266 ~ RECEPIE FOR REVIVAL ~ PART 5

We welcome you to the We Are Zion sermon podcast.

We are a church based out of Chennai, India.

We are thrilled that you tuned in today and hope that you will

be refreshed, revived, and energized by what you hear.

Our desire is that you will live life with a renewed sense of

purpose that stems from a vibrant faith in Jesus.

The year 2025 is 1 where we will be positioned by God to possess

our promise. We continue our sermon series

called A Recipe for Revival where we look at different

instances in the Bible where God poured his spirit out on his

people leading to reformation and restoration.

Hi Judge, what a joy it is to share God's word with you today,

even as we're on the last weekend in the lead up to

Pentecost Sunday. You know, it doesn't have to be

just a Sunday that we celebrate. The Holy Spirit is worth

celebrating all day, every day through the year.

But today we're going to be looking at a very specific part

of revival that we have been seeking for from God for a

while. And it's generational revival.

It's a revival across generations.

Because the beautiful thing is when you look at any church, you

look at a community, most communities, most, most of the

body of Christ is so multigenerational.

You have people in the age groups from, you know, 60 to 80.

Then you have the 40s to 50s, you have those, you know the

young working adults, You have the adolescents, you have the

teenagers, you have the little ones, you have the babies in

the. Wombs.

Our lives are surrounded by the evidence of generations, and I

believe that God is a God of generations.

Every time he reiterated his word to his people, he said I am

the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob because He was the God who

cared for every generation. You know, and he had plans for

every generation, and we believe that revival occurs in our

individual lives. You know, when we allow God to

heal and deliver us across generations.

What does that actually mean? What does that actually mean?

Does stuff that happens in previous generations affect us?

It absolutely does. I remember growing up when my

mother used to discipline me. Or, you know, correct me.

There were certain things she could say or do which I would,

when I was receiving the correction at the time, would

bow to myself. I will never say that when I

become a parent. I will never do this when I

become a parent. And then 20 years later when I

had my own children, when I correct them, I do the exact

same thing. I say the exact same thing, much

to my shame. And that's when I realized that,

you know, genetics works in a certain way.

Indoctrination across generations.

Works a certain. Way, experience, all of that

contributes to us repeating the things that our ancestors did,

whether we like it or not. In the good and the bad, there

are certain traits that ancestors had.

They may have been teachers, they may have been lawyers, they

may have been doctors, and then the next generation just somehow

has the same kind of abilities. They're able to grow and develop

on those abilities of the ancestors.

So it's great. But there's also stuff that

comes down through generations which is not so good.

It could be a spirit of lust, it could be a spirit of greed, it

could be addictions, it could be wastefulness, it could be

idolatry. It could be so many things that

come down our bloodlines and I believe.

That God is calling us into a revival across generations.

You know, I love looking at memes and funny videos.

I think as we get older, we just need something to, you know,

kind of decompress. So these are some of the things

that I, I found online when it comes to generational issues

where, you know, Mona Lisa, just, you know, how Mona Lisa

looks. But when she inherits

generational trauma instead of generational wealth, this is how

she ends up looking. That's what the meme said.

And I realized that, you know, there was a multitude of memes

on this particular topic, but the sum and substance of it all

is this. If a previous generation has not

dealt with the issues that plagued them, they pass it to

the next generation. The next generation has to deal

with it in greater measure, right?

If you received correction in a harsh way from your parent, you

tend to pass that on. But I want to challenge you

today that when revival touches a generation, that person in

that generation can effect change for the better.

So maybe you received harsh correction.

Unkind words spoken over you by the.

Ones who should have protected you.

But you can change that stance when you look at your children

and you can completely break a cycle.

And I believe that it's up to each generation to unearth, to

uncover. The things they are holding onto

and repent of it, release it to God for God to do his work.

You know, many times we refuse to repent for what we didn't do.

But I believe in this place, we, when we come together as

generations in a church, it's very powerful when each

generation repents of the things that they have been harbouring,

maybe even without their knowledge.

Because when we do that, we're inviting God in to come and mix

it up. We're inviting God in to say

come in Lord and do your thing. Have your way revive us.

It is so important for revival to flow across generations so

that in entirety in communities, we receive the power of God for

the the work that is given to us that is entrusted to us because

it's important to understand this revival needs to happen in

order that every generation fulfills their God-given

purpose. I love that verse.

I I think it was in the book of Acts where it says when David

had. Done all that he was that was

required of him, he rested with his father's.

And it's such a powerful voice because in one line it explains

what David's life was about. He had a mandate, he had to

fulfil it. He did it.

And then God gave him rest in death.

How can God, when God looks at us, how does he describe us?

Christine, as long as she had life served me fulfilled.

Her mandate and then was taken up to heaven.

What if that was written on our gravestone and our desire is

that each of us in every generation?

You could be Gen. Z, you could be a boomer, you

could be a millennial. The names are many.

But are you fulfilling what God has written for you in the book

of life? Are you fulfilling the purposes

of God for your time? That's what we want to do.

Today. We're looking at the lives of

King ASA and King Jehoshaphat. These are one two of my favorite

characters from the Book of Kings and Chronicles and.

They were a father and son duo. ASA served God as a king for

about 40 years, Jehoshaphat for about 25 years.

Both these guys were so intentional in following God and

leading their people. They came from the lineage of

David, right? They came, they were kings of

Judah. They were honourable.

