Amen. Turn your Bibles there to Acts 12. We're there in Acts 12 and we are continuing our study
through the book of Acts and the title of the sermon this afternoon is Acts 12, God Almighty.
It was kind of hard to name this one just because I was trying to capture something about the power
In Acts 12, we see a lot of miracles and just the things that God does both for his people and the people that are against him
And so it's just interesting. But before we do that, let me just keep keep on task
We are covering every time the word accord is used in the in the book of Acts because we see that
75% of the usage is in the book of Acts and we have a couple of verses there in Acts 12
I'm not going to go through all of them because this list is actually starting to get really
long, but we've seen now in Acts 1 and in Acts 2, mainly most of the times that they're
doing things, they're doing it in the court at what?
In the court in prayer or they're meeting together in the congregation, they're doing
everything in one accord.
Here though, in Acts 12, as we get there, we see two things.
Or the angels release Peter from prison the you know the the gates open in one accord to them and then
When
Your country was nourished by the king's country and hear it well
They come to him in one accord when some people come to hear it in one accord. Please close that door. Thank you
And sorry for that. I don't know what's going on with the kids startled me. I was like, what's going on?
But uh, we're there in acts 12. We're let's start there in verse one
And the first thing that we're gonna see here in the first few verses is that
The church's response to persecution
So there's really only two ways to respond, right? You know, you can cower in fear or you can just get more bold a
Cup mean this is now man talk about aging yourself
But back in the somewhere in the mid 90s
There was a pastor who preached a really famous sermon against and I don't remember his name or anything like that
This is several years now that I've seen that
But he preached a really tough sermon on sodomites.
I mean, and he's like, you know,
what is it, smear the queer and something like take out a fag day or something.
I mean, it was really rough.
Like it was a tough, good sermon on it.
And then fast forward, like a decade later, when the Sotomide agenda really started pushing
forth, remember right around 2012, shortly after Obama's first term, it really started
to kind of really pick up, he actually issued an apology because that sermon resurfaced
as a popular sermon.
he actually issued an apology because of all the scrutiny and pressure he was
getting about speaking out against them. And so whenever you face persecution you
can do one of two things. I mean really that's where the you know the boys are
separated from the men right? You're either gonna hunker down and say no the
word of God and God's gonna either protect us or you're just gonna give
into the world. Now here in the book of Acts obviously that's not the case. If
and they keep pushing forward and they keep pushing forward right and we see
here the church actually it's not just Peter and James and John but all of them
as a whole keep pushing forward and keep sorry about that what is that noise
let's get that out of there please and we see them pushing forward
Man, that really distracted me.
We see that pushing forward, they keep pushing forward regardless of what's going on.
And the persecution not only is getting, it's not getting less, it's getting stronger.
Now not only are they being persecuted by the church itself, but now there's individuals
we'll see here, King Herod, who's actually doing persecution because it pleases the people.
He's doing it basically for sport or entertainment.
right here in Acts verse 1 of chapter 12 it says now about that time Herod the
King stretched forth his hand to Vex certain of the church and he killed
James the brother of John with a sword remember we saw their introduction in
Acts chapter 1 but he killed them but what's interesting is why did he kill
them in verse 3 says and because he saw it pleased the Jews he proceeded further
to take Peter also
Then were the days of unleavened bread. Now, what we'll keep reading here
It says that when he had apprehended him he put him in prison and delivered him to the four
Quartarians of soldiers to keep him
Intending after Easter to bring him forth to the people Peter therefore was kept in prison
But prayer was made without seizing of the church and to God for him
And so we see here that Herod is basically puffed up and emboldened because the Jews were happy not only that he killed
But he's like, you know what?
I'm going to go further and we're going to throw Peter in prison.
So sometimes things are happening that may not seem, uh, we don't have all the details,
but we do know that it's under persecution.
It's going to come out, right?
And here here, it's not necessarily telling everybody, but he's doing it just to please
the Jews.
Whatever relationship he has with them, whether it's money or business or just influence or popularity
He likes it so much that he's willing to continue to do it just to keep getting that same response, right?
And you don't have to turn there. You can turn over to Matthew five, but in mark three
We see there's actually a lot of mentions of James and John, but I this is one of my favorites. I think this is why
Number one James was killed
John continued to do great work for the Lord
But it says in Mark 3 verse 17 it says in James the son of Zebedee and John the brother of James is when Jesus is recruited
In the Gospels says he certain named them Bonargies, which is the sons of thunder
Right, and so we see that they're doing great, you know, there's sons of thunder because they're preaching hard. They're causing
Disruption in the world with their with their faith and that's really what we should be doing as Christians, right?
We should be causing a disruption to the world because of our faith
We should be out there preaching the word of God boldly
We should be out there unapologetically standing for God's word regardless of what's going on, you know
The last couple of weeks have been really, you know, a little bit tough for me as far
as work, but the one thing that, you know, I always remind myself is the reason that
work is rough is because I'm, you know, we're here at church and I'm committed to preaching
three times a week, make sure my family shows up, going solo, winning all these things.
And then I, whenever I get a little flustered to myself, I'll always tell my ex-own, I'm
just like, you know, the Bible tells us it's but a light affliction.
You know, we haven't even been revealed in glory how great it's going to be to the things that we're suffering now
And so then I when I start doing that going through that exercise just remind myself
It's not that bad
You know it's just because we get in the flesh and the flesh wants to complain and gripe and moan about how difficult things are
When the reality is it's it's not that difficult
It's just that we're a little spoiled because you know if the AC went out right now
We'd all start fending ourselves like how horrible life is when it's really not that bad
So what we should do is take advantage of that and just continue to preach the word harder.
I mean, we have no excuse when Paul and Peter and John and James are being persecuted highly
and they're going through a bunch of, uh, you know, they're being scattered abroad,
they're being thrown in prison. I mean, nobody's doing that to us.
