Grace Revolution: Experience the Power to Live Above Defeat (5 page)
Read Grace Revolution: Experience the Power to Live Above Defeat Online
Authors: Joseph Prince
Tags: #Religion / Christian Life / Personal Growth, #RELIGION / Christian Life / Spiritual Growth, #Religion / Christian Life / Inspirational
When I visited the Mount of Beatitudes in Israel some time ago, the Lord opened my eyes to see for the first time
how
He had met the man with leprosy. After preaching to the multitudes, our Lord didn’t go down the mountain toward them, otherwise the Bible would not have said that the multitudes “
followed
Him” (Matt. 8:1, emphasis mine).
Our Lord had actually walked down the mountain in another direction, very likely toward Capernaum, because after His preaching on the mountain, the gospel accounts tell us that He entered that city (see Matt. 8:5).
As I took a path down the mountain toward Capernaum that day, I saw slabs of stone strewn along the foot of the mountain. These stone slabs are just the right size for a man to crawl under to find shelter. Right then and there, I had the revelation of how the man with leprosy could have hidden under one of these slabs for fear of being discovered by the people, and how our Lord Jesus had known the man was hiding there and deliberately gone to seek him before the crowds caught up with Him.
In Jesus’ day those with leprosy were ostracized and isolated in accordance with the law of Moses. Because they were conscious of how unclean they were and what the law required of them, their natural response was to withdraw and hide.
But hiding didn’t get the man with leprosy in Matthew 8 the healing and restoration he needed. Fortunately, hearing about the goodness of God—how God wanted to be a loving Father to him and take care of all his needs—got him out of hiding and into seeking the Lord for his miracle. It changed his mind from seeing a God Who ostracized and condemned unclean people to seeing a God Who loved them no matter what their condition. This change of mind lit his faith and put courage in his heart to seek and receive the healing he so desperately wanted.
Like the man with leprosy at the start of his story, could you also be hiding from God today? Maybe you’ve been struggling with an addiction or cycle of defeat that you can’t seem to get out of. Maybe you’ve been a victim of sexual abuse and you blame yourself for it. Maybe you’ve had a failed marriage or business, or made a bad decision that
has led to loss. And maybe your failure has caused you to avoid God, avoid going to church, and avoid people in general. Beloved, whatever may be causing you to feel “unclean” or disqualified today, God wants you to change your mind about Him and, instead of hiding from Him, run to Him!
How does one change from hiding from God to running to God? Well, the Bible tells us that “faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ” (Rom. 10:17
NASB
). The man with leprosy had enough faith to come out of his hiding place and head straight for Jesus because of the gracious words he had heard from Jesus. If our Lord had preached a hellfire-and-brimstone message of condemnation, do you think the man would have dared to approach Him for healing? Of course not. He would have walked away fearful of punishment, and feeling more condemned and hopeless than ever. But because he heard words of grace—how God wanted to be a loving Father to him and provide for all his needs—faith arose in his heart, giving him the confidence to approach the Lord Jesus for his miracle.
My dear friend, what you hear about God is of utmost importance. It can mean the difference between receiving your miracle and remaining where you are in your lack or bondage. It can draw you close to God, or drive you further away from Him. Faith comes by hearing, but fear also comes by hearing. If you’ve been hearing about a God Who is mostly angry and out to get you for your sins, how can you have faith to look to Him for help? If you’ve been hearing that He gives people (even believers) sicknesses and punishes them with horrible accidents for their sins, how can you look to Him for healing? If
you’ve been hearing that He wants you and your family poor to keep you humble, how can you believe Him for financial breakthroughs or deliverance from mounting debts? How can you possibly trust God for anything good if all you’ve been hearing are sermons that make you feel more condemned and fearful of His judgment?
It’s sad, but the things I’ve just mentioned are the very things people are hearing about God. Just look at the movies made about God today—God is always portrayed as mean, judgmental, petulant, destructive, and even murderous! How they’ve perverted Who God really is—“compassionate and merciful, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love” (Ps. 103:8
NLT
)! Don’t misunderstand me. God does have anger, but the Bible never defines God as wrath; it defines God as
love
(see 1 John 4:8, 16). Did our Lord Jesus ever condemn the prostitutes and tax collectors, those despised and rejected by society? No, He was a friend of sinners! Did He ever take away from the poor, or inflict the sick with more diseases? No, He fed a hungry multitude, with twelve baskets full of leftovers, and healed everyone who sought Him for healing, wherever He went!
