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About the Book
"Are You Ready" by T D Jakes is a motivational book that aims to help readers overcome obstacles and achieve their goals by embracing change and letting go of fear. Through personal stories and practical advice, Jakes encourages readers to step out of their comfort zones and take control of their lives to create a brighter future.
John Alexander Dowie
By John Alexander Dowie (1847 – 1907)
I sat in my study in the parsonage of the Congregational Church at Newtown, a suburb of the beautiful city of Sydney, Australia. My heart was very heavy, for I had visited the sick and dying beds of more than thirty of my flock, and I had cast the dust to its kindred dust into more than forty graves within a few weeks. Where, oh where, was He Who used to heal His suffering children? No prayer for healing seemed to reach His ear, and yet I knew His hand had not been shortened. Still it did not save from death even those for whom there was so much in life to live for God and others. Strong men, fathers, good citizens, and more than all, true Christians sickened with a putrid fever, suffered nameless agonies, passed into delirium, sometimes with convulsions, and then died.
Oh, what aching voids were left in many a widowed or orphaned heart. There were many homes where, one by one, the little children, the youths and the maidens lay stricken, and after a hard struggle with the foul disease, they too, lay cold and dead. It seemed sometimes as if I could almost hear the triumphant mockery of evil ringing in my ear whilst I spoke to the bereaved ones the words of Christian hope and consolation. Disease, the foul offspring of its father, Satan, and its mother Sin, was defiling and destroying the earthly temples of God’s children and there was no deliverance.
There I sat with sorrow-bowed head for my afflicted people, until the bitter tears came to relieve my burning heart. Then I prayed for some message, and oh, how I longed to hear some words from Him Who wept and sorrowed for the suffering long ago, a Man of Sorrows and Sympathies. The words of the Holy Ghost inspired In Acts 10:38, stood before me all radiant with light, revealing Satan as the Defiler, and Christ as the Healer. My tears were wiped away, my heart strong, I saw the way of healing, and the door thereto was opened wide, so I said, “God help me now to preach the Word to all the dying around, and tell them how Satan still defiles, and Jesus still delivers, for He is just the same today.”
A loud ring and several raps at the outer door, a rush of feet, and there at my door stood two panting messengers who said, “Oh, come at once, Mary is dying; come and pray. “With just a feeling as a shepherd has who hears that his sheep are being torn from the fold by a cruel wolf, I rushed from my house, ran without my hat down the street, and entered the room of the dying maiden. There she lay groaning and grinding her clenched teeth in the agony of the conflict with the destroyer. The white froth, mingled with her blood, oozing from her pale and distorted mouth. I looked at her and then my anger burned. “Oh,” I thought, “for some sharp sword of heavenly temper keen to slay this cruel foe who is strangling that lovely maiden like an invisible serpent, tightening his deadly coils for a final victory.”
In a strange way, It came to pass; I found the sword I needed was in my hands, and in my hand I hold it still and never will I lay It down. The doctor, a good Christian man, was quietly walking up and down the room, sharing the mother’s pain and grief. Presently he stood at my side and said, “Sir, are not God’s ways mysterious?” Instantly the sword was flashed in my hand, the Spirit’s sword, the Word of God. “God’s way?!” I said, pointing to the scene of conflict, “How dare you call that God’s way of bringing His children home from earth to Heaven? No sir, that is the devil’s work and it is time we called on Him Who came to destroy the work of the devil, to slay that deadly foul destroyer, and to save this child. Can you pray, Doctor, can you pray the prayer of faith that saves the sick?” At once, offended at my words, my friend was changed, and saying,” You are too much excited, sir, it is best to say ‘God’s will be done,’” and he left the room.
Excited?! The word was quite inadequate for I was almost frenzied with divinely imparted anger and hatred of that foul destroyer, disease, which was doing Satan’s will. “It is not so,” I exclaimed, “no will of God sends such cruelty, and I shall never say ‘God’s will be done’ to Satan’s works, which God’s own Son came to destroy, and this is one of them.” Oh, how the Word of God was burning in my heart: “Jesus of Nazareth went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with Him.” And was not God with me? And was not Jesus there and all His promises true? I felt that it was even so, and turning to the mother I inquired,” Why did you send for me?” To which she answered, “Do pray, oh pray for her that God may raise her up.” So we prayed.
