The Apostolic Lifestyle

But wave those Bibles around, make Jesus glad, the devil man.

Let's get into the word.

Let's study the Bible together.

Tonight we can do a little studying and we're gonna look at what words mean.

And let's say this together say, heavenly Father, I am a person of destiny.

Thank God, I'm living in the last of the last days.

Every bit of information I get under the anointing you will bring to the surface when I need to release it in this present age, and I thank you for the harvest in Jesus name.

Amen, amen, amen.

Let's turn in our Bibles to 2 Corinthians, chapter 10, and start reading with verse one.

2 Corinthians 10 · chapter mention

I mentioned Corinthian church this morning how they were a carnal church.

They had a lot of things about them that was not perfect, but he loved them, wrote them two letters.

He didn't give up on them and they lived in an area of Asia Minor that was filled with the occult.

All of them had that occultish background in their lives and people that have ever lived that way and they get saved.

I mean the devil leaves but he wants to come back.

He says I know what I'll do.

I'll come back to my house.

He thinks we're his house.

And so here in verse one he says now I, paul myself, beseech you in that sweet, and he doesn't command them, he's beseeching them, he's wanting their cooperation.

I beseech you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ who, in presence and base among you but being absent and bold towards you.

But I beseech you that I may not be bold when I am present, with that confidence where, with I think to be bold against some which think of us as if we walked according to the flesh.

Now, what's he talking about?

He's talking about some people in the church that don't want to obey him.

They don't want to recognize who he is, and he is the apostle of those people, he's their leader.

He said I'm base among you, but let me tell you something.

I can know how to be bold.

I'd rather be bold from a distance.

See, read between the lines, because some of you think wrongly of me that I walk according to the flesh, verse three, though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal or of the flesh, but mighty.

Our weapons are mighty through God, to the pulling down of strongholds, casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ and having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.

That's kind of an ominous verse right there.

I'll read it in another version here a little bit later.

But first of all I want to give you the title of this message, called the Apostolic Lifestyle.

The Apostolic Lifestyle.

I teach frequently about the apostolic because this church is an apostolic vine with a prophetic river.

God told me we're a regional center.

What's a regional center?

Well, that's a place of governmental authority.

The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but they're mighty through God.

Actually, I believe that all the church in the end days has a measure of the apostolic anointing on it.

Very few have stepped to the plate.

I certainly didn't have any teaching on these things.

God has had to take me by the hand and show me and give me revelation about it.

Governmental authority, I mean, you know we're in a contest and I want to prepare you for some of our Sunday nights coming up because we're going to have some power hour pluses before the election in November.

I don't have the dates right here in front of me, but they're coming up soon and I want to begin to give you a little background before we get to those prayer meetings, because that's the weaponry we've got to wage a warfare.

Paul talked about a warfare.

He said warfare is a weapon.

Warfare, he said war, we war, a good warfare.

He speaks of war in warfare in verse four, for the weapons of our warfare.

That word warfare is a noun, the Greek word strataea, and it means military service, expedition, campaign, apostolic lifestyle or apostolic career.

You know, it's not just, you know swatting the wasp nest a couple of times, it's combat In another place.

Paul told Timothy endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.

You know, soldiers don't always get to have hot meals.

I remember Patton volunteered the third army to pull out of a winter battle in Belgium, go into Germany, into Baston, and this was the battle of the bulge, the last great conflict of World War II.

The Germans mounted a winter offensive.

They'd never done it in history and Patton knew it ahead of time.

I believe the Holy Ghost showed it to him and he started preparing his generals to prepare a way to pull out of that winter battle and go 100 miles and attack and support Baston.

The Germans had and that was a very important city that if it fell, it would mean possibly years to the war.

In fact, it could mean that we, the allies, could actually lose the war to, basically, germany that was really basically ready to give up.

Russia had decimated them and we had decimated them, but they were fighting with such a crazed intensity.

Why am I bringing all this up?

Because I believe it kind of shows you what the devil will do.

It came to lie after the war that the Nazis were given speed.

They were on drugs.

Yeah, that's right.

That's why that they were so relentless.

They would go and go and, go and go and go, and sometimes they'd just go so far, they'd just keel over dead.

