Prayer Partners

Is this okay? You got me? Can you hear me now? Can you hear me now? Okay.

You have your Bibles? Would you turn with me to John, chapter two, and we'll look at verses one through 12 or one through 11. And it's good to be with you today. It's good to be with First Baptist Church. And I thank God for you and thank God for your pastor.

I know he is at the convention, and it's good for him to be there and vote for things that are happening in our convention, that it will stay the convention that it needs to be. Now, this is a special time for Susan and I, and matter of fact, it's our 57th anniversary. It was just a day. And thank you.

We were right here where Dr. Henry Lyon gave us our vows to each other and for his premarital counseling. We looked at deer pictures where he had shot deer and all this kind of stuff. I don't know if that did any good, but he really loved that deer hunting, so. But I thank God for him and the legacy he and his wife left here at this church and pray for Tim to follow also in that legacy of Dr. McCrummon and others that have stood in this place. So Susan and I are very fortunate.

If you look at chapter two, John, John is one of my favorite writers. I really. I wrote my dissertation on Luke, but I really enjoy reading about John. John not only wrote the Gospel of John, but he wrote first, second, and third John, and then he wrote the book of Revelation, and he was the last of the disciples left. And so as an old man, he's remembering back.

He's been banished to the island of Patmos, and he was a pastor at Ephesus in the latter part of his life. And so he has been banished to the island of Patmos, and there he writes. And Susan and I have been privileged to be at Patmos. And you go up this top of this mountain where John wrote Book of Revelation, and it's an amazing kind of thing. You feel like you're in the presence of.

Of what God had been doing then and what he continues to do now. So if you have your Bibles, would you stand and I'll read just one verse? I think the early church, when God's word was read, they'd get a letter. They would stand and read that. Okay, now we'll just do verse 10 and 11.

And saith unto him, every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine. And I know that sounds like an Episcopal kind of sermon, but I'll try to Bring it into the Baptist level. Okay.

Forth good wine. And when men have well drunk, then that which is worse but thou has kept the best to last. And as I hope, the best is life. This is the beginning of the signs or miracles that Jesus did in Cana of Galilee. Showed forth his glory.

And it was kind of in a private setting, but the disciples saw it and they're beginning to move toward the fact of who he is and what he was there to do. May God bless the reading of His Word. And you may be seated.

My neighborhood in Fairhope is a good neighborhood. I thank God for our neighborhood. There are several that do not go to church. And God has placed us there to help them to go to church. That's our mission, is to help them find their place in God's church.

But there were some little girls down the street and these little six, seven year old little girls, they had a lemonade stand. And so as I rode by, I wanted to encourage them. So I said, how much is your lemonade? And they said, $2. And I thought, man, that is expensive lemonade.

They're putting a tariff on it. I ring somewhere down the line. But so I said, okay, I only got a dollar. Can I get. Can I get some?

Said, yeah. So they poured me half a cup of lemonade. So I got a dollar's worth of lemonade. As I came back later on, I came back to a lemonade stand and they were still there. And I was surprised after charging so much for their lemonade, but they were still there.

And I said, okay, I got $2 here, give me some lemonade. So they gave me some lemonade and stood by my car and I said, okay, that's good, that's fine. And he said, well, we really need our cup back. This is. We've given out of cups.

And so I don't know where I was on the list. I reckon I was third or fourth on the list. That kind of discouraged me.

But they had run out of resources. They never thought that they would have to face that kind of situation. But whatever situation you're in, we need resources because they run out. Our own resources run out quickly. And facing life without resources, without God's resources is a very dangerous situation.

I'm talking about today about prayer partners. And if we go back to the Old Testament, one of the first prayer partners is that of Moses. And Moses had taken the children of Israel out of. Out of Egypt. And they were going to go hopefully to the promised land.

But they never made it. It took another generation to take them to the promised land. But as they came out, they went to a place called the Desert of Zin. And the Devil's den is just a dry place. It is nothing there.

There is only one kind of place where you can go and get water, and that's a place called Rephidim. And so they got to Repidim. When they got there at Repidim, the wells had draw dried up. And that's a terrible thing to happen in the desert. Water is essential for life.

