Christians and non-Christians alike agree: These are crazy times. So many aspects of our way of life have undergone drastic shifts since the beginning of 2020.

But Pastor James Levesque says on a recent episode of the Engaging Heaven Today podcast that the craziness extends past the culture. Although Christians have what he calls a “miracle mandate” on our lives, he points out, “Your affections are being taken away every second. Everything in your life is trying to tell you to not pray, to not lean in, to not get close to God. Fear, anxiety, concern, depression [are at an] all-time high.

“Christians are getting crazier by the minute,” Levesque says. “But yet through it all, He gives us peace. And through it all, we’re not called to live this way. … Jesus, in Matthew 9, was preaching and teaching the gospel of the kingdom. And it says he was ‘moved by compassion.’ And he looked upon everybody who was there and felt like they were sheep without a shepherd. And He got so moved with compassion that He turned to those closest to Him.

“And in Matthew 10, verse eight, He sent them out to heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils,” Levesque says. “‘Freely you’ve received; freely give.’ That started because He was moved with compassion.

“And what I’m asking you today is, ‘What are you moved with? … because you have a miracle mandate from heaven on your life, and it will not be at rest,” Levesque says. “You will have constant unrest until you give yourself to end the spiritual void on this earth.”

To learn more about God’s miracle mandate on your life, listen to the entire podcast at this link. {eoa}

Author, evangelist, healing minister and TV host David Diga Hernandez works to guide believers into true intimacy with the Holy Spirit, including the practice of speaking and praying in tongues. And Hernandez has no problem practicing what he preaches.

Many churches, he tells host Isaiah Saldivar on the Revival Lifestyle podcast on the Charisma Podcast Network, don’t talk about the Holy Spirit. The reason? Hernandez puts it plainly: “They’re run by a different spirit. … If they were being run by the Holy Spirit, there would be no shame in anything He does or anything He offers.

And many believers, he says, find themselves unable to pray in tongues even after years of asking God to release that gift in their lives. Hernandez offers what may be a surprising explanation. “The reason you cannot pray in tongues, after you’ve prayed the prayer to receive the Holy Spirit, after you’ve gone from conference to conference, the reason you can’t pray in tongues, in one word only: It’s your ego.

“You can’t pray in tongues because of your ego playing into it,” Hernandez says. “I don’t care what story you make up about your past, about why you didn’t or how you were nervous. It’s ego. When we go to pray in tongues, I’ll tell you what happens when you start feeling that unction, and you go to speak that first syllable. What’s the first thought? That’s just me. … What if it’s the enemy? What if it’s another spirit? What if I’m just making this up? Is this the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit?

“All these thoughts are coming to the mind; that’s overanalysis. Another thing that comes to mind is, I’ll look foolish,” Hernandez says.

“Can I just settle the matter for you? People ask, ‘Will I look silly when I pray in tongues?’ My answer is yes. Yes, it’s very silly, praying in tongues. You’re going to look weird. OK, we’re strange, being among the Spirit-filled believers.

“You’re going to look silly, and you’re just going to have to accept that,” Hernandez says. “Leave it to God and all His wisdom to leave such power, the power of praying in tongues, hidden beneath the childlikeness of praying a language of faith.”

To learn more about supernatural gifts and how God uses them in the church and in you, click here to listen to the entire podcast. {eoa}

The tradition of kneeling in prayer goes at least as far back as Jesus (Luke 22:39) and probably much further. But in today’s context, kneeling can have all sorts of meanings.

“I couldn’t find in the Bible anywhere where it said you had to kneel to pray,” Dr. Mark Sherwood says on a recent episode of the Healthcare’s Missing Link podcast on the Charisma Podcast Network. He points out that a couple of years ago, “a famous football player named Colin Kaepernick decided to begin to kneel in the presence of the national anthem. So in the tradition of sports, pregame, we would raise the flag and play or [have] someone sing the national anthem.”

Kaepernick’s decision, Sherwood says, “generated all kinds of controversy, all the way to the White House—extremely controversial. And to this day, as of the date of this recording, Mr. Kaepernick is still unemployed by the National Football League. Does that have anything to do with him and his kneeling? Who knows? That’s up to the employers of the National Football League now; it’s enough.

“Mr. Kaepernick’s protests were in regard to … the perception of police brutality against African American males,” Sherwood explains. “Now with that said, everybody has certainly a right to peaceful protests, a right to their opinions. And Mr. Kaepernick does too. So you have to respect that.”

Sherwood adds that people took Kaepernick’s kneeling posture as a sign of disrespect. However, he points out, “He could have turned his back on the flag, which clearly would have been a sign of disrespect. When you kneel down, it does not necessarily mean a sign of disrespect.”

