(November 6, 2009)

Prayer House News!

This must be Indian Summer. What a great weather weekend we are going to have. Finally some typical Fall weather. Enjoy your day today and tomorrow and then tomorrow night make sure if you registered for our Missions Convention to be there at 5:00pm.

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UnShakable Kingdom

Abiding Fellowship

continued from yesterday

Isaiah 40:31; "Those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength, they will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary."

The word "wait" means to attach yourself to God. Both hands are to be gripped upon Him so that you cannot be shaken. Intimacy really means attachment. Through intimacy the two become one, they become a part of each other so that they cannot be shaken apart.

Most Christians do not possess this type of intimacy with Christ simply because they do not desire it. Why do we loose our passion for Christ? What happens to our first love desires? Why doesn't our heart pant for the presence of God in the same way the deer pants for the water brook? It's because we have learned to refuse Him who is speaking. In so doing, we are on shaky grounds, we lack intimacy, we lack a closeness. Anything can throw us for a loop.

Let's get back to this issue of abiding fellowship. Abiding fellowship is different from being saved. I realize that being a Christian means we house the Holy Spirit and subsequently, we take Him where ever we go. But there is a difference between having the Holy Spirit with you and desiring abiding fellowship with Jesus. It's like the difference between being married and having a good marriage. If you are married, you are married whether or not you spend much time with your mate. If you have a good marriage you have a desire to be with your mate. You want to be in their presence.

Jesus once said, "If you keep My commandments, you will abide in my love; just as I have kept My Father's commandments, and abide in His love."

I had a minister friend once that died of cancer. His death was long in coming and so in the midst of it he wrote his memoirs. He wrote all about his ministry in Africa and various parts of the world. But when it came to writing about his prayer life he said this; "I was never the type of person to actually spend a lot of time in prayer. But rarely was there a moment in my life when I was not god-minded." In other words he was saying that he thought about God all the time but never really sat down to spend time with Him.

It sounds good to be god-minded however, how would that sound if he were writing about his relationship with his wife? Suppose he wrote in regards to his marriage and said, "Concerning my wife, I was not the type of person to actually spend time with my wife, but I rarely found myself not thinking about her."

You can be married and not have a closeness with your mate at all. Just like you can be saved and not actually desire to spend any time in Christ's presence.

Most of you know that I have written some books. My very first book is called, "Prayer Can Change Your Marriage." Suppose my wife was reading my book and that's all she ever did, just read my book. One night I come to her and say, "Honey let's spend some time together. I've got the night off and maybe we could just be together tonight."

Then suppose her response was something like; "I think I just want to keep reading this book. It's very good." I say to her, "I can certainly understand that, I read it several times while writing it, however, isn't that book dealing with how to develop an intimate relationship with one another and with God?" "Oh, yes," she says, "It talks about the great need for a close relationships and how the only way to come into that kind of relationship is to spend time with one another." "Hum," I say stroking my beard. "Then does that mean we are going to spend some time together tonight?" Finally she looks up at me with her big eyes and says, "No way! I like just reading the book."

This is a very common attitude. Somehow we have come to believe that reading the Bible is the same as prayer. We somehow think it accomplishes the same thing in our relationship with God as prayer does - but it does not. There has to be more than just knowledge of God and theology, there must be a knowing of God that can come by no other means than spending time in His presence.

If all you have is knowledge and theology then you tend to get involved in discussions and arguments about God that are irrelevant even if you are correct. So what if your theology is correct but you have no intimacy with Him. Without intimacy, theology becomes all consuming. I would almost rather be off a little in my theology and yet know God than to be correct in my theology and not know God.

You might say, "How can you say that, you are our pastor you must be correct in all your theology." First of all, I do want to be correct, and I do study the scriptures for that purpose but, have you ever met a man that had all the light there is to have?" Did Peter have all light? When Peter took the sword and cut the guards ear off, Jesus rebuked him and told him he didn't know what he was doing.

What would you rather be, one of the disciples of Christ or one of the Pharisees? The disciples had a bunch of bad theology but they also had a longing for abiding fellowship. The Pharisees had their theology down pat - but they had no desire to abide with Him. They had no desire to spend time in His presence.