And so what, the people got angry at Moses. They sound like a bunch of Baptists. Amen. They started complaining. And you know, any Baptists that ever complain, any at all, that's a gift.

Some lady told me it is a gift. So, you know, may know somebody that has that gift of complaining. But so Moses took it to the Lord and he said, lord, I need your help. And the Lord said, okay, get a rock, and I want you to strike the rock. And water will come out of the rock.

He had to do that for twice time. Last time was a bad time. But he gathered the congregation, got a rock, and he struck that rock and water came out of that and filled up the wells there at Repanum. But the problem was the Amalekites. The Amalekites wanted the same place.

And Amalekites were desert outlaws and desert raiders. They were really in laws of the Israelites, but they had turned outlaws. And so they were coming after the Israelites. They were not a trained army. They had no kind of training.

They had been slaves in Egypt for all those years. They didn't have the material that was to take on the Amalekites.

And so Moses told Joshua, says, I want you to go down there and you got to defeat the Amalekites, take on the Amalekite. And it was the first battle of these slaves, none training. They were in a crisis situation.

So Moses went to the top of a mountain, and when he got to the top of the mountain, he lifted up his hands. And when he lifted up his hands, the Israelites prevailed over the Amalekites. But Moses got tired. He was getting on up in age. And lifting up his arms gets to be a tiring kind of thing.

So he kind of dropped his arms. And when he dropped his arms, Amalekites came back and did a resurgence and began to push the Israelites. And so Moses knew he was in a bad position. Aaron and Hur were the two old men that was that were there with him. And they put props for him to raise his Hands.

And they both took both sides and they held up his hand. And the Israelites. The Israelites ended up defeating Amlicites because the Israelites had a prayer partner. How important our prayer partners are. I stand here today because my mom lifted me up.

I'm standing here today because Susan has prayed for me. And I thank God for a praying wife. She's a treasure above everything. Prayer partners are people that stay with you. They.

They lift you up to the Lord in prayer like Moses lifted up the Israelites. And I hope you have a prayer partner. I hope that maybe you have become a prayer partner. And one of the best things about the church is to have a prayer partner. And that's what churches exist for, to have prayer partners.

God help him. He's going through a rough time. Sometimes I like to preach at a black. A black church because they have audience response. And when things are not going real well, they will say, help him, Jesus.

Help him, Jesus. So you might want to say, like Alex did, help him, Jesus, to get through this and dismiss us and we can go home and eat whatever it is we're going to eat. But anyway, help him. She needs help. He needs help.

Each morning that I walk outside my back door in my backyard, and I have a rocking chair, that I sit there in my rocking chair and I list the names of our. My family.

And I say, lord, be with them, Lord. Watch over them, Lord. Protect them, Lord. Keep them safe. May your face shine upon them and give them your peace.

And I hope somebody's praying for you like that. And I hope you're praying for somebody like that now, Jesus. First miracle takes place at a wedding. And I just got through having a wedding for a couple and Philip and Caroline. And as we went to.

Both of them, just very special as they start in their life together. And as we went to the reception afterwards, they kept saying, guess what song they kept saying singing at that reception. Sweet Caroline.

Good times never seem so good.

Bump, bump, bump. Have you heard that song before? I asked Frank if he would sing that, and he said no, because it's not in the Baptist hymnal. Amen.

But, I mean, he was ready, man. It's not good for Philip to be alone. He needed Caroline. And it was true that he really did. Before I told him he could kiss her, he kissed her anyway.

He didn't ask for my permission. And I wanted to tell him that one second kiss has 50 germs in it, but he didn't want to listen to that at all. And even when we're going down the aisle, he bent her over and kissed her again another time. But weddings are special occasions. And this is one of those special occasions in a place called Cana of Galilee.

So if you have your Bibles, let's watch and see what happens in verse two. It's the third day, verse one. It is the third day. John's very good. John hides things, he puts out things that are there.

And if you don't, if you just read it surface like you would almost pass over that. But it's a third day. Ministry. Jesus just starting out his ministry. He has been baptized by John the Baptist and he started gathering his disciples.

