Destined to Reign (31 page)

Similarly, when you think that you can still save yourself, God’s grace cannot flow. If you mix law and grace, both will “drown” and you will lose BOTH. In other words, the person who is “drowning” must
know
that he is drowning and that he cannot save himself. (Now, isn’t that a deep revelation!) Only when he gives up on his efforts can grace come and rescue him. Jesus had no effect on the Pharisees precisely because they thought that they were self-sufficient in their law-keeping and saw no need for the Savior. They had no revelation that they were drowning!

Falling From Grace

Paul told the Galatians, “Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are
fallen from grace
.”
8
This is the true definition of “falling from grace”. Today, when someone sins, ministers say that the person has “fallen from grace”. But Paul
never
told the Corinthians that they had fallen from grace despite all their sins. To fall from grace then is to fall into the law. Notice that grace is the high ground. When you are under the law, you have fallen from your high ground of grace. In the ark of the covenant, the mercy seat is positioned
above
the Ten Commandments. You fall from grace when you go back to the Ten Commandments.

The law makes everything of man’s efforts, while grace gives all the glory to God. That is why Paul told the Galatians that the gospel is not a man-pleasing gospel
9
. He was essentially saying, “If I want to please man, I would be preaching the law.” Legalistic people react when they hear that they can no longer boast in their self-efforts to keep the law. The only people who appreciate grace are those who have come to the end of themselves, to the end of their own efforts to save themselves. They have tried over and over again until they have finally given up and admitted that they cannot meet the law’s unyielding standard. That’s the time when they are ready to receive God’s undeserved favor — His saving grace.

We are all against sin, but grace is the power to get out of sin.

My friend, we are all against sin, but grace is the power to get out of sin. The more entangled you get with the law, the more the law will stir up sin in you. The law was designed to expose sin. It is sad that many preachers refuse to accept the gospel of grace until they themselves are caught in sin. Only when they find themselves ensnared by sin do they realize that only grace can give them true power over sin. This is what Paul asserted when he said, “For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.”
10

The good news is, you can embrace the grace of our Lord TODAY and have dominion over sin TODAY!

My Journey Toward Understanding Grace

By the way, in case you are wondering,
I was not introduced to the gospel of grace because of any moral sin
. The Lord revealed His grace to me through my own struggles against all the erroneous teachings I had received in my youth. I heard so much legalistic preaching that I really believed that I had lost my salvation. I believed that I had committed the unpardonable sin of blaspheming the Holy Spirit. I would walk down the streets evangelizing to people, all the while thinking that I had lost my salvation. I did this because I had hoped that one day, those whom I had witnessed to would go to heaven and God would ask them, “How did you get saved?” and they would say, “By someone called Joseph Prince.” Then, God would realize that I was in hell and He would remember me. I really believed that! I tried with all my might, all my strength and all my vigor to keep the law. I was confessing all my sins almost every waking minute, until my mind nearly snapped. It was only until I came to the end of myself that I saw the need for my beautiful Savior Jesus Christ, and it was He who opened my eyes to the new covenant of grace. Well, that was my journey toward discovering the gospel of grace. So my friend, I know what it means to be under the law. I have first-hand experience of the impossibility of keeping the law and it has led me to Christ, just as Paul said that it would.

It Is Time To Leave Babylon

Beloved, mixing law and grace is dangerous. It will cause you to live in confusion. It will cause you to think that God is sometimes pleased with you, but at other times angry with you. Confusion makes you believe that the same God who can heal you today may also punish you with a disease the next day. Mixture leads to confusion and God is not the author of confusion. But praise be to God, the Gospel Revolution is setting God’s people free all around the world.

I see the body of Christ coming out of Babylon. The word “Babylon” means “confusion by mixing”
11
, and I see the church coming out of the bondage of mixture and confusion. Hallelujah! The church has been in Babylon for too long, but it is coming out.

My friend, it is time for you to come out of mixture and confusion. Choose either the covenant of grace or the covenant of law. Either you enjoy the blessings of the Lord through His undeserved, unearned and unmerited favor, or you trust in your own efforts and your own behavior to deserve, earn and merit favors from the Lord. You cannot hold on to both. I pray that you will choose the first. Come out of Babylon and enjoy the abundance of His grace today!

Chapter 21: The Secret To Great Faith

Have you ever felt like you needed more faith? Have you ever looked at yourself and told yourself that if you just had more faith, you would see your financial breakthrough or healing?

My friend, I have good news for you today: Faith is not a struggle. The
hearing of faith
and the
works of the law
are total opposites. And since the law is about our self-efforts,
there is no self-effort in faith
.

I give thanks to God for my roots in the Word of Faith teachings. It is truly on the shoulders of great men of God like Brother Kenneth E Hagin that we are able to see further into the Word of God today. Growing up, I learned a lot about faith from Brother Hagin who truly had a special revelation of faith from the Lord. I deeply honor and respect him for all that he has taught me.

However, after many generations of faith teachings, there are people who have turned faith into a work. Have you heard people saying, “Oh, this thing happened to you because you don’t have enough faith” or “Oh, you have to have great faith to see that breakthrough”? I don’t know how you feel when you hear things like that, but I always felt condemned for not having more faith.

