Daily Devotional January 29 - Principles Of Power

 "He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength.  Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall:  But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."  Isaiah 40:29-31

Principles of power:

1st principle of power: Making a decision to spend time alone with God.

2nd Principle of power: Making a deliberate, firm and irreversible (YES) decision to do what God says prior to going to God in prayer.

 If you really want power in your life, you will have to do it God's way.  God does not issue His power to those whom He knows will throw it away, not His power.  There is other power available and some of it looks good, but God's power is easily recognized:
 God's power doesn't require a certain setting like when all the cameras are on or when the right people are present.
God's power is not performed by slight of hand. God works through yielded vessels, not self-proclaimed spiritual iconoclasts.
God's power does not require confirmation from the general assembly.
God gives His power and His gifts severally as He wills, not as 'we wills'.
The power of God cannot be arranged to be captured on film at 9:00 p.m. EST.
God's power proceeds forth from God at His will, on His timing, and the only thing that moves God is a yielded vessel with a YES on their tongue.  YES I will - YES I can - YES, Lord, YES

What moves God is a praise of His glory. 
What moves God is a right view of His Son.
What moves God is a follower of the leading of the Holy Spirit.
What moves God is a prayer of thankfulness, thanking God with real zest for life.
Thankful for who God is.
Thankful for His revelation
Thankful for what we have
 If we spent as much time thanking God for what we have, as we do complaining to God about what we do not have, we would have what we don't have.

What moves God is an act of compassion:
A gift to the poor
A word for the lonely
A song for the weary
What moves God is a heart of worship.
Someone willing to bow the knee.

Submission to His wooing.
Recognition of our powerlessness apart from Him.
A yielded vessel.

The power of God is given to those who have stepped aside and lifted up the name of Jesus above their own. You can tell when a man or a woman is full of themselves or yielded to God. The power of God is through the yielded and never wielded.

Those who are still full of themselves may have charisma and charm, authority, position and sometimes fame. They may be educated and informed. But the power of God is manifested in weakness and humility.

God pressed on me to search this word out, faint, because I always thought it meant the weak-willed, the helpless, those who were despondent and without, but I found out differently.  The word faint as used in the scripture comes from the Hebrew word, (yaw-afe) which means fatigued or utterly exhausted. The faint are not the despondent or weak-willed, but those who are utterly exhausted from their labors.

The power of God is given to the laborers of God to perform the will of God.

The power of God doesn't stop and land on someone, as if, they could then wield the power of God at their own discretion. The power of God flows through a yielded man or woman to produce God results at God's discretion.

God is fed up with the modern prophets and so-called Apostles, some pastors and teachers who are puffed up with pride and self elevation and make a mockery of God's Holy and incorruptible power.

Galatians 6:3 says, "For if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself." 

Those who are still trying out God to see if they really have any interest in continuing with God are not awarded the power of God.

Those in whom God works His mighty power through:
They have stopped testing God.
They are done fighting God.
They have submitted to His will.

It's not that God does not work through others. God works through the ungodly and the unaware. The difference is, that those who adore the Lord - those who are yielded and submitted - they know when God is working in them and through them.

The power of God and the anointed life is for those who have made up their mind that God is who He says He is in the scriptures.
No other kind of faith will do:
Only faith in the Father as revealed in Holy scripture, the Holy Bible.
Faith in Jesus Christ, the Son of God as revealed in Holy scripture, the Holy Bible.
Faith in the Holy Spirit as revealed in Holy scripture, the Holy Bible. (period)

• Seeker faith will not do.
• Show me first faith will not do.
• I love you Lord, but not enough to do something about my situation faith will not do.
• Sunday faith will not do.
• Extra-biblical faith will not do.
• Your spouses faith will not do.
• If it goes my way faith will not do.
• As long as I can believe what I want to faith will not do.
• As long as You don't test me faith, will not do.
• Don't ask me to give up what is mine faith will not do.
• As long as I can continue in my sin faith, will not do.
• As long as I can have control faith, will not do.
• As long as You don't bother me faith, will not do.
• As long as You don't tell me what to do faith, will not do.

Today, even born-again believers and especially young believers are in rebellion to God's Holy Word.
Where did the body of Christ and our teenage believers hear that when we get saved, we get to keep?

