Pastor Gail – Opening and Prayer
1. It’s a beautiful day today to be in the house of the Lord. A lot of us have been very busy this last week. I think we’re playing catch-up with ourselves. And that’s the wonderful thing about the Lord though, even if we’re trying to get everything in order, He already is at peace and in order. Amen. What a great, great God, Amen.
2. I invite you to look at your Bibles today, and if you don’t have a Bible, there are some on the seats. We’re going to look in the Word for a moment today. We just want to know the Holy Spirit more and more. He’s the third person of the Godhead, of the Trinity and He’s here. So, if you’d like to look in your Bible, we’ll turn to 2 Timothy 3:14-17. Timothy is receiving a word from Paul, how to be prepared for the last days.
3. “But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
4. So, Father we come before You today, none of us knows what the future holds, but the Holy Spirit knows. The coming joys and the pains, and we want to learn of the Holy Spirit today, to learn from His instruction as we gathered together today in this service. We thank You, Holy Spirit, Father, Son that You will prepare us for whatever is in the future. You always know, You always know what is best for us. Amen. Would you stand and let’s worship the Lord.
5. Oh, yes, we praise You Lord. Hallelujah, Amen, Amen. Today and next Sunday, (3rd and 10th November 2024) is the international day of prayer for the persecuted church. We may think that we have been persecuted some, if our families, you know, don’t like the way we worship, or maybe people make fun of you because you talk about Jesus, but we really have no idea, of the faith of people that live in countries, that to be a Christian, they could possibly die for their faith.
6. Even today, I hate to say it, but I’m sure that someone somewhere in the world is going to die because they’re Christian. Would you mind joining hands that we might be united, to pray for the persecuted church, that God will give them faith in Jesus, that whatever is before them, Jesus goes before them, the Spirit of the Lord, Amen.
7. Let’s pray, let’s pray. Father in Thy name, we pray right now for those who live in countries where they are persecuted for their faith. Lord, You know their names, Lord you see their hearts for You. Lord, You see how they suffer, Lord, But You see that they haven’t given up on who You are. Lord, some even today, God, if they enter glory, we know that You’ve already opened the door of heaven for the. Lord, we know that You welcome them with arms, arms of Love. Lord, we pray for them, they are our brothers and they are our sisters around the world, God. We stand with them today God; they will know the power of Your love God, the wonder of Your presence God, the victory Lord, of being in Your arms, that Lord, whatever may happen to our physical body, God, You will protect our spiritual man, God. Lord, You will guard our hearts and minds, Lord, until that day when we all see You face-to-face. We thank You Lord for victory, we thank You Holy Spirit, for the anointing, God, of victory. We thank You God, for joy, joy, joy to cover them now today. In the name of Jesus.
8. And this week, as you often might think of them, I challenge you today to pray for them. We will pray for them next week also. Amen. Would you greet someone here, you’ve taken hands, now greet them. Praise the Lord. Sometimes, we can feel like life is just overwhelming us, and it feels like the Lord has asked us to walk somewhere, that’s so difficult. Maybe we’ll even think it’s too difficult. But the fact is, the truth is, when we call on His name, when we speak His name, we realize He’s there and He always has been. Amen. And He makes us able to walk through the most difficult times. Amen.
9. I want us to take a moment right now, we’re getting ready for Holy Communion. And sometimes when we are preparing to take communion, we can almost feel like our problems are so big, it takes our eyes off the Lord at the table. But His grace does abound. His hand is with us. And our feet may fail, but His never do and today, I believe that the Lord wants to just lift some of up, His hand just to lift you up. So, you can take just a moment, you can kneel, you can stand, just search your souls. I’m never worthy of Communion; it’s only because I’m covered with the blood of Jesus, and He lives in my heart. He’s the One that’s worthy. So, just take a moment as the music plays, just to search your heart.
Pastor Gail – Main Message
1. My word today might seem very simple, but it’s the most foundational thing we need to hear in this time. I think that everybody would agree with me that life is rather tough. All around the world, we hear of great difficulties. And I hear people lots of time talking about they’re afraid about what’s going to happen, what’s coming next. And because of the worry, sometimes it becomes fear, sometimes it becomes anger, and I think sometimes as I’ve been talking to the Lord, probably the last 2 months about this sermon today, I felt like the Lord told me, that often His Church, His Children, His beautiful Body, we’re trying to get answers, we’re trying to bring heaven down and get things from heaven, maybe through our words, through our works, but really the things of heaven can only come through prayer.