And he has about five or six disciples at this point. And he takes them to that kind of wedding. It says in verse one that it was a marriage in Cana of Galilee and the mother of Jesus was there. John never mentions Mary's name. And when she he is at the cross.

He's the only disciple that's there at the cross. When he is at the cross, Jesus stops dying long enough to say, john, take care of my mother. How much a mother his mother meant to him probably. Joseph had passed away when Jesus was 12 years old. Went to the temple at 12.

After 12 years old, that's the last mention of Joseph. And so Jesus has been raising his family. He's in charge of his family. The oldest son, it felt the obligation that he would take care of his family. So Jesus takes care of his family.

And his mother has had that kind of authority over him. He listens to his mother. He appreciates her very much. When he had gone to the temple and they lost him and they found him, Jesus said, I must be about my father's business. And Mary said, no, we're going home.

And she takes him home. But now's the time for him to separate from his mother. And what's going to hold him in the next three and a half years of his life here on earth is the fact of his mission. His hour is going to come, and his hour is what determines him. Look in your passage in verse 2, Jesus calling His disciples to the marriage.

Probably Mary was in charge of getting all those things together. You know, in a Baptist church, it is women who put all those things together. There may be a man in charge. And it was a man in charge in this wedding, but it was women who were probably putting all the things together. And Mary here comes to Jesus, Machicado says, this is the first prayer that Jesus answered his ministry.

So in verse three. And when they lacked wine, so it's a resource that they had. It was a social kind of thing. You don't want to have a marriage in Cana of Galilee and you run out of resources. And probably they had been taking the water that was supposed to fill up all those jars that were there and trying to dilute the.

The wine that was there as long as they could and holding on to what was there until it was totally drained out and it was gone. And there's so many things that just drain our lives.

I have a friend who is a plumber, and he says his life is draining.

Are you there, the choir guy? Did you get that?

Things drain our lives. Wrong decisions we made in the past, directions about where we're going now, people won't speak to each other.

Those things just drain our lives.

And it's a draining moment. They're drained. The guy I was talking about, the plumber, he. His mother passed away, his father passed away. His marriage had come apart.

He.

He didn't have life together at all. And he could play the part and look like he had together. But that soon runs out.

And so here's a scripture. They have no wife. It's gone. We tried to cover it up for so long, but it is gone. And we tried to hide it.

The habit became an addiction, and he tried to hide it. That's what a pastor at a church in Mobile told me. And he had to go to a drought place. He was so embarrassed by that. It had just run out.

And so it run out, it was gone. Now, here's a principle that if you can't remember what happened today, remember more this. God takes empty situations and he fills them with meaning and whatever empty situation. And John is going to give us seven examples, those seven signs that he's going to give us. Go all the way to chapter 12 of People who had problems in empty situations.

And God filled them. Christ filled them with meaning. And the last empty situation he has, verse 12 in chapter 12 is that of Lazarus, who comes out of the grave.

And he brought him forth out of the grave.

And so many. We think it's over, the story's over, and that's it.

God looked at his creation and he. It was empty, and it didn't have any structure to it. And God says, let there be light. And there was light. And he looked at his creation afterward, that which was empty to begin with.

And he looked at it. And almost like a little child at play, he said, it is good. It is very good. That is, God took an empty situation, and he did that with My plumber friend.

And people prayed for him and they prayed for him. He quit coming to church. He quit even reading his Bible or doing anything. He quit praying, people prayed for him, people kept praying for him. And God did something to his heart.

And now he meets me every Sunday morning with two sausage biscuits. Amen.

The guy who was drained has become an example for what Jesus Christ can do in somebody's life. God takes empty situations and fills them with meaning. In verse four, Jesus and his mother have this kind of come together deal and then come apart. Now all she did was she didn't tell him how to handle that situation. So often it was Martha who told Jesus, now tell my sister to help me.

She comes to Jesus and gives him a formula for her prayer that's kind of her self centered kind of need.

But she comes to Jesus and she says, there I went.

And I think he already knew that, but he was waiting for Mary to bring the situation to him.

Here's what she did. She brought Jesus to the problem and she brought the problem to Jesus.

Left it in his hands.

