Have we come to listen to God or Man

D

deltadom Sep 11, 2010

Exodus 20:19 kjv
And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear : but let not God speak with us, lest we die .

Exodus 33:11 kjv
And the LORD spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend. And he turned again into the camp: but his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, departed not out of the tabernacle.

Do we come to a church or to meetings to meet with God or to meet with men! or should our time and communion with God on our own be a crescendo with the others who have met with God during the Week,
There are some of us, sometimes like me who need prayer to meet with the Lord!
Do we love the Lord so much to spend time with him!
One of my favorite stories in the Bible is when Moses is going into the Tabernacle of Meeting and meeting face to face with the Lord, and Joshua is still left in there!

It reminds me of going to a church service and staying and praying when everyone had left!

Exodus 17
9 And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose us out men, and go out , fight with Amalek: to morrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in mine hand. 10 So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amalek: and Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill. 11 And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed : and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed . 12 But Moses' hands were heavy; and they took a stone, and put it under him, and he sat thereon; and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands

I so want alive words not dead words, I so need Jesus! Why do we come to Church ? Is it a social gathering? or have we come to play?
None of these things such as a social gathering is not wrong in its first sense as we need encouragement by other believers! Sometimes we are depressed and we need someone like Aaron and Hur to hold us up in prayer! I so love this picture, A mighty man of God being held up by Aaron and Hur, with the power of God opened the Red Sea and peformed the Miracles in Egypt but yet it was all God who did it through the power of men!
I think someone used that God used very plain objects such as Sticks, Melting Pots, Summer Fruits but with the Power of God they become mighty god!
I guess it reminds us how mere human flesh without God is nothing!

John 15:5 kjv
I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing

Do we need Sermons the answer is Yes! As God needs instruments ! It has been my heart if everyone during the week was after the Lord and on there knees during the week and then in church! You cannot do on your own , I cannot do it without Jesus!
I dont know why this is such a simple question, I am always interested in those that say that don't spend time in Christian Books but just the Bible.
I figure that if you spend time with say a wife or a spouse you get to know them. So i just figure that Someone who reads the Bible rather than Christian books should know the Bible back to front , I sometimes need encouragement from people from the past who have spent time with God aswell to encourage me into the Bible and Prayer!
I so want a desire to hear God everytime I go into a sermon and before the sermon and after the sermon!

sermonindex Sep 11, 2010

My brother from England is asking a crucial question.......

"Do we come to a church or to meetings to meet with God or to meet with men!"

I wonder that myself. Do we come to conferences to meet with men or God? Can we honestly say that as we get up in the morning to get ready to go to church or a conference, that we come expecting to meet the Living God?

Can you imagine if you knew that in an hour the President of the United States was coming to your church and that you were the one that was being presented to Him. I imgaine that you would have some nervous excitement. I imagine that you would make sure that all of your friends and relatives knew.

If one does not expect to meet the Living God, then one will probably not meet the Living God. God has to be pursued. "Come to me," the Scriptures say. " Draw close to me," the Scriptures say. "He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him,' the Scriptures say. "He is our exceeding great reward," the Scriptures say. " As the deer panteth for the waterbrooks so my soul longeth after thee," the Scriptures say. " I stand at the door and knock," the Scriptures say. So the question would be " Do we diligently seek Him and draw close to Him and come to Him, do we answer the knocking at the door of our heart?

Are we ever still and quiet enough to even hear the knocking of the door? Has the noise of the world and men drowned out the small still voice of God? Do we merely hear sermons, are we profesional sermon hearers? Have we become so accustomed to listening to sermons preached without the power and the presence of God that there is a generation that have no conception of what it means to hear words preached with the power of God and His presence? It was said of A.B.Simpson that one time after he preached a sermon on the glory and the majesty of God that the people remained in their seats, the glory of God have fallen upon them and they were afraid to even move, they just sat there in silence in awe and in reverence in the mighty presence of the Living God. Oh God, without this we die. Where is the desperation for you amonng the speakers and the hearers?........brother Frank

A

ADisciple Sep 11, 2010

Very encouraging posts, Dominic and Frank.

...The thing is, to be a man whom to meet is to meet with God. To be a man that, there is such a fragrance of Christ with us, others when they meet with us, they are meeting with God. They have an awareness of a certain "Something" in us. They may not even know what it is... but they are in touch with God.

As John said, "truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ." Oh that we might pursue that kind of fellowship, so that the fellowship we have with others... it brings them into fellowship with the Father and the Son.

Is this what we have our hearts set on? Is there anything else worth pursuing? In all the things that men are seeking, even in Christendom... isn't it all just refuse compared with this?

David said, "One thing have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the House of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to enquire in His Temple."

When it's the beauty of the LORD that's being revealed, is being seen in men, in His Church, His Body-- His Temple-- oh! How precious!

sermonindex Sep 12, 2010

AD writes............

"The thing is, to be a man whom to meet is to meet with God. To be a man that, there is such a fragrance of Christ with us, others when they meet with us, they are meeting with God. They have an awareness of a certain "Something" in us. They may not even know what it is... but they are in touch with God."

Amen brother, amen. An encounter with a man of God should be an encounter with God through the Holy Spirit that fills a man and magnifies Christ.....brother Frank

Psa 84:2 My soul longs, yea, even faints for the courts of Jehovah; my heart and my flesh shout for joy to the living God.
Psa 84:3 Even the sparrow has found a house, and the swallow a nest for herself where she may lay her young, Your altars, O Jehovah of Hosts, my King and my God.

sermonindex Sep 12, 2010

"Do we come to a church or to meetings to meet with God or to meet with men!"

Both!

