How can you develop an awareness of the presence of the Lord? There sometimes seems to be a veil between you and the Lord, and you don’t sense that the Lord is with you. You know now and then when He answers a prayer that the Lord was really with you, but if that veil could be taken away so that you were always aware of the presence of the Lord and having communion with Him you would get a hundred times more from God. The promises would be enriched—promises have an impersonal quality to them until you sense His presence.
David sang, “The Lord is my Shepherd.… I have set the Lord always before me.… Because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.” He was never moved because he was aware that the Lord was with him. He practiced His presence; he had faith for it; he set the Lord always before him. He drew the presence of the Lord to himself and he could say, “The Lord is my Shepherd.” They were not empty words; the Lord was right there. “He leadeth me, He prepares for me, He satisfies me.” Everything came out of that awareness of the Lord.
We dare not let this move of God get to the place where it is just doctrine and we are talking about something to come, blessings to come, or what God is doing only in the church. If we talk just about His acts, only about what He is doing, or about what He is revealing, we are going to miss the important part—that we develop an awareness of the Lord. This is the day of the Lord’s promise, “Then shall we know if we follow on to know the Lord …” (Hosea 6:3). You are coming to know Him and to have an awareness of Him; He will be with you. This walk from the very beginning has had the one thing that has caused me to both weep and to rejoice before the Lord. It has had a promise of the presence of the Lord and a walk with God.
I didn’t get into this to see another movement spring up. I don’t care to see mere churches come up. As long as I can remember I have hungered for a real walk with God, to walk with Him, to talk with Him as men did in Bible days—even to exceed that. The promise was, “Then shall ye know if ye follow on to know the Lord.… He shall come unto you as the rain.”
He is going to make known His presence. The great day we are living in is the “Parousia,” the Greek word meaning the “presence of the Lord” (it is sometimes translated “coming”). You are going to know His presence before you see Him coming in the clouds. In the history of the church the wonderful, wonderful presence of the Lord has never been known as we are destined to know it in this day. By faith we can begin to practice the presence of the Lord, we can get into that right now. By faith men walked with God—by faith.
You may think, “If the Lord came near me and manifested Himself, it would be wonderful!” You forget that the presence of the Lord is at your initiative. The Lord says, “Draw nigh to me, and I’ll draw nigh to you” (James 4:8).
If we believe that, then we have to have faith to literally project ourselves into the presence of the Lord and walk before Him. When we do, the Lord’s presence will constantly be drawn closer to us. Every day I am persuaded this is the greatest truth; this is the thing I’m going to emphasize. Every message will teach you one thing: everything you know, everything that you have experienced in this walk is based upon one great step—you must practice the presence of the Lord. You must develop your awareness of the Lord. This is something YOU do. As you sense how close He is, He will be real to you. It will just flow. The curtain is there, an insensitivity in us toward God, but by the Spirit we can see that taken away until we can walk and talk with the Lord.
You may say, “But you don’t know my problems; I have troubles.” It doesn’t make any difference. Great men of the Bible had circumstances and problems that you and I will never know. Their very lives were in jeopardy; they were harassed continually. Men went through things far beyond what we know, but they were able to endure because they had an awareness of the Lord’s presence. The Lord is a very present help in the time of trouble. It is in the time of trouble that He will break through and manifest His presence.
Three Hebrew children walked into a fiery furnace saying, “We don’t know whether or not God is going to deliver us. One thing we know, we will not bow down to anyone but the Lord.” In they went. A fourth one was in with the three, like the Son of God (Daniel 3:25). The presence of the Lord was there.
The Lord is with us, and we must sense that the same thing is available for us now! the awareness of the Lord. It is not enough to be a New Testament church in structure, in organization, in doctrine, in the teaching and to have all the necessary ministries. The thing that makes the church is that the Lord is in the midst of His people, and the people are aware of His presence. We are coming more and more into that. The time was that we had no awareness of the Lord unless the chills were going up and down our spines and people were shouting and jumping, but as we drew closer to the Lord, we were aware that something else began to take place. We had a sense that He was Lord, He was the Master, that He was there.
The day will come that men will minister up to a certain point, and the presence of the Lord will be so much in the congregation that we will have silent worship. You will be awestruck, unable to move, the presence of the Lord will be so great. No matter what is preached or done in the service you will get the message if you are aware of the Lord being there.
