Prayer and Fasting

We looked at in the last couple of uh weeks, starting in August, we looked at, God had laid on my heart, during this by vacation, I was reading through the Beatitudes.

God had really laid on my heart the message that I'd given to the guys about the new fall series, investing in eternity, which came out of verses God laid on my heart when we look at Matthew chapter 6, verse 16 and through 18 and 19, but verse 19 was the key verse that God gripped my heart and he says, Lay not up yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust does corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal.

Matthew 6:16

And so, ladies and gentlemen, we as we pass through this journey of life, and by the way, as I'll be 68 years old this December, and I was looking back at our twin boys' new grandchildren's pictures, and then turning back and looking at Mary, my oldest daughter, the mother of those twins' pictures, and said, My goodness, where have these years gone?

I mean, they go by pretty quick, folks.

And for you that are in your 30s and just maybe 40, I know what you're thinking.

You're thinking what I was thinking about a 68-year-old guy.

That's old.

But not now.

Actually, not now.

It's joyful.

It's uh actually it's kind of exciting.

And let me tell you why.

I've been able to live long enough now, since I was called into the ministry preaching the word at those early 20s to see God's word be as true and faithful as it was when I first started preaching it.

In fact, even more so.

And so it's been exciting to be able to not just preach about faith, think about faith, but walk by faith.

For we walk by faith and not by sight.

2 Corinthians 5, 7.

But you know what I've learned?

Life is a journey.

There's ups, there's downs, there's joys, there's sorrows.

That's life.

And what I've learned, now coming to the ripe age of 68, that you are investing your whole life either in earthly things or eternal things.

And it doesn't matter where you are for you teenagers, you're so fortunate.

Boy, that's a good looking row of teenagers.

Let's give them a hand.

Amen.

Over here, Aiden and Hunter.

I mean, they just awesome.

And to be able to get the truths that you're getting right now, and to start to live those truths as a teenager, and that's when God got my heart.

Right.

About I was uh almost 16 years old when I got saved.

And then he got a hold of my heart uh about really when I was 17, 18, I really understood what lordship meant.

And to begin to live out the truths that I was being taught and discipled was just phenomenal.

And then in my early uh couple years at Liberty, uh, when we just by faith just loaded up a U-Haul truck and overnight left.

You said, why'd you do that?

Because I was afraid I'd be talked out of not going.

And I was afraid I'd I'd just been offered, I'd just been offered my life, should I say, my life goals, jobs, both of them at the same time.

One to help with a youth in a in a uh church, Southern Baptist Church, Northside Baptist Church, to be the youth pastor.

And secondly, I'd just been offered, because I was almost through with my BS degree in physical education, I'd just been offered to come on coaching staff at my high school and be the weightlifting coach and help with the football team.

And those were what that's what I was going to school.

I wanted to come back and coach and and and work with teens during the summer.

So Satan had offered me both, and I you say, why do you say Satan?

Because he was trying to keep me from going to Liberty University.

See, sometimes you can have good things that's keeping you away from the best thing.

Hello, you okay?

That's a word for you.

Sometimes you can be offered good things to keep you from the best thing.

Satan's wise, he's deceitful, and he's powerful.

Amen.

So, you're investing.

And so, as we get ready, Rick and I to start this new series, Rick's gonna help me preach it.

And uh, on investing in eternity, basically we're looking at the whole Sermon on the Mount, chapters five through seven, but mainly we're gonna key in on the Beatitudes.

But there's so much before, really right before the Beatitudes, and then all the way through chapter seven.

In fact, I got a message I gotta preach.

I can't wait to preach it.

Probably gonna preach it within the next two weeks because after fasting, I want to do uh the key to a prayerful life.

That's next.

But then that third message, right before we get ready to start our new series, we're trying to get into the building to start the new series.

But God laid on my heart, he woke me up at 3 o'clock this morning.

Susan said, Are you still awake?

I said, I am.

I said, I can't go to sleep.

And I sat there and I prayed and uh this week praying and fasting, because the message is on fasting.

And I couldn't help but go to he kept bringing me back to the verses I'd memorized in Matthew chapter 7, where he says, Judge not that you be not judged.

Matthew 7 · chapter mention

You know what's wrong with America and what's wrong with all of us?

