Sunday, January 30, 2011

Fasting - The Key to Breakthrough

Fasting - The Key to Breakthrough
January 30, 2011
Matt 17:14-20
Introduction
  • We are continuing our series about healing
  • Today we will encounter the subject of fasting
  • This is the key to spiritual breakthrough
  • This relates to the issues Foursquare and our church are facing
  • It also relates to the way in which we do ministry, following Jesus' example
Reading
  • Matt 17:14-21
Background
  • The 12 disciples had already been appointed to be apostles - Luke 9
  • This incident happens after this - the twelve had been sent out in Matthew 10
  • They had experienced the healing of the sick, with jesus' authority, as well as casting out demons and the accompanying preaching of the gospel
  • Yet they were not able to heal this boy of epileptic seizures
  • Jesus says the key to breakthrough in this case was prayer and fasting
  • Some demons are harder to cast out than others
  • For some of them, a closer walk with the Lord is required
Why do we fast?
  • Isa 58:6-12
  • The purposes:
    • v.6 - To loose the chains of injustice
    • untie the cords of the yoke
    • set the oppressed free and break every yoke
    • v.7 - To take care of the needs of the homeless - food, shelter, clothing
    • not neglecting your own family
    • v.9b - Do away with the yoke of oppression, pointing finger, malicious talk
    • v.10 - feed the hungry
  • The results:
    • v.8 - Your light will break forth
    • your healing will quickly appear
    • your righteousness will go before you and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard
    • v.9 - God will answer your prayers
    • God will be close to you, immediate response
  • David Yonggi Cho pastors the largest church in the world (believed to be the largest church in history) - over 700,000 members! He and his staff have such a belief in the power of prayer and fasting that they rarely, if ever, counsel people. If someone comes to them with a great problem or urgent need, their standard answer is, “go to prayer mountain and fast and pray for three days”. If they return with the problem still unmet, they tell them to go and fast and pray for a week. (Then for ten days/then for forty days.) They do not think it possible that a person would ever return to them again with the problem still!
  • This expectancy in prayer comes from intimacy with God
  • Fasting is a key to this intimacy
  • Jesus had this intimacy
  • Jesus did what He saw the Father doing
  • He was in constant touch with the Father
  • If we want to be a part of the revival that is coming to this town, we too need that intimacy
Conclusion
  • When you fast, do things that have an outward focus, not focusing on yourself
  • Search your heart to find where we need to set people free, ourselves
  • What broken down walls can we repair?
  • Matt 6:16 Don't make it obvious to others that we are fasting
  • It is between us and God
  • Be blessed in our relationship with the Lord
  • Fasting is a key to breakthrough, which will allow God to work through us in the ways He wants.

"I Don't Want to be Hurt Again!" - Mat 18:21

I Don't Want to be Hurt Again
January 30, 2011
Matt 18:21

Introduction
  • Jesus tells us in the Lord's prayer that if we forgive men when they sin against us, our heavenly Father will also forgive us
  • So we know we should forgive
  • But it seems so hard to do this
  • It is probably one of the hardest things you will ever do
  • You see, hurt is an emotional pain
  • Hurt is like a stab wound - sometimes it is near the surface, but sometimes it goes really deep
  • It being emotional does not make it any easier to forgive
  • And then God says to us, you must forgive
  • How can we do this?
Ways we get hurt
  • People let us down
  • Psa 35:11-16 They repay me evil for good and leave my soul forlorn
  • God seems to let us down
  • Job 30:20-26
  • Circumstances let us down
  • Matt 5:45 He [the Father] causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous
  • Things happen in life and we are upset at the economy, our job, the finance market,

The effect of hurt
  • When we are hurt, we tend to go one of two ways
  • 1. We withdraw
    • We withdraw from the person who caused the hurt
    • We want to hide and lick our wounds
    • If it is a person who has hurt us, we avoid being with them
    • We dont talk about the hurt, we bottle it up and avoid them
    • This affects our relationship drastically
    • People who are brothers and sisters in Christ avoid each other
    • If we are angry at God, we tend to isolate from him
    • We stop praying, listening to him, reading his word
    • Our relationship does not disappear, but it weakens and we cant communicate effectively
  • 2. We lash out
    • Our anger can cause us to lash out and say something we later regret
    • We may try to repay the other person by causing them pain
    • We may talk about them behind their back
    • Job said some things about God that he later had to repent of
    • Job 42:1-6