Some people can be in a congregation and get nothing, and those sitting next to them get everything. Why? Because some people are aware that the Lord is ministering, and they draw it, they appropriate; they know that it is for them. Other people sit and listen—weighing the words. They never break through that barrier to touch the Lord.
Even in Christ’s day it was so. The woman with the issue of blood hemorrhaged for twelve years. She came to the Lord and pressed through and touched the hem of His garment (Matthew 9:20). Jesus said, “Who touched me?” You see, the woman was aware of Him, aware of all that He was, and she reached through and touched Him. He that would please God must believe that He IS and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him (Hebrews 11:6). To believe that He IS, without believing some vague theory about God, you breathe in the person of the Lord as well as His promises. You do not divorce the Lord from His Word, but you take that Word, and the Lord Himself is present with you. Believe it!
Let’s talk about how to tap the power of God’s promises, how to really take hold of the promises so you can make them work for you. You may be aware that the promises of God are very rich, but often you are unable to get them to yield real power, real potency in your own personal life. The theory, the promise is wonderful, but the level at which you walk is low by comparison. We comfort ourselves by thanking God that we are getting more and more from the Lord, and we are drawing closer, but we are always aware there is something higher being taught to us, that God is revealing something to us, whispering to our hearts. Then there is the level down where we are living. We would like to know how to tap the power of God’s promises so that those promises begin to live for us.
First, I am going to show you that the promises of God are universal promises; they belong to everyone. There isn’t anything promised in this walk that is for only a few. Everyone can have it. Next, I will show you why those promises are often unprofitable to you as an individual, why you can’t tune in on them. The third thing I will do is show you two things that become activators of the promises.
To explain what an activator is: you can have a gun and it can be loaded, but if the bullet in the gun doesn’t have a priming cap, when the trigger is pulled and the hammer comes down, nothing happens. The powder won’t explode the bullet; it has to have that priming cap, then off it goes. There has to be something to activate the tremendous promises of God, break them open, and cause a nuclear fission in higher spiritual realms that will release God’s power and energy, for His words are Spirit and they are life. They are powerful. No word of God is without that power.
When God sends a word, it has the power within itself to perform itself. When you speak a word and promise that tomorrow you’ll do such and such a thing, to say it, is not to have it done. Tomorrow you must set about to perform that word. But when God speaks a word that tomorrow such and such a thing will be done, He never has to say it again. That word has in itself the power of fulfillment.
We want to have that same power loosed and released in ourselves, so when people by the Spirit prophesy over us, it will not be a long period of laboring to have it happen. Our faith will detonate and activate that thing and make it powerful. There is such a thing as impartation. But there is another thing of appropriation that has such power that every word that comes your way you can grab and watch it unfold in its miracle power in your life.
Let’s go back to step number one. This message could change the whole course of your faith walk with God. Read carefully what God has to say. There is a universality of the promises and the provisions of grace. To simplify this: the promises of God, the provision of His grace that He says He will minister to you, belong to everyone. Now if that is true, it is going to be a rebuke to some of you who have not appropriated the promises and have not been able to walk in them.
Let’s start with salvation. God is not willing that any man perish, but that all come to the knowledge of truth. When He made salvation a promise and a provision of grace, it was for everyone. If any man doesn’t get it, it isn’t because God hasn’t promised it—it is because he has not appropriated it.
What about the Holy Spirit? Peter says, Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is unto you and to your children and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call. Acts 2:38, 39.
We sense here that the Holy Spirit is promised for everyone who has ever accepted Jesus Christ. For someone to sit back and say, “Well, if the Lord wants to fill me with the Holy Spirit, He can.” He has promised it to you! If He hadn’t wanted you to have the Holy Spirit, He wouldn’t have made the provision for you. It is clear and evident that the promise is for as many as the Lord our God shall call. And if you’ve been called to live a Christian life, you have been called to receive the Holy Spirit. The promise is to you. That makes the promise a universal promise to the whole church, although I would estimate that not one percent of bornagain believers have ever gone on to receive the fullness of the Holy Spirit.
