NATIONAL
BEST SLcLlNG U*l*HOR
PRAYING
WITHPOWER
OTHER BOOKS
by the Author
Let’s Laugh
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PRAYING
WITHPOWER
how to Pray effectively
and
hear
Clearly from God
C. PETER
WAGNER
©
COPYRIGHT 1997—C. PETER WAGNER
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Scripture quotations
are from the New King James Version.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION 9
CHAPTER
1 | PRAYER CAN BE POWERFUL (OR OTHERWISE) 15
“how prayer action of human
beings relates to the
sovereignty of god is a key issue in under- standing the difference between
prayer in general and effective, fervent prayer.”
CHAPTER 2 | TWO-WAY PRAYER: HEARING GOD 41
“the essence of prayer is a personal relationship be- tween two persons, or intimacy with the father.”
CHAPTER 3 | STRATEGIC-LEVEL INTERCESSION 67
“strategic-level spiritual warfare seems
to be the level
that promises the greatest payoff for world evangelization. it also demands the
greatest risk. ‘high risk, high return’ applies.”
CHAPTER 4 | TARGETING OUR PRAYERS:
SPIRITUAL MAPPING 89
“spiritual mapping,or targeting our prayers as ac- curately
as we can, is one of the more
important helps to pray powerfully instead of otherwise.”
CHAPTER
5 | THE POWER TO HEAL THE PAST 113
“of all the forms of prayer, none surpasses the po- tential of the prayer of identificational repentance
for opening the way to spread the gospel.”
CHAPTER
6 | FRESH PRAYER
ENERGY FOR YOUR CHURCH 143
“the Chinese use much of their prayer time
to pray for
more and better prayer time!”
CHAPTER 7 | GOD’S GIFT OF PERSONAL INTERCESSORS
FOR LEADERS 167
“the most underutilized source
of spiritual power in our
churches today is intercession for Christian leaders.”
CHAPTER
8 | PRAYING FOR OUR CITIES 189
“revival will come when we get the walls
down between
the church and the community.”
CHAPTER 9 | PRAYER POWER FOR THE NATIONS 213
“While we continue to pray for individuals to be saved, we also pray for whole nations to be trans-
formed.”
CHAPTER 10 | INNOVATIVE PRAYING 243
“our role is simply to hear
and to obey god’s in- novation and creativity.”
ENDNOTES 271
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES 281
MINISTRY INFORMATION 286
INTRODUCTION
T
book. how
things change!
the book you have in your hand is the sixth volume in the prayer
Warrior series, containing a cumulative
total of more than 1,500 pages. back in 1987, God gave me the as- signment of researching, writing, and
teaching about how prayer relates to advancing the Kingdom of God through
missions, church planting, and church
growth. I knew so lit- tle about prayer at the time that I thought I might be get- ting
a boring assignment.
I also wondered
why God would
choose to do such a thing to me at this stage of life. I now
know, however, that God did not plan to bore me, but rather to bless me.
these
past 20 years have proven to be by far the most ex- citing ones out of more
than 50 years of ordained ministry!
CAN PRAYER BE “ASSUMED”?
I became so enthusiastic
about my involvement in the worldwide prayer movement that some of
my friends thought I had abandoned
my calling as a professor
of church growth. that was because my colleagues and I in the
field
of church growth had not previously paid much atten-
tion to spiritual factors such as prayer. We believed in prayer
all right, but we had assumed that prayer would always be there, and that not much could
be said about it anyhow. When I discovered
that such was far from the truth, I
was misunderstood for a time by some of my friends.
those days are past,
though, thank the Lord. books,
tapes, and conferences about prayer are difficult
to keep track of because they are multiplying
almost too rapidly. I now have nine shelves of books about prayer in my personal
library, soon to be ten.
As I travel across the country and into many other parts of the
world, people frequently ask me which one of my
prayer books I would recommend they read. (this question
reflects the fact that many people can think in terms of only
one book at a time. Some do not have a personal
budget large enough to purchase many books. others may be able to read, but they are not habitual book readers.
Certain people feel a considerable sense of accomplishment if they read just one or two books during the period of a year.) to be honest, I have
not had a
ready answer for that question about recommending books in the past. In the rare instances
when I have time, I talk with the people long enough
to attempt to discern their needs, and then I try to name the book that will help them the most. My problem is that
each one of the first five books of the
prayer Warrior series is specialized and targeted toward a certain
kind of prayer to meet a certain set of needs.
WHEN YOU MUST CHOOSE JUST ONE
From now on, I will tell those who think they can handle only
one of my books about prayer to read
this one—praying
with power. true, it is the last one, but I
have written
it as an introduction to the whole series.
In this book, I have picked up the major threads of the other five
books and tried to put them all together. this
is the overview of
all the subjects I have written about, and those who are interested can move from here to obtain the other books and then delve deeper into any of the themes that
especially interest them.
you will
find a couple of emphases in this book that are not included in the others,
namely identificational repen- tance (Chapter 5) and prophetic prayer acts
(Chapter 10). you will also find a certain amount of overlap with the other
books, but I tried to keep that to a minimum. I did not copy anything
directly from the other five books in this one, and it does not contain as much overlap as we find, for example,
in the four Gospels. Nevertheless, I am the same author,
and I thought it necessary to repeat some of the things I con- sider
among the most important. I like to look at it as “creative redundancy.”
I have mentioned
the other books from time to time in this one. this is not intended to be a promotional
stunt to get people to buy the other books. It is, rather,
my attempt to provide readers with a road map of sorts for moving in a variety of directions as the Lord leads. I have listed further
resources at the end of the book for readers who wish to read
more about the subject.
this book
is also an update. I have learned a great deal since I wrote my first book
about prayer five years ago, and I am excited about sharing many of the newer
things God has been showing us. the bible
says there is nothing new under the sun. (See
ecclesiastes 1:9.) this is true, but it is equally true that I as an individual
have been discovering things I never knew before, and the same would be said by
those representing many substantial segments of the body of Christ.
Christian
people are praying and talking about prayer more than at any time in memory.
Pastors are elevating prayer toward the top of their agendas for the local
church. Seminaries and bible schools are teaching courses about prayer
that they have never taught before. Denominations and mission agencies are
adding prayer leaders to their top- level staffs. New independent prayer
ministries are multi- plying on every continent. this is the time for
you to
be informed, and for
you to become involved. My prayer
is that this book, praying with power,
will be used by
the Lord to bring
thousands and
thousands into the mainstream of the worldwide prayer movement, and that his name will be exalted among the nations as
never before!
C. Peter Wagner
Colorado
Springs, Colorado
CHAPTER 1
PRAYER CAN BE POWERFUL (OR OTHERWISE)
T
assigning
church names.)
No other
church I am aware of better exemplifies what this book is all about—praying
with power. I think it is im- portant for us to understand that prayer is not
some ethe- real exercise that has little measurable effect on the
real world in which we live. I know of no better way to begin to
understand how powerful prayer can be than to explore a concrete
example such as the Prayer Cave in
Kiambu, Kenya. I will tell you more soon.
PRAYER TRULY WORKS
Meanwhile, a central thesis underlying all my writings about prayer is that prayer works. Not all prayer works, but effective prayer does. powerful prayer works. I have empha-
sized those adjectives
to highlight what many of us already
know in our hearts, but sometimes
hesitate to admit—not all prayer
is equal. Just as some prayer is effective, so some is ineffective, and some is in between. Just as some prayer
is powerful,
so, unfortunately, some is equally impotent. I am enough of a born pragmatist
to have virtually no in- centive to write a series of books about prayer in general. My
interest is almost exclusively in powerful prayer, not in the
other kinds.
the essence of prayer is a personal relationship between
a believer and God. Some call it “intimacy with the Father.”
this is true, and it is important. For this
reason it would not be correct to say that any believing prayer
is bad per se. I would not want to make a distinction
between good prayer and bad prayer, for example. Some prayer,
however, we must admit, can be misguided
and therefore lack the power it could have.
James says,“you ask and do not receive,
because you ask amiss…” (James 4:3). Wrong motives can weaken prayer, as can sin in our lives and many other things I will
mention from time to time as we move on. the distinction I
am making is, more accurately, between good prayer and better prayer. My wife, Doris, likes to say, “No prayer is wasted.”
