June 29, 2005 Inspired Word

INSPIRED WORD

JUNE 29, 2005

TEACHING / SCRIPTURE / EXHORTATION

I am a teacher, for those of you who don't know. I went to the Citadel Mall and Father Gene was preaching today. Father had a great message and I just had to share it with you because I was hoping that it could shape the way that we see this evening. The reading today was when Peter is in jail. Acts 12: It was about this time that King Herod started persecuting certain members of the church. He beheaded James, the brother of John, and when he saw that this pleased the Jews he decided to arrest Peter as well. This was during the days of Unleavened Bread. He put Peter in prison, assigning to him fours squads, four soldiers each, to guard him in turns. Herod meant to try Peter in public after the end of Passover week. All the time Peter was under guard the church prayed for him unremittingly. That is the community you are talking about. Ray, you said, “bring it to the community”. On the night before Herod was to try him, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, fastened with double chains, while guards kept watch at the main entrance to the prison. Then suddenly the angel of the Lord stood there and the cell was filled with light. He tapped Peter on the side and woke him, saying, “Get up quickly.” The chains fell from his hands. The angel then said, “Put on your belt and sandals.” After he had done this, the angel then said, “Wrap your cloak around you and follow me.” Peter followed him, without knowing that what the angel did was all happening in reality. Peter thought he was seeing a vision. They passed through two guard posts, one after the other, and he reached the iron gate that leads into the city; this gate opened of its own accord. They went through the gate and had walked the whole length of one street when suddenly the angel left him. It was only then that Peter came to himself and said, “Now I know it is all true. The Lord really did send His angel and have saved me from Herod and from all that the Jewish people were so certain would happen to me.” We have been speaking about miracles, but sometimes we feel like we are between two guards with chains double binding us, with the gate locked and guards watching outside. We feel imprisoned. I don't know what your prison is, I don't know what the prison is for your loved ones; but we feel it. I give glory and praise to God for miraculous moments, but the Lord wanted to speak to those people tonight who say, “I want to believe that, but I feel so trapped.” Our Lord is sending an angel and the community here is praying for you. Nothing can prevail against the Lord. Nothing can prevail against Him! Tonight you are not here by accident! The message that He sends to you is that the Spirit of the Lord breaks all strongholds. Jesus said, “Peter, you are the rock and on this rock I will build the church and gates of hell will not prevail against it.” Father Gene said, “gates are for keeping people out, not keeping people in.” Often Satan has strongholds on our lives that we invite in through our sin and other times they come into our life for reasons unknown. Then he gets us because we are down, because we are tired, because we have seen a loved one struggle with an illness or we have been struggling with an illness and it doesn't seem like the Lord is answering. It is like Peter sleeping between two guards; it is a stronghold. But the Lord says, “No, the gates of hell will NOT prevail against it.” When you and I come together in the name of the Lord, Jesus Christ, there is power; there is power! We have to remember that. That is what He wants His church to know. He says, “know My power!” There is a song that we had sung about two weeks ago, something about His outstretched arms…, I was going to refer to the song. The sense was that we have different visions of God. God is a warrior, but I don't mean that in a bad sense of the word as in violence; but I mean He comes to break the strongholds, as we come together. But sometimes He does it quietly. He sneaked into the prison at night with His angel when everyone was asleep. In the stealth and cover of night He freed Peter. God can come in His power quietly, like when we sit and we give time with song, worship and praise, He walks among us in this meeting. He honors the fact that we come together to praise His wonderful and glorious name. During the Mass, it hit me that this was a message that I wanted to share with you. I wanted to share that the Lord comes to break strongholds and He calls us. Father Gene says we need to be aggressive in our faith. I think he meant that in the best sense of the word – by living the glorious, wondrous, loving and merciful power of Christ; by letting that Spirit into our hearts; by being joyful, faithful, obedient to the Spirit of God in our lives. For those of you who are saying, “Where is my God?”; sometimes we feel like He has forsaken us, but I am here tonight to tell you that is not true. Don't believe the voice that says there is no God or that if there is a God, that He doesn't love you, because it is a lie from the pit of hell. Our God is glorious, kind, merciful, and unconditionally loving; He takes us, accepts and loves of where we are at and loves us He loves us into the image that He created us to be. So trust this loving God and pray for your brothers and sisters; pray for people here; bring your family to Him and ask the Lord to break the stronghold. So people of God, be aggressive tonight in your prayer. We say we love Jesus, so let us approach Him with that love and give to Him all the problems and things we hold within us. Surrender them to Jesus tonight . Tonight the stronghold comes down!

PRAYER

There is that Spirit inside of us that wants to give praise to God tonight. Lord, give us the gift of praise tonight, God. Spirit of the Living God, touch every heart in this place. Let every mouth proclaim the praise of Jesus and every tongue confess that He is Lord. Lord, allow us to do that! We ask for that grace! Lord, let us be people of praise in this place tonight! Glory to You, O God! We proclaim Your marvelous deeds and give You thanks for Your works among us. Praise to You, O God!

