Friday, January 9, 2009

Excerpts

When assailed by physical sickness or infirmity

Jesus Himself bore my sins in His own body on the tree, that I having died to sins, might live for righteousness – by whose wounds I was healed.
See I Peter 2:24

I have also prepared the following special proclamation, which combines truths from different Scriptures and which has helped Christians in many areas of the world:

My body is a temple for the Holy Spirit, redeemed, cleansed and sanctified by the blood of Jesus. My members – the parts of my body are instruments of righteousness, presented to God for His service and for His glory. The devil has no place in me, no power over me, no unsettled claims against me. All has been settled by the blood of Jesus.
I overcome Satan by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of my testimony, and I do not love my life to the death. My body is for the Lord, and the Lord is for my body.

Based on:

I Corinthians 6:19;
Ephesians 1:7; John 1:7;
Hebrews 13:12; Romans 6:13; 8:33-34
Revelation 12:11; I Corinthians 6:13

Someone might ask: Is it honest for me to make proclamations such as these, when I see in my body the physical evidences of sickness, or when I feel in my soul the oppositions of sin? The answer depends on your point of view. If you are looking at yourself in your own natural condition, then it is not honest. But if you are looking at yourself as God sees you in Christ, then you have the right to make such a proclamation.

Once we have repented of our sins and committed ourselves to Christ, God no longer looks at us as we are in our natural state. Instead, He looks at us from the perspective of the exchange that took place on the cross. Spiritually, He sees us as made righteous; physically He sees us as made whole.

It is significant, that in the Scriptures, the healing provided through the sacrifice of Jesus is never spoken of in the future tense. In Isaiah 53:5, written more than seven hundred years before the death of Jesus, healing is already presented as an accomplished fact. “By His wounds we are healed”. In the New Testament, in I Peter 2:24, the apostles refer to Isaiah 53:5, but uses the past tense. “By whose stripes you were healed”.

When the words we speak about ourselves agree with what God says about us in Christ, then we open the way for Him to make us in actual experience all that He says we are. But if we fail to make the appropriate confession – or proclamation – about ourselves, we are confined to the prison of our own natural state. We have shut ourselves off from the supernatural, transforming grace of God, which works only thru faith.

Again, someone might ask: What about someone who says and does all the right things, and yet the promised results do not follow? An answer is to be found in the words of Moses in Deuteronomy 29:29 “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.”

The reason some people do not receive some part of the promised blessings often belongs in the category of “secret things”. It is vain for us to seek to pry God’s secrets from Him. It is also irreverent. If God withholds an answer, it is more important to trust than to understand.

On the other hand, the words of Moses reminds us of our responsibility, as God’s people, to believe, to proclaim and to act upon those things He has clearly revealed in His Word. Central to this is the provision God made for us though the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. We must not let our concern about the secret things keep us from believing and obeying things which are revealed.

from Blessing or Curse by Rev. Derek Prince



According to the Scriptures, God has put repented sins behind Him and never looks at them. They are far from Him as the East is from the West. If you keep coming back and asking for forgiveness, He really doesn't know what you are talking about. Repentance. The washing of the blood. Forgiveness. A clean slate. It never happened.

from The Annointing by Rev. Benny Hinn




I consider Rev. Derek Prince's Blessing or Curse and Rev. Benny Hinn's The Annointing as the two most important books I've read in 2008. I recommend that you read them,too.