Morning Chapel Prayer Playlist
Morning Chapel Prayer Today
Pastor Ken…
Good morning, everybody. Whether you’re here in person, online or watching later, we are glad that you’re with us.
Our life with God is a journey…
The thing that is stirring in my heart as we began to worship this morning is to share this thought. And that is that I know in life and especially maybe in America, we focus a lot on the outcome. As Christians, we probably focus on the answer, the breakthrough, the result, the fulfillment of the promise in our lives. And while that is certainly great, remember that this life that God has called us into, this relationship first and foremost that God has invited us into with Him by way of the Holy Spirit is a journey, after all. It’s a walk.
The Way…
The early church was called “The Way.” We are following in “the way” this morning, the way of Jesus journeying day by day to know Him more. Journeying day by day to reflect His nature through our lives and to fight the good fight of faith.
He sustains us…
And I guess the thing that really occurred to me is I just want to point out that while you maybe are still standing for the promise and you’re still looking for the answer to the prayer and the breakthrough and your family turning around and your finances righting themselves and you seeing prosperity like you know the Bible promises, understand that God in the moment, in the journey is sustaining you. Much like the widow woman of Zarephath and Elijah in a foreign land, he was sustained. All three of them. The widow woman, her son, and Elijah were sustained in a foreign land through a season of drought.
Practice gratitude…
Maybe you don’t see the answer yet. Maybe you haven’t experienced the healing yet or witnessed the turnaround with your own eyeballs, as I say. But practice gratitude today and recognize and even celebrate the fact that you are awake, that there is breath in your lungs, that God is still on His throne. That His Word is still “yes and amen.” That He is still watching over His Word to perform it. And He’s sustaining you.
He has gone ahead and prepared the way…
As humans, we have a very short attention span, maybe more than ever in this postmodern era where there are perpetual distractions and opportunities to go ADHD. But the Lord is leading us in the way as pray-ers, as believers. And part of His way is to practice patience, to understand that He is at work and He’s already gone ahead of us as individuals, as a church, as a nation, to prepare a way. There’s no nervousness in the heavenly realm. There are no angels wringing their hands and wondering, “Oh my goodness, what are we going to do now, Heavenly Father? I don’t think we have an answer for that situation. Or I don’t think we have enough to respond to their prayers.”
No, God in His great divine providence went ahead of time, went into the future, and prepared the way, and made provision and put it in place. And as Ecclesiastes announces, He makes all things beautiful according to the Father’s timetable… in His timing.
“Oh my goodness, God is faithful!”
I’ve been through seasons of adversity and I’m sure you have as well. And I can look back and reflect and see now how I was feeling in the moment facing impossibilities, facing uncertainty, facing what seemed to be failure and how I felt and what it looked like. But at the end of the day, now I can look back and I can say, “Oh my goodness, God is faithful. He followed through on His promise.” What was I worried about? What was I all bent out of shape and stressed out about? He is still on His throne. His Word still holds all things, even on a molecular level, holds all things together by the Word of His power.
At least that’s what my Bible says. Did it get taken out of yours? Didn’t out of mine? It’s still there.
He’s exalted His word even above His name…
He holds all things, including all things in this earth realm together by the word of His power. He’s exalted His Word even above His name. If you professed His name and have accepted the invitation of Jesus into a life of salvation and grace and relationship with Him, then He’s got you. Recognize He’s sustaining you. Like the widow woman and Elijah and that widow woman’s son, He’s sustaining you. You can go another day today. You’ve got what it takes because you are imbibed and you are inhabited by Him. He’s going to see you through.
“Well, what if nothing happens tomorrow, Ken?”
You’re going to get up and you’re going to go another day. You’re going to apply yourself to faith. You’re going to choose to devote yourself to Him. You know it’s not just raised hands and a song on your lips that emits worship. It’s the fact that you devote a portion of your day to Him today, that you devote time to Him even, just waiting in His presence, that you take time to acknowledge Him and recognize His hand in your life and the fact that He prepared your future in advance of you even showing up on this planet.
God is not limited…
So let your heart be encouraged this morning. Let your mind be stretched to understand that God is not limited by even time and space. He’s not limited by all the things that we think are limitations. Including the laws of physics. He can override them if He needs to. So that He can get to you the answer that’s needed. So that He can get you where He’s called you to in the coming days.
