Joseph Herrin (03-17-09)
This post continues the correspondence between myself and Brad Daugherty. I sent to Him the following writing that he might test carefully the matters being discussed, and that we might sharpen one another as we both earnestly desire to comprehend accurately the things of God.
The Power of God to Accomplish His Will
Joseph B. Herrin (7-28-03)
Just this morning the Spirit of Yahweh has revealed to me that a pattern is being worked out among His overcomers and called out ones that will lead to great power being released. This power will be displayed in the form of healing being performed, miracles being manifested, and tremendous signs and wonders occurring. These things are absolutely necessary in order for the purposes of God to be accomplished.
Many in the church, perhaps most, have come to the conclusion that the power of God is not really necessary. They are content to preach their messages and conduct their programs and make some mediocre impact upon the world around them. Yahweh, however, has much more planned in soon coming days, and nothing short of the manifested power of God will suffice. He is seeking to raise up a people who will be to the praise of His glory, a people strong and mighty who will do exploits in the earth. He is seeking to have a people who will be renowned for their faith and love and holiness. Such a people will not be raised up by the effort of man, not even sincere men who love the Lord.
The vast majority of the church are blinded to their impotence today. They have not observed the lack of power present in the lives of the saints and in the ministries in which they are engaged. Satan is rampaging freely through the church, leaving death and destruction in his wake, having conquered the saints with false doctrines, deceptions, moral failure and a growing conformity to a darkened world. The tide of these things will not be reversed without power, and right now power is absent from the body of Christ.
Are you crying out for the Spirit to endue you with power? Do you even know that asking that your life and ministry might be attended with signs and wonders is both Biblical and necessary, and the reason that it is so lacking is that the saints have become content to not have it? “You have not, because you ask not.” When was the last time you asked for power when you prayed to God, or when have you heard others asking for it? Yet it is absolutely necessary if a body of overcomers is to accomplish those things the Father wills to be done in this hour.
I want to show that the manifested power of God has always been necessary to accomplish His purposes. I think that some have developed a mindset where they have come to despise such power, thinking that true faith does not require signs and wonders. Such a mindset was foreign to Christ and the early church. The manifested power of God was given to bear witness to the truth and to testify to the people that the messenger and the message had their origin in Yahweh.
The early church was marked by a profusion of power, and they depended upon this power to advance the gospel of Jesus Christ, Yahshua the Messiah. The early church expanded greatly and made an impact largely due to the power in which she walked. Consider the following descriptions of Christ.
Luke 4:14
And Yahshua returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about Him spread through all the surrounding district.
Luke 4:36
And amazement came upon them all, and they began talking with one another saying, "What is this message? For with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits and they come out."
Luke 5:17
One day He was teaching; and there were some Pharisees and teachers of the law sitting there, who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and from Jerusalem; and the power of the Lord was present for Him to perform healing.
Luke 6:19
And all the people were trying to touch Him, for power was coming from Him and healing them all.
Yahshua understood that this power was necessary to accomplish the task assigned to Him. He walked in great power, and He gave this same power to His disciples, for they too needed it to advance the Kingdom of God.
Luke 9:1-2
And He called the twelve together, and gave them power and authority over all the demons and to heal diseases. And He sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to perform healing.
This power continued after Pentecost as the Spirit rested in power upon the apostles and other saints. Yahshua commanded the church to not try to do the works of the Father apart from this power. He instructed them with great earnestness to wait for the endowment of power to come upon them. They were not to attempt to do the works of God in the strength of the flesh. They were to receive heavenly power.
Luke 24:49
"And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high."
Acts 1:7-8
He said to them, "It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority; but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth."
Only AFTER the power of the Holy Spirit had come upon them would the disciples of Christ be able to go forth as His witnesses to the world. What a tragedy has occurred that the church in these last days has become content with a powerless existence! The early church knew great growth and advancement because she had great power, and this is seen throughout the New Testament. The book of Acts is a book of power.
We would be wrong to think that because the Spirit is present among the saints today that the power of the Spirit is therefore present. The power is rarely seen today, and the apostle Paul declared that in the last days men would have a form of godliness while denying the power thereof. The saints of Laodicea may have truly been born of the Spirit, but they did not know the power of God in their midst. They falsely assumed that material possessions and great blessing and ease were a sign of their godliness, and they did not consider how poor and blind and naked they truly were. They were overcome by the world, rather than overcoming it. They were overcome by immorality and a pursuit of mammon, and truly the church of this hour bears the same marks.
