Courts of Heaven – Where Justice Prevails
Have you been to the courts of heaven yet?
Wait – what? There’s a courtroom in heaven? What does that mean?
Yes, there’s a courtroom in heaven. I’ve heard there are several. It’s a great way to make sure Justice prevails in your life and in the life of your family.
So how does it work?
We all know that God is the Judge of all the earth. The Bible says,
“For the Lord is our judge; the Lord is our lawgiver; the Lord is our king; he will save us.” Isaiah 33:22 ESV
“The LORD judges the peoples; judge me, O LORD, according to my righteousness and according to the integrity that is in me. God is a righteous judge, and a God who feels indignation every day.” Psalm 7:8, 11 ESV
“Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?” Genesis 18:25 ESV
So imagine a courtroom where God is sitting in the judge’s seat. We already know He is righteous and perfect – that means that justice is what He desires. He wants GOOD to triumph over evil.
Just like we are encouraged to come boldly before the throne of grace to find grace to help in time of need (Hebrews 4:16), we can also come boldly before the court of heaven to find justice to help in time of need.
It’s a very powerful thing to do – to go to the Court of Heaven, present your case and ask God to make a ruling in your favor – for your good and His glory. He loves to do this and He would love to hear your case!
You may have heard the illustration of going before God as the judge and the devil accuses you of sin (breaking the law of God). Then Jesus steps in to advocate for you. You confess your sins and ask the Lord to forgive you. God then makes a ruling in your case that you are “not guilty” because Jesus took your sin on the cross. This is a common sermon illustration I’ve heard many times, especially around Easter.
But what if you could go back to the Court of Heaven regarding specific issues in your life that are not working out in your favor? What would that look like?
There are many books written about the Courts of Heaven – Robert Henderson is a popular author on this topic. I try to keep it simple – the way the Lord taught me. In fact, many of us learned how to go to the court of heaven without having a clue about what we were doing. So you don’t have to know much for it to be effective in your life.
Here are the basic concepts – ask Holy Spirit to highlight to you what you need to know for your individual case.
- There is a court in heaven.
- You can get justice there.
- You can approach the Judge and ask for justice on your case. He already knows about your case, but it can help if you explain it to Him because it gets the issue clear in your own mind what you are asking for.
- You can’t use this for selfish reasons. It’s based on your integrity – the righteousness of your cause.
- It’s a matter of the heart. It’s your trust in God’s goodness and His ability to respond to your needs that enables this process to have effect in your life on earth.
So what does this look like? Obviously it will be different for each person based on their individual case. It’s very hard to generalize. Justice is very personal, isn’t it?
I’ll give you an example to get your imagination started.
Recently someone I know was being targeted by witchcraft. She received a death threat from a powerful person who knew how to travel in the spirit realm. It scared her when this person’s spirit (or soul) showed up in her house and said, “I’m going to kill you.” 😲
She had enough courage to reply, “No, you’re NOT!” and the other person left. But it was still very unnerving.
A short while later she had an accident that caused her a lot of pain. She felt that this accident was tied to that person’s threat. It didn’t kill her but it felt life threatening.
We decided to go to the Court of Heaven to get help. If you can get a restraining order in a natural, earthly court when someone threatens you, then why not ask for the same thing in a heavenly court? So we simply said, “Lord, we would like to go before you in court please.”
As we stood in the Court of Heaven, she could feel the oppression of this threat and felt that this person somehow had access to her. I reminded her that “the curse causeless cannot come” (Proverbs 26:2).
So we asked Holy Spirit, “Is there any legal right or open door that is allowing this?”
Immediately she sensed an agreement she had made with this person when they had worked together in the past. So she said out loud, “I break all agreements that I have made with this person – I no longer want them to have access to my life. I close the door.”
We also prayed some other things regarding the injury she had and she forgave the person who threatened her.
We both sensed a breakthrough and she told me, “Whew! I don’t feel that oppression anymore – it’s lifted! It’s gone! There’s no more access – I feel free!” 🙂
“Going to the court of heaven” is just a way of saying you are willing to deal with any legal ground the enemy has in your life. Someone broke God’s law of love and now you want to deal with it.
