Showing posts with label miracle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label miracle. Show all posts

April 7, 2011

Days after Quakes and Tsunami: “Never Let me Go” (reblog for a Japanese blogging friend)


Here it is, ‘Never let Me Go’, the tragedy of being clones trying to become human through love. Alas, it never could be no matter how hard they tried. Only humans have spirits (which live on forever). Where do clones go after they no longer function temporarily as live humans want them to? One wonders. Alas, many humans do not even know they are humans with an eternal spirit that can only come from God. They live in the physical and sensual realm, and perish when these two realms pass away, being mere mortals on earth…

A sixty year old Japanese man was rescued from a piece of floating roof after two days. He told the rescuers that he had lost his wife. The watchman once got to know someone through sharing the same interest of reading books written by Kazuo Ishiguro . Here are some quotes from Kazuo Ishiguro. The excerpts are from “Never let me go” (2005) and “The remains of the day” (winner of the Booker Prize, 1989) Quotes_____________ “I keep thinking about … Read More
http://kzlam36.wordpress.com/?p=4116

December 5, 2010

Watchman’s Adventure: a matter of spiritual method

It is easy to talk about why we need to deal with spiritual realm but it is difficult to know the right spiritual methods to use. For example, how to bind and cast out demons? Do we need to use repetitive command to address one demon and treat it as if it were deaf, dumb, or slumbering? Can one command of binding and casting out be effective? How many times do we need to bind and cast before that one reluctant demon get out and go away for good? The watchman could not help but ponder on this issue of spiritual methodology.


He has no particular role or assignment in this area of ministry. But he could not help but wonder the number of times one uses to issue one command before that command takes effect, as though the recipient of that command could choose not to obey the Mighty Name of Jesus and the Authority of Jesus.

So he decided to ask the Holy Spirit to reveal to him the answer in case one day he too goes to a foreign field and be assigned such task. The answer came, covering two aspects:

1. The use of authority.

2. The perfect example of Jesus.

When one knows the right (legal) spiritual authority he is using, he should use that authority confidently by faith. The authority is based on the unchangeability of God’s Word. There is no way the demon could refuse to obey that authority.

In the example of Jesus he observes the following:

1. Jesus knows His authority. He uses His authority calmly and confidently. He does not need to say twice to the demons to get them to obey His commands.

2. He knows where His authority comes from and He is confident of the ultimate sovereign power of the source of authority (God Himself). He does not fear that the authority may not work.

3. He always sees the real root of the problem and addresses it directly. He speaks to that root.

4. He is a spiritual man and He sees, hears and talks to the spiritual beings as though He is talking to the physical beings.

5. He knows His authority covers the natural realm as well as the supernatural realm and effectively uses the same authority to address it, for example, the wind, rough waves, demons, unclean spirits, the functioning of the body, creation etc.

The watchman also takes note of Jesus’ commanding words. They are short, accurate and to the point as illustrated in the Gospel of Mark, as follows:

1.Jesus rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Silence! Be still!” Suddenly the wind stopped, and there was a great calm. (He addressed the natural elements with a direct command and they obeyed Him)

2.Jesus said to a legion of evil spirits, “Come out of that man, you evil spirits!” after their repeated pleadings He gave them permission and the evil spirits came out of that man and entered 2000 pigs which plunged into the lake and drowned. (He commanded the legion of demons directly and they obeyed Him)

3.Jesus spoke to a woman who got well by touching His robe, “Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace. Your suffering is over.” (He focussed on why she was healed, i.e. her faith, and proclaimed her well, by His Word)

4.Jesus told a Phoenician woman, “Good answer! Now you go home, for the demon has left your daughter.” (He commended her, i.e. her faith, and proclaimed her daughter delivered and set free, by His Word)

5.In the case of a deaf man with speech impediment, Jesus led him away from the crowd so they could be alone, put His fingers in his ears, spitting on His own fingers, touched the man’s tongue, said, “Be opened!” The man was instantly healed. (He touched the malfunctioned organs and issued a specific functional command to them)

6.In the case of a mute and convulsive boy, and a growing crowd of onlookers, Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, “Deaf and dumb spirit, I command you, come out of him and enter him no more!” The spirit cried out, convulsed the boy greatly and came out of him. (He addressed the spirit describing its specialty, commanded it to get out and also blocked it from re-entry by His Word. He identified why His disciples failed as they had not detected the ‘re-entry’ tendency of this particular type of demons, quite possibly re-inforced by the many demons in that growing crowd! He later advised the disciples to fast and pray in future similar cases as that faith action would sharpen their spiritual discernment!)

