Success and Failure Blog

A Model Believer – Philip

And the angel of the Lord spake unto Philip, saying, Arise, and go toward the south unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert. And he arose and went: and, behold, a man of Ethiopia, an eunuch of great authority under Candace queen of the Ethiopians, who had the charge of all her treasure, and had come to Jerusalem for to worship, Was returning, and sitting in his chariot read Esaias the prophet. Then the Spirit said unto Philip, Go near, and join thyself to this chariot. And Philip ran thither to him, and heard him read the prophet Esaias, and said, Understandest thou what thou readest? And he said, How can I, except some man should guide me? And he desired Philip that he would come up and sit with him. The place of the scripture which he read was this, He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and like a lamb dumb before his shearer, so opened he not his mouth: In his humiliation his judgment was taken away: and who shall declare his generation? for his life is taken from the earth. And the eunuch answered Philip, and said, I pray thee, of whom speaketh the prophet this? of himself, or of some other man? Then Philip opened his mouth, and began at the same scripture, and preached unto him Jesus. And as they went on their way, they came unto a certain water: and the eunuch said, See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be baptized? And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. And he commanded the chariot to stand still: and they went down both into the water, both Philip and the eunuch; and he baptized him. And when they were come up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord caught away Philip, that the eunuch saw him no more: and he went on his way rejoicing. But Philip was found at Azotus: and passing through he preached in all the cities, till he came to Caesarea. – Acts 8:26-40

These verses are at the end of a passage of true revival. Philip was preaching in a big way, and multitude after multitude were turning Christ. To the human eye, it would seem that Philip was exactly where he needed to be. Things were going well. People were getting saved. But God had other plans for Philip, and those plans included leaving the crowd and going to witness to one man. Philip’s response to this change of plans is what makes him a model believer for each of us.

1. He was so in touch with God that He heard when God spoke. I don’t know about you, but when I feel the nudge to do something, I often have to wonder if it’s God speaking or my flesh. Does God really want me to stay home and write, or is that just what my flesh wants? Was it really God’s voice that I heard? According to the passage above, Philip didn’t have any such problem. When God spoke, Philip knew exactly who was speaking and jumped to obey, which leads us to our next point.

2. He obeyed immediately. Philip didn’t argue with the Lord. He could have. He could have said, “But Lord, look at the good work I’m doing here. These people are really listening to me, and they’re getting saved. There’s more work to do here. Surely, You don’t want me to leave all these people so that I can go win one man. It just doesn’t make sense.” It probably didn’t make sense to Philip, but he obeyed anyway. Without complaint. Without argument. Without trying to rationalize the decision. God directed, and Philip obeyed.

3. He was anxious to do God’s will. When God gave Philip instructions, not only did Philip obey, but he showed an eagerness to comply. The Bible says that he ran to the chariot. When was the last time we were so excited to do God’s work that we ran to accomplish the task?

4. He was prepared with the Gospel. When the Ethiopian eunuch asked for help in understanding what he was reading, Philip was ready with an answer. He was studied up and prayed up. He was acting in the power of God and knew that God would supply the words needed to win this soul to Christ. Not only did he have to be willing, but he had to be prepared. He had to know what he was talking about. Do we?

5. He was persistent. At the very end of the passage, we see where Philip is caught away and “transported” to another place. So, what does he do then? Simple. He does the same thing he’s been doing all along. He picks up right where he left off–preaching the Gospel. He never misses a beat. He knows what he’s been called to do, and he’s persistent in seeing that it gets done.

There’s a lot more that could be seen about Philip, but there was enough in just this one passage to fill a post. Philip was not perfect. He made mistakes just like the rest of us do. But Philip had some character traits that we would do well to imitate. It could mean the difference between finding joy in the journey or being weary in well-doing.

Will the real preachers please stand up! Who is with me in these last days? Who is willing to rise up and proclaim Repent for the Kingdom of God? Who is willing to see righteousness restored in our nation? Who is willing to worship Jesus as… not only Savior but King of Kings of Lord and Lords? Who will stand with me and proclaim revival on this nation? Who will preach with power and authority in these last days? Who will STAND? Is there anyone who wants REVIVAL? Is there anyone sickened by the utter stench of wickedness that is pervading our country? Is there anyone burdened over lost souls? Oh God, I am burdened! I am crying out for one last move of your Spirit! I am crying out for Reformation! Oh God remember the remnant in this country who still love you and still want your presence! Oh God, I pray that you will put someone under the burden tonight! God use me and other men to be voices of righteousness and revival! Oh God save souls! Forgive us of our iniquities! I am tired of the status quo church service where people are more concerned about what time it is instead of the Spirit moving! Oh God stir us up! Remove the Apathy and the Indifference that is plaguing our churches! Forget the programs and all the methodologies of Church Growth! We need you Oh God! Burn away the chaff and infiltrate our hearts and our lives Oh God! Spirit of the Living God have your way!

How to Save Our Country – Taking America Back

No matter where you are on the political spectrum, you know this country has problems.  Violence, unemployment, poverty, and many other things are causing many to wonder what’s wrong, and how our country can be saved.

Before I answer that, let me ask a question.  Could imperfect man ever build a perfect system?  No, not totally perfect.

The Bible tells us that “If my people, which are called by My name, will humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from Heaven, and I will forgive their sin, and I will heal their land.” (2 Chron. 7:14)  Now, this promise was for Israel specifically – America is not called by God’s name.

We are, however, very blessed, and we have had great Revivals in the past. The question is, how do we have them again? We can find things in that verse, and apply them to us, because God is rich in His mercy. We are not a chosen nation. Still, those in our country who have put their trust in Jesus Christ as personal Savior can rest on one important thing. God is unchanging. And, He has blessed us despite our sins before this.