What about tongues? Even those who believe in the Holy Spirit in a vague sense, will often back off. “Well, if the Lord wants me to talk in tongues, I’ll talk in tongues.” Not so! In I Corinthians 5 Paul says, I would that ye all spake with tongues, but rather that ye prophesied.… And again he says, Forbid not to speak with tongues. I Corinthians 14:39b. If that was not a universal promise in the plan and provision of God, Paul wouldn’t have spoken it: “I would that ye all spoke in tongues, but rather that ye prophesied.”
That brings up prophecy: it is apparent from “but rather that ye prophesy,” prophecy too is a universal promise. Everyone who has received the Holy Spirit can prophesy. I Corinthians 14:31 says, For ye may all prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be comforted. Also, I Corinthians 14:39 tells us, Wherefore brethren covet to prophesy…
You never would be told to covet to prophesy unless you could. God never entices you or commands you to want something or to covet something just as an empty torment, knowing that you could never have it. You would never have been told to covet earnestly the best gifts unless God intended you to have those gifts. God never teases people with the unattainable. Believe that! God has not created a hunger and a desire in your heart that He is going to deny. Oh, believe that! God has not created a hunger and a desire in your heart that He will deny if you are hungering and thirsting.
There are many things I want and need right now, many things my heart is yearning for. It has taken God years to put in me the desire for those things. Do you find yourself wanting things that ten years ago you wouldn’t have thought of, wouldn’t even have wanted? How long has it taken God working in you to will? But he also would work in you to do His good pleasure. This is one of those jarring messages that begins to open the door and makes you realize you are going to have to dig in, get with it, and actually walk in the things that God has for you.
Let’s talk about the “whatsoevers” of the Bible. We talk about the “whosoevers”—whosoever will may come; now here are some “whatsoevers” to show the universality of God’s promises. They belong to everyone. The promises of God in Christ Jesus have their yea, their amen and their verily. And, if we believe that, we are going to have to begin to stand on the promises that we have shied away from. We have quoted them but we have never really believed they are for us and will yield their power and grace to us.
In John 14:12, we read, Verily, verily I say unto you, he that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also. Who does that belong to? “He that believeth on Me.” If you believe in Jesus Christ, this provision is for you, and, greater works than these shall ye do because I go to my Father. These are whatsoevers: and whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it. John 14:13, 14.
How broad is the scope! Those promises are so broad that it staggers you. “Whatsoever ye shall ask,” and, “If ye shall ask anything in my name, I will do it.” John 16:23b, 24 hits us awfully hard: Verily, verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, He will give it you. Hitherto ye have asked nothing in my name: ask and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full.
“Whatsoever”: whosoever, shall ask whatsoever. They shall have whatever they desire. It can’t be any more inclusive or any more universal in its scope than to lay it before you in those terms.
Do you realize I am trying to show you from the Word that whatever God says He means? Whatever God brings as a promise, He intends that every believer will tap into it.
The universality of the promises and the provision of grace are a necessary thing in order to bring us to the realization that if we have not tapped in, there is a cause for it. If we are not walking in the promises, there is a reason for it. These are the disturbing things that have moved me more and more into real faith, more and more into the ministry of the word that is actually creating faith in the people also. When I preach, faith is imparted.
You can walk in faith from this message. You can have a faith in it, and it will impart something to you. This word will do something to your heart, and you will begin to pray and believe and watch those promises come to pass. This will be the beginning of a miracle walk if you appropriate it.
Mark tells us how Jesus went out from Bethany, passed a fig tree and, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet. And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And His disciples hear it. Mark 11:13b, 14.
And in the morning as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. And Peter calling to remembrance saith unto Him, Master, behold the fig tree which thou cursedst is withered away. And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God (the Greek reads, “have the faith of God”) For verily I say unto you (notice the following), whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith. Mark 11:20–23.
“Whosoever” shall have “whatsoever” he saith. How universal is that promise of faith. Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them. Mark 11:24. “What things so ever ye desire” is not speaking of needs. It reaches on into the desires of your heart.
You may say, “But you don’t know how many times I’ve tried to believe for something and it hasn’t come to pass.” It doesn’t matter how many times you’ve failed, there will be a breakthrough and there will be a company of people who will walk in this apostolic company, and they are going to change the course of the whole world. It will come. There will be days of heaven on earth. There will be days in which the power of God will be released. We are living in a new age. We are living in a time of release of power such as the world has never known. We are living in a staggering time. The world is moving at a rapid pace, but if a few people can just make this one little breakthrough in faith, you will be surprised what God will do in the earth, and in the realm of spirit.