They were, they were so filled with the fear of God and they

were so mindful in leading a nation towards God, which is so

powerful about that because, you know, they could have just lived

in the fear of God by themselves.

But no, they influenced an entire nation to follow God.

But the interesting thing is they were not all perfect.

Just like any of us humans, they had these human frailties, which

again, is much that we can learn from.

And so we're going to be looking at their life today, and we are

going to look at how two different generations

accomplished what God had planned for them, and two

different generations made certain mistakes that repeated

across a generation. But there was also moments of

transformation in that because God's grace is sufficient, God's

power is evident, and we don't have to think.

You know what? I can't run for my genetics.

Neuroscientists today will disagree with you because of the

study of epigenetics that, you know, we can actually

superimpose what is passed on genetically as a trait can be

superimposed because of our will, because we can step in and

say, no, I'm not going to do that again.

I'm going to choose a different way.

And you know, our lifestyle, our choices, our mentality, all of

that can be changed. And in the context of being a

believer of Jesus, the minute I bring the Holy Spirit in when I

ask Him to give me the mind of Christ, I begin to change even

what is deeply ingrained within me.

And it's not me who does it. It's.

Christ. In me.

And so I want to encourage you today even as we're looking.

I don't know what your situation is with the generations that

have gone before you or the generations after you.

Maybe you're someone who's older and you're saying, you know

what? I don't know if I'm imparting

anything to the next generation. I want you to be encouraged that

when you live your life's purpose so on point, when you're

so in connection with God and you're you're so dependent on

Him, you will be influencing another generation.

I want to encourage those of you of the younger generation.

That you would lean into the wisdom of the older generation.

They are not perfect, they're far from it.

But lean into those who have been leaning into Jesus for many

years. There's so much of wealth in

them. And so I want to.

Look first at King ASA. King ASA had two incredible

traits which his son inherited from him.

The first thing was that King ASA followed God wholeheartedly.

There was no wavering in his devotion to God.

Two Chronicles chapter 14 verses 2 to 6 explains this to us.

ASA did what was good and right in the eyes of the Lord his God.

He removed the foreign altars and the high places, smashed the

sacred stones, and cut down the Ashara poles.

He commanded Judah to seek the Lord, the God of their

ancestors, and to obey his laws and commands.

He removed the high places and incense altars in every town in

Judah, and the Kingdom was at peace under him.

He built up the fortified cities of Judah since the land was at

peace. No one was at war with him

during those years, but the Lord gave him rest.

Isn't that amazing? ASA did what was good and right

in the eyes of the Lord, and I particularly like that he was he

sought God throughout his life. It says now he ruled over Judah

for 40 years, and it says 35 years of that was one of peace,

which is incredible in any monarch's rule to.

Have 35 years of peace is a big deal.

And the interesting thing is Asa's father was Abhija.

Abhija only reigned for three years and he was not a very good

king. Yes, he relied on God, but there

was also reliance on other things.

But somehow ASA had learnt to cling on to God wholeheartedly

and it's so important to remember this if.

You want a. Recipe for generational revival.

Here's recipe number one. You do not have to repeat the

sins of your father's when you follow God scrupulously.

What does that? Mean.

Yes, maybe you come from an heritage where, you know,

fathers, grandfathers, mothers, grandmothers, didn't model a

Christian way of life, didn't live in a way that honoured God.

But you can choose to follow God wholeheartedly if you are, you

know, reading his word, meditating it, living in close

communion with him. You don't have to live the way

your ancestors lived. There's no requirement.

There's no requirement. If you want a revival in your

lifetime, you need to begin to choose that.

It starts with you. I'm going to choose to follow

God wholeheartedly. In my family one.

Side of my family, we have a tendency to be worried what's

and I've seen it happen in my grandmother and then I've seen

it happen after that with her children.

And then I found that I had this incredible trait of saying I

trusted God with my, you know, words and my demeanor, but there

was always the sense of worrying.

And I, I convinced myself that worrying was the way I

demonstrated that I cared about something or someone.

And then I realized that this was something that was coming

down generation. And I was talking to many years

back, I was talking to one of my aunts and she said our granddad

was like that. That is my great grandfather.

He would walk around the house. Incredible man of God, loved his

family, was very faithful, very committed, hard working, but he

would worry. He had four children.

He would pace up and down in his house worrying, mulling over

things and needing things that, you know, he wanted God to work

on. But worry had, you know, a

prominent place in his life. And I realized that this was

something that was there generationally for me.

And I can't tell you, I can tell you honestly, I've still not

beaten it. There is a tendency to worry.

But the minute I identified that this is coming down

generationally, I had to take control of it more than

anything. I had to bring God into it.

Because, you know, we, we tend to say we trust God, we are

devoted to him. Then where does worry come in?

And I was so. Caught up with what Jesus says.

Do not worry about anything but in everything by prayer and

petition, make your request known to God.

And so it began with me turning every worry to prayer.

And then I found that once I prayed, I still worried because

there was the element of Thanksgiving was missing and so

I had to bring Thanksgiving as the prominent.

Portion of my life had to bring it to the forefront.

And The funny thing is, the minute you begin to thank God

for all that He has done and is doing, worry doesn't have too

much. Of a place.

Because you're remembering all that he has done, and you're

thinking, well, if he did it before, he's probably going to

be able to do it again. And so it's so important for a

revival within us to address the things that have been passed on

generation. And instead of blaming a past

ancestor for it, we say, hey, you know what?

I see the pattern and God, I'm bringing the pattern to you.

