality was created. In Genesis 14-16 we read how the sun, moon and stars was for time keeping. It was for man to follow time. In Psalm 8, as it mentions the moon and stars by name, it says that God has put all reality under man’s dominion. This is the same we read in the 1 Corinthians 3:22, when referring to Christians.

Because time is part of creation, not God, and creation has been put under the boot and dominion of Christians, then time is subject to man. This is why Joshua told the sun to stop and it stopped. This is why the sun dial went back 10 degrees for the king and why when Jesus made wine from water it was good tasting “aged” wine. In fact, when people are healed time is in effect reversed for them in the healing. Joshua and Calab had time held back for 40 years, because their bodies did not age, and their clothes did not wear out. These aspects of time being dominated were by men who had faith in God. When there is faith, then there is a way out of every trouble. Even if time is standing in the way, yet with faith, time must yield to the will of man.

Time was made for man and not man made for time. Under the curse, time dominated man, but this was not the original creation of time. Those under the curse are dominated by time to the point time is a nightmare. For the reprobated time is a monster that hunts their dreams and never stops chasing them down and stealing their bodies, minds and dreams. Under the curse, time becomes a curse. Time was created by God to be dominated by man and to serve man, not the other way around. For those in Jesus Christ, the curse is reversed and through faith they have access to cause time to serve its original purpose, which is to be a blessing to man. In Jesus Christ the truth that creation is for man (the elect) is even more so, because they are not merely the image of God, the image of Jesus Christ, with His imputed righteousness and adapted as sons and heirs of God.

Let us ever allow man to hinder us in expanding our faith and expanding the Kingdom of God. Let us never put limitations the glory of God, by limiting the glory of man and glory of man’s domination over creation. Let us never see time as a curse, but a servant to the will of man, through faith in Jesus Christ. Reprobates speak of time from a position of fear and defeat, whether it is from false preachers, co-workers, or how it is spoken of in popular movies. Let us recognize, for us, time is under our boots and a servant for those who have faith in Jesus Christ.

For those who fear time as a monster that ravages their bodies, minds, and dreams in this life, will find it will continue to do the same in the next life. Only those who have been born-from-above and make time serve them now in this life will find it will be so in the next.

Receive God’s Love & Give God’s Love

Lastly, we test to see if we have known and believed our new identity correctly when we can receive God’s love and give His love.

We are mature, as has been discussed, when we sit at Jesus’ feet and receive from Him and not giving to Him. We are mature when we receive His love for spiritual things such as forgiveness and joy, but also when we receive things like health, prosperity and fruitfulness in all our lives.

When we are strengthened in our inner man by receiving the full measure of God’s love that effects our entire lives, then we have even more strength to love our neighbor. It is not that we choose not to even try to love our families and neighbors without being mature in our inner man, but that there is a priority. The first effects the second to be better and not the other way around. Thus, there is always a priority to receive from God first, while never neglecting the second.

“The love chapter” is in-between “The Power Chapters.” But that is a little misleading because there is no such thing as The Love Chapter, as Vincent Cheung points out.

“There is no such thing as “The Love Chapter.” The topic of 1 Corinthians 13 is spiritual gifts, not love itself. Paul’s point is that spiritual gifts should be pursued in love, not replaced by love.

Don’t read 1 Corinthians 13 at your wedding unless you are prepared to put this love into action and lay hands on the sick among the guests as a couple after the wedding vows. That’s love…”[1]

The bible defines love in the middle of Paul defining different types of power. Paul’s answer is that supernatural power is to be used with love. The context is power and not love. Power is to be used with love. Thus, when people read 1 Corinthians 13 at their wedding, they should not do this without having a healing service right after, for this is the context for how to use power.

Because power and love cannot be separated, then Christian love cannot be Christian love without miracle power. We are to be like our Father in heaven. With God there is no such thing as loving without power. It is with great power that He loves us.