7.With a blind man outside Jericho, Jesus responded to his repeated cries, “What do you want Me to do for you?” The man said he wanted to receive his sight. Jesus said to him, “Go your way; your faith has made you well.” And immediately he received his sight. (He focussed on why he was healed, i.e. his faith, and proclaimed him well by His Word)

Reading the above examples, the watchman concluded that he would choose to go the Jesus way, i.e. issuing simple command with the authority of Jesus, effective and straightforward, to malfunctioning parts, demons and even natural elements. Of course the best way is to encourage the faith level to rise in the persons in need of healing. Faith based on God’s Word alone can make the person well regardless of what they suffer from. He also notes that the manifestation of the appropriate gifts of the Holy Spirit and His anointing are required on all occasions of needs.

March 6, 2010

Chapter Eighty-One: "Every Christian is a supernatural person!"


The Bible has been preparing elect Christians (those born of the seed of God) for End-Time, Jack discovered. Only a supernatural person can live and walk according to the Holy Spirit: by faith and by the word of God.
When you walk by faith, you cannot walk by sight and other senses at the same time. If you can see or sense with any of your senses you do not need faith. A natural person is directed by feeling, smelling, tasting, hearing and seeing. A supernatural person is directed by the word of God and faith, activated by the power of the Holy Spirit.

A supernatural person needs faith and obedience (to the word of God) to live. There are conflicts faced by a natural man who professes to be a Christian. For example:
The word of God says that it is God's will to heal you. Indeed, the Bible declares that Jesus has healed you by the stripes He bore on His back 2000 years ago to fulfill the prophesy of Prophet Isaiah. But you still see and feel symptoms on your body and in your mind. In the nature, mankind is conditioned to take physical evidence as conclusive and final. A supernatural Christian knows and believes in a higher court of appeal, the word of God and revelation faith.

In practice this means you need to practice not taking the physical symptoms as final. No doubt the symptoms are warning signals from your body or your mind. What you do with them will depend on what you believe. When you believe in a God who declared to 3 million people that He is the healer, and that all the 3 million who believed were all well and healthy and strong, you will choose to follow the word of God to get your healing. However, if you believe in a man-made system to deal with the symptoms you will do so accordingly. The crunch comes when the man-made system reaches its limitation and pronounces in finality that there are no more man's ways to heal your condition. A desperate natural man will then seek supernatural means.

But a supernatural Christian needs not go through such costly trauma. He can opt for God's way in the beginning and not let the condition gets worse (even after having depleted all his natural resources). If God is real, why do not Christians go to God first? It does not make sense for Bible believing Christians to seek man's way first and put God last!

Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for. (Heb. 11:1-2) Those who had this faith received a good report from God!

Read God's word. Feed on His word. Read Hebrews Chapter eleven on the ancient hall of faith. "By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's word, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible." (11:3). By faith all those mentioned had lived supernaturally. They admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. (11:13) They were looking forward to a better country (which God has prepared for them). By faith, they lived out miracles: the Red Sea parted, the walls of Jericho fell, Abraham received the promise of God ( including Isaac back from death figuratively speaking), conquered kingdoms, administered justice, shut the lions' mouths, quenched the fury of the flames, escaped the edge of the sword, dead raised to life again, the weak became powerful in battle and routed foreign armies.

What has been recorded in the past in the Bible serves as an important prediction of what is to come. The Lord God Almighty thus declared in the Book of Prophet Isaiah, "Remember the former things of old, for I am God, and there is no other; I am God and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done, saying, 'My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure.'" (Isaiah 46:9-10)

For Christians who want to live supernaturally, there is no other guide book except the Bible.

