Decisions that Define Us – Graham Cooke
This is an awesome video:
Transcribed:
This is called, “Decisions that Define Us”
We have decided, that teaching the Gospel without demonstrating the Gospel is not enough
good preaching, good doctrine, being good people — it’s not enough
We’ve decided that having a good church club is not enough
good fellowship — it’s not enough
just being a member of that club is not enough
We’ve decided that having good bible studies is good, but not good enough.
That just making it to heaven is not our goal
and that knowing about God without truly knowing Him and experiencing God is meaningless
We’ve decided that having good programs is not enough,
That change without transformation is intolerable
And that staying the same is not an option
We’ve decided that gifting without character is futile
We’ve decided that singing songs without worshipping is hollow
Having meetings without God showing up is pointless
We’ve decided that faith without works is not enough
And having works without love is not acceptable
That our function comes out of our relationship first, with our father and second, with each other
We have that decided that reading about the book of Acts without living the book of acts is unthinkable
We’ve decided that confident faith is good, bold faith is better
We’ve decided that hearing about the Holy Spirit without experiencing Him is silly
That believing in His presence without seeing it manifested in signs and wonders is hypocrisy
That believing in healing without seeing people healed is absurd
and that believing in deliverance without people being delivered is absolutely ridiculous
We’ve decided to be Holy Spirit filled, Holy Spirit led, and Holy Spirit empowered
Anything less doesn’t work for us
We have decided to be the ones telling the stories of God’s power, not the ones hearing about God
We have decided that living saved, but not supernatural, is living below our privilege and short of what Christ died for.
We have decided that we’re a battleship, not a cruise ship
an army, not an audience
special forces, not spectators
missionaries, not club members
We have decided to value both pioneers and settlers
pioneers to expand our territory and settlers to build on those territories
but we are not squatters — people who take up space others have fought for without improving it
We have decided to be infectious instead of innocuous
contagious instead of quarantined
deadly instead of benign
We have decided to be radical lovers and outrageous givers
We have decided that we’re a mission station, not a museum
Therefore, we honor the past, but we don’t live in it.
We live in the present with our eyes on the future
We see past events, success and failures as stepping stones, not stop signs
We pursue learning in order to be transformed, not learning in order to know
We are people of engagement, not observation
We focus on what could be, not what is or has been
We are not limited to the 4 walls of this building
Our influence is not restricted by location
Not even the nations are ‘out of bounds’
We are more concerned about how many we send out into the world,
Than how many we convince to come into the building
This building is meant to be filled, and it will be
but it will not be the measure of who we are, or the measure of our effectiveness
We raise up world-changers, not tour-guides
We train commandos, not committers
We are people of our destiny, not our history
We have decided that it’s better to fail while reaching for the impossible that God has planned for us than succeed in settling for less
We have decided that nothing short of His kingdom come, and His will be done in our world as it is in heaven will satisfy
We have decided we will not be satisfied until our world freaks out, and cries out “those who have turned the world upside down have come here too” (acts 17:6)
These are some of the decisions that define who we are as a community and how we live our lives
These decisions are not destinations but rather journeys
Journeys along an ancient path, we’ve not found some new way
but rather we’ve discovered the path as old as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
The same path followed by Moses, Joshua, Caleb, Paul, John, and Peter
A path followed by the first century church
A church that revolutionized the culture of the 1st century and beyond
It’s a path that will impact the world we live in today
It’s a path of bold faith
believing that what God says is really true and acting on it
It’s a path of outrageous generosity
Giving our life away in order to demonstrate his kingdom
It’s a path of radical love
Loving God with everything in us
and our neighbors as ourselves
It’s a path of liberty freedom and healing
On this path, you will find significance purpose and destiny
It’s a path less traveled, however
It’s not a path only available to a select few
but to whosoever will may come
It’s for people of every nation tribe and tongue
for those in any occupation or vocation
No matter where you are on this life journey, there’s room on this path for you.