The primary issue is Justice. Whenever I see an injustice, it makes me think of the courts of heaven. So if there’s an issue of injustice in your life, please consider whether going there might help you. For instance, if you are working really hard at your job and you keep getting passed over for a promotion, I would ask Holy Spirit if there’s something that needs to be dealt with in the courts of heaven. Or if you have a legal case on earth that is not going well, you can take it there for God to be your judge. Perhaps someone has done you wrong on earth – stolen something from you or cheated you out of something. Go to the court of heaven and ask God what legal ground they have to do that to you. Then follow whatever He tells you – usually there’s something you need to repent of on behalf of yourself or your bloodline. You also generally have to release the other party from your judgement by forgiving them so that God can judge them directly. He honors your judgment and won’t interfere unless you ask Him to step in and take over (I Corinthians 6:2).
I have been to court many times to deal with generational curses. Often when an issue doesn’t go away even after you’ve prayed about it, repented of your part in it and asked God for help, it’s because there’s a deeper issue – someone in your generational bloodline opened a door or allowed something to have a legal right and now it’s been passed down to you. You can repent on behalf of yourself and your bloodline and ask God to break the curse passed down to you from your ancestors. He loves to do that!
Sometimes you really feel as though you are standing in a court room. I’ve had that experience many times. Sometimes you don’t feel or sense anything, but it is still true and the results become obvious in your life. It can help to imagine you are standing before the judge – it can make it feel more real in your heart and mind. Because in one sense you are literally standing before God as your Judge – whether you sense it or not.
Have you been to the courts of heaven yet? If so, what happened when you went? Please comment below – we learn from each other when we share our experiences with God. 🙂
DIY Deliverance & Healing – Sapphire Blessings App
A friend just reminded me of an awesome app for your phone/tablet that has a TON of really good, really deep content that can help you on your path to freedom and wholeness.
It’s called Sapphire Blessings and it’s available on both Apple and Android devices.
You pay a small monthly fee ($4) and you get access to the library of recorded teachings and blessings from Arthur Burk of Sapphire Leadership Group.
Arthur Burk is the first person who taught me the difference between my spirit and my soul. That single insight majorly helped me and set me free of so much stuff! Whenever I share it with someone, it helps them too – I’m amazed that this insight has not become more wide stream yet. You can read about it here.
He’s a little “out of the box” for most people. And to be honest, some of his stuff is too far out there for me. Ask Holy Spirit what you need to hear and follow that leading. 🙂
Arthur has discovered some really good insights and tools to help people, especially people who have not been able to be helped through the usual path of counseling or inner healing prayer. He’s especially good at providing helpful information to those who have severe dissociative identity disorder and those who have been through severe trauma.
He also has a lot of free stuff on his website and on his YouTube channel, if you want to check him out first before paying a monthly fee. You can also search for him by name on YouTube and find even more free content, posted by other people. His series, Blessing Your Spirit, is very powerful. I highly recommend it.
The app description says:
Arthur Burk is not afraid to go where others have not – he’s a true pioneer and forerunner, especially in the realm of inner healing, deliverance and “out of the box” insights.
If you feel drawn, I encourage you to go check him out!
Has an Arthur Burk teaching impacted your life? If so, which one? Please share below to inspire us and help us find the truth that will set us free! Thanks – I really appreciate personal comments from my readers. 😊💗
Break Through Fear! Have More Peace!
When I was first exploring my awareness of the unseen realm, I was really scared! I could sense things, but I couldn’t see them with my eyes. Many of the things I sensed made me very afraid.
I really wrestled with a fear of the unseen realm for many years growing up. I knew it was there and I knew I could sense beings, movement, messages, etc. but at the same time I was very hesitant to explore or learn more.
Have you ever felt that way?
Not only was I afraid of the unseen realm, I was also afraid to talk to anyone about it! I was also afraid of what other people thought of me – I didn’t want to be “weird” for seeing things that other people couldn’t see, right? The fears kind of multiply and build on each other, don’t they?
By the time I was a young adult, I had so many fears on top of fears that it was paralyzing.