As Paul says, anyone who does not recognize that we are to zealously seek the spiritual gifts (power) is not recognized by God. We are not to merely seek them but have enough faith to have gifts regularly in our lives and ministries. Any ministry leader or pastor, who does not do this needs to step down immediately or be excommunicated. If God does not recognize such a person, then who I am to recognize them as spiritual? If God has disregarded them as trash, then who I am to treat trash as something different? If God has a low definition of them, who I am to define them differently?

“Prophecy is said to be imperfect, not because the gift itself is defective, but it offers incomplete knowledge. So “when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears.” Paul does not leave the time of “perfection” in doubt. He writes, “Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.” When perfection comes, there will be “face to face” knowledge. When perfection comes, we will know fully, even as we are fully known. This is not a potential knowledge, as in knowledge revealed but not completely assimilated, but an actual knowledge, so that we will know as we are fully known. When this happens, the gifts will cease, and we shall not miss them, for we will lack nothing.”[2]

“Paul does not refer to a potential knowledge, but an actual knowledge, as actual as we are “fully known.” As perfect as the Bible is, we do not even know fully the Bible. It takes an extraordinarily delusional person to think that he already knows fully, even as he is known fully. A “face to face” knowledge should not need exegesis, reading, revision, debate, and research. If the way I will know fully is the way that I am known fully, then unless God himself needs to perform exegesis, revision, and debate in order to know me, “face to face” knowledge cannot refer to what we possess at this time. Thus if a person insists on his cessationism on the basis of this text by sheer determination, although even then it can apply only to prophecy, he loses his God, and so his salvation as well.”[3]

The gifts will be imperfect in the next life because we will have so much spiritual power that the gifts will be too weak, or imperfect. Paul also teaches we will know as God knows us. Even with the completion of the Scripture, in order to know God we do so by study, mediation, review and revise, and debate; yet, God does not know us this way. He knows us intuitively and immediately. This is what Paul refers to the “prefect.” Thus until we know God this way, the “perfect” has not come and the gifts are still in play to help us. Paul’s command to seek them and use them to love others is still on the books.

God intends for us to love with supernatural power. When someone is sick, God wants you to love them not merely by sacrificing your time to “be there for them,” and fix them a meal, but to make the sickness and pain go away by commanding it to leave. This is how Scripture defines love. Love that does not command the sickness to leave is not Christian love, or at best it can be describe as a defective form of Christian love. The same for lack of insight. Christian love will bring a prophecy to help their family member or friends so that they have more understanding and wisdom for their jobs, ministry, relationships, and godliness. If your neighbor needs a specific type of knowledge for their life, you cannot give them true Christian love without spiritual prophecy, insight, and visions. Anything less than this is not Christian love. Your church family will have all sorts of troubles thrown at them and the bible’s answer is to overcome these troubles by miracles. You do not qualify as giving biblical love without helping them by providing miracles to help. Human love is merely human power; however, Christian love is distinguished by God’s supernatural power. Christian love cannot be Christian love without this miracle working power. Worldly love can be defined without God’s supernatural power, but not Christian love.

When we are sick, the bible defines this situation as coming from Satan, Acts 10:38; Luke 13:10-17. This does not mean it is only from the devil (1 Corinth. 11:30), however, these are the exceptions. That is, the type of high-level sinning that would invoke God’s response in 1 Corinthians 11:30 is not normal or the average. Rather, Acts 10:38 shows us that the norm for sickness is from the devil. Your theology needs to include this. God is the foundation of sickness, just as God is the foundation for all things in the metaphysical sense. But this God who is the foundation mostly speaks to us on the human level, and defines sickness as almost always from Satan. Jesus, the apostles, and followers, were on a one-way mission to eradicate sickness; by destroying sickness they were destroying the devil. Jesus did not interpret all the sickness he encountered as the “will of God,” and so we are to just let people be sick. No. He saw sickness as demonic victimization of people. Jesus could have spent more time preaching but instead directly attacked Satan’s power by healing people. In the one act of healing Jesus had compassion on people and destroyed the kingdom of Satan. Healing is one of those spiritual acts of power that accomplishes huge amount of compassion, grace, gospel advancement and devastates the devils kingdom in one punch.

