By Their Fruits

For a good tree bringeth not forth corrupt fruit; neither doth a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. For every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes. A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh. And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say? Luke 6:43-46

Jesus Christ never minced words. When he called Herod a fox, he meant every word of it. When he called the Pharisees, Sadducees and scribes, “hypocrites,” he didn’t back up and say, “Oops, I didn’t mean that…let me find something more polite to label you!” Truth is truly never politically correct. He always said things exactly how he meant them.

My former pastor was notorious for similar statements, especially, “If He can’t say NO, you can’t say Lord!” In this case it is very fitting. He was very shoot-from-the-hip and blunt. We love him for it still to this day.

I’ve spent the evening in church last night and talking to a friend of mine who has more insight into people that is even believable at times. Things I endured in my life the past 8 years came slamming back this morning. Things talked about, conversations, body language that people used in the past, their actions, all of them started clicking together like pieces in a puzzle.

My friend thinks that Apostolic preachers are “empaths” because they are so in-tune with things around them, be it people or the Holy Ghost. She’s yet to admit that God could ever talk to a preacher, let alone a man or woman, we’re working on her. She does however believe in angelic and demonic activity!

So often I’ve forgotten things in God’s word that could have made my life a whole lot easier. Recent dealings with someone that I opened my heart to and fell in love with ended disastrously when they began to lie to me repeatedly. She said she wanted “spiritual guidance,” but Stone’s first law of spiritual leadership is “I can’t lead where you don’t follow.” I told her this repeatedly. She asked me to attend a denominational church with her that even if I’d been totally backslid would not have fed me spiritually. After 2-3 services that wasn’t working for me. She complained that I wasn’t going with her and I told her that I had a church she should attend. Four services later she had been baptized in Jesus name and filled with the Holy Ghost…unfortunately, at that point all growth stopped.

I don’t know how it is for you, I’m patient with new converts, but there comes a time with me when people do things that even non-Christians would do I begin to questions their actions, their honesty and their intentions. I’m not a judgmental person. I believe in working with everyone and meeting them at the point of their needs, hurts or trouble. Being honest with myself though, some people simply do not want help or see that they have a problem. It was the case with this young woman.

She projected the image of having it all together when we first met, even telling me that she was the kind of woman that I needed, educated, successful, stable, everything she said my ex-wives were not. However, after a few emotionally charged incidents, things changed almost like flipping a light switch and I realized I was dealing with something I had often dealt with in the past...An identical something.

She began to lie to me, first about small things. First she would tell me I said something or did something I did not do. Always an agreeable person, I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt since we’d only been seeing each other and hanging out a few months. It wouldn’t be the first time I had ever told someone something then realized that the person I had told had been a previous date, or friend from church. This however quickly spiraled into something far more drastic. Soon everything I said was supposed to be “being critical” of her. I was supposed to always be “changing my story” when we would discuss past issues. These issues quickly became present issues, because no matter how often we tried to “talk things out,” she would never drop them and no amount of apologizing ever ended the matter. The next time we talked, she would bring them up again, and again, and again.

I started making it a point never to talk about previous relationships yet almost every time she would bring something up to channel the conversation back into that vein, or what I found she would deliberately misquote something said, simply to get me to correct them…then quickly tell me I was interrupting her. At one point she told me she was suicidal and wanted to kill herself. I immediately told her I wasn’t letting her out of my site and she agreed to stay with me.

She went to the barbershop and store with me that evening and she did not take off on her own, but she stared off into space like a zombie the entire time and then threw up in a bag in the car on Quantico…and I began to realize a little of what I was dealing with. Then when she went to work she vanished. A call to her command pretty much left me wondering when they did not forward the word of her threat up the command chain. Two days later she was back, telling me the person who took my call “knew her very well and knew she’d never do that,” so they didn’t notify the command. Those of you who have had military or government training in suicide awareness and training, know that this is a big no-no! You always forward suicidal threats up the chain of command.

