Adam Short's Blog

I hope this finds you well and that your New Year has begun full of hope, joy, and anticipation for how much God has in store for you in 2009!

As I sit down and write this newsletter, I’m listening to a song by Suzy Yaraei (Wills), and she is singing: “He’s in every minute, He’s so excited. Do you want to get in it? Behold, He does a new thing.” I feel like that is a fresh word from the Lord for all of us this year, myself included. Just in the past several weeks, I have entered into a sweet newness in my relationship with God where His tangible presence feels near me, around me, in me, and on me. Life is so much more fulfilling when we are aware of His presence.

As you know, I’m in my 2nd year at Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry, and I love it here. Since I returned to America from Africa in August 2007, my time here at Bethel has been the most restoring and healing season of my life. God has breathed life back into my heart, and I have been a part of a supernatural culture here at Bethel where miracles, signs, and wonders are a normal part of life. I have learned so much here about what it means to be freed from religiousness and be filled with freedom and empowerment from God and people around me.

I still have a heart for all French-speaking countries, especially Africa, and I plan to go back to Africa in the future, though the details of that aren’t clear now. I also have been pursuing the early stages of writing a book, and my best friend Tyler has been the one who has encouraged me to do that. It was his idea, and the book will be a compilation of stories that have happened all over the USA, Africa, Europe, and Mexico as God has intervened in impossible situations and done miracles.

Since last summer, I’ve worked (in a paid position) as the Campaign Coordinator at United Way of Northern California, which is a nonprofit organization in our area. I’ve learned lots of life skills about dealing with people of influence in high places at this job! God has given me lots of favor in my position.

One of the highlights for me in 2nd year at Bethel has been the opportunity to travel on ministry trips. I went to Alabama in early January with Bill Johnson to a very small town called Webb. The people there are more southern than me, which is hard for lots of y’all to believe! Ministering under Bill’s anointing was incredible, and we had many healings and miracles during our time there, not to mention lots of fried food. God healed one man of stuttering!

On another note, like last year, I will be heading out on a missions trip this spring. For the first time, Bethel is sending a team to French Polynesia (Tahiti), and I chose that trip! You’re probably thinking, “I know why you picked that one!” Well it is a fringe benefit that Tahiti is said to be the most beautiful tropical paradise on earth. But I also picked it because it’s French-speaking, and our leaders, John and Barbara, are from Hawaii, and they are awesome. We will be going from March 30th to April 11th, and a lot of the focus will be prophetic worship and igniting the youth there so we can release revival. We will hold meetings in the churches to empower them to walk in the healing power of Jesus, and there will also be a lot of street ministry, which I love! I’ll probably be one of the translators for the team too, since I’m fluent in French. We have a team of about 20 people from Bethel going on the trip.

I want to invite you to ask the Lord about contributing financially to make this trip possible. It’s $2,500 for the trip costs, and I still need $2,250 in order to go on the trip. Would you consider giving a gift? I also would like to make known some other needs if God lays it on your heart to help in different ways. I still have a fair amount left to pay on my school tuition. Also, I need a car, as my Corolla engine blew up back in November!

Thank you, thank you, and thank you for all your generosity to me over the years! It’s humbling and an honor to partner with you to bring the Kingdom of God here on earth as in heaven.

Blessings,
Adam Short

P.S. Financial gifts or letters of encouragement may be sent to: Bethel Church, 933 College View Drive, Redding CA 96003. In order to receive a tax-deductible receipt, please make the check payable to Bethel Church and leave the memo line blank. Please include a separate slip of paper that says, “Adam Short—French Polynesia Trip.” Or if you choose to donate to Adam’s school tuition, include a slip of paper with your check that says, “Adam Short—2nd Year BSSM Tuition.” This will ensure that your gift is designated to the proper person. Any gifts are non-refundable, and if for any reason Adam does not go on the trip, the money will support another missions trip sponsored by Bethel Church.

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Here's the interview with Peter who was healed of deafness.

http://www.ibethel.tv/watch/212:3:4

Posted by marseille at 08:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

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Sometimes it feels like you’re just in the right place at the right time and God shows up in undeniable power to touch somebody’s life.

This was one of those times. It was a Sunday morning service, and Kris Vallotton, the senior associate leader at Bethel Church announced that he felt like there were a number of people present who needed healing who had not yet received it earlier in the week during some other healing services.

