Tarry

Hello, everybody, and welcome again to Wednesday Night Live. My name is Ron Crawford, and I'm coming to you from very hot Dallas, Texas in this middle of July. And I am very happy to know that so many of you are joining in this broadcast. I speak blessing over you and I really appreciate the wonderful privilege of knowing that we at the Father's Church and our Saints Network family around the world have such a great, great nation of people who are devoted to the same type of commission that the father has given to all of us. And thank you for that.

This is a is a unique broadcast in that tonight at the Father's Church we're going to be gathering to pray and our objective is certainly to seek the Lord but to also reflect upon the upcoming Saints Network mission into Manaus, Brazil. And subsequently, next Wednesday night, which is, if you're listening to this live, would be the twenty second of, July. We will not be having a Wednesday night broadcast. We we're just simply asking everyone to remember to pray for us as we have, 20 folks coming from The US and Mexico joining 30 from various parts of Brazil. And, we're gonna be ministering throughout all of next week into the weekend.

And we really appreciate your devotion to pray that will accomplish what God is sending us there to do. I also want to remind many of you that you should have received an email with a sign up, Google sign up to commit if the Lord leads you to fasting on at least a day during our journey. You can pick the day that is most, applicable for you. We also have the Brazilian saints doing a similar thing. And the reason we fast is as a as a measure of showing our submission to the Lord and acknowledging that it's not by our might or by our power, but it's by his spirit.

And I would say that although we primarily agree on those two things, we recognize what fasting is, and it's a it's a demonstration wherein we submit our strengths, our capabilities to the Lord. And it's really a fast of meekness, and we know that God is pleased with that. So if you can pray for us, we would love to enjoin your help at the throne. And, we're all in this together, saints. I mean, is this is all of our mission, and we're looking forward to what God is going to do.

So tonight here at the Father's Church, we're praying. If you want to pray wherever you are, that would that would be wonderful. It's it's good to know that we have such a strong body of intercessors. God always looks for that. Christ, our Lord, is the chief intercessor.

And so you really can't go wrong by being the type of person that is aligned with what Jesus is doing and the type of individual who God looks for when he wants to accomplish something. So the the bulk of our teams leave this weekend. I will be going on Friday. We will be at Prometheus Church in Sao Paulo celebrating the anniversary of pastor Luciano and Anna's opening of the church. It's been, I guess, eleven years now, and so it's an honor to be able to be with them.

And we will link up then with the Manaus group, and we have ministry on Tuesday night, Wednesday night, Thursday night, Friday night, all day Saturday night, and, all day Sunday at night. I cannot give you a list of the churches because other than the weekend is gonna be Vassault Church. But as of last night, we were still having churches added for the nights. And so just know that we're in prayer on those, we're in ministry on those nights and we'll probably be, I know at least on Wednesday we'll be sending as of now three different teams to three different churches. And, but it's so much spontaneity when you deal with the Brazilians.

And that's not a denigrating term. That's just a cultural thing, and it's acknowledged by them. So we really I cannot list a an itinerary as far as ministry. Now I will say that next week, on Tuesday morning through Friday morning, we will be praying every morning in a room that we have rented at the hotel. And we've invited our Brazilian teams to come and join us, and we'll pray together.

And then every day we're gonna be ministering to those teams, imparting to those teams. So it's just basically going to be a time from early morning through the night of constant ministry. Maybe we'll get a few hours to rest in the afternoon, but the Lord is our rest and we want to get every measure of impartation and ministry that we can out of those days that we have. And our objective is, first of all, to honor the Lord in that city. And we are we're laying claim in prayer to the spiritual resources there, and we're trying our very best to be sensitive to whatever measures of prophetic activation God would have us to, to follow.

Last year, we knew going in that we were gonna go out where the Amazon meets the Rio Negro and a boat, and we did that. It was very powerful. This year, no directive whatsoever going in, which usually means God has a suddenly in mind for us, and we don't wanna go chasing demons or, you know, the the normal tourist hotspots. We want to go where the Lord says to go. And I know it's hot down there, but it's it's probably cooler than it is here.

