“What are the Stakes?” - Steve Hemphill AlongTheWay 108

ran back up to me screaming in my face. He stuck his finger right in my face. He says, Don't you dare pray for me. And I don't know why I did this because I've never done it before since but I looked at him and smiled. And I said, I can pray for you right now. You can't stop me. You know, he just turned around and ran at a Burger King. I mean by now the Burger King workers are all stopped and they're staring at us with their mouth open the the drive thru is backing up. People are starting to honk and you know, and this guy's running out of Burger King. Now they've come out of the back, they're watching this scene unfold. He slams the glass door, I thought it was gonna break ran to his car. And when he jumped in and backed up, he threw it in gear and he burned rubber. And it was only 50 yards to the highway. And it dawned on me in that instant that he is defenseless, against my prayers. And he knows that.

Welcome to along the way. I'm John Matarazzo, your host and fellow traveler, thank you for joining me along my way as I tried to become more like Jesus every day. The goal of along the way is to identify the moments in life that Jesus really is walking with us and trying to get our attention. But just like the disciples along the way to Emmaus, we are missing those moments that our hearts are burning within us. I want to identify those moments, learn from others and apply these lessons to our lives, so that we don't miss the blessings that God has for us along the way in our life journey. Spiritual Warfare is constantly around us. But we need a battle plan to counter the spiritual attacks and defend our family. But what are the stakes if we don't do this? In this episode of along the way, I'm joined by the host of the podcast battle plan with Steve Hemphill. And he has amazing stories of staking scriptures around houses, cars and other strategic locations. He joined with me to share his journey and the amazing stories of how simply staking scriptures and praying really is making a difference around the world. I'll get to our conversation in just a moment. But I want to thank you for listening to along the way. All of my episodes and social links are available on my website along the way dot media. All of the links from this episode will be in the show notes. And now here's my along the way conversation with Steve Hill. Well, Steve Hemphill It is great to have you on along the way. Thank you so much for being here. Thank being able to share your story with the audience that God's entrusted me with. You're one of the Steve is one of the charisma Podcast Network hosts. He's got an awesome podcast full of testimonies of how God has given him the spiritual warfare battle plan and how people are implementing that and giving him testimonies. And so we connected through me trying to help coach our podcasters and get to know them. And I instantly was blown away by the stories that Steve was telling me. And so I am grateful that he is able to be with us on along the way. So he can share those testimonies, and how God has brought him along the way in, in his journey with this along the way audience. So Steve, once again, thank you for being here. And I can't wait to hear more of your story.

Well, the honor is all mine is, as I say at Chick fil A. It's my pleasure.

Yeah. That's it. That's always a good model to have with the Chick fil A stuff. And, you know, I was supposed to have a Chick fil A breakfast today. But that didn't work out. But the person didn't show up. That's okay. That's okay. The Lord provides in other ways. And so I'm probably going to get that for lunch. We'll see anyway. But Steve, I want to hear about what tell us about your the ministry that you have right now. And I want to hear about these steaks, because you sent me a set of these, which is pretty cool. And then once you talk about what you're doing now, I want to back up then and talk about how God brought you to where you are today. So just kind of introduce yourself to this audience and just what you do and what the ministry is that God's called you to?

Well, well thank you again, for for having me. It's just it's great to I love what you're doing. I appreciate your instruction and coaching in the Podcast Network. I think we have a great thing going I'm really honored to be a part of that network and glad to be with you today. Discussing God is just God stories. He just put me in the middle of a bunch of great God stories event. And I'm just kind of become a story collector. But God stuck me in the middle of a series of spiritual warfare situations and sort of nudged me into into this whole ministry. And believe me, I came kind of kicking and screaming I was raised very conservative, aka Pella Church of Christ. I mean, I'm the last guy in the world you should be hearing any miracle stories from an essay that laughingly because truthfully, we were in the word but we never talked about the Holy Spirit and we didn't talk about demons at all. And yet God put me in the middle of a series of people having serious spiritual warfare situations. or to sort of gave me some solutions that turned into a whole series of stories and events and things. And so that's kind of the quick thing, but it has to do with Bible verses on 10 steaks. I know that sounds crazy.

bible verses on 10 steaks. Well, I can't wait to hear more about how those bible verses on 10 steaks became an actual ministry. Because that doesn't seem to be that doesn't seem to necessarily compute. How does Jesus and camping work hand in hand, but we're gonna explain that in just a little bit. So, I mean, you haven't always been in, in this type of ministry, though. No, tell me about how you grew up. And you said, you grew up in the church of God and sing in an acapella group, but like, how did you meet the Lord? How did God? Or how did Jesus meet you? Really? How did he find you?

You know, I was raised in a very religious family. So we went to church all the time growing up, and went to Christian college. But we were just very, very conservative. We love the word, but we kind of ignored the verses that talked about supernatural things. And so when God started sticking me in the middle of supernatural situations, because of real life, depression or things, then I just walked away from a business I had for almost 30 years and became full time ministry. I had a technology company. I started in 1982, shortly after I got out of college in 79. And I had that in ran that for almost 30 years. And it was very successful still in still in business, but I'm not there anymore. But God kind of made it obvious that he wanted me doing spiritual warfare ministry, as opposed to business things. And so I just left it about 13 years ago.

Okay, so I want to talk about that business. Because you started a business. I mean, that always perked my ears up because God gave you a gift to do something like that, to start a business that you've, you're employing people and then you were able to sell it, which is a great thing. And the business is still running without you. So that speaks to the longevity of what you've been able to do. But God gave you that gift. What was the business? And how did God How did God lead you to do that?

You know, I got a marketing degree. I kind of enjoyed sales and people I love people. And so my, my wife and her dad had had a business, a technology company. And so when we got married shortly after we got married, we've been married 42 years now. He and I started a copier, business, copier, fax, printer, software, all kinds of business, technology, consulting and all that for businesses. And we started from scratch. When I left it 13 years ago, we were doing 6 million a year in sales have 36 employees. God really blessed it. I, you know, I can't, I can't take the credit. He gave me good coaches, and he gave me some some gift of gab may be bad. But it really was a blessing from God, because a lot of people start companies in it, and it isn't successful. And it was very successful. And I enjoyed it until God started putting me in some ministry situations. And I really wanted to help more people because I saw that making a difference in their lives. I always shied away from from being full time in ministry, even though I love the Lord and love church, a shot away from it, because I saw so many church leaders and preachers get fired for no reason and have to pick up move their families. And I'd say, Well, I want to be a business guy that does church work all the time. And that way, they can't fire me, you know, yeah. So that that mindset left me to be very involved in Bible study and church work. And yet, the business was was the was the method that gave me the free time to take off when I wanted and do what I wanted. But once once I started doing writing, and people started wanting me to speak and and I heard how it had changed their lives. I wanted to just help more people. And all of a sudden I realized why people go into ministry in spite of the difficulties they face sometimes in that arena.