We're judges.

Hello, you okay?

We go around judging things.

So I've got a message.

God gave me the title, and I'm gonna work it up.

I can't wait.

What kind of judge are you?

So, buckle up.

It's coming.

What kind of judge are you?

You said, Well, I'm not a judge.

Oh, yes, you are.

You just don't realize it yet.

But he says, judge not that you be not judged.

And I don't think we understand the consequences of our critical, criticizing, judgmental spirits.

And it starts at the top from the president all the way down.

Can I get an o' me?

The critical and the judgmental stuff going on, it just breaks my heart.

We looked at last week the key and the the giant of wealthiness, and and and we saw that one of the things that we're to do, and we talked about uh laying up treasures in heaven, and we said that God rewards our giving.

And secretly, as we do it, and as we don't go around, you know, showing off what we give and how we give, but we're in verses three and four, if you remember, he says, in fact, just look at it there.

He says, But when thou doest alms, when you give, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, and the alms and their gifts may be in secret, and thy father which seeth in secret himself shall reward thee openly.

And then we said, Hey, that's one way of laying up treasures in heaven.

And then we said, He rewards praying.

Verse 6 go into your prayer closet, enter into the closet, and when thou shut the door, pray to the Father which is in secret, and the father seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly.

You'll be rewarded greatly, folks.

So next week we're gonna look at the key to a life of prayerfulness.

But then we get, and he said he rewards fasting.

Verses 16 through 18.

Moreover, when we fast, now notice what he said.

Not if you fast, but when you fast.

And this is a subject that's been very neglected in the evangelical church.

We don't talk about fasting a lot, we don't teach about fasting a lot.

But notice what Jesus said.

He said, When you fast.

Moreover, when you fast, be not as the hypocrites of a sad countenance, for they disfigure their faces that they may appear unto men to fast.

Verily I say unto you, they have their reward.

In other words, and we'll talk about that, but he says, But when thou fast, anoint thy head, watch thy face, that thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto the Father which is in secret.

There's that same phrase, and thy father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.

Three different times.

He says he's going to reward us openly with our giving, with our praying, and with our fasting.

So this morning, I want us to talk about a subject that is not just seldom talked about, but very seldom talked about, because it's not just an idea, it's not just a thought, because it's a truth that runs consistently from the very beginning of Genesis all the way through Revelation.

In fact, we know that the patriarchs fasted.

We read that when Moses was on Mount Sinai, 40 days and 40 nights, listen to what it says in Exodus 34, 28.

He neither ate bread nor drank water.

And then we see it exemplified through the lives of Elijah, Ezra, Daniel, and others in the Old Testament.

And then when we get to the New Testament, we see, we find our Lord fasted 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness.

Matthew 4, 2.

And then the apostles fasted following his conversion.

Paul in Acts 9 9, listen, was three days without sight and neither ate nor drank.

And then later on, he speaks of his frequent periods of fasting.

He fasted consistently.

2 Corinthians 11 27.

And then leaders in the early church also fasted.

We see that throughout the planning of the church in the New Testament church in the book of Acts.

So according to church history, every great leader whoever God used in a mighty way understood the importance of fasting and praying.

They understood that.

To take them to a deeper level with God.

So as we look at this, and great reformers like Martin Luther, the reformers, John Calvin, John Knox, John Wesley, Jonathan Edwards, Charles Finney, and my mentor, Dr.

Jerry Falwell of Liberty University, who birthed that whole thing.

And I had the privilege of being a student during that time.

And then going back and working with him and for him for almost 14 years.

And we prayed and we fasted for great movements of God, and we literally saw him.

So today, I want us to see the importance of fasting.

Number one, in your notes.

Look at verse 16 again.

Moreover, when you fast, when you fast, now, if you study Scripture, strictly speaking, fasting in the Bible times meant that there was a voluntary and seasonal abstaining from food.

For the Jew, there was one compulsory fast, and that was the Day of Atonement.

And from morning until evening, all men had, hey, they all had to afflict their souls.

And how did they do that?

By what?

They were forbidden to eat, drink, bathe, or to anoint oneself, or to wear sandals, or to indulge in any kind of physical relationship for the whole day.