A good number of people stood up, one of whom was sitting directly behind me. Kris directed the congregation to find a person to pray for who was standing, and I turned around and felt like the man I should pray for was right behind me. I asked him what he needed healing for, and didn’t say a word to me. I asked him again, but he said nothing in response to my question. Then I turned to his wife, and she told me that he is 100 percent deaf in both ears. Earlier in the week, God healed somebody who had been born 100 percent deaf, and I asked the man’s wife to share with him about that testimony. She told me that her husband can read lips, so I told him myself as he looked at me.

Before I go on, let me emphasize how important it is to share testimonies of healing to release the power of Jesus into a situation, particularly if the testimony is pertaining to the same sickness or condition. A testimony actually releases real, tangible power for God to perform a miracle again. As Bill Johnson says, sharing a testimony is an invitation for God to do something again.

The man’s wife, myself, and another friend of mine laid hands on Peter, the man who was deaf. I put my hands on both of his ears and commanded them to open. I didn’t really pray. I just commanded healing to come—probably for no more than a minute. We finished, and I asked him if he sensed any improvement in his ears. Remember, he’s 100 percent deaf. He said absolutely nothing. I asked him again. Nothing. Then his wife asked him, and with his eyes still closed, he said, “What did you say?” At first I thought he was joking. Then he said again to her, “What did you say?” I will never forget the look on his face. He opened his eyes, looked at his wife, and in astonishment they embraced each other!

God opened Peter’s ears! I asked him if his hearing was back to 100 percent, and he said yes! He could hear perfectly fine. You may be wondering, “If Peter was 100 percent deaf, how could he talk intelligibly?” Great question. I found out that four years prior, he had been shot with a BB gun in his ear, and the BB went all the way through his head and out the other ear. This punctured and ruined both of his ears to the point that he had no hearing capacity whatsoever. So up until being shot, he had no problem hearing, and thus no problem talking. So Peter never forgot how to pronounce words, whereas people who are born deaf have never heard words before.

In excitement, I ran up to the front of the church to let Kris know that Peter had been healed. Bill Johnson had already begun speaking, but I couldn’t keep myself from going up to share with them the news. I told Kris, and he told Bill, and Bill announced it to the whole congregation, and we all thanked God!

This was truly a creative miracle that God did. Peter’s ears were sufficiently damaged from the BB that it required that God give him new parts in his ears to enable him to hear again. This intervention of God was different than a simple healing. Healing is when God restores an existing part of the body back to its original function. For example, if somebody is healed of the flu, God restores their body to health. However, in the case of Peter’s miracle, this was a creative act of God. We don’t know exactly what God recreated in his ears, but we do know that something was recreated. This is a miracle.

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One of the most influential people in the present day worldwide move of God is Randy Clark.

Because of a life-changing encounter with the presence of God in 1984, he suddenly was commissioned by God to spread revival all over the world. Because of this impartation he received, the Holy Spirit fell in abundance upon Toronto Airport Church in 1994, sparking a move of God that has literally affected the four corners of the earth. It was in connection with this outpouring of Holy Spirit that Bethel Church also began to experience revival in 1996, and this awakening has continue since then at Bethel. It was also through this move that Heidi Baker had such a radical encounter with God that she could not move for seven days. The fruit from her encounter has resulted in 10,000 churches planted in Africa, with countless miracles, salvations, over a hundred dead-raisings, and the whole nation of Mozambique being changed.

Randy came to Bethel to equip the School of Supernatural Ministry in January 2009, and along with this school, he held healing services each night. There were at least twenty-five people who were specifically healed of diseases and conditions that they had once been healed of previously, but for some reason or another had lost their healing. The Lord spoke specifically to Randy to minister to these people. One man who had Parkinson’s disease came forward to tell how he previously could not speak intelligibly until God miraculously touched him. His speech became clearer and understandable! Many other conditions were healed by God that night.

Towards the end of the meeting, Randy called for School of Ministry students to come forward to deliver words of knowledge for healing. During the entire service, I had “put my antennas” up to be particularly aware of what Holy Spirit would speak to me regarding people that He wanted to touch and heal. Learning to listen to and understand the language of the Spirit is an art in and of itself. As we know, Holy Spirit’s first language is not English! This means that we need to become students of how God speaks so that we can accurately receive into our hearts and spirits what He is saying. Bill Johnson says that many times we are convinced that God is not really speaking to us, but the truth of the matter is that He actually IS speaking, but that He has changed His way of speaking to us. We easily become conditioned to hearing God’s voice in certain ways, and that can hinder us from understanding the fresh ways that He is speaking in the present moment.

