The Switch Of Faith 1 | Pastor John Greiner

In The Switch of Faith, the message opens in Mark 5 with the woman who had suffered an issue of blood for twelve years, showing how her faith became the "switch" that released God's power despite her weakness, status, and uncleanness. Stories from Kenneth Hagin's ministry and personal testimonies of healing and provision illustrate what can be gained through faith, and what can be lost through disorder or unbelief. From these examples comes a simple four step formula given to Hagin in 1953: say it, do it, receive it, tell it, a pattern for turning on the switch of faith in any situation.

Transcript

Opening Confession And Expectation

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Let's uh pick our Bibles up and wave them around, make Jesus glad the devil mad say this together and say, Heavenly Father, I'm so glad it's Sunday morning. I'm right where I belong. I'm at the right place, at the right time, where the right folks and the right message is coming toward me. I'm not gonna just hear it, I'm gonna digest it, I'm gonna put it into action and watch you do miracles in my life and the lives of others in Jesus' name. Amen.

Introducing The Switch Of Faith

SPEAKER_00 0:34

You can be seated, let's turn in our Bibles to uh Mark chapter 5 today, and I want to begin a series of messages entitled The Switch of Faith. I like to teach on faith a lot. The Lord told me years ago we moved in this building to uh teach what I take for granted. That people don't know what you know, your children. He said, You're children, I consider you my children, I'm your father. And some of you don't know what I know, and of course, we know that faith cometh by hearing and hearing, not by having heard. Some of you are gonna have heard this message. Well, that's fine. Let this be water for what you already know, let it grow bigger. And for some of you, you're gonna hear something you haven't heard before. So let this be a seed that's planted that will bring forth fruit. Everybody say the switch of faith. See, somebody's messing with a switch of faith, a switch of lights on these lights, and I messed up the switch on my microphone. I had it halfway between on and off, and I said, Where's my sound? And finally, I, you know, the Holy Ghost nudged me and I thought, Oh, it's my fault. I'm sorry, Sharay. It wasn't your fault, it's my fault. So, anyway, praise God.

The Woman Who Touched Jesus

SPEAKER_00 1:47

All right, Mark chapter 5, the switch of faith, and we'll start reading verse 25, and a certain woman which had an issue of blood, uh, 12 years, everybody say 12 years. That's a pretty long time to suffer with uh hemorrhageing. And uh had suffered many things of many physicians and had spent all that she had and was nothing better, but rather grew worse. When she had heard of Jesus, came in the press behind and touched his garment. For she said, amplified says, she continually said, If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole. With every step, I shall be whole. I shall be whole. And straightway the fountain of her blood was dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of that plague. And Jesus immediately, knowing in himself that virtue or power had gone out of him and turned him about in the press, the press, what is he talking about? I mean, the people were pressing on him, they were thronging him. He turned about him in the press and said, Who touched my clothes? Who has made a demand on my anointing? See, we can say it like that. Who has made a faith demand? Who has turned on the switch of faith that caused the power to go out of me? We can say that. We can say that and not do despite to the word. Who touched my clothes? And uh, or who touched me? And uh, well, he said, Who touched my clothes? Because he know he knew nobody touched him. And so his disciples said unto him, You see the multitude thronging thee, and sayest thou, who touched me? You know, they need to learn a little bit. I mean, they're not just responding to him properly. I mean, trying to correct the Lord. But anyway, so uh, what are you saying that for? Everybody's touching you, and uh and he looked round about to see her that had done this thing, but the woman, fearing and trembling, knowing in herself what had done in her, came and fell down before him and told him all the truth. And he said unto her, Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole. Go in peace and be whole of thy plague. So faith is a switch that turns on the power of God. I mean, this woman, her faith made a demand on the anointing of Jesus. And so it Bible says that she heard. What must she have heard? Well, she must have heard about a healing Jesus. She didn't hear about a mean Jesus, she didn't hear about a rude Jesus, she didn't, you know, somebody devoid of any kind of compassion. She heard about a healing Jesus. And whatever she heard motivated her to take a journey. I mean, she didn't just sit in her house. I mean, she she rose up and began to walk. Now, you know, you've been bleeding for 12 years, you've had hemorrhaging out of your body, and you've gone to every doctor that you could find. You spent all your money. Back then, most doctors treated uh infirmity by bleeding you. Can you imagine? You're already you're already bleeding, and some doctor goes, Let me let me cut you here, let me bleed into a cup. I mean, she's anemic. She's got to be anemic, and you can imagine all of her bodily functions are affected negatively. Her liver, her everything, her digestion, her brain, her muscles, every part of her body has been affected for 12 years, it's been negatively affected. It's not just the hemorrhaging, it's all of the of the other things that anemia and hemorrhaging will do that will bring upon your body all kinds of terrible things. She didn't just need the bleeding to stop. She needed to what? She needed to be made whole. She needed a multitude of things to change in her own body. I mean, okay, so you stop the bleeding. That doesn't fix the anemia, really. That doesn't fix all the other aspects of her life that have been affected negatively. And so, so she heard of Jesus. We'll talk more about what she must have heard. And that motivated her to get up and she came. The Bible said she came in the press behind. She came slash overcame. See, she didn't just come, she came, she had to overcome every. I mean, let me tell you, she's weak. She didn't feel like walking. Let's just say it was 10 miles. I don't know. I I had a hiking marriage, I was in the Boy Scouts and I was a kid, and I had one of my marriage badges, hiking marriage badge. I remember I had to do five five-mile hike and one 20-mile hike. And I mean to tell you, I was 12, 13, I was strong, you know. The five-mile hike was was, you know, kind of boring after the fifth one. You're work walking down the same circuit, you know, the same country road and making a loop, you know, and my dad drove me to give me the five miles, then he drove me the 20 miles to show me how long how far 20 miles was. 20 miles halfway to Beeville. Oh my God, the 20-mile hike did me in. Me and Crutch, John Crutchfield, my bit buddy down the street, went to school with him. I went and met roomed with him at AM, so we had a long time to be friends. But anyway, we took that 20-mile hike together down the Beaville Highway and drive. And there's no place to walk, you know, the highway slope like this. You walk it on the slope. Here comes an 18-winter, man. We dove, you know, dove away from, you know, thought he was gonna run over us, you know. 20 mile. I was ready to get in bed after that 20 mile. I don't know how far this lady had to walk, but I was fully strong, and this lady is weak. This lady had to overcome with every step. All of her body is saying, you can't make it, you can't. That's why she said if. She said if because she wasn't sure she was gonna make it. She said if she didn't know for sure that she could get to where Jesus was if she could go through the crowd to even touch him everywhere he went. There was crowds. So that you can give her forgiveness. The if part is not a lack of faith on her part, it's just the fact that she had to overcome. Everybody say, overcome. Some people won't walk across the street to get delivered. I mean, they just drive by this church. They this church has got everything they need, and they just keep on going. Oh, well, that's a funny-looking play. I'm gonna keep on going. Thank God you're here. You're here at the right place at the right time.

