The Problem Of The Stone

                                                         

Mar 16:4  And when they looked, they saw that the stone was rolled away: for it was very great.
 

Mar 16:5  And entering into the sepulchre, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, clothed in a long white garment; and they were affrighted.
 

When the Lord moves for His own Son's sake, and has those interests governing, and when those interests have brought us into such a relationship with Him that we can say there is no stone so big to be removed, no problem so great for solving, no difficulty so intense, but the Lord will do what is necessary for His Son's sake.

When we have come to a position like that the Lord is free to do a lot of things very quietly. As we say, they just "happen." Ah, but they have been the objects of the exercise of exceeding great power.

There was a great earthquake (Matt. 28:2). But here, in this aspect of the situation, it does not seem to be an earthquake at all. It has just happened. We must recognize that there is an aspect of activities in which the secret, quiet working of His immense power dismisses the greatest difficulties as though they had never existed.

Sometimes He may bring us into the presence of the working of His power that is manifestly terrific, but not often and certainly not always. For faith it is more like this: there is such power at work as to make possible the setting aside of the obstacle very quietly, so that we afterward wonder

And they were amazed. And the angel said, Be not amazed. It is good to have amazement, but let us recognize that a certain amount of our amazement is because we have not sufficient faith.

~T. Austin Sparks~

Self ~Denial And True~Repentance

                                                                            

Repentance means more than saying, "Lord, I am wrong." It also means saying,"Lord, You are right!"

Repentance means facing the truth about your sin — the truth that it must end now. It is a crisis moment of truth, a place of recognition where you admit, "I cannot continue in my sin and have the Holy Ghost living in me. If I do, I will lose everything. Lord, You're right about sin bringing death upon me. I see that
if I continue in it, it's going to destroy me and my family. God, I make no more excuses."

Simply put, repentance is a confrontation with your sin. The battle is fought before you get to the cross~it takes place as the Holy Spirit deals with you.

The same is true of self-denial. In short, self-denial is a confrontation that  says, "Sin ends now at this point!" Contrary to what many "comfort preachers" say, self-denial is not some heartache you have to bear, or some infirmity of your flesh. When Paul said, "I die daily," he meant simply, "I have to deny that I can continue in sin and still have Christ's favor. I don't
have a special dispensation from God to hold on to a pet sin just because I do good works. No! I agree with the Word of God and I deny all my rights to continue in sin."

The glorious truth of the gospel is that if we die with Jesus, we also come into the glory of His resurrection and into newness of life. His cross is our cross, His death is our death, and His resurrection is our resurrection, through our identification and union with Him. That is the real cross we bear.

Yet this is the cross that many so-called ministers of the gospel have done away with. The real cross is not about lovely words describing our Savior's suffering and bleeding on Calvary. No, the true meaning of the cross is that Jesus bled and died to bring our sin-sick souls into glorious liberty and freedom
To break every chain of sin that binds us.
 ~David Wilkerson~

CONFRONTATION Of The CROSS

Let me show you what I mean by the confrontation of the cross.

Consider a man who is fed up with his sinful habit yet he continually falls deeper into its clutches. He has promised himself a hundred times he will never do it again - and, for a while, he submerges the temptation and enjoys a measure of freedom. But later it comes back with greater force.

This man has covered up his sin, lied about it, cheated because
of it - and it has brought him great sorrow. He no longer enjoys
it, but he can't quit. He just keeps going back.

The man knows he will have to stand at the judgment seat one
day and he goes through life fearing exposure and scandal. His
sin has drained him, shackled him, deceived him. It has brought
him down to a weariness in which he can hardly exist - he's at
the end of his rope.

In this sad, weary, worn-out state, the Holy Spirit brings the man this word: "There is a way out for you. There is a place of victory, peace, joy, newness of life. Accept Christ's call to run to Him and find rest. Go to the cross of Jesus Christ."

Beloved, when you kneel at the cross, you will not hear an easy,
soft word, at least not at first. Even though the cross is the only
door to life, you are going to hear about death - death to every sin.