Later in life, I finally found the key to break through my fears but boy was it hard work before I found this key! I remember one night I woke up and I could sense darkness in my house – a tangible “something” or someone unseen was there. I lived alone out in the country at the time. It was very dark outside and no one was around (or at least, no one should be around my house in the middle of the night!). I turned on all the lights in the house, but I could still sense this “evil energy”. I was afraid and I had no idea what to do!
I started yelling and praying! I commanded that dark thing to leave – I yelled at it like you might yell at a big dog that was coming to bite you. I got mad! I stamped my foot and stared at the corner where I felt it and then I yelled at it. Then I whirled around to the other side of the room where I felt other “somethings” and did the same thing. It was terrifying but I was so mad that it gave me the energy to fight. I felt like I was chasing out a bunch of cockroaches that had been hidden – so creepy! Like that old commercial from Raid Ant & Roach spray – remember that? LOL
Eventually, I felt peace return to my house. I left the lights on and went back to bed. For years I slept with a night light on, just in case. I hated that experience and I never wanted to encounter creepy invisible things at night ever again!
Years later the Lord taught me an important lesson on Fear that would have really helped me that night.
What I wanted to share today was the Key that helped me break through my fears. Because today I don’t fear the things that I can sense in the middle of the night. In fact, it’s been a long time since I’ve sensed anything creepy in my house because now I’m not afraid. Most of my fears have completely disappeared and I am so happy and at peace!
Recently the Holy Spirit led me to create a short online course to share how the Lord taught me to overcome fear and anxiety (that Key). Here’s the link to the course (or click on the course image below).
This course can really help you if you suffer from fear or anxiety. What I share in this course, I still use today! (because it REALLY works). You can preview the course by clicking the link above – to see if it’s something that you would be interested in.
This course is for:
- People who are tired of living with anxiety every day.
- People who are ready to make a change in order to have more Peace in their lives.
- People who are open to new ways of looking at the world and themselves.
- People who are spiritual and want a connection with something bigger than themselves.
The purpose of this course is to simply help you discover and eliminate the root source of the things that make you feel anxious or afraid. This course will teach you how to cultivate more peace in your daily life and how to more quickly recover from unexpected stressful situations.
- You’ll learn how to remove the source of your anxiety and make it disappear.
- You will be able to more quickly recover from sudden, unexpected stressful situations. What a relief!
- You will be able to cultivate more peace in your daily life, both mentally and emotionally.
- You will overcome specific fears, like the fear of snakes or public speaking, and help others do this too!
A lot of people have been feeling more fearful and anxious since the COVID Pandemic of 2020. It’s like the things we used to be able to depend on are not as dependable as we thought they were – this uncertainty is causing a lot of anxiety about many different areas of life.
It’s time to get FREE of anxiety and fear so we can enjoy the Goodness of God! 🙂
Related posts:
How to Remove Blocks to Hearing God
A lot of people ask me how they can see or hear from God more clearly. It’s a common desire among those who are earnestly seeking God. Many people find this blog by searching for “how to see in the spirit”. Seeing and hearing from God are closely related – so after the last post, “Why Can’t I See or Hear in the Spirit?“, I thought this might be helpful to explore.
Many of us believe things about God that are simply not true. We don’t even realize it! If we did, we would stop believing those things, right? We often believe things unconsciously that are deeply affecting our ability to hear from God and see in the Spirit.
So how do we find these things?
Several years ago the Lord gave me a little heart exercise called the Lie Detector. It really helps you work with Holy Spirit to uncover and remove anything you believe that’s not true (which we call lies).
Lie Detector: God Concept
Go to a place where you will not be interrupted. Turn off any devices that might distract you. Take a few deep breaths, letting them out slowly to help you relax and to quiet your mind.
Say these statements/questions out loud and then wait for an answer. An answer may come as a feeling, a thought, a picture in your mind, a word, a memory or just an inner knowing. You can do this alone or with a friend. If no answer comes to the first question – this may not be the right time for this process.
“Spirit of Truth, is there a lie I believe about God?” (pause and wait for an answer)
“I release myself from the lie that says _(the lie)_. I give it up and let it go.”
“Who taught me that lie?” (pause and wait for an answer)
“I forgive _(name)_ for teaching me that lie.”
“What truth do I need to hear?” (pause and wait for an answer)
“I receive the truth that _(the truth)_.
