Equip to Disciple 2010 - Testimonies

1. I have been delivered of issues that I have carried my whole life. Some that I have not thought about since childhood. Nothing very dramatic, emotional or physical has occurred, but I believe that God has heard and answered my prayers. I have become a more compassionate and less judgmental person since attending EtD. I have a clearer understanding of the reality of the spiritual realm. I know more than ever that God the Father is my father. I am less fearful. I am more able to set boundaries without feeling guilty. I feel far better equipped to minister my life group members.

2. Ek was maar die alleen en deurmekaar ou wat gedink het ek kan alles op my eie manier regkry. Ek het baie geleer van myself en het besef dat dit wat nou in my lewe gebeur het vir ‘n doel is, dit wat ek deurgegaan het met die hofsaak, dat ek daaruit moes geleer het. Ek het ook besef dat God in beheer van my lewe is en Hy vat my waar Hy wil hê ek moet wees, en dat Hy vir ons sorg al voel dit nie so nie. Al die eer aan God, as Hy my lewe so kon omdraai is alles moontlik.Ek het nog baie om te leer en uit te vind en dit toe te pas, ek wil net hê dat die Here my moet gebruik en dat ek Hom sal ken in al my weë.

3. I did not plan to attend the course, but filled out a form for counseling during new members orientation. I was experiencing marital problems at the time and also used anti-depressants. I was pleasantly surprised to what extent the course addressed all of the issues relating to my problems. (emotional) The course provided me with the opportunity to face the mess—one issue at a time and to be touched and healed by God in every area. Although I realize that there is still more work to be done, a good start was made. I look forward to walk the rest of the road with God and has grown in my trust of Him.Thank you, I was blessed.

4. I learned a great deal! I had received a measure of understanding and healing in the past but this course is very comprehensive and I now have greater knowledge, healing and understanding and the benefit of excellent notes. I appreciate my past childhood so much as I have listened to what others have been through. The teaching on ‘Restoring the human spirit’ was very encouraging, the Lord showed me so much about myself. The Lord has caused me to want more and more to live in the power of the Spirit. I do feel more adequately equipped to lead a Life Group. One thing I know for sure, I have seen and experienced the Holy Spirit’s healing and restoration in my own life and in the lives of our group members—especially one person where the change was dramatic and virtually overnight. I will certainly recommend this course to many others.

5. My life was completely changed. I was a child of God from long ago, I feared God the Father more than any thing.I was raised by a stepfather who cared for me so much. I didn't feel that I didn't have a real father, but this course taught me so much about legitimate children that God is our Father. I am a daughter of God. I used to be so angry about life, poverty at home, curses from our neighbours, being undermined at work by my senior but really, I have changed dramatically. I no longer have fear, no longer angry at all. I let things go and face the future. I used to complain about finance, it is over now. If I don't have food, lights or money, I leave everything to my Saviour. He will sort it for me and my family. I can pray if a situation arise, I have confidence in me and my God. I love my children more and more, not forgetting my husband and my family. There was a time in the course when we could take out our anger and this was my turning point. Everything that was hidden inside me, disappeared because of the love of God. I have learnt that I have to bless my enemies and not hate them. Learned about healing from critics, condemnation, verbal abuse, riots and being a perfectionist. I can share God’s Word to my friends, families, etc. I have learnt to be closer to God, I have learnt a lot about being faithful. I realized that my dignity has been restored. People value me, unlike as before.

6. The Lord has set me free from the burden of unforgiveness, bitterness and hatred. I am so free, I don't believe it sometimes. I am able to pray and bless people that I could not do before. I am now free. I have seen and understood why I was going through other things. I have learnt that it is all a pattern and that I can break free from it. I have learnt to speak about my sexual abuse and felt happy that I did and had no shame about it anymore. I learnt that God is a Father that loves me with all His heart and that has made me feel secure and loved by God. I feel blessed and happy all the time. I know that God has the best interest in His heart for me. It made me peaceful inside and opened my eyes to the love of God.  I was able to learn more about anger and that it is ok to be angry. I have learnt to release my anger in a positive way. I feel good about myself. I have forgiven my parents and mended my relationship with my mother. I used to hate it when people told me I am beautiful but now I feel that a veil has been lifted from my eyes. God set me free from condemnation. I grew in knowing that God is head over heels in love with me, that there is nothing that He could not do for me. I got to love people and feel the emotions of love moving freely inside of me. I was once again compassionate and started to deeply care about people.
This course helped me to put down a lot of baggage I had. I was freed from phobias and all kinds of fears that I had.