All good prayer can be seen as a step in the
right direction, but some of those steps may be smaller than they need to be. If you are reading
this book, the odds are high
that you have a burning
desire in your heart
to pray more powerfully than you ordinarily
have been doing. you may be on a relatively low level right now, but
you do not want to stay there. you may be on a high level of prayer power, but you know that there are higher levels yet, and that is where you want to be.
MEASURING THE POWER OF PRAYER
how will you know when you reach a higher level of prayer? one way is to see an increase in concrete, measura-
ble answers to your prayers. that is why I like to assert that prayer works.
James does not say,“the prayer of a righteous man avails much.”
he seems to go out of his way to say that “the
effective, fervent prayer of a
righteous [person] avails
much”(James 5:16, emphasis added). If he had left it at that point, the statement would certainly have been true, al-
though somewhat
vague. to
avoid this, James immediately
goes
on to make it more concrete. he uses elijah, a human being
just like us, as his example. elijah prayed
that it would not rain, and it did not. then he prayed that it would rain, and it did. elijah’s prayers
worked! (See James 5:17-18.)
I wish all my prayers would be like elijah’s. I must con- fess,
however, that I have not arrived at elijah’s level—yet. I am not even at the level of many of my closest friends— yet. one thing I do know is that I am on a higher level than I was last year, and that next year I intend, with God’s
help, to be higher than I am now. I may never reach elijah’s level, but it is not because such a thing is impossible.
In the passage I am citing, James
takes pains to point out that “elijah was a man with a nature like ours”(James
5:17). It is certainly possible that God could use you and that he could use me the way he used elijah. Why not? that is ex- actly what I desire. I want my prayers to be more effective
in the future than they have been in the
past.
this book, I
have no
doubt, will help your
prayers be-
come
more powerful than they have been in the past. Just
feeling
the pulse of a
dynamic church such
as the
Prayer Cave will fill you with renewed faith and hope for effective
prayer in your personal life, in the lives of your family, in your church, and in your community. I think you will agree with
me that
Pastor thomas Muthee is fairly
close to
the elijah level.
THE KENYA PRAYER CAVE
Pastor
thomas Muthee is a valued personal friend. he is my east African director of
the International Spiritual War- fare Network. he is a clear thinker,
articulate, wise, and re- spected by his peers in Africa and other parts of the
world.
I
say this, not to inflate my friend thomas,
but simply to assure the readers that we are not talking about some
ob- scure flake, but about a church leader of good reputation and high
integrity. As a side note, I am deeply grateful to my colleague,
George otis Jr. of the Sentinel
Group, for
introducing me to Pastor thomas Muthee and for interviewing him to collect details of this remarkable story. the following story is para-
phrased
from George otis Jr.’s
book, the twilight Labyrinth
(Chosen books).1
thomas
Muthee would be commonly identified as a
megachurch pastor. the Prayer Cave church is growing rap- idly and, at this
writing, approaching 4,000 members, or 5 percent of Kiambu’s population of
80,000. Almost all the members are new converts because very few residents of
Kiambu were Christians when thomas arrived. how
did this church grow so vigorously, and how did it come to have such a
measurable influence on the whole city?
Without
any hesitation whatsoever, thomas Muthee would say that
it happened through powerful prayer.
thomas and
his wife had
returned
to Kenya from a time in
Scotland. he was ministering as an
itinerant evangelist, and his wife was teaching
school.While in prayer one day, he heard the Lord say to him,“I want you to
plant a church in Kiambu.”
(hearing from the Lord in prayer was not a new experience
for thomas, although it would
be for many
Christians whom I
know. this is such
a vital
component of
powerful prayer that I have dedicated the entire next chapter to the
subject of two-way prayer.)
After
spending a good deal more time with the Lord and testing the word with his wife
and others—always a good safeguard—thomas was certain
this was indeed the command of God for a new career and
for a new place of residence. there was no question
in his mind that he had to obey. thomas,
however, did not look forward to the assignment with one bit of pleasure.
A MURDER CAPITAL AND A PREACHER’S GRAVE-
YARD
only a
few miles distant from the beautiful capital city of Nairobi, Kiambu had gained
a national reputation for having the worst crime, violence, drunkenness,
immorality, thievery, and human degradation. Public disorder was the rule, and
loud rock music was blaring from speakers in front of barrooms throughout the
nights. It was the murder cap- ital of Kenya, registering up to eight killings
in a given month. the economy of the city was so bad that government officials
reportedly paid bribes to their superiors so as not to be assigned to Kiambu.
A cloud
of mystery also hung over the city. everyone there knew that in one certain
place many, and often unex- plainable, automobile accidents regularly occurred.
It was considered a good month when as few as three fatalities were reported as
a result of traffic accidents. Stranger still was the fact that no matter how
mangled the bodies of the accident victims were, to all intents and purposes,
no bleed- ing occurred—ever! At times, some reported hearing screeching tires
and crashing metal, but when they ran to the site, no cars could be seen at
all! Although he had never visited Kiambu,
thomas knew its reputation well, and he did not like the city, much less
the prospects of making his home there. Add to that the fact that, although he
had been in Christian ministry for years, he had never contemplated planting a
new church. he believed he had the gift of evangelist, and he was using it suc-
cessfully as he traveled around the nation.
even if he had intended to plant a church, Kiambu
would have been thomas’ last choice as a likely site because
the
city had also gained the reputation as a preacher’s grave- yard. Pastor after
pastor tried to plant a church there and soon left defeated and discouraged. the Pentecostal/Charis- matic kind of churches, which were growing vigorously in other parts of Kenya, could not seem to grow either in Ki- ambu. the largest, pastored by a wonderful,
dedicated man
of God, had grown to less than 60 members
after 15 years of faithful ministry! Another,
also 15 years old, had 40 mem- bers, and another only 30.
SIX MONTHS OF PRAYER AND FASTING
the
assignment was clear; but how to implement
it? If thomas had taken my course at Fuller in church planting, he might
have conducted demographic surveys, feasibility studies, public opinion polls,
and cost analyses studies. Not that any
of these are bad—I continue to recommend
them highly to the best of intelligent church
planters. God, how- ever, gave thomas a different strategy few church planters
have used, but in this case it was probably
the one way a city as engulfed by spiritual darkness as Kiambu could be pen- etrated to any significant degree by the gospel.
by
mentioning this, I do not want to leave the impres- sion that I am suggesting
thomas Muthee’s method should be substituted for tried-and-true church
growth and church-planting principles. I definitely do, however, want to
leave the impression that church planters of any stripe would do well to take a
close look at what thomas did, dis- cern the spiritual principles behind his
activities, and, al- though they decide not to copy his method, at least
consider employing the principles.
God’s
plan for thomas and his wife was
for them to pray and fast for six months, which they faithfully
did. thomas did not so much as visit
Kiambu, only 10 miles from his home, during
that time period. they practiced a variety of fasts
during those months, sometimes fasting a meal or two, sometimes for extended
periods, drinking juice or water only, as well as some absolute fasts when they
con- sumed no food or drink.
I
personally heard thomas describe this season of wait- ing on the Lord. he saw
it as proactive spiritual warfare. he said,“If we are going to win the battle
for Kiambu, we must win it in the air. the ground troops must not invade
the territory of the enemy without first achieving victory in the invisible
world. I would not want to step my foot into Kiambu until the spiritual forces
of darkness over the city have lost their grip.”
thomas
was no stranger to the devices of
satan. he was an experienced intercessor, and in his evangelistic work he had
confronted the enemy in power encounters on a variety of levels. he had learned
that the devil as- signs certain specific demons over towns, cities, and na-
tions, as well as families. he said, “over this extended time of prayer and
fasting, I wanted to know exactly what was keeping Kiambu so politically,
socially, economically, and spiritually oppressed.”
the term many of us are using for the quest that was en-
gaging thomas Muthee at the time is “spiritual mapping.” the major
purpose of spiritual mapping is to target our prayers as accurately as possible. this is so important that I
have written about the subject in Chapter 4. So I will not go
into much detail here except to say that as thomas prayed,
he
found himself asking more and more for the exact iden-
tity of the major principality over the city. As I often say, it is not necessary to know the name of the chief spirit to pray effectively for a city such as Kiambu, but if God chooses to reveal the name, it is an advantage. In this case, thomas be- lieved
he should ask specifically for the name.