For the whole day.

But it is quite clear, and I really believe this with all my heart, when we study this subject, that while fasting had to do with the idea of abstaining from food, it consisted of a lot more than just food.

In fact, I am convinced it consisted of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.

1 John 2.

Those things that we so allow our fleshly appetites to sometimes control us and take control of us and to keep us from being all that God wants us to be.

So there's a need for fasting.

Fasting means denying ourselves that which the flesh craves that we may more earnestly live for Him.

For me.

It's sugar.

I crave sugar.

I'm a sugarholic.

Don't laugh, some of you are with me.

Amen.

I mean, I could eat sugar three times a day.

Actually, I could eat sugar all day.

I mean, I wake up wanting a honey bun.

I go to bed wanting a donut.

And at lunch I want ice cream, milkshake.

Hello?

That's me.

That's my diet.

If it was my will, that would be my dad.

And I'd weigh 500 pounds.

But this is the purpose of fasting is denying ourselves that which the flesh craves, that which, so that we can have a more intimate and dynamic relationship with God.

Now listen to me.

And the more deeper we walk with God, the more power of God we see on our lives and our ministry and our church.

That's why you don't see the movement of God like you see in third world countries.

Because, see, we're caught up in the world instead of caught up in God.

And the materialistic world that we live in has so encompassed us that we don't even realize it.

But yet we'll turn around and we'll see God move in little bits, but not magnificent ways.

Because until you can walk in the deep steps with an awesome God, you'll not see the deep steps of an awesome God's power.

Because without faith, it is impossible to please God.

And until your faith gets so real and so deep, walking with God, that it's like it's like I'm walking with Susan, and we're so intimately uh bound together.

We're so in love with each other.

We're we we we talk about everything.

We know I even know what she's thinking before she thinks it.

Which is good.

The problem is she knows what I'm thinking before I think it.

That's bad.

She's a lot more spiritual than I am.

The preacher said his wife's more spiritual than him.

For most of your men, that's true.

Just a thought.

But what I see here, folks, is the needs.

Are ready?

Here we go.

There's four things that fasting does for us.

Boy, this is so good.

Well, man, I needed this.

I just needed to be refreshed.

I've got a renewed emphasis on praying and fasting.

And by the way, I'm going to call for a church praying and fasting every Wednesday.

I did, I started this Wednesday.

Praying so that we can get into that new building and the new ministries.

We've got so much about to transpire here.

And again, we're we're just now trying to get it all together so we can show you.

And Benji's going to share a little bit today, but but we got a lot coming.

But we need prayer, and hey, hey, and we need to fast because Satan is rearing his head and he can't stand about what's going to fix it.

Going to fixing.

Fixing to going.

Going to fixing.

He can't stand what's about to happen in a great and mighty way.

You can take the boy out of the country.

Sometimes you can't take the country out of the boy.

I was born in Albany, Georgia, and lived in Sylvester.

But hey, now listen, listen to me.

I know I've seen this happen three times.

And I'm excited.

Somebody says, do you ever get discouraged?

No.

I get mad.

Hello?

I don't get discouraged.

There's a difference in being discouraged and mad.

I get discouraged.

I don't get discouraged because I know that, hey, I've read the last chapter and we win.

I know the battle's been won.

But what I get discouraged is how I see Satan take us and defeat us and trap us and trip us and just get us grumbling and griping and complaining and not doing what God wants us to do.

I get mad.

Hello?

You okay?

We need, number one, times of fasting for personal examination.

Look at the prophet Joel in Joel 1.14.

When the prophet Joel called the nation to repentance, he said, Consecrate a fast, call a sacred assembly, gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the Lord your God and cry out to the Lord.

That's what we're doing with us elders, our our your pastor's team here.

Hey, we're praying every Wednesday now.

We come together here at 12 o'clock, and we're praying for about an hour from 12 to 1, and we're just getting a hold of God, asking God to give us wisdom, to give us discernment, to give us direction.

But more than that, to give us the power of God on our lives and on our ministries.

I'm kind of calling, going over into the promised land, but now I've called it Wednesday.

I said, we got a beach, we got a beachhead.

We got to take the beach.

Like Normandy.

Remember Normandy when they landed?

They had a group going here.