Nothing wrong in meeting with both. Since God's contract is with the man Jesus Christ and God's residence is in man, it's only fitting that we come to see both man and God. It was God who said in the cloud, "this is my beloved Son, hear Him". The same God that was in Jesus Christ is in us. It's nothing for God to say to Frank, "I have given a message to Frank, hear him". In fact God has said this to many of us at one time. Not directly in those words, but indirectly like, "I want you to go to this church as I have a message for you". Or we turn the dial and we hear a man speaking of the things of God that causes us to soak up what he is saying. Certainly it's God we are looking for, but the avenues to which God has ordained to work through is man.

Let us not shun the ordinances to which God has established in His Church. Sometime we go overboard with out policies. If Brother Tom had the gift of a certain type of healing, though I may seek God, it would be in my right also to go to brother Tom knowing that the gift of God is in his life to be healed of that, and God would honour that. Why? Just as the prophets of old when a man came to receive something of the prophet. A prophet on the earth was a representation of God, as if God Almighty was standing there. We speak very lightly of our calling and we shun it because we think we are unworthy of it, and yet God sees us as worthy. We have a serious problem with our faith and how God sees us.

sermonindex Sep 12, 2010

I appreciate what Snuf says but i dont think anyone was suggesting that we should not look for fellowship, or turn a deaf ear as to what the Lord would say to us through the preaching of the Word or the gifts of the Spirit. In fact I love the brothers and sisters that I know ( not too many) that I can speak to and go straight into deep fellowship with and know that when I leave them that I have walked in the untiy of the Spirit.

There comes a point of desperation. Now many believe that we are in a desperate crisis in the " Church," and that much of the church is in a deep sleep, that much of the church does not operate in any of the gifts and that much of the church does not " hear from God." Many believe that there is a famine of the Word in the land, not a famine of the Word preached, but a famine of the Word preached with the power and the presence of God. I believe that is what the original poster was getting at and that is what I agree with. A desperate need indeed for an encounter with the Living God that ruins a man for this life and takes him from a man that has one foot in the world and one foot in the " church," to man who serves the Lord with his whole heart. The world desperately needs to see an expression of the Living God in the lives of those who profess His name..........brother Frank

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Goldminer Sep 12, 2010

Amen Bro. Frank

R

rsmpdx Sep 12, 2010

A good post, here's some perspective I gained just recently...

I was asked to fill in by my pastor and preach at the Wednesday prayer meeting. I mentioned it to a church member who then stated that she would NOW have to attend the prayer meeting since I was teaching. My first thought was sadness, I didn't want her to come to see me, I wanted her at the prayer meeting because it's the time we pray to our God as a body. Don't come for me, or the pastor, but come because it's a chance to speak to God on behalf of his people. I know this sister means well, but sadly she implied a lot more in her brief statement.

My heart breaks for the lack of attendance at the prayer meetings, by younger people, by members - Jesus said my house should be a house of prayer, you wouldn't know it by going to my church on Wednesdays.

K

KingJimmy Sep 12, 2010

Interesting thoughts one and all. Our primary reason we gather together should be to receive something from the mouth of God, so that we might be made more and more like Him. There is definitely a cult of personality that exists in the church today, where people are attracted to preachers in droves because of their personality in the pulpit, and not for the prophetic like utterance they give as they speak the mind of Christ and declare the word of the Lord.

Having said this though, I also agree with snuf. If a preacher is embodying his message from heaven I am greatly interested in seeing him, and hearing what he has to say. For such is the miracle of incarnation all over again. The unique example of a man who is also the message, and is somebody who is more than just a voice, but is a true apostolic father of faith, is a man whom I desperately want to see. Such men are rare.

My pastor is such a man. He's not a great preacher by any stretch of the imagination. His messages are simple and straight forward. Nothing super impressive. But he definitely is what he preaches, and emodies the message perfectly. As a result, I love seeing him preach. In my opinion, I believe I am a better preacher than he is. He's less inclined to give a strong prophetic word from heaven. But, I will say with certainty, that he is much more the message he preaches than I am. He's obviously more mature and seasoned in the faith, and I cherish who he is in the Lord greatly. I'd rather listen to him any day.

Jimmy

sermonindex Sep 12, 2010

rsmpdx writes...........

"My heart breaks for the lack of attendance at the prayer meetings, by younger people, by members - Jesus said my house should be a house of prayer, you wouldn't know it by going to my church on Wednesdays."

Amen. And right here is the heart of the matter. This is a problem in almost every church in the land. This is the Spiritual gauge of any church, the prayer meeting..........brother Frank

J

Joyful_Heart Sep 12, 2010

I wasn't able to read all the posts so forgive me if I repeat.

A couple of us would go on Sat. nights to the Church of about 1,700 people. That's all that would show up is 2 or 3. But we would pray for an hour or so for the service the next day. And we were amazed at how the Lord moved on the Pastor and the congregation. It's not all up to the pastor but for us to be praying. Sometimes they are just worn out and need for us to hold up their arms. God really blessed with those couple of people praying the night before.

Also, the mature Christian should be taking Jesus to Church or where ever they go. One Pastors wife used to say, "I know Jesus is here because I am here". She meant that she had been spending time with Him and they came together. She was able to pour out to the congregation the love of God. She came to give more than receive.

It is frustrating but it is up to us as well to be praying during the week etc. for the Pastor and for the H.S. to pour out upon us as we gather.

God have mercy on us all and be glorified.

J

Joyful_Heart Sep 12, 2010

PS

I get the meat of the Word and am full right here. And you lovely saints are my prayer partners. God hears! God moves!

I have to keep my heart right with Him and be still and know He is God. To walk in the forgiveness of sin, with a clear conscience, not in condemnation. Glory to God!