Open—Bob Thonney
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330.
What raise the?
Heart.
Rate of the Revenge of the US.
I would like to.
Just touch on the rest of the Armor of God that we didn't get around to this morning in our reading.
I want to make an additional comment on the.
Shield of faith. To me it is such an important part of the armor of God.
Believing God.
And we are so taught in today's world to go by what you see around.
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But the verse comes so clearly in Scripture. We walk by faith, not by sight. Doesn't mean you close your eyes. No, you use your eyes.
But you don't go by what you see, you go by what God says in his Word.
And one of the illustrations I'd like to give for your meditation is in Acts chapter 27, where Paul is on his voyage to Rome and you remember they got into one awful storm.
And in the middle of the storm, God came comes to Paul.
They have been driven up and down and it says all hope that they should be saved was taken away.
But notice.
He says in verse. I'm going to just read a few verses here in chapter 27 and verse.
21 But after long abstinence, Paul stood forth in the midst of them. Remember, there's 276 people on board this ship. That's quite a few.
I'll guess. I don't know. Is that the amount of people that are here at the conference? Brother Joe? Oh, Brother Joe's not here.
More or less. I hear some, see some nods.
And he says he stood in the midst of them, and says, Sir, she should have hearkened on me when and not have loose from Cretin to have gained this farm and loss.
Now I exhort you to be of good cheer, for there shall be no loss of any man's life among you, but of the ship. For there stood by me this night the Angel of God, whose I am and whom I serve sane. Fear not, Paul.
Thou must be brought before Caesar, and lo, God has given thee all them that sail with thee.
Verse 25 Notice what he says. Wherefore, sirs, be of good cheer, for I believe God that it shall be even as it was told me. You might say Paul, Paul, come on, be reasonable. Look at this storm we're in the middle of and the condition of the ship.
I believe God. He didn't choose to believe the circumstances, He believed God. That's the shield of faith. And brethren, we're going to be increasingly challenged to doubt God.
Choose, dear young people and older ones too, to believe God. When you have some statement of Scripture that specifically says it, choose to believe God. That's the shield of faith. But I'd like to go back now to Ephesians chapter 6, just to touch on those that we didn't get around to. We mentioned the helmet.
Of salvation, which is the next one after the shield of faith.
The assurance that all is going to end well, We know that from Scripture.
If you could tell a soldier that he was going into battle, I know you're going to come out victorious.
With what assurance he would go in to fight, knowing that no matter what happened, he was going to come out victorious. That's the helmet of salvation. And brethren, that's what we have. Are there trials? Let me tell you, they're all over the place.
Sicknesses, death, and I don't know how to explain it. Don't ask me please. But Scripture is clear that He is going to bring it to work together for good according to His eternal purposes.
That were depended on me. I'm kind of hard headed and stiff necked brethren, but who do you think is going to win?
God and his eternal purposes or this hard headed, stiff necked guy that's standing up here, You know who's going to win? God and his eternal purposes and we can count on him. Oh, how wonderful it is, brethren, that's the helmet of salvation. But now.
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The only offensive part of the armor is the second part of verse 17. Ephesians 617 and.
The sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
Oh how important it is to have the word of God in our hearts. You know the Lord Jesus, every time Satan tempted him, he did not stop to reason with the devil. He simply said it is written and the devil quoted scripture to him. Not completely, but partially it was so.
The Lord Jesus said it is.
Written again, you know we have the tendency sometimes to reason with unbelievers.
You don't have to reason with them, just give them scripture. The word of God is living and operative and sharper than any two edged sword. How important it is to be able to give scripture to them? Somebody has said when the Lord Jesus answered in those three.
Instances the devil why he quoted all three are found in Deuteronomy and two are found in the same chapter. So it doesn't mean that you have to know a whole lot of scripture, but let it be living in your heart Scripture and that's what will the Satan will have to give way to he could not.
He could not withstand.
When the Lord Jesus said it is written, that's the sword of the Spirit. How important it is to be versed in Scripture. Now I want to encourage you to memorize Scripture. You know what, when I was a young person, a young boy, we had Sunday school treat in Walla Walla and I had to memorize Scripture those.
Still stick in my mind. I try to memorize today and I can for some bit, but it doesn't last that long now because my mind isn't that fresh as it was. So I just want to encourage you to memorize scripture. You know, we used to have a different term for memorization. We used to call it learn by heart.
And what was said this morning about the heart getting into the picture, how important it is?
I find when you enjoy a scripture in your heart.
It sticks, it really does. So I ask you, in your reading and meditation, let it sink down into the heart to enjoy it. You will find it sticks.
And then I want to briefly mention as well, because I want to give way to others here the last, which is verse 18.
Pray always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for All Saints, and for me that utterance may be given unto me.
That I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in bonds.
That there and I may speak boldly as I ought to speak.
Well, here we have the matter of prayer.
And in this warfare?
Brethren, we go forward on our knees in prayer.
I don't know how to impress the importance of prayer.
You know Martin Luther.
Stated one time and it impressed me. It was a man that God used mightily in the time of the Reformation.
And.
He didn't get all the truth of God, but he did get the question of justification by faith very clearly and gave it out.
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But he made this statement. I have so much to do.
Every day I dare not take any less than three hours to pray in the morning.
That impressed me. We say I have so much to do. I'm afraid I just have to pray as I run out the door. No wonder there's no power.
Brethren.
Praying always doesn't mean that we're always on our knees.
No, you can pray as you're driving down the highway. I hope you don't close your eyes, but you can pray as you're driving down the highway. You can pray at all times. Praying always let your life be a constant conversation with the Lord that is beside us. Oh, how important it is.