They didn't care about life of their own soldier.

Hitler was a demon, possessed Antichrist, as were all of his generals, just about all of them.

So what am I saying?

Well, warfare that we're called into is not a natural warfare, it's a super natural.

See, the weapons of our warfare not AR-15s and M, no, it's weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but they're mighty, through God, to conduct a military campaign, and it is a military lifestyle.

Warfare is an apostolic lifestyle.

It's not just something we do when we're in trouble, it's not just something we do in election time.

It's a lifestyle, you know, some people can take it and some people can.

Getting back to Patton's men, they pulled out of a winter battle and marched.

They had tanks but they had.

Most of the soldiers were marchers.

They had marching.

They had no hot food.

The movie shows them bundling up their feet.

Their feet got frostbite from how bitter cold it was and they would bundle up their feet to try to protect it.

And they're marching along in this ice and snow and bitter cold.

And they attacked the day after Christmas.

They couldn't even stop and think about Christmas.

They had to go over there.

And I mean, you know, maybe we don't have any physical battles like that, but we have the kind of conflict that takes military type of hardness.

Where do you get it?

You get it from the Word of God.

You gotta understand what kind of church this is and what kind of battles we conduct.

So warfare is a noun.

Again, it's a military service, military expedition, military campaign, apostolic lifestyle or apostolic career.

For me it's a career.

It marks my ministry, not by choice.

I was drafted and I certainly didn't even understand the implications of that.

When he said you're a regional center, regional center, governmental authority.

I had no idea what he was talking about, but you know what?

We're beginning to get the idea now, and then in verse three, for though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh.

There the word war is a verb and that is the Greek word stratiume.

It's a derivative of strataea and it means to serve in a military campaign to execute the apostolate with its arduous duties and functions, to contend with carnal inclinations.

So the first place that we need to execute the apostolic is in ourselves.

We have to pull down wrong thinking imaginations, ways of thinking.

Amen.

Now, back in the 80s you had some of the prayer.

People got off in the air on these verses and they thought that you would go and pray in a city and pull down the strongholds over cities and they would have groups that would go.

I remember hearing about one that went to Kabul, Afghanistan, and they prayed for three weeks.

That's just a bunch of hooey.

That's not what this verse is talking about at all.

He's not talking about praying down principalities and powers.

That's what they thought they were doing.

Jesus never did that.

What did Jesus do?

He preached the gospel.

The gospel is the power of God under salvation to everyone that believed it, to the Jew first and also to the Gentile.

That's it Not about shouting in tongues for hours on end?

I knew one kid that got all into this warfare stuff and he had warring tongues and he would scream hours a day until he lost his voice.

He couldn't even talk.

I said what are you doing, boy?

I tried to talk to him, he wouldn't listen.

I said you're in error and you're under a ministry that's filled with error.

Get back under Brother Hagan and Brother Ovestain, you're off.

You remember of Lakewood?

That is not in agreement with Brother Ovestain?

I can tell you that right now.

Or Brother Hagan, that's error.

We're not here to slap a wasp mess.

We're not here to enter into foolishness, but we are here to serve in a military campaign and we have to endure hardness as a good soldier.

Jesus Christ, those guys that marched that 100 miles.

They marched it without any hot food.

They marched without any rest, without any sleep, and they got there and they annihilated the Germans, hopped up on dope.

We weren't hopped up on dope, we had the hand of the Lord on our side, amen.

So whatever we do, we do under the leadership of the Holy Ghost, amen.

Weapons of our warfare are not carnal, they're not of the flesh, but they're mighty through God.

All right.

And so it says here in verse four, that mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds.

Listen to what strongholds means.

Ocuroma means fortress or castle.

Pull down strongholds.

Verse five casting down imaginations, imaginations, is logeesmos.

It means reasonings, thoughts, logic, arguments, mindsets, and ourselves and others.

You know, if we're going to enter into this military campaign and we're compromised ourselves, not going to be effective, devil's going to laugh in your face when you start.

You know, trying to join in this military campaign and you haven't exercised any of the weaponry on your own mind, your own minds can have castles and fortresses of wrong thinking, wrong imaginations, wrong reasonings.

And that's why I teach and preach the Word, because if you'll get into the Word, those things will be confronted so easily.