7. My faith has grown tremendously. I can’t believe I doubted His love for me. I have become a better wife and mother, daughter and friend. My first instinct is not to judge anymore, for every action I know there is a root and I don't blame the person. I made a total life change. We had a lot of difficulties, but God has helped us through it. Now today my relationship is stronger than ever with my husband, God really restored my marriage 100%. My life, daughter is restored and my relationship with God deepens every day.

8. The Lord has revealed many things to me in this year. I feel that a lot of baggage has been lifted off my shoulders, but I believe that the Holy Spirit is still busy with me.

9. I was equipped to deal better with challenges I will face as an adult especially concerning boundaries and false shields. I have also started to find my identity in Christ and also find comfort and rest in who He made me. I have learnt to be a better daughter, friend, partner and sister.

10, I struggled with accepting the love God had for me. It was always: How can a person I don't see love me when my own father that contributed to my being here doesn't / didn't love me enough to stay with us. And again being molested I just suppressed the hurt within. I had so much anger within me towards God, that man and my father so my image of male figures / fathers was dented. That is why it was so difficult for me to accept love. I was angry at God because it was if He was absent from my life. When I was molested I asked myself why didn't God strike him dead at that point if He really loved me, how could He let that happen? But when I heard about the Father Heart of God I realized that it wasn't God’s plan to see me in pain due to anger. When I heard this: it hurts God if you hurt, it just opened my eyes to see the love He has for me and to know that He wants me to prosper just like in His Word. I accepted and let go of all the anger I had towards Him and I forgave my father and that gentleman that was not so gentle. It is all in the past and part of my life but it will not define me or my future. It is all in God’s hand, NOW THAT’S MY FATHER.

11. What a wonderful journey this past 9 months has been. I learned so much and Holy Spirit ministered to me on many things. I have become more aware of Holy Spirit in my life and in my every day walk with the Lord. I also have a much better understanding on why people behave the way they do. The ‘family tree’ and the negative behaviours was such an eye-opener to me. I will be going over my notes again and again as I am sure Holy Spirit will continue to highlight areas that I need to focus on. It has been a WOW experience.

12. When I started this course, I did not even know that I will see it to the end. I had so much anger, hatred, bitterness and was unhappy. Every Tuesday I struggled to come to church, there was always something happening in order to stop me from coming. I also had pains in my body and didn't know where they came from. I went to the doctors, they checked and did not know what to treat. It has been God’s grace that I have seen the end of this course and actually feel that I still want to continue. I have forgiven people who hurt me and set them free, I got rid of the anger and bitterness and have learnt to bless people—even my enemy. The most challenging part was forgiving the ones who hurt me and bless them. The Lord has helped me to do that. The pains I started with have disappeared. I know I am healed in Jesus Name. I have more confidence in the Lord and have learnt to spend more time with God and in the Word. Through deliverance, I felt that I was set free, have a sense of peace in my life and happiness and feel fully prepared to serve God.

13. You never realize how much baggage you carry around with you until you participate in something as introspective as this course. You realize that there are so many people burdened, who do not realize what they are going through has deeper root causes. I used to forget and push bad memories and emotions back, put them in a locked-up place and not deal with them. God has opened up those locks and unbuckled the chains, and allowed me to deal and take responsibility of what has happened. He has healed wounds of sadness and loss, and those of self-rejection and worry. I have learned about obedience and grace. These are the things which Jesus Christ lived by when He was on earth. I may have lost my physical father, but I have a Father who will never leave or forsake me. He is my comforter and my guide, I can rely on Him for anything because He knows all my needs. He is my Shepherd, I do not have to carry all these burdens and try to do things on my own, He is there for me.

14. I started the course with the intention of obtaining knowledge and wisdom, however Holy Spirit took me on a long journey of surprises, revealing mysteries of hurt, pain, physical, emotional and spiritual brokenness, changing my life. God’s love was taught to me, how great and sovereign my God really is. During these months my God restored me spiritually and emotionally. He revealed scriptures to me that assisted me with the areas in my life that needed victory. I struggled and was tempted, fell and the Lord whose mercy and grace is so magnificent, touched me, carried me and comforted me and gently urged me to persevere once more. God brought me to a place of openness. Holy Spirit taught me how to forget what lies behind and press on towards what lies ahead for me for the kingdom of God, doing all things to glorify God and to crucify my flesh and take the cross and follow my Lord Jesus. Jesus helped me to conquer my giants—anger, unable to maintain self-control. He blessed me with amazing dreams as to what His purpose is for me.  I am now able to let go and trust God to take all my mistakes and turn them to all things that work out for my good. I know and feel His love in my very being and I love Him with all that I have in me.

