2-11-07
(part 1 of the fasting series)
~Any place where you read of a moutain top in the Bible, it refers to a high place in God. It represents a high experience in God.
~So Abraham gave Lot first choice and Lot didn't choose the high experience of God, because it looked rocky, it looked hard to get to, it didn't look green. Meanwhile, in the valley, lights were beaming, people were singing and dancing, there were feastings, and Lot chose this direction.
~You can not be in a place like that, and not have evil affect you. You cannot be in a place like that, never experiencing God's presence, and think "I can stay a Christian and never attend His presence." You cannot be in a place like that and say it doesn't matter, that you know what to do, that you can get out of it yourself. NO YOU CAN'T. You always have to have a mountain top experience which represents a high experience in God.
~God told Moses, if you will bring the people up, I will be with them, and the people got scared, and they said, we don't want the mountaintop experience, Moses, you go and get me a Word.
~When Lot and his family left Abraham, they were blessed of God. They were so blessed of God that they had abundance in everything. But evil began to take hold and began to change his way of thinking and mindset, and because of what was going on, that Abraham had to begin to fast and pray. Thank God for His mercy and grace that He sent an angel to Abraham telling him that his nephew is changing (not in a good way), and Abraham falls on his face, but God said He was going to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham said, if you can find just 50 righteous, God, would you not destroy it? God said okay, but God couldn't find 50 good people who wanted His presence. He went back to Abraham and told him this.
~Will we come to the day when God cannot even find 50 good churches in America that want His presence and His will there?
~Abraham says, but if you can just find but 10, God, but God couldn't even find 10 good who wanted His presence. He had the angel tell Abraham that he'd better get Lot out of there because He was going to destroy it.
~God then sends an angel to Lot to tell him everything that is going to happen. He (Lot) is in the midst of the evil and brings the men of God (angels) into his house, and because homosexuality was running so rampant, men came to Lot's and wanted to be with the angels of the Lord.
~Look at Lot. The very things that you laid down for God are the very things you start making excuses for when you stay out of church, when you stay out of His presence.
~Look at what Lot says, he says, if you just won't touch these men, "I've got some daughters that I will freely give you and they're virgins; take them." Where before this, I imagine Lot was probably guarding those daughters with his life, because that is in a father to do. It is built in a father to guard his daughter's purity with everything that's within him. But because of the evil and staying out of the mountain top experience, which is the very presence of God, Lot was willing to sacrifice.
~The angels of the Lord told Lot to get his wife and two daughters and get out of there, because God was about to reign fire and brimstone on this place. The angels of the Lord said to Lot, "I'm going to take you to the moutaintop, I'm going to take you to where your uncle lives, I'm going to take you because somebody's been fasting and praying for your soul; I'm going to take you to the very presence of God," And do you know what Lot says? He says, "I can't go there because I am fearful." He's saying I can't go into the presence of God because I know where my heart's been, I know what I've been thinking, I know what my deeds are, and I don't want to die." Lot then asks that instead of going to the mountain top, if they could instead take him to the city of Zoar. The city of Zoar is like a suburb. He didn't want the mountaintop experience of the presence of God, but he didn't want to burn up in fire either. So he says "if you can just get me a little ways away".
~How many of us don't want hell, but don't really want the moutaintop experience of God's presence either? We try to bargain with God and we try to get out of Sodom and Gomorrah just enough. We don't really want to climb anything. We don't really want to be anywhere, and we still want just a little bit of Sodom and Gomorrah in our heart.
~The angel of the Lord was through messing with Lot and grabbed his hand, Lot grabbed his wife's hand, the wife grabbed the daughters' hands, and the angel said, "you're coming wether you like it or not because I am obligated. Not because of what you want to do, not because of what's in your heart." Because Lot didn't want to go; his wife proved she didn't want to go because she turned into a pillar of salt. The angel stressed to Lot, this is not on you, but I have to oblige the fasting and the praying of your uncle because he loves you so much, that he doesn't want to see you destroyed."