It's not something that you've got a fast, 40 days and 40 nights, to get rid of.

I'm going to tell you something.

You just get your mind renewed in the Word of God and all those things are going to be dissolved.

You're fit for duty Now you can report for duty and say yes, sir, I'm ready to enter into the apostolic ministry a military campaign you've got for me and we're recruiting right now because we're going to have some mighty prayer meetings coming up.

So, verse four let's go back to four, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal or fleshly, but mighty through God, to the pulling down of strongholds.

Now let's hold her place and run over to second Corinthians four, very similar verse three.

Chapter four, verse three.

But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost.

In whom, the God of this world word world there means age.

The God of this age has blinded the minds of them.

Who has the God of this age little G?

Well, that's the devil.

Yeah, it's the devil, but it's not exactly.

That's not what the Greek is talking about.

The God of this age is blinded, the minds of people that are lost blinded, the minds of them which believe not lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ should shine unto them.

So the God of this age is responsible for people not getting saved.

The God of this age has to be dealt with in a military campaign.

So what is the God of this age?

What does he mean?

I used to think well, that's just the devil.

Well, no, it's more than just the devil and listen to the linguistic key to the Greek New Testament describes what it means the God of this age to mean.

It means all that floating mass of thoughts, opinions, maxims, speculations, hopes, impulses, aims and aspirations at any time current in the world.

That's all you hear on television.

Is the God of this age We've got to have.

We've got to address climate change.

We've got to have electric cars.

That's their idea.

Never mind it's not scientific, never mind that it doesn't work, never mind that it's fossil fuels that generate most of the electricity that's going to power the car.

So then you're going to have a loss.

I mean, I'm an engineer so I mean it's kind of like the perpetual motion machine is what they're believing in.

Have you ever heard of a perpetual motion machine, a machine that runs without any fuel, that just keeps running all the time?

Is that possible?

No, it's not possible.

Stupid or I said it again, I'm sorry parents, there's no other word for it really stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid.

So, the God of this age, you know we've got to have equity.

In order to have equity, every white person has got to confess that they're a racist.

It's never going to happen.

It's never gonna happen.

That's not what.

It's not true.

We gotta have, we gotta have.

Now they're talking about having environmental equity, so they're gonna drive away all.

They wanna get rid of all the refineries, concrete batch plants.

They wanna get rid of anything that puts out any kind of you know any kind of smoke or you know all that kind of thing.

Well, you know, you're gonna just shut all the commerce down.

You're gonna get rid of manufacturing altogether.

You're gonna have solar panels.

Where is all of the stuff gonna come to build the solar panels?

And what about the batteries you're gonna have to have, because if you got solar panels, sun doesn't shine at night.

So what do you have to have?

We have to have batteries.

What do you make?

Batteries out of Manganese cobalt.

You got all these real highfalutin minerals that we don't have in this country.

Where do they have them?

They have them in Russia, in China.

They got them.

We'll be dependent from now on on Russia and China for the batteries.

We need to have solar power.

So what is that?

It's the God of this age to have an ever increasing impossibility of things that they're holding in front of you.

Okay, how about COVID?

We're gonna flatten the curve.

We've got to close the country down for 15 days to flatten the curve.

Whatever happened to that?

It didn't work and it wasn't necessary.

We built all those hospitals in New York City and they weren't needed.

The Meridians Purse filled Central Park up there with I don't know how many beds 500 beds.

They were never used.

Remember the hospital ship sent up there never used.

It's always an emergency.

What is that?

The God of this age?

How do we confront it?

We have supernatural equipment.

We're not gonna pick up a rifle, but we're gonna pick up a gospel gun.

We're gonna pick up, you know, our time in prayer.

We're gonna confront these things.

God of this, everybody say the God of this age LGBTQ plus plus, critical race theory.

We've seen all of the things that are floating around right now drag queen hour, all ages invited, sponsored by HEB, sponsored by Citgo, citibank, wells Fargo, target.

I could go on and on and on about our woke corporations that have no regard for America, that made them great.

Without America they wouldn't be anything.

Well, pastor, what does that have to do with church?

It has to do with the age that we're living in right now.

This church and others like it are to confront these things.

