04.29.10 – unwillingness to receive

I was AMAZED last week when I went out with James Dickey into downtown Jamestown how RECEPTIVE people were to receiving prayer. In about an hour we must have prayed for about 20-25 people with only 4 people saying no.

Today we went out again and got turned down a lot more but we did get to pray for about 10-15 people. It’s amazing the responses we get when people say yes, people are blown away and honest with you about what they’re going through. We had one guy come right out and tell us about his drug addiction and how he wanted to quit, we had another guy just tell us that he was trying to hold a job down because he had 5 kids at home.

The interesting thing though is the excuses that we get when people say they don’t want prayer. Things like… “nah, I’m alright my mom’s Catholic.” Or when you walk up to someone with an obvious infirmity and they say they are fine.

Last week we walked up to a guy sitting in a motorized wheel chair and an oxygen tank. When we asked if we could pray for his healing he told us that he didn’t need prayer and was okay.

So do we walk around with less than God desires for us simply because we believe thats what we deserve?

Last time I checked John 10:10 says that Jesus came to give us life to the fullest and it was the devil that kills, steals and destroys.

Let’s stop living in LESS than what God has for us. Fullness of life. Jesus came with GRACE to FREE us from the power of sin and death. That means that sickness isn’t part of what God desires for your life. It’s NOT HIS WILL!!

God thinks we are so valuable that He sent His one and only son to come and die for us so that we could be in relationship with Him.

I don’t see many people wasting the lives of their sons on something they think is worthless.

If God thinks we’re that valuable… then maybe our view of ourselves should change.

John 15:9 – “As the Father has loved me, so I love you…“

JIM baker