Brother Gary Wednesday Evening 2/26/14

Brother Gary Wednesday Evening 2/26/14

Luk 11:1  And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.

We have been praying, and we are glad that we have been praying.  We have been worshipping God, but anything that God will reveal and teach us, we want it.  It is not about us, it is about Him and knowing how to do His perfect will.

Luk 11:2  And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth.

Luk 11:3  Give us day by day our daily bread.

Luk 11:4  And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.

As best we can, it is important that we remember people’s names.  There are people that really like you to pronounce their names right.  Jesus taught us that when we pray to realize this terminology is not just flippant, “Our Father, who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.”

It is wonderful to be saved tonight and we thank God for all that we have been taught about prayer.  We need the Holy Spirit to teach us and to bring things back to our memory.

How few have the kingdom of God: righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.

Thy will be done:  It is a beautiful expression that God left with us.  The will of God is always best.  Most of us have lived long enough and have been taught this lesson more than once.

It is wonderful that we know about devotions; we must have food from heaven. 

It is vital that realize, “God keep me away from temptation; help me to gird up the loins of my mind.”

Then Jesus began teaching the value of importuning for a need:

Luk 11:5  And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves;

Luk 11:6  For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him?

Luk 11:7  And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee.

Luk 11:8  I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.

We see the setting, a man had company come and he had nothing to serve them.  The hour was late but he knew a friend that had the resources that he needed.  It was not the thought that the friend didn’t want to supply the need.  The thought was, “This is not a convenient time.”

Jesus gave us this visual or word story so that you and I can kind of grasp it. 

We are dealing with a God that is able to do clear past what you and I have thought.  There is one thing that you and I can rest assured of, when we seek God with all of our heart, God has what is needed to work conviction on souls and bring them to a position of, “I need to get saved now.”

God knows how to help men and women to feel the urgency.  Ask, “God you know how to work with our son-in-laws and our daughters.”  God knows how to work with our family.  God can speak to souls.  He is God.  You and I, every one of us here tonight, are undoubtedly in multi situations where we need God to move. 

As long as there is an individual that you are burdened for that is unsaved, we need God to move in a mighty, mighty way.  Just because it was not a convenient time for the man to get up and get the bread to give to him, he didn’t stop. 

Never give up.  It may look black and bleak, they may have made statements: “I’m never going to do this or that.”  It is just hot air.  When God begins to deal with a soul, things begin to transpire.

God has a way of sending an overwhelming scourge.  I believe that is the Holy Spirit going out and working.  It has a way of going to precious souls and causing them to realize that they are lost and undone.  “All the things that are standing in the way of me getting saved are only mountains that I have created.” 

Because of his importunity, he will arise and give him as much as he needs.  In my personal life, I pray first, “God give me a revival.”  I pray for souls that need to be saved.  The Holy Spirit of God can quicken us.  I believe that is a part of intercessory prayer, that you and I feel the reality that they are going to be lost forever. 

When it comes to salvation, it is something that must be obtained in this lifetime.  Other opportunities may be lost.

When it comes to God and the need needs supplied, we have this very open statement, “Ask.”  It is not limited to just someone being saved, it can be for your spiritual, emotional, or other needs.

We are instructed to come boldly to the throne of grace.  If you are facing a situation and God convicts you, “Son or daughter, spend time with me because you are going to need a very special grace.”  If that is the case, I would ask, seek, and knock.

God I am not willing to be lacking in my spiritual life without temperance, patience or a soul burden.  God you have something better for me than me getting all fired up spiritually and then cooling off.  We want to keep the revival fire burning everyplace we go.  We don’t want to let anything crowd it out. 

There will always be more than you can get done, there will always be things drawing your mind here and there and somewhere else.  We are seeking something that is of spiritual significance to you and to me. 

Daily we are faced with “God I need to ask, I need to seek, I need to knock that I will have something from you for whomever you lead me to today.”  Something real from God!

Luk 11:9  And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.

Luk 11:10  For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.

This is a promise.  “For every one that asketh receiveth.”  May God help us to ask.  Ask specifically, definitely.  Not general, “God help me to be what you’d have me to be.”  Get specific.  He has been very specific.

Luk 11:11  If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?

Luk 11:12  Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?

Luk 11:13  If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?

The father is out to give the very best to us. 

We want to train our mind so that when we are agreeing in prayer we are not thinking of the wood that needs chopped or the care that is idling. 

Galatians 3:28 teaches us in oneness with Christ.  When he is dealing with a soul, I want to be right there praying and working the best I can in oneness with Christ.

Importuning and keeping focused in importuning. 

Pray for one another.  Pray for me and let’s pray for each other.  We have a congregation that needs miracles and we want those miracles.  Pray that the Lord of Harvest will send laborers into His harvest.

