Faith’s Voice

You cannot be saved simply by believing that Jesus died for your sins and rose again.  There is another step involved in receiving your salvation.

Romans 10:9-10:
that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.  For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

You must confess the Lord Jesus with your mouth. The term confess has confused some people because they think of confession as something you do in a confessional, or as only applying to acknowledging your sins. But confessing the Lord Jesus means to acknowledge His lordship in your life before men.

Luke 12:8:
Also, I say to you, whoever confesses Me before men, him the Son of Man also will confess before the angels of God.

There is no such thing as a closet Christian.  If you are unwilling to tell anyone who asks that Jesus Christ is your Lord, you are not saved.

Your words determine your destiny!

Matthew 12:37:
For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.

Proverbs 18:21:
Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.

What most of the church world misses is that you receive the blessings of your covenant the same way you receive the new birth.  You believe with your heart and you speak (confess) with your mouth.  If you want to receive healing, you must not only believe that Jesus Christ took your sicknesses in His own body for you, but you must also confess that by His stripes you were healed.  It does no good to believe that Jesus did something for you and then refuse to acknowledge it with your mouth, or worse yet, speak contrary to the Word.  Salvation includes healing and well-being in every area of your life. If you want to receive healing (the physical part of salvation), you must believe you receive it and then say that you have it.

Most Christians unwittingly nullify their prayers. They say, “Lord, I receive my healing now” (if they even know to pray that!), but then they go out and talk about how sick and miserable they are. That doesn’t work!

It is sometimes said, “You can have what you say,” but that isn’t quite accurate.  Jesus said that you will have what you say!  Unfortunately, that works in both directions. If you believe and say the wrong things that contradict the Bible, you will still end up with them. If you believe and say the right things, you will end up with them. This principle isn’t just for believers – it works for anyone – “whosoever”!

Mark 11:23:
For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, “Be removed and be cast into the sea,” and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says.

You don’t just get what you believe – you get what you say.  It is critical that you say what God says.  Make your words agree with the Bible.

The devil will put pressure on you to speak contrary to the Bible. He will try to get you to say, “I guess I’m not healed after all,” “See, that faith stuff doesn’t really work,” and so on. But Jesus said that faith works and you will have what you say.  Can you see why the devil wants you to say words of unbelief? He knows you will have what you say! If you speak the Word, you will get the result promised you by the Word. If you speak contrary to the Word, you will not get what the Word says you can have.

Remember, the devil cannot defeat you because you have already overcome him. You already have victory and authority over him and all his demons.  He was stripped of his power 2000 years ago. He does not have the power to beat you!  But you have the power to defeat yourself, and the devil knows it.  How do you defeat yourself? With your mouth! If the devil can get you thinking contrary to the Bible, he will get you to speak contrary to the Bible, and you will have something other than what the Bible says is yours. Believing, speaking and receiving works in both directions – good or bad.

God promised in Jeremiah 1:12, “I will hasten My word to perform it.”  This can also be translated, “I am watching my word to perform it,” or “I am ready to perform my word.” But where will that word come from?  Yes, God has already spoken it, but God gave man authority on the earth to determine what happens here. (If God were running everything, there would be no wars, murders, racism, envy, etc..) For God to have the legal right to move in certain ways, He needs a man to cooperate and agree with him.  (The same is true of the devil – he can’t just run around and do what he wants; he needs men to agree with him and cooperate with him.) It is up to man to speak God’s word – to return it to Him.

Isaiah 55:11:
So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; it shall not return to me void, but it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

God’s will does not get done automatically.  (If it did, why did Jesus say to pray for His will to be done on earth as it is in heaven?) He needs man to speak and believe His word to give him the legal right to move. Here is an important Scripture on this subject – you should know this one so that you have an answer the next time someone asks you, “If God is in control of the earth, why are so many bad things happening?” Answer: Because He gave man authority over the earth.

Psalm 115:16: The heaven, even the heavens, are the Lord’s, but the earth He has given to the children of men.

Also,

Genesis 1:26:
Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

Want to put some angels to work for you? They are listening for God’s Word, and they will perform it when they hear it.  So speak God’s Word out of your mouth, and you will commission angels to go out there and perform it. But if you’re speaking something other than God’s Word, they have nothing to perform!

Psalm 103:20:
Bless the Lord, you His angels, who excel in strength, who do His word, heeding the voice of His word.

As we saw in the previous lesson, James said that he would prove his faith by his works, and that faith without works is dead. If you are unwilling to testify to anyone that you have received your healing, for example, you have not really received it at all!  If you really believe, you will speak what you believe:

2 Corinthians 4:13:
And since we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, “I believed and therefore I spoke,” we also believe and therefore speak.