The road to recovery
  • Open up
    • Part of the reason the hurt lingers for so long, is that it has been bottled up
    • We need to let these hurts out, with a trusted individual
    • We should all have someone to whom we turn, who will listen without judgment
    • For a lot of things, this person may be our spouse
    • But often it is good and wise to have an accountability partner who is not family
    • James 5:16 Confess your faults ... be healed
    • This particularly relates to emotional healing
    • We need to express the pain to someone, and let it out of our system
  • Give it to Jesus
    • Then we need to give the burden of pain and hurt to Jesus
    • Matt 11:28 - when we are carrying hurt and pain, it is a burden
    • Jesus offers to carry it for us
    • Psa 55:22 Cast your cares on the Lord
    • It is not for us to carry these burdens
    • When we carry them they will embitter us, break relationships and ultimately destroy us and our relationship even with God
    • We need to let it out, and then give it to God
  • Reconcile
    • Then we go to our brother and sort it out
    • Matt 18:15-17
    • Remember that the purpose of going to our brother is to reconcile, not to accuse and stab them back
    • Sometimes we are at fault, and while talking to the other person we recognize this
    • Matt 5:23-24
    • Then go and tell him you are sorry and ask for forgiveness
    • Reconciliation is the name of the game
    • 2 Cor 5:17-20

Moving on
  • The sea of forgetfulness
    • Once we have reconciled, let it go
    • God forgets our sins, he remembers them no more
    • Psa 103:8-14 East from west
    • Jer 31:34 I will remember their sin no more
    • Micah 7:19 Depths of the sea
    • As Jesus dwells in us, we will be taking on his attributes
    • We too will be forgiving and forgetting

Conclusion
  • It may seem easier to not make waves
  • But the results are a deep bitterness inside, and broken relationships
  • We will be with each other for eternity!
  • Better to express our pain, give it to Jesus and reconcile

Sunday, January 23, 2011

According to Your Faith - Matt 9:27-31

According to Your Faith
January 23, 2011
Matt 9:27-31

Introduction
  • Jesus was in Capernaum, where he lived
  • He appears to have had a home in this town
  • Peter had a house here too, this was his home town
  • Andrew, James and John also lived there
  • Capernaum at that time was not large
  • Its population in Jesus day is estimated between 600-1200
  • Jesus was at home there, he probably knew everyone in town, more or less
  • This day, Jesus had just visited the home of Jairus, the ruler of the synagogue
  • His daughter had died, and he asked Jesus to raise her to life. Jesus went to his home, and the young girl was raided from the dead
  • On his way back to his home, two blind men followed Jesus
  • As he gets indoors, they come in too, and have a request to make

Jesus is Messiah
  • These two blind men repeatedly called Jesus the son of David
  • This was a term used for the Messiah
  • One of the prophecies of the Messiah was that he would make the blind see
  • Isa 35:5
  • These two blind men believed first of all that Jesus was the Messiah, and secondly, that the Messiah would heal the eyes of the blind
  • So they based their faith on a scriptural promise
  • We too need to find God's promises for our situation
  • There are verses which give a general answer to us
  • There are also verses which are specific, seemingly just for us and our situation
  • It may be no verse seems to cover our situation.
  • Ask the Lord for a word
  • He will respond, he loves it when we communicate with him
  • That word may be in different forms, but it may often be in the Bible

Jesus is God
  • Jesus asks them if they believe that he is able to do this
  • This question implies, do they believe that he is divine, and having the power to heal
  • So they identified him as one whom the Bible promises would heal the blind, and they also believe he has the power to perform the miracle
  • How does this relate to us?
  • We need to be in a relationship with Jesus, knowing and believing he is real
  • We need to be seeing his fingerprints in our life, seeing areas where he has changed situations or healed relationships, without our doing

According to your faith be it unto you
  • Because they had recognized him as the Messiah, the one who would bring restoration to people's lives, and healing to the blind, Jesus wanted to help them
  • Because they had pursued him and persisted, he saw their deep desire for healing, and he had compassion opn them
  • Because they believed he was divine and had the power to actually heal them, Jesus desired to grant their request
  • These three things added up to faith
  • They had faith that Jesus would heal them
  • One final quality was apparent
  • In calling out, have mercy on us they showed they needed mercy and grace
  • They could not take healing for granted

Conclusion
  • If we find a word in scripture, or in our relationship with God, that applies to our situation, we can expect that God will fulfill our request
  • If we are close to God and he is real to us, and we know beyond doubt that he has the power to answer our prayer, we can expect a response
  • If we pursue healing and persist in our prayers, even if the answer does not come immediately, it will come
  • If we recognize our need for grace, God will see our humble heart and he will be delighted to give us our heart's desire

