The Prayer of Commitment
Ephesians 6:18 — a Scripture
written to the Church — is one of my favorite verses on the subject of prayer.
EPHESIANS 6:18
18 Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all
perseverance and supplication for
all saints.
Another
translation says "all manner of prayer." Yet another
says "all kinds of prayer." We need all kinds of prayer
— not just one kind. The Bible speaks of several kinds of prayer.
One is
"the prayer of commitment," or casting your cares
upon the Lord. Our main text on this is First Peter 5:7, "Casting
all your care upon him; for he careth for you." That's
from the King James Version.
My
favorite translation of this particular verse is from The Amplified Bible: "Casting the whole of your
care — all your anxieties, all your worries, all your concerns,
once and for all — on Him; for He cares for you
affectionately, and cares about you watchfully."
Philippians
4:6 contains instructions concerning prayer given by the Spirit
of God through the Apostle Paul. The King James Version reads, "Be
careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and
supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be
made known unto God."
That
phrase "Be careful for nothing" is unclear to us in the
20th century. A modern translation reads, "Do not have any
anxiety about anything." Another translation, which I
like better, says, "Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything, but in
everything by prayer and supplica-
Casting Your
Cares Upon the Lord
tion with thanksgiving let your requests be made known
unto God."
Now turn back to the sixth
chapter of Matthew's Gospel.
MATTHEW 6:25-34
25
Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your
life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall
drink; nor yet
for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more
than meat, and the body than raiment?
26
Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not,
neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your
heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better
than they?
27
Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit
unto his stature?
28
And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider
the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not,
neither do they spin:
29
And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all
his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
30
Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the
field,
which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven,
shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?
31
Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we
eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we
be clothed?
32
(For after all these things do the Gentiles
seek:) for
your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all
these things.
33
But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his right
eousness; and all these things shall be
added unto you.
34
Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the
morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Suf
ficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
Different rules regulate
different kinds of prayer. If you take the rules that regulate
one kind of prayer and try
The Prayer of Commitment
to apply them to another, it will
lead to confusion. Therefore, we need to learn which kind
of prayer we need to do under certain circumstances and
conditions.
In
crusades and meetings around the country we endeavor
to move people to faith — to believe God now — to get an
answer now. We're only in their areas for a brief time;
we're usually not holding prayer seminars. In order to help
the most people we possibly can, we try to move them to
believe God to receive for their own individual needs; primarily in the healing
area.
But that
brief instruction we give is not the last word on the
subject of faith and prayer. And if people accept it as being
the last word, they will be disillusioned in life.
Because
we emphasize the prayer of faith, some people have faith
in my faith and they don't have faith in God. They want
me to pray the prayer of faith for them. They come up to
me with prayer requests. Of course the Bible does teach
us to pray for one another, and the Bible does teach intercession, but we need
to determine which kind of prayer will work for a given
condition.
One day
after a service, a woman came up to me and said,
"Brother Hagin, I want you to pray for me."
I said, "What for?"
She
looked surprised and said, "Do I have to tell you?"
I said,
"Well, I'm not going to pray unless you do tell me, because I wouldn't know
what we're praying about otherwise. I can't believe for
something I don't know about, and I can't agree on something unless I know what I'm
agreeing on. What is your request?"
She began
to cry. She said, "Brother Hagin, the burdens
of life — the cares, the worries of life — are just so heavy
I can't bear them. I wanted you to pray that the Lord
Casting Your
Cares Upon the Lord
would do one of two things:
He'd either take about half of them away, because I can
carry half of them — I just can't carry all of them—or else
He would give me grace to carry them."
My heart
went out to her. I did my best to help her. I said,
"Sister, I can't pray either way. That would be unscriptural.
You see, the prayer of faith will not work in that
case. In fact, there is only one kind of prayer that will work
in this case: the prayer of commitment. Isn't it wonderful,
Sister, that you and I already have the answer?"
She looked startled.
I said,
"We have inside information on the subject." (What I
meant was inside-the-Bible information.)
I said, "You see, the
Word of God tells us exactly what to do with
our worries, our concerns, our anxieties."
