October 23, 2008

• Prayer by Pastor Don

  The passage in Romans 8:28 And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. Is used out of context.  All things work together for good to those who love God, is how people read this, they forget the part about those who are called according to God’s purpose, in the will of God.  And that does not mean that bad things will not happen to good people.  Bad things can happen, but God will turn even the bad things to good.

  When the Holy Spirit wants to have something done on the Earth, He will get someone to pray in agreement with His (the Holy Spirit’s) will.  The person may pray in the Spirit, and may not even know why they are praying, but they are praying at the deepest level of prayer, with groanings that can’t be understood.  Sometimes the Holy Spirit gives the interpretation to the person, other times the person may not be aware of what the Holy Spirit is doing to them. 

  God works through deep spiritual prayer to accomplish His will, through groanings, utterances, travail.  A few weeks previously a visiting pastor, Pastor Abraham went into travail.  Other people picked it up – we were in the upper classroom of the church (the upper room).  God permitted this to happen to demonstrate what had been taught at that time about praying in the Spirit.

  It is not our will, but God who exercises His will in us.  When we get to this point of travail it often is not our needs or our problems that we are praying about, but the Spirit of the Lord drops in on you, and you get into an intense sorrow, feeling the Hand of God for someone or some situation we don’t know.  The Holy Spirit works through us, and gives interpretation through our heart. 

  When God wants to do something on Earth, because of the Adamic Covenant, He needs a saint to pray.  Some of us never get to that point in prayer because we don’t avail ourselves of what the Spirit of the Lord wants.  God can choose to use us for intercession.  We can step into the office of prayer (1 Corinthians 12), but we need to divorce ourselves of our personal will.  This is not a person who gets lost in emotionalism, but is steady.  The Holy Spirit gives the gift of tongues and interpretation.

  Pastor Don shared that one day he was feeling fine, and all of a sudden went into travail, crying out to God with tears and groanings.   His wife came in and asked him what was wrong, he stopped, smiled, and said nothing was wrong.  Went back into prayer and into travail. 

  Not everyone is a true prayer warrior.  You must, as a prayer warrior, realize that some things that you are inspired to pray for you may not understand the end result in the here and now, but only later in Heaven may you realize what your prayer accomplished.  God does not have to give you an answer, often won’t until He knows He can trust you with the information.   What God sees, we may not see, but He needs us to pray.  God wants to communicate to us, but everything He tells us can’t be told to others.  Sometimes the information is meant for you alone, not to be spread to others. 

  Romans 8:26 Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.

  We don’t know the whole matter that we are praying for, and there are many times when we don’t know what we should pray for.  The Holy Spirit knows, and makes intercession for us.  We want to pray according to the will of God, not according to our own limited understanding.  We need the help of the Holy Spirit to do this.  We may want to be an intercessor, but we may not be equipped for that role – an intercessor is a sufferer.  They are often happy with isolation, not needing the spotlight to intercede, comfortable with being in the physical presence of God. They are drawn to pray in accordance with Romans 8:26.  The deep intercessor can accept the fact that they don’t know the answer and may not know the answer until after they have died.

  Why do we pray in tongues?  Tongues identify the Spirit filled believer, and they help us to pray in accordance with God’s will.  Tongues are not always interpreted. The Spirit Himself groans with groanings that can’t be uttered.  It is not coming from our intellect.  It is a groan so deep that often no sound comes out, it isn’t praying with understanding.  The Holy Spirit knows what to intercede for.

  Romans 8:27  Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.

  The Spirit intercedes with the mind of God, praying for a saint, but it may not be the saint that is groaning in the Spirit that is being prayed for.  The Holy Spirit is God, and He makes intercession for saints according to the Will of God.  He wants someone to pray for what God wants us to pray for, to touch the depth of our being. We may be praying for a saint in another country, and we are just there awake and willing to be used by God in whatever way that God needs.