She moved to a new apartment and first she lied to me and told me she was with an old roommate and it wasn’t costing her anything. A week later she forgot what she told me and said she was paying $2000 a month for an efficiency apartment…basically a hotel room. Other little lies followed, and being a former Marine NCO, I have great attention to detail when people talk to me. Then she lied to me about one of her friends, claiming she had never dated him. I knew it was a lie, and her friends quietly told me that she would go nuclear on them if she found out they told me...but yes they knew the guy that she claimed was just an old roommate, and they had dated. Then she later told me we weren't going to Missouri and Colorado together to meet each other's families and when I asked she  said she was traveling alone. Another lie. At this point, I figured God doesn't reveal anything unless he plans to deal with it.

None of this was what I expected of a new convert who has just received the Holy Ghost, and although I know God doesn’t make us robots when we come to him, I’m pretty sure we all have a conscience. The thing about it is when I confronted her about the lies, she got angry and said she couldn’t believe I would call her a liar! No apology. No remorse. No repentance…nothing, but anger that I would even accuse her of something so obvious. I spoke to my parents about it and they told me to watch her eyes and body language, knowing I had been married to a woman in Florida who was mentally and emotionally ill. I didn’t realize back then just how ill until after I got out of the situation and met a friend of mine who worked as a therapist with mentally ill patients.

Over dinner one Sunday afternoon (long dinner…I think we were there for 6 hours) we talked and Karin wanted to know all about my past. She tells me she never really turns off, she’s always diagnosing people. I told her everything that I had been through and pretty much left out no major details and when I finished she told me, “Les, they were borderlines. Every single relationship you have been in has been with a borderline.” She told me she was diagnosing me the entire time we ate dinner and talked and it was actually interesting. I learned a lot about myself and my exs!

I had no idea what she meant by “borderline” then, but since then I have learned a lot. That was nearly a year ago. At that time she told me she wanted to know what about these kinds of women attracted me or what it was about me that attracted them. Finally she told me that female borderlines (borderline personality disorder) are attracted to strong male role models, successful, mature, protective, loving, affectionate…a daddy figure. They keep weak, spineless men around as their close friends, because they can manipulate them easily, but they want a strong daddy figure in their life too...as long as they don't get too close.

I figured her male friend who was drummed out of the Navy for being overweight and unable to hack it in even Navy PT, and unable to get or keep a job while he mooched off of her for the few years they were roommates...probably fit the weak-minded male roll Karin told me about that BPs tend to keep around them...and she told me that because I was too much of a Marine and wasn't willing to be manipulated she had bitten off more than she could chew and was running before her house of cards tumbled down...now that I had talked to several of her friends and family members about the BPD disorder. All her projections of a "perfect" life she tried to project to others was tumbling down around her. She told me the panic she was experiencing was normal when I told her about her calling and making the accusation about her mail being rerouted.


Karin likened a Borderline's closest friends to week-minded drones, basically people without two brain-cells to rub together, or easily influenced. They like to portray their selves as powerful people, but it's all just a facade. They desire power, but never really obtain it. It's just smoke and mirrors, thus the reason for them bailing the first time a BP get's near someone who knows what they really are. Karin told me that they won't get help or seek help from man or from God...unless something traumatic happens to them and they suffer a great loss. Whether an injury, losing a family member they've known for a long time, or a nervous breakdown, something has to force them to get help. They will not seek it of their own accord while they can still try to maintain their smoke and mirror projection of being in total control of their lives. That's sad.

BPs, like Sharon, have a "God complex" that makes them have to be in control of everything...and Sharon had already admitted to me that she had anger issues and was rebellious and had to always be in control of her situations. They perceive admitting they have a problem or seeking help, or even asking God to heal them as a weakness. Sadly, that's the only way they can be healed. I think that if they could focus their drive for control at throwing their need at the feet of Christ he would heal them instantaneously.

