About two years later, my neighbor gave me a Bible to read. It was one of those Bibles that was organized some Old Testament, New Testament, Psalms, and Proverbs every day. And so I just started reading it. I would say about 200 of the 365 days, we would talk in my front yard about what we read. Everything was over my head. I had no idea what I was reading, I was just kind of addicted to going back to it every day. 

About six months into that process, I was sitting at church – Oh, the other neighbor, on my other side, invited us to church. – and so I was sitting at church, and we had been several times to the church, but six months after I started reading the Bible, just one day, the Lord took the veil off my eyes and had me fully understand who Jesus was and why I needed Jesus as a Savior. I just, it was that moment, I just accepted His sacrifice for me and His death, burial, and resurrection and that was when I became a believer. 

A few months later, I jumped into a class at our church. It was a class that really kind of taught you how to have a relationship with the Lord, how to live the life that Jesus has called for us. They taught me how to read the Bible and journal and just hear from the Lord in the reading and write it down so I could go back and look at it, how to do Bible study, how to share my faith with other people, and just all of that, and it was a fantastic class. I took three of them, 11 weeks each and then after that, I jumped in and started leading those classes, and I haven’t left, it is so fun. So I really do feel like the Lord has made me a disciple maker, I get to teach the women how to hear from the Lord through the Word and it’s been totally life giving. 

By God’s grace, I have read the Bible, starting six months before I became a believer, every day since I’ve been a believer, so about 12 years now. And every day, no matter what, even if I’m in the middle of the book of Numbers, God gives me something very personal. And that has been fantastic. But more recently, the Lord has shown me there’s more. 

So about a year, a little over a year ago, just out of the blue, I just started praying, “God if there’s more, I want more. I just want to understand more.” Around that time, or maybe even prior to that time, a podcast was sent to me. It was a seven series podcast, and I listened to the whole thing. It was definitely teaching about the spiritual battle that we face that I had never heard of, never heard of in church before, and never studied on my own. So like, that’s curious, like, Why has my church not talked about this? Why have we not talked about this in community? I just was really quite surprised that I’d never heard anyone talk about this. So like a good Borean, I listened to these several times. I listened to them with my Bible open and my journal and my pen. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t ever walking outside of God’s Word. 

After doing that for a good long time, I decided I am going to try what I’d been taught. So, for a really long time I battled with what I probably would have loosely labeled FOMO – fear of missing out – because I didn’t have another better word. But that wasn’t really quite it. Over time God was showing me…eventually I learned that it was really more of I was believing I wasn’t likable. And so I had known that for a little while and this podcast showed me how to get healed of that. 

I was like, Okay, I’m gonna try this. I’m gonna walk in faith. I just started praying, “Jesus, is there a backstory that You want to heal me of that relates to this, I am not likable?” And really, before I was able to finish my sentence, He already put on my mind the very clear backstory. I just pictured it in my mind. 

The backstory was, in second grade, I was walking around the playground at my school with my best friend, Jenny. We came across some girls that were playing Foursquare and they asked Jenny if she wanted to play. She said, “Well, yes, but I’m playing with Becky today, so only if Becky can play too.” And they said, “No, we don’t want Becky. We just want you.” And she goes, “Well, I’m not going to play then.” And we walked on. 

I remember that story very vividly because I thought, what a beautiful friend to stick by my side. I had even told my own children that story as an example of the beautiful friend. I totally missed the part about what was said to me. So Jesus said, that’s where it started. 

I had learned from these podcasts that we can make agreements with the enemy, which was like foreign to me. So I followed what the man had said, which was a very simple command, not a prayer. “Satan, I break the agreement that I made with you, in second grade, that I’m not likable. By the death, burial, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ, I break that agreement, and I replace it with that I’m likable.” And radical transformation in my heart. The peace in my heart, I mean, definitely surpassed all understanding. 

This had been a battle for a lot, a lot, a lot of years. Actually, it never bothered me until I became a believer, about10 years, or 11 years prior to this. There was progress made in that. There was progress and there was a ton of prayer. And I do believe God was working in every one of those prayers. But this one wasn’t just answered by prayer alone, this one I needed to take and do business with the enemy and the authority of Jesus Christ that I have. And I just was radically set free. 

I mean, it got to be so bad at some points that we could never eat dinner to the west of our house, because you have to – we live on the east side of our neighborhood – to the west, you have to pass all these homes, and I would see homes that were empty, and I’m like, Oh, they’re all at parties and we weren’t invited. Or I would see homes that were full with people like, they’re having a party, and we’re not invited. And it was so painful to me that we just ate everywhere East, because I didn’t have to see those homes. And that’s how it came to a point where I was really manipulating my life, it was really bad. And I was just radically set free. 

