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The Violence Of Faith, Part One | Nancy Dufresne | Jesus the Healer Broadcast
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Hi, I'm Nancy Dufresne. Welcome to our podcast channel. We know you'll be blessed by today's message.
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Turn with us, if you would, to Matthew chapter 11. And this passage has just been standing out to me in all actuality. I don't really get too far away from this passage because it's so important to the life of faith that we understand what is shown to us here. Matthew chapter 11. And in verse 12 and I going to read out of the King James, it says, and from the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence and the violent take it by force. The Amplified says, and from the days of John the Baptist until the present time, the kingdom of heaven has endured violent assault. Listen to the way the Amplified says this and and violent men seize it by force as a precious prize. A share in the heavenly kingdom is sought with most ardent zeal and intense exertion. So notice the very descriptive adjectives used that what does it mean when it says, the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence? The next phrase tells us the violent take it by force. So this is what the kingdom is offering us, that the blessings that belong to us, God's made available. It's waiting for you to take it. And this is where a lot of people miss it. They're just waiting for things to show up and God is waiting for us to take it. 20, 20, our best year yet won't just show up, we have to take it as our best year yet. And so the kingdom of heaven has made everything available for the taking. You know, if you'll remember over there in the Book of Revelations, there's one passage, one verse in there, and I don't have it noted right now, but it says, let all who will come and take the water of life freely. Notice this, it's flowing, but you have to approach it and take it. And if your life is not having some things that you know it should have, it's waiting for you to take it. It's not being withheld. God's not withholding. It is still waiting for for the one who takes it. And we realize that a passive approach to spiritual things will leave us without a casual approach will leave us in want, not because God's not providing for us, but because we've got to do our part of taking. And I can't over express how important that is in every season of your life, but even in this season when maybe your work hours have changed, maybe job opportunities have changed, well then there's other avenues for you to be taking. And so many times we can just settle back on the avenues that we're used to, the avenues that we've had flowing in our life. And if those changes, it doesn't matter. Our supply is still available for the taking. Our answers, our help are still available for the taking. So know this, faith people are people who take. And if you're not taking, you're not in faith. You might have faith, you might believe in faith, you might believe the word of God. But without taking, faith is inactive. And so I want to remind the church, family, our friends and partners who are watching, be a taker. A casual sit back approach will leave you without. And the devil loves to then accuse that God's not taking care of you, that something is lacking in this different social time, political time, economic time, that if you're doing without, the devil will say, see, this is just part of what's going on. Not for the taker. This is not part of what's going on for the person of faith who's taking. We keep increasing, we keep walking into more. It doesn't matter what economically, politically, socially, what's going on there should be increase, quit being okay with not having increase. And that's going to come because you took. Not because the government was all in place, not because social things were all back to normal. This has nothing to do. This taking that God offers us has nothing to do with society, has nothing to do with the economy or the politics of today. It has everything to do with what God made available. And Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever. Your supply is the same, your health is the same. The provision of heaven, it's the same. And it's waiting for those who have the violence to take it. Now let me say this. Have you ever seen children, I mean if we, I would say toddlers, but I've seen children older than toddlers do that. They will push one another around to get hold of the toy. I mean if there's one toy, if there's one treat, I mean, I gotta tell you this, I gotta tell you this story on my family growing up. I have two older brothers, one older sister. And my mother was always, she had such good common sense in raising the kids. And so there was one piece of pie left. Now, in a family of sugar takers, I mean our family, we were, you know, sugar is all four main food groups. You know, that was the mentality of our family. And mother made a pie one time and my brothers would have been about 12 and 13 years old. And so There was one piece of pie left, and they came in at the same time to get it. And so mother said to my oldest brother, said, you cut the piece of pie, and then the other brother chooses. You know, they're gonna half it. So the one who cuts it doesn't get to choose first. So therefore, you're gonna cut it straight. You know, you don't just cut the part you want, you cut it and then the other one chooses. So I guess they didn't trust their ability to cut it straight. So she said to my oldest brother, okay, you cut it. And the other brother, you choose. And he said, and the oldest one said, I'm not cutting it. He was afraid he couldn't cut it straight and he'd be robbed from having an equal piece. So then she said to the younger brother, she said, okay, now you cut it then and let the older one choose first. And he said, I'm not cutting first. Neither one of them wanted cutting. So my mother said to the oldest one, you're not going to cut it. And he says, no, Mother one said, she said to the other brother, you're not going to cut it. He says, no. She