Growing your Spirit

Thirty years ago, hubby and I drove into an Australian town well known for its New Age and witchcraft practices. We glanced around the place for a gift shop and for somewhere to eat, but before we had time to find anywhere, I asked hubby if we could drive on to the next town. I sensed something ‘awful’ in the atmosphere, and it felt like a fear descended on me. Fast forward twenty years, and hubby, the kids, and I drove back into that same town, and it ‘felt’ completely different. We loved the place so much that we hung around that place for several days.

                   What was the difference?

A Christian church had a massive impact in the town ministering to the New Age community, but the New Age and witchcraft presence was still ‘thick’. The major difference, though, lay within me. I had grown and matured as a Christian, but I now knew my identity as a daughter of the Most-High King. I was also aware of ‘brushing’ off negative atmospheres (see here). My spirit had grown enormously and could now ‘defend’ itself instead of being intimidated.

How do you ‘grow’ your spirit?

Just as your physical body needs nutrition to grow, your soul needs love, safety, and care to grow, and your mind needs intellectual stimulation to grow, your spirit also needs to grow.

The top five ways to grow your spirit:

  1. Intimacy with God through worship, relationship, obedience, decreasing sin, and open communication with Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus.
  2. Grow your identity in God. Go after your inner healing. Have prayer ministry regularly to deal with issues.
  3. Speak/pray the Bible over yourself.
  4. Pray in tongues often, i.e. daily. 1 Corinthians 14:4 says, “anyone who speaks in a tongue edifies (or builds) themselves up”. One of the most effective methods is to pray in tongues each day.
  5. Bless your spirit.

How do I ‘bless my spirit’?

I first realized the enormous impact of calling one spirit to attention and blessing it after I found some teaching from Arthur Burk and Sylvia Gunther and started practising on my family. Our son is a spiritual thermostat. He quickly and automatically ‘picks up’ the spiritual atmosphere of a room, place, or land region. This caused numerous hassles earlier in his life until we became more fully aware of what was happening. (A particular city in Australia has the ruling spirit of rebellion over it, and when we stayed there, our son became very rebellious. We tried disciplining him with no effect and began to doubt our parenting until I ‘connected the dots’ and realised what was happening. As soon as I identified it, our son’s behaviour immediately normalised.)

Thus, when I began calling my family’s spirits to attention and reading a blessing over them of a night, this son loved it. Each night he would ask me to ‘do that thing that makes me feel good’.

As a side note, I used to call people’s spirit forth eg “Jane, I call your spirit forth”, but a Pastor’s wife became quite anxious about that, as if I was trying to make people’s spirit travel. Thus, I now call them to attention. Look at it as if you are asking them to stand up on the inside and take notice. Eg “Jane, I call your spirit to attention” or “Jane, I call your spirit to take notice of what I am about to say”.

Over time, I have noticed a massive effect on people whenever I bless people’s spirit. I use this all the time in our Church’s Healing Rooms at the end of each person’s ministry time. It is uncommon for me not to use it when praying for someone.

I have several friends who will call their spirit to attention each night and bless their spirit and their spouse with a blessing. There is no magic formula for what to say. Go with what you feel Father God is saying to you. With my kids, I will often bless their spirit with their identity, their prophetic words, the giftings they have, their dreams and their sleeping, and their relationship with Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus.

David Tensen has an excellent course on this. He bases his blessing on 4 D’s – delight, design, destiny and dominion. I can never remember the 4 D’s, so I ask Father God to show or tell me how to bless each person.

I have crafted a short blessing for you, my readers. Please feel free to try it and speak it over yourself, inserting your name into it.

Blessing:

“(Your name), I call your spirit to attention and bless you with knowing that Father God loves you so much. There is nothing you could do to make Him love you any more or any less. (Your name), Father God had you in mind before He created the world. He ordained your parents, time in history and birth date. I bless you with knowing how precious and valuable you are to God, your family, friends and community. I bless you with knowing that Father God delights in you and loves being with you. I bless you with an ever-increasing intimacy with Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus.

I bless your spirit with knowing that God has gifted you with unique gifts and has created you with your personality. He so loves you and has incredible plans and purposes for you.

(Your name), I bless your spirit with realising more deeply today the reality of God’s love in your life. I bless you with experiencing today Father God romancing you in a fresh novel way, with you seeing, hearing, and experiencing his extravagant and generous nature and goodness and kindness. I bless you with receiving His kisses of joy and delight in you today. I bless you as you walk out the next few days and weeks and months ahead that you will see the hand of Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus on your life clearly. I bless you with incredible insight and discernment from God, with hearing Him at a deeper level and seeing what He is up to in the spiritual world.

(Your name), I bless you that wherever you walk, you carry the peace of God and change atmospheres; that people will know that a child of the Most-High God has been there. I bless you with leaving a lingering fragrance of the presence of God wherever you step. In Jesus’ name, Amen.”