What She Had To Overcome

SPEAKER_00 8:38

So uh, so she had to overcome number one, her weakness, number two, her status. Number one, she, you know, women in Bible days in Israel, they didn't have the same rights as women do today. Women can drive the car to the mall, they can go, they can do this and do that by themselves, they can go here and go there, and nobody even thinks about it. But but in that, in those Bibles, and still like in Iran, you know, a woman can't go out by herself. She's got to have a younger brother or a man with her. I mean, you you just don't do that. It's just not done, see. They're stuck in the they're stuck in ancient traditions. I mean, those women, I can't imagine a woman wanting to be a Muslim. I can't under why you'd want to marry into that mess where you get beat all the time, treated like a dog. But that's how they're treated. They can't drive. Oh no, you can't drive. I mean, I read the story of a lady in Saudi Arabia that just went against the grain and she just she suffered a lot of beating, but she secretly learned to drive, you know. I mean, God, horrible. So, you know, think about this. I mean, normally, it just even if she was healthy, she would not be, it would not be looked upon with favor for her to be walking down the road uh by herself. And then on top of that, she's unclean. She is, she has got an issue of blood, which means that she should, by the Jewish law, say, unclean, unclean. Well, she didn't do that. She violated religious tradition, she violated the law to go get healed. You know, sometimes these made up. I mean, I know it's in the Bible. I mean, I know it's in the law that they had, but you know, Jesus did away with it, didn't he? So uh she had to overcome all these uh circumstances, and of course, finally, when she got there, the crowd, that's why it was the hem of his garment. See, he she could have touched his clothes, but she couldn't get there. She had to get down on the ground, crawl, hands and knees, and touch the hem of his garment. And immediately, see, she felt power go into her. She felt that she was healed of that plague. He felt virtue or power go out of him. He felt, she felt, everybody say he felt, she felt. See, there was a power transfer.