Satan has kept many Christians in bondage, helpless and weak through sickness. The one who is sick is shamed, time constrained, in pain, usually must take money meant for the kingdom of God and try to buy healing from men. They are experts in giving glory to man. Many hours that could be devoted to ministry or devotion to God are spent in shameful pain and prostrating oneself to glory of man to heal them. Depending on how bad the sickness is, those in the family must also divert money and time that could be spend in ministry or devotion to God to helping the sick spouse or child. The one person who wins in this situation is Satan. If your family member is sick, then you better help them, or you are worse than an unbeliever. However, God has not called us to love and help by power of man, but through God’s power. God has called to destroy the works of Satan, which includes sickness. We are not permitted to allow Satan to steamroll our families with sickness, and all the effects that come from this, such as shame, time constrained and money spent on human medicine.

When God strengthened barren women to give birth it is said that God has taken away their “shame.” We know, and God also knows, that such sickness and physical defects brings us shame. You can lie to yourself and say, “this deformity or sickness does not define me,” but you are deluding yourself. The bible defines it as shame and so it is. If you are a Christian it is not part of your new identity, but God still recognizes that it does bring shame to a person. God is compassionate and wants to heal and bring honor to you. If you seek Him, He will heal and take away all your shame and make you sit on a throne of honor among princes. Then and only them, will that shame no longer be part of your definition. Satan wants you defined by shame, but God is able to destroy the works of the devil. With faith you can command Satan and sickness to leave. You can command the shame to run from you and it will.

Compassion that only helps the symptoms and does not cure the sickness is a human way to love, but not God’s way. Compassion that helps to only alleviate some pain, while drugging up your brain, is a human glory and power. If you are a Christian you are not a human any more, but a child of God, a new creation and the image of Jesus Christ. You have divine favor, authority and power to heal your family members. You can love like God does. You can love with real power. Compassion without power is how sinful, fallen men love, and it is pathetic. God loves with power that fixes, heals, transforms, and supplies miracles. When God loves the sickness is healed, the poverty is replaced with cash surplus, impossible situations are leveled to the ground, giant’s heads are cut off, bodies are transported to different cities, barren women give birth and the dead are raised to life. God’s way to love to is to make the bad go away and replace it with good; to make the trouble disaappear and command blessings; to make the sickness run and give honor with double portion. God’s powerful love destroys the works of Satan.

It is often said, “The Scriptures say that God is love, but it does not say that God is power.” Actually, it does. It says this in a way that is stronger than most Christians would want to admit, and in a context that is more intense than “God is love” in the letter of John. Jesus declared, “From now on you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power and coming on the clouds of heaven” (Matthew 26:64; Mark 14:62). In other contexts, the word refers to miraculous power, such as when Jesus said, “Power has gone out of me” to heal the woman with the bleeding disease, or when he said, “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you.” Power. This is what Jesus called God. He did not say that he would be seated at the right hand of Love or Wisdom. He did not use a different word for power to call him Authority, but he called him Power, raw ability and force. No matter what hermeneutical excuse you attempt to use, I know all the tricks and I have already considered them, and the fact remains that in this place he did not refer to God as anything else but POWER. God is Power as much as Jesus is Word. Where is Jesus? Power. He is next to Power. What kind of power? Power for miracles. Power over demons. Power to rule in creation. Christians are ashamed of power. And if you are ashamed of power, you are ashamed of God, for God is Power. If you refuse to seek power, you refuse you seek God. If you mock miracle power as if it is some sideshow, you mock God as if he is a sideshow.