We got a group going after the children's ministry.

We've got a group going after the youth's ministry.

We're going to get a group going after the seniors.

By the way, I want to start a group with seniors.

Amen.

And we're going to start at 55.

And we're going to call it the SS.

What is that?

Super Saints.

I want to, hey, hey, I want the super saints, the super seniors, so we'll call them super super seniors.

That's even better.

Hey, to show, hey, these younger couples and these younger folks and these young, hey, what it really means to live and and operate in the unbelievable power of a real God that God answers prayers, God moves in our lives, and God can do the impossible.

And we're to be teaching the younger ones anyway.

Instead of sitting around doing nothing.

Or sitting around doing nothing.

I'm gonna be nice.

But really.

So we gotta we gotta get ready, folks.

Hey, Satan's fighting.

We gotta fight back.

He's trying to tear our country up.

He's trying to tear, hey, our cities up.

He's trying to tear.

Our government up.

He's trying to tear our cities up, and he's trying to tear our churches up.

Actually, he's trying to shut the church up.

So they call for a fast.

He says, If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face, turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven, forgive their sins and heal their land.

Amen.

2 Chronicles 7, 14.

There's times for personal examination.

We need therefore to deny ourselves of the food, the sleep, the social activities in order to get along with God to examine our hearts.

Listen to what David said.

David fasted often.

He said, Oh God, search me, know my heart, try me, know my thoughts, see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way of everlasting.

Psalms 139, 23, and 24.

Amen, folks.

So we've got to have that time.

Secondly, we need times of fasting.

Are you ready?

For personal humiliation.

You say, What does that mean?

Listen to what Joel said again.

Joel 2, 12.

The Holy Spirit speaking through Joel says, Turn to me with all your heart with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning.

What he's saying there is that we are to open up our hearts and we need to humble ourselves before an awesome real God.

Oh, 1 Peter 5, 6 and James 4.10, he says, Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord that he may lift you up.

Because listen to me, church, if we won't humble ourselves, God will humble us.

Hebrews 10 31.

Amen.

So it's very important.

Humility is a disposition.

And I love this.

I wrote this down.

You may want to write this down.

I was looking at the definition of humility, and God gave me this thought.

Humility is a disposition inasmuch as it is the outworking.

It is the outworking of the mind of Christ.

Now watch.

In us and through us.

In other words, and I really believe this.

I really do.

Because a discipline in that we allow the cross to humble us even to the death of sin and self.

In fact, the verse God gave me there was Galatians 2.20.

I am crucified with Christ.

Nevertheless I live, yet not I.

But Christ liveth in me.

In the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.

Here's what it is: it is a disposition of allowing the mind of Christ to so control our thought process that we act out the characteristics of all that Christ is in and through us.

Woo! Now when that takes place, when that transpires, folks, I'm telling you, you know what you are?

You are a walking testimony, but more than that, you are a walking instrument and tool and woo weapon for the glory of God.

Because Christ is all over you.

Amen.

And people don't see you, they see Christ.

And I need that in my life.

Amen.

So it's a, hey, we need times for fasting for personal examination, humiliation, just to reveal to us all the ungodliness and sinfulness that we are and the ways that we aren't like Christ, so we can confess it.

And if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

And then notice the third thing we need times of fasting for personal mortification.

Listen to what David said in Psalm 69:10.

Psalms 69:10

When I wept and chasten my soul with fasting, that became my reproach.

Wow! As he chastened his soul in penance and in the presence of God, he discovered the true nature of his sinfulness.

And he abhorred it.

He detested it.

He hated it.

I am convinced.

And I'm talking about me too.

One of the reasons that we so often are casual.

Now listen, with our walk with God is because we know when we come to the point in our life and place in our life and we be still, Psalms 46, 10, and know that he's God.

And we really get honest with God, with our thought process, with our actions, with all the garbage and the lust and all the immorality and the stench that is on us.

We can't take it.

So we just kind of half-heartedly cruise.

Oh, we'll go to church when it's convenient.

We'll read our Bible when it's convenient.

Or we'll read a five-minute little devotion.

Oh, I've had my quiet time.

Instead of spending hours in a week with the Lord saying, God, I'm I'm I'm so unworthy.