The Ministry Of Disqualification

For years, my ministry was a ministry that disqualified people. I would preach, “The reason you are sick is that there is something wrong with you.” I would teach on “the seven reasons” why people were not getting healed, and the more I preached along those lines, the more I saw our people not getting healed. I would tell my congregation, “There’s nothing wrong with God, nothing wrong with His Word, so there must be something wrong with you!” I thought that this was good preaching because it was what I heard other preachers preaching as well. But one day, as I was preaching like this, I heard the Lord speaking to me on the inside. He said, “Stop disqualifying My people! My blood has already qualified them. Stop disqualifying them!”

There’s nothing wrong with God, nothing wrong with the Word and through the blood of Jesus, nothing wrong with you! Receive your miracle!

Now, I know that faith is the opposite of the law, and that the more people become self-conscious, and the more they look at their self-efforts to receive from the Lord, the more faith is depleted from them. So when the Lord opened my eyes to grace, I changed what I was preaching entirely and I began to declare to my people, “There’s nothing wrong with God, nothing wrong with the Word and guess what? Through the blood of Jesus, there’s
nothing wrong with you
! Receive your miracle!”

Hallelujah! Once I stopped pointing the people to what was wrong with them and pointed instead to
what was right with them because of Jesus
, faith was imparted and we began to experience an explosion of healing miracles like never before. Cancers were healed, tumors were supernaturally removed and lives were transformed. That is what happens when believers know that they have been made righteous by the blood of Jesus. They begin to understand that they have the blood-bought right to be healed, to experience financial breakthroughs and to enjoy restoration in their marriages!

Faith no longer becomes a barrier to receiving God’s promises. People stop thinking that they are unable to receive breakthroughs because they do not have enough faith. No way! When believers catch the revelation that there is nothing wrong with God, nothing wrong with His Word and by His grace, nothing wrong with them, guess what? Something happens to their faith. They begin to see more of Jesus. They begin to become more and more conscious of Jesus having been crucified on their behalf. And the more they see what Jesus has done for them, the more they see what Jesus has QUALIFIED them for, the more faith springs up within them and miracles break forth. Hallelujah!

Beloved, you don’t have to wish that you had more faith for whatever miracle you are asking God for right now. See Jesus on the cross for you, and the faith you need to face any situation or challenge will come into your life. Just look to Jesus! He is the author and finisher of faith
1
. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of Christ. The more of Jesus you hear, the more faith rises in your heart. Get hold of teachings that preach all about Jesus and His finished work. There is no power in human philosophy or the traditions of man, but there is power in the gospel of Jesus Christ!

I received a powerful testimony of a lady in our church who just sat in one of my services, hearing Jesus being preached. There was no laying on of hands or any specific prayer for the sick that day. But when she went home that evening, she passed out a cyst that had been in her body for months. All praise and glory to Jesus! God confirms His Word through signs and wonders. When people hear the gospel of Jesus, faith is imparted and healing flows.

The Secret To Receiving Your Miracle

I attended a conference years ago and I remember hearing about all kinds of things that we had to do to work the miracles of God. For instance, we were told that we had to pray long prayers. Please don’t misunderstand me. I am not saying that I don’t believe in praying. I love going to my Abba in prayer. I have also taught our church about the importance of praying, especially praying in tongues. But is the secret to having miracles take place in your life found in praying?

I have also heard people saying that the key to miracles is found in fasting 40 days and 40 nights.

“Pastor Prince, I would have you know that Jesus fasted 40 days and 40 nights!”

Well, that was Jesus. The question we should be asking is, “Did Jesus tell us to fast?” Now, I know that when Jesus’ disciples were unable to cast out a certain spirit from a boy, the NKJV (as well as the KJV) Bible does record that Jesus, in reference to the spirit, said, “This kind can come out by nothing but prayer and fasting.”
2
So people have read this one verse and concluded that the secret to spiritual power is fasting. But do you know that in the original Greek text, the word “fasting” does not appear in that verse
3
? It was added by the translators! And if you look at the NASB and NIV translations, you won’t find the word “fasting” in that verse.

In 1 Corinthians, when Apostle Paul said that husbands and wives should not deprive each other of sexual relations “except with consent for a time, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer”
4
. Again, after reading this one verse from Paul, people have run off saying that the secret to spiritual power is to abstain from intimate relations with your spouse! Now, if you check the original Greek text (or the NASB and NIV translations), the word “fasting” does not appear here either
5
!

If you are curious about what Paul was really talking about, then let me tell you that he was actually encouraging husbands and wives to have a healthy sex life, and not to deprive each other of sexual pleasure. God wants you to enjoy your marriage, and when you do, the Word of God declares that the devil will have no room to tempt you. In the same verse, Paul tells husbands and wives to “come together again so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control”. Think of it this way: After a man has eaten at home, he wouldn’t be hungry anymore when he goes out with his friends. (He who has ears, let him hear!)

Throughout the New Testament, Paul hardly spoke about fasting. Yet, the body of Christ has somehow managed to make man’s own works (like fasting) the main emphasis. Paul’s emphasis was the new covenant of grace, but instead of focusing on understanding the new covenant, people are obsessed with doing! They are saying, “Forget about grace. Just tell me what to do.”