Where is the Man of God?

We admire a man who was firm in the faith, say four hundred years ago...but such a man today is a nuisance, and must be put down. Call him a narrow-minded bigot, or give him a worse name if you can think of one. Yet imagine that in those ages past, Luther, Zwingle, Calvin, and their peers had said, "The world is out of order; but if we try to set it right we shall only make a great confrontation, and get ourselves into disgrace. Let us go to our bedroom, and sleep over the bad times, and perhaps when we wake up things will have grown better." Such conduct on their part would have entailed upon us a heritage of error. Age after age would have gone down into the infernal deeps, and the evil heaps of error would have swallowed all. These men loved the faith and the name of Jesus too well to see them trampled on...

It is today as it was in the Reformer's days. Decision is needed. Here is the day for the man, where is the man for the day? We who have had the gospel passed to us by martyr hands dare not tinker with it, nor sit by and hear it denied by traitor, who pretend to love it, but inwardly abhor every line of it...Look you, sirs, there are ages yet to come. If the Lord does not speedily appear, there will come another generation, and another, and all these generations will be tainted and injured if we are not faithful to God and to His truth today. We have come to a turning-point in the road. If we turn to the right, perhaps our children and our children's children will go that way; but if we turn to the left, generations yet unborn will curse our names for having been unfaithful to God and to His Word. 1888 Charles Haddon Spurgeon (some words modernized)

It seems to me that man of God had it right. Many of this nation's churches have become parlors of disgrace to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. There is nothing like the word of God. However, any man who manipulates an entire body to error is not of God. Man can miss God at times by accident, but to manipulate others for ones own gain is completely wrong. I will no longer allow my Lord and Savior to be defamed by such men. I will no longer allow my God to be trampled on by such men. I must speak out, or I am not much better than those who pierced His side.

Faith- Is God Powerless in your Life? (Part 3)

Real faith reaches down and grabs a lame man expecting to see God work (see Acts 3:1-9). No one in the hall of faith, located in Hebrews 11, accomplished God movement without first over-extending themselves to what is beyond the natural man's reasoning. Even Jesus spat in the dirt and made some spiritual eye salve (John 9:1-7), put spit in the eyes of a blind man (Mark 8:22-25), and gave a man a wet willy (7:32-35) all in the pursuit of God's will. Real faith drowns out the fear of what people think is over-reaction and accomplishes God's will.

There is a way that seems religious to others that does not accomplish God's will. True faith moves beyond the desire to look spiritual to the desire to speak God's will into existence. To me, faith is like throwing a baseball. I know when I rear back with God's word, when I hurl it out of my mouth, it is going to make an impact. That word is going to hurt something; it is going to pop satan in the mouth. God's word trumps satan every time, not me.

I used to look at faith like jumping off a cliff into the water. You wait until you get enough nerve and then leap. I would wait until I felt my faith was the strongest and then pray. At times I walk in great faith and in others, I have little faith. True faith comes from living in the word and the word living in you. "If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.” (John 15:7 NAS If someone abides some place it dwells there. Many people know the word of God, but they are not at the point of it living inside them. The person is just a dwelling; the word of God is what actually lives. This is what Paul was saying when he said, "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.” (Galatians 2:20).

Prayer- Is God Powerless in your Life? (Part 2)

Many people never seem to get prayers answered. Prayer is very simple. It is faith that God is going to perform His word, coupled with lining your will with God's.

I used to ask for things that would make me more powerful; make me more highly esteemed. Jesus asked for those things that would build God's Kingdom, not mans. That is the difference between a righteous man and a carnal man.

You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. James 4:3 NASB

Let's look at it through a message that Jesus gave.

"I (Jesus) am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. 2 "Every branch (us Christians) in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. 3"You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. 4"Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. 5 "I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. 6 "If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned. 7 "If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8"My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples. John 15:1-8 NASB
Does the branch get to make a choice what fruit it will bear? It is only when the branch lines itself up with the will of the vine that it produces fruit. This is the act of abiding in verse 4-7. When your will becomes God's will, you can ask for “whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.” At that point you are not asking for your own glory, but for His.
Notice that verse 2 tells us that our branches take must be pruned. That means that those things that are not for the production of fruit are removed (your dead wood). What is it that is not producing fruit in your life? It is either His will or your will.
Part three will be about the faith component.