Hearing, Believing, Speaking, Manifesting

by Dave Bell

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Hearing, Believing, Speaking, Manifesting

I was trained as an Electrical Engineer, with degrees from Cornell and Stanford University.  Most of up my upper level classes were really a variety of mathematic topics applied to communications and computers.  I was trained and taught to use my mind as a tool to analyze situations, solve problems or come up with new solutions.   The achievements of the human mind are held in high esteem by the secular world and tremendous advancements to men’s lives have come from the discoveries in science, medicine, technology and other “softer” sciences.

It is with that training and mindset that I first came to the Bible.   I also came with a very healthy  respect for pragmatism.   If it works, it deserves some attention.   If it does not work, it deserves less attention.  Or more simply put:  Can I get any results?

I could read and make sense of the Bible but my approach was largely mental or legalistic….Truths to be discerned with the mind and obeyed with the will.    Not a terrible place to be but when I read the Gospels, I, along with other Christians, would see the person and actions of Jesus that seemed to stand head and shoulders above all around Him.  Then into the book of Acts, the Holy Spirit lit up the disciples’ lives so that they seemed to stand head and shoulders above those around them. “Where was that sort of action in today’s church”, I wondered?

In his letters,  Paul made statements so bold that I would think, “Wow, Paul is talking about something that we might  get a little trickle of in this age but we will see it all when Jesus returns.  It’s a hope for the future.”

I along with Christian friends in my circle, believed that God gave the early church a quick glimpse of the glory that what was to come when Jesus returned.  A sort of hoped based encouragement, something to look forward to, that would give a believer a boost to obey and to make through the difficult parts of this current life to make it into the golden age of the future.  We thought the next life was when all the amazing statements of Paul made would be fulfilled.  Until then we would have to, “walk by faith.”

In my mind, to “walk by faith” meant to just keep going forward, obeying the scriptures as best I could, and not expecting much of anything in this life from God.

To me and to my friends, that was a walk by faith and not by sight.

And so that was our mental picture of what it meant to have faith and use faith:  “Keep on trucking,” no matter what.  Energizer bunny Christianity.

I was 21 at the time and given the extra natural bodily energy that one has as a youth, as one pushes him/herself in any direction, which  is rewarding in some manner.  So even with this approach to “walking by faith”,   it had its rewards and God did honor our obedience and hunger… but He would honor it by showing us more.

Reading the Old Testament you run into men and women who seemed to have a special relationship with God. People like Noah, Abraham, David and others.    Their walk was not a legalistic relationship with God.  They interacted directly with God and had results from their faith.   I remember the first time I read Hebrews chapter 11.  Here the writer recaps the Old Testament people of faith and their victories.  Now that got my attention.  People who got results in their walk with God.  One scripture jumped out at me and I knew it was the Holy Spirit bringing it to life to me.  It was like the scripture jumped off the page to me.

Hebrews 11:6

But without faith it is impossible to please Him: for he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. (KJV)

It struck me.  I knew how to apply myself to things in this natural world, but I had  never really applied myself with that sort of diligence to God.

In fact most people know how to apply themselves to things in this natural world.  Professional and amateur musicians practice for years to perfect their technique and to learn new styles.  Professional and amateur athletes hone their skills over many years of practice.   Professional tradesmen and amateur home repair folks build their skills over many years and need to update their knowledge every time a new product, technique or industry rule comes out.  Even thieves and drug dealers learn their craft over time and have to apply themselves to it to reach their version of success.    And so, if you are in the ministry as a “professional” or if you are an “amateur” walking out your life with God, you are going to have to show some diligent pursuit to make progress at it, as well!

So,  I knew how to diligently pursue something in the natural, but how do I diligently pursue God I wondered.  Well the first half of the same verse told me that it was IMPOSSIBLE to please God without faith.  The rest of Hebrews chapter 11 was filled with short testimonies of those who in the Old Testament had used faith to gain victories and please God.  It was pretty clear to me that faith was going to be very important in this pursuit of God.  Faith was essential to pleasing God and faith produced results in this life!

So began my quest to understand faith.    I have many testimonies to share about that journey, but for the remainder of this article I am going to give he condensed version of the faith aspect of my pursuit of God.

My journey started out like most Christians.

I heard the gospel and believed that Jesus died for my sins and was resurrected and that faith brought me to Jesus.  I believed that Jesus was my Lord and I would say the same thing whenever I was asked.  I was operating in the most important and basic faith, i.e. faith to be born again, but I had know idea what the difference was between my soul and my spirit and how faith worked.

