Jerre led group in worship…
Pastor Ray shared…
I’m thankful that I had a mother-in-law who was baptized in the Holy Ghost while in her house because she read about it in the Word and said, “If they had that, I want that. By faith, I take it.” When she got it, she never quit.
Do you remember before you were filled with the Holy Spirit? It’s so life changing to be filled. But then to be ever “being” filled more and more.
This morning I have a couple things about seeds. The Word is a seed. If you attend church here, you know the last few weeks, Pastor Mac has been teaching on sowing and reaping. What you sow, you shall reap. Words can be seeds.
We have a smaller group at noon here in the chapel. One of the ladies said when she was maybe 7 or 8, just a little girl, she said over the years her parents had been married and divorced four times. To each other! She thought when her father left, the only way she could get him back was if she was sick. So she actually used her faith to believe to get sick. She lined up her words with what she desired just to get her father back. She’d take her shoes off and put her feet under the water until she got pneumonia and was in the hospital. It was serious. But her father came back.
This is how the negative side of faith works. The negative words we speak or doubt and lack, they also work as seeds. What we sow, that’s what we’re going to reap.
I’m going to read this short story from the book called God’s Generals by Roberts Liardon. He has a chapter on Oral Roberts. There was a lot of stuff that took place in the 50s about him. This story is about a little boy that used his faith.
[start excerpt]
“I’m Supposed to Be Healed Today!”
“Suffer the little children, and forbid them not to come unto me,” Jesus said in Matthew 19:14. Even young children had their faith for healing enlarged through Oral Roberts’ television broadcasts. Willie Phelps was a young boy who had been afflicted at six years of age with Perthes disease, a flattening of the hip bone due to a lack of blood flow to the hip. From the time of his diagnosis until he was ten years old, Willie had worn a shoe with an extra two-and-a-half-inch heel and had used crutches. He often experienced pain because of the inflammation in his hip.
One evening, Willie and his mother were watching a televised Oral Roberts crusade. At the end of the program, Oral announced an upcoming crusade in Roanoke, Virginia. Willie turned to his mother with a certainty that comes only with childlike faith, and said, “Mom, if you take me to that meeting, I know I will be healed.”
After Willie’s mother agreed to go, he simply responded, “Mom, when that meeting is over and I get healed, will you take me to get new shoes?” “Of course,” replied his mother, with tears of hope streaming down her face.
Willie’s father was a farmer who worked late into the afternoon. By the time they left for the crusade and drove forty miles to Roanoke, the family was too late to get inside the crusade and thus couldn’t sign up for the healing time. The same thing happened to them each of the remaining evenings of the crusade—they stood outside to hear the message but couldn’t get inside to receive the healing power.
On the final night of the crusade, Willie and his parents traveled the forty miles from their home, praying fervently that the Lord would open a way for them to get inside the prayer service. As they stood outside of the large building, unable to get in once again, an unusual thing occurred. An usher had noticed the little boy with crutches who had stood outside each evening, and he opened a side door, motioned the family in, and let them to a small room where they could watch the service.
Oral prayed for two or three thousand people to be healed that evening, touching each of them with his right hand. He left the service totally exhausted. As he walked down a back corridor to return to his hotel, Oral noticed a young boy sitting in a room with his head bowed and a pair of crutches on the floor beside him. Oral asked him what he was doing, and he replied that he was waiting for Oral Roberts.
“I’m Oral Roberts,” Oral answered. “What do you want with Oral Roberts?”
“I’m supposed to be healed today!” the boy replied confidently.
Oral was so exhausted that he hardly knew what to say. He explained that he had just prayed for thousands of people and that he didn’t have the faith to pray for anyone else.
“I don’t know about that, Mr. Roberts,” the boy said, “I just know I’m supposed to be healed today.”
Seeing what great faith the boy had, Oral agreed to pray for him. But he told Willie that his faith would have to be strong because his own was so weak at that moment. Oral reached out and touched Willie Phelps, prayed a prayer for his healing, and then went back to his hotel. In his exhaustion, Oral was just hoping that the Lord would answer the prayer.