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God and His way of communicating with us. This enables us to grow in our relationship with God and also to impart to others what God tells us for them. Feel free to use as many of these activations each week as you can. The more you practice, the sharper you become at hearing God’s voice. Enjoy! Remember that whenever you give another person a prophetic word or picture etc, please make sure that it is encouraging, edifying (strengthening) and comforting (1 Corinthians 14:3) and that it comes from a place of love.

1. Children / Families Activation:  Ask God to share with each of you a present He would like to give another family member at the moment. Write down or draw what you feel God is showing, telling or giving you for that person. Then share with that person, putting it into a blessing to pray over them eg ‘Jane, I bless you with peace.’

2. Group Activation: Partner up and spend a few moments listening to God as to what He would like to give your partner. Pray a blessing over them, calling their spirit to attention.

3. Beginner Activation: Spend time worshipping God. Then spend time listening to God, focusing on Him and soaking (meditating) on Him and His goodness. Write down, draw or capture what you feel God saying, showing or giving you.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to show you a Pastor in your local area who needs encouragement. Visit them or send a letter to purely pray for them, bless and prophesy over them.

5. Advanced Activation: Ask God to show you someone in a significant position of power who desperately needs encouragement. Find a way to encourage them by blessing and prophesying over them.

Creating your own Prayer Closet

For the first twenty years of my marriage, I strongly disliked ironing. I now love ironing. What caused the 180° turnaround?

Prayer.

Not prayer that I would love ironing.

Prayer whilst I was ironing.

When the kids were younger, ironing was the one place I was never disturbed. I found that I finally had a few minutes of peace – mental and physical. I then began to use that time to pray for friends and start interceding for them. I then realised that some friends were consistently asking for prayer and there were so many issues popping up in people’s lives that I was spending more time praying for them than my own husband and kids.

I made a change to pray for my family to begin with whilst ironing. Now, I can’t believe how quickly the time seems to go when I’m ironing a basket of clothes. (Whilst writing this blog post, I have just realised that when I am in the laundry, I look at a blank wall. After googling ‘prayer closet’, I have now received inspiration to put some artwork and Bible verses and encouraging pictures on that wall for inspiration when praying.)

I also have found that since I use that time in the laundry to pray, it has created an atmosphere of prayer in there. I can sense it when I go in there.

Concerted prayer in the one place changes the atmosphere over that tiny piece of earth. Where I stand whilst ironing has a ‘grace’ upon it for answered prayer. Whilst ironing, I often find myself asking God questions about various issues. Almost immediately I will sense the answer. It is like so much connection and relationship between God and I have occurred on that very piece of my floor, that God answers immediately. The atmosphere is rich with grace and mercy.

Much the same as our shower. When I have a shower, I often pray for friends. Now I have quick showers as I was brought up on a farm and on tank-water, we were only allowed one-minute showers. Thus, as soon as I jump in the shower, I ask God what He wants me to pray for a certain friend. Tuesdays I pray for my friend Katharine who does prison ministry that day. Almost immediately God will download to me what to decree and declare for her. So, I immediately do it. All up, 30 to sixty seconds maximum. Due to daily spending time in that place, the atmosphere has become rich in there so that I can hear God immediately. Like a ‘thin place’ between heaven and earth.

A thin place is a location where we can sense the divine more easily and readily. A place where the space between heaven and earth grows thin and the Sacred and the secular seem to meet.

A ‘thin place’ comes from the mystical world of Celtic spirituality. The Celtic Christians were known for believing, and practicing, that the most ordinary elements of everyday life are infused deeply with God’s presence.

Do you have the one or two places you love to spend time praying in? If not, I encourage you to find a place where you feel comfortable, where you are alone with God, where you won’t necessarily be disturbed and begin to build up the prayer ground in that place.

For inspiration, the movie “The War Room” inspired many people to build a prayer closet in their house. If you google ‘prayer closet’, there are oodles of photos for inspiration. For me, I prefer a portable prayer closet, in the shower or laundry or with my journal in a favourite chair. You may prefer out in nature, on the beach, during a walk in the park. It doesn’t matter where. What matters is that you have somewhere you feel comfortable spending time investing in your relationship with God.

 

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God and His way of communicating with us. This enables us to grow in our relationship with God and also to impart to others what God tells us for them. Feel free to use as many of these activations each week as you can. The more you practice, the sharper you become at hearing God’s voice. Enjoy! Remember that whenever you give another person a prophetic word or picture etc, please make sure that it is encouraging, edifying (strengthening) and comforting (1 Corinthians 14:3) and that it comes from a place of love.

1. Children / Families Activation: Ask God to show, tell or give you a picture of how He sees your teacher. Share with the rest of the family or group. Draw a picture of this to give to your teacher. Share with your parents and maybe even make or buy something that resembles how God sees them.

2. Group Activation: Explain to the group that you will ask them to get up and move around the room. You will have some music playing and at short intervals, you will stop the music. As soon as the music stops, they are to find a partner. Then they have one minute to ask God for a book of the Bible for their partner and why that book relates to them. Allow a few minutes for people to share with their partner, but keep it short and snappy. Then repeat the process, with people finding new partners when the music next stops. At the end, debrief and see how many people received the same book of the Bible or if they received different ones but they were all applicable.