Wow. So you, so you, basically you've been a Christian pretty much your whole life. I mean, yes, probably prayed the prayer when you were a little kid, because you grew up in a Christian family and 1111 Okay, tell me about that.

Well, my dad preached on and off, he was a church leader and priests, but at 11 I just realized I, you know, wanted forgiveness, I realized I had done some things and thought some things and said some things that were ugly. And I realized I needed forgiveness because I wanted to go to heaven. You know, I did not want to go to hell. We used to have a lot of sermons about hail and how hard it was and how, you know, we didn't want to go there, but they don't talk about that much anymore. And I think that's a, there is a fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And so, so age 11, I walked to the front of the church and gave my life to the Lord. And then my dad even came forward and baptized me that day, that same day. Yeah, that same day, I was baptized. And so, you know, I've just been walking with the Lord ever since but I wasn't always that trusting of His Word. You know, I sort of, you know, we started to get trained to think of things just symbolically and not think of the literal nature of God's word, and I started to realize how many things were actually literal and in fact, in a book on heaven, and it was a shock for me to realize that all the First Coming prophecies were literal, there were not any symbolic only. First Coming prophecy, hands and feet repairs betrayed by a friend 30 pieces of silver buried in a rich man to born of a virgin rise in three days, Not a bone broken. That's how we prove Jesus is the Messiah, that the Bible, literally the prophets prophecies are literal. So that made me go well, if all the First Coming prophecies are literal, what are the Second Coming are two and I reread the Bible with the Second Coming prophecies that talk about eternity. And that made me go, wow, if they're literal, then these verses make more sense than they did otherwise. Of course, I wrote a book on heaven. But But Randy Alcorn, and others have come out with books now. And and they've said that too, so I kind of I just trusted God's word. Yeah. Haven't book and then a spiritual warfare series of books.

Wow. So what does your relationship with Jesus look like? Could you explain how you spent time with him and how long he's grown? You? I guess that's the best way to say it?

That's a great question. I don't think he's ever asked me that question for John. I take seriously my personal relationship with him. And that, that I want to fulfill everything that He created me to fulfill nothing less than that, because it would be wasteful, nothing more than that, because it would be prideful, I'm going to stay in the authority that he's given me. So I wake up every day and say, Okay, I'm still alive. What do you want me to do for the kingdom today? How can I help today? I want you to manage my schedule, not me. I'm not a big goal setter. My goal is to please God one day at a time. And so it's funny, I'm even to the point when I go to a to a Christian convention, have a booth with my books and the stakes of the verses on them and all those things. And I'm sitting there, you know, 10 hours from home and just pray. Okay, Lord, I came all this way. Is there somebody you want me to talk to? If so, send them over, and somebody will walk up and and they'll get in? We'll have an hour conversation, I'll sit down and say, Thank You, Lord, for sending that person. That would you send another one if there's somebody else, and somebody else who I've learned to really trust God day to day for the minute by minute things, you know, it never does say give us a year, our yearly bread because he wants a daily, ongoing conversational relationship with each of us. And I, I take that seriously. So when I spend time in the word I try to PowerPoint is my way to study, I'll read a chapter I'll copy and paste into PowerPoint. And I'll make, you know, maybe 10 slides on one verse from the different aspects. So what that slide, I've got over 17,000 PowerPoint slides right now, and I make more every day, we're gonna make those into an app. That's one of the projects we have on the drawing board for the for the nonprofit active active dash faith.org is the website where we, we have a lot of the ministry stuff, but anyway, I take that daily relationship seriously, I pray as I walk, I pray as a talk, I pray is a grind. I want that closeness. I feel like that Jesus is my best friend. And it's really enhanced my life and helped me overcome stresses and struggles and heartaches and lots of physical pains and different things over the years. I'm learning to pray the blood of Jesus, that's one of the weapons I'm learning that we have up to 56 weapons from scripture, I thought we had about two. Now that's a whole nother book I'm still working on so

so this whole concept in your podcast is called the spiritual warfare battle plan. Yeah, battle. So you are all about equipping people to be successful in the spiritual warfare that we're engaged in every single day. And your podcast is great. I love the stories and the teaching there. But how did you get started focusing in on this because it's it's you said you didn't grow up with that. You are you were like the kind of the furthest thing away from that spiritual warfare. What spiritual warfare did you go through that opened up your mind to say, I got to develop this battle plan for myself? And then it eventually turned into a battle plan for other people?

Oh, that's a great question. What happened was, as, as I was working on a book on heaven, I told you about that. And the reason I did that my dad died and left a note in a sealed envelope in his safe address to me and my brother, but it had said on the front, if you boys find this after I'm dead, don't open this envelope. It's not important destroy this envelope without opening it, dad. And it was signed and dated six months before he died unexpectedly with a heart attack. And so we we did not open it. We burned it without reading it. And then that created a burning passion in me to know more about heaven. And just wondering what he put in the envelope. I never, never did learn if you beat me to heaven, you can ask him about it. But we don't know what it said because we burned it without reading it. And so I went to the Bible bookstore to ask for the

i Hold on a second. Hold on a second. So let me get this straight. Your dad wrote a letter that was addressed to you but told you don't open it if I'm dead, right?

Yes. Exactly. What do

you have any idea Yeah, of why he would give those instructions.

No, no, it's you beat me to heaven, you can ask me.

Okay, I'll look at my directory. Yeah. But we

we did the hard thing. And I mean, that was the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. We burned it without reading it. You had to know Dad. You know, I knew there was going to be a reunion when I saw him and the Resurrection Sunday, and I didn't want to have to hang my head when I walked up. I wanted to be able to hold it up high and say, Okay, Dad, I don't know what was in an envelope. But what you know, we did what you said that tell me what was in it, you know, to be able to, I want him to be proud of us for doing that.