2. And I expect, and this is one of those sermons that are harder to preach about. Nobody wants you to talk about prayer. Because lots of times, if we’re honest with ourselves, most of us don’t pray like the Lord would like us to pray. He doesn’t hear our voices as much as He would like to hear our voices talking to Him. I think, sometimes we become like the man in Acts 8, his name was Simon the magician. And it seemed like he accepted Jesus, and Jesus came into his life, but as he was seeing the miracles that the disciples were doing, he actually offered to pay for the presence of the power of God. And of course, as you know, that didn’t happen.
3. His heart was not right, he was trying to buy something on earth, that can only come from heaven. Our deserts no longer being dry, they can only come when the Holy Spirit begins to water them., with the presence of the Lord. We cannot purchase the power of the Holy Spirit, with formulas or finances. It comes through prayer and humility.
4. And I don’t know about you, but the day I’m living in right now, me personally, I feel like I know less and less, how to have an answer. And I know I need Jesus more than ever before. We cannot buy the Spirit of God, His presence, that is the spirit of Simon in Acts 8. We cannot pay for it, but we can pray for it. Amen, Amen. We can’t bargain with God. Like, ‘God if You do this for me, I promise I’ll pray more tomorrow.’ It doesn’t work that way.
5. But Stavros and I have had this discussion through the years a lot, about prayer. Prayer is hard work; it is a struggle. And do you know why it is a struggle? Because prayer is powerful. Prayer is talking to the Godhead. Prayer is inviting the Holy Spirit to come and be with us to do what only He can do.
6. Let me just share a few stories on answered prayer. And if you’ve got a pen and paper, you might even like to note one or two, just to remember for yourself. Peter was in prison. And he got released from prison, because of a house prayer. Paul and Silas, they were in chains in prison and they fell off them at midnight, because they prayed.
7. In Acts 2, the Holy Spirit came, while a prayer meeting was going on. Elijah prayed for the rain to stop for three and a half years. It stopped. He prayed again and it started again, and it proved to the king of that country, who was really in charge. Hanah prayed to have a baby and Samuel was born. Steven was about to go into eternity, and the heavens opened as he was praying, and he saw Jesus standing in front of him.
8. Moses asked and he prayed, “Oh God can I see you?” And the Lord said, “I will hide you in the cleft of the rock as I pass by.” Daniel had 3 friends that were about to die in a fiery furnace. And he prayed for them for interpretation of a dream. God gave the interpretation and God saved the three friends and Nebuchadnezzar knew who God is.
9. Let me give you a few more examples. Elisha and his servant were surrounded by an enemy (2 Kings 6:17-20). He prays for God to reveal His power, and to open the eyes of his servant. As the eyes of the servant were opened, he saw the angels, the armies of God surround him and it was more than the army that was physically before them.
10. David was king. His very first battle against the Philistines, he prayed. God, what do we do? How can we win this battle? I love this answer from God – “When you hear the sound in the mulberry trees, when you hear that sound, go to battle. You will win.” Amen.
11. Abraham prayed for his nephew Lot, to be rescued. The thief on the cross. He asked Jesus, ‘Will You save me before you die?’ And moments after he died, he opened his eyes and he was in paradise. The list could go on and on. I didn’t even know where to stop, when I was looking for answers to prayer in the Bible.
12. What kind of Church would we become, if we really prayed? I believe God is calling this house, this family, to become prayer warriors. Prayer is never a waste of your time. I have told myself that I will never say, ‘I don’t have time to pray.’ Don’t say that. God can stretch the time, amen. He can do it!
13. I love this next passage in Matthew 6:6, “But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.” Your Father will reward you. He’s saying when you pray it pays off. But this is a very interesting passage of Scripture. It is the only verse in the New Testament, that the word, ‘you’ is singular. It’s not plural. Usually we think of ‘you’ when we read the Bible, it means ‘all of you.’ This happens nowhere else in the Bible but here, and look at how many times He says it. I didn’t have time, but I think in the ancient Greek, I think it’s even 8 times, “When YOU pray and YOU go into YOUR room and shut the door and pray to YOUR Father, who is in secret, and YOUR Father who sees in secret will reward YOU.’