So that's kind of weird. I'm gonna tell those people we came to Manaus to cool down. But we're we are going to be ministering at churches. We're gonna be imparting the, the touch of the Lord, hopefully, spiritual languages, be instructing on that. We have such a large team that we're going to be doing a lot more personalized ministry to people, you know, because if you have a team of 10, you have 500 people, it's kind of hard to do a personalized thing.

But with 50, you can group out, and that's TMI. But we really are looking for those that God wants to make disciples of this calling. And we we know that there is opposition, but we're not afraid of that. We've had different prayer groups ministering for several weeks, both here and in Brazil. I'm here by here I mean in nations other than Brazil.

We've got at least three words, very graphic visions of individuals who are moving in the dark realm, and they are trying their best to stop us. And, I'm not worried about them. It's nice to have the visuals because you can somehow analyze by what people have seen the characteristics of these individuals that are opposing. I know that the host church has had a lot of opposition coming from local witchcraft cousins, you know, offering sacrifices at their doors, doing really strange things. And we're we're believing that there's gonna be breakthrough for these folks.

And, but the point of it is we want to, by the spirit's guidance, indicate who is feeling a calling to this ministry of the saints. We want to establish a template of what it means to be a saint and be someone who is partnering with the Saints Network, and we're gonna allow the Brazilians to lead that even though we've written several of them for ourselves, haven't we? But we also are looking at ongoing training that they will commit themselves to. And you say, well, what about the teaching platform? Yeah, that has its benefits for them.

We need to get some folks that will come up here and do the teachings in Brazilian Portuguese. And that's easier said than done. But that's not going to be all they need. They they need to have, like, classroom teaching and then discussion. And they need to be skilled in how to present these teachings to their churches.

And the platform is not designed for that as it currently stands. It's our teaching hagios platform is more of a of a study for someone who is already walking in the Saints, who knows how to study the word, and I feel like we're starting from scratch there. So, hopefully, they'll catch up, and we can get can get some Brazilians. And I've got we've got some in mind. In fact, one young man is gonna come up here, and he'll be with us in September at our at our patients seminar celebrating 50 of these seminars here in Dallas.

It's gonna be a fun time and one wherein we give glory to the Lord. But he's gonna be with us, and I hope to work with him and have him at least do two of the teachings on hagias. We're gonna get them up on Spanish. We're gonna get them in French. So but it's we've we're we're working, but we need a system of teaching these folks in Brazil not to speak in a derogatory fashion in any way.

But you know, first of all, what it means just in any general church when you start talking to people about how to study the scripture, how to study the words that are used. You know, we'll we'll be talking about, you know? I'll just say this. People in different parts of the world think differently. They do.

Not everybody has a Western mindset, and we need this to be brought forward from Brazilians as Brazilians would think. And I learned this in, well, to some degree in India. It was kinda hard to read. The Indian people had largely been trained by the British, so they they had a lot of Wesleyan background, and so they were used to studying, you know, their Tyndale Bibles and, you know, the different translations. So they were used to that.

But in France, I I I remember so many times when Luke would tell me, my dear brother translated for us for so many years. You know, you really have to have a French person saying this because, you know, somebody who speaks French who doesn't have the French mentality is not gonna be as effective in communicating as somebody who has the cultural background. And I I thought initially, I thought, well, Luke, I love you, but I I don't really understand that. You know? Here in America, we have well, it it's kinda this way.

You know? We've been trained to hear all kinds of different accents and idioms from people who come here from all over the world. You know? I can hear even different parts of our country the way people speak. You know, I can for instance, in Pittsburgh, Baltimore, that region, people speak differently.

They have different ways of pronouncing words. I can talk that way. I can. I can turn it on and talk that way. You know, for instance, like, if you said my name Ron, they would say Ron or or you know, they they they would just talk that way, and they had their own words.

