What does Bible say about Decreeing and Declaring

If you have been in the Pentecostal movement long enough like me, you might have come across the subject of declaring and decreeing things.  From my own experience, I grew up believing this and claiming things. Most people in my circles did but is it biblical? Let’s find out.

To declare is to state a fact with a loud voice. To decree is to issue a command with authority. Declaring and decreeing is the habit of speaking things into existence. For example, if someone is sick, he/she may say something like, “I speak healing into my body right now,” or “I declare that I am healed.” Declaring and decreeing takes different forms. They may even say something like, ‘I command every sickness to get out of my body.’ Many times this will be accompanied by the words, ‘In the mighty name of Jesus Christ.’

Professing Christians who practice declaring and decreeing things believe that it is biblical and supported by scriptures. They believe that since mankind is created in God’s image (Genesis 1:26-27), we have the power to bring things into existence if we have faith. Others also believe that believers are little gods and therefore we have the power to create realities by speaking what they want into existence.

It is true that we are created in God’s image and His likeness but to suppose that we can declare and decree things into existence is wrong because of that is to wrongly apply that truth. Being created in God’s image and likeness, we share some of God’s communicable attributes finitely and imperfectly like Justice, Holiness, Truth, Mercy, etc. By this, we have the capacity to have spiritual fellowship with God.

What about  Job 22:28 ”You shall decree a thing and it shall be established”?

There is one verse in the Bible that seems to imply that decreeing and declaring is biblical but a closer look at the context proves otherwise. It is Job 22:28 and it says;

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

Job 22:28

The context is significant. Job 22:28 isn’t spoken by God or even Job. Job’s friend Eliphaz says that Job’s suffering is the result of abandoning God and sinning, and if he’d turn back to God he’d prosper once again. This was a lie; Job’s problems weren’t the result of sin in his life. God said Job was a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil (Job 1:1, 8; 2:3). Job 1 and 2 explain Job’s losses for entirely different reasons and God later rebuked Eliphaz for lying to Job and falsely accusing God about what He was doing (Job 42:7-9).

What about if You declared something and It happened? Well, it is possible for people to declare something with faith and it happens but that is not the reason it happened. If you declare to have a successful journey and it happens, it is not because you declared so. If you are honest, you will agree with me that there are many other things you declared and they did not happen. The declarations are not causative.

Declaring and decreeing things puts us in danger of putting our wills over God’s will. Even worse, it is like making all-decreeing God our slave to fulfill whatever we say. Jesus taught us that we should pray that God’s will would be done and showed us the example (Mathew 6:10, Luke 22:42).


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