Ominous Times & the Power of Prayer Part 1 - Ominous Times & The Power of Prayer

You're listening to the road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.

Now, minute, women.

You know, you have this deep conviction that when you pray, God really hears your prayer.

He does.

This is God speaking.

Everything now we're gonna read is God telling Solomon.

Remember, they didn't have all the scriptures yet.

They don't have the whole Bible yet.

So God speaks in marvelous and wonderful ways this way, because God's gonna use Solomon to actually write.

Be a part of writing the scriptures, but he said, I've heard your prayer and I've chosen this place for myself as a house of sacrifice.

At The Road, our mission is to empower people to change the world.

For more information on The Road, visit theroad.org.

We hope you are encouraged by today's message from Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.

I've said this before, I'm gonna repeat it again here this morning because I feel like we need to talk on this.

We need to speak to this issue not as an auxiliary issue, but actually central.

But on April 9th, April 9th, 2019, I had a dream.

And in that dream, I saw this cityscape.

And I remember thinking in my mind, it looked like Denver.

It was a cityscape, and it was dark, and it was ominous, and I saw clouds rolling in in the dream, and the Lord said, ominous times are coming.

Ominous times are coming.

And I wrote it in my journal.

I wrote it in my Bible.

Ominous times are coming.

And then he wrote in white letters, big white letters, across the dark buildings.

2 Chronicles 7.14.

Now, men and women, I've shared this before, but today I felt like I had a whole different message I was gonna do, but I felt God saying, Steve, you really haven't exeged, you really haven't exposited that particular passage.

And so that's what we're gonna do today.

We're gonna look at 2 Chronicles 7.14.

But I want to say this.

I hate to say these kind of things because I get, because some of you tend, here's the thing: there's two types of people.

There's people who tend toward faith.

Jeff, there's people who tend toward faith, even as non-Christians.

And that I tended, I've always tended to be pretty optimistic.

I like to say I was a happy pagan in high school and college.

Okay, and so I just tend toward optimism.

Well, some people, some of you tend toward pessimism, and with that you tend toward fear.

So what I'm about to say is gonna make you fearful.

But listen to the whole message.

You gotta hear the whole thing.

So it's gonna be, it's gonna be a downer at first, and then we're gonna move toward what I think God's saying, because God's giving us a warning.

Here's what I believe from looking at prophetic words from people I trust and some in this church, is that I believe we're gonna have a two-month window.

I believe we have a two-month window.

That is July and August.

I think we're gonna have a reprieve in our country.

Might even be COVID-related, but I'm thinking more in the area of cultural disruption that's been happening.

But I believe the fall is going to be very, very tumultuous.

Possibly way more tumultuous and dangerous than what we've seen up to now.

Okay?

So, what's God saying?

I think God is speaking, at least He's speaking to me.

All I can do is speak for the road.

I'm not speaking to anybody else but you guys as a family at the road, that we have this opportunity to turn the tide, maybe turn the tide in many ways through the power of prayer.

So I'm calling for the next two months, every Wednesday night, 6 p.m., we're gonna have, I'm calling it the 7-14 initiative.

The 7-14 initiative based on 2 Chronicles 7.14.

We're coming in here, we're gonna worship, and we're gonna pray, and we're gonna ask God to bring revival.

We're gonna ask God to bring a kingdom of God revolution in our country.

We're gonna ask God, and this is what I'm praying.

I'm praying that in the seven mountains out there, business and arts and entertainment and sports and schools and all those different mountains, that God would raise up leaders that are already in place to be leaders, to be Christian, spirit-filled, spirit-anointed, word-rooted, wholehearted disciple leaders that would start to actually make an impact for righteousness in their arena.

In their arena.

Okay, we, you know, here's the thing.

Christianity is one of the only faiths where we really haven't done a very good job lately, we have in centuries past, but lately, of actually changing the worldview of a particular Muslims do it great.

I mean, I don't like the I don't like the effects of what's happening, but Sharia law is an example of that, where they they come and they take over every part of the culture.

The Jews have done that.

Jews have been powerful at this because here's what they do: they train up their kids.

They train up their kids, and so you have Jewish kids coming up, and they just know they're not supposed to be the tail, they're supposed to be the head.

And so Jewish men and women tend to become leaders.

Well, I'm gonna keep challenging us again and again.

I'm gonna say it again, we've heard it before, that God's got each one of you in this room in a mountain area.

He's got you in a place where he wants you to find your voice, to find your heart, because we will lose this country.

We will lose our democracy, we will lose our constitution if men and women don't start praying and then stepping out of the prayer meeting into the powerful opportunities that God's given them in the arena, the public arena, that changes culture.