I mean, maybe one day, not maybe one day welcome, but right now the country's more worried about
You're there Matthew 5 but in John 15 the Bible says in verse 10 says remember the word
That I said unto you thy servant is not greater than his Lord if they have persecuted me
They will also persecute you if they have kept my sayings. They will keep yours also
We got a key I know we could use other verses and we all love like yay and all that live god in Christ Jesus
She'll suffer persecution, but I like this one because it says hey look
They're gonna persecute you if you keep my sayings
Right, they're gonna persecute us if we're involved in soul winning
They're gonna persecute us if we continue to push forth and say, you know
And show up and do the right thing and sanctify ourselves and become a peculiar people
You know, so that stands out not because of the greatness that we are but because of the greatness of Christ that shines through us
Right? That's really what we should be concerned about.
Go to Matthew 5 verse 10, it says,
Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you when men shall revalue you and persecute you,
and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake.
Rejoice and be exceeding glad for great is your reward in heaven,
for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.
You know, we have to get excited and we have to continue preaching the word and we might
not be going through any technically any persecution right now.
But if we just keep preaching long enough, it's going to happen, right?
I mean, in the 10 years that I've been here, it's not so public, but you know, we've been
through some trials and tribulations of persecution and God's gotten us through all of them.
Some of them came through direct like through the church through things like that some of them came in our personal life
I just know the devil was just trying to make our lives difficult and every time it just felt like you know
There was no no light at the end of the tunnel way because and that only reason
The only reason you feel like there's no light at the end of the tunnels because you're not looking up
Cause the light's always there, right?
But let's go to verse six of Acts 12.
So the first point is that the church will continue
and will always face persecution.
Our attitude should be like the more they persecute us,
the harder we'll go, right?
The bigger the fight, the harder it will swing.
We're gonna go down swinging.
I know, I love, it always reminds me of brother Bobby.
I know a lot of you didn't know him, but brother Bobby, the one thing you knew about
him was he was going to go down swinging, right?
I mean, he went down swinging to the last, his last breath, I guarantee you.
You know, and that's the attitude we need to have.
We're just going to go down swinging no matter what.
Well, let's go there.
Verse six of Acts 12, it says, and when Herod would have brought him forth the same night
Peter was sleeping between two soldiers bound with two chains and the keepers before the
And behold, the angel of the Lord came upon him, and a light shined in the prison, and
he smote Peter on the side, and raised him up, saying, Arise quickly, and his chains
fell off from his hands.
And the angel said unto him, Gird, thyself, and bind on thine sandals.
And so he did, and he saith unto him, Cast thy garment about thee, and follow me.
And he went out and followed him, and whist not that it was true, which was done by an
angel, but thought he saw vision.
When they were first when they were past the first and second ward they came on to the iron gate that lead us on to the city
Which opened to them of his own accord and they went out and passed on through one street and four with the angel
Departed from him and when Peter was come to himself
He said now I know of a surety that the Lord had sent in his angel and it delivered me out of the hand of
Herod from all the expectation of the people of the Jews
So, God will deliver his people according to his will.
And that's why I named the title or I titled the sermon, God Almighty, because we start
to see God's power.
First of all, sometimes in his power, he's going to allow people to be not only strongly
persecuted, but even up to death.
And we know that's called martyrdom, right?
It's obviously it's not in the Bible, but it has a specific purpose.
you know, what is it, James and Stephen were martyred for the cause of Christ,
and all it did was embolden the saints that were left behind to preach harder.
It didn't back them off. If anything, it says, you know, we're 12 chapters in,
and all we've seen is, oh, they were scared abroad, and yet they were not discouraged,
and yet they keep preaching the Word of God in every city, daily, in the temples.
You know, they're just basically meeting in one accord, praying in one accord.
you know praising God in one accord constantly what preaching the word of God in one accord
and today you have Baptists who get mad at Baptists like us who continually say hey we need to go
preach the word of God they're like why do you constantly just brag about that which is interesting
because I would rather go to a church that pushes soul winning every Sunday than a church that just
Because I don't understand why you got to preach a salvation message to people who are already saved over and over again unless you're teaching them
Unless the only reason that you would preach that is you think that people have to continuously to get saved
Right like when I'm telling you about salvation is to reassure and reinforce
Your boldness for Christ. I'm not trying to get you saved again. You're already saved
I mean, I'm not gonna waste my time on stuff like that, but
I am going to tell you, hey, we need to go out there and so when, and if there's an opportunity
and there's a verse that I can point to in my preaching to say, hey, this is something
you can use when you're out so many, I'm going to do it.
All right.
And well, so we see that God's going to constantly deliver his people.
I love the way this is worded, right?
First of all, it says, and when Herod would have brought him forth.
So Herod was going to bring him forth, probably make a spectacle of him, probably kill him
It says that same night Peter was sleeping between two soldiers. So he's like like they're really protecting him
So I think that the words out that the gods doing a great work because they're like man
We need to get Peter like not only and it says he's in several wars meaning he's not just in the in the in the in the
In the prison. He's deep in the prison. They really want to make sure he's not getting out
This is, this is why we're reading this, right? He's between two prisoners.
He's three wards in, basically three layers in. Let's just think about that.
But I love this. It says,
And behold, the angel of the Lord came upon him and a light shined in the prison.
And then it says, and he smote Peter on the side.
You know, today, people get offended.
If you just slap someone upside the head, right?
We live in such a politically correct world.
Peter, I mean, that's literally what they did, right?
He's like, hey, Peter, wake up.
Notice it wasn't nice or kind.
Sometimes we have the wrong view of Christ, right?
We're too nice.
And I'm not over-emphasizing this,
but I am making a point.
You know, God's not gonna coddle us.
He's gonna treat us like we are,
men and women of Christ.
It makes me think of like Job, remember he says, I love this because when Job and his
three comforters are going back and forth, right, we read all the stuff and I mean obviously
Job is under a lot of duress.
And so when we read it from a human perspective, what's the very first thing that we probably
instinctively do is we're trying to empathize or sympathize with Job.
