The Generous Family: A Call to Prayer or a Misguided Technique?

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]
[00:00:00] Would you say this word with me? Say it one more time.
[00:00:07] So back in 1990, now some of you weren't even a gleam in your mother's eye at that point.
[00:00:17] In 1990, I was in Virginia and I was teaching a series of meetings, an eight-day meeting at a church in Virginia.
[00:00:27] and I made the decision while I was there to fly back home and to pray and fast specifically for the salvation of my parents and who did not have a relationship with the Lord at the time.
[00:00:45] So I made that decision and I remember it was a Wednesday evening and I was seated on the platform.
[00:00:52] Some of you won't remember this, but those were the days that actually seated everybody participating in the worship service, the preachers and everybody on the platform. And these great big heavy seats that you needed two
[00:01:03] people to move them, right? And everybody was on the platform. And I remember sitting there in the center, getting ready for the service to be turned over to me. And suddenly, without any warning, anticipation, this unseen attack, it's the only way that I can describe it, came onto my mind.
[00:01:31] It was highly accusatory, and the only way that I could describe it was like somebody shooting an arrow, or the Apostle Paul will describe some of the things he experienced as the punching of a fist, because that's really what the Greek word refers to, and
[00:01:53] just being punched, and then it would stop, and it would come back again, and it would stop, and it would come back again.
[00:01:58] and I'm seated there. I'm saying, God, what is going on? Remember that there is a description of the devil in the Bible. He is called the accuser. Anytime you're feeling accused, recognize where the source is coming from. And I'm sitting there, and these accusations are
[00:02:22] coming to my mind, and there's this immediate struggle that is going on. I'm saying, God, I got to shake this off, whatever it is, because I've got to teach here in a moment. So I get up,
[00:02:34] I did the service. From that moment on, for the next several days, there was this thing, and that's the only way I can describe it. Some of you may be experiencing even something in this
[00:02:49] room right now that is attacking your mind, and there was this thing happening. So I finished up that meeting. It went Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. And then on Monday, I flew back home, and I went to this little trailer that my father owned. My grandmother
[00:03:09] used to live there. And just to give you a visual of it, it had red carpet in it, if you can just imagine. That's how old it was, paneling on the wall, right? But I said, I got to be by myself.
[00:03:21] So I went off there, and I began to pray.
[00:03:24] And I want to tell you, it was one of the most difficult, the worst challenging times of prayer that I had ever had because there was this constant distraction.
[00:03:47] I would try to pray, and then this thing would go.
[00:03:50] And then I'd kind of shake it off, and I'd try to pray.
[00:03:55] and this would go on for the entire time that I was in this little trailer.
[00:04:00] You see, the goal of the enemy in your life is not to get you to commit some deep, dark sin.
[00:04:12] The goal of the enemy in your life is to simply distract you from time with Jesus.
[00:04:24] And there have been numerous times in my life where I have been undistracted, totally focused, the ability to pray and get a hold of God.
[00:04:38] But there have also been a number of times in my life when I've allowed the enemy of my soul to distract me to my own loss. And we're not talking about distractions with bad things
[00:04:55] necessarily. We can be doing good things. We're just distracted because the only people that really influence culture, that shift families, shift cities, are those individuals that are undistracted in prayer. That's why it is a challenge for most of us frequently
[00:05:29] to make sure that this and that and the other thing is not hammering away at our time or our mind, or emotions. Because if you get distracted from prayer, then the enemy has accomplished his goal. And so I'm in this struggle. And I didn't realize it was demonic at the time. I
[00:06:02] wouldn't realize that until afterwards. Because here's what the enemy will attempt to do with you is to make you the center of attention instead of Jesus being the center of attention.
[00:06:18] And as long as he can get you and your issues and your struggles and your problems and your sins and everything else, the center of your attention when you're trying to pray, you'll take your focus off from Jesus
[00:06:29] and that is exactly what he wants us to do.