Karin told me that borderlines (75% are female) were traumatized in their childhood, usually between 3-9 years old, by sexual or physical abuse or abandonment. Something in them shuts off and they turn off their emotions. Unlike an adult who endures a traumatic experience, our emotions are mature and we learn to only close out people who are strangers or have harmed us, not those we love. We don’t blame others for something someone else did to us. Borderlines can’t do that. Once turned off as a child, their emotions never grow beyond the age they were at when they were traumatized. I’d been told this same thing by Norris, a counselor in Florida I talked to about my ex-wife. Molested at 9 and physically, emotionally and mentally abused, she had snapped and even as an adult she could not control her rages, often physically assaulting her kids, my kids, and me.

With the current girlfriend, I asked Karin about the lying and she told me they can’t help their selves. “Borderlines do that, Les. That’s all they know.” I can’t even give an exhaustive list of all the behaviors I’ve witnessed, but constant false accusations, mind games, lies, manipulations, belittling, ignoring other people’s feelings, are all tools of the trade for borderlines. Lies are the least of their deck of cards.

BPD splitting is one of their main characteristics of borderlines. It’s a switch between idealizing and demonizing others. In other words they either hate or love you, and can’t seem to accept anything in between as “normal.” It’s the whole “I hate you, don’t leave me,” reaction. That combined with mood swings tend to undermine relationships with friends, family and co-workers. Untreated, the symptoms worsen. Below are other listed symptoms from psychcentral.com. They want to rename the disorder to Emotionally unstable personality disorder. Either way, the results are the same. Parents (of both sexes) were typically reported to have withdrawn from the child emotionally, and to have treated the child inconsistently. Sad, I know.

• Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment
• A pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by alternating between extremes of idealization and devaluation
• Identity disturbance, such as a significant and persistent unstable self-image or sense of self
• Impulsivity in at least two areas that are potentially self-damaging (e.g., spending, sex, substance abuse, reckless driving, binge eating)
• Recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, or threats, or self-mutilating behavior
• Emotional instability due to significant reactivity of mood (e.g., intense episodic dysphoria, irritability, or anxiety usually lasting a few hours and only rarely more than a few days)
• Chronic feelings of emptiness
• Inappropriate, intense anger or difficulty controlling anger (e.g., frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights)
• Transient, stress-related paranoid thoughts or severe dissociative symptoms  from http://psychcentral.com/lib/2007/symptoms-of-borderline-personality-disorder/

I mentioned in a previous blog of being called yesterday and being accused of rerouting her mail from another state back to Virginia. I was taken completely aback by the ludicrous allegations until I realized she actually meant it!

I’m generally sensitive to people’s needs, but having been married before to a borderline, I know they have no remorse whatsoever. Like King Saul, they can turn on the tears one minute and try to pin you to the wall with a javelin the next. There is no consideration to the consequences of their actions. They do not care who they hurt. Emotionally they are so detached that you can sit and tell them that what they are doing is hurting you and they will give not a single acknowledgement to what you said or what they are doing…then walk away and continue doing it!  I’m shocked to my core when I see a person professing Christianity blatantly do things that violate God’s word with impunity but if you look into the Word of God you see why.

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness; Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: Romans 1:18-20

And when you see how they do not want to even consider that their actions are against the scriptures, you see why they are the way they are.

And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful: Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them. Romans 1:280-32

This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away. For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts, Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith. But they shall proceed no further: for their folly shall be manifest unto all men, as theirs also was. 2 Timothy 3:1-9

Without natural affection…that flabbergasts me. When I look and see that Paul in the word of God almost 2000 years ago knew that the world in the last days was going to be a royal mess, it blows my mind. The word of God is so transparent. Having dealt with 4-5 borderlines in my life I still find the drama and lack of emotions among them totally amazing. I remember how empty sounding the threats were now, the suicidal statements sounded hollow. It wasn’t until I talked to Karin that I realized that generally they weren’t suicidal…although without treatment they can end up that way.