I need help. I can't do this on my own.

Too many of us are wasting our energy and breath.

You know, blaming ancestors, blaming parents, blaming

grandparents. But honestly, they didn't have

the resources we have today. You have, you'd have a doubt on

parenting. You just have to type it in.

You get a whole bunch of resources.

You get books, you get ebooks, you get audiobooks, you get

articles. Everything is available.

There was a generation that didn't know that they worked

with what they had and it's time that we release them in

forgiveness and that we take ownership for how we are going

to channel this revival. 1 Kings chapter 15, verse 19 shows the

1 Kings 15:19

tendency. To repeat the sins of the father

or the OR even habits and mannerisms.

This is 1 Kings chapter 15 verse 19.

1 Kings 15:19

He says, let there be a treaty between me and you, he said, as

there was between my father and your father.

This is King ASA. See, I'm sending you a gift of

silver and gold. Now break your treaty with

Basha, king of Israel, so he will withdraw from me.

So this is basically the king, King ASA talking to a foreign

king, saying break your alliance with the king of Israel and take

my side. And it turns out it's the exact

same thing that King Abijah did. ASA is unconsciously or

consciously doing exactly what his father did as a wartime

treaty. And The thing is, many of us are

just content to do exactly what our parents did, but then

pretend to say, oh, we're doing it differently.

I would never do what my parents did, but somehow it's.

Deeply ingrained in us to make history repeat itself.

So I believe for revival to come in, it requires decisive action.

It requires strong convictions. If you don't have conditions

that are based on the Word of God, if you don't have the

ability to take decisive action to deal with these generational

patterns, they will repeat and they could get repeated

generationally. After you as well.

And so I want to just give you an example of what ASA did to

look head on at his generational influences and break it right.

He had a very tough stance against idolatry.

This is what he did. One King's chapter 15 verses 11

to 13 it says ASA did what was right in the eyes of the Lord,

as his father David had done he. Expelled the male shine

prostitutes from the land and got rid of all the idols his

ancestors had made. He even deposed his grandmother

Marka from her position as Queen Mother because she had made a

repulsive image for the worship of Ashra ASA, cut it down and

burnt. It in the Kidron Valley.

Now, you have to understand a bit about this picture.

This Asa's grandmother was Makka.

Makka was a granddaughter of David, King David.

Her father was Absalom. OK, she's royalty.

She's a royal mother. If you watch any of these,

period. Dramas you know of, you know

monarchs in France, in England, you know that the queen.

Mother holds a lot of power, even if she doesn't have.

The ability to take action. She controls a lot of the things

that are happening behind the scenes.

And so Queen Queen Mother Marka was actually controlling a lot

of the idolatry that was happening in the land.

And she herself had erected this huge defiling statue of Ashra in

the land. Imagine that she's a daughter of

Absalom, granddaughter of David, and yet she had brought idolatry

into the royal family. And so ASA identified where the

source of the problem was, and he dethroned her.

Now, today, I'm not asking you to dethrone your grandmother or

your grandfather or, you know, disinherit yourself.

That's not what I'm saying. What are the influences that you

have allowed unconsciously or consciously into your life?

And you're coexisting with them, saying, well, my parents did it

this way. My my grandparents did it this.

Way so it's OK. When you come to a deep

relationship with God, He will make certain things not OK.

He will make you uncomfortable with sin.

He will make you uncomfortable with deception.

He will make you uncomfortable with things that you know hurt

his heart. There is no way you will be able

to coexist with such idolatrous practices or beliefs.

And imagine Asa's conviction that he was able to stand up to

his grandmother and get her out of the throne.

Imagine the conviction. Imagine the guts that it needed

to do that. I bet he was remembered by many

just for that. And I'm asking you today that

you would look into your generations before and identify

the idolatry. Identify the things you know,

the attitudes, the behaviours, the lifestyle, the immoral

choices, the the sinful patterns.

It could be anger, it could be lust, it could be greed, it

could be envy, unforgiveness. Whatever it is, pride, Identify

those things. It could be an addiction to

substances, it could be a dependency on a toxic

relationship consistently, it could be immoral lifestyle

choices, whatever it is. I pray.

That you would identify and identify and call it out and

then lay it before God and repent of it.

Because there is. A time when there's going to be

a day of reckoning, when God is going to hold us to account for

every decision, every choice that was not honouring of Him.

A full commitment to God will require that you identify the

idea. You identify the idolatry.

You identify those repeated patterns that have come down

generationally. You repent it because it has

invaded your life. I know for a fact worry

infiltrated my life. Anxiety was just something I

lived with because I thought, well, those before me have done

it. They manage, they live to 75,

they live to 79. I think I can manage until I

realise that that's not the kind of life God wanted for me.

He didn't want it dotted by worry.

He didn't want it overwhelmed by anxiety.

He wanted me to live in freedom. And so it's so important that we

relinquish what the generations have passed, that we relinquish

it to God's hands and say, God, deliver me, I need help.

ASA could have. Played it safe.

You know, when you think of a grandmother who's seated there,

you know, pushing for idolatry, he could have.

Pretended not to see it. He could have said, well, you

know what, it won't be dignified to do this.

You know, it's safer if I just pretend not to see it.

May I don't have to go worship there.

Of course, I'm pulling down, you know, idols and high places, so

no one's going to judge me for that.

But it was a decisive action he had to make to cut the influence

of generationally generationally.