15. I had serious anger issues in my life and battled a lot with unforgiveness. After finding the root cause of it, I could really deal with it more easily. I have always told myself that I must go do bed angry otherwise I will wake up as an angrier person, but now I believe that is not true, and I apply it to my life. I have always set boundaries in my life thinking that I am protecting myself. Instead I was keeping good things and people from entering into my life and my heart. Now I am free, free to love and be loved, free to be myself and know that people love me. I am me. And because throughout this course I got to deal with my issues, I now know who I am in Christ and what my God thinks of me and nothing else matters.  I have also realized that I have grown a lot on the side of the fruits of the Spirit, like joy, peace, love, patience and self-control.

16. I don't know where to begin. I have gone through a few years of difficult times with anxiety, depression and my mom being diagnosed with cancer. A friend sponsored me for this course and a new journey began. There were so many things in my life that I had not dealt with or even realized had a bearing on my life and responses. I learnt about how far down roots can grow and why certain fruit was evident in my life and other fruit was lacking. All my life I have been ashamed and afraid of God, worked to gain His approval and tried to do everything ‘perfectly’ according to me. That way I would be pleasing to God and then He would love me. Only it didn't work. When the Spirit and the Word opened up to me I realized I had never known how to receive the love of God. God revealed His love to me and I am learning how to receive His love. His love for me is genuine, pure, without partiality, no reservations, despite and in spite of my inadequacies or blemished past. This means that nothing I ever say or do or not do will make a difference to His love for me. God is not a hard task master waiting for me to do wrong so that He can punish me. Everything about God is love, He is always motivated by it. It is liberating and relaxing and I want to love Him more and love others more with more good fruit in my life.

17. God did so much for me, I can’t even begin to imagine where will I be without Him. God changed my life so much, I as lost not sure where I was coming from and where I am going.  My life changed so much. I used to feel lonely, bitterness and angry at God. I felt like God did not love me or He is angry with me about my life and my past. Now I am so very much happy, I feel free and I know God loves me very much. I am peaceful. One important thing I thought I will never be able to do is forgive, but now I can tell a different story about forgiveness. I love God very much with all my heart and my everything. I know He knitted me together in my mother’s womb and He will never leave me or forsake me. He is the stronghold of my heart. Through Him everything is possible. I will continue to walk with God all my life. I know with Him I don't have to fear or worry about anything. Put everything in His hands and He will be in control of my life / situation / circumstance. I have learned to trust in God.

18. For me it was more of revival, I think I have been rescued from near loss. I was about to be destroyed because I had lost courage, hope and I think my prayer life had not even gone down, but almost vanished. I was no longer reading the Word or praying. I was a walking corpse. I thought that I trusted God but I realized that when challenges came and persisted there were times where I got frustrated and thought that God doesn't love me. I got to a point where I was just living my own life. I did not care. Even the prophecies that were spoken over my life did not matter anymore. I thank God that I started with EtD, to get emotional and physical healing in all areas of my life that needed to be touched again by God. I am grateful to God because He touched areas of my life that needed to be touched and healed areas that needed to be healed and opened my eyes to things that I thought I knew but I was blind to see. I feel God has set me free from destruction and hopelessness. I feel strong spiritually, I feel I can face any mountain set before me now. For now I know that the Word is alive in me. It is no longer just scriptures but I know it is life. I know I can speak and situations and circumstances will change because of the authority of God given to me. I know that I have been set free, the devil has no longer a hold over my life because strongholds and chains that held me back has been broken, bloodline curses and spoken curses and curses that I brought over myself because of a sinful life has been removed. Praise God, I love Him, I have fallen in love with Him all over again. God has started to use me again to minister to others

19. God has set me free from anxiety and rejection. He has changed my thought patterns which has resulted in healing and restoring of relationships. I believe my spirit is softer and I have climbed off the road to destruction. I am more patient and I am able to control my anger and direct it in a more rewarding, satisfying results. I feel joy in my spirit.

20. I was delivered from looking down on myself, as I have been believing the lies of the devil that I am not good enough. After sharing my testimony of my childhood, although I was scared, before then, God gave me so much peace, that even that night I could sense the presence of God so strong in my room and I knew that God was with me. It felt as if He was saying, it was alright and I felt that His warmth and His assurance that He was with me. I felt so much weight lift off my shoulders.

