The Power of Words #5: Faith Filled Words That Agree With God

Faith filled words are words that agree with what God has already said, spoken by people who believe that what they say will come to pass. That is the heart of this fifth message in The Power of Words series at NTC Ministries. Dr. William P. Hohman walks from the creation account, where God said “let there be” and there was, through Jericho, Zacharias, Mary and the withered fig tree, to the Roman centurion whose faith made Jesus marvel. This part follows The Power of Words #4 What You Say Is What You Get.

Below you will find the full video, a structured summary of the sermon, every key Scripture linked to the New King James Version on Bible Gateway, a timestamped outline, and practical steps for training your mouth to speak life this week.

Sermon at a Glance

This message runs about 54 minutes and was preached to the NTC Ministries congregation and its online and radio audience. Pastor Hohman opens by reminding listeners that people are created in God’s image and likeness, and that Jesus Himself is called the Word of God, who said only what He heard the Father say. If that is how the Son lived, he argues, believers should care deeply about their everyday words.

The teaching then builds one idea: the words of your mouth are where the fruit of your life comes from, or the disasters. He calls the mouth everyone’s biggest problem and says it has to be trained the way a lion tamer trains a lion. The message ends with an invitation to receive Christ and a prayer for God to set a watch over our mouths.

Detail	Information
Speaker	Dr. William P. Hohman
Series	The Power of Words (#5, Faith Filled Words)
Main text	Mark 11:20–24
Key theme	Believing that what you say will come to pass, and speaking in agreement with God
Length	About 54 minutes, ending with a prayer of salvation

Why Every Word Matters

Pastor Hohman starts with creation. In Genesis 1, the earth was without form and void, and God said “let there be light,” and there was light. He notes that God could have simply spoken everything into being in one sentence: light, fish, animals and plants all in a row. Instead He spoke over each detail, day after day, for six days.

The point, he says, is to show how important it is to speak over every detail of our own lives rather than assuming words do not matter. “Your words have the power to create or kill,” he tells the church, and most people are never taught it.

He then reads the warning of Jesus in Matthew 12:36–37: by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned, and people will give account for every idle word. An idle word, he explains, is one that is not producing anything. God told humanity to be fruitful and multiply, and he teaches that this fruitfulness flows through the words of the mouth.

Job is his example of a man who finally understood this. After all the problems recorded in his book, Job said, “how forcible are right words” (Job 6:25). Pastor Hohman compares this to Adam in the garden: it was not God who cursed Adam, but the fruit of what took place. He also points to James 3:2, where the one who can bridle his tongue is called perfect, as proof that this is worth the effort.

When God Shut Mouths to Fulfil His Plan

Recalling the previous week’s teaching, Pastor Hohman shows that God sometimes had to shut people’s mouths to get His will done. After forty years of grumbling in the wilderness, Israel finally stood before Jericho, a small city of roughly seven to nine acres with walls so thick, he says, that chariot races could be held on top of them.

The Lord’s instruction in Joshua 6:10 was clear: “You shall not shout or make any noise with your voice, nor shall a word proceed out of your mouth, until the day I say to you, ‘Shout!'” For six days they walked around the city once and went home. Pastor Hohman reasons that ordinary people would have started complaining and talking against God’s plan, so God told them to stay silent until the moment to shout.

On the seventh day they circled seven times, shouted, and the walls fell. Pastor Hohman describes it not as stones tumbling one by one but as the earth opening and the walls going down flush with the ground. His lesson is direct: if a word is contrary to what God said, do not let it come out of your mouth, because once it does you are in opposition to God’s plan, goodness and promise for your life.

He moves next to Zacharias, the priest who was told by the angel Gabriel that his prayers were answered and his elderly wife Elizabeth would bear a son. Zacharias questioned how that could happen, and Gabriel shut his mouth (Luke 1:18–20). Pastor Hohman says this ensured the forerunner of Jesus would come into play.

At the naming of the child, relatives objected that there was no John in the family line. Zacharias wrote, “His name is John,” and immediately his mouth opened and he praised God (Luke 1:63–64). Mary, in contrast, did not need silencing. When Gabriel told her the Holy Spirit would overshadow her, she answered, “Let it be to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38). Pastor Hohman calls her a woman of faith who used her mouth to agree with God.

The table below sets the four scenes from this part of the message side by side, as Pastor Hohman presents them.

Person or people	What God required	What their words did
Israel at Jericho	Silence until the command to shout	Kept complaint from opposing God’s plan, then released the shout of victory
Zacharias	His mouth shut after he doubted	Opened again in praise once he agreed: “His name is John”
Mary	Agreement with Gabriel’s message	“Let it be to me according to your word,” and she conceived
The centurion	Trust in the word of Jesus	“Speak the word only,” and his servant was healed

Words That Create or Kill

Pastor Hohman shares a testimony from the ministry’s daycare. A newly enrolled baby girl cried day and night, and her parents said they could do nothing with her. Two of the staff, whom he describes as ministers rather than workers, began speaking over her, calling her an angel of God and a good girl. Within a week or two, he says, the crying stopped, and the parents came asking what had happened. The staff told them they had used their words.

