Stubborn Faith
1106 E. Morehead Street Burlington, NC (336) 226-0838
“Return, and tell Hezekiah, the captain of my people, Thus saith the Lord, the God of David, thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears; behold, I will heal thee. On the third day thou shalt go up into the house of the Lord” (2 Kings 20:5).
Hezekiah, the king, the captain of God’s people, was a godly man but he had great troubles heaped upon him. His country was under siege and he was deathly sick. National crisis is bad enough but to have a personal crisis is trouble piled high.
What do you do? He turned to the Lord with tears and used the means God had given him for healing. Sometimes God will alter things in His universe just to meet our needs. Sometimes God heals on earth and other times He heals in glory.
Friend, we do not know when we will die, but we do know we will. It is up to us to live and to live well in the power of the Spirit of the living God. To live in lethargy, complacency, or self-sufficiency, is to live with the threat of settling down in a world that is cursed with sin and death.
This is not God’s best. God’s best is to allow our needs to continually drive us to Him upon our knees and for each of us to stay close to Him. Let your troubles drive you to Christ. This is the power of the third day. And by the way, we are all terminal, for we do not know when or where, but we do know we will not live forever in this body of clay.
| “There are three things which are too wonderful for me” (Proverbs 30:18).
Science may be able to explain the flight of birds, the movements of serpents, the currents of the atmosphere and of the ocean, and human sexuality, but that does not take away from the wonder of it all. |
“And he said unto them, Look on me, and do likewise; and, behold, when I come to the outside of the camp, it shall be that, as I do, so shall you do” (Judges 7:17).
God is looking to those to whom He can trust His life to. Gideon was one of those men who knew he was weak but he found God to be strong. So in this belief and faith in God, Gideon commands the three hundred men by his side to do as he does because the end result will be victory.
What was Gideon asking the men to do? He was asking them to hoist the sails of their faith and wait for the wind of God to blow. Everyone who is born of the Spirit tests his life by the Word of God, and by doing so, he is setting his sails to catch the breath of God. We place our hands on the rudder, but we are totally dependent on God’s wind to blow.
Gideon blew the trumpet, broke the clay vessel wherein was the candle, and the light inside began to glow outwardly. When you and I are ready for God to work we will blow the trumpet of proclamation of life in Christ, and those around us will see the light of illumination in us because of our broken consecration before God.
Are you ready to take steps to discipline your inner man? If you are, what course corrections need to be made in your life even today?
| “Watch ye, therefore, and pray always, that you may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man” (Luke 21:36).
1. There is a devil.
5. Our Lord is even now interceding for us.
7. Prayer gives to us God’s fullness of His joy.
8. Prayer along with thanksgiving frees us from anxiety.
9. Prayer is the means in which we keep watchful.
10. Prayer promotes our spiritual growth, brings power into the work, leads others to Christ and gives power and blessings to the church.
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“And he took away the treasures of the house of the Lord, and the treasures of the king’s house; he even took away all. And he took away all the shields of gold which Solomon had made” (I Kings 15:26).
Israel was once a powerhouse of divine wealth. But then the nation plunged into evil by allowing idolatry and apostasy to stagnate their lives. They slid in and swam into a cesspool of evil and sinfulness with glee.
There was a king by the name of Shishak. He was king of Egypt. On the heels of apostasy Jerusalem was attacked. This devilish King came and took the treasures of the house of the Lord away.
All over our land today are hearts and homes and churches who were once rich in prayer, the Word of God, good works, joy, but now they are ransacked and barren because Shishak has stolen the treasures of the Lord from the people of God.
It is time to return to the Lord with acknowledgement of sin. We are dusting ourselves off instead of confessing our sin. How can we teach transgressors God’s ways until we profess our great lack? May God help us to see our exposed sin that sinners see and we do not. There is hope when our hope is in God. May God lay His axe to the root of our lives by His Word and by His Spirit.
“And if it be eaten at all on the third day, it is abominable; it shall not be accepted” (Leviticus 19:7).
The peace offering was to be a offering of voluntary measures. It was not forced upon the people of Israel to offer. But if it were not offered, or offered with a heart that was cold and indifferent, the worship of the people was not acceptable in the sight of God.
The offering was to be celebrated together in appreciation of God’s grace through the burnt offerings, the meal offerings, and the peace offerings. They each represented facets of the love of God expressed by sacrificial giving.
You and I should study these offerings and learn the value and virtues of the sacrifice of Christ for each sinner. The more we dive into the Old Testament the more we will understand the New Testament cross of Calvary.
When you and I try to worship or serve God in our flesh we fail to appreciate and have true communion with God and other worshippers. In the sight of the Lord it is an abominable thing to sit in a worship service and be out of contact with Him. That worship, either in a Sunday gathering or a Lord’s supper celebration, is not accepted by Him.
Why do so many stay at home while God has called us to gather? Why is there seemingly dullness and boredom in church? We have forgotten the power of the third day. God says that every day is to be a day of communion and when we forget and fail to remember we fail to reign in grace by One who is the Lord Jesus Christ.
Kinnett Memorial Baptist Church 1106 E. Morehead St Burlington, NC 27215
336-226-0838
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