3. Beginner Activation: Grab a piece of paper and a pen. Spend time seeking God’s heart for yourself. Then write a letter to yourself from God.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to show you a person in a leadership position who desperately needs encouragement. Seek God how you can most effectively give them a prophetic word that will encourage them.

5. Advanced Activation: Address the latest issue that has become a worldwide fear eg Coronavirus that began in the Chinese city of Wuhan. Ask God for His heart and His perspective on this and what He would have your role to be. Then do what He shows or tells you.

My Prayer for You

As we go into this New Year, I am praying this blessing over you, my blog readers.

(I encourage you to put your name in the space and say this blessing over you out aloud. There is power in not only reading a blessing but speaking it out aloud over you and calling your spirit to attention first. It helps grow your spirit on the inside.)

“…(your name)…” I call your spirit to attention and bless you with fresh eyes to see and ears to hear that which God is doing around you and what He is calling you to. I bless you with seeing God in the small things and the big. I bless you with experiencing ‘God kisses’ each day where God shows you something that is personal for you or something that you can delight in.

I bless you ……….. with joy. I bless you with being able to experience true joy and freedom and being able to laugh. Laugh at yourself, laugh in the face of adversity, laugh with others. Like the woman in Proverbs 31:25, I bless you with being able to laugh without fear of the future.

I bless you ………… with being able to rest. Able to rest in God and with God. I bless you with being able to operate from a place of rest and not needing to strive or attain perfection. I bless you with being comfortable being you, the amazing person God created you to be. I bless you with peace.

I bless you ……….. with wrestling with God in the hard times and when you don’t understand or like what is happening. I bless you with being totally honest with God and laying everything out before Him. I bless you with working with God to come to a place of peace and knowing that God is truly a God who cares for you and loves you and is there for you no matter what.

I bless you ……….. with relationships that are deep and meaningful and sustainable. I bless you with the courage to form new friendships and to see those who need a special human touch and someone to just notice them. I bless you with partnering every day with God in communicating with others how God loves them. I bless you with receiving a special touch from someone in those times when you need a human interaction.

I bless you ……….. with knowing how valuable and unique you are. I bless you with knowing how important you are to your family and friends and to this world.

I bless you ……..… with an increased awareness of God, Holy Spirit and Jesus. I bless you with feeling and seeing and hearing a whole lot of new things about Jesus. I bless you with going deeper in intimacy with Father God. I bless you with allowing the Holy Spirit to have His way in your life and to flow in and through you. I bless you with a love for reading the Word of God.

I bless you ………… with hearing and seeing and knowing God’s goodness and desires and plans for you and I bless you as you seek Him and realise them for yourself. I bless you with Jeremiah 29:11 for knowing the plans that God has for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future. I bless you in experiencing this come to fruition.

I bless you ……….. with the courage to step out and prophesy over people, to see healings occur and to operate in a whole new area of supernatural miracles and provision.

I bless you …….…. with being able to create space in your calendar and time schedule so as to be able to implement those things and actions that God is calling you to.

I bless you …..…… with being able to create space in your life and daily activities so that you can hear, see and feel God afresh and in more intimate ways. I bless you with being able to enjoy this year and to have fun, laugh aloud and see the good in every situation. Most of all, I bless you with experiencing how God is present with you at all times.

In Jesus’ name, Amen

 

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God and His way of communicating with us. This enables us to grow in our relationship with God and also to impart to others what God tells us for them. Feel free to use as many of these activations each week as you can. The more you practice, the sharper you become at hearing God’s voice. Enjoy! Remember that whenever you give another person a prophetic word or picture etc, please make sure that it is encouraging, edifying (strengthening) and comforting (1 Corinthians 14:3) and that it comes from a place of love.

1. Children / Families Activation: Spend time with God as a family and ask God to show you one thing He would like you to do as a family this year. List what every person says. Create a vision board or picture from what was said or write these things down and put them in a place where family members can see it.

2. Group Activation: Break into pairs. Spend five minutes listening to God as to what He would like to communicate to your partner. Then turn that into a blessing and pray that blessing over your partner. (Instead of saying “I pray …” say “I bless you with …”)

3. Beginner Activation: Spend time with God and ask Him what He would like you to focus on this year. Try and narrow it down to one word if you can.

4. Intermediate Activation: Choose a group or an activity that you are involved with. Ask God to show you His heart for this group this coming year. If appropriate, write this down and share with the leader of the group.

5. Advanced Activation: Spend time with God hearing His heart for world events for this coming year. Write down what you are sensing, hearing, seeing. Keep this confidential. At the end of the year, look at what you have written and see what has unfolded for the year and how accurate you were in what you were sensing.