At the cross, you face the crisis of your life and that is what is
missing in so many churches. The preaching of the cross brings
about a crisis of sin, of self-will. It will speak to you with loving,
but firm, words about the consequences of continuing in your sin:

Deny yourself. Embrace the death of the cross. Follow Me!

And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me (Lk 9:23).

~David Wilkerson~

GOD Ran Out Of Patience With Them

Israel refused to believe God's message about how precious they were in his eyes. Instead, they preferred to focus on their condition their problems,weaknesses and inabilities and they gave in to their fears.

After a time, God ran out of patience with them, saying to Moses: "How long will this people provoke me? And how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have showed among them? I will smite them . . . and disinherit them" (Numbers 14:11-12).

The Lord forgave Israel for Moses' sake but they were not permitted to enter into the Promised Land. Instead, they were assigned a wilderness existence, a life given over to constant fear and destructive doubts. They were forgiven but miserable! They had lost the hope, rest and peace that come from accepting and believing how special God's children are to Him.

Beloved, the only time God's patience runs out with us is when we refuse again and again to accept how much He loves us and wants to see us through our battles. Indeed, many Christians today have been turned back into a wilderness of their own making. They have no joy, no victory. To look at them, you'd think God had forsaken them years ago when actually He has just turned them over to their own complaining and murmuring.

Thank God, Joshua and Caleb entered into the Promised Land. And what joy they had! God blessed them incredibly and they stood as green trees in His house until their dying days. They were men of power and vision because they knew they were precious to God.

You also are precious to the Lord, in spite of all your problems and failures. No matter what your trials or struggles, you can be a green tree in God's house, just as Joshua and Caleb were. Simply stand on what His Word promises:"He brought me forth also into a large place; he delivered me, because he delighted in me" (Psalms 18:19). That is the foundation of true faith.
~David Wilkerson~

I Am Come To Send Fire

Luk 12:49 I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled? 

Luk 12:50 But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!

Luk 12:51 Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:

If you and I are going to be men and women of the Spirit, we are not going to have an easy time. Hell will see to that. At once the clash arises and it is true that the more the Holy Spirit is able to have His way in us and to lead us into all the will of God, the more we find this opposition, this antagonism. And it not only comes between us and the world, it sometimes comes in the circle of the Lord's own people. It is inevitable provocation. You wonder why, sometimes. As you read the New Testament you wonder, "What is the matter with these people? Why should they be so upset and so annoyed? And why should it be so spontaneous, this thing? And persistent; so unreasonable?" but there it is. There is the fact. It is inevitable.

You see, this thing that the Lord came to do and is doing, will not allow for any neutrality. It is going to be one thing or the other. It is going to be for or against. The eyes of flame (here the fire comes in again) the eyes of flame will not allow lukewarmness or anything that is of the Laodicean character. 

The fire is a positive element always, and it will create positive situations. If everything is all just nice and quiet, no disturbance, no trouble and no antagonism and opposition, you have reason to question whether the Holy Spirit is doing much, because He does aim at such a positiveness, which is a very, very costly thing. It is either with the Lord, or not with the Lord, and there is nothing between. It is going to come out sooner or later and be precipitated. Now, the Lord says that is what He came to do. This is not an accident, a chance or things having gone wrong or miscarried.

This is exactly what He came to do – to scatter fire on the earth and these are the inevitable effects of the fire. They are going to work out.
~T. Austin Sparks~

Help Thou My Unbelief!

                              

Mar 9:24  And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.

 

Here is something that you and I must dwell upon. Personally, I am constantly brought to this: I have not yet learned thoroughly to believe what I believe in! I believe in the finished work of Christ, yet sometimes I am just as miserable about myself as any man could be.

I am often almost at the point of giving up because of what a wretched kind of thing I am. If there is anything in this world that would cause me to give up the Christian ministry, it is myself. Do you understand what I mean? Oh, how we are discouraged by what we find in ourselves! And so, we don't believe what we believe in. We believe in the finished work of Christ, and that God puts all that finished work to our account.