What did I say? It may be that I cannot recall the words without mistake, but words are in themselves of small importance. The prayer of faith may be a voiceless prayer, a simple heartfelt look of confidence into the face of Christ. At such moment, words are few, but they mean much, for God is looking at the heart. Still, I can remember much of that prayer unto this day, and asking God to aid, I will attempt to recall it. I cried, “Our Father, help! and Holy Spirit, teach me how to pray. Plead Thou for us, oh, Jesus, Savior, Healer, Friend, our Advocate with God the Father. Hear and heal, Eternal One! From all disease and death, deliver this sweet child of yours. I rest upon the Word. We claim the promise now. The Word is true, ‘I am the Lord that heals thee.’ Then heal her now. The Word is true, ‘I am the Lord, I change not.’ Unchanging God, then prove Yourself the healer now. The Word is true. ‘These signs shall follow them that believe in My Name, they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.’ And I believe and I lay hands in Jesus’ Name on her and claim this promise now. Your Word is true. ‘The prayer of faith shall save the sick. Trusting in You alone. I cry. Oh, save her now, for Jesus’ sake. Amen!”
Then, the maid lay in sleep so deep and sweet that the mother asked in a low whisper, “Is she dead?” “No,” I answered, in a whisper lower still. “Mary will live; the fever is gone. She is perfectly well and sleeping as an infant sleeps.” I was smoothing the long dark hair from her now peaceful brow, and feeling the steady pulsation of her heart and cool moist hands. I saw that Christ had heard, and that once more, as long ago in Peter’s house, “He touched her and the fever left her.” Turning to the nurse, I said, “Get me at once, please, a cup of cocoa and several slices of bread and butter.” Beside the sleeping maid we sat quietly and almost silently until the nurse returned, and then I bent over her and snapping my fingers called, “Mary!”
Instantly she woke, smiled and said, “Oh, sir, when did you come? I have slept so long;” then stretching her arms out to meet her mother’s embrace, she said, “Mother, I feel so well.” “And hungry, too?” I asked, pouring some of the cocoa in a saucer and offering it to her when cooled by my breath. “Yes, hungry too,” she answered with a little laugh, and drank and ate again, and yet again until all was gone. In a few minutes, she fell asleep, breathing easily and softly. Quietly thanking God. We left her bed and went to the next room where her brother and sister also lay sick of the same fever. With these two, we prayed and they were healed too. The following day all three were well and in a week or so they brought me a little letter and a gift of gold, two sleeve links with my monogram, which I wore for many years. As I went away from the home where Christ as the Healer had been victorious, I could not but have somewhat in my heart of the triumphant song that rang through Heaven, and yet I was not a little amazed at my own strange doings, and still more at my discovery that He is just the same today.
Excerpt from the Sermons of John Alexander Dowie Champions of Faith by Gordon Lindsay
Secret Allies in the Human Heart - The Advantage We Have in Evangelism
One warm, dusty midday, Jesus sat alone near Jacob’s well outside the Samaritan town of Sychar. His disciples had gone into town to buy food, but he had planned a different meal for himself (John 4:34). Soon a solitary woman arrived at the well with a large clay jar and began to draw water. Jesus asked her for a drink. So began one of the most famous evangelistic conversations in history. And this conversation is remarkably relevant to us twenty-first-century Christians. Because in it, Jesus demonstrates that hidden in the human heart are secret evangelistic allies, as Scottish preacher James Stewart once observed (Heralds of God, 53). These secret allies are deep-seated intuitions and longings that can help a person recognize the truth of the gospel. And like Jesus, if we listen carefully and prayerfully, both to the person and the Holy Spirit, we can engage these allies in the pursuit of that person’s ultimate joy. Obstacles to Evangelism In numerous ways, this woman would have appeared to most of us as an unlikely candidate for conversion. “Hidden in the human heart are secret evangelistic allies.” First, she was a Samaritan, which meant she was viewed and hated by most Jews as a member of a heretical, idolatrous religion. We would have assumed she reciprocated the hatred. She was a woman, which meant (according to ancient Near Eastern social norms) that she would have been reticent to enter into such a conversation alone with a strange man. And given the odd, hot time of day she chose to fetch water, we might have intuited some social estrangement from her own townspeople. In other words, there were layers of complex awkwardness about the whole situation — the kind of awkwardness most of us want to avoid, the kind we tend to assume will make fruitfulness unlikely. But Jesus, alert to the Holy Spirit and lovingly eager for this woman to experience grace and forgiveness and liberation and joy, stepped into the awkwardness. And notice how he navigated this conversation, engaging several secret allies along the way. Secret Allies in an Unlikely Convert It began with a mundane-sounding yet provocative request: “Give me a drink” (John 4:7). This simple question caught the woman off guard. Not only was a man addressing an unaccompanied woman, but a Jew was addressing a Samaritan. In doing so, however, Jesus acknowledged her as an image-bearer of God, according her the dignity due such a creation. Her deep, intuitive knowledge of the rightness of this became one secret ally in helping prepare her to receive the grace and mercy he offers. Then, given the immediate context of their conversation, Jesus used the metaphor of thirst to raise the