It might be in this season of what seems like adversity and impossibility and nothing much happening, let’s say, it might be that you’re on your way toward promotion, that you’re right where He wants you to be, in fact. But it doesn’t feel like it. It doesn’t look like it. Aren’t you glad you don’t live by feelings in your five physical senses? But that we get to choose today to live by faith. By putting His Words in our hearts, in our minds, and on our lips. Oftentimes, it doesn’t look like the answer’s coming. Oftentimes, it doesn’t look like I’m going anywhere good. Because there’s opposition. And there’s a waiting period.
But remember, if you grow not weary in doing good and doing life by faith, you will reap.
Wait in faith…
Good things come to those who wait. That’s a biblical principle, really. Wait in faith, not wait in fear or anxiety or freaking out in some way. But wait in faith. Wait in confidence and in trust.
Good things come to those who wait…
So down through history from a Christian standpoint, so many good things have occurred because of those who waited. Beginning with 2,000 years ago, those in the upper room waited for the promise of the Father. They didn’t have degrees or all kinds of initials behind their names, theologically speaking. They just heard the directive of God the Holy Spirit and obeyed. And refused to grow weary. Refused to be moved by what they saw, what they felt, or what they were being persecuted about.
Instead, they took God’s Word at face value and responded to it. One day, and then the next day. They began to stack days of obedience. And oftentimes that obedience looks like being patient and devoting yourself to waiting in His presence, devoting yourself to prayer, devoting yourself to the study of God’s Word.
You can choose to refuse to be denied…
When I look back now and I see some seasons I’ve been through, what got me through was getting up and putting one foot in front of the other and seeking the Lord. And refusing to be denied! You can choose to refuse to be denied in prayer and in your personal life.
Lord, I refuse to be denied the promise of your Word. Lord, we refuse to be denied in any way. We will have revival. We will see America saved. We will see Israel saved. You and I will see our households save. As concerning me and my household, we will serve the Lord. I will live the full length of my days and do all of the will of God, even as His Word promises.
I shall arise…
Sometimes you just got to exert your will in conjunction with the Word and faith that’s in your heart. You just got to pull your bootstraps up and stand up and put your head back and your chest up, spiritually speaking, and say, “This is the way it’s going to go today. I’m not going to remain beat down. I shall arise. I shall stand strong and I will realize the fullness of His plan for me, His plan for the church.” So I said good things come to those who wait. That’s a scriptural principle.
In fact, let me share two accounts with you this morning.
I feel like this is kind of a good primer because we are in the midst of awakening right now. Revival is now. The glory of God is breaking out across the world, including in this nation on college campuses, in high schools, in homes, in personal situations. The glory of God is breaking out. These are not the days of normal. These are the days of the unusual and the remarkable and the greatly consequential acts of the Holy Spirit once again. Like it was in the days of Acts. Not because we’re so good or we have something special about us. But because we choose to believe and stand in faith.
Shearer School House Revival…
But in 1896, there was something called the Shearer School House Revival. This is before Azusa Street by about four or five years. And this is interesting. Now just listen to what they did and what occurred. In 1896 in the mountains of Western North Carolina, a group of believers gathered in Shearer schoolhouse near Camp Creek. Led by RG Spurling and WF Bryant, they were hungry for something more than cold religion.
Are you hungry for more of God?
Can I get an amen here this morning? Are you hungry for something more? We maybe have experienced some good things. We may be a part of a really amazing and awesome church, but I’m here to tell you there’s something more. There’s more! God wants us to personally and collectively encounter Him in fresh and new ways in this hour. These are to be days of consequence and days of divine glory upon the earth and in the church. That’s why we come here. That’s why we log on. Yes, maybe because we need something individually, but also because we know there’s something more. And it’s our prayers and it’s our waiting and it’s our call inspired by the Holy Spirit because all prayer originates from God.
God grants prayers…
Pastor Lynne likes to say God grants prayers. So make no mistake about it. God has plunked a prayer, excuse my alliteration, into your heart today. He’s granted and deposited a call and a cry of the Spirit on the inside of your soul. Today, I don’t care if you’ve only been born again for one day, you are recreated in His image into a vessel fit and worthy and holy enough to receive the divine impartation of God.
And oftentimes that’s just in a cry. That’s a request. That’s an intercession. That’s a groaning. That’s a “Lord, there’s something more for me and my family.”
Surely there’s something more great and destined for this nation and for this generation.
Surely you’ve not relegated this generation to be lost and to go into darkness until the end comes.
Instead, we believe His glory has come.