THE POWER OVER THE CITY: WITCHCRAFT
God
answered, this time through a vision. In the vision, thomas clearly
saw the principality over Kiambu, and its name
was “Witchcraft.” he also saw many other demons around Witchcraft and under its
command. From that point onward, the prayers of
thomas and his wife were much more specifically
targeted, and they sensed in the Spirit that considerable damage was being done
in the invisible world to the dark angels that had enjoyed such a free reign
over Kiambu for generations.
the name
they received was a functional name—a spirit of witchcraft. that demon
might well have also had a proper name, similar to some we read about in
the bible such as “Wormwood” or “Abaddon” or “beelzebub,” but in this in-
stance thomas apparently did not need to know what it was. If he needed it, God
would undoubtedly have revealed it to him. At the same time, the vision was so
clear that thomas assigned the proper name,“Witchcraft,” to the spirit who was
controlling that activity and thereby influencing much of what was happening in
the city.
At the end of the six months of prayer and fasting, thomas felt peace in his heart and mind. he sensed that the major
phase of the ministry to reach Kiambu with the gospel had been completed. he saw in the Spirit that the spiritual atmosphere over Kiambu had been
sufficiently cleared through powerful prayer and that the forces of dark-
ness
over the city were losing their stranglehold on the city and were now
in disarray. It was time for
the
ground forces to move into enemy territory.
INVASION: BY AN ARMY OF TWO!
the ground forces consisted
of only two people—thomas
and
his wife. When they moved
there, though, they discov-
ered that the way had been prepared so well that they were
the
first Christian ministers allowed
to use the Kiambu mu-
nicipal hall to preach the gospel.
their strategy
was to
win people
through public evan-
gelistic meetings, so thomas, drawing
on his extensive
ex- perience as an evangelist, began
the meetings in January
1989. one of the first things he did was to borrow some used tires from a local mechanic, because thomas is very short.
“WHAT IS GAINED BY PRAYER MUST BE MAIN- TAINED BY PRAYER!”
he piled
them up, fashioned a platform, preached the Word, and saw eight people saved
the first night!
the
evangelistic harvest continued, and the new church met in the municipal hall
for more than a year. thomas be- came more and more dissatisfied, though,
because they could not pray as he wanted
on site. they had use of the building on Sundays
and on Wednesday nights only. thomas’ vision was that his church facility
should be used for prayer 24 hours a day, every day. he knew well what I have
heard many intercessors say, “What is gained by prayer must be maintained by
prayer!” he was convinced that if his new church was to continue to grow and ulti-
mately have an influence on the whole city of Kiambu, prayer had to be the most
prominent ongoing component of his philosophy of ministry. Soon they were able to move out of the municipal hall, but only into the basement of
another building. It might have been
rather dark and dingy,
but from the day they moved in, the 24-hour prayer has never stopped! Going into the basement felt something like going into a
cave, so peo- ple naturally began referring to it as “the Prayer Cave,” and
the name stuck. the church, as might be expected, has a more
official name (Word of Faith Church),
but it is known far and wide only as the Kiambu Prayer Cave, although it
no longer meets in the basement.
THE SPIRITUAL COUNTERATTACK
the way I am narrating this case study might sound as
if the first couple of years of the Prayer Cave were a piece of cake—no problems, no heartaches, no setbacks. on the contrary,
the spiritual
counterattack was fierce. thomas
soon
discovered that the human being whom the principal- ity over the city, Witchcraft,
was using the most was a noto- rious
sorcerer named “Mama Jane.” She did her witchcraft
and fortune-telling in a place she had perversely
named “emmanuel Clinic.” She
was considered by many as the most powerful person in the city, and both politicians and
businesspeople frequented emmanuel Clinic to have their fortunes told and to receive Mama Jane’s
blessing.
one more thing—the emmanuel Clinic happened to be located
near an open market and precisely at that part of the city where the
mysterious fatal traffic accidents had been occurring month
after month! every Saturday
night Mama
Jane went
to thomas’ church site, performed
magic, and cast her spells and curses.
She let it be known to the city officials
that she could not
help them with her fortune-telling as much as she used to
because this new church seemed to be “cutting
her lines of communication.” Consequently, one of the outcomes was that not only the city authorities, but also the pastors of other Christian
churches began attacking the ministry of the Prayer Cave. that part of it was no fun!
thomas Muthee
and the church
members, praying 24 hours
a day, did what they could to counteract the demonic attacks against the church.
Some Christian leaders seem to think that
Christians are immune to satan’s attacks.they trivialize the devil
by calling him a“toothless lion.” Such an attitude
of denial only plays
into satan’s hands and gives him free rein to continue
his plans “to kill, steal and destroy”(John 10:10). Such was not the
case
with the members
of the Prayer Cave.they knew well that
Mama
Jane’s counterattack was real, it was powerful,
and it was doing considerable damage to the cause of Christ. the Chris- tians,
day after day, cried out to God for more power.
WAS MAMA JANE’S SORCERY TOO MUCH?
God answered by bringing
thomas Muthee and his con-
gregation to a
place of desperation. the power of evil
had invaded the church to the point that they could hardly pray. one day it got so bad that they started a worship song and were never able to finish it! Something was going on! they went outside and found the remains of fresh places of sac- rifices and rituals left behind by Mama Jane.
After that, thomas Muthee went before the Lord, crying in agony. Was this
work going to fail? Was Kiambu truly a graveyard of pastors? Would his
spiritual tombstone be added to the others? by this time, Muthee was thoroughly
convinced that the demonic powers entrusted to Mama Jane had been the very
forces that had driven pastor after pastor out of Kiambu. “God,” he prayed, “Do
not let me be the next to go—show me the way forward!”
God answered this prayer in a still, small voice by sim- ply suggesting,“My son, I want you to get intercessors on the job.”
Fortunately,
thomas understood what God meant. he realized that
although he had a congregation of many, many pray-ers, he had not recognized,
designated, empowered, and released intercessors. Just as all Christians are
expected to be witnesses for Christ and of them only a few are cho- sen by God
to be evangelists, so all Christians are expected to be pray-ers, but only a
few of them are chosen to be in- tercessors. this is another
one of those important compo- nents of a full-orbed
prayer ministry I have included later on in Chapter 7.
Not wanting to make a mistake or stretch the time line, thomas came right to the point and said,“Lord, I am ready to do it. Who are the intercessors you have chosen?” re- markably, God immediately answered and told him five in- tercessors had been selected at the present time. he also gave thomas their names! one approach
might have been to bring the five together to
fast and pray once a week. A much more radical strategy seemed to be called for, though. thomas
assigned each
in- tercessor to fast and pray for a whole day, then another for the next day and so on. that way, one of the intercessors was
always fasting and praying.
INTERCESSORS NEED ARMOR BEARERS
the
initial results seemed to be positive, but the inter- cessors began suffering
serious attacks. on their desig- nated fasting days, sickness and other things
debilitated them and prevented their prayers from being as powerful as they
should be. Pastor thomas asked the Lord to reveal what should be done, and God
took him to the biblical story of Jonathan, who, unlike King Saul, went to war
hav- ing an armor bearer at his side.
through this seemingly trivial detail, God showed
thomas that each intercessor needed armor bearers on the
specific day designated for fasting and praying.
thomas
called together his intercessors, who by then had
grown to a team of nine, and told them that each per- son who was designated to
fast on a particular day would be covered by two armor bearers. one would be
the person who had fasted and prayed the day before, and the other would be the
one who was scheduled to fast and pray the following day. these two would form
a protective hedge of prayer around the one on duty. they did
it, and it worked!
the spiritual
harassment suddenly stopped.
the armor-bearer plan has been in place ever since, and at this writing the intercession team has grown to 400 highly-committed individuals. Instead of only
one intercessor fasting and praying each day, they
are now divided into blocks of 15 or 20, which means that every sin- gle day either 15 or 20 are praying and have a prayer
shield spread over each one by two other intercessors.