Power Transfer And Turning The Switch

SPEAKER_00 10:58

See, I mean, when I when I turn on the switch, there's a power transformer transfer. It comes runs all the way down those lines. It comes in the church, goes in that in that room back there, and distributed to all the light fixtures, and these I think are all 220 volts that go to these lights, and some of the places are 110, and so it's got to all be split out. But one thing about it, nothing nothing happens unless you turn on the switch. When you turn on the switch, what happens? There's a power transfer where it comes in and it goes and illuminates this building. It goes to the air conditioning. Aren't you glad it went to the air conditioning this morning? And we've got cold air. We didn't get turned on just right before you got here. It's been turned on since about five o'clock this morning to get it cold enough. For we can be comfortable and not be sweating. I re you know, in Europe I've been, they criticized us for having air conditioning. They turned, Paris is having a heat waste, they turned off, you know, oh, set your thermostat to 80 degrees. You know, they don't believe in the eat up with the Green New Deal. So I'm glad we've rejected that. We got to keep rejecting that. I believe in air conditioning. Praise God. All right. I remember what it was like in life without an air conditioning. I drew up, you know, in my younger day without air conditioning. It's no fun in Houston. Forget about it. All right, so she everybody says she turned on the switch of faith. And the power of God healed her infirmity. He said, Woman, you know, your faith, it's not my power. He focused on her faith. See, your faith hath made you whole. Go in peace, be whole of thy plague. See, not just healed, but be whole of thy plague. Daughter, called her daughter. See, she's a Jewish woman, had every right. So many Jews of the day that Jesus was, they were living far below what the what their covenant had had uh given them. They didn't know. Why? Because there were no teaching priests. The priests were just, you know, fat and sassy and big on giving a lot of rules and regulations that weren't really attached to God's word, and they quit teaching the covenant. That's why we're teaching what we're teaching. I'm telling you, God told me to teach what you take for granted so that people can live and have a quality of life that Jesus' blood bought and paid for. So what you know, so 12 out of the 19 healing miracles that are listed in the gospels, and some of them are listed more than one. This is one that's listed more than once, but it's just one of the twelve. And then there's 19 total. So faith must be pretty important.

Why Many Miss Faith And Healing

SPEAKER_00 13:43

I said faith must be pretty important. I was reading a testimony, brother. I've read it many times, but I read it again the other day. Brother, Brother Hagin talked about God, dealt with him. He was praying. You know, he his his thing was praying to edify himself. He never prayed about a service and what to do about it. He would just pray in tongues and get edified, and then whenever he got to the service, you know, he had something to give. I mean, he's built up in his spirit and he's sensitive, more sensitive to the moving of the Holy Ghost. He didn't have to hear ahead of time what to do. Sometimes that would he would hear. And so this particular time he's just praying at the altar. He's traveling in the in the ministry, you know, teaching faith. God told him to go teach my people faith. And he's uh at the altar praying. And God said, okay, he said, uh, uh after this, you're going to Dallas. He's in point A. After this, you're going to Dallas, point B. After Dallas, you're going to point C. And then when you get to point D, now he didn't mention all the other, he only mentioned Dallas. So I don't know what other cities he went to, but there were four steps ahead, God told him about was going to happen, something four, four places ahead. He said, when you get to that fourth place, a man's going to call you, a pastor. You don't know him. I want you to go, and he's going to call you for help. I want you to go help him. And he wrote everything down, folded it up, put it in his bill fold. Didn't tell Aretha, didn't tell anybody. Just wrote it all down. He said, it all happened just like God told him. And by the time he got to the fourth place, he got a message from this pastor that he'd never met, and the pastor never met him. He didn't know him. And he said, My wife is dying of cancer. Would you please come and minister? So he, and it's not easy. I mean, you're you're he's preaching in churches. For him to pick up and go uh talk to one person, I mean, that's just not normally