14. Five times, personally you’re told. The Holy Spirit is there to intercede for us. And when we don’t know what to pray, but when you begin to pray, when you don’t know what to pray for, He can give you the thoughts, He knows what you need to pray for. He can also give you that heavenly language, that communicates directly with the Father. Prayer is a fight, and we all need breakthroughs, I do believe that. But we have got to become fighters, where we will wrestle and pray until breakthrough comes.
15. You see the enemy knows, that if we will pray, that on the other side of a prayer, there’s answers. And sometimes, I think, if we begin to kneel and pray. I remember when I was a little girl, in the church I grew up in, every Sunday night, we’d come and kneel at the altar, and whatever need you had, you just would stay there, and you’d pray, and others would gather around you and you would pray, until you felt you had breakthrough. And I believe that some of those prayer times, are why I have been able to stay and fight for victory in Greece, and we are going to have victory in Greece.
16. Powerful answers do not come without a formidable fight, a big fight. And we need to understand that we’re in a fight. And Leto, we’re going to show the movie ‘The War Room’, remind me. It’s a great movie. It talks about prayer. Fighting in prayer.
17. Whether it was Abraham pleading for Sodom for his nephew, Lot, whether it was David, brokenhearted with grief, whoever it was, the examples in the Bible, they were pleading with heaven, what about Jesus on the cross; what about Jesus before the cross, in the Garden. What was He doing? He was praying. He was praying and fighting so hard, for you and I, that it said that His sweat became as blood.
18. Can you add your name to the list who have prayed and prayed till you have seen a breakthrough? There does seem to be the cost of passion and blood. People who prevail in prayer, continue in prayer, it turns ordinary people into men and women of power, Amen. And I believe we are going to meet a lot of them in America that we never knew their names here, but they prevailed in prayer, and they saw the power of God come for many needs.
19. Prayer is spiritual warfare and when we pray, it brings God into our situation. Praying is not just praying once; Oh, I did that once. Sometimes, it’s praying and praying and praying, prevailing and persevering. In Ephesians 6:17-18, Paul is talking about the armor of God, “Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.” Paul is saying, “Take your sword, and your salvation, and pray in the Spirit, always.”
20. The interesting thing in this passage, too, it says, ‘Take the helmet of salvation, and the sword,’ they’re connected. They’re not separated. We’ve got to learn, to have the helmet of salvation on, ‘Lord, I’m saved, and Lord, I have an offensive weapon, I have the sword.’ So, because I’m saved because of who You are, I take the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God, and no weapon formed against me shall prosper, Amen. And it says in verse 18, ‘So, keep alert, keep making supplication, in other words, keep praying.’
21. Guess what, when Paul wrote this, he was in prison in chains, and all through this section, he mentions prayer many, many times. Pray for me, pray in the Spirit, pray all the time, if you want breakthrough, pray. There are miracles on the other side of the wrestling match of prayer.
22. 1 Thessalonians 5:17, “Pray without ceasing.” Three little words. A lot of people ask, ‘How can you pray without ceasing,’ and people try to explain it all the time. If I obey what it says, does it mean, I never eat, I never sleep, I never talk, I never go on Facebook, or Tik Tok, I cannot worship, … This word here in Greek, and Greeks probably know this, it’s actually a medical term, and it describes an incessant cough. A cough that won’t stop. It is impossible to have one long cough. So, it can’t mean that. It’s impossible to have one long cough, if I did do that I would die, you would have to take me to the emergency room. That’s not what it means. But you know when you’ve had that kind of cough, it’s like you’ve got an itch in your throat. And you try to get rid of it. Brian gets coughs like that a lot. But his aren’t an itch.
23. So, have you ever sat beside someone with one of those kinds of coughs? You want to say, stop it, stop it. But what Paul is saying, that nagging and hacking cough, that prayer continues, you’re so in tune with the Spirit. Cough, Oh, I’m on the bus, I must pray for her. Cough, Oh, I’m on the street, that person must need prayer. It’s a cough. Every time you feel one of those, it’s saying, Oh I need to pray for Billy. I need to pray for Eva-Lena to write more songs.
