Are You Cowardly?

I was reading the book of Revelation today, and as I was coming to the end I found a verse that shocked me. Revelation 21:7-8 says "He who overcomes shall iherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son." 

Verse 8 "But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in teh lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death." 

I added the bold, italics to cowardly up there as I'm sure you know. However this shocked me so much because cowardly, is right next to murders, sexually immoral, and so on! Imagine that, God sees cowardice as just as bad a sin and those things! 

Most Christians never share their faith because of fear. Every day they walk down the street and pass several, maybe hundreds, maybe even thousands of people who are going to the lake of fire and they don't even hand out a few tracts! This is a horrible sin, and those who do that need to repent. We can see here in Revelation that it is not something to be taken lightly. 

Let's look at another example, Paul said in 1 Corinthians 9:16 "For though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of: for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel!" Paul himself said "woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel." We need to take these things to heart and understand that it is sin to live in fear, and to keep the gospel of our Lord Jesus bottled up inside of us. Cowards will have their place in the lake of fire, we don't want that. We have no been given a spirit of fear, but of courage. So let's put off that old fear, and take up courage, and preach the gospel with fearlessness.  We know that the goal is to hear the words "Well done, good and faithful servant." There is nothing more important than that. 

Amen.

Christians in Crisis

I have always had a broken heart for our brothers and sisters in chains all over the world. They need our prayers. Here are some stats that I took from christiansincrisis.net. I highly recommend going there and reading, praying, or even donating to their ministry. 

Were you aware that ...

Since the death of Jesus Christ 2000 years ago, 43,000,000 Christians have become martyrs.   Over 50% of these were in the last century alone. More than 200 million Christians face persecution each day 60% are children.   Every day over 300 are killed for their faith in Jesus Christ.

These things are happening every day, look at this new report from yesterday.

Date:          October 8, 2008

The Persecution & Prayer Alert

Three Christians were killed in Mosul, Iraq over the past week. On October 4, an armed group of suspected Islamist militants assassinated a man named Hazim Thomaso Youssif (40) in front of his clothing shop and Ivan Nuwya (15) was shot to death in front of his home, located near a mosque in the Christian-majority neighbourhood of Tahrir. On October 6, a disabled 25-year-old shopkeeper was shot and killed in the neighbourhood of Karama. Some Christians believe that Islamists are targeting shopkeepers in an effort to wipe out the Christian community's economic activity and drive out believers from the area.

Pray for those who mourn these lost lives. Ask God to continue to embolden the Christian community in Mosul to proclaim the Gospel even while suffering. (2 Timothy 4:16-18).

To learn more about Christian's suffering for righteousness' sake in Iraq, 

visit www.persecution.net/iraq.htm.

Look at this report from India.

TAMIL NADU, INDIA (ANS) -- Gospel for Asia missionary Vinay Ganpati is still facing threats months after an anti-Christian mob attacked his church in Tamil Nadu, India. The attack happened after a local woman, believed to be a goddess, blamed two deaths on the Christian community.

After the attack on the church building and congregation, one of the anti-Christians died in an accident. This caused people to further blame the Christians, and there were threats of more violence.

On September 26, a group approached pastor Vinay and told him to vacate the church and stop all activities by October 10. Vinay tried his best to reason with the group, explaining the land was lawfully owned by the church and that he couldn't leave so suddenly.

"The extremists were not ready to listen to him and again warned him to vacate by the deadline or face dire consequences," GFA's correspondent wrote. "Vinay seems very worried."

Vinay and his leaders plan to file a complaint with the police station in an effort to protect their land. This is not their first choice, as it could further hinder relationships with the people of the village.

Vinay earnestly requests prayer that God would remove fear from the Christians' hearts and make them strong to face these trials. Pray that the Lord will bring a peaceful solution, and that those opposing the Gospel will realize God's love for them.

So often we forget that 2Timothy 3:12 says "Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution." 

There is a great war going on in the world today, and we need to take part. There are too many benchwarmers out there. We are all soldiers of Jesus Christ and we must take up our shields and swords and fight the good fight. The older I get the faster time seems to pass, and the more I realize how little I have done with the time I have been given. I refuse to regret the way I have lived my life, and you should too. There are billions of souls that need Jesus, let's do everything we can to give them the Kingdom, with every breath we take. In the name of Jesus. Amen.

 

Stages of the Christian Road Pt. 3

Part 3: Spiritual Fathers

"I write to you, fathers, because you have known Him who is from the beginning."