[00:06:32] The moment I put my focus back on Jesus, I get to have focus to where I need to be.
[00:06:39] Okay. Finished this time of prayer and fasting. Went back to the house. I'm sitting there reading a book. And then I suddenly realized why this was so demonic. And a couple of things will happen.
[00:06:53] Number one, I'm sitting there reading this book, ironically, on the history of revival.
[00:06:58] And I felt it leave. I felt it go like this. And I said, I still remember where I was seated at.
[00:07:10] remember the book I was reading? And I said, where did that come from? What was that?
[00:07:18] And two things would happen. I would take off the next week or so. I had a meeting scheduled in a place I'd never been to before called One Cheese, North Carolina. If you don't know where
[00:07:36] that's at, it's on the Outer Banks. It's where I would eventually spend a lot of my time because it's where Tiffany is from.
[00:07:45] We hadn't met.
[00:07:47] And two things came out of this time of prayer and fasting.
[00:07:50] When I got down, it was Sunday night.
[00:07:52] I preached that evening, and I would always call mom and dad on the evening just to say hey, because they were highly involved business people and were very busy all week long.
[00:08:03] But on Sundays, they would take the day off, and they would go to the lake house, and they would just kind of chill out and then come back on that evening.
[00:08:09] And nobody answered, and nobody answered, and nobody answered.
[00:08:11] And I said, that's odd.
[00:08:13] finally got a hold of somebody and I found out that my father had fallen on the ice.
[00:08:21] And keep in mind, it's February. And in Holton, Maine in February, it is the frigid north.
[00:08:29] And it was icy. And he had broken the thing behind his knee that lets your leg be able to do this and to be able to walk normally. So now he has to have surgery. And you could never get my father
[00:08:46] to sit down long enough, really, to have a conversation with him about his relationship with God. But now he's in a hospital. I think an angel tripped him. Now he's in a hospital.
[00:08:59] And I'm back in another state now and preaching. And I would start sending people into him, saying, hey, can you go talk to my dad? Can you go talk to my dad? Well, this time,
[00:09:08] I can't go anywhere. And they're talking to him about the Lord. And I called him. I remember I was in Ohio and I called him and I said, dad, does the hospital room have a Bible? He said, yes. Do you
[00:09:21] have a verse? And in what this time, I didn't realize spiritual warfare and struggle that was happening over that man's soul. That's why this distraction was trying to keep me from praying effectively. You see, if you get serious about prayer and waiting on God and asking God to
[00:10:01] intervene in the lives of people, don't expect your life just to go normal. You are a challenge to hell itself. This is the reason why a lot of people don't experience a lot of warfare because
[00:10:22] they're no threat to the enemy. The only threat to hell are people that take this seriously enough. And so I started to understand in that moment that this was a demonic distraction because eventually this would lead to my father's salvation. And then something else would come out
[00:10:52] of this time of prayer and fasting, which I was not asking for at the time. Because you will always get things out of your times of prayer and fasting that you're not asking for. Because God takes our
[00:11:04] words. We think we got to pray it right. I wish I could pray better. I wish I could pray as good as somebody else. I wish I could say it. It's not about your words as much as it is about your heart.
[00:11:15] And God translates what you're trying to communicate and puts it into heaven's language so it makes sense there. Even if you feel like you're not a real great prayer, I don't really pray that good forget that god is responding to the cry of your own heart and he translates it
[00:11:31] into heaven and he does whatever he does with it and then he sends it back to earth in the form of an answer you you you will always get things out of times of prayer and fasting that you're not
[00:11:42] asking for well i wasn't asking for a wife but following this time of prayer and fasting i end up going to a place where Tiffany and I will meet. Listen, when you decide to separate your life
[00:12:03] to the Lord, you'll get things you're asking for. You'll get things you're not asking for.
[00:12:12] But look at me. You have to ask. You have to spend time with Jesus. So here's the text.