Growing our Faith

faithIn living a natural supernatural life, it is important to grow your faith to believe that God can, and will, do anything. I have prayed for God to heal someone of cancer and they received complete healing. I have also seen my mother die of cancer but I haven’t let that deter me. I have seen a man’s eyesight restored. I have seen a lady healed of needing a heart lung transplant. Perhaps the greatest miracle I have seen is for people to accept Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Saviour.

I recently found up a journal entry I wrote last year about the day before and what had occurred. I am including it here so that you can see an example of believing that God can do the impossible. Lastly, I have listed numerous ways that I grow my faith.

What do you do to grow your faith and the belief that God can, and will, do the impossible?

 

***(Beginning of Journal Entry)***

Believing anything is possible

Hubby and I were in bed last night chatting after a full day of church, hanging out with friends and ministry. Hubby commented on how it was exciting to be in a church where one of the cultural values (whether anyone realises it or not is another question as it is an unwritten and unspoken value) is that of believing that anything is possible with God. Not just believing it, but actively pursuing it.

Core Value:

As we reflected on this more, I realised that whenever we want to see the supernatural become our natural lifestyle, this has to be a core value. That God can and will do anything and that anything is possible with God.

Miracle – an illiterate person able to read the Bible

Yesterday morning in church, we heard an amazing testimony from one of our church members who was ministering in Cambodia. An old village woman had become a Christian and 3 days later wanted to be able to read the Bible but had never had the opportunity to go to school. She heard a testimony from some other people who had supernaturally been given the ability to read the Bible. This lady was prayed for by those people and within 20 minutes or so the lady could read the Bible.

Testimony:

Last night were having a meal with friends and reflecting on the testimonies we hear in church. Most of these testimonies come from the Healing Rooms we are part of. I was voicing that I am a bit tired of hearing about the back pain and the neck aches being healed. Sure, it is a big thing for those people but what about the exciting stuff we see of cancer being healed, eye sight restored, the time I prayed for the lady in hospital who no longer needed a heart lung transplant etc. I then shared how our family had experienced some amazing healings – anaphylaxis, teeth miracles – no longer needing fillings or a root canal etc.

Creative Miracle:

My friend then expressed how she has been waiting for 9 years for a huge creative miracle. Straight away I knew we had to pray for her in this area. So we did. In the natural, it seems completely impossible but with God anything is possible. We joined our faith with hers and her husband’s faith. There were a couple of prophetic acts I asked her to do as I felt they were an important step. A huge step of healing had already been overcome by our friend sharing this unusual and personal issue with us.

Prophetic Act:

In asking my friend to do a certain prophetic act, I was reminded of at least 7 years ago when I was at a ladies’ camp and I really felt to pray for a lady with a thyroid issue who had bulging eyes. This lady at the same time approached me and asked me to pray for her. As I waited briefly to hear from God, I sensed that I was to spit on my hands and place them over her eyes. I was relatively new to praying for physical healing for people and was aghast. “What would the lady think?” As I shared this with the lady, she became very excited. She shared how she had asked God to heal her and that she had told God that she would know if it was going to happen or not if the person praying for healing spat on their hands and placed their hands over her eyes. I learnt a huge lesson that night to be obedient to what God wants you to do.

God is at work:

When we left our friend’s home, nothing had appeared to have occurred in the way of a creative miracle for this lady but something had shifted in the spiritual. I totally believe that God can do this seemingly impossible creative miracle of growing body parts that are no longer there. I also knew that God was at work since we also prayed for my back pain from a pulled muscle that was causing me some incapacity. The pain completely disappeared and I could move freely.

I know that God will come through for this beautiful friend and her miraculous testimony will be huge in her future ministry that she will have in changing teenagers lives and perceptions.

God is in the business of the impossible.

*** (end of Journal entry)*** (Addit – today, yes, this very day, I received a text from my friend saying that the huge supernatural creative miracle had occurred in her body!!)

 

Align your mind:

If you need help in this area, I encourage you to take a Bible verse from the list below. If you believe the Bible is the Word of God, then meditating on the Bible and verses from it, will help your mind align to what God wants to do.

Bible verses:

  • Job 42:1- 2 Then Job replied to the Lord, “I know that you can do all things, no plan of yours can be thwarted.”
  • Jeremiah 32:17 “Ah Sovereign Lord, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and your outstretched arm. Nothing is too hard for you.”
  • Matthew 17:20 Jesus replied, “Because you have so little faith. I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”
  • Matthew 19:26 Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible but with God all things are possible.”
  • Mark 10:27 Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.”
  • Mark 11:24 “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”
  • Luke 1:37 “For nothing is impossible with God.”

Turn these verses into a declaration that you can declare regularly eg “Thank you God that nothing is impossible for you. Thank you, God that you say in your Word that whatever I ask for in prayer and believe that I have received, it will be mine. Father God, I now thank you for giving me (answer to my prayer) and believe that You will give it to me because nothing is impossible for you Father God. Thank you, God.”