I don't know what he's going to do. That's what she said. I don't know what he's going to do. In verse five, if you have your Bibles, you want to underline this verse. I don't know what he's going to do, don't know how he's going to solve this.

I don't have any solutions in my mind.

But this is what I want you to know. Sold to servants. Whatever he tells you to do. What, what's the latter part of that? Whatever he tells you to do.

What do it. And I think the biggest problem in the church is the fact that we know what to do, but we're not doing it. And there are grudges that we're held, people that we haven't forgiven and we're not going to forgive them unless a miracle happens. Maybe we, we thought tithing's a good thing. That's, that's good.

And one of these days I plan to do that. I need to be baptized because my baptism was before I really became a Christian. And one of these days I plan to do that. And the God's been kind of laying it on my heart.

Whatever he tells you to do, the blessing doesn't come. And knowing what to do, the blessing comes when you do what you know.

Whatever he tells you to do, that's what he needs, that's what you need to do. But we resist it. We resist his input on our hearts and on our lives because I'm afraid or I'm angry and I'm going to hold this against them for the rest of my life. And that anger just kind of sucks the life out of it. And I know so many churches that have been split and come apart because they treat mistreated each other and it should never have happened.

Jesus didn't tell you to do that, but I've seen it happen. I remember a church that didn't have a piano. So they gave a church a piano because somebody passed away and they had his piano and so the church put it on this side of the church and they had a service where they played the piano and just had a great time. The next week a committee came to the pastor and said we believe that piano ought to be on this side.

And so this is what he did. He moved the piano over to this side. And then another committee came to him the next week and said we believe that piano should be on this side. And so the church split and it became the Grace Baptist church offering grace over which side should the piano be on?

Should never have happened. Jesus didn't tell them to do that. Whatever he tells you to do, better do it. So here's what Jesus told him to do. He said to fill up and his bring him to the brim.

And I don't know if you've had a bring it to the brim kind of experience, but they had these water pots in verse six. They're stone water pots, not clay water pots. And they were using them for cleansing. The Jews really washed their hands before any kind of meal, but they probably used that to try to fill in for the wine that kept getting worse and worse and worse. And so now they're empty, they're empty situation.

They're waiting to be filled.

And so Jesus tells them in verse 8, draw some out now and bring it to the governor of the feast. He gives them directions and he's still speaking and he still gives us directions.

Ask him, God, James tells us we have not because we ask not give us direction because that self sinningness in our lives kind of takes over and wants us to do what we want to do rather than what God wants us to do. So he says to fill up the water pots, bring them to the end, feel them all the way to the brim, have a brim experience, give him the full measure of what he's asking for, bring them to the brim. And another thing, it tells us that there was nothing in there to dilute what was There and then take them to the master of the feast. And they did. They took him to the master of the feast.

And he was overcome. He said, wow, Wow moments. God sometimes gives us some great wow moments. That was a great wild moment at that wedding. When he stood there, he turned around, looked at her as she.

Those doors flew open and sweet Caroline. And he looked at, he said, wow.

God gives us wow moments.

When I hold my grandchildren, and they're getting older now, but I say, I love you, and they say, I love you, granddaddy. That's a wow moment.

That's a wow when people change their life.

So the disciples had a wow moment.

Nobody else saw that. That was kind of a hidden way. And the more he goes through the miracles that Jesus does, all the way, he becomes more and more public with what he does. And he gets to the point where he goes into Jerusalem and he declares himself or there with his disciples and they declare him to be king. And the Israelite nation rejects him and puts him on a cross.

They didn't stay there.

He came up out of that grave. And that's God's wow moment. Because we have hope, because we have a living Savior. And the disciples begin trusting him. They didn't know where he's going, but they begin trusting him.

And as he goes through his life in the three years is with him, they trust him more and more until he gets to the cross and they run away. But here's a wow moment. He brought him back because there's a God who doesn't want to give up on us.

Now, let me tell you about a lady I just had a funeral for. Her name was Pam. Susan. And I just love Pam and her husband Rob. And Pam is just this excited person.

She loves to run. She jumps and does all these things. She is a goer and a doer. That's what she is. She jumped out of an airplane from 10,000ft.

