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BIOGRPAHY OF DOYLE DAVIDSON
Doyle Davidson was born on a farm near Sarcoxie, Missouri in 1932. He served as a hospital corpsman in the United States Navy during the Korean War, spending 27 months in Yokosuka, Japan. After his return to the states he was one of thirty students admitted to the University of Missouri, School of Veterinary Medicine in 1958. In August, just prior to entering veterinary school, he was rotating the tires on his car and the presence of God fell upon him and he heard, "I don't want you to be a veterinarian, I want you to be a minister of the gospel." He did not obey God that day and went on to receive a doctorate in veterinary medicine. He moved to north Texas and established a successful equine veterinary practice.
In 1968 God moved in Doyle's life and for two years, the presence of the Lord rode in his car asking him when he was going to preach the gospel. The Lord directed him in 1969 to sell his hospital and practice and obey him. January 2nd, 1970, the sale was finalized, and he drove away not knowing where he was going. Although born again as a small boy, Jesus became Lord of his life that day and he was subsequently baptized in water and the Holy Spirit.
God sent him to Israel in 1974, anointing him to preach the gospel at the Garden Tomb, June 16th, with Acts 1:8 burning in his heart. In 1980, God instructed Doyle to speak to the people of Plano, Texas. He established Water of Life Ministries, and in 1982, closed his veterinary practice.
Doyle is called as a servant and apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ. In 2017 the Lord said to him, "I have chosen you, sent you, to the four corners of the earth to deliver my word without despair or fear."
INTRODUCTION
In November 1988, I
received a request from a pastor in Africa for some of our tapes. God directed
me to send 10 teaching tapes, and I did. We received an additional eight
requests for tapes in November and December 1988, and we received 6,000 requests
in 1989. Through June 1990, we have sent over 88,000 hours of teaching and
worship tapes to 9,000 people in the United States of America and 18 foreign
countries.
In August 1989, God directed me to make available on tape the
teachings He has given me on "The Gospel and Its Benefits" and "The Blood of
Jesus." Since August 1989, we have sent, free of charge upon request, one tape
each month for 20 months, beginning with the first tape in the series--"He Rose
Again."
God has now directed me to put the teachings from "The Gospel and
Its Benefits" and "The Blood of Jesus" in book form and to distribute these
books--again, without charge upon request. In I Corinthians 9:9-18, the apostle
Paul says:
For it is written in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not
muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care of
oxen (v. 9)?
Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes,
no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he
that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope (v. 10).
If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a
great thing if we shall reap your carnal things (v. 11)?
If others be
partakers of this power over you, are not we rather? Nevertheless we have not
used this power; but suffer all things, lest we should hinder the gospel of
Christ (v. 12).
Do ye not know that they which minister about holy
things live of the things of the temple? and they which wait at the altar are
partakers with the altar (v. 13)?
Even so hath the Lord ordained that
they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel (v. 14).
But I
have used none of these things: neither have I written these things, that it
should be so done unto me: for it were better for me to die, than that any man
should make my glorying void (v. 15).
For though I preach the gospel, I
have nothing to glory of: for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me, if
I preach not the gospel (v. 16)!
For if I do this thing willingly, I have
a reward: but if against my will, a dispensation of the gospel is committed unto
me (v. 17).
What is my reward then?
Verily that, when I preach the gospel, I may make the gospel of Christ without
charge, that I abuse not my power in the gospel (v. 18).
That is what God
has instructed me to do--make the gospel of Christ without charge.
God
has revealed these teachings to me over the last 20 years. If you have ears to
hear, lay aside your religious pride, your religious tradition, your tradition
of man, your denominationalism, your theology, and your bible school teachings.
I Corinthians 8:1 tells us that knowledge puffeth up, but charity, or love,
edifieth. II John 6 states: "This is love, that we walk after his commandments."
And John 14:23 states: "If a man love me, he will keep my words."
If you
love God, you will keep His words. If you keep His words, you will keep His
commission, and if you keep His commission, you will preach the gospel. If you
preach the gospel, God will send you, and if God sends you, you will preach the
gospel.
If you preach the gospel, it is the power of God unto salvation
to everyone who believes--to the Jew first and also to the Greek. "For therein
[the gospel] is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is
written, The just shall live by [His] faith (Romans 1:16-17, quoting Habakkuk
2:4)."
CHAPTER 1
THE GOSPEL IS
A BLESSING
I want to begin by saying that the gospel is always a
blessing. In our earlier book, "He Rose Again," we learned that the gospel
is the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. We also
learned that it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes.
Now, I want you to know that the gospel is always a blessing.
In
Romans 15:29, the apostle Paul said:
And I am sure that, when I come
unto you, I shall come in the fulness of the blessing of the gospel of
Christ.
Do you see that? The "fulness of the blessing of the gospel
of Christ." The gospel is a blessing.
Now, if the gospel is a
blessing, then if God makes you sick, sickness must be a blessing. This is
not true. God does not make you sick.
One time I heard a preacher
ask, "If sickness is a blessing, why are you trying to get well?" Good
question, isn't it?
So, the gospel is always a blessing. It is always
with power. And it is always "yes." It is very simple. Remember these three
things, and you can tell whether you are listening to or seeing the gospel.
CHAPTER 2
THE GRACE OF CHRIST
If the
gospel is always a blessing, then we need to be able to recognize the gospel
so that we can understand God's blessing. In his letter to the Galatians,
Paul is writing to a church that has departed from the gospel. We are going
to look at what Paul said to them.
In Galatians 1:6-7, he says:
I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into
the grace of Christ unto another gospel: Which is not another;...
Notice what he says here: "The grace of Christ." The Galatians were
removed from the grace of Christ into another gospel, which is not another.
What was that other gospel? John 1:17 states:
For the law
was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.
Can you
see this? The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus
Christ. The law is not grace. The law is not truth. The law is the "another
gospel" Paul speaks of, which is not another.
Look at Galatians 1:6-7 again:
I marvel
that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of
Christ unto another gospel: Which is not another;...
What
happened to these people? How were they removed from the gospel? Galatians
3:1 tells us that they were foolish and did not obey the truth. They started
out in the Spirit and were ministering faith, but they put themselves under
the law--under the Ten Commandments.
Some That Trouble You
Galatians 1:7 continues: "...But there be some that trouble you..."
Isn't that amazing? People trouble you who preach anything but the gospel.
The church is troubled by false teachings such as: "God does not heal;"
"God does not cast out devils;" "God does not want you to be prosperous;"
"God will not forgive all your sins; He wants you to keep two or three of
them around to remind you how bad you were."
I was talking to
someone about forgiveness of sins, and the Spirit of God told me to show her
Isaiah 43 and 44--to show her that God has blotted out our transgressions.
So I did. I was as nice as I could be.
She said, "You're treading on
holy ground." I said, "I know, I just read you holy words."