Have I established with many Scriptures this one point: that the promises that are so great belong to you? There is no vagueness about it; it is very specific. Whatever you need, whatever things you desire are possible if you believe. Do you see that every provision of God’s grace is to whomsoever will believe it? Whosoever! The promises are not reserved for just a fraction of the church, but everyone. Do you see that the promises have a universal application? They are intended for you. Will you accept that? Has that truth been established in your heart and mind?
One more very basic point now—why these promises are unprofitable to so many, why they don’t work, why they don’t yield their power. If they are intended for us all, why don’t they work in all of us? To get the answer we will read Hebrews 3:12–4:11, but we want to note especially verses 2, 6, and 11. It will be lengthy reading, but it will be profitable to you in order to tell you the whole meaning of it.
Take heed brethren, lest haply there should be in any one of you an evil heart of unbelief, in falling away from the living God: but exhort one another day by day, so long as it is called Today; lest any one of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin: for we are become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our confidence firm unto the end: while it is said, Today if ye shall hear his voice, Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation. For who, when they heard, did provoke? Nay, did not all they that came out of Egypt by Moses? And with whom was he displeased forty years? was it not with them that sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that were disobedient? And we see that they were not able to enter in because of unbelief.
Read this carefully: Let us fear therefore, lest haply, a promise being left of entering into his rest, and one of you should seem to have come short of it. For indeed we have had good tidings preached unto us, even as also they: but the word of hearing did not profit them, because it was not united by faith with them that heard. For we who have believed do enter into that rest; even as he hath said, As I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world. And he hath said somewhere of the seventh day on this wise, And God rested on the seventh day from all his works; and in this place again, They shall not enter into my rest. Seeing therefore it remaineth that some should enter thereinto, and they to whom the good tidings were before preached failed to enter in because of disobedience. Hebrews 3:12–4:6.
There remaineth therefore a sabbath rest for the people of God. For he that hath entered into his rest hath himself also rested from his works, as God did from his. Let us therefore give diligence to enter into that rest, that no man fall after the same example of disobedience. Verses 9–11. Now I will explain this passage, for I have never before seen the deep revelation in it. This is one of the greatest mysteries of faith.
“The word of hearing did not profit them because it was not united by faith with them that heard.” God’s promises are powerful, but fulfillment of the promises requires three ingredients: there is your own spirit; there is living faith; there is the word. Faith unites the word with those who hear it. Faith is united with them that hear it. The word spoken could not profit them, not being united by faith with them that heard it. With faith that Word becomes a living, vital thing.
When the Word begins to live in you, because faith has made it a part of you, it yields its power and begins to be fulfilled. As long as you are only quoting it along, it is not good. But when faith reaches out and takes the spoken promise and unites it to your heart, and it becomes a living part of you, it is going to have its fulfillment because it is a living vital thing.
Your faith is like the wheat found in the old Egyptian tombs: buried for three thousand years or more, if it is taken out and planted, it grows. Some of those grains of wheat are six times as long as any wheat we have today. Scientists are trying to cultivate new strains of wheat—something that has been lost through the generations. Those ancient grains of wheat still have life in them. They are still able to grow. How do you explain the miracle of it? Is not the Word of the Lord like a seed that can be planted in your heart, and your faith takes the Word and begins to open up the power of the word to come forth in your life?
The Word was spoken to the Israelites in the Old Testament, but God swore in His wrath they would never walk in that promise. God’s promise hung like a cloud over them, but because of the unbelief in their hearts the Word was never united to them. The unbelief seemed to detract.
In electricity there are some things that repel and other things that attract. A cloud can be moving overhead but there has to be the right charge from below to literally reach up and pull lightning down. This shatters the clouds, and they yield their rain.
That is the way it is with us. In Zechariah 10:1 the Lord says, “Ask of the Lord rain in the time of the latter rain.” The King James Bible says, “The Lord will make bright clouds,” but the margin gives the old Hebrew word, “lightnings.” The Lord will make lightnings and bring rain, rain in the fields. But you ask of Him. It is your faith that reaches up. This is the day the promises hang like clouds over us: promises of tremendous things in the earth. God will bless you. God will do anything for you. He will meet you. Tremendous things can happen, but you ask the Lord rain in the time of the latter rain. You believe, and you literally pull. The Lord makes the lightning, He brings the faith that seems to shatter you. The cloud is broken, the heavens are opened, and the Lord brings the rain. Then the fruitfulness begins to come forth in your life.