- Graham Cooke
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God. is. with. You.
It frustrates me when people reduce “healing the sick” to a theological argument.
Think about this.
It’s not even supposed to be a “stance” of scripture. Jesus didn’t even try to prove that healing was for His day.
He didn’t try to validate it through Scripture. He just did it.
It wasn’t an argument. He just did it.
It wasn’t a formula. It was just a byproduct of who He was with — His Father (John 5:19-20)
“God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.” – Acts 10:38
Jesus never mentioned “this is for the elite”. He never said, “for pastors and people with ministries only”. He did it because God was with Him.
Doesn’t that make perfect sense?
God, Creator of the universe, spoke worlds into existence…
Jesus healed all who were oppressed by the devil because the Creator was with Him.
Hmm…
Ok.
God is with US. We have become the temple in which God Himself dwells. God is with us (1 John 4:4, John 14:16, Joshua 1:5). We have the same spirit that Christ had.
Are you connecting the dots?
God was with Jesus, therefore, Jesus healed all those oppressed by the devil.
God is with _____, therefore, _____ can heal all those oppressed by the devil.
Must I fill in the blanks for you?
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See, it’s not about, “let’s examine the theological soundness of this statement”
It’s about healing those who are oppressed by the devil.
(rephrase)
It’s about freeing people from the devil.
Do you realize that the sickness that Jesus healed are the same sicknesses that are still here today? Deafness. Blindness. Muteness. Paralysis. Epilepsy. Leprosy. Fever. Sickness of the blood. Death.
All those sicknesses, Jesus healed.
All those sicknesses are from the devil.All those sicknesses are still here today.
All those sicknesses are still from the devil.
Do you see where I’m going?
Healing was a tool that Jesus used out of the overflow of compassion that He had for people.

He healed people because He wanted to free them from the devil. Because when you get someone free from the devil, that’s actually good news.
Healing isn’t about a doctrine. It’s a jail-break from the prison of physical bondage (Luke 4:18). It’s about serving people who are in need (1 John 3:18).
Think about this: When Jesus encountered someone sick, He could say to them:
“You don’t have to be blind anymore.”
“You don’t have to be deaf anymore.”
“You don’t have to die of this sickness.”
“You don’t have to suffer from epilepsy anymore.”
“I can set you free from the devil. Right now.”
What a privilege! What a joy to get to be able to say that! How was He able? Because God was with Him.
Think about this: When a Christian encounters someone suffering, we ought to be able to say:
“You don’t have to have chronic depression anymore”
“20 years of scoliosis? No problem.”
“Doctors said you have stage 4 cancer? Would you want that report reversed?”
“You were born deaf? Would you like to be able to hear?”
“Your husband has advanced Parkinson’s? Do you want your husband back?”
“You’ve had migraines for 10 years? It can stop today.”
Why?
Because He is with us.
What an honor to be able to represent King of Kings.
What an privilege we can bring hope to people who have lost it.
To not run after this is like shirking at a $10,000 bill.
Yes, it seems like only rich, famous, renown people have been able to use this $10,000 dollar bill.
Yes, people have abused their use of the $10,000 bill.
Yes, people have idolized the $10,000 bill.
Yes, people have boasted in their $10,000 bill instead of using it.
Yes, the devil has created counterfeits of the $10,000 bill.
Every believer has been given the $10,000 bill.
But God gave it to us with the intent that we would freely give to others, because it has been freely given to us (Luke 12:32, Luke 17:21, Matt 10:8, Acts 3:6).
It was given to us as a tool to better serve the people around us. It was a tool to equip us in a supernatural way to express love for people, not something to wave around and idolize.
Do you get it?
You get to demonstrate love for people in a supernatural way because God. is. with. you.
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Weekend Trip
A few weeks ago (September 17), I went to Tijuana, Mexico with a team of ~15 people led by Chris Preitauer. Chris actually compiled the majority of the team’s testimonies here, including videos and pictures.