Everything else that Christians have been saying about “God is love” can be said with even greater emphasis about Power. Do you worship the one who is on the throne? Do you raise your hands and praise the one whose right hand is your Lord? Good! But your Lord called him Power. Now do you still worship him? Do you worship Power? Are you now zealous to excel in power no less than you wish to excel in love? Or do you shrink back and insist on calling him something else? We do not worship power, as in some impersonal force. But Power? Certainly, we worship Power, as in God who is All-Power. If you do not worship Power in this sense, you do not worship God at all. As the Scriptures say, “No one has ever seen God, but the One who is himself God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.” If you reject the God that Jesus himself declared, which is Power — miracle power — you will burn in hell. But Christians are ashamed of power. They are ashamed of such a God, who is All-Power. How often have you heard it said, “God has power, but God is love”? Jesus denied this. God is power at least as much as God is love. Power himself is on the throne, and Jesus is at Power’s right hand. This is the gospel. Accept this, or make up some other religion.

Satan has convinced Christians that it is unholy and unspiritual to seek spiritual power. But Jesus is at the right hand of Power. To seek the one on the throne is to seek Power. Thus it is most holy and most spiritual to seek spiritual power, no less than it is holy and spiritual to pursue divine love, because – you guessed it – God is love. Of course Satan has also tried to hinder Christians from walking in love, but it seems he has never tried to convince them that it is unholy and unspiritual to walk in love. Power is what he is afraid of. And love remains ineffective without the spiritual and miracle power that it is supposed to wield. If you love as God loves, you will want to preach the truth, heal the sick, and cast out demons. Power lets you do these things. Compassion is the strongest catalyst in the ministry of healing, but without power, it is either counterfeit compassion or compassion frustrated. Love and Power are not in conflict, but if you walk in love, you will seek the power. Pray that God would grant you, “according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with power by his Spirit in the inner man.” Power. You must have truth as the foundation. Then you must rise up in power. All this discussion about power is theological truth. But it will not release power if you only debate it and sit on it. Truth will release power when you boldly affirm it and act on it. Do it…[4]

When we can receive God’s love in powerful healing, prosperity, and miracles; and when we can give love to others with powerful healing, prosperity and miracles, then we have proof we understand and walk in our new identity in Jesus Christ.

[1] Vincent Cheung. From this wordpress blog commenting on the essay called “Way of Love.” Dec. 2018.

[2] Vincent Cheung. The Way of Love. 2011. Web. (www.vincentcheung.com)

[3] Vincent Cheung. The Worst Text for Cessationism. Web. 2016. (www.vincentcheung.com)
See ebook, Sermonettes Vol. 9. Chapter 1, page 6. 2016.

[4] Vincent Cheung. “On Spiritual Attacks”

From the ebook, Contract. 2020.

Receiving God’s love

“Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:28NIV)

“But we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the wisdom which has been hidden, which God predestined before the ages to our glory,” (1 Corinthians 2:7 LSB)

“She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”
“Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:39-42 NLT)

“For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us.” (Ephesians 3:14-20 NLT)

For many this seems like the opposite of Christian ethics. Does not James say religion is taking care of widows and orphans and staying unpolluted from worldly lusts? This is correct, but it is only partially correct. I do not want to undermine the importance of this. If a man does not work to supply for his family he is not even a Christian but worse than an unbeliever. Paul has guidelines for helping widows who have been faithful Christians. Orphans need help and guidance. The New Testament constantly stresses the need for sexual purity and how our relationships are founded on the same forgiveness and kindness that God showed us. But in the category of ethics such things are in the category of human interactions. God has also given commands in how we are to view our relationship with Him.

The first commandment is to love God, with all your mind soul and strength. Some infer this to mean that our relationship with God is about us giving to God, but this is a mistake. Loving God with everything does have this broad idea of giving God the best of your intellect, time, focus and admiration. This leads us to the study of the Word and theology. However, when we give our time and focus to the Word and theology, we realize it says that “Love is not that we loved God but that He loved us and gave us His only Son.” We realize “Jesus chose us” and not that we chose Him. We read that Martha was serving God and God was serving Marry, and God said Marry chose the “better part.” Marry was letting God serve her, and Jesus approved this as the better. Jesus said He came to “serve man.”