Do you see that faith has never really been understood? People quote the promises of God, but they use them like tranquilizers to soothe themselves in the midst of their troubles. They should be used with faith to literally open up the power of God, to open up the doors of the kingdom to your life so that you can go in and have His blessing.
I am going to believe God. I have been set on a course of seeing the Lord open up things that have never been opened up before. I will not stand on the outside and preach about them, I will walk in them. In this walk, we are not going to linger year after year without having them. We will possess everything that is possible for God to give in this generation.
What is God going to do for us? “He is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think.” How? “According to the power that worketh in us” (Ephesians 3:20): faith reaching up and drawing. It is right there now. The word preached to the people of Israel did not profit them because it was not united with faith in them that heard it. It was faith that united the word to the hearts of some, and then it became a living thing. Many people can hear the word, but to some of them, it is nothing. It just rolls off and is never united to them. But with others the word comes, and faith reaches out as that essential ingredient. They believe the word, and it becomes a real, living part of their life.
Have I shown you why the promises of God are sometimes unprofitable to those who hear them? They have no profit in them at all. They might as well be watching a television program—they are hearing something they don’t intend to walk in. There is nothing in them that responds; a wall is up. They don’t intend to walk in it; there is no expectation; there is no anticipation; there is not even any hunger that could generate faith. What is there in their life? I don’t know; some desperate thing keeps them coming, but let’s shatter that passivity and see God put faith in people’s hearts. You would be surprised—you have enough faith, if you knew how to let that faith reach out and grasp the word and let it be incorporated into your heart.
The third thing I would tell you is how you can activate the promises of God if you have even a little faith. To me this is the great frontier where all things will be won in the kingdom of God. Are you disturbed by the fact that these promises are for you and you must have faith? We want to know exactly the procedure for getting these promises to work. We will see how our belief and our confession are the activators of the promises of God, and little by little this walk will change in its scope, and we will begin to walk in the blessings of the Lord.
In Romans 10, from the middle of verse 6 through verse 11 is a promise quoted from Deuteronomy, chapter 30. It can never be understood intelligently unless you understand the background of that promise as it was given back in the book of Deuteronomy. This is the meat, the heart of it, and you will come to a real appropriation of it. You can learn how to effectively apply these truths by two very simple rules and find your way out of a jungle and out of spiritual limitations into the fullness of the Lord. You can begin to walk in the things you have learned. It is that simple—so practical and so easy.
Say not in thy heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down:) or, Who shall descend into the abyss? (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead.) But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach (notice it is “the word of faith”): because if thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and shalt believe in thy heart that God raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved: for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be put to shame. Romans 10:6b–11.
This is quoted many times for a basic elementary salvation, but understand, it refers to everything in our walk with God. From the beginning, from the time we are saved, all the way through, because it is showing us a process of faith. Now we will look to the book of Deuteronomy from which this Scripture was quoted.
For this commandment which I command thee this day (Moses is speaking) it is not too hard for thee (notice: “the word that I command thee today is not too hard for thee”), neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it to us, and make us to hear it, that we may do it? Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it unto us, and make us to hear it, that we may do it? But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou mayest do it. See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil; in that I command thee this day to love the Lord thy God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his ordinances, that thou mayest live and multiply, and that the Lord thy God may bless thee in the land whither thou goest in to possess it. Deuteronomy 30:11–16.
In effect, what did Moses say to the children of Israel? He had given them some commandments and they said, “My, this is hard. How are we going to do it? How will we do it?” Moses said, “Here is the key, the way you will be able to do this, is under the law” (and they were not under grace, they were under the law).“You are not to say that these laws are too hard for you; you are going to love the Lord your God with all your heart and keep His word.”
“Oh, how can we do it? Who is going to bring this thing to us?”
“Listen, this Word is very nigh. I have given you the Word. It is in your mouth, it is in your heart. You speak it, and as you speak it the power of it will be released, and you will be able to do it.”