what he would do. I mean, it's not very effective use of your time. But God had told him. So he went and uh fully expecting now that he's gonna be able to make a difference and get this woman healed. And he and he sits down and talks to them and kind of finds out where they are and finds out that you see she's a great Bible teacher, very accomplished Bible teacher. As a matter of fact, the church where they pastor preferred her ministry to her husband because she was such a fabulous Bible teacher. She was really good. She said, I'm an expert in all areas of the Bible, but the faith and healing are uh two areas that I don't know anything about. Now that's what Brother Hagin said she said. And when I read that, me, when I read that, he didn't say anything about it. But when I read that, I think, what a goofball. What kind of a Bible teacher are you? What good is your teaching if you miss faith and healing? I mean, the just shall live by faith. I mean, that's kind of basic, you know. If you don't have anything to say about faith, you're not teaching people how to live. What good is any of it? Or am I the only one? Mr. Critical. Well, I'm just, I mean, I just, it's hard to believe. It's hard to believe that somebody could call themselves a Bible scholar and skip faith and healing in the Bible when it's all through it, old and new testament. And so he knew he was gonna have to pour into her, you know, have to talk to her about, you know, uh how to get healed. And she did not get healed. And he went away weeping that a woman 43 years of age is gonna have to go to heaven early. Because she's not gonna get her healing. She just, and he was so disappointed by the time he got back home, he said, God, I just don't understand. You told me to go. I expected this woman to get her healing and she didn't get it. I don't understand. And he said, Well, I moved supernaturally on her husband to contact you. He didn't know you, you didn't know him. He was able to hear the instructions they needed for her to get her healing. She certainly didn't want to die. And I sent you to her, and they did not receive. They did not receive. That's the only way she's gonna get healed, is if she received what you said, and they neither one of them received what you said. So that in the in the when they stand before me, you know, the Bible says every Christian has got to give an account of their ministry. See, I'm not talking about the great white throne judgment when everybody, all the unbelievers come before God, that's called the great white throne judgment, and he just says, Depart from me, I never knew you, and throws them in the lake, you know, throws them into hell. And that's not, that's gonna happen way later, and that's for the unbeliever. No, every believer, every Christian is gonna stand before Christ to give an account. And what has been done for God and done according to what he wanted to happen, you're gonna get rewarded for. And everything that you did, everything that you decided to do without him, is gonna get burned up. Yet you'll be saved, but so as by fire. In other words, you're not, it's not a judgment going to hell, it's a judgment of reward, it's a judgment of works. And I mean, there's gonna be a lot of people in in heaven that that are not gonna have any reward. They're not gonna have any medals on their chest, they're not gonna have any crowns on their head, they're not gonna have any uh uh fancy sashes on their gowns. I mean, they're just gonna be plain. You know, dressed plain. Like a Mennonite's dressed. He's plain. He's looking he dresses plain. You know? And uh, no, I tell you what, I want, I want diamond doorknobs in my I want diamond doorknobs in my mansion. I want, I want a cut different color every day when I walk in that mansion. I'm probably not gonna spend much time there, but when I do, I want to, I want it all changed, every bit of it, every time. What do you say? Why are you saying that? Because I believe I can have that. If I just obey God and do what he tells me to do, there's rewards for obedience. And somehow this woman had gotten through the whole Bible without finding what she needed to live past 43. She died. And the only reason Brother Hagin went there was so that they would have no excuse on that day when they stand before him. Which tells me, and he didn't say any of this, I'm just talking. In other words, that's what I've received from that testimony. She's gonna get zero on her Bible teaching. She didn't impact anybody like he wanted, and so she gets zero. Isn't that a shame? Plus the fact the devil was able to take her out. I I believe faith, the switch of faith turns on God's power. We need something about faith. That's why I'm teaching this today.