A Cripple Jumps to his Feet - Acts 3:1-10

A Cripple Jumps to His Feet
January 23, 2011
Acts 3:1-10

Introduction
  • We sometimes hear that miracles were something that are no longer for today, because the age of the the apostles is past
  • The truth of the matter is that miracles still happen today
  • Reinhard Bonke ministers mainly in the third world, and hundreds of thousands of people have been healed in his crusades
  • Even the dead have been raised to life.
  • This has happened many many times
  • The Bible does not say that the miracles recorded in the New Testament were only for that period of time
  • When we say that they were to cease when the apostles died, we are adding to scripture, we are speaking our own words and not those of the Bible
  • The truth is that history records miracles continuing in the early church, centuries after the apostles died
  • People were healed, demons cast out, people were filled with the Spirit and received the spiritual gifts, including tongues, prophecy, interpretation
  • It was normal practice for lay members to exercise these gifts - it was only during the reign of Constantine around 325ad that these gifts were concentrated in the clergy - he wanted them to have more power in the church
  • Now let's read the passage
Reading
  • Acts 3:1-10
They were doing their normal business
  • Peter and John were going up to the temple at the time of prayer - at the ninth hour, or 3pm
  • The apostles had not yet been weaned away from temple worship, though Jesus had told the Samaritan woman in John 4 that the day would come when people would no longer look to the temple at Jerusalem as the center of worship, but that believers everywhere would worship in spirit and in truth
  • The Jews had three different times of prayer
  • They recognized that this was not a Biblical standard, but that it had a basis in scripture
  • David says he prayed morning, noon and night - Psa 55:17
  • Daniel says it was his custom to pray three times daily - Dan 6:10
  • They would pray at 9am, or the third hour - Acts 2:15
  • They would pray at noon, or the sixth hour - Acts 10:9
  • And in this passage it mentions the time of prayer as being 3pm or the ninth hour - Acts 3:1
  • Later, Paul tells us not that we should pray three times a day - instead he tells us to pray without ceasing - 1 Thes 5:17
  • The point is, that Peter and John were going to the temple for prayer
  • They were not going out to look for someone to heal
  • It was in the course of their normal, customary schedule that suddenly they were confronted by this situation
  • Jesus had walked by this man many times, as he lay at the entrance to the temple
  • But the time had come for this man to be healed
  • The Holy Spirit prompted Peter to speak to the man
The man was not a believer
  • This man was not a believer in Jesus
  • He was not expecting to be healed, he was begging for money
  • Peter spoke the words "Silver or gold I do not have, but what I have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk" He helped him to his feet, and the miracle happened!
  • Peter and John ascribed the healing to Jesus, not themselves
  • The man's healing convinced him of the reality of God and he latched onto Peter and John
  • Peter had to have faith that God was going to back him up
  • And God did so
The healing led to the man's conversion
  • In the early church, miracles were signs for unbelievers
  • Justin Martyr (c.110-165) wrote about the gifts of the Spirit in the churches with which he was familiar. He noted that the gifts of the Holy Spirit, including exorcism, were widely in use.
  • For one receives the spirit of understanding, another a counsel, another of healing, another of strength, another of foreknowledge, another of teaching and another of the fear of God. The prophetic gifts remain with us to the present time.
  • For some [believers] do certainly cast out devils, so that those who have thus been cleansed from evil spirits do frequently both believe and join the church. Others have knowledge of things to come; they see visions and utter prophetic expressions.
  • Justin’s comment that the exorcism of unbelievers was a frequent occurrence and in some cases led to conversion is significant. It contrasts sharply with contemporary Pentecostal and Charismatic churches where much of the focus has been on the exorcism of members of the believing community.
Miracles are a confirmation of the Word
  • Mark 16:19-20
  • When a person is confronted with the reality of a living God who has intervened in their life, there is a step that follows
  • People can argue till they are blue in the face, but a healing or a deliverance is real
  • If you have experienced this, you know, your life changes
  • Example of Evelien
  • 1Peter 3:15 But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:
  • This same Peter who said this also was the Peter who spoke to the cripple, and helped him to his feet
Conclusion
  • As Christians, filled with the Holy Spirit, we should follow in the footsteps of those who have gone before us
  • When we are prompted by the Holy Spirit, we should be obedient
  • When we hear of someone at work who is sick, ask if we can pray for them, and expect God to respond
  • When we are at the supermarket, and some one needs prayer, offer to pray for them
  • We are the salt of the earth, it is our responsibility to represent the Savior King and lead people to Christ