picked up that pie, shoved it in her mouth and walked off. Because if you're going to just sit back and wait for all the circumstances to be right, if you're just going to sit back and wait for somebody to do for you, the enemy will come and steal that. Now, Mother wasn't the enemy. I'm not saying that, but I'm trying to say you have to do your part. And if you won't do your part, someone else will do their part and they'll get your portion. And I want you to know there's a lot of things that were intended for others that people who took got hold of first. And you say, well, is it true that something that was intended for me, someone else could end up with? Remember the one who was given talents, one was given one talent, one was given five talents, one was given ten talents, and the one who had the ten talents, and he multiplied that. He caused that to increase. The master said, take from the one who had the one talent and give it to the one who had the 10. Why? Because if somebody is not going to be responsible and active toward what God's provided, God's going to still make sure his blessings work for somebody. And if you're not going to take it, somebody that will take it will get the blessing of it. And so I'm just saying there's just something in Me, that is just reminding me of we have got to be active toward what God has made available. It's not enough to believe it in the sense of knowing what he's provided. You have to be aggressive and notice what the amplified says, the adjectives it uses. It says that violent men seize it by force. What's he talking about? Is he talking about physical force? Absolutely not. He's talking about the force of faith. So faith is a force that will win. Faith is a force that will not let go. Faith is a force that will hold a grip. As I was saying, you get toddlers or you get younger kids and they're fighting over the same toy. The person who won't let go is the one who wins. The person who lets go or waits for mama to come and do something and take the toy away and hand it to them, they're going to end up doing without because somebody is going to. Somebody's going to be present that's going to want it more than you. Let me just say this. The one who gets it is the one who wants it most. And I will say this. If the devil wants to rob from you more than you want to take, he'll rob it. I'm going to say that again. If the devil will rob from you and if he wants to rob it more than you want to take it, he ends up with it, not you. He's a thief. He will steal from you what belongs to you. And so you have to make sure that you're taking because there is a thief that will make sure he'll rob from you what you do not lay hold of. And so the kingdom of heaven, it says it suffereth violence is what the King James says. Well, what's that mean? That means that it allows, it permits violence. And what kind of violence? The violence of faith. A faith that just goes after something and won't let it go until it lays hold and sees it come into manifestation. A casual half hearted approach will never receive all God makes available. So many Christians are just half hearted. Listen. It's easy for the flesh to lull you into half heartedness. It's easy for the flesh to just sit back and take the easy way, the coasting way. I remember years ago, oh my goodness, probably about 35 years ago now. I awoke one night, I had gone to bed about, oh about 11 o' clock or so. No, excuse me, it was about 10 o' clock because I woke up at midnight and when I did, every flu symptom was on me and I just laid there in the bed. And I, you know, I rebuked half heartedly, I resisted half heartedly, you know what I'm talking about? To where I didn't disturb myself, I didn't have to get up out of bed, I didn't do anything inconveniencing myself. And so as I was laying there doing this half hearted rebuke, hoping something would show up, the spirit of God spoke to me and said, now would be a good time to do what you preach. And I go, oh, he nailed me, you know, because why, when you don't feel like you want to do something, you better make sure you're not walking by what you feel. And so I knew that, man, I'm going to have to get up and violate this thing. And I tell you, physically, I was so nauseated that every movement stirred that nausea to where you didn't want to move because of the nausea that was present with it. And so I got up out of bed and I tell you, you know, when you're partially asleep and your body wants to fall back to sleep and your body feels bad, I did this, I just knew I've got to get out of this bedroom because if I stay, I'm going to fall back in that bed. Why? Because it's so easy to fall back into. What's easy? And so I got up, I went downstairs and I started walking around the coffee table. And I tell you, I could not even stand up straight. The pain was so bad in my abdomen area that I was bent over like this and I was walking and you know, in the middle of the night, how spiritual do you feel? I mean, really, you know, when your body is hurting, how spiritual do you feel? But it's not about what you feel. It's about a force that's on the inside of you that you have to stir up. You know. And Paul told Timothy, stir up the gift that's on the inside of you. Well, the Holy Ghost is in you. And he was referring, stir up what the Holy Ghost has put in you. The Holy Ghost deposited a measure of faith in you at the new birth. It's in you now. You have hopefully been feeding that measure of faith and causing it to grow. Stir it up. Everything that's in your spirit has to be stirred. If not, you will just lay back casually and wait half heartedly for something to show up. And so I knew I had to just stir myself up because my body didn't feel like doing the right thing. My body didn't feel like engaging in some kind of taking action. But I knew this violating the way my body feels now is better than being sick for days or weeks. And so I got up and I was walking around that coffee table. And as I said, I was stooped over. You ever been that way physically where you feel so bad you don't even feel like you can stand up straight? And I was walking around that coffee table, and