That's the first thing. Asad completely was devoted to

God wholeheartedly. The second thing that he did was

he trusted God wholeheartedly. And you might think, well, they

sound kind of the same. It isn't because you know, it's

very easy to to follow someone you know go behind them, but to

actually trust them. When the rubber hits the road

is, you know, is the is the moment of reckoning.

It's when you are actually put on the hot seat and you have to

decide what to do. Will you trust the one you are

following or will you, you know, come up with your own devices?

Yes, he was devoted to God wholeheartedly, but he trusted

God wholeheartedly. And you know, trust is tested in

times of struggle, in times of battle.

ASA was faced by a terrible enemy, Zera the Khushite, and I

want to read that passage for you Two Chronicles chapter 14

verses 9 to 15. It says Zera the Kushai had

marched out against them with an army of thousands upon thousands

and 300 Chariots and came as far as Meresha.

ASA went out to meet him and they took up battle positions in

the valley of Zepheta near Meresha.

Then ASA called to the Lord his God and said, Lord, there is no

one like you to help the powerless against the mighty.

Help us, Lord our God, for we rely on you, and in your name we

have come against this vast army.

Lord, you are our God. Do not let near mortals prevail

against you. And ASA and his army pursued

them as far as Gerar. Such a great number of Kushites

fell that they could not recover.

They were crushed before the Lord and his forces.

The men of Judah carried off a large amount of plunder.

They destroyed all the villages around Gedar for the terror of

the Lord had fallen on them. They looted all these villages,

since there was much plunder there.

They also attacked the camps of the herders and carried off

droves of sheep and goats and camels.

Then they returned to Jerusalem. He was faced by an intimidating

enemy. The Khushite king came with his

armies. And yet his go to response was

crying out to God. Lord, we are powerless.

These guys are mighty. You need to step in.

Trust is always tested during trial.

It you when you things are good. You really don't.

You don't you can't really confess that you know you're

trusting God when things are going bad, when things are going

South, that's when our trust is tested.

And Assa didn't flinch our sudden Finch.

And so the next recipe for a generational revival is that we

will need to bring God into every battle, big or small.

We need to come to a realisation that we can achieve nothing on

our own. And you know in a generation

that was to be self. Made, you know, independent

completely, you know, autonomous.

This is so antithetically, but the truth is this.

Every battle, big or small, needs got to be at the head of

the army. I can't decide.

Oh, well, you know what? God, you can sit this one out.

It's a small army. Remember what happened when

Israel went to the city of I just they said, you know, it's a

very small city. We'll just take a few guys.

They went as a bunch of I think around 300 they went, they were

routed by the enemy because there was sin in the camp.

But when you bring God into every battle, when you are, you

know, saying Lord, I'm lifting my hands and surrender, goof

before me. God has already done a work in

us. He has cleansed us.

He's prepared us for battle and we stand in victory over the

enemy. It changes the ball game

completely and God is calling us into a place of desiring this

revival across generations because He.

Is the one who bleeds us into battle.

He's the one who brings us out victorious, and it's important

that we trust him as wholeheartedly as these kings

did. Now here's the the flip side to

this. OK, King ASA didn't finish on

the best note, right? He was as human as anyone of us.

So while we, he started amazingly 35 years of rest,

which is incredible, but the 36th year war broke out and it

looks like something shifted. I think with the, the war that

happened in his, you know, later years, there was something that

happened with his trust and there was a wavering.

And while he lived with his devotion to God, he loved God.

He had wiped out idolatry and deposed his grandmother.

He he had this trust in God that you know he will win.

Battles for him. But towards the end of his life,

when faced with a new enemy, he turned to a foreign king, the

king of Aram. Right, Ben Haddad, he turned to

him and he took the gold and the silver that he had dedicated for

the temple of the Lord, took it and offered it to the enemy and

said, you know what, withdraw from King Bashar of Israel, you

know, leave him without any kind of defenses and take my side in

the battle. Right.

And it's very sad because there's this conversation where

the seer goes and meets him, a prophet goes and meets him.

And he gives him a word and says, you had the Kushait king

come against you and God fought with you and he was a huge

enemy. Why did you turn to this king,

the king of Aram, in this season to get you help against the king

of Israel? Why didn't you rely on God?

And unfortunately, Assad didn't receive the correction.

Well, he put the seer in prison. He oppressed many people

brutally. Eventually, it says, he had a

disease in his feet. The disease got so bad and yet

one of the saddest verses. It says he still didn't consult

God. He only leaned on his

physicians. And the closing verse in Second

2 Chronicles 16:14

Chronicles chapter 16, verse 14 is what I want to highlight to

you. It says they buried him in the

tomb that he had cut out for himself in the city of David.

They laid him on a bio covered with spices in various blended

perfumes and they made a huge fire in his honour.

Here's the interesting thing. They buried him in the tomb that

he had cut out for himself in the city of David.

If that is not a diagnosis of the entire problem of the last

five years of Assa's life, I don't know what is.

He cut out for himself a tomb in Israel.

They were already the tombs for the kings that King David and

Solomon and others had instituted.

So the kings were buried in the royal tombs, right?

But Assa felt he needed to cut out something for himself.

He had to prepare for his future death, and it's kind of

diagnostic of the entire last five years wherein he had to

plan for himself. Imagine if, like Hezekiah, he

had turned to God and said, Lord, look at my legs, it's

diseased, help me, what should I do?