Like, if you were if you were somebody that was, kind of, too interested in other people's business, we would say you're nebby. Like, a rubber band is a gum band. You know, you were going downtown, it's going downtown. And so I'm used to hearing people from Minnesota and from Boston and from the from the Deep South. And my mind just triggers that.

But here in Dallas we hear people that have come across from Mexico and they have their own way of speaking English. And Asian people, almost said a word that's not acceptable anymore, the Asian peoples, they speak differently. Even the Indians, they speak differently and you have to program your mind that no matter what you're hearing, what are they saying in English. But for the most part, people come here and they start thinking in a Western way. But not everybody in the world thinks that way.

And so we really need to find the saturation of training our brothers and sisters. And, you know, that's just phenomenal that we've got 30 people from all the way from Rio to, Sao Paulo and some other places in between who are making that journey up to Manaus. They're investing their time and their money. These these folks are are really God given, and it's our objective to make them representatives of what we're showing in the word. And then they can communicate this in a way that is more effective than what my attempt, from a Western standpoint, would have.

Does that make sense? And so indicating the development of those folks and working alongside with them, becoming one with them in objective in ministry is is absolutely critical to this mission. And it's been evolving through the years. It's so much better now in in the point of understanding and agreement and accord. These folks are really your family.

We're eating the same spiritual meat, the same spiritual drink. And that's how when we all come together, we're on the same team. You know? We we don't we don't have to quibble about doctrine. We're all marching forward.

And so we have to identify those that the Lord is putting his hand on in these new churches saying, will you come along with us? And Jesus taught about these kinds of things. You know, he he wasn't necessarily speaking about what it would be to be born again when he said, if you go into a city and you go into a house and that person there or that household is not willing to embrace the peace that you're being sent to to apply. And peace is really the objective and the progression of the fulfillment of that objective and the coming back knowing you've done everything God wants you to do. If they reject that, leave that place, shake the dust off their off your feet.

And that that's kind of an interesting thing. That's really it's not just some kind of societal rebuke.

I'm shaking the dust off my feet.

It's there's there's something spiritual there, and I I've seen it, but I'm not gonna belabor this point. Everything Jesus said, it's God speaking, And there is the opportunity for those people to become as dust, to become as contrite. And God brings the pattern. He brings the opportunity for them to receive and embrace. If they don't, they reject it, you go off from that place and the feet of the preparation of of of the gospel of peace, you shake that off.

Whatever God equipped you to do at that point is not something you store in a bag and use next place. With every place is the different dispensation of God's appeal. And you can see that a lot of times. I mean, you you can really see a lot of times in the spirit realm if God has established different types of, instruments of in the spiritual, weapons or mantles or clothing, and sometimes you can see them. They're there in the place and when somebody opens themselves and you're praying for them and they're saying, yes Lord, very often those things will just automatically come and be upon them.

It's their responsibility then to develop it. And it's interesting to see that thing in in motion and it's really sad to go into some places and you can see not a bevy of these types of, accoutrements, but you see some of them and when you leave they they're with you. And very very soon after you leave the place, those things disappear. There were sometimes I remember when we would go we were in Winnsboro at a conference many, many years ago. And when the conference was over, our people were still in the white heat of being changed and intercession.

And when I was leaving, I saw several of these just laying on the floor. And I asked God, I said, I know that you offered these and the persons you offered them to rejected. Oh, obviously, here they are. These weren't for us. These were for these people.

Can we can we have them? And some of them did come to us. Others just disappeared. So I don't know why God does these things. But for those of you who are listening this, you say, well, that's nonsense.

You know, be careful what you say is nonsense. I can only imagine what you think about Jesus saying, leave the place and shake the dust off your feet. God's saying that. He's not being retributive. So we need to see God do some things that, I think I think I think if I were to qualify, the objectives that I have, it's first of all, this goes without saying, but I'm gonna say it because if I don't say it, somebody's gonna say, well, aren't you really forgetting something, pastor?

We wanna obey the Lord. We wanna do what he's asked us to do. We need desperately his presence and his covering. We have to have that. We have to have him.