I quoted
to her from the King James Version first. I said,
"In First Peter 5:7, the Holy Spirit said through the Apostle
Peter, 'Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for
you.' And The Amplified Bible says, 'Casting the
whole of
your care — all your anxieties, all your worries, all your concerns, once and for all — on Him; for He cares
for you affectionately, and cares
about you watchfully.' "
I told her, "You don't
have to do it every day. You do it once and
for all. From then on, you're carefree."
She
looked up at me and said, "You're hard-hearted. You're
just hard-hearted!"
I put all
the kindness in my voice I could, and I said, "Dear
Sister, I'm not hard-hearted. I didn't write the Bible! I
wasn't the One who said that. That's God's Word, and God loves
you."
"Yeah," she replied, "but you don't
know whatl've got to
The Prayer of
Commitment
worry
about!"
I said,
"Dear Sister, I'm sure I don't know what you've got to
worry about, but God knows — He knows everything — and
it's God's Word that says, 'Casting the whole of your care —
all your anxieties, all your worries, all your concerns,
once and for all — on Him.' "
She said, "I just can't do it."
I said,
"Yes you can. God is just and kind and good, and He
didn't ask you to do something you can't do."
It
seemed to me that anybody would be glad to find that verse in
the Bible and would be thrilled to act upon it. But she
turned, walked away, and said, "I couldn't give up worrying."
Chapter 2
The Sin of Worry
The only
sin that I had a great problem to get rid of was the sin
of worry. (That statement always goes over big because
most people still have that sin, and they don't want to
acknowledge that it's wrong.)
I never
had any trouble with lying. After I got born again, I
never wanted to lie anymore. I haven't had any problem
with that one at all. And I never had any problem with
other sins. No, the toughest time I had was with this worry
business.
You know
my story. I was born again on the 22nd day of April 1933 at 20 minutes till
8 o'clock on Saturday night in the south
bedroom of 405 North College Street in the city of McKinney, Texas.
I never
had a normal childhood. I had become bedfast. I'd gone
to Baptist Sunday School and church all my life, so I had a
Bible. I had read so many chapters each week just so I
could say I had read them — but they didn't mean anything to me. I didn't think
you were supposed to understand the
Bible.
But the
morning after I became born again, I asked my family to
bring me the Bible. I got blessed just looking at the
cover, where it said "Holy Bible." Then I looked inside. I
got blessed just reading the table of contents. Oh, when you're
born again, the whole thing becomes alive and new to you!
In
Vacation Bible School, we had learned to sing the books of
the Bible, and we could rattle them off with head knowledge,
but it didn't mean a thing to us. Now I was born
again. I read the names of the Old and New Testament
books. Blessed be God, when you begin to say them
The Sin of
Worry
out of your spirit, they mean
something. I got blessed just reading the books of the Bible.
The doctor
had recently warned me, "You could go at any
minute," so I thought, I'll start in the New Testament since
my time is limited. I am going to get in here in a hurry and
find out what belongs to me.
I opened
to Matthew. Then I prayed, "Lord, before I ever
start reading, I promise You this: I make this covenant with
You. I'll never doubt anything that I read in your Word.
And the moment I read it and understand it, I'll put it into practice."
I got as
far as Matthew 6 and read that 34th verse. "Take
therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the
things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof."
I was
reading out of a New Testament, because it was lighter and easier for me to
hold. It had a little footnote at the bottom of the page. It
referred me to Philippians 4:6: "Be careful for
nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication
with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God."
It also referred me to First
Peter 5:7: "Casting all your care
upon him; for he careth for you." Then
whoever wrote the footnotes said, "God doesn't want you
to worry or be anxious about anything."
I was just
a youngster —just 15 years old (this was a little before my 16th birthday). You
talk about worrying — I was taught to worry from the
time I was a little child. I was actually a
"worrywart." Do you know what a "worry-wart" is? I was one
of them.
My mother
and grandmother were world champion worriers,
and I had learned to worry from them.
Casting Your
Cares Upon the Lord
When I first became bedfast, I
had two doctors. Finally there were five
doctors on my case. They didn't tell me much about what was wrong with me. When you're an invalid, you can lie there and imagine that everything in the
world is wrong with you. And you're sure taking thought about
tomorrow, because you may not even be here tomorrow!
