When my biological father passed away of a heart attack I never even thought of calling an ambulance. My first and only thought was to call on God. I prayed for almost thirty minutes. After about twenty to twenty-five minutes the Lord told me He would breathe life back into my father, which He soon did. (See https://jondavidbanks.com/2018/09/08/a-little-about-me/.
Right now, as I’m sitting here writing, is the first time I’ve considered the fact that I never thought of calling an ambulance that day. I just automatically went to the Lord. Jesus had already ordained me about year before that. Maybe that was why I went straight to God. I don’t know. God knows. This was forty-nine years ago.
The point I want to make is that, for whatever reason, I had no one but God to lean on. I prayed to Him in Jesus’ name asking that He give my father another chance. He was not a Christian at the time. The second he came back to life he was praising Jesus. He knew he had been dead and that he returned a Christian.
I don’t know how God did all that. I just know He did. Another experience that affected me in the same way was when I was caught up with Jesus, Peter, James, John and Paul. I don’t know how God accomplished all that. I only know He did. In one moment I was standing up in church; in the blink of an eye I was standing beside Jesus somewhere above the earth, looking down at my now prostrate body on the floor in the church. In one moment my biological father lay dead without Christ; in the blink of an eye he was alive praising Christ.
So many “experts” today write books on how to heal, how to pray in the will of God, how to sing in the Spirit, how to interpret tongues, how to walk by the Spirit, how to claim the promises, how to bind the devil, how to declare and decree things into being, how to pray the prayer of faith, etc., etc., etc. Whatever you want to know there is a book about it. If these experts had been around during these experiences, they wouldn’t have helped me in any way. That’s because there’s only been one book written by the Holy Spirit and that is the Bible. All other books were written by men. Before these two experiences I was reading Christian books. But after my spirit was caught up with Jesus and the other apostles, Jesus told me to forget everything I had learned, and to stop reading all books, except the Bible. So, for nearly fifty years now I have read nothing but the Bible.
And I tell you now from experience, the Bible is all anyone needs to live the Christian life. As a matter of fact, if I was going to read another book, Christian especially, I would read it with an abundance of caution. And, yes, I am saying this as I write this letter, and I admonish everyone reading it to weigh its contents on the scales of the Holy Bible.
This has been a somewhat blabbering letter and I apologize for that. I started it to impress the necessity of faith, rather than the knowledge of men. Faith is not something you can make up in your mind. Faith is believing that God is, and that He rewards those who seek Him. It is the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen. I had faith when my biological father came back to life, for the Lord told me he would make it happen. I also had faith when my spirit was caught up with Jesus and four apostles. I submit to you that it would not have happened if I hadn’t had faith.
Did I know I had faith? No, I did not. By faith Sarah herself received ability to conceive, even beyond the proper time of life, since she considered Him faithful who had promised. Sarah and Abraham both laughed at this promise of God for they were way beyond the child-bearing age. Still they believed the Lord was able to do the impossible, and it was counted to them as faith. So it is with us, when we believe the Lord exists and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him, He counts that as faith and we soon experience the substance of what we hope for, and the evidence of what we can’t see.
Our faith is in God, and not in ourselves. Thus, we do nothing to try and hurry Him to give us what we want, we simply wait patiently for Him to do what He has promised to do.
Dear friends, we must always be truthful with God, even when we are having trouble believing something. We are to confess our unbelief and our shortcomings. Our Father admires it when one of His own speaks the truth in all things.
There is no formula for faith. It is simply believing God.
Jon David Banks, God’s most unworthy servant
jondavidbanks.com 