The Prevailing Word

So let's just pick our bibles up, wave them around, make Jesus glad, the devil mad, and let's say this together I'm gonna believe that I hear you over the camera, everybody say Heavenly Father.

I'm being taught the ever living, everlasting word of God, the word that never changes, and I depend on this word in my everyday life.

The word is life unto me.

I'm a word of God person and I'm a Holy Spirit person, and so tonight the word meets the spirit and brings truth into my heart that will stabilize and strengthen my faith, nourish my spirit in Jesus name, amen.

Let's turn in our bibles to Acts, chapter 19, one of my favorite chapters, and you could read the whole thing, but tonight, in the interest of brevity, I'm just gonna start with verse eight.

Acts 19 · chapter mention

This is Paul in Ephesus.

It's kind of the history of the Ephesian church.

We'll pick it up in verse eight.

And he went into the synagogue and spoke boldly for the space of three months, disputing and persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God.

But when diverse were hardened and believed not but spake evil of that way before the multitude, he departed from them and separated the disciples disputing daily in the school of one tyrantus.

And this continued by the space of two years, so that all they that dwelt in Asia Minor heard the word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks or Gentiles, and God brought special miracles by the hands of Paul so that from his body were brought into the sick handkerchiefs or aprons and the diseases departed from them and the evil spirits went out of them.

Then certain of the vagabond Jews, exorcists, took upon them to call over them, which had evil spirits, the name of the Lord Jesus, saying we adjure you by Jesus, whom Paul preached it.

And there were seven sons of one, sceva, a Jew and chief of the priests, which did so.

And the evil spirit answered and said Jesus, I know and Paul, I know, but who are you?

And the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them and overcame them, prevailed against them so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded, and this was known to all the Jews and Gentiles also dwelling at Ephesus and fear fell on them all and the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified and many that believed came and confessed and showed their deeds, and many of them also, which used curious arts, that's, the occult, brought their books together and burned them before all men, and they counted the price of them and found it 50,000 pieces of silver.

So mightily grew the Word of God and prevailed, and so tonight I wanted to bring a message entitled the Prevailing Word.

You know, this chapter is a chapter of history of the early church, the church at Ephesus where Paul was at, and he found 12 disciples and he asked them if they'd been baptized in the Holy Ghost, as we've never heard of the Holy Ghost.

They were disciples of John, and so he told them they needed to believe on Jesus, whom John was preparing the way for Jesus.

They all got saved and then he laid hands on them and they all received the baptism of the Holy Spirit, with evidence of speaking in other tongues.

So that was the nucleus, 12 men of the church at Ephesus.

And then we picked it up in verse eight.

So he began to preach in the synagogues, began to build that church, and here we see that God's Word has the ability to supernaturally mightily grow, not just grow, but mightily grow and prevail.

You know, the thing we need to keep in mind right now, because of the world and the safe shape it's in, is that the Word of God is alive.

You know, jesus is alive.

He's the same yesterday, today and forever.

And his word is alive.

He said the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life.

And so when we teach and preach the word, it's a living thing.

The living Word has the ability to grow, not just a little bit, but mightily grow and then to prevail.

And so the Word always starts out small in comparison to the circumstances or the surroundings.

I mean, the church there started out small, just 12 men.

And then, you know, he starts to preach in the synagogues and they turned against him after three months, you think about three months of teaching and preaching every day.

And you know a lot of preachers would have just packed their bags, you know, and gone home and had a meeting with the board and say, well, you know, we tried it out there at Ephesus.

We got about 12 guys, but it just all ended.

I mean, nobody agreed with us, everybody didn't like us, and so we packed our back.

No, paul just kept on.

He, he left the ones that were Hardened.

The Bible says hardened and.

And so he kept on preaching, teaching and demonstrating despite the opposition, and the word is designed to prevail.

I mean, if you'll keep, stick with it.

I think about.

We stuck with a word.

Now this is our 27th year.

There have been times when it looked like the circumstances were bigger than us and bigger than everything and seemed like, you know, we had people that were Hardened against us, talking bad about us.

You know we've gone through all kind of things in 27 years, but here we are.

You know we've changed this whole part of town.

We we've got roads because we've been here.

We've got two subdivisions.

Because we're here, we've changed the politics in this area.

I tell you things Things have happened because of the word mildly growing and prevailing, and so the word is designed to prevail and the word prevail means to exercise force, to do much work I, and to have strength to overcome.

And I listen, folks, right now it looks like Christians are on the outs, it looks like Christianity is under attack and it is.

But we've got a supernatural weapon that's greater than all of what the devil has and the devil's kids.

Let me tell you something the Word of God is busy If we will hold with the Word and keep preaching it, keep speaking it, keep teaching it.