She started telling me how you cannot
be forgiven. You always had to be reminded of your transgressions. I spent
about 45 minutes speaking the words of God to her, and I convinced her to
believe the Bible. People who teach another gospel trouble you.
I
Corinthians 15:1-4 tells us that the gospel is that Jesus died, He was
buried, and He rose again the third day. The gospel is not: "Thou shall not
commit adultery;" "Thou shall not steal;" "Thou shall not bear false
witness;" "Thou shall have no other gods before thee;" "Honor thy father and
mother." That is not the gospel.
The gospel is this: Jesus died, He
was buried, and He rose again the third day. He is seated at the right hand
of the Father. Further, God raised you and me with Jesus, and we are seated
in heavenly places in Him, this day.
We are at the right hand of the
Father in Jesus, far above powers, principalities, dominions, and wicked
spirits. In addition, Jesus is making intercession for us today. That is the
gospel.
Removed Unto Another Gospel
Paul said in Galatians
1:6-7:
I marvel that ye are so soon removed from the grace of Christ
unto another gospel: Which is not another;...
In other words, they
started out in the gospel, and they went back under the law--under the Ten
Commandments. The
United States of America may have started out in the gospel, but it has gone
back to the Ten Commandments. America is trying to practice the law.
I heard an evangelist say that America's problem is guilt. The reason
America's problem is guilt is that he and other ministers of this nation,
all my life, have preached, "Thou shall not!"
If they will preach
that Jesus died, and He was buried, and He rose again, they will learn that
the gospel is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes, to
the Jew first and also to the Greek. I love that man. I love you. I love you
enough to read you the Bible that you say you believe every word of.
Why don't you believe it? It is written on a fifth grade level. It does not
take a lot of intelligence to read the Bible. It just takes humility. God
grants grace to the humble, and He resists the proud all day long. And
religious people are proud.
Be a Servant of Christ
Look at
Galatians 1:10:
For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to
please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ.
That is powerful, isn't it? God said that if you are going to please
men, you cannot be His servant.
If you preach the Baptist doctrine, the Methodist doctrine, the
Pentecostal doctrine, if you preach prosperity or healing because it pleases
some, Galatians 1:10 tells us that you should not be the servant of Christ.
If you preach the gospel--that Jesus died, He was buried, and He rose
again--you are preaching Jesus' words. If you preach John 8:31-32--that if
you continue in His word, then you shall be His disciples indeed, and you
shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free--you are preaching
Jesus' words.
If instead you preach religious words--traditions of
man--you have made the gospel of Jesus Christ of none effect. And if we do
that, He said that you and I have no business being a servant of Christ.
CHAPTER 3
THE GOSPEL BY REVELATION
Paul received the revelation of the gospel for the Gentiles. He received it
by the Spirit of God. He received it into his spirit as the Spirit of God
revealed it to him. It was not taught to him by man. And he received the
entire counsel of God.
In Galatians 1:11-12, Paul says:
But I
certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after
man (v. 11).
For I neither received it of man, neither was I
taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ (v. 12).
I thank God
that He revealed the gospel to Paul by His Spirit and did not have Jesus
teach it to him while Jesus was here in the flesh. There was a time in my
life when I thought a man in the flesh needed to teach me the things of God.
It amazed me to think that Paul received all his epistles by revelation from
the Spirit of God to his spirit and that he wrote them all down.
Look at Galatians 1:12 again:
For I neither received it of man,
neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ.
I can truthfully tell you that I have
not been to any man's Bible school. I have not sat at the feet of any man
but Jesus. I have been taught the Word by Him.
No man made me. God
did. He revealed the gospel to me. And I know one thing. I know the Man I
serve.
Traditions of Man
That Man, Jesus, was raised from the
dead, after He descended into hell for you and for me, and He makes
intercession for us today. Galatians 1:8 says that if we preach any other
gospel than the gospel of Christ, we will be accursed. Denominations are
cursed because they preach man's tradition. They preach another gospel,
which is not another.
Denominations need to repent of their pride,
their rebellion, their traditions of man, and their doubt and unbelief.
Denominations need to come humbly to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
fall on their faces before Him, and say, "God forgive me for my pride and my
tradition of man, for my arrogance, and my self-esteem, and for my
intellectual knowledge of the gospel," which is not the gospel. If they do,
God will forgive them and set them free.
You may ask, "What makes you
think you can teach this?" I cannot. It is Jesus in me Who teaches it. I can
only say what Paul said in Galatians 2:20:
I am crucified with
Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the
life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith of the Son of God, who
loved me, and gave himself for me.
He is the One Who is speaking out of me. These are not my words.
I am not a gift to the human race. I am not a gift to the church. I am only
a servant of the Most High God!
You Can Hear God
Paul
received the gospel by the revelation of Jesus Christ. The reason that
amazed me is that I was so blinded by the god of this world--Satan--that I
could not hear revelation from God. Now, God can talk to me for hours. I
hear God talking to me all the time. I can be writing letters or taking a
walk, and God will be speaking to me. He talks to me all the time.
I
was at a meeting in Denton, Texas, and a Spirit-filled Christian said, "I
despise people who have a pipeline to heaven." Today, I would stand up and
say, "Glory be to God, here is one you despise, because I have a pipeline to
heaven!" I would be that bold.
I want the devil to know that I can
hear God. You can, too. John 10:27 says, "My sheep hear my voice." If there
is anything I have taught people, it is that they can hear God.
I
have a friend in Denton, Texas, whom I have not taught in any Bible study
since 1975. He said to me recently, "If there is anything I learned from
you, it is this, that I can hear God." Anyone can hear God.
CHAPTER 4
CURSES FOR PREACHING ANOTHER GOSPEL
Galatians 1:7 concludes: "...But there be some that trouble you, and would
pervert the gospel of Christ."
People that teach the Ten Commandments
pervert the gospel. People that teach, "Jesus does not heal," pervert the
gospel.
Paul continued in Galatians 1:8-9:
But though we, or
an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we
have preached unto you, let him be accursed (v. 8).
As we said
before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than
that ye have received, let him be accursed (v. 9).
Curses come from
preaching any other gospel. Anything that is not the gospel of Jesus Christ
brings curses into your life. That ought to be read in every church in the
United States of America every Sunday morning.
A man who preaches,
"God does not heal," is cursed. A man who preaches, "God cannot forgive all
sins," is cursed. A man who preaches "God does not offer divine prosperity,"
is cursed. The reason he is cursed is that healing, forgiveness, and
prosperity are all benefits of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.
How many of us have heard,
"God does not cast devils out; God does not heal; God does not prosper us;
The only thing God does is save you"? That is what we were taught. The
people who taught those things are cursed. They are cursed.
Many
preachers and theologians in the United States of America are cursed because
they have taught doctrines that are not the gospel. If you can read this and
believe, it ought to frighten you enough that you never teach anything other
than what is in the Bible. I hope I can convince you of that.
Who
Hath Bewitched You?
Look at what Paul says in Galatians 3:1:
O
foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you,...