Note: For those who perceive God as a Trinity, it may be helpful to break down this step and ask, “Spirit of Truth, is there a lie I believe about the Father?”. Then after completing the step, ask the question again separately for Jesus and then for the Holy Spirit. People have reported some amazing experiences when they have tried this. 😍
As you do this exercise, you may discover that the answer to “Who taught me that lie?” is YOU! We often come to faulty conclusions about God from our life experiences. For instance, if someone close to you passed away when you were a child, a well meaning adult might have said, “God needed your grandma so He took her to heaven.” If you really miss your grandma, then you might get angry at God for “taking her” away from you. It makes God a bad guy in your little hurting heart. See how that works?
When bad things happen in nature (i.e. hurricanes, tsunamis, tornadoes, etc.), what do we call them? Acts of God. That’s another way we can get the idea that God is a bad guy – kind of big and scary, right?
So there are lots of ways we might have unconsciously decided that God is not good or trustworthy. Even if you had a religious upbringing, most people don’t have a solid, heart-felt knowledge of God’s goodness.
If you don’t really believe God is good and that He loves you unconditionally, then guess what? You don’t really WANT to hear from Him. You might feel kind of “cautious” because you’re not sure you are going to like what He says. Part of you might say, “Yes, I want to hear from God and see in the Spirit!” but another part, deep inside your heart might think, “But what if I don’t like it? Or I can’t handle it? What if God is kind of scary?”
This Lie Detector exercise can help get to the deeper part of our hearts. I’ve done this exercise over and over and it has helped me SO much! In fact, I encourage you to write down the answer you get to the last question, “What truth do I need to hear?” Put it on a post-it note where you can look at it each day. Meditate on it. Say it out loud to yourself. Really let it soak in – it might take awhile for it to become your new default way of perceiving God (especially if that lie was in there a long time). The more you embrace the truth, the easier it will be to see in the Spirit and hear God more clearly. I promise.
I hope this has been helpful to you today. Feel free to comment below what experience you have when you try this exercise. I’ve used this exercise with many people, even people who tell me, “I can’t hear from God.” and they always get an answer to the questions. It works!
Why Can’t I See or Hear in the Spirit?
A few years ago I was asked to intercede for a meeting at church while the speaker was presenting – the speaker was a friend of mine and she felt she needed “extra prayer” for this meeting, especially for people’s hearts to be open to receive God’s love for inner healing. As I prayed with another intercessor in a small side room away from the meeting, we saw “in the spirit” the room full of people listening and they all had helmets on their heads. I asked the Lord about the helmets because it was clear that these helmets were preventing them from seeing or hearing what was being said. They were solid black motorcycle helmets. What He showed me was that it was unbelief in His goodness – and we needed to pray for these helmets to be removed. We did pray for that and it was amazing how He showed up to heal people! Their hearts opened to Him and His love was tangibly felt by many – we were so happy! 😍
Later I asked for more insight about these helmets and how they affected our lives. Here is what I received.
The Helmet of Unbelief prevents you from perceiving truth, especially the truth of the unseen spiritual realm. It prevents you from experiencing Truth – Truth is a Person (Jesus). You cannot hear Him, see Him, feel His touch, smell Him or taste His goodness. You cannot know Him intimately. Your senses are clouded; you feel dull and foggy. It is like wearing a motorcycle helmet with a solid black face screen – you can’t see anything and you can’t hear clearly (aka Deaf & Dumb spirit). I’ve experienced this, have you?
You can see a little bit sometimes, but not clearly. Being able to see and hear a little bit makes you think you can see & hear clearly because you don’t know any better. You think it’s “normal” – the way you see and hear is all you know.
The Helmet of Unbelief is “orphan thinking” – it is the helmet of victimization. Stubbornness, Pride and Independence fueled by Fear and Self-Rejection keeps the Helmet of Unbelief on. We don’t want to walk by faith – we want to see FIRST and then choose to believe. It’s not until you choose to ACT to trust Him – then you can ask for grace to remove the Helmet of Unbelief. It’s an act of faith – you do it BEFORE you can see and you are rewarded with sight. 😃
Having an encounter with God gives you a glimpse of how good life can be WITHOUT the Helmet of Unbelief. You become dissatisfied – you don’t want to go back to your “normal” life. You don’t want to settle for less – now you want MORE.