You know, if you ever talk to someone you're like, man, at least you don't have it as bad as Job poor Job
I mean, he really lost all his family. I mean, and these are not lies, right? This is real Job did all that
But when God talks to him, he says hey gird up thy loins like a man
Right, he says I'm about to talk to you. You know, you can't be a sissy about this thing. I
Was a row of housing with my son
Because he went to karate class, there's this, I guess this is his program.
By the way, we live, people are so spoiled in this country, if you're not doing great
things for the Lord and great things in your life, all you are is lazy, or you're lying
to yourself.
And this is a side point, but this is just the, you know, the greatest of just...
When you build things on Christ and I know our country is not the greatest as it was maybe 2030 even 50 60 70 years ago
But we go my wife tells me that there's this and I was actually kind of skeptical
She's like there's this free karate class and all you have to do is pay $50 for the ghee
You know the little thing so we took him to the karate class
And it's legit. It's at a community center. It's a 501 C3
I don't know. She makes money on the tournaments and all that stuff if you want info for your kids
Let me know apparently they do it all around town. It's five days a week. So and it's actually really cool
It's a legitimate thing
But you know, he's all excited and he's doing you know, how kids are like he learned two things
And all of a sudden he's like a martial arts expert, you know, he you beat everybody up
But as we were of housing as I pulled them to me I pulled his hair a little bit
I you know I toughed on it when I was trying to pull him and he screamed really loud and like I got onto him
And I'm like look you can't get mad if you're rough housing with someone just because your hair got pulled first of all
I wasn't intending to pull his hair
I was pulling his head and and the hair got pulled and the lesson is you don't you say you know
Most people would take that the wrong way. Well, where do I get that thinking from from the Lord Jesus Christ himself?
I mean literally God sends an angel
Poor Peter's in jail, right? Most people would be like poor Peter. He's in jail and the angels like Peter
Wake up the word smoke means he punched them or hit them hard
If you don't believe me just go to the Gospels when Jesus is being
Tried unfairly, what do they do they smote him on the face
And I know it's a maybe that's a smaller point
But I just think the Lord's not gonna treat you the way you think you need to be treated
Right, we ask the Lord to give us mercy and to deliver us from things and the only way that he's gonna do it
Is he's gonna toughen us?
He's gonna like he has to be tough in order for us to get a little bit of a callus
And most Christians want like to be coddled by the Lord Jesus Christ when God's like I'll coddle you when you're in heaven
But right now we're in the battle like there's no room for coddling
There's only room for slapping you upside the head because I need to get you out of prison
Anyways, they come out of prison
He's way deep in it and then when he comes to he finally realizes that you know, this wasn't a vision. This was real
I mean, I can understand Peter, I'd be kind of in shock if I'm sleeping between two probably
stinky soldiers, I'm way deep in the darkness of the third layer of this prison, and all
of a sudden a light shines, somebody slaps me upside the head.
It tells me that I got to get out of prison. I feel like is this thing really real or not?
You know, I've had it moments like that
My wife has this one moment that she makes fun of me
There was a period where I was traveling every two weeks to
McAllen for work and then I was traveling back to church to make sure I was here for church on Sundays
And then in that time this is about 2018
Do you guys remember when there was all those conferences in the new IFB like and and I was going to all of those
And I guess at one of them, there was a perfect storm and they all just lined up.
And I think I had, I had gone to McAllen and then for McAllen,
I flew out to one of these things and then from there I flew back.
And so I was, I mean, I was just exhausted.
I mean, one of those where you're just straight up, just beyond tired.
And I remember getting home and, you know, greeting the kids and my wife.
And we went to bed early that night.
And there must have been a loud noise or a bang downstairs.
And I mean, I got up and I'm like, it's happening.
It's happening.
My wife's like, what's happening?
She says I ignored her completely.
I ran downstairs to check.
I vaguely remember going downstairs to check.
I ran back upstairs and then I just went back to sleep.
I'm like, so just things happen when you're really tired.
I mean, I'm assuming poor Peter.
I mean, you think about it, he's preaching everywhere.
The word is spreading.
He gets thrown in prison.
He probably was just exhausted,
even though he's between the prisoners.
Then a light shines and you get punched in the face or slapped upside the head by an angel.
You're like walking out of the, you know, the door opens by itself.
You know, it says the door opened on its own accord.
And then you finally come out and you're like, oh, okay, this was real.
This is what's going on.
So, you know, and you don't have to actually go to Psalm 34.
But the Bible does give us a lot of scripture.
I didn't want to spend too much time on it because it would have been a much longer sermon.
The Bible gives us indication that there's angels
Surrounding us that there's another realm that we're not open to right Elijah
Asked that the Lord would open the eyes of his servant so that he would see the angels and camped about them
Right and we know that there's different types of angels and by the way angels aren't like what you've seen in the movies or
Described or on Hallmark cards angels are different. They're tough. You know the Lord the Lord's got some pretty
cool angels but here in Psalm 34 just just as a reference it says verse one it says I will bless
the Lord at all times his praise shall continually be in my mouth my soul shall make her boast in
the Lord the humble shall hear thereof and be glad oh magnify the Lord with me and let us
And he heard me and delivered me from all my fears.
They looked unto him and were enlightened,
and their faces were not ashamed.
This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him
and saved him out of all his troubles.
And the reason I read all that is
because the Lord's gonna deliver us,
but we've gotta be committed to the Lord.
Right. These are people that are wholly dedicated to the Lord. I'm not talking perfect people. Nobody's perfect in here
I'm talking people who are willing to serve the Lord
Recognize their sin
Confess their sin and then move on
And then it says there in verse 7 says the angel of the Lord encampment round about them that fear him and
Deliver them. Oh taste and see that the Lord is good
Blessed is the man that trusteth in him
So I mean we want to talk about and then what's true the Bible speaks of guardian angels
But you want to have that fearless boldness to go out there and preach the word of God when you better fear the Lord
You know, I've been trying to keep up on a little bit here and there on that guy that got all the boils
Right, and it's just getting worse. He didn't fear the Lord
Honestly, I'm not even being nosy.
