God Has a Different Way of Working!

Sermon preached at Faith Assembly August 17, 2003

Revised November 1, 2004, again December 17, 2005

Is it okay if I tell you some exciting things about our wonderful Father, HIS Son Jesus and the Holy Ghost???

The Lord wants me to tell you something about HOW HE works, because HE is SO glorious!! The way HE works is glorious. Somehow or another we Christians have gotten some mistaken ideas about how our God works.
I wish God's people would read ten chapters in their Bibles for every chapter they read in some other Christian book! I wish God's people would pray ten hours for every hour they listen to Christian Television and Christian radio. Following that plan would clear up a lot of confusion. God's people need to get their information first hand!
Holy Spirit anointed Bible reading and Holy Spirit anointed prayer can revolutionize our lives!!

That is because the Bible is far more than what it appears to be to the naked eye. The Bible becomes a MIRACLE disguised as a book, if the Holy Spirit is allowed to anoint the words within!
In the same manner, prayer is not just words spoken on your knees: prayer is a MIRACLE in disguise, when the Holy Spirit anoints it.

The Lord wants me to tell you how HE works and to use HIS Book to show you what I'm telling you is true.

Many have heard again and again the story of Elijah on Mount Carmel calling down fire to consume a sacrifice. That miraculous wonder proved that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob was the true, living and authentic God.
That Old Testament story is part of A REVELATION on how our God works.
It's in 1st Kings, Chapter 18.

The Secret of this story is NOT in what God DID do. It's in what God's mighty and infinite powers DIDN'T do!

We don't realize how mighty, how awesome, how spectacular, how unbelievably powerful our God is!!
He's so powerful that the greatest wonder really isn't how much power HE has, but how HE can limit, contain and focus HIS infinite powers, keeping those powers under such precise control that they don't do any secondary damage!!

Researchers know that one of the greatest power sources is what runs a star: fusion. But there isn't hardly anything that can safely contain or house the fusion process. So the greatest discovery will be how to limit, focus and contain fusion, so it won't burn a hole into the center of the earth.
But if God hadn't been so glorious in HIS very powerful and precise control over HIS own powers, at Mount Carmel, the people present might have been burned, or the country damaged for miles around, or the world, or the solar system burned to nothingness! Almighty God so precisely limits HIS powers, powers that have absolutely unlimited reserves! God has powers that make fusion look like a rubber-band-powered toy airplane!
Satan only has limited powers. Only God is able to control and perfectly manage such awesome, limitless power and authority.
Can you imagine what it would be like if Satan had infinite powers under his wicked control?? Why, if Satan had such powers he might accidently hurt himself! He might have burns all over! No demon would dare get close to him, sparks and fire and burnings might be spilling here and there, burning devils damaging Satan's stuff. It could be a devil's nightmare. It takes an infinite being to control infinite power and Satan is NOT infinite!
The truth you need to see is that our God doesn't spill HIS powers here and there sloppily. God releases HIS mighty power with a precision and control that is beyond imagination! God doesn't waste or exceed the needed release of power by even one watt, or even a tiny fraction of extra horse power.

On Mt. Carmel ONE man was all that God needed, because God and one human being are a majority!
"Then said Elijah unto the people, I, even I only, remain a prophet of the LORD; but Baal's prophets are four hundred and fifty men." [1st Kings 18:22]

We need to understand that God regularly allows HIS people to be outnumbered. HE gets the glory that way. Don't look for numbers. If you have numbers, okay, but be suspicious, because numbers are more important to Satan. Our God is beyond numbers!
The Lord wants you to know that even today there are about 450 deceived prophets for every Holy Spirit directed prophetic person.
Our God is so far beyond numbers that it really doesn't make any difference whether HE is using many or few, great or small, big or little, smart or dumb. When God comes on the scene everything changes for the better, even if you can't see a change in the natural realm! In fact, God likes to work with weak, small, puny and stupid things because in that way HE receives the true and proper glory HE deserves. Here are some Scriptures from God's Word that show us how our God is beyond numbers.

"And Jonathan said to the young man that bare his armour, Come, and let us go over unto the garrison of these uncircumcised [Philistines]: it may be that the LORD will work for us: for there is no restraint to the LORD to save by many or BY FEW." [1st Samuel 14:6]
"For many are called {See John 3:16 "whosoever believeth on him"}, but FEW are chosen" {See how out of 2 million adults only Joshua and Caleb made it from Egypt to Canaan Land.}. [Matthew 22:14]
"Because strait (narrow and confining) is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and FEW there be that find it." [Matthew 7:14]

The Lord wants me to tell you that HE likes endings where it appears like HE loses...but in actuality HE wins!!