What Needs To Change Now

SPEAKER_00 20:32

So, what needs to change in your life? See, we all have things that need to change. Jesus said, you know, the beginning of the year, this is the year of the new. Behold, I make all things new. There's some old things that need to fall off, some new things. Until the old falls off, the new you're not going to be able to experience. Is there chronic pain? Is there chronic uh sickness? Is there lack? Too much month at the end of the money? Is there fear? Is there torment? Is there bondage? Is there addiction? Is there trouble in your marriage, trouble in your home, trouble with your kids, trouble on the job, controversy? See, this miracle that we just read about with a woman, the issue of blood, is Old Testament. I know it's in the New Testament, but if the gospels are all a record of basically, except for the last part of each gospel when it talks about after the resurrection, but everything before the resurrection is Old Testament. And we have a better covenant found upon better promises. See, she had to rise up and go to where Jesus was. The only place where the power was was where Jesus was, but that's not true of us. No, the Holy Ghost is everywhere present. We don't need a man, we don't need a meeting, we don't need a movement. All we need to do is contact. Our faith can contact, our faith can contact the power. Source right now. Now it's not wrong to get in a good meeting. I mean, if I had, you know, a bad uh condition and I'm believing God, I mean, a few years ago, gladest first time she ever fell has been

A Healing Lost To Disorder

SPEAKER_00 22:14

30 years ago. She fell, broke her kneecap, half and two. Man, it was terrible. We had no insurance. And uh, you know, I asked the doctor, said, How long? We're faith people, we believe in healing, how long can we go before she has this surgery? He had to have she had to have surgery with a wire to pull her kneecap back together so it'd grow back together. He said, You've got two, maybe three weeks at the most, and then after that, the bones are gonna start putting little feelers out, and they're gonna try to grow and they're not apart. And so then when they try to put them together, they're not gonna match and you're gonna have a weak situation. So don't wait any more than you, in other words, he's telling me you've got you've got two to three weeks to believe for this miracle that you're believing for. And so, you know, we go to Lakewood, we're we're in the front of the church, we're praying for the sick every week, every every service. We're laying hands on people for different things, but a lot of it's people that are sick. And now she needs healing. And so certainly we went to Lakewood, and certainly we we but you know, Benny Henn's coming to town. Benny Henn's got a healing ministry. And so, you know, why not go? Why not go where there is a so I mean we didn't, we didn't, we look, we're time is ticking by. I mean, you know, I I got to thinking, hey, time is ticking by. We need to go. Let's go, let's go to that meeting. I mean, it was a lot of trouble to go to that meeting. Go down there to compact center, and now it's Lakewood Church. But back then it was compact center, that's where Benny was. And so we went and sat down on the floor. We had to get there five, six hours ahead of time, sit there. She's miserable. And she's got this brace on her leg where she can, you know, can walk, but she's stiff-legged, you know. But without it, she can't walk. It, you know, it won't hold her weight. You this whole thing is that that pathway from your muscles down is broken, and so your leg just kind of dangles. You can't go like that. You can't make your leg go forward with that broken in two. So she had a brace, and and so finally he calls out, and God's healing legs. I mean, it wasn't even specific. It wasn't kneecap. God's healing legs is what he said, you know. We had a long praise and worship time, and we worshiped God for an hour. You know, all these songs. I don't know if you've ever been to a Benihen meeting, but back then, you know, he had a big crowd. It's 15,000, 20,000 people there, packed out at the compact center. And so that meeting has got an atmosphere of faith. It's got an atmosphere, the gifts of the Spirit are flowing. Why not get under that? I'm not saying you shouldn't do that if you've really got an emergency, you've got a big thing. But what I'm telling you is let's not be limited to that. Let's let's know that we can contact with our own faith. And so we did go, and I and I said, Oh, that's you, honey. And she said, Yeah, that's me. And she stood up and she pulled that brace off. I had the the uh X-ray and I had the doctor's report in my hand. I pulled her her brace and I held her brace, and she walked out in the aisle, she started walking up and down the aisle like this. She was healed. I mean to tell you, she was going like this, stomping up and down. I mean, God healed her right in the moment. And he said, now if you're healed, go to the side and and go over there in the line and the doctor will interview you. So we went over to the side in this long line, fixing to go up on the platform and give testimony. See, I mean, the lady with the issue of blood, she didn't just stop getting healed, she told it. And so we we got in this long line, you know, and pretty soon this lady came up to us. We found out later she's a pediatrician, and she wound up being uh later uh married to Evander Holyfield, and she uh was one of the doctors that was examining people, so she said, What happened? I showed her the x-ray, and she got down on her, uh, down on the floor and wrapped Gladys on the kneecap like that with her. Bap, pap, pap. Does that hurt? No. Grabbed her leg, jerked it up like that. Does that hurt? No. She said, Go to the front of the line, go up there, get ready to go up on the platform. And I mean, we're going, wow, God, you know, wow, man. And so we get up there, and these steep steps, you know, it's good up on the platform. And they see steep steps, and they're they got plastic laminate on them. They're not, they're not carpet. They ought to be carpet. It ought to be something that's got some friction. These are slick, like this, it's slick. And and uh, and so we got up to that place, and they had us wait until we, they didn't get us all the way up. They held us halfway up the steps. And there's no riser, so it's open under there. And there's a little girl and her mother behind us, and it was about 12 years old, and she had been wearing Coke bottle glasses. I mean, in other words, her glasses were so thick that she couldn't see anything without these big, thick, and God had healed her eyes, and she was without those glasses, and her and her mother were going ape. They were going crazy. They were jumping up and down and they were screaming, and they fell into us and knocked us underneath the stairs. And Gladys lost her healing just like that. By the time we got up there, we had to testify to nothing. And it was so crazy. I mean, I never forget getting up the next morning and I said, God, I just don't understand. See, like Brother Hagin, I just don't understand. You know, I just she was healed. I know it wasn't just a fluke. I how did that, how did the devil steal that that quick? How did he steal her healing? And he said, a lack of order. You had disorder at the altar.

unknown 27:57

Come on.

SPEAKER_00 27:59

See, somebody should have been calming that little girl and her mother down a little bit. Okay, now let's not get in the flesh and get crazy here. Let's, let's, let's, you've got, I kept glad to kept trying to get involved with them because you know she was so excited for her. You know, I said, honey, honey, honey, let's, we've got to get up on the platform, leave them alone. See, I was already trying, I could tell it was flesh, really. I'm not saying she wasn't healed, I'm just saying her reaction was crazy. Some people just don't know how to be in the presence of God, really. They're not been trained. So God told me, He said, it's disorder. So you wonder why we have order in this church, because the anointing won't flow when you have a bunch of disorder. You don't just get to come up here and just do anything you want to anytime you want to. We have order. Taught me that a long time ago, paid the price for it, too. She had her two surgeries and she got over it. Are y'all with me now? So uh uh we we just need to learn on this how to switch on the switch of faith. Now, everybody say the switch of faith.

