But Will You Let Him?
We received this letter from a lady who got our address mixed up with that of Don Stewart:
Her tragic letter reveals much. By examining it I hope that anyone with similar misconceptions can be helped. Let’s take a closer look.
Jesus encouraged us to have faith in Him. At every opportunity, you see His remarks in the gospels about trusting in God, having faith in God, relying upon God, not giving up on God, being aware of His wonderful faithfulness and love.
That being so, what is most needful? Prayer to ask Him for what He knows you need already? Or prayer to help you get in line with His will? A lot of people don’t understand that the main purpose of prayer is to help bring YOUR mind into tune with God’s. So, prayer has to be coupled with study of His Word, so you can know His will. That’s why we have written at length about God’s will in MM publications. I sent the lady our book Faith and Healing, but there was no reply. I suspect she wants an easy answer rather than the full Truth of God which comes with responsibilities of commitment. When people just want a ‘quick fix’, they are asking selfishly, and that sort of prayer is not answered, as James said (Jas 4:3). Mind you, James said it’s OK to ask (Jas 4:2). But what use is the asking if it’s just for self? God is not selfish, and you are made in His image, meant to become like Him in spirit, so the primary aim of any request must have that underlying motive in your life. What do you live for? Yourself? Or to fulfil the purpose of God in your life? That motive determines everything that happens to you, and whether or not God works in your life. When James wrote:
the purpose of that prayer is to help you draw closer to God so that He can give you His comfort. As you speak to Him, He also responds and speaks to you. When James wrote:
the purpose of that prayer is to hear from God, BECAUSE He has not been answering you directly. You don’t need an elder to pray any more than your own request. God does not have respect of persons. But if you are in sin, an elder – if he is a man of God and not one of so many charlatans – will hear from God, to point you in the right direction, so that God can provide whatever it is that you need. That’s why I wrote to the lady and sent her MM literature to help her move into the will of God.
It’s ironic, but invariably the case, that more money goes to the false ministers than to those who are true! I’m not going to address the reasons for that here; that is covered elsewhere. But Jesus did warn:
Jesus also spoke about the paradoxes in life that will be reversed in time:
Falsity doesn’t come with a government health warning. It comes with an attractive veneer. It looks good on the outside, but underneath it’s rotten. My reasons for calling Don Stewart a false minister are given in the article about him, entitled, The Deceit and Cunning of Don Stewart. The man is deceived and doesn’t know it, of course. He thinks he does right. And, occasionally, some people get healed, just to make his efforts seem laudable. It can be very confusing to the ‘uninitiated’. Sometimes God will heal through a false minister if that is His only avenue to reach a person who is trusting in Him. The lady’s words above, however, imply that she is trusting in Don Stewart more than in God.
When you look to a thing as your means of help, to what are you looking? You’re not looking to God. You’re looking to a substitute which thus becomes an idol. God commands you NOT to erect anything as an idol in your worship (Ex 20:2-4). But then, most Christians don’t even keep God’s commandments. They haven’t been taught properly. So, most are in idolatry without realising it. God reveals to whom He responds:
Yes, God heals thousands! Many thousands! He is also looking for something from you in return. It’s not as though He wants payment. It’s not like that. He wants obedience, because obedience is evidence of your faith. Remember Abraham. He was the father of the faithful because he did whatever God asked. There are very few like him! As Abraham obeyed, his faith in God increased. You may not understand why, but the principle is simple. As you obey God, you draw nearer to Him. He comes into you by His Spirit. There is more of a home for Him in you, and that enables Him to heal you and plant HIS faith inside you. It is a faith that you don’t have of yourself. It is His, and it causes you to be able to believe in Him fully and trust that He will work out the impossible situations in your life. He is very pleased when you yield yourself to Him so that He can dwell and work within you. So, it was written:
If any think that faith excludes works, listen:
Do you want to be a friend of God? Then, you have to DO what He asks. The place to begin is to know what God requires of you. First you’ve got to know His will, not merely seek His benefits in a capricious manner like the lady who wrote. God is not capricious. He is reliable, and ALWAYS delivers in line with His will and purpose. He wants you to be reliable, too. He wants you to do His will ALWAYS, not just when it suits you. After receiving our literature, she didn’t reply. There was not even a simple acknowledgement. What does that tell you? Granted, it would come as a shock to receive from another ministry, telling you that the man you wrote to is a false minister. But what do you want? To believe a lie, or to have and hold the truth? The truth hurts at first. She was willing to go running round the country to chase that man in whom she places so much trust, but was she willing to move an inch towards the real truth? Why do people chase empty pipedreams? Remember the woman who had spent all she had seeking healing from the physicians? (Lk 8:43.) She spent everything, looking to man, first. Only when she had given up on the human solution did she touch Jesus (Lk 8:44). Only when you’ve got no one else to rely on will you reach out and touch Him. That’s the principle. Unfortunately, human nature is not to seek God. We try to do things our way first. We go running after a man. We look to a substitute. We don’t have the faith to trust in the Real Thing. But when you come to the end of yourself, and are willing to do what HE says, not what men say, He comes in, gives you the faith to believe Him, and heals you. That’s when you and He become friends.
When Paul wrote to the early churches, his letters contained much to point people in the right direction – upward, instead of downward. He constantly emphasised that everything they needed resided with God through Jesus. He pointed people to their need for Jesus, and not in an intellectual, theoretical or clinical sense, which is the emphasis of so many preachers today. Paul’s emphasis was on the life-giving power of the SPIRIT, which brings all we need, when we submit to Jesus fully. He continually pointed his audience to the indwelling of the Spirit. He encouraged them along that route, away from looking to men, away from reliance upon the flesh. Spiritual problems require spiritual solutions, so it is only through accepting the Spirit into our lives that such help comes. People find it hard to relinquish self and submit to the desires of the Spirit. MM publications have been written with that spiritual aim. That is their only purpose – to help you move closer to God. In Him you have everything. You have healing, forgiveness, salvation, deliverance. What more could you want? Tragically, some believers want more. They want money or some physical thing more than they want God. But what’s the use of physical healing if you don’t have the Spirit of the living God inside you giving you comfort, peace, faith, assurance and love? If you think the Spirit is here to merely provide your physical needs, you can forget about receiving healing. Healing starts with the restoration of the inner man, the spirit. The body comes second. That’s another principle. Underline these principles – not merely on paper – in your heart and mind. I was hopeful that this lady wanted truth above all else, so I wrote to her and sent her a number of our publications:
At the Spirit’s prompt, I wrote a second letter:
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