God Answers Persevering Prayer

 Time and again, Jesus taught that our faith connects us with God, that faith releases God's miracle-working power.

Just then a woman who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak.

She said to herself, “If I only touch his cloak, I will be healed.”

Jesus turned and saw her. “Take heart, daughter,” he said, “your faith has healed you.” And the woman was healed at that moment. Mt 9:20–22 NIV

But is it true that you cannot receive anything from God if you do not expect God's grace and do not pray for it yourself?

The apostle Paul was not always the holy man of God.

For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 1 Cor 15:9 NIV

Did Saul, the brutal Pharisee, pray for God's mercy?

Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest… Acts 9:1 NIV

Saul was authorised by the high priest to arrest the Christians in Damascus.

As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.

He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”

“Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked. “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. Acts 9:3–5 NIV

God acts when people believe, but Saul only believed when he received a visitation from Jesus.

What role did faith play? Jesus taught that we must love our enemies.

But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, Mt 5:44 NIV

Saul was the leader of the persecution and the Christians prayed for him. God hears our prayers for ourselves, but also for others.

In Islamic countries, Christians are cruelly persecuted, but millions of Muslims experience visitations from Jesus, mostly in dreams. Many believe immediately, but many believe later, sometimes only after years. Many probably never believe, despite God's grace. God respects our free will.

Why does this happen? Islamic countries are bombarded by evangelistic outreach, through radio, satellite TV and the internet. At the same time, millions of Christians are praying for Muslims and God is answering our prayers. The faith of Christians is sparking the intervention of God.

There was an Islamic preacher in Africa who was considered a holy fundamentalist, but he was a hypocrite who was secretly involved in sins. Then he reaped what he had sown and he was about to die with AIDS.

Then he saw Jesus next to his deathbed. Jesus healed him and he became a Christian preacher. The Christians had obviously prayed for him.

Do you have children who are mentally ill or addicted to drugs for a long time, or involved in prostitution? Please never give up!

I prayed for my family for years. My parents didn't believe until they were on their deathbeds. I have seen lost children restored after years of prayer.

Do you have enemies that torment you? Pray for your enemies. Jesus died for your enemies too.

What is Faith and Repentance?

 Muslims believe that they can avoid the flames of hell if their virtues outweigh their sins. They endeavour to live a virtuous and religious life in order to earn their eternal reward with Allah.

Jesus taught quite differently.

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. Jn 3:16 NASB95

Then we are confronted with a question that will determine our eternal destiny.

What is faith?

After the war, the top leaders of the Nazi government in Germany were arrested. They had to stand trial for war crimes before a court in Nuremberg. Some were then executed.

Before the trial, the Americans appointed chaplains to provide pastoral care for the prisoners.

Some of the leading Nazis were Catholic, others Protestant. They were baptised as children and belonged to this or that denomination. Do you think these criminals would go to God's heaven?

Göring was supposedly Protestant. He wanted nothing to do with Jesus and he didn't want to be humiliated before the court. He committed suicide.

Hitler's foreign minister reacted differently. Von Ribbentrop repented.

Then we have to ask what real repentance is. Many attend a church service, but God does not play an important role in their everyday lives. They confess a sin now and then, but they do not change.

Was Joachim von Ribbentrop really converted? Before his execution, he begged his wife to bring up their children as Christians.

When Jesus began to preach, he told the Jews that they had to believe. What was that supposed to mean? Most Jews already believed in God.

After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God.
“The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!” Mk 1:14–15 NIV

What is true repentance? What does repentance mean? The Greek word is METANOIA. It means a significant change of mindset. Whoever repents in the Christian sense changes his thinking and his attitude, just like von Ribbentrop before his execution.

Anyone who genuinely believes in Jesus believes in the risen Son of God. He opens his heart to the love of God. He believes in God's word and the message of Jesus himself.

My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me.
I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. Jn 10:27–28 NRSV

There is a religious faith found in some churches, but so many people in church don't have a personal relationship with Jesus.

What role does Jesus play in your everyday life?

“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Mt 11:28 NRSV

Jesus is still with us. He has sent his Holy Spirit into this world. He wants to help you today.

‘Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’ Jer 33:3 NKJV

Miracles Still for Today

 There is a highly questionable and controversial teaching that the supernatural spiritual gifts that appear in the book of Acts and 1 Corinthians were taken away by God in the first centuries of the Christian era.

This idea is supposedly supported by some verses in 1 Corinthians 13.

For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. 1 Co 13:12 NIV

This clear recognition is intended to point to the appearance of the New Testament. But neither Paul nor most of the Corinthians had seen the complete New Testament.

How many Christians in our day who know the New Testament have a clear recognition of God that so surpasses the revelations of the apostles themselves? This makes no sense.

This verse in 1 Corinthians is not a new idea. David had the same revelation in Psalm 17.

As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake I shall be satisfied, beholding your likeness. Ps 17:15 NRSV

The psalmist was David, who believed that in his afterlife he would see God himself directly.

I once looked for this text in various Bible commentaries in a Christian bookshop. The commentaries were not Pentecostal, but they all explained that 1 Cor 13:12 is supposed to be a reference to our encounter with God in the next life.

