A Testimony of Freedom!
(From during our time at Iris Harvest School in Africa, 2014. The tool we used for Healing and Deliverance ministry is called Restoring the Foundations, and it’s something I still love, have grown in, highly recommend, and use regularly in my life!)
Hi everyone! Sam here. God told me to share one of my testimonies from last week’s healing and deliverance time. It’s a bit lengthy, but it’s gold from Jesus and I have to give Him glory! I hope it encourages one of you!
Jesus is deliverer! That was such a normal part of His ministry, and He wants it to be a normal part of ours.
2 1/2 years ago, I had a traumatic event which affected my everyday life from that point on. I talked to some people about what I was dealing with, and we prayed, but I still dealt with the issue. It was choking out life, and I felt like I was losing my calling, that I was no longer equipped. It was so debilitating that I was embarrassed to talk about it, and no matter the conversation, no matter the well-meaning prayers, it was still oppressing my life.
On our way back from our honeymoon, John and I encountered a very surprising, severe bout of turbulence in the airplane. I have never been afraid of flying – in fact, I’ve always quite enjoyed it! It sounds so silly typed out, but what happened in those moments, when I was looking in the eyes of my new husband, thinking I was about to lose him and my own life, haunted me. I was upset at God that He let that happen on our honeymoon. I experienced post-traumatic stress, nightmares about airplane crashes and dying, uncontrollable imaginations about death scenarios while driving or just out and about or lying in my bed at night. It’s one of those issues that seemed so big and shameful that I didn’t want to tell anyone. I also had this extreme ungodly belief that if I exposed my issue, that I would risk for others to “catch” my fear or I would give it more power. Those few I did tell prayed and offered their best godly consult, but I still dealt with this traumatic fear and oppression. It was a cycle I couldn’t escape. I couldn’t “pray through it” or push through it or muster up enough spiritual mojo to combat it until it was gone.
The worst part is that I felt like my calling couldn’t be mine anymore. I convinced myself that maybe I could just stay where I was forever and get by in life so I could be safe and sound, even though I knew that’s not what John signed up for as my husband. Everything I thought I had heard God say about my life – loving different cultures, being a “border-crosser”, singing nations to their freedom – seemed childish and ludicrous to my mind. But in my heart, I knew that I wouldn’t be satisfied with my made-up “safe” life. God doesn’t want us to just get by in life! He doesn’t intend that we just “push through” our issues while He sits on the sidelines scoring our game plays. Jesus died so we could have life abundantly!! And He wants to heal us intimately, not distantly!
As we prepared for Harvest School by reading and watching through the Restoring the Foundations material, I started to get excited that Jesus really did want me to be healed of my fear! And let me just say – He made it SO clear that we were supposed to attend HS this fall that I had to be obedient, even obedient to the point of taking 4 airplanes to get here. It was a battle, an exhausting battle in my mind every minute of every hour of those 19 hours of being up in the air, but He gave me such grace and assurance. He comforted me and assured me that my healing was coming. He cared about my fear and had grace for my struggling! Thank you Jesus! It’s easier to say no but it’s SAFER TO SAY YES when Jesus tells you to do something!
As the week of healing unfolded, Jesus and I recovered some important legal ground which the enemy had in my life. I had never heard of “legal ground” before, but the enemy CAN have it even in the life of a believer – not to “possess” but to “oppress.” The enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy, and he uses whatever open doors he can to oppress God’s people, to deflect them from their call and debilitate their lives.
Restoring the Foundations is a Biblical Healing & Deliverance ministry which uses an integrated approach to appropriate the blood of Jesus and receive freedom! They focus on 4 main problem areas: Sins of the Fathers and resulting curses, Ungodly Beliefs, Soul/Spirit hurts, and Demonic Oppression. We split it up between 2 days, 2 problem areas for each day. Here’s my brief story for each!
We closed ancestral doors of fear and idolatry and cut off those curses in Jesus’ name. This legal transaction was easy and so powerful, and took away legal ground from the enemy in my life. God and I replaced ancestral sins with new ancestral blessings – that my descendants would have a permanent place of belonging in the Kingdom of God, freedom, peace, joy, abundant life. Then, Jesus revealed some ungodly beliefs that I had been agreeing with in my head and heart. What we focus on before God is an idol, and it’s also what we have faith for. Yipes. My fear was an idol before God and agreeing with those fears was having faith for what I was fearing. I was so humbled and convicted, and God was faithful and just to forgive me, AND He gave me new Godly beliefs based on His perfect Word to agree with! I want to share them!
I am God’s child! He loves me and will never abandon me. I will always put my trust in God, and He will keep me safe and protect me because I am His beloved daughter!” (Jeremiah 29:11, Ps. 23, Ps. 4, Prov. 3:5-6, Ps. 139: 7-12, Ps. 16:8-11)
I am a jewel of great price to Jesus, precious and irreplaceable. I am not designed to be hidden away, but enjoyed by God and others. He designed me to have a unique purpose. I choose to unlock the box and no longer hide in fear, but come out and shine! (Prov. 3, Isaiah 61, Zechariah 9: 16-17, Ps. 139, Matt. 5:14, Col. 3, Matthew 13:44-46)
THEN – this was one of the sweetest parts to me – Jesus came into specific hurts in my life and healed those painful moments. There is a difference between forgiveness and healing. We asked the Holy Spirit to reveal a specific memory Jesus wanted to heal. We invited Jesus into the memory, and He redeemed them. It was SO POWERFUL! Jesus was active in those memories and revealed some awesome things. Like in my childhood home, Jesus was sitting at the piano playing a song. I asked him what the song was, and He said He made music before the foundations of the earth, and these songs were just for me. He was always there with me. In another memory, He was giving me blueprints and what I thought I was doing on my own, He had actually given me the blueprints for – I just didn’t know it. It was an extremely personal experience but I just wanted to share a bit about that to say – Jesus cares about hurts we think are insignificant, are justified, or maybe we think are already “dealt with.” He is thorough in His love
THEN – It came to deliverance day. And I was so aware that this struggle with fear was a real struggle with demonic oppression in my life. The enemy was trying to kill, steal, and destroy, and he came in all the ways he could to stand his ground. But since we had obliterated the only legal ground the oppressors could stand on, now I could clean house in Jesus’ name and with His authority and my authority as a believer. Can I just say how empowering this was?! So we cast out those demons of fear – fear of flying, fear of death, torment, dread – and they had to obey! It was a beautiful experience, so full of grace and peace and Jesus, and FREEDOM! I immediately felt a release of pressure in my mind and off my chest. Since then, Jesus has been redeeming the call He has purposed for my life. Like the steady rush of blood to a place that has been numbed, He has begun to bring heat and life and excitement into my identity and my calling. I look to the future and smile at the things to come!
THANK YOU JESUS for your finished work on the cross and for healing and delivering us so that we could be filled with more of you!