24. Continual prayer is not a prayer that continues without interruption, is what it’s saying. But it continues whenever possible. We always should be ready to pray. That’s pretty simple, isn’t it? Cough. Yeah, anywhere and at all times. Imagine what would happen if we had an epidemic of prayer. We would always be in touch with heaven.
25. I just really quickly end with 3 points.
a. There was a woman in Matthew 15:22-28, and this woman needed the attention of God. She was a prayer warrior. She was battling to get God’s attention. “A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly.” Jesus did not answer a word. So, his disciples came to him and urged him, “Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.”
He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.” The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said. He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.” “Yes, it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.” (NIV). She’s losing her daughter to demonic forces. She begins to pray and cry out to God, her only hope. And as we read the Scripture, she calls to Jesus, but He doesn’t answer her. And the disciples begged Jesus to please send her away. She’s not a Jew, she’s a Canaanite. So, she would have been considered a dog by Jews of that day. But it says that she kept shouting, she kept fighting. But as you read the Scriptures, even looks now when Jesus answers, He’s not answering her. He’s answering the disciples. “I came to the lost sheep of Israel.” The Scriptures say that she knelt down before Jesus and begged Him, bowed before Him. ‘Lord, help me!’ And He answered and said, “It’s not good to give the children’s bread to the dogs.” You can read this and wow, what an answer from Jesus! But she looked at Jesus and she said, ‘Even the dogs feed from the crumbs that fall from the master’s table.’ Jesus saw her great faith and her daughter was healed. I think we can see three levels of prayer to fight through this story to get a breakthrough. This woman was not a Jew, she was a gentile and she faced these hurdles. I think it is a great example for us how to get an answer in prayer when we don’t see an answer.
Somebody once said, ‘If you want to do anything for Christ, first pray the price.’ To really do something for God, you need to pray. It costs you time, it costs being in His presence. This is what this woman did. She was facing an impossible situation; she asked for an answer, and He did not answer even a word. Have you ever felt like that – ‘Jesus, I’ve asked, You’re not answering me!’ Can you pray when you feel like He’s not listening, when you keep praying? Do you give up, do you stop? This woman could have left, ‘Well He’s not answering. There’s nothing here for me.’
b. But she pressed through and faced hurdle number two. And Jesus said, and probably not to her. It looks like, in that text, He’s just telling the disciples, ‘Yes, I’ve been sent to the lost sheep of Israel.’ She could be thinking, ‘Everybody’s getting answers but me. He’s not even talking to me!’ She’s still not getting an answer. ‘Yeah, yeah, Jesus, I know that’s who You were sent to, but I have a daughter, and I’m losing her to demonic spirits.’ Can you face this hurdle? When it seems like He’s talking to everybody else but you? Everybody else is getting an answer but you? Will you keep praying? ‘Jesus, I’m going to keep on praying, I need Your attention.’ It would kind of be like if some of us were there, ‘Quit looking at those twelve guys, look at me!’
c. And the third and final hurdle. And this one is where most of us kind of live and explain the lot. When people ask us, ‘Why isn’t God answering me?’ We give a standard answer, without really giving heaven’s answer. Oh, you’re in a testing time, or God is maturing you, all things work together for good. We give those answers. That’s crazy, instead of praying, we give a standard answer. And she’s standing there and her daughter is possessed by a demon. Now think about this. I just learned this too. That this is such a cool passage, all of this. The children’s bread is what Jesus was sent to give to Israel. And I’ve already told you that ‘dogs’ is what jews called non-Jews. So, when Jesus said that, ‘The children’s bread is not for the dogs,’ He was giving her a standard answer. And she wasn’t offended. Do you know why? Because that’s what everybody said in the land of Israel at that time. If you’re not a Jew, you’re a dog, and then the Messiah is coming for the lost tribe of Israel.
Maybe the Lord wants us to learn like her, when we just feel like the standard answer is coming, oh, God is maturing you, or get better. God wants to give you an answer besides a standard answer. He wants you to press through like that woman. She came and knelt and got His attention. Because suddenly what does He say? “Woman your faith is great.” And her daughter was healed instantly. She wrestled and wrestled and suddenly Jesus looks at her. Yes, yes. She said, ‘Jesus, even the dogs get the crumbs.’ And she was telling Jesus, ‘Jesus, I’ll even take the crumbs. I’m not offended, give me the crumbs.’ And when He saw that great faith, she wasn’t embittered, in fact she pressed on, ‘I want an answer because I know You have it.’ “Oh woman, your faith is great.”