When the scripture says it is more blessed to give rather than to receive, it is referring to human relationships. It is not referring to our relationship to God. Jesus said that Marry chose the better thing by receiving from Him rather than giving to Him. In our relationship to God it is better to receive from Him and not give. The gospel is one immeasurable gift God gives to us. God serves and glorifies man. As Paul says so boldly in 1 Corinthians 2, God “predestined” the gospel to glorify man. The gospel values, honors and glorifies man. It is not that man is already these things or already possesses these, rather, it is Jesus’ finished atonement that conveys these things on His chosen ones. God wants us to approach Him knowing He will serve us in giving, helping and freely supplying all the good things He has promised.

Even with sanctification it is better to receive. The New Contract says God promises to write His laws on our minds. Hebrews 12 says our sanctification is looking to Jesus who is the author and perfector of our faith. We do not “give” better performance to God in sanctification; rather, we look to God to be faithful to do what He promises, and we “receive” sanctification from Him by faith. This does not mean we do not work and consider how to obey God better. It means as we strive for these things, we look to God to give us the sanctification He promised. By faith we receive sanctification power. We do not work to get sanctifying power, we receive this power by faith and then because we have the power, we walk in godliness.

Paul says in Ephesians that His prayer is that we can know and receive the length, width, depth and height of God’s love for us. He does not pray that we love God with our length, width, depth and height, but that we receive His great love. His prayer is that we both know how great His love is and experience this great love, here and now (not just later in heaven). By receiving His love we become complete with His life and fulness. We do not become complete by giving Him our love, but by receiving His love. Since the blessing of Abraham and the gospel has good things that effect the inner man, body, finances, relationships and ministry, we therefore know, experiencing God’s love is receiving fruitfulness in all these areas. When we receive fruitfulness in all these areas by faith, we are made stronger and grow more into God’s fullness.

Paul wants our inner man strong. Paul says by receiving His great love for us, Christ lives in our hearts more and more. We receive His love by faith. The explanation is simple. By faith we receive His love, then Christ lives in our hearts more, and the outcome is that we become stronger in our inner man. To be stronger in our inner man is to be more mature and more developed as a Christian. This happens not in our giving to God, but in faith receiving His love for us.

Paul then says that God will answer our prayers exceedingly and beyond all that we ask. This shows us what type of application Paul had in mind when instructing us about knowing and receiving His love. The application is to ask and have God give us much more than we ask. Think about all the extra baskets left over from the feeding of the 4 and 5 thousand. According to Paul this application is how you experience God’s love. Asking for good things and God giving these to you in overflow is how you experience God’s love; this is how you become stronger in your inner man. This is how you mature as a Christian and how Christ lives in your heart more and more.

When you ask for healing and God heals you of cancer and you also feel stronger than ever, then you become stronger in your inner man, mature as a Christian and are more complete with God’s fullness. When you ask for financial help and God causes 7 times more money to be sent to you, then you become stronger in your inner man, mature as a Christian and are more complete with God’s fullness. When you ask God to bless your spouse or children with their heart’s desires and God gives them more than they dreamed, then you become stronger in your inner man, mature as a Christian and are more complete with God’s fullness.

Vincent Cheung helped me to understand this better in his essay, What is Mature doctrine, saying:

“As Paul said, “However, we do speak a message of wisdom among the mature…what God has prepared for those who love him…that we may understand what God has freely given us” (1 Corinthians 2:6, 9, 12). What is mature doctrine? It is not what we do for God, but what God does for us (1 John 4:10).

Jesus said that a person cannot be his disciple unless he first counts the cost, and then renounces everyone and everything to follow him (Luke 14:26-33). This is not the pinnacle of spiritual maturity, but it is the beginning. This is what spiritual infants do. We repent of our transgressions and reorient our lives on Jesus Christ. We become God-centered…

Although the gospel demands total commitment, since the beginning it is not about what we do for God, but what God does for us, in all areas of our lives, by Jesus Christ (Romans 8:31-32). We truly come to know him as the Father that Jesus talked about, the one who is greater than all (John 10:29), the one who supplies everything (Psalm 103:2-5, Matthew 7:32-33, Philippians 4:19)…

Therefore, spiritual maturity must entail learning more about the benefits that God has given us in Christ, and then receiving and experiencing them (1 Corinthians 2:12). For this reason, Paul prayed that Christians would receive a spirit of wisdom and revelation to know God, to know the gospel hope and inheritance, and to know the super-surpassing power that God has put to work in us, which is the same power that raised Jesus from the dead (Ephesians 1:15-22). He prayed that Christians would be strengthened with power in their spirits, to have power to grasp all the dimensions of the love of Christ (Ephesians 3:14-19).