Oh, good. Good for you. I probably would have gotten somebody else to open it and then just say don't don't tell me anything and let but you can know, but don't ever tell me. I just need to have somebody know what dad said. But oh, man, I respect you and your brother a lot for you know, honoring your dad's wishes when? Yeah, Mike. Yeah, that was hard. Yeah. But you were writing about heaven and yet

sound weird, but the envelope created a curiosity in me about heaven itself. And I realized I've been in church all my life and never heard a sermon much on heaven. We heard about hail and it was hot and bad, don't go there. But we didn't talk about heaven what it was like. So I went to the Bible bookstore to buy all the heaven books, and there were none. In 2000, when dad died, there were no books on heaven. Everything on heaven has come out since 2000. Really, he died. And so I began my own study. And I would go to breakfast by myself every day and lunch by myself from then on. And that two hour period a day was the only free time I had which I used to reread the Bible looking for details about heaven. And I started to color code, the different categories of details. Green was prophecies about heaven and eternity. Red was spiritual warfare and the decisions we're making that lead us to heaven or hell. And then, you know, I used gray and, and I used covenant was brown, and I used the silver color. There was just I just color coded my Bible and those ended up becoming the chapters. That's too long a story to tell you right now. But anyway, in my study, I'd go to Burger King across the street from my office every morning, who was handy, right across the street, read and it's a quiet place. And because everybody's going through the drive thru, and it's morning, so I'm sitting there reading and one morning, an older gentleman came in turned out, he's a retired professor from Stanford, you know, jokingly say that Christian college out west, and he sees me reading my Bible. He turned out he's a retired professor from Stanford, and his brother lives in Longview. So he's in visiting his brother. He sees me reading my Bible, he assumes that since I'm reading my Bible, I must be a minister. So he comes up to my table and says, Son, what do you preach? And I said, Well, sir, I'm not a preacher. I'm just a business guy. And he sits down with me in the booth uninvited, which is okay, but weird, you know, he started to say some strange things about the Bible that really were false. And I had just read first Corinthians 12, verse three, and First John four, verse three, both those verses say that you can only say Jesus is Lord by the Holy Spirit. So if you can't use this as Lord, you don't have the Holy Spirit. In other words, only Christians can say, Jesus is Lord. And so a little voice in my head, I think the Spirit told me what to say. Said it said, basically ask this man if he can say Jesus is Lord test that test that Bible verse to see if it's literal can can he say Jesus is Lord if he's not a Christian? Test it? so I gently interrupted this guy, I call him Dr. Smith, and the book is not his real name. I said, Dr. Smith, let me ask you a question is Jesus Lord, and he got so angry. At that question. He jumped up out of the booth, and started running around Burger King screaming at me through gritted teeth. Wow. No, who is Jesus? I don't know who Jesus is, I'm wasting my time talking to you. And I looked up at him and said, Sir, I want you to know that I'm going to pray for you that someday you can know Jesus as Lord that really made him mad. He he ran back up to me screaming in my face, he stuck his finger at my face. He says, Don't you dare pray for me. And I don't know why I did this because I've never done it before since but I looked at him and smiled. And I said, I can pray for you right now. You can't stop me. And he just turned around and ran out a burger. I mean, by now the Burger King workers are all stopped and they're staring at us with their mouth open. The drive thru is backing up. People are starting to honk and you know, and this guy's running out of Burger King. Now they've come out of the back. They're watching this scene unfold. He slams the glass door. I thought it was gonna break, ran to his car. And when he jumped in and backed up, he threw it in gear and he burned rubber. And it was only 50 yards to the highway. And it dawned on me in that instant that he is defenseless, against my prayers and he knows that what's in him knows that you know. So at that moment I said, Okay, I'm almost through this book on heaven. I want to research spiritual warfare. I know the Bible has a lot to say about that. So that began,

you had an encounter with the King of kings in Burger King.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, actually call that story, the atheist at Burger King, and it's one of my podcast episodes now. But anyway, that led to a book called my search for prayers. Satan hates my first book on Spiritual Warfare. I love that title. And yes, it is a fun title. And I intended to share prayer success stories from all my years in business when you had one difficulty after another, getting people to pay their bills, so you can pay your bills and people going bankrupt and different things that were hurdles to cross. God got us through so much. And I was going to share those kinds of stories. However, I wanted something unique and special to put in the book that truly helped people. So I prayed and asked God for that. Please give me something special to put here that helps people. And right after I prayed that, I got a call from a Christian friend of mine, a leader of a local church and said, Steve, is it true? Your next book is on Spiritual Warfare? And I said yes. Why? He said, I have a friend I've been trying to bring to Christ for 25 years. He's a great friend, a great guy, but he's mad at God about some things that happened a long time ago. And I haven't made any progress with him. But right now he has a spiritual warfare problem. And I'm wondering if maybe God is orchestrating this, and this is gonna be our chance to convert him? Would you be willing to meet with him and talk if if I set up a meeting? And I said, Sure, I don't know if I can help, but I'll try. So I meet Bill face to face. And we're just talking and I said, Well, what's wrong? What's your spiritual warfare problem? And he looks at me dead serious and says, I have demons on my property. I'm getting ready to commit suicide. I just wanted to talk to you first. And I realized how serious this situation was. And I did what I call panic prayer. You know, he's still talking and I'm praying, panicking saying, What do I say, Lord? I don't know how to help this guy. I have no experience in this arena. I grew up not even talking about this stuff. How do I help he's gonna kill himself. And he's not a Christian. And a weird verse from Deuteronomy six popped in my head. And if you didn't ask me to quote this verse, I couldn't have done it if you'd paid me and all of a sudden, I could just see it clears day it's the one then I think it's verses six through nine of Deuteronomy six, you're living in a land that's full of evil. So be sure and put my word on your gates and doorposts. And the Jews did that. They didn't say, oh, that's just symbolic. You don't literally do that. No, they did it. They still literally do it. It's called them, Azusa. It's got the Shema on it. It's their, it's their connection to God. Obviously, it's not a magic box. It's a it's a symbol of their relationship with God. And so I was trying to think through that quickly as he's talking, how do I apply that in this modern situation? And literally, I'm grasping at straws, trying to help a guy who's about to commit suicide who's not a Christian. And then it clicked. And I said, Bill, stop. Don't Don't kill yourself yet. Let's try something bizarre. You know, the Bible is full of bizarre stories, just talking snakes and walking on water and resurrection, let's put some tent stakes on the corners of your place where this weird stuff is happening. He was having nightmares and hearing voices and fear, like crazy. And I said, Let's just put some 10 sticks out with Bible verses on them, and read the verses together, and pray and ask God to make this stuff, stop and see what he does. And he said, Okay, I'll try anything at this point. And we did that. It's a long, complicated story. We won't take time for now. But everything changed. He became a Christian the next week and wanted to be baptized, and he prays for me every day. And the idea took off. And I got talked into seven states. And the next thing, you know, a plastics manufacturer has contacted me, and he's willing to spend $10,000 to build a mold so that the the verses are built into the plastic with writing inside the mug, and you don't put stickers on them. And so far, I've ordered 98,000 steaks from this guy, and we've shipped them all over the world. And many people make their own obviously, it's not a magic steak. It's an act of faith, and it's the

