How to stop a dog from barking

A record of miracles and testimonies

Writing down my testimonies of God’s faithfulness and miracles is not something that I have typically done in the past. A lot of times amazing things happen and I marvel at them at that a time. However, I do not sit down and record how marvelous they are. Some things I recorded in journals that I now have no idea where they are because I have now lived in several different countries. These records of testimonies may be random, according to how and when I remember them. I am hoping that my memory is trustworthy enough.

The beginning

I will start with a short one. When I was 18, I was living with my two sisters. They joined this Church which will remain unnamed. There was a revival at the church and all of us went. As a Christian, I went for several all-night prayers, miracle healing services and such but none quite like this one. I had always been kind of skeptical of anything that claimed to be a miracle. Nonetheless, on this day, God shut me up for good.

Do I believe in miracles

There were several altar calls for the sick, but I never ‘saw’ any miracle. The shocker of the night came when the Pastor asked a woman whose child was born with club feet to come on stage. Her baby had bandages on her feet so we could not see the club feet, just bandages. Before the Pastor started praying, we heard the mother of this baby scream. The first thing I saw was the bandage on the left foot unraveling. Then I saw the other foot grow through the bandage. It took me a while for it to register that this little girl grew feet right in front of our eyes.

The shock of Miracles

To say that I was shocked, is the understatement of the century. I was shaken all the way home. As we walked home from the bus stop, we walked up an alleyway that we used daily to get home, and one of the neighbor’s dogs started barking as we got closer to our house. I shouted immediately, ‘shut up in the name of Jesus’. And the dog stopped barking. I thought the dog just freaked out at the noise and was shocked into silence, so I did not thing much of it. That night we all slept in silence for the first time as the dog was not barking at all.

The prayer

The next morning, we woke up and went about our business and the dog was still quiet, we did not even worry about it till my friend came over with a worried look on her face. She told us that the dog had not barked since the night before and it still was not barking. I knew immediately what had happened and I told her not to worry, the dog would probably bark soon. As soon as she left, I went to my room and prayed that God would open the mouth of the dog, and as soon as I finished praying, we could hear the dog barking again.

New vision

That was the first time that I believed in the power of declarations, power of words, power in the name of Jesus, and the dominion we have as Christians. The only thing that had changed was my faith. I believed, I declared, it happened. My faith was activated by seeing the feet of that little girl grow, and it gave me the confidence to believe that I too could declare a thing and it would happen. I pray that I may start to believe again as I did then.

Thou shalt also decree a thing, and it shall be established unto thee: and the light shall shine upon thy ways.

Job 22:28

Disclaimer

I just want to add a major disclaimer to this story, you cannot access the Power of God if you are not connected to Him. I believe that one of the reasons why God allowed me to declare that and see it work was because of my relationship with Him. Trying to use the Power of God when you do not have a personal relationship with God does not work. You must be born again. If you see a person who is performing miracles and they do not have a personal relationship with God, most times they are accessing power from elsewhere at the cost of their soul. This particular testimony is in reference to Praying in Jesus’ name or declaring a thing in Jesus’ name and seeing it come to pass.