Belief + Confession = Change Within

About 3 weeks ago, I wanted to take a hot soaking bath to relax.  Out of nowhere, the tub's drain began to leak a lot of gunk into the water. Immediately, I jumped up and got out. I said, "God please don't let this affect my body". The next morning, I woke up with external bleeding. I go to the doctor, and they tell me that I have the worst stage of a bad infection. Wow! That escalated quickly. I hadn't taken any type of medication, not even ibuprofen, in 5 months, so I tried begging them to give a natural way to recover. The doctor said that this case can't be cured without antibiotics. She ordered it and made a follow up appt for two weeks later. As I was heading home, I began to pray " Jesus. Please find a way to help me get rid of this infection a natural way and no antibiotic" (I am not saying that this is necessary for everyone, nor am I say anything is wrong with antibiotics. I just didn't want them). When I got home, I received a text from the pharmacist that they would update me when the meds were ready to pick up. The next morning, I woke up bleeding again, so I called the pharmacist to get an update. They informed me that the medication was out of stock and that they had no idea when it would be back and ready.  Still to this day, I have not received the meds. It was on that very day and the same hour that the bleeding stopped! I truly believe Jesus helped me!

That week, I came across a ton of different natural things to do that involved changing my diet tremendously. I made a commitment to Jesus that if He healed me, I would go back and tell the doctor about Him". The day of my follow up appt, it was cancelled, and I rescheduled to the next day. This gave me a totally different doctor. I began to tell her about the situation to catch her up and I told her that I still hadn't received the meds. She immediately freaked out and asked me if I was ok. I told her, "Yes, Jesus healed me! I don't know if you believe in Jesus, but He healed me". She responds with " I haven't seen this in my practice, and it's not heard of for anyone to heal from this external bleeding infection, without meds. But seeing it happen with you, shows that it is possible. I do believe in Jesus. I also believe in the brain He gave us. If we believe in Jesus, and our brains believe it, then our brains can feed that belief into our bodies, ultimately causing the body to heal by belief that Jesus is going to heal it" Wow! I couldn't believe what I was hearing. She was teaching me!  Of course, I asked to test, even though she didn't think it was necessary. She sent me the results the next day stating that I had been completely cured  and she thanked me for the story.

What an insane story! And how true is this? As a man thinks so is he! What we believe can truly alter the change inside of us. But this is also a beautiful picture of our lives. One small piece of filth getting into our minds, our hearts, our talks, etc. can affect us tremendously. Sometimes we overlook even the smallest thing such as our thoughts, and we don't realize that it's creating a large incurable mess inside of us. Do we truly BELIEVE that we ourselves need to be cleaned daily? 

It is not enough to accept Jesus for salvation and to go about our lives. It is a daily CONFESSION of the filth we take in, that must be cleansed from the inside. Jesus says it's not what comes out of us that defiles us, but what's inside of us. However, many of us do not want to look within. Many of us do not think we need to look within. Yet many of us want change.

If any of us want CHANGE, we must first be willing to look within to see what needs to be changed IN US. However, the Holy Spirit is only One who can reveal to us what's within, because He is the Only One living inside of us. But many of us don't sit still enough to let Him reveal the filth to us. We read the Bible quickly and count it as done. Maybe we're afraid of what He might say to us, if we sit still enough to let Him speak. Many of us don't believe we have anything that need to be changed about us. Sadly, this is a deception of heart, because the Bible says that our hearts are deceitful. No one can know it.

We can usually tell what our relationship with Jesus is based on how much He is changing US! The change has nothing to do with the outward appearance and the works of our hands. It has everything to do with what is happening on the inside. Every time Jesus changed someone in the Bible, it was an inner cleansing. He always followed up with "Your faith has made you whole". NOT your works. NOT what's on the outside of you. Nope! It was Faith, which is an INNER change!

Everybody needs to be changed on the inside, daily. Jesus does this to make us more like Him, so that when people see us, they do not recognize us, but they recognize Jesus. It is a beautiful thing for people to see Jesus when they see you.  It is a beautiful thing for others to remember Jesus' name, after they talk with you.

I am convinced that Jesus will not change us if we don't believe He can change us. I am also convinced that Jesus will not change us if He knows we will not share the change. We will not share the change from Jesus, if we don't first believe that He can change us or that we need Him to change US. Why would Jesus entrust us to share what He's done for us if we can't believe first that He is the one that needs to change us?

Every time Jesus changed someone in the Bible, He encouraged them to share that change with others. That's what brought others to Jesus.

If we want to be used by Jesus, we have to first be changed and continue BEING changed daily.

Jesus uses change to reach the lost. He does not use perfection. He uses CHANGES
He uses BREAKING

The truth is, without saying we're perfect, our flesh believes we are.  If our lifestyles depict that we're perfect, then our mouths will do less confessing of our faults. It is one thing to acknowledge our fault, but it is another to confess those faults with our mouths.

Without the belief, there is no confession. Without the Confession, there is no help. Without the help there is no change.

Come to Jesus and find Rest.

How many of us need to sit still and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal to us, what needs to be changed within ourselves?