Jack has a sense of urgency in his spirit. He must read and understand the word of God as much as the Spirit leads him. He has stopped watching TV for years and stopped reading other stuff (including his management books and daily newspapers) too. Even his cupboard full of Bible commentaries has become redundant. He has stopped attending social gatherings except for fellowship with the brethren in Christ after worship service. He now lives with the End-Time on his mind constantly.

Is he practicing divine living (without painkillers)? Oh, yes. Physically painful at times...
Be a supernatural Christian! This is all he now says to every one (especially himself and his household) who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ.

March 1, 2010

Chapter Seventy-five: A watchman's prophetic acts


Often Jack has found that the things he is required to do are insignificant and at times foolish in others' eyes. When he read the Bible he found that many faithful watchmen were asked to do ridiculous acts. He lists some of the more prominent ones as follows:
Noah was asked to build an ark on dry land based on God's specifications for his family and two of every sort of living things (possibly becoming the greatest laughing stock among the inhabitants of that land then). (Genesis 6-7)
Moses was asked to lift up his rod and stretch out his hand over the Red Sea in front of at least two millions of panicky people under death threat by the powerful enemy army close at their heels. (Exodus 14)
Joshua was asked to march daily once around the Jericho city walls  for six consecutive days, with seven priests bearing seven trumpets of rams' horns before the ark silently in front of his entire armies , and on the seventh day march around the city seven times, and the priests shall blow the trumpets. (Joshua 6)
Samuel gathered all Israel to Mizpah, drew water and poured it out before the Lord, then took a suckling lamb and offered to the Lord as a whole burnt offering, while their arch enemies the Philistines armies drew near to battle against Israel. (1 Samuel 7)
When three nations' armies came to battle against Judah, King Jehoshaphat led his people to worship the Lord and the Levites praised the Lord with loud voices. On the day of the battle, Jehoshaphat appointed those who should sing to the Lord and those who should praise the beauty of holiness to go out before the army saying, "Praise the Lord, for His mercy endures forever." (2 Chronicles 20)
Elijah took his mantle, rolled it up and struck the water of the River Jordan. (2 Kings 2:8)
Elisha cut off a stick, and threw it into the River Jordan where the axe head had fallen into. (2 Kings 6:6)
Naaman, commander of the army of the King of Syria, dipped seven times in the River Jordan, at the instruction of Elisha the prophet. (2 Kings 5:14)

What happened when men did the foolish things in obedience to their callings by God? God acted and performed the great things. God sent the great flood, rid the land of evil and gave Noah and his family a fresh new life as promised. Moses and his two million people saw the Red Sea parted and they were delivered from the Egyptians. The tall and mighty walls of Jericho fell down flat and Joshua captured the city without fighting. Samuel and his armies saw the defeat of their enemy armies. God thundered with a loud thunder upon the Philistines and so confused them that they were overcome before Israel. When King Jehosaphat's men began to sing and praise God, the Lord sent ambushes and defeated their enemies.  Of course the River Jordan parted and even iron axe head swam to the surface! Namaan, an alien leper, who chose to obey the watchman/prophet, was instantly healed after the seventh dip.

1 Corinthians 2:13-14 "These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man (the man without the Spirit) does not receive (accept) the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned". v16 For “who has known the mind of the LORD that he may instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ."

Unless a man stops trying to reason the things of God with his mind, he will not see a miracle. This is called unbelief. Unbelief cancels out faith. Faith rests in our spirits. Let your spirit man rise up and you will see miracles! Jack has taken a long time to accept this truth. Now he knows the truth and the truth has set him free just as Jesus has promised! (John 8:32)

A watchman has to see with his spirit and not his mind, to reach God's rich supernatural resources. The Holy Spirit provides the way to such vision.

December 8, 2009

CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX: SPIRITUAL NOVICE COUNTING BLESSINGS!


One thing Jack learns to tell himself is not to give the false impression that he is so spiritual that he can hear God loud and clear, knows God and practices perfectly all things pertaining to godliness. That is false. He must admit that he is still a novice in all spiritual matters and all things pertaining to God. He has a long long way to go to live in the Spirit and by the Spirit.