The lost: there is a population of 270,000 people in the coldest city of the world.  I wondered, are there prayer meetings there.  Are there saints there? 

There are people on the beaches where it hot and it doesn’t satisfy.

Pray for the rest home.  As best you can, learn all their names. 

Pray for the boy’s ranch.  Pray for the saints as they go, before they go.

Pray for our families.  Anyone that is not saved, sanctified, and on fire for God are in bad shape.

Pray for precious souls wandering in Babylon.  From the fellow that wrote the song, “Prone to wander.”  His testimony is that he backslid.  When people wander, they wander out of the way.

Pray that souls get saved and filled with the Holy Spirit.  If you want to get stirred, study on those that get saved and then refused to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Pray for revival in the pastor.  I am not too old to be revived.  Pray for revival in the congregation and revival in Montana.

Brother Gary Sunday Evening 2/23/14

Brother Gary Sunday Evening 2/23/14

Psa 1:1  Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.

Psa 1:2  But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.

Psa 1:3  And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

Planted: it is vital that you and I let God plant us where He wants us.  Planted by the rivers of water:  Thank God we are not by a dry stream or tapped into something that will go empty.  We are planted by the rivers of water.

The river of pardon:  I am planted by that river.  I have been forgiven of so much.  I trust I am as the little lady that took the best that she had and broke it and anointed Jesus’ feet.  There were those that questioned, “Why is she using this very expensive oil to anoint Jesus’ feet?  Why wasn’t it sold to feed the poor?” 

She was anointing Jesus’ feet because she loved Him so much.  She had a past that she couldn’t deal with and the people she lived among had no answer for.  Jesus said, “She that is forgiven of much loves much and she that is forgiven of little loves little.”

The river of grace:  isn’t it wonderful that in a world that is so graceless, ugly, and behaves itself so unseemly we can have grace?  They know nothing about virtue, modesty and many of them have turned a deaf ear to God and they don’t know anything about morals. 

It is terrible that you cannot even listen to the radio; the lyrics are so corrupt that you don’t want to hear it.  It may be a part of reality, but I don’t want it going over and over in my mind.

It is wonderful that you can be planted by the river of the God of all grace.

The river of promises:  it is wonderful to be planted by that river.  When we are faced with heartache and disappointment, among people whose life is haunted by failure, we can go to that river of peace.  Oh drink of this river of peace and pleasure. 

The river of joy:  We draw from the wells but there is a river of joy and it flows into our soul and then it flows out.  Isn’t it wonderful that there is a source of something that is pure and uplifting and is valuable to us on the journey and to those it will flow out to?

The river of hope:  Isn’t it wonderful to have hope? 

The river of fellowship:  Isn’t it wonderful to have fellowship, an agreement of prayer, to feel that accord?  We are here to worship, give God praise, and love.

It is a river of life, a river of pleasure.  We will go through deep trying times but this God of ours at just the right time will say, “Come to the river of pleasure; let me give you a time of rest, relaxing, and pleasure.”

This is for the righteous.  The ungodly cannot get there.  Isn’t it sad how unforgiving the ungodly are?  Isn’t it sad how full their mind is of the bitterness of the past.  It doesn’t do them or anyone else any good. 

Unless they let God plant them by the river of pardon, they will never give nor know forgiveness.

Psa 1:4  The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.

The chaff doesn’t know where it is going because it goes wherever the wind blows.  Babylon tells how wonderful Jesus is but they always conclude with saying, “No one can live without sin and you cannot get rid of the carnal man.”  We can be partakers of the divine nature today.

Psa 1:5  Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

Psa 1:6  For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.

We have a perfect accord, God you know the way of the righteous.  Lead me.  We have five or six days before next Sunday, we want to be led of God this week.  We want to know His way, for we want Him to know our way.

Brother Gary Sunday Morning 2/23/14

The fig tree:  Jesus hungered on his journey and went to this beautiful tree.  The fig trees could have fruit on them all year long in Palestine.  They had early figs, and there is a heavy fig bearing season.  As Jesus went, He undoubtedly knew already that there would be no figs and knew what He would teach the disciples from this. 

Mat 21:17  And he left them, and went out of the city into Bethany; and he lodged there.

Mat 21:18  Now in the morning as he returned into the city, he hungered.

Mat 21:19  And when he saw a fig tree in the way, he came to it, and found nothing thereon, but leaves only, and said unto it, Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever. And presently the fig tree withered away.

Mat 21:20  And when the disciples saw it, they marvelled, saying, How soon is the fig tree withered away!

Mat 21:21  Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done.

Mat 21:22  And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.

If you have faith:  Everyone on this audience has the ability to read scriptures and know scriptures.  I have been studying trying to understand the book of 1 Corinthians.  If you have faith: it takes faith to bear fruit.   Fruit is born spiritually by us obeying the Word of God that is revealed to us or the Word of God that we understand.  We continue to bear more fruit as we understand more.