I’d spent weeks reading relationship books like, Love and Respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs, Bringing Out The Best In Your Wife, by H. Norman Wright, and The Five Love Languages, by Dr. Gary Chapman. In addition to my daily Bible reading, I’ve been a very busy man trying to “learn what I wasn’t doing right” in my communication with women…until Karin told me bluntly, “Les, you aren’t the problem. You communicate fine.”

I felt like I wasted months, even years of my life, right then. I’d wasted my time trying to communicate with someone who doesn’t want to communicate beyond a superficial level…because communication builds knowledge and knowledge is power…and borderlines will never allow you any power. To know them is to know that they have problems, and that to them is the chance to destroy them or hurt them. They will not leave their self vulnerable and that’s what love does! They won’t allow it. For almost 5 months I beat my head against that wall. They won’t let anyone know they aren’t perfect and topple their long maintained house of cards. To them emotions mean pain and they can’t and won’t allow their selves that vulnerability.

In this case, no matter how beautiful, gentle and tender of an image this girl presented, I had to realize it was all a façade. Borderlines learn how to hide their disorder. They will go to any lengths to keep anyone from not only finding out that they are borderline, but to keep you from telling anyone they know about it or forcing them to get treatment or help.

I know this from personal experience. The first time I tried this in Florida 7 years ago the woman physically assaulted me, attacked my girls and then filed false charges against me to try and get me put in prison for something she did. She lied to our pastor continuously for 3 years, turning on the tears to get him to back away from the truth of the situation and manipulate him…then she’d come home and beat me and the kids brutally.

Later on after a “time of repentance” she attacked the kids again and that was the last straw. At the direction of an Army chaplain at my unit and my local pastor, I turned her in to Florida DCF. Two days later she filed for divorce and other than in court I never saw her again. Her father called me a few days later and apologized to me, saying his daughter was broken irreparably before he met her at 15 years old. He told me if he had known me before hand he would have warned me not to marry her. It had been 18 years since he had seen her and he’d never even met his grandchildren!

Regardless of the issues, disorders, or past trauma, Christians have the responsibility to obey the word of God. Lying, deceit, abusive behavior is not condoned by the word of God. Christ spoke specifically of this to John in Revelation stating no one who does those things will ever enter heaven.

And he saith unto me, Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this book: for the time is at hand. He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still. And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city. For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie. I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star. Revelations 22:10-16

I will continue praying and fasting that something will break in their lives and that God will grant them a chance to come to repentance. Ultimately the choice is theirs.

The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. 2 Peter 3:9

Flashbacks of Another Time, Another Place

Today I got a call that took be back 4-6 years. I’d barely gotten a blog posted when someone I care about dearly, called me accusing me of forwarding their mail from Colorado to Virginia. Yes, I know people normally don’t do stuff like that but she has a situation that is getting ready to spin out of control in her life. Her emotions are random and totally out of control.

I’ve been gone on vacation for two weeks, driving all over Missouri and Alabama and have barely been home four days and haven’t even opened all of my own mail. I have no desire, need or motive to reroute someone else’s. I haven’t even been to the DNRP office to start getting my home on the market yet for sale. I’ve been too busy and when I get home at night I’m too tired to try and go anywhere or do anything. I haven’t even set down to a decent meal since Sunday down in Alabama. I’m living on tea and water basically.

I hate seeing someone I care about tailspin out of control emotionally, but there is nothing I can do physically for them. I’m doing the only thing I can do, pray and fast and seek God’s face for an emotional healing for her. I’ve been through this before…the exact same thing down in Florida. I also have another friend with the same disorder, but she is currently getting help and therapy. It’s not really treatable unless they want to get help…or unless God intervenes and heals them. At least the later is going to visit an Apostolic church and seek God for a healing.