To listen to the full discussion on “to kneel or not to kneel,” click here for the entire podcast. {eoa}

If God is so good, why is our world in so much trouble? Many people, believers and nonbelievers alike, have this question today. Even without COVID-19, we see child abuse, sex trafficking, malnutrition, crime and more.

Pastor Todd Smith, senior pastor of Christ Fellowship in Dawsonville, Georgia, home of the North Georgia Revival, recognizes these problems, and he says the church has developed some faulty belief systems that keep us from fulfilling our divine destiny. In a recent episode of Kingdom Ready podcast on the Charisma Podcast Network, Smith seeks to correct those errors. One of those he mentions is this: “‘God is in control of everything.’

“This is a bad belief system in the church,” Smith says. “Now, don’t hit the stop button. Here what I’m about to say: God has the capacity to control everything. It’s a part of his DNA, if He has a DNA. You understand that it is a part of His essence. God has the ability to control everything, all things at one moment. He knows the thoughts. He knows the hairs on our head. He knows; He listens. He has the capacity.”

But when catastrophe strikes, Smith often hears people make the statement, “God is in control.” He says, “There’ll be a mass shooting happening: ‘God is in control.’ There’ll be an earthquake, and there’ll be hundreds of people killed: ‘God is in control.’

“I get what they’re saying: God is in control,'” Smith says. “But He’s not in control of everything at this moment. Because He has chosen not to be in control of everything. He has given mankind the ability to choose the ability to govern their own life. He did not create us to be robots; He created us to have the ability to either choose him or to reject Him. And in the choosing to reject Him and not [choose] his plan for our life, there are always consequences to our behaviors and our choices that not only affect us, but they affect those around us,” he says.

“God is not in control of everything,” Smith says. “Does He have the capacity? Could He at any moment take the reins of the whole world back? Yes, yes, yes. He’s not in control of abortion. He’s not in control of adultery. He’s not in control of the addiction to opioids. He’s not in control of those cutting themselves. He’s not in control of suicide. He’s not in control of murder. People make those choices.”

To hear more of Smith’s teaching and how God works to bring peace in the midst of chaos, listen to the entire podcast here. {eoa}

Caleb McCall is a former drug addict. But he’s also the founder and executive director of Be the Bush Ministries in Manchester, Tennessee. After his own time spent at David Wilkerson’s Teen Challenge ministry, he knew God was calling him to start a Christ-centered addiction center. Be the Bush opened its doors in 2018. Like Teen Challenge, the ministry treats the whole person—body, soul and spirit.

And McCall knows what a difference that makes. He tells listeners on a recent episode of the Recovery to Recovered podcast that out of 71 students who have walked through the ministry’s doors, they have seen 31 salvations. These were not just people who “prayed a prayer,” but, McCall says, “genuinely wanted to live for Christ.” The ministry has also seen 22 water baptisms and seven people baptized in the Holy Spirit.

Baptism in the Holy Spirit, McCall says, is “another level. … that baptism in the Holy Spirit helps you to bridle the tongue. James says a man who can bridle the tongue is a mature man. … We believe in the baptism of the Holy Spirit, and we teach it and we see it happen to men,” he says.

And this Spirit-fired baptism is unique, McCall says, because of the addicts Be the Bush serves. “I’m dealing with drug addicts who aren’t churched-up people,” McCall says. “Every now and then you’ll get somebody who comes in who grew up in church … but these are not church-type people; they haven’t even heard about these things.

“I’ve had so many guys get baptized in the Holy Spirit that didn’t even know what had happened,” McCall says. “They started speaking in tongues and praying in the Spirit. Getting them in the middle of an atmosphere where the Spirit of the Lord is is like, “Come home. This is amazing.”

McCall adds that the “baptism of the Holy Spirit takes guys to the next level; we get our guys in Spirit-filled atmospheres. My program can’t save anybody. But when the Spirit of God gets on a man, when the Spirit of God penetrates somebody’s heart, and a baptism of the Holy Spirit takes place … it’s an incredible thing.”

To learn more about how God is using the power of the Spirit to change lives through Be the Bush Ministries, click here for the entire podcast. {eoa}

If you are in crisis, please call 1-800-273-8255 or visit . You are not alone.

Pastor Jason Daughdrill of Gateway Church in Shelbyville, Tennessee, believes in following God—matter what that may look like.

“Sometimes He tells you to do crazy stuff,” Daughdrill says on the Jason Daughdrill Podcast on Charisma News. Early in his ministry, he says, “I was in Louisville [Kentucky]; I had just gotten there. Twenty-six years old. Started pastoring, didn’t know a lot of what I was doing.”