They were told to write the Word and put it on their wrists, on their foreheads, on their walls, and speak it to their children. They were to rehearse the words of the law. Joshua said to them, “Meditate upon the law day and night. It will make your way prosperous and you will have good success” (Joshua 1:8). The power of it was released as they meditated, as they spoke it, and as they confessed it. The power of it was right there as they believed it in their hearts, and confessed it with their mouths.
Speak the word! Speak it! Watch it open up! Watch it yield its power. Something very basic was brought out that Paul began to quote in Romans 10:6 “Say not in your heart, ‘Who is going to ascend into heaven to bring Christ down?’ ” In other words, you don’t need a personal visitation of the Lord Jesus Christ to fulfill any word He has spoken. You do not have to call Jesus on the scene in order to fulfill any promise quoted in this message. If someone is lying sick, do you say, “O dear Jesus, come on the scene and heal this person”? If you do that, you are speaking unbelief. The Lord has promised, “By His stripes ye were healed!” He has done it. He says, “YOU go and heal the sick! YOU lay hands on them and do it!”
“How am I going to do it?” You either believe His word or you don’t. Start believing it! Start confessing and ministering it, for that word is nigh you. It is in your mouth. It is in your heart. Start speaking; start believing; start confessing it, and the promises will start working because God has not done an incomplete thing. When the Lord Jesus Christ said, “it is finished,” He sat down at the right hand of the Father; everything was accomplished. There is nothing more to be done. Any one of these promises has enough power in itself. You speak them. You confess them.
“Who is going to go up into heaven to bring Christ down, to make His word real to us, to make His word have a fulfillment?” You won’t bring Him down to do that. He is right here in the midst. He is in His Word. His words are Spirit. They are life. You believe them. You speak them. You confess them. You don’t have to bring Christ on the scene any more than He is; there is nothing more He has to do. “O Lord, please come down and deliver these people!” He has already done everything to deliver them. We have to believe and apply that, and speak it and confess it. “Oh,” you say, “this sounds revolutionary!” Yes it is, and it will really work.
Who is going to send down into the abyss to bring Christ up as though there had to be another visitation, another suffering, another entering into the bowels of hell in order to rebuke Satan and make His word live? He arose from the dead! He has the keys of death and hell! Nothing more has to be done except that you believe it with all your heart. You believe in your heart and confess with your mouth, and it is done! It starts working!
You say, “Is it that simple?” That is the drawback; we have never done it that simply. We have never approached to that simple, childlike faith and said, “Yes Lord: thank You; it Is done, and I constantly speak it.” Oh, faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Day by day and hour by hour we confess this. We rejoice in it and we believe in it. But I’ll wager that your life has an experience like mine. You have pumped up faith to believe at times, but you have refused to walk in the constant confession and constant expectancy that keeps rehearsing the promises of God. Just watch this faith released and watch that word released.
It is not enough to get the seed to germinate if you come out with a vicious hoe of unbelief and hoe it down. People come to church, service after service, and have the word planted and watered, and it starts to grow. Before they get out, they be to talk unbelief. They begin to talk bitterness. They begin to talk fear. They talk everything else that is negative and chop the word down before it ever gets a chance to grow. Unbelief is a pretty sharp hoe, and it will hoe out that good planting every time. What you need to do is to plant the word and water it with the constant confession of faith. Your faith will unite the word to you, and it will grow in your heart. Don’t cut it down. Watch God begin to bless you day by day; watch your faith begin to grow.
Two very simple rules will help you with your first project as you start to believe. Here is the secret and the key to some desire you want to work on—some real burden. First, be definite and descriptive. Second, be consistent and cheerful.
To explain the first, about being definite and descriptive: you miss a great deal on faith by being so vague; you have to be definite and descriptive about what you want. “Whatsoever” doesn’t leave any room for vagueness. There is an interesting story about a man who was supposed to be a little bit off because he took people literally. Someone shaking hands with him might say, “Why don’t you come over to the house sometime?” “Oh,” he would say, “When did you have in mind?” Or someone would come up to him and ask, “Is there anything I can do for you?” He would answer, “What would you like to do?” Anytime anyone gave a vague invitation, he pinned it down. They tried to put him in an institution for that because people think it is quite normal to be indefinite and vague.
