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If
not here, where? If not now, when? If not us, who?
Can You Pray
the BIG Prayer? from Doug
Perry, FellowshipOfTheMartyrs.com From the
"Do It Yourself City Church Restoration" book
The point is, when
we act like Jesus, God honors it. And Jesus had MASSIVE backup. His
army included enough angels to FLATTEN the planet in an instant! But
He never called them. He stood alone, knowing God would back Him up.
He stood in the gap for all people for all time against ALL of Hell
and the weight of ALL sin. He just knew that He knew that He
knew that God would back Him up. He just knew HIS Dad was
bigger than THEIR Dad. That's why God loved David – and
the others throughout history who have gone up against impossible
odds alone (but with God at their back) and willing to lay down
anything for others. That's why He loved Moses and Paul. Can
you pray the BIG Prayer?
Exodus 32:30-32 (KJV)
30 And it
came to pass on the morrow, that Moses said unto the people, Ye have
sinned a great sin: and now I will go up unto the LORD; peradventure
I shall make an atonement for your sin. 31 And Moses returned
unto the LORD, and said, Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and
have made them gods of gold. 32 Yet now, if thou wilt forgive
their sin--; and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which
thou hast written.
Romans 9:1-5 (KJV)
1 I say the
truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in
the Holy Ghost, 2 That I have great heaviness and continual
sorrow in my heart. 3 For I could wish that myself were accursed
from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh:
4 Who are Israelites; to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the
glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service
of God, and the promises; 5 Whose are the fathers, and of whom
as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for
ever. Amen.
Clearly, as the
ultimate Apostle, this is the model Jesus set forth for us when He
offered Himself as the scapegoat for all the sins of everyone for all
time. He had to have known He could never go before the Father again
with all that sin on Him! Can you get your head around the kind
of sacrifice that was? Not just about His physical body being beaten,
but what it was like for the Son of God to be fully separated from
the Father by the weight of ALL sin?
Are you willing to
pray that God would blot YOU out of the Book of Life if only He would
send the people into the Promised Land? What is the Promised
Land for us now, but a true community under God's headship, in
oneness and harmony and sharing with each as they have a need?
What is the Promised Land but “church” outside the walls,
all day, every day, being One Body? Doesn't that sound
great?! What's it worth to you for Christ's Body to be restored
and for Jesus' final prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane (John 17:21)
to be answered? How much have you been begging and weeping and
groaning for it to come? Can you pray the prayer of Moses?
What HAVE you prayed?
John 15:12-13 (KJV)
12 This is my
commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.
13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his
life for his friends.
I'm not going to
mince any words. (Why try to be subtle now all of a sudden?)
Which is more valuable? Your physical life or your eternal life?
You are a blade of grass that withers. (Job 14:1-2) But
your eternal life is where your treasure is.
John 10:27-28 (KJV)
27 My sheep
hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: 28 And I
give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither
shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
If you are one of
His, no one can take it from you – but you CAN lay it down.
I just gave you three examples of people who did (Moses, Paul and
Jesus). It's your birthright, but you can offer it in exchange
for another. If you have too much of YOU in your cup, there's
no way you can pray that prayer. But if there is hardly any of
YOU left and you're so crammed packed full of Jesus that nothing else
can fit, it's no problem – because He prays that prayer really well.
I'm not going to
make any excuses about this. My goal is to raise up or gather
together (or whatever) the people who understand this and get them to
pray together the biggest prayers they can pray and see what
breaks. I know lots of them. I've helped grow some of
them. NOTHING is more loving than to be willing to lay
EVERYTHING down. It's nice that people give 10% to the
“church”. It's better that some people will offer up
their car or sell their boat or invite strangers into their
home. It's amazing when someone sacrifices their life for the
Gospel. But ALL the forces of Hell quake in fear before those
who are broken enough and sincere enough and fearless enough and so
full of Jesus that they can offer up their eternal salvation if only
their kinsman could enter into the Promised Land – whatever that
“land” might be.
These are people
who love God so much and trust Him so much that if it brings Him
glory and furthers His kingdom – or heals one little old lady or
restores one marriage – they will be willing to go to Hell for
eternity. And this isn't a reckless self-deception or bravado
or empty offer. These are not people who don't know what they
are doing. These are people who may have even seen Hell. These
are people who have their eyes fully open and are STILL willing to go.
Hear me, DO NOT
pray that prayer unless you mean it!! You may THINK you mean it, but
God will correct you REAL FAST if you're holding something back!