In this story of Elijah, Elijah runs off after the victory. But God is the winner!
Jesus defeated Satan by letting Satan murder HIM!
God used Noah to bring a salvation by holding a 120 year long revival campaign that no one came to, and no one got converted in! And Jesus said, "But as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be." [Matt 24:37]

The most important part of that prophecy that Jesus gave, about Noah, is not that in the last days people will be marrying and giving in marriage, foretelling the breakdown of the family. The important part is that in the last days, before JESUS removes the purified church, there aren't going to be many true converts in comparison to the population. Noah had few converts! And, God is going to close the door to the escape vehicle at a certain point, and after that escape door closes the only escape from the Tribulation times will be by execution.
Many people are getting "religious" in these last days. But few are seeking to fully please God. We are in that end time! We need to get purified and ready. We need to fully enter God's Kingdom! We need to be ready for the "twinkling of an eye." [See 1st Corinthians 15:52]
The secular world rushed in large numbers to book stores and movie theaters to take in the story of the boy wizard, Harry Potter. They read the story of Harry to their children, as if it were some kind of wholesome bedtime story. Few notice that Harry Potter is a cleverly disguised follower of Satan. Large numbers of people are hurrying to get more Harry Potter merchandise.

Numbers are very appeasing to the mind. Churches get caught in the numbers game too. Satan loves numbers....and he has got big numbers in his corner these days. God's side looks like it is losing. But God is at ease. God is in control. God is able and God has already succeeded.

Joseph was the winner as he sat in Prison!
Paul and Silas were the winners as their backs bled in the inner dungeon.
Paul was the winner as his ship went down and he floated about in the sea without a life jacket.
Beggar Lazarus was a winner as he lay out by the rich man's trash can with sores all over his body, dying.
Paul was the winner when a poisonous snake bit him, and when they gave him 39 wicked lashes, ripping open his back.
John the Baptist was a winner as he set his neck in the executioner's block.
Stephen was a winner as they crushed his skull with stones.
Peter was a winner as they crucified him upside down!
Jesus' Friend Lazarus was a winner as they buried him in a grave, because four days latter Jesus came on the scene and raised him back to life. They could have put the Indy 500 checkered flag in Lazarus' hand as they carried him to the grave because he was winning even though it looked like he was losing the battle with disease.

The Lord wants me to let you know that the reason GOD allows HIS TRUE people to look like they are failing when they are really succeeding is because: God is allowing evil to come to full bloom.

Satan has been given a time to succeed, a time to develop his plan.
Remember God is the KING of "cliff-hanger endings".

If you don't believe it look at Calvary: Satan murders Jesus, thinks he wins, looks like he wins, is positive he wins, but all of a sudden the keys to death, Hell and the grave are snatched from Satan's hands! Then in the next instant Satan finds himself down and Jesus' foot is on old Lucifer's throat. How did that happen??

I want to show you that Satan has been given a time to succeed as foretold in Scripture.

"And in the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up. And his power shall be mighty, but not by his own power: and he shall destroy wonderfully, and shall prosper, and practice, and shall destroy the mighty and the holy people." [Daniel 8:23-24];
"Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression,..." [Daniel 9:24a]

God is allowing evil to remain long enough to blossom and produce full fruit!

Have you ever noticed that cancer's goal is to kill it's victim and guess what...cancer ends up in the grave, consumed by it's own evil workings??? Isn't that odd! If cancer would slow down and not be so wicked it could live longer. Instead it kills itself as fast as it can kill it's victim.

"And the king [the wicked Anti-Christ] shall do according to his will; and he shall exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak marvelous things against the God of gods, and shall prosper till THE INDIGNATION (horrible wickedness) be accomplished: for THAT that is determined shall be done." [Daniel 11:36]

God has determined how it will happen and that evil shall be allowed to increase and to produce it's own deadly fruit, bringing down judgment on itself.

"And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax (grow) cold." [Matthew 24:12]
"Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first (many people turning away from God and backsliding), and that man of sin (the Anti-Christ) be revealed, the son of perdition (perdition means damnation)." [2nd Thess. 2:3]

A friend of mine preached an amazing sermon, proclaiming how Joseph, who was right with God, sat in Prison looking like a failure. At the same time his evil brothers and the whole clan enjoyed their father, Jacob, and lived in freedom. Nevertheless Joseph was succeeding in prison, while the evil brothers were failures living it up in an important family!

Let me back that up with some Scriptures:

"Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:" [John 11:25]
"For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it." [Matthew 16:25]
"Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." [John 12:24]
"To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified." [Isaiah 61:3]

You can't get beauty for ashes until you've got some ashes! That means you've got to go through some tough times to get some ashes so that God can turn it into victory!

"But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant." [Matthew 23:11]

Do you see how the World is all backward from God. In God's economy God dispenses HIS power in controlled, focused and sometimes totally invisible bursts. God doesn't very often do publicity stunts! In God's economy the servants, the nobodies, the nothings are the winners.

Jesus said, "the meek shall inherit the Earth! [See Matthew 5:5]

God is the master of endings that look like the end, but they are really the beginning, that look like defeat, but they are truly victory!!

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