Pastor Ray shared…
When we were in the other building, we’d have a staff meeting every week. Usually either Pastor Mac or Pastor Lynne would be there. The ministry was smaller and the whole staff could meet in his office. They would open in prayer and we’d all pray. Sometimes during prayer, Pastor Lynne would go, “Stop!” And we would be still. Then she would encourage us to go deeper inside, just yield to the Lord a little bit more and to get out of our minds. Why do that? Because as we yield more to Him, it causes us to hear Him more clearly. We need to hear Him because it’s our responsibility to pray out His plan and His will… Wow! It’s a privilege and an honor.
Happy Friday! This is from Bishop Butler’s book entitled, “Grace vs. Judgment.” It’s about the scripture in 2 Corinthians 12 where the devil was after Paul and he asked the Lord to take this thorn away three times. Then in verse 9 it says,
[begin quote] He said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. God told Paul, “My power, My anointing, and My miraculous ability is enough for you! My supernatural power is made complete in your inability.” In other words, God said, “Son, I know you can’t deal with that demon spirit. You couldn’t beat a baby demon with one hand tied behind its back. But you don’t have to take him down. Your Big Brother has already done that!” These are shouting words! Jesus has already defeated Satan! [end quote]
In this next quote, he was talking about Paul and Silas in prison.
[begin quote] After Paul and Silas were stripped, beaten, thrown into prison, and chained to a post, they sang, “The joy of the Lord is my strength.” It didn’t matter what the dungeon smelled like. It didn’t matter what it looked like. It didn’t matter what was going on. They chose to believe the word God gave them, and the power of God showed up. The jail shook with an earthquake, and everybody’s bands were loosed.
You’ll see the power when you use the joy. When you praise, you will release the power, God’s ability to move. If you give credit to God instead of to the circumstances, there will be a whole lot of shaking going on in your life! There is some shaking that is going to happen to your money. There is some shaking that is going to happen to your body. There is some shaking that is going to happen to your family. If you will do what God says to do, the power of God will be on its way!
Get ready to receive the manifestation of the power of God. Get ready to have your circumstances turned around. Get ready for the devil to be kicked out of your life. James saw tests and trials as an opportunity to get better, and that was Paul’s attitude as well. You can see the circumstances as reason to doubt God, or you can see them as an opportunity to learn and grow. God’s not using the tests and trials. Your trials don’t come only to make you strong. They come to knock you out! But you can choose to say, “I know where this comes from, I know why it is here, and I know what to do about it.” [end quote]
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Isn’t that right? Because our big brother has already taken care of it, and His authority has been placed within us by the power of the Holy Spirit. Thank You, Lord! What were Paul and Silas singing in prison? The joy of the Lord is my strength. Can we sing that?
Jerre leads in song about joy…
♪ The joy of the Lord is my strength. It’s my strength, it’s my strength, it’s my strength. ♪
Jerre shared…
Sometimes it takes a while to get that joy stirred up and so you have to keep singing for a while.
Barb shared…
The scripture says that Paul and Silas started to praise at midnight. But does it say they got arrested at midnight? It doesn’t say when they got arrested. They got arrested and there was a time lapse there. We don’t know what happened right when they got arrested. They could have been pretty bummed out, right? Like, “What in the world is going on? God, You’re on our side. We shouldn’t be getting arrested.” But there was a time lapse and in that time, they figured something out. So when midnight came around, they had either stirred themselves up and said, “You know what? We believe what Jesus said. We believe that He can deliver us.” Can you imagine them going back and forth? One could have been bummed out and the other one is like, “Come on, we can get out of this situation. God can deliver us.” So by the time they got to midnight, they had figured out, “You know what? God is going to deliver us.” They made a decision and said, “Okay, let’s get on the God train. Ready? Let’s praise the Lord regardless of the circumstance.” So you may be going through that lapse where you’re saying, “I don’t know why this happened. I don’t know why this attack came, but you know what? It’s midnight now and I choose to believe and I’m going to praise the Lord and He will deliver me!”
