This is a good message.
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Our walk with God is actually a race with destiny.
In I Corinthians 9, Paul gives us some rules for the race.
Know ye not that they that run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize?
Even so run; that ye may attain.
And everyman that striveth in the games exerciseth self-control in all things.
Verses 24-25.
You may want to run and to have power, but the most important factor is your focus.
It is not difficult at all to make a touchdown if you are running in the wrong direction.
Many ministers are making touchdown after touchdown in 'mega churches.'
They boast that the devil is not fighting them.
If they would turn around and start moving toward the right goal, they would turn around and start moving toward the right goal, they would find a host of satanic forces awaiting them.
People used to tell Billy Sunday, a great American evangelist who is now with the Lord, "You always talk about fighting the devil. We never have that problem."
His answer explained their situation: "You are going in the same direction that he is. That is why you never meet him."
In order to run the race and attain the goal, forceful appropriating prayer is needed; but it must be more than just sound and fury, or it will be of no effect.
All the tremendous force of the Lord of lords and the King of kings in His authority must come through your prayers.
Your will must be set with His will, and you must do what He is doing; then it is He who is working within you to will and to do of His good pleasure ( Philippians 2:13 ).
As your will becomes in tune with God's will, it is overwhelmed and comes forth with an explosive force that is beyond anything ever known in the human will.
Your human will becomes a sanctified, holy determination.
Then everything within you is channeled God's way.
Paul speaks further of the focus that is needed: Now they do it to receive a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible. I therefore so run, as not uncertainly; so fight I, as not beating the air. Verses 25-26.
Every blow has to count!
We must be dedicated to focus our intensity of prayer so that a greater effectiveness comes forth.
We will be more effective with what God turns loose in us, if we learn to focus without running uncertainly or beating the air.
In the race that is set before us, we do not want to be just a nice orderly congregation of people who meet together.
We want to be participators who come together and explode like a living organism.
We are members of one another in Christ.
We are to be absolutely one in spirit with one another.
When there is this oneness, no one feels as if he is being ignored.
The oneness with one another is not even challenged; all are absolutely one.
Self-consciousness and sensitivity, which are evidences of individuality, die.
God brings us to the place of complete confidence in what He has done.
He makes us one and we walk in that oneness together.
Pail speaks of the way we should strive: I therefore so run, as not uncertainly; so fight I, as not beating the air: but I buffet (bruise) my body ( those who walk with God sometimes feel as if they have the bruises to prove it ), and bring it into bondage: lest by any means, after that I have preached to others, I myself should be rejected.
Verses 26-27.
Some people do not like to bring themselves into bondage.
They want to be liberated and free.
Paul said, "For freedom did Christ set us free" ( Galatians 5:1 ), but this is not speaking about man's concept of freedom.
We are to be free so that by love we can serve one another.
The only acceptable liberty is the liberty of the servitude of love.
True liberty is not for the individual who says, "No one can legislate to me and tell me what I can and cannot do; I am free of legalism."
That individual is a free "nothing," until in the freedom of his love for God, he presents himself to the members of the Body to serve them.
Paul was free from all men and could do anything that he wanted to do, but he brought himself under bondage to all.
He said that he would not eat meat again if it should cause his brother to stumble ( I Corinthians 9:19; 8:13).
That is the bondage of love.
Your love for Christ makes you a slave.
I Corinthians 10 is a continuation of Paul's exhortation to buffet our bodies, and he gives us this illustration:
For I would not, brethren, have you ignorant, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; and were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea; and did all eat the same spiritual food; and all did drink the same spiritual drink; for they drank of a spiritual rock that followed them; and the rock was Christ.
Howbeit with most of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the wilderness.
Now these things were our examples, to the intense we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted.
Neither be ye idolaters, as were some of them; as it is written.
The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.
Neither let us commit fornication, as rose up to play.
Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day three and twenty thousand.
Neither let us make trial of the Lord, as some of them made trial, and perished by the serpents.
Neither murmur ye, as some of them murmured, and perished by the destroyer.
Now these things happened unto them by way of example; and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages are come.
Verses 1-11.
In this passage of scripture, Paul is saying in effect that no matter how God leads us out of Egypt, no matter how many plagues and miracles He brings to deliver us, or works out in our lives, there must be diligence on our part to apply ourselves to what He is doing.