[00:12:23] I never understood this until recently. I've read this for years. I said, God, I don't get the connection here. But honestly, about a month ago, this all came together for me. So here's Jesus. And they said to him, John's disciples often fast and pray. And so the disciples of
[00:12:44] the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking. And Jesus said, well, can you make the friends of the bridegroom fast while he's with them? But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken
[00:12:58] from them. And in those days, they were fast. And he told them this parable. He's going to explain what he just said. He said, no one tears a piece out of a new garment to patch the old one.
[00:13:09] Otherwise, they're going to have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old one. Well, that makes sense. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. This is
[00:13:19] how they would have the containers for wine. They were literally wineskins, because the new wine will burst the old ones because wineskins, the animal skins will eventually get hard and brittle and when the wine begins to ferment, it will break or damage the wineskin and so Jesus says
[00:13:41] the wineskins will be ruined. No new wine must be poured into new wineskins and no one after drinking the old wants the new for they say the old is better and I would read this and I said,
[00:13:55] God, what does fasting have to do with animal skins and pieces of leather, okay? Let me walk you through this for just a moment, and then we're going to pray together. Jesus did not dismiss
[00:14:09] fasting. He upgraded it. They were thinking in Old Testament ritual kinds of things, but Jesus says, this is about your relationship with God, and how do we know this? Because he will say this, but someday the bridegroom will be taken from them, and then they will fast. Listen, when we
[00:14:28] read the Bible, and most of us have been taught that our relationship with God is about Savior and saved. That is not primarily how the Bible frames it. From the Old Testament to the New
[00:14:43] Testament, the Bible frames your relationship with God and my relationship with God as a bride and a bridegroom as a covenant relationship. That changes things because that means that I don't do things because it's the religious thing to do or the spiritual thing to do. I do it out of
[00:15:11] relationship. We're going to spend a lot of time on this bridegroom bride thing over the next couple of weeks because God wants us involved with him not out of obligation but out of relationship as a hunger for his presence as a desire for him as an alignment with his mission as resistance
[00:15:36] to the flesh and a dependence on the spirit so what does fasting and prayer do it moves me from ritual. I have to do this. Interrelationship. Fasting and prayer creates a new container.
[00:15:51] Jesus will say this, no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the new wine will be burst to skins. The wine are going to run out. The wineskins will be ruined. New wine has to be
[00:16:00] poured into new wineskins. Listen to me. If you want the very best that Jesus has, you have to become a wineskin that God can stretch. You can't be this brittle, angry, offended, mad, religious Christian. Fasting will help work some of this stuff out of us because I have to be stretchable
[00:16:42] in order for God to be able to use me because he's wanting to pour something into me, but he can't give me everything that is available for me if the container won't stretch.
[00:17:05] Fasting and prayer challenges old mindsets.
[00:17:10] No one, after drinking the old wine, wants the new, for they say the old is better.
[00:17:16] You know, I've been a Christian a long time, Pastor.
[00:17:20] You know, I really know a lot.
[00:17:24] Pastor, I know more than you.
[00:17:25] You probably do.
[00:17:28] Pastor, I've been at this a long time, okay?
[00:17:31] I've been in church a long time.
[00:17:34] And there's the problem.
[00:17:36] Because we continually say the old is better when God has something new.
[00:17:41] When God has something fresh.
[00:17:45] When God has something that is so real that maybe we've never experienced before.
[00:17:50] Well, yeah, I haven't experienced it, so it can't be real.
[00:17:53] that is the problem with a lot of Christians they say if they haven't experienced it that it can't be real my response to that is if you haven't experienced it why don't you say Jesus I want
[00:18:04] whatever you've got let God challenge an old mindset the way things were versus the way things are supposed to be fasting and prayer helps people in spiritual bondages the story remember out of Mark's gospel. It's also told in Matthew's gospel. And Matthew gives us a little different
[00:18:27] insight to this. It's a story where the father brings his child to church and they pray. It was great worship that day. It was great preaching that day. And when they prayed over the boy,
[00:18:39] nothing happened. He's got a spiritual issue and he brought him to the disciples and nothing happened. I wonder if anybody's tired of coming to church when nothing happens.
[00:18:51] and Jesus frees the boy. When they get inside, he said, Jesus, couldn't we drive it out? And Jesus makes it very clear. And the Greek makes this very clear. This kind of issue. You were able to deal
[00:19:24] with other stuff, but this kind of issue that you've got, this kind of issue that you're dealing with, this kind of spiritual problem, physical problem, emotional problem, you're dealing with of this kind. The Greek makes it clear. It's different. I believe that in America right now
[00:19:43] and among many of us in this room and across the body of Christ, we are dealing with a this kind that we've never dealt with before. And Jesus says, this kind of issue, you can do what you've
[00:20:00] always done, but you're going to get what you've always gotten. This kind of issue is only going to come out, guys. If you decide that you want something to move that's never moved before, it happens with prayer and fasting. And then when you read the same story in Matthew's gospel,
[00:20:17] he gives a little different perspective on it. Then the disciples came to Jesus in private, same story, same issue. Why couldn't we drive it out? And he said, because you have so little faith. Okay, wait a minute. What does fasting and prayer have to do with faith? Jesus says,
[00:20:33] I tell you the truth, if you've got faith as small as a mustard seed, you can speak to the mountain. You can say to the mountain, yep, Jesus says you can talk to the problem. Oh, that's so
[00:20:47] weird. Jesus says talk to a mountain. Anybody got any mountains in the room? Anybody got any giants in the room? Anybody got stuff that hasn't moved? Jesus says you can talk to the mountain. Move from
[00:21:03] here to over there and it'll move and nothing will be impossible to you. What's that got to do with fasting and prayer? When you decide to fast and pray, you gain a level of faith to believe God
[00:21:17] for the impossible of things you could not believe him for prior. Fasting and prayer activates the gift of faith to deal with issues that we couldn't deal with before, to help people in spiritual bondage. Fasting and prayer helps us to understand the Lord's mission. One of my favorite scriptures,
[00:21:45] Acts 13. The church at Antioch, there were prophets and teachers. What are they doing?
[00:21:52] They're worshiping and fasting. There's no preaching. They're just worshiping and they're fasting. They're in a prayer meeting. And what are they doing? They've been fasting, waiting on God.
[00:22:04] They're just worshiping. While they are doing that, the Holy Ghost, the Holy Spirit speaks a word probably through one of the prophets that were there. Separate me, Paul and Barnabas. I want Paul and Barnabas to the work I've called them to. And from Acts 13 to Acts 28, you begin
[00:22:24] to see the missionary journeys that the apostle Paul and others would take. Listen, the whole missionary plan of the New Testament church did not come out of a board meeting. It came out of a prayer meeting. When the Holy Spirit said, I want you to go and do this, then the gospel
[00:22:45] was spread to Europe. From Europe, it would eventually come to here. You're sitting here today as somebody that has the opportunity to receive Christ or already know the Lord because in Acts chapter 13, they decided to fast and pray and God gave them the missionary plan
[00:23:05] for the rest of the history of the body of Christ. Think of that a minute. Came out of a fasting and prayer. If you want direction, sit with you. I don't know what to do. I got decisions to make.
[00:23:21] Sit with Jesus for a while and give up some meals and be quiet before the Lord and ask him, God, what do I do? You're not smart enough. I'm not smart enough to make all the decisions that
[00:23:40] need to be made. Business decisions, physical decisions, family decisions, health decisions.
[00:23:47] None of us in this room are smart enough to be able to make all those decisions on our own.
[00:23:52] When you come before the Lord in fasting and prayer and humble yourself, you get guidance to know what to do for things you didn't know what to do with before. To appoint leaders, fasting and
[00:24:05] prayer. Notice what they did. Paul and Barnabas appointed elders. Let's find out who's the most qualified here. No, let's get elders. And with prayer and fasting, we will commit them to the Lord. We'll ask God about it. Now, Jesus would say this in Matthew chapter six. This is the
[00:24:28] Sermon on the Mount. He'll use the word when. Listen, the Greek tense of this word is the present perfect tense. What does that mean, Pastor? It means it's an action that starts and is ongoing.
[00:24:47] It's not just one time random thing. So Jesus will say it three times. When you give, He doesn't expect giving to be random, okay?
[00:24:57] So great time, first of the year, for you to make a commitment to God with your money, not randomly, but to have the lordship of Jesus in your giving because it's the expectation of the Lord.
[00:25:11] Not if, but when you give.
[00:25:14] Not if, but when you pray.
[00:25:19] There's an expectation that there will be an ongoing prayer life and not if, but when you fast. That's good for the spiritual people. It is the expectation of Jesus that every one of us in the room will find times of prayer and fasting
[00:25:39] in our lives. And he expected it to be an ongoing activity as a believer. Some of you have heard me speak about in times past, about the awakenings that have occurred around the world. You have
[00:26:01] Peggy and Christine Smith with Duncan Campbell and the Hebrides revival on the island of Lewis.
[00:26:09] One was blind, one was crippled. They couldn't get out, but they began to pray and they would organize prayer meetings because they looked at their and said, we got problems. People are cold toward God. We have kids, we have students, we have parents who have no hunger for Jesus.
[00:26:41] Before it is over with, the presence of God will descend upon the Hebrides Islands. It's off the coast of Scotland. And the power of God would be so strong. And you read this story of this,
[00:26:57] people were literally on the ground, on the street, in the ditches of the community, rolling on the ground under extreme conviction of the Holy Spirit, asking, how do I give my life to Jesus? Come out of prayer. Evan Roberts, the leader, one of the
[00:27:26] leaders of the Welsh revival. We were there a couple of summers ago in Wales, and I took these pictures while I was there. That's the church where the Welsh revival would begin, and I went
[00:27:39] into the sanctuary where Evan would preach. The Holy Spirit had been dealing with him about full surrender, and his famous words were, God bend me. You know, the issue with a lot of us is that we're
[00:27:56] not bendable. His prayer was, God, bend me. And he had some simple things that the Holy Spirit said to him. Confess every known sin to Jesus. Share Christ publicly. Give up every habit that is
[00:28:22] questionable. And he started having these encounters with Jesus. And he kept asking his pastor, will you let me preach? Will you let me preach? He was a young man. And the pastor said, no, no, no. Finally, the pastor said, all right, if you want to preach, I'll let you do it after
[00:28:42] church. And 18 people, whoever shows up, you can preach to. 18 young adults and students showed up.
[00:28:52] Listen to me. 18 young adults and students showed up. And before it's over with, in six months, 100,000 people had come to Christ because the presence of God had descended. You have Jeremiah Lamphere, who was really more of a businessman. He got hired by a church in New York to win people
[00:29:20] to Christ, and nobody wanted to come to Christ. It wasn't going very well. He said, well, maybe I could start a prayer meeting. He starts this prayer meeting. It became known as the Fulton Street Revival, the businessman's revival. He starts this prayer meeting, and 10 people show
[00:29:33] up, and then 20 people show up, and then 40 people show up. And the following week, there's a financial collapse in the economy of America and around the world. It's the mid-1800s, okay? If we
[00:29:45] think revival, these kinds of awakenings, it's about church people coming and getting blessed.