David expected that he would meet God directly and visibly after his death. This had nothing to do with the appearance of the New Testament.

In our time, we need God's supernatural help like never before.

And these signs will accompany those who believe: by using my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues;

they will pick up snakes in their hands, and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.” Mk 16:17–18 NRSV

In our time, millions of Muslims are becoming Christians. In millions of cases, they are converted after seeing Jesus in a dream or vision, and in many others they are converted after experiencing healing miracles.

I know an Arab Christian who was formerly a Muslim. A Muslim Arab tried to kill him with poison, but he was unharmed. When the would be assassin saw him alive, he was shocked.

The Christian man quoted Mark 16:18. … and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 1 Co 13:8 NIV

When will prophecies and tongues cease? When we see Jesus.
What about knowledge coming to an end? We still need knowledge because we are not face to face with God.
 

Healing from God.

God promised the Jews health and healing in the Old Testament.

He said, “If you listen carefully to the LORD your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep all his decrees, I will not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I am the LORD, who heals you.” Ex 15:26 NIV

This promise was not unconditional. The Jews had to obey all of God's commandments.

But then we come across an exception, Naaman.

Now Naaman was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded, because through him the LORD had given victory to Aram. He was a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy. 2 Ki 5:1 NIV

He had a Hebrew slave girl. She was a young woman with a good heart. Jesus later taught that we must love our enemies, and she cared for her master who had enslaved her as a captive.

She said to her mistress, “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.” 2 Ki 5:3 NIV

The general went to Israel to look for the prophet Elisha.

Elisha sent his servant to Naaman with instructions. The general was to dip himself seven times in the Jordan River.

This hurt the general's pride.

But Naaman went away angry and said, “I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the LORD his God, wave his hand over the spot and cure me of my leprosy.

Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn’t I wash in them and be cleansed?” So he turned and went off in a rage. 2 Ki 5:11–12 NIV

Naaman’s servants went to him and said, “My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more, then, when he tells you, ‘Wash and be cleansed’!” 2 Ki 5:13 NIV

The general thought again and went to the Jordan River. When he emerged from the water for the seventh time, he was completely well.

Naaman was a pagan and worshipped other gods, but God spoke through the prophet and he obeyed.

Today, many Muslims are healed supernaturally in the same way. Many convert only after their miraculous healing, and others never convert.

It was similar in the New Testament. Many received miraculous healings from Jesus, and not all repented of their sins.

Jesus lamented this tragedy. He loved his countrymen with all his heart. His heart was broken.

And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted to the heavens? No, you will go down to Hades. For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day.

But I tell you that it will be more bearable for Sodom on the day of judgement than for you.” Mt 11:23–24 NIV 

In the New Testament, healing is an effect of the love of God, who loves everyone, and not a reward for virtue. Likewise, salvation and eternal life are a free gift from God.

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Rom 6:23 NIV

God promises in Psalm 103 that he will forgive all your trespasses. In the same verse in the same psalm, he promises to heal all your diseases.

He forgives all your iniquity; he heals all your diseases. Ps 103:3 CSB

Some Christians think that the gift of miracle healings was only for the first apostles. But this misguided teaching is clearly contradicted in the New Testament.

Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord.

And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven. Jas 5:14–15 NIV

God Calls All Kinds of People

 In China, Christians are multiplying every year. Over twenty years ago, missionary experts said that there were at least one hundred million Christians in China and that several million Chinese were converting to Jesus every year.

Nobody knows how many Christians there are in China now, but the communist government is afraid of Jesus. The basis of the powerful Christian movement in China is not an ordained leadership with professional preachers who have to undergo years of theological training.

Most meetings are not held in well-equipped churches, but in private homes. Many pastors are arrested or simply disappear. Someone then has to lead.

More than seventy per cent of the church leaders in these house churches are women with no extensive theological training, but they burn with love for Jesus and their devotion is unlimited.

Education is not worthless. Paul and Luke were educated men. Martin Luther and John Wesley were educated, but Peter and John were fishermen.

In the mighty move of the Holy Spirit that is soon to come, educated preachers will also be anointed with power, but the mark of the coming revival will not be education, but heavenly love, miracle-working faith and unstinting devotion.

A woman in Brazil was the daughter and granddaughter of high-ranking witches. She became a prostitute and then a witch with terrifying demonic powers, but true Christians love their enemies. Christians prayed for this woman until she converted to Jesus in a traumatic crisis. She became a preacher who was able to reach many lost souls for Jesus.

But many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first. Mt 19:30 NIV

A highly respected Muslim preacher in Africa led a double life. He secretly visited prostitutes until he was infected with AIDS. The Christians prayed for their persecutor and God answered. On his deathbed, he experienced a visitation from Jesus. He was converted. He was supernaturally healed and then became an influential evangelist for Jesus.

But many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first. Mt 19:30 NIV

In the revival that is coming in Europe, God will call evangelists who are now in other religions or in pubs or brothels.

The apostle Paul said:

Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. 1 Ti 1:15 NIV