  We need to discern if what we are doing is emotionalism or the Spirit of God.  Our personal baggage can get in the way, until God purges our rebelion and self-centeredness.  When we have had experiences in the past like abortion, abuse, neglect, anger, etc. that touched us deeply it can be baggage until the Holy Spirit helps us heal.  God has told us that He set His word above Himself.  Adam was to rule and reign on earth, but in disobedience, Adam delegated that role to satan.  Jesus delegated His authority on the earth to the saints, telling us to GO and DO on the earth.  Jesus is at the right hand of the Father, sitting and waiting for the plan of His Father to make His enemies His footstool comes to pass.  WE are the vehicles to do this.

  There are many new age teachings now that are teaching a different scripture – lies such as ultimate or universal salvation, with no heaven or hell.  We can’t live this way, for God can’t be both judge and providing universal salvation or else God is not fair.  God gave every man free will to choose, and we are told to choose today whom we will serve. God will not force a person to choose to obey God. 

  Ultimate Will (God) said, I give you will, great rewards, great trials, great success, great failure, but this depends on your choice.  If you do not discipline a child they will do foolish things.  The spirit of rebelion is like the spirit of witchcraft.  Disobedience leads to active rebelion.  We end up exercising our will against a benevolent God.  When God says, “don’t” to you, it is because not doing that particular thing is to your benefit.  If we choose to reject God’s direction in our life, we are no longer under the umbrella of protection from this benevolent God, and we will face the fruits of our neglecting God’s best for us. 

  The Israelites chose at one point to think about going back to Egypt (slavery) and worship a golden calf.  They ended up wandering in the wilderness for 40 years because of their rejection of God, ultimately dying, and the second generation made the promised land.

  In the end, God wants to be with those who love Him.  The depth and height of hell will be determined by how much you hate God. 

  Choose wise elders to serve under.  God is watching.  If you choose to sit under an elder and disobey, God will judge you.  It’s not about following someone you can see, but how can you follow someone you can’t see?  Pray in the Spirit, hear instruction and then you will know how to follow Him.

  Romans 8:27-28  Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.

  We know God’s will is good, God’s purpose is eternal and specific.  The Holy Spirit makes intercession for us who are fulfilling God’s will.  We came to Bible study tonight by our free will, chose to come, sit down, open our Bibles, take out a pen and take notes – when we made that free will choice, we made it in the perfect will of God. 

  But what happens if someone begins to intercede, God prompts them to get in their car, run in and disrupt the Bible study, telling us to leave the building now.  Do we discern that it is from God and leave immediately or do we sit there and ignore the prompting of the spirit?  If the building collapses and we have chosen to remain in the building, ignoring the intercessor who came in and told us to leave, we may die in the collapse, because we refused to listen and discern the prompting of the spirit.  When we did that, we were out of God’s perfect will and have to face the consequences.  If we stop and pray, receive a confirming word or an inward witness, and Pastor Don and the head elder agrees with the word spoken, and we all get up and leave the building, and then the building collapses, that confirms that the word spoken was accurate. 

  We are to test the Word of wisdom or knowledge.

  Romans 8:29-30 For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.

  Justified – just as if it never happened. God foreknew and He will get glory out of it.  Watch it and see.  When God gets the glory, and God is doing good for His good people, God get’s the glory.  God does not put sickness on people to get glory.  He doesn’t do evil to get glory or to get what He wants.  The devil will do evil gladly for he is God’s enemy.  Everything that happens to a saint who is in God’s will will meet these qualifications.  He will be called according to God’s purpose, and the saint will love God.  God has a specific purpose for our lives. 

  God had a specific mission for the Apostle Paul, and when Paul was shipwrecked, building a fire on the beach and a deadly viper bit him, Paul shook the viper off. The people watched and waited for him to die, but Paul did not die.  Paul was in God’s perfect will, where God wanted him to be, and thus God did not permit the viper’s poison to kill Paul.  God ended up getting glory from this situation because many were converted because of that incident.

  God did not make the snake jump up and bite Paul, but God did turn the incident to good.

  We then went to look more at spiritual gifts in 1 Corinthians 12. It was a very long lesson, so I think I will stop here and type more of the lesson tomorrow.

  Praying your day is blessed. It is a sunny, crisp, beautiful fall day today.

  Heather

  • 2:16 pm
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