All of America shall be saved…
And revival is now once again. And all of America and all of this generation shall be saved. That’s what we’re contending for. That’s what we’re believing for. In the heavenly realm, there’s a whole nother perception, a whole nother standpoint or view of things than we have here in this earth realm… where there’s an atmosphere that is also populated by demonic entities, that seek to harass us and discourage us and get us to doubt and not believe. But in the heavenly realm, there’s not even a second thought or one doubt even that God’s will and plan won’t come to pass.
It will!
If you were to ask somebody, maybe a loved one of yours that has gone over to the other side and is in the heavenly realm, they would say, “Why, of course, Susie, John, Ken… Why, of course they’re going to do all of the will of God. Why, of course, they’re going to receive and carry away and enjoy the fullness of the promise and the fullness of God’s blessing and the fullness of what they’ve interceded for. There’s nothing but pure faith in that realm.
You can’t do it in yourself…
Well, we may not have that here, but understand that’s where what we’re called to. But we can only do that in Him. You can’t do it in yourself. Kenneth Copeland once said that the Lord gave him a directive to give $50,000 to Kenneth Hagin Ministries. This was back in the early seventies, and it might as well have been a million dollars back then. The Lord said, “I want you to give $50,000 to Kenneth Hagin Ministries.” And brother Copeland said back then, they were still broke and in debt, he and Gloria. And he was tempted to say, “Lord, I can’t do that. That’s impossible. I have my own debts to pay. How am I going to give this money to this other minister that you’ve asked me to do?”
You can do it in Me…
And the Lord prompted him and said, “You can do it in Me.” So brother Copeland made an adjustment on his perspective and on his words, and instead of saying, “I can’t do that.” Because he was looking at himself. He was filtering what God was asking him to do through his five physical senses, through what he knew his limitations were. But instead he just made an adjustment. He made a shift and said, “But I can do it in you. You’re the one that grants seed to the sower.” You can do it in Him today. All things are possible to those who will simply choose to believe.
The rest of the story…
Let me finish here and share the rest of this story about the Shearer Schoolhouse Revival back in 1896. It says, “As they waited on God, the Holy Ghost was poured out. People began speaking in tongues, trembling under the power of God, crying out and falling to their knees. They hadn’t seen it before, hadn’t been taught it, but they knew it was real. It was the Book of Acts all over again. The word began to spread. Meetings broke out in homes and brush harbors. Some were healed, some were filled, some were set free. The established churches rejected them, but they kept meeting anyway. What happened in the schoolhouse laid the foundation for what would become the Church of God, which is the other big Pentecostal denomination, Assemblies of God, but then also the Church of God. This happened before Azusa Street, but it was the same Spirit. They didn’t try to start anything. They just followed what they saw in the Word and obeyed what God was doing right in front of them.
Oh, is it that simple? Yeah!
We need to uncomplicate our spirituality…
…our Christianity sometimes, and get back to the simplicity of what it means to follow Jesus, to obey God. Revival had come and it would not be stopped. So this began in 1896 in North Carolina.
Bethel School in Topeka, Kansas…
Fast forward four and a half, five years. Let me read you another story about a woman by the name of Agnes Osmond in the year of 1901. In fact, this occurred January 1, 1901, the beginning of the 20th century.
On December 31, the day before 1900 at Bethel School in Topeka, Kansas, Charles F Parham and his small band of students gathered for watch night prayer service, earnestly seeking the baptism of the Holy Spirit as the book of Acts describes. Parham had challenged his students to search the scriptures for the initial evidence of the spirit baptism. And they concluded, it was always accompanied by speaking in tongues. With that conviction burning in their hearts. They spent hours in prayer, worship, in expectation as they crossed into the new century.
In other words, they waited on God…
They devoted themselves to Him, not even really knowing what this Spirit baptism looked like or what God wanted to do. But they sensed something in their gut and they leveraged their wills and brought themselves before God to seek Him to see what He had for them.
What does He have for you today?
Agnes Osmond…
On January 1, 1901, Agnes Osmond, a young student, approached Parham and asked him to lay hands on her to receive the baptism. Though at first hesitant, Perham prayed and suddenly the power of God fell upon Osmond. She began to speak fluently in tongues, a language she had never learned and was reportedly unable to speak English for three days. She couldn’t speak English for three days. Witnesses described her face shining with glory and even claimed she wrote a foreign script under the Spirit’s inspiration. I believe it was Chinese. And they confirmed that she had written in Chinese the weeks the following. The room was filled with awe as they realized they were experiencing the same Pentecostal power that shook Jerusalem in Acts two. In the days following, many other students at Bethel received the same outpouring, including Charles Parham himself.
