Walking in Christ’s Power: Overcoming Darkness with Grace
Matthew 9:8
Now when the multitudes saw it, they marveled and glorified God, who had given such power to men.
Jesus has wowed the crowd with His proclamation that the paralytic man’s sins were forgiven and after reading the thoughts of the Scribes, He also heals the man and the man walks away free from the destruction of his sins and liberated from the spirit of infirmity.
Jesus’s power is fueled by Holy Spirit. It is the same with us. He has given us the Comforter to teach us, to instruction us, to reveal truth to us, and to empower us. The power to heal, set free and deliver has been given to us.
This power displays the grace of God through miracles and deliverances. The power is accessed through a firm agreement with the Word of God. We must insist in our thought life that all of the Word of God is absolute truth no matter our circumstances or experiences.
In the past I would offer great heartfelt prayers for God to heal somebody if it be His will. If I didn’t see deliverance I would wrongly assume it wasn’t God’s will and my experience would dictate my faith.
I will never let experience dictate my faith ever again. I would often hear people in the “God allowed it” crowd justify sickness as if Father is trying to teach the sick person some lesson that they would otherwise not be able to learn. Father does not bring sickness, the evil hater of mankind does.
That why it can be cast down because if it came from Father we would not be able to command it to go. While I’ll admit that we can learn some lessons from those times of infirmity when we are leaning hard on our Savior, but I also know that Holy Spirit is a better teacher than the spirit of infirmity and doesn’t use affliction to make His precepts known.
The whole “God allowed it” is false humility, false perception, and false demonic teachings. If Jesus Christ ever said “I can’t heal you now because Father allowed this illness to come into your life to teach you something”, then I would embrace that narrative.
But He DOES NOT ever say that or anything like it! NO! ALL God’s promises are YES and AMEN through Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior! Well “God is sovereign” some would counter.
Of course Father is ultimately in control of the way history moves and we sometimes see Him intervene in people’s lives but He has given us the power and authority of Jesus Christ in which to combat the lesser spirits of the evil manager of this planet who is clearly in charge of the affairs of man and despises the image bearers.
The reason why people get diseases is because the cut-off withering branch hates us and tries to extinguish life with infirmities and accidents, wars and murderous plots. He uses misery and sinfulness to inflict pain on people and shift the blame onto our Good Father to stop us from living in new creation freedom, liberty, power and authority.
Unfortunately, most of the time he is successful. However, we can take back territory that he has stolen from us with simple steadfast belief in the finished work of Jesus Christ.
Our new creation identity is waiting for us to agree with the truth of God’s Word so that it can thrive in its holy power. Today, let’s take every thought captive that accuses our righteous Father of wrongdoing and insist that He has made us new creations full of love power and soundness of mind. Hallelujah!
Father, I am grateful for Your Grace and Your Salvation plan. I know that You want me to completely embrace Your Powerful Word. I believe everything that You say is absolutely true.
I know the plans that You have for me are to prosper me and not to harm and to give me a future and a solid hope. I will use the power and authority that You have given me to push back on the darkness that is all around me and crush the enemies strongholds. I am made righteous and holy and blameless and above reproach because of the perfect life of Jesus Christ. I am new and the old man is dead forever.
I will take captive every pretension that raises itself up to try and compete with Your truth and slay it with praise. I am Your child set apart to do Your will. I am forever thankful that You pulled me out of the mire of my sins and placed my feet on a solid rock, Jesus Christ. I love You. In Jesus name. Amen.