But I had
just promised God, "I'll practice whatever I understand
in your Word." The Bible had been all light, joy, and
a blessing to me. But the further I got into Matthew,
it became dark, with no joy, no blessing, no reality to
it. I stopped to check up. I asked myself, What's wrong
here?
Matthew 6
kept popping up. "You said you'd put into practice
whatever you read and understood."
"Dear
Lord," I said, "if a person's got to live like Matthew
6 said, I'll never make it. I can't live without worrying. That's as much a
part of me as my hands and feet!"
I went on reading, but I never
got a thing out of it. That was the 23rd day
of April 1933, and it took me until July 4th to get out of the sixth chapter of Matthew.
There's
no use in continuing to read the Bible if it is not a joy and
a thrill to your spirit. You need to go back to where you quit walking in the
light, start walking in the light, and it will be light again
to you. (And you know where it was you quit.)
Somebody will say, "No, I don't."
Now quit
lying about it. Repent for lying first of all. I know you
know, because I was just like you. I tried to make excuses for myself, but the
Lord didn't listen to me, so I had to go back to the sixth
chapter of Matthew again and get on
The Sin of
Worry
the right track. Then the Bible
became all light to me again.
I never
will forget July 4, 1933.1 had a pity party all day. I
cried all day long. I was sure I couldn't do what Matthew 6
said.
"Lord,"
I complained, "if we've got to live like that — if we've
got to live without worrying — I might as well give up now.
I'll never make it as a Christian!"
I was
feeling sorry for myself. I couldn't live like the Bible said
to live, and besides that, I was dying. And I wanted to
blame it all on God.
I said, "Lord, You
haven't done right by me! Here I am just 15
years old, and I've got to die — the doctor said so. You know I've been physically handicapped all of
my life. I was born prematurely with a
deformed heart."
Then I
said, "Look at So-and-so. (I named a certain boy who
started school with me in the first grade. He lived a few
blocks away.) He's wearing good clothes. He's got money in
his pocket. He's got his health — and I know how he got
his money.
"They're not supposed to
do it — it's illegal — but they gamble in the
back of the drugstore. He entices others in there. He is just a teenager — that's illegal, too — but they'd just as soon take a teenager's money as an
adult's. No matter what he wins, he
gives all the money back because he's working for them. And the other
boys lose all their money, You know. He's a
'shill,' as they call them. So, he's
got money; he's got clothes; he's got health — and I never was as mean as him!
"You
know, Lord, I've always been pretty good. Of course, handicapped like I
was, I couldn't do too much that was wrong. .
. But I never was as bad as him!"
10 Casting Your Cares Upon the Lord
Then I
said, "There is So-and-so (and I named a boy who lived
in my end of town and who started school with me in the
first grade). He's got money. He's got new clothes. He
even has an automobile!" (For a teenager to have an
automobile in 1933 — brother! They were fortunate to
have a bicycle in those Depression days.)
"And
he's running around in an almost-new automobile —
and I know how he got his money! His brother is a bootlegger,
and he runs it for him in his car. And I never was
as mean as him!"
I was
telling the Lord about these other people, pointing
out to Him that I wasn't bootlegging, I wasn't gambling,
"And You know," I told Him, "I never was as bad
as either of those fellows. And I don't have any good clothes.
And I don't have any health. And I have to die. And You've been better to them
— as mean as they are — than You have
been to me. Poor ol' me!" And I began crying even harder.
I continued, "And now
I've gotten saved — born again — and I've
got to quit worrying, and I know that I can't."
I was
about dead to begin with, but I was about to worry myself to
death trying to figure out what was wrong with me. You
imagine you have every disease in the world. (Thank
God for Dr. Robason, one of my doctors. He finally came and
sat by my bed about a month later and told me exactly
what was wrong with me physically.)
If I were
preaching here against using tobacco, a lot of people
would jump up and down and shout, "Praise God, that's
right, brother — preach it!" But the sin of worry is worse
than the sin of tobacco. God doesn't want you to be bound by any
habit, but the habit of worry is worse than the
tobacco habit! 11
Doctors have told me that there are more people sick in hospitals, mental institutions — and already dead — because
of worry than any other cause. Worry will kill you. (Tobacco will just half kill you, and you'll stink while you're dying. But worry will kill you.)