He is still concerned with two things: Is he living in the Spirit correctly as instructed in the Bible? Is he known by Jesus?

The worst thing that can happen to any Christian is to be addressed by Jesus as worker of iniquity and to be told to depart from the living God forever and ever when that day of the Lord comes.

Things continue to happen to him and his family and friends. As they seek God they discover the positive intervention of the Holy Spirit to make their paths easier. The Holy Spirit indeed provided guidance and arranged for people and events to work together for them.

Recently Jack found that some major prayers were answered in ways that he never thought could be possible. God is a worker of the impossible!

He also learned not to give up hoping and seeking God.

In review, he found that he has again received a big bonus from the Holy Spirit. Two years ago the market crashed and all that he had invested previously in the fund market lost significant monetary value. He was led by the Spirit to read Jeremiah and trusted in the Lord’s faithfulness. He was asked to read “Enter by the narrow gate”.

After reading Jeremiah, he trusted God and hanged on to the original funds. During this year he listened and bought more of certain funds (which value he had earlier lost) at lower cost.

At the lowest time he was led to buy a particular stock at the time that everybody was selling. He sold the stock earlier this year when he made a good profit. The benefits of this one deal were as follows:

1. He used part of the sale proceeds to buy a similar stock at the same earlier buying cost of the sold stock. However, the new stock is worth twice the value of the sold stock.

2. A month later he made a second profit from the new stock which gave right issue at a cost way below the market value.

3. Within two months the stock gave dividends at an earning rate way above other stocks.

4. Within half a year, the stock gave further dividends, totally the best earning in the market.

5. He banked in the remaining unused profit after giving one-tenth of the total to support his church evangelical and healing ministry.

During the last month of this year the original funds which had lost value two years ago had regained their values and gained considerable further value. He just sold some to reap the promised harvest. All in all, just as promised in Jeremiah, God’s steadfast loving kindness and faithfulness are new every morning!

Lean year or fat year, a Christian’s hope and security rest in the Lord.

No wonder God asked His people to come out of Egypt and enter the Promised Land prepared for them. All they had to do was to follow Him, obeyed His command and sought His presence all the time.

Translate the above to today’s scenario, all we need to do is to deny ourselves (be separate from the world and the worldly values), follow Jesus (including His cross), obey His words (carry our crosses), and seek His presence daily, i.e. living by the Spirit.

Another year is over soon, have you come out yet?

P/s: Jack is not a stock market pundit and never has much interest in stock market. The one stock he invested was in plantation as he was led to read the particular passage in Jeremiah, meditated on it and trusted the Holy Spirit to lead him to the right counter at the right time. The same applies to the funds.

July 20, 2009

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: NO OTHER VISION EXCEPT ONE



Jack was so accustomed to seeing a number of visions that he thought seeing one was unusual. Today he thus recorded, “Read Psalms 1-10. Shoulder pain: asked for healing. Saw Jesus holding a fig cake (paste, as in Isaiah?) No other vision.”

Nevertheless, he went on and read Psalms and pondered on a number of questions pertaining to his present life. He asked:

1. What advice should I give to others in this pres
ent economic crisis?
2. Why must I continue to live in the world system?
3. How to prepare for end time?
He pondered on the possibility and practicality to buy a plot of land to build a self-sustaining farm and a sanctuary (a safe place to live, worship, prayer, retreat and training) for his family and people of the same mind and Spirit. He was thinking of organic living and a retired home.

He also listed the foreseeable limitations to overcome: No experience. Lack knowledge. Physical limitations. Too used to city comfort. Workers (trustworthy issues). Security and safety issues. Finance matters. Age issues.

Reading Psalm 8 lifted his spirit. He noted, “We have dominion over the works of our hands. He put all things under our feet, domestic animals, wild beasts, poultry and fishes (that pass through the paths of the sea).”
The sea has paths (like land)! He marveled. This was new to him. He realized how little he knew about God’s works.

Hearing from God- fig cake
I had terrible shoulder pain so I asked Jesus to heal me. As I lied on the floor face down, I saw the following picture: Jesus holding a fig cake in His hand. I recalled the verses from Isaiah about how the prophet was sent to heal the king Hezekiah and he made a fig paste. The king was healed.