God does not see us in ourselves – He sees us in Christ. He does not see us, He sees Christ in us. We don't believe that! If we really did we would be delivered from ourselves and would indeed be triumphant Christians.

Of course, that does not mean that we can just behave anyhow. We may speak and act wrongly, but for every Christian there is a refuge – a mercy seat. It has not to be made; it is there with the precious Blood. That has not to be shed; it is shed.

There is a High Priest making intercession for us. There is everything that we need. The work is finished, completed. Oh, we Christians must believe our beliefs! We must take hold, with both hands, of the things which are of our Christian faith.

~T. Austin Sparks~

The Adulteress Will Hunt

The adulteress will hunt for the precious life (Proverbs 6:26).

The adulteress spoken of in this verse is Satan. He hunts down those who are precious to God.

The devil tries to seduce everyone who hungers after the Lord. Why do you think you are being so tested? You may have had a lifetime of trials, but it hasn't been because you are evil. No, it is because Satan knows how precious you are in God's sight and it is the precious life he is after!

During an evangelistic crusade on the West Coast, I met a young man who was a witch. In fact, he was the leader of a coven of witches. Even though this young man was deeply involved in the occult, he didn't believe Satan or his demons
would ever possess him.

One night as he tried to go to sleep, he saw horrible, demonic faces swirling on the ceiling of his bedroom, leering down at him. As they began to gather like a cloud and form a funnel, the young man realized they were about to come into his heart.

He was petrified. Then he remembered something from his childhood so he cried out, “In Jesus’ name, go!” And all the demons vanished.

The next night those forces rallied even greater legions. As the young man lay down to sleep, he heard a roaring sound. He looked up and saw the whole room filled with ugly, horrible creatures. They had formed a funnel again. This time the young man stood up on his bed and shouted, "I claim the blood of Jesus!" Again the demons fled in disarray.


The young man thought, "The next time they come, I won't be able to handle it." So he called a Christian friend and asked him to accompany him to one of my crusade meetings.


During the service, the young coven leader was convicted by the Holy Ghost, and he gave his heart to the Lord. He testified that even though his family had a background in the occult, he remembered that when he was about six years old, he had a heart for Jesus. “I clearly recall going into the woods behind our house and preaching my heart out," he said.


I have seen this same heart for God in my own children and grandchildren. I had that kind of heart when I was a child, so I knew exactly what this young man was talking about.


Suddenly, a light went on in me and I knew why the devil had tried to possess this young man and destroy him. It was because of how precious he was to God.

~David Wilkerson~

HE DELIVERED ME FROM MY ENEMY

                                                     
He sent from above, he took me, he drew me out of many waters. He delivered me from my strong enemy, and from them which hated me: for they were too strong for me. They prevented me in the day of my calamity: but the Lord was my stay. He brought me forth also into a large place; he delivered me, because he delightedin me" (Psalms 18:16-19).

In this psalm, David was looking back after a great deliverance. He was  rejoicing because the Lord had rescued him from his enemies: "I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised: so shall I be saved from mine enemies" (verse 3).

Indeed, David had just been through a terrible time of testing. Saul had put a bounty on his head and had chased him relentlessly, so that he was forced to sleep in caves, dens and open fields. David said of that dark time, "The sorrows of hell surrounded me, and I lived in distress. Ungodly men made me
afraid that my enemies were too strong for me. They all hated me!"

But God came roaring out of the heavens to deliver David: "He bowed the heavens  also, and came down. . . . The Lord also thundered in the heavens. . . . He sent from above, he took me, he drew me out of many waters. He delivered me from my
strong enemy" (verses 9,13,16-17).

Demon powers had surrounded David and the enemy had come in like a flood. Yet  David was able to say, "God came roaring forth to pull me out of those swirling waters. He rescued me from all my troubles!" "He brought me forth also into a large place; he delivered me, because he delighted in me" (verse 19).