word of God. So 98,000 sets are nice

98,000 steaks, some people buy for the covers, but some people will buy more because it's an odd size at all. They want to stake out their house and their kids house and their grandparents house and you know, so it just kind of escalates we've, we've staked out cities are we stick that our city and crime went down? 45% after going up for 25 years.

Okay, talk more about that. Let's talk more about some of these steaks that you've you've done. Now. They've got

16 verses about God's promise to protect his people basically. And we read the verses and we pray somebody had the idea. Our crime rate is through the roof. Why don't we stick out the city and we did that in January of 2017. Here in Longview, Texas, northeast Texas. 83,000 people, crime had gone up for 25 straight years. Here's the recent years the cost of the crime had gone up astronomically. We had gangs now we never used to have gangs. Anyway, we staked out the city and prayed at every entrance to the city limits that Jesus be the king here and the Holy Spirit come and work on the heart of all the unbelievers to prepare him for the gospel. And amazing things started happening at stake the city businesses start moving in the economy got better and better. crime went down 45% in 18 months, we stick the jail out and the jail population dropped by a third. They've never had it get that low. So I could just sit here for days and not repeat the same story. God's word is powerful. You don't need my steaks. I do have the coolest steak. So yes, you do. Yes. You faith and the power of the Word of God.

Okay, so there's 16 verses on these steaks. And I I'm so grateful that you sent me actually two sets, which is great. I got to read in a blue set, and the verses are literally embossed or whatever they call

it engraving. They put engraving molded, and then plastic. It pops out. It's already already. Yeah,

so the references are there. But yeah, okay, so tell me about this process of what you do to actually, like stake an area, because, you know, it's you can just do the you can just do the basic thing and just kind of put a stake in a different area. But there's more to it than that. You know,

it's sort of that Satan has taken the land. And we're marking it off and taking it back one house at a time, one church at a time, one city at a time. We got states that are planning, coordinating, staking out the whole state and we have people hiding these things around their loved ones. Many of us know a love hiding them. That's great. Yeah. Have you heard my steaks in the trunk story? Have you heard that? Go ahead, tell it. Well, the Christian leader here in East Texas heard about this and came and got a set of the stakes. And it didn't hear the whole story till later. But his daughter was raised as a Christian. She confessed her faith in the Lord at age 11. She was active in her youth group, she went to Christian college, but once she graduated college, she tells her parents, she doesn't want anything to do with them anymore. She's lesbian, she's moving in with her girlfriend, and she's through with church and God. And their only connection to her was her cell phone, she wouldn't even tell them her new address after she graduated college and got a job. And so they would text her every week that they loved her and Mr. And they could always win, they would always be willing to help her start over when she's ready to walk away from that life. And she never responded. So they got the stakes for me. In the meantime, they heard about that, and then happened to get to see her for a little while on Christmas. And as they helped her pack and load, they hid the steaks in her trunk. And the next week, she called them and said she and she was crying, she missed them. And she wanted to restore their relationship. And they said, Honey, there's nothing we want more. We can't endorse that lifestyle. But we'll help you. We'll do anything to help you out of that. And we'll hear we help you start over. And so long story short, before long, they were talking on the phone every day. And then later that year in August, she called them one Friday morning and said I'm coming home and walking away from this life. And I'll be home by midnight. And when I get home, I want daddy to rebaptised me as a symbol of my renewed commitment as a Christian. And so they invited me to their church for midnight baptism. When she arrived at home, they went straight to the church. And after the baptism we had, you know, family, we were the only ones there. My wife and our own was there that weren't family. We held the circle held hands and circle and the father prayed. And when he said a man, he looks at me in front of his daughter and says, Okay, Steve, tell her what's in her trunk. And so I told her what I just told you, and the tears just started streaming down her face. She said, I wondered why my car was the only place I felt safe. She never called them from home. And she never called them from work. She only called them from the car. She didn't even know those verses ruin those steaks in the trunk. God's word is powerful. That's the only way I know how to explain that. And we all have, by the way, she got married last year and I let a prayer at the wedding for the dinner that followed the wedding celebration. You know God, God can fix anything. He is the great I Am he is the Physician He is the creator and we we we've forgotten to have the faith and prayer in his power that really is capable and I think I think this idea of taking the land back one car at a time one child at a time one home at a time is just what God is looking for. You know I started to realize how many how many prayer plus action things are in the Bible they prayer they prayed an active when they marched around Jericho when they held up Abraham's arms so they could win the battle against the angelic guides when he had to raise his staff for the red seeds apart. Prayer plus action is all through the Bible. The woman with the issue of blood should have been yelling unclean but she wasn't she was sneaking in there to touches him. So prayer plus action prayer plus touch prayer plus fasting. These are all weapons that we can be using. Don't just pray harder. We have other weapons than that. And that's why I'm up to 56. And that's another book coming out in a video series we're working on. But the idea is keep adding weapons into what you're praying for begins to happen and place God's word strategically around people and watch his word do its work. It's amazing.

Amen. Amen. Steve, I got to ask, what are those verses that are on those steaks and why did you pick those specific ones?