Not only will you bear more fruit but you will see mountains removed. 

All things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer:  It is a very important thing that we grasp how God has made the promise and qualified it in this thought.  As you and I are praying, not the ushering up of, “God I want this and I want that.”  When you have gone into the closet and shut the door. 

It is marvelous that we can identify with that in our day.  How real it is to us that there is a real truth of getting somewhere alone with God and getting our mind, the pressures of the world, the troubles that we know about, and the fears of ‘what if this happens’, the fears that are the making of our own mind, shut down.

When you have entered into the closet and shut the door, when you pray to the father which sees in secret.  There is something about knowing that we are in the presence and audience of God. Life and prayer take on a total different thought pattern than before. 

Yes, if there are tangible needs and needs for the necessities of life, yes we are definitely going to pray that they be met.  But when we were in the closet, there is something past the tangible things of life.  whatsoever you desire.  There is something in the heart of every individual that was born, they have or had the desire to bear fruit for God.

There is something about us that even before we are aged, we don’t want what the selfishness of life has to offer.  Selfishness is one of the ugliest traits that is in the world.

“God, I want to please you and bear fruit for you.”  We have all seen lives that were beautiful on the outside but when you got to examining the fruit you found it without valor and virtue.

Jesus taught the disciples that He hungered to see their fruits.  Brother and Sister Green sang the song, “There is an All Seeing Eye Watching You.”  There is an eye that is looking for fruit in our lives. 

For all these precious children that are here this morning, we are happy and thankful that you are all here.  The parents desire to see the children mature and bear the fruits of manners, of being well trained, of following whatever the rules of the house are. 

That is the same way with God the Father and Jesus the Son with you and me.  After we are saved, He desires to see real fruit in our lives.

The healthy fig tree bears fruit year around in Palestine.  John the Baptist said, “Bring forth fruit worthy of repentance.”  Remember John gave a very strong introduction to that text.  He was dealing with people that were trusting in their self-righteousness.  Self-righteousness doesn’t make us righteous. 

John taught people to come to Jesus repenting.  The reason that is important for our day is that it is vital that every child learns the value of repentance toward God.  Every sin is toward God.  Rom 3:23 teaches that we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God.  God requires that in order for us to be right with Him, we confess our sin and turn from our sin.

Jesus finding the fruits of repentance on an individual life:  It is difficult for me to grasp that there is something in the personality of some people that find it very difficult to ever be wrong.  I was a child that grew up in trouble in school, at home, and in other places.  I got a lot of correction. 

John the Baptist teaches that there are definite fruits of repentance:  humility.  How beautiful humility is.  How beautiful it is when we come before God and say, “At this exact season of my life I really need you.”  There will not be true humility without repentance.  It is what allows us to be right with God and to bear fruit.

I think of how many are crying out for direction for the season of their life in this audience.  Through the eyes of a parent and a grandparent I can see how the job that my daughter has applied for is a really good job.  God alone knows what would be best, whatever it would be: spiritual, material, a job, or a season of being a parent and grandparent.

Jesus found people at the temple that were interested in utmost seats and buying and doing business in the house of God. The saddest thing was that they were not teachable.  Being wrong is not the issue, it is:  Are you teachable? 

The problem that Jesus had with most of the religious people of the day was that they were not teachable.  They were interested in it being their way.  Humility was not one of the fruits that were on their tree.

Other fruits are faith, honesty, and obedience. 

If you have faith, Rom 12:3 God has given us all a measure of faith.  Vs 1 present bodies a living sacrifice. Vs 2 don’t be conformed to this world.  Vs 3 to every man is given a measure of faith. 

Think soberly.  We are all given a measure of faith.  Ps 19 teaches us that because every eye has seen the creation of God, they have a measure of faith.  Everyone is accountable to God because of this and God created it beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Paul told the Romans “Think soberly.”  I am too old to have any unbelief in my life.  Yet it is an old battle.  Unbelief got Adam and Eve in real trouble.  In Matthew 13 you can see where Jesus couldn’t do many mighty works because of their unbelief. 

It comes to work on a lot of people.  Think soberly about this measure of faith.  Faith is under attack, Paul wrote in Romans, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.

There is something about drawing close to God and how alive the Word of God comes to us.  I thought of when I awoke Saturday morning.  I remember my first thought was, Colossians 3, “Ye are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God.”  Every day you and I awake we have the blessing and the opportunity of dying to self, to the world, to the many voices that would try to attract us here or there.  You are alive in Christ.

The Word of God becomes alive over and over again.

2Pe 1:1  Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:

Peter was humble here and wanted us to know that he was a servant.  We were given a measure of faith as a child.  I cannot remember the grocery list but I remember some things about my childhood.  I wanted to know where I came from and what would happen to me when I died.  Now as I look back I understand that it was that something within hungering after God.