A baby does not need to know anything about nutrition or digestion to grow.  All the baby has to do is drink the milk.  As Peter said in 1 Peter 2:2 “As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby”.   All I had to do was feed on the word of God and it seemed I was growing as a Christian.  Things were changing in my thinking, my will and my emotions.  As Peter described, 1 Peter 1:9, “Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls.”   I was operating in faith for the salvation of my own soul.   You couldn’t see it physically, but if you watched my life you could see the effect of that faith.

So what had this faith accomplished?  I was born again.  You could say that in an instant, my spirit was made alive, I was born again spiritually and my faith was working out the salvation or transformation of my soul.  Salvation of spirit and soul is very important and should not never be minimized but we should not leave out the impact of faith on our physical body and this physical world.

Detour 1:
Don’t Discount the Physical!  God doesn’t

It appears from scripture that Enoch and Elijah were taken up with their bodies to heaven.  (Gen. 5:24, 2 Kings 2:11)  The details of how that worked, I do not know.  We know that Jesus went up with a resurrected new creation physical body. Luke 24:39-43 One with flesh and bone and one that could eat fish with his disciples.  We believe that when Jesus returns for the church, those that remain on earth will be caught up and their bodies transformed to the new creation body.  The bodies of those Christians already dead will be resurrected as new creation bodies and joined to their spirit and soul (1 Cor. 15).

So while we know that the salvation of the spirit and soul is very important, we see that we should not discount the salvation of the body.

Jesus came to us with a first creation physical body.

He ministered healing to people’s bodies while he was here on earth.  His physical body and blood played an essential part in purchasing our salvation.  He then left with a new creation physical body.  The sacrament of communion focuses on a remembrance of the sacrifice of his body and blood for our salvation.  Believer’s here on earth today are the body of Christ while still in their first creation physical bodies.  Their bodies are temples of the living God like Jesus body was a temple of God.  We are the only body of Christ the world sees until Jesus returns.  When the rapture occurs we all get new bodies and we later return to rule and reign with Christ for 1000 years with new creation bodies on an old creation earth.   That may sound amazing but it is no more amazing than a born again spirit living inside an old creation body, which is your state right now as a Christian here on earth.  When I read to the end of Revelation, I find a new heaven and a new earth…. a new physical earth.    The importance of your body and the physical appears to continue off in to the future with our new bodies and this new earth.

There is a misconception in the Christian church that we all just hang around in heaven with God in the sweet ages to come.  But even a simple reading of Revelation shows believers with physical bodies and redemption for the physical earth.    Jesus as our Leader is out ahead of us.  He already has a resurrected physical body.  In fact almost all conservative Christian seminaries believe that an essential Christian belief is that Jesus came in a physical body and left in a resurrected physical body.    A lack of these beliefs is considered heretical.

1 John 4:1-3

1  Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. 2 Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: 3 And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world

Luke 24:37-43   Jesus after the resurrection

37   But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit.   38  And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? 39 Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have. 40  And when he had thus spoken, he shewed them his hands and his feet. 41  And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, he said unto them, Have ye here any meat? 42  And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb.  43  And he took it, and did eat before them.

Romans 10: 9,10

9    That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.  10  For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

Most Christians agree that Jesus’ greatest miracles were the resurrection miracles.  The synagogue leader’s daughter.  The son of the mother from Nain.  Lazarus after 4 days.  Jesus own physical resurrection is considered the greatest and most important miracle in the New Testament.  All of these events involve the physical.  Almost all Christians would agree to their greatness.

Given that, why do so many Christians discount God working in the physical realm as unimportant relative to the spirit realm? I think there are several important reasons but I will get too far down this detour if I pursue them here.  We will save that for another article.

I think is suffices to say that the Bible from, “Let their be light,”  to Jesus miracle physical birth, physical death and physical resurrection and finally to a new physical earth,  maintains the importance of the physical body and the physical realm continues from beginning to end.

Back to my story…

You can only go so far on milk and someone else feeding you

With almost no effort, I seemed to grow on the milk of the word as a new Christian.  It was almost effortless at the beginning as long as I was on the milk of the Word.

But to get beyond the baby stage, it seemed like everyone was switching to “Will Power,” Christianity.  Just try a little harder.