Do they teach you how to receive things from God by faith? Jesus taught these things as gospel, intertwined with the doctrines of faith, the atonement, and the Fatherhood of God (Matthew 6:32-33, 7:7-11, 8:16-17, Mark 9:23, 11:23-24, Luke 8:50, 18:1-8, John 11:40, 15:7, 15:16, 16:26-27, and many more). .. It takes spiritual power to grasp the magnitude of divine love toward us. Learning more and more about God’s love for us in more categories is not for babies, but adults, because it takes spiritual strength and maturity to grasp it.

If you are selective about the blessings of God, then you are spiritually feeble and immature. If you accept his forgiveness but reject his healing, then you are weak. If you embrace his discipline but refuse his prosperity, then you are a baby. You are not some epic apologist, some defender of the faith. You are just a crybaby…”[1]

It is interesting that Paul defines a “message of wisdom for the mature” is about knowing and receiving all the free blessings God has given us. If you listen to many theologians (past and present) they seem to say the opposite. They teach denying yourself and fearing God is wisdom for the mature, but this is reversed. Such things is wisdom for babies to start on the good path. Vincent is correct. To deny yourself, to fear God and follow Him, rather than your selfish lusts, is the beginning of wisdom not the maturity of it. The fear of God is the beginning, not the maturity of wisdom. The fear of God will start you on the path of wisdom and it will keep you firmly planted on it. Because the fear of God will keep you on the path of wisdom it is always relevant to remember the fear of God; but again, it is not the height of wisdom. Mature wisdom is receiving all the free goodies of God.

As Vincent says, “it takes spiritual strength and maturity in the inner man to receive from God.”[2] The bible teaches that it takes power in the inner man to fear God and deny yourself, but it takes even more power in the inner man to receive free goodies from God like healing and prosperity. Those who receive healing, prosperity and miracles from God prove they are mature in their inner man, and they prove they can handle at least some level of higher tier wisdom. Those who rebuke the “health and wealth” guys, if they don’t want to be hypocrites, at the very least must prove they have greater wisdom and more inner maturity by more healings, more prosperity and more various miracles. However, one who teaches Expansionism and God’s true level of absolute sovereignty has the correct place to rebuke the health and wealth guys, along with cessationist.

According to Paul you cannot claim to be spiritually mature and able to handle greater wisdom if you don’t prove it by receiving God’s freely given blessings in your life. You can give your money to the poor and help widows and receive forgiveness, but if you cannot heal the sick, cast out demons and receive various miracles, you are not mature and you cannot handle greater degrees of wisdom. You are still a baby who needs to be instructed.

Because denying yourself and the fear of God is the starting of wisdom, pastors who keep their message on this level either think their listeners are babes in Christ who never grow, or they are deliberately keeping their listeners stunted and deformed. When the bible tells us to run the race as if to win it, these pastors keep Christians crawling on all fours with wishful hope they might cross the finish line dead last. I am saying this nicely, because my rebuke could be ruthless here. Remove yourself from such teachers. They are your enemy, not friends. They are your worse type of enemies. They are brutal taskmasters employed by Satan. They are worthless at applying mature doctrine. They are trash who refuse to receive God’s love and free blessings. There is no healing, no casting out of demons and no obvious signs of God working miracles to help then. They know they are garbage with no proof of God’s love on them. They instruct you to be twice as worthless at receiving God’s blessings as they are to make themselves feel better. They trample Christ to hide their feelings of jealously.

