“Father, I am your servant, willing and desiring to be used to bless your people.”
The Fields are white and the laborers are few!
2. C.H. Spurgeon said, “If God does not save a man by truth he certainly will not save them by lies, and if the old gospel is not competent to work a revival, then we will do without the revival;
Isaiah 55:6 Seek ye the LORD while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near:
Isaiah 55:7 Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
Isaiah 55:8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
Isaiah 55:9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
As a child of the most high God, we must never forget the true attributes of God. “He is Infinitely Holy” And many Christians have forgotten the absolute essentials of living a clean life before this HOLY Lord and therefore settled into living in a very shallow relationship only to exist and never experience true joy of walking in victory in their lives.
Revelation 2:5 Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent.
His invitation has never been to condemn us but to free and empower us.
He never intended for us to grit our teeth and try figure out a way to live for him, but rather learning from him and allowing him to fully live through us cleanly.
Here in, Psalms 139:23 “David Cries unto the Lord” Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:
When we approach God in sincerity with this prayer he will answer it EVERYTIME.
From the moment of true conversion our lives no longer belong to us, and a series of lifelong daily events of one YES LORD at a time began. Therefore when the Holy Spirit convicts us of something our only answer that pleases this Holy God should always be YES LORD.
The sin that causes most believers to live in defeat is the little foxes of habitual or repetitious in nature. We have a tendency to only size ourselves up among other believers and justify our own actions with the false assumptions of at least I am better life than so-in-so. Pharisees still come in all shapes and all sizes. God has at no time every lowered his standard pertaining to our lives, and we will never give account of how much better we were than our brothers and sisters.
Even here you may be saying Pastor I am not aware of anything in my life that might hinder my abilities to walk in the power and victory of the Holy Spirit.
Here are some often overlooked areas among even some of the most, Godly people.
1) In every sense, to neglect God’s word is to neglect God. You cannot love God and not love his word.
2) Is Christ central in all your priorities, or does he only occupy a small corner of your thoughts and plans? Are you more passionate about earthly things rather than Spiritual things? Do you honestly get more excited about work, sports or recreation rather than God’s kingdom?
3) If the church patterned itself after your example would there even be a ministry?
4)Are you willing to pray for God’s will even when it does not fit your plans?
5)Does your worship cool off when things don’t go your way? Insincere ritualistic worship is one of the most serious sins a believer can commit. The very root of all sin is a lack of fervent love for God. Remember true revival always begins with deep humility and brokenness over sin.
6)Do you barely tithe and yet pay enormous interest to creditors? Do you think nothing of giving fifteen percent to your waiter but find it asking too much to give ten percent to the giver of all life? Failure to tithe is called robbery and spiritual idolatry, because this is blatant financial disobedience.
Remember your money is not your own, It is God’s.
Malachi 3:8 Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed thee? In tithes and offerings.
Malachi 3:9 Ye are cursed with a curse: for ye have robbed me, even this whole nation.
Malachi 3:10 Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the LORD of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.
Spirit filled believers give cheerfully, generously and sacrificially. Carnal believers put money and things ahead of God and wonder why they are broke, living in defeat, and a powerless prayer life.
7) If you are doing anything without the firm conviction that is God’s will, or if you are involved in something and have a nagging lack of genuine peace, you are committing sin.
8) It is all too common for people to be highly religious, yet possess a judgmental, un-loving spirit. Remember you cannot be truly right with God and be wrong with someone else. Though we say we forgive, many time we really don’t.
These are just a few many things that can be a hindrance and unfortunately many will do almost anything to avoid a deep cleansing encounter with a Holy God, and yet the very essence of true worship is to bow before God in genuine reverence and surrender with one “Yes Lord” at a time. The self life can never be improved, it must be crucified!
May God grant us a heart that hungers for a holiness that is, Genuine.
Please understand here, I am in no way suggesting you can get to a place where you will no longer be a sinner! The Bible clearly states in 1 John 1:8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
Only when we fully acknowledge our sin before him and turn from it will he hear, cleanse and forgive. This should be done daily as we choose to take up our cross and follow him.
Many of our pulpits are preaching a compromised gospel. This is precisely why so many believers are spiritually tired and lack supernatural power!
This is one of the main reasons why many church folk tend to shop for a church like shopping for a health club. They want one with the most benefits and the least amount of cost. In doing so many people are considered nothing more than a permanent visitor.
We will never walk in power walking only on the advice of man. Man may speak to the Head, but only God’s truth speaks to the heart.
The trouble with the advice, "Follow your conscience" is that most people follow it like someone following a wheelbarrow—they tend to push it in the direction they would have it go and then they follow! That goes against everything about God.