Many Christians kid themselves into thinking they have received their healing, but they don’t want to tell anyone they did because they are afraid of looking silly when the healing doesn’t manifest.  They want to play it safe and make sure that their healing has manifested in the natural before they tell anyone else they have it. Hedging your bets in this manner is not faith. If you really believe you have received something, you will have no problem telling others that you have received it.  If you’re afraid to speak, you don’t really believe you have it.

Jesus said in Matthew 15:11 that it’s not what you put into your mouth that defiles you, it’s what comes out of your mouth! James said that if you can control your tongue, you can rule your entire body (James 3:2). But James also warns that your tongue can set the course of nature on fire (James 3:6). He likens your tongue to the rudder on a ship – it’s small, but it controls the whole ship!  Your mouth controls your life.  You will never have more than you are willing to confess before men with your mouth.

There are some people who think they have a badge to be the local Confession Sheriff, and anytime a Christian makes a “bad confession,” they are ready to pounce and say, “Don’t say that!  That’s a bad confession!” But such people are more annoying than they are helpful. Telling people to quit saying the wrong thing is no better than telling a sinner to quit sinning and get his act together.  The problem is usually that the person doesn’t have the Word in his heart to a sufficient degree, and so he speaks unbelief because unbelief is in his heart. The solution is not to badger people about their bad confessions, but to keep giving them the Word so that faith will come by hearing it, and eventually they will speak the Word when they really believe it.

Matthew 12:34:
Brood of vipers! How can you, being evil, speak good things?  For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.

If you want to fix your confession, fix what’s going into your heart.  If you don’t like where you are spiritually, change your spiritual diet! Trying to fix your words without changing what’s in your heart is like putting a band-aid on a broken arm – it isn’t going to fix anything.

Confession & Faith Quiz: Are the people who make these statements in faith? Why or why not?

 

• 1. I think God is going to heal me.
• 2. I am 100% sure that God is going to heal me.
• 3. I received my healing and I am standing on the Word.
• 4. My friends and I are in agreement that God will heal me by next Tuesday.
• 5. I have symptoms in my body, but I am still healed by the stripes of Jesus.
• 6. I feel better, so I know God heard my prayer to receive healing.
• 7. I have received my healing but it has not manifested yet.
• 8. I forgave everyone, and I am asking God to do something about my healing right now while I’m praying.
• 9. God is going to make the devil stop afflicting me with this sickness.
• 10. Jesus already paid for the healing of my back problems.
• 11. The Bible says that by Jesus’ stripes I am healed now.
• 12. I have thrown away all my medicine before I feel any different.
• 13. Doubts are trying to come to my mind, but I am standing on what God says about my healing.
• 14. Hands were laid on me by faith in the name of Jesus, therefore I shall recover.
• Answers:

1. No, there are two problems here:  (1) Faith doesn’t “think,” it KNOWS because it is the certainty of things unseen.  (2) “God is going to heal me” is future tense, proving that the person has not yet received anything.

• 2. No, this would fool more people, but “God is going to heal me” still means that the person has yet to receive his healing by faith.
• 3. Yes, this is fine, even if you don’t feel like you have received anything yet!
• 4. No, you’re only in faith if you have received. Saying that you will receive is hope, not faith.
• 5. Yes, this is good way to put it when you sneeze and the person in the next seat “consoles” you by telling you how awful you sound and look.
• 6. Feelings have nothing to do with faith – faith is not moved by feelings even if they are contrary to what it receives!
• 7. This is a good way to put it when you are in this situation.
• 8. No, forgiving is nice, but if you’re asking God to do something about your healing, you have missed the boat. God already did something that you need to receive. Therefore, this statement is contrary to the Word and thus not faith.
• 9. God has already done all He is going to do about the devil when it comes to his sicknesses. God gave you authority over the devil and all his works. You’ll wait the rest of your life if you think God is going to do something about the devil for you when He already did!
• 10. This could go either way.  Jesus did pay for your healing, but if you still consider them your back problems, you haven’t received healing yet. If you had, they would no longer be “yours.”
• 11. This is a true statement, but the fact that you know it doesn’t mean that you have received anything.  A sinner could say, “Jesus paid for my salvation” without being saved.  He would only be saved when he received the gift of righteousness through the new birth.  So we don’t know where this person stands.
• 12.  Throwing away your medicine does not “prove” your faith or obligate God to move.  If you have really received healing, the doctor will be able to confirm that you don’t need the medicine. But you could do this because someone else did and still be in unbelief – and face ugly consequences.
• 13. This is fine – it’s a normal experience in your walk of faith.
• 14. Yes, this is fine to say after you receive laying on of hands, as long as you believed you received your healing at that time.