It was at this point that the Lord got me involved with a prison ministry and that ministry was run by people who had spent some time in the Faith Message with Fred Price.  The prison ministry allowed me to see more dramatic changes in people’s lives as they fed on and pursued the word of God.  I remember the thought that went through my mind:  “There must be more to this word of God than I originally thought.  People’s lives are being dramatically changed by hearing the word of God.”    I was also introduced to the idea of a covenant, the promises of God and that God would fulfill his Word.  The people I was hanging around with in the ministry talked about God as acting now in this world, and they believed it and expected it.

Place and Value of Meditation

I began to more seriously feed myself on the word of God.  Meditating daily on the word, praying and seeking God.    I began to gain an experiential understanding of the value of meditating on the word of God.  I would study a particular topic.

For any given topic, I would right down all the scriptures I could find on 8 ½  x  11 paper and go over them again and again.  I would find books on the topic I was studying and then read what other teachers had to say.  Invariably, God would bring situations into my life that would involve the very scriptures I was meditating on.  Some were educational, some were funny and some were dramatic.  One bears telling as the most dramatic “spiritual” experience I have ever had with God.

Up to that time I had mostly attended a main line Presbyterian Church that had no strong belief in the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.  At my job at NASA, I was on my lunch break at an outside table reading my bible.  A Christian woman came by and in a short course of our conversation she asked me if I had been baptized in the Holy Spirit.  I told her that I didn’t know if I had.  She shared with me a few scriptures on the topic and told me it was important that I get baptized in the Holy Spirit.  That statement lit a fire under me.  I proceeded to write down every scripture I could find in the Gospels and in the book of Acts on the Holy Spirit and I found some books on the topic.  For a month or more, that was just about all I read about and meditated on.  The Scriptures were rolling around in my brain and without my understanding they were growing in my spirit and would bear fruit.   I just had no strong knowledge of how that process worked but you don’t need that knowledge for it to work, you just have to participate.  So after this month of meditating on the scriptures related to the Holy Spirit, even after my friends telling me to, “Watch out for those Pentecostal people”,  I determined that there was something to this Holy Spirit baptism.    My new Faith Message friends also  told me the baptism in the Holy Spirit was real and gave me a few testimonies of it’s value.  My take on it was that everyone in the New Testament that, “Got it,” was empowered by God to do the works of God.  So, I was sitting on my bed, reading my bible and I finally just said to God, “This Holy Spirit baptism looks like something good.  If it is still for now, I want it.”  At the end of that sentence I felt like some one had plugged me into an electric circuit and my entire body surged with the power of God.  It was like nothing I had ever felt before and it just kept coming.  Thoughts raced through my mind.  “What have I done?  What have I asked for?  People warned me about this Pentecostal stuff. This is overwhelming.  This must be the Baptism in the Holy Spirit though.”  I had no experience based reference point for what was happening and many of my friends had been advising against it.  Finally I said out loud, “I have to know if this is You, Lord.”  Not a statement of faith but more a response of unbelief.

In hindsight it is curious to me that meditating on the scriptures brought faith for the Baptism, but the event occurred in so much power,, and was so outside anything I had experienced before that the actual experience brought out unbelief.  There is a message in that statement.

In His mercy, God did something for me which I had never experienced before or after.  As I sat covered and pulsating in the power of God, an oval window seemed to open up in the air, 5 feet in front of me, and through it I could see Jesus seated on a throne.    This lasted about 5 seconds and He looked something like how John described Him in the book of Revelation.  His hair glowed and His eyes had power/light coming out of them.

I think I walked around for the next two weeks almost unable to speak about the event.  Even to people who believed in the Holy Spirit baptism.  Who would believe that I had seen Jesus seated on the throne?  But from that moment forward, I began to experience the manifest presence of the Holy Spirit when I would tell people about Jesus or the scriptures.  He had empowered me to be a witness.

Years later I would look back on this and ask Jesus why this had been such a powerful experience and why it happened apart from laying on of hands or by ministry from some other person.  Why was it like an upper room event?  The answer was in my own question.

The Lord showed me that He had led me through this  much in the same way Hhad led the disciples.

He had promised the Holy Spirit baptism to them and gave them scripture for it out of Joel.     The message that Peter preached at the day of Pentecost out of Joel was not given by a miracle.  Rather the Lord showed me that the disciples had been meditating and talking about that scripture and the promise of the Holy Spirit the entire time they were in the upper room waiting for it.  Yes, it was an event timed by God to the celebration of Pentecost but from a spiritual standpoint it was birthed from a promise and meditation, prayer and confession, the same way it works for other aspects of faith.