The word Father here means Parent in the greek. So again, this is for male or female.

Here we have arrived at the stage we must all aspire for. As you can see, John only said ONE thing about the spiritual fathers; those who are mature. "You have known Him who is from the beginning." You see, spiritual parents have moved on from knowing God simply as a forgiving Father, and Warrior King. They still know Him in those ways of course.  However they have come to understand deeper, eternal aspects of Him. For certain, even spiritual parents have MUCH to learn and will spend eternity learning about God. Despite that, they have at this point reached a maturity where they can understand the great secret of this saying, "I AM". They know God like Moses, Elijah, Paul, and John. They speak to God as a friend, their relationship with Him is so deep, they drink from His love and power profoundly. They are like the great oaks planted by the river of life. They are the ones who should disciple the children and youth.  Unfortunately there really aren't very many of these spiritual parents around. We all know how much we need them, and we all know the great desire for more discipleship. However with this there is a great responsability, when someone is a spiritual father or mother, they are the ones that people flock to for help, they very often don't have privacy, they don't get much rest because of the constant flow of people who need.  These are the people who when you see them, you see the eyes of Jesus looking back at you.

These fathers and mothers are the ones that people see and they can feel the presence of Jesus, when you see one of these elders, you know they have been with Jesus. Most people don't make it here because this is the narrow path, this is the group of people who truly have been crucified with Christ, they have made great sacrifices and found the great treasures of heaven that most of us long for. We need these great men and women of God, and sadly they are so hard to find. 

To conclude I want to make one clear point, these different stages of the Christian road are based on spiritual levels. They have nothing to do with age, Timothy was young, and Paul told him to be an example, and not to let anyone look down on him because of that youth. I have met pastors who have led churches for thirty years, and yet are still immature in the faith. I have also met teenagers who truly have intimacy with the King.

What will you become?

Stages of the Christian Road pt. 2

Part 2: Young Men

Okay, let's turn our Bibles once again to 1 John Chapter 2. 

Verse 13 "I write to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one."

Verse 14 "I have written to you, young men, because you are strong, and the Word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one."

In these verses, "Young Men" is translated from the Greek word "Youth", so don't think that this applies only to young men, it has the same application to young ladies.

Youth are the ones who have moved on from infancy and have begun to use the sword of the spirit, which is the Word of God. They have learned to feed themselves and defend themselves against temptation and many kinds of sin. This is not to say that they are perfect of course, even a soldier with the best training can still be wounded.  However, they are strong, the warriors of God. They have overcome and are no longer bound by sin, youth are still immature in many way but they have the hearts of champions and are moving forward. They have soaked in the Word of God and have a passion and a fire for our King Jesus. They have learned about the power and authority that we have in the name of Jesus. This is usually the point where people start to think that these youth are radical. By now they have usually overcome most if not all fear of man, and understand that following Jesus is all that matters. Not looks, money, comfort, or anything else but the cross. They have the hearts of martyrs and are willing to die for the sake of Jesus. However, they still need the spiritual fathers to disciple them. Without guidance from a spiritual father, the passion they have can become misplaced and lead to teaching false doctrines and pride.  

Many times people get to this stage and think that this is all there is to it. Be on fire and radical for Jesus, just go for it! This is a mistake though, because even though in this stage there is great adventures and exploits for the sake of the Kingdom, there is still more maturity to be attained. With more maturity comes greater authority and power. Even though growing to this stage is better than being stuck as an infant, it is still sad when people get stuck here. We will talk about more reasons why in our next teaching. The stage we all must aspire for. Many times ministers, missionaries, and any other Christians stay here as I said before. They tend to be leaders because they are the ones who are willing to move forward. The baby Christians can't handle the responsibility yet, so the youth step up and lead. This is good because youth need to learn leadership, however without the spiritual fathers we end up where a lot of churches are stuck now; which is spiritual youth leading spiritual babies. Everyone ends up thinking that youth is the end and you come out with a church that is only half baked..

I hope you've enjoyed this teaching, and learned something as well! I will be posting the 3rd and final part of this teaching tomorrow, so stay tuned!

Don't forget that you can always write us with prayer requests at seekingnewheights@gmail.com! 

                                                           

Blessings!

Stages of the Christian Road

Here is an old sermon I preached from some revelation God gave me. Today we are going through such a drought of spiritual maturity, I think ahead to our children’s future and wonder who they will have to look up to. It is time to step up and be mature in Christ.

