“Verily I say unto you, that whosoever shall say unto this mountain, be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith.”

—Mark 11:23

Jesus said we will have what we say. Do you suppose He knew what He was talking about? I believe He told the truth.

If Jesus told the truth, we should check up on what we are saying—especially if we aren’t satisfied with what we have.

Once at a Full Gospel Business Men’s Convention, a lady came up to me after one of the teaching sessions. “Brother Hagin,” she said, “I want you to promise me something.”

“Well,” I responded, “I want to find out what it is first.”

Products of Words

“To be in the mess your son is in,” I said, “you had to talk him into it. We are products of words. Children are products of words.”

Words will make a child love education. And they will make a child want to go to church or keep him or her out of church.

“What am I going to do?” she said.

“First, since you have been talking this way for such a long time, and because he is as old as he is, just leave him alone. He resents you trying to tell him anything. Don’t say anything. Don’t preach at him.

“Second, change your thinking and talking. When you don’t know where your son is, say, ‘I surround my son with faith.’ You have been surrounding him with doubt. Even if your heart doesn’t believe it initially, say it out of your head. Your heart will start believing, ‘I do not believe he will end up in prison. I believe he is coming to God.’ State what you believe.”

“Well,” she said, “I’ll try it.”

“It won’t work if you try it. But it will work if you do it. Jesus didn’t say we will have whatever we tried. He said we will have whatever we say.”

The following year, the Full Gospel Business Men invited me to speak at another convention in that same city. After one service, a lady came up to me and said, “Brother Hagin, do you remember me?” I told her I didn’t.

A Good Report

“When you were here a year ago,” she began, “I asked you to pray for my boy. You shocked me by saying you wouldn’t!

“I want to tell you one thing,” she continued. “Keeping a positive confession works! It didn’t look like it would work. My son got worse. Keeping my mouth shut was the hardest thing I ever did. Every day and night I kept saying, ‘I surround him with faith. I believe he’s coming to God. Things will work out right in his life. I believe he won’t end up in a juvenile detention center or a prison.’

“My head said he was going there because of the crowd he was hanging with. But I said from my heart, ‘He’s not going to a detention center. I do not believe he will wind up in prison.’

“It went that way for nearly a year,” she continued. “Then one Sunday morning, after he had been out all night, he got up early. Ordinarily, he would sleep in, but he came to the breakfast table. While we were eating, he said, ‘Momma, I believe I’ll go to Sunday school with you this morning.’

“I just acted nonchalantly and said, ‘Son, you were up awfully late. You probably need rest.’ ”

“No, I want to go.”

“Well, it’s up to you, but you only had a few hours of sleep.”

“I want to go.”

“He went to Sunday school and stayed for church,” she said. “The next Sunday, he was out until 4 o’clock in the morning. Again, he was up for breakfast.”

“Momma,” he said. “I believe I’ll go to Sunday school with you this morning.”

“Son, you were out late last night. You need the rest, you know.”

“Well, yes,” he said, “but I can go. I’m going.”

“He went to Sunday school, stayed for church, and that evening he said, ‘I believe I’ll go back with you tonight.’ When the invitation was given, he went to the altar and was saved!”

A Brand-New Son

“Since then,” the woman said, “he’s been filled with the Holy Spirit. In the same way he was all out for the devil, he’s now all out for God. I believe he’s going to turn into a preacher! He’s a brand-new boy.

“When you talked to me last year,” she said, “at first, I almost got offended. You were so blunt with me. But I saw it and corrected myself. Thank God, because now I have a brand-new son. And I’ll tell you something else. He has a brand-new momma.”

The woman had been saved, filled with the Holy Spirit, and in a Full Gospel church for years, but she told me that day, “I don’t think the way I used to think. I almost pinch myself sometimes and say, ‘Is this really me?’ I used to worry all the time. Now I don’t worry anymore. Not only that, I feel good physically. I feel like a young girl. I have vim, vigor, and vitality!”

When the woman began saying the right thing, it worked for her. Jesus said, “He shall have whatsoever he saith.”