 

Ways I grow my faith:

  • Blessing my spirit. I call my spirit to attention and bless it with increased faith. I bless it with knowing beyond a doubt that Father God can, and will, do the impossible. That Father God specialises in making the impossible the possible.
  • Personally experiencing miracles and healing. Thus, I need to position myself in places where I will see miracles. I see them in our Healing Rooms where our family are team members. I saw them when I took my family with two young kids to Mozambique for three months. It can be costly to position ourselves but do it if you want to grow your faith.
  • Studying the Bible and what it says about faith, healing, God.
  • Surrounding myself with people of great faith, who know the Bible and live by the promises in the Bible.
  • Listening to great teaching about the promises in the Bible.
  • Worshipping God – giving Him glory and worth.
  • Spending time with God asking Him the hard questions and growing in intimacy with Him.
  • Prayer ministry has been another way that has helped me to see some faulty beliefs that I had about God. When I now react in a manner that is inappropriate to a situation eg get angry, I try to take a few minutes to ask God, “Father God, can you please show me why I acted that way. What lie am I believing? After I have my answer, and confess that lie/belief to God, I then ask God, “What truth do you want me to know instead?”
  • Our identity is so important. We defeat our internal giants first before we take on external ones. Going on a journey of discovering my true identity.
  • We need to become the person God sees us as – claiming & possessing our internal territory.
  • What we say with our words. I try to be very careful about the things I say as the words we speak have power to create. Isaiah 55:11 says “so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”

Where are you currently at in believing for the impossible? Believing with such a certainty, not just that it would be great but a total belief that God can and will do anything.

 

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God and His way of communicating with us. This enables us to grow in our relationship with God and also to impart to others what God tells us for them. Feel free to use as many of these activations each week as you can. The more you practice, the sharper you become at hearing God’s voice. Enjoy! Remember that whenever you give another person a prophetic word or picture etc, please make sure that it is encouraging, edifying (strengthening) and comforting (1 Corinthians 14:3) and that it comes from a place of love.

1. Children / Families Activation: Gather paper with pictures on them (eg an old calendar, scrapbooking supplies etc). Distribute the paper around the room, making sure you have enough for each person to choose a sheet. Ask people to get into pairs and then walk around looking at the pictures. When they see a picture that stands out to them or they like, pick up the picture and find their partner. Ask God to show or tell them what the picture represents for their partner or what God wants to say to their partner through the picture. Give their partner the picture to take home.

2. Group Activation: Contact a ministry like ‘Voice of the Martyrs’ for the details of how to support a person imprisoned for their christian faith. Gather blank postcards and pens. Distribute to group members to ask God what to write or draw on the postcard as a prophetic word to encourage and comfort the prisoner. (Leave room for a postage stamp in the top right corner). Gather the completed postcards and send to the ministry to enable them to be posted to the prisoner.

3. Beginner Activation: Ask God which food He sees you like or that represents you and what it is about that particular food that relates to you. Spend time asking God more questions about that particular food item and how it applies to yourself.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to bring a homeless person across your path and what you can say, give and do. Ponder this so that you are ready with a physical item to assist them. If no homeless person comes across your path, go out of your way to find someone homeless.

5. Advanced Activation: Ask Father God to highlight a group that you are a part of and that group’s future. Prophecy into the future of the group and the people it interacts with.

Easter Blessing

Dear Readers and Subscribers to my blog,

As we journey towards Easter over these next few days, I want to release a blessing over you that incorporates the values of Easter and the journey Jesus made.  I encourage you to say this blessing over yourself out aloud. Feel free to read this aloud over your family and significant others in your life. There is power in not only reading a blessing but speaking it out aloud over you and calling your spirit to attention first. It helps grow your spirit on the inside.

 

“I call your spirit to attention and bless you throughout this Easter season.

I bless you with being able to communicate yourself fully and articulately. I bless you with intimacy and fun in your relationship with Jesus. I bless you with knowing your true identity and allowing people to know the real you. I bless you with being celebrated for who you really are. I bless you with allowing others to extravagantly express generosity towards you and it to flow abundantly from you. I bless you with ease and acceptance with those few close people in your life, that you can truly be yourself and disclose your true feelings. I bless you in discerning the flattery and the ability to see the lies and the truth.

I bless you in keeping focussed on what God is focussed on, your gaze focussed where God’s eyes are focussed. I bless you with peace in the uncertainty of the future. I bless you when you dread the immediate future. That you will be able to glimpse the other side of the huge mountain just in front of you and it will sustain you in the plodding onwards. I bless you in keeping alert when the things of this world press upon you. With not slumbering but having an alert spirit at all times.

I bless you with integrity. Compassion. Standing firm amidst any false accusation and that you will see your name cleared and your reputation upheld. I bless you in being able to forgive the betrayal and the lies. I bless you when it appears to be the end of your dreams and I bless you with perseverance to see the start of redemption. I bless you with being able to see things as God sees them.