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But first, here’s some background to how I met Chris:
The last time I went to Southern California (SoCal), I was staying a night in Los Angeles and I came across Chris’ site that my friend had cross-posted. I read a few of the testimonies on the site and realized that this guy was on a similar page as me.
I looked him up on facebook and found out that he was in San Diego — it just so happened that I was going there the very next day. I sent him a friend request and a message saying something along the lines of:
“Hey I came across your site, seems like we’re on the same page. We should meet up! Are you free in the next few days?”
He responded, and a few days later, we met up at a local mall and spent a few hours sharing our stories/journey/testimonies. At one point in the conversation, Chris told me that he went to Mexico on a consistent basis and he invited me to go with him the next time around. This trip we just came back from was a result of what we discussed that night.
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I left 5:30am from San Jose, picked up my friend Christian as I was passing through LA, and we arrived at the meeting area around 2:30pm. Chris had me do a short training on the basics of healing. Here’s the clip:
We drove across the border, and before we got started with anything, we had tacos. While we were ordering at this small taco shop, Chris yelled out at me and pointed across the street. I looked, confused at first because I didn’t know what he was pointing at. And then I saw it. It was a man on crutches; he was missing his left leg.
As other similar occasions, this is what went through my head.
“You’ve never seen an amputee healed.”
“This is IMPOSSIBLE. HELLOOOOOO”
“What? A limb’s gonna grow out? You crazy.”
I blipped. I decided it would be more convenient to not go after the guy. I spent a few minutes fixing my thinking. If I blip, I intentionally confront why I had the hesitation, and correct it with the right thinking. I picked myself back up mentally and went on with the day.
I went back to ordering tacos and getting acquainted with the team. We ate tacos and talked for a little bit, and after a while, to my surprise, the guy with the missing leg came into the store. I turned to one of my teammates, Francisco, and asked, “Hey you wanna translate for me?”
“Sure.”
We went to approach the guy, but he was ordering tacos so we decided to wait a little. When we finally greeted him and asked, I asked, ‘Hey, you mind me asking what happened to your leg?’ Francisco translated for me and the guy told us that it was a medical mistake; the doctors ended up amputating his whole leg with the exception of a stump.
I asked, “Do you mind if I pray for your leg to be restored?” He welcomed it. I put my hand on his stump and commanded the leg to be restored, and then asked him how he was doing. He said he felt some tingling in the area, but not much else. I went in to pray again, commanding bone/flesh/tendons/ligaments to form and then asked again how he was doing. Not much else.
I decided to close it. “Thank you for letting me pray for you. Make sure you keep checking your leg for any change.” He was grateful that we even took the time.
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The church we were ministering at was “Charismatic Family Center” in Tijuana. There were probably about 100 people there.

I decided to hang outside the building just before the meeting was about to start. I saw a younger woman pushing an elderly woman in a wheelchair across the street. It just so happened that Francisco was outside as well. “Hey there’s a lady in a wheelchair across the street, you wanna come?”
We approached the lady and asked what had happened to her. The younger woman told us that she had diabetes and it was affecting her eyesight and her strength. I asked if she wanted to be made well (who doesn’t??), and she nodded. I wish I could give a solid result of what happened, but that was lost in translation.
Immediately after, I met Jose and his wife. Jose was using a blind cane, so I went to talk with him to see what happened. He told me he had glaucoma and he lost most of his vision. I laid hands on his eyes ~3 times without much concrete progress. He dismissed himself and told me that he was heading to the church meeting anyway. We will continue with his story later..

On a side note, we didn’t just go to this church to minister to the sick, Chris also arranged for clothes and food to be given out to the locals.
During the church service, there were probably about 100 people. Before the ministry time started, Chris and I shared some testimonies from recent weeks. After that, Chris called for every sick person to come up to the front. To my surprise, it looked like 75-80% of the room came up for healing.
The first guy I prayed for needed healing for his back. I checked his legs and his right one was just a tad short. I told him to keep his eyes open because I wanted him to see it grow. I commanded the legs to even out and it shot out really quick and I asked, “Did you feel it?”
He nodded. He said he still had a little bit of pain, so I told my translator to put her hand on his back. She commanded the pain to go, and the rest of the guy’s pain left.
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The next guy I ministered to was the same guy I met before the meeting (Jose). I don’t know the exact extent of his blindness, but from how he described the situation, it seemed like he was 80-90% blind when I first ministered to him.
For the first 5 minutes, we didn’t see any progress. Slowly but surely, it went to 20%, then 40%, then 50%, and it suddenly jumped to 70%.
At this point, he and his wife were in tears. “I can see, I can see.” He told me how most of the ‘clouds’ in his vision were no longer there. He just kept looking around the room, glad that he could actually see. Here’s a short before and after video:
At this point, I wanted to continue with the guy because I wanted him to see 100%, but the lady who was mediating the meeting grabbed my arm and ‘suggested’ me to pray for another girl on crutches.
Chris had actually already ministered to her previously, he wrote about it in his post, but he didn’t see much progress. When I saw her, she had been crying because of the pain and told me in very broken English that her back and legs were hurting. I took her hand, commanded all the pain to leave, and told her to stand up.
She stood, but all the pain was still there, she winced and started tearing up again. I didn’t want to push it too much, so I told her it’s ok if she sat down. She slowly sat in her seat and I prayed again. “How are you now?”
“I’m fine.”
I wasn’t quite sure if I understood, so I told her to stand up again. She stood and almost immediately she starting crying again. I didn’t know what to think… I thought she said she was fine!

I asked her again, “You ok?”
“Fine! I’m fine,” with sobs in between.
She went from tears of pain to tears of joy so quickly that it caught me off guard. I told her to walk, and she went forward without any pain. It looked like she was moving a bit slowly and when I asked, she told me that her muscles were just stiff.
She continued on, and shortly after, she testified on the microphone that was completely pain-free. That encounter rocked her to the core, she thanked me over and over. I definitely won’t forget the look of gratitude that she had. Jesus!
Here’s a short vid of it:
After that, I just hung out a little just to see what else was happening. Every few minutes there would be cheers, the sound of someone getting free. I would look around the room, many people were in tears. I’ve never seen people this impacted by miracles.
Soon after, an old lady motioned me over and signaled that she wanted healing for her ears. *Sweet*, I thought. I put my hands on her ears, commanded them to hear normally. I tried to ask if it was better with simple English and gestures, she gave me two thumbs up.
I went to get my friend to translate for me and said, “Hey, ask this lady what just happened.” He conversed with her and found out that her hearing was now about 70% better than where it was before. I asked my friend if he wanted to ‘finish’ the job (he had not seen many people healed, so I wanted to let him take a shot at it).
I instructed him, “Just put your hand on her hears, just command what you want to see happen.” He went for it, and when he interviewed the lady, she confirmed that her ears were 100%. Woot!
By this point, because we had such a big healing team, pretty much everyone was ministered to. There was one other guy I spent a little time with. A teenager with a lump protruding from his chest about an inch. It was a bone-y growth, didn’t cause pain, but it was definitely not normal. We (as a team) didn’t see any change with that.
Overall, it was an awesome trip, 2 of my friends finally got to experience people getting free as a result of their action. They got to see the power of God happen through them and watched people get free.
What’s greater than walking in the freedom Christ gave, is seeing other people walk in it as well.
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I left for San Jose on Monday morning at 2:30am.
I remember this so clearly. This was hands down the best testimony for me during the weekend. This is a video of me sharing the story:
That story probably impacted me the most. Just to think, one simple act of kindness for another can completely turn around someone’s day. I felt like I relived the story of the good samaritan…
And the last thing that happened before I got home… later into my drive, around 5:00am, just before I was about to hit Bakersfield, I stopped for gas. When I got there, I was the only one at this gas station. While I as pumping, a car drives up behind me, a girl gets out and asks, “Hey.. we’re out of cash.. we’re trying to get to Bakersfield, can you help us out?”