Imagine if when the seer had corrected him and said, you

know, you shouldn't have turned to a foreign king for help, you

should have turned to the Lord. Imagine if he had.

Torn his robes and turned to God in repentance.

Can you picture? How differently it would have

ended. These are momentous decisions

that mark lives forever. And I want to ask you, how do

you plan to finish your life? Do you plan to finish it on a

note that is so pleasing to God? Maybe you didn't accomplish all

the things that you wanted to, but you accomplished all that

God had planned for you. Maybe you lived in such a way

that was honouring of God and the big and the small things.

It's important to know if you are depending on yourselves for

your future. It's very easy, you know, when

we as people get older, you know, I watch older people

around 60s and 70s start to worry about their future, what

they're going to do. Will anyone look after me?

Where will I stay? But sometimes, even when we're

younger, we we decide to plan for our own futures.

We decide, you know, to have something as a safety net.

We decide to preserve our, our reputation, preserve our job,

preserve our careers, preserve relationships by control.

And but God is saying this is not the opposite of a

surrendered life. A surrendered life is saying

hands up. I have nothing in my hands,

Lord, I'm coming face down before you.

Whatever you choose to do, I'm in for it.

I say yes. I don't know what my future

holds. I don't have children.

I don't know who's going to look after me in my future.

I don't have resources, Lord, for a retirement.

I don't know what's going to happen, but I trust you.

It's maybe saying, Lord, my parents haven't given me much of

A legacy or an inheritance, but God, you are my inheritance.

You have said that the boundary lines have fallen in pleasant

places. Take me to those places, Lord.

A surrendered life is a beautiful life.

It's a life where your devotion and your trust to God just

becomes, you know, implicit when you look at King Jehoshaphat,

I'm guessing. He learnt of his father's

mistakes. 1 Kings chapter 22, verses 41 to 44.

1 Kings 22:41–44

Jehoshaphat son of ASA became king of Judah in the fourth year

of Ahab, king of Israel. Jehoshaphat was 35 years old

when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem 25 years.

His mother's name was Azuba, daughter of Shilhi.

In everything he followed the ways of his father ASA, and did

not stray from them. He did what was right in the

eyes of the Lord. The high places, however, were

not removed, and the people continued to offer sacrifices

and burn incense there. Jehoshaphat.

Was also at peace with the King of Israel.

Now, if you see the commonality, just like his father, he was

deeply devoted to God. He was completely, wholly

devoted. He also completely trusted God.

When he was faced with this huge army of the Ammonites and the

Edomites and the Meunites, when he was facing them, the first

thing he did was rush to God and say and cry out him and say,

Lord, I don't know what to do. The army is huge.

We are so little in number. They are mighty.

And God said, I will fight you. Just go take your position, I

will fight for you. And all Jehoshaphat did was set

the singers in front. And as the singers were

worshipping God and singing, you know, his love endures forever,

God did the fighting for them, he said ambushes.

And the three countries that came against them fought each

other, slaughtered each other, and.

All Jehoshaphat and his people had to do was go into the

battlefield and collect the plunder.

Can you believe it? This is what generational trust

can do. When you carry the trust that

you saw in your parents, when you carry the trust that you see

in people older than you may be at your church, in your

community, wherever, and you carry that into your life, the

victories that God gives you will set you apart and.

Jehoshaphat is known for that particular battle, for that

particular battle strategy. But there was a mistake that

Jehoshaphat made. If you look at the last verse it

says over there Jehoshaphat was also at peace.

With the king of Israel. Now, you have to understand what

this the the northern and the southern Kingdom were at war.

When King ASA was leading. He was always at war with the

king of Israel, right? But somehow Jehoshaphat had

created a peace treaty. How did he do that?

He did it through an alliance, and the alliance was marked by

marriage. So what had happened was

Jehoshaphat's son had gotten married into Ahab's family.

Now what is the background on Ahab?

Ahab was married to Jezebel, OK, And they had a daughter called

Athalia who was as wicked as her mother Jezebel, right.

And about Ahab, there's one verse which is very disturbing.

It says there was number King as wicked as Ahab who sold himself

to do evil. Why would King Jehoshaphat, who

followed God with all his heart, trusted God so deeply, desired

to please God so much, go and ally himself with such a wicked

king? It's a big.

Question, right? And this was the one mistake

that he made, which I think didn't please God much.

Let's read two Chronicles chapter 19, verses 2 and 3.

Jehu this year the son of Hanani went out to meet him and said to

the king. Should you help the wicked and

love those who hate the Lord? Because of this, the wrath of

the Lord is on you. There is, however, some good in

you, for you have rid the land of the Ashara poles and has set

your heart on seeking God. So there was good in

Jehoshaphat, there's no denying it.

But should you help the wicked and love those who hate the

Lord? I want to ask you this right

now. Who have you allied yourself

with? What relationships are you

entertaining in your life with people who could be?

Toxic to others and yet somehow you're thinking, well they're

fine with me. What's wrong with this?

Who are you in business with? Who are you?

Dating Are these people in God's will for you?

Are these people in God's will for your current season?

It's. So important because the, the,

the rationale we use over ourselves is, well, you know

what? This, they're harmless enough.

They've not done anything to me. Well, I've heard some things

about them. I've heard that, you know, they

have certain preferences or they live a certain way.

But it doesn't affect me. The alliances we entertain can

either make us or break us. It's very easy.