Once you start preaching like this on people's pet habit, they'll start to feel sorry for themselves.
They think God is not treating them right; the preacher is not treating them right; the world is not treating them right;
their brother is not treating them
right; and nothing is right. So they have
themselves a pity party, like I did. What a struggle I had that July Fourth 1933. At 6 p.m., Momma was by my bed again, trying to comfort me.
I said, "Momma, if you just want to live, will that help any? I mean —just want to live?"
She said, "Well, that's about
50 percent of the battle."
I made a little adjustment on the inside of me, and I said, "Well, I've got 50 percent of it made now.
I'll lay that aside and go to work on the
other 50 percent."
The minute I said that, something on the inside of me said, "Matthew 6." I knew what He meant.
I turned back to Matthew 6 and read it. After I finished the 34th verse, I said, "All right, Lord. Forgive
me. I repent. I repent for worrying. And
I promise You this day I'll never
worry again the longest day I live. I promise You this day I'll never be
discouraged again. I promise You this day
I'll never have the blues again."
Thank God I haven't — and I've passed up some marvelous opportunities,
too!
I started practicing that as a teenager. It's easier if you start early in life; it's more difficult when you're
older, because you've been going a
certain way for many years.
12 Casting Your Cares Upon the Lord
It's easier for me now. At first
it was difficult, but I refused to worry.
I didn't
know about divine healing then — I hadn't gotten far enough in the Bible; I
hadn't gotten over to Mark 11:23,24 yet, so I really
didn't know that I could be healed.
I still
had my physical condition. It still looked like I was going to die. Not only
was I bedfast, but every day I would have three to five heart
seizures or heart attacks. My heart would stop and I'd think
it was never going to start again. I'd fight to stay
alive with every fiber in my being. I wore all the varnish off
of my bed, right down to the bare wood, just holding on.
You hold on with everything you've got to stay here.
Right in
the middle of one of those attacks, I turned loose. I
turned everything over to the Lord, fell back on my pillow,
and said, "Let 'er go. I know where I'm going, anyhow."
I never had any more problems with fear. I still had the
attacks, but they didn't bother me. I had cast that care upon
the Lord.
So I
started living that way. I never read a book on the subject;
I just saw it in the Bible.
Chapter 3 'Not
Enough Sense To Worry9
When you walk by faith—when
you do what the Bible says — you're an oddity
to others, even in the church world.
They think something is wrong with you because you don't worry.
After I
was healed, I started praying for the sick. I anointed
folks with oil. That didn't go over too well with the
Baptists.
I was
never an ordained Baptist preacher, although they
offered to ordain me. They can ordain you in the local church. In
fact, the pastor said, "We'll ordain you, Kenneth,
on one condition: if you'll tone down just a little bit on
this healing business. Go ahead and preach a little prayer and
faith if you want to, but just tone down on this healing
business."
I said, "I was planning on toning up on
it!"
I didn't pray for anybody
publicly back then. I'd preach it publicly,
but would pray for them privately, and I was planning to start praying publicly for them. That's the reason I said, "I was planning on toning up on
it."
I never
will forget it. When I told the pastor that, he said,
"Well, just forget it, then. Just forget it," and walked off
and left me. And I don't remember ever seeing him again. Then, of course, when I
got the baptism of the Holy Spirit and spoke with other tongues, I did get
"the left foot of fellowship" sure
enough.
I came
over among the Full Gospel people. They had the
baptism of the Holy Spirit — they spoke with other tongues — and I was sure they
were all sprouting wings. It took me a
little while to find out that those weren't wings they were sprouting; those were just their shoulder
blades
13
14 Casting Your Cares Upon the Lord
sticking out!
I took a Full Gospel church to
pastor, and being new in Full Gospel circles,
I didn't know that nobody else would pastor
this church. It was a "trouble" church. But God told me to take it. I guess the reason was because He
knew I wouldn't worry about it.
In those
days, it was a common practice to have a pastors'
fellowship meeting the first Monday of every month. I'd
go and find all the pastors lined up, talking. They'd
say to me, "How goes the battle?"