I bless you with journeying close to Christ during the dark times. With knowing the love of the Father so intimately and realising that one day you will understand more fully the dark and lonely times. I bless you with holding on to hope when everything seems hopeless. I bless you with realising Jesus is with you in that crushing, seemingly senseless time of pain that overwhelms.

I bless you in the waiting season. For perseverance. For joy in the journey. I bless you with intimacy and finding shelter in the secure and intimate place. I bless you with having people support you through all times. I bless you with being prepared to last the journey that is your call, despite the circumstances.

I bless you with seeing the answers to your greatest prayers. I bless you with experiencing the risen Christ and the full impact of that in your life – joy, life, hope, freedom, reconciliation, fulfilling potential and reaching your destiny. I bless you with a new and renewed perspective of God’s love, goodness, grace and mercy. I bless you with being able to celebrate and celebrate well. I bless you with enlarging your supernatural gifts and seeing miracles in your everyday life. I bless you with seeing and taking opportunities to share God’s goodness with others and your testimony of what God has done in your own life. I bless you in living in a new way with a new attitude. I bless you with a burning desire to devour the Bible, the Word of God, and love reading it. I bless you with allowing the Holy Spirit to permeate and access every part of your life and fill you to overflowing, accessing deeper levels of empowerment and intimacy.

I bless you with finishing well. With staying the course. With being a world changer.”

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God and His way of communicating with us. This enables us to grow in our relationship with God and also to impart to others what God tells us for them. Feel free to use as many of these activations each week as you can. The more you practice, the sharper you become at hearing God’s voice. Enjoy! Remember that whenever you give another person a prophetic word or picture etc, please make sure that it is encouraging, edifying (strengthening) and comforting (1 Corinthians 14:3) and that it comes from a place of love.

1. Children / Families Activation: Ask the children present to pray a blessing over each adult. If they have never done this before, pray a blessing over them first. Practice calling each other’s spirit to attention first as this commands your spirit on the inside of you to stand to attention to fully hear and absorb what is being said.

2. Group Activation: Partner up and spend a few minutes asking God to show you what He would like you to pray for your partner. Then turn the prayer into a blessing and pray aloud a blessing over your partner that incorporates what God showed you.

3. Beginner Activation: Spend time with God listening to Him about what He would like to bless you with. Then write out the blessing for yourself. Say it aloud over yourself and begin a practice of daily praying it over yourself.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to show you His heart for your local church and the leaders. Compile this into a blessing that you can pray aloud daily for the next little while, calling the spirit, heart and identity of your local church to attention.

5. Advanced Activation: Spend time with God aligning His heart for your nation with your heart. In Australia at the moment, we have an election in a few weeks and this is a fantastic time to be blessing the heart and identity of the nation as it can significantly affect the future of Australia. Compile a blessing for the nation, the leaders and politicians. Pray it aloud daily over your nation for the next little while.

Growing your spirit – Living from a Place of Victory (part 10)

Twenty eight years ago, hubby and I drove into an Australian town well know for its New Age and witchcraft practices. We briefly looked around the town for a gift shop and for somewhere to eat but before we had time to find anywhere, I asked hubby if we could drive on to the next town. I sensed something ‘awful’ in the atmosphere and something like a fear descended on me. Fast forward twenty years and hubby, the kids and I drove back into that same town and it ‘felt’ completely different. We loved the place so much that we decided to revisit it again on that holiday.

 

                        What was the difference?

 

As far as I could tell, there was a Christian church that was having a massive impact in the town ministering to the New Age community. But the New Age and witchcraft presence was still ‘thick’. I believe that the main difference lay within me. I had grown and matured as a Christian, but more importantly, I now knew my identity as a daughter of the Most High King. I was also aware of ‘brushing’ off negative atmospheres (https://www.unlockingthegold.com/spiritual-hygiene-living-from-a-place-of-victory-part-8/). Most of all though, I believe the greatest difference was that my spirit had grown enormously and could now ‘defend’ itself instead of being intimidated.

 

How do you ‘grow’ your spirit?

Just as your physical body needs nutrition to grow and your soul needs love and care and intellectual stimulation to grow, so too does your spirit needs things to help it grow.

 

I have identified the top five things I have done to grow my spirit.

  1. Worship God regularly.
  2. Grow your identity in God. Go after your inner healing.
  3. Speak/pray the Bible over yourself.
  4. Pray in tongues often ie on a daily basis. 1 Corinthians 14:4 says “anyone who speaks in a tongue edifies (or builds) themselves up”. One of the most effective methods is to pray in tongues each day.
  5. Bless your spirit.

 

How do I ‘bless my spirit’?

I first became aware of the huge impact of calling one spirit to attention and blessing it after I found some teaching from Arthur Burk and Sylvia Gunther (www.theslg.com) and started practicing on my family. I immediately noticed a difference in our son and how he loved his spirit being blessed. Our son is a spiritual thermostat. He easily and automatically ‘picks up’ the spiritual atmosphere of a room, place or land region and acts this out. This caused numerous hassles earlier in his life until we became more fully aware of what was happening. (A particular city in Australia has the ruling spirit of rebellion over it and when we stayed there, our son became very rebellious. We tried disciplining him without any effect and began to doubt our parenting until I ‘connected the dots’ and realised what was happening. As soon as I identified it, our son’s behaviour immediately normalised.)