Here is a Spirit-filled
church bound up by witchcraft.
...Who hath bewitched you, that ye
should not obey the truth?
What does witchcraft do? Witchcraft keeps
you from obeying the Word of God.
Any time a spirit tries to lead you
away from the Word of God, it is a spirit of witchcraft. It does not make
any difference in whom it is operating. It is there solely to seduce your
faith and take you away from the truth.
There are many spirits
preaching in the church today, seducing the faith of God's people. Many of
them. And you will hear them.
After God has opened your eyes and ears, those spirits will be
evident to you. When you get the Word of God in your heart, you will hear
them speaking all the time, because they are on every corner, trying to
seduce your faith.
Obey the Truth
In Galatians 3:1, Paul
told these people that they were foolish, that they were bewitched, and that
they were not obeying the truth. Do you want to know what the truth is? It
is the gospel. In John 14:6, Jesus said: "I am the way, the truth, and the
life."
In Mark 1:14-15, Jesus came into Galilee preaching the gospel
of the kingdom of God, and saying, "Repent ye, and believe the gospel."
Repent and believe the gospel. Have another mind--change your will--and
believe that Jesus died, He was buried, and He rose again the third day.
When Jesus preached the gospel, He had not even died. He still said
to believe. "Repent ye, and believe [that I died, and was buried, and rose
again the third day]." The church has not believed it yet. Preachers still
have not believed.
Do you know what preachers say? "Repent!
Repent! Repent, you sinners!" Jesus did not say that. He said, "Repent ye,
and believe the gospel."
Do you know what preachers say? "Repent, and
join my church. Get into a good Bible teaching church." They are so
deceived.
Jesus
said, "Repent ye, and believe [that I died, was buried, and rose again the
third day]." That is all you are required to believe. Did you know that?
Thank God!
You do not even have to believe that you are a sinner.
Merely believe that Jesus died, was buried, and rose again.
Did you
know that people in the churches of the United States of America have never
heard this message? All they have ever heard is, "You are involved in
pornography, you are involved in liquor, you are involved in this and that."
They have never heard, "Repent and believe the gospel."
Jesus said to
repent and believe the gospel because the gospel of Christ is the power of
God unto salvation. The truth that Jesus died, He was buried, and He rose
again is the ability of God unto salvation to you who will believe.
You can believe that you are a sinner. You can believe that beer is wrong,
that pornography is wrong, and that all those other things are wrong. It
does not do you any good. It will not get you anywhere.
If you will
believe that Jesus died, He was buried, and He rose again, it will get you
to heaven. Not only that, but it is the power of God unto salvation while
you live on earth. That is nice to know. Praise be to God!
CHAPTER 5
HEARING OF FAITH
In Galatians 3:2, Paul
reminded the Galatians how they received the Holy Spirit:
This only
would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by
the hearing of faith?
Did you receive the Holy Spirit by sitting in
your church pews, saying, "Thou shall not covet; Remember the sabbath day
and keep it holy; Thou shall not murder; Thou shall not steal; Thou shall
not commit adultery; Thou shall have no other gods before me"?
Did you get the Holy Spirit by the works of the law? Of course not. You
received the Holy Spirit by the hearing of faith.
You may say, "Well,
Doyle, are you saying that we can disobey the law?" No, I am not telling you
that. I am telling you that if you walk in the Spirit, you will not fulfill
the lust of the flesh. Look at Galatians 5:16 and Romans 8:1 and 8:4 for
yourself.
Continue with Galatians 3:3:
Are ye so foolish?
having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?
The law operates in the flesh.
The Holy Spirit comes through faith.
Look at verse 4:
Have ye
suffered so many things in vain? if it be yet in vain.
"If it be yet
in vain." Thank God, there is still a chance. There is still hope. Religious
televangelists and preachers in the United States of America taught you and
me from our youth, saying "Thou shall not, thou shall not"! Well, my friend,
"Thou shall not" has done nothing but bring this nation into bondage and
caused us to commit more sin.
The fact is, bringing you to a
knowledge of sin is exactly what the law was intended to do. If you knew the
Bible, you would know that to teach people the law--to teach them "Thou
shall not"--makes them sin more. Read Romans chapter 7 for yourself.
Thank God that we can repent. Thank God that if we are confused, we can turn
around and go on. That is what I am teaching you.
Working of
Miracles
The Holy Spirit comes by the hearing of faith. So does the
working of miracles. In Galatians 3:5, Paul asked:
He therefore that
ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you, doeth he it
by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?
The answer is obvious--by hearing of faith.
All you have to do is say, "Thank you, Jesus, for working miracles," and He
works miracles every time. That is the way Jesus works.
One time,
Jesus said to me, "I want you to see how I fed four and five thousand
people." I saw in Matthew chapters 14 and 15 that He took the fish and the
loaves, looked up and blessed them and gave thanks, and then He divided
them.
I said, "Why didn't you show us the rest of your prayer? Why
didn't you record the prayer you prayed?" I could not believe that anyone
could take a piece of fish, look up and say, "Thank you, Father," and start
feeding people.
I was a hypocrite when it came to praying. I
thought that you needed to speak at least 20 words. Jesus just said, "Thank
you, Father," and started feeding the people.
I have learned since
then. I say, "Thank you, Father, for working miracles. Thank you for
healing. Thank you for the Holy Spirit. Thank you for prosperity. Thank you
for forgiveness." That is my prayer. I do not have long prayers anymore. I
just thank God. What happens? My prayers work. And that is what Jesus is
saying here.
Have you ever gone out and said, "Well, today I want
Jesus to heal," and you preach the law--you preach, "I want you not to
commit adultery; I want you not to steal; I want you not to bear false
witness; I want you not to covet; I want you not to have any other gods
before you," and all of a sudden people were healed? Has that ever happened?
No! It has not.
But
have you ever laid hands on the sick and said, "Thank God that with His
stripes, I was healed," and people were healed? Did they get healed when you
did that? Yes, absolutely! Do you know why? Because healing is in the gospel
and because the gospel brings faith. And without faith, it is impossible to
please God.
Religious people have so many things that you cannot do
if you want God to bless you. "You cannot do this. You cannot do that. You
better not do this. If you do this you are going to get sick. If you do that
you are going to die. God won't like you. He will cut you off." They have
more "Thou shall not's" than you can think of.
Jesus fed 5000 men by
simply saying, "Thank you." When I realized that, I said, "It is easier to
remember _Thank you_ than it is to remember all the _Thou shall not's_." So
I took the easy way out. But believe me, it was not easy to get the religion
out of me.
CHAPTER 6
CURSED UNDER THE LAW
The Holy Spirit ministers by the hearing of faith, not by the works
of the law. Faith comes by hearing the Word of God--the gospel. The only
thing that comes by the works of the law is a curse. Look at Galatians 3:10:
For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse.