Thus, even if history prizes certain Christians in the past as heroes, if they did not heal the sick, cast out demons and receive regular miracles from God, they cannot by definition of scripture be wise and mature. Scripture, not historical fame, defines if a Christian was wise and mature.

As shown in the previous section on the gospel, the gospel includes for this life healing, prosperity and excessive fruitfulness for all areas of life. Even if forgiveness of sins is a greater blessing in the gospel, in the since it takes one from hell to accepted, yet God commands us to receive all gospel blessings. It is not optional to obey commandments. To disobey and disbelieve any promise of God is not maturity, but immaturity and stupid. It takes a strong inner man and higher wisdom to believe the entire finished gospel and receive all its benefits. It takes a little wisdom to receive forgiveness but refuse the rest of the gospel. It is mature wisdom to receive all of the gospel.

Lastly, consider the Lord’s Supper. This is something Christians do all the time or should be doing constantly. It is the only repeated religious thing we do. The whole Old Testament religious activities has been boiled down to this one thing, the Lord’s Supper. What is it that we do in our one religious activity? We remember and receive God’s love for us. This is Christianity. We do not give to God, God gives to us.

In a correct understanding of ethics (God’s commands), this is the beginning and foundation of ethics. God commands us to be saved by faith in His Son, to receive His forgiveness, receive His love and receive all good blessings. It is on this ethic we receive strength to do other ethics that involve human interactions and purity. Receiving God’s love is the primordial ethic.

[1] Vincent Cheung. What is Mature Doctrine.
From the ebook, Fulcrum. 2017. Pg 69-70.

[2] Paraphrased from source.

Our Royal Authority and Power.

“I tell you the truth, whatever you forbid on earth will be forbidden in heaven, and whatever you permit on earth will be permitted in heaven. “I also tell you this: If two of you agree here on earth concerning anything you ask, my Father in heaven will do it for you. For where two or three gather together as my followers,[h] I am there among them.”
(Matthew 18:18-19 NLT)

“Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
(Matthew 16:16-19 NIV)

“Don’t you realize that someday we believers will judge the world? And since you are going to judge the world, can’t you decide even these little things among yourselves? Don’t you realize that we will judge angels? So you should surely be able to resolve ordinary disputes in this life.” (1 Corinthians 6:2-3 NLT)

“He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned. 17 And these signs will accompany those who have believed: in My name they will cast out demons, they will speak with new tongues; 18 and they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
(Mark 16:16-18 LSB)

“When Jesus had called the Twelve together, he gave them power and authority to drive out all demons and to cure diseases, 2 and he sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal the sick.”
(Luke 9:1-2 NIV)

“Then Peter said, “Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk… By faith in the name of Jesus, this man whom you see and know was made strong.”
(Acts 3:6, 16 NIV)

In context of Matthew 18 it does mention forgiveness, but it also mentions faith to ask for anything and then get this anything. Thus, do not let someone deceive you as if such a passage is not for the Christian to use God’s authority today, as Jesus states it.

This same phrase is said by Jesus in Matthew 16, and thus has the first mention hermeneutic. The context is Jesus asking Peter who he says He is. Peter makes a confession that Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus responds by saying He will build His church on this Rock. Some fools think this is referring to Peter himself, but they are confused. Jesus is referring to Peter’s faith confession that Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus will expand His kingdom with faith that declares He is the Son of God. Jesus refers to this like a military expansion. His kingdom will march forward and the gates of hell will not stop His Kingdom expanding and trampling the walls of hell. Fools have tried to make it all about Peter, but it is all about Jesus being the Son of God, and those who have faith in Him. This faith is a victorious expansion that has so much authority and power that it tears down the gates of hell. As faith marches forward, demons scream in terror.

It is in this context Jesus then says, what you lock on earth will be locked in heaven, and what you unlock on earth will be unlocked in heaven. Jesus sees His kingdom expansion as unstoppable, and in this context says you have the authority to loose and bind things. This authority is given to a faith confession that Jesus is the Son of God. Obviously, it is not about Peter, but about faith in Jesus. Peter is not the only one who believes Jesus is the Son of God.

