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What Does It Mean to Be In the Spirit?

Roaming through Romans

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Port Authority Police Department officers Will Jimeno and John McLoughlin were the last two people rescued from the World Trade Center after the September 11 terrorist attack. For Will Jimeno, that tragic day represents a defining moment in his Christian faith. Jimeno, McLoughlin, and three other officers entered Tower 1 to rescue civilians. But when they got inside, the building collapsed. McLoughlin and Jimeno were pinned under large blocks of concrete rubble and twisted steel. The other three officers were killed. For the next ten hours, Jimeno and his partner fought pain and thirst inside a concrete tomb swirling with dust and smoke. At times, ruptured gas lines would hurl fireballs into the ruins, threatening to burn the two men to death. In another terrifying moment, heat from the fireballs “cooked off” the ammunition inside the firearm of a fallen officer, sending fifteen bullets ricocheting around the chamber.
Jimeno’s hope began to falter. “I was exhausted. I had done everything as a police officer that I could do, and everything as a human being,” he said. “I just knew I was going to die.” Just then, Jimeno saw a figure coming toward him through the rubble. “He wore a glowing white robe and a rope belt,” Jimeno said. “I couldn’t see his face, but I knew it was Jesus.” The vision filled Jimeno with hope. “I had this resurgence of the will to fight,” he said. Turning toward McLoughlin, he yelled, “We’re going to get out of this hellhole!” Several hours later, U.S. Marines and NYPD rescue workers lifted the men out of their concrete prison. The events of that day have given Jimeno a new perspective on the brevity of life. He noted that, even if a person lives to be ninety years old, that’s only a little over thirty-two thousand days. “It’s not that many,” Jimeno said. “You have to do good and do right with the small period you have in between.” 1 Jimeno had a vision of Jesus. The Lord enabled him to momentarily be in the Spirit. Paul references the phrase in the Spirit in Romans 8. What can we learn from Paul about this place called ‘In the Spirit’?

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#S3-004: Why It’s Important to Flow in Faith’s Domain [Podcast]

Healing and Miracles in the Life of Jesus

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In April 2000, a boy named Nathan was in a near-fatal car accident while trying to avoid a deer. When he arrived at the hospital, he had a broken leg, spinal cord damage, numerous lacerations, and a collapsed lung. To stabilize him, doctors put him into a drug-induced coma. Nathan was in a coma for four days, but when the drugs were discontinued, he didn’t come out of the coma. That night Nathan’s father prayed and read the Bible to him, repeating the words Jesus said to Lazarus: “Come forth.” You’ve got to fight. You’ve got to wake up.” The next morning he came out of the coma. The parents were beside ourselves with joy. But the spinal cord damage was a major concern. Nathan had a fracture in his neck, the same vertebra that actor Christopher Reeve had injured several years ago. The doctors gave Nathan a protective neck collar to prevent further separation of the vertebrae. He was in danger of full or partial paralysis.
For two weeks Nathan prayed earnestly for healing. One night as he was falling asleep, he heard and felt a popping in his neck. The next morning physicians performed three sets of X-rays to see if the vertebrae were continuing to separate. Instead, the tests showed that the vertebrae had fused back together. The doctors were stunned; there was no medical explanation for the healing. Three months after the accident, doctors cleared Nathan to resume his participation in athletics, including football, wrestling, and track and field. 1 Our God is a healing God. He is a miracle worker and He will do a miracle for you.

This is Part Two of a Series entitled ‘Healing and Miracles.’ You can find part one of this series, ‘How to Minister Healing Like Jesus Did‘ here.

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What is Carnal Mindedness and Why Is It Deadly

Roaming Through Romans

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According to the Greek dictionary, carnality means to have the nature and characteristics of the flesh (or more simply, it means “fleshly”). What, then, is the flesh? Sometimes it refers to the whole material part of man (1 Corinthians 15:39; Hebrews 5:7), and based on this meaning, carnal sometimes relates to material things like money (Romans 15:27) or to the opposite of our weapons of spiritual warfare (2 Corinthians 10:4). But the word flesh also has a metaphorical sense when it refers to our disposition to sin and to oppose or omit God in our lives. The flesh is characterized by works that include lusts and passions (Galatians 5:19–24; 1 John 2:16); it can enslave (Romans 7:25); and in it is nothing good (Romans 7:18). Based on this meaning of the word flesh, to be carnal means to be characterized by things that belong to the unsaved life (Ephesians 2:3). 1  The Apostle Paul addresses carnal mindedness particularly in Romans chapter eight. Let’s take a look.

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#S3-003: How to Minister Healing Like Jesus Did [Podcast]

Healing and Miracles in the Life of Jesus

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In the USA, at the declaration of independence, only 5% were Christians. By the Civil War, the figure rose to 12%. At the turn of the century, 1/4 of the people included Christians. Billy Graham told reporters in 1977 that 40% of Americans claim they have been born again, and 95% of young people believe in a personal God.1 The number of people who claim to be religious is staggering. But there’s a difference between being religious and being divinely, supernaturally spiritual. Jesus was never religious. He didn’t act religious. He didn’t talk religious. He didn’t have a bumper sticker on His camel. He didn’t have rosary beads hanging from His donkey’s neck. He was not a pious prophet. He was uniquely spiritual and highly effective in His ministry to the sick. And here’s the marvelous truth. You can be just like Him.