Four Steps Of Bible Faith

SPEAKER_00 29:05

Years ago, 1953, to be exact, Brother Hagan was in a was in a meeting and God and Jesus appeared to him and gave him a sermon. And he said, uh He said, go get a sheet of paper and write down one, two, three, four. And he did. And he said, I'm gonna give you four principles out of this, Mark chapter five, that if anybody anywhere will employ these four steps or put to work these four principles, they can have anything that they want to from me or from their heavenly father. Now think about that statement that Jesus made to Brother Hagin. It's in the Bible, but he told him. Now he'd been teaching faith. Brother Hagin had not been a novice at teaching faith. He'd been teaching faith for years, and then here comes Jesus in 1953 after I don't know how many years, seven, eight, nine years. I don't remember his last church that he pastored before he went into the field ministry, but he'd been teaching a long time and he didn't know these principles like this. Jesus said, write down one, two, three, four, gave him a formula. You know, formulas. I I went to school, I learned a lot of formulas. I took a lot of math, I a mechanical engineering degree. There's lots of formulas I had to learn. It it appeals to me to know that the Bible gives you a formula on how to how to navigate faith and how to get what you need in the natural. Get it out of the spirit realm and get it right here where you need it. Amen. So he he he said the four things are this say it, do it, receive it, and tell it. Everybody say that. Say it, do it, receive it, tell

Say It And Keep Saying It

SPEAKER_00 30:50

it. Alright, those were the four steps. And so he goes through this particular one. Number one, she kept on say, first thing you gotta do, turn on the switch of the word. What are you saying about your situation? Are you agreeing with God's word or not? She agreed with what she had heard about Jesus. She said, I shall be whole. She kept on saying it, I shall be whole. What are you continually saying? See, it's not what you say once, but you have to have a systematic discourse. Jesus told Brother Hagin, he said, you tell him that you'll have what you'll have whatever you say, whether it's positive or negative. It's a law. And that's why the world is programmed negatively because the devil wants you to get all the dregs. He wants you to get all the trouble. And he has just infected even the church. He's infected and well, I just tell it like it is. I'm not going to say I've got something when I haven't saved it. I don't say I'm not going to say I got something I haven't seen. Well, have you ever seen your brain stupid? You haven't seen your brains, and you know you got one, right? Surely you have one. So see, it's just that it's that attitude. And uh, you know, I don't know if you've ever had that attitude, but you know, faith calls the things that be not as though they were. So she was she healed? She said, I shall be whole. I shall be whole, I shall be whole. She said it. And you know, I I got to wondering about this one time. I thought, well, how did she come up with that confession? And obviously it's something that the person that told her about Jesus, but how did she have the faith to say, I shall be whole instead of I shall be healed? See, what she needed was to be made whole. Healing wasn't going to be enough. Do you get that? I mean, she's been pleading for 12 years. She's got a lot of things wrong with her. So she had the faith to say, I shall be whole. She didn't say, I shall be healed. And so I was I was inquiring one time, and I'd preach this a lot of times. Well, for not without knowing this, but sometimes you know you just dig a little deeper. And he said, Well, well, what about Matthew uh uh 14? Let's turn over there real quick, Matthew 14. Just a few pages to the left. Verse 34. And when they were gone over, they came into the land of Genesareth. They were on the Sea of Galilee, and they landed in the land of Genesareth, and when the man of that place had knowledge of him, they sent out into all that country roundabout, and brought unto him all that were diseased, and besought him that they might only touch the hem of his garment, and as many as touched were made perfectly whole. Notice it didn't say healed, it said they were made whole. As many as touched the hem of his garment. See, there that hem of his garment again, because why? Because they're all around him, they're thronging him. So as many as you could just, all they had to do was just touch his clothes. So it must have been that someone from that meeting that had been healed gave her that news. Said, you know, I was in a meeting one time, and all I did was touch the hem of his garment, and I was made whole. So she had somebody that testified, your testimony is so important. Quit shutting your mouth and quit being ashamed of what Jesus had done for you. Somebody's life might depend on it. So, you know, believe in your heart and speak with your mouth. Romans 10, 9 and 10. John 6, 47. Uh, you know, believing is having. He said, He that believeth on me sh hath everlasting life. He that believeth, hath. He that believes, has. He that believes possesses. See, when you believe, you have it. And then you, you know, you count it that you've got it. See, she counted that she would be made whole. And so, uh, what have you been saying about your situation? What have you been magnifying the problem or magnifying the solution? And the king of the solution. There's a king of the solution. There's a way of escape. You know, there's a way of escape. Gladys didn't feel like coming to church this morning. I mean, it took more than four, you know, we had Claire and I got, you know, encouraged her. I'm not speaking bad about it. I just want you to know it's it she didn't come over here just hop, skipping, and jumping. She had to overcome a whole bunch of things this morning for some reason. And we just had a tough night last night. We could she could have stayed home, but I said, no, the anointing's gonna be in the church. You're gonna feel a lot better if you get there. And we're we're not gonna feel any better sitting here. And yeah, we had to encourage her a little bit. That makes this more miracle even more amazing. I it doesn't say anybody encourage this lady. It doesn't say a husband, it doesn't say a daughter, it doesn't say anybody. And she just, I mean, she just bless God, she was tired of being sick and tired. So that brings me back. What are you saying? Check up on what you're saying. Amen. I mean, Jesus is the one that said this. He said, you know, tell them that they can have what they say, whether it's positive or negative. So we got to quit talking to death. We got to quit talking destruction. We got to quit saying things like, I'm just devastated. I heard that again. I hear it all the time. I'm just devastated. I never say that. I will you know what the meaning of devastation. Why don't you look it up? You're not devastated. No matter what happened, you're not devastated. You're an overcomer. You're victorious in him. Amen. All

