A number of great healing evangelists have been led by God to "fast and pray"
for quite long periods in order to break through into greater realms of
anointing and communion with God. W.V.Grant Sr, who was a mightily used and
anointed man of God from earlier this century, was one such evangelist. Before
coming into his full ministry anointing, he was one who spent all his spare time
with Jesus in the secret place. This man constantly sought God, and fasted on
the weekends. He read many books of God's servants in the past and studied his
Bible day and night. He would pray for a couple of days until he got answers. He
would not leave his prayer room until he got an answer from God. This and
Christian work was virtually his lifestyle for fourteen years.
He had already received the baptism in the Holy Spirit fourteen years earlier,
and he spoke in tongues. "Yet, I felt like I had a bow without an arrow, a car
without a battery, or a boat without a paddle. I read how Peter did it, but I
could not do it. I had the highway map. I was on the right road, but on the
wrong side." (W.V. Grant, 'Searching for the Supernatural', pg 6). "I prayed
around the altar. I fasted three days at a time. I testified about a
supernatural God. I told people that I had the Holy Ghost. I spoke in tongues to
prove it. All the time my heart was crying out, Where are all the miracles the
Bible tells us about?" (Pg 2).
"I was a director over 13 churches... I saw people saved, filled with the Holy
Ghost with other tongues. I saw a few people healed. I preached that we had the
Pentecostal power. But where were the results we saw in the early church after
Pentecost? I read about 200 books written by Godly men. I read every word in the
Pentecostal Evangel for years... After I fasted three days, I still felt empty.
That longing surely can be satisfied in some way? Who was putting that longing
and searching in my soul?" (Pg 3).
"What was I waiting for? Nothing else mattered to me. I wanted to see His Glory.
I wanted to see His Miracles. I wanted to see the dead raised. I wanted to see
the devils cast out. I wanted to see the deaf, blind, and the mute made whole.
Did not God say in the last days the lame man would leap as a hart, the tongue
of the dumb would sing, and the eyes of the blind would be opened? (Isaiah
35:5)... John said in Luke 3:16, 'He shall Baptize you with the Holy Spirit and
with FIRE'... It was fourteen years after I received the Holy Ghost and tongues
before I received the Holy Ghost and power." (Pg 13).
"If God has called you into a full time ministry of healing the sick and casting
out devils He usually gives you time to give yourselves to fasting and prayer...
Then one night to my surprise the Lord appeared to me and told me to go on a
seven day fast, which I was willing to do. After the fast was over the Lord
appeared to me. I heard the angels singing a song I had never heard. I wrote it
down. It was beautiful! It was like heaven. Then an angel just above my head
spoke these words, 'In My name shall ye cast out devils, ye shall lay hands on
the sick and they shall recover.' As I began to eat, I felt something like an
electric cur- rent run out at the ends of my fingers and down to the bottom of
my feet. The fire of God was all through my body!" (W.V. Grant Sr, 'Must I Fast
for Forty Days', pg's 20, 36, 37): -
"But on the last day just about break of day, the Holy Spirit began to speak to
me. Mark 16:17-18 - 'These signs shall follow them that believe. In My name
shall you cast out devils, they shall take up serpents, if they drink any deadly
thing, it shall not hurt them, they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall
recover'... I got up, and walked, and my feet were burning as they were
connected to a high voltage wire. The Holy Spirit, and Fire was running all
through my whole body from my head to my toes. It seemed like all my strength
had been drained out of me, and the strength of Christ had taken its place. For
several years since, devils have been cast out, and people healed.
"I had the Holy Spirit for years, but it seemed that now, I was not only filled,
but baptized with zeal, compassion, and with the divine nature of Jesus, with
virtue, and with the fire... If you feel like the Lord has called you into a
special ministry of casting out devils, then remember this: There are many more
things, which are just as necessary as fasting. Fasting within itself will not
be sufficient... But when I was called to fast, it was just as real as being
called to preach. I was conscious of the fast, that it was the Lord's doing and
not my own... It takes a longer fast for one man to be brought to the place
where he is yielded to the Lord enough to receive certain gifts in his life than
it does for other men. It took a certain amount of days for me to fast and to
become so yielded to the Lord; it seemed that all my strength left my body, and
the Lord's strength came into its place! Then I felt the virtue and divine
nature, and the fire of the Holy Ghost dwelling in my body, which gave me power
to meet devils and to cast them out.
"But I still have to be led by the Lord when and how to do it. It is not myself
that doeth the works but the Father that dwelleth in me. God will not trust you
with a ministry if you do not know the leading of the Spirit. I have talked
personally to several evangelists whom God has called into a supernatural
ministry. None of them went on forty-day fasts without any food. Since God has
given other people ministries of deliverance without a long fast you can take
courage and believe for a ministry without fasting forty days..."
With permission from Job Anbalagan
gloryofhiscross@yahoo.co.in
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