“Yea sure,” I gave them $20 and they thanked me. The girl looked really ragged and worn out, she went inside the gas station to buy something. The guy was waiting in the passenger seat, so I started to chat with him. I ended up giving him some extra water bottles from the back of my trunk.
I went inside the gas station to get the receipt, and when I came out, they were parked and thanked me for everything I did. I figured it was an opportune time to dialogue with them. I asked them if either of them needed prayer/healing for anything. The girl was learning on the side of the car in her flip-flops and said, “My foot’s broke…”
“Really?” She didn’t have cast on, “Well here, check this out,” as I reached out my hand. I commanded her leg to be healed and then I told her to check it.
“Move it around”
She took a few steps and said, “The pain’s gone.”
“Jump on it.”
She gave a good hop and landing normally. The guy in the car said, “what are you serious?”
“I’m serious! Pain’s gone.”
They got rocked. They told me that they were actually on their way to Oregon, so I decided to bless them with some more money.
Freely I received, freely I give.
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To read Chris’ testimonies go here.
To read Felicia’s testimonies go here.
http://powerdemonstration.com/2011/09/21/videos-the-blind-3-receive-their-sight-in-mexico/
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Business Conference and Sunday Meeting
Two weeks ago (Sept 8th-Sept 11th), I attended a life-changing business conference with Ryan. The meetings went from 9am to 9pm and we were constantly meeting people all day. The conference had about 800 people, many of them ‘soloprenuers’ learning how to make a brand for themselves. Many of them were excited to network so everyone was proactively getting to know each other.
We had some pretty cool opportunities to minister to people there, but here’s one of the stories from the last day of the conference:
On the last day (Sunday, Sept 11th), we decided to wear our “free healing shirts” because we realized that there were a lot of New-Agey folks who were interested in healing. Anyway, during the last lunch, we were eating at Togo’s. While we were in line, I overheard two ladies behind me talking.
“L” was talking to “J” about how she didn’t want to eat pizza because they didn’t have her special crust. So I asked, out of curiosity, “what’s your special crust?”
It led to a conversation about diet and how she was gluten-free. After the conversation started to fade, she said, “So your shirt says, ‘just ask.’ Ask about what?”
I had a jacket on, so she couldn’t see the whole shirt. I opened my jacket up and said, “free healing.”
“How do you do that?”
“Well, do you need healing for anything?”
“Yes, I have a headache!”
“We can take care of that for you.”
“How do you do it?”
“MMmm.. It’s easier if we just show you,” Ryan said.
I put my hand on top of her head and commanded, “Headache, GO.”
We told her to check herself. “Wow,” she was impressed. She said there was still some pain down her right shoulder, so Ryan went for it and the pain immediately left. She still had a hint of pain lingering somewhere in her upper neck.
Both “L” and “J” were impressed. They asked again, “How did you do that?” Ryan showed them his “Jesus” tattoo.
I started explaining to them how this was what Jesus did when he was walking the earth. He would constantly be healing the sick, casting out demons and setting people free. They liked what we were saying…
Ryan ended up paying for their lunch, and we continued to converse. Finally, “J” told us that she was dealing with back pain. So to demonstrate authority, Ryan told “L” to lay hands on her friend.
“Do I have to put my hand on her back?”
“No, you can put it anywhere. Actually… just put your pinky on her shoulder,” Ryan replied.
Most of “J“‘s pain left. I put my hand on her back, commanded it to go and she said it was gone.
“Completely?”
“Yea!”
After we got our food, Ryan told them that they probably had one leg shorter than the other. “J” said that she was a personal trainer, and she knew for a fact that one of her legs was shorter. Both of their legs grew out, both of them felt it, and both of them were very interested in what we were doing.
They asked again, “How do you do it?”