After that I did not see any further picture so I got up and found that my shoulder pain had subsided.

March 12, 2009

July 10, 2009

CHAPTER ONE: PROLOGUE- IN THE BEGINNING

Religion Blogs



One man’s journey in the Holy Spirit
chapter one: prologue- in the beginning
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and The Word was God. (John 1:1)

Jack was a man who loved reading and could spend all his time submerged in the ocean of knowledge without knowing other desires. After all he had reached an age the conventional world called retirement and had time in his hand. He was new to this city and had kept a low profile, living like a hermit. Not because he was very religious, but because by nature he was a detached man and socializing was not his favorite word. Neither was any pastime that did not have any meaningful purpose able to draw him. To him, meaning could only be derived from the depth and breadth of knowledge. Socializing or engaging in anything superficially, however satisfying to the emotion, was meaningless. To him, the mind ruled. Anything not of the ration was to be viewed with suspicion and skepticism.

He performed his religious duty alright, including attending a church weekly and giving whatever small sum of money he could to charity. He read the Bible and duly treated other brethren with respect and kindness. He lived humbly with his wife and kept a mongrel dog as a guard dog. He liked to have trees around as a green shield that blocked off the dust and noise from neighbors and traffic that passed by. So he maintained a small garden with lush green trees lining its outer walls. The garden was modeled after an English courtyard for practical purpose so it would not demand much time and effort to up-keep.

Having no good library around, he relied a lot on buying seasonal discounted books in bulk so that his appetite might be satiated for a season. However, his all time favorite was the Bible. He collected not less than ten Bibles and had spent scores of years as far as he could remember reading the Bible daily without fail. He read books on religions, politics, philosophies, literature, economics and management (which happened to be his first occupation), health psychology (his second occupation), medicine (his wife’s occupation), classic children stories, classic detective stories, classic science fictions, lastly, poetry and fictions written by a few favorite writers.

However, this book was not about Jack. This book was based on what Jack had recorded in his journal when he was taken over completely by the Holy Spirit along a journey in the Holy Spirit.

Jack was in the habit of keeping a journal about ideas that interested him from the reading he made daily, mostly from the Bible. Sometimes he recorded some passages from other books too when he found them interesting to remember. Perhaps he was thinking of using them as quotations later. Sometimes around the middle of the second month of the ninth year after the second millennium, Jack started a new religious venture. He signed up as an intercessor for the churches of the city where he resided.

He happened to attend a worship service one Sunday morning and he was asked to sign up for a 7/24 weekly Friday-Saturday 6am-6am prayer chain. He only needed to choose one hour slot out of the 24 hours. He chose to pray at 6am-7am every Friday. It seemed easy enough as he was an early riser. He was given a little guide booklet to read and prayed the model prayers if he ran out of words of his own. So armed with the booklet and a little pamphlet of songs he felt ready to embark on this noble project on his own in the comfort of his home.

Of course, he was mistaken. That was how his amazing journey began.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

