Do I Have Enough Faith?

Imagine that you are walking along a dirt path in the woods admiring nature and communing with God. As you are enjoying God's presence, you see in the distance that a large tree branch has fallen across the path ahead. You reach the branch and realize that there is no way to pass unless the branch is moved. Thus, having the faith that God has the power to move mountains (let alone a tree branch), you fall to your knees and plead that God would remove the branch so that you can continue on your walk and get back to enjoying God's presence without hindrance. After a few uneventful minutes, you recall the story of the widow and the unjust judge (see Luke 18:1-8), and you decide that it is God's will for you to persevere in prayer until He answers. So you pray for 10 minutes. 30 minutes. 1 hour. 10 hours. ...

Blessing

A "blessing" is an impartation of goodness and life into someone, or a declaration of goodness and life over a situation. When someone sneezes, we often say, "God bless you!" We are imparting God's blessings upon that person! But since the phrase is so common, we often say the words without connecting the substance of the meaning behind them, and so the blessing is empty. But what difference do blessings make in someone's life, anyway? Words don't really make a difference, right? Besides, "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me." The opposite should also be true then. Words won't actually help me... they're just words.

Spirit of Anger

About a week or two ago, I felt myself giving into feelings of anger like I hadn't for years. Understand, I am not an angry person. I am very easy-going and usually, if something bothers me, it brings me to tears -- not rage! So, this particular explosive emotion inside of me was very peculiar to me and unexpected.

Against Flesh and Blood?

This week I was reminded once again of a phenomena that has occurred on a regular basis over the past few years of my life: just as I cozy up to fall asleep for the night, I will begin to manifest allergy symptoms, specifically, watery eyes and swollen nasal passages. I don't think it happens every night, but it doesn't seem to have been seasonal, either.

Well, this week I did a set of experiments. About 30 minutes before I intended to go to bed for the night, I laid myself down and snuggled up my face right next to the sheets and then snuggled up into my pillow. I waited awhile in each position, monitoring my nose and eyes. No allergy symptoms appeared! But, sure enough, about 30 minutes later when I was determined to go to sleep for the night, my eyes started watering and my nose became swollen to the point that I had to breathe with my mouth open. I did similar tests for the 2 following nights and had similar results.

Wii Resurrection

For our 4th anniversary (a couple weeks ago), we took a small vacation to a house on the lakeshore of Lake Michigan. We brought our Nintendo Wii along as part of our vacation experience. On the last day of our vacation, there was a thunderstorm that led to a power surge throughout the house. We had our Wii plugged directly into the wall outlet at the time of the power surge. An hour or two later, we attempted to turn on our Wii so that our son could play for the remaining time while we packed up our stuff. But the Wii would not turn on. In fact, the LED indicator was completely black. (The LED is usually red when the Wii is plugged in.)

In the Face of Uncertainty

Josh and I prayed for healing for a childhood friend of Josh's a couple days ago who has been told by doctors that he has 1 year to live. As we prayed, we felt "electricity" flowing through our hands and forearms (with various intensities throughout the session), and Josh's friend experienced shaking on the left side of his body for a portion of the time. We commanded evil spirits and sickness to go in the name of Jesus after taking Josh's friend through some prayers to release negative emotions (unforgiveness, bitterness, resentment, fear/anxiety, etc.). There are several visible abnormalities due to Josh's friend's condition, but we have not yet seen any visible improvements of these.

Healing Close to Home

This past weekend, my family came to visit us. On the Friday night they arrived, my sister expressed much physical discomfort, including a stomach ache, hurting back, and many other things. Now, you must realize that my sister ALWAYS tells me that something is hurting her whenever I see her. I must admit, it can be taxing to carry the emotional burden of her being sick all the time. Thus, when she expressed her discomfort on Friday night, I was tempted to become disheartened. But, realizing this, I took my thoughts captive to Christ and gave my heart over to His desires for my sister instead.

I felt "electricity" concentrated in my forearms and palms, which from past experience indicated to me a special presence (or, "readiness") of the Holy Spirit, so I decided to do an experiment. I went over to my sister Sarah, who was sprawled out on the floor on her belly, and said, "Sarah, put out your hand palm-up."

Beam Me Up, Jesus!

Tonight while I was gathering together with my prayer partners, one of them mentioned that she was struggling with a question: Why doesn't God just beam us up to heaven after we become Christians? She expressed that she was having a hard time figuring out what her role is for God's Kingdom, but even more, what God's purposes are for the world in general.

Her question made me reflect on how I might answer that question based upon what I know from the Scriptures. She suggested that I post my thoughts on my blog, and so that is what I will do now. :-)

Instantaneous Transformation?

Many Christians (mainly, Protestants) believe that when Jesus comes back, we will experience an instantaneous transformation that will make us immortal, incorruptible, morally perfect, and spiritually mature--qualities that make us fit to enter the Kingdom of Heaven into God's presence. I think that this idea is based upon the following three passages, primarily:

"51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet." (1 Corinthians 15:51-52a, NIV)

Learning How to Speak in Tongues

Does it make sense to learn how to speak in tongues? How can we know for sure that tongues are really from the Spirit of God and not simply from random movements of our own mouths? Although I've been pondering and praying about this for several months now, my mind is not completely settled on what to think. But, I can tell you that at the present moment, I believe that speaking in tongues is something that Christians should pursue. It's such a foreign concept to so many Christians that perhaps it could be helpful if I share my experiences so far. Feel free to share your own experiences or to ask questions below by posting a comment!

How I "Learned" to Speak in Tongues