I still did not make any connection to confession but this event set me on a course of studying a variety of bible topics.  I was convinced now that if you sought God out on a topic and meditate on the scriptures related to that topic, God would move in your life related directly to that topic you were pursuing and meditating on.  He would be a rewarder of those who diligently sought him.

Hearing the Spoken Word

I am already running long on this article so I will try to accelerate and cover the remaining ground in less time.      Several years after that experience, I obtained a 24 cassette tape series by Kenneth Hagin on the “Name of Jesus” from a friend who said, “These tapes don’t do anything for me, do you want them?”   I knew the name of Jesus was important in the scripture but it was not an area I had ever focused on before.  So off I went down this path.  Same strategy, write down all the scriptures, meditate on them, but also add to it listening to preaching on the topic every day from these tapes.  To make a long story short.  Within about one month I began to see people physically healed in the Name of Jesus:  friends, neighbors, relatives and guys locked up in prison.   Up until the first person was healed, I had no idea or sensation that the fruit of the Name of Jesus was growing in my spirit.  The spoken word, planted in my heart by these tapes, was growing and bearing fruit in the spirit realm and I had no idea.  God set up a series of events that would begin to harvest the fruit and bring very dramatic physical healing to people around me.

It was at this point that I began to understand the power of hearing the word.  Like the parable of the sower,  with  the seed falling on good soil which would produce fruit.  I did not, however,  connect confession much with faith at this point …. even though I would speak some of the scriptures out loud.

The place of confession

It would be years again before I would understand the importance of confession. You can find some my testimony for that in the article entitled “Death and Life Are In The Power of Our Tongues”.   Numerous times God would try to show me but I just would not seem to catch it.

I first saw it when listening to and singing along with Christian songs.    In my early years I was singing along to a song about how I was born again and somebody new lived in me, old things past away and that new life had come.  I went weeks singing this song   in the car while traveling.  And it was funny, after a few weeks I started to feel different inside.   It was like the scriptures and truth I was singing was coming to pass on the inside of me.  I was feeling new inside, I was feeling empowered inside and so on.  I remember thinking, this is exactly like the song.  It is happening.  I am new on the inside.

This was my first inkling that confession was important to manifestation of God’s word.

The next one would be similar.  I had one of Chuck Girard’s albums on tape, the “Name above all names.”  I got it around the time I was studying the “Name of Jesus”.   There was one song on it about the Righteousness of God.  The song was called, “We Are The Righteousness Of God.”  {You can find the lyrics at:   http://christianoriginals.com/music/lyrics.php?id=1574 }

The entire song is a confession about the how we are the Righteousness of God.  I liked the entire tape and would sing along to it.   Driving down the road one day, this one particular song was playing and the Lord spoke to me and said, “Listen to this song.”  So in I put this song on, “heavy rotation,” as I was always listening to it or singing along with it already. After some days of focusing on this song, listening and singing,   I could feel a change happening inside of me.  A new boldness was coming into my life.   I don’t know if there is a way to describe it but I “felt” more righteous.  I felt like I had more authority in the spirit realm.  In my prayer times with my friends,  the power of God was flowing stronger.  We were seeing more difficult problems come to us for prayer including issues related to demon possession and it was like God had turned up the power/authority level in my life for that time period.  But, I still just chalked it up to a special event with God and did not make the strong connection that you could use confession on anything the same way I had been using scripture meditation on any Bible topic.  It would still be years later and experience with my wife’s illness before I would make that strong connection (as mentioned in my article entitled “Death and Life Are In the Power of Our Tongues”).

One might ask, “Why didn’t you make the connection?”

Well I had such great success with just meditating on the word that I did not see the need for confession.   All the tremendous manifestation of God’s power and the fruit of God’s promises I had seen were almost all born out of meditation…. and of course I was trained to think about things.

Faith – Always located in the heart AND in the mouth

It was hard for me to understand that faith would work without my mind getting involved.  In fact, this was probably one of my reasons for focusing on meditation.  I thought that I had to figure it all out first for it to work.  I had to get my mind lined up.

I was even more surprising to me to find out that the mind has very little to do with faith.   Faith does not work in the mind and faith can work even when your mind is going another direction if you can discipline your tongue to say the right thing.

As an engineer trained to always involve the mind, this was probably the hardest, yet most important revelation on faith for me to get.