That changes culture.

And so, and so I know that we've got a window of opportunity.

And I'm gonna challenge you guys, come on Wednesday night.

So on Thursday night, we call an impromptu meeting.

It was just, it was it was just, we just sent out, it was like 16 hours ahead of time.

Liz and I felt like we need to have a prayer meeting.

We did.

It was over there in the chapel, and it was powerful.

And what we prayed about for during that time was we had intel that there was something up in our city with some very, very bad people.

Did anything happen?

No, nothing happened.

God, I think, is on the move when we pray.

And so you don't even know.

I don't even know what's happening in the heavenly realm.

There's demonic principalities and powers that want to take this city and burn it down.

I've got prophetic words from key people in this church who've told me that.

And they're they're they're unrelated to each other, nobody's inclusion or anything like that.

It's just coming and it's happening, and this is our watch.

And this is our city.

I'm not responsible for New York.

I'm not responsible for LA, I'm not responsible for Seattle, I'm responsible for Colorado Springs.

And men and women, so are you.

And so I'm challenging you and I'm empowering you.

It's gonna be inconvenient, but come and let's worship together.

Let's come and pray together.

The last one we had was super powerful with Congressman Doug Lamborn here and and and just all the guys that are friends of mine that have Latino church and black church and the you know, director of SCLC.

I mean, it's just it was awesome.

How many were at that?

Many of you there?

Okay, a lot of you.

That's great.

Well, you remember what that's like?

Well, I want to put that one on steroids this Wednesday.

And I want to call out to God God come and drive the darkness back.

Well, it's 4th of July weekend.

So my prayer is that the fire would work in you.

We actually at my house we had some fireworks.

No, we didn't we didn't have any fireworks.

We didn't have any fireworks at our house.

Um now, let me just let me say that as I prayed about this, I felt like I needed to take us back just a little bit, just a little bit.

So the quotes I'm using today come from the founding fathers.

There's tons of other quotes, even better quotes recently, but I felt like it's it's 4th of July weekend.

Today's July the 5th.

I want to talk about 2 Chronicles 7.14, but I also wanted to give you a quick history lesson.

Because I you don't you don't read about this very often.

And that is that when the founding fathers came together after they had won the war, they won the war of independence, it's 1787, and they're trying so hard to put the Constitution together, and they can't do it.

It just week after week, it's just a disaster.

And they're all getting ready to leave to go to their states, everybody's mad at each other, everybody's frustrated.

And by the way, our founding fathers were not perfect, okay?

Like you need me to tell you that.

How many, how many are graduates from a you from a secular university?

Raise your hand.

Okay, so you already know that.

That's all you heard.

Okay, but you probably didn't hear this part.

Benjamin Franklin calls everybody back to the convention hall, and this is what he said.

In this situation of this assembly, groping as it were in the dark to find political truth, and scarce able to distinguish it when presented to us.

I thought that's a great point.

It's right here.

It's like you can't even, you guys can't even recognize it.

How has it happened, sir, that we have not hitherto once thought of humbly applying to the Father of Lights to illuminate our understanding?

In the beginning of this contest with Great Britain, when we were sensible of danger, we had daily prayer in this room for divine protection.

Our prayers were heard and they were graciously answered.

All of us who are engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of the superintending providence in our favor.

And have we now forgotten that powerful friend?

Or do we imagine we no longer need his assistance?

I have lived a long time, he was in his 70s at this point, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth, that God governs the affairs of men.

And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it not probable that an empire can rise without his aid?

We have been assured, sir, in the sacred writings that except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.

I firmly believe this.

And I also believe that without his concurring aid, we shall succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel.

I therefore beg leave to move that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of heaven and its blessings on our deliberations be held in the assembly every morning before we proceed to business.

And so they got down on their knees.

I've got the portrait in my house, and I was gonna bring it today, but I forgot.

But I've got the portrait of that first time they prayed there in the assembly, and they got on their knees and they prayed, and suddenly wisdom came to the group, and in a matter of a few weeks, they put together the constitution, the greatest constitution, the most long-standing constitution, the most long-standing constitution the world has ever known, folks.

Don't believe the stuff you hear in the media.

I'm telling you, it was birth in prayer.

And after they finished putting the Constitution together, again, Franklin said this.

I beg, I may not be to understood, to infer that our general convention was divinely inspired when it formed the new federal constitution.

Yet, what he's saying there is, I'm not saying it's on the level of the Bible or something, but yet I can hardly conceive a transaction of such momentous importance to the welfare of millions now existing and to exist in the posterity of a great nation, should be suffered to pass without being in some degree influenced, guided, and governed by that omnipotent, omnipresent, and beneficent ruler in whom all inferior spirits live and move and have their being.