[00:29:49] That's not God's mind. God's mind is the awakening of cities economically, governmentally, socially, physically, spiritually, in every way. That's where God's mind is. We're so myopic in our thinking about what God wants to do. It really becomes all about our blessing. And that's a
[00:30:07] statue of him that sits outside of wall street where the bowl is located if you've ever been to wall street in new york city people go there and get their picture done all the time it's a
[00:30:16] i believe it's king's college there they made a statue of him because his life was so impactful and all he ever did was call people to prayer all he ever did was call people to prayer
[00:30:31] and within six months 10 000 people a day were praying in new york city 100 000 people had come to Christ and people were coming to the Lord all across the country because of a prayer meeting
[00:30:46] that he called. You want to influence people for Christ? Don't worry about how many followers you have or how many times somebody recognizes your name. Call people to prayer and you'll be the most influential man or woman that has ever lived. Charles Palms, who's a street revival, black man,
[00:31:07] had to deal with terrible prejudice, made him sit outside of classrooms because they didn't want a black man sitting in the classroom. He never got offended. Offense will stop the move of God in your life immediately. It's my right. You know what? If we could get Christians in
[00:31:24] America to stop crying about their rights and just humble themselves before God, we could start getting to where God wants us to be. And he was a black man. He was blind in one eye. He never
[00:31:36] declared his rights he never said i demand this never did that and azusa street would start it was 24 hours of church that would spread across the country it was such a massive move of god
[00:31:52] and he prayed he was he was just a man of prayer are you a man of prayer are you a woman of prayer he put his head in his shoebox and he would pray the moravians persecute a group of people end up
[00:32:08] on the plantation of a guy named Count Zinzendorf, but they were divided.
[00:32:14] If you don't know the history of the Moravians, you need to read it.
[00:32:17] They had no unity.
[00:32:19] They're all believers, but they're fussing at each other because of ethnic issues, because of theological issues and all kinds of other things.
[00:32:26] And Count Zinzendorf said, I'm calling a prayer meeting because we've got problems.
[00:32:31] You know, a lot of us could fix a lot of the stuff that we've got going on if you just pray and stop whining and talking about it.
[00:32:38] get off social media about it get off the phone about it get off the text about it and get yourself with Jesus and pray about it the Spirit of God would descend in a communion service with the Moravians it would change everything and
[00:32:56] they decided to do it a 24-hour prayer meeting okay that prayer meeting would last 100 years non-stop they would send missionaries all over the world it all came out of prayer. They would buy 100 acres here in North Carolina. You know this. Moravian Falls,
[00:33:16] over in Winston-Salem, used to be Salem, it's now Winston-Salem, and move to North Carolina and establish a missions ministry that has gone around the world. And it all came out of prayer.
[00:33:31] I'm going to tell you, I'm going to tell you the people that will have an influence is people that pray. You got no influence if you don't pray. And guys, listen to me. Gentlemen, listen to me. Yeah, good, my wife. That's my wife's deal, praying and fasting. No, sir,
[00:33:49] it is your deal. 2026 is going to be the year of the man. You know what's happened the last number of years? The whole masculinity has gone away. We've been emasculated because we can't be
[00:34:04] men. I'm telling you what God is going to do in 26. He's going to raise up men. They're going to be men of God, men of prayer, men of purity, men of holiness. And God's calling you, sir. Stop
[00:34:16] looking at your wife. Stop looking at your teenager. God's calling you, sir, to be the man of God and come to the table and start fasting and praying and believing God to do something in your life,
[00:34:27] in your city, and in your family. God's calling men this year to step up to the table.
[00:34:34] fasting is about aligning myself with the heart of god stand with me right now here's what i here's what i want you i'm going to give you some brief instruction let's do this first i want everybody
[00:34:47] in the room to come to the altar right now come on come on move in as close as you can move up as close as you can to make room for everybody okay we're going to pray a prayer together i want to
[00:35:13] give you some instruction we're going to pray a prayer together we got some room up here guys I wonder what would happen, folks, if you decided not to make prayer a once or twice a week event
[00:35:34] in your life, but if you became so focused, even at your work and whatever you're doing, became so focused, said, you know what? I got to keep my mind on the things of God. Set your heart
[00:35:44] on things above, not on the things of the earth, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
[00:35:49] Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. I wonder if things would change, if some of
[00:36:00] us would stop whining and start praying. Let me give you five simple things to do. Number one, make the decision what you're going to do ahead of time because hunger will get the best of you.
[00:36:19] Don't say, well, I might do this. I might. You'll never do it because you'll be hungry.
[00:36:25] Don't pay attention to what you feel because emotion doesn't determine results.
[00:36:29] Watch out for, pray the scriptures.
[00:36:35] Let me show you how this works.
[00:36:36] Here's Psalm 23.
[00:36:38] Many of us just read the scriptures.
[00:36:40] You know, prayer lists are fine, but if you're only using a prayer list, you can pray through that in five minutes.
[00:36:47] You'll never run out of things to pray if you'll pray the scriptures.
[00:36:51] So how does that work?
[00:36:53] So when I'm reading Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd.
[00:36:55] Lord, I thank you that you're guiding me.
[00:36:58] I thank you that you're my shepherd.
[00:37:00] Help me not to be a rebellious sheep.
[00:37:02] watch over me, Jesus. I'm not going to lack anything, Lord, because you're going to make me lay down at green pastures. Lord, sometimes I don't feel I'm beside quiet and still waters.
[00:37:13] Sometimes I feel like my life is confusing. I'm asking you to bring the quiet waters into my life.
[00:37:21] Do you understand how you can take that and pray the scripture? You'll never pray more powerful scriptures than you do when you take the Bible and actually pray it. And number five, give God time to work after the fast. I've never really seen God do it in the middle of it.
[00:37:40] I have seen God do things at the end. What are you doing, pastor? I'm going to do a Daniel fast.
[00:37:47] Okay, now most of the time, Daniel fasts are vegetables only. That's the worst kind of fast anybody could have on the face of the earth is vegetables only. You might love that. Mine ends up being fruit and potatoes and matzah crackers. You know what matzah crackers are? They're the
[00:38:09] worst thing in the world because they don't have any yeast in them, right? Yeast, of course, is a type of sin. I'm eating a matzah cracker one time during a fast. And I said to God, I said,
[00:38:19] God, oh, this thing is awful. Why do I have to eat this? And you know what the Lord said to me?
[00:38:24] He said, it's representative of what I'm trying to get out of your life. However you do it.
[00:38:34] The slide, the QR code has been on every one of these slides. We'll give you videos. We'll give you updates and all kinds of, that's why you need to get on that. I'm looking for 200 people across
[00:38:44] this church. Surely there'll be that many. Church of 1,300, 1,400 people will call this church home.
[00:38:49] Surely 20% that could do that, right? So here's what I want you to do. We're going to pray this together. Let's go. Pray this with me. Come on. Lord, I come to you at the beginning of this year
[00:39:03] to humble myself before you. There are many things that feel like I want, but my greatest need is to know you in ways I have never experienced, seen, or known before. I acknowledge there have been
[00:39:18] times I've done my own thing, gone my own way, and have missed the sweetness of spending time with you. Because you are a God who is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love,
[00:39:32] and will not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.
[00:39:38] I approach you with a heart of repentance and brokenness, but confident of your unfailing love.
[00:39:45] Please forgive me of my silly ways that have satisfied my flesh, but have grieved your spirit.
[00:39:52] help me follow after you with everything in me as I pursue your presence and every promise you have made to me and my family. In this holy moment today, I place last year behind me and rest in
[00:40:07] your kindness, strength, and power to fulfill every purpose you have declared over me and believe what your word says about me. Give me the grace and ability to hear your voice and to feed every enemy as today I make a new commitment and will walk in authority, victory, and hope
[00:40:28] in Jesus' name. Amen. Come on. Give the Lord praise right now. Come on, church. Come on, church.