Amen, we're gonna confront them.

We have been confronting them, amen.

So Paul's apostolic anointing was sent to destroy false teachers and false apostles, sent to destroy wrong mindsets and churches.

Now let's get back to verse six here, second Corinthians 10.

He told them what the weapons would do.

They're not corner, but mighty.

But they're gonna pull down strongholds.

They're gonna cast down imaginations and reasonings.

You can see the connection imaginations and reasonings to the God of this age.

You see how they're connected.

It's the same thing.

So this is not just one thing he preached.

He went over this, over and over with the Corinthian church which came out of the occult.

That was the God of that age.

Are you with me now?

Y'all following me In verse six and having a readiness to revenge, all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.

Now I like the NLT, it's a little clearer.

So he's confronting false apostles and false teachers.

Well, when did that happen?

Well, it happened.

How about Galatians, old, foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you that you have departed from the faith and you've laid down salvation by grace alone and you started basically following Judaism again?

Were you perfected by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith?

He confronts that they had false teachers.

Are you with me now?

So he's here to confront and destroy and pull down false apostles and teachers, wrong mindsets in the church, their imaginations, their thoughts, their reasonings, their logic, logismo, logic.

Are you with me now?

And then he says and after you have become fully obedient, we will punish everyone who remains disobedient.

That's kind of solemn, isn't it?

We will punish anyone who remains disobedient.

Kind of solemn, isn't it?

Wow, I thought we're just to love one another.

Well, love doesn't put up with rebels.

A little leaven, leaven at the whole lump.

Oh, y'all kind of looking at me.

Ooh, I don't know if I like this.

This is the place we're entering into.

Why I'm teaching this?

Because we have to get ready.

We have to be part of cleansing our minds and pulling down every stronghold of wrong thinking in our own minds.

And if you've got somebody, somebody that's in church, that won't do that, then you might have to take it a step further and prove to them that they're wrong.

Are you with me now?

Well, I don't understand that.

Well, okay, how about in 1 Corinthians, chapter five, where a young man was sleeping with his stepmother and coming to church like everything is cool, and they didn't do a thing about it?

He said I dare you allow that to go on, and I've judged already that you need to hand him over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh.

That so that his spirit can be saved in the day of judgment.

Ah, pastor, what does that mean?

It means he's going to get punished for his sin because he's unrelenting about it.

He's absolutely convinced that he's right, that he can have his stepmother in public and there's no problem with that.

Well, if you allow that to happen, you're going to have more of it.

You can't allow that to happen.

So what do you do?

How do you punish somebody?

Turn him over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh?

That's what they did, and so they did.

They obeyed Paul and they got together.

The next thing, you'll get together, you all get together, and you turn him over.

How would you do that?

You take your pastor or covering off of him.

He no longer has a pastor that will have his rod stretched out over him and now he's vulnerable to Satan to attack his health.

And after he's paid that price for a little while, he'll be more soft-hearted.

Maybe he'll be ready to listen, which in second Corinthians, is that okay now?

That's enough.

He's repented.

Let him back in the assembly, let him come to church again, restore such a one, let him you know love on him.

He quit doing that behavior.

It's straightened him out.

We don't know what he suffered, but must have been good enough for him to decide to obey.

To obey is better than to burn.

And what's the?

What's the reason behind it?

Because if someone in that condition, doing what they were doing, open sin, no one confronts it and it says you can't do that.

And I'm gonna take it one step further.

I'm gonna punish you until you stop doing it.

Don't you do that with your children.

You don't let them get by with everything.

You push them.

We had Mr Spoon.

You use Mr Spoon when they're little bitty and then you don't have to use it's too late when they're 15.

Forget about it.

You can't whip them when they're 15.

You messed up.

You didn't do it early enough.

You do it when they're three, and that's the same way in church.

You punish the and he said I'm gonna punish the ones that are still disobedient about this letter here.

I know I'm based among you.

You don't think I have it together.

I'm kind of stutter and I'm real simple and everything.

But let me tell you something I do know how to punish people.

I'll punish the ones that are still disobedient after this letter here.

This is their last chance to get in line.

So he, if a person is allowed to remain in sin, they could.

They could cauterize their heart.

They could just like.