Hearing someone’s testimony of God’s goodness in their life confronts the unbelief in us. If He did it for them – He could do it for me too! You may have experienced God’s goodness in a way that I have not yet experienced it. By sharing your story with me, it gives me faith.
What can we do? Ask the Holy Spirit to reveal areas of unbelief in our hearts and how to remove them. Ask Holy Spirit to show you what it looks like in YOUR life.
You can CHOOSE what to think. That’s free will. That’s why “repent” means to change the way you think. We are not in control of many things, but we CAN choose what we think, what we believe. Which helmet are you wearing – the Helmet of Salvation or the Helmet of Unbelief? 😊 The choice is yours!
If you have any insight to add to this, please feel free to comment below. I share these things on this blog so we can have a conversation and each learn from each other. We all see in part so when we each bring our “part”, it makes a fuller picture (like a jigsaw puzzle). Do you have something you’d like to add? I’d love to hear it! 😃
Here are two more specific ways to help you remove the Helmet of Unbelief:
How to Remove Blocks to Hearing God
Mike’s Near Death Experience of Heaven
I read this story today by Mike Olsen and I LOVED it!! I have never heard of anyone doing what this man did during his near death experience. It will warm your heart. 💕
“Mike, we found a match,” my doctor said over the phone. “You’re getting a new set of lungs. I’ll see you in surgery early tomorrow morning.”
I stared at my wife, Patti, in shock. I could hardly believe what I was hearing. This was the call we’d been praying for. I hung up the phone, and Patti swept me into a hug.
Five years before, I’d been diagnosed with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), a disease that causes scar tissue to form in the lungs, making it hard to breathe. There is no cure and, in some cases, like mine, no known cause. Before my diagnosis, I thought I was healthy. I was 54 years old, the pastor of our church in Louisville, Kentucky. I had never smoked a day in my life. I was even a singer who’d performed on-stage. After my diagnosis, my condition had continued to deteriorate rapidly until I needed to be on an oxygen tank 24/7. I’d been on the transplant list for three years.
That night we packed a bag and hurried to the car, my oxygen tank in tow. During the drive to the hospital, I was lost in thought. Receiving a new pair of lungs was a huge blessing, but it was a lot for me to take in. Even though my lungs were no longer healthy, it was hard to reconcile losing the organs I’d used to take my first breath, sing my first song. They were about to be replaced by the lungs of a total stranger, an anonymous donor, someone whose death meant that my life would be saved. I felt guilty that I got to keep on living. It felt as if I were taking something from a stranger that didn’t belong to me.
I knew one potential risk of surgery was that my body could reject the new lungs. I couldn’t help but wonder—if my soul couldn’t come to terms with the transplant, what chance did my body have? Though I tried to push the question from my mind, it needled me like a thorn.
At the hospital, we settled in and waited for the operation, which was scheduled for 6 A.M. In the morning, the nurses prepped me for surgery. I kissed Patti and held her close. “Everything is going to be okay,” she said. Still, as the nurses got me ready, I remained uneasy. When they wheeled me into the operating room and put the anesthesia mask over my face, I sank into a timeless darkness.
Then I was conscious. I couldn’t feel anything, but I could see. What’s going on? I thought. I was in the operating room, but I wasn’t on the operating table. I was floating above it. From my vantage point overhead, I saw my body on the table. The surgeons were hunched over my body, conferring with one another, their voices strained. Something must have gone very wrong.
I kept rising upward. The scene below me disappeared, and I came to a space of swirling lights. Reds, to blues, greens, yellows, all spinning together in a mesmerizing display. The lights were comforting, as if beckoning me to follow. As I moved along, I heard voices. Singing voices. The melody was enchanting, but I couldn’t make out the words. That is, until a chorus of voices announced over the singing: “Mike’s coming home!”
“No,” I heard a commanding voice say. “He is just here for a visit.”
In a sudden burst of energy, I was transported to a place of blinding white light. It surrounded me and stretched on endlessly. I felt only pure peace and joy. I’d never experienced such bliss before. I was in heaven but, as that divine voice had said, only there for a visit. I knew what I needed to do.