Religionists have put the United States of America under the curse, because
they preach, "You cannot drink, you cannot smoke, you cannot curse, you
cannot do this, you cannot eat that." The devil has the church of America
blinded.
Preachers say, "You cannot eat red meat." But Abraham's
servant killed a calf in the heat of the day, Sarah prepared it for Jesus,
and He ate it. Look at Genesis 18:7-8. Jesus is my example. If He ate red
meat, so can I.
There are many other seducing doctrines: "We cannot
do this, we cannot do that." Do you know why? Those doctrines are the works
of the law--the deeds of the law.
People in the United States of
America are so bound up with the deeds of the law that they are under the
curse. The more we hear "Thou shall not," the more ill this nation becomes.
The reason Christians build medical centers is that Christians believe,
"Thou shall not." The reason there are so many physicians in this land is
that Christians believe, "Thou shall not." The reason there are so many lawyers and courts is
that Christians believe, "Thou shall not, or cannot unless I tell you to."
Christians do not know the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
I
once heard a Baptist lawyer from Houston, Texas, arguing in favor of the
inerrancy of the Bible. Simply believe the Bible instead. If you are a
lawyer, you ought to be able to read. You are supposed to be educated enough
to read simple language. Read the Bible, which is written on a fifth grade
level, and believe it.
The reason you do not believe the Bible is
that you have been so blinded by the god of this world--by your education,
your arrogance, your pride, and your intellect--that you cannot even read
the simple gospel: that Jesus died, and He was buried, and He rose again.
Instead, you believe the law--that everyone who drives over 55 miles per
hour will get a ticket; that everyone who eats certain foods will get cancer
or high cholesterol or have a coronary attack; that every woman who eats
certain foods and takes certain drugs is subject to certain types of cancer
in her body.
The medical profession in the United States says it
will not advertise, but it advertises fear, doubt, and unbelief for the sake
of public health: "You better have your X-ray; you better have your checkup;
you better have your blood pressure checked." You hypocrites, admit that you
say those things for nothing but money. You know it, and I know it, because
I was in medicine myself.
Do not try to deceive God. You cannot even deceive me. Everyone who is
under the works of the law is under the curse.
Under the Curse
You should not want to be under the law. You have been taught the law in
your favorite church and in your favorite denomination, but you should not
want to be there. It brings a curse to you.
The fact is, though, that
you do not want to believe that Jesus died, and was buried, and rose again
for you on the third day. You do not want to believe that His body was made
a sacrifice for sin, that the exchange is His righteousness for our sin, His
riches for our poverty, His health for our sickness. You do not want to hear
that. You want to believe everyone with a Ph.D. or two, even though they
cannot even read the Bible written on a fifth grade level.
Lord God,
have mercy on America--have mercy on the people in this prideful nation, who
cannot believe simple statements which challenge their intellect and their
preeminence. Let me say to you, as God spoke to Paul in I Corinthians 15:25,
that Jesus Christ shall reign until He puts down all rule, all authority,
and all power.
That word "rule" means to be preeminent. Jesus will
put down every Ph.D. He will put down every professor and every college. He
will put down every judge. He will put down the Supreme Court. He will put
down every person who has preeminence, who has a law or word that is above
the Word of the living God.
Do not fool yourself, America. Jesus has come to visit you. He
will visit you in a way that you will not like. However, if you will humble
yourself and receive His instruction, it will be life to your flesh.
Jesus loves you. He died for you. He was buried. He rose again the third
day. He is seated at the right hand of the Father making intercession for
our rebellion.
I was just as rebellious and arrogant as you. You say,
"You still are." That is your opinion, but that is not God's. God grants
grace to the humble, and He resists the proud. And He has not started
resisting what I say. He has blessed me and encouraged me in the things that
I teach. And I will continue to teach as He continues to bless me.
I want to teach you about God's blessing. God is trying to correct the
human race. He loves you. He loves you enough to raise someone like me, to
take my life and break it into pieces, and to show the gospel to me, to
reveal to me the mystery of God, and then to cause me to speak it to the
world.
All Nations Shall Be Blessed
Genesis 12:1-3 states:
Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from
thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will show thee
(v. 1):
And I will make
of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and
thou shalt be a blessing (v. 2):
And I will bless them that bless
thee, and curse him that curseth thee:...(v. 3).
Do you believe
that? Praise God! Do you believe that you will be blessed if you bless those
who walk in the steps of faithful Abraham? Do you believe that you will be
cursed if you curse them? Well, Jesus said it, and you would be smart to
believe it.
Look at the rest of verse 3:
...And in thee shall
all families of the earth be blessed.
Jesus said, "In thee shall
all families of the earth be blessed." You have probably never realized that
this is the gospel. Paul says so in Galatians 3:8:
And the
scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith,
preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations
be blessed.
Notice two things here. First, notice that justification
comes through faith, not through the law. Second, notice that God preached
the gospel to Abraham before He justified the heathen through faith.
What is the gospel?
...In thee shall all nations be blessed (v. 8).
That is the gospel.
The gospel is a blessing. God announced the gospel to Abraham in Genesis
12:3. He preached the gospel beforehand, because He knew that in Abraham
everyone would be blessed. He knew that you and I would be blessed through
faith.
Blessed with Faithful Abraham
Galatians 3:7 says:
They which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham.
Verse 9 says:
So then they which be of faith are blessed with
faithful Abraham.
If we do not have faith, we are not going to be
blessed. We cannot be blessed by the works of the law. We will never be
blessed by the works of the law.
Faith will bless your house. The
works of the law will curse you. God did not bring the law for some 450
years after Abraham. He gave the law to Moses, and He brought it for one
reason: to be our schoolmaster--to bring us to Jesus.
The law is
intended to be our tutor, our guardian, and our manager and to bring us to
Jesus. After we come to Him, we are no longer under the schoolmaster. The law shuts up faith!
Teaching the Law is Witchcraft
Preachers in the United States of
America have taught us the law. They taught me the law when I was in church.
I learned the Ten Commandments. I recited them.
I grew up in a
Christian home. My mother and father are both over 80 years old, and both of
them have been born again for over 60 years. My mother has Baptist roots,
and my father has Methodist roots.
I was taught the law--the Ten
Commandments. The school that I attended in Missouri had the Ten
Commandments posted on the walls in more than one classroom.
It was
an act of God for the United States Supreme Court to declare
unconstitutional the requirement that the Ten Commandments be posted in
classrooms. Do you know why He caused that to happen? He took away the law
and the Ten Commandments that He might establish Christ. It was the mercy of
God on this land that He used the Supreme Court to take away the law.
The religious people in this nation came against the Supreme Court
and have come against God. They do not know the God of Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob. They cannot even read the Bible they preach and say they believe
every word of.
Why? Because they have departed from the living way,
and they have been bewitched. Bewitched! As Galatians 3:1 states: "Who hath bewitched you, that
ye should not obey the truth?"