And you know some folks get real excited about the spectacular and, but we ought to be equally thrilled with what the Word has to say and that the Word is growing and mightily prevailing.

You know, miracles come and go.

We believe in miracles, but you know you can't base your ministry on miracles.

You need to base your ministry on the Word of God.

So we wanted to talk tonight to you about the Word of God prevailing Again.

The Word prevailing means to exercise force, it means to do much work and it means to have strength to overcome.

Without the Word, we're not going to have any prevailing Without, I mean, you know, politics only goes so far and it depends on the people that are involved in the politics, and the more at, the deeper you get.

Should we be involved?

Absolutely?

We ought to be involved, absolutely.

We ought to be involved because that's our doorway into preaching and teaching the Word of God to our elected officials and make them accountable.

At one point this whole country was based on the Bible and the Bible was the textbook of schools.

Now it's the last many years we've allowed it to just run fallow.

Well, you know what?

God's not running out of power and he's not running out of work to do.

We still work a work in our nation.

So the Word of God prevails over, and I've got three things tonight that we find in this account.

The first thing is found in verses eight and nine.

The Word of God prevails over the naysayers, the doubters and the debaters of this world.

Naysayers, doubters and debaters of this world oh my goodness.

There's such debate.

There's such people that are just almost blaspheming.

In fact, they are blaspheming God.

They're trying to rewrite their nation's history.

They're trying to throw rocks at Christians and rewrite what actually happened in this country.

The Word hardened there.

The people were hardened in the synagogue.

The Word hardened means stubborn or obstinate.

Some people have been so deluded and deceived.

What they call drank the Kool-Aid and they have hardened themselves.

They are so stubborn in their ideas.

Listen, we're not called to change their minds.

Let's move away, because there's a whole bunch of people that are hungry.

There's a whole bunch of people that want the truth.

They can look at things right now, the way that things are, and they're looking for answers.

You know, the church needs to rise up and give them the answer.

Jesus is the answer.

He's the answer for critical race theory.

He's the answer for all these terrible things that they're trying to foist upon the LGBTQ and all of that.

Listen, we can't allow the world to define us.

We're defined by the Word of God.

And so notice here that the naysayers, the doubters and debaters of this world, you know, paul just left them and he brought his disciples out from among them.

He said okay, this the way you want it.

We're gonna leave you now.

We're gonna go find the hungry ones.

And they did.

They found the hungry ones and they stayed with them two years, preaching and teaching on a regular basis, and after two years, everyone in Asia Minor had heard the Word of the Lord.

Now, it didn't say that they all agreed with it, didn't say they all obeyed it.

But our job is not to convert people.

Our job is to confront people with the truth.

I thought it was our job to get people saved.

No, that's the Holy Ghost job.

Our job is to preach the Word.

Our job is to teach the Word.

Our job is to bring the Word of God with demonstration, and that way, people will never, ever in a million years, have any excuse that they didn't hear the truth because they won't be able to say it.

God will say oh no, I brought so and so into your life and they told you all about me and you rejected it that God is looking for people that will bring the truth.

And so, after two years, verse 10, two years see, it's not quick, it's not.

We've been here 27 years and I think about how the word has grown.

I think about how the word is mightily prevailed.

We're seeing more and more evidence of it every day.

It's amazing.

You know, on my Facebook John Griner Facebook page, pastor John Griner Facebook page we're about to break 7,000 followers, I mean just in a few months.

I see the hunger out there for the truth that we're putting out and all across the country, people, and by looking at some of the posts, I see how ill-equipped many believers are.

They're not getting the truth that we're hearing tonight, and I have a heart to maybe change that and try to get on there and start ministering to 7,000 people.

I'm not sure how to do it exactly yet, but God's got a plan.

But you know, this is how the whole country can come around and Christians can wake up and see that we're vital right now.

We've got a voice that we need to use.

And so, after two years, everyone in Asia Minor heard the word of the Lord.

You know, in December of 03, when we were just pouring the slabs on this building that we're in right now, I went away to pray in Galveston and God spoke to me this word.

He said there's a dearth of the word.

A dearth is an Old Testament word.

It means famine.

And I said Lord, how can there be a dearth of the word?

There's more churches now than ever before.

He said your children don't know what you know.

He wasn't talking about my blood children.

He was talking about the second generation, and I believe that's been proven Our children in school.

They have been watered down.

They have been.

The truth has been hidden from them.

We have a whole generation, actually more than one generation, that has been so far removed from God's word that many of them doubt it.

Many of them don't even believe that it's real.

And listen, the word of God is more real than anything.

And so you know, what did we do?

Well, we didn't give up.

We found some people that were hungry like you.

Everybody say I'm hungry for the word, I'm hungry for the truth.

See, we found you, you found us, whichever way it was, and eventually everyone in Houston is gonna hear the word of the Lord.