Even as a church can deny that the gift of tongues is for the saints today, or the gift of prophecy, or the word of knowledge, they can also deny the power that is available from the Spirit. In their denial they will not see manifested that which they have despised. The early church relied upon expressions of God’s power to see the gospel spread and the Kingdom of God increased.
Acts 3:1-8
Now Peter and John were going up to the temple at the ninth hour, the hour of prayer. And a man who had been lame from his mother's womb was being carried along, whom they used to set down every day at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, in order to beg alms of those who were entering the temple. When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he began asking to receive alms. But Peter, along with John, fixed his gaze on him and said, "Look at us!" And he began to give them his attention, expecting to receive something from them. But Peter said, "I do not possess silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you: In the name of Yahshua Messiah the Nazarene -- walk!" And seizing him by the right hand, he raised him up; and immediately his feet and his ankles were strengthened. With a leap he stood upright and began to walk; and he entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God.
Peter said that he did not have silver nor gold, but he was willing to give from what he did possess. What was it that he and John had that this lame man needed? They had received POWER from the Holy Ghost. The Jewish leaders recognized that Peter and John had power, and they questioned them about it.
Acts 4:1-7
As they were speaking to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple guard and the Sadducees came up to them, being greatly disturbed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Yahshua the resurrection from the dead. And they laid hands on them and put them in jail until the next day, for it was already evening. But many of those who had heard the message believed; and the number of the men came to be about five thousand. On the next day, their rulers and elders and scribes were gathered together in Jerusalem; and Annas the high priest was there, and Caiaphas and John and Alexander, and all who were of high-priestly descent. When they had placed them in the center, they began to inquire, "By what power, or in what name, have you done this?"
By this one demonstration of power five thousand men were added to the church. The Jewish leaders wanted to know where this power had come from. The Jewish leaders were not winning five thousand converts a day. They were jealous of these men who were seeing such great effect to their ministry. They coveted such power, but it was not for sale.
The Jewish leaders threatened Peter and John to no longer preach in the name of Yahshua the Messiah, and, in response to the threats of these men, the saints prayed that God would give them even more power and even greater boldness to walk as witnesses of Christ.
Acts 4:29-31
"And now, Lord, take note of their threats, and grant that Your bond-servants may speak Your word with all confidence, while You extend Your hand to heal, and signs and wonders take place through the name of Your holy servant Yahshua." And when they had prayed, the place where they had gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God with boldness.
Notice that the saints did not merely ask God to give them boldness to preach the gospel. They asked that Yahweh would extend His hand to heal and to grant signs and wonders to take place. Why do we not ask for the same today? Do we need such attesting signs any less than these early saints? Some might argue that we have the complete Bible today, which the early church did not have. Yet there are many religions and cults today that have their own religious writings that they claim are divinely inspired. Do we have any less of a need for Yahweh to attest by signs and wonders that His book is the authentic book today, even as the saints of old needed God to attest to the fact that they were God’s messengers bearing His message?
How badly we need to begin praying that God would grant that power would be given to heal and that signs and wonders might take place at the hands of His servants today. We need to have spoken of us what was spoken of the early church:
Acts 4:33
And with great power the apostles were giving testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Yahshua, and abundant grace was upon them all.
We live in an age of hardened people and the church itself has become hardened against the will and mind of Christ. How futile it is for ministers today to speak truth to such a skeptical and wayward body of believers. True ministers everywhere need to cry out for a return of power to their ministries. How unusual would today’s ministries appear to the apostles of old as they observed the lack of power. The apostles of old would surely get down on their knees and pray for the power of the Holy Spirit to be granted to today’s ministers before they would encourage them to lift a finger to perform the will of God. Paul spoke of this power that was present in his own ministry.
I Corinthians 2:4-5
And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.
Ministers today have a need for people to witness the power of God that their faith should also rest upon a firm foundation. Paul also relied upon this witness of power to silence those who were detractors of his calling and ministry. He used it to prove who were true an false ministers.
I Corinthians 4:19-20
But I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I shall find out, not the words of those who are arrogant but their power. For the kingdom of God does not consist in words but in power.