Brother Hagin used to talk about an old man that he stayed with as a young Baptist preacher and he would drink hot boiling coffee every morning.

He'd pour hot boiling coffee off that wood stove it's boiling Pour it in a cup and throw it down Just all the way down.

Big old.

And of course he couldn't start off drinking hot boiling coffee.

But over the years his throat and his tongue and his and his roof of his mouth was was just toughened and where he could do it.

And that's what sin will do.

Sin will harden your heart.

It will make you to where you're not sensitive anymore to God and you won't confess your sin the way the Bible says if you sin, use faithful justice to forgive you.

Your sin cleans you of all unrighteous.

If you just confess it, you quit confessing, you quit owning what you're doing and you quit saying and admitting that it's wrong.

So it's on there.

Your sin is still on there and eventually you could get to the place where you deny the Lord that bought you.

Now you're going to hell and there's no remedy.

Are you with me now?

So what's more merciful?

Allowing somebody to get away with this type of sin and no confront, confrontation, nobody to say no, you're not going to do this, sir.

And save them so that they don't go to hell later, because they will repent after you turn them over to the Satan.

They'll repent I'll tell you that right now, amen, and they'll get right with God.

And now they're going to go to heaven.

Isn't that better?

Well, we just walk in love in our church, we don't do anything.

Well, that's not love to let somebody do that and then they wind up hardening their heart and turning away from the Lord.

So in our culture today we have very little of that going on, and yet the Bible speaks a lot about it.

The Bible says if you see a brother overtaken in a fault, restore such a one in the spirit of meekness, lest the worst thing should happen to you.

You witness somebody doing something like that and you don't say anything to them.

You don't go and love on them and say now look, brother, I see what's going on in your life.

You need to stop that.

It's dangerous.

What you're doing is dangerous.

You're not getting by with anything.

Come on, let's pray.

Let's.

You know, I know what's going on now.

Now you know, I know.

So, let's, I'm gonna hold you accountable.

All right, we love you.

That's why I'm bringing it up.

So you got to have a spirit of meekness on yourself.

You can't be superior, you can't be ugly.

You can't be mean and look down your nose at them like Mr Holy Joe is going to straighten you out now.

You know what the Bible says.

If you witness that and you don't do anything, the same temptation can come on you.

Why, if they'll wonder why the church isn't such a mess, we're not doing what the word says to do.

This is all a part of the apostolic lifestyle.

This is all a part of confronting the God of this age.

So, essentially, paul is pleading now so he doesn't have to punish later.

He's pleading with them.

Listen to me, do what I'm telling you to do and everything's gonna be all right.

But if you don't, I'm gonna come around.

I'm gonna punish the ones that are disobedient.

I don't wanna have to do that.

I don't wanna do that I'd rather get your cooperation, amen.

So there's a lot of examples in the book of Acts and the epistles Acts.

Chapter five, ananias to Sapphira, you know the whole church.

The spirit of giving came on the church.

I mean, the Holy Ghost came and people had houses and lands.

They sold them and they brought all the proceeds from the sale of the houses and lands and laid it at the apostles' feet and distribution was made to everyone that had a need.

There was not one among them that lacked kind of reminds you of Egypt leaving, of Israel leaving Egypt.

Not one among them was feeble, not one of them lacked.

And so that was God's way of getting their hearts softened and for them to have corn and nea among each other.

And the Holy Ghost told Peter, ananias to Sapphira, they lied, they decided to sell the property, but they didn't give the whole thing, they gave part of it.

Well, it would have been perfectly fine if they'd have just admitted that.

Well, you know, we just don't have the faith, peter, to give it all.

We're gonna sell the property and we're gonna come in and we're gonna give half, or we're gonna give 40%, or we're gonna give 10%, or we're gonna just tithe it or we're gonna.

You know, if they'd have just been open about it, there wouldn't have been anything said.

Not everybody's got faith to give it all.

That's a pretty big gift to give something that's yours house, land, sell it and give the whole thing.

But that's what people did, except for them.

They acted like they gave it all, they took credit, they joined in.

Yeah, we're one of the ones.

Yeah, woo, woo.

They lied to the Holy Ghost.

So Paul calls Ananias and says did you sell the property for so much?

Yeah, we sure did.

He said how in the world did you concoct a plan, you and your wife?

You didn't lie to me.

You lied to the Holy Ghost.

And now they're gonna come and haul you out of here.

And he dropped dead right in his presence because he had a chance to tell the truth and he lied again.

Well, why is that so serious?

Because if both of them had gotten away with lying, you'd have had a whole lot more lying You'd have had.

The early church would have been defiled with lies.

And let me tell you, the church is the pillar and ground of the truth.

You can't misrepresent yourself, you just can't.

That's what they did.

So then you know, they wound him up, buried him.

How about that for the ministry of helps?

I'm on the burial detail at Gloria's Way Church.

We bury liars.

No, we all tell the truth around here.

And Sapphira comes in.

Hey, sapphira, you know, I'm not gonna lie to you.

I'm not gonna lie to you.

Hey, sapphira, is it true that you sold the land for so much?

Yeah, well, the ones that buried your husband are at the door.

They're gonna bury you too.

She dropped dead right there.

So what was that?

Well, that's part of what I'm talking about confronting the God of this age to stop any kind of impurity in the church and listen.

The glory in the church in the early days was so palpable.

You know when Uzzah was one of the guys that was steadied the cart when David didn't read his Bible and he thought I'm gonna bring the Ark of the Covenant back to the city of David and he sent an ox cart over there.

Well, that wasn't the way to do it.

He needed to be handed on the shoulders of the priest.

That's the only proper way to transport the Ark of the Covenant.

And so he didn't read his Bible before.

He wanted to do the right thing, but he did it the wrong way.

And so they put it on an ox cart and it stumbled and the cart kind of went like that and Uzzah put his hand out there and the glory broke in on him and killed him right there on the spot.

Well, what did he do wrong?

He was out of place.

He was not a priest, he had no business being there.

It was on David's conscience.

David was the one that was wrong, but Uzzah is the one that died.

So the glory in the early church was so maximum.

There's no wiggle room for lying, there's no wiggle room for sin.

There's no wiggle room for somebody sleeping with their stepmother.

There's no wiggle room.

Now we don't have that kind of shekena yet, but it's coming.

I said it's coming.

I'm telling you the glory of God is gonna come on the church and I mean we've got to prepare ourselves and then we've got to help prepare other people, and then we need to prepare our region and pull down these strongholds and cast down these imaginations and confront the God of this age.

In Acts 13, elimus the sorcerer was subverting the governor from getting saved.

He had bewitched the whole area.

He was a sorcerer and he had bewitched the whole.

Everybody thought he was so big and so great and he had bewitched the governor, who wanted to get saved, and he was interfering with Paul's ministry.

And Paul came up to him and he said he said you, child of the devil, you enemy of righteousness, will you not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord?

And now, behold, thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun for a season.

He pronounced judgment on him.

See, that's part of pulling down that God of this age.

He pulled down that occult spirit.

He pulled down that ruling demonic power that was holding people bondage.

And I mean, people got saved, including the governor of that area.

Now, he was blind for a season.

He wasn't blind permanently.

That's the mercy of God.

God's not trying to kill people, he's not trying to blind people.

But what's worse?

Well, a whole lot worse is when you go to hell.

That's a lot worse, that's more permanent.

No, really it's God's mercy.

And really it's God's mercy.

It's really what it is.

Elimus got a chance to repent.

He's blind.

He had to have somebody lead him by this and we don't know whatever happened to him, but my guess is he probably repented.

He probably came down off his high horse and accepted Jesus.

I'd like to think that anyway.

And of course we already talked about the young man.

Let's look at third John.

Are you getting anything out of this?

This is the kind of church we are.

I'm not saying we're gonna have to all be, you know, worried about dying or something.

I do think some of these politicians are gonna start keeling over.

Yeah, third John, I wrote verse nine.

I wrote under the church, but diatrophies who love it to have the preeminence among them, receive with us.

Not I wrote to the church, but diatrophies who love it to have the preeminence.

He's the big cheese.

He's fog horn, leg horn, the big cheese Wherefore, if I come, I will remember his deeds which he doeth, preting against us with malicious words.

And not content therewith, neither does he himself receive the brethren and forbids them that would and cast them out of the church.

The whole subject to this is receiving traveling ministries.

The atrophies didn't want any competition, he didn't want these people coming through and especially didn't want John to come there.

And so he's using his power over the flock in an abusive manner.

And John just said I'm gonna remember what he's done.

That sounds like a pretty ominous warning.

But the apostleship is warfare.

It is a military campaign.

It knows how to confront the apostle.

The apostolic confronts and pulls down this type of spirit, and so then he says in verse 11, and beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is good.

He that doeth good as of God and he that doeth evil has not seen God.

And now Demetrius has good report of all men and of the truth itself.

Yeah, and also bear record.

You know that our record is true.

So, in other words, get rid of diatrophies, quit listening to him and get over there underneath Demetrius, amen.

Well, I just don't want to speak any names.

Well, in the Bible they spoke names.

They name names, paul name names, peter name names, john name names, jesus name names.

Did he talk about Judas or not?

Are you with me?

We're not here to run people down, we're here to help people get right with God, amen.

So the apostolic, then, is confronts and pulls down to monically inspired reasoning and arguments, and it does it supernaturally.

And the two main weapons that are not carnal are number one.

I've already mentioned preaching the word, the preaching of the word, the word of truth, with demonstration.

You know, paul preached with demonstration in 1 Corinthians, chapter two.

Quickly, let's go over there.

Same group of people.

And he said here in 1 Corinthians, chapter two and I, brother, when I came to you, came not with the excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring under you the testimony of God, for I determined not to know anything among you, saved Jesus Christ and him crucified, and I was with you at weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and of power that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men and the power of God.

So what is this thing about?

Fear and trembling?

What's that about?

What was he afraid of?

He had the fear of God.

Then he knew the weight that was on him to preach only the truth, not to get himself and his agenda mixed up with God's agenda.

Because if you're gonna be a preacher that allows the demonstration of the Holy Ghost, the Holy Ghost cannot compete with man's performances.

And when man begins to perform, the devil is involved in that, and that's happened to many good Holy Ghost preachers.

They start off in the spirit, they start off the words of knowledge and words of wisdom and people start bragging on them, people start almost worshiping them and they show up at a meeting and the Holy Spirit might not be moving in that direction, like tonight.

He didn't move in the direction of words, of knowledge.

I didn't try to make it happen If I'd of got up here.

We had some prophetic words, we had tongues and interpretation.

We went that direction, but I didn't have anything else and I'm not gonna get up here and try to have some kind of soft shoe routine in the performance, because what's gonna happen is you're gonna have familiar spirits and some of the greatest men and women of God have had that in their ministries.

Because of the adulation of men, the almost a worship, people put them on pedestals.

Oh, gotta be careful.

You wanna honor the man and woman of God, you wanna honor them, but you don't worship them.

Amen.

So preaching the Word or the truth with demonstration, so the trembling and all of that.

He was based in their presence.

He didn't try.

Listen, he's a very educated man.

He could have wowed them with his knowledge of the scriptures.

He sat at the feet of Gamaliel.

The man knew the Bible left all backward and forward.

Are you kidding?

He knew how to speak.

He's a man of letters, but in their presence he was base and he was humble and he only wanted to speak the things the Holy Spirit wanted him to speak.

That's what that's talking about, and sometimes they could mistake that for weakness.

They could mistake that for somebody that's not really all there.

He said another time if I'm beside myself, it's under God, but if I'm in my right mind, it's for you.

He said I'm foolish in your presence.

I've been drunk in the Holy Ghost up here on the platform.

It's kinda makes you look like a man, makes you look like a nut.

I don't care what you think, preach it, but I do try to stay in my right mind for your sake.

Amen, all right.

So two main weapons preaching the word with demonstration, and then, of course, prayer.

And that's what we're gonna be doing.

Coming up here With these elections, we're gonna target some targets.

We're gonna have a target each meeting.

I don't know yet, I haven't prepared yet, but we've got a prophet coming in next Thursday night.

Gene Wiseman's gonna be here.

If you've never come Thursday night prayer, that'd be a good time to come, cause he's gonna be here.

I invited him specifically to be here for prayer because he's a great prayer warrior.