The church of America is bound by
witchcraft. One of the greatest blessings that could happen to America would
be for God to change this nation's attitude toward the Ten Commandments and
the law. God told me that. I did not say it. He did. Praise God!
CHAPTER 7
TURN US FROM OUR INIQUITIES
God told
Abraham that in him all families of the earth would be blessed. Now I am
going to show you how we are blessed. Look at what the apostle Peter said in
Acts 3:25-26:
Ye are the children of the prophets, and of the
covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, And in thy
seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed (v. 25).
Unto you
first God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in turning
away every one of you from his iniquities (v. 26).
God raised up
Jesus and sent Him to bless us. God blesses us by turning you and me from
our perversities and our iniquities. Until He turns us from our iniquities,
the blessings of Abraham will never come upon us. The reason the church is
rarely blessed is that people believe they can walk in their own
righteousness and not in the righteousness of God.
Look at verse 26
again and see why you should bless your enemies. When you bless your
enemies, God corrects them and turns them from their iniquities.
Jesus taught me years back from Luke 6:28: "Bless those that curse you. Pray
for those that despitefully use you." I said, "Why? They do not like me." So
He showed me that when you bless your enemies, He turns them from their attack and from their
iniquities. They stop yielding to evil spirits when you start blessing them.
You will have to learn to bless your enemies.
That is why I spend so
much time blessing people. Few days go by that I do not bless someone. And I
hope all of you bless me every day--three or four times. I do not want to be
going the wrong way, either.
The Gate of His Enemies
Jesus
blesses us by turning us from our iniquities. He blesses us by possessing
the gate of His enemies.
Look at Genesis 22:15-17:
And the
angel of the Lord called unto Abraham out of heaven the second time (v. 15),
And said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord, for because thou hast
done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son (v. 16):
That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will
multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon
the sea shore; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies (v. 17);
Verse 17 says: "Thy seed"--that is, the seed of Abraham--"shall possess
the gate of his enemies." His enemies, not yours.
Continue with verse 18:
And in thy seed
shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my
voice.
You cannot be a blessing to anyone in the earth if you are not
obeying the voice of God. You can preach the Bible from daylight until dark
and still not obey the voice of God.
Look again at verse 17:
...Thy seed shall possess (take possession of) the gate of his enemies.
In Galatians 3:16, Paul tells us who the seed of Abraham is--that is,
who is going to possess the gate of his enemies:
Now to Abraham and
his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but
as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ.
Combine Galatians 3:16
with Genesis 22:17, and you will see that Jesus is the seed and that Jesus
shall possess the gate of the enemy. And that is exactly what He did on the
day He was raised from the dead. He destroyed the works of the devil.
Attack the Gates of Hell
Jesus possessed the gate of His
enemies when He was raised from the dead. Not only did Jesus possess the
gate of His enemies, but He promised us that the gates of hell would not
prevail against His church.
In Matthew 16:13-18, Jesus and His disciples had come into
Caesarea Philippi, and He asked them:
Whom do men say that I the
Son of man am (v. 13)?
And they said, Some say that thou art John the
Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets (v. 14).
He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am (v. 15)?
And Simon
Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God (v.
16).
And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon
Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father
which is in heaven (v. 17).
And I say also unto thee, That thou art
Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it (v. 18).
Why will the gates of hell not
prevail? Because when Abraham had the gospel preached to him, God told him
that his seed--Jesus--would take possession of His enemies.
Jesus
will possess sickness. He will possess poverty. He will possess doubt. He
will possess unbelief. He will possess any spirit of witchcraft. And it
cannot prevail against Him.
Notice, Jesus said, "prevail against." "Prevail against" tells me
that you are on the attack. You have to attack the devil. You have to attack
the gates of hell. You cannot cross your arms and sit down and be religious.
You have to war a warfare. You have to attack Satan. You have to press into
the Spirit of God. If you want the devil out of your life, you have to take
authority over him and command him out.
God intended for you and me
to attack the gates of hell. Torment is hell. Fear is torment. Anything on
this earth that brings fear and torment is of the devil. All sickness and
disease is of the devil. The church would do well to believe that.
Preachers in the United States of America preach that good Christians can
get sick. Jesus said in Luke 18:19: "None is good, save one, that is, God."
The only reason Christians get sick and stay sick is because they do not
believe God heals. It is that simple!
You can preach what you want
to. You can condemn and intimidate people, but you cannot intimidate Jesus.
He laughs at you day and night, because you are a foolish preacher when you
preach that sickness can be of God. There is no such thing written in the
gospel.
Contrary to Peace and Godliness
When I first read
Matthew 16 and heard people say, "You have to command the devil out of your
life; you have to bind the devil," it was as if they were speaking empty
words to me. I would think, "Why would you want to bind the devil? Who is
he?"
My impression
of the devil was that he was a man in a red suit with horns! I would think,
"How could that creature be so effective against anyone?"
My mind was
so entangled with medical knowledge that I thought, "Why would you want to
bind the devil? Give him some streptomycin or penicillin or tetracycline."
God had to deliver me from the bondages of this world so I could see that
the devil was the enemy who produced sickness and disease and confusion and
poverty and strife and tornadoes and wars and earthquakes and anything else
that is contrary to peace and godliness.
The Bible tells us that
Abraham's seed shall possess His enemies. Jesus shall possess cancer and
heart disease. Take possession of it. Lift it up. Take it out and restore it
with new tissue. If He has to, He will put in a new heart.
Spare
Parts Room
Someone once told me about a person who went to heaven and
saw the spare parts room. I have never heard anything so ridiculous. God
creates things from nothing. If He wants to make a heart in you, He does not
have to bring a spare heart from heaven.
People tell stories like
that so someone will listen to their testimony: "Well, I have been to
heaven, and I saw the spare parts room." I am glad God gave me a sense of
humor.
I do not believe that God has a spare parts room. A spare
parts room is not a blessing. And the gospel is always a blessing.
CHAPTER 8
THE GOSPEL IS "YES"!
You have
just seen that the gospel is always a blessing. In this chapter, I am going
to show you that, contrary to your religious teaching, the gospel is always
"yes."
Look at II Corinthians 1:17:
When I therefore was thus
minded, did I use lightness? or the things that I purpose, do I purpose
according to the flesh, that with me there should be yea yea, and nay nay?
Paul asked, "Do I purpose according to the flesh, that with me there
should be [yes yes and no no]?"
Did you get that? The Word of God is
not "yes and no." Hear the Bible! The gospel is always "yes."
Fleshly Teaching
If you have been taught that the answers in the
gospel are "yes or no," or "yes and no," you have been taught fleshly
teaching. When I first entered the charismatic wilderness, this "yes and no"
gospel was commonly taught: "God answers yes and no, wait and not now, and
maybe."
That is not the gospel. That is fleshly preaching. Fleshly
preaching is preaching "yes and no." The gospel is "yes"--always "yes." I
will show you this. Look at II Corinthians 1:18-20:
But as God is true, our word toward
you was not yea and nay (yes and no) (v. 18).