Dave shared…
Okay, one step further. We’re going to take steps into this. It is a decision to believe. Let me make that clear. Sometimes you stir yourself up but there’s a point in that stirring up where you actually make a decision. Let me explain that. Jerre says sometimes you need to sing for a while. The reason why you need to sing it for a while is so you can get it in your head that “Hey! The joy of the Lord is my strength!” But once you get it right here, there’s a decision you have to make once it gets there—whether you’re going to believe that or not. And what happens next determines whether you believe that. And that is what you do. Cuz when you make that decision, I guarantee you, the anointing will be there to take you to the next level. The decision of faith opens the door to the miraculous. It allows you into that room where miracles are flowing, healing is taking place, provision is being made. It allows you into that room. But let’s not be deceived here. It is a decision. I have to emphasize that. Because when you feel down, like you’ve been trampled under by some circumstance and your body isn’t responding like it should respond or some difficulty that you’re dealing with is just overwhelming you, that’s a time to make a choice. That’s the time to take hold of the hand of the Holy Ghost. He’s reaching out His hand to take you into that place to allow you to shake that thing free and enter into that room where the miracle presides. I’ve seen this happen time after time after time. And I’ve seen miracles happen. And every single time I’ve ever experienced that, I didn’t feel like being joyful. We’re all in that same boat. We don’t all feel like praising when we’re down. But faith is a decision. Let’s make the right decision. Let’s go into that room and allow God to do what He does. He does the work. He does the miracle. He does the healing. You don’t have to do it. He does it. It’s His job. It’s not my job. Mine is just to get in agreement with Him. Right?
Ray shared…
He made the room. He created it all. He started it and He’s finished it. It’s already been done. I just heard this while you were sharing; you do not have enough money yet to do what I’ve preplanned for you to do. So you better see some shaking in your finances and not shaking away “from you” but shaking “to you.” So by faith, let’s enter every room that’s opened. The doors have been opened because the power by the blood that was shed on the cross did it for us and it’s doing it for us now and I’m getting shaken up right now to enter into every room where the doors are opened. And every “door for more” has been opened before. It’s already been done so by grace we receive it today. So we can say I’m all shook up! Things are shaking and moving and changing and turning!
Jerre leads in song and praise…
♪ All shook up… things are changing… things are turning and I’m all shook up. All shook up… Something is shaking over there… I choose joy… I choose joy… I choose joy… ♪
Dave shared…
What does joy have to do with anything? How does me being happy going make any difference in my circumstance?
Jerre says…
I know! It’s the sound of faith!
Dave continued…
You being happy acknowledges God’s supremacy over your circumstance. You voicing that declaration allows the angels to do the work of the ministry. They’ve been sent here to minister to the heirs of salvation and you are an heir of that salvation. God put those angels here for a purpose for His people to do the work, to get the plan done. And when you voice your joy and when you express yourself in faith that way, it releases their ability to go out and cause those things to come into being. It causes the things that are not the way they should be and makes them the way they should be. It turns it around. So if you believe that, I don’t know about you, I’d get excited. If I knew that me being happy caused that angel to get out there and do that work, I’d get excited.
Jerre continued to lead in joy and praise…
Dave shared…
Every time you practice this joy, you get closer to God. You learn about Him because what He does is He lets you see Him the way He is. This is communion with Him. You’re hanging out with Him. And when you hang out with somebody, you become like them. My mom told us to stay away from bad people by saying, “Don’t hang around the dogs or you’ll start barking.” She also used to say, “You show me your friends and I’ll show you, you.” That’s it! If we are a friend of God, then people will see Him in us. The more communion we have with Him in fellowship whether it’s through the joy or whether it’s stepping out in faith, that will draw you closer to God and give you a communion that you can’t have any other way.