Don't refuse Him who is speaking to you. The word refuse is often associated with intimacy. Don't refuse Him. Develop a desire to be with Him. God can sort through your theology. He can bring you into doctrinal purity. The issue really isn't whether or not you have it correct. It's whether or not you are refusing Him who is speaking to you. Do you have a prayer life? Do you have any sense of longing for His presence?

Most of you know that I travelled full-time for 20 years teaching prayer conferences and prayer retreats, I taught pastor's schools in many different places around the world even. Being gone from home a lot caused me to think about communicating with my family. I used to say suppose God allowed me to invent an apparatus that allowed me to be in my families presence without being home. It's kind of like a time machine, but it's a presence machine instead. It would be better than the telephone where you simply hear their voices. Plus this would be free - no long distance charges. They could literally get ahold of me wherever I am.

With this apparatus you could actually experience the presence of the one person. The only problem with this invention is that it is to large to bring with me on airplanes. I don't fully understand why God could not have helped me to invent this thing a little smaller but He didn't. I had to leave it at home.

So here is the dilemma. My family needs to initiate the use of it. I could call them on the phone and prompt them and encourage them to use it. I even left a great owners manual they could read and learn all about using it so we could experience each others presence. But they just are not interested. They have no desire for abiding fellowship.

Pretty soon you would have a situation like God has with our prayer lives. God has come up with a way to spend time in His presence called, prayer. The problem with prayer is that it must be initiated by us. He prompts us, he draws us, he woos us but we are just not interested. He has left a great owners manual for us to read, and we do read it, but we really have no desire for abiding fellowship.

Christianity in America has learned how to refuse Him who is speaking, while convincing themselves they have a great relationship with Him. Subsequently, we can't handle the shaking. We don't have the attachment we need to hang on during the hard times. We have very little spiritual capacity, therefore we drift off and come back, we drift off, we come back. Don't refuse him who is speaking. Determine to develop a prayer life that consists of a pursuit of Him, not just things from Him, but Him Himself.

END

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Medication: A Merry Heart

YOU JUST MIGHT BE A BLUE NECK (somebody from up North) IF:
Instead of referring to two or more people as "Y'all," you call them "you guys," even if both of them are women
You think barbecue is a verb meaning "to cook outside."
You think Heinz Ketchup is really SPICY.
You would never stop to buy something somebody was cooking on the side of the road. (e. g., boiled peanuts).
You don't have any problems pronouncing "Worcestershire sauce" correctly.
For breakfast, you would prefer potatoes-au-gratin to grits.
You don't know what a moon pie is.
You've never had an RC Cola.
You've never, ever eaten okra -- fried, boiled, or pickled.
You eat fried chicken with a knife and fork.
You've never seen a live chicken, and the only cows you've seen are on road trips.
You have no idea what a polecat is.
You don't see anything wrong with putting a sweater on your dog.
You don't have bangs.
You would rather have your son become a lawyer than grow up to get his own TV fishing show.
You drink either "Pop" or "Soda"- instead of "Cokes."
You've never eaten and don't know how to make a tomato sandwich.
You have never planned your summer vacation around a gun-'n-knife show.
You think more money should go to important scientific research at your university than to pay the salary of the head football coach.
You don't even have one can of WD-40 somewhere around the house.
The last time you smiled was when you blocked someone from getting on an on-ramp to the highway.
You don't have any hats in your closet that advertise feed stores.
You have more than one professional sports team in your home state.
You call binoculars opera glasses.
You can't spit out the car window without pulling over to the side of the road and stopping.
You don't know anyone with at least two first names (i. e., Joe Bob, Faye Ellen, Billy Ray, Mary Jo, Bubba Dean, Joe Dan, Mary Alice)
You don't know any women with male names (i. e., Tommie, Bobbie, Johnnie, Jimmie)
You don't have Maw-maw's & Pawpaw's.
You get freaked out when people on the subway talk to you.
None of your fur coats are homemade.