For the Son of God,
Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, even by me and Silvanus and
Timotheus, was not yea and nay, but in him was yea (v. 19).
For all
the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God
by us (v. 20).
A "yes and no" gospel gives religious preachers an
escape route for their doubt and unbelief. If you believe the gospel, all of
the promises of God will be "yes" and "so be it" in Christ for you.
Promises of God are "Yes"
All of the promises of God are "yes,"
in Christ. It is simple. The answer is "yes!" So, if you pray according to
the scripture and believe God, you always know what is going to happen.
If you pray to receive Christ, and you believe on Him, you are going to
receive Him. If you pray to receive the baptism in the Holy Spirit, with
evidence of speaking in other tongues, you are going to receive the
outpouring of the Holy Spirit. You are going to receive it with tongues.
Why? Because the promise is "yes." That is the only way the Holy Spirit
comes.
If you pray for
forgiveness of sin, and you believe that God forgives you when you ask Him,
your answer is "yes." He forgave you when you asked Him, and He blotted your
sin out of the book. Further, He put it as far from you as the east is from
the west, and cast it into the depths of the sea. He does not have any
remembrance of it. He is not the one reminding you of it every day.
Reminding you of sin is one of Satan's great games. He seems to know every
sin anyone ever committed. I think he works overtime to remember them. When
you are following God, Satan never hesitates to try to stop you by reminding
you of sin.
Even though God has forgotten your sin, and has blotted
it out of the book, and has set you free, Satan still wants to remind you
over and over and over. You can tell what spirit you are walking in when you
keep remembering your sins. Instead, remember that all the promises of God
are "yes," and in Him "Amen," unto the glory of God.
Hypocrisy in
Preaching the Word
Preachers in the United States of America need to
learn to preach the truth. They will preach one verse exactly as it is
written, and argue and debate that it means what it says. Then they preach
the next verse, and because that one is contrary to their doctrine, they say
it means something else. The reason American preachers are this way is the
dishonesty of their hearts.
When I first got into the Charismatic
movement in 1970, I set out to find who in America followed God. I saw
hypocrisy in American preachers.
I was in Dallas, Texas, in 1973, listening to one of the leading
faith ministers in America teaching out of Acts 8:12. He said many of the
Samaritans believed and were baptized. The 13th verse says Simon believed
also and was baptized.
This minister said Simon was not a Christian.
The words "believed" and "baptized" in the 12th verse have exactly the same
meaning as the words "believed" and "baptized" in the 13th verse. But
because this man is a hypocrite and because of the dishonesty of his heart,
he said Simon was not a Christian.
I sat in absolute disbelief and
astonishment that a man who called himself a faith minister would be so
hypocritical as to claim that the words "believe" and "baptize" in verse 12
changed meaning in verse 13. I was stunned. I could not believe his
dishonesty, even though I grew up with people like him.
I do not find
many ministers in this land any less dishonest than he. They preach what
they want to preach. They do not preach what the Word says.
God have
mercy on America--on the hypocrites of this land. They have their own
version of the gospel and are afraid to speak the truth:
A PROPHECY
For judgment will come unto them, saith the Lord. And they will receive
My correction or they will be cut off. For everyone shall hear My voice. And
everyone shall hear My word. And every man shall have the time to consider.
For as it is written in My prophets, many shall be in the valley of decision when the great day of
the Lord is coming. Many shall be in the valley of decision, and they will
have to believe whether My word means what it says or whether their doctrine
shall prevail. For My words shall take preeminence in the land, saith the
Lord. And the things that I have spoken out of my prophets' mouths shall
come to pass. For I have ordained it from My heart, and it has gone forth
out of My mouth and it has come to pass that My Son should come into the
earth. And that He should die, that He should be buried, and He should rise
again. And that the first covenant should be set aside and He should become
the mediator of the second. But many have rejected that word, saith the
Lord, and they have chosen to speak the words that the people would like.
They have chosen to speak a vision of their own heart. And they have not
chosen to speak by the Spirit. For they have yielded to their own mind and
their own intellect. And they have chosen to exalt their own knowledge and
their own opinion instead of humbling themselves and receiving the things of
the Lord. But many shall be in the valley of decision, saith the Lord,
before that great day of the coming of the Lord. And they shall have
opportunity to consider and believe and receive the gospel of My Son. For I
have sent Him and He died, and He was buried and He rose again. And He is
salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first and also to the
Greek. Praise be to God. Thank you, Lord Jesus.
CHAPTER 9
THE GOSPEL IS WITH POWER
I want you to see that
the gospel is with power. The gospel is always a blessing. The gospel is
always "yes." And the gospel is always with power.
Because the
gospel is with power, it will always be "yes." If your version of the gospel
is not with power, it will be "yes and no." Furthermore, it will not be the
gospel of Christ.
You will not see anyone moving in power who is
preaching a "yes and no" gospel. You might as well know that. Preachers will
never preach a "yes and no" gospel if they are moving in power. They cannot
move in power if they are preaching "yes and no." That is not God's Word.
I Corinthians 2:1-5 are verses God showed me early as a Christian:
And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech
or of wisdom...(v. 1),
The word "wisdom" is "skill."
...Declaring unto you the testimony of God (v. 1).
For I determined
not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified (v. 2).
And I was with you in
weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling (v. 3).
And my speech
and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom,...(v. 4).
"Enticing" words are "persuasive" words of man's wisdom. Paul's
preaching was not with persuasive words of man's wisdom, or of man's skill.
... But in demonstration of the Spirit and of power (v. 4):
That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of
God (v. 5).
Examine these verses carefully. They are very significant
to you and me as we walk in the body of Christ. You must understand that
preaching as you know it will do nothing for you. The gospel is the power of
God unto salvation if you believe. The true gospel is always with power.
The Gospel and the Cross
Paul said first of all that he did
not go to the people with excellency of speech or of wisdom--that is, skill.
He did not use his own skill. Instead, he declared unto them the testimony
of God. Remember I Corinthians 2:2:
For I determined not to know any
thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified (v. 2).
Can you see that? Paul said he
determined to know nothing except Jesus and Him crucified. That excludes the
law. That excludes the Ten Commandments.
In I Corinthians 15:1-4,
Paul said that he delivered first to them the gospel. Here, in I Corinthians
2, he says that he came preaching Christ and Him crucified.
I want
you to see that the gospel and the cross are that Jesus died, was buried,
and was raised from the dead. If Jesus was crucified--if Jesus died on the
cross, then He was also resurrected--He was raised from the dead. The gospel
and the cross are the same. Once you receive this in your heart, you will
never miss it again.
In the church today, there are "gospel"
preachers, and there are "cross" preachers. One group is always preaching
the cross. The next group will say, "I do not preach the cross, I preach the
gospel."
When I first became a Christian, I met people who said,
"Everyone in the church brings us to the cross. We have to leave the cross."