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Are You After the Flesh or Following the Spirit?

Roaming through Romans

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Romans chapter eight has several ‘who or what’ we have ‘in Christ’ positional statements. The entire chapter includes what Jesus has done for us as well as information we need to access His finished work through the vital ministry of the Holy Spirit. In today’s post we are going to look particularly at verse five in relation to what it says about flesh versus spirit.

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#S3-002: Why It’s Important to Slow Yourself Down [Podcast]

Soul Power for Your Present Hour

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It’s important to shut down certain voices like sinful thoughts.  You don’t argue with those thoughts. You don’t examine those thoughts, you just cut them off in Jesus name. It is scriptural to talk to your soul.  David, if you remember, told his soul to bless the Lord (Psalm 103:1).  In last week’s podcast, we also talked about the multitude of arrows hitting the soul. The point being, we often live overloaded lives. How many irons in the fire can you have before it affects your ability to divide spirit and soul? How much mental angst can we have before our heads are roaring so much we can’t hear our hearts?  For this series finale, let’s go down two separate tracks as we look at the important idea of slowing ourselves down so we can better hear our hearts.

This is part two of the Series entitled, ‘Soul Power for Your Present Hour’. You can find Part One ‘Why Renewing the Mind is Important for Soul Development’ here, Part 2 “Why Renewing the Mind is Important for Soul Development” here, Part 3 “More of Why Renewing the Mind is Important for Soul Development“, and “How to Keep Your Soul from Going Tilt“.

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Why Redeemed People Can Walk Free from Fear

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An Indian fable says that a mouse was in constant distress because of its fear of the cat. A magician took pity on it and turned it into a cat. Immediately it became afraid of the dog. So the magician turned it into a dog. Immediately it began to fear the tiger. So the magician turned it into a tiger. Immediately it began to fear the hunter. Then the magician said, “Be a mouse again, you have only the heart of a mouse and I cannot help you.” If you have Holy Spirit ‘In Him’ truths registered in your heart, if you know who you are in Christ, you can walk free from areas which have hindered you in the past. In this post we are going to look at one of those areas, fear. You can boldly walk free from fear in Jesus Name.

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#S3-001: What You Need to Know to Keep Your Soul from Going Tilt [Podcast]

Soul Power for Your Present Hour

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Finagle’s Laws of Information state the following:  One, the information you have is not what you want.  Two, the information you want is not what you need. 1 In this information glutted age, how does one discern between the two?How can you tell what you want from what you need? Knowing the answer is a key to keep your soul from going tilt.

This is part two of the Series entitled, ‘Soul Power for Your Present Hour’. You can find Part One ‘Why Renewing the Mind is Important for Soul Development’ here, Part 2 “Why Renewing the Mind is Important for Soul Development” here, and Part 3 “More of Why Renewing the Mind is Important for Soul Development“.

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How to Boost Your Prayer Life into the Presence of God

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Heaven is filled with a room that will surprise all of us when we see it. The room has within it large boxes neatly packaged with a lovely ribbon on top with your name on it, “Never delivered to Earth because never requested from Earth.” Prayer is not a substitute for work, thinking, watching, suffering, or giving; prayer is a support for all other efforts. So says George Buttrick, quoted in Lloyd Cory, Quote Unquote. 1 There are some steps we can take to insure heavens packages are delivered to earth. Effectiveness is the goal but how do we get there?

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#S2-052: Light on Life Season 2 Review [Podcast]

Light on Life Season Reviews

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This is a special edition of the Light on Life podcast because it’s Season Two, Episode 52 which means two full years of Light on Life. And so that’s what we are going to celebrate today. We will look at year two in Review. We will detail the most downloaded episodes and posts for this past year as well as Season One. And finally, we will go into some direction for Season Three’s edition of Light on Life.

You can find the Season One Review here.

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Why Quantity Is Important in the Prayer Life

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Have you noticed that many times in the life of your prayer our conversations with God are more us talking at God than speaking to Him? You know if you walk up to a person and have a conversation with them and all you do is talk, talk, talk and the manner of that conversation is that way all that time, what do you think about that?” Would that annoy and disinterest you rather quickly? Prayer is a conversation between two beings that love each other. It’s a conversation not a monologue. Prayer is speaking and listening, that is what conversation is. You can become more effective in this essential Christian discipline by incorporating some practical steps into your everyday life.

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#S2-051: How to Cultivate Gods Presence in Your Life Encore [Podcast]

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The world is perishing for lack of the knowledge of God and the Church is famishing for want of His Presence. The instant cure of most of our religious ills would be to enter the Presence in spiritual experience, to become suddenly aware that we are in God and that God is in us. This would lift us out of our pitiful narrowness and cause our hearts to be enlarged 1. These are penetrating words from the pen of Tozer. Does your heart agree with these words? Do you hunger and crave the Presence of God? This is the first of a two part post on this important aspect of life in the Spirit.

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