I'd walk
by them and say, "Men, I don't have a care." They'd
stand there and blink their eyes. They'd say to one another,
"I don't believe he's got enough sense to worry!"
One of my
neighboring pastors told them, "I know he does have
a care. He's got the hardest church to pastor there is
in this section. He's got this problem and that problem."
(He knew more about my church problems than I did!)
I'd get up
to preach on Sunday mornings and be tempted to yield to the
flesh. I felt like starting in with the deacon
board, taking them one by one, skinning them, salting
their hides, and hanging them up on a wall of the church;
then starting in with the Sunday School superintendent
and all of the Sunday School teachers, skinning them,
salting their hides, and hanging them up on the other wall
of the church.
But when
I had that kind of temptation, I'd turn to the 13th chapter of First
Corinthians and preach on love, or I'd turn
to Revelation 21 and 22 and preach on heaven.
The
first year I pastored that church, I spent most of my time
preaching on love and heaven! It's amazing what preaching
on love and heaven will do. When you can get
'Not Enough
Sense To Worry' 15
everybody loving one another and
heading to heaven, things straighten out pretty well!
I said,
"Lord, I know something ought to be said, but I don't
know what to say. And I know something ought to be done, but I don't know what
to do. I'm just a novice when it comes to pastoring. I'm going to
do right. I'm going to preach the Word. I'm going to
treat everybody the same. I'm going to visit the sick — and I'm going to turn
all the rest of it over to You, because this is my care, and
You said to cast our care upon You."
It was amazing what happened
when I turned it over to Him. We had
constant revival! I mean, every week! Every weekend we had people saved, baptized with the Holy Spirit, and healed. And God blessed us so that when
I left that church, 40 preachers put
in their application for it. (When I took it, nobody would have it.)
It
wasn't what I did; I cast all of my care upon Him. But that
doesn't mean I didn't do my part. I studied, I prepared messages,
etc. But the worry part — the anxiety part of it — I
turned over to the Lord. I didn't carry it.
The
parsonage was right next door to the church, and some of the people would stop
by and tell me things. I would reply, "I'm not going to worry about it.
I'll tell you the truth: If the church catches fire and burns
down and it's nighttime and I'm asleep, don't even wake me.
Just let it burn. We'll just build a bigger church.
"If the deacon board gets
in a fist fight in the front yard of the
church, don't come over to the parsonage and disturb me. Just let them fight it out. After they get
through, I'll pray them through and get
them right with God. I'm not going to
lose a wink of sleep. I'm not going to miss a meal about this. (I did fast if the Lord led me.) I've
turned it over
16 Casting Your Cares Upon the Lord
to the Lord."
If you
don't commit your cares and anxieties to the Lord,
there will come a time when all of your prayers, and all the
prayers of the church, radio and TV ministers, and everybody
else you can get to pray will be to no avail. When they
all get through, you're going to be right where you were when you started as
long as you hold on to those things yourself.
You're going to have to turn them over to the Lord.
Every one
of the preachers who made fun of me eventually
came to me and said, "You've got the answer. We don't. Our wives have had
nervous breakdowns. Your wife hasn't. We had
to retire from the ministry or take a year or two off to rest. You just keep going."
One
fellow who was only 39 years old wasn't feeling well
physically. Finally his wife said to him, "I believe you owe it to me and
our daughter to go to a doctor and at least find
out what's wrong with you." (In those days, Pentecostal preachers believed solely in trusting God
and not going to doctors.)
So he
went to the doctor. After checking him, the doctor said,
"Well, there isn't anything wrong with you as far as sickness and
disease are concerned, but you've worn yourself
out. You're only 39 years old, but you've got the body of a 90-year-old man." (A 90-year-old man hasn't
got much longer to live, friends!)
"I'll
tell you what you've done," the doctor continued. "You've
carried the load of everybody in the church — all their
burdens — all their worries. You've eaten these problems
at meal time. You've slept with these problems. You've
talked about them. You've carried them."
"Yes, that's what I've done," the pastor
agreed.
'Not Enough
Sense To Worry' 17
"Well," the doctor
said, "you might live another couple of
years if you give up the ministry and rest."