So I did. I did not know what the cross was.
Then I started reading
in the Bible that the cross is the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.
My friend, if you ever leave the cross, you have left God. The cross is the
gospel, and the gospel is the cross.
The cross and the gospel are the
power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes. If you ever want
anything from God, it must come from the gospel and the cross. Do not ever
leave the cross. But do not stay on it.
You must know Jesus--the resurrected Jesus. The
cross does not merely include Jesus hanging on wooden timbers. The cross
includes the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus.
There
are many preachers in America in many denominations who hang you on the
cross and leave you there. You are there every day, bleeding, and you never
die. You just wish you could. You need to know that the cross is the death,
burial, and resurrection of Jesus.
Power of God
The gospel
is not in the wisdom of man. Look at
I Corinthians 2:3-4:
And I
was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling (v. 3).
And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's
wisdom,...(v. 4).
If you see a person preaching man's wisdom,
know this, it is not the Holy Spirit. That is devastating to someone who has
been studying and developing his own teaching. Preach the Word of God.
Consider your own teachings dead--because that is what they are.
Paul
did not come with enticing words of man's skill. He did not even come with
enticing words. He did not even come with the Word only. Instead, he came,
"In demonstration of the Spirit and of power" (verse 4).
How did Paul come? In demonstration.
Notice that the demonstration was of the spirit and of power. The word
"power" is from the Greek word dunamis and means "ability."
Wisdom of Man
Paul came not with words, but demonstrating the spirit
and power. He tells us why in I Corinthians 2:5:
That your faith
should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.
Your
faith should not stand in the wisdom of men--in physicians. It should stand
in the power of God.
I Corinthians 2:3-5 are the verses that God
used to convince me that He never mixed medicine with His healing power. You
cannot mix medicine and the power of God because they are incompatible. Paul
did not come with enticing words of man's wisdom.
Religionists say,
"We have a medical clinic over here. We want all the sick to come. We want
to preach the gospel to you and dispense medication. We will bandage up all
your wounds. We will give you some splints. We will send you home to die, in
Jesus' name." Well, that is all they can do, if a sick person is terminal.
Paul said that he did not come in man's wisdom. He came in demonstration
of the spirit and power. Why?
That your faith should not stand in the wisdom (skill) of [a man],
but in the power (ability) of God. (v. 5).
Being told to count
his wisdom as nothing is devastating to an intellectual person--to a person
who has spent any time studying. However, God said to count your wisdom as
nothing.
I have almost succeeded in counting my wisdom as
nothing, but it has taken time. It is going to take you time, too. You are
not going to get out of the wilderness in a day.
Let God Lead You
Out
Do not be proud. Do not just decide to get hold of this message
and say, "I am going to leap right out of this and be perfect in a day."
You did not start relying on medicine in a day, and you are not going to
stop in a day. Let God lead you out. Let Him take you out step by step.
Let him lead you from one miracle to the next, as He led the Jewish
people out of the land of Egypt. It took 11 miracles to get them out of
Egypt. It will take at least that many to get you out of medicine.
It
is incredible how many miracles God did for me before I finally said, "God,
you truly do not heal through medicine, do you?" He simply does not.
But, you see, if you come
teaching man's wisdom, the faith of the people will be in the wisdom of a
man. That is where our faith is today. In the United States of America, our
faith stands in the wisdom of men.
Man's wisdom can cause people to
have confidence, or faith, in it. However, it is not God's faith, it is your
faith. Your wisdom is a vision of your own heart. If we, as ministers of
this land, will obey the call God has put on us, and demonstrate the Spirit
of God, men's faith will not be in the wisdom of man. Their faith will be in
the power of God.
Please do not misunderstand me. If you get sick, go
to the doctor quickly. Do not stop going to the doctor until God tells you
not to go.
A man used to come to Water of Life Church who thought he
was a faith person. He threw his glasses in the trash and flushed his
contact lenses down the drain. His glasses lay in an alley three days. The
trash people did not even come.
He thought the devil was keeping the
trash people from coming to pick his glasses up. He left two hundred dollars
worth of glasses lying in that alley. God was trying to tell him, "Go back
and get your glasses, you blind person, you. You are going to need them."
He told me this story, and I said, "Oh, my Lord, you're deceived." He
said, "What do you mean? I have faith." I said, "You are deceived." The man
had no faith.
Not too long after that, he came to me after I taught
Deuteronomy 28 and said, "Do not tell me the blessings in Deuteronomy 28 are
Abraham's blessings." I said, "Well, whose are they, then?" He said, "Those were Moses' blessings."
I said, "Can't you read that in Abraham all of the world is blessed?
That includes Moses. Can't you read that?"
Needless to say, he did
not stay in Water of Life Church much longer. People say they believe, but
when you talk with them, you find that they believe nothing.
CHAPTER 10
THE KINGDOM IS IN POWER
The kingdom of
God is not in word, but in power. The kingdom is not in the preaching of
words. It is in publishing, or demonstrating, the gospel--that Jesus died,
He was buried, and He rose again.
Look at I Corinthians 4:19-20:
But I will come to you shortly, if the Lord will, and will know, not the
speech of them which are puffed up, but the power (v. 19).
For the
kingdom of God is not in word, but in power (v. 20).
The kingdom of
God is in power, and the gospel is the power of God unto salvation to
everyone who believes. The kingdom of God is not in word, but in power. It
is in the ability of God.
"Puffed up" means full of pride--no power,
just pride. God will not send you to preach unless there is power. Why?
Because He does not want the faith of the people you address to stand in the
wisdom of a man. He wants their faith to be in the power of God.
The
church Jesus Christ is coming back for will operate in the power of God.
Now, church, hold steady, do not get nervous, and do not run out on God. He
is capable and able to bring us into the land that He has set before us, if
we only believe Him. He
will not hurt us, either, while He is bringing us into the land.
After all, God kept the rebellious Jews walking in the wilderness for 40
years, and their shoes did not even wear out. That is a blessing, did you
know that? In 40 years, their shoes did not even wear out. They died in
shoes that would not wear out.
God will bless you in the
wilderness, too. However, just because you are being blessed does not mean
that you are obeying God, nor does it mean that God is pleased with you. God
is only pleased with people who obey His Word.
God blessed the rebels
along with the people who were obeying Him. But rebels have to beg. They
have to strike rocks instead of merely speaking to them. They murmur. A few
of them die. God has to open up the ground and bury some. Read the Bible and
see that these things happened.
Blessings do not necessarily mean
that you are obeying God. It depends upon how you obtain the blessings. If
you are obeying God, though, you will always have all sufficiency in all
things that you may abound to every good work. Read II Corinthians 9:8 and
see.
You will always have sufficiency in all things. You will not be
up and down. There will not be peaks and valleys. You will always abound to
every good work.
I have found this to be true over the years. It has
been a blessing to learn to flow in the Spirit--to walk in the Spirit and watch God bring
the blessings upon me and overtake me. Believe me, I experienced the
alternative, and I did not like it.