So now, turn to 2 Chronicles 7.

And just as the birth of a nation was birthed in prayer to hear from God, like the United States of America was, we find ourselves in a great ordeal even right now.

And I believe we're called to this same level of conviction.

And if you don't have that conviction, I pray that you'll have it by the time we're done.

If you don't have it by the time we're done, then come on Wednesday night and you'll get it.

And if you don't get it, keep coming.

And eventually we're gonna get all over you and you're gonna get the glory of God pandemic.

And you're gonna start to see that conviction grow in your heart.

So look at verse 12.

So Solomon's dedicating his temple.

Remember, we did a series on Haggai.

And in Haggai, we talked about the shaking of the nations, and that God's shaking the nations, we believe right now, to bring people to the desire of the nations.

I won't go through it all, but that was Zerebel's temple.

That's the second temple.

So this is the first temple built, first ever in Jerusalem.

And so just if you go back to the very beginning of this chapter, Solomon prays, fire God falls, and now he has that night this dream or vision.

We don't know exactly.

The Lord appeared to him.

Verse 12.

Then the Lord appeared to Solomon by night and said to him, I have heard your prayer.

Now, men and women, do you know, do you have this deep conviction that when you pray, God really hears your prayer?

He does.

This is God speaking.

Everything now that we're gonna read is God telling Solomon.

Remember, they didn't have all the scriptures yet.

They don't have the whole Bible yet.

So God speaks in marvelous and wonderful ways this way, because God's gonna use Solomon to actually write, be a part of writing the scriptures.

But he said, I've heard your prayer and I've chosen this place for myself as a house of sacrifice.

Now, folks, don't miss this.

God cares about places.

He really does.

He cares about places.

Now listen, when God begins to move, listen to what I'm about to say, God chooses places and people for a purpose through prayer.

Let me say it again.

God chooses places and people for a purpose through their prayer.

That means that we often miss God's purposes in our life if we're not praying.

Because of our prayerlessness, God can't move in your life.

Some of you are struggling financially, some of you are struggling in your marriage, some of you're struggling in your singleness.

You're compromising.

But when you come to God and you begin to pray, guess what?

Prayer gets God's attention.

It always gets God's attention.

And when we cry out to Him, it's almost like God just kind of moves over and He starts to listen to your prayers and then He moves on your behalf.

And He's saying here, he's saying to Solomon, Solomon, I hear your prayers.

I care.

And in my Bible, I wrote the road.

In my Bible, I wrote the road, and just above it, I put Colorado Springs.

Because I care about this city.

And I care about this church.

And as a people of prayer, when we start to pray God, we want to see a kingdom of God revolution.

We don't want just a revival.

We don't want just an awakening.

Those are all short-lived.

That's like to me the spark plugs on the engine.

Revolution changes everything.

Everybody look at me.

We're not going back to the way it was.

We're not.

After what's happening, if you haven't been awakened yet to the move of a Marxist movement that's marching through our universities and our society, you need to do a little more research.

Because the reality is, this nation is teetering.

We need a revolution.

What a revolution is, is it's a takeover of all the different parts of society.

And there's believers all over the place.

God's calling you to stand up on a whole nother level through the power of his Holy Spirit.

I'm not talking about getting a soapbox, taking it to work, and getting yourself fired.

Okay, I'm not talking about that.

I'm talking about being a little more winsome than that.

But that winsome witness of loving God with all of your heart, soul, mind.

What we say, Jeff, here, we call that a whole-hearted disciple.

That's exactly our definition, and that's my definition for a kingdom of God revolution.

So when I've been asked, what do you mean by a kingdom of God revolution?

I say it's just a bunch of people getting bigger and bigger who love God with all of their heart, soul, mind, and strength than their neighbors themselves.

So it's just being a whole-hearted disciple in your job and in your family.

And so, first of all, God has the attention of Solomon because Solomon is praying.

Verse 13.

Now, this is the downer.

We don't like this part.

How many of you like positive promises?

How do you like when someone says, hey, if you'll come to this place, I'll meet you there and I'll buy you dinner.

Anybody like that?

I mean, that's kind of cool, right?

How many of you like the promise that says, if you don't, okay, all the young people in this room.

Has your dad or your mom ever said, if you don't do this, you're not going to be able to do that?

Uh-huh.

Charity, raise your hand.

I know how that works.

Well, that's kind of what God's saying here.

He's saying, I don't want to do this, but this is how I also get your attention.

When I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people.

Now let me give you a little systematic theology lesson.

In the Old Testament, everything flows from God.