Monday, January 17, 2011

My peace I give to you - Gal 5:20

My peace I give to you
January 16, 2011
Gal 5:20

Introduction
  • How many of us here could use more peace in our life?
  • Peace seems to be less available as the years progress
  • Each time Dianne and I visit our kids in LA, we are so aware of the frenetic pace of life
  • It is as though each time we go there, there are more cars on the freeway
  • Shops are open 24 hours and it is as though there is no time for rest any more
  • Here in Susanville, things are not quite so much in the fast lane
  • But even here, the pace of life pursues us
  • I find that it takes all my available hours to get everything done
  • It is not easy to balance work responsibilities with wife and family
  • Each summer, Susanville seems to empty and people move to the lakes, at least for the weekends, to enjoy a hard-earned rest

What things detract from our peace?
  • Things that get in the way of peace are :
    • the demands of a job
    • time required for education - classes take time and the homework itself can swallow us up
    • the family requires time and emotional involvement
  • On top of these scheduling things that stop us from having peace and quiet, other things intrude
    • Relationship problems can take away our peace
    • Maybe fear can get in the way of peace
    • Fear about losing our job, that our home may be repossessed
  • We may be afraid of any number of things
  • But this is not the way God intended for us to live
In the Beginning
  • God created man and placed Adam and Eve in a wonderful garden, a paradise
  • The animals did not hurt each other, there was perfect peace and harmony
  • God had created everything that was necessary for a peaceful existence
  • Adam was the gardener in this utopia
  • Gardening is a peaceful kind of job
  • It provides time for reflection and thinking, it quiets your senses
  • The garden of Eden was a peaceful place
What happened then
  • Once Adam sinned, things changed
  • The vegetation changed and weeds and thistles started to grow and take over
  • The ground became hard and difficult to work with
  • The nature of animals and insects changed, and they now turned on each other, and man
  • The peace that was once in the garden, was no more
  • Man was evicted from the garden, and now had to fend for himself
  • Man's nature had now changed as well
  • Jer 17:9 – the heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure – who can understand it
  • Rom 8:7 – the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law, nor can it do so
  • Adam and Eve's son Cain murdered his brother
  • Violence came into the earth and it became so violent that God had to start things over through Noah
  • Peace had gone for good.
God offers us peace
  • And yet, God wanted man to have peace instead of warring against God and man
  • Jesus came to bring us peace
  • One of his names is Prince of Peace – Isa 9:6
  • That peace came by forgiving us our sins
  • Eph 5:1 – Therefore since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ
  • v8 – God demonstrates his own love for us in this, while we were still sinners, Christ died for us
  • When our sins are forgiven, that enmity that came between God and us is removed, and we can now have peace with God
What is peace?
  • Strongs – Gr eirene -
    1) a state of national tranquillity 1a) exemption from the rage and havoc of war
    2) peace between individuals, i.e. harmony, concord
    3) security, safety, prosperity, felicity, (because peace and harmony make and keep things safe and prosperous)
    4) of the Messiah's peace 4a) the way that leads to peace (salvation)
    5) of Christianity, the tranquil state of a soul assured of its salvation through Christ, and so fearing nothing from God and content with its earthly lot, of whatsoever sort that is
    6) the blessed state of devout and upright men after death
Why is peace with God so crucial?
  • When we don't have peace with God, we are subject to our sinful nature that is hostile to Him
  • If we are hostile to God, it will be impossible to live at peace with others, because man does not know the way to peace
  • The fruits of the flesh are given in Gal 5:19
  • These lead to the kind of society we see around us
But God gives us the Holy Spirit
  • When we repent and turn to God, he comes and dwells in us through his spirit
  • He sends us the Comforter, Helper, the One who comes alongside
  • The Holy Spirit in us starts to produce outward evidence of His inward presence
  • This is through the fruits of the Spirit
  • This is why Jesus said in Matthew 7, you will know them by their fruits
  • The tree will produce fruit according to its nature
  • Hostility, fear and anxiety belong to the sinful nature
  • But the fruits of the Holy Spirit's indwelling, are listed in Gal 5:22-23
And so God gives us peace
  • That peace, is the absence of rage, and warring
  • It gives us harmony between individuals
  • It gives us assurance of our salvation
  • It gives security, safety, prosperity
  • It gives a sense of God being in charge of our lives, and that He will take care of us
Psalm 46
  • We do not need to fear
  • The Lord Almighty is with us, the God of Jacob is our fortress (v7, 11)
  • God tells us “Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth” (v10)
  • So whatever we are going through, we can be still, and look to God for help – he will be exalted and show himself strong on our behalf
  • I can be at peace because my God is on my side and will work out all things for good in my life, because I am called according to His purpose - Rom 8:28