One night, he says, he was driving home, and the Lord spoke to him, saying, “I want you to go run at the track.”

Daughdrill’s first thought, he says, was “We’ve got to test the Spirit. This may not be the Lord. And then I thought, Is my wife praying that I’ll lose some weight?” But in obedience, he went to the track because he believed he had heard a genuine word from God.

As he was running there, he saw a woman. “And I see her there, and I’m thinking, Great. It’s the middle of the night. It’s like 10:30 at night; we’re the only ones out here. It’s dark. I may get sprayed with mace if I run up on her, so this is not going to be good.”

So Daughdrill decided he would just run past her and keep going. “I noticed she had headphones on, so maybe she [wouldn’t] even hear me. So I went to go run by her. … And I run by, and I notice she’s crying; mascara is all over her face. And I’m thinking, This is not good. I’m out here with a lady, middle of the night, no one else out here. And she may be crazy.

“So the Lord spoke to me and said, ‘I want you to go tell her that I love her. That I’m with her, and that it’s going to be OK.'”

After a moment of hesitation, Daughdrill went back to the woman, making sure she knew he was a local pastor. He then said, “The Lord just wanted me to tell you that He loves you. He is with you, and it’s going to be OK.”

The woman started crying harder, but through her tears, she thanked him. Daughdrill told her he would be praying for her and left the track.

“Three days later, I got a letter in the mail,” he says. “She wrote me a letter that I still have to this day. And it said, ‘You don’t know this. But I was walking around that track to work up the courage to kill myself, and I asked God, “Do You even love me? Are You there? Is it going to be OK?” And you answered the things I was asking God.'”

The woman ended up coming to Gateway Church and gave her life to Jesus, Daughdrill says. “I was led by the Spirit. I didn’t just go home like I wanted to. … And I did something that seems so unconventional, but I was obedient,” he says. “And on the other side of the obedience was a miraculous moment for a person. So understand, your obedience isn’t just about your miracle. There’s some people out there who need a miraculous touch from heaven. And they’re waiting on your obedience to experience it.”

To hear more of this story and how you can experience true revival, click here for the entire podcast. {eoa}

Pastor and author Dan McCollum flows in the supernatural, and he wants to help others do the same. But the enemy comes to steal, kill and destroy (John 10:10b), and he has put forth lies to prevent believers from walking in the fullness of the Spirit.

One of these lies, McCollum says on the Prophetic Company podcast on the Charisma Podcast Network, is vilification. What does that mean? “It’s to attack the reputation of a person or a thing with strong and abusive criticism in the context of the supernatural. It means to attribute something to Satan, to self or to evil, which is actually coming from God,” he says.

McCollum recalls an “extraordinary service” that he led many years ago as a youth pastor and worship leader. “I was invited to one of the largest churches in a Midwestern state to speak to a youth conference. There were about 400 youth there. And the moment I stepped up to speak, I said, ‘You’re not going to believe what happens tonight.’

“The two front two rows were totally slain in the spirit,” McCollum says. “They just fell out. And I was shocked. I wasn’t trying to do that I didn’t do that. Holy Spirit did that. And all of a sudden, a spirit of intercession fell on the rest of the young people in the room, and every single one of them was saved, baptized in the Holy Spirit [and] began to speak in tongues, to prophesy, to cry out in intercession. It was one of the greatest meetings that I’d ever been in.”

But the next night, McCollum says, “We were in a general session with the whole church, about 4000 people, and they were getting ready to introduce me as the speaker. I was excited. I was expecting great things based upon what the Lord did the night before.

“And when the pastor of the church got up to introduce me, he said, ‘I want to apologize to our congregation. Last night, our youth had a service, and many things happened that we don’t endorse. We want to publicly say, “We do not endorse this man. And we will only have safe speakers from now on,” and he denounced me right from the pulpit instead of introducing me, with no warning, with no conversation.

“I was so shocked,” McCollum says. “I was like, ‘What did I do? I didn’t even preach; I didn’t teach. Just the Holy Spirit moved, and they just objected with how it happened and vilified me in that situation.”

Heartbroken, he returned to his church, afraid to move in the supernatural lest he mishandle the situation or do something to hurt or confuse others. But one day, a visiting speaker who had no idea of McCollum’s background gave him a prophetic word that changed his life. “He said, ‘Dano. the power of your anointing will increase in direct proportion to your ability to endure persecution.’ Oh my goodness; when he said that, not knowing my situation, not knowing what I’d gone through, I knew it was a word from the Lord.”