I would say this. I'm of the household of faith. Now, why did I say that? To earn something? No, to remind me to stir me to start doing something that was aggressive. Faith is aggressive. And if you're not aggressive, you haven't reached the flow of faith yet. And so I was walking around that table, and I would say to myself, and I'd say it under my breath, I'm of the household of faith. In the household of faith, there's no sickness. There is absolutely none. So I refuse to have to be a partaker of something that's not of the household I'm a part of. And that was just. That was the scripture that the holy ghost seemed to prompt in me. Can I tell you this? When you go to do some taking, follow the direction of the spirit. He'll prompt you what scripture to use in your taking. He'll prompt you in a direction of where you should set your faith. Follow the holy ghost in this. And so I was just saying that scripture. I'm of the household of faith. In the household of faith, there's no sickness. And if I'm found with something that doesn't belong to my household, that makes me wrong. I'm a thief to have something that doesn't belong to me. I will not be a thief allowing something in my household that's from a different household. Satan, sicknesses of your household, not God's household. And so for me to permit it in this household makes me as wrong as you are. And I will not be found with something wrong in this household of faith. What was I do? What was I doing? I was stirring myself up. Because faith, in the middle of the night, your faith can seem very dormant. You've got to stir it up. In a time when we're under the different kind of government restrictions we're at right now, your faith can go real dormant towards spiritual things because you can just get lulled into the news of what's going on. You have to stir yourself up and say, not me. This is my best year yet. And I'm so glad God told us in the midst of a year like this. He knew about this coming. He knew about that the rest the of restrictions would be up on us. He knew that the avenues for your income may change. He knew that. And he already told you what to do. He already told you what to say. This is our best year yet. That's to me so impressive because he didn't say anything in previous years like that phrase. And that phrase was reserved for this year. That is so different. And I'm just so grateful that he saw what was coming and said now just because everything's so different. Greatness still belongs to this year. This is our best year yet. The best is for us this year. But it won't just be because you go to this church. It won't just be because you're a Christian. It'll be because you take will be because you take it. So here I was in my den, walking around that coffee table. And after I just used my authority. I told Satan to take his hands off. I told that sickness to leave my body. And after that I just started worshiping God. So for the next 20 minutes, that's all I did. I just worshiped God. Do you know that worship is one way you take Worshiping God is a taking action. First of all, use your authority. Tell the devil to take his hands off something. Because why does he put his hands on something? He wants to take it. Why does he put his hands on. You know what symptoms are. It's the Devil putting his hands on your health. He wants to take your health from you. And so you have to first of all use your authority. Speak what the word says. But then after that, worship is still you taking. And so after I had resisted the devil, then I started just worshiping God, walking around. And I tell you what, I couldn't stand up any straighter. But I started worshiping God, worshiped my healer. What was it? What was I doing? I was focusing not on what I was feeling, but on what I was on. The one I was receiving something from, the one I was taking, the one that. And when we say this word take, don't fall into the thinking that God is withholding and you have to coerce it out of his hands like he's holding it out like this. And every time you go to reach for it, he takes it back so that you have to try to, with effort, take it from him. No, it's not taking from him. He's already made it available. It's already left his hand for your life. But the devil is the one who puts in hindrances. Your taking is to get past the Hindrances, your taking is to get past the opposition. You're not taking it because God's withholding. You're taking it because there's going to be opposition to what God has already released toward your life. And you have to reach past that opposition and take it from opposition, take it from hindrances that show up. Take it from wrong thinking, take it from wrong feelings, you know. And so when I was worshiping, I didn't feel any different. But what I was doing, the worship, helped me focus on. On the one who already made it available to me so that I wasn't approaching this with, I'm trying to get something. I'm approaching it as he's already made it mine. I tell you what, the moment you release faith, power always starts moving in your direction. The moment you release faith, not when it shows up did power get released, but the moment you released your faith and took with the hand of faith, you say, how? Pastor Nancy? How can I take something I can't see? By the hand of faith. You cannot see the hand of faith, but the hand of faith that's invisible to you is for laying hold of the things that are invisible to you. And so with the hand of faith, you take it and so you don't let go of it. And your worship, after you lay your hand of faith on it, your worship. If I could say this is you reeling that back toward your life. I remember growing up, my. My sister and I would go fishing with my dad. He had some creeks on his property, and we would go down and we would go fishing, and we would throw that bait out, you know, on the hook. And we always had a bobber, you know, on our. Because we were younger, and so we liked watching to see if that bobber went down, if that fish was on the end of it. And you could always feel when you hooked it, when a fish got on that, it felt different than when that bait was just sitting in