They're right here on the side there. Second, Psalm 22, three, Nehemiah four, nine, Proverbs 30, verse five, Jeremiah one, eight, Psalm seven, one through 10, Isaiah 3321. Mark 620, Luke 14, Ezra 821 22. Job 1118. Job 110. John 1711. Genesis one one which says God made the world and since we're children of God, we have the right to stake it with authorities why we put that one first Peter one, five, Matthew 2653, and x 2622. These verses are the ones I found, as I was searching keywords in scriptures about God's protection of his people, how we rely on God, sometimes he uses angels in this process. It's all about God's ability to protect us. But let me just say, there's lots of categories that we're noticing that people have other issues like anger, and sexual purity and racial unity, and, and suicidal thoughts. So we're adding stickers to the steaks with these verses on them and other issues. And we're kind of commanding that the the demons of anger leave as we do this. So we encourage people, you can take a permanent pen and write those things on the front of the stakes where it's blank, favorite verse, you can put your kids names, you can put the issues, no more fear, no more anxiety, no more depression, and watch out, melts away, because God's word has that kind of power. That's the idea.

Amen. God's word is so powerful. I mean, the beginning of John says that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, you know, God's word is, is Jesus. I mean, Jesus is the Word made flesh. And so as we are declaring his word, we're really declaring Jesus over these situations, and you talked about praying and declaring and claiming the blood of Christ over these different situations, and that's something that's been recent for you. I mean, it's been a recent focus. It's not like a brand new thing for you. But yes, I've been hearing a lot about the blood of Jesus, too. And I've always just accepted that his, you know, by his stripes, we are healed. You know, it's His blood that, you know, he needed to shed his blood for us to be, you know, forgiving of sins. But could you explain more about the whole claiming and declaring the blood of Jesus? Because it sounds weird.

It does. It does. And I'm not sure I can explain it because I'm still learning it. But I'm gonna take what I've been learning. Yeah, please urges you. Because I'm learning to pray the blood of Jesus in in particular situations. You know, I'm like you the blood of Jesus was a background thing. We knew that it was part of the big picture. It's why you know, his blood was given we have the communion, that record represents his body and his blood. But I'm learning that, in fact, this comes from I think it's revelation 2212 that says they overcame by the blood of the Lamb. Right? And so I started thinking about that. And I'll tell you a fun story. There's, there's a guy that's a star of one of the Pure Flix most popular shows called sons of thunder Randall readers, the star we become friends. Randall called me one day, and he had this issue who's facing difficult decision. He didn't know if it was God's discipline in his life, or if it was, if it was the enemy's attack, you know that our problem most of time, we don't know. We don't We can't discern if it's we need to just endure this because God put this here to teach us the enemy's attack. So I said, Oh, man, you just need to pray this prayer, just just off the top of my head. What came to me in that moment I gave to him. Two weeks later, he called and said, Steve, that prayer changed my life. I said, Oh, my goodness, I need to pray that prayer for myself, then I didn't think about it. Because at that moment, when he called back, I had just had an issue with my left leg. Now I'm diabetic for 45 years. So you know, there's gonna be we're human, there's going to be deterioration of your body. But my left calf has started hurting for no reason. I mean, I didn't bump it or hit it. I didn't fall on it. It's just all of a sudden, it's throbbing. It wakes me up in the night, it will come and go. And I was praying, you know, I learned to pray two things. One was the blood of Jesus. I'm going to tell you how did that just a second, but the second is, I figured out a prayer. That puts the discernment in God's court instead of virus. Okay, this is pretty cool idea now yeah, it's real super rare, but this is the idea. I just pray it like this. It's a simple one sentence prayer. Okay, my leg is hurting. So I'm going to pray. Lord, is this what you want for me? Hmm. Because if it if it is and it's gonna keep hurting, and I just need to get tough, I need to learn from it. I need Jesus learned obedience through suffering. I need to learn obedience and trusting him through suffering. But if it's not from God, then it's the enemy. Me. There's no gray angels. They're either on God's side or they're on Satan side, you know, so there's no cat. There's no fence riding Angel. So this this pain I have is either God allowed this because he's teaching me something important that I need to learn. Please help me learn it or the enemy's attack trying to distract me from what I'm trying to do for the kingdom. So if it's the enemy, then I'm binding gag in Jesus name ask you to put pit chains, so it can't hurt me anymore. So when Randall called me back and said that prayer, I changed my life as soon as I prayed it, put the discernment in God's hands, like you said, and then the answer came in no time and I said, okay, then I got to pray that prayer for my leg. So I'd actually had a doctor's visit, scan on it, and they're scheduling an MRI on my leg. When I realized this needs to be prayed. So I just said, Okay, Lord, My leg hurts. It's waking me up in the night, I can hardly walk. I need to walk for exercise so that I can stay healthy with my diabetes and everything. Is this what you want for me? Is this leg pain that is excruciating. When it hits me? Is this what you want for me? Because if it is great, but if it's not, then I bonded in Jesus name and ask you to put it by the blood of Jesus and a bit. And you know what? My leg immediately quit hurting? Wow. And I called and said, Your MRI has been scheduled, I said, cancel it, I don't need it anymore. And that was last year. So I started praying the blood of Jesus on other issues. I finally did get a side effect from my 45 years is diabetic. My right foot started getting neuropathy, which is a pain, there's a burning, it feels like you stuck your foot in a fire, and you can't get it out. You know, that's what it feels like. So they told me that's what it was. I said, Okay, now I know what to pray against. So I said, Lord, is this what you want for me? Do you want me to have diabetic neuropathy, because if it is, maybe I supposed to learn something special from it, but if it's not, I'm bonding Jesus name, and I pray the blood of Jesus, on my right foot where this is hurting. And immediately it stopped. It's come back to other times, and both time I prayed the blood of Jesus immediately, and it stopped. So it was from the enemy. It wasn't from God, that's we're putting the discernment in his court. It's just a neat way to let God choose what happens and be okay with whatever he chooses.