I called out into the light—not with my voice but with my soul, “I want to thank my organ donor.”
A presence materialized behind my left shoulder. I turned and saw two figures approaching. I could see only the outlines of their forms, shimmering and iridescent. I recognized one as Jesus, and the other alongside him as my anonymous donor.
“Thank you,” I communicated. With every bit of my essence, I exuded pure gratitude. “Thank you.”
I sensed that the donor accepted my gratitude with humility. Then Jesus put his hand on my shoulder.
“These are your lungs now,” he said.
“Yes,” I agreed.
With that, I fell backward, the space of light turning into a speck before disappearing entirely. I was back in my body on the operating table at the hospital for a moment, then everything went black.
I’d later learn that I was in a coma for 10 days. During the transplant, the first lung went in fine. After the second lung was put it, the surgeon released a clamp too early. I’d bled out and needed to be resuscitated. Only through the staff’s best efforts had I been brought back. I was hooked up to a machine that breathed for me until I regained consciousness. Despite everything that had happened, the transplant was successful. I had my new lungs.
Today I continue working in ministry, while advocating for funding studies about IPF. I can even sing again. And I do it all using the lungs God gave me.
Saturated in God’s Love You Are💕
Last night I was asking Holy Spirit, “Why don’t people feel/experience the Love God has for them? Why is it only in their head (as a concept) and not felt with their hearts? What is the obstacle that prevents them from perceiving His Love and RECEIVING His Love?”
Holy Spirit showed me this:
The air is SATURATED with the Love of God! But we often cannot perceive it. One way to become more aware of it is to cultivate gratitude. Being grateful is a CHOICE. But we often focus on what’s wrong rather than what’s right. Gratitude draws MORE good things to you. It’s like a magnet of favor.
In Him we live and move and have our being. He IS Love! Yet many people do not perceive or feel God’s Love for them. They feel like an orphan, alone and not taken care of.
Start paying attention to all the GOOD in your life, the silent mercies you take for granted every day! Open your emotional heart and say to God, “Thank you. I know that is You.” It will transform the way you see the world around you! 😃 You will begin to feel God’s Love for you – it’s inescapable! You are living IN IT!
How do you know that someone loves you? By the way they treat you. God is being good to us every single day – we just don’t pay enough attention to it. Change your focus and you’ll see it!! 🙃😍💕
You are NOT alone! It’s impossible for you to be alone – you are IN Him!
Spirit vs Soul, Surprising Power in Prayer
Did you know there’s a difference between praying from your spirit versus praying from your soul?
I’ve seen this time and time again – especially in prayer meetings where various people pray. I can immediately tell from the frequency in someone’s voice (their tone, passion, etc.) whether they are praying from their spirit or their soul.
So what’s the difference? And does it change the results?
When we pray from our souls, we tend to connect with our emotions. We focus on the problem and we pray the problem out loud. When someone prays from their soul they often focus on the pain of the problem and it can make them cry or speak very passionately. There’s nothing wrong with that. It is one way of praying. It may make us feel better or sometimes it makes us feel worse (more emotionally upset). Here’s an example,
“Lord, you know what is happening with our young people. They are doing drugs, they are not listening to their parents, they are going after the world. Oh, Lord, you know this breaks our hearts. It is not right. We need you to intervene and change their hearts. They are headed down a very dark path that leads to destruction. We don’t want that to happen. We don’t want them to die young from a drug overdose or from violence in the streets. Oh Lord, please help us! Please help our young people turn to you!”
When we pray from our spirits, we are listening to the Holy Spirit and waiting to hear from the Spirit what we should say. We are not focused on the problem, we are focused on what the Spirit is saying. I often hear spiritual authority in someone’s voice when they pray from their spirit instead of from their soul. When someone prays from their soul, they are using their emotional energy to convey the importance of their request – by getting more passionate about it, they feel they are connecting more with God. When someone prays from their spirit, they are using the energy of spiritual authority and that has a completely different effect. Here’s an example,
“Thank you, Lord, that you are taking care of our young people. We see that some are not honoring you, but we know that you are already working in their hearts to dismantle their love of the world. Thank you that you have dispatched angels tonight to fight on their behalf against the darkness. We specifically release an increased awareness of Your presence and Your goodness in the lives of Sammy, Tom, Junior and Olivia. We expect to see the outworking of Your grace in their choices soon. Thank you so much for your love and kindness that you care about them and their future. You are a good, good Father!”