Thank God I came along to hold
him a meeting, taught him how to trust God,
and got him healed. I read years later
in a denominational magazine that he retired from pastoring at age 75, but was still preaching.
Glory! When he was 39, the doctor said he was going to die.
I learned
to walk in the strength of the Lord and cast my cares
on Him.
"Casting
the whole of your care — all your anxieties, all your
worries, all your concerns, once and for all — on Him;
for He cares for you affectionately, and cares about you
watchfully," The Amplified Bible renders that Scripture.
When you
turn it over to Him, you don't have it anymore.
He's got it. Then you can say, "I'm carefree," even when
it's still there from the natural standpoint. Because you're
not carrying that load; He is.
We used
to sing a song that went, "Take your burden to the Lord
and leave it there." The trouble with most people is that
they come to the altar, or wherever they pray, take their
burdens to the Lord all right, tell Him about them — and then when they get up
from that place of prayer, they pick their burdens up again!
It helps
to imagine your burdens as a 100-pound sack. People put
it on their backs and carry it home with them from
their place of prayer. No! Leave it there! Leave it there! "Casting the
whole of your care ... ONCE AND FOR ALL on Him," that verse
says. So I refuse to worry. (Of course, when you don't, you're an oddity.)
Once I was fumbling around
with the key, trying to get the parsonage
door open, and holding our son Ken in my
18 Casting Your Cares Upon the Lord
arms at the same time. My wife
was holding Patsy, who was just a baby. (Ken was bigger
and heavier.)
Oretha
said, "I don't believe you would worry if both the kids and I fell dead
right here on the front porch."
I said,
"Well, I'd be a fool to start worrying then, wouldn't
I? That would be stupid." (The Lord plainly said, "Which
of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature," Matt.
6:27.) I would have been concerned, but I
wouldn't have worried about it.
Oretha
finally learned not to worry. I heard her say to another preacher's wife one
time, "Well, I finally learned it works. I don't ever
worry." And right at that time in our life, you talk about having
problems and needs! They were piled on us
knee deep. But she wasn't worrying, because she had learned to cast those cares upon the Lord.
We can do
it — we can cast all of our cares on Him — because He said to do it. He's not
unjust. He's not going to tell you or me to do something we can't do. That
would be unjust.
Chapter 4 Dealing With Anxieties
It's easy
to find out why prayer doesn't work all the time for some people. They
want you to pray the prayer of faith and get
the victory for them — but they want to hold onto their cares, too.
Did you notice that verse in
Philippians 4? Let's look at it again. Here
is instruction. Why not take God's instruction on prayer? Don't you believe God knows what He is talking about?
PHILIPPIANS 4:6
6 BE CAREFUL FOR NOTHING; but in
every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.
That's from the King James
Version. We don't talk that way today.
Today we would say, "In nothing be anxious," or "Do not fret or have any anxiety about
anything."
Notice
that this is instruction about prayer. What is the first
thing the Lord said to do? Deal with your anxieties; deal
with your worries. That's the first thing. And that's
the first thing the Lord dealt with me about. I didn't know as much about the
Bible then, but the Spirit of God led me in line with the
Word.
So do that first. Then pray.
It's easy enough to practice
the second part of the verse ("in every
thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto
God"), but this part is not going to work without taking the first
step ("Be careful for nothing").
Do you
understand? The first thing the Lord said was, "Do
not fret or have any anxiety about anything." Take
19
20 Casting Your Cares Upon the Lord
that step first.
When you give people the Word
of God, some accuse you of being
hard-hearted. Wanting to help people is not being hard-hearted, however.
I was
holding a meeting in South Texas once, and a Full
Gospel minister contacted me through the pastor to see if I
would talk to him. He was in a lot of trouble. I knew him, so I
said, "Tell him to come here. I will talk to him."
So he came
to that town and he told me his problems. Among
other things, he was being sued, and that was going to
cost him a lot of money in lawyers' fees alone. Troubles
were piled on him. He was so nervous, he hadn't eaten for
days. His stomach was jumping because he was worried,
fretful, and full of anxiety. He couldn't even keep water on
his stomach. He couldn't sleep at night. He was full of
anxiety with all of this staring him in the face.