Wow, all that you're talking about right now is really exciting to me. And I love just hearing these testimonies. And that's what your podcast is all about, as well as teaching. But I want to hear from you like, how did you decide that? Okay, I'm gonna leave this successful business to focus on the ministry and see God's sustain me. And like, I mean, the idea of sending people tent stakes is doesn't sound like a lucrative business model. You know? Like, let's, let's talk about that a little bit, and how God's how God has used you in this way over the last 13 years? Well,

that's a good question. Let's think of it this way. I'm not trying to say this is a lucrative business model. I didn't leave the business for the money, I walked away from a six figure income to zero income. Now, I had been careful with my money, and I didn't have any debt. So the fact that God had helped me kind of learn to be smart financially and not accumulate a lot of debt and buy a house I could afford and pay for and not have to have this long big house payment or whatever, those things. That backdrop let me be able to say yes to God in the moment where it took faith to walk away from a stability to you would think this be called instability. And my wife thought I was crazy for a while, you know, too, because you know, you're in your 50s, when I walked away in the early 50s, that's your that's your biggest money making potential for a time you make more between 50 and 60, than any other decade. Obviously, you're, you know, the business, you're mature, and you're in a position to do that. But I, it became so obvious that God wanted me in ministry instead of there. Through a series of little events. One one was when my heaven book came out, I got an email from a lady now, by the way, I'm just I'm still working at this point. I have a book out, but I have no plans. Right? I have another one at this moment, or, or quit my job. So this email comes and this lady goes, Dear Steve, Mom, my mother passed away and we were very close. And I have one younger sister. And two weeks after we buried my mother, my sister died in a car crash. And I lost the two people closest to me in the whole world in two weeks, and I was so depressed, that in the last two months, I've lost 40 pounds, I can hardly sleep or eat. But then my neighbor loaned me your book on heaven. My search for the real heaven. Thank you. Now I can sleep and eat again. And I just cried in that moment. And I said, Now I get it. Now I know why people go into ministry, when you can truly help people. It's worth it. And so that sort of thing started happening regularly and I was just said, Okay, I need to walk away and do this. And I was work on a book on Spiritual Warfare. So I have two books to sale. But I had two Christian partners. And they came to me and said, Well, you're getting invited to speak all over. And obviously, this is a God thing. Would you like to take off three months? And, and? And full pay, we'll pay you full pay. And we'll rearrange. Well, I'll cover what you do, and see if this is what God wants you to do the rest of your life. I mean, to tell you, and it was such a, a thoughtful thing to do. It's just that's one of the reasons God says, Don't yoke yourself on equal the in business or anything non Christian, because these these Christian partners go, this might be from God, do you want to take off three months? And yes, well, I didn't know at the time, but summers, not when you get a lot of speaking opportunities. Most of them are fall in spring. And so this was July, August, September, and I only had one book, it's, it's a $15 book at the time. And, and it's just me, nobody knows me. I mean, nobody knows I'm doing this. And I never had an audience over 70. I spoke three Sundays out of four, that three months, but by myself with one book, and never have an audience over 70. In three months, I sold $12,000 worth of books. And it became so obvious people would buy a case of books and start giving them away. It was really, people were just so kind to me. And I think that was just a God orchestrated series of circumstances that led me to realize you need to be in ministry the rest of your life. So that's, that's where I was comfortable. And it took my wife a little while to be there with me. Because, you know, I was given up a lot. And we had we had, who still had to in college at that moment. So that was expensive. But you know, we got through all that. And God blessed us over and over and people, people buy stuff when I speak. In fact, I don't even charge to speak, I've been to 300 cities in 25 states and three countries so far. 26 states now I just got to speak in Washington. I've never charged anybody to speak now. Some pay me, but I never asked for it. And you know what, it just works out people buy stuff when I when I speak or that get home to order something on our website, it just works out. I'm not I don't worry about that anymore. I just try to help as many people as I can.

That's amazing. I mean, I'm just blown away that you went from how God called you from full time business ministry, where you were writing books and you know, teaching at your church and you know, very involved in Bible study. And then God provided a way for you to take that next step. And then really be launched into the ministry that you're in now active faith active dash faith.org, which there will be a link in the show notes for that. But it's really interesting to see how God has led you along the way in your life. It's easy to see that he's put He's allowed you to put one foot in front of the other. And it's not been too crazy for you. So it's just been God's been leading you. And so you've been obedient with that. So yeah,

he's he's been gentle with me. He knew I was hard headed and weird. And let me tell you one of the unique stories, I don't always share this story. But one of the really fun stories to share that's unique is when when I started researching heaven, my first book, my search for the real heaven. I didn't feel qualified to write a book, but two different people that didn't even know my dad came to me and said, God said you're supposed to write a book about your dad and about heaven. And I would say you didn't even know my dad. Yeah, no, but you're supposed to write a book. So after the second time it happened. I realized, okay, this must be from God, I need to do this, but I don't feel qualified. So I prayed. I prayed a weird prayer, I pray weird prayers. I said, Lord, You sent two people to tell me to write a book, but I don't feel qualified. So I need to help. I'm gonna ask you for two things. I need to know the title of each chapter. And the order that should go in. Now keep in mind I'm underlining and color coding my Bible, right prophecies, heaven, rewards and our new body and all these different things. But I don't know what order they should go in. I don't know what to call the chapters. So one night after I prayed that, I wake up at 3am. And it was like a recorded message I was listening it said, Chapter One is this chapter two is this chapter three. And literally, I got up and put a sticky note by the sink in the middle of the night. That's where I got the chapters. So fast forward to when the book came out. I get invited to a Christian college in Arkansas to speak at their lectureship, not because I'm some famous person, but because I'm one of the few people has a book on heaven, and they're doing a lectureship on heaven. So they give me three hours to speak three different subjects from the book that put me in a classroom that seeded 12 120 people showed up, they had to move me to the chapel to accommodate everyone. And this young lady from South Korea comes to those three lectures and later contacts me in my wife and I sat down with her, and she said, Mr. Hale, I want you to know something. I was an atheist. My families are still atheist in South Korea, but I got accepted a few years ago into the foreign exchange student program. And I got put with a Christian family in South Texas. And even though I was an atheist, they went to church every Sunday and I didn't Want to stay home by myself? So I went with them and sat in church, but I listened to the preacher, I started reading the Bible, I became a Christian. But I was scared of heaven. I was scared to die and become a floating ghost. Now, that's not in the Bible, but a lot of people think you're gonna die and be a floating ghost, right? And she said, I was so scared of that I kept a list of questions about heaven in my Bible. So if it ever came up in a small group or a worship service, I would pull my list of questions out about heaven to see if any of those would be answered. Nobody ever answered any of the questions on my list until your book came out. Your book answered every question on the list in the same order. I had them written down. Chapter one answered question one, chapter two entry, question two, all the way through. And she said, You know, I'm gonna tell you only God can do that. Yeah. only gonna do that.