issue of the woman’s deep, inconsolable longing for lasting hope, joy, meaning, and love — a longing she shared with all fallen humanity (John 4:10–15). He wasn’t put off by her skepticism and derogatory comments. He was after her joy, not defending himself. What he did was engage her soul-thirst as a secret gospel ally for her highest good. Then he gently stepped into another very awkward place: the woman’s sinful, painful past littered with the ruins of broken relational cisterns that had only left her more parched (Jeremiah 2:13; John 4:16–18). And he offered her the only water that could quench her thirst: the gracious, merciful love of God. Her pain proved to be the pivotal gospel ally in her heart (John 4:39), because she had an undeniable desire and need for God’s forgiveness, reconciliation, and redemption. But there was one more massive issue to deal with: What about the deep, bitter, complex, hostile, centuries-old ethno-religious disagreements between the Jews and the Samaritans (John 4:19–22)? Notice where in the conversation Jesus chose to address this (he ignored the controversy in verse 9). Jesus discerned that this woman needed to taste God’s care and kindness toward her before she would be open to hearing that she and her ancestors had worshiped in ignorance (John 4:22). So, he did deploy the ally of the truth she already knew from Jewish Scriptures, but not until he had developed some initial trust first. Having glimpsed the Great Well and tasted the living water (John 4:23–24), this woman forgot her jar by Jacob’s well and ran back to town to share the good news she had received (John 4:28–30). And her testimony resonated with the secret allies in the hearts of many of her neighbors in Sychar. Common Secret Allies This evangelistic conversation is admittedly exceptional because Jesus is exceptional. We rarely receive such supernatural insight into someone else’s life — though such gifts sometimes are given to believers by the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 14:24–25). But we can still learn from how Jesus engaged secret evangelistic allies in the hearts of his hearers. And while we may not be able to discern all he discerned as the God-man, we can still ask good questions, listen carefully, and pray for the Spirit to help us identify allies in each conversation. Certain allies are specific to particular people, like the Samaritan woman’s painful past. But there are allies that God has implanted in the hearts of every person. Here are some of them: We all instinctively recognize design in creation (Romans 1:19–20). We all are irresistibly drawn to transcendent glory (Psalm 8:1–4). We all have an intuitive knowledge of providence — that there is a purposeful intent to the created world, the events in it, and our own lives (Acts 17:22–31). We all know deep down that nihilism (ultimate meaninglessness implicit in metaphysical naturalism) is not true (Ecclesiastes 3:1–14). We all know we must have hope to keep going (Psalm 43:5; Lamentations 3:20–24; Romans 15:13). We all have an irrepressible longing for joy (Psalm 16:11; 43:4; Ecclesiastes 3:12; John 15:11; 1 Peter 1:8). We all intuitively recognize the moral law (Romans 2:14–15). We all know that we have transgressed the moral law and to some degree long to be free from guilt (Romans 3:23–26). We all at various times experience an undeniable desire for justice to prevail (Deuteronomy 16:19–20; Job 19:7–11; Proverbs 17:23; Micah 6:8; Matthew 12:18–21). We all have a sense of eternity in our hearts — we instinctively know death is not our ultimate end (Ecclesiastes 3:11). We all recognize the supreme beauty of love (Matthew 22:36–40; John 15:13; 1 Corinthians 13:13; 1 John 4:7–8). In claiming that we all know these things, I don’t mean that we all admit them, recognize them to the same degree, or explain them in the same way, but they are all part of the universal human experience. And the fact that we continually discuss and debate them is evidence of their presence. They are internal witnesses and pointers to the existence and nature of God, and in that way they become allies in our evangelism. Take Them to the Well On that warm, dusty day, on the slope of Mount Gerizim, the Lord himself became one massive, momentous fulfillment of the words of the old prophet: How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.” (Isaiah 52:7) “We all have eternity in our hearts — we instinctively know death is not our ultimate end.” He employed gospel allies already residing secretly in the heart of an unlikely convert to lead her to the living water she so desperately needed and longed for. Isn’t that essentially our story too? When it comes to evangelism, we can be too easily intimidated, especially when someone looks unlikely to respond well. It can appear to us like the ground isn’t level, like we occupy the less defendable ground because our hearer is likely to judge our gospel as foolish or weak (1 Corinthians 1:22–25). In truth, the ground is often not level, but not in the way we might fear. Often, we have the advantage because, as with Jesus that day outside Sychar, we have unseen gospel allies residing in the hearts of our hearers. And if we listen carefully and prayerfully to our hearers, the Holy Spirit can show us how to employ them. Because when it comes to the power of God in evangelism (1 Corinthians 1:18), “the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1 Corinthians 1:25). We don’t need to be experts in apologetics or trained theologians to share the good news with others, even with the most resistant and entrenched. Often, we simply need to care more about helping them find the living water they so desperately need than about protecting our reputation or demonstrating how right we are. And if we do, we will find that we have secret allies in the pursuit of that person’s highest joy. Article by Jon Bloom Staff writer, desiringGod.org