~You ask what's going on? There's some people in here that love you so much, that despite your dumb choices, they are fasting and praying for you. I know that's bold. Despite the fact that we allow our heart to become so wrapped up in the things of this world, that we can't even see that the very things we used to stand against, are the very things we find ourselves doing.
~Thank God we have some Abrahams who say, will not allow my uncle to die; God if you could but just spare him (or her); God I'm gonna stay here at this altar, I'm gonna sacrifice unto you, I'm gonna offer you drink offerings, I'm going to give you peace offerings, God I"m going to fast unto you...Just save him, just save him, just bring him out of that place. ?He don't know what he's doing, the devil's got him deceived, he doesn't understand that the time is short, he doesn't understand that America's not always going to be America, things are changing."
~Things are changing and they are changing in America. I believe by the year 2008 you will look back and not believe how much change happened in one year.
~Some of us, as Christians, better quit playing around and find an altar..and start fasting and praying. God is about to start doing some things in America, we better get on our knees and start fasting and praying.
~We need to be careful because we give up. We as the so-called church, as the so-called elders, we don't really want the presence of God either, because climbing a mountain's hard. It's rocky and you have to give up your manicures and cute shoes. We don't want to give these up because we don't want to get wrinkled from the climb. God knows they'll expect something of me if I get too far up there.
~And a lot of us are saying, can I just have a little of Sodom and Gomorrah. Can I just go to Zoar? Zoar means "adequate". There are several definitions for this word but adequacy is one of them. Lot had the opportunity to go to the mountaintop, but chose adequacy.
~Lot didn't even realize what he was doing. Even in making the choices he did for his children. A lot of us spiritual mothers and fathers don't even realize what we're doing to the next generation because of our choosing adequacy over the very presence of God.
~Matthew 17:18-21
~We need to learn the principles of fasting. The devil doesn't want us fasting because we come into deeper relationship with God.
~When you fast, it doesn't change anyone but you.
~The word "howbeit" in verse 21 means that it goes with the above passage. It's a continuation. In other words, you can't quote this scripture and see results if you've never fasted a day in your life. If prayer is hard for you, you better not quote because it's not going to mean anything. "I can stand up here all day and say that I'm a millionaire, but that ain't gonna make it happen, unless I put action, investment and hard work behind it. So, "howbeit" means don't quote this Word that will only be words, unless you follow it up, through prayer and fasting.
~Sometimes you will come into a situation or problem that is going to take supernatural power to get you out. This comes by prayer and fasting.
~Some have made excuses, "well, Pastor, I would fast with you all but I get headaches." or "I would fast with you, but I get ill." Well, some of us have never given our digestive system a break. If anything, our digestive systems have worked on overload. Think of fasting as spring break for your body.
~Fasting is when you set aside a chunk of time, whether by a week or a day, or a chunk of time in the day and you give up food for God.
~There are several types of fasts. You can give up one meal a day, you can go three days with nothing but water, you can go twenty one days with just fruits and vegetables, etc.
~Fasting is hard and nobody wants to do it, but it is a command by Jesus Christ. In Matthew 6, there's three things that He commands if you're going to claim to be a born-again Christian. Those three commands are: 1) when you pray, 2) when you fast and 3) when you give. Notice Jesus says, "when" not "if." It's a commandment. It's expected.
~When one person fasts and pray, it's powerful. When Abraham fasted and prayed, he changed Lot's future, he spared Lot's and his children's lives. But when you get a group of people collectively fasting and praying on certain times...the Bible says that one can put a thousand to flight, but two..ten thousand.
~If Lot didn't even want to leave Sodom and Gomorrah, but because of Abraham's praying and fasting he was spared, what could fifty people in this body fasting and praying together do? What's more important to you, your kids or your steak? What's more important to you, your friends, or your corn-on-the-cob?
~The reason people don't like to even talk of fasting is because you are speaking of crucifying king's stomach, and we can look down and see we have kept that king high and lifted up for many years.
~Quick examples of when king's stomach controlled things:
-Eve at of the forbidden fruit and gave to her husband and they literally ate themselves out of the will of God for their lives. They were kicked out of the garden and had to till the ground...over a piece of fruit.
-There were three reasons God burned Sodom and Gomorrah.