In thomas Muthee’s opinion,
adding the serious inter-
cessors to the prayer
ministry of the Prayer
Cave was the
decisive turning point in the spiritual battle
for Kiambu. An increasing number of Mama Jane’s clients were becom- ing Christians and publicly
burning the charms and fetishes
she had sold them. the way was
now open for
Muthee to
issue a public ultimatum: “mama Jane either gets saved and
serves the Lord or she leaves town! there is no longer room in ki- ambu for both of us!”
In plain terms, thomas
Muthee had
challenged Mama Jane to a power encounter,
much as eli- jah had challenged the
priests of baal.
THE POWER ENCOUNTER
by now
the word was spreading around to the city offi- cials that Mama Jane did not
seem to have the power she used to have. her clients were embarrassing her by
openly burning fetishes and renouncing curses. Some began point- ing out that
it could be no coincidence that her emmanuel Clinic was right next to the
area where the serious accidents were occurring. the whole process was brought
to a climax when three young children were killed in one of the
mysterious accidents. the people of the
city were furious. they suspected that it was Mama Jane’s black
magic that was causing the accidents. they wanted to stone her!
the police were called in, and they entered Mama Jane’s house to investigate. In one room of the house they were startled to find one of the largest pythons they had ever seen. they immediately
shot the snake
and killed it. that
natural act caused the spiritual battle to end. Mama Jane was taken by the police for questioning
and was later re-
leased. She quickly and wisely opted to leave town for good.
Instead of a preacher’s graveyard, Kiambu had miraculously
been transformed to a witch’s graveyard!
Let’s not lose the significance of the snake. that was the
event in the visible world that reflected
what had been hap- pening
in the invisible world. before he had arrived in Ki- ambu,
thomas Muthee had been informed by
God that Witchcraft was the principality ruling the city,
supported by any number of lesser spirits.
Witchcraft’s human vehicle was the witch, Mama Jane, who had
blasphemed God by calling her den of iniquity
“emmanuel Clinic.”
She had also
become the most powerful woman in Kiambu. When the apostle Paul arrived in Philippi, he encountered a similar situation. the most
spiritually-powerful
woman
in Philippi was a slave
girl “possessed with a spirit of divination [or witchcraft]”(Acts 16:16). the details were different, but after a time, Paul also provoked a power en-
counter and said to the spirit,“I
command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her”(v. 18). the slave girl immediately
lost her magical powers, many miracles took place, and a strong
church was planted in Philippi.
What
about the snake? Most of our translations use the phrase “spirit of divination”
or “spirit of clairvoyance,” which is the functional name of the
territorial spirit over Philippi. biblical scholars, however, tell us that a
more literal rendering of the Greek would give the spirit a proper name.
For example, Simon Kistemaker points out that the best way to translate the
Greek is “a spirit, namely a Python.”2
here is
one indication of the relationship of the snake in the visible world to spirits
of witchcraft in the invisible world. It is common that in art designed to
glorify the demonic, snakes are frequently used to represent witchcraft.
It comes
as no surprise, then, to those familiar with spir- itual warfare and spiritual
mapping that a huge python was found in Mama Jane’s house, and that killing the
snake was the final blow to her evil power in Kiambu.
POWERFUL PRAYER CAN CHANGE A CITY!
the point I am trying to make in this
chapter is that
powerful prayer works. our case study of the Prayer Cave
is a convincing example. the spiritual defeat of Mama Jane
is
convincing enough, but that is not all. What effect did the prayer ministry of the Prayer Cave have on the city of Ki- ambu
as a whole?
When Mama Jane left the city,
things began to change quickly and dramatically.the unbelievers in the city also rec-
ognized the cause-and-effect relationship between the power encounter
and the subsequent changes in
the community.
economically,
the city is now prosperous. Govern- ment officials, instead of allegedly paying
bribes so as not to be assigned to Kiambu, now are said to pay bribes to get
the assignment.
the crime
and violence associated with the city in the national media
is now virtually gone. the chief of police
has recently visited Pastor Muthee and told him that be- cause of what he has
done to Kiambu, he has been granted permission to preach anywhere at any time;
he can use any volume on the loudspeakers and does not need a permit. Some of
the most notorious criminals of the city are now saved and
are members of the Prayer Cave. one
of the worst drug dealers has renounced such behavior and is en- rolled
in the church bible school; he plays bass guitar in the worship team, and he
uses his spare time to evangelize patients in the hospitals. Alcoholism
is notably diminished in Kiambu. the in- tercessors went on prayerwalks around
the barrooms, and the loud music is a thing of the past. one of the most
prominent high-volume discos is now a church! A small valley near the city had
been notorious as a den of bootleggers, producing and selling native beer on
the black market. the intercessors targeted
it for prayer- walking. the still is now closed, and the Prayer
Cave has purchased the land to build its new church facility!
Do Not ForGet the CeNtrAL CAuSe oF
the AWeSoMe ChANGeS IN the CIty oF KIAMbu, KeNyA: PoWerFuL PrAyer. Finally the Kingdom of God is
coming to Kiambu. No more hostility is present among Christian pastors.
repentance and reconciliation is the order of the day. Churches of all
denominations across the city are now growing rapidly, the same as they have in
other parts of Kenya. Pastors regularly eat together and pray together. At this
writing, they are making plans for the first joint evangelistic citywide
crusade that Kiambu has ever known.
Do not forget the central cause of these awesome changes in
the city of Kiambu,
Kenya: powerful prayer.
PRAYER POWER IN ARGENTINA
Mama Jane got off easily, compared
to two cases of power-
ful prayer in Argentina. My wife, Doris,
and I have been work- ing
with ed Silvoso, author of that none should perish
(regal books), in Argentina for many years. the first season of min- istry
was in the city of resistencia in northern Argentina. one of the territorial spirits that had resistencia under its control was
San La Muerte, the spirit of death.
Multitudes worshiped this spirit because it promised them “a good death.”
think of the desperation
and hopelessness that must
have been
present in the hearts of
those people to grasp hold of such a promise! Death was worshiped in 13 shrines
around the city. Many people
would take one of its images, carved from human bone, and have it surgically implanted under their skin so that no matter where they
went they would be assured of a good death!
A great
deal of fervent prayer began to be offered in re- sistencia after seminars
about intercession were taught by Doris, Cindy Jacobs, Argentine Pastor eduardo
Lorenzo, and others. When the time came for the climactic evangel- istic event,
Doris and Cindy flew to resistencia and were met with a startling piece of
news. the week before they ar- rived, the high priestess of the cult of San La
Muerte had been smoking in bed. She fell asleep, her bed caught on fire, and
only three things were consumed by the flames: her mattress, herself, and her
statue of San La Muerte, which was in another room! Nothing else in the house
was touched. the one who had promised
others a good death had died a horrible death herself!
Needless to say, the harvest was great in resistencia. In a short time,
the number of believers there had increased by 102 percent! the
spirit of death was defeated by powerful
prayer, and the Kingdom of God poured through resistencia.
CONFRONTING WITCHCRAFT IN MAR DEL PLATA
the other
incident in Argentina took place in the resort city of Mar del Plata. After
careful planning and painstak- ing spiritual mapping, Doris, Cindy, eduardo
Lorenzo, and others felt led to take a team of local pastors and interces- sors
to pray in the central plaza of the city after conducting a prayer
and spiritual warfare seminar. they prayed
for a couple of hours, asking God to break the spiritual strong- holds
there. As they were praying out loud, specifically against the spirit of
witchcraft, which they had discerned was the major principality over the city,
several noticed that the bells in the cathedral rang for a considerable period
of time at exactly 4:00 P.M.
the news did not reach them until the next day, when they heard from one of the pastors who had attended the seminar
but felt led to pray at home rather than go to the plaza. this pastor’s home happened to be right
across the
street from the home of a Macumba witch of Mar del Plata, the
one who had boasted of joining other witches in launch- ing spiritual attacks against the Christian pastors of the city. Shortly after 4:00 P.M., the pastor saw an ambulance pull up to the witch’s house and carry her away, dead. She had been in fine health, but witnesses
said that she suddenly dropped
dead at 4:00 P.M. for no apparent cause! Cindy Jacobs comments about the incident: “We were stunned when we heard this report
. While we were not happy
that the woman had died, we were acutely aware that God was sending
a clear message
of judgment against
witch craft. ” 3
WHY DOES PRAYER MAKE A DIFFERENCE?