“O Lord, bless me.” And the Lord looks down and asks, “What did you have in mind?” “Lord, I have a great need.” “Just what are you aware of that you need?”
So you see, be definite and descriptive. I think that you could use imagination in this. Be definite and imaginative. Sit down and begin to think about what you need, and then imagine what it would be like to have it. Do you ever daydream? Put your old thinker to work. Imagination was never given for unholy purposes; it was given to be a divine thing. “Your old men are to dream dreams, your young men are to see visions” (Joel 2:28). And, as one brother expressed it, “The beginning of prophecy is a little bit of sanctified imagination.” I believe that’s right. At first you begin to imagine; you think about a thing; you imagine it in your heart. You think what it would be like to have that deliverance, to have that blessing. You begin to dream about it; that dream is important. And as your imagination is working, be definite, very definite.
What is the second thing you should do? When you have thought about it until you really desire it, the second step is to be consistent and cheerful. Unbelief is very spasmodic in its manifestation, so your faith must be very consistent. A man can have much faith for ninety-nine days in a row, and then that hundredth day something pushes him, he wavers. He says, “I don’t believe it was ever going to happen anyway.” Five minutes later he is sorry. “Lord, I am sorry; I apologize.” What has he done? He has taken a shotgun and shot his faith full of holes in five minutes.
Faith has to be consistent because it is the confession of your mouth that is activating something. You are believing in your heart. You are confessing with your mouth. You go along for days with a pure stream of faith coming from your mouth. Then you speak one word of unbelief and you kill it, and you wonder why you don’t get an answer. “Well, I was praying so much and trying so hard.”
This is so important: be consistent, consistent and cheerful! Why do I say be cheerful? Because the control of all your emotions is in your own will. It is your choice to be happy or unhappy. You make up your mind to rejoice and be happy; you make up your mind that you will be cheerful and not grumble. There isn’t anything more deadly to faith than to be a grumbler, to be despondent, to be a murmurer.
Go over these rules again. First, be definite and descriptive in what you are believing for. Second, be consistent and cheerful.
You are going to stay with it and you are going to believe. Not a day is going to go by but what you are rejoicing in the Lord and you are cheerful. You are rejoicing in the Lord. You are consistent, making one confession, “I’ve believed the true report. I believe the promises of God.” You are definite in what you are claiming in God because the Spirit of the Lord has borne witness to it; it is yours and you are hanging on to it. I know you may have had witness after witness in the Holy Spirit of something that belongs to you, yet still you waver. You don’t dare to do that. Be consistent. Be definite. Visualize it in your mind and heart, and live with that constant expectancy. You have the golden secret.
Can you apply these two basic rules? Can you repeat them in your mind? Be definite and descriptive. Be consistent and cheerful. Remember this: be definite and descriptive; be consistent and cheerful.
Nothing is going to come from your mind, or your mouth that is not an absolute verification of God’s word. You are not going to speak God’s word one day and then counteract it the next day. Just a little bit of unbelief coming from your mouth, once it is spoken, is activated and just as powerful in the realm of the spirit as spoken faith is activated in the spirit. Do you believe that?
If you believe that life is in the power of the tongue, you must also believe the rest of the Scripture, “Death is in the power of the tongue” (Proverbs 18:21). If you believe and confess, you are going to keep faith alive; if you believe and murmur and express unbelief with your mouth, you are going to kill it. You must be consistent, because you could believe ninety-nine days in a row and speak one day in five minutes, words of unbelief that would be powerful enough to be like a living hell and give Satan a foothold to counteract everything that God has said.
But God is a God of faith, and He will listen and respond to people who believe Him. His words are filled with power. His words are filled with His own Spirit. Let those words be united by faith with your heart. Believe them. Confess them. Watch them work. Become aware of the Lord, aware of what He has for you.
Do you know where you are going to apply this? Are you going to start on it? Remember exactly what you have read, and then get down and pray and begin to claim the promises of God. Quote them from your heart. You are believing them; with your mouth you are confessing them. Set yourself on a consistent course day by day that confession and rejoicing in the Lord are going to come forth, and you are going to visualize the answer. It won’t be long before great things will happen in your life.
This message so simple in structure and yet so basic, so real in its power, that it can be the key for unlocking many things that you have wanted for years.