Every season has people that God puts into our lives to journey

with. Some he keeps there just to

sharpen us. We're not always going to have

people who agree with us who are exactly on the same wavelength

as us. No, But there are some alliances

which will, you know, really push us and urge us towards our

destiny. There are some which are

completely off, They're completely wrong, which can

derail you and delay the fulfillment of your destiny.

They can clutter your life with so much of drama and

distraction. And in this situation,

Jehoshaphat's connection with King Ahab's family was not

something God was pleased with. And you have to understand this,

it didn't just end with them. So Jehoshaphat had a son called

Jehoram. Jehoram married Atalia, who was

Ahab and Jezebel's daughter. Now Ahab had already corrupted

the bloodline of the kings of Israel.

Him and his wife, they'd done such outrageously terrible, evil

things. But it didn't end there.

It came to Atalia, entered the line of Judah.

Now, Atalia married Jehoram, right?

And when, when, you know, Jehoshaphat died, Jehoram was

supposed to take over the throne.

He was already the Crown Prince. But what Atalia made him do was

it says she incited him to do evil, just like her mother

Jezebel Haddam. And she caused him to

assassinate everyone of Jehoshaphat's brothers, the

other children of Jehoshaphat, so that his place was secure

and. After Jehoram died, Atalia

ruled. Over Judah, and she was one of

the most. Wicked Queens, most wicked.

And I want to ask. You this.

What alliance are you entertaining that could complete

completely derail your destiny That could completely.

Take you off. Track that could you know God is

more powerful than all of this. He will bring things back

because even in this line of Jehoram and Italia came a little

child called Joash who restored godly worship to the land of

Israel. He cleaned the temple out, he

killed Italia, but there was 2 generations.

That we're suffering under the influence of evil just because

of a wrong alliance made by Jeko Shifet?

What alliance are you allowing in?

Is it an extramarital affair? Is it that one business partner

that you know God is not pleased with?

Is it that one relationship that is so toxic but you somehow feel

you need it? Maybe it's something that you've

outgrown. God is saying the season has

shifted, you need to move on, but you're still clinging on to.

Those old things God's saying, let go, let.

Go. Our alliances matter.

Wrong alliances can be so detrimental to revival touching

our generation. So my question to you is, how do

you and I practically make this work for us?

So we desire revival. We have the recipes of, you

know, really pursuing God to be devoted to him completely.

You know, we want to bring God into every battle, correct?

We also want to not repeat the sins of our fathers.

But how do we practically outwork?

This. How do we actually create an

heir for revival? How do we allow the generations

to thrive? It's so important, and I want

you first of all to remember that it's not going to be my

might or power, but by my spirit, says the Lord.

Zerubabel and his counterparts were called to rebuild the

temple after the exile had finished 70 years.

Right. And God was speaking through the

prophets to Zerubabel saying this task is too big and right

now all you're doing is you're laying the foundations.

He said don't. Despise the day of small

beginnings. And he said this is not going to

be happening because of your willpower, your might, your

connections. No, it's going to happen.

This is the Spirit of God, and I want to encourage you.

Therefore, a revival to break out across generations is only

going to be the Spirit of God who does it.

But there are certain habits and certain disciplines we need to

inculcate in our lives in order to make the ground ready for

such a revival. And the first thing is that you

would remember and replicate the godly deeds of your ancestors.

Too many of us are calling, you know, the previous generations

responsible for the state we are in.

We're calling it trauma. We're calling it, you know,

abuse where there has been abuse, where there is trauma,

God sees it. God brings healing.

It is good to name it. But then how long will we be

stuck in that rut? How long are we going to keep

blaming them without saying you know what, God you?

Heal me now. I move forward in healing, I

move forward in restoration. And it is important for us that

we remember and rehash the good also, not just the bad.

Every generation has good and bad.

There would be terrible things that they may have done in the

past generation. But when you unearth, when you

dig deeper, you find that there were godly things as well.

And I pray that you would remember and replicate those

godly things, you know, find the gold in the rubble.

Find the gold in the rubble. Two Chronicles, chapter 14,

verse 7 to 8, it says let us build up.

This is King ASA. He is building up the towns in a

time of peace. There's no war, so he has time

on his hands. He has resources.

He says let us build up these towns, he said to Judah, and put

walls around them with towers, gates and bars.

The land is still ours because we have sought the Lord our God.

We sought him and he has given us rest on every side.

So they built and prospered. Assa had an army of 300,000 men

from Judah equipped with large Shields and with spheres, and

280,000 from Benjamin armed with small Shields and with bows.

All these were brave fighting men.

Assa had rebuilt the walls, reinforced the place, fortified

the place, so that if war was to come, they were ready.

Now look at what the psalmist writes in Psalm 48, verses 12 to

Psalms 48:12–14

14. He says, walk about Zion, go

around her, count her towers, consider well her ramparts, view

her citadels, that you may tell of them to the next generation.

For this God is our God, forever and ever.

He will be our guide even to the end.

When you look at the ancestors, when you look at those who have

gone before you, the older people, I pray that you would

look at them for what they have accomplished.

Did ASA end well? Not so well, but what did he

accomplish? He built these towers up and the

psalmist is saying look at those citadels, look at those towers.

Tell your children, hey, this is what our kings did.

This is what our ancestors did. If you would only look.

For the gold and the rubble, there'll be so much to tell

generations. So when I talk to my children

about their grand great grandparents, I talk about one

of my great grandfathers who was a temple pujari who accepted

Jesus and he and his wife transformed an entire town in

the southern parts of India. They brought education to a

village. I tell them about that, that

granddad who though he worried, loved the Lord with all his

heart and was so compassionate to anyone he met.