1)Pride (that's America),
2)Homosexuality (that's America),
3)Gluttony (that's America). The Bible says that they had an abundance of bread. They would not fast and that was one of the things they were required to do as the Israelite people.
-Esau sold his birthright because of his allegiance to his stomach. Esau changed his history for one bowl of food.
-By the millions, the children of Israel died because they couldn't control their stomachs. The Bible says that they would go out every day and find manna and that not one feeble was among them, not one illness was among them for forty years. Everthing that was in that manna sustained their diet for forty years. But they got to complaining to God wanting the meat they used to eat in Egypt. So He sent quail down and they prepared it. As they began to eat it, they began to drop dead because they didn't think God's way was the right way, even though it was proven it was. They literally ate their way out of the Promised Land. and died right there in the wilderness.
~We have a book of promises (in the Bible) and you will never see some of those promises until you learn to fast and pray. There are promises that will never be released into our lives until you and I put down the fork.
~It is possible for God to want to give you things and have them all set aside, but because you don't want to seek His face for them, they just sit there and collect dust.
~How many times have we chosen chicken over the blessings of God?
~How many people could have had life changing experiences with Christ by now if we would have fasted and prayed as He required, not requested...but required of us.
~Satan knows that fasting releasing the power of God in our lives and he becomes disturbed when he realizes that you are going to be more than just a Sunday morning Christian.
~Fasting is not a freakish thing to do. It is to be a regular part of the Christian walk. If you read in the New Testament, they fasted.
Moses fasted forty days, on two different occasions.
Joshua fasted forty days.
Paul fasted fourteen days and God healed his eyes.
Fasting...healing. Fasting...healing. But do we really want to be healed? Because if we were really healed, then we would have no more excuses...
Peter fasted and God gave him a vision for the purpose of his life.
Daniel fasted for twenty one days and many times he fasted for a day at a time.
~The Bible teaches us of half day fasts (from sunup to sundown). The Bible teaches of a normal fast which is no food and water only for a certain amount of days. There is also an "absolute" fast where you go with no food and no water, but this should only be done in short chunks of time. There is also a partial fast. God will honor all of these if you are fasting with the right heart and pouring into your spirit.
~There are benefits to fasting, even in the natural. I did some research and have found some doctors that say that fasting is good for the body because our kidneys need a break. They said that fasting helps us to live longer. So fasting is not a bad thing as the god of this world would have you to believe. So, we reap not only spiritual benefits from fasting.
~Remember that God is not going to command you to do something to your body, that's not good for you. He would not have you destroying yourself, His creation or your body (which is the temple).
~I have heard other preachers speak, saying, we can't get tattoos or piercings, all the while, we're sucking down fast food and never fasting.
~In my research I found that there are a lot of things that happen to our kidneys, stomachs, lungs, intestines, because we don't want to put down the food. We get diseases, we eat so many preservatives that it causes toxins and acids in our bodies and the reason why we get sick.
~The Bible says that when we fast, things begin to happen. God gave me a Word last year to call a churchwide fast toward the first of the year, and that three things were going to happen. 1)Sets the course for the rest of the year, (that means you're fasting now for the problems in September). 2) Blessings will happen throughout the year because you fasted at the first of the year. 3) You release Matthew 6:33 principle into your life.."Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you." (Remember, this came only after Jesus said "when you pray and fast and when you give". Read the whole chapter of Matthew 6.)
~Christ said that fasting wasn't needed while the bridegroom was here, but after He was gone, then the disciples should be fasting. He is still gone away, so we should still be fasting and praying.
~4 things happen when you fast.
1) fasting breaks the chains poverty off of your life. Learn to fast when you plant seed, and you will see major blessings on your life. (Read Joel chapter 2).
2) healing follows fasting. (Read Isa 58)
3) you cause the next generation to do their job; our prayers and fasting empower them to do what God can use them effectively. And sexual addictions are broken (there's a spirit behind, homosexuality, there's a spirit behind pornography, etc.)
4) demonic powers are broken off your life and you become sensitive to the spirit world. You can walk in a room and discern the spirits there.