In the case in Mar del Plata, the attitude of God against witchcraft had not been changed by the prayer action
in the plaza. had it not been for
the prayer, however, witch- craft in Mar del Plata would
have been business as usual, at least according to my best understanding of the theol- ogy
of prayer. the
prayer
in the plaza was
targeted, it
was aggressive, it was empowered by the holy Spirit, and it was intentional.
It was an elijah kind of prayer. exactly the
same thing could be said about the prayer in resistencia and in Kiambu, Kenya.
In each case, prayer moved the hand of God to show his
power in the visible world. Al- though prayer did
not change God’s attitude, it did influ-
ence his actions.
how does
the prayer action of human beings relate to the sovereignty of God? this is a
key issue in understand- ing the difference between
prayer in general and effective, fervent prayer.
When I
was first moving deeply into my study and un- derstanding of prayer some years
ago, one of the statements that helped me most was a chapter title in Jack
hayford’s book prayer is invading the impossible: “If We Don’t, he
Won’t.” Jack hayford did not say, “If we don’t, he can’t.” that
would have been terrible theology. God is
sovereign, and he can do anything he wants to do. the sovereign
God, however, apparently
has chosen to order his creation in such a way that many of his actions are contingent
on the prayers of his people. It is as if God has a Plan A he
will implement if believers
pray. If they do not, he has a Plan b.
Plan A is obviously better for all concerned
than Plan b. the choice, according to God’s design, is ours. If we choose to pray and if we pray powerfully, more blessing will come
and God’s kingdom will be manifested here on earth in a more
glorious way than if we choose
not to.
I love the way one of the great scholars of prayer of our generation,
richard Foster, puts it, “We are working with God to determine
the future. Certain things will happen in
history if we pray rightly.’’4
Any
who might doubt this need only
ask thomas Muthee or Cindy Jacobs or, for that matter, Mama Jane to
dispel doubts and to build faith that powerful prayer can, indeed, determine
the history of our cities and nations.
REFLECTION QUESTIONS 39
REFLECTION QUESTIONS
talk about the suggestion that
some prayer
is powerful
while other prayer may not be. Why don’t we hear very
many sermons about this?
See if you can name two or three tangible
answers to your prayer
or the prayer of someone you know. Could
you prove a scientific cause-and-effect relationship between
the prayer and the supposed answer?
40 PRAYING
WITH POWER
thomas Muthee discovered that the territorial spirit over his
city was named “Witchcraft.” Can you tell
of another such case in which the name
of a spirit over an area be- came known?
Some people might not believe that the
spirits where Mama Jane served would have enough power to cause
mysterious accidents in a certain place. What do you think?
CHAPTER 2
TWO-WAY
PRAYER: HEARING GOD
C
plary life of faith while in a Nazi prison
camp in holland. She tells a
story that is simple, but at the same
time a pro- found illustration
of what I like to call
“two-way prayer.”
When she was incarcerated in the prison camp, one day she caught a severe cold and was distraught
because she had no handkerchief. She told her sister,
betsie, who was a pris- oner with her, that she desperately needed a handkerchief, and said,“What can I do?”
betsie
said,“you can pray!” When she saw that Corrie’s only response was a patronizing
smile, betsie took matters into her own hands and prayed,“Father, Corrie has a
cold and has no handkerchief. Will you please give her one? In Jesus’
name. Amen.”
Soon after this, Corrie
heard her name called. At the win- dow was a friend who worked in the prison hospital. She handed Corrie a little package,
which Corrie opened and was astounded
to find a handkerchief! “Why did you bring
this?” Corrie asked her
friend.“how did you know I had a cold?”
“I had no
idea,” her friend said.“but while I was folding handkerchiefs in the hospital,
a voice in my heart said,‘take one to Corrie ten boom.’”
Corrie ten boom’s comment was “What a miracle! Can you understand what that handkerchief told me at that moment? It told me that in heaven there is a loving Father who hears when one of his children
on this very small planet asks for an impossible
little thing—a handkerchief. And that heavenly
Father tells one of his other children to take a handkerchief to Corrie
ten boom.”1
think back for a moment to thomas Muthee at his low- est
point in Kiambu, Kenya, when God told him that the only way forward was
to build a team of intercessors.
Muthee, like Corrie ten boom’s
sister, betsie, prayed a sim- ple prayer:“Lord, I am ready to do it. Who are the interces- sors you have chosen?” As an answer, God gave thomas the
names
of the five intercessors he had chosen for the pastor.
CAN WE HEAR THE VOICE OF GOD?
the preceding stories are two vivid
examples of indi-
viduals hearing the voice
of God as part of their prayer
lives. I chose these two stories
because they are uncomplicated.
the prayers
were direct and unemotional. one was
prayed by a pastor and the other by a layperson; one by a black man and the other
by a white
woman. they experienced no flashing lights or feelings of ecstasy or angelic appearances or sounds of a rushing mighty wind. In both cases, a loving Father spoke to his children in a small, quiet voice. In one case,
he spoke back to the person who prayed, and in the other he spoke to a third party.
those to
whom he spoke had spiritual ears to hear, com- bined with the
will to obey what they heard. the result?
Great blessing!
Furthermore, the voice of God in both
of these incidents was so clear and so specific that there could be no question
about its source. Granted, sometimes the voice of God is a bit vague; sometimes he speaks in parables that may
need interpretation; sometimes he gives us a partial response and expects us to be patient before receiving
the rest of it. With the
handkerchief, though, for example, God gave a specific command to be implemented
immediately in a specific
way. No room is found for error there!
this is the way prayer
should be. As I
have mentioned previously, the essence of prayer is a
personal relationship between two
persons, or intimacy with the Father. our re- lationship with God is not just a close friendship; it is fam- ily. I love
my pastor, Dutch Sheets, for example, and he lovesme. he sometimes refers to the members of Freedom
Church, which he pastors, as a “family.” this, however, is a metaphor, not to be taken literally. Dutch Sheets has a literal family, and their primary meeting place is not the church,
but his home. because I have never been in that home I obviously do not belong to his family.
I have never seen Pastor
Dutch in his pajamas!
MEETING GOD IN THE LIVING ROOM
God, however, tells us that he is our Father. When we talk to him, we talk to him as if we both were in the living room of our own house. I had a wonderful
relationship with my own father,
who is now with the Lord. During the last 15 years
of his
life,
he lived in Massachusetts, and I lived
in California. I made a habit of calling him on the telephone
every Sunday. When I called him, I did not expect to talk, and talk, and talk, and then hang up. I expected to talk a bit, and
listen to what my father had to say, and then go on from there. this is the most natural thing for a father and his son.
Why would we expect differently
from our heavenly
Fa- ther? too often our prayer lives are conducted
as if heaven
were a big telephone bank that we call and leave voicemail
for God. that is not what God wants. he wants us listening and
able to hear when he says something such
as, “Give Corrie ten boom a handkerchief.”
I like the way Pastor
bill hybels of Willow Creek Commu- nity Church in South barrington,
Illinois, puts it,“you can’t build a
relationship on one-way speeches. you need
frequent, sustained, intimate
contact between two persons,
both of whom speak and both of whom listen….Listening to God speak through his holy Spirit is not only normal; it is essential.”2 I must admit that I did not always know this. the Christian circles in which I moved did not stress two-way prayer. For years, I was not at a place
where I could have heard
the voice of God as did thomas Muthee or Corrie’s friend. It did not
matter that I was an ordained
minister and a seminary professor and an author of several Christian
books. No one had taught me in seminary what I am teaching
in this chapter.
Learning to hear the voice of God was a long process for
me because it was such a radical departure
from my past. Among
my circle of close friends and trusted colleagues, the one who first began to hear God’s voice clearly,
as I recall, was
John Wimber. he encouraged me to begin experiment-
ing a bit in distinguishing between my own thoughts and what the Father was attempting
to speak into me. As I was
working my way through this concept,
I will never forget
the effect of a statement
made by Pastor Jack hayford as I was
reading glory on Your house, the book he wrote about his church, the Church on the Way, in Van Nuys, California.