And in the New Testament, you see the definition and the directives throughout the pericopes in the New Testament of demonic power or dark power, satanic power, and God's power.

But in the Old Testament, it's all together.

They're seen as one and the same.

Here's what he's saying.

He's saying not that I'm going to just directly send pestilence or I'm going to directly ruin you economically.

Rather, there's a restrainer.

So what I'm going to talk about on Wednesday night, the message I'm going to give on Wednesday night at the prayer gathering is the mystery of lawlessness.

Because what we're seeing is lawlessness in our country, in a few cities.

If that spreads, and it has spread in the Bolshevik Revolution, it did spread in Cuba, it has spread in Latin America, and I could go through China and Mao and all that.

It will spread.

So listen, really important here.

That when God begins to move within our midst, he has a restraining over that.

How many of you have known someone who they're really fired up for the Lord?

They got saved, they get fired up, and they go strong for, say, two or three years, and then they kind of start drifting back.

They start to drift back to stuff, and then it's like all hell breaks loose.

I mean, it's almost like everything that they had built up, they just ruin in no time.

Well, part of it's reaping and sowing.

Part of it's sowing and reaping, reaping and sowing.

You sow what you reap, you reap what you sow.

But the other part is there's a restraining, and I'll talk about that from 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 on Wednesday night.

2 Thessalonians 2 · chapter mention

I believe there's four great restrainings.

Restrainers in a nation.

Four great restrainers.

That God says in the latter days He's going to actually lift the restraining to allow lawlessness.

You say, well, then I guess there's nothing we can do about it.

Well, no, I think that as we look at Scripture and I look at the destiny on this nation, I don't think God's done with this nation yet.

Do you?

You think he's done with you yet?

I don't think so.

But we've it this is going to be a conditional clause that I'm about to give you.

There's an unconditional promise, but there's a conditional clause.

So write this down.

Write this down.

When a country drifts away from God, God drifts away from that country.

When a country drifts away from God, God drifts away from that country.

When God drifts away from a country, his blessings also go.

His blessings are.

That happens individually, corporately, and nationally.

So I see three things he says here.

He says, number one, he's going to hold back blessing over your life in answering your prayer.

When I look at verse 13a, when I shut up heaven, I believe he's speaking here of the brassy heavens.

You guys have heard me say this before.

Let me just repeat it.

I want to open heaven.

We want to open heaven over our city.

We want to open heaven over our houses.

We want to open heaven over our church.

I want to open heaven over Steve Holt.

Well, when I obey God, when I follow God, it opens heavens.

He's saying, because of sin and disobedience and rebellion, I'm actually gonna, I'm gonna allow the enemy to shut up heaven.

I'm gonna allow principalities and powers to shut up heaven so that I can't bless you.

You've made the choice, but I can't bless you.

He says, when I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land.

So here's what he's saying.

He's saying, even economically, secondly, economically, because this is an agrarian culture, so he's speaking in agrarian language, I'm gonna allow things to happen that could ruin a nation economically.

I can allow demons to have access to ruin you and me and a nation economically.

And then thirdly, he says, and send pestilence.

Now that can be translated in Hebrew to be plagues, and I would just parenthetically say probably viruses is probably included.

God allows that to happen.

That's a conditional, he's saying, This is what I do.

Now, here's the conditional clause.

This is, okay, how many of you feel a little bit down right now?

Okay, all right.

No hands went up.

Thank you.

Liars.

You know, I get down, man.

I read it all the time.

But you hear what I'm saying?

This is a promise that spurs me to action.

This is a promise that should spur you to action.

So here's what he says.

This is a good news.

Verse 14.

If, so it's a conditional clause with an unconditional promise.

He's gonna make an unconditional promise here, but it's conditional to our obedience.

If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then, if, then, in my Bible I circled the if and I circle the then, I draw a line to it, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin, and I will heal their land.

Turn to your neighbor and say that's pretty exciting.

Why would he say that?

Why would he have verse 13 and verse 14 together if it wasn't needful?

I mean, listen, this is the way it works.

If the economy continues to zoom upward, we feel completely secure, we're just sitting around and watching ESPN and living our life.

And I make, and I say something like this, you go, man, what drug's he on?

But when we start to see the enemy, demonic powers at work, and I'm not talking about peaceful demonstrations, I'm talking about some of the Marxist anarchists that's behind this, then it's a wake-up call.

You see, here's the thing.

When we pray, we get God's attention.

When God brings these elements, he gets our attention.

And when he gets our attention, people who care start to pray.

So he's saying here that there's something that I will do if you will do it.

And here's the first thing he says humble yourself.

So, what's another word for humble?