A friend of the former told me to cut off communication and I had to an extent, only forwarding necessary information about mail being misrouted to my house and praying with or for them. The last two phone calls were completely hateful and bristling with a desire to find fault and cause strife. I’ve chosen not to respond in kind, keeping a calm voice, explaining I have nothing to do with their issues, mail, etc. They told me they don’t trust me, and I can’t help that. I’ve made close friends, ministers and family available to them to talk to and get to know more about me from those who know me best, but someone with emotional trust issues isn’t going to trust someone they’ve met and gotten to know, let alone a stranger they haven’t met! Honesty is key and unfortunately I have not received that in the past from this person. Even in talking to me today they revealed they had lied to me in the past. It hurts, but I also know it is part of their emotional hurt. Not pain. Not fear. It is simply what they do because of their disorder.

Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned: behold, the judge standeth before the door. Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction, and of patience. Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy. But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath: but let your yea be yea; and your nay, nay; lest ye fall into condemnation. James 5:8-12

James knew that if we lied about something or held a grudge against our brother we would fall into condemnation…not just with them but with God. We have no prerogative in the word to hold a grudge against someone. Nor do we have a right to lie to, for, or against someone.

I’ve cut off contact with them and all I can do is pray that God will heal them before their situation gets worse, because every time God has dropped a borderline in my path, it was only a short time before they rejected the healing and restoration of God and spiraled out of control. God doesn’t reveal anything unless he plans to deal with it. You can play mind games with man, but you can’t play mind games with God!

http://www.bpdcentral.com/resources/basics/games.shtml

This Kind

This Kind

In over 31 years of walking with God, I’ve encountered things as most Christians have that totally baffle them. Like most Christians my life and my walk with God had the typical ups and downs. Unlike most Christians though, I refuse to gloss things over and I think that that fact alone has been the saving grace of my walk with God. Integrity with one’s self is a prerequisite to being honest with God and your fellow man. I don’t say that with any pride either. Those who know me best know the things I’ve lived through, the embarrassments, humiliations, mistakes…and my losses.

Paul gave a list of the things he endured from the time Christ put him on his face on the road to Damascus, things he endured for the Truth, but also things he endured at the hands of nature and even false brothers in the church. Gloss it over all we want to, that still happens today. I think we have robbed Pentecost of the power of our testimony by trying to make everything politically correct and to protect offices and positions that do not need protecting.

We’ve been so dishonest with ourselves as a movement, hidden things…or tried to hide them…from the saints in the body of Christ that it is no wonder we have lost so many to attrition over the years, only to see them raise up websites and name names and list incidents where our people, our ministers and our organizations have acted with less than the dignity of a Christian in most cases, and in some simply defied the ordnances and principles of the Word of God. God have mercy on us as a movement who has truth…but who walk in such a dishonest fashion! I wonder how long as a movement we will last before God strips us of that truth and moves on to the next group, movement or church organization and reveals the truths of the Word of God to them and totally bypasses us as oneness people like he did the Jews. Don’t think he won’t. There is precedence for it in the word of God!

Paul never glossed anything over for his self or anyone else. He was very humble, but very blunt in his dialogue of all he endured, sparing no one in his dialogue:

Seeing that many glory after the flesh, I will glory also. For ye suffer fools gladly, seeing ye yourselves are wise. For ye suffer, if a man bring you into bondage, if a man devour you, if a man take of you, if a man exalt himself, if a man smite you on the face. I speak as concerning reproach, as though we had been weak. Howbeit whereinsoever any is bold, (I speak foolishly,) I am bold also. Are they Hebrews? so am I. Are they Israelites? so am I. Are they the seed of Abraham? so am I. Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep; In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Beside those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? who is offended, and I burn not? If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things which concern mine infirmities. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is blessed for evermore, knoweth that I lie not. In Damascus the governor under Aretas the king kept the city of the Damascenes with a garrison, desirous to apprehend me: And through a window in a basket was I let down by the wall, and escaped his hands. 2 Corinthians 11:18-33

Paul went on to talk about the visions and revelations he had received of God, but despite all his reproaches and the things he endured, he came down several verses in Chapter 12:10-11 and said.

Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong. I am become a fool in glorying; ye have compelled me: for I ought to have been commended of you: for in nothing am I behind the very chiefest apostles, though I be nothing.

In the face of all he had accomplished for God, and in the face of all he had endured carrying the Gospel, he announced to the world that he was nothing! God help us to have the same humility! I look back over all I’ve gone through, and what God brought me out of and the firestorms that I’ve lived through and have to realize that all the times I was on my face weeping over hurts, fears, losses, he was molding and shaping my life, my walk and the ministry he called me to. How must Paul have felt at times like these. In looking back he doesn’t tell about his personal feelings during these times. We see the mind of Christ in him though, the thought process we have to have to effectively minister to the hurting, bruised and broken in this hour.

And I will very gladly spend and be spent for you; though the more abundantly I love you, the less I be loved. 2 Corinthians 12:15

He understood that in ministering to the needs of people that some would never love him. We cannot produce a political elite among us that we somehow figure will be the only ones who will reach this generation. By so doing we have robbed hurting, wounded, broken people of healing and deliverance that Christ said all his believers would do in his name. God never followed the politics of an organization to determine who would and would not accomplish something great for him. He owes no allegiance to the organizational structure of men. He always seeks out a human need.

People who are wounded and need a physician will readily seek out a doctor. Those who cannot bring their selves the humility to admit publicly there is something broken that they cannot fix will always and forever hate and bite the hand that tries to minister to their wounding. Paul knew this unequivocally. Wounds in the body are readily evident. Those in the spirit, soul, emotions and mind are not. Nor can a half-hazard walk with God heal these wounded souls.

And when they were come to the multitude, there came to him a certain man, kneeling down to him, and saying, Lord, have mercy on my son: for he is lunatick, and sore vexed: for ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the water. And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him. Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him hither to me. And Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour. Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out? And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you. Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting. Matthew 17:14-21

The last 8 years of my life I was in a massive storm. Unwittingly, the more I thought I knew about it, the less I knew. It wasn’t until the past year that I realized a small part of what God was doing in my life by the things he kept taking me into. I knew that when we fail a test, God will never let us pass on to the next level until we get the revelation of what he is wanting to do in us and we buckled down and actually pass the test, do what he wants us to do and fulfill the obedience he wants accomplished in us.

Jesus said that there are some things, some wounds, some conditions that don’t come out except by prayer and fasting. Up until that time his disciples had not fasted and he said so in his word. Christ’s answer was that while he was among them the disciples would not fast, but after he was taken away, they would. Prayer and fasting is the bedrock doctrine of the Apostolic church. We aren’t debating the New Birth here. You don’t get into the Apostolic church without the New Birth…but once you are born again of water and spirit there is one thing that we are lacking in…prayer and fasting!

In 30 years I’ve been in more churches than I can count off hand…but of those I can count on one hand the number of those churches who were given to fasting and prayer. When you walk into a church like that, you know it. You know when someone has reached past the hands of God and reached up to touch his face. If you don’t understand that statement, then pray and fast until you do.

The disciples had been sent out by twos into the nation and had cast out devils, healed the sick, raised the dead, opened blind eyes, made the lame walk…but even with all of that they came back and a man with a boy who was possessed of a certain type of demonic spirit (for the therapists we’ll just say he was clinically insane, suicidal, depressed, epileptic, bi-polar, borderline, multiple-personality disorder, schizophrenic, or whatever disorder you want to label him with). At any rate, the boy couldn’t get any relief and the father who loved his son was tormented. If you don’t think he was, think about raising a child like that!

Buckle up, lock yourself down, strap yourself in and get ready for turbulence. This plane isn’t coming in for a landing any time soon.

You never see in this passage that the child came to Jesus. Whether the child knew he had a problem or not is not recognized in this passage. All the child knew was pain, hurt and trauma from his earliest memory. He didn’t come running recognizing his need and fall down like the maniac of the Gadarenes. The child was nearly completely and totally consumed by what had befallen him from infancy.