He follows it with a lighter story against himself. The family once named a puppy Lumpy, and the dog developed lumps all over its body. He says he knew better and had not connected the name with the result. They changed the name, and over a couple of months the lumps went away. His conclusion: your words work, whether against you or for you, and it is up to you.

That choice is laid out in Deuteronomy 30:14–19, where God sets before His people life and death, blessing and cursing, and says to choose life, because the word is near them, in their mouth and in their heart. Pastor Hohman links this to salvation itself in Romans 10:9–10: with the heart one believes, and with the mouth confession is made.

Next comes Proverbs 18:21: “Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.” He has the congregation read it in several translations, then adds Proverbs 21:23 about guarding the mouth and staying out of trouble. Words, he says, create or destroy, injure or inspire.

He points back to Adam naming the animals in Genesis 2:19 as Adam’s first course in the meaning of words. Because meanings matter, he says, Satan works to pervert words and turn them toward cursing and division. Believers answer that with Ephesians 4:29–30: no corrupt word, only what builds up and ministers grace to the hearers. He adds that God has given His Holy Spirit to help tame the tongue.

Faith Filled Words and the Fig Tree

The center of the sermon is how Jesus used His words. After the triumphal entry and the cleansing of the temple, Jesus was staying in Bethany, about two miles from Jerusalem. In Mark 11:12–14, hungry, He saw a fig tree with leaves and found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. Jesus said to it, “Let no one eat fruit from you ever again,” and His disciples heard it.

Pastor Hohman offers a prophetic reading: the fig tree was an object lesson. Israel, under the law, was supposed to produce a good life, and Jesus was declaring that this would now come by grace through faith instead. Jesus did not say all of that aloud, he notes, but the moment pictured it.

The next morning, in Mark 11:20–24, the disciples saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. Peter pointed it out, and Jesus answered, “Have faith in God.” Whoever says to this mountain, “Be removed and be cast into the sea,” and does not doubt in his heart, “but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says.”

He has the church say wow, then say it backwards, because the principle works both ways. Faith filled words are not a technique for prayer time only. The key, he says, is believing that the things you say will come to pass. People pray “God, heal me” and then tell everyone how sick they are, and the second statement works against the first. Faith filled words line up with the prayer instead of cancelling it.

The Faith of God in You

Pastor Hohman notes that the New King James renders Jesus’ words as “have faith in God,” while Young’s Literal Translation reads “have the faith of God,” and The Passion Translation reads “let the faith of God be in you.” His application is that a child of God, made in His image, carries the faith of God and should use words the way God does: whatever God says happens.

He grounds this in Romans 12:3, which says God has dealt to each one a measure of faith, and in 2 Peter 1:1, which speaks of like precious faith with the apostles. Every believer, he says, received the same faith Peter had, the faith that saw people healed as Peter’s shadow passed over them.

That faith grows by hearing. Romans 10:17 says faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Pastor Hohman stresses “not a distorted word,” and says it has to be the Word of God, not just talks. Because God says “I change not” (Malachi 3:6), what He promised will come to pass for those who agree with it.

To picture how spoken faith works, he uses water behind a dam. It has potential power, but it must pass through a turbine to become kinetic power that turns on the lights. In Genesis, the earth was dark and empty until God spoke light, and potential power became creative, life-giving power. Faith comes by hearing; believers speak it out, and it creates.

His second picture is the shoreline. In Jeremiah 5:22, the Lord says He placed the sand as the bound of the sea by a perpetual decree. Pastor Hohman notes how quickly loose sand washes away in a hard rain, yet the sand holds back the ocean. That, he says, is a miracle seen every day, held in place by what God declared.

The Centurion Who Trusted a Word

The final teaching section is Matthew 8:5–13. A centurion, a Roman officer with standing and authority, came to Jesus because his servant lay at home paralysed and tormented. Jesus offered to come and heal him. The centurion answered that he was not worthy for Jesus to come under his roof, and asked Him to “speak the word only, and my servant will be healed.”

Pastor Hohman says this man had been watching Jesus and saw that whatever He said happened. As a man under authority, the centurion understood how a spoken command works: he tells a soldier to go, and he goes. Jesus marvelled and said He had not found such great faith, not even in Israel. For Pastor Hohman, this is the image of faith to Jesus: how much one man believed in the power of words.