Do It With Corresponding Action

SPEAKER_00 36:47

right. So we say it, and then the next one is do it. See? Turn on the switch of words, turn on the switch of action. And we talked about that. She came, she overcame. She acted on what she heard. She heard somebody testify, I just touched the hem of his garment. I was whole. And more she she heard that and said, Well, he's no respecter of person. She's a Jewish lady. She knows a little bit of the word. She knows God's no respecter of person. If you did it for him, do it for me. All I do I need to do is get to the power source. All I need to do is get to where he's at. We don't have to get to where he's at. He's in us. We got a better covenant. Got a better covenant found upon better promises. And so she acted on what she heard and what she said. Faith is acting on the word. See, you can speak something, but then you've got to do something besides speak. Speaking is important. A word is important, but by itself, if you don't put action with that word that you're speaking, then you're the Bible says in James 2.20, faith without corresponding action is dead. Your faith is dead. I mean, without action. You need to say something, yeah, but you need to also act. Everybody say, I'm acting. See, I mean the simple definition of faith is acting on the word or acting like the Bible is true. So a good prayer to pray after you have made your confession of faith about whatever it is, Lord, how do I act my faith? Well, in Gladys's case, she acted her faith by getting out of bed, getting ready, and coming to church. And she didn't feel strong enough to walk in here, so we wheeled her in here, but that's just temporary. We're gonna keep on until we're not standing still, we're not putting up with anything. We're gonna keep on keeping on and overcoming day by day by day by day, day by day, day by day by day by day. Are y'all with me now? So faith is acting like the Bible is true. You know, great prayers. How do I act on my faith? Years ago, I uh I had a uh I had been out of the home builder business for several years, and I didn't think I'd ever been back in the business, but then I had an unction and I had a desire finally, and won't go to the whole thing, but I just knew it was God's will for me to get back in. I just didn't have the faith to go all the way in. I had been laid off. I had no money, I had $35 to my name, so it's not really a good time to go in the home building business. $35 in the bank and no job, no money coming in. But I just believed that I could, if I could start this interim business, I sat down just in the natural. I just sat down and, you know, you've got to do something. You can't just sit there and hope and wish and all of that. You gotta put you to put something together. I sat down at the kitchen table and I started figuring out what I can get in the business of rehabbing these vacant houses. I I knew about a subdivision that had a thousand vacant houses back in the 80s. Thousand vacant houses. Can you imagine how much glass breakage, yard mowing, I mean, people living there, shit, squatting in there, and all that kind of stuff, no telling what all. And I said, you know, I could, I've done this before. I've I've fixed houses for banks. I could go to a bank and tell them, hey, I'll fix your house up for this amount of money. And I figured I figured it all up. I said, if I had $25,000 in cash, I could start my own business. And then after a while, like a relationship with these bankers and everything, then I could parlay that into getting back in the home builder business. That was my plan. If you have to have some kind of plan, even if it isn't God's plan, you better have something that you're working on so that because God can't move a ship sitting at the dock. You've got to be moving in the water, and then God can steer you in the correct direction where you need to go. Maybe you're not going in the right direction, but at least you're moving. Do something lest you do nothing. I don't know who this is for. No extra charge. So, you know, so I said, now Lord, I need a thousandfold return. I don't know. He said, Well, in Deuteronomy, Moses uh prayed uh for Israel that the Lord make them a thousand times more numerous than they are today. They had three million people. Lord make you a thousand times more numerous than you are today. I said, Okay, that's what a thousand-fold return. I'll put $25 in the offering tonight, Wednesday night service. Gonna leave me $10. That's what we did. We we put the $25 in there, and we believed we received the $25,000. And the next morning I'm quick to say, okay, God, now what? See, I knew. I knew I had another action to take. What is my next action? I've got $10 in the bank. What is my next action? Do I stand on the street corner? No. And uh, and so he said, I want you to call these three gentlemen, gave me three names that guys that I knew at Lakewood. They're all businessmen, successful businessmen. He said, and and get them to agree with you for this provision, $25,000. I said, Lord, I can't do that. Don't look at me so innocent. You know that he's told you to do things you told him he couldn't do. I said, I can't do that. They're gonna think I'm just monkeying around trying to get them to give me the money. I I can't I can't go around with my hand out. He said, No, you you tell them that I told you their names and that they would not be intimidated by $25,000. Not everybody can believe for $25,000. They have $25,000 faith. You tell them I said so. I said, Oh. Okay. And so the first guy called on me, and he was quite, you know, flattered, I guess you'd say. I mean, he felt kind of good that God thought about him like that. He agreed with me, and the second guy agreed with me. And the third guy I called, you know, went through the deal. I need $25,000 for this business I'm gonna start. And I'm not asking you for the money, I'm just asking you to agree with me because God told me that it wouldn't intimidate you. You're, you're, you're able to believe God in that realm of that kind of money. It wouldn't be that hard for you to believe that. And he started weeping. He said, No, come over to my house. I want you, me and my wife, I want to pray for you. Well, come to my house. Well, I've been to his house. And so I went to his house, I stood in his music room. I don't think you've got, have you got a music room? I don't have a music room. He had a music room, he's got a big house. I mean, it's a mansion. And we stood in that music room, three of us, and he was weeping and crying and praying, and and I mean, the power of God came in there. And he later became my partner, and he didn't bring 25,000, he brought a hundred thousand, and we started a home building business within 30 days. See, I that was God's plan. That wasn't my plan. I didn't have my hand out. I didn't say, hey, give me, give me, give me. No. I did what God told me to do. Are y'all with me now? I acted on my faith. And God did exceeding abundantly above what I thought he would do, quicker than I thought. Praise God. Come on, let's praise him right now. It might look bleak, but I tell you, it's not as bad as it looks. So, do it. Everybody say do it. Now you gotta put your money where your mouth is, they say. You know, you gotta put action to your words.