Thus, when I began calling my family’s spirits to attention and reading a blessing over them of a night, this son loved it. Each night he would ask me to ‘do that thing that makes me feel good’.

As a side note, I used to call people’s spirit forth eg “Jane I call your spirit forth” but a Pastor’s wife became quite anxious about that as if I was trying to make people’s spirit travel. Thus, I now call their spirit to attention. Look at it as if you are asking them to stand up on the inside and take notice. Eg “Jane, I call your spirit to attention” or “Jane, I call your spirit to take notice of what I am about to say”.

Over time, I have noticed a huge effect on people whenever I bless people’s spirit. I use this all the time in our Church’s Healing Rooms at the end of each person’s time of ministry. In fact, it is uncommon for me to not use it when praying for someone.

David Tensen has a great course on this (www.davidtensen.com). He bases his blessing on 4 D’s – delight, design, destiny and dominion. I can never seem to remember the 4 D’s so I just ask Father God to show or tell me what to bless each individual person with.

I have crafted a short blessing for you, my readers. Please feel free to try it and speak it over yourself, inserting your name into it. I have several friends who each night will call their spirit to attention and bless their own spirit (& their spouse’s if they are married) with a blessing. There is no magic formula for what to say. Go with what you feel Father God is saying to you. With my kids, I will often bless their spirit along the lines of their prophetic words, the giftings they have, their dreams and their sleeping and relationship with Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus.

I also find that if people have their eyes open and look into mine whilst I am blessing them, there seems to be a greater impact on the person. Try it and see.

 

Blessing:

“(Your name), I call your spirit to attention and bless you with knowing that Father God loves you so much. There is nothing you could do to make Him love you any more or any less. (Your name), Father God had you in mind before He created the world. He ordained your parents, time in history and birth date. I bless you with knowing how precious and valuable you are to God, your family, friends and community. I bless your spirit with knowing that God has gifted you with special gifts and has created you with your personality. He so loves you.

(Your name), I bless your spirit with realising in a deeper way today the reality of God’s love in your life. I bless you with experiencing today Father God romancing you in a fresh new way, with you seeing, hearing and experiencing his extravagant and generous nature and goodness and kindness. I bless you with receiving His kisses of joy today. I bless you as you walk out the next few days and weeks and months ahead that you will see the hand of Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus on your life in a new way. I bless you with amazing insight and discernment from God, with hearing Him at a deeper level and seeing what He is up to in the spiritual world.

(Your name), I bless you that wherever you walk, you carry the peace of God and change atmospheres. That people will know that a child of the Most High God has been there with you. I bless you with leaving a lingering fragrance of the presence of God wherever you step. In Jesus name, Amen.”

Please feel free to forward this blog post to any of your friends and encourage them to subscribe to receive my blog posts on a weekly basis. Thank you.

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

The purpose of these exercises is to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and recognise God’s voice and His way of communicating with us. This enables us to grow in our relationship with God and also to impart to others what God tells us for them. Feel free to use as many of these activations each week as you can. The more you practice, the sharper you become at hearing God’s voice. Enjoy! Remember that whenever you give another person a prophetic word or picture etc, please make sure that it is encouraging, edifying (strengthening) and comforting (1 Corinthians 14:3) and that it comes from a place of love.

1. Children / Families Activation: Chat about what ‘blessing’ is. Have a time of focusing on each individual person and ask God to show, tell or give to everyone else some words to bless that person with. Then all say it over that person. Then move on to the next person. At the end, feel free to share how it felt.

2. Group Activation: Pair up and spend a few minutes asking God what He would have you bless your partner with in regards to the 4D’s – delight, design, destiny and dominion. Then release the blessing over your partner.

3. Beginner Activation: Spend time this week intentionally calling your spirit to attention and blessing it with hearing God’s voice clearly. Also ask God each time what else to bless your spirit with.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to show you someone to bless today. Make or buy a gift for that person that represents the essence of what you are blessing in them and give that to them during the time of releasing the blessing over them.

5. Advanced Activation: Ask God to reveal to you an unreached people group. Spend time with God crafting a blessing for that people group. Ask God to then show you how often He would like you to say that blessing, speaking as if over that people group.

Easter Blessing

I have written a blessing down for you to read aloud over yourself as you prepare for Easter. Just as the disciples walked to Bethany, ate with Jesus in the Upper Room, tried to stay alert all night, felt the pain of betrayal, experienced brokenness, saw dreams die, waited in the period of the unknown, confronted with forgiveness and then experienced a new season of hope and life, may you be blessed as you journey through similar periods in your life.