I read it just to remind myself I'm not messing with the Lord.
We need to have a healthy fear of the Lord and just remember he's going to protect us.
Man can't hurt us.
James and John, even though James was killed, they were considered, they were called the
sons of thunder.
They were bold and the Lord took care of them.
And we don't know why the Lord takes people out early at times.
It does prove that the exception is the rule, right?
Not every... The Bible tells us that if we do certain things, we're gonna have a long life.
But there are exceptions to that rule. James was one of them.
Stephen was one of them. But we also know that, like, for example, Stephen was full of the Holy Ghost and power.
So there's something to be said about that. You know, John the Baptist didn't even live that long.
Jesus didn't live like long. I mean, 33 years old is a young man.
I remember when I was 33 years old,
I thought I was getting old and then I got 45
and I'm like, now I'm getting old.
I wish, you know, 33 is like the peak of your youth.
Like you're just, you got it going on.
Go over to James five, go over to James five.
But the next point I have for you is, you know,
the Lord will deliver us.
And then there is power in the prayer.
There's power.
the prayer of the church. So there's power in prayer period and as a matter
of fact I'm almost done with preparing my series in prayer that I'm going to bring
on Sunday mornings. I've actually
Been going through like a really intense study. There's like five hundred eleven verses or mentions of the word prayer
And I've sifted through all of them and I separate out all the words all the verses that say pray like pray
Tell me you're pray. I pray the let me know of this because obviously we're not talking about that prayer
And then I'm gonna go through and just break it down into the difference prayer
Why am I doing that because there's power in prayer?
You know, we were talking last night my wife and I and I was just like one of the things I've admired most about her
And besides all the wonderful things that made me fall in love with her is I didn't know this until we got married
That she's just a really strong prayer warrior
You know and a lot of things in our in our life have happened probably because of her prayers
And one of the things that we could always look to improve on is prayer, but also the church needs to improve on its prayer
That's why we have a prayer list and as a matter of fact one of the things that
Well, I'm gonna if you'll remind me we need to do is part of our regular like broadcasting system is to
Put out the list and make sure people are praying and I'd love to get feedback on prayer answered prayers
Because that that just encourages us to pray more because here the church is praying it says and in verse 12
It says and when he had considered the thing this is Peter after the prison says he came in the house of Mary
The mother of John who surname was Mark
Where many gathered together praying I remember in the first verses
What does it say they were praying right in Acts 12 and it says in
And therefore in verse five it says,
but prayer was made without seizing of the church
unto God for him.
The people who were already praying for Peter
when he was immediately apprehended,
but notice they didn't quit.
They kept praying and praying.
They knew that they just needed to pray.
And it says that when he was considered,
he came into the house of Mary,
the mother of John, who's surname was Mark,
where many were gathered together praying
And then this is another, this is a great chapter by the way.
It's just funny.
Like first of all, Peter gets slapped upside the head and then this next interaction is
just hilarious as well.
And as Peter knocked on the door at the gate, a damsel came to Harkin named Rhoda.
Rhoda just didn't have any comments, Rhoda's too excited, right?
This is just what we, she didn't have a lot of common sense, I guess, and I'm not picking
on her.
She just, you ever read that?
Rhoda, I'm assuming was a little bit young.
You know, like that's something my kids would do. What's gonna happen here? It says and when she knew Peter's voice
She opened not the gate
For gladness but ran in and told how Peter stood before the gate poor Peter's like hey
I'm at the gate and wrote it hears it. She's like it's Peter and
Instead of opening the door. She's like let me go tell my mom and dad that Peter's here and Peter's like I'm just out here in the rain
I'm not it's not rained. I don't know right it says and then they said unto her
Now aren't mad
But she constantly affirmed that it was even so
Then said they it is his angel. So now I don't know how big this house is or where they're at
But apparently they're like rota. We don't believe you
So I that's why I think she's young like, you know, these kids do that. She probably I don't know
She has a reputation for that. I'm
I'm just making assumptions here. This is not biblical. It's not strong doctrine.
I can do that because this is not going to change your belief on anything.
But Rhoda is like, Rhoda, you're crazy. Peter is not here.
So they're praying, but they still haven't, you know, they're not clear on the answer.
They're like, no, well, it's his angel, right? But Peter, he continued knocking.
And when they had opened the door and saw him, they were astonished.
But he beckoning unto them with the hand to hold their peace declared unto them how the Lord had brought him out of the prison
And he said go show these things unto James and to the brethren and he departed and went into another place
And I like that. I highlighted here
Pay attention says he said go show these things to James
And I think Peter's doing this to encourage James because James just lost his brother
And I'm pretty sure news of his brother's death has now has, you know, gotten to James and Peter
Wants to encourage the congregation and not only courage the congregation
He wants to encourage his brother in Christ and it says go show these things into James and their the brethren
And he departed and he went into another place, but notice Peter also stayed on task
He delegated the task out because he he knew that he was released for a purpose
His purpose was to continue doing the work of the Lord, but he still gave messages to be delivered, right?
Which takes us back to the very beginning of Acts when there's murmuring in the church for the widows
And what do the Apostles say? He's like, are we supposed to wait tables?
No, we're gonna continue in prayer and fasting and preaching the word of God
I mean, we need to have segregation of leadership and duties so that things can get done in the
church.
One of the things that I'm trying to do in 2025 in addition to all the other things is
the more duties I can delegate out as we've grown a little bit, the better it is for the
things that we need to do for the church, because my main responsibility is to preach
Now that doesn't negate the fact that if there's nobody around I've already said it if I need to clean the toilets
I'll clean the toilets
But if I can delegate that task out not because it's disgusting
But because it's not what I need to be doing and that's what needs to be done
Right and the church needs to remember that look they're praying first of all
There's things that we can do together where we're all equal prayer is an equal task. My prayer is no better than your prayer
As a matter of fact, I would go so far as to say that if I've got something wrong in
my life, your prayer is going to reach God much better and quicker than mine.