Paul relied upon this power everywhere. He did not want the faith of those he preached unto to rest merely upon his words, but upon the attesting signs and wonders that God granted to accompany his preaching. Even Yahshua spoke to the people and told them that if they would not believe Him because of who He was, then at least they should believe due to the wonders He had worked among them. Yahshua testified that because He had done so many wonders among them and they did not believe that their guilt was upon them.
John 15:24
"If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well.”
So hardened was the generation that Christ came unto that even though He raised the dead and healed many and cast out demons and performed many signs and wonders they would not believe.
John 12:37
But though He had performed so many signs before them, yet they were not believing in Him.
If Yahshua performed so many works of power in the sight of the people, and He granted this same power to His disciples, and they too relied upon it in order to be His witnesses, then how can we possibly be His witnesses without this same power today? God used signs and wonders to attest to the authenticity of His messengers. He did not send His Son, and later the disciples, to proclaim a message that originated with Him and not give some sign that the message was truly from Him. The signs and wonders were Yahweh’s stamp that these messengers were from Him.
Acts 2:22
"Men of Israel, listen to these words: Yahshua the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know...”
The world we live in is filled with false prophets and false religions and cults. People are besieged with many, many voices all claiming to be speaking truth. Many are professing to be messengers of God. The servants of Yahweh just as surely need their words attested to as having their origin in the One true God as in any day since the time of Christ. Even among the church there is a mass of false doctrines that are being proclaimed, and those ministers that the Father would send forth to restore the church to a foundation of truth are faced with great opposition and many who speak arrogantly against them. Where words fail, power will prevail.
We err greatly by relying upon our feeble strength to accomplish the works of God. The apostle Paul confessed that his own appearance and speech was not impressive, but the deeds that he performed were a manifestation of the power of God.
II Corinthians 10:10-11
For they say, "His letters are weighty and strong, but his personal presence is unimpressive and his speech contemptible." Let such a person consider this, that what we are in word by letters when absent, such persons we are also in deed when present.
II Corinthians 12:11-12
Actually I should have been commended by you, for in no respect was I inferior to the most eminent apostles, even though I am a nobody. The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance, by signs and wonders and miracles.
It was not merely apostles that were granted manifestations of the power of God. On Pentecost there were 120 saints gathered in the upper room, and of this number 108 were NOT apostles. Yet the Spirit came with power upon all of them and they all began to speak in other tongues which was a sign to the people in Jerusalem. In the book of Acts we read of saints who were not apostles that performed great signs and wonders.
Acts 6:8
And Stephen, full of grace and power, was performing great wonders and signs among the people.
We should also note that the apostles’ prayer for God to grant signs and wonders through the saints was a request for all those gathered, and God moved upon all of them.
Acts 4:29-31
"And now, Lord, take note of their threats, and grant that Your bond-servants may speak Your word with all confidence, while You extend Your hand to heal, and signs and wonders take place through the name of Your holy servant Yahshua." And when they had prayed, the place where they had gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God with boldness.
The New Testament is a witness of the power of God being displayed through weak vessels. The power of God is despised and rejected today. To be despised means that something is given no attention, and the saints have given little attention to their need for the power of God to be manifested in their lives. Yet if we are to be witnesses of Christ today, then we just as surely need the power of God as did the saints of the early church. Yahshua revealed the pattern:
Acts 1:8
You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth.
Being a witness of God is preceded by receiving power. When Yahweh assigns man a task He also provides the power. He does NOT want His servants to attempt to fulfill the tasks appointed to them in their own strength. Moses was a man whose life clearly demonstrates this principle. At the age of forty Moses went out to see his fellow Hebrews, and we are told:
Acts 7:23-26
Now when he was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brethren, the children of Israel. And seeing one of them suffer wrong, he defended and avenged him who was oppressed, and struck down the Egyptian. For he supposed that his brethren would have understood that God would deliver them by his hand, but they did not understand.
At the age of forty Moses already knew that God had appointed him to the task of delivering his brethren from the hand of the Egyptians. Yet Moses thought that this work could be accomplished through his own strength. This Moses had many strengths. He was a powerful man in many ways, as is recorded in Scripture.
Acts 7:22
And Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and deeds.