“AND I QUOTE”
hayford
writes,
And yet
when I say that the Lord has spoken to me, I mean something even more specific
than general rev- elation or private inner impressions. I reserve these words
intentionally for the rare, special occasions when, in my spirit, I have had
the Lord speak directly to me. I do not mean,“I felt impressed,” or “I sensed somehow.”
Instead, I mean that at a given
moment, al- most always when I have least expected it, the Lord spoke words to me. those words have been so distinct
that I feel virtually able to say,“And I
quote.”3
It is
safe to say that the majority of those reading this chapter will, at this
point, agree that we can and should practice two-way prayer and listen to the
voice of God. Not all, however, will agree. Jack hayford may have convinced me,
but he has not convinced everyone else that we can in- deed hear the very words
of God.
As a
matter of fact, growing evidence reveals that this issue may be one of the last
remaining major barriers be- tween charismatics and traditional evangelicals.
After we agree on levels of tolerance relating to such things as pray- ing for
the sick, casting out demons, speaking in tongues, raising hands in church, and
falling down under the power of the Spirit, hearing the direct voice of God is
still a non- negotiable issue for some.
A MAJOR BARRIER?
Speaking
of Jack hayford, he recently took a giant step in helping to remove barriers
between charismatics and tra- ditional evangelicals when he wrote the Beauty
of spiritual Language; the whole book focuses on speaking in tongues. In
it, he naturally raises the issue, dear to the hearts of clas- sical
Pentecostals and others, of whether speaking in tongues is to be regarded as
the initial physical evidence of receiving the baptism in the holy Spirit.
his conclusion, based on his understanding of the bible, is that those who have
suggested that speaking in tongues is the initial physical evidence have built
“an unintended but nonetheless restrictive barrier.”4 hayford
believes, as non-charismatic evangelicals have long contended, that evidences
other than speaking in tongues may verify a believer is filled with the holy
Spirit.
Soon after hayford published his book, Pastor Chuck Swindoll was invited to become the president of Dallas theological Seminary, an institution widely known
for its serious concerns about Pentecostal/Charismatic theology
and practice. Christianity today magazine
conducted a sub- stantial interview with Chuck Swindoll, and the interviewer
kept probing areas that might uncover
possible changes Swindoll
would implement once he became president.
Swindoll was diplomatically noncommittal in his responses
until the interviewer posed the following question:“In the Beauty of spiritual Language, Jack hayford says that speak-
ing
in tongues is not necessarily a precondition for fullness
in the Spirit. If that’s the case, what are the barriers between evangelicals
and charismatics?”
Swindoll’s
response, coming from such a highly- respected evangelical leader, will leave
no doubt that hear- ing from God remains a central issue to many:“the primary barrier would
be extra-biblical revelation. Now, Jack’s
a good friend, and I love him dearly.
he’s taught me as much about worship as anyone else. but I think he would have room in his theology for extra-biblical revelation, of god speaking outside the scriptures
and beyond the scriptures.I have trouble
with that.” (emphasis mine.)
JACK DEERE’S PARADIGM SHIFT
the best response to this key question about whether we can receive
valid information from God outside the Scrip-
tures, in my opinion, comes from Jack
Deere, who for many years served in a distinguished career as an old testament
professor at Dallas theological Seminary.
During
Deere’s time at the Seminary, he taught his stu- dents that God did not engage
in present-day revelatory ac- tivities. God’s revelation was contained in the
66 books of the bible, and hearing God’s voice today means correctly exegeting
the Scriptures. A tacit understanding existed be- tween him and several of his
colleagues who regarded it as disreputable behavior to attribute the reason
they had de- cided to do or say a certain thing to the idea that “God told
me to.” those who wished to be
more technical labeled such a statement as “dangerous
epistemology.”
Five
years before Chuck Swindoll became president of Dallas Seminary, Jack Deere was
forced to leave the faculty because he had undergone a paradigm shift and broke
sem- inary taboos by attending a Vineyard Christian Fellowship church. No
longer a cessationist (believing that the mirac- ulous gifts of the Spirit
ceased with the Apostolic Age), he was regarded as incompatible with one of the seminary’s
major tenets of faith. Deere subsequently wrote a masterful book, surprised by the power of the spirit, in which he defends contemporary ministries of healing, deliverance, and miracles. When he originally outlined the book, he had planned
on including a section about hearing
the voice of God. In- stead, he mentioned it only in an epilogue.
Why? As Deere searched the Scriptures, prayed fervently, and organized his thoughts about hearing from God, he says,
one “chapter quickly became two
chapters, then three,
and then I realized
that I had begun another book altogether.”6 As a background to this, he reveals to his readers,“the most
difficult transition for me in my pilgrimage
was not in accepting
that Scripture teaches that God heals and does miracles today through gifted believers. the thing I resisted the most, was most afraid of, and which
took the most convincing was accepting
that God still speaks today” (italics his).7
the
result of this process was the publication of a second book, 80 pages longer
than the first one, which, at least in my opinion, should put to rest all
biblical, theological, his- torical, and epistemological arguments against the
possi- bility of God’s speaking and our hearing his voice today: surprised
by the Voice of god.
No rePutAbLe
ChrIStIAN LeADerS
We KNoW Who beLIeVe thAt GoD SPeAKS
toDAy WouLD eVer equAte ANythING they heAr or thAt otherS heAr WIth SCrIPture. Jack Deere and I both agree that the motivation
in the hearts of those who do not believe
in present-day divine revelation
is a commendable motivation. We join them in the heartfelt
desire to affirm the
unique authority of the written Word of God
in the bible. thinking back, Deere says the thing that frightened him the most was this: “If I admitted that God was still
speaking apart from the bible, wouldn’t I be opening the canon of Scripture again?”8
Jack now realizes that his was an unfounded fear because no reputable Christian leaders we know who believe
that God speaks today would ever equate anything they hear or that
others hear with Scripture. he sums it up by saying, “today, after years of practical experience
and intense study on the
subject of God’s speaking, I am convinced that God does indeed speak apart from the bible, though never in con-
tradiction to it (italics mine).9
PROPHECIES AND PROPHETS
up till now, I have not used the term“prophecy,” although it is directly related
to two-way prayer and hearing
the voice of God. If God does not speak today, there are, by definition, no longer any prophets. Prophecy
has the distinction of being one
of only two spiritual gifts
(the other one being teaching) that are mentioned in all
three primary lists of gifts: 1 Corinthians 12:8-11, romans 12:4-8,
and ephesians 4. I de- fine prophecy as follows:“the gift of prophecy is the special
ability that God gives to certain
members of the body of
Christ to receive
and communicate an immediate message
of God to his people through
a divinely anointed
utterance.”10 We live in a time when prophecy
is becoming more and more recognized throughout the body of Christ. the argument that God
does not speak outside of the bible may well belong on some “endangered doctrine” list. the best I can calculate, the
resurgence of biblical prophecy and the prophetic
movement began around 1980 and has been picking up speed ever since.
Jack
Deere’s is not the only book helping spur this move- ment along. Professor
Wayne Grudem, then of trinity evan- gelical Divinity School in Deerfield,
Illinois, has provided solid biblical foundations in the gift of prophecy in
the new testament and today (Crossway books). one of the most helpful books
to me during myparadigm shift in the 1980s was prophets and personal
prophecy (Destiny Image Pub- lishers) by bill hamon, president of the
Christian Interna- tional Network.
Mike
bickle, who was pastor of the Kansas City Metro Christian Fellowship, has been
regarded by many as the na- tion’s foremost pastor to prophets. he shares his
wisdom, refined through many years, in growing
in the prophetic. one of the most highly-recommended books by
practi- tioners active in prophetic ministries is the Voice of god by
Cindy Jacobs.
the
combination of scholar, theologian, and theoreti- cian in
Jack Deere, along with intercessor and practitioner in Cindy
Jacobs, is notable. the two together, both good friends
of mine, provide a dependable compass point for those who desire to explore the
path of contemporary prophecy, still a rather unfamiliar
journey for many, including me. I love the titles of these two books, which were
published within a year of each other. Jack, the former cessationist, is
surprised by the Voice of god. Cindy, who has been hearing from God since
she
was four, was not surprised at all. She calls her book, simply, the Voice
of god.
