Pastor Robby Dawkins swung by the offices to share his thoughts on healing and how to engage young people in ministry
Q. Your ministry started when you were 12 – how did that happen?
A. My parents were always really engaging, so if my father went to the hospital he took us with him. Our family time was really involved with ministry, so it was very natural for me. I never saw myself starting ministry, ministry was just who we were – it was just what we did.
Q. Should this be our approach with young people?
A. I think young people get really underestimated, and one of the most powerful things you can do is give young people real ministry opportunities. Even when they’re struggling with rebellion, when you give something it becomes valuable to you. So when I was youth pastoring I would pull young people in and get them to do the ministry and healing, and through that engagement they would be pulled into a relationship with the Lord.
That’s why mission trips are effective, but you don’t need to wait for a mission trip. Get them involved in doing things right away. I would call a young person over and say, ‘This person needs prayer, can you pray for them?’ and if they weren’t sure I’d say, ‘Let’s do it together.’ Then I would see them develop. That’s translated even today; I don’t pray for everyone who comes up for healing. I pray for one and then lead the others who come up to pray for each other. The biggest thing I want to do is give it away. It’s perfect in working with young people. Young people just jump in, which is perfect. It’s not that they have more faith, they just have a higher level of expectancy.
Q. What would you say to the average youth worker out there who’s thinking , ‘That’s all well and good – but this sort of stuff could never happen to me or my group!’
A. Don’t believe the lie of the enemy, because that’s a lie. In the local setting it’s more powerful. I love the big meetings and festivals but the reality is that there’s a deceptive quality to them because there’s momentum going on. The best stuff is outside of the church, outside of those meetings, in the one-on-one with the guys on the street - because there’s no context for what we’re about to do, so it utterly catches them by surprise, and they are blown away by the reality. I would say you’ve got the best opportunity in a local setting. I’m only here to model for people what they can do. The same Christ that lives in me lives in them. There’s no missing ingredient, we all have it. It’s just us stepping into more of that reality. The only way to eliminate your doubt is in the doing. Doubt doesn’t disqualify you. The risk is what brings the results.
These guys following Jesus around had no theology, he just said follow me and they did. They were unlearned and uneducated but people were surprised by their wisdom, and that was a result of hanging around Jesus and being sent out by him. And so we grow in all these things as we step out and do it. So take your doubt and go. Jesus didn’t say, ‘Get rid of all your doubt then go’. He just said, ‘Go’. He didn’t even mention their doubt.
Q. Do you have doubts?
A. Sure I doubt - I just don’t see it as a disqualifier. That’s why my book is called Do what Jesus did not ‘Believe like Jesus believed’.
Q. Why don t we do that more ?
A. Fear of failure holds us back, the fear of blowing it. My solution to this is: you’re a failure. So if I’m going to fail - I’m going to fail big. And I’m going to choose what I fail at. So if I’m going to fail, I’ll fail at seeing the dead being raised, and I’m ok with that. John Wimber said he had to pray for 1000 people before he saw his first healing, and I don’t think that God was holding something back. John was in a learning curve that whole time, and he got to the place where he saw stuff happen.
Jesus didn’t say, ‘Get rid of all your doubt then go’. He just said, ‘Go’
It’s this perseverance that’s so powerful and effective. Don’t just pray once for somebody, keep praying until something happens. I get bored and say ‘let’s do this again later’, and that’s ok; we don’t have to feel confined to this. But I will pray for every single person that I see on crutches or who is in need of healing - I’m going to stop them and ask to pray for them. The more you do this the more you’ll begin to see stuff happen. Nobody goes into war, shoots one bullet and wins. You’ve got to be prepared to shoot some rounds.
Q. Do we need to be natural about it?
A. We refer to it as naturally supernatural. We need to see this as part of everyday life – just as part of what we do, and who we are. Waiting for God to tell you to go and pray for someone is slave mentality, and Jesus said I call you heirs – I have given you my rights as the son of God. We see that in our views on redemption, but not so much in our views on healing and power. God doesn’t restrict this stuff, he has released it fully to us – we have everything we need, there’s nothing we’re waiting for. It’s waiting on me to put it into action. Too many people are asking the question ‘what would Jesus do’, and not enough people are actually doing it. If you do it, stuff will start to happen like crazy.
Q. Some people might say that they don’t have the gift of healing . How does that fit in to this?
A. Just go, don’t wait. John Wimber was once praying on the way back from a conference, asking why everyone didn’t get healed. And God spoke back to him and said: you’re not waiting for anything from me up here, it’s all there for you. We’re not waiting for God to give us more, we just need to step into it and start acting like we have it. It’s not anything I can earn or deserve.