Lord, I need you.

These thoughts are terrible.

My thinking's terrible.

The way I all all the stuff I listen to is terrible.

The things I watch are terrible.

Lord, I am, I, I am, I'm just, I'm, I'm rotten.

You say, well, I don't want to say I'm rotten.

Well, we are.

All our righteousness is filthy rags.

Isaiah 64, 6.

But the exciting thing about that is when you get to that place and you really mean it and want it, then you're ready to be purified and have humbled and cleansed, and then you're ready for a relationship that you can't even imagine.

Because the purer you are, the more power and more presence of Christ you have.

Be holy in all manner of conversation behavior, because it is written, Be ye holy, for I am holy.

So, folks, and a lot of say, Well, that's negative talk.

No, it's not negative talk, it's truth talk.

You got to know the truth.

And the truth shall say it with me.

Shall what?

Set us free.

Set us free of the bondage, of the discouragement, of the disappointment of all that Satan is.

We can get rid of him.

Get thee behind me, Satan, because we have the power of God through the person of the Holy Spirit living in and through us.

And what we need to is, are you ready?

Plug in to what we already have.

We're on the 110 instead of the 220.

We need to plug in.

We need to plug in.

We got to plug in.

Listen to what Colossians 3.5 says.

Put to death.

Here it is.

Your members which are on this earth, in other words, the earthly things.

Fornication, that sexual immorality, uncleanness, impurities, passion, lust, evil desires, covetousness, greed, hey, which is adultery.

Worship, worshiping things that are worldly.

That's adultery.

That's what it is.

And then listen to what Romans says.

If you live according to the flesh, you will die.

But if ye by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

And then he says, verse 14, for as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God.

In other words, we've got the power to keep Satan succumb.

Oh, that's exciting.

It's so exciting.

Which brings me to the fourth thing why we need to fast.

Not only examination, humiliation, mortification, but number four, rededication.

We need times of fasting for personal rededication.

Listen to the verse in Acts 13, 2 concerning the church at Antioch.

Are you ready?

As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, Now separate to me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.

Before the Lord Jesus, listen, chose his apostles.

The Lord himself, listen, this is so good.

In Luke 6, 12, he went out to a mountain to pray and continued all night in prayer to God.

And by the way, he wasn't eating, in order that he might know the divine will regarding the disciples he was about to appoint.

Wow.

Fasting means more than abstaining from food.

It has a purpose.

And that purpose is I got to thinking about when's the last time you prayed and fasted before you made a major move in your life?

When you made a job change, maybe.

Well, it looks good.

Hey, more money.

It's always about the money.

And by the way, if anybody tells you it's not about the money, it's a lie.

It's about the money.

I hear that all the time.

Boy, preacher, it's not about the money.

Yes, it is.

Yes, it is.

Just go ahead and see, that's what happens.

We're deceptive with our own selves.

Amen.

And then we get there and we wonder, what in the world did I do?

I'll tell you what you did.

You made the decision without praying and fasting and getting hold of God and godly counsel and making sure that you had the peace of God before you made a major move in your life.

Now let me take that to the church life.

Why don't we have men and women in the church praying and fasting about where God wants them to go to work in the church?

When you pray and fast about a ministry and God opens the door for you to have a ministry, let me tell you, if God did it and you're walking with God, you're gonna hang in there.

Hey, when the going gets tough, you're gonna get going.

You're not gonna give up on the first obstacle.

Amen.

Every major move, Susan, I've made, we have prayed and fasted over.

I don't take this lightly, folks.

Think about it.

If God be for you, so if he gives you the go, the green light, oh, hell can't stop you.

Amen.

Oh, he'll try.

That's why, hey, I'm so excited about us going over, taking the beach.

I mean, hey, we it's gonna be so exciting.

You're gonna watch God move in ways you've never believed before.

And he's gonna move in your life.

And several of you, and and I know we hadn't said a whole lot about it, but because again, we've had so much going on and we hadn't gotten over there, but the parking lot's done, it's not striped.

Can we give God a hand?

Amen.

But as we kicked off that parking lot to raise the$220,000 in the next six months to year to pay off the parking lot, we raised about$45,000,$50,000 real quick.

And the people that was involved in that were the way God just provided.