Right?
The Bible is clear.
It says that if I, if I'm at odds with my wife, our prayers are going to be hindered.
So I could be up here preaching the word of God and if we're having a tiff, and I think
we're praying better than everybody else, God's like, that's not happening.
Right, we need to pray as a church because we just don't know where every where people are in their life
And I like to assume that we're just a great church and that nothing bad ever happens, but the reality is stuff happens
You know, I didn't make a big deal about it, but I'm gonna tell them myself remember on I don't remember if it was Sunday morning
So the evening I said I'd never drop a glass of water and most of you missed it
But when we went to mighty burger, I spilled a glass of water by accident
And I told my wife was like well, there's my punishment and that's why I didn't make a big deal
But I was like people are gonna make too much fun of me
I'll give it a couple of days and then I can leave it alone, you know, because we just don't know where we're at in life
We're gonna make mistakes. We're gonna falter, you know
We need to constantly be praying. We have a church that's a little bit split
It's not so much now, but it was in the past
But there's still this this group of people that are way older
That maybe they can't go out so many or they can't go out as much
But you know there you guys they're still important just like we are because they can pray
And there is power in prayer, you know, and I know not only Pastor Ka, but a bunch of the people that don't go, they pray for us because we have success.
We've had great success this year.
And even if we haven't had success in the past, the fact that we're having success now means that at some point, somebody prayed for that success.
And it wasn't just my prayer, because I'll be honest with you, I pray, but just like everybody else, there's times where I forget to pray.
And it shouldn't be like that. We should pray without what seizing the Bible says as a matter of fact
It says the church was praying without seizing and I hope I'm saying that right
My wife always kind of picks on me because I can't pronounce that word
That's my Mexican word of the day that I can't pronounce. I hope I'm since am I saying all right seizing no
I've stated it wrong. Okay. Thanks both of them
Yeah, it's a it James 5 it James 5 it doesn't matter. I know you guys understand what I mean without stopping
Right apparently I have a really I struggle with that word, but in James 5
Verse 14 the Bible says is any sick among you let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him
Anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord and the prayer of faith shall save the sick
So it's not just prayer, but a faithful prayer and the Lord shall raise them up if we have committed sins
They shall be forgiven
Confess your faults one another and pray for one another that you may be healed
And it's interesting that it ties healing to what to confessing your fault in your sins
Well, there is literally biological truth.
I've got two nurses in the audience today.
Stress is something that can cause a lot of malfactors in our body.
Stress releases toxins and anxiety releases toxins that can cause us to be susceptible
to disease and illness, and not just like the flu and the cold, but even more serious
stuff.
It says that they may be healed.
fervent prayer of a righteous man availed much.
It's not just the prayer, but the effectual fervent prayer.
An effective prayer is a fervent prayer.
What's fervor mean?
Well, the best way that I can think it,
because it kind of has the rude word like from fire,
I think of a bubbling boiling pot, right?
You know a bubbly boiling pot will cook a meal if you were being attacked and you threw a boiling pot at someone
I'm telling you you don't need a gun
You'll stop somebody in their tracks if you threw boiling pot if you needed to cleanse something you put it in boiling water
If you want to even if you want to just purify regular water you boil it
You know, it's that rolling
fervent strong
active prayer
Right, it's not like when you just turned on your stove prayer
It's of a righteous, but it's also what of a righteous man availed much and I think this this can have two applications
obviously a
safe person's prayer
right, but also
One that's sanctified because you're not going to be fervent in prayer if you're not cleaning up your life or at least making the effort. I
Mean, it's just a fact
You got a ton of
Consent contemporary churches that are filled with people
But they're not doing anything for Christ. They're just basically, you know, going through the motions
There's no fervor in those churches and you know because they do polls all the time about how unhappy Americans are
with religion and church in America
They do all the things that they can do as a matter of fact
It's so sad because our churches should be the ones that are spotlighted, but we're not the conservative right
and has now got his own podcast.
He's like a famous talk show host.
Anyways, it'll come to me.
I was just watching a clip from him
and he had like this pastor from Minneapolis
and the clip was that they're like,
oh, well you're making waves.
And he's like, yeah, the reason that I'm making waves
is because at my church,
I preach the whole word of God
and people don't like the,
and I try to look him up.
I didn't have time and I got distracted with work,
By the fact that he's on the Carson, something Carson, whatever his show, Tucker Carson,
thank you, that he's on Tucker Carson, that he's not preaching hardcore, right?
He might be preaching more hardcore than the contemporary churches, but he's not preaching
what we're preaching.
I guarantee you that.
But the state of America is so sad that now all you have to do is just preach a little
When the hard preachers nobody's even paying it trying to bat an eye because they're too offended
You know, I mean, I don't
We don't get that much media attention or anything like that and I'm not by the way
Whatever the Lord does is the Lord does but I guarantee you if it got some people would be highly offended with like
80-90% of what I say behind the pulpit
And it has nothing to do with me. I'm just telling you the truth from the Bible. I mean God's is clear on his word
Hey, you know, we need to confess our faults.
Let's go there.
Verse 17 says, Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are.
And he prayed earnestly that it might not rain and it rained not on the earth by the
space of three years and six months.
And he prayed again and heaven gave rain and the earth brought forth her fruit.
You know, I got a great idea because I've been thinking about sometimes people ask me
about the building.
They're like, why don't you build a new building?
And I'm like, well, you know, I mean, we don't,
we have tides and the tides are consistent,
but we don't have tides to like pay a mortgage payment
on a new building.
Like we'd have to take out a mortgage
and build out and there's plans.
And I think many years ago there was plans,
but at the time they asked for a retention pond.
It was a big deal.
This is way before my time, but we thought about it.
And then I was like, you know what, Lord?