That unchanging nature, and his gifts before this, show why we know He can come to help now; it’s not the verse that tells us that.  The verse simply guides us toward how we must be to cause Him to hear.

My people

In this case, we apply it to mean Christians.  We must take back America the only way possible; on our knees.  Only God can fix what’s wrong.  Only His people, who have the indwelling Holy Spirit, can have their prayers heard to do that. Christians are called by his name, so we can pray for this land.

Humble ourselves and pray

We must never go to God insisting on our rights. We are to go boldly before the throne of grace (Heb. 4:16), but we must also be humble, asking in faith but trusting in God’s perfect will to be done. Remember that God will always resist the proud, and give grace to the humble. We must accept we don’t have all the answers. Imperfect man can never build the perfect system.

When we humble ourselves, we must do like in Daniel chapter 9.  We must accept that we have sinned as a nation – but not just in the last few years.  We sinned as a nation for 200+ years.  See, here is the difference between the liberals and Godly people. Liberals want to keep bringing up the past.  God wants to forgive us, and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.  But, in order for God to forgive us, we must *want* Him to forgive us.  That means accepting that we sinned greatly against Him in our treatment of others, our culture was one that often only spoke of Godliness on the outside, though inside our hearts were wicked.  We were selfish in some of the things we sought.  Yes, of course, we sent missionaries to the ends of the earth.  But, we twisted doctrine selfishly to support our own views.  The “curse of Ham,” for instance, was a lie straight from the pits of Hell.  Canaan was the one cursed, he was a part of Ham’s line, and his line got wiped out when the Israelites took the land.  Canaanites had drifted into horrible idolatry, even practicing child sacrifices!  They were judged by God, and that was the end of that curse.

Imagine if Bible believing Christians, 150 years ago, had insisted on Godly behavior toward other races.  We sinned against God, but He wants to wash our sins away.  He wants us to humble ourselves and pray, asking forgiveness for the sinful, selfish attitudes.  He doesn’t want it to be held against us. He wants to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)  In that and other areas, we need to humble ourselves, and admit we are *not* the perfect nation, and never have been.  We’re a *great* nation, but greatness is not perfection.

Seek His face

Next, God says to seek His face.  That means seek who He is – *not* who we think He is – with His Word.  Instead of all the modern Bibles, we can go back to the original King James Version and ignore all the liberal scholars who try to change it so often while removing thousands and thousands of words.  But, we must remember something else.

Seeking His face means that we seek Him for who He is.  He is all-present, but there is a difference between His being everywhere and His being everything.  His being everywhere is just the attribute of omnipresence.  His being everything is a false doctrine that we must get rid of.  We need His Spirit to cleanse us and get false doctrine out, but He can do it.  Only if we seek His face, though.  He is not a pantheistic deity.  He is the Triune God, Who shows Himself in three persons – Father, Son, and Spirit.  He can be talked to directly through prayer.  He lives in each believer through the Spirit.  We should *never* mistake other religions for Christianity.  Christianity really isn’t a religion like others, because all religions are about man trying to reach up and please god.  However, true Christianity is about God reaching down to us, sinful people for whom He died for our sins and rose bodily from the dea! Hallelujah!

Turn from our wicked ways

We must put God at the center of our hearts, as individuals, and as a nation.  We must repent, and let Him change us on the inside, and then seek for Him to do the same to others, and for others, in this land.

What do we repent of?  We need to ask the Lord to touch our hearts, and show us *every* problem area, and we must commit to changing that to conform to His will, which is perfect.  We must also seek Him for every area of our nation’s sins, and cry out for His forgiveness there.

Now, He won’t tell us to give up everything; each person is called to do something different, and someone whose ministry is on the Internet will surely be called to stay in it – but they should still dedicate that computer or whatever to the Lord.  Others, who use the Internet for sinful purposes, will feel called to give it up.  But, remember, God will give them something far more satisfying in the long run.

See, this is all about accepting that He is sovereign, and knows what’s beat for each of us.  He wants us to follow Him, but He doesn’t want us to be mindless robots.  He wants us to have free choice.

But, He’s also telling us that by refusing to turn from our wicked ways, we sacrifice blessings and rewards.

Part of those wicked ways is in our attitude.  It’s not just an attitude that we put other things ahead of God, it’s that we selfishly put ourselves before anything.  We must remember the old Sunday School acrostic – true joy is in this order – Jesus, Others, You. We must act that out in our lives, and show others who Jesus is in our actions.

And, if we do all this, praying without ceasing – alays being in an attitude of prayer – we can call upon the Lord, in faith, and expect Him to:

1. Hear from heaven.  He gives grace to the humble.  He’ll hear that prayer, because the person is praying from an attitude of true need.

2. Forgive their sin.  If we confess our sin, He is just and faithful to forgive us of our sin, and cleanse uf from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)  When he forgives, He remembers it *no more*

3. Heal their land: And, this one is really special.

See, the Holy Spirit was not free to roam in Old Testament times because the curse of sin hadn’t been broken.  But, when Jesus died on the cross, the veil in the temple was torn from top to bottom, and the Glory of God was free to spread around the world. (Matt. 27:51)  What this means is, He is freer today than He was.

We need to pray not just for our land to be healed, but for a great repentance revival to break out.  We must pray for hearts to be changed.  We can pray for so much more now, and He will give us, as in the past.

See, the Great Awakenings that came in the past, all the great repentance revivals, came about *despite* our nation’s sins.  God is unchanging.  We should never go to God and insist on something.  But, we can certainly humbly note that as we speak to God about our sins, and the sins of the nation as a whole.

And, above all, pray without ceasing for that repentance revival.  Pray without ceasing for the unsaved to get saved, and pray with specifics about each situation you can think of.  But, let it begin with us.