Receive It Then Tell It

SPEAKER_00 44:06

And third one is receive it. Turn on the switch of receiving. I listen, I had to just humble myself after that guy convinced me that he was my partner. I had to humble myself and receive that I didn't want to. I'll be honest, I did not want a partner. I wanted the money with no partner. And God had to deal with me. God had to get me and said, oh no, I want you to be accountable to him. And see, he was preparing me to be pastor of this church. I have to be accountable. I'm accountable to you. I'm accountable to him. And so I'm accountable to my family. I'm accountable. Why? Because we need to be accountable. Are y'all with me now? So I was accountable to him. And uh and so I had to believe I received. So here in her case, she felt, and as soon as she touched the Him in his garn, she felt in her body she'd been healed of that plague. And then he said, Hey, who touched me? And so she couldn't sit there any longer, you know. She so so God and his power, see, are everywhere present. Now they were only present with Jesus in those days, but now we can have what we we can believe we receive. When we pray, we believe we receive and we shall have. Learn to receive. Especially in the money area. You don't have your hand out. You're not begging anybody, but when somebody comes up to give you money, don't be religious and say, Oh, oh, well, I don't need that. Brother Hagin used to tell the story about being a poor pastor, you know, in the Baptist realm. He was a Baptist pastor. They had a uh a guest preacher. And so the head deacon came to him one day and said, you know, uh, pastor, I know this it's this is costing you money. You're having you're having to feed this guy and you're having to keep it keep him up and drive him around. He said, here, here, I want to help you out with that. Here's here's $100. Here, here, here. Just put this, not in the church, just put it in your pocket. I want to give it to you because you're you're putting money out for this this guest preacher. And and and brother Osteen says, he took it, it took the money by the corner of the $100, like this. He says, Oh no. Let us put this in the treasury, you know. And and and with a hundred dollar bill fell out of his hand and went into this box. It went into his into his uh uh desk. He just went, his heart felt and he said, Oh, goodbye, $100. He needed that $100 so bad. But he was too religious and too proud to receive it from God's hand. God's trying to help him, and he just, oh no, he said, try me now. I'll change. Try me now. And so I started trying him. I gave him lots of money, praise God. I didn't ever want him to doubt about money. Hallelujah. Are you getting anything out of this then? And so, when you, how do you really receive? Well, you praise God as if you already have it. You just praise God. I mean, the minute you say I believe, I receive, then that's when you start praising God before you ever see any difference. And you praise him, and every time you think about the situation, you don't bring it all back up again and ask again. No, you just praise it. Oh, thank God it's done. I prayed on uh July the 12th, and I believe I receive it, and I shall have it. Glory to God. It's a done deal. All right, and the last one is tell it. Turn on the switch of testimony. She told him all the truth. She testified, and people all around the front, just think about a throng. I mean, a multitude of people were thronging him, and they all heard her say and give her testimony, just like she had heard. I mean, the fame of Jesus spread abroad mainly through testimony. They didn't have newspapers, they didn't have Facebook, they didn't have internet. People testified. People spoke of what God had done for them. Word and the fame of Jesus spread abroad. So let's keep our mouths open. Let's tell about what great things he has done for us. And uh turn on the switch of faith and see God change your circumstance. Come on, lift your hands and receive today. Hallelujah.