Those Presbyterians are all sending people
to hell in a handbasket.
So, why don't we just pray for them to sell their building and we'll just make a little
attachment and one of them can be the main congregation and then one can be the, you
know, the fellowship hall.
And then we don't have to build a building.
That one's a brick building.
We could make that one the main congregation.
I'm not kidding.
I'm just going to pray for it.
The Lord will provide.
I really think that we could have that church maybe in a couple of years because they're
a dying church.
Literally, I don't know. Maybe some of you were here a few months back. Remember that pastor?
They they filled up our parking lot because they asked to borrow it because the pastor was retiring
That's the most people I've ever seen at that church that church has and I'm not picking
I mean our church is small too, but I know most most of those people because what's a presbyterian church do most people go
For what the liturgy right they just go for the motions
They're not going because of the great preaching and the great works. They're doing they're going because
Their daddy and mommy were Presbyterian, they're Presbyterian, nobody's really pushing them,
nobody's preaching hard on them, so they're comfortable. That's why they're doing it.
Not because they're being fed, but because they're just going through the motions.
Philippians 4, go back to Acts 12, but in Philippians 4 verse 6, the Bible says,
But in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your request be made known unto God and the peace of God
Which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus Matthew 21 22 Bible says and all things whatsoever
You shall ask in prayer
Believing you shall receive
You know we could go to James and it says hey don't ask a miss
We need it not only pray, but we need to believe in the prayer
But the only way to believe is to be strengthening ourselves in the Word of God
and the only way to strengthen yourself in the Word of God is to do the things that God's asked you to do.
And one of the things that God's asked you to do is to show up to church
and to be involved in church and to raise your children in the fearing admonition of the Lord.
Right? I mean, there's there's a lot of aspects and most people only fulfill one aspect. They'll go to church Sunday morning.
They won't even go to the right church.
And then they wonder why their lives are the way that they are.
They won't read the King James because they read some article about how, you know, some
idiot professor said that, you know, that you can have multiple versions.
So now they're going to church, but they're not even getting the right word.
Then you ask them about soul winning.
I guarantee you, I would encourage you to try this exercise.
This is look at you like you're talking about aliens.
I've done it.
I'm like, oh yeah, I don't even invite them.
I'm just telling people like, they're like, oh, you know,
what about Sunday?
Usually in the job, in the trades,
people want to do things over the weekend as well.
And I'm like, well, Sundays I can't go
because I have church in the morning
and then we go soul winning and then church
and then they're like soul winning, huh?
What are you talking about?
Like what do you mean? I'm like, yeah, soul winning. We what we do is we just go door to door and we knock and we preach the gospel
like
Like it's just like what in the world are you even talking about I
Remember talking to this business owner the CEO of a company in Canada
And I was like, hey, you know, he, this was the second go around.
It didn't go as well, but he wanted me to consult him on selling.
And I said, look, I'll do sales for you and I'll, I'll build the sales team and we'll
do all this.
I said, but Wednesday nights, because with the, he's an international business, so there's
calls that we were taking like Australia and the Philippines, well, all those calls are
like happening later in the day.
And I said, so I said, I can't take calls on Wednesdays and I can't take calls on Sundays.
because I go to church three times a week.
He goes, you go to church three times a week?
He's like, I haven't been to church years.
You go to church three times a week?
I was like, yeah, that's like normal in America, brother.
Like he was shocked.
Like he's like, you go to, he said it like two or three times.
He's like, I can't believe you go to church three times a week.
I'm like, I can't believe you don't go to church three times a week.
Why wouldn't you go to church three times a week?
Why wouldn't you go to church daily like the apostles do?
I'm not even asking you to do that.
Right?
Go back to Acts 12, we're there in verse 18.
We there's power in the prayer of church right the church praying
There's power and I probably butchered that but it's irrelevant and then in this next one this next point is God
Will judge the proud and the wicked look we need to focus on the things that we need to do
Which is pray for God to deliver us pray for boldness pray for souls to be one
And we can even pray the impregatory prayer, but then we just move on.
Notice Peter didn't go back and was like, man, Herod's such a jerk.
He threw me in jail.
Herod, this, he just went to do the work of the Lord because Peter knows
that God's going to avenge him.
And here we see in verse 18, it says, now as soon as it was day, there
was no small stir among the soldiers.
What was become of Peter?
So all of a sudden now they figured out Peter's out of jail
It says that when Herod had sought for him and found him not he examined the keepers and commanded that they should be put to death
And he went down from Judea to see Serea and their abode
Inherit was highly displeased with them of Tyre and Sidon, but they came with one accord to him
And having made blasts the King's Chamberlain their friend desired peace because their country was nourished by the King's country
So there it is. They're all buddies because they're basically all helping each other out.
You know, you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.
And upon a said day, Herod, a raid and royal apparel, sat upon his throne and made an oration.
And immediately the angel of the Lord smote him because he gave God not the glory.
and he was eaten of worms and gave up the ghost.
Now go over to Daniel 4.
We have other examples.
This is one of probably the most,
I don't know, sensational examples
in the Bible of God's judgment, right?
I'm not gonna go through it all,
but I think it's worthwhile to just
at least cover some of the verses.
But here, the King of Babylon,
King Nebuchadnezzar,
He's actually the one that wrote Daniel 4, you know, if you were to go to Daniel 4
I'm not gonna read we're only gonna read it in down to verse 30, but it is worth going to and just giving you the
The cliff notes here
In a
Daniel 4
We see here says Nebuchadnezzar the king unto all people nations and languages that dwell in all the earth
Peace be multiplied unto you. I thought it good to show the signs and wonders that the high God has brought toward me
So he's the one speaking in Daniel 4
So he's talking about himself and the experience he had
Obviously, he didn't get struck down like Herod, but he did suffer basically madness
because of it, right?
You don't mess with the Lord and there's no repercussions.
I mean, here Herod is basically the way that it reads is that
It says, it is the voice of God, the reason he, nobody shouts that he's like the voice
of God, unless the king's already made it clear that he, you want him to think of him
as a God.
And I'm not even extrapolating, like I'm not going above and beyond.
Throughout history, literally, you have kings and emperors and rulers go around saying,
hey, I am like a God, you need to treat me as such.
I mean, you could go to North Korea today.
or any communist country today,
and where are you gonna find in all the classrooms
and in the homes and everything?
A picture of what?
The ruler, that dictator.
And people have to like, revere that picture.
You know, I've seen countless documentaries
of people who go and like, sneak in cameras
of like North Korea, and people are afraid
to like say anything bad about like the emperor,
especially when the picture's in the presence,
like it makes them,
Uncomfortable because that's how they treat them like a deity, right? We're here in Daniel 4
Let me just read for you really quick in Proverbs 16 verse 18
The Bible says pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before the fall. We know this right and in Daniel 4
Nebuchadnezzar is talking about his experience and we get to verse 30. It says the king spake and said
It's not this great Babylon that I have built for the house of the kingdom of thine might
by the might of my power, and for the honor of my majesty.
While the word was in the king's mouth,
there fell a voice from heaven saying,
O king Nebuchadnezzar, to thee it is spoken,
the kingdom is departed from thee.
And they shall drive thee from men,
and thy dwelling shall be with the beast of the field,
they shall make thee to eat grasses oxen,
and seven times shall pass over thee,
until thou know that the most high ruleth
in the kingdom of men and giveeth to whosoever he will.
The same hour was the thing fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar
and he was driven from men
and he did eat grass as oxen
and his body was wet with the dew of heaven
till his hairs were grown like eagles feathers
and his nails like bird claws.
At the end of days, I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up mine eyes unto heaven, and mine understanding
returned unto me, and I blessed the most high, and I praised and honored him, that liveth
for ever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom is from generation
to generation, and all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing, and he doeth
according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth, and
none can stay his hand, or say unto him, what doest thou?
At the same time, my reason returned unto me, and for the glory of my kingdom,
my honor and brightness returned unto me, and my counselors and my Lord sought unto me,
and I was established in my kingdom, and excellent majesty was added unto me.
Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and exult and honor the king of heaven,
all whose works are truth, and his ways judgment, and those walk in pride, he's able to abase."
So at least he learned his lesson, right?
He's like, hey, pride cometh before the fall and a honey spirit before destruction.
But think about it, that's crazy that the king of a great nation
literally was out in the fields eating grass and his hair was grown
and his nails were grown. I mean, he's kind of unkempt.
He's nuts.
It doesn't give us the exact time, but you know, obviously it's for a time.
It says seven times will pass over.
whatever that time, and I think it does in earlier verses,
but like I said, I'm just passing this through,
but there's a period of time long enough
that people are like, this guy's nuts.
And when did it happen?
When he got a little bit too proud,
and he's like, I did this, and God's like, no, I did this.
And we need to remember that.
Herod thinks he's a God, and God says,
no, let me remind you who's God.
You know the sad part about Herod and people like that is that when they die they go straight to hell
right
People think oh God just took him out. No
He started their anguish. It would have been better for them to be on earth and suffering because now they're in eternity
Suffering in hell for all eternity
It's sad because they could have had the opportunity we're not sad for them we don't mourn them the Bible says
But, at some point, it would have been good, maybe somebody give him the gospel, but people
are going to reject the Lord anyways.
Let's go down to the last two verses.
The last point and this is where I'm telling you there's just that's why I said God Almighty
That's one of my favorite terms that would I like to use is I like there was a
Radio preacher. I don't know if you saved her now, but when I first got saved I would listen to him
You know on the Christian radio station the conservative one
He was he had a Scottish or Irish accent. I don't remember
And I would listen to him on the radio when I was first, you know, I didn't know who to listen to or what to read
But I always like the way he said it. I'm not gonna try to replicate it
But he always used that term God Almighty with that Scottish accent or the British
And it sounded really cool and that stuck with me and I love that, right?
But the reason is because it encompasses what he's almighty. I
Mean in here, he's listening to the prayers of the church in chapter 12
He's allowing James to get killed. That's his might got allowed that
For whatever reason other than I mean, we know it's for the bull like for the martyrdom for the spreading of the word of God
But there's a purpose right. He's also
Releasing Peter out of jail
He's putting Peter back to work because he needs him for the work of the Lord
He's listening to the church the church prayed and and and now they're encouraged
John is encouraged by Peter after losing his brother and then Herod is taken out
God's doing all of this all at the same time
You know the the world tells you and it's true
Multitasking is not a good thing right if you try to multitask you're probably gonna fail at something
It's a bad habit. I I have a habit of multitasking
I've gotten try to get better about it, but I do it, but you know who can multitask God because he's all mighty
You know, that's just a cool attribute and the last thing that we add to that whole list is that God's word cannot be stopped
Nobody will ever stop the word of God
That's why you know that nobody can ever stop me or you or spring crest as long as we have people
That are faithful to the word of God the word of God is going to continue
You know as small as our church has been and it's been pretty small at times
I never doubted that God was going to get us through and get us people that were right because our church is willing to serve
The Bible says all we need is to be a light on the shining hill
And I don't have to be a bright light because on a shining hill it's gonna you can see it from miles away
That's why in the military if you're in enemy territory
They teach you to just tough out the elements
Because you can't even start a fire because the minute you do at night. It could be seen from miles away like you're just gonna be
Discovered but there in Acts 12 verse 23 the Bible says but the word of God grew and multiplied
After all of this stuff what happened the word of God grew and multiplied
And I said I was going to bring it, I am, I just, I forgot, honestly.
But here we see, who do we see again, Barnabas.
And Barnabas and Saul returned from Jerusalem when they had fulfilled their ministry and
took with them John, whose surname was Mark.
So they came and grabbed John, who just lost his brother and they're like, let's go.