He is with us. And I I think that we're to make disciples. So I would think that this large team that is coming, if if we can see God take them into the next dimension of his development, And if we can see them receive from the Lord and work together in harmony and embrace the things that are from the scripture and let it be their marching order, let it be their sustenance. And I would say that if as we go forward that all of our people would grow in ministry and be wise and learn and to have encounters with the Lord and that we would identify these ones that God is pinpointing. Because, you know, you say, well, they're inviting you into their churches.

Isn't that an invitation? Not necessarily because there, especially in Manaus, that's kind of cut off. It's not as cosmopolitan as Rio or Sao Paulo. You have to want to be going there, to go there. And even a lot of the Brazilian teams, a large percentage of them last year had never been there, ever.

So churches want to have guest ministers, especially from The United States. And to have a big team come in of international folks, Oh yeah, that's that's something they want. And I understand that. I mean I I understand a pastor wanting to have other other measures of ministry coming into the church. But it's more from what's gonna happen in this service.

Oh, I hope something happens that we'll talk about for a long time. There's an experiential desire. And I understand that, I'm not denigrating that. But we we want to be able to see people in that place not only receive from the Holy Spirit, but become, as Paul said in the scripture, I know some of you don't like this term, but it's in the King James, addicted to the ministry of the saints. That's what we need.

And I'm praying that we'll come away with those things being accomplished. Yeah. We'll do spiritual warfare there. Yeah. We will address various aspects aspects of opposition that's coming against our host church.

We will be open to going to do activations in a place that the Lord will direct. But I'm not just looking for one. This isn't a sightseeing thing. This isn't a tourist thing. And that's another thing that we've had to break a lot of our teams from doing.

When you first go into a place, especially a hotly contested spiritual environment like Manaus, and it is, you don't want to go off the trail where the Lord has led you. Stick with the mission. Salute no man by the way. Yeah. Now when we go to certain nations, there'll be time where we if you've gone someplace 20 times, 30 times, you know, you're you're gonna go and you're going to see things.

We I think we've been all over Paris. I don't say that lightly. I do believe we have. Been all all through London. We've been in lots of major cities.

We know Nice very well in the Cote D'Izoux. But this, we have to really be careful. Now last time people said, well, I didn't notice any spiritual opposition. Well, I think that we need to recognize some of the main aspects of of warfare, spiritual warfare. In the first place, we have three very tangible visions that have been submitted by people that we know and trust as seers that are telling us that there is opposition.

We know that the horrific stories that some of these pastors down there tell about the things that come against them. We know from the history studies and the studies of that region that this place is a hotbed of spiritist activity, especially when you go into the reaches of the Amazon. And I think that when the Saints first come into a place, we saw this in Argentina, in Buenos Aires, We got off the plane, and we could see almost shock on the on the on the faces of the percentages of the enemy forces. We're trying to figure out who are you? What are you doing here?

What what is this that's with you? I know these angels and we don't wanna tangle with them. So they they try to analyze and they try to they're not going to engage in open warfare. They they try to discover weak points and vulnerabilities. So just because you're not seeing anything or sensing anything means diddly.

You know it's there. It's not that you're afraid, but you just have to be wise. And I won't tell any more stories. What time is it? Oh my goodness, it's half past.

So we wanna look today at a well known verse in first Corinthians 16 verses eight and nine. Paul says, I will tarry at Ephesus until Pentecost because a great door, a megastore, an effectual is opened unto me and there are many adversaries. Anachemi, we know this passage. But I want to talk about what it means to tarry in this. This is a nice Greek word called epimeno.

Epimeno. And meno is abide. And to epimeno means to be coming into a place of abiding, staying there for a season, a determined time, primarily to impact the people in that area where they're abiding, where they're sent to stand with the Lord. And during that time, you're trying to develop the doors of commune, the doors of establishing what their households of of faith should be, and really opening up their measures of function in that locale. And it's it's a megastore so it's spreading, and it's effectual.