And why? Because she just wanted to. She didn't tell her husband till the next day. She was jumping out of an airplane at 10,000ft. She'd go to Alaska.

She'd go where? Disney World and meet Mickey, Mickey, Mickey, Mickey and all this stuff. She. She was this gorndua. And then she heard the dreaded word cancer.

She loved the Lord. She brought her excitement to every situation. But the cancer was kind of a bummer.

And so for six years, Pam went to Houston to see what the next plan was and the next plan and the next plan and the next plan and the next plan.

Susan and I Would meet her at. When she'd take her chemotherapy, and we'd pray for her husband, and she would go back and get ready, and her husband would say, I just need help. And it's hard to be the helper in that kind of situation because there's a drain on both of them. But she had this foundation. She and Rob had this foundation.

And the foundation they had was this hold on Jesus Christ. Her question was, where is God? It wasn't saying, where is God? I know he's absent. Their question was, where is God?

I want to be right there with God. That was her question. I want to be there.

And there were times she couldn't even lift her head.

She had foundation. She had flexibility.

Flexibility, as I've learned from her wind. Hurricane season then fair, open. And I've learned about palm trees. Palm trees can go all the way down like this. And then boom, when the wind goes, they snap back.

But they can go all the way down without breaking.

And Pam would take a hit.

That plan's not working. That plan's not going. Let's try another one. And so they exhausted all their plan.

And the whole time, her prayer partners were lifting her up. They were lifting her up. Lord, be with Pam. Give us strength. Help her to snap back from this.

Help her not to lose us a foundation. Help her not to lose that excitement that is Pam. And help her not to lose that sense that God is with her, Even though sometimes you cannot see him. He is there.

But those prayer partners stayed. They with her.

God answered prayer with miracles. And the story here is in prayers, there's a lot of miracles that you could go to and see how God answered prayer in so many different places. Three times he prayed for somebody to come back, and they came back. So sometimes God gives us a miracle. Sometimes God says, this, you do this, and I'll do this.

You go take your treatments, and I'll bless them. Like the children of Israel, they came to the river Jordan. And when they came to the River Jordan, they said, God, you part the river, and we'll walk across. And God says, no, you step out there. And as you step out there, the waters will part.

Now, I'm pardon before you. You step out, and the waters will part. Sometimes God says, you do this and I'll do this. But sometimes he said, no.

Sometimes he says no.

But whenever he says no, he will give you the strength to go through that. And if you remember Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, he prayed three times. God, take this from me. Take this from me. But he always added the conjunction.

And the conjunction was this. Nevertheless, not my will, but your will be done.

And they came to the point where all the options were out. And we no longer prayed for Pam to get well.

We prayed for her to get ready to go to that place that God prepared for her. It's called a personal gethsemane.

And one of the places that we need prayer partners so much is when you and I face that personal gethsemane when we say, I want this to be taken care of. I want to be healed.

Nevertheless, not my will, but your will be done. And those prayer partners stayed with her. Stayed with her and never let us go. Until finally she took her last breath.

Susan. I was seeing her and I put my hand on her shoulder. God give me the right words.

And just like God, just gave this to my heart. Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me in my father's house. So many mentioned. If it were not so, I would have told you.

And I go to prepare a place for you.

And if I do, I come again and receive your matzev.

Pam, the Lord's coming for you. He has something special for you. He has a place prepared for you because he saves the best to life. Amen. Now, would you bow your heads with me for just a moment?

And I wonder in your heart, is there somebody that you need to pray for?

Is there a prayer partner that you need to be for somebody?

Maybe they're facing a marriage that's kind of coming apart. Maybe they're facing a health issue. Maybe they're facing a spiritual issue. They wandered far away from God, and they need somebody to pray for them. If Mary had not asked, I wonder if that had ever been filled.

But because of an ask, a powerful ask of a prayer partner, God made a difference.

God can make difference. Prayer partners have such power on behalf of this person, Father, I pray for them.

Just for a quiet moment.

If somebody comes to your mind that you need to pray for, Father, where two or three are gathered, then you're right here with us.

I pray for these prayers for someone that's in an empty situation.

Come to them with your fullness.

Touch their lives.

Set them in the right direction.

May they hear your voice and do what you tell them. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.