David could say, "The reason God delivered me from all my enemies—from all my sorrows and the powers of hell—is because I am precious to Him. My God delights in me!"

Beloved, if you need deliverance, whether from lust, temptation or trial;  whether your problem is mental, spiritual, emotional or physical, the key is simply this: God delights in you! 
You are precious to Him!


~David Wilkerson~

Mixture Of Truth And Error

                                                      
It does not require a great deal of intelligence in order to recognise that, throughout the history of God's work, the master stroke of the great perverter has been confusion. God is not the God of confusion, but of order. Satan is the god of confusion. 

To get order out of chaos, God said: Let there be light. To get chaos out of order, Satan says Let there be confusion. His it is to confuse issues and elements. To do this, he must - as the word suggests - fuse (or try to fuse) elements which are constitutionally different and do not belong to each other. Thus there is a constitutional contradiction and inconsistency. It is only when his master-method runs amok that we have utter and unmitigated wickedness. His main work is deception by mixture. 

It is just here that the place, meaning, and sovereignty of the Holy Spirit in the life of the child of God has its meaning and importance. He is The Spirit of Truth. He alone knows where truth ends and falsehood begins. Only as we truly walk in the Spirit shall we know the truth and be made free from error. A walk in the Spirit demands a circumcised heart, a heart in which the severance has been made between flesh and spirit, Christ and self.

There has never been a heresy that has not had in it sufficient truth to deceive very good people. Likewise, there has never been anything wholly of God but the strategy of the Evil One has been to fasten on to it some implication, insinuation, interpretation, or suggestion, that would make it questionable or dangerous.

He even did this with the Lord Jesus Himself. He did it with Paul all through his life. Let a demon-possessed girl in Philippi sponsor the preaching of Paul and Silas, and it is damned and discredited. 

So, we come to this. A good thing can be made its own enemy, by being either confused, or taken out of its true meaning.

~T. Austin Sparks~

THE BEST IS YET AHEAD!

                                                                                                         
Perhaps during times of affliction you have almost fainted. You may have been so weak and weary you thought you couldn't go another step. But now, from where you stand, you can say, "I never want to go through that again but God brought me out. He has been faithful. Praise the Lord!"

God is not satisfied with a heartfelt "thank you" from us. Rather, He says, "Wait just a moment, My child. I did not bring you through all those troubles and afflictions just to make you a grateful overcomer. I've spent years training you, putting you through all these things for a purpose, and I'm not going to let you waste them now. I fully intend for my investment to pay off. I tell you, your best work is ahead of you!"

Now, as you emerge from your college-level afflictions, God opens your eyes to  your struggling friends in kindergarten. These beloved ones don't think they can make it, so what do you do with your affliction experiences? God whispers to you, "I need seasoned, tested veterans, people who have survived deep waters and awful fires, who have been refined through suffering. I want people who will prove My faithfulness to this generation!" The psalmist writes: "That ye may tell it to the generation following" (Psalm 48:13). "Now also when I am old and greyheaded, O God, forsake me not; until I have shewed thy strength unto this generation, and thy power to everyone that is to come" (71:18).

Paul sums it all up beautifully: "But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel" (Philippians 1:12). That is saying something! When Paul wrote this, he was an older man with years of experience and he was in the midst of one of the worst trials of his life. He spoke to his friends from his heart:

It would be the most wonderful thing right now if I could go home and be with  my Lord. That is my greatest desire. But I'm a veteran; I've been through afflictions and trials and I know I'm needed here. This generation needs to see a sufferer who survives and rejoices in any affliction.

My son Timothy is going to face all that I've faced, and he needs to know that God will bring him through. So, it is best that I stay and endure these deep afflictions. Look at me! Not only have I survived, but I have true hope. I'm not down or depressed. I rejoice in the Lord for all He has brought me through!