the water waiting for something. Can I tell you this? Faith can tell when it hooks something, even though it hasn't seen it yet, you can tell whether or not you hooked that thing. With your faith, how do you know if you have hooked it or not? If you try to believe it with your mind, you're not hooking anything. And you can tell because you're clamoring, you're grasping, you're trying to. Sometimes you might feel a bit overwhelmed. That's because you haven't hooked it yet. It takes faith that comes out of your heart. You have to quiet the mind and you have to with your heart, lay hold of things, take it. But once we would feel and you could even see that bobber going up and down, that would show us that we had a fish on there, we still did not enjoy the fish. As long as it's still on the hook, we had to reel it in. Worship is you reeling in what you hooked with your faith. And so you cast out your words of faith. You hook what God already made available to you. And you know this. When we would hook something, you know that there we would see turtles in the water. They would come up and they'd try to get at that feet fish that you just hooked, then nip at it or whatever. That's the exact same way when you hook something, devil's always trying to nip at that, get it off your hook of faith is what he's trying to do. He'll try to steal it from you. He'll try to steal what you hooked with your faith. It hasn't shown up yet, but it's still, it's moving toward your life, you know, I'm so certain, I'm so assured that I've hooked it with my faith. I know even though I can't see it yet, I know I've hooked it. Well, the devil will send all kinds of things. He'll send thoughts of doubt. He'll send sometimes an opportunity to be offended with somebody. He'll send. He'll remind you of an unforgiveness thing, you know, trying to get you into unforgiveness towards somebody. What is that? All of those things are things he tries to eat away at what you hooked with your faith. He's trying to steal it off the hook of faith. So it's your job, though, to keep reeling it in. Don't fall prey to any of that. If there was something nibbling at the fish that we caught, the way to secure it is keep reeling it in. Well, worship is how you reel it in. After I hooked it with my faith, that healing that God had already provided for me by worshiping, I was reeling that thing in. And you know, when you reel it in, you don't just spin that reel once you spin it over and over and over. How many times you have to spin it depends on how far your hook is out there. How long do I have to worship it depends on how far your words have pushed your answer from you. Or it just depends on how bad you want it. If you reel it part of the way and go, oh, my goodness, I've Been reeling here for 30 seconds. And you get tired of reeling and you lay your pole down, you could lose your pole. You won't just lose your fish, you lose your pole, too. That thing will swim off with your pole Just because you started reeling it in. Don't quit. How do you know? How long do I have to. How long do I have to reel? Till the thing's in your hand. Till the thing's in manifestation. Till it manifests. That's why dad hagin, after, he would lay hands on people and he would know we hooked your healing. The healing belongs to you. That power is working in you right now. No, it hasn't manifested, but you've hooked that thing. And he would say, keep the switch of faith turned on. What is he saying? Keep reeling. Keep reeling. You've hooked it. Keep reeling until that thing manifests in your body. This is all part of taking. This is all part of taking. So here I was. I was worshiping God. That was what I was doing. I was taking. And so after the end of 20 minutes of worshiping God, all of a sudden, something dropped in my spirit. I mean, I can't. I don't know how to say it. It was just. I didn't feel anything physically, but I felt it tangibly in my spirit. It's like that coin that dropped in the vending machine. Something clicked. I got it. And then I knew this. Well, since I got it, I'm going to bed. It's now, you know, well, after midnight. I'm going to bed. And so as I got up to go up the stairs to go get back in bed, this thought came to me. You better stay down here and worship till it manifests or you don't have it yet. And I stopped a moment, and I considered what those words says. And I said, no, in here. I got it. If I stay down here and keep worshiping supposedly in faith, it's going to be an act to say, I don't believe I have it. See, the devil will use real subtle deceits. What was he trying to do? He was trying to get me in the mental arena because it hadn't shown up in the physical. He was trying to get me to get in the mental arena. And he would even use an act of worship to get you in the mental arena. Why? Because in my spirit, I knew I had it. And it's time to go to bed. But if I do something different than what the spirit was leading me to, now I'm following my mind and not my spirit. And then the devil has a place of entrance to steal from you what you laid hold of. So I went off and I went to bed. I still had every symptom in my body. And all of a sudden I was awakened. I looked at my clock. It was 1:00. It was 1:00. The morning and I was awakened. Why? Because I felt something touch me. I felt physically, a hand touch me. And the moment I did, I felt every symptom. Shh. Just leave my body. Why was it? Because I didn't just lay in bed and wait for something to show up. I took it. And I want you to know that God has the best year yet for us. But it won't be by us just sitting in our church chair, sitting in our chair at home. It won't just be us just sitting and just knowing that the Word is true. It's going to be by us taking it. The kingdom of heaven invites violence. And you will have in the year 2020 what you took. So I'm just saying. And December will show us what we took. So start taking every day. Every day, every day. Be a taker with your mouth, with your worship. Be a taker every day. Don't just. And wait for God to dump something on you. Take what he made. Yours. Amen. Hallelujah.
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