My Testimony

My Testimony - Part 5 A love For Word Puzzles

My love for word puzzles developed in my teens, when I'd catch my mum trying out the little puzzles in our local newspaper. We'd often tag team on a colossus or cryptic crossword. Before long I was asking mum to buy me large crossword puzzle books that I happily got into when I was feeling bored, which was most days that I wasn't playing sport. Eventually my high school would introduce me to Logical Puzzles and to my delight I'd find a book ready and waiting for me at the store.

Logical Puzzles were such a huge part of my life during my teens and early 20s. I was even known to take my puzzles to a few parties in case I got bored. I once even begged God in my heart to give me a job that involved solving logical puzzles, little did I know what He had in store for me all along. 

Upon reading the New Testament of the Bible (in particular), it didn't take very long for me to realize that the Bible has been structured very similar to the Logical Puzzles I used to do as a teen. The only real difference I can see is that the surface text of the Bible still makes a lot of sense and tells a coherent story, while the text in Logical Puzzles sounds very illogical on its surface. Where they are alike is that you have to match the text that goes together to solve the puzzle of any given topic. Take the story of the Deaf and Dumb spirit for example. It's connection to my personal life is what set me out on this trail to begin with. This personal connection caused me to have a keen ear for all things involving unclean spirits, familiar spirits, demoniacs, etc. Probably the most important thing that stood out to me about this subject is that it seems the more you had the more you were a prime candidate for healing by Jesus and His early Disciples:

And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people. And his fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto him all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatic, and those that had the palsy; and he healed them. Matthew 4:23-24

And he called unto him the twelve, and began to send them forth by two and two; and gave them power over unclean spirits; Mark 6:7
 
And certain women, which had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom went seven devils, And Joanna the wife of Chuza Herod's steward, and Susanna, and many others, which ministered unto him of their substance. Luke 8:2-3
 
What was especially notable about my particular condition is that none of the 12 disciples were able to heal that particular child. Only Jesus was able:
 
When Jesus saw that the people came running together, he rebuked the foul spirit, saying unto him, Thou dumb and deaf spirit, I charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him. And the spirit cried, and rent him sore, and came out of him: and he was as one dead; insomuch that many said, He is dead. But Jesus took him by the hand, and lifted him up; and he arose. And when he was come into the house, his disciples asked him privately, Why could not we cast him out? And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting. Mark 9:25-29
 
Now is probably a better time than ever to point out that many things in the Bible have a double meaning. Take the word fasting for example. Most people would assume that this is speaking about going without food. But a chapter in the Book of Isaiah highlights that even fasting can have a much deeper meaning. This is a perfect example of the logical puzzle-like structure of the Bible:
 
Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the LORD? Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh? Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the LORD shall be thy rereward. Then shalt thou call, and the LORD shall answer; thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here I am. If thou take away from the midst of thee the yoke, the putting forth of the finger, and speaking vanity; And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noonday: And the LORD shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not. And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in. If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the LORD, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: Then shalt thou delight thyself in the LORD; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it. Isaiah 58:1-14
 
I think it's important to point out that when the Lord said earlier "This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting" he obviously wasn't suggesting that the child with the deaf and dumb spirit needed to pray and fast to be healed otherwise Jesus himself wouldn't have been able to heal the child either. No, Jesus was talking about the healer needing to pray and fast to bring this particular spirit out.  This is important because I've noticed this habit among some deliverance ministers, to blame the person who wasn't healed, for not being healed, rather than seeing it as their own shortcoming.  I think this is very damaging, because it means the person is left to try to figure out why they aren't being healed.  There is not a single example in Scripture, where a person was expected to do this, before getting healed.

Since becoming an adult and being plagued with unclean spirits on multiple occasions, I have definitely entertained the idea that in order to heal myself, and free myself of these spirits, it will probably require that I pray and fast.  Hence the reason I've paid particular attention to the fasting mentioned in Isaiah 58.  And I have noticed that when I follow these verses, the Lord's presence and voice seems ever-present to me.  I definitely encourage all Christians to pay closer attention to these verses in Isaiah 58 because they involve the fasting that the Lord says He accepts and He promises that our prayers will be heard when we fast in this way.