21. Every Tuesday was relevant. The night of the Father Heart teaching was the turning point for me. It really loosened a lot of emotions in me. I just cried and did not know about what. God has been so faithful to me during this whole course. I have been freed and delivered from a very long time of abusing sleeping tablets. This course really was such a blessing! It touches every area of your life. My walk with God really intensified. It also taught me to persevere because sometimes on a Tuesday I was so tired and did not want to come. Also financially it took some serious trusting God. Every evening I went home and thanked God that He took me through this process of healing. I have become very sensitive to the voice of Holy Spirit.

22. Through this course I was healed. I walked into this class thinking that nothing is wrong with me and there is not much for me to learn. Surprise, surprise! The first few weeks I was constantly crying every Tuesday and for a few days afterwards but not because I was sad but because I have realized how much the devil has stolen from me, how he lied to me and worse, that I believed him. I never realized that my life was a lie. I have been healed and set free of my past of everything that was spoken over me, from any soul ties I had. I am now, more than ever, hungry to learn more about myself, my new healed self. My marriage feels as if we have been married for a few months. My relationship with the Lord, I am now open about it and want the whole world to know I am not ashamed about anything anymore and have learned that through forgiveness also comes healing.

23. Before I started EtD, I was dead, I felt defiled. I had no purpose for living. I was living but not alive. I was filled with a lot of self loathing, condemnation, resentment, anger, fear and frustration. I had never experienced love, joy and acceptance in my life. I had accepted Jesus as my Lord and Saviour because I felt empty inside. I had a desperate need to fill that void inside of me. I had tried everything, alcohol, friends, material things and they could only fill it up for a while. Days later I would wake up feeling empty again.  Before I recommitted my life to Jesus Christ my Lord I had attempt to commit suicide several times. I hated my life. After dedicating my life to Jesus Christ, I heard that ‘we are a new creation’, but I did not feel new. I still lived under bondages, condemnation. The more I tried to change myself with no success, the more hopeless I felt. I felt like a failure. I thought I was failing God. I had no idea of a father’s love since I was raised by a single mother. I allowed my circumstances to determine who I was and who I was to become. I heard about God’s grace but those were just words to me. At a Christian talk I heard about God being sovereign, but that too was not a reality in my life. In church they preached putting your trust in God as your main and only source. For me all those were just words. I thought how can I put my trust in God, when I have done it all by myself. My mother did it all by herself.  I looked at the women in my family, independent. Nothing comes for free, they would scream at me. Once I started with this course I learned about myself. I found out things about me that I was not consciously aware of. This course was painful but worth while. I took this opportunity, by the grace of God to work through my fears, rejection, self hatred and all the other people’s inherited or self inflicted curses. I took up my cross and followed Jesus Christ. I have received God’s joy in my life. I AM ALIVE AND FREE. THANK YOU FATHER, THANK YOU JESUS, THANK YOU HOLY SPIRIT.

24. I came to this course unexpectedly. Last year I got a word that I will help others through my testimony. I thought I was so broken and messed up on the inside, that I will not be able to help myself, let alone someone else. God have then spoken to me through Jeremiah 31:21-26 and I knew there was no turning back on the road I was on.When I was asked to do Equip to Disciple I was in turmoil, because I did not intend to be helping others, since I felt inadequate, in need of help myself. During the 21 days corporate fast I heard Holy Spirit telling me to complete and submit the forms. I came to the course unprepared and with an ideal that I would be taught how to minister to others, but instead I received a life changing experience! Every Tuesday the devil would try and keep me away from the classes, but I remembered, through Holy Spirit, those were the days I was meant to be there. That my healing was waiting for me. And indeed it was. Every Tuesday I would listen to the topic and think this is really for me and I had to open my spirit and my soul, dig deep into the chaos inside of me and God helped me to sort it out, one by one, Tuesday after Tuesday. He gave me wonderful facilitators and through the group dynamic I felt such love and acceptance, than ever before. All the pain I had inside of me slowly disappeared as I learned to trust God to bring the healing through the power of Holy Spirit. My shame was washed away through the blood of Jesus. This course was exactly what I needed, because God was right on time again. He gave me exactly what I needed. I was overflowing week after week and sharing the knowledge of my testimony with others. I found that God have changed me in ways I would never have thought was possible. I used to be untrusting, hard and cynical. I have lost all faith in humanity, my life was ruled by fear of the devil, my life was in such a mess, but through this course God restored my life. I encourage people every day to come closer to God, not by looking for people, but by opening my eyes to those around me, those who I see everyday and Holy Spirit has made my spirit sensitive to minister love, hope and faith to people like myself who are hurting, and I tell them, “I am introducing you to Father God who has sent His Son Jesus Christ to die for you and me.” He has changed my life, and He can do it for everyone!