Often a prayer from the Spirit becomes more and more specific. Instead of just praying for “young people” in general, the Spirit will bring specific young people to mind and how to pray for them personally. God is a personal God – He knows each of us by name and can give us very specific insight into how to pray for those we care about. Or He may reveal a specific strategy He is using to reach a large group of people. Either way, it becomes more and more specific the longer we listen and pray what He is saying.
When we pray from our spirits, we are not trying to move God by our tears or our passion. We are simply agreeing with what HE is already doing and we are partnering with His purposes on the earth. How do you know what He is already doing? By listening to the Holy Spirit as you pray – He will tell you what to say and how to say it. I’m not kidding – it really works that way! Then, guess what? Those prayers tend to get answered more quickly and effectively! Why? Because you were praying according to His will, not according to yours.
John said it like this, “Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.” I John 5:14-15
I LOVE to be in a prayer meeting where each person is listening to the Holy Spirit and only praying what they hear the Lord saying. There’s such freedom and power! It is incredibly encouraging as the Lord reveals His plans for the problems we see. By the end of the prayer time, we are so filled with joy and anticipation of what God is going to do!!
I don’t enjoy as much the prayer meetings I have been in when people are praying from their souls. It can be moving to hear how much they care about an issue, but often it begins to feel almost like charismatic witchcraft – trying to get God to do what YOU want Him to do. It’s actually quite painful at times as you sense the lack of faith in God’s goodness – when you “pray the problem”, it tends to grow in your mind and weigh you down even more. Yuk!
If you need help learning how to listen to the Holy Spirit, I created a short course to help with that. It only takes a few minutes to go through the material and then practice – I recommend 15 minutes each week for 4 weeks. The more you practice, the easier it gets! The course is called Developing A Close Relationship with God: A Simple Method. You can click on the course icon below to find out more information. You will enjoy it! 🙂
So how about you? Do you know the difference between when you are praying in your soul versus when you are praying in your spirit? Can you shift between them when you want to? Do you know how to listen to the Holy Spirit when you are praying? Comment below! Share your experience – I shared mine. We learn from each other that way. ❤
Related post you might be interested in: Spirit vs Soul, a two part series discussing the difference between the two & what it means for your everyday life
Walking by Faith – Amy’s story
Here’s an example of what it means to follow Jesus.
Amy works at Best Buy, an electronics store chain. She used to work in real estate selling homes several years ago, but took a break after she had a car accident. During her recovery, her husband suddenly died of a heart attack. Without her husband’s financial support, she needed a job – fast. She felt drawn to work at Best Buy and did very well there – she became a “pastor” to the people she worked with and often had opportunities to pray for them and help them find hope. This job provided a much needed sense of stability to the sudden roller coaster of her life. She’s been there for almost three years now.
A few weeks ago, she began to feel the Lord directing her to go back into real estate. She was a little hesitant because it had been so long and she was used to getting a regular paycheck from Best Buy. It would take her out of her comfort zone. She told the Lord, “If you give me a listing to sell a house, I’ll resign.” Someone called her and asked her to list their home for $650,000 (USD).
However she still had doubts. What if she didn’t get any more listings? What if she couldn’t pay her rent? A friend in real estate told her that right now is a seller’s market which means it is hard to find properties that are for sale (new listings). Plenty of buyers, but very few people are selling. This discouraged her and made her wonder if she really should quit her dependable job.
As she pondered it, it dawned on her that with just 2 real estate listings she could make as much as she made all year with Best Buy! This gave her courage to step out. So she said, “Yes, Lord, I am willing. I will turn in my resignation tomorrow.” That night a woman she knew called her at 1:30am. The woman had been looking at a particular house she wanted and it was suddenly listed as available for sale. She asked Amy to write a contract for that house immediately – at 2am she completed the contract and sent it in.