Our old self
Our former inclinations
Our unsaved behaviors and attitudes
Where did the body of Christ hear that when we get saved, we get to keep?
Our old ways and
Our old habits
Who was it that taught that it's OK to struggle with the same old habit for twenty-five years?

I hope that you never placate your peers, your friends or your family with a 'feel good because I don't want to hurt their feelings gospel'.

The main reason that most Christians are living below their calling is because they have been taught that it is OK.  It was never OK, nor will it ever be OK, for you and I to think that God saves His people so that they can continue to live the way they used to live. God forbid. I believe that if we were careful to give the gospel, without apology, new believers would seek God's heart and learn of His ways and make every effort to find God and serve Him.

If we were teaching people that YES is the only appropriate answer to our call from God and that YES is the only appropriate answer to the call to His ways, more people would be believing God with unswerving faith - And we wouldn't have to drive to Orlando to get healed either.

Here's the problem. Most people that go to God to get alone, first make a pack with themselves, that if God directs them in something that they don't want to do or go to a place they don't want to go, then they will renege.

They don't mind going to God to get alone as long as God comes through and meets their own particular requirements:
As long as God answers their prayer the way they want it answered.
As long as they aren't kept too long.
As long as God doesn't put them on the spot.
As a matter of fact, for some, as long as God just keeps His place, everything will be alright.

Some people go to God to see what God is going to say, and if God says the right things, they will consider it.  But God is likely to say the wrong thing, if the right thing, is that thing, that we have already made up in our mind about.
If we've already made up our mind that:
We aren't going to go to where God says to go.
We aren't going to be what He called us to be.
We aren't going to do what God tells us to do.
We aren't going to say what God told us to say.
If we've already made up our mind, that what we hear from God, must echo of our own mind........

The only way to hear God clearly is to go to God with an open heart and an open mind and let God place into us, His will.

• If you go to God with and open heart and an open mind, God might tell us to rest.
• If you go to God with and open heart and an open mind, God might tell us to go.
• If you go to God with and open heart and an open mind, God might tell us to give.
• If you go to God with and open heart and an open mind, God might tell us to go to the mission field.

Some of us still think of missionaries as a small group of people who had nothing better to do, but give up everything: they had to move to a remote area to teach the unteachable, while earning their own substance, because they really couldn't get a job anywhere.  No way. Missionaries are simply those who said YES, before God told them what they would be doing.

One night ma and pa were sitting at the edge of the setee and they knelt down to pray and they made the mistake of praying like this, "Oh God, why is this burden on my heart? I feel you tugging on me. What is it you are trying to tell me. Make it clear and I will obey."
"Go to Nairobi"
"Go to Sri Lanka"
"Go to Bangledesh"
"Go to Frankfurt Germany"
"Go to Tajikistan"
"Go to Sydney Australia"
"Go to your family"

And sometimes God calls us to more familiar places.
"Stay where you are for five years. Be faithful and serve in this place."

People go and needs are met when we go to God with a YES, fixed in our heart and on our lips.

If we go to God with and open heart and an open mind, God will use us to accomplish His good pleasure - and sometimes His good pleasure is to intercede for others or to go and do what others have left undone.

Those who are still listening for God to say what they want to hear, have not read the Word, nor do they know the heart of God.

We put too much emphasis on me, myself and I. We sing to God to take us and mold us but we end the song with "as long as it is my way."

Personal fulfillment
Creature comfort security
Financial independence
Material satisfaction
Immediate gratification - take precedence over the call of God.

Too many people are going to God in prayer, primarily for personal fulfillment. There's nothing wrong with expecting God to move on our behalf and to bring to pass what we cannot or to infuse His supernatural power in our natural situation, but personal fulfillment is only a part of the whole truth.

• God does want His people fulfilled. God has proved that to each of us.
• God provides for us and sustains us apart from our own works and abilities.
• God directs us to go this way and that and leads us to follow Him.
• God heals our bodies and heals our emotions.
• God takes away the pangs of the past and gives us hope for the future.
• God fills us with blessings and makes us to prosper.
• God wants His people fulfilled, but personal fulfillment without intercession for others and integration with others is shallow and ultimately un-fulfilling.

God has made available His power for you to operate in, but power isn't always measured in overwhelming success, sometimes there's more power in restraint than misguided action.