This expansion of His kingdom will be so unstoppable that the gates of hell will not prevail against it. Thus, the context allows for a broad use of this authority. It is an all encompassing power that belongs to followers of Jesus who have faith; this is the same faith one uses to be saved, to be healed, to move mountains, to expand His kingdom, to forgive, and ask for anything you desire. It is a broad authority for anything related to kingdom expansion.

Think about it. You have faith to receive a miracle of wealth, and then use this to fund the gospel mission. Not only did you unlock a financial door here on earth, but by sowing this back into God’s work you have unlocked treasure for yourself in heaven. Faith opens doors on earth, in heaven and in other dimensions. Faith is the master key. Jesus says give to Caesar what belongs to “him.” He says if “you” tell this tree to be cast into the sea with faith, then it will “obey you.” Thus, if “you” cast out demons and “you” free an enslaved soul who receives Jesus, then what “you” loosed on earth will also be loosed in the next life. And God will reward “you” for using His authority to expand His kingdom.

It is first recorded that Jesus gave the 12 “authority over all demons.” But then later it was expanded to another group of 77 non-apostles. Then later in the last part of Mark 16 Jesus says this power is for all believers. Then Luke shows in Acts the power of the Spirit was given to a super majority of non-apostles, so that table bearers had so much faith and power they could see into the very throne of heaven and some teleported over time and space. Faith makes time and space your servants. Faith makes time and space bow to your will, not the other way around. Jesus made good tasting “aged” wine for the wedding. Thus, with faith “you,” are the master over reality and even with unyielding things such as time and space. The prophets multiply material substance like reality was their personal Lego set. Then Jesus command the disciples “you give them something to eat.” Jesus expected them to have faith and do the same, as if this was something normal for a believer to do. Jesus commands us to do the same. Jesus commands us to both multiply and distribute. The issue is not if God has promised, but if a person will believe God more than their eyes, experience, and calculations. Acts, shows the common Christian had more power than entire armies, just like with Samson and the Philistines.

Right after the baptism of the Spirit and the huge emphasis on this in Acts 1 and 2 and then throughout the book, Luke shows in chapter 3 how Peter helped to heal a man by authority in Jesus’ name. Luke shows how Peter “loosed” the man from sickness by faith in Jesus, rather than saying a gift of the Spirit empowered him. Thus, even after Jesus’ resurrection, the authority to loose and bind things, on the foundation of faith is still in full force, if not more so. Luke goes on to say God gave the man faith in Jesus to be healed, or ‘loosed’ from his sickness.

Thus, all who have faith in Jesus as the Son of God, have this access and authority to loose and bind. For any who love Jesus and want to see His Kingdom expanded, will desire and use this authority and power seriously. Jesus did not say He would expand His kingdom with governments or some cultural mandate. No. He wants you to expand His kingdom with authority to loose and bind. If you love Him, you will do it the way He has commanded you.

Our new identity and definition in Jesus is one were we are gods. We have the power to expand God’s kingdom. Our power to do this are words of faith that can bind and loose reality, sickness, demons and blessings. God obviously has this power and when He speaks reality obeys. But God has handed this kingdom expansion to us. God has given us His lightning bolt. He qualified us to speak and make reality obey us, and cause demons to tremble in fear. Like with Joshua, God told them to expand their territory with sword and shield. God would back them up with His power, but they were to march forward with weapons in their hands and use them.

Our weapons are faith filled words and confessions. God and His Word or promise is one and the same thing, as we learned in previous sections. Thus, when “you” speak God’s promise in faith you release God. “You” release unstoppable power. It is God’s power, but because the bible denies pantheism, “you” release God’s power when “you” speak in faith. With this “we” tear down the gates of hell. With faith filled words, mountains must “obey us.”

Furthermore, one day the saints will have so much authority that we will judge both the earth and angels. Not only do we have the glory of owning reality, but we will one day judge reality. Because angels are part of reality and we own and judge reality, we will thus judge angels one day. This is our definition in Christ. This is who we are.