It was the father that sought out the ministry, but you see no response from the child. Nothing is noted in scripture other than the fact that they could not cast him out. The ministry didn’t have the goods at that time and moment in history. Sorry, but truth sometimes hurts. We’ve returned to that time as a movement. Our forefathers were men and women of prayer and fasting. They were men and women of sacrifice. They weren’t the most popular show in town. They endured much as Paul did when Pentecost was in its infancy. Yet they had power with God. What have we got?

The father knew the child needed help. He came to the only one that could help him. We are still there today. The disciples were not given to prayer and fasting and for the past 30 years as a movement, neither have we except in limited measure among us. You never see where the disciples had the power even after all their exploits of being sent forth to heal and carry the gospel without purse or scrip, without two coats, without anything that would make them self-sufficient. They were totally and completely dependent on Christ. Today we have multi-million dollar edifices, million dollar homes and Gentiles paying Jewish tithes like they are still under the law…but I regress. That’s another article all together. We aren’t dependent on God for anything. If the entire city we were called to burns up and goes to hell tomorrow, we are fine with that, as long as we live fat, happy and comfortable until we cross over into Glory! Dear God help us….

In this child’s case, he didn’t even have the wherewithal to come to God and seek help himself. It fell to someone who loved him to come running to Jesus and entreat him for someone else. We aren’t quite there as a movement. A check of the world climate tells me we will be soon, whether we want to or not. The earth is groaning because intercessors are not. Earthquakes in Haiti, China, Japan have been prevalent in the news. Tsunamis, mudslides, floods, oil spills and now nuclear contamination are all over our news, but still the church dances along content to give itself to folly, lackluster lifestyles, prayerlessness, no sacrifice, no sincerity, no hunger for souls, not even aware of the times and seasons around us.

The church in the book of Acts turned the world upside down. Our generation prefers to blend in with the world, not raise a fuss or rock the boat.

I was shaken awake to my surroundings recently; due to the love of someone I could not help. I’d won a young woman to God, taken her to a church that preaches truth (few that there be in my area…and don’t attack me for this, it was even prophesied to me by a very well known evangelist in our movement. I’m merely relating fact.) and seen her get baptized in Jesus name and filled with the Holy Ghost…and then my world endured an earthquake.

As I said, honesty and integrity has always been the only saving grace to my walk with God. That integrity would not let me lie, or pretend to be something I’m not, even in the face of rejection by a minister who I love like a father. It would not let me lie to keep the wife I loved in the face of her mental illness, lying to the ministry and fighting a healing from God that was promised her in prophesy by two evangelists. It would not let me lie in court to keep custody of my children in order to counteract lies by my ex-wife, a godless backslider who has blasphemed the Holy Ghost and done spite to the Spirit of Grace. And this time it would not let me lie to keep the woman in my life I had fallen deeply in love with.

I’ve always been one to give people the benefit of the doubt, always looked for hidden godly potential in them, always desired to see them excel and grow and become more than they were. I never considered whether their growth and accomplishments for God would eclipse what I’ve done. It never registered with me. I simply don’t care. It’s not me that counts. It’s Him.

The girl in question is budding with potential. I saw this the first time we met and knew that she was special, yet over time I came to realize a deep-seated wound in her spirit and emotions that she admits to in private but would not admit publically. A prophesy came forth the week after she was filled with the Holy Ghost, declaring that God was going to heal her. I’d told her the same thing the day before. God confirmed his word and from that point on she began a steady withdraw from me. I’ve lived through this at least 5 times in my life. Each time I was told to give myself to prayer and fasting and that a healing would take place. Each time I fell, failed and lost.