July 9, 2009

July 6, 2009

DAY 119-122: MORE SIGNS AND WONDERS AND MIRACLES



Prophet Isaiah thus recorded, ‘Thus says the Lord, the Holy One for Israel, and his Maker: “Ask Me of things to come concerning My sons; and concerning the work of My hands, you command Me.”’ (Isaiah 45:11)
When I read of this verse previously I always wondered how we could ever ask God to tell us things about ourselves. But this is God’s saying. All we need to do is ask. I did ask before but could not differentiate what was from God and what was from my own thoughts. So I had stopped asking after awhile many years ago.
I believe the best thing in one’s life is to know that God is real and He is good. The more years we have lived the more we appreciate the need to know God and be assured of a place in God’s kingdom. I used to think that God was a faraway ‘person’ or being who had nothing to do with me except perhaps on the Lord’s day when I went to church for a mere 1-2 hours religious service.
Recently I have discovered that God is real here and He is present even in the daily living matters which I used to think too small for Him. Yesterday we had to give a very important talk on how to live a positive, optimistic life Biblically. After I prepared the PowerPoint presentation, I saved it in a pen drive memory key. I tested the file in the key and found it functioning alright. However before we left for the talk the speaker asked me to delete two slides so I changed the presentation in my computer accordingly and took out the key and replaced the file. After that I suddenly decided to save a back up file in another memory key as well. Instead of copying and transferring the file from the first key to the second one, I decided to save the talk from the master copy in my computer. Then I carried both keys to the talk.
On reaching there I tested the first memory key in the church computer, and the key failed to work as it was virus infected. The files were blank. I took out my back up key and it worked perfectly. Otherwise the speaker would have a tough time using oral illustration alone for the solid two and half hours talk. The talk went well and the audience which consisted of mainly older and middle aged folks sat through the two whole sessions attentively and with obvious enthusiasm. It was the best I had heard so far, being very much led by the Holy Spirit.
To me it was a miracle. I have never prepared a back up for any of our previous talks all these years. I was always confident that the memory key would work perfectly. Yesterday I was led by the Holy Spirit to back up and bring it along. When I did that I was puzzled but I just obeyed without question. It turned out that the Holy Spirit knew what I did not know and He saved the day!
This talk was important to us as this was the first talk we presented with the overt help from the Holy Spirit. The speaker did the writing and has prayed for Holy Spirit guidance all along. I did the typing and visuals. We used to pray for every talk too, but we did not know about spiritual matter then. So we depended on our human mind and effort. This time we knew that the spiritual world is very much involved and we really need to listen to the Holy Spirit through out. Our morning and evening worships as led by the Holy Spirit helped us to be more focused and clear about what we were to share.
On the night before the talk I thought the talk was to be held in a common community open place at some low cost housing flats. So I prayed for angels to encamp around. Then I indeed saw lots of huge angels cordoning off a place (which I could not see).
Yesterday morning I was led to pray for that church to be Spirit-filled etc. Then I heard God telling me (for the first time He talked to me as in a conversation) He has heard and answered my prayer, and has taken care of things, and His presence will be there! I was surprised and honored. I was speechless but I thanked Him.
Then He told me to go on and pray for an African country for an 85 years old missionary doctor who, having served there for over 50 years is still faithfully serving the Lord. When I finished praying I asked what Bible verses I should read and I was led to read a chapter in Hosea, John, James (no chapter was given, so I presumed the whole book) and psalm. I read all the verses and left James to be read at night.
When we were on the way to the talk, the speaker realized my misconception about the place and told me that the talk was in a church and not as I thought earlier. I was relieved and realized why God said His presence will be there and asked me not to worry!
The end result was that the talk was carried out as planned by the Holy Spirit. In the second part of the talk the speaker did not follow the original text at all. Instead she gave a personal testimony which was very touching to many of the audience who later gave their feedback.
In the evening when I read James I read the whole book but then I thought I would just ask what chapter the Holy Spirit wants me to pay attention to. I immediately got the message that it was chapter 3 (about our speech). So I read it again and prayed over it. It was indeed a Spirit led passage as the speaker’s talk that day was about controlling our way of talking and the contents thereof which came out of our hearts!
To be led by the Holy Spirit is wonderful. We are indeed thankful for God to have intervened and taken part.
Yes, sons and daughters of God can ask God about your lives, your future, your pending decisions, choices to make, directions and paths to take, your career, your relationship, your health and so on. Do ask and wait for answer. Listen carefully to the still small voice. I have personally found that the words from the Holy Spirit usually flow smoothly without hesitations. There is no time for me to write down. There is no time for me to think. They can come as if I am thinking. They also come in the way I received yesterday as in a conversation.
One thing to bear in mind is, do not be in a hurry. God has eternity on His side. He created us to worship and minister to Him. You need to come and worship Him and seek Him first. Do not rush into prayers and requests without being prompted by the Holy Spirit. Do not babble a one sided speech. Listen in quietness and rest. Endure long silence.
Listen today to God and you will be greatly blessed!
AAA Jack

2024 not abandoned: a new spiritual journey

How may we hear God and understand Him more accurately? Last night while praying my heart purposed to start afresh the unfinished journey ov...