Wow. And God does that. And it's amazing to see how what God spoke to you. That night that you wrote down on a, on a sticky note, was exactly what that girl was asking for. And God is so faithful to do that. And I love how you know, that's a moment in her life that she'll never forget, you know, her life was forever changed and yours is to, because you know that by your obedience, just to write down what you heard God say that that obedience, that single act of obedience to order the book that way, then you taught that way. Answered somebody else's prayer. That is incredible. I love how God works that way.

And you know, just just to amplify how cool that is. You remember I told you, I'm very conservative, my wife was even more conservative than me. So as these stories began to happen, I would kill them, tell her about it. And she smiled nod. She said, Honey, that's great. Let's don't tell anybody about this. Okay, I want people to think you're normal. Because this was so out of out of character for either one of us because of our ultra conservative backgrounds.

Wow. And so now you have a podcast and you're telling other people about these stories, and you're no longer hiding that or keeping those away? No, you know, it's not.

Everyday on chip, she'll call me and say what happened today, what happened today, everywhere I go, it's it's just something else I'm learning. I'm, I'm a story collector. But I'm also learning from those. And by the way, I have started a mentor program, I wanted other people to begin to learn what I'm beginning to learn, I have a new group that kicks off in January. So if you have any listeners interested in that mentor program, then contact me through that website. But it's really been fun to, to learn. And we consider what I call case studies. People tell us a story and say, How would you how would you approach this? And the group thinks about it says, Well, I would bring up this first hour. Oh, that's a good one. And we learn from each other. It's a it's a growing process. I'm still learning so many new things every day, I'm learning how demons act, they don't, they have a route, they don't all go back to the same house every night. They have a route. They scared different people on different nights. They're, they're visiting our children. They're targeting children in Christian homes, as young as three podcasts about that. And I've got stories about that in my books, it's if he can get the children in Christian homes, then he's wiped out the church in one generation, because he's got everybody else. Wow, he's got the world in the world, kids, but he can wipe the church out by targeting Christian children. Wow, that's what he's doing. I think, Wow,

that is the battle plan of the enemy. And we have a battle plan to counter that, which is amazing. You know, Steve, I don't want to let this episode wrap up without asking you my quintessential along the way question, you know, just like the disciples were walking on the road to Emmaus, Jesus met them along the way, but they had no clue that it was him until they invite him in for dinner. Once they, once they reach their destination, after walking for a few hours together, they sit down at the table, Jesus blessed the food breaks the bread, their eyes are opened, and then poof, he's gone. They turn to each other and Luke 2432 and say, weren't our hearts burning within us along the way as he was revealing the Scriptures to us? You know, I don't want to miss those moments in my life as they're happening. I don't want to look back and say, Man, I missed it, you know, but you know, God's faithful and we can learn from those moments. But, you know, Steve, I want to learn from a moment of your life where you look back now and you see that Jesus was there, but in the moment, you didn't recognize it. But you look back and you see it now, you

know, you're talking about epiphanies. And that's fun to talk about. One of the big epiphanies I had recently because, you know, there are people that say, I'm crazy. I mean, I because there and you know, people ask me, how do you how do you handle all the criticism? And I always answer by saying, I don't focus on the people that say, I'm crazy. I focus on the people that are crying telling me this changed their life and brought their child back from evil and back into the kingdom that focus on that. And I started thinking about, you know, Jesus didn't do many miracles in certain places for one reason they didn't have much faith. Now, if you had told those little villages, hey, do you know why you've heard about miracles? Jesus did over in Cana data? Do you know, you know why I didn't do him here? And they would say why? And then the answer from the Bible is because you guys didn't have enough faith. They would have argued with that, they would have said, we have faith. That kind of stuff only happened in Moses time. It didn't happen today in Jesus's time. And there are people that today are saying Steve's crazy that only happened in Jesus time. But they're repeating that same thing that those guys are repeating to Jesus saying that only happened in Moses time. It didn't happen today, faith and miracles are connected. And that's my big aha, epiphany. You know, I scales for Jesus saying, Didn't our hearts burn, that's my biggest moment of this whole thing is, God is not the great I used to could. He's the I Am, because he's still in the miracle business. He's still touching hearts, he's still changing lives, he can still do miracles today. And the only thing that limits it is our lack of faith. If I don't think God uses dreams anymore, then I won't ever have one that'll be life changing. But if I'm open to that idea that uses dreams, then I'll have them. I learned that as firsthand in my life. I didn't, I started to meet people that he used a dream to convert them. And maybe he does use dreams. And then I started having dreams that would help people and it changed my whole life. That's my big aha moment. And that's a great question. And I can't tell you what an honor it is to be on your show and get to talk about that.

Well, thank you. I love how you said that God isn't the great I used to could, you know, that's, that is such a just accessible way to you know, sometimes we think, Oh, God used to do it that way. Or he's done it that way in the past. So you know, it's not going to happen that way now, but to know that God is active in our life, and our active faith needs to be stirred up every single day. And we need to walk with Him. And then we'll start to see those things. I love how you just answered that question. You know, you didn't tell a story of a particular thing. But it's more of a progression of how God has led you to where you are right now. But I do want to ask you as a follow up, if you could go back in time and visit young Steve, before you started this ministry, probably before you started your business. And you could give yourself a piece of advice somewhere along your somewhere along your timeline. You could give yourself a piece of advice, what's going on in your life that you would want to give yourself that piece of advice? And what would you say?