THE NEW APOSTOLIC REFORMATION
I am giving considerable emphasis to prophecy on these
pages because I sense we are living
in the midst of an ex- traordinary move of God. It
has recently become evident that the fastest growing segment of
Christianity on all six continents is a movement I call the New
Apostolic refor- mation. It includes, among many others, African Independ- ent
Churches, Chinese house churches, Latin American grassroots churches,
independent charismatics, and many local congregations still operating within
traditional de- nominational
structures. one of the most innovative
char- acteristics of this movement (although several exceptions
might exist) is the reinstatement of the New testament of- fices of prophet and apostle.
Many of these churches have a strong desire to imple- ment, in a practical way,
what some call “the fivefold min-
istry” of ephesians 4:11: apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors,
and teachers. Most traditional churches, they point
out, have functioned for years by using evangelists, pastors, and teachers, but for reasons now considered inadequate by the
leaders of the New Apostolic reformation, have decided not to recognize apostles and prophets.
I have mentioned that I believe acceptance
of the office
of prophet began diffusing
rapidly throughout the body of
Christ around 1980. Likewise,
I believe reinstatement of the office
of apostle began a similar process
around 1990. Pastor David Cannistraci
of evangel Christian Fellowship
in San Jose, California, has published an excellent textbook,
the gift of apostle
(regal books). bill hamon, whom I mentioned earlier, has
now written a
new book
titled apostles,
prophets and Coming moves of god (Destiny
Image Publishers). My most mature thoughts on this can be found in my
book, apostles today (regal books).
RECOGNIZING THE OFFICE OF PROPHET
My
purpose here, in a chapter called “two-Way Prayer: hearing God,” is to explain
the office of prophet. because this is new to much of the contemporary Church,
it is ex- pected that for some time certain issues will be discussed and
debated, and various leaders will come to various con- clusions. one of these
issues is whether titles such as Apos- tle So-and-So or Prophet So-and-So
should be used.
the
discussion is not so much whether the functions or ministries of apostles and
prophets should be recognized, but whether individuals should formally be set
into the of- fices and use titles as we do for the other ephesians 4:11 of-
fices, such as evangelist billy Graham, Pastor robert Schuller, or
Professor/Doctor Peter Wagner.
Mike
bickle is among the more cautious. his church, which was the spiritual home of
what some have called the “Kansas City Prophets,” was strongly criticized in
the media awhile ago by some
who had not yet come to terms with high-visibility prophetic ministry.
bickle has therefore tried to develop
a way of communicating in the least offensive way possible,
and so he says that he is not at all comfortable with
labeling most people who prophesy as “prophets.”
Instead, bickle classifies “prophetically-gifted people” in his church
on four levels: Level one: “Simple
Prophetic”; Level two: “Prophetic Gifting”; Level three: “Prophetic
Ministry”; and Level Four: “Prophetic office.”12 he clearly does not deny the
existence of the prophetic
office, but he says few people he knows personally (and he knows
more po- tential “prophets”
than most) qualify for such a designation.
As a matter of fact, Mike
bickle says,“I think the church
does itself harm when it allows people to quickly identify themselves
as ‘apostle’ or ‘prophet’ simply because they con-
sider themselves to be so.”13
Cindy
Jacobs agrees. She says,“years before I was actu- ally set into the office of
the prophet, people would often ask me,‘Are you a prophetess?’ each time they
would ask, I would reply in return,‘No, I’m not a prophetess. I’ll know when he
sets me into the office.”14 It is one thing for indi- viduals to
recognize the fact that they hear from God more frequently and more accurately
than most. It is quite an- other, however, to add to that the godly character
and ma- tured wisdom, as Mike bickle says, that causes peers to agree that the
person merits the designation of “prophet.” this eventually
happened to Cindy
Jacobs in
a time
of powerful corporate intercession when
she heard the voice
of God say to her heart,“Cindy, this
night I set you in
as a prophetess to the nations.” She herself might not have an- nounced
this to others except that the leader of the meeting
later began to pray specifically for Cindy and, among other things, prophesied
personally to her: “And the Lord says, ‘this night I stand you up as a prophetess to the nations.’”
Jacobs says, “In ways that are hard to describe, I was different
from that night forward.”15 even so, she prefers not to use the title
“Prophet” or “Prophetess” mainly to avoid misunderstandings on the part of believers who are not yet
sure the
New testament
office of prophet is valid
today. I think that in a relatively
short period of time
this inhibition will largely evaporate.
GOD COMMUNICATES IN VARIOUS WAYS
When we practice two-way
prayer, expecting to hear God, we must
be prepared to “hear” him in various ways. God has not chosen to limit himself to verbal communication Jack Deere clarifies this as thoroughly
as anyone I know. he explains that God at times uses supernatural means
to speak to us, such as what Deere calls the audible voice: the voice audible to
you alone, the internal audible voice,
and the voice of angels. God also uses
natural means such as dreams, visions, trances, sentence fragments, single words, impressions,
and human messengers.16 My own experiences in hearing God are the more se- date
kind. I have yet to hear the audible voice of God or to receive divine
communication through a dream or a vision. As I pray every morning, for
example, I try to pause from time to time to see what God may bring to my mind.
More and more I think I am able to know it when it happens. I want to hear the
Shepherd’s voice. on other occasions, rather infrequently I must admit, the
power of God seems to come on me in a rather special way, and I am sure that
what is coming through my mind is none other than the voice of God.
this happened, for example, when I
was preparing
to write Churches that pray, the third
volume of the prayer Warrior series. It was such a clear experience
that I can still remember where it happened: in a motel room in Portland, oregon. In that motel room, God spoke to me and told me I was not to write Churches
that pray yet because I was not ready. Instead, I was to add a volume about spiritual
map- ping as the fourth in
what was at first projected to
be a three-volume series.
this is
admittedly a paraphrase, but here is the way I re- member it: God said,“I want
you to write a book on spiri- tual mapping.”
I said,“but, God,
I don’t know enough about spiritual
mapping to write a whole book on it.”
“I know
that,” he replied,“but you now know the peo- ple who do know enough. you know
enough to write one chapter, and the others will write the rest of the book.”
As soon as God said this, I knew he was referring
to the people with whom I was
by then in touch through serving as the coordinator of the International Spiritual
Warfare Network.
I took out my yellow pad, began to write under a special anointing of the holy Spirit, and in prob- ably less than a half hour I had written the outline of what resulted in Breaking strongholds in Your
City. this is the
first
time I had ever received the vision and design for a
book
through directly hearing the voice of God. So far it has been the only time.
this does not mean breaking Strongholds in your City
is
a book written under divine inspiration. once again I say
that
receiving a word from God must never be confused with Scripture or put
on a plane
equal to Scripture. to
prove it, let me make a confession. I firmly believe I heard
the voice of God in the motel room, but I was only 90 per- cent
accurate. In my original outline I had included
10 chap- ters, but later God showed me, this time through trusted colleagues instead of a direct voice that, although
the man- uscript had been written, edited, and designed, I was to re- move
one chapter, and the end result was to be only nine. removing it was a painful process I might have avoided had my spiritual ears been more finely tuned at the time.
INDIVIDUAL OR CORPORATE?
experience
has shown that some who are just beginning to realize that two-way prayer is a
reality and that God does, indeed, speak to us today, prefer to limit hearing
God to an individual’s own situation. they draw a line when some believe they may be receiving a message from God that applies to another person, to a group, to a
ministry, to a church, to a
city, to a nation, or whatever.
Mike
bickle describes this well. he says, usually people have no problem with the woman in the prayer group who feels a burden to pray for some- one,
who senses the holy Spirit leading her prayer,
and
who states that God is “impressing” something on her heart….but if she speaks up during the Sun- day
morning service…and loudly proclaims her rev- elation interspersed with “thus saith the Lord,” she could get
a significantly different response... here are the same words and the same message,
but delivered in a very different
package.17
It IS IMPortANt to reCoGNIze thAt GoD’S
reSPoNSe to tWo-WAy PrAyer CAN be CorPo- rAte AS WeLL
AS INDIVIDuAL.
that is putting it mildly. Some churches
I know
would give her the legendary
right foot of fellowship if she did it too often.
It is important to recognize that God’s response to two- way prayer can be corporate as well as individual. I like the subtitle of Cindy Jacobs’ book the Voice of god. It says, how god speaks personally and Corporately to his Children today.
