Clean Hands

There are two people who I know right now who have been given a death sentence by doctors. Both of them have cancer, and both have been told they have a day to live, and yet they still continue to live. I heard about the first one two weeks ago, when I called a woman I love very much because I had a word from God for her. I told her that she was going to be married and that it had something to do with someone who was coming back into her life or who had come back into her life. She told me that she had heard from an old boyfriend who she had not spoken to in probably 20 years or maybe even more now, and that he was dying of cancer. She had been spending time with him because it was the end of his life and she wanted him to know that he was loved. I told her I didn’t want to get her hopes up, but that it was possible for God to do anything – that He could heal this man, no matter what the doctors said. She said that she knew that God could do anything, but that she knew what the outcome would be, and that he wouldn’t last much longer. When we got off the phone, I kept thinking that God can do anything, and that this is just the kind of situation where He can show up and show everyone that He is Lord. Every day after I made that call, He has given me a word about His power to raise the dead to life. No matter what I hear about this man, I have to believe what God says, because He is "the God who gives life to the dead, and calls things that are not as though they were." (Romans 4:17)

That was just after Easter, and now we are near Pentecost, and I received a call yesterday from a woman I met a year and a half before I was born again. I had gone on a vacation to Oregon with a friend of mine, and we were in a bed and breakfast in a tiny little town my friend had discovered on the internet. The population was 8, and there was a general store, a few restaurants, an antique store and the bed and breakfast. It is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been, and I’ve been blessed to see some beautiful places in my life. One night my friend and I were sitting in the breakfast room sharing some local wine together with a pizza we’d bought at one of the only restaurants there. Two women came in and were sitting on the other side of the room, and all of a sudden one of them started talking to us. She started to tell us a story, her testimony of when she was born again, and it was such an amazing story that I was mesmerized. It was something that could have sounded impossible to have happened, but somehow I knew it was true. Her name was the same as my grandmother’s, and it is not a common name that you hear often. Even though I didn’t know then what I know now about God, I knew that this was a very special meeting, and that somehow my grandmother was part of it, and that there was also some other power much bigger than I was that was in charge of what was happening. I asked for this woman’s number and email to keep in touch and we did keep in touch. A year and a half later I was able to call her up and let her know that I had my own crazy story to tell about what God had done in my life.

It was that woman who called me last night. Her husband had been dying of cancer and had been told he had 24 hours to live back in April, but he was getting better against everything that every doctor and nurse was trying to say. He had cancer in every part of his body, and he had died and come back to life. He had died just after 3:00 one morning, and his wife had prayed for him and he came back at 3:33. Jeremiah 3:33 is known as the hotline to God, “Call on me and I will answer you and show you marvelous things that you do not know.” If I didn’t know what I know about God, I would not have believed this story, but I know God, and I know this couple, and I know what they are telling me is real.

It amazes me that she called me when she did. I had been hearing from God just yesterday once again that the other man I had been hearing about could live in spite of everything that anyone else was saying. What God had spoken to me is that it was my faith that mattered, because I was the one who was born again. Other people say the things they say and think the things they think because they don't know Him, but because I do know Him and have seen what He can do in my own life and for others, because I know He is real and His power is more powerful than anything else, I have the choice to believe or not to believe, and it is that choice that matters. On Sunday I had heard a sermon about the faith and hearts of women that could move the heart of God, and what the Lord was speaking to me yesterday is that I had the faith that could move His heart in this situation, because I was praying in His will. When people have been near death and not expected in any way to live and they come back to life and recover, it could only be the hand of God. If someone has the faith to speak life in that situation, everyone remembers it when it comes to pass. People who have not known the Lord, or people who have known Him but have not understood His great mercy and love and power on our behalf, see the miracle of the dead coming to life and can believe where they may have had doubt before. It is human nature to doubt, to justify, to find some other reason for miracles, but there are some miracles that can’t be explained easily, and this would be one of those times. It would mean salvation for the woman who loves this man, and for the man himself, and for everyone around them who knew what the doctors had said and who had seen him at his worst. That is why it is so much in God’s will, and why He needed me to have my faith at work. God only needs one person to testify, and His glory will be shown, His glory that shows others His light and His love.

Because of what God had been speaking to me, the call I received yesterday was a confirmation for me, an encouragement to keep believing that He could raise the dead to life. And because of what God had been speaking to me, I was able to encourage her that yes, He was the God she knew Him to be, and yes, He would bring them both through this despite all of the challenges and struggles physically, emotionally and financially that they are facing. And they are facing many challenges. Whenever God is doing something really miraculous, whenever a really big blessing is coming for not just one person but for many people, whenever He is going to be shown in all the glory of His power and love and mercy and grace, the attacks and obstacles and hardship and struggle get stronger and come from every direction. It is always when things are at their worst that God is going to show up at His best.

When we were finishing the call, after we had prayed together, my friend gave me a word from Isaiah 54:17 that the Lord has been speaking to me over this past year about the promise that He had made to me to bring something to life that I was having trouble believing sometimes. "No weapon formed against you shall prosper, and every tongue which rises against you in judgment, you shall condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is from Me says the Lord." It was the first word He gave me when He gave me that promise, and He gave it to me over and over again each time something seemed to block it or end it, and here she was again, claiming it over my life. "No weapon formed against you shall prosper . . ." When I told her that, she said, "Well, He also tells us, 'Decree a thing and it shall be established.' You just keep decreeing it and He'll bring it to pass."

I know my Bible verses, and I did not know that one, so when we got off the phone, I looked it up, and there it is in Job 22:28. Job is one of those books that the Lord keeps surprising me with. It is such a hard book to read because so much happens to Job that is awful and I don’t like reading about awful because Job did nothing to deserve it and I know I have done plenty to deserve it. When I read Job, I kind of skim over all the things that are scary to me, and go to those wonderful passages like “I know my Redeemer lives!” and of course the end when Job has everything restored to him more than he had lost. But in this past year, several times the Lord has surprised me with messages from Job, and this was another of those times. I went back to read chapter 22, and found this, “If you return to the Almighty, you will be restored: if you remove wickedness far from your tent and assign your nuggets to the dust, your gold of Ophir to the rocks in the ravines, then the Almighty will be your gold, the choicest silver for you. Surely then you will find delight in the Almighty and will lift up your face to God. You will pray to Him and He will hear you, and you will fulfill your vows. What you decide on will be done, and light will shine on your ways. When people are brought low and  you say, “Lift them up!” then He will save the downcast. He will deliver even one who is not innocent, who will be delivered through the cleanness of your hands.” (Job 22:23-30)

When I read that, I knew it was a rhema word for me. The word rhema is Greek, and  it means
"utterance or "thing said." A rhema word is a word that we hear that could only be God speaking directly to us. He wanted me to know that before I was born again, I couldn’t even save myself, but because I have turned to Him, my prayers can now be answered, not only for myself, but for others who I pray for, and even those who have not turned to Him because they do not know Him. Because of my faith He has made my hands that once were so dirty clean, so clean that they can help to lift up someone else.

That is a powerful word and a powerful promise, and something that I needed to hear. And it’s a promise He has for all of us – if we turn to Him, He will hear our prayers and shine His light on our way so that we can be a light for others. It doesn't matter where we were walking before. When we turn to Him, He will show us the right way, and help us on that way so we can help someone else.

Blessings,

Jannie Susan