INSIGHTS & NOTES FROM
CHAPTER 19
"PATTERNS TO FOLLOW" "...church ...It is to be a house of purity, prayer, power & perfected praise." "The Spirit of God longs to teach you to walk in the yoke He has fitted for you." "There is always the agony of choice before the promise of change. Therefore, we must consciously, deliberately choose to go on with God." CHAPTER 20 "FOR TEN'S SAKE" "God is birthing a prayer revival - not a doctrine, not a teaching built around the charisma of men, but a spirit of intercession that is invading the lives of His people." "Towering thunderheads of divine wrath loom on the horizon, & prophetic rumblings of impending calamity reverberate throughout the land." "The Prevailing Ignorance of the Unrighteous" Genesis 18:24, 26 "...Abraham reverently pled with God for the city's welfare" "Would the Lord destroy the city if there were forty-five righteous? Forty righteous? Thirty? Twenty?" "'Would the Lord destroy the city if He found ten righteouse there?' And God answered, 'I will not destroy it for ten's sake' (Gen. 18:32)." "The entire city could have been spared for the sake of ten righteous people within its walls, indeed, only Lot, the one righteous man in Sodom, & his family were saved (Gen. 19:16)." "It is not the presence of evil which brings the mercy & long-suffering of God to an end, rather, it is the absence of good." "The Preserving Influence of the Righteous" "The haughty enemies of God who undervalue & persecute those who live 'soberly, righteously, & godly in this present world' are also unaware of the preserving influence of the righteous (Titus 2:12)." "Remember: God would have spared Sodom for the sake of ten." "...in God's eyes, ten righteous people would have been sufficient cause to spare Sodom." "The Purposeful Intercession of the Remnant" "The Spirit sometimes inspires people to pray by showing them things to come. God reveals His intentions to His friends, thus inviting their intercession." "God is bound by His nature & by His covenant with mankind." "...pled God's perfect justice" "The Powerful Impact of the Righteous" II Chronicles 7:14 Ezekiel 22:30, 31 "The church is sometimes prone to measure influence by numbers & nickels. But we cannot use our arithmetic to estimate the impact of the righteous; God saves by many or by few." "God will not allow this nation to destroy itself if His people will repent over the sins of our nation & seek His face. If we will pray, destruction will be averted & judgment can be turned." "May the pledge of God Himself echo in our ears & drive us to our knees: 'I will not destroy it for ten's sake!'" Could You Not Tarry One Hour?, by Larry Lea, pgs. 177 - 188.
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"PREREQUISITES, PATTERNS, PARTICIPATION"
"PUTTING FIRST THINGS FIRST" "By begging over & over for God to forgive a particular sin or failure, I was remembering what God had forgotten." "Promises" "Each day of my life I thank God that, because of the blood of Jesus, I can call Him Father. I praise His glorious names, appropriate His mighty promises & seek to sanctify His name through my manner of living." "Priorities" "...God's priorities" "Provision" "He gives me my daily bread." "'The day you answer the call to pray, I will begin to meet your needs.'" "People" "Every day we need to forgive our debtors before we can receive God's washing & cleansing, & then set our wills to forgive those who may wrong us that day." "Power" "Learn to overcome Satan in the place of prayer by the blood of the Lamb & by the word of your testimony because if you do not, you will be overcome." "...we must answer the call to pray!" "Jesus was the busiest man who ever walked the face of this earth, yet prayer was the primary focus of His life." "To develop an effective prayer life, you must overcome these 3 enemies of prayer: interruptions, drowsiness, & wandering thoughts." "Interruptions" "Don't be bound to a clock; instead, be obedient to the Spirit." "...have a set time & place to pray." "...having a set time & place to pray will help defeat those interruptions." "Drowsiness" "...try walking as you pray" "Wandering Thoughts" "...defeat that enemy by praying aloud instead of silently." "Learn to be sensitive by using your prayer language, praying in the Spirit & listening for the Holy Spirit's promptings. At times the Spirit will lead you to take verses of Scripture & turn them into petitions" "Follow the omniscient Holy Spirit's quiet & forceful impressions, for His choices & leadings are never wrong. So be sensitive. Be flexible. Be obedient. Don't grieve the gentle Holy Spirit by demanding your own way." "God your Father makes this promise: 'When you answer the call to pray, I will begin to meet all your needs.'" Could You Not Tarry One Hour?, by Larry Lea, pgs. 165 - 176. CHAPTER 21
"Job here recommends himself, both his case & his discourse, both what he suffered & what he said, to the compassionate consideration of his friends." "'Is my complaint to man?'" "...my complaint is to God, & to him do I appeal. Let him be Judge between you & me." "It is worthwhile to enquire into the reasons of the outward prosperity of wicked people." "Sensual pleasures are all the delights of carnal people, & as men are themselves so they breed their children." "God suffers them to prosper; but let us not wonder at it, for the prospering of fools destroys them, by hardening them in sin. Proverbs 1:32; Psalms 73:7-9." "The eyes that have been willfully shut against the grace of God shall be opened to see his destruction." "Dare we arraign God's proceedings or blame his conduct? Shall we take upon us to tell God how he should govern the world, what sinner he should spare & whom he should punish?" "He is the Judge of all the earth, & therefore no doubt he will do right. Genesis 18:25. Romans 3:6." "Let us... be always ready." "The prosperity of fools destroys them, by setting them (in their own conceit) above reproofs, by which they might be brought to that repentance which alone will prevent their ruin." "...there is a day coming when those shall be told of their faults who now would not bear to hear of them, those shall have their sins set in order before them, & their way declared to their face, to their everlasting confusion, who would not have it done here" "Death is the way of all the earth" "Every one must go in his own order, the order appointed of God." "Where there is not truth there is little comfort to be expected." CHAPTER 22 "...when God does us good, it is not because he is indebted to us;" "Can the light of a candle be profitable to the sun or the drop of the bucket to the ocean?" "God needs not us nor our services." "...nothing is infinite but God;" "Sin, being committed against Infinite Majesty, has in it a kind of infinite malignity." "Those that have not shown mercy may justly be denied the comfortable hope that they shall find mercy;" "Those who build upon the sand choose a foundation which will be overflown when the rains descend & the floods come (Mat. 7:27), & then their building must needs fall & they perish in the ruins of it, & repent of their folly when it is too late." "...it is strange that out of the same mouth, & almost in the same breath, both sweet & bitter should proceed." "Do not only turn from sin, but turn to God & thy duty." "Family reformation is needful reformation; we & our house must serve the Lord." "The way to have our heart's desire is to make God our heart's delight. Psalms 37:4. If God give us himself to be our joy, he will deny us nothing that is good for us." "Under all thy burdens, in all thy wants, cares & fears, thou shalt send to heaven for guidance & strength, wisdom, comfort & good success." "God's wisdom shall be thy guide, his favour thy comfort, & thy ways shall be so under both those lights that thou shalt have a comfortable prospect of what is future. Psalms 90:17." "Those that humble themselves shall be exalted, not only in honour, but in comfort." CHAPTER 23 "It is of great use to us, in every thing wherein we have to do with God, to keep up good thoughts of him." "He was quite at a loss to know what God designed to do with him; & whatever conjecture he advanced, still something or other appeared against it." "Those that keep the way of the Lord... when they are sufficiently tried, they shall come forth out of the furnace, & not be left to consume in it as dross or reprobate silver. The trial will have an end." "Good people are followers of God." "He governed himself by the commandment of God's lips, & would not go back from that, but go forward according to it." "The word of God is to our souls what our necessary food is to our bodies; it sustains the spiritual life & strengthens us for the actions of life; it is that which we cannot subsist without, & which nothing else can make up the want of; & we ought therefore so to esteem it, to take pains for it, hunger after it, feed upon it with delight & nourish our souls with it; & this will be our rejoicing in the day of evil, as it was Job's here." "God has an incontestable sovereinty;" CHAPTER 24 "Those who show no mercy to such as lie at their mercy shall themselves have judgment without mercy." "Sinful works are therefore called works of darkness, because he that does evil hates the light (John 3:20), knows not the ways thereof, that is, keeps out of the way of it, or, if he happen to be seen, abides not where he thinks he is known." "Let the sinner change his heart, & then he needs not disguise his face, but may lift it up without spot." "Shame came in with sin, & everlasting shame is at the end of it." "That honour which is got by sin will soon turn into shame." "...those that speak the words of truth & soberness need not fear having what they say brought to the test, but can cheerfully submit it to a fair examination, as Job does here." Matthew Henry's Commentary: Job To Song Of Solomon, Mac Donald, pgs. 116 - 138. |
AuthorCross Preaching Pentecostal Pastor. Husband to Tonia, Father to 3 beautiful girls, Monica, Zoe & Briana, & Grandfather to Wesley & Elliott Archives
September 2023
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