On the average believer having authority in simple words - my experience

I have always hated crying. 

I feel that crying is weakness. Before I got saved, the only time I cried was when I was so mad I wanted to hit you or when I was extremely hurt I didn't want to be friends anymore.

When I got saved, I cried every single time I got into the presence of God. I cried so much it was embarassing but I couldn't stop it, I seemed to have no control over it.

When I got into God's presence I lost control of everything till I learned how to let go and give everything to Him.

To me, people who are surrendered to Holy Spirit are the most beautiful and attractive people on the planet.

I mean how beautiful is it, that someone who has the right to be heady and arrogant chooses submission and humility.

Back to authority:

I believe that authority is important.

I believe that authority is primarily expressed through prayer. I believer that everyone should aspire to walk in authority.

A Christian life without authority is a boring life. It is also a life left to chance.

Who has ever heard Kenneth Hagin preach?

He is a powerful anointed preacher who never preaches fear. 

Anytime I listened to other messages there was always a taint of fear in it.

It is pretty much like a cup of orange juice with a little dash of kerosene/petrol added at the end of the message. It made it unfit for my consumption.

Let's go into my background so that you can see how according to worldly standards I was unqualified to have the believer's authority.

Intro: I am a simple girl, your regular African woman from Nigeria. I come from a family of seven children, six girls and a boy (Valiant One).

I grew up under parents who believed in me and let me know that they did. I have not always valued my upbringing, I do now. It has made me who I am.

My earliest memories of faith was Brother Peter in the Catholic Church teaching us about the catholic faith, this put sound moral values in me and my siblings. On practical faith I learned from my mama and grandma.

By practical faith, I mean when you put all of the stuff you learn into practice. When you can pray and get answers.

My mama learned faith early. She was the only child of my maternal grandma. She had to. They had to.

My mama was born at a time when female children were not very valued. Or not considered valuable by society. It is not very much different today. I am sure strides of progress have been made (I am not being pessimistic) I just see that not much in mindsets have changed.

As per the believers authority, I didn't practice faith much.

My mom had this elderly pastor who lived in Festac Town (7th Avenue) and we attended church at his. As a young child, the most important thing about attending church was the bread that we got to eat at church.

Now I know he was probably practicing 'breaking of bread' at the communion table but then the bread was the reward for the long trek to get to church.

My mom had many children and not a lot of money and yet she was still on the look out for a male child. Shortly after attending this man's church, my mom took in and gave birth to a baby boy.

He was God's blessing to my mom.

God knows we needed him.

The amount of faith that you have will change you but it will not change your village and their archaic ways. We needed him in the village because when you have a male child, your father's brothers are unable to jump in and share your father's wealth.

Not for want of trying though. My father's nephew Mr O. who I met for the first time at the village was the one who intervened so that an uncle did not waylay us at the village.

So you see, I am hardly the most perfect specimen to write about the authority of a believer. Since I know that all believers need to know how to walk in authority I will say this, the believer's authority is available to all.

Many will tell you that you can't have authority if you don't do this and that. 

There are many people who do this and that and yet do not have authority.

Our authority as believers comes from Jesus Christ.

Our authority grows as we meditate on God's word

Our authority grows as we learn to relate with God's Spirit and follow His instructions.

God wants us to have authority on the earth.

Honestly I made certain decisions in my life that caused a turnaround.

I got born again

I got filled with the Holy Spirit

I got very interested in developing 'fruit that remains'

Then I got serious about finding God's call for my life and pursuing it.

My life changed the day I read this book about Kenneth Hagin's The Authority of a Believer.

I have this funny habit. 

When I read books, spiritual books, as the chapters progress I pray about what I am reading and ask Holy Spirit to make it real to me.

Aside: I believe that the Holy Spirit is a real person just like Jesus. I believe that no one can live a victorious Christian life without partnership with Holy Spirit.

When I started to exercise the believer's authority I didn't even know what I was doing. I was simply doing something that my spirit agreed with.

My college pastor was highly prophetic. He taught me and a thousand other members of the fellowship how to speak into the spirit realm.

I am well aware that a huge faction of the church like to pretend there is no spirit realm.

IMO (In my opinion) it will be difficult for you to have many answers to prayers or have much conviction if you lack understanding about the spirit realm.

Much of what the believer does is by faith.

All of what the believer does should be by faith.

the just shall live by faith

This appears almost five times in the OT (Old Testament) and in the NT (New Testament) 

So when my pastor says, speak into the spirit realm, God can hear you, I used to do it somewhat half heartedly or whole heartedly or God knows what.

I used to ask God a lot of silly questions. Expecting answers, sometimes not expecting answers because at the time I had not really asked God for anything tangible myself.

In college all I had to do was wait for my mama's pastor's prayers to come true and his prayers usually did. All I had to do was wait a couple of weeks.

So when I had to pray on my own you can see my dilemma. I didn't know exactly how long to wait. I didn't know God's will about the things I was asking for. I didn't know if my tongues was adequate.

I just did what my pastor said. Many times I tried to stop attending church but the Holy Spirit always carried me to church.

Most of the time, the things I asked the Lord questions about were what the pastor preached about. The more times this happened, the more my trust in the Lord increased. 

I was happy that the Lord paid much attention to me. I was more terrified that the enemy was out for me too because of my new status as a believer.

Many times I wanted to draw back but I pressed on.

I depended on my pastor's prayer points.

The only thing I had that was mine was the scriptures that I meditated on daily. Those were mine and as I prayed them I would ask Holy Spirit to make it real to me.

I told the Lord all the problems that I faced and if persecution came I told him about that too. I told the Lord everything.

If someone hurt me, made me mad, lied on me, cheated me, I told the Lord too. I was doing my best to obey, vengeance is mine, says the Lord.

I cried sometimes when I couldn't be nasty back to someone who was nasty. I was and still am a regular human who is sometimes hurt by the injustices and unfairness of this world.

If I talk to the Lord about it, I am fine.

If I don't talk to the Lord about it, it just keeps festering. So I learn to run to the Lord in all things.

I am babbling about so much. I pray that as you read snatches of this solo conversation, you get get a thing or two about walking in aiuthority even though your life may seem messy.

Just remember God wants you to show up daily, stay in intimacy with Him, know His will and declare His will daily.

You don't have to be perfect.

You need to be willing to surrender the stuff you can't handle to him instead of worrying and obsessing about it. 

Key Points to Remember

Another can use the believer's authority:

No one is exempt from using the Believer's Authority.

Authority is exercised simply by words.

You can't use just any words

You need to know the word of God

Authority is exercised in partnership with Holy Spirit

Listen to this video from Kenneth Hagin. 

Video: