Today's lesson will take you back in time, into a live New Testament service like a fly on the wall. This is a balanced government of God type of a service where there is a new Testament pattern of an apostle, prophets, elders, deacons and many others present; an apostolic company. The exact time and place is uncertain.
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The evening worship has gone on for about an hour or so. The Spirit of God has manifested and everyone has been drawn into the Spirit. There is a thick atmosphere of love permeating the meeting place.
It is a pleasant warm summer evening; the crickets can be heard chirping off in the distance.
The apostle gets up on the platform and begins to teach:
If a man in his youth were to look ahead and plan his life, if he could choose the way he were to go- all the paths he would walk, the mountains he would climb, the rivers he would ford- he would only reveal his fallibility and lack of judgment.
However, if he could make the choice after many years, after the weights of responsibility had rested upon him and turned his hair gray, his decision would no doubt be different.
If he were then asked, "What was really important in your life; what did you want to have, above everything else, as part of your life?" he would not choose the same things that he chose in his youth.
When you are young, when your ministry is just in formation, when as a young prophet or prophetess you come to learn at the apostle's feet, what is it that motivates you?
What is it that you want?
If you could write the story of your life, chapter by chapter, the way you want it to be, if you could sit at the loom of destiny and weave the pattern according to your own choosing, what would you choose?
It will be different now than the choice you would make when you are bowed with cares and able to say, with the apostle, "I have fought the good fight. I have finished my course. I have kept the faith."
Will your sense of values be the same then?
I do not think so.
The Lord told Peter, "When you were young, you girded yourself and you went where you would, but when you are old, another will gird you and take you where you would not" ( John 21:18 ).
He was saying, in effect, "There is a time when you are young that you seem to feel such a personal sense of directing your destiny; you want to choose that destiny and do your utmost to fulfill it."
When spiritual maturity comes, there is a surrender to His leading.
There is no flinching or withdrawing from every step that He leads.
You want to do what He wants you to do.
Before that, it is a struggle to do the will of God, but later the wisdom comes.
God grant that it be given to the young, that they say, "Yes Lord, I choose what You choose for my life.
I want what you want for me.
What would you choose now?
What do you think is the most important thing that you could choose for your life?
If the apostolic blessing could impart to you anything you want, anything you desire, what would you choose above all else?
What would be your choice?
Some destiny that you want to fulfill?
Think.
Reach into the depths of your heart.
What do you choose?
This message must have meaning to you.
With some, the choice would be just a little relief from the pressure.
"Lord, let up on me"
Others might say, "I would like to work the exploits, the great signs and wonders."
Others would say, "I'd like to walk with the apostolic company, no matter how humble the place."
What do you want?
The Platform is opened to comments:
"I want to be able to have a kindred spirit with the apostolic ministry, to see the Body as the apostolic vision sees it."
"I would choose the ability to be the vessel of God."
"To be led by His Spirit."
"I would like to be a man of God. I would like a heart like the Lord Jesus Himself."
"To abide in Him."
"To know the Lord."
The apostle continues:
All of these choices are very deep, very good, and they reflect the maturity of those who spoke.
There is a broken spirit over this service.
Almost before you know what I am going to say, I see the tears.
There s an anointing of the Lord, and a brokenness.
The School of Prophets is not a brainchild of meditation, of reason, or of experience.
In The School of Prophets the Lord walks among us by His Spirit, and He teaches us by the word of wisdom and the word of knowledge.
Let me tell you what to choose.
Find the thing that s most valuable, not by the thinking of men, nor even by the thinking of God's people.
Look to Him and say, "Lord, teach me what t is that is most valuable.
What is it You count to be of great price?"
For Thou dost not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it; Thou art not pleased with burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise.
Psalm 51:16,17.
The dealings of God are designed to bring about that which in the sight of God is of greatest value.
I know that He is concerned that you walk with Him, that you be led by Him.
I know that He is concerned about your dedication to bless one another and to minister to one another.
But in the final analysis, the greatest thing of all is that He looks down upon you and says, "To this one will I look-the one who has a broken and a contrite spirit before Me" ( Isaiah 66:2 ).
A man may have many other things, but nothing is going to equal a broken spirit before the Lord.
It is for this reason that all the prophets and all the ministries who are to come forth are put through a certain dealing of the Lord.
It deals with your arrogance.
I think this is as much a part of a repentant spirit as to repent over actual infractions of the divine law, over violations of purity in a walk with God, over lust or greed.
All of that is important, but a greater part of repentance is that continual brokenness that walks before the Lord.
The man after God's own heart, David, cried continually in the Psalms.
He wanted to be searched.
He humbled himself.
God's dealings upon him were very great.
In the School of Prophets, you will learn the mechanics of ministry, the basic teaching, the lessons on repentance, and it may seem to you that this is the sum total of it, but it is not.
...To this one I will look, to him who is humble and contrite of spirit....Isaiah 66:2.
Where does the Lord dwell?
The heaven of heavens cannot contain Him ( I Kings 8:27 ), but He dwells with him who is of a contrite spirit.
There is something unique about God.
He resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble ( James 4:6 ).
How do you recognize the anointing that gives witness to us that God is with us?
Actually, we can tell better when it is not present: when there s contentiousness and criticalness.
A young man who wants to walk with God may suddenly think that he knows all the answers.
The arrogance comes popping out in long dissertations and arguments about an issue.
He insists on presenting his side, as if that were going to do any good.
He may look at the problem and draw back from it.
He withdraws, and so he does not walk with God.
He knows that if he walks the path required of him, it will break him.
But that is not bad.
Many people need to be broken.
I wish I could convey to you what the past years of experience have meant to me, what they have done in my life.
I wish I could draw you a picture of those early years.
With the call of God upon me, I walked into problems, wanting to withdraw, and pulling under the dealings of the Lord, not able to go ahead, and not able to go back, but just standing there until He crushed me.
If I were to evaluate all the things that have happened, if I were to choose something to glory in, it would not be the churches that I built in my teens; nor would I boast about the years of service.
What was really important?
The victories were all wrought by the Lord.
Then what have I done?
At this particular point, I do not feel that there is anything I could really glory in.
I know what Paul meant when he wrote to in Galatians 6:14:
But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.
Again we are talking about a broken spirit, about that which takes everything of this world and crucifies it and kills it.
Everything within you that would respond to it, even in a religious sense, He crucifies; and so you come to walk with the Lord with a broken and a contrite heart.
( The apostle pauses and looks meditative for a moment before continuing.)
I am going to tell you the truth.
This is what will make a Walk with God- the preaching of broken hearts.
Nothing else is going to make it.
You are too young to know the importance of this, but the only sacrifice that God is looking upon today is the sacrifice of a broken and a contrite heart, a broken spirit that worships the Lord.
There is not too much that I can emphasize, because it does not sound like anything.
I wonder if God can actually get you to appreciate Himself, until He has broken your spirit.
Is there any way that we can see beyond ourselves, if we are hopelessly swallowed up in our own defense and in our own aggressiveness, until He breaks our spirits?
It is no wonder to me that God deals with you as He deals.
Whom the Lord loveth, He chasteneth and scourgeth ( Hebrews 12:6 ).
It is not some sadistic trait in God that causes Him to do that; it is something more.
He wants you to give to Him what He is really looking for.
He is not looking for arrogance of your spirit or your involvement-not even your involvement in a walk with God; He is not looking for that.
He is looking for your personal spirit as it relates to Him.
Oh, how arrogant is the human spirit.
"If the prophet had asked a hard thing of you, you would have done it," Naaman's servant told him.
"But all he asked of you was to go to a muddy river and dip seven times."
"But there are better and cleaner rivers in my country and I could have a better press coverage there. Why this muddy river?"
Because the prophet in his wisdom, had directed it in God.
When he came back healed.
Naaman offered Elisha everything he had, but the prophet refused it all.
Then Naaman said, "I beg you, give me one more thing.
Let me load the mules with dirt and take it back, so that i can build an altar, and there thy servant will wait before God, the God of Israel."
And thus was an arrogant Naaman, the captain of Syria, broken in spirit.
What pride had made him want to run?
His servant said, "My Lord, if he had asked of thee a hard thing, you would have done it. Why do you not just do what he asks you?"