26. I often read lots of books about how people used to pray. I have a whole bunch of them if you’d like to borrow one. But I think its time for us to quit reading about how it used to be. Sometimes, like me, we think we’re like the cheetah. It’s the fastest animal on earth. But do you know that it can only run that speed for 5 seconds. If they run longer than that they die, their heart will burst. It just small bursts of energy and a really tiny heart. So, if it doesn’t catch the pray, the thing it wants to kill, on the first attempt, it just has to back off, or it’s going to die.
27. Paul is saying to us, ‘Don’t lose heart. Don’t give up. In due time you will reap a harvest, you’ll see an answer. Don’t give up. Instead pray without ceasing.’ Pray on your knees. I think we need to practice that more and more.
28. I love this Psalm 119:32, “I will run in the way of your commandments when you enlarge my heart!” We don’t have to go quicker, like the cheetah. But we need to go deeper. The Lord is wanting us to fight in prayer. ‘Lord, enlarge my heart. When things get tough, enlarge my heart.’ Amen. Pray without ceasing. Pray, pray. You have family members that need Jesus. Economical needs. Physical needs. Maybe just yourself, you struggle with fear, or anger, critical spirit, judgmental, I don’t know. But the enemy wants to keep you locked in that.
29. But the Scripture says, “Whom the Son sets free, is free indeed.” (John 8:36). Do you feel free today? Well don’t just talk about it if you don’t. Let’s start praying. Pray so that you can live in that freedom. Amen.
30. I’m going to invite you to stand. And if you’re here today and you don’t know Jesus, there’s no better day than today, then ask Him to come into your life, because He will answer you at just the right time. That’s who He is. He’s the Lord God of answers. But remember this too. Sometimes we wonder, ‘Why did that take so long, God?’ It’s not always just about you. Lots of times, He’s weaving lots of answers together, for the greater glory of God.
31. Jesus could have healed Lazarus, the minute He found out that he was dead. But Mary, Martha and Lazarus, would have been the only ones that would have been blessed. But He waited. He waited and the crowd grew around the house. And when Jesus said, “Come forth,” all those people that saw it, they were there they saw the miracle of resurrection, Amen. Bringing someone back from the dead. Oh, help us God to remember that it’s not just about me. Sometimes, the answer is that You want to touch a lot of peoples’ lives by what You do in my life, Amen.
32. And if you ask Jesus today, He’ll come into your life. I’d like for us to pray for a moment to pray. Pray to pray. Pray to want to pray. Pray to fight to pray. Pray to believe that God will answer it. Father, we pray together right now oh Lord, I know, the enemy does not want us to pray. He doesn’t want us to battle. He doesn’t want us to wait on You. He doesn’t want us to take our eyes off of our problems and put them on You, instead he wants us to stay tied in a life filled with difficulties and pressures and anxieties, worries and cares, but oh God, You want to set us free, to believe oh God that every answer we need is in the name of Jesus. The Holy Spirit of God is with us, bringing answers from heaven. Lord, today I pray for an anointing on this house, an anointing on this house that we will pray, we will call one another to pray, we will meet one another to pray, God. We will bend our knee in Your presence God, believing God, that greater things are yet ahead, God, that’s it’s nothing that we do. Man cannot do it, but it is by the hand of God from heaven. In the name of the Lord. It is the hand of God, Lord. We need You Lord, we need Your presence. Lord, we pray, Holy Spirit, rain down, open the windows of heaven and pour out blessings, we cannot contain. We come into Your presence Lord. You are the Lord. We are not. You are the answer, we’re not. Lord, we pray for every need today, God, we come before Your throne Lord, we lay the economic needs before Your throne, the physical needs Lord God, we lay our children that need to know You before You oh Lord, we lay our questions about the word before You that You will answer and teach us God. We pray, Holy Spirit come in a whole fresh new way. Yes, Holy Spirit, we need You. Yes, Holy Spirit, we need the freshness of heaven. Oh, Hallelujah. Oh, Holy Spirit, rain over us. Hallelujah, spend time with God. Spend time with Him. You’ll begin to have a prayer language and a relationship with God, that is so rich, oh Hallelujah. It’s worth more than anything in this world.