Now if I see a big party, if I hear a big party, I’m like, I don’t care. I’m totally set free. I know, that was a lie and it’s done. It’s gone. One of my favorite verses is Galatians 5:1 where Jesus tells us that it was for freedom that Christ set us free. I was like, I’m definitely living in that freedom. I often dwell upon John 10:10, that the enemy comes to steal, kill and destroy, which is really what he had done for a lot of years with that lie. But Jesus came to give us life and life abundant. 

You know, that life abundant, I maybe would have thought I had abundant life but I’m like, really Jesus wants full abundant life for me. Battling that lie, He wants to take that too. We’re told to resist the devil and he will flee from you. And I’m not sure what many Christians would say is their definition of “resist the devil.” But now I have lots of ways to resist the devil, you know, “Shut up Satan! Get out.” 

Another story is [of] somebody who’s really close to me. It was always difficult to be around this person. Not the entire time we were together. But there were jabs. It was just really, really hard for a long time, many years. And finally, it just dawned on me one day that there was a spirit of envy that was attacking me from this person. And the same podcast that I was listening to taught me how to deal with that. And I’m like, Okay. Again, I started in Scripture and made sure it was right. And I asked Jesus to stop this right now if this is not of You. 

All I said was a “Spirit of envy that’s attacking me from so and so I bind you in the name of Jesus and I cast you out. I replace you with the spirit of love.” And radical transformation in that relationship! When I used to go and be with this person, hanging out for let’s say, a weekend or a week, I would have probably 20 people praying for us, because it was that hard on me at times. And again, I believe God answers every prayer and He’s working through every one of those prayers. But this wasn’t just answered by prayer. I needed to go forth and resist the enemy. And I think that the way I did that was to tell him, he can’t attack me.

Jesus tells us in Colossians 2:15, on the cross Jesus disarmed the rulers and authority. He took away their power. So I have the power, because of Jesus in me to say, “You have stop! I bind you, cast you out.” And he fled, and it’s gone. It’s been over a year and a half or maybe nearly two years and amazing, radical transformation. Again, the enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy, but Jesus came to give us life and life abundant. And I now have an abundant relationship with this friend. 

With God opening my eyes to this and giving me these real tangible experiences that other people can even see the fruit of these miracle healings, I’m then able to go and tell other people. God has spoken to me every single day through the word. Now He’s never spoken me through the passages that said, Go cast out demons, heal the sick and raise the dead. I just kind of probably read past that, until recently. But now He does! All the time! 

I was in Honduras and I was teaching on some of the scriptures that say…I was really wanting to teach on casting out demons, because I’ve had experiences in that. Like, my testimony is my testimony, no one can argue it, right? And I just want other people to be set free. It was for freedom that Christ set us free and I want that for everybody. I just want that. So I was teaching on that. But in that passage, it’s in several the Gospels, Jesus is saying, cast out demons, raise the dead, heal the sick, preach the word or whatever. It’s a combination of them. So I was reading that stuff and all the different areas that I see it in Scripture and I said, “Well, I don’t have a raise the dead story so we’re gonna skip that for now. But I want to talk about casting out demons.” 

So I talked about them and you don’t get a lot of feedback because they don’t speak your language and there’s an interpreter so it goes really slow. And at the end of it, I said, “Okay, does anyone have anyone, anything they want to share?” And I’ll never forget this lady in yellow, like, she raised her hand, and she stood up and she started sharing, and like the whole group, their jaws dropped and they’re hanging on her words. And I’m like, “I don’t understand Spanish. Like, what is that? What did she say?” 

My interpreter was so mesmerized by the story and so she’s finally giving me bits and pieces, because the lady is speaking rapid fast. She has a story and like, it’s totally animated. It’s amazing. And so finally, [the interpreter’s] telling me that [the lady in yellow] raised her husband from the dead. And I’m like, Oh, my gosh, here I am saying I don’t have a story like that. We’ll talk about that another time. I didn’t know the other time would have been 25 minutes later. 

Her husband had had, I think it was, his fifth heart attack and he was at the hospital in Honduras, she’s Honduran. And he had passed away, but the Lord had promised her that her husband would come to saving faith in Jesus prior to passing away and he hadn’t yet. She knew that and she’s like, “No, no, no, he can’t be dead.” And she said that the doctors came out and told her she’s like, “No, no, no, go back and work on him. You gotta go back and work on him.” And they’re like, no, no, but the doctors went back in and they sent the nurses out and the nurses are like…She’s like, “No, no, go back and work on him.” She stood her ground and they went back and that man came back to life and she stayed by his side until he was totally stable. Then she went and she preached the good news throughout that entire hospital. He’s still alive to the day that I saw her. 

I was like, Oh my gosh, God, You are so funny because I had the cast out demons stories, and here’s this lady in yellow that had a raise the dead story. I just hope everyone would pray, “Lord, give me eyes to see You working in through and around me.” because this is the abundant life. This is the fun life to see Him working and to hear these stories and to be able to repeat them to people and encourage them! Yeah.