If we allow these other things to come in, we will perish just as those who left Egypt did.
The same truths still apply to us.
We do not read of any special evangelists teaching the Israelites how to live and walk with God during the 400 years they were slaves in Egypt.
Many of them were probably worshiping the various gods of Egypt.
They still had that idolatry in their hearts when they made a calf in the wilderness like that which was worshiped in Egypt.
Egypt was still very much in their hearts, but it did not become an issue until God had delivered them and baptized them in the sea and under the cloud.
Then they were immediately brought into a new place of responsibility.
God winks at our times of ignorance too, until He delivers us from bondage and shows us the way of holiness, righteousness and purity.
We must love and desire righteousness and strive for purity within, in order to see the manifestation of His presence that is coming.
God has been merciful to us, but as He is bringing us into a new day, there will be a more strict responsibility upon us to walk with God.
Perhaps you have murmured at times, and God did nothing more about it than slap you on the wrist a little.
God sometimes lets you wander around a little while in your mess, and then He takes hold of you and brings you out of it.
It is like convalescence; after a period of time you get over your sickness and you go on.
But that may not happen any longer.
You are not being delivered to play church or to play Kingdom with God.
Kingdom requirements demand that after you put your hand to the plow you do not look back, or you are not fit for the Kingdom of God ( Luke 9:62).
If you have been praying for judgments to come forth, and yet you have not hearkened to the Word of the Lord and submitted to the grace of God that can change you, you may be among the first to be judged.
If you curse a withdrawing or a murmuring spirit, and yet it is in your own heart, it will boomerang back on you.
You will be judged with the same judgment.
The judgment that you measure out will be measure to you again ( Matthew 7:2 ).
That is why Paul said that he could preach to others, and yet he himself might be rejected and become a castaway; therefore, he buffeted his body.
The doctrines and the teachings and the Kingdom message are to no avail if you are not disciplining yourself, not learning t buffet yourself and to bring yourself under, not learning to really run the race or to fight.
It will do little good to run if you just run around everywhere.
It will do little good to fight if you just swing and swing without hitting anything.
You will not be fit to handle what God is bringing forth unless you discipline yourself and walk carefully with all of your heart.
You cannot take lightly what God wants to do through you.
If you want to stay in the race, you must stop complaining and stop walking in any way other than in total submission to the Lord.
Rejoice in the battle, for to this you were called.
Being in a race would be easy, if you did not have to train and discipline yourself.
In order to go after the prize, you must change.
You can change by listening to every Word of the Lord, drawing it into your heart and walking in it.
Worship God with all of your heart, whether you feel like crying or laughing, or whether you feel angry or happy.
Ignore your soulish feelings.
When you are walking with God in the Spirit, He takes possession of your soul, and then your will is motivated to do His will.
Joel 2 speaks about the army of the Lord that is being raised up for the end-time devastating scourge of judgment.
They will not break ranks nor thrust one another through ( Verses 7-8).
Revival will come to the earth, as Joel prophesied: Whoever will call upon the name of the lord shall be saved, for there is going to be deliverance in the remnant ( Verse 32).
First there will be a ministry of judgment; then there will be a ministry of mercy.
The army of the lord must get people's attention before t can minister to them.
It will be like a force that cannot be withstood.
Let us not be concerned only about trying to win a few souls.
Millions must find God, but this will not happen until the present establishment is brought down and the principalities and powers are bound.
Let us fulfill Isiah's prophecy by bringing down every mountain, filling every valley, and making a highway of holiness for our God ( Isaiah 40; 35:8 ).
The road is still rough, and there is much to do yet to prepare the way of the Lord.
The presence of the Lord, the Parousia, is going to come to those whose hearts are prepared.
They who have that hope within them are purifying themselves and making themselves ready.
They are reaching in to what God has for them.
Oh, that we may be set for everything that God has for us, no matter how it might upset us!
If we become a little grumpy, may he not pay attention; let Him see only that our hearts hunger for Him and desire to walk with Him.
May He have mercy on us, but still keep the pressure on us.
We do not want to be pampered; we want God to help us to endure hardness as good soldiers.
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