They might not be converted, but everybody in Houston, texas and beyond is gonna hear the word of the Lord, because we're not the only church preaching the word.

I realize that, and we're not the only city where the word of God is being preached, and I really do believe God's got a plan to revitalize America and bring a revival.

So the word of God prevails over the naysayers, the doubters and the debaters of this world.

And then the second thing I see is that the word of God prevails over demons and disease.

It says that special miracles that God brought, special miracles by the hands of Paul, that from his body, handkerchiefs or aprons were laid on sick people and diseases left them, they were healed and evil spirits came out of them.

And so these special miracles that they happened first, no, they happened after two years of preaching.

See, I think the church you know, sometimes we get things out of order we wanna see special miracles, we wanna see the spectacular, we wanna see great miracles first.

No, it comes after plowing the field, it comes after you've preached the word.

And you've preached the word, and you've preached the word, and it grows and it starts prevailing, it starts doing its work, it starts, you know, exercising force and change in people's lives.

It's not all at one time.

And then suddenly, after a period of time has occurred, all of a sudden now there's a doorway into the spectacular part of God's kingdom, and I believe that that's right ahead of us.

I believe we're going to see the most glorious miracles we've ever seen.

But we can't give up on the word.

We can't give up on it.

We must keep preaching it and teaching it.

And so these, you know, there were regular miracles and then there were special miracles.

What do I mean by that?

Well, you know, preaching of the Word will get people motivated to believe in faith for their miracle.

And they'll have miracles.

They'll recover from sickness, they'll demonic bondages will be broken over them, people will get saved.

You know, the greatest miracle of all is when people get saved, come into the kingdom of God.

And so those regular miracles happen all the time.

But then there are special miracles.

This special miracle was amazing.

I mean just cloths from his body laid on sick people, and they were healed.

Demons left people, and so much so that you know they were called special miracles.

I remember this church.

We've had special miracles, you know.

We had regular miracles since the first day.

We've had people saved, we've had people healed and when I say healed, a lot of times it's recovering.

They recover.

It's not instant.

Sometimes it's instant.

But I remember we had a grandmother coming to the church and she had a granddaughter that was born with a hole in her heart and the doctors told them he said she's gonna have to have an operation.

She's about 10 years old, it's gonna be.

You know you better.

You know she can't live very long with this hole.

We're gonna have to go back in.

She's not ready to have it yet.

She's gonna have to mature a little bit.

So she got to be 10 years old.

The doctors were watching.

She had all these tests and she was brought for prayer.

Gladys and I laid hands on her out in the lobby.

We weren't even a church service.

She came by just during the week.

We laid hands on her in Jesus' name and so they went back to the doctor.

The doctor begged him to run another test.

They were just believing for a miracle.

The test showed she still had the hole in her heart.

She needed the surgery.

It was very risky.

It was gonna take 10, 12 hours.

He said I'll send a nurse out every hour, give you an update, and I'm not making any promises.

She may not survive the surgery.

This is a terrible surgery you have to go through, and so within 30 minutes.

And so they were so disappointed that it didn't look like they had their healing and they were trying to avoid the surgery.

Well, what was that?

Well, that's a special miracle.

I mean, you needed a creative miracle.

You don't need just healing, you need a creative miracle where a hole is gone.

That's different than a regular miracle.

And so, anyway, they were disappointed and they're waiting, they're telling me the story.

And after 30 minutes the doctor comes out and they thought, oh, my goodness, the doctor's out.

What is he gonna tell us?

They thought the worst.

They thought maybe their granddaughter had died.

Their daughter mother was there, the grandmother was there.

He said I just can't explain it, but something told me to run one more test.

And I did a different test where I could see the backside of her heart and they called that a TEE, a transesophageal electrocardiogram, and they dropped that probe down her throat while she was out and he said there is no hole.

I have no description.

It was there, we got the diagnostics, it shows it, and today there's no hole.

The girl did not have to have surgery, jesus healed.

Talk about a special miracle.

Talk about, oh, my goodness.

Well, what it received.

By that time we'd been preaching and teaching the Word 20 years.

See, let's not get our eyes on the spectacular.

Let's let God confirm His Word, with signs following, and if we'll be faithful over that, we'll see the special miracles they've been.

Oh, let's come on, let's lift our hands.

Thank God, thank God.

Well, what happened to that girl?

Well, she never came to church, as far as I know, she grew up and we never saw her.

We never saw her mother, we never saw our grandmother.

They left the church for whatever reason.

I don't know if God did something like that for me.

I don't think I would ever leave a church where that happened.

But anyway, that's just me.

Hallelujah.

Well, we're gonna keep doing what we're doing, okay.

The Word of God, then, prevails over the naysayers, it prevails over the doubters and debaters, it prevails over demons and disease, and then, finally, it prevails over religion and religious thinking, or we could say, tradition.

