-
I think what the Lord has directed me to,
-
and many of you don't have a Bible, and that's fine...
-
Most of you probably know this verse already,
-
It's in Jeremiah, the 33rd chapter, in the 3rd verse
-
and what strikes me about this verse is that
-
we are encouraging you to pray...
-
we encourage our families to pray,
-
we encourage our churches to be fervent in prayer
-
But here, the Lord Himself is encouraging us to pray.
-
This is the Lord's encouragement for us to pray.
-
We should know our God is sovereign.
-
He is all powerful; He calls the end from the beginning,
-
He ordains the end...
-
But He also ordains the means to that end,
-
And the means to the end, one of the means is prayer...
-
it's fervent, effectual, constant prayer of the saints.
-
If God's going to do something, He's going to
-
move His people generally to pray before He does that.
-
In the 32nd chapter here,
-
God is promising Jeremiah some things.
-
Jeremiah is shut up in prison.
-
He is promising him that He is going to
-
take the people of Israel into captivity,
-
but also there in verse 37, He says "I'm going to gather them
-
back out of those countries, whether I have
-
driven them in My anger, and My fury, and My wrath,
-
I'm going to bring them again into this place,
-
I'm going to cause them to dwell safely
-
and they shall be My people, and I will be their God
-
and I will give them one heart, one way that they may
-
fear Me forever, for their good and their children after them,
-
and I will make an everlasting covenant with them."
-
Wonderful promises that are promised to you and I as well.
-
So, Lord, how are You going to do this?
-
He opens up chapter 33, he's still in prison,
-
The Lord comes to Jeremiah again and He tells him
-
how He's going to do this,
-
and here's the verse, verse 3 of chapter 33,
-
He says, "Call unto Me, and I will answer thee,
-
and show thee great and mighty things that you do not know."
-
I'm going to show you great things.
-
I'm going to show you hidden things, that you don't yet know.
-
This is how I'm going to answer My promise to you.
-
These hidden things.
-
So, He commands us to pray.
-
"Call unto Me."
-
This is encouragement for us to pray, brethren.
-
"Call unto Me."
-
Can you imagine, the Almighty God, the God of Heaven,
-
the Sovereign One, the Eternal One, Jehovah God,
-
the self-existent God speaking to you and saying,
-
"Call unto Me."
-
And we might bring this to our level...
-
"Give Me a call."
-
"Call me."
-
You know I love it when my daughter or my son says,
-
"Dad, call me. I need to talk to you."
-
They don't do that very often, but I like that.
-
This is our God saying, "Call Me."
-
"Call unto Me and I will answer you."
-
Not only I will answer you, but I'm going to show you
-
some great and hidden things that you don't yet know.
-
Now here we are at this conference,
-
who knows what the Lord may do?
-
Often times, seed is sown and it's weeks, months...
-
even years before the fruit comes forth,
-
but don't you have an expectation here?
-
This is what this verse says,
-
"Call unto Me and I'll answer you."
-
This should be our expectation as we call upon the Lord.
-
You're going to answer us, God, You promised.
-
And not only that, You're going to enable us to experience something.
-
Now we're not here just to go through the motions I hope...
-
I hope we're here to experience God.
-
What do we want to see?
-
We want to see God working in our own lives personally,
-
We want to make advances; we want to reach higher ground, brethren.
-
We want to be more faithful than we were when we got here.
-
We want to go home with our wagons loaded,
-
and walking in the light that God gives us.
-
But we want to see this in our families, and in our marriages,
-
and in our churches.
-
What a blessing last night was!
-
Practical, real helps for the people of God.
-
So, how's this all going to happen?
-
Well, pray.
-
"Call unto Me. I'll answer you and I'll show you
-
great and mighty things that you have not yet seen."
-
Paul says it this way in the New Testament:
-
"Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
-
neither has it entered into the heart of man
-
the things that God has revealed to those that love Him.
-
Who knows what the Lord may do?
-
Who knows what great things the Lord is going to reveal
-
to each of us, through prayer,
-
through conversations that we might have
-
with others, through fellowship, through singing,
-
through encouragements; God breaking strongholds of sin,
-
God opening eyes...
-
You know I've had many conversations through the years,
-
And someone will share something with me,
-
and it's just like the voice of God has spoken...
-
I hear. I hear. I understand.
-
And so, let us pray, brethren. God is encouraging us to pray.
-
"Call unto Me. I will answer you, and I'm going to show you
-
great and hidden things that you don't even know yet."
-
And when we leave here, we go home, next week, next month...
-
maybe we can raise an Ebenezer
-
and say, "Lord, You've brought me this far...
-
and You've used even this weekend,
-
this conference, these prayer meetings,
-
these preaching meetings, these conversations,
-
these times of fellowship...
-
You've used this to advance Your kingdom."
-
And it's a very easy verse to remember. Call 333. Jeremiah 33:3.
-
"Call unto Me. I will answer you and show you
-
great and mighty things that you don't know."