If you remember nothing else from this article remember that one statement above:  that Faith does not work in the mind and faith can work even when your mind is going another direction IF YOU CAN DISCIPLINE YOUR TONGUE TO SAY THE RIGHT THING.

It is this revelation that began to set me free in the area of faith.  It cleared up my confusion on the topic and made other pieces of scripture come together.

The mind is NOT designed to operate in faith.  The mind cannot operate in faith.

It is like asking an electric powered computer to grow a tomato.   The computer neither has the makeup nor the design to grow anything, it can only “think”, calculate and solve things, it cannot grow things.

I had for years demanded that my mind get involved in faith and had been continually frustrated as to why doubts would arise in my mind.   A doubt would come and I would think, well I have fallen from faith now.  I guess it is not going to work.  This is why meditation was so important to me.  I had to flood my mind with the word so much to make sure that it would not contradict my heart or the few confessions I was making.  If doubts came, I would be in a struggle with them, not knowing I could over power them with confession… so I had to minimize their chance of coming via constant meditation.  The good thing was that the results of transforming my mind made it line up with the word and get out of the way so that faith could work in my heart and in my mouth.

Based on input from others and studying the scriptures, I found out that faith in the bible is almost always, if not always, associated with the heart and with the mouth.

As an engineer, I came to love the clinical description that Paul gave to it in Romans 10,

Romans 10: 8-10

8    But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach;  9    That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.  10  For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

Here we see Paul state that the word of faith is in your heart AND in your mouth and its action is based on your heart believing and your mouth confessing.

This is similar to faith found everywhere else in the Bible.

It is always heart and mouth.

That is the way God designed it.  That is the way God designed you and that is the way to get faith to work.

Speak and believe.

First in the mouth and then in the heart.

I heard Kenneth Hagin say, “You can have doubts in your mind while still having faith in your heart. “  Just don’t confess the doubts, keep confessing the word and you will be fine.

That advice was hard to swallow for someone so geared up mentally and someone who had great results from meditation… but as I began to take that advice to heart and practice it, it was freedom!

I used to struggle to keep my mind lined up.   I thought doubts in my mind would screw up my faith.  They probably did many times when I gave up and spoke out those doubts, not understanding the power of confession.  I used to think that some sin I committed would cancel my faith and I would have to start over.  It probably did many times when I gave up and spoke doubts out not knowing the power of confession.

Now it is easier to ignore doubts or more importantly not give them voice.  And if I sin, I can repent and move forward knowing that it has no consequence on my faith unless I give it consequence through unbelief or a confession of doubt.

One More Testimony

I was working with kids in a juvenile prison and after some time away from the topic of faith, I was back on to it.   I just picked some things to confess to prove that I could believe and confess for a manifestation.    Among other things I began to confess,  “The gifts of the spirit operate in my life”,  and I would speak out the 9 gifts of the Spirit. I also confessed.   “Demons are afraid of me, they get uncomfortable around me.  They get nervous and manifest and want to get away from me.”

After about 1 week, the Lord spoke to me and said, “Within one month I am going to show you something about confession.”   That was Sept. 1^st 2007 and I wrote it down and then forgot about it but I continued to make the confessions daily.  I was doing zero meditation on the topics that I was confessing.  I was not striving in any fashion to live a holy life.   In fact my walk with God was below nominal at the time.  My meditation time in the word was near zero and my prayer time was near zero.  The only real active part of my Christian walk was this one aspect of confession.  If ever there was a time to prove out confession apart from other forms of Christian discipline, this was it.

I was at the juvenile camp to hold a Bible study on Monday October 1^st, exactly one month from the date the Lord spoke to me, but I would not realize that until later when the events that transpired prompted me to check my notes.

Most of the time, the kids at the camp are pretty well behaved in Bible study.  I showed up this night and a small group of 5 or 6 kids came out but one guy in particular started to be disruptive and instigate others as we were trying to get into the Word.

He kept interrupting me and asking silly questions and that stirred up others to either do the same or tell him to be quiet.  Things were getting out of hand.  Finally I got control back of the situation but the look on the face of this one disruptive kid started to change.  He looked upset and he began to say over and over again,  “I don’t feel comfortable here, I want to go.”