At that point we just started preaching the kingdom. We talked about how healing wasn’t about a method, it’s about a person. How so many people are in a constant search to find peace. We told them that we have peace; peace is a person, not a state of mind. We started to preach Jesus and the fullness of Christ in believers (Col 2:8-10), that no other religion can say that they have found the ‘fullness of God’ except Christians.
They were interested. So I told “L”, who was a massage therapist, “So the next time you’re working with a patient, and you want to heal them, just say this, ‘Holy Spirit, if this is real, teach me how to do it’.
At that point, they told us that they had to get going. They were so excited about everything we told them.
You don’t realize how bright your light is until you get out in the darkness.
If you make ministry an event, it’ll never flow like a lifestyle.
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Our intent with the group is to provide a place for people to gather, develop relationships with each other, intentionally invest in each other, and learn to serve one another (learning to love by practicing).
A lot of times, people come to the meeting because they need healing in their body. Well, the mother of the lady whose house we were in, had been dealing with arthritis for 10 years.
From experience, and most of the cases of arthritis I’ve seen, she was more on the severe end. Her back was bent over, her arms looked stiff, she wasn’t the happiest person in the room…
Before I ministered to her, her arms could only go up about a fourth of the way up, she had trouble getting her arms straightened, she had intense pain even if you touched her hand, her back and shoulders hurt with the slightest movement…
That’s what I started with. Easy.
I’m a son of the King. I have Holy Ghost power flowing through me. Easy.
For the first 5 minutes, we didn’t see any change. I prayed probably ~10 times and each time, I would ask, “Is there any change?” She would consistently say, “It’s the same.”
When I first started out doing this stuff, hearing “it’s the same” would shake my confidence.
*crap I don’t see any change, that must mean it’s not working*
I still get the same thoughts running through my head even now, but I’ve learned how to not act on it and not let affect the way I see and the say I move forward.
We walk by faith, not by what we see. Faith doesn’t ignore what is seen. Faith just has a conviction that what you see will change.
Faith sees the end result from the beginning.
There were a few times, after checking herself, she would shake her head, look dejected and she would say, “Sorry…” and I would respond, “This has nothing to do with you, there’s no pressure, it’s not on you!”
Then finally, we saw progress. She said that her hands were hurting less, and her back/shoulders felt looser. I asked her specifically how much better, and she said her hands were 50% better.
I could tell she was very encouraged with the progress. It was a breath of fresh air after not seeing any change for what seemed like an eternity.
After the 50% progress, we kept going. We prayed again, commanding muscles/tendons/bones/ligaments to be healed, whole, and restored. I asked her, “Any change?” again. It looked like every bit of discouragement jumped back on her. She sighed and said, “No…”
She looked like she wanted me to stop, as if she couldn’t believe that I was willing to spend the time with her, so I said, “You’re worth it.” She sort of flinched as I said it. It seemed like she had a hard time believing it. For the next minute, I just kept saying over and over, “You are worth it. You’re in His family. You’re His daughter. You’re worth it. You’re worth it. You’re worth it.”
It took a bit, but it started to click for her. When it seemed like it registered for her, we continued. It was like a snowball effect after that. Before, she could only raise her arms a fourth of the way up. We prayed, it went to a third. Again, and it was half. Again and it was three-fourths. Again, and her range of movement was almost completely restored.
She was beaming after that. There was still some lingering pain in her hands at that point, but it was noticeably less. I quickly commanded the last bit of pain to leave, and it left instantly. To my knowledge, she was pretty dang close to 100% restored. We didn’t see the swelling in her joints decrease, but most of her functionality was restored.
After we were done, I told her to hug her husband the way she hasn’t been able to for 10 years. They hugged for a long while. It was a sweet moment.
Her daughter earlier mentioned to me that they had flown out to San Jose for this single purpose — to be healed.
“Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.” – Matthew 9:35
“ And as you go, preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.” – Matthew 10:7-8