To have that openness with the Lord praying always. And notice it says with all prayer and supplication. What is supplication? It is something more intense. Why do we have to supplicate God?
Do we have some? Do we have the idea that we have to convince him? No.
God has more desire to bless than we do of getting the blessing.
But brethren, has come to me this way, that in prayer and supplication we show our fellowship with God in his desire to bless, and so supplication is in the Spirit.
I really want to encourage you. I must say I cannot say I'm an example at all. Please don't take that way. But I have found it such a blessing to get up during the night hours when you like to be sunked out and snoring and get up.
Discipline yourself to go out and take time to present yourself before the throne of grace.
You know, I have a particular place in my house where I go and I kneel down there and sometimes I say, what importance is this place in my house? It's not here, but in spirit I'm going into the very presence of God.
Think of it, the God of the universe. What right do I have to enter his presence?
Because of Jesus, because of that precious blood that was shed, the way is opened and there around his throne are those mighty angels.
Millions.
Upon millions of those mighty angels. And when I approached the throne, those angels opened their ranks and let me go.
Writing to the very presence of God.
Oh, brethren, we don't understand the amazing blessing privilege of doing that. And I just want to say that in Scripture we have clearly.
Three areas where prayer is made. Just going to mention briefly that in Matthew's Gospel it says enter thy closet. That's individual prayer and that's very important.
It's what we've been talking about to get individually before the Lord. You know, the Lord Jesus one time in the Gospels it said he spent all night in prayer to God.
Why did he spend all night in prayer to God? If you notice, the next day he chose his 12 disciples.
And I think one of the reasons he spent all night was one of those disciples was Judas Iscariot. God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. And I think that cost him a lot to have to choose Judas Iscariot, knowing that he is called the sun.
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A perdition.
But the Lord encouraged us in our individual prayers. Brethren, remember our brother, late brother Clem Buchanan saying.
Long prayers for the closet. Short prayers for the prayer meeting.
And I remember him and his prayers for the prayer meeting were fairly short. Generally speaking, I'm afraid I haven't followed his example quite as much as maybe I should. But I must say, brethren, we have collective prayer given in Acts chapter 4. I'd just like to show it to you because I think it's important.
To see that we have the example of collective prayer.
Here in this chapter, they are threatened. The disciples are threatened by the authorities.
And they verse 23 says, being let go, they went to their own company, and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said unto them, And when they had heard that, they lifted up.
Their voice. Notice it's one voice.
To God with one accord that beautiful.
One voice, but they are all represented in that one voice. So one who gets up to pray in a prayer meeting, a collective meeting of the Lord's people, speaks in the plural.
Lord our Lord Jesus, we have come together. This is collective prayer and what you say you are representing all the ones that are present there.
And I think that is important to see that that is the case. And so when they say Amen.
Why we can say Amen.
I'm not sure why, brethren, but in Latin America the sisters say quite a bit of amens too.
Here, I don't know, maybe they say I'm under their breath, but.
But it's proper that we should say Amen. That's collective prayer. I remember one time being at a meeting somewhere and I forget where it was, but when I said Amen at the end, nobody said Amen. Oh boy, did I say something wrong. I must have said something wrong. That's why they didn't say Amen. But brethren, let's give the sense that it is collective prayer, and that's the way we should do it. But.
I would just want to encourage you younger brothers too. You know when we pray.
We are exercising priesthood. We are not exercising gift.
You younger brothers are priests just as well as the older brothers, and I want to encourage you to exercise your priesthood in the prayer meeting and also in the breaking of bread meeting. We exercise priesthood.
Remember being at some of the meetings in the Testimony in Brazil in the early days just after they had come into fellowship there. One place we were at was a prayer meeting.
And I think there was maybe 25 brethren together.
You know, in that prayer meeting, I must say I was blessed. All the 25 prayed once. I would say more than half prayed twice and some prayed even three times. You know that that had to be pretty short prayers. And I find when you keep your prayers short and concise.
That we keep more awake, otherwise sometimes we fall asleep.
Lord help us brethren, to be exercised by these things. I think it's really proper and I want to encourage you, younger brothers, we live in a world that is so full of need. Not only.
We think about praying for those that are sick, and that's proper, my brother. There's a lot of other reasons to be praying for our dear brethren. There's many parts of the world where there's severe persecution going on.
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And we should be aware of it, and we should be praying for them, seriously praying for them. The Lord help us, brethren, to be stirred to be praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching there unto that word. Watching means that we expect an answer.
It's so interesting the prayer meeting that is registered in Acts chapter 12.
It seems like nobody expected Peter to get out of prison.
What kind of a God were they praying to anyhow?
Rather, we don't. We don't grasp these things. I have to say for myself, please don't think I'm just pointing the finger at you. I have to point it at myself. But we don't grasp. We need to be watching for the answer. And so here comes Peter down the street.
Who would have ever thought that could happen? He knocks at the door and I suppose he was pretty anxious to get inside so he wouldn't be exposed outside there. But they didn't answer the door. That little girl ran in and said it's Peter at the door. No, you can't be right. You've got to be. That's got to be a spirit.
And so finally they come out, and because he keeps knocking in, it is Peter.
Brethren, why don't we more simply believe that's what it means? It says, watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for All Saints, not only those of us gathered to His precious name, but All Saints, just like our brother was mentioning in the address.
The one body of Christ includes every true believer.
On the face of the earth and we are united with them even though we may not break bread with them. We need to pray for them and supplicate for them. Lord help us brethren. I just wanted to finish with these before we got to the end of our meetings.