WORD OF KNOWLEDGE / EXHORTATION

I have two words for you tonight. The first one is mine. In the last song we had sung, where it says, ‘The battle is the Lord's'; it struck me that in a lot of what we heard tonight, that it is the Lord's battle. Cancer is a scary word but the fact of the matter is, it is a name. The Bible says that Jesus is above every other name. Sometimes I know that when we are praying for people, we are tempted to say, “Well, if you just had faith!”, but since it is the Lord Who is fighting the battle, it is faith. Now for the word the Lord has for you tonight: there are some people here tonight and some that are not here that are fighting a major battle in their life right now. It seems like every time they turn around they are bumping into a wall. The Lord wants you to know that just because you can't see it, just because you can't feel it, does not mean that that wall is not there. But the Lord wants you to overcome that wall. There are two things that you can do: 1) He wants you to die to yesterday, so that you can be more alive today. 2) Stop concentrating on your circumstances and concentrate on your obedience to Him. Thank you, Jesus!

SCRIPTURE

John 15:12-17: This is My commandment, love one another as I love you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. You are My friends if you do what I command you. I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from My Father. It was not you who chose Me, but I Who chose you, and

appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain; so that whatever you ask the Father in My Name He will give you.

SCRIPTURE

Psalm 93:1-5: The Lord reigns; He is robed in majesty; the Lord is robed, girded with strength. The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved. Your throne was established long ago; You are from everlasting. The floods have lifted up, O Lord, the floods have lifted up their voice; the floods have lifted up their pounding waves. More than the sound of many waters, more powerful than the breakers of the sea – the Lord on high is Mighty. Your testimonies are fully confirmed; holiness belongs to Your house, O Lord, for evermore.

WORD OF KNOWLEDGE

I am getting a very strong feeling that there is someone here who needs prayer. I don't know who it is or what it is for. If you need pray, bring it before the community; Jesus has told us to ask in His name.

PRAYING OVER INDIVIDUAL PRAYER GROUP MEMBERS WHO NEED PRAYERS

PRAYER

Lord, we ask You to let Your healing love flow through us and touch those in need; to meet the needs of the moment; to meet the needs of the heart; to meet the needs of the families; to meet the needs of the people. Jesus, You break all strongholds! Jesus, You are our Savior indeed! Jesus, You are our Mighty Lord! Jesus, You are the One we come to with all problems. Jesus, we love You with all of our hearts! Glory to You! Glory to You!

IMAGE / EXHORTATION

As we were singing that song, I kept asking the Lord over and over, “Lord, what do You want us to do? What do You want us to become?” The Lord showed me a vision. At first I didn't understand it. He showed me two words; sin and pride. I asked the Lord for the interpretation of this vision. He showed me that the middle letter of sin is “ i ”; and that the middle letter of pride is “ i ”. He said, “What I want you to do is to put Me inside; put Me in your middle.” Amen.

EXHORTATION

Earlier I was thinking about the word ‘repent' and that word ‘repent' is one of the most beautiful words in the Bible. Often times we run from it, but we need to run to it and embrace it; so that we may turn to God, instead of having that “I” in the middle.

IMAGE / SENSE

The Lord gave me a picture of everyone, with eyes closed and having their opened hands resting in their laps or lifted up in the air, in the sign of receiving. He wanted us to offer up Prayer Tongues; where we just pray together in Tongues, letting ourselves praise the Lord and bringing to Him whatever is broken in our lives, whatever is wounded or dark within us and whatever is empty within us. Jesus just said, “Open your hands and lift up praises in Tongues, trust in Me, have faith and receive.”

SCRIPTURE

Tonight we have given praise and thanks to the Lord. All through the evening I have been continually hearing the word ‘fitting'. Two Scriptures come to me: Psalm 33:1: Sing joyfully to the Lord, you righteous, it is fitting for the upright to praise Him. Psalm 147:1: Praise the Lord. How good it is to sing praises to our God, how pleasant and fitting to praise Him! What came to me was this: to sing praises to our God fits like a glove.

SCRIPTURE

John 1:1-5,14,16: In the beginning the Word already existed, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. From the very beginning the Word was with God. Through Him, God made all things, not one thing in all creation was made without Him. The Word was the Source of Life and this life brought light to people. The light shines in the darkness; and the darkness has never put it out. The Word became a human being, full of grace and truth, and lived among us. We saw His glory, the glory which He received as the Father's only Son. Out of the fullness of His grace, He has blessed us all, giving us one blessing after another.

WORD OF KNOWLEDGE / PRAYER

Our hearing is a hearing that is attuned to the voices of the world around us; attuned to things other than the Lord. I believe the Lord would want to give us spiritual hearing this evening in a deeper way, that we might hear the Word more clearly; that we might be attuned with our ears to His voice and His heart. Lord Jesus, so many things come against us and we listen to so many lies. We pray as Your people, that You may attune our ears to hear Your voice, to hear Your truth. Let us desire that in our hearts and give us that spiritual hearing, Lord, where we hear the whisper of Your voice and the promptings of Your Holy Spirit. Heal our hearing, Lord, where it needs to be healed tonight. Let us hear You ever more clearly, Lord Jesus! Lord, we turn to You and give You thanks.

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