He would if, if a poor person asked him for a cycle, he would

give the cycle that he had to them.

This was the kind of man he was, goodness personified.

He had the goodness of God in him.

And so I teach my children both sides of it.

Hey, you know what, don't worry, let's not worry, let's trust

God. But then also say, you know

what, hang on loosely to the things God has given you.

Give it to those who need it more than you.

You see what I'm saying? Repeat.

Replicate. Remember the godly things that

your ancestors have done. Every generation has.

Gold in it. Find the gold.

The second thing is repeatedly restore your trust in God so

that future generations are impacted.

Had ASA known that the God who rescued me from the Kushite king

will rescue me from Basha, king of Israel, he could have gone

back to God boldly and said, Lord, you didn't once do it

again. Two Chronicles chapter 16,

verses 7 to 10. At that time Hanani the seer

came to ASA, king of Judah, and said to him, because you relied

on the king of Aram and not on the Lord your God, the army of

the king of Aram has escaped from your hand.

When are the Kushites and Libyans a mighty army with great

numbers of Chariots and horsemen?

Yet when you relied on the Lord, he delivered them into your

hand. For the eyes of the Lord ranged

through the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully

committed to him. You have done a foolish thing,

and from now on you will be at war.

Why didn't Asad think that God could be trusted again with

another battle? Over 40 years I've had different

struggles with health in different areas of my life and

at one point I used to think I feel embarrassed to come to God

again with a, you know, a issue. God, you've already done it

before. I'm content with that, but I'm

realizing as I get older that with each season comes its

struggles and I can keep coming back to this God even if I feel

I'm wearing him. He is not wearied because He has

not ceased being my heavenly Father.

He still delights when I say, God help me.

I know you rescued me from this 10 years back, but rescue me

again, Lord. 2 Corinthians chapter 1 verses 9 to 10.

2 Corinthians 1:9–10

It says indeed we felt we had received the sentence of death,

but this happened that we might not rely on ourselves, but on

God who raises the dead. He has delivered us from such a

deadly peril and will deliver us again.

On Him we have set our hope that He will continue to deliver us.

When I was reading this verse this week, it just challenged me

to never stop asking God for deliverance.

So maybe you, you had Deliverance in your 20s and now

you're in your 40s and you're thinking, well, I don't want to

bore. God with this, no please, by all

means trust Him because you have to keep reinstating your trust

in Him alone. Repeatedly restore your trust

because the minute our trust drops, we are at a potential for

the next generation to face warfare like never before.

But when you choose to stand firm and say Lord you delivered

me before, deliver me again. And the beauty is he says he

will deliver. Continue to deliver us present

continuous into the future. There is a dot, dot, dot there.

There is no end till you close your life eyes on earth.

He promises to deliver you. Why do we put limits on God?

Lord, you already healed me of this.

It's come back. Should I ask you again?

Of course, ask him again. Should I just maybe trust the

doctors this time around? Go to the doctor, but trust God.

Maybe it's a struggle that has been recurrent in your life and

you're so embarrassed to go to God with it.

Please don't be embarrassed. Go to Him again and again

because the God who delivered you back then from such a deadly

peril will deliver you again, and He will continue to deliver

you. You don't have to feel bad.

He is your heavenly Father. You know, the thing that is

thing about, you know, genetics and stuff that is generationally

passed down is it will keep rearing its ugly head out of the

blue. That anger that, you know, white

rage will raise its head suddenly that envy will pop up.

Suddenly the unforgiveness will will slink its way back in.

And so it's so important that you ask God for repeated

deliverance from those patterns, from those cycles.

And the third thing that I want to leave with you a habit, a

discipline that you need to have in order to experience and to

set the ground for such a revival is to sacrificially

serve God in your generation. Two Chronicles chapter 14 was 4

talks about King ASA. It says he commanded Judah to

seek the Lord, the God of their ancestors, to obey his laws and

commands. Right.

ASA was very clear about what he had to accomplish.

He tore down the Pagan altars. He rebuilt God's altars.

He led the people towards the altar and, you know, sacrificed

so much of Cate. He, you know, they made a

covenant with God that they would seek his face.

And it's, it's interesting. It says when they sought God,

they were he they found. Him and the land had.

Rest for 35 years. Isn't that amazing?

Two Chronicles 15 verse 7 is is the culmination of a prophetic

word that comes to King ASA even as he is setting his mind about,

you know, seeking God as a community, as a country.

This here goes to him and says, But As for you, be strong.

And do not give up, for your work will be rewarded.

What was the work that King ASA did?

It was not just ruling the people in matters of law and

justice and all of that administratively, but it was

also teaching them the Word of God.

Moving them towards their God. That was his passion project

during his reign. And the prophet is giving him

God's work, saying do it, it's going to be hard, but do it

because you are going to be rewarded and.

It says that it's. Spurred us on to do greater

things. God has a desire for his.

People to know Him personally and whatever you are doing as

your work, as your calling right now, if you look at the baseline

of it, God would have kept you in that job.

God would have kept you in that particular task, doing that

particular task or growing in a particular skill so that you can

be an agent of reconciliation to someone, so that you can connect

that one person that you might meet to Jesus, to their Maker,

to their creator, so that they are no longer estranged from

God. And so would you sacrificially

serve God in your generation? See, it's interesting.

ASA had this clear mandate from God.