Uh we told you to start praying and getting involved and asked God to give you extra money.

He gave Susan and I$4,000 within a month extra to give to buy uh two uh parking spaces.

That's just the way he works.

Amen.

Amen.

So, hey, it's personal rededication.

Fasting means much more than just separation from food or or or sleep or work or play or social activities and any other preoccupation in order that it might spend, that we might spend adequate time with God for personal examination, humiliation, mortification, and rededication.

That's that's why we do it.

We get along with God and say, God, purify me so you can use me.

Isn't that good?

Listen to me.

God will not use a dirty vessel.

God will not use a dirty vessel.

Now I didn't say you couldn't perform as a dirty vessel.

Hello?

You with me now?

I can preach in the flesh.

I have preached in the flesh.

You can minister in the flesh.

You can get up here and sing and play instruments in the flesh.

And it'd be good music.

But it's God in it.

And there's only one way, hey, that it's gonna penetrate and be used for the glory of God.

He'll only get honored when a clean vessel is being his representation.

Now that's tough preaching.

You won't hear that in the average pulpit.

I know that.

But see, I'm too old.

It doesn't bother me.

I don't have, I don't need to be put on somebody's pedestal.

Because I know one day I'm gonna bow before the Lord Jesus Christ.

And I'm giving an account of everything that I preach from this pulpit.

And by the way, if you're in a ministry, whether it's singing, whether it's teaching, whether it's whatever you're doing, if you're not doing it for the honor and glory of God, we're hypocrites.

Well, the church is full of hypocrites, absolutely.

We're all one.

But aren't you thankful for the God's grace and his love?

And the exciting thing about God's grace is he takes a hypocrite and turns them into a vessel that's honoring and glorifying to him because we allow him to come into our lives.

We allow his mind to become our mind, and we start thinking like him, we start acting like him, we start talking like him, we start singing like him, we start playing like him, we start teaching like him, and next thing you know, he's lifted up, and I'm about to have a running.

And John 12, 32, if I be lifted up, I draw all men unto me.

Justin over here is he's a jailer with our uh jail system in is it Hoover?

Yeah.

Well, he had invited another jailer with him for a couple of weeks.

Brian, he's not here because he got sick.

But last Monday afternoon, we led him, he because of Justin, he had already been laying the groundwork and sharing, and I said, We're going to see him.

And he was over, he came over to Justin's house.

Long story short, Rick and I led him to Christ right there in the driveway.

Amen.

You know what I told him after we got there, and I always go into my routine.

I said, Well, if you're to die right now, you're sure you'd go to heaven.

And you hear me say it every week.

Every time I preach, I will say it.

I give somebody the opportunity every week to get saved.

Everything I preach, teach, funeral, wedding, I give the gospel.

That's what God called me to do.

Been doing it 45 years.

But anyway, I said, well, you know, Brian, I don't have to.

He said, Well, I'm not sure.

I said, Well, if you're not sure, that means you're probably not.

Hello.

Let me help you out there.

If you're not sure to say, you're probably not.

Hey, I know I'm saved.

These things have written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that ye may know that ye have eternal life.

1 John 5, 13.

I can tell you when I got saved, where I got saved.

Now, have I always been the best Christian?

No.

But I know I got saved.

And I know if I had to die right now, I'm going to heaven.

I know that.

No doubt in my mind.

No doubt.

But let me tell you, here's the whole thing.

I looked at Brian and I said, now, Brian, I don't, I'm not going to sit here and start at Romans 3.23, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.

Romans 5.12, for by one man sinned entered into the world, death by sin.

So death passed upon all men, for all men have uh have sinned.

And then go into Romans 10, if thou should confess with thy mouth.

I take you through the Romans row.

I said, I don't have to do that.

You sat right there, right where Paul is, right there, for two Sundays in a row, and you've heard me give the gospel.

So my question to you is, would you like to get saved?

He said, Yep.

Amen.

Folks, that's what it's all about.

That's what it's all about.

God uses vessels that are willing to be clean and used.

Amen.

And he's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

He needs us.

Brings me to the second point.

The practice of fasting.

Look at verse 16 and 18.

Jesus said, When you fast, do not be like the hypocrites.