To hear more from McCollum on how you can step out in the supernatural and live “above normal,” listen to the entire podcast here. {eoa}

Bill Wiese of Soul Choice Ministries knows more about the reality of hell than most people. He detailed the vision the Lord gave him in the bestselling book, 23 Minutes in Hell.

But Bill says knowing more about hell is a positive rather than a negative. In fact, his strong belief in hell spurs him toward sharing the gospel message of life and hope. The Christians who don’t believe in a literal hell, he says, are in real danger.

In a recent episode of 23 Minutes in Hell on the Charisma Podcast Network, Bill and his wife, Annette, discuss the importance of believing in a literal hell. Bill says that Solomon Stoddard, the grandfather of Great Awakening preacher Jonathan Edwards, said in his book The Fear of Hell, “It would be a great benefit of godly men in If they had more of the fear of hell, for it would help them against a lukewarm and slumbering spirit and would strengthen their heart against many temptations.”

Annette adds that Stoddard “went on to say, ‘The miseries of men are that they do not fear hell. They are not sensible of the dreadfulness or danger of damnation, and so they take great liberty to sin.” She says, “And we see that today, sadly, in the church today—the compromise, the lukewarmness.”

“It’s basically because there’s no fear of Almighty God,” her husband says. Not only does a belief in hell help you appreciate God’s saving grace, but it will “give you more of a passion for the lost, a desire to want to share God’s truth with people to witness,” he says. “I think Bill Bright said only 2% of Christians even bother to witness, yet that’s what we’re all called to do. Jesus told us to go into all the world and preach the gospel. It’s a command, not a suggestion. And yet most don’t witness, but when you understand how severe hell is, when you get a view of this place, you will think, Man, I didn’t know it was that bad. I can’t let my family go there, or my friends. I’ve got to take some extra effort in witnessing.”

In this way, Bill says, witnessing is “not out of a burden. It’s a delight. You want to tell people to warn them of this terrible place that they’re heading for if they don’t repent and receive Jesus as their Lord and Savior.”

To learn more about the reality of hell, click here for the entire podcast. {eoa}

In her years of supernatural ministry, author and deliverance minister Joan Hunter has never been one to avoid challenges. In fact, she has seen God bring healing and deliverance to thousands through her ministry of prophetic prayer.

She shares practical, spiritual steps to this kind of healing in her new book, Prayers and Promises for Healing. And on a recent episode of Today With Marilyn and Sarah on the Charisma Podcast Network, Hunter shares some of the miraculous ways God has worked. Her book contains a section on addiction, which she says she included “because it’s such a need. … Even in the body of Christ, addiction usually starts with some form of emotional trauma, different situations: hurt, betrayal, trying to soothe the pain, whether alcohol, drugs, different things like that,” Hunter says. “And in this, it’s to mask the pain, to postpone the actual hurting. And so the hurt needs to be dealt with more than the addiction.

“And a lot of times in the area where people are addicted to smoking, you look at the person— when did it start?” Hunter asks. “And they knew it was wrong, but did it anyway, they knew their parents didn’t approve, but they did it anyway. They knew it wasn’t good for their health, so they did it anyway. And all of that bottom line is rebellion, which that in turn opened the door for rebellion in every area of their life, too.”

“Oftentimes, people are trying to deal with the actual addiction, rather than what brought the addiction on.” Hunter shares the story of one woman who was instantly healed of addiction when her husband brought her to one of Hunter’s services from an institution. People had told him, “You’re young enough, go get another wife.”

Hunter says, “He got another wife that day, but it turned out to be the exact same person, but totally, completely set free.”

To hear more of this story and of God’s power to heal and deliver, click here for the entire podcast. {eoa}

As Christ-followers, we know Jesus promises us abundant life (John 10:10b). But we often get sidetracked as to how to live in that abundance and walk in the power of the new creation life.

Liz Wright teaches believers how to do just that in her podcast, Live Your Best Life, on the Charisma Podcast Network. In a recent episode, she discusses some special promises of God. These are keys to new-creation living that can help us “live in the fullness of God’s intention for your life, as the bride of Christ, as a new creation, able to co-reign with Him and live victoriously,” she says. So how do we live this way?

“We want to live a victorious life, then the wisest thing we will ever do is to sit down on the inside and just begin to engage the attention of our heart, focusing the attention of our heart on to Jesus,” Wright says. “That’s where He’s had me living for a long time now … [God] has so much he wants to share with us in this hour.”

Wright adds, “As we move into the high places with God, we start to co-reign with Him. We begin to overthrow the work of the enemy from the high place, from really knowing ourselves seated with Jesus, in the realm of glory in the heavenly places.”

To learn more about these keys to new-creation living, listen to the entire podcast here. {eoa}