Now it is a rule in the camp that once a kid chooses an activity for the evening they are not supposed to move on without staff approval and as a vistor I was typically not allowed to approve a change without involving a staff member, so I told the kid he had to stay.  On and on he went saying , “I don’t feel comfortable here,” and now the other kids were picking up that he was acting strangely and they were trying to figure out what he was up to.    I was slow in making the connection to my confession but it suddenly dawned on me,  this kid was saying the same thing that I had been confessing for the past month.  It was a demon that had been inspiring him and was the cause of all the disruption and his strange demeanor.   Now I started to just watch him more carefully.  He would not quit,  “I’m not comfortable here.  I want to go.”      If I would have been smarter or bolder I would spoken directly to the demon but as it was, with the other kids confused and upset by all this, I finally said to the disruptive kid, “Go on, you are free to go,”  Zing!… he bolted out of his chair and out of the door to other activities on the yard.

The kids asked me, “What was up with that?  One of the other kids said, “That was crazy.”  I told them that the disruptive kid was under the influence of outside sources that made him disruptive.  Another kids said, “Yeah it was like he was on drugs or something.”  So we launched into our Bible study again and we took up the story of Paul being saved on the road to Damascas and Jesus calling out his name, “Saul, Saul,” and how Paul got saved by the mercy of God and somehow we got over next to the story of the Centurion’s faith.

As I was explaining to the kids that a Centurion was a Roman officer, one of them asked, “What was his name.”  I responded,  “Well I don’t know, pick an Italian name, Giovanni.  His name was Captain Giovanni and he saw Jesus was like a General.  And as a Captain, he was not even worthy to have a General come under his roof so he just talked to Jesus like he would have talked to a General in his army, saying, ‘General, you don’t have to visit me, you just give the order and that is enough for me General.  I am lower ranking and not worthy of your presence but just speak and order and it is done.’”    I had heard preaching before that the Centurion’s understood faith because of his military experience but I had never heard any one preach about him seeing Jesus like he would see a General in his own army.  That preaching about rank and the Captain and the General just rolled out of me by revelation.   While I was saying it I was thinking, “Wow that is pretty interesting.  I have never heard it put that way before,” and I was the one that was saying it!

The room got silent at that moment and the kids started looking at each other with surprised faces.  I thought, “That explanation was new to me but it was not that good… was it?”  Then the kid that had asked me, “What is the name of the Centurion,” spoke up again saying, “Do you know what my name is?    And some of the other kids chimed in, “Yeah, did you know what his name is?”  I replied, “No what is your name.”  He responded, “My name is Giovanni!”  Then the scripture about Jesus calling out Saul’s name came to my mind and I told him, “Mr. Giovanni, I did not know your name, but Jesus knows your name and just like He knew Saul’s name He has  called out your name tonight.  Just like He called out Saul’s name to call him to salvation.”

We all were further surprised by that revelation.  We had a mini awakening and revival that night with 5 kids at a juvenile detention camp.  Everyone there, including the one influenced by the demon, left knowing that they had been in touch with the presence of God.   The events were mentioned for the next few weeks of Bible study and we never got tired of calling out Mr. Giovanni’s name.  It became a faith memory for us all.   The disruptive kid did return to bible study in later weeks and yet was never as disruptive again.

I got home, searched for my note book and checked the days date.

Exactly one month to the day, exactly as the Lord had spoken to me and I had written down.

I got exactly what I said.

Demons were afraid of me and uncomfortable around me and a gift of the Word of Knowledge gave me the name of Mr. Giovanni.

I got more revelation about Faith and speaking the word while I was giving the message of the Centurion and I learned that confession of God’s word WILL work even if the rest of your Christian walk is not at its tip top form.

That revelation on the powerful action of faith was very freeing and showed me in a new way the authority we have as believers that is based on faith and not based on works.

What an awesome God we serve.

What an awesome kingdom He has placed us in.

What an awesome privilege and authority He has given us to exercise faith apart from works.

Here confession had worked to manifest an event like you read about in the Gospels, that is, preaching confirmed by signs from God that are designed specifically to capture the attention of the people listening and turn them to God and demons getting nervous around the kingdom of God and wanting to flee.

And it was all by faith and confession.

No prayer, no will power based holy living, no meditating for hours on scriptures, no keeping of the law…. except the law of faith.

In Conclusion

I don’t recommend a nominal walk with God but I am glad it all happened, the way it did and when it did, to show me the power of confession apart from the other disciplines of our Christian walk.  That alone was a revelation to me!  I hope it is to you as well.

Now… what would happen if I applied hearing the word, meditating and strong confession, and mixed in prayer and pursuit of holy living?  I would probably have to give up my job and go full time into the ministry just to keep up with it all.  Not a bad outcome.

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