Then verse 18, he said, Your father who sees and secret will reward you openly.

First of all, look at it.

Under that, number one, we must fast sensibly.

How do you do that?

Look at verse 16.

When you fast, do not be like the hypocrites.

In other words, don't go around telling everybody you're fasting.

Oh, I'm fasting.

Oh man, they would go around, they'd put ashes in the beards and on the head, and they would look so pitiful.

They would want, they would, they were hoping that people would see them going around and oh you want something to eat?

No, I'm fasting.

And they would they would want people to call them holy men of God.

See, let me tell you something.

God's not interested in the outward appearance, God's interested in the heart.

God sees not as man sees.

Man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart.

Amen.

1 Samuel 16, 7.

Oh man, that's good.

So, and not only should we be sensible about it.

Fasting also is to be, watch this secondly, secretly.

Verse 18, do not appear to men to be fasting.

Now, in the word in the Bible, the Jews took fasting beyond the Day of Atonement, which was very important to them once a year to fast.

And actually, here's what they did in Luke 8, 12, listen to what it says.

They took it to fast two days a week, Mondays and Thursdays.

We don't know why, but the Pharisees in the temple made this clear when he when they prayed, listen to what they prayed.

I fast twice a week.

I give tithes of all that I possess.

Luke 18, 12.

And again, the apostle Paul practiced fasting.

What I'm saying is, you determine how often and when you want to fast.

But let me say this it ought to be for purposes that are consistent with what God is doing in your life.

You just don't say, I'm gonna fast because I want to fast.

I want God's blessing because I'm fasting.

That's the wrong, wrong attitude, wrong disposition.

Right now, God's laid heavily on my heart that the church needs to pray and fast for this major move that we're about to undertake.

It will be massive.

We've been here.

You know what?

We've been in our little cocoon for eight and a half years.

Well, actually, nine.

Nine years today.

Do you realize it's really the anniversary today?

Nine years ago, this church was birthed.

Can we give God a hand?

Amen.

I will Rosemary right there.

My neighbors moved into the neighborhood.

I will, some some ghost was cutting my grass.

Come to find out it was my neighbor.

I thought he was doing it out of a goodness of his heart, but he didn't like my tall grass.

A little bit of both.

I didn't have a lawnmower.

But we've watched God do the impossible here, folks.

Don't forget where we've come from.

But he's been, we've been comfortable, we've been, we've been cozy, and and we've we've enjoyed it.

But I got news for you.

Are you ready?

The honeymoon's over.

We got to go to work.

We've got a whole community to reach.

We've got Christian schools.

We've got Christian homeschools.

We got a lot that we've got a facility that we can be a blessing to to help get the gospel to thousands of people in this community.

Amen.

I'm excited.

I like hard work.

Builders.

I was telling the staff Wednesday, if I could have lived in another time period, I'd love to have been a Daniel Boone or Davy Crockett.

I'd have been in the Alamo, no doubt in my mind.

Yep, I'd have been there.

That's who I am.

Let's go.

New territory.

Let's go.

You know why?

Because it's not boring.

Because you don't know what you're going to find until you get there.

And then you don't find what you think you're going to find.

And then you, what does that mean?

You just have to trust God.

Can I get an amen?

But if God be for you, who can be against you?

Oh, I love it.

I love it.

I love it.

I think when we get to heaven, I think he's got a seat right by Peter for me.

Because Peter would just charge and then ask questions.

He wasn't like the beloved John.

See, John, if there was a cliff here, John would come here and look over and say, whoo, man, that's a pretty long way down.

We got to jump.

Is the water deep enough?

I'm not sure.

Is there a ledge we might could go down?

Is there a rope we all then?

You know what Peter did?

Peter just take back and go.

Where we're going to land.

Amen.

Thank God we need, we got all of us.

We need each other.

Amen.

Because by the time Peter gets ready to jump, there's Susan or some of y'all, John grabs Peter and says, Whoa, buddy.

Let's make sure it's deep enough for we jump.

Oh, that's a good idea.

Oh, I didn't think about that.

Why?

Because he's got one thing.

We're going.

We're taking it.

We need each other.

We need it.

It's a team.

And boy, when it does and it functions right and you're walking with God, it's beautiful.

It's beautiful.

