Abra cadabra.  Open sesame.  I am healed in Jesus’s name.  What’s the difference?

Some say there is none.  They say “name it and claim it” is basically the same as speaking a magical incantation to make something happen.  And Scripture speaks against divination, sorcery, etc.  So, are they the same?

Admittedly, there is power in the spoken word.  God said, “let there be,” and it was.  Proverbs 18:21 says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue.”  Jesus said we could speak to a mountain and, if we don’t doubt but believe it’ll move, it will (Mark 11:23).  And if we abide in Him, and His words abide in us, we may ask what we desire, and it shall be done for us (John 15:7).  Scripture also says we can be confident that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us (1 John 5:14).

And there’s the difference.  Will power.  Not that you can will something to happen.  Rather, whose will is empowering something to happen?

Granted, God says He’ll put desires in your heart and He’ll bring them to pass (Psalm 37:4-5).  But some desires won’t happen.  Here.  We live in a fallen world.  For example, while there will be no disease in heaven, there is here.  But miracles do still happen here.  And when they do, they’re intended to point people here to the hereafter.

And a lost person being saved is the greatest miracle of all.  “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me’” (John 14:6).