So he laid aside all of the beautiful robes, went down into the muddy river with his leprosy exposed, and dipped in the river ( II Kings 5 ).
I have been doing the same thing lately, in a figurative sense.
Have you?
You will.
Naaman came out whole.
He came out healed and clean.
His skin was like that of a little child.
It is when you begin to humble yourself with that broken spirit that God will use you.
I have a responsibility before God.
I can tell you the things that will bless you and exhilarate you.
I can give you the mysteries of the mystical side of the moving of the Lord, and I do it freely.
But let me tell you that there is no word as great as the word that i am giving you here.
If you would walk before the Lord, you must have a spirit that pleases Him.
It is in the breaking of your spirit, it is in the humbling of your heart, that the Lord is glorified.
Then He looks upon you and blesses you.
There are many Scriptures speaking of this that you can quote as well as I.
God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. James 4:6.
We have learned much about submission, but the word "submission" means very little until there is a brokenness in your spirit before the Lord.
It is the sacrifice that He is looking for from your life.
The mechanical obedience is not enough.
It goes deeper-very deep.
I want the Lord to help me with this.
I want nothing more-for there is nothing greater-than to walk before the lord with that brokenness.
Do you?
Do you really want it?
Can it be that the Lord would make real to your heart now, that above everything else there is nothing more important than to give God the sacrifice of a broken spirit?
A broken and contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.
Psalm 51:17.
Blessed are the poor in spirit: for their's is the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 5:3.
That is what it means, does it not?
You say, "Well, I'm just reading books on how to win friends and influence people, trying to build myself up and build up that drive"; but it means nothing without the brokenness.
Hear me!
Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. Matthew 5:4.
How do we go about this?
I do not really know.
As I remember the years that have passed, I believe that I learned at His feet when I was most broken before Him.
I am fearful and uneasy for the man or woman in the church, for the ministry who is being blessed too much, according to the definition that people have of blessing.
Can you understand why?
I think you can.
I look at the man whom God has dealt with deeply, and I have such a kindred spirit with him.
It must come through.
I do not forget these sufferings.
"After you have suffered for a little while, the Lord establish you, strengthen, settle you," we read in I Peter 5:10.
The suffering is there.
I am concerned about many things, but I remember a man's sufferings.
His sufferings are more important to me than any apparent ability he has.
That is meaningless.
God honors him and blesses him in the brokenness of his spirit and his submission under the hand of the Lord.
I watch men of ability come into a walk with God.
They have so much that they could glory in; it looks so good.
Then the day comes when they say, "God forbid that I should glory, save in that cross by which the world is crucified to me, and I to the world." ( Galatians 6:14 ).
I never lay my hand upon the ark to steady it when it is going over Nacon's threshing floor ( II Samuel 6:6,7).
That is suicidal to all who would glorify god.
God will have to shake it.
He has to shake you.
The greatest thing that you can do is this: to the best of your ability cry to God for grace, to go out and become the ministry that God wants you to be.
A walk with God was never meant to be a shallow movement, that comes up by some strange hocus-pocus and a certain formula which prevails and wins the world.
The mountains will be moved when God has men of faith greater than those mountains.
The seas will be passed over when He has men who are not afraid to walk through them.
And that will never come until men have been broken, until their spirits have been crushed before the Lord.
Then it will come.
Sometimes a kind of phony humility exists and this drives men away.
It looks humble.
It seems to be a studied attitude: how to look real humble.
But cross such a person and see what happens.
Scratch him, and see how he bleeds; see what reaction comes out.
A man with a broken spirit only turns the other cheek.
He does not react, not even in his ministry.
He can be assaulted, but he does not fight back.
Do you want to be a prophet?
Do you want to walk with authority that will call the nations to bow before the Lord?
Then your heart will have to be less arrogant than that of the ungodly.
Your spirit will have to be broken.
Fall on the rock and be broken, for if it falls on you, it will grind you to powder ( Luke 20:18 ).
It is a solemn moment, isn't it?
Do you realize that the Lord is putting His finger on something that you need to know in the School of Prophet's?
You need to know this-the humility, the brokenness.
There just is no other way.
Some men you confront, and they rise up and fight back.