If his voice is heard personally,
it can be for a general direction or for a specific situation. believers seem to have less of a
problem with the general direction kind of word
than with the specific situation kind of word.
A biblical example for a general direction
would be the well-known “Macedonian Call.” this time God used a
vi- sion to communicate
with Paul. A man from Macedonia ap-
peared and said, simply,“Come over to Macedonia
and help us”(Acts 16:9). this was all Paul needed to take his church-
planting team to Macedonia. he was particularly ready for such a clear word because just before this he thought the Lord
was calling him to Asia, and he was
wrong. then
he thought the Lord was calling him to bithynia, and he was wrong again. I must say it is comforting to know that even the famous apostle Paul did not hear the Lord correctly
every time.
A more
specific individual word came through an angel to Philip when he was in the
midst of a revival in Samaria: “Arise and go toward the south along the road
which goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza” (Acts 8:26). Philip obeyed, he saw a
chariot, and this time the holy Spirit, not an angel, said,“Go near and
overtake this chariot” (Acts 8:29). Such “quote-unquote” words appear often
enough in the bible to lead many of us to believe that God might do that very
thing today. Let me give you a fascinating example.
DEATH TO MORRIS CERULLO
My friend
Morris Cerullo tells of an incident in haiti some years ago when hearing the
voice of God may well have saved his
life. he had been invited to conduct an evan- gelistic
campaign there by none other than Francois
“Papa Doc” Duvalier, the dictator at the time. When he arrived, he found that all the posters advertising the crusade had been torn down by
the voodoo witch doctors, taken to their
homes, and stuck with pins to seal the voodoo curses against him. he was met at the airport by a large group of senators, businesspeople, and other dignitaries. the government had provided a full motorcade
to take him past the presidential
palace and then to his hotel.
the moment he settled into the backseat of the lead lim- ousine, Morris Cerullo developed a horrible
pain in the pit of his stomach. It got worse and worse until it became to-
tally unbearable. he said to his
song leader next to him, “tell the driver to get out of this motorcade and take me to
the hotel.”
“he can’t
do it,” was
the reply. “the
president has
or- dered us to pass by his palace.”
Cerullo
raised his voice enough to startle a senator who was sitting in the front
seat:“Get me out of here! Don’t ask any questions!” the
automobile turned off on the next street and sped
to the hotel.
once in
his room, Cerullo fell prostrate on the floor in a soaking sweat. his prayer
was a very simple one:“God, what is going on?”
he then heard the voice of God, who said,“Son, I
have allowed this to happen for a reason. I wanted to get you out of the motorcade and have your full
attention so that I could talk to you.” At that point the pain suddenly and to-
tally left Morris’ body!
Still
stretched out on the floor, Cerullo said,“What is it you want to tell me, God?”
“I wanted
to tell you that tonight 300 witch doctors are coming to your meeting to kill
you!”
Morris
replied,“that’s fine. I am consecrated to death.
Now what am I supposed to do? Do you want me to die as a martyr?”
God said, “No. Instead, I am going to tell you how to identify them,” at which
point God proceeded to show him the color of their clothing and exactly how to pick the indi- vidual voodoo
witch doctors out of the crowd. then
God said,“Son, tonight the words that you speak will be as if I have spoken them. I will bring to pass what you speak.”this is as clear a directive
word from God for a specific situation
as I can imagine. What happened?
THE CHALLENGE OF A POWER ENCOUNTER
When Morris Cerullo stood up to speak in front of the 15,000 people in the stadium, he soon noticed that here and there
all over the audience certain individuals were begin- ning
to sing chants in a soft voice.
Cerullo called for order, and
they stopped. Soon they started again, and this scenario re- peated itself several times. the pitch of the battle in the in- visible world was increasing rapidly. the Creole interpreter,
a bible school student, was so terrified that he wet his pants! At the highest point of tension, Cerullo was
ready for the power encounter, much as elijah had been on Mount Carmel.
“People of haiti,” he
announced,“there
are hundreds of witch
doctors here tonight. they
have come
to kill me.
you
say,‘how do you know?’ I know because the living God has told me. Now you witch
doctors, listen to me. I know exactly who
you are and where you
are sitting! the living
God has showed you to me!”
Cerullo then started pointing to them one by one, and said,“tonight we’re going to find out whether the devil you
serve
or the God whom I serve has more power!” he turned
to all the dignitaries
and their wives seated on the platform and said,“I will not be responsible for what is going to hap-
pen now.”
Facing
the witch doctors, Cerullo said, “If you open your mouths one more time, I will
not be responsible when they carry you out of this meeting dead!” From that mo-
ment on not one person chanted, spoke, or moved at all.
“MY GOD! THAT’S MY NEIGHBOR!”
After
Cerullo had preached for 20 minutes, a scream was heard in the back of the
stadium. A commotion started, and the crowd passed a little child four or five
years old over their heads toward the platform. the inter- preter said,
“they are shouting that this baby was
born blind and now he can see! they sent him up here because they didn’t know
what else to do.” Soon the mother and
father pushed through the crowd and arrived at the platform. their child
had been totally
healed! right then an army general in full regalia
who was on the
platform literally jumped out of his seat, put his hands on his head, and screamed,“My God! that’s my neighbor!”
the crusade
stretched
out morning, afternoon,
and evening for three weeks as multitudes
came forward to be saved and healed. It was clear to all concerned
that the liv- ing God whom
Morris Cerullo had come to preach was
supremely powerful.18 question: What might have hap- pened if Morris Cerullo had not been prepared, before he went to haiti, to practice two-way prayer? the magnitude of
the
potential disaster stretches our imaginations.
CORPORATE WORDS FROM GOD
First
Corinthians 14 focuses not on personal prophecy, but on prophetic words given
to the whole congregation. because of the public nature of this kind of
ministry, many local churches that encourage the gift of prophecy establish
guidelines to maintain order and credibility. Frequently, these prophecies are
devotional and inspirational. At other times they are directional.
because
of the public nature of this kind of ministry, many local churches that
encourage the gift of prophecy es- tablish guidelines to maintain order and
credibility. Fre- quently, these prophecies are devotional and inspirational.
At other times they are directional. Needless to say, responsible prophets who receive directional
words for a church or another
such group always check them
out with the leadership beforehand. If the leaders
do not witness positively to the word, saying it in public is not
allowed until agreement is reached. In the local church,
prophets willingly and humbly
submit to the authority of the pastor.
Although I do not pastor a church,
my wife, Doris, and I do lead a ministry: Global
harvest Ministries.We had been living in Pasadena, California, for almost a quarter of a century and were intending to spend the rest of our days there. two of our
team of intercessors, however, Cindy Jacobs and Jean Steffen- son, had on two separate
occasions brought us a word from the
Lord that we would
soon be moving
to Colorado Springs.
We honestly thought they had missed
it just as Paul missed it when he
thought he should
go to bithynia.We should have paid more attention to them. We have now moved Global harvest
Min- istries to Colorado
Springs. As a matter of fact, this is the first
book I wrote in our new home in Colorado
Springs.
the word from God that Cindy and Jean had was a corpo-
rate word, which affected the future of a whole ministry, just as
words from others can affect a whole church. they were pru- dent in the way they gave it, and they prayed it into fulfillment
in God’s own time. My wife and I are grateful
that these two in- tercessors, and many others as well, were experienced in prac- ticing two-way prayer. If this has not yet become a part of your prayer life,
I hope it does very soon.
It will bless
you and those around you.
REFLECTION QUESTIONS 65
REFLECTION QUESTIONS
Some say that if we believe
we can hear the voice of God directly, we open the door to subjectivism and violate the clear words of what has been written in the bible. In what
ways do you agree, and in what ways do you disagree?
Prophetic ministry has become common these days. Do you agree that
certain people should be recognized as “prophets”? Why?
66 PRAYING
WITH POWER
Sometimes God communicates in an audible voice. have you ever heard of examples of that today?
What do you think of people who have prophetic min- istries and, from time to time,
stand up in church meet- ings and proclaim to the congregation,“thus saith the
Lord…”?
(Note By Blogger: Due to the length of the book which this content is from I have broken it up into a short series of blog posts.)
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