Lessons from 70 years of ministry: ‘What I have received I passed on to you as of first importance.’ (Part 2) Available on iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, YouTube.
I want to share with you something that God has been saying strongly to ME since 1992 and which is powerfully motivating MY life. And I want to give YOU the same strong spiritual challenge which Moses gave to Israel in Deuteronomy 4:32 – “Ask now of the days that are past, since the day that God created man on the earth, and ask from the one side of Heaven to the other, WHETHER THERE HAS BEEN ANY SUCH THING AS THIS GREAT THING IS, OR HAS BEEN HEARD LIKE IT?” I have not found any other man who could make a statement as strong as this, that Israel had witnessed the greatest miracle ever! Yes, this was 3000 years ago, but I believe that it also relates to today, and will be EXCEEDED in Russia – which is why I evangelise there!
“For ask now concerning the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created man on the earth, and ask from one end of heaven to the other, whether any great thing like this has happened, or anything like it has been heard. Did any people ever hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as you have heard, and live? Or did God ever try to go and take for Himself a nation from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by great [a]terrors, according to all that the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes?” (Deuteronomy 4:32-34, NKJV)
At the time of speaking, Moses is 120 years old, but forty years before this something had happened which brought a bigger change to the nation of Israel than anything ever experienced in any nation before or since – the moment when God, for the first time, began to demonstrate the greatness of His power by working the most outstanding, visible miracles in front of the most powerful nation in the whole earth.
Moses asks the people a question in two dimensions – time and space. First Moses says, from the very beginning of time until now, has anyone ever witnessed a miracle as big as this, the biggest, most earth-shaking demonstration of God’s power ever seen? Secondly Moses says, ask the question in space, from one side of the world to the other, from America to Russia, from the north to the south – in the whole world – has ever any man seen a greater miracle than this happen, visibly, on earth? The answer is no! It is the greatest miracle ever. And it happened just forty years ago. What was it?
This is the background: God chose a baby, born to a slave woman, who became the son of the king’s daughter by the plan of God. Later, he saw an Egyptian beating one of his fellow Israelites and killed him. As a result he fled Egypt to escape justice; married, had a family, looked after sheep and worked for his father-in-law until he was 80 years old; now suddenly God called this man, saying, “Go back to the place that you came from, challenge the greatest leader in the world, the most powerful nation on earth, demand that they release your persecuted, suffering people, command Pharaoh to let them go!”
Because Moses gave every possible reason why he could not do it, God had to use a lot of persuasion before Moses would agree – but then God said, “When you go, I will cause Pharaoh to rebel, he will not listen to you or do what you say, he will fight against you with all his strength! I am calling you to do something, which I Myself am going to make absolutely impossible! I will cause him to refuse you, and make him stronger than ever in his anger against you – why? So that I can then demonstrate that I am God by destroying the power of Pharaoh and delivering My people – and this will not be with human power. Instead I will demonstrate on the face of the earth the power of an Almighty God, such as has never been seen before – the greatest miracles ever seen!” Here God is dealing with the most powerful nation in the world at that time, the Egyptian Empire. The Jewish people were slaves under that system – and God had said that He would deliver the whole nation of Israel! It was impossible!
Can you understand, God chose an 80-year old man, born into a slave family, yet brought up in the king’s palace, who became a murderer, fled from the nation and spent his life as a shepherd looking after sheep in the desert! God told him, I have chosen YOU to go to Pharaoh and tell him to release all his slaves, empty the prison camps, set more than two million people free! Moses protested – I can’t do it, I’m not an ambassador, I’m not a statesman, I’m an outcast, I ran away from this nation because they were going to kill me for murder. All I have done for the past forty years is keep sheep!
Yet this man Moses had an experience with God – he had met God in the fire – and that fire came into HIM, transforming HIM, and now God takes the reluctant hero and commands HIM to do the impossible! This experience Moses had with God was so powerful, he could not refuse to obey! If only our encounters with God were as powerful and life-changing as this man’s was! BUT after God commanded Moses, He warned him that Pharaoh would NOT listen to him and would NOT release Israel! What a shock! The only preparation for Moses was that he had met with God in the fire. Now he has a job he doesn’t want – and God says, Pharaoh will NOT do what you ask! God actually says, I will MAKE him refuse you!
The only qualifications Moses had were the fire and the command of God! And with those two things the whole life of Moses – and the nation – were transformed!
Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible. (Matthew 19:26, KJV)
I want to challenge you to dream the dreams of the impossible, get a vision of the God of the impossible, who can do what no man can do, the God who has more power than any president, any army, any government, any financial corporation on the face of the earth – the God who is in control – and the God who will fulfil every promise, He will give you the command and the fire! I want you to dream until it becomes a vision and a reality. I want you to see the Power and the Glory of God as Moses saw it!
The prophet Jeremiah (16:14) speaks about the FUTURE, when he says that something is about to happen: “Behold the days come, says the Lord, that it shall no more be said, the Lord lives that brought up the children out of the land of Egypt. God says, there will come a day in the future when everything in the Bible will be eclipsed by the light of the miracle that I am about to do. Your past will be nothing, compared with what I am going to do – don’t look at the past, look at the future!”
“I tell you the truth, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done, and even greater works, because I am going to be with the Father.” (John 14:12, NLT)
God is pouring out the Holy Spirit, working miracles, greater than anything seen in the Bible. That’s why, even when I see the sick healed night after night, I still go home and weep and shed tears, because this is not yet the full power of God that I am waiting to see. This move of God will only begin when men and women come again into the fire and the power of God. God can use YOU - to show His power on earth!
‘Peace like a River’ used by kind permission of www.vinesong.com