The next morning the agent that had listed the house was shocked. Who writes contracts at 2am? She had to find out so she called her. Amy explained how much this woman wanted THAT particular house and had contacted her in the middle of the night. The agent explained that she had only listed the house for a few minutes last night and that the house was not available right now. However she said she would talk to the owner and get back to her. Within a few hours, she called back and said, “We’re not going to list the house to the public, but we ARE going to work with you and the buyer who really wants this house.”
That was the listing she needed. Praise God!
That morning she went to Best Buy and turned in her resignation, giving them a two week notice. Two days later a coworker invited her to lunch with some friends of his (a couple). She had met these friends at a previous event and felt prompted to go. They had a nice lunch and she went back to work. A few hours later, the woman called and said, “We are moving out of our condo and we want to buy a house. We want you handle the real estate transactions for both properties.”
That was a third listing! And she would represent them in a fourth listing when they bought a new house!
But wait, it gets even better. 😃
She wanted to have her own office, but did not have the means to rent a place. A lot of agents work from their homes, but she knew with family obligations, she would prefer to have a space to focus just on business.
The next day, a business associate from her past called her. He said he was having a lot of trouble doing business in his country due to COVID-19. He asked her if they could build a partnership where he could do business in a city near her and she would represent him. He told her, “Find an office we can use and I’ll pay half of all the expenses.”
Yes! In less than 1 week, she got three new real estate listings and she now had the means to get her own office! She also would have even MORE business as she partnered with this colleague who would send her clients who were looking for real estate in her area.
She said, “I had been waiting on God, but as I stepped out to walk by faith, I felt like He had been waiting on me! He had all these people lined up, ready to bless me with business – and here I was afraid to step out. He is a good, good Father.”
This is an example of what it means to follow Jesus – to step out in faith, obeying the prompting in your heart from the Lord, even when you have no idea how it will work out. It means taking the risk that God is who He said He is and that His plans for you are always good. ❤
Do you have a story like this that you’d like to share? Please post it in the comments! Or you can write a guest post for this blog. We’d love to hear from you. 🙂
Dealing with the Desperate
Last week we talked about dealing with the Spirit of Fear. This week we are talking about dealing with fearful people – when people are really very afraid, afraid for their lives.
When people are afraid of death and they feel threatened that they might die, they become desperate. Desperation motivates people to do desperate things, usually ugly things – things you would not normally do. Things you would not expect – even dangerous things.
I asked the Lord what to do – how do you deal with people who feel this way?
Desperation can give people a sense of power to act boldly, however the fear driving it means that logic or reasoning doesn’t work. Their thinking is skewed. You can’t “talk them down” from their desperation – they are usually too far gone for that. Sometimes their fear triggers an inner child – meaning that they start thinking and reasoning like a three year old. Have you ever tried to reason with a scared three year old? It doesn’t work very well, especially if they are terrified.
What the Lord showed me was this: Fearful people use fear to control others. They may try to threaten you with bodily harm or public humiliation. They may try to threaten your life or your livelihood. They will try to find your weakness and exploit it – to try and get you to do what they want. Remember whenever they tried to get Superman, they often used Lois Lane as bait – if her life was in danger, they could manipulate him to come to that location in order to try and capture him. They knew he cared for her and would be afraid of something happening to her.
However when you show no fear, they have no control over you! When you stand up to them, it makes THEM fearful – it crumbles the illusion of power they thought they had. As a result, they often crumble and flee or give up their threats and simply leave you alone.
They also can be affected by the Peace and Love you carry – it disarms them. They are so desperate it makes them vulnerable, like children. They long for safety and security, which Peace and Love offer by their very existence. So sometimes they will crumble in the face of that Love and Peace. Or they will run away because it doesn’t make sense to them and they fear it. Either way – you are no longer being threatened by them.
I wanted to share this with you to prepare you. World events are starting to create desperation in a lot of people. If you are faced with a desperate person, don’t show fear. Don’t let them manipulate you. Offer Peace and Love in exchange for their threats. Be kind and patient. You will see them crumble and leave you alone. Maybe you can help them – maybe you can’t, but at least they will not be a threat to you any more.
What do you think? How do you deal with the desperate?
Discernment of the Supernatural Realm 