How do we practice hearing His voice? I believe two major ways is to spend time with Him, and practice taking risks in words of knowledge and prophecy. As we step out and do this, we will notice that our ability to hear Him will become sharpened and focused.

So as I listened for Holy Spirit’s voice during the meeting, I received at least two words of knowledge as Randy was speaking. First, I felt a brief, dull sensation of pain in the right side of my abdominal area. Secondly, I felt pain briefly in my left elbow. You may be asking the question, “How did I know those were words of knowledge?” To answer this question, it’s important to understand that God speaks to each one of us uniquely and individually, so our guidelines for hearing the voice of God should never become rigid and methodical. However, there ARE some principles that will help guide us along in recognizing His voice when we hear it. Much of the breakthrough that we’re needing in hearing God is in knowing that we are hearing His voice far more often than we realize, so we just need to become aware of how He is speaking.

When I stood up and began walking towards the front of the room, I felt a very slight and subtle “feathery” sensation on my nose. It felt like somebody touched my nose very faintly with a feather. Then in my spirit, I heard the words, “loss of smell.” I knew that Holy Spirit was giving me a fresh word of knowledge for somebody who had loss of smell. I knew this was from God because I would have not thought of this on my own. I’m usually focused on seeing God heal things such as broken bones and random pain in the body. But I’ve never even thought of God healing the sense of smell before.

One of the results in hearing the voice of God in a word of knowledge is a confidence that what you’ve heard IS right. There is a deep rest that accompanies hearing Him because He has announced His intention of intervening the moment we deliver the word. In other words, I know that I know that I know that God will show up to execute what He has said.

A long line of students formed at the platform at the front, ready to give their words of knowledge. Randy’s assistant, Annie, led this portion of the meeting as each student shared their word. One after another, when every student called a word of knowledge, one or more people raised their hands to acknowledge that they had that disease or condition. People were getting healed all over the building.

The mike came to me, and I said, “Loss of smell.” Immediately, a guy raised his hand in excitement! It turns out that there were several people who had experienced a loss of smell. A man named Aaron approached me to tell me that he has not been able to smell his wife’s perfume, or any other good smells. He was only able to smell bad odors, such as skunks! Aaron’s faith level was through the roof. He had no doubt that God was about to heal him.

This is one of the beauties of words of knowledge. Why would God speak to somebody else about a person’s sickness or condition? There are lots of reasons—here are a few. We are the body of Christ. Each of us has a unique, special role in which to function so that the entire body is built up, edified, and strengthened. As Paul says, if every person was an eye, then where would the sense of hearing be? God has designed His kingdom in such a way that our dependence on Him actually also involves being interdependent on each other in the body of Christ. So when God shares a word of knowledge with another person, it is not to invade the privacy of that person, but to invite others into the situation to release His Kingdom. God has commissioned HIS people to carry out and continue the exploits of Holy Spirit across the earth. Another reason God will speak through the word of knowledge is to raise faith and expectancy in people’s hearts that God really cares about them, and to encourage them to believe that He is about to do a miracle! How special would YOU feel if a stranger walked up to you and knew that you needed a touch from God in a specific part of your body that needed healing?

Before I began to pray for Aaron’s nose, one of the leaders in the School of Ministry, Theresa Dedmon, scurried over to me, and said to me excitedly, “Adam, Adam, I need you to pray for my nose!” Come to find out, she too had lost her sense of smell two years earlier due to a brain injury in a car accident. Theresa was unable to smell anything at all. I told her that we both should pray for Aaron first, and then we’ll pray for her.

So we laid our hands on Aaron and invited Holy Spirit to heal him. We prayed a few times. Each time, we had him test his nose out by smelling the perfume of another young lady who was nearby. Sure enough, God healed Aaron, and his sense of smell was once again back to normal! He smelled the perfume with no trouble at all! We were so excited.