He'll probably minister a little bit that night too.

But we will do some praying and then Sunday morning he's gonna be here to minister and then after that we're gonna have some of these power hour pluses.

So prayer includes praise, petition, crying out, crying against.

Yeah, the church has almost lost the idea of crying against things.

You know Jonah.

God told him you go to Jonah, that great city there's sin has come up before me.

Cry against it.

Cry against it.

When he finally obeyed God and the whale spit him out with a seaweed wrapped around his neck.

No, I don't know if that was how it looked, but can you imagine three days and nights in the whale of the, in the belly of a whale?

It had to be pretty smelly, had to be pretty gross, but he got the idea of obeying.

He thought you know, to obey God is better than the belly of a whale, so I'm good.

So he marched through.

Took him a whole day to march from one end of of that city it was a great city, nine of a from one end of that city to the other.

Took him a whole day and he said repent, for in what was it?

Seven days going to destroy the city, and from the king all the way down to everybody.

They all repented and sack, clothed in ashes, and God turned away his wrath from the city because they repented, hallelujah.

So praise, petition, crying out, crying against praying in the spirit, groanings, travailings, intercession.

You know, you had that kind of a prayer meeting, acts 431, and the whole place shook.

They were all filled with a whole of ghosts.

God started doing miracles.

What did they do?

Well, they were persecuted by the, the Sanhedrin, and told not to preach and teach anymore in that name.

And they say, well, if it's wrong, it's you judge that, but we can't help but just preach and teaching that name.

They went back to their own company, rehearsed, rehearsed everything.

Lord, behold their threatenings grant with all boldness that we may preach thy word and, and you know, and grant that with all boldness, you know, and that signs and wonders may be done in the name of thy holy child, jesus.

And when the play, when they prayed, the place shook.

And what was that?

In response to persecution.

We're under persecution right now.

If Biden could eliminate the church, he'd do it tomorrow.

All the Democrats hate the church, they hate God, they hate Jesus and they hate the church of Jesus Christ.

Don't be deceived, I don't care who they are.

Well, you know, I know a good Democrat, he's a Catholic.

No, they all hate the true church.

Quit allowing yourself to compromise with that.

It's a lie.

In Acts 12, five, you know, Peter was thrown in jail.

They killed Philip and they intended Herod intended to kill Peter after Easter.

But earnest and and fervent prayer was made without ceasing unto God by the church for him and God sent an angel, broke him out of jail and he shows up at the house where they're having the prayer meeting, at John Mark's mother's house, knocks on the door and here comes Rhoda.

Oh, it's Peter.

It doesn't even open the door for him.

He's out there in the cold.

It's Peter.

Oh no, it can't be Peter.

He's in jail.

Here they are praying for his release.

Oh, it can't be.

Peter Must be his angel.

They had more faith in angels and they did.

God releasing Peter from jail Wasn't a whole lot of faith involved, was it?

But God honored it, yes.

Acts 16, 25,.

They got through, beating Paul and Silas with many stripes, threw them in a common prison, the inner prison, locked them up in a cell and put their feet and ankles and and their hands and stalks, and at midnight Paul and Silas prayed and sang praises and the other prisoners heard them.

It was so loud and there was an earthquake the devil sent to kill them all and God invaded the earthquake and turned it into a jailbreak.

From an earthquake to a jailbreak, hallelujah, romans 826,.

But the the Spirit himself helped us, our infirmities, for we know not how to pray as we ought or what to pray for as we ought.

But the Spirit himself helped us, our infirmities with the groanings which cannot be uttered.

Help us means take hold together with us against, and so that's what's going to happen, coming up, and it's all a part of the apostolic lifestyle that this church has been called to do, and I believe that we're getting more and more effective as time goes on.

So I wanted to preach this so many I mean I know many of you have heard it before, but I like to.

I like to preach it almost every year.

It's one of those cornerstone things that we need to be very skilled in so that our faith can grow, and we have a lot of new folks that aren't familiar with this type of teaching.

But hopefully that we gave you the word and the background for it.

Amen, did you get anything out of this tonight?

Let's lift our hands and receive the apostolic lifestyle.

Everybody say I've been drafted into the army.

I'm part of this military campaign In Jesus' name, amen.