Inconvenient.

The word I'm gonna use is inconvenient.

Wednesday night's gonna be really inconvenient for some of you.

That's the night that what is that show?

N S C I or NCSI or whatever it is.

I don't know if that show is on or not.

They're going, no, you got the wrong days.

I'm gonna watch TV if I don't know.

I'm gonna make your life inconvenient on Wednesday night.

Because I want to see the glory of God come.

And here's the deal, guys.

I want to be able to stand before the Lord and say, you know, hey, if if we lost this nation and it was on my watch, but I did what you told me to do, I've got a clear conscience.

But if I just sat around and watched the watch the enemy just come in and maraud through and pillage this place, and I just wanted to watch my TV shows, that's on you.

Right?

Okay, so here's the deal.

He said, humble yourself, it's gonna be inconvenient.

And then he says, pray.

So we're not gonna come and just sit around and worship and just sit around and worship and sit around and worship.

We're gonna call out to God and worship.

We're gonna worship and call out to God and seek my face.

How many of us need more of the presence of God in your life?

How many of you just raise your hand if you need more of the presence of God in your life?

Turn to the person next to you.

I need more of the presence of God in my life.

Just say it right now.

Here's what happens when I say that.

It's like all the wives say it to the husbands and husbands.

I'll look down.

All right, all right.

See, here's two things you need.

Men, all the men look at me.

You need the digital conference on Saturday, you need a prayer meeting on Wednesday, and you need to try this again.

So turn to your wife, all the men in this marriage, and you say, I need more of the presence of God in my life.

All right, say it a little louder.

Amen.

God hears that, he's aware of that.

And then he says, and this is the part we don't like, it's the hardest part of this conditional clause.

Turn from your wicked ways.

Alexis de Tocqueville was a French aristocrat, diplomat, political scientist, and historian.

He's best known for his books on democracy in America, and in the 1830s he came to America.

Here's what he said.

I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her commodious harbors and her ample rivers, and it was not there.

In her fertile fields and boundless forest, and it was not there.

In her fertile fields and boundless forests, in her rich mines, in her vast world commerce, it was not there.

In her Democratic Congress and her matchless Constitution, and it was not there.

Now listen up, guys.

He wrote, Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits aflame with righteousness that I understand the secret of her genius and power.

America is great because she is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, she will cease to be great.

We must turn from our wicked ways.

We must turn from the mistakes of the past.

We must turn for our current sins.

George Barna, the eminent national pollster who does regular surveys on biblical thinking and values, reports that of the thousands of surveys he has conducted over recent decades, of more than 70 moral behaviors we study when we compare Christians to non-Christians in America, we rarely find any substantial difference.

This is very, very dangerous.

Founding father Samuel Adams reminds us that, quote, while the people are virtuous, they cannot be subdued.

But when, once they lose their virtue, they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader.

Benjamin Franklin agreed, declaring, quote, only a virtuous people are capable of freedom.

As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.

So, church, seek the Lord while he may be found.

Isaiah 55, seek the Lord while he may be found.

Call upon him while he is near.

Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts.

Let him return to the Lord, and he will have mercy on him and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

Isn't that good news?

He will abundantly pardon.

Oh God.

We come before you right now.

God, we know we're not perfect.

We know that there's areas of our life that need a lot of work.

God, we repent.

We come before you, and God, do a house cleaning.

Lord, come and sweep through and vacuum up our life.

And God, put us in a place where you want us to be.

So men and women, look at verse 15.

Now my eyes, this is so cool.

So not only will he forgive our sin and heal our land, he says, My eyes will be open and my ears attentive to prayer made in this place.

For now I have chosen and sanctified this house that my name may be there forever and ever.

And my eyes and my heart will be there perpetually.

It's like the Constitution, man.

It sounds like we're writing like a spiritual constitution here.

He says, My eyes will be open, my ears attentive to the prayer made in this place, for now I have chosen and sanctified this house that my name may be there forever, and my eyes and my heart will be there perpetually.

We want a nation where every person is free, where every person has the opportunity to know God and has the opportunity to access to jobs and work.

We want that in our nation.

It'll never be perfect.

But here's what I know: that if we will come together and we'll begin to pray and we'll challenge other churches to do the same, God will come.

He promises that he will.

And he's gonna make Colorado Springs a great city, a beautiful city here in the Rockies, where when you get to that top, you know, when you're at the top of the Rockies, what they call the continental divide, right?

The rivers go west, the rivers go east, and if God were to move here, move in a mighty way here, that river would flow west, and that river would flow east.

And it would be called not the continental divide, it would be the continental unite of the church and that God would use us.

Isn't that exciting?

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