It's full of energy. People are receiving and they're moving. And there are many adversaries. And the unique thing about adversaries is that it's kami kami, but it's against the kami. Kami means that there are people in the demonic realm or even in the religious realm that have been positioned.

That's what kami means. Sometimes appointed, sometimes anointed in some way, and they're based there, and they're opposing this work. So but to Tarry Epimeno is, I think, a lot of what our mission really is when we go into these places. Now we don't stay for a long period of time because we've not been called to be an indigenous missionary in these places. We have families in our homes, you know, we have responsibilities in our homes where God has planted us.

But when we go on these missions, we we want to impact the place of their abiding. We want to help them to develop the doorways of commune, the doorways where their households are being established, The doorways as to how to to proclaim the cross and move in the efficacy of that purchase stake that Jesus died on. And this this is this is where what we're doing right now. Yeah. There are there's antichami.

There are many adversaries. I'm not worried about them. You know, the the hardest antichemi we faced was from our own brethren. And David wrote a lot about that in the Psalms, not about us, but he was talking about having people who were in rulership who had anointings that were attacking. I'm grateful that those days are over.

Those were hard. Those those those we overcame through the Lord. He defended us, but those were hard. These are extant. You know?

These these are separate. And, yeah, there are some that are religious, but I've in the past, just in Brazil, the anointing of the Lord, there have been a few times when people have come to check us out. People who had governing authority over different associations that these churches were affiliated with. And in every one of those cases, the spirit of the Lord came upon those folks, and they said, this is of the Lord. So I'm not worried about that.

God is in charge. I believe these are either demonically driven rulers of darkness, these that despise those that are moving in the glory of the Lord. These are scriptural terms whether you recognize them or not. And we just deal with it. You know, Paul dealt with it.

Peter did to some degree with Simon. Paul dealt with it with Elamos. There are others other examples. I hope not to come face to face with any of these, but because who wants to do that? If if you really have a hankering to do that, we need to lay hands on you because your your perspective is cattywampus.

That's an old Texan term, cattywampus. It means it's out of whack. But pray for us. Paul says, in other places, pray. There are many adversaries.

And I I I know that this is a door of grace. So I speak blessing over my church, my family, the families of the people that are leaving with me to go from this church. I speak blessing upon the other pastors and churches and their people. I speak over every person that is coming to join with this Saints army. We we pray the blessing of the Lord over everybody.

We don't need to be in fear. God is with us. You know, every time, sometimes when I'm going on these journeys, I I I don't wanna say I have trepidation, but there's kind of a weird feeling. And I'm gonna go, but I don't really wanna go. And when when I actually did go, things were great.

And I'm still trying to figure out a lot of the things that we sense in our own spiritual climb, who who god made us to be. I don't understand God never gave me an owner's manual. Bless God. You got the word of God, brother.

That's the only that's the only owner's manual I need.

Will you tell me what to do interpreting the sensings of the spirit within you? Yeah. The scripture speaks, you know, I was troubled. I was grieved. I was I was restrained.

The reins of my heart were being pulled. All of those. But there there are are sensings that each of us have that are from the Lord. And I'm not talking about fear here. I'm talking about legitimate things that our spirit tries to communicate with us and we need to learn what they mean in the Lord.

I'm still trying to learn. I'm asking God because I just don't wanna feel something and then be trouble as to its meaning. God tells us not to give an uncertain sound, and so he doesn't he doesn't want he doesn't want his word to be an uncertain sack. So I speak blessing over everybody going on this journey, and it's gonna be a good one. And I'm so grateful.

We just need his direction and all these things that we've already enunciated, and we need those other things that God has reserved, the here little, there little, suddenlies, and the wisdom to know how to function in them. So that's it. Thank you for joining today, and, thank you all who will be praying tonight or throughout the week to come. I really do appreciate each of you and I speak blessing upon your faithfulness and your devotion to the Lord, to the mission he's given you, and to your care about the success of what we're all trying to do in this beautiful nation of Brazil. So look forward to prayer today and Friday devotional will be up and available for you.

God bless you all and, thank you. Goodbye.