The old country house had been abandoned for 12 years. The elderly man who had owned it left when his wife of 54 years passed. At one point, the pipes burst, flooding the 1600 square feet and ruining everything six inches down. Drywall, trim, carpet and what had been hard wood flooring.
Lush green pastures, polka-dotted with bunches of trees. Five ponds and a horseshoe of a river completed the utopia we called home.
The land had been leased out to a local cattleman for hay. A hundred head of cattle and the millions of tics, they fed populated the ground. We could scarcely go for a 10-minute walk without coming back with as many ticks on each of us.
The cattle remove, we populated the land with our own animals, including chickens and guineas, which managed to quickly delight on the tiny bloodsuckers.
Once the ticks had been disposed of, we started a garden. This was no ordinary garden. Both my husband and I had large families which we expected to join us at some point.
In order to feed all these people, we had 10 rows of garden beds. Each bed measured five feet by 70 feet. My husband never could do anything small. To illustrate this point, along with all your typical produce, like tomatoes, green beans, cucumbers, squash and the like, he decided he wanted asparagus. Not just a few asparagus. 1100 asparagus starts. I’m not sure why he picked the number 1100. I mean, why not 1000 or 1500? I didn’t ask. There were some things that just were not worth questioning.
And God created man in his own image; to the image of God He created him; make and female, He created them. And God blessed them and He said, “Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and the flying creatures of the air, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” ~Genesis 1:26-28
I had recently begun learning about spiritual warfare and the Lord had been highlighting Genesis 1:26-28 to me. We had many of those creatures on our property, and not just our own animals. Snakes, possums, armadillos, skunks, to say nothing of the bugs we found in our garden, both crawling and flying. As far as they were concerned, we were on their land, not the reverse.
One day I came home from the grocery store carrying a bag up the steps to the front door when suddenly I felt an instant of pain followed by burning. I hurried inside to set down the bag and looked at my arm. There was a red mark which quickly swelled. I had been stung. I went to the steps and found a small wasp nest under the railing of the banister. Apparently, I had gotten too close to the nest at which the guardian of the nest took offense and attacked the aggressor.
On the other hand, I felt I had been wronged. I did go on the attack. I didn’t even know the nest was there. Besides, this was my house. At least the mortgage was mine, so I had every right to every inch of that property, including the railing of the banister!
Knowing the land hadn’t been occupied by humans for many years, there was no reason for the ‘wildlife’ to curb their habits to make room for two insignificant humans. She saw the banister as a nice place to build her nest. So, she did. This was pretty much par for the course when it came to all the other critters on our land.
From that time on, I began to declare my authority over the land and house whenever I went out to work in the garden. I would say something to the effect of, “by virtue of the word of the Lord in Genesis giving humans authority and dominion over the earth, and by the mortgage in my name, I declare dominion over this land and creatures. You do your thing. I’ll do my thing and ne’er the twain shall meet.”
This seemed to work. I didn’t have to deal with snakes or spiders or other things that usually make gardens their habitat, including one particular bumble bee which liked to frequent the garden. He was hard to miss because he was the biggest bumble bee I’d ever seen.
As usual, I declared my authority over the garden as I walked toward it. Carrying my bowl, I headed toward the asparagus beds. I dropped the bowl to the ground, knelt and proceeded to pick asparagus. I finished one row, picked up my bowl and went to the next. I dropped the bowl on the ground, got on my knees and started picking. We had a lot of asparagus, so I filled the bowl quickly and I took the first load inside. Back outside, I went to the next row, starting the process again. Finishing the row, I picked up the bowl, went to the next row, dropped the bowl. But before I could kneel, I heard “zzz, zzzzz, ZZZZZZZZZ!”
I picked up the bowl and my bumble bee shot up from the ground and started circling four or five feet above my head. I was guiltless and so I started defending myself. Speaking to the bee, I said, “it’s not my fault. You flew under the bowl. I didn’t do anything wrong. You shouldn’t have…”
By that time, the bee had circled my head twice. On his third time around, I realized he was scoping me out and taking aim. He was looking for the best place to do the most damage.
Suddenly, I told him, “Don’t even think about stinging me!”
With that, he flew away.
I stood there. Stunned. I questioned myself. Did what I think just happened really happen?
I replayed it over in my mind. Surely, I don’t have that active of an imagination.
This was the first of many situations where I happened to find myself in a situation where I spoke, and creatures or nature and they obeyed my words.
I am not special in this ability. It is in Scripture and, therefore, for all of us to have as a normal part of our lives. We are made in the image of God, and like Him, our words have the power to create or destroy. Let your words begin to create a supernatural existence for your good and God’s glory.