He wanted
me to pray the prayer of faith that would straighten
out all of his problems.
I realized I had to deal with
his anxieties before I could get the prayer
to work, so I began to talk to him along these lines. I even gave him
the same Scriptures I've been giving you,
encouraging him to cast all of his care, anxieties, worries, and concerns on the Lord before taking his
problems to the Lord in prayer.
He said,
"Why won't the Lord hear me? I've prayed, and prayed, and prayed. I've done
everything I know to do, and I can't find
any relief." He was full of anxiety and fear, that's why.
I began
to tell him what the Bible says. And this born-again,
Spirit-filled, tongue-talking, Bible-believing, divine
healing-believing, miracle-believing, Full Gospel minister
said to me, "Well, everybody doesn't have as
Dealing With
Anxieties 21
much faith as you do."
I said,
"It isn't a matter of faith, dear Brother. You've got the same Bible I've
got. I'm not telling you to do something I haven't done. I don't
like to magnify your problem, but let me tell you about
a few problems I've faced . . . ." And I told him — and they
were worse than what he was facing.
He began to soften. He asked,
"What did you do?" (He saw I had
been about 10 times worse off than he thought he was.)
I replied, "I never missed
a meal. I never missed a wink
of sleep.
I'll tell you what I did____ " The Amplified Bible
had been published by then, so I
read these verses to him out of it.
I told
him, "I got down by my bed and read these verses to the
Lord. I said to Him, 'See, You told me right here, "Do not
fret or have any anxiety about anything," and I'm not going
to do it. I'm going to do what You told me to do. You said,
"In every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your
requests be made known," so I'm bringing this problem to
You and turning it over to You. Now I'm going to thank You for the answer and go to
bed. Now You've got it. You work on it while I'm asleep.' "
"Do
you mean that it worked that easy for you?" the preacher
said.
"No,"
I said. "I didn't say it was easy. I'd wake up in the middle of the night
at first, and that problem would hit me. I'd
start thinking about it. I couldn't go back to sleep, so I got out of bed, got on my knees, opened my Bible,
and read it to the Lord and to
myself.
"I'd
say, 'There it is, Lord. I'm not going to take it back. The
devil is trying to bring it back to me. He brought a
22 Casting Your Cares Upon the Lord
picture of it to me, but it's your problem. You keep
working on
it. I'm going back to sleep now.' "
I said to the preacher,
"I had a little struggle there for a day
or two, but I got it over into His hands, I rested, and He worked it all out."
Then this
preacher asked — and you'd think he would know the
Bible works, for he was Full Gospel — "Will that work for me?"
I said, "Certainly it'll work for you." "All
right," he said. "I'll do it. I'll do it myself." I said, "I'll
agree with you. Go on home and do it." I
saw him afterwards, and he admitted, "Oh, I had a struggle. I couldn't sleep. But I got out of bed
three times, read those verses you gave me — I knew they were in the Bible, but I had never acted on them in my life —
and I said, 'Lord, it's yours and I'm
going to turn it over to You.' And I finally went to sleep.
"The next night," he
said, "it was a little easier. By the third night it was a breeze, and
after that night I could eat, sleep, and my stomach didn't jump
anymore. Then after about 10 days, they contacted me about the
lawsuit and said, 'The suit has been dropped. Things have
been taken care of. Everything is fine.' I thought, Dear God!
That lawsuit nearly killed me, but as soon as I got
it into your hands, You worked it out in just a few days. Hallelujah!"
Say this out loud: "He is our burden-bearer." Now
make it personal: "He is my burden-bearer. He knows all about me.
He carries the load. I turn it over to Him.
Hallelujah!"
Several
years ago we were building on four buildings at once
at RHEMA Bible Training Center in Tulsa. That takes a
lot of cash flow. We were in financial difficulty.
Dealing With
Anxieties 23
There would be every reason in
the world to worry at a time like that. Some of the
people may have, but I refused to.
A
minister friend and his wife came here to visit. We were driving them around the
campus showing them what we were building,
and I remember he said to me, "Ohhh, Brother! Ohhh! I know you must carry a heavy loadl"
"No," I said.
"I don't carry any load at all. I'm carefree, load-free, anxiety-free, worry-free, and burden-free, hallelujah!"