Which brings me to the third thing.

Fasting cultivates a life of purity.

And we talked about that.

The last thing.

The last point.

Fasting.

The profitableness of fasting.

Are you ready?

Number one.

Fasting cultivates a life, first of all, of purposefulness.

It cultivates a life of purpose.

I like those adverbs.

My wife gets, she doesn't like me to do that.

It's homiletically good.

Concerning the prophetess Anna, remember her?

We read.

She served God with fasting and prayers night and day.

Woo! There was purpose.

There was concentration.

There was discipline.

There was self-denial in her.

When the Lord Jesus rose a long while before daylight to meet with the Father in prayer, he did so with a sense of purposefulness or purpose, even though it meant denying himself sleep at a very busy time that he was ministering.

He still rose up early every morning to be with the Lord.

He had a purpose.

Let me tell you what God taught me here.

You want to write this down.

This is a nugget.

This is one of those nuggets of gold we've dig out of the passage of Scripture.

This is one of the greatest lacks in Christian living today, I believe.

And that is there's plenty of desire in us as Christians.

Plenty.

We have a desire.

And you get that when you get saved.

You have a desire to live for Jesus.

Can I get an amen?

You have a desire to serve Jesus.

Amen.

You have a desire to get involved in a community for Jesus.

All that.

We have a desire.

The moment the Holy Spirit gets in my heart, man, you become a new creation.

Old things have passed away.

Behold, all things become new.

You have a desire, a new desire.

Can I get an amen?

But if we do not, are you listening?

Have determination.

It won't happen.

Desire has to be transferred into determination.

Then you'll see.

And I love that.

Determination, not desire.

Are you ready?

Now here's the nugget.

Determination, not desire, determines destiny.

That's good, preacher.

Determination determines destiny.

You can have the desire.

But if you don't have the determination, you will not fulfill what God's called you to do.

So, fasting is cultivate a life of purpose.

It cultivates a life of prayerfulness.

Look, he said in Matthew 17, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.

You cannot get the power of God on your life when you go against Satan and have the power you need except through prayer and fasting.

You've got to have a double portion of God's power on your life, and that comes through prayer.

And next week we're going to look at a life of prayerfulness.

It's going to be good.

And then the last thing fasting.

Cults of cults to vate.

A life of purity.

Got to be pure.

Got to be pure.

I didn't say perfect.

Can I get an amen?

I said pure.

We all fail.

More than we should.

I'm afraid sometimes we use that as an excuse.

I have people all the time, well, nobody's perfect.

I understand that.

But it's amazing that Jesus said we ought to strive for perfection.

Huh?

They don't ever say that.

They don't, they forget that.

We ought to, our goal is to be more like Jesus tomorrow than we are today.

Can I get an amen?

Right?

That's it.

That's it, folks.

Listen to me.

There's some people right here watching online, listening to my voice.

You've never really tried fasting.

Let me challenge you.

There's many ways to fast.

You can fast all day, you can fast more than one day.

You can fast with a liquid fast, not eating anything.

All I do is when I fast on Wednesday, drink water.

So I try to do without coffee that day or anything sweet that day.

The things that I crave.

I try to do away with so I can be totally in tune with what God wants for me, and I make sure I have extra times of prayer during that fasting.

I have in my quiet time a passage of scripture like I've been studying that I just constantly think about all day during that fast day.

It's so important.

I memorize the scripture that God is using, like judge not that you be not judged.

Matthew 7, 1, that he's given me.

And then men ought to always pray and not to faint, Jesus said in Luke 18.1.

So these are the things that I'm asking God to help me to be more sensitive to Him and in tune with Him.

I'm doing away with all the social activity.

I all day Wednesday, just me and you, Lord.

Just me and you.

Nothing but just me and you.

Me and you.

Talk to me.

Help me.

Give me wisdom.

Lord, I need to know you more.

I need to walk with you more.

And then you know what I do?

Guess what?

I remind him.

Hey, after I've praised him, I remind him of his problems.

Hello?

I'm serious.

Casting all your care upon him, what?

He cares for you.

I remind him.

And you know what he all immediately tells me?

They're not problems, they're opportunities.

And he says, I got this.

Yeah.

Every head bowed, every eye closed.