Proving that no earthly power can stop God's mission. It's 2025
But you've got probably thousands now of versions of false Bibles
You've got marketing dollars going to these Bibles being promoted in all kinds of churches and still the most popular
Version the one that's read the most by the English-speaking people is what the King James
You've got you've got people I mean literally the enemy tells you
What's wrong with us the and I mean I've literally heard from all the religions
You know when I'm doing my research and my son or I've read and they're like
These Baptists all they want to teach you is one saved always saved
You know easy believe is like they know the doctors just as good as we know
Why because it's biblical like they can't deny the things of Christ as a matter of fact
That's why they couldn't fault find fault with Christ
Right. It's always has to be based on lies because God's work can't be stopped truth can never be stopped
You can suppress it for a while, but you can never stop it
It's going to find a way to bubble up to the surface, you know
I mean we see there and Isaiah you don't have to turn there
Yeah, actually if you want to turn to the 2nd Timothy 2 that's where we'll end
but
In Isaiah 55 verse 11 the Bible says social my word be that go forth out of my mouth
It shall not return unto me void, but it's so accomplish that which I please and it shall prosper in the thing where I
Where to I sent it, you know one of the things that I do to encourage myself and encourage others when we go so many
Even when we don't lead souls, I always remember Isaiah. God's word is not going to return
void to him. And it's weird the way that God grows the church, right? You would think
that God would just send the people you lead to Christ to fill the church, but most of
those people never show up to church. But the fact that we're preaching the word, God
sends people that want to preach the word to go preach the word with you.
I don't even know how people find out about us.
I mean, I do everything I can to keep us on social media
and update the website and all that, but I'm just spread thin.
We'll do better now with Moe.
You know, I have high hopes for her, but before that,
you know how they find us?
Because we're preaching God's word and we're, you know,
birds of a feather flock together.
That's really the only reason.
I don't need marketing dollars.
I have the best market in the world. God Almighty.
All right, he's gonna get it out Matthew 16 verse 18 the Bible says and I say also unto the Thou art Peter
And upon this wrong I will build my church and the gates of hell
She'll not prevail against it. I
Love it
And in second Timothy 2 9 the Bible says wherein I suffered trouble as an evildoer even unto bonds
But the word of God is not bound
Look, God's word will never be suppressed God word word God's word will never be censored
There will be
Times when it may be harder to get it out, but even in China. I'm sure you could find a Christian
Even in Russia. I'm sure you could find a Christian. I'm not saying you're gonna find them in droves
You might just find one Christian
But you'll find them. I
Believe that
God's word has been promoted throughout the ends of the earth. They were talking about and that's probably why we haven't seen that much how
In Malaysia, you know that earthquake kit and they were trying to get more information on it
But it's been under basically a dictator run
Government and so they suppress the internet and stuff like that and even with all of the suppression. You know what happened?
It still got out.
We still see, you know, there's still videos of, like, you know, that building falling and
people almost dying.
You know, there were still outlets because the truth can't be suppressed.
As much as they try to suppress it, stuff's going to make it out.
There's always an underground movement.
There's always people that are going to preach the truth.
I mean, even if they turned off all social media today, what?
That's going to stop us from preaching the word of God.
Somebody's going to hear it.
Tyndale was it that died on the, you know
there was bird right at the stake and
What was his prayer?
That the word of God would be for the English people and shortly after the word of God was for the English people
God always finds a way it might not be us who do it, but somebody down the line is gonna do it
We just got to keep doing that work. I mean you think about Abraham Isaac Jacob Moses says they never saw the promise
Yet if it wasn't for them
Joshua and Caleb and all the new people wouldn't have seen the promise
You know if it wasn't for all you think about always think about this. I'll close with that
Because you think about God's power. I'm a little old Mexican
From Mexico City from 1980 before the time of internet
When Mexico now it's a little bit more diverse, but even then it's not as diverse
It's always been what? Predominantly Catholic in 1980 for sure 80 if I would say 90% of the country was Catholic
I mean, I vividly remember being four or five years old going to Catholic Church lighting candles and putting them for the Saints
and somehow
My parents migrated
Immigrated to the United States to the border McCallan the first church we ever went to was a Baptist
Style church. I don't know if it was a Baptist church and the gospel was presented to me there
I didn't know it at the time and then we make this
Stark shift when I was eight years old and we become seventh day at Venice
And I'll never forget my mom always told us growing up
The reason we were seventh day at Venice and they thought that was the best religion was because it was a religion that recruited educated people
It was so weird to me all any time she would say like that
It was just weird to me because she's like, you know, it's it's one of the few religions
It's just full of doctors and lawyers and educated people and blah blah blah like that to myself like even then
I always thought it was a strange statement. I didn't understand why I now I do
But the that plant that seed that was planted five six seven years old
Was the was the seed that germinated over the years that made me question the teachings of the Adventist Church
And then they made me find the person that said hey
You're going to hell and then I wanted it or more and then at 25 I got saved
I've been saved for 20 years, but really the work was done
You know 20 years before when I was five years old
So it took 20 years for me to get it so that the next 20 years would be some of the best years of my life
Right. We don't know what God's doing in our life today that in 10 15 20 years, you know, it's gonna change
I mean Moses died at 120 pastors. So, you know, you're only 88 you're a spring chicken
You gotta get you gotta get with the program
But you know what I'm saying? We've got to focus on the fact that God's mighty power is what's gonna guide us
So let's close in a word of prayer. Heavenly Father Lord. Thank you so much for today. Thank you for your blessings Lord
Thank you for those true and faithful here on a Wednesday night
But more importantly, Lord, just help us to continue to be a praying church, a preaching church,
a church that won't back down when times get tough.
Lord, remind us also that when things get tough, you're going to avenge us
and that your word won't be bound. It won't be stopped.
We can't be stopped. We're unstoppable, Lord.
Because of your word, because of your truth, because of the fact that everything you say is truth.
So help us to just use that to impulses and and
motivate us not only for the rest of this week, but for the rest of our lives. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.