The Bible never defines God as wrath; it defines God as
love
.
The Bible tells us that Jesus “went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil,
for God was with Him
” (Acts 10:38, emphasis mine). What does that tell us? God wants to do good, not evil, to us! If this were not true, God would not have been with Jesus, backing Him up. Jesus said, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father…. Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works” (John 14:9–10). If
you want to know what God is really like (and not what man portrays Him to be), look at Jesus in the Gospels. He is God’s will in action, and He went about doing
good
—saving, delivering, healing, restoring, providing, guiding, and loving the unlovable. That’s our God!
Beloved, if you want to have faith for your breakthrough, make sure you are hearing and believing right about God through the word of Christ. By the way, it is the word of
Christ
, not the word of
God
, as written in some Bible translations. The Greek word used in Romans 10:17 is
Christos
for Christ. What’s the difference? The word of Christ refers to the word of the
new covenant
, the word of
His grace
.
To have faith for your breakthrough, make sure you are hearing and believing right about God through the word of Christ.
In the book of Acts, the apostle Paul says, “So now, brethren, I commend you to God and to the word of His grace, which is able to build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified” (Acts 20:32). What is able to build you up and give you an inheritance among the saints? It is the word of His grace or the word of Christ. The Bible exhorts us to “Let the word of Christ [
Christos
] dwell in you richly in all wisdom” (Col. 3:16).
So if you’re feeling discouraged today, I encourage you to keep hearing messages full of the grace and finished work of our Lord Jesus. Whatever your circumstances, keep hearing about how your
sins have all been forgiven through Christ, and how you are today the righteousness of God in Christ. Whatever the prognosis you’ve heard, keep hearing about how much God loves you and wants to be a loving Father to you, to watch over you, provide for you, and deliver you from all your fears and afflictions.
My friend, when you give priority to this daily, you will have the word of Christ dwelling richly in you. And it is this word of His grace that will impart faith and hope to you. When you know God’s love for you, it will cause you to run to Him instead of hiding from Him. His love upon you and in you will make you strong. It will cause you to overcome every temptation and fear, slay your giants, and live life with greater boldness and victory!
When you know God’s love for you, it will cause you to run to Him instead of hiding from Him.
Let me share with you the personal story of Calli from Florida. As painful and heartrending as her experiences were before she encountered the person of Jesus, much greater was the Lord’s restoration to her when she began to hear the word of His grace:
Throughout the years I was raised in church and studied at a Bible college, legalistic teachings had led me to believe that my sin was greater than the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and His finished work on the cross. As a result, I lived in constant fear that I would lose my salvation every time I sinned. My past
haunted me and I could never seem to outrun it as the torment simply overwhelmed me.
I was sexually abused and threatened into silence when I was younger. This caused me to live in shame, guilt, and a cycle of violence, abusive relationships, rape, drug abuse, insanity, suicidal tendencies, and self-mutilation. I was also tortured and beaten by my first husband when I married him at the age of twenty-three.
Consequently, I developed multiple personalities and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). I was admitted to a state institution and hospitalized in psychiatric wards thirty-eight times over a span of twenty-nine years. I was also bound to an addiction to cigarettes and drugs for over thirty-six years.
I was hopelessly enslaved by the chains of addiction and insanity for many years. I was considered permanently and totally mentally disabled, and was in a day treatment program for the chronically mentally ill. Churches started developing “compassion fatigue” and got tired of praying for me. I was even told, “Perhaps your schizophrenia is your cross to bear.”
Since they gave up on me, I immersed myself in a world of bondage and sadomasochism. Still, I was not content and I wanted to go home to my heavenly Father, even though I thought that He did not want me anymore. I felt like I was the beaten leftovers of the church.
But oh, thank You, Jesus! He did not give up on me! I had begun watching Joseph Prince Ministries’ broadcast on television. And as I listened to Pastor Prince teach on grace, the Lord began to open my heart, and for the first time, all the head knowledge of Scriptures I had memorized since I was
a child began to bring illumination to my mind when I saw them through the lens of God’s grace, and hope and faith began to spring in my heart.
Then one day, I heard Pastor Prince share on how Noah never fell out of the ark even though the ark was tossed about in the water, and how Jesus said nothing could take us out of His hands. As I listened, the Lord spoke to me. I heard Him in my heart, calling my name, and telling me, “My child, I have held you in the palm of My hands all these years that you have stumbled, fallen, and wandered. I have called you, and waited for you to turn and hear My voice. You are Mine.”
