One day in late September, I was in my pickup truck in the parking lot of my employment. I was so hopeless and desperate. I was crying out to God to please help me! I needed Him to show me where to go and what to do next in my life. At that moment, my phone rang. On the other end was a woman I had only met a few times in my life. She asked if I wanted to attend a home fellowship. My crying stopped. I felt better somehow. God was opening up a door for me. God was answering my cry for help. I said, “Yes! Yes! I would love to attend a home fellowship.”
I attended my first home fellowship and then my next one. By October/November I attended my first Foundational Class. God was talking to me and helping me along the way. By January, I was taking the Intermediate Class. By this time, I had learned that all Scripture is God-breathed, which means to be moved by the Holy Spirit, which is revelation. I also learned to pray with the spirit by speaking in tongues. I grew up tithing in my church, but in class I learned that you can NEVER outgive God.
By June, I was in my first Defeating the Adversary class. My knowledge of the adversary and how he operates was growing. We are in a spiritual competition every day: “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Ephesians 6:12). At that moment I was healed from forty years of pain and resentment that I carried with me. I felt a huge weight off my shoulders. I had a true sense of peace within me. The anger that I kept inside of me against the people that hurt me was gone. The adversary wasn’t going to take or steal from me anymore.
Proverbs 18:21 says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue….” That scripture changed the way I choose to talk to people. I can open my mouth to hurt someone and make them feel like nothing, or I can choose to open my mouth to edify someone. I can witness to them about how The Way has shown me how to understand God’s Word by rightly dividing the Word, how to know that Christ is in me, and how to know that the Word of God is the will of God.