Jesus then warned that many would come from east and west to sit with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, while some who assumed their birthright would be cast out. Pastor Hohman reads this as a word to those who spoke contrary to God. Jesus told the centurion, “Go your way; and as you have believed, so let it be done for you,” and the servant was healed that same hour.

He calls this the self-fulfilling proof of what Jesus taught at the fig tree. The more people work at their words, he says, the better their lives become. He points to the ministry’s campus and its reach into 37 nations as fruit of a small church that believes and speaks in unity, of the same mind and judgment as 1 Corinthians 1:10 describes.

Living It Out This Week

Pastor Hohman closes with an invitation to give one’s life to Jesus publicly, followed by a prayer that includes the request to put a watch over our mouths, as David prayed in Psalm 141:3. Here are practical steps drawn from this message on faith filled words:

• Search your words first. When something is going wrong, ask how you have been talking about it before blaming circumstances or other people.
• Stop cancelling your prayers. After you ask God for something, do not spend the rest of the day describing the problem as if He had not heard.
• Speak over the details. Like God in Genesis 1, name what you want to see in your home, work and family, one area at a time.
• Bless people out loud. Follow the daycare example and call out the good in children and others rather than labelling them by their worst moments.
• Feed your faith with the Word. Faith comes by hearing the Word of God, so give your ears Scripture before you give your mouth opinions.
• Agree with God like Mary did. When God’s Word says something about you, answer with “let it be to me according to your word” instead of listing reasons it cannot happen.

Timestamped Outline

• 0:00 Created in God’s image: let there be light
• 1:06 Speaking over every detail
• 2:12 Idle words and how forcible are right words
• 4:18 Jericho and the command to stay silent
• 6:28 The shout and the falling walls
• 7:33 Zacharias and the angel Gabriel
• 9:43 His name is John, and Mary’s yes
• 11:45 The crying baby in daycare
• 12:52 The puppy named Lumpy
• 13:55 Choose life: the word in your mouth
• 16:01 Proverbs 18:21 and Adam naming the animals
• 19:17 Ephesians 4: no corrupt communication
• 21:25 Mark 11: Jesus and the fig tree
• 23:31 Dried up from the roots: have faith in God
• 24:38 The faith of God in other translations
• 27:50 Adam, Eve and an embellished command
• 33:10 Every believer has the measure of faith
• 35:18 Faith comes by hearing the Word
• 36:21 Potential and kinetic power
• 38:30 Jeremiah 5:22: sand as the bound of the sea
• 40:38 The centurion: speak the word only
• 43:53 Unity, confession and 37 nations
• 49:10 Invitation to give your life to Jesus
• 51:25 Prayer: set a watch over my mouth

The Power of Words Series

This message is part of a multi-part teaching on the words of your mouth at NTC Ministries. Start from the beginning or continue where this one leaves off:

• First message: Power of the word #2 Creative
• Previous: The Power of Words #4 What You Say Is What You Get
• You are here: The Power of Words #5 Faith Filled Words
• Next: The Power of Words #6

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does Pastor Hohman say Adam, not Eve, sinned first?

He points out that God gave the command about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil to Adam before Eve was formed. Yet when Satan questioned Eve, she said they could not eat it or even touch it. Pastor Hohman reasons that God would never have told her anything different, so the added words must have come from Adam, like a parent who exaggerates a warning to a child. That embellishment gave Satan his opening, which is why he says Adam sinned first.

Why did Jesus keep saying “you have heard it said”?

Pastor Hohman connects this to Matthew 5:43–44, where Jesus corrects the saying “love your neighbor and hate your enemy” with “bless those who curse you.” In his view, God’s original intent had been embellished and twisted over time, so Jesus, as the second Adam, restored what God really said. He adds that God sends sun and rain on the just and the unjust, so believers should do good and speak good things over everyone.

Is this message only about avoiding negative talk?

No. Pastor Hohman treats silence as only half of the lesson. Israel kept quiet at Jericho, but the walls fell when they shouted. Zacharias was silenced, but his mouth opened in praise. The goal is to remove words that oppose God and fill your mouth with words that agree with Him: blessings, confession of Jesus as Lord, and the promises of Scripture spoken with the expectation that they will come to pass.

Scripture References

All passages open in the New King James Version on Bible Gateway:

• Mark 11:20–24 — whoever says to this mountain
• Mark 11:12–14 — Jesus speaks to the fig tree
• Matthew 8:5–13 — the centurion’s great faith
• Proverbs 18:21 — death and life in the power of the tongue
• Joshua 6:10 — silence before the shout at Jericho
• Luke 1:38 — Mary agrees with God’s word
• Romans 10:17 — faith comes by hearing
• Jeremiah 5:22 — sand as the bound of the sea
• Ephesians 4:29–30 — words that impart grace

How this summary was made: written with AI assistance from the sermon’s own transcript and checked against the Scriptures listed above.

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