Theresa was next. I had Aaron pray for Theresa because he just received healing from the same problem. This is a surefire principle in the Kingdom. What one person freely receives from God can all of a sudden be released into the life of another person. It’s kind of like “catch and release” fishing! So Aaron and I prayed over Theresa’s nose. We prayed a few times, and after finishing, she too received her sense of smell back! She tested it out by smelling a bag of coffee, and yes, she once again could enjoy the fragrance of coffee!

These healings amazed and astounded me more than usual. One of the reasons is because God cares about the desires of our hearts. He cared about Aaron’s desire to make him able again to smell his wife’s perfume. He cared about giving Theresa’s sense of smell back. I’ve heard of people having surgery on their noses and paying thousands and thousands of dollars to fix that problem. And its success is a shot in the dark, at best. But God does it for free!

I learned yet again in this experience that the whispers of God are so powerful. I didn’t see a flash of lightning that told me that somebody lost their sense of smell. Instead, I felt a VERY subtle touch of God on my nose, and heard Him whisper in my spirit. THAT, my friend, is the goodness of God.

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One of the privileges in being a part of the Second Year program of Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry is the opportunity to travel with the leaders of Bethel Church to be activated and released the Kingdom of God with seasoned people like Bill Johnson and Kris Vallotton.

I recently had one of these opportunities to travel with Bill to a tiny town called Webb, which is located in southeastern Alabama. Being from the south myself, I felt right at home in Webb because of the southern culture and the familiar accent. Bill and his staff have been traveling to New Freedom Church for the past eight-plus years, and he says that it’s one of his favorite places to go because it is such a pure place.

There were twelve of us students who went on the trip, and one of our major roles was to be available to give words of knowledge for mainly physical healing at any point during the meetings. One particular night, Bill called us up to the platform to give our words of knowledge. Jazmyn Aaronson, one of the students, had a word that somebody stutters, but when she gave the word, nobody acknowledged it by raising their hand. In the meantime, God was already healing people throughout the building.

Oftentimes, momentum will build in a meeting as people begin to experience healing in their bodies. As people see that others are being healed, it generates a deeper atmosphere of faith where Holy Spirit has more room to move. Along with this, the angelic realm will often be activated, especially anytime words of knowledge are given, because they are commissioned by God to partner with us as we release the Kingdom of Heaven.

The presence of God increased in the room as Bill continued ministering, and he asked us students to go throughout the crowd to lay hands on as many people as possible to release fresh impartation of Holy Spirit’s presence. Lots of people were experiencing mighty touches of God.

Then Bill changed the direction of the meeting slightly and started focusing on the people who still needed healing whose condition or sickness was not mentioned in any of the words of knowledge. This is one of the most powerful times when Bill ministers because he empowers and equips every person in the meeting to learn how to pray for the sick. This is one of the greatest ways of stewarding the increase of breakthrough anointing and revival, because when all the saints are empowered to release the Kingdom, God is particularly pleased. If it’s just about the “man of God” up front, much less will happen. But if the people of God are equipped to do the impossible, then we’ve just positioned ourselves to have greater outpourings of His Spirit.

I found a man in the back of the sanctuary who had his hand raised. He had not yet been healed. I asked him what was wrong in his body. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out for about five seconds. Then he managed to tell me, “I…I…I stutter.” I was suddenly filled with a heightened expectancy for a miracle because this corresponded with Jazmyn’s word of knowledge earlier! Even though this man may have not had the courage to raise his hand when stuttering was mentioned, nevertheless God’s heart to heal him had not changed a bit.

The man’s wife was sitting beside of him, watching what was about to happen. Another man and I began praying for him, commanding his brain to be realigned according to heaven. I commanded the connections in the brain to be restored, which would allow him to speak properly. I’ve noticed that sometimes I don’t even need to say anything for a person to be healed, because the presence of God is so tangible and available that a miracle of healing is inevitable. Other times, it is necessary to command healing. The bottom line is that we be in the place of rest and faith, connected with Holy Spirit and responding to Him.

We stopped praying, and I asked him how he’s doing. Without any hesitation at all, he said, “My name is Billy!” There was no stuttering in his voice! His wife said that he has not been able to do that before. Billy was so excited, as were we. I personally was in awe of God because of His goodness and love shown towards him. I’ve never before seen something like stuttering healed, and I would imagine that, in order for him to be healed, God must have rewired something in Billy’s brain!

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