Some men you confront, and their ego is so sorely wounded that they almost die right in your sight, but you know it is not true humility; you know it is only wounded pride.
Then there is the man with a true broken spirit.
Are you going to do anything about this word?
All you can do is say, "Lord, I submit to what You are doing in my life."
He will bring that broken spirit to you.
He will help produce it.
How long it will take, I do not know.
As I look back, I could remember all the things that I did not have and all the things that happened; however, I do not think there is anything greater that the Lord has done for me than this-that I never stand in His presence without weeping.
I think this is the most important thing.
More important than any relationship, than anything else He has given me, is the fact that when I kneel before Him, I always know that my broken spirit is speaking.
How about you?
I suppose this service will not go down in the annals of history as anything great, but few wise men will point back to it and say, "Of all the lessons that came in the School of Prophets, none was more important than this.
It opened the door to my brokenness before the Lord."
This word came just when you were working at a little self confidence, right?
It is rather rough, just when you get a boldness to speak out for the Lord, to have somebody tell you that this is what it is all about.
Do you think it is?
I do.
We will be facing some difficulties in the days to come.
It will be hard on many people because we live in a generation that has been conditioned to believe that the world owes them a living, and if the world does not owe it, at least the federal government does.
They feel as if everything has come to them.
They have never known what it is to suffer and to be without.
The arrogance and the pride of the poor can be worse than the pride of the rich.
It really can.
Come to the place where you really submit to the Lord.
We are probably again facing days as difficult as those I knew as a boy.
I can remember what it really was to go without.
I can remember a thousand things as I look back, and in all of it, I had one feeling: I was never really poor.
I think it was because I never knew a day or night that God was not close to me.
It is a walk with God. Believe me- it is a walk with God.
From the time that I can remember, I was broken before the Lord.
No man in the world is wealthier than I, because I have something that in the sight of God is of great price.
Money can't buy it.
It is a broken spirit.
It is not a man's experience or ability, it is not his oratory or eloquence, that makes him a winner in the sight of God.
It is a broken spirit before the Lord that is of great price.
I hope I have bothered you, that I have troubled you deeply.
I want to sleep well, knowing that you are not going to sleep quite so well.
Jeremiah was the greatest prophet of judgment in the Old Testament and he is called "the weeping prophet."
God's judgment is already in motion and it must be spoken from a broken spirit.
It is not a vindictive, revengeful judgment that God is bringing to the earth.
We will see it come as prophets, who are like unto Jeremiah, who weep in their brokenness before the Lord, who prophesy His word.
This message would be beneficial if we could take time to counsel with each one and help you to understand how you can walk in this word.
I urge you to walk humbly.
Do not be argumentative, nor opinionated; but humble yourself before the Lord.
I have said again and again that when a man is under fire, the safest place is the foxhole of humility .
There the fiery darts of the wicked one sail over him harmlessly.
When we break our spirits and humble our spirit before the Lord, we enter into a place of protection, so that when the battle comes we survive it.
(The apostle then gathered up his robes and stepped down from the platform and one of the prophets present stepped up and began to prophesy.)
How the Lord shall establish thee, O house of God, as ye shall walk humbly before the Lord.
Hath He not said in the prophet Micah, "What doth the Lord require of thee, but that thou shalt walk humbly before the Lord thy God."
This is the thing that He hath chosen, tat those who are broken and poor in spirit shall inherit all of the Kingdom that He hath prepared.
(Another prophet began to prophesy in his turn.)
O little flock, the arrogant and the proud are cast down, but ye who have walked humbly before the Lord shall the Lord lift up and establish.
He hath brought forth those in this walk with God that are not great in their own esteem.
In their own sight they are as nothing, yet the Lord hath lifted them up to make them His Kings and His priests, and hath caused them to inherit the Kingdom which He hath prepared before the foundation of the world.
Rejoice and let not thy heart be heavy with discouragement, but let thy heart be bowed low before Him in humility.
In the sacrifice of a broken spirit shall He not take delight in thee, O house of the Lord?
Shall He not order thy steps before thee, and prepare thy way and make it perfect in His sight?
He shall not cast thee aside.
Behold, He shall not turn His back upon thee, but He hath said in His Word, "To this one will I look, to him who hath a broken spirit."
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