I realized then that just hearing about Jesus and His grace had broken through all my chains of darkness, insanity, and addictions. I shouted “HALLELUJAH!” in my apartment, and I broke down and wept. For the first time in my life, I felt all my shackles fall off. After that, it was as though I had never picked up a cigarette or drug in my life, and all the insanity was gone!
I now take no medication for schizophrenia or PTSD. I no longer have fourteen personalities. My doctor, who had worked on me for almost twenty years, has seen the changes—and has declared that I am no longer a mental patient.
Praise God for the grace message that Pastor Prince is preaching—the same gospel that Apostle Paul preached in the Scriptures! This gospel is indeed the power of God unto salvation! I am living proof and am now in a church where I am giving my testimony and sharing with others the hope that they too can find peace and deliverance from the chains that have them bound! Praise the name of Jesus!
What a glorious testimony! Thank you so much, Calli, for sharing it and encouraging countless others. Transformed lives like Calli’s are living proof that the word of His grace is the power of God unto our salvation. When we know God’s love and grace toward us, we overcome whatever the enemy throws at us. Instead of hiding from God, we run to Him Who is our help, and we find grace and strength to come out of the darkest pit, to become shining testimonies of God’s goodness.
Knowing God’s love for you makes you strong. It makes a champion out of you. The book of Daniel tells us that “the people who know their God shall be strong, and carry out great exploits” (Dan. 11:32). Daniel himself started out as a young captive taken from Jerusalem to serve in the courts of Babylonian and Medo-Persian kings. Yet Daniel stood out among his peers. Over his lifetime he interpreted dreams by the wisdom of God and demonstrated an “excellent spirit” people around him could see (see Dan. 6:3). He always found favor in the eyes of the Gentile kings he served and experienced supernatural deliverance when there seemed to be no way out. Daniel walked out of the lion’s den unharmed, because he knew his God, His power, and His heart for him.
Dear reader, is this what you desire today—to walk in strength, wisdom, and favor that is undeniable and irresistible? Do you desire to see the God-kind of miracles and breakthroughs in your life? Then I encourage you to keep hearing and growing in your knowledge of God’s grace and mercy toward you. In Daniel’s story, the Lord,
through an angel, addressed him as a “man greatly beloved” (Dan. 10:11). So the more you hear about and are confident in His love for you, the more you will live life with boldness and a different, excellent spirit that sets you apart from others and testifies of His power in your life.
The more you hear about and are confident in God’s love for you, the more you will live life with boldness.
Consider also young David, the shepherd boy who was bold enough to challenge and take down Goliath when others were cowering in fear. David knew God as a covenant-keeping God Who loved him. David would have been reminded of God’s love for him every time he heard his own name, for David’s name means “beloved,” the beloved of the Lord. I believe David became such an amazing worshiper, a leader beloved by His people, and a man after God’s own heart because he knew and was conscious of how much the Lord loved him. Even when David failed, I believe it was his revelation that he was still beloved of the Lord that kept him going. Beloved, when you know how much God loves you, you will bring down the giants in your life, and your life will testify of His goodness and glory!
Can I give you one more example? Do you remember Gideon, who saw himself as least in his family and who was threshing wheat in a winepress for fear of being seen by the Midianites? We read his story in the book of Judges and see how he overcame his insecurities and fears and single-handedly saved Israel from the Midianites, because he first heard gracious, encouraging words from the Angel of the Lord: “The L
ORD
is with you, you mighty man of valor!… Surely I will be with you, and you shall defeat the Midianites as one man” (Judg. 6:12, 16).
When he began to see how the Lord saw him, and believed that the Lord was with him and for him, he fulfilled his destiny!
If, like Gideon, you feel small and powerless in the face of your challenges, I encourage you to keep hearing how because of Jesus’ sacrifice and finished work, nothing can separate you from God’s love. I want you to know right now that He has already made you more than a conqueror in Christ (see Rom. 8:37–39). When you know who you are in Christ and believe in God’s love for you, you will become strong and you will see God do great things in and through you. When you know that God is with you and for you, who or what can stand against you (see Rom. 8:31)? You will surely win the fights of life and live out the amazing destiny God has prepared for you!
When you know who you are in Christ and believe in God’s love for you, you will become strong and you will see God do great things in and through you.