I encourage you to put your name in the space and say this blessing over yourself out aloud. There is power in not only reading a blessing but speaking it out aloud over you and calling your spirit to attention first. Calling your spirit to attention first just helps your spirit to stand up and take special notice. It helps grow your spirit on the inside. I am discovering tremendous power, growth, comfort, encouragement and healing coming from being blessed and saying blessings over my spirit and growing my spirit. I encourage you to do the same. I especially love to bless my children as you can almost see the visible difference in them as their spirits are encouraged and blossom in response.

Blessing at Easter:

“……(your own name)…., I call your spirit to attention and I bless you with knowing how valuable, precious, unique and beautiful you are. I bless you with knowing how important you are to God, your family and friends and to this world. I bless you….(your name)… with an increased awareness of God, Holy Spirit and Jesus in this sacred season of preparation for Easter.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. with living out a lifestyle of integrity as your internal beliefs match your external behaviour and actions. I bless you as you walk out your journey, your individual path that you are called to walk and where you intersect with others along this path. I bless you with beautifully touching everyone you relate to and leaving behind you a refreshing fragrance of Christ’s presence. I bless you as you lay down your life for Christ.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. with a gift of hospitality, generosity and acceptance of all and to all. I bless you as you give generously and extravagantly to God. I bless you with a deep connection with Jesus. I bless you as you share your life with others, with deep and intimate connections emotionally, spiritually, mentally and physically. I bless you with laughing and crying and feeling the full range of emotions.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. as you wait on Jesus and as you wait for Jesus. I bless you in the waiting time. I bless you as you try with all your might and realise that it isn’t enough. I bless you in being you, in being all you were created to be.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. when you go through betrayal and experience brokenness. I bless you when the outcome looks less than favourable that you will be able to see from heaven’s perspective. I bless you when your dreams appear to die and have no apparent future, when hope is lost, that you will get a glimmer of heaven’s view and experience hope restored and justice in the midst of injustice. I bless you as you resist peer pressure. I bless you as you choose joy over despair.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. as you deal with faith and doubt and questions and the ensuing struggle, that you feel a peace in the struggle and a willingness to be totally honest and open with the Father, Son and Comforter about your thoughts and feelings. I bless you as you journey through pain and doubt and things that appear not as they should and the ensuring heartache. I bless you with peace and comfort at this time and of experiencing true comfort through the Holy Spirit.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. as you wait in the period of the unknown, that you will experience the Father’s love afresh. I bless you with experiencing peace in the chaos of life, a moment of ‘all is well with my soul’. I bless you with ‘hanging in there’ when the going gets tough. I bless you with courage as you walk the narrow path. I bless you with being able to forgive when all is screaming out no. I bless you with experiencing the light that comes after the darkness.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. with New Life, the promise of something better. I bless you with feeling and knowing that God is romancing you and pursuing you with a relentless love.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. as you rediscover life, joy, colour and your hope being restored. I bless you in having many new beginnings, of experiencing promises fulfilled. I bless you in this new season of grace, joy and thanksgiving. I bless you as you enjoy the banquet of faith, and experience the promise that everyone who comes to the Father will not hunger or thirst.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. as you experience the resurrection power of Jesus and the impact of Jesus’ death and resurrection, and His willingness to go to the cross for you is fully realised in your life. I bless you as you live a life full of intimacy with the Holy Spirit. I bless you with living a life of pointing others to Jesus Christ.

I bless you ….(your own name)…. with spiritual eyes and spiritual ears to see and hear whom you can encourage in this season and whom to release blessings to. In Jesus’ name, Amen

 

If you have found this helpful, please take a moment to consider whom you can either contact and pray this blessing over or to email a copy of this to for their benefit and also encourage them to subscribe to my blog. Thank you.

 

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

The purpose of these exercises is to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and recognise God’s voice and His way of communicating with us. This enables us to grow in our relationship with God and also to impart to others what God tells us for them. Feel free to use as many of these activations each week as you can. The more you practice, the sharper you become at hearing God’s voice. Enjoy! Remember that whenever you give another person a prophetic word or picture etc, please make sure that it is encouraging, edifying (strengthening) and comforting (1 Corinthians 14:3) and that it comes from a place of love.

1. Children / Families Activation: As a family, practice blessing each other. Take time after a meal to start with the adults saying a blessing over each other and over each individual child. Then ask each child to bless each other and you. Remember it can be very simple and short eg I bless you Sarah with being kind and having great friends.

2. Group Activation: Get into pairs. Spend a few minutes asking God to reveal which aspects of your partner’s life to bless and how. Then take it in turns to call your partner’s spirit to attention and bless them. When you have both blessed each other, share with your partner how it felt for you.

3. Beginner Activation: Practice calling your spirit to attention and blessing yourself. Ask God to reveal to you that which is hidden that would be great to be brought into the open and blessed eg unmet desires and dreams etc.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to reveal to you someone who needs encouragement and how. Contact that person and pray a blessing over them.

5. Advanced Activation: Spend time with God asking Him what He would have you bless your country with and how. Then do it.