His Spirit we speak forth with our human lips the word of believing faith, of authority, just as He did when He said, “ Let there be light and there was light,” or as the Lord Jesus did in the above incident. And we are told in Romans 4:17 the char acteristic of the faith of God, who “ calleth those things which be not as though they were.” We are to do the same. Thus Christ said, “ Say unto this mountain.” “ SAY ,” not “ PRAY .” The word is most significant. The thought is not that prayer should be omitted—for the Word counsels us to pray. PRAYER is the attitude of one who has not and needs. SAYING the word of faith is the attitude of one who has and dispenses what he has. Such is the “ throne life” as we commonly speak of it. A throne is occupied by a king. A king is a pos sessor and dispenser of gifts. Thus, as we who are believers are joined to Christ, He the head, we the mem bers of one Body, physically on earth, spiritually enthroned, we are told that we are “kings . . . unto God,” and “ seated in the heavenlies.” LACK VERSUS SUPPLY Examine the men of God through the Bible — prophets, apostles — and you will find this conscious attitude of authoritative faith to be theirs. The difference stands out clearly with Hezekiah and Isaiah. Hezekiah was a man of prayer. The threats of the enemy came upon him with over whelming force. He prayed. He be moaned weakness. “ This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of blasphemy; for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth” (Is. 37:3). “Not strength” was his emphasis. Then he sent word of the situation to the man of faith. Hear Isaiah’s answer, a declaration, a saying unto this mountain. “Thus saith the Lord, Be not afraid o f the words that thou hast heard, wherewith the servants of the king of Assyria have blas phemed me. Behold, I will send a blast upon him, and he shall . . . re turn to his own land” (vs. 6, 7). And later, “ The virgin, the daughter of Zion, hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn . . . I (will) put my hook in thy nose, and my bridle in thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way by which thou earnest” (vs. 22, 29). The one — god ly , praying man though he was—spoke in weakness. The other spoke in authority. The one was fully conscious of need and lack and separation from the supply of power. The other knew union with God and spoke as His mouth piece.
“ We all need to learn how to be aware of Satan’s devices . Every cloud can vanish! "
DECLARING " I H AV E " The use of “ the faith of God,” which was operative there against an attack of the enemy, has been proved hundreds of times over to be equally the secret for obtaining sup plies, moving governments, saving souls, transforming characters, and the like. Written on a river steamer in the interior of South America, these are but scrappy jottings on this “ lost chord of Christianity,” but, I trust, sufficient to put a seeking reader on the trail. To one who asks, “ But how can we realize this as a personal ex perience?” we answer, as God an swered Moses in the incident at the beginning of this article, “ Awake. Arise from your deluded condition as if you are still fallen, still separated by sin, still weak. Realize your equipment, the mystery hid from ages and from generations: CHRIST IN YOU. Declare it, as the prophets of old; ‘I am full of power by the Spirit of the Lord.’ Cease to live bound up in those old graveclothes of ‘judging by appearances,’ ‘walk ing by sight.’ You appear weak, you appear to be without the presence of Christ, you appear loveless, of little faith, and all the rest of it. You still live in the devil’s lies of the have-not life. But you have—-all things. All is within, if Christ the Saviour is with in. Burst through those bonds of feelings. Say, ‘Though all men and devils say I have not, I say I have, on the authority of God’s Word.’ ” The •principle involved cannot be applied arbitrarily to just any need in the whole world, but rather to the sphere for which God in His grace has made you individually respon sible. Then, according to the needs of your calling and sphere of life and service, speak forth the word of faith. Call the things that be not as though they were. Carry out Mark 11:24: “What things soever ye de sire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.” Used by permission from the Christian Litera ture Crusade, Fort Washington, Pennsylvania.
THE PRINCIPLE IN OPERATION Latterly, in the Worldwide Evan gelization Crusade, of which I am In ternational Secretary, I was notified of a severe crisis in one department of the work, sufficient, if it came to a head, to spoil the advance of years in that area. Before I understood the life of authority in the Spirit, I would have recognized the attempt of the devil to disrupt a work and would have labored in prayer for the destruction of his devices. But, in the maintaining of the position of the throne life, the Lord spoke to me through one sentence in a letter con cerning the affair. It said, “ I am afraid you are in for a sea' of trou ble.” The Holy Spirit said “What did Jesus do in a storm? Walk on the wa ters, or sink beneath them?” I saw in a moment. I was not to spend one wasted minute fearing, doubting, burdened, magnifying the power of Satan. I was immediately to declare the victory over Satan gained two thousand years ago. I was to see it to be a present victory in this very affair, not a future one. I was to enjoy the defeat of Satan. I was to count this actual trial as “ all joy” and no sorrow, and to realize that if God does allow the enemy to come in like a flood, it is always to give an opportunity for the authority of faith to be mani fested, by which Satan is given a bigger defeat and the work of God a bigger advance. So from that day to the day five months later when those concerned met for the critical settlement, I en joyed the trial, laughed the laugh of faith, bore testimony in public and private that there was this severe trial but that the devil always makes a laughingstock of himself (Col. 2:16), for his attacks in the hands of faith become boomerangs; he gets the defeat and we the new blessing, as at Calvary. And I told folk that I would return to describe the victory in due course. And thus, of course, it has been. In one meet ing every cloud vanished, unity and stability came to this department beyond anything in its history.
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AUGUST, 1965
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