You know, before Paul came on the scene, the traditions of men were ruling in that area.

They had what Jews were there, they were Judaism, you know.

And then you had some disciples of John that hadn't been saved.

Yet you had a mixture.

In Mark 713, jesus said that the traditions of men render the Word of God to none effect.

There is no substitute.

I like to define religion as man's vain attempt to provide good works or to provide their own way to heaven.

There's only one way to heaven.

His name is Jesus.

He's only got the Word of God.

That's the only word that's alive and powerful, and so our job is to bring that Word.

And so now he had encountered the naysayers and separated from them.

I think sometimes we spend too much time trying to convince people that are just in.

You know they're not interested.

Let's not waste our time.

Let's talk to people.

You know, brother Osteen taught me something very valuable in my ministry.

He said you know, when you're ministering to somebody, talk to them.

If they don't receive it, don't go chasing down the road after them.

Let them suffer the consequences of ignoring your advice.

It's so hard to do.

I'm tasked with watching after your soul as one that gives an account, or in other words, watching after your way of thinking.

That's what I'm doing here tonight.

I'm giving you some word here that will watch after your way of thinking.

Let's not spend all our time on the naysayers.

Let's spend our time on hungry and thirsty people, because there's lots of them.

There's lots of them that want what we have and we can get so caught up in a project.

Well, I just don't want to give a well, learn when to you know, pray in the Holy Ghost and learn when God is releases you from somebody, because some people just won't learn you know they just won't.

And so, uh, uh, in Isaiah 55, 10 and 11, the word of God is always producing it.

The word of God goes forth out of God's mouth and it prospers in the thing where to it is sent.

It always accomplishes what he pleases.

It does not return unto him void.

So I think about the word that goes out from this place every week, multiple times a week plus on the telephone, when we answer the telephone, when we're praying for people.

Uh, it's just after 27 years.

It's growing mightily and prevailing.

Lives are changing, people are being healed and God is granting special miracles.

I believe we're going to see.

I believe we're going to see greater miracles than ever before.

I really believe that.

So the religious crowd is jealous of these results.

That's what happened here.

You know you had the seven sons of Sceva.

They tried to do what Paul did.

They tried to use the name of Jesus without having a personal relationship with him, and it backfired.

They got defeated.

They were prevailed upon.

The demon prevailed on them.

And when people heard about it, what happened?

The fear of God came upon them, the name of Jesus was magnified and there was deep repentance.

People realized, you know, even when the devil did something, god turned what the devil meant for evil into good and he changed the whole climate of that area.

How did that happen?

Well, because for two years, the word of God grew mightily and prevailed.

That's why that's how it happened.

It wasn't just one event.

See, let's not leave out the word.

You can't leave off the word going forward.

And since we've been so consistent all these years, I'm expecting great and mighty, special miracles, because that's what we need right now.

We need the fear of the Lord multiplied.

There's a lack of it, even in the church.

We need the name of Jesus magnified Everybody else's name is magnified and we need deep repentance.

Oh, our nation and the church, we need a deep repentance.

You know, here in the book of Acts, the church at Ephesus they had a book burning in that way and you know the people were mixed up.

They had religion and then they also had the occult.

The occult was part of society, much like it is now.

You've got the occult mixed up with churches, and especially churches that don't preach the word like we do.

You've got the occult, you've got idolatry, you've got hero worship, you've got the worship of personality and all of that kind of thing, and there needs to be a deep repentance and turning away from those things toward the Lord.

And so what they did in the book of Acts?

They had a book burning 50,000 pieces of silver.

I don't know how much money that is in today's money, but it's serious money.

I mean, 50,000 pieces of silver at any time is a lot of money.

And so you can see how they had a whole business of selling these materials.

That's what's going on right now.

There's one of the instruments of the occult is drugs.

When you get people into an altered state of consciousness, they see demons, they act on voices, they do things.

Supernatural strength happens to them and our police forces has to try to calm somebody down.

That's high on crack or high on PCP, and it's a losing battle.

Why?

Because they have this demonic strength.

It's greater than what we have in the natural.

Oh, I tell you, we need deep repentance.

We need to burn these.

I just believe that we're going to see crack pipes and evil artifacts of every kind books, cds, dvds, thumb drives, the occult materials, everything that has to do with the occult.

I believe we're going to see big old bonfires in Houston.

I believe we're going to see a mighty repentance.

I believe we're going to see a mighty move of God.

Well, what makes you believe that?

Because I have confidence in the prevailing Word of God.

I have confidence in the Word to supernaturally and mightily grow and prevail.

Amen, the prevailing Word.

Why don't you receive that tonight?

Be encouraged, don't let the present circumstances get you down.

We still have the Word of God on our side, hallelujah.