Be Led by the Spirit of God
In I Thessalonians 1:5, Paul said:
For our gospel came not unto
you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much
assurance; as ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sake.
Notice how the gospel came:
...Not unto you in word only, but
also in power, and in the Holy [Spirit],...
The gospel came with the
Word and with the ability of the Holy Spirit, and it came led by the Spirit
of God. That is how the gospel is to be preached.
Do not take the
Bible and preach. Do not even take the Bible with faith and preach. Go when
God tells you. Be led by the Spirit, and teach where He tells you to teach.
Demonstrate the power where He tells you. If He tells you not to pray
for someone, He means do not pray for them. Yes, God will tell you that.
People who preach the Word and say, "Now I have preached the Word to
you; I have done my part; now it is up to God," are deceivers. Their hearts
are hard. They are blind guides.
They strain at gnats and swallow camels. Jesus said that--I did
not.
The church of America, basically, is led by blind guides who
strain at gnats and swallow camels because they do not believe the Bible.
They do not know anything about the power of God. If the power of God had
been in the church I attended as a child, everyone would have run away.
My mother came to visit Water of Life Church a few years ago, and on the
way home she said, "Doyle, you know, when we were worshipping God, something
came on me." I said, "What was it, mother?" She said, "I guess it was that
Holy Ghost you talk about." Then she said, "Do you want to know something
else? It is still on me!"
God was trying to show her that the people
at the church she attends do not know anything about the Holy Spirit. They
know a little bit about the scripture, nothing about Jesus, and nothing
about the Holy Spirit.
When the true gospel is preached, it will not
come in word only. It will come in power, and in the Holy Spirit, and in
much assurance.
CHAPTER 11
THE GOSPEL IS FULLY
PREACHED
When the gospel is preached, it comes in power. When the
gospel is preached, it will be fully preached, with mighty signs and
wonders.
Paul fully preached the gospel of Christ in places that
had never heard the gospel. Look at Romans 15:15-19:
Nevertheless, brethren, I have written the more boldly unto you in some
sort, as putting you in mind, because of the grace that is given to me of
God (v. 15),
That I should be the minister of Jesus Christ to the
Gentiles, ministering the gospel of God, that the offering up of the
Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost (v. 16).
I have therefore whereof I may glory through Jesus Christ in those
things which pertain to God (v. 17).
For I will not dare to speak
of any of those things which Christ hath not wrought by me, to make the
Gentiles obedient, by word and deed (v. 18),
Through mighty signs and wonders, by the power of
the Spirit of God; so that from Jerusalem, and round about unto Illyricum, I
have fully preached (not partially preached) the gospel of Christ (v. 19).
When I first got into the Charismatic movement in 1970, I heard
Spirit-filled ministers say, "You cannot teach the full gospel. The church
of America cannot receive it."
Well, how do you know they cannot
receive it if you never preach it? Those same people say, "Do not go to
Africa and preach prosperity." They actually say prosperity is an American
gospel.
The Gospel in Africa
In 1985, God sent me to
Africa. I wanted to go over there and watch blind eyes open, because eyes
are sometimes difficult to open in America. I wanted to see blind eyes
opened, deaf ears opened, the lame walk, devils cast out, and other
miracles.
The first night I was there, God brought a blind man to
us. We laid hands on him, and God healed his eyes. He took the Bible and
read it. Glory be to Jesus!
I was so naive that I just handed him
a Bible and said, "Read." I did not even know if the man could read. I never
thought that he might not be able to read. He started reading that Bible.
Five minutes before, he could not see anything.
The second night, God healed more people. The
third day, Sunday, God said, "Now you are going to do what I sent you over
here for. You are going to preach prosperity to these people." And we cut
loose.
We had a six hour service one Sunday, and I spoke three of
those six hours--an hour and a half on faith, and the next hour and a half
on prosperity. Those people never moved out of their seats. I did not know I
could speak that long.
I preached the gospel--prosperity--to people
who had never heard it. Our host said, "I have heard many people preach II
Corinthians 8, but I have never seen what it says."
Well, those
verses are obvious, if you have revelation. But if you are afraid that a
poor person cannot receive the gospel, you do not believe in God. Poor
people are the ones to whom you are supposed to preach the gospel.
The Gospel in McKinney, Texas
We started a mission in McKinney,
Texas. When we went to McKinney and started giving food away, we preached
the full gospel to the people right away. I thought, "God, slow down, these
people might stone me." Finally, they began to like us.
We fed
108 people one night. Later, the sanctuary was full. They liked the service.
They even began to raise their hands. In the beginning, they would not raise
their hands. You would tell them to raise their hands, and they would look
at you like you were dead.
At the end, though, I got them to raise their hands. Do you know how? I
stood up front, raised my hands, and looked them in the eye. You have to be
bold when you preach the gospel.
Signs and Wonders
In
Romans 15:18-19, Paul says that he did not dare to speak of anything that
Christ had not worked in him:
...To make the Gentiles obedient,
by word and deed (v. 18),
Through mighty signs and wonders, by the
power of the Spirit of God...(v. 19).
Gentiles will never walk in
obedience to God without the power of the Holy Spirit and signs and wonders.
The reason so few people walk in faith is that they cannot obey the Holy
Spirit, and the reason they cannot obey the Holy Spirit is that there are no
signs and wonders.
In II Corinthians 10:4-6, Paul talks about pulling
down strongholds and casting down everything that exalts itself against the
knowledge of God and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience
of Christ. The church will never be obedient without the power of the Holy
Spirit and signs and wonders.
The full gospel of Jesus Christ must be
preached. Those who believe will be saved. The Word will be confirmed with
signs following.
Spiritual Gifts Establish You
Finally, look at Romans 1:9-12:
For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son,
that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers (v. 9);
Making request, if by any means now at length I might have a prosperous
journey by the will of God to come unto you (v. 10).
For I long to
see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift, to the end ye may
be established (v. 11);
That is, that I may be comforted together
with you by the mutual faith both of you and me (v. 12).
The
purpose of spiritual gifts is to establish the church. The church cannot be
established without the gifts. That is why the gifts must operate in every
service you attend. You must let God have the liberty to do what He wants to
do.
The reason the church of America, both denominational and
charismatic churches, has not been established is that few spiritual gifts
are manifested. Occasionally, there might be some healings, but few devils
are cast out. Religionists in America do not believe Christians can have
devils.
The church must repent and believe what Paul said in II
Corinthians 3:6. Paul says in that verse that God has made us able ministers of the new testament, not
of the letter, but of the Spirit, for the letter killeth, but the Spirit
giveth life.
We are to be able ministers of the new testament--the
new covenant: Jesus died, He was buried, and He rose again. We are to be
able ministers, not of the letter, but of the Spirit. When we obey God,
people will receive life. This is the true gospel, and it must be ministered
by the Spirit of God.