They have obtained like precious faith.  We come to the realization that, “That which was given to me is so precious.”  Don’t let anything mine it away.  The devil comes to steal and destroy.

Those that have obtained like precious faith:  the affects:

2Pe 1:2  Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,

There is something that is so amazing about grace.  Amazing grace how sweet the sound!  God has a very special grace for you in seasons of your life.  We receive that grace by having like precious faith of you and me coming to God, “God you know where I am.” 

Sometimes our minds doubt that anyone one understands, but God understands.  You can open your heart and God fully understanding.  Grace multiplied:  when you start dealing with doubling things, 2X2=4; 4X4=16; 16X16=?  There is something about God, He knows His times tables.

Peace:  there are some things that you and I have never experienced.  With cancer, the disease reaches a certain place…, whatever you dread the most, if it happens, if you are rightly related to God and His Son and the Holy Spirit, and you exercise your like precious faith, peace can be multiplied past 16X16.

Through the knowledge of God:  Oh that we can know God and how great He is!  In Psalms 1, I read that some commentator said, “This book starts with a benediction:  Blessed.”  Usually the blessings are given at the end.  Jesus started the beatitudes with a blessing.

If we can have a knowledge of God, how great He is, how blessed God is, how often times before we are at the end of something He gives a great blessing.  It has happened over and over again:  The blessing of peace, of confidence that God will see us through.  Think of the confidence: Moses with millions came to the red sea and before they got through it, God gave the blessing of opening up the sea.

2Pe 1:3  According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:

2Pe 1:4  Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

This was written for every one of us.  Peter failed God, was converted, found that place of repentance, and got it all right with God.  He was there in Acts and received the Holy Spirit of God and knew what it was like to have the divine nature of God. 

We are undeserving but we are blessed.

2Pe 1:5  And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge;

2Pe 1:6  And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness;

2Pe 1:7  And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity.

You may have faith in God; begin adding virtue: moral excellence, doing right.  Know about God, about what the Bible teaches, and about prayer.  Know about secret prayer and the secrets that God gives us in prayer.  It is no secret what God will do.

To knowledge add temperance.  Have a balance in your life in everything.  Temperance toward yourself, toward those that you have to do with, toward those things that you enjoy in the world, a balance toward everything.

To temperance patience:  Patience is a wonderful trait to be added.  Your faith will be put to the test on patience.  There is an epidemic in the world that does its best to try your patience almost every day.  When Jesus comes looking for fruit, have moral excellence, knowledge, temperance, and then patience. 

I will be patient.  Maybe it is patience in understanding the Word of God.  Maybe you feel that no one understands you.  I want to encourage you that God wants you to have patience. Sometimes we fall all over ourselves trying to explain ourselves, patience.

To patience brotherly kindness:  Not just because of what we went through Thursday.  Don’t rush out of here this morning.  Show brotherly kindness to your brother and sister.  The last opportunity I had to see one of my brothers that is in eternity, I didn’t take the time.  I should have stopped.

I have time to be kind.  As I age, things bother me more.  You probably know someone that is old enough that get urgent things in the mail, pre-sorted with stamps on it, “Urgent, open at once.”  Brotherly kindness:  You will probably reach that age that you call someone up, “I have something urgent come over.”

Know brotherly kindness as a child.  It is amazing how long it takes us to get to be a teenager and it is then amazing from 20 to 21, it gets to be 30.  For some it is a journey accepting 40.  Then 50 comes and you think, “Oh my fifty!”  I was so happy that I made it.  Brother Herb would say, “Fifty, that is nothing.”  Then 60 comes: Brotherly kindness in every age.

To know how to share, to know how to enjoy and how to be enjoyed:  If you are going to have a party with certain people there, make sure that you have Jesus there and then you will feel that it is a perfect party.

Add to godliness brotherly kindness.  To brotherly kindness add charity, holy love in action.  Before you try to make any expression to anyone, “My brother I think you ought to do this or that, or I see a shortcoming in your life.”  Until you have added all the previous things, your ability to instruct and add charity will not get anywhere.  But when your tree has these fruits and your brother has a need and you go with all these things and love, then you will be described:

2Pe 1:8  For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

2Pe 1:9  But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.

I have been so challenged by the eye of faith.  I want to have the eye of faith.  Not that I am totally blind, but I want to have a clearer vision of what God can do.

My father is glorified, my father is honored, when you bear much fruit.  My disciples bear fruit.

The saddest thing in the world is a life without spiritual fruit.  The most beautiful sight in this world is a life bearing fruit for God.

Fruit begins with repentance followed by obedience, followed by adding faith.

Blessed is that man that is as a tree planted by the rivers.  He bears fruit.  His testimony is sure.  God takes care of him.

The greatest miracle ever seen is the miracle that God does in our own personal individual heart because we know that miracle.