It wasn’t until one year later when Oral and Evelyn went back to Roanoke for another crusade that someone reintroduced Oral to little Willie Phelps. After hearing Willie’s testimony of healing, Oral invited him onto the stage where Willie shared about his miracle.
Following Oral’s prayer that previous year, Willie had requested that his mother take his shoes off of his feet. He had put down his crutches and placed his bad foot on the floor. As Willie took a step, he realized that his bad leg, which had been shorter, was just as long as the other one. He walked across the room to his mother, then asked her, “When am I going to get those new shoes you promised me?”
Willie went to school the Monday following the crusade and walked in without his crutches. When his astounded classmates and teacher asked him what had happened, Willie shared the power of a God who heals: “A preacher prayed for me and God healed me!” he proclaimed. The whole school rejoiced at the wonder of a God who still heals people today.
Oral and Evelyn kept in touch with Willie Phelps for many years. The last time they spoke with him, he was fifty years of age and was still well and whole. [end excerpt]
Pastor Ray continued…
We are talking about seeds that we sow; our words are seeds. Erika has a good story about seeds. Many seeds have already been sown for our country, for unity, for change. If you think back over the months past in 2016, prayers have been sown. There’s also been a watering of those prayers to have them come up. We believe it’s happening. We’ve seen it in the election, but the election is just the beginning of an absolute, all out, Holy Ghost fight to move our nation in the way that God wants it to go. Amen?
Erika shared…
Even now the word, the seed, is going forth once again concerning the power of God and His goodness. This is called “The Celestial Seed.”
[begin excerpt]
He was holding in one hand a cloth bag and in the other a small shovel. He led me to a spot of soil that had been marked out for planting. He reached into the bag and placed in my hand a sample of its contents.
“Seeds,” he said. “Potential miracles. Each one is filled with the potential for life, growth, blossoming, and fruitfulness. It’s all there in the seed—the plan, everything it will become, the plant, the flower, the tree. It’s all there inside the shell. Now what happens if the seed says in the bag?”
“Nothing. Nothing happens.”
“Exactly. All its potential stays unrealized. But if we take the seed and plant it in the soil, everything changes. The seed becomes one with the earth. The shell opens up and the life inside the seed joins itself to the soil around it. It puts out roots and draws in life from the earth. The plan is activated, the promise unlocked, and the potential becomes reality.”
“So you’re going to plant the seeds?”
“Yes,” he said, “but that’s not why I brought you here.” Reaching into his pocket, he took out a book and handed it to me. It was a Bible.
“What’s inside this?” he asked.
“The Word,” I answered.
“Seeds,” he replied. “The Word of God itself refers to the Word of God as a seed. The Bible is the container of many seeds. And every seed, every word is a potential miracle. And as is a seed, so is the Word of God. Each Word has the potential to produce life, growth, blossoming, fruitfulness, and a miracle. It’s all there inside the seed, inside the Word.”
:”But if the seed stays in the bag…”
“If the Word says on the pages and is never sown to life, then its life stays unlocked, unrealized. So the Word must be sown.”
“Sown to what soil?” I asked.
“Sown to the soil of life,” he replied. “To the lives of others. And to the soil of your life. The seed must become one with the soil. The Word must become one with your life. So you need to sow the Word into every situation of your life and let it become one with that soil—the soil of your heart, your thoughts, your emotions, your life. For when the Word becomes one with your life, then its shell will break open, its plan will be activated, its promise unlocked, its life released, and its miracle begun.”
The mission: Today take a seed from the Word of God and plant it in the soil of your heart. Let its promise be unlocked and bear its fruit in your life.