God was saying, there's been a time when nobody was following

God, Nobody knew the law, nobody knew the word, right?

Nobody knew God, nobody knew the law.

What Jehoshaphat did was he knew what God had, you know, given as

Asa's mandate. He lived it out.

He brought it to fulfillment. You know what Jehoshaphat did?

He raised up Levites. He released them into the land

and said go and teach the people the word.

He raised up judges and said judge wisely, judge impartially,

make sure the people are looked after, care for them so.

What ASA had received as a mandate, and ASA did to the best

of his ability, Jehoshaphat came in and completed it.

At the end of Jehoshaphat's life, of course it says not

everyone was committed to the Lord, but I don't think God

holds that against him because he did what he had to do.

So what has God asked you to do in your generation?

Maybe you saw your your the previous generations not

accomplish much. Or maybe you feel your

generations before done too much.

You can't step into those big shoes.

But ask God, Lord, show me what I must do in my generation, and

give me the grace to sacrificially serve you.

Would it have cost ASA and Jehoshaphat a lot to be so

committed to worshipping God? Absolutely.

See, because when you're ruling as a king, you're actually

taking from the people. It's more of a grasping thing.

You know, you're, you have people who work for you as

foremen, as labourers, bakers and this and that.

You're receiving from the people.

But when you're worshipping and you're trying to get an entire

community to turn to God, you're sacrificing your cattle, you're

giving of the temple wealth, you're tithing, you're you're

giving generously more than receiving your giving.

And God is calling his people in this time.

Each generation needs to sacrificially serve.

You cannot serve from the place of your comfort.

You cannot serve from the place of excess.

You have to serve sacrificially. It has to cost you something.

What is it costing you? How are you serving God?

What is the mandate that God has given you?

Look for the gold in the generations before in that

rubble. You may look at it as a rubble.

God has gold in that. There's treasure in that.

Look for it, repeat it, repeat it.

It's so important that you do that.

Secondly, repeatedly. Restore your trust in God.

Every battle that comes, don't think, Oh my gosh, this, this.

I feel bad bringing it back to God.

Oh you know what? Maybe this one I can handle on

my own. No.

Repeatedly restore your trust. In him finally, sacrificially

serve Him in your generation. I want to ask you, even as we

close, what alliances have you gotten yourself tied into?

What alliances are wrong that you have contemplating getting

back into which could completely derail your destiny?

Are you living with the lack of surrender to God where like

Assad dug himself for his own tomb, You are planning out your

life without realizing that God has already got it all planned

out. You are sorted, eternally

sorted. If you chose Jesus, you are

sorted. All you need to do is live in

surrender. Would you choose to have strong

convictions that are based on the Word of God?

That would even if it requires you to have certain guts to do

certain things, to cut certain relationships off, to cut

certain idolatrous practices out of your life, that you would

have the courage to do it. That is my challenge to you.

Can we pray together? Father in Heaven, I just pray

and invite you in right now. I thank you that you are the God

of generations. I thank you that every

generation has your heart. I thank you Lord, that you are

so in love with the people you have created.

And I just. Pray right now for those of us

who are in the service, irrespective of our age.

I pray, O Father, that you would give us a deep download of your

mandate for this season. I pray, Lord, there will be no

more laziness, there will be no more apathy, there will be no

more checking or prematurely, but instead we will be all in.

Spirit of God, I pray you would put a fire within our hearts.

Lord, I pray for reconciliation between generations.

Parents would turn towards children, children towards

parents. We pray, O God, that you will

bring healing and relationships. I pray for restoration.

We pray where there have been sinful patterns being practiced,

that Lord, irrespective of whether the ancestors repented,

we repent right now that you would forgive us, Lord.

Of all idolatry, of everything unclean, everything sinful.

That you would. Wash our bloodlines clean in the

blood of the Lamb, and you would restore us.

Father, I pray for fresh assignments to be given to

people. I pray, O Lord, for fresh love

to be given between parents and children.

We pray, O Father, for the next generation to be told of the

praiseworthy deeds of God. We pray that your might and

power will be on display on the earth because of what you do

between our generations. I pray for every church.

We pray God that. As we are so multi generational

in our churches, we pray that we will glean from the wisdom of

the elderly and that Lord the elderly will will receive what

the younger people are carrying right now.

We won't look at each other with antagonism, we won't look at

each other with insecurity, but there will be so much love that

holds us together. I pray for those who feel they

have no fathers, no mothers, nobody of their previous

generation to learn from to glean from.

Father in heaven, I pray that they will lean into you, that

God you will give them the best of heaven above and the earth

below. That Lord, they will receive

your love and walk in it or Father, that they will begin to

establish a legacy for generations to come.

I thank you that with you as our Father, none of us are orphans,

none of us are abandoned. We are loved, we are cherished,

we are called, we are chosen, we love you and we honour you.

In Jesus name I pray. Amen.

Amen. God bless you.

Even as you get into this week, I want to just encourage you to

seek God with all your heart for your life, for the generation

that's coming after you, for the generation that's gone before

that, you will ask God where there is, you know, a lack of

reconciliation, that he would bring peace, He would bring

healing. And where he wants to, you know,

release new revelation. He wants to bring fresh

thoughts, fresh healing that you would invite.

That in. Even as you head into this week,

I pray that you will have a spirit filled week one with you

know many God moments you'll be aware of Him.

Every second of every day, remember that whoever finds

Jesus finds life. God bless you.

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