I didn't tell him anything
about the struggle we were in right then; I
never even mentioned it to him. Why? Because I had already turned it
over to the Lord. The Lord had it, and He was
working on it.
Instead, I
told the minister, "To tell you the real truth about the
matter, it wouldn't bother me at all to close this thing
down; I didn't want to do it to begin with. I didn't want a school. I was enjoying
it out there in field ministry, going from
crusade to crusade, seminar to seminar. I was having a high time, and the Lord came along and disturbed me. I never wanted to build any training
center. I didn't want one. But the
Lord said, 'Do it.'
"I'll
tell you exactly what I said to the Lord. I speak very plainly to Him. I don't
talk in 'religious' terms to God. I figure He
knows us anyway. I just talk to Him plain, for He's my Father.
"I
said to Him, 'Lord, I didn't want to build this school anyway.
It wasn't my plan or my idea. I didn't want to do it, and I
still don't want to, but You said to do it. We've done what You said to do, and I'm
going to turn it over to You.
" 'It
won't bother me — I won't be the least bit embarrassed
at all — if we close it up. It won't embarrass me. I'm
24 Casting Your Cares Upon the Lord
not embarrassed. I've turned it
over to You. If it doesn't succeed, do You know what I'm
going to do? I'm going all over the United States and tell
on You. I'm going to tell them You weren't big enough to
put it over.
"
'So there it is. You've got it. I'm not going to miss a meal;
I'm not going to lose a wink of sleep.' "
And I
told the minister, "I slept well every night, and I ate well every day
while He worked on the project. Some way or other He managed to
put it over! You can see that!"
Chapter 5 Turn
Loose of Your Problem
You're
going to get into difficulties in life. You're not going to
float through life on flowery beds of ease. The crises of life come to all of
us. The difference is if we know the
Word; if we know the Spirit of
God; if we know how to pray correctly.
Some of
you are holding onto cares and anxieties. You're
still fretting. In fact, you've even gone beyond fretting.
You're "stewing." And others are possibly boiling over
with anxiety, care, and concern.
What God wants you to do is
turn it over to Him. No, I didn't say it was easy; especially if you've been in
the habit of worry for a long time. Get in
the habit of faith instead. Just
release the worry habit into His hands.
Say,
"Lord, I'm putting it into your hands. I'm going to turn
that over to You. I refuse to fret anymore, I refuse to worry
anymore. I refuse to be unduly concerned anymore about this. I refuse to be
full of care. You said to cast it all on You because You love me; You
care for me affectionately and You care about me
watchfully, and I thank You for it.
"It's
in your hands, Lord. It's in your hands from this moment
on. I rest on You. Thank You, Master."
Yes, the
devil will bring a picture of it back to your mind after you get into bed
tonight. What are you going to do? Start
laughing at him!
Say, "Yes, devil, you
brought that picture back, but I'm not
worried about it. I turned that over to the Lord. And while I'm asleep, He's working on the case, ha,
ha." And
25
26 Casting Your Cares Upon the Lord
then go to sleep. That is being
a doer of the Word and not a hearer only (James 1:22).
There are
those who are on the verge of receiving their manifestation
for healing, but it hasn't come yet - and the reason is
because you are holding onto that sickness, disease,
or physical condition. Turn it loose! TURN IT LOOSE!
Quit holding onto it. Let it go, and just lean back on Jesus.
Just fall back on Him. Jesus is there. Say it out loud:
"Jesus is there."
Our text
says, "He cares for you affectionately." You see, He likes you. Yes, He
really does. Yes, He does. Even you. He likes you. He loves you. He cares for you
affectionately and cares about you
watchfully."
He is
watching. He'll see you. Just turn loose and fall back into His arms. Glory to
God, He'll catch you.
Just
relax and rest in Him, and you'll find that your symptoms
will disappear.
Prophecy
You see, the Word of God does not just work for one,
And
it is not written just for the benefit of one;
But the Word of God belongs unto ALL.
Take the Word as a special message from the kind,
loving,
giving heart; From
your own Father, And apply it unto yourself. Act upon it with
the simplicity of a little child, And you'll
get results every time.