Matthew 13:3–23; I Peter 1:23 [end excerpt]
Prayed…
Thank You, Father, that You’ve entrusted Your Word to Your people
We stand in the power of agreement
Revelation of that precious seed comes once again to the Church
Revelation of seeds we sow, hold fast to, and becomes planted in the soil of our lives
The world will see the evidence of a fruitful life
They’ll see this is the hand of God, the work of God
We ask again for increase
All across this nation seeds have been sown… we look for more… we look for increase
Dispensary of the seeds… going into the highways and byways
That we would understand our parts
We know You’re the one that brings the increase
Father, we desire to be greater used by You
Used in a diversity of ways and operations
Come out from the locked-in place you’re in
Be loosed from that which holds you in bondage, that which constrains you, that which says you can’t
Scatter freely… give liberally
Words… seeds of love, seeds of kindness… miracles and signs and wonders
Gifts of the spirit in operation
Demonstrations of Your Word
Men are yearning and hungry to see the power of God to see the real
Let’s leave some things behind and cleave unto You
Let’s live in the realm of God in the Holy Ghost
In the economy of God… in the laws of sowing and reaping
Word…
Some positions of authority have been placed where they should be, but still as we sow seeds for the change and changes in our nation, we must continually water those by faith, and in our hearts, begin to watch those seeds materialize, come up and come up and come up… even higher. See the great manifestation of God’s plan for our nation.
Continued praying….
So every leader, we hold up this morning
Based on the Word in Timothy, we lift these positions of authority before heaven today
In Jesus name, we call for every seed that was planted to come up into maturity
For increase to come forth, for Your Word, Father, we declare Your Word over each one
We plead the blood of Jesus there and there and there
Governors, mayors, all the way down, from the President, cabinet, Senate, Congress and all the way down
We must have… we will have… we shall be one nation under You, Lord
We hold the blood against division, against lies that are being declared
We hold the blood against the spirit that would attempt to sabotage the plan of God
Every fowl spirit that come against that plan, we hold the blood against you
You come to naught in Jesus’ name
Pastor Paul shared…
Last night when I was having my prayer time, I felt led to read this wonderful declaration and I felt impressed to bring it with me today. When Pastor Ray started talking about brother Hagin and about declaration, I said, “That’s why I brought it.” This is a word that the Lord gave brother Hagin. It’s about a declaration about the Holy Spirit. Let’s make this confession together. Say this after me:
For the Greater One dwells in me. He is greater than any test. He is greater than any trial that I face. He’s greater than any power or force that could come against me.
He’s greater than “he that is in the world.” And He’s in me. He rises up in me. He speaks unto my spirit. He enlightens my spirit. He fills my entire being with light.
While others are in darkness and are feeling their way and say, “I do not know, I cannot see,” yea, He rises up within me and directs my path. And I know now the way in which I should walk, glory to God. And I walk in the way of the Lord. For my paths are directed by Him.
Yea, He is the strength of my life and my portion forever. I shall not fear what man shall do unto me. For He is my helper and my strengthener.
And while men search for answers and even many in the Church search within their heads, within their intellects, and in the books of theology for the answers, yea, the Answer lives in me, yea, the Light dwells in me. Yea, the answer, the wisdom, the direction, the guidance are all in my spirit.
And so I rise up and walk in the light of the Spirit. For I am Spirit led, Spirit filled, and Spirit taught. Hallelujah.
I magnify Thy holy name. I thank You for Your bountiful provision and for Your great love with which You loved me and made such wonderful provision for me.
And while others walk in the low lands of sorrow and bereavement, forlorn and saddened, overcome with the natural, overcome with the tests and trials of life, darkened and almost alienated from the light, I rise above all the clouds of despair and doubt. I rise above all that Satan and his cohorts bring my way and all that he may try to throw upon me.
And above the turmoil, I shout, “The light has shined! The victory is come! Direction is mine!” I walk with the Holy One.
And in the face of the enemy and darkness, though the rain clouds gather and the lightning flashes, yet in the face of the storm, I laugh because I know “Greater is He that is in me than the storm, the test, or the trial.”
So I shall prevail, not because of me, but because of Him, for the Great One in me doth dwell.
Dr. Kenneth E. Hagin in the Spirit
10/15/1983
Fall Prayer Seminar