For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ; And having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience, when your obedience is fulfilled. Do ye look on things after the outward appearance? If any man trust to himself that he is Christ's, let him of himself think this again, that, as he is Christ's, even so are we Christ's. 2 Corinthians 10:3-7

I’ve never doubted the power of our spiritual arsenal. I’ve always known that intercessory prayer was like heavy artillery in the spirit world, able to topple the moste hardened bunkers of demonic and manly opposition. Yet, my pastor spoke on “dual consciousness” a few weeks ago as I’ve mentioned in various blogs I’ve written, but this time it had a deeper meaning to me in my walk with God.

I was repeatedly told over the pulpit to get my eyes off of the things going on around me in the physical by ministers in 3 states and to focus on the Spirit, the things we can’t see. Still, the more I prayed, the more I fasted, the worse the situation looked. It still does…in the physical. Finally I was rebuked for walking in fear and not faith and I knew that there were things I had to do in my life and walk with God. It was time for self-examination at a level I’ve not done in all my years.

The verse that has hounded me from 2 Corinthians 10 for 8 years has been verse 6…”And having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience, when your obedience is fulfilled.” Am I obedient? Have I submitted every area of my life to God and removed all the “leaven” from my life. A little sin poisons the whole life, much as a little leaven will leaven an entire loaf of bread. Self examination isn’t fun, not if you are honest with yourself and God. It’s crippling us as a movement.

Think I’m blowing smoke? Whatever happened to Old Time Pentecost when someone repented and got right with God and they went to everyone they had hurt, offended and did wrong and apologized and repented to them to? We’ve lost something as a body of believers. Sit and soak in that for a bit. Don’t get out until you are pruning….

I’ve been soul searching, clearing out things in my home, my life, my heart…I don’t even care if they aren’t sins if they are weights or things that hinder my walk with God, they have to GO! If they are things that hinder my prayer life, they have to go. If they are things that hinder my bible reading, they have to go. Are there friendships that aren’t producing fruit to win souls? They have to go. Lifestyles? Have to go. Do I have ambitions that aren’t in alignment with the word of God? They have to go. Are my life-goals in accordance to God’s will? I have to pray about this. How about my diet? Am I pleasing to God in the things I am taking in? Or do my habits encourage fasting and sacrifice? Does my fasting follow biblical principles? (I’ll get on this soon. Just hang on.) This area needed looked into.

I started with the refrigerator then moved on to my computer, my music, my games and my home. Anything that is a distraction has to go…a permanent partial fast from frivolity.

I’ve begun a fast and my closest friends know that it is common place with me. It’s something God has given me the ability to do. I will not go into details. If you don’t know me well enough to know, then maybe it’s something you should inquire about. I found out from Evangelist Keith Clark many years ago that there is a difference between fasting and being anointed to fast. When God anoints you to do something, it’s kind of like Sampson…even the jaw-bone of an ass can be a mighty weapon.

All the years of having friends with mental and emotional wounds came to a head recently and although I’ve tried to ignore the nudge of the Spirit to shut the door, push away the plate, plant my face in the carpet and give myself to fasting and prayer for…a season…can no longer be ignored. In this case I have two friends in particular dealing with the same infirmity. One admits it under duress. The other will only admit it in private in generalization but denies anything specific. Here is what has hamstrung me for 8 years:

This is the fast he will never hear or look on!

Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours. Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high. Isaiah 58:3-4

This is the fast that God will recognize:

Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the LORD? Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?

And this is what he will do for the person who humbles their self in the fast he has called for:

Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the LORD shall be thy rereward. Then shalt thou call, and the LORD shall answer; thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here I am. If thou take away from the midst of thee the yoke, the putting forth of the finger, and speaking vanity; And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noonday: And the LORD shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not. And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in. Isaiah 58:3-12

I’m not sure when I will blog again. I’m not sure what the Lord will answer me. I only know that I must do what I’ve been directed of the Holy Ghost in prayer and from the Word. Please keep me in prayer.

Sharon told me recently to make sure I remembered a sermon preached recently about being pruned. Some trees don’t bloom for several years after being pruned. Now it’s time. Thank you, Sharon.