Risk Taking Part 2

Here are a few assumptions:

1. You want to see more of “Your Kingdom come on Earth as it is in Heaven” through your life and your church.  After all, this is how Jesus taught us to pray.

2. You believe in the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit.  That is to say, you believe in the supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit; healing, prophecy, miracles, divine guidance and wisdom, tongues and interpretation of tongues. I have been around you long enough to know that this church’s theological position says “yes” to these gifts.

3. You believe that these supernatural gifts operate through Faith;

So, this brings us to a question: In view of our assumptions, why aren’t we doing more of this stuff – healing, prophesying, etc.?

See Part 1 for the start of this message.

Participating in the Kingdom of God takes force. We cannot sit passively and wait for it to happen to us. Think of most of the healings Jesus did… He called for some kind of response or involvement from the person to be healed. Think of His parable about the two sons the Father asked to work in his fields. The first said “yes” but then failed to act on it. The second said “no’ but then went and did it. The Father commended the one who chose to act. The truth is; there is more than just believing in the supernatural gifts in order to experience them. We have to take them by force! We have to act. But why?

Satan is opposed to us using our Spiritual Gifts, especially the supernatural ones. They are a threat to his power so, he opposes them in two ways:

1. He talks us out of believing in them

. Or,

2. He talks us into not risking for them, e.g. don’t get “carried away”, don’t get emotional, don’t get embarrassed, they are for someone else, they are not for everyone [you!]

He will say or do anything to prevent us from actually doing something. This has gone on for so long that we actually believe that believing in them is all that is required of us, e.g. “Of course I believe in Evangelism! If anyone stops me on the street and asks me how to become a Christian, I will be happy to tell them but, I am not going to go out and witness because I am not an Evangelist! Yes, you are, we all are!

Taking risks is how we make our faith real. Our faith is dead without actually going out and doing the stuff. “But what if I am not sure I have the faith for seeing supernatural stuff? How can I go out and do it without being convinced it will work?” That’s easy, just obey! Go and do it out of pure obedience. In my experience, most of the dramatic healings I have seen occurred when I had little faith for them, but I had a high level of obedience. I was willing to take a risk. My mentor used to say, “spell faith R-I-S-K. It worked.

Let me tell you about my friend Chris. He was a non-spiritual gifts Christian when he came to our church. He received an accurate prophetic word and decided he wanted to know how to do this stuff. I taught him all the theory I could, and he decide to go out and try it.

He started at the local Target store. He took a few friends with him and they went looking for sick people. He found a young man with a cast on his wrist. He asked him if he could pray for healing for his wrist. The guy said sure. Chris determined his pain level and the lack of mobility in his fingers [he established a base line]. He then asked the young man if he believed in God. He said no. Chris began to pray for his wrist. The guy felt something moving in his wrist and got excited! He began to move his fingers freely without pain. He was socked saying, “what the !!#@ is this???” Chris explained that he was being healed by Jesus. Chris led him to the Lord right there and then. This got Chris excited, so he took it to the next level…

He began walking the streets of Tijuana alone on the weekends looking for a sick person to heal who could speak English. Chris figured that if he could get an interpreter healed, then healing the next person would be easier. And that is exactly what happened.

I suggested that he keep a record to document his healing experiences. He did so with his smart phone. Over a period of 2.5 years Chris saw approximately 125 physical healings and led 55 people to Jesus. He calculates that his success rate for physical healings was approximately 60%. During that time, he saw Hepatitis C healed as well as Cancer and Cerebral Palsy.

The lady healed of Hepatitis C came to our church to give her testimony and brought her medical reports from both before and after her healing. I read the reports that confirmed her diagnosis of Hepatitis C and the report coming after her healing confirming her free of the virus.

I am convinced that much of the success that Chris experienced came because he was willing to take risks to see the supernatural evidence of the Kingdom of God. He is not particularly gifted in healing. He is not a man of great faith. What he is, is a person who is willing to risk.