I've seen it happen and it hurts!
My goal is to
raise up the kind of people who love the brethren enough to lay down
anything – including praying the Big Prayer – if only the
Gospel will be preached in power and things will change. Those
kind of people don't really want to argue about dogma or doctrine or
any man-made thing. They do not hold tightly to their cash or their
stuff or have other idols. They will lay down their family, their
marriage, their hobbies, their job – anything if God tells them
to. They hear His voice and they won't settle for anything less
than Him directing ALL of their paths ALL of the time. They
will NOT listen to man anymore. They know Jesus' voice –
even when it's coming out of another person – and they won't
settle for less.
Never mind
teleporting through walls or being bullet proof or fire coming out of
your mouth or whatever other stuff some folks have been
preaching. Those people I just described are the “Manifest
Sons of God” that the earth is crying out for! (Romans 8) Those
who are dead to self, have a giant cup of Jesus, are walking in
holiness and are unshackled from this world. Those whose love for
each other is so big, so sacrificial, so totally not like the world
that no one can figure them out. They are led by the Spirit and hear
Him – and go and do as He says. The “glorious liberty of
sonship” is absolute submission! The “Manifest Sons
of God” are those who understand the meaning of the word “ALL”.
Prov 3:5-6 (KJV)
5 Trust in
the LORD with ALL thine heart; and lean not unto thine own
understanding. 6 In ALL thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall
direct thy paths.
ALL thy ways and
ALL thy paths. Period. All means everything – what
to eat, what to wear, what to say, where to go, how to spend every
dollar, what to pray – everything at every moment. Unless
you think “ALL” means something else? How much
freewill does a Bondservant really get? I think you had
freewill just long enough to decide to be a Bondservant. Now
you're not your own anymore. Bondservants don't need forty days
to decide what their “personal purpose” is. They don't get
to decide what they think they would like to do for the Master and
King. They trust and obey – ALL the time. (Here's a tip:
There's no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.)
These are the
people who can walk shoulder to shoulder without jostling each other
because they're not looking at each other for cues, they're watching
the Commander in Chief – and He is their Head. (Joel 2)
They keep their eyes straight ahead and keep marching. And if one
falls, they don't stop and pick him up, they just keep marching and
another takes his place. And yet, they are true community and
have true love for each other. It is a great mystery how both
can happen – and God's wisdom will be revealed in them.
When they come together, the world has never seen anything like them
before. But they are just the first-fruits of what's to come.
Said another way,
it's entirely possible that you have made your going to heaven an
idol. Ever consider that?! Are we worshiping salvation
more than we're worshiping the Saver? Are we giving people a
“short-cut” method to get saved and escape Hell, but
allowing them to make THAT the end-all-be-all of their spiritual
walk? That would make heaven an idol. And it's just as deadly
to do that as to make an idol of wood or stone and bow down to it
every day in your living room. We are not to worship ANY
created thing – and heaven and our own eternal soul are created
things – we're to worship the Creator and Him only. If you
hold onto something too tightly, it's an idol. We have to hold
everything in an open hand. It's all His anyway, and if He
wants it, He can have it.
Extended to the
extreme, that applies even to our own salvation. If He wants to
send me to Hell, I totally deserve it. A thousand thousand times over
I deserve it. It's only by His grace and mercy that I'm not already
there. And He is really big and I'm really not, so if He wants to
change His mind or cash my soul in to save someone else, who am I to
argue with Him? Whatever brings Him the most glory is fine with me.
If you hear God,
ask Him if I'm bluffing - or if this is bravado or blind
stupidity. I'm deadly serious about this. As the Lord is
my witness. “I lie not, my conscience also bearing me
witness in the Holy Ghost.”
This is the big
league. If you're going to try to restore the Body of Christ,
you better be ALL THE WAY willing to lay down anything He asks
for. He will allow the enemy to test you – like Job.
Or like Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac, the son of
promise. Those are the kind of people who change things. (And
if you make it about YOU, He'll crush you.)
Zechariah 2:5 (KJV)
5 For I,
saith the LORD, will be unto her {the city} a wall of fire round
about, and will be the glory in the midst of her.
Copyright 2007. FOTM
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badly we
- the
Christians in
the West - have
mismanaged the massive gifts which God has entrusted to
us. Maybe we can change
directions if we try something different. Maybe if we started
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the cost. Yeah, that might work.
Although
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