1:) He didn’t come to chose side with you He comes to take over! He demands it all or nothing. Never fall into the trap of believing you can have a savior only and not a LORD. He is BOTH Lord and Savior not one or the other, pick and choose.
Joshua 5:13 And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand: and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?
Joshua 5:14 And he said, Nay; but as captain of the host of the LORD am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my lord unto his servant?
Joshua 5:15 And the captain of the LORD'S host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so.
Even Though, God is willing to touch his people one again with Resurrection power, Un-confessed sin has blocked his mighty answers to prayer. In order for us to truly move in power, God requires deep cleansing and genuine repentance among his people. Psalms 66:18 make this crystal clear: If I regard iniquity in My heart, the Lord will not hear me.
Then again in Isaiah 59:1-2 Behold the Lords hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy it cannot hear: But your iniquities have separated you between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you, that he will not hear.
Because of Un-confessed sin, crucial prayers go unanswered and countless believers live in both defeat and pain.
You may be asking, because I struggle so much, I wonder how I could really know victory.
You need to fully understand here that Jesus didn’t just die to take you and I to a place called Heaven, but to indwell and empower you here on Earth!
Serious cleansing requires regularly getting alone with God for a thorough examination of your life.
Unfortunately Many will do almost anything to avoid a deep cleansing encounter with God
If you allow God to do a deep daily work, you will experience a life changing discipleship! You will never have to put up with a mediocre prayer life again.
The promises of Jeremiah rigs ever so true as God is not a man that he should lie.
Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.
Jeremiah 29:12 Then shall ye call upon me, and ye shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you.
Jeremiah 29:13 And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.
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Ask yourself this question this morning. Am I guilty of seeking God more for what he can do for me than out of a genuine love for Him? When you get disappointed do you tend to cool off toward God and the Church?
Matthew 15:8-9 This people draw nigh to me with their mouth, and honor me with their lips: but their heart is far from me. In vain they do worship me.
Remember. the root of all sin is a lack of love for Christ.
True revival always begins with deep humility and brokenness over sin.
Remember from whence you are fallen and repent.
God wants his Church back and his people clean and empowered. We must be vessels of honor meat for the masters use. I do not believe for one minute God will serve true revival from a dirty vessel.
Many people are under the false assumption that just because they attend church, teach a class, or even preach the word of God, they are born again. On your best day you could never be good enough to appease a Holy God! Because of this I believe the harvest is wasting in the fields and the bridegroom could be standing at the very door. Jesus said in John 10:27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: How could you be in right relation with God and allowing habitual and repetitious sin remain in your life? Only when we choose to die to self can we fully understand the meaning of John 12:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.
That passage of scripture describes the vital principal of spiritual brokenness.
When the outer shell of the kernel is broken, the life within comes forth to produce many more kernels. Yet if the outer shell remain unbroken, the life within can never come forth. This is what Paul understood when he penned Galatians 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. It is here we become a new creature!
2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. This is the vessel God will honor.
I want to be an honored vessel in God’s House. It’s a privilege and an honor to be used by God in any fashion. I thank him for allowing me that chance. But before I can become a vessel at all there has to be a real change in me.
Before I can become a vessel, God had to find me in the pit where I was nothing more than an impure lump of clay.
The Bible says in Psalms 40:2, "He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings."
That’s what the potter does when he begins to bring to pass the new creation that he has in mind for me to be.
I’m not anything special, but I am a chosen lump of clay. I didn’t look any different from all of the other clay that was in the pit with me. All around me there were other people, other lumps of clay, we all looked the same. All of us were just dirt, lost in sin, stuck in the mire where there was no escape for we were are dead lumps of clay with no hope and no future to speak of. Some of those other lumps of clay, at least to my own point of view, would have been a lot better pick for the Master’s House. They had a lot more to offer than I did. But in God’s sight, he is no respecter of persons.
The only thing God looks for in the clay he chooses is whether that clay will yield itself to his design.
Praise God! He chose me. God’s hand reached down into that pit, scooped up this old piece of clay, examined it and said, “Now here’s a lump of clay with promise.” He saw something in me that I couldn’t see.
I am reminded of the word of the Lord to the Prophet Jeremiah in Jeremiah 18:1-4, "The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, Arise, and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will cause thee to hear my words. Then I went down to the potter’s house, and, behold, he wrought a work on the wheels. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it."
The clay didn’t make the choice to jump into the potter’s hand. It was the potter that chose the clay.
John 15:16, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you."
God chose me, and God chose you! The Great Potter, maker of all vessels and the one who will give honor to whom honor is due, chose us for his House!
May we choose this day Genuine pursuit of a surrendered Life!