I’ll be adding each part over the next couple days. So stay with us to see the conclusion!

Part 1
The Stages of the Christian Road
1Jo 2:12 "I write to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake."

1Jo 2:13 "I write to you, fathers, because you have known Him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. I write to you, little children, because you have known the Father."

1Jo 2:14 "I write to you, fathers, because you have known Him who is from the beginning. I have written to you, young men, because you are strong, and the Word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one."

These verses are often read, and often overlooked. However I found something very important and impacting within these passages. You see what we find here are three stages of growth in Christianity, or perhaps the three ranks. It is very important that we understand that there are in fact different stages in our walk with Jesus, different seasons and changes.  The Bible says that we change from glory to glory; I believe that this lesson will help shed a little more light that.

Children: "I write to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake."
                "I write to you, little children, because you have known the Father."

The word "Children" in Greek here literally means infants, one who is newly born. Children are those who have just received Jesus, the new converts who only know God as a loving and forgiving Father. They don't have much experience in Jesus, they don't know other aspects of his character than His love and forgiveness. However, unlike in the physical world, you can actually stay in this area of Christianity. It's nice to remain only in the forgiveness and love part of Him.  It's easy because it is the most comfortable rank. It is where you can be saved and still have a minimum amount of responsibility. This is the stage where the majority of Christians dwell. These are the ones who just absorb, like children. They don't, or won't walk by themselves, feed themselves, or advance in any way because they don't want to for whatever reason. They live their lives just feeding, absorbing, and depending on others. They are still immature in the faith and don't know how to fight. They are the babies, we all start there, but a lot of us stay there, and that is truly a horrible mistake. It is not only dangerous but very sad, because those who stay in this area never get to experience any more of the Father; not until they are in Heaven of course. It is not wrong to be in this stage, it's wonderful, it's just wrong to stay there.

Stay tuned for part two, where we will be talking about young men, and then fathers!

The Moravians

1Thessalonians 5:17 

"Pray without ceasing."

Have you ever heard of the Moravians? Today they are not very well known in the church, perhaps they never were as popular as say, the Vineyard church. However they had an incredible impact on the world. In fact, it was a group of Moravians showing humility and example on a ship crossing the Atlantic ocean that impacted John Wesley powerfully.  Their lives directly effected his life, and eventually lead to his salvation. During a severe storm the Moravians remained calm, singing hymns and worshipping Jesus. Wesley was deeply touched by this.

Now, who were the Moravians? You can read all about them all about them in a lot of different places, today they are still functioning in several parts of the world. However I want to take a look at a very specific part of their history. 

At one time the Moravians were just a group of Refugees being cared for on a piece of land in Germany called Herrnhut, by a certain Count Zinzendorf. They were Christians, as was the Count, and they had an increible life serving the Lord. They preached the Gospel and were some of the first missionaries into many countries all around the world. 

When they arrived in Herrnhut, they began a prayer service. They prayed, and prayed, and then prayed some more. Then, 100 years passed and they were still praying! The Moravians prayed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year for a century! They were incredibly devout and out of that prayer came revivals all over the world. 

For example, we can see one huge effect they had through of their impact on John Wesley. Wesley's  Methodist teachings are still held all over the world today. In Kansas City, Missouri we have the International House of Prayer, who have also been directly effected by the Moravians prayer life. For many years now the House of Prayer has held intercession for the world 24/7.  

Now the Moravians were not the only people to have such prayer lives. We can see not only in the Bible, but all throughout history groups of people who devoted themselves to prayer, and nations were changes. Evan Roberts prayed for hours every day, sometimes for days on end before the Welsh Revival broke out. 

We could take a more detailed look at every revival in history, but there is one common event, prayer. Prayer has the power to change individuals, it has the power to change nations. Without prayer Billy Graham would be just another motivational speaker. It was through prayer the Elijah raised the dead, and through prayer the Jesus fed the five thousand and calmed the angry sea. 

The Moravavians who started that hundred year prayer meeting, and Count Zinzendorf are all gone now. The power of prayer remains though. We have access to that power, but only on our knees before King Jesus. We have the ability to effect the world as well. Unfortunately though most of us have lives that are too full of the world to have any kind of potent prayer.  We can pray 8 hours a day, but if there is sin in our lives it will be to no effect. Let's return to the old paths, seek lives of Holiness, and pray. We can bring nations to Jesus.