~David Wilkerson~

Passive Faith

                                                                                 
Abram was called by God to leave his home, his land, his father, his mother, his upbringing, his heritage — leave it all and go to a land of God’s leading (Genesis 12).

What faith! It takes amazing faith to leave everything behind and respond immediately, wholeheartedly to the word that one is hearing in his heart —whether it is an audible or an inner voice.

So Abram left and took with him his young nephew named Lot. Then Abram said to Lot, ‘Let there be no strife between you and me, and  between your herdsmen and my herdsmen, for we are kinsmen. Is not the whole land before you? Separate yourself from me. If you take the left hand, then I will go to the right, or if you take the right hand, then I will go to the left’” (Genesis 13:8-9,).

Abram was employing what I call a passive faith. I don’t mean passive in the sense of, “I don’t care” or “Que sera, sera — whatever will be, will be.” This type of passive faith says that you are not going to take action on your own behalf. You are not going to try to make things happen by the will of man. You will allow God to orchestrate the events in your life in such a way that His will will be accomplished.

There are times in life where we need to have that type of passive faith, when there’s nothing else we can do but say, “God, your will be done, not mine.”

Passive faith looks at situations that seem impossible and says, God, I  don’t know how this will ever be worked out. I don’t know how any of these difficulties and troubles that I’m facing will ever be resolved, but I put my trust in You.

Abram had the confidence that God was looking out for his best interests, confidence that God knew what was better for him than he himself knew.

Abram did not just rest in the Lord but he trusted that God was going to make the right decision for him

~David Wilkerson~

Building On The Rock

                                                   
If you say you're a Christian — that you love Jesus and walk in obedience to Him~yet you neglect Him day after day by not praying, then you really don't know Him. Your house is not on the rock, it’s on sand and it's going to collapse completely in hard times.

You cannot get to know Jesus only by going to church. You must have a  day-by-day, hour-by-hour conversation with the Lord. You must get to know Him, grow to love Him, and desire to know what pleases Him.

We consider the Lord's commandments to be something burdensome, restricting to  our personal freedom. And rather than embracing His words to us, we look for ways to escape them.

We distort God's grace by making it out to be some kind of tunnel out of the  prison of His law. But grace is actually a teacher of holiness: "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly,righteously, and godly, in this present world" (Titus 2:11-12).

The man on the rock embraces and joyfully fulfills the Lord's commands. He  doesn't see God as someone with a belt in His hand, always ready to chastise him. No, he sees the Lord as One with arms outstretched to him, saying, "Come to Me and receive life, receive strength. I'll carry you through!" God’s Word shows us what it takes to build upon the Rock.

Enoch obeyed God with the sole objective of pleasing Him. "By faith Enoch was  translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God (Hebrews 11:5). Enoch was translated because he pleased the Lord.

The apostle John says: "And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, because we  keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight" (1John 3:22). "For thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created" (Revelation 4:11).

~David Wilkerson~

The Realm Of Satan's Power

It is very evident that any ground of the world, which in its nature is a kingdom without suffering, without the Cross, without the setting aside of natural life, is the realm of Satan's power and authority. It is perfectly clear that, in the case of countless individual Christians, the weakness, defeat and dishonour which characterize them, and which became so manifest in Peter's case, are due to occupying the ground of Satan's strength. That ground may be said to be compromise with the world in its principle.

~T. Austin Sparks~

Are YOU Hearing The BLOOD And Seeing The EVIL?

                 What's Your Focus And Conversation Christian?

Isa 33:14  The sinners in Zion are afraid; fearfulness hath surprised the hypocrites. Who among us shall dwell with the devouring fire? who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?

Isa 33:15  He that walketh righteously, and speaketh uprightly; he that despiseth the gain of oppressions, that shaketh his hands from holding of bribes, that stoppeth his ears from hearing of blood, and shutteth his eyes from seeing evil;
 
Isa 33:16  He shall dwell on high: his place of defense shall be the munitions of rocks: bread shall be given him; his waters shall be sure.