What a temptation it is for ministers today to observe their own abilities and, knowing that God has a call on their life, to believe they might be able to accomplish this call in their own strength. Like Moses they go forth to deliver the people, but no deliverance comes. It required forty more years on the backside of the wilderness for Moses to reach the place of humility where he would never again seek to perform the work of God through his own strength. So broken was Moses that when God called him at the burning bush Moses declared that God had chosen the wrong man for he could not even speak. No longer was he “mighty in words and deeds,” for now he had been broken and placed no confidence in his flesh.
Yahweh has been taking many of His children through wilderness places of their own that they might be emptied of all confidence in the flesh. Many had a small and fleeting taste of entering into their calling, but what looked promising was suddenly cut off, even as was the career of Moses when at the age of forty he set out to deliver his brethren. Many know that God has called them to a task, but in the wilderness they have become so aware of the weakness of their own flesh that they have begun to doubt the vision. Their eyes have seen their own impotence and inability to accomplish a single thing for the Kingdom of God.
This place of awakening to our absolute weakness is right where God must bring us in order that He might bestow upon us His power. He will allow no flesh to glory in His presence, and He will have none of His servants taking credit for accomplishing anything of value through the power of their flesh.
After Yahweh called Moses at the burning bush, Moses proceeded to go to Egypt, and a very important event occurred.
Exodus 4:24-26
Now it came about at the lodging place on the way that Yahweh met him and sought to put him to death. Then Zipporah took a flint and cut off her son's foreskin and threw it at Moses' feet, and she said, "You are indeed a bridegroom of blood to me." So He let him alone.
Circumcision is a symbolic removal of the flesh, and it speaks of a man not attempting to do the works of God through the power of the flesh. Moses had failed to circumcise the flesh of his sons, and God could not allow Moses to proceed to accomplish this great work until the flesh had been removed. There could be no mixture of the works of the flesh and the Spirit. All had to be done in the power of God that Yahweh might be glorified.
As God prepares a people to walk in great power in this day He must also do a thorough work of cutting away the flesh. There can be no confidence in the flesh, and no reliance upon the strength of man. Perhaps you know that God has called you to some great work, a work of deliverance, or a work to lead a people into their inheritance in Christ. He cannot accomplish this work through you until He has dealt thoroughly with your flesh, for the work must be one that is performed in His power, and He must receive all the glory.
Consider now that Yahweh did send Moses to bring the children of Israel out of their bondage in Egypt. Yahweh has also called His elect and overcomers to many differing tasks in His kingdom. When Yahweh sent Moses, He revealed His power through Moses. It was not Moses who delivered Israel, it was God. None could deny this, for all were witnesses of the signs and wonders and mighty miracles that God performed through this man. It was the power of God that brought Israel out, and it will be the power of God that accomplishes any good work in this day.
After the deliverance was accomplished, all who heard of it knew who had done it. After coming out of Egypt, Moses met his father-in-law Jethro and recounted to him all that God had done. Jethro’s response reveals that the glory went where it should.
Exodus 18:10-11
So Jethro said, "Blessed be Yahweh who delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the hand of Pharaoh, and who delivered the people from under the hand of the Egyptians. Now I know that Yahweh is greater than all the gods...”
The pattern seen in Moses is being revealed in many of God’s servants today. Many have been aware of their calling for some time, and some have attempted to enter into this calling in the power of their own flesh. What was begun was suddenly aborted, and then a wilderness period ensued where Yahweh has been working to break down all confidence in the flesh as He prepares vessels to receive His power. Many have begun to hear the call anew, only to experience a further flesh cutting. The power of God is coming, and the power is absolutely necessary. Let none think that the purposes of God will be accomplished apart from His divine power.
Many sons will soon be walking in unprecedented Kingdom power and authority. These will not glory in their flesh, but they will give all glory to God as He extends His hand to heal and to grant that signs, wonders and miracles be performed. Do not think that such power is unnecessary in this hour. Do not think that we have grown too sophisticated for such things, or have graduated to a level of faith and spirituality where this power is now optional. It is needed, for the flesh is powerless to bring forth the Kingdom.
Prayer:
Father,
Grant that Your bond-servants may speak Your word with all confidence, while You extend Your hand to heal, and signs and wonders take place through the name of Your holy servant Yahshua.
Amen
Heart4God Website: http://www.heart4god.ws
Parables Blog: http://www.parablesblog.blogspot.com
Mailing Address:
Joseph Herrin
P.O. Box 804
Montezuma, GA 31063
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