That is also a great question. And I'm going to reveal one of my big weaknesses, but by answering it is I used to, I never used to read very much. I was not a reader. I didn't read I only read what I had to go through college even I read what was required. I read my Bible, some but I wasn't a reader. And then when Frank Peretti, his book came out about this present darkness and Piercing the Darkness and Randy alicorns books that Frank Peretti got me interested in reading. And once I became a reader, I started to I started to read Christian fiction, which really opened my eyes to scriptures. In many ways. Randy was one of the best at that. And I started to read nonfiction Christian stuff. And now I do audible. I listen to books all the time. Yeah, I would say I wish younger Steve had become a reader much earlier in life than I could have followed God closer sooner. And that would be my advice to younger people is become a reader, even if it means finding something you're interested in and just listen to the book on Audible, but become a reading habit person, it will change the future in a very positive

way. Amen. Amen. That is, that is great advice. And thank you for being vulnerable to say that you haven't always been that way. But you've grown in that area as well. And that's a very practical thing that we can all take away and apply that to our lives as well. You know, Steve, we've talked a lot about your, your books and your website and your podcast, how can people find that I know I'm gonna make sure to put this in the show notes so that people can access it easily. But tell us a little bit about how they can get these 10 steaks and how we can get connected with you.

Well, the steaks are called spiritual warfare steaks, they're actually on Amazon too. You can buy them in four packs in apex. But the but the interest in it is growing so that we have a lot, you know, 40 and 80 and 120 and you buy box at 250. But our main website is active dash faith dot o RG and then my email is Steve Hemphill, one@me.com. And we're trying to do more and more we have we have battle plan is the biggest thing. We're doing new that we love. We do that three times a week. I'm at this point, it's early in the I didn't start till June of this year. But eventually I'm going to bring in a lot of these people that I'm telling their stories and we can interact and talk about their situation together. So that's one the drawing board. And then because so many demonic issues are connected to mental health situations with bipolar and autism and agoraphobia, all types of phobias, we're going to start mental health Mondays on our battle pan podcast, and I have a trained therapist with 28 years experience going to be coming on the show. And we're gonna take little bite sized pieces of mental health situations, I've had people with diagnosed bipolar that put that staked out their place and were cured. And and you know, what the trained therapists who work for the state or the school district or for the government, or they're not allowed, it's illegal for them to bring up demons as a possibility for your situation as the problem, but a private practice counselor can do that. So we're going to try to help the world realize that maybe there's more demonic connections to our mental health crisis we're facing today in many areas. And so battle plan is one of the best places to get a hold of that. I have a mentor program and that's explained on battle plan two, I just did a podcast that aired last week about our, our that all that stuff, so active Nash fight.org, and then spiritual warfare stakes on Amazon, and Steve MPL one@gmail.com, those are the best ways to get ahold of me,

great, I'll make sure to put all that stuff in the show notes. So people can just click that really easily and be directed to you. But before we wrap up here, I don't want to miss an opportunity for you to pray for our listeners. And if you could maybe lead us in a prayer to start, basically kind of what you would do to start the staking process or something. Something like that. You know, because somebody right now, they don't want to wait for the steaks to come. They want to get started right now. Yeah. And they want to do this today.

And they can they can I've got a free download of how to stake your property with the vs. You could make your own steaks. Yeah, let me just pray for his buddy, about that right now. Father, thank You for this time together on John's show, and for his listeners and their love for you. Thank you for the opportunity to share the power of your word and to share great testimonial stories about how you're bringing us closer to you through acts of obedience and remind us in scripture of how many times that was faith plus action. All through the scriptures help us to be people of action, prayer plus action. And when we pray, and we don't seem to see things happening, remind us that that even Jesus taught prayer alone is not always enough. In Mark nine Jesus example was some sometimes these demons require prayer plus, plus fasting. And then there's prayer plus touch and prayer plus oil help us to apply your weapons in the right situations. Give us the right words at the right moment for the right people. Father, all of us have loved ones we know who walking away from God, help us to somehow hide your word around them in a way that makes a difference. Give us the right verses give us the right mindset give us faith. So you will do miracles among us. Don't let us be like those cities who didn't have enough faith to see the miracles. Help us to have the faith that it requires. So that you can do your work. Give us opportunities to be bold for you to speak up for us to stand up for the truth and for the Kingdom. And also to be reminded that hail is still hot and you want us to avoid hell help us to, to have that fear of you. That's the beginning of wisdom, but help it to grow into love and closeness and a desire to wake up every day. And say, Lord, I cancel any curses against me today. And I'm still alive. So what can I do for the kingdom today? Give me a willing heart to do that. Finally, help us every day to wake up and put your kingdom above our own kingdoms every day as long as we live, and then one day in which we see you face to face. We're looking forward to hearing that well done good and faithful servant. Until then, help us to serve you faithfully and wholeheartedly. in Jesus precious name we pray.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Steve, it's been an honor to hear your along the way journey and just how God has used you, is using you and will use you. I'm excited to hear more of your stories that you share on your podcast. Definitely check it out. Steve is a great storyteller, as you've heard in this podcast. Today, go check out his website and get the PDF of how you can today stake out your property, you know the things around you and put your faith into action right now. Because this is going to change your life. I've done it in my apartment, that's I did it the best way that I could in my apartment. It's something that we need to continue to just stand and believe that just like God told Joshua, wherever your feet tread, that's the land that I'm giving to you. And we can't let the devil take back what God has given us. And so we need to continually fight for that. And to war for that and pray for those that that God has put into our lives and just like the story of that girl with the stakes in her trunk. You can have stories like that too. And I'm believing that we want to hear from you. Please let Steve know whenever those things happen. Please let me know whatever Things happen. And I just want to encourage you today to go and put your faith into action by praying those prayers by praying those verses and seeing what God is going to do in your lives. Steve, thank you so much for allowing me to join you along your way.

Thank you. I enjoyed being here.

I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Steve. I really want to encourage you to check out his podcast to hear the inspiring testimonies and visit his website if you want to get your own set of spiritual warfare stakes. I'll be providing his info in the show notes. Thank you for listening to along the way. If you've enjoyed joining me along my way, please share this with a friend who you think will be encouraged by this podcast. Also, please rate in review along the way on iTunes. That helps more people discover along the way. And subscribe to this podcast wherever you're listening. And you can follow me on facebook, instagram at my website along the way dot media. If you want to support me in this podcast, I also have a Patreon page. The link to become a supporter is in my show notes. I hope that you've enjoyed this part of my journey, and may you realize when Jesus is walking with you along your way. Along the way is honored to be part of the charisma Podcast Network. You can find tons of spirit filled content from their vast catalogue of podcasts, including my Monday through Friday news stories for the charisma news podcast. Go to CPN shows.com To see the full list and latest episodes