Living in Times of Crisis

Let us turn to the word of the Lord in the Book of Second Kings, chapter 4. And we are going to continue with the theme we began a couple of Sundays ago ("Living in Times of Normalcy"), which was based on the life of this wonderful woman whom we call the Shunammite. Why do we call her the Shunammite? Can anyone tell me? Because where did she live, in what city? Shunem. Everyone say, "Shunem." And that is why she was called the Shunammite. It was a city in Israel, and the prophet Elisha went there to stay in her home.

A couple of Sundays ago we began that sermon, and the Lord changed the direction of the sermon I had originally planned. I had shared another teaching based on that text in the morning; but you will remember that the Lord stopped me there, at that moment when Elisha, moved by the generosity of this woman—who had offered him a room in her home so that whenever he went on his missionary journeys and passed through that city, he could stay at her house and have a quiet place there to go and rest—

And that image is so beautiful, where it says, "She wanted there to be a desk, a lamp, a chair, a bed..." She thought about the details; she wanted this man to be comfortable.

She put these things there, and it touched Elisha’s heart. Elisha called her, and that was when the Lord sort of "hijacked the sermon," and Elisha said to her, "You know what? You have been so attentive to our comfort; you have been so meticulous in caring for us. Is there anything we can do to help you? Would you like me to go to the government authorities and arrange a meeting for you with the general of this region so that, if you need anything, it can be provided for you? Or would you like me to speak to the king, or is there something special you need me to do for you?" And what was her response? "I dwell among my own people."

She did not mean to be rude to the prophet. What did she mean by that? "Do not worry, Mr. Prophet; I am fine. I have my people around me; I am with my family, among my people, in my city. I have what I need. Thank you, but I am fine. What I have done, I have done out of love for God and out of love for you, who are a servant of God."

And God stopped me there, and remember that I spoke about what it means to "dwell among one’s people." God called me to share with you about the importance of being a community as a church. We should not merely be like ships passing in the night: we come for a little while, sit down, and there is someone beside me whom I neither know, nor know who they are, nor care about; then we leave, and there is no sense of family. I also spoke about the importance of maintaining good relationships with the brothers and sisters in the church, right? When there is tension, when there is friction, when there is a disagreement, quickly seek reconciliation. Ask forgiveness, forgive, be generous.

If the person beside you sings off-key, forgive them, or ask the Lord to give them a better ear. Do not be saying, "When will this rascal leave so that I can sing the way I am supposed to?" Bless that person, and remember that when that praise reaches the throne of God, it sounds in stereo with all the... God has purified it. Let us seek to be tolerant people. Let us watch over one another.

I was thinking this week: Do you know when you know that you are sanctified? When there is a meal, a buffet, and you serve yourself what you need while thinking that the brother beside you also needs to get a little food. What happens? At those meals, we first serve ourselves everything we can, and whoever comes afterward—well, that is their problem.

There goes all our sanctification; there go all our values; there goes everything.

And I say that when you see a congregation whose members watch over one another, there is a people who understand and who have truly been touched by the presence of God. In those moments when we are a community, when we dwell among our people, when there are good relationships in the home, there is also your family... How does your family see you? Do they see you as an agent of peace and reconciliation? Or do they say, "Here comes so-and-so; everybody run before he starts talking. Because whenever he talks, everything gets ruined"?

And how wonderful it is when you arrive at a relative’s home and people say, "Wow! It is so good that you came! Because the blessing has arrived, joy has arrived, service has arrived." That is so beautiful. I give thanks to the Lord.

I am going to take a moment. My sister Nancy is a woman who serves; she is a woman with a servant’s heart. And when Nancy comes to the house, she is the last one to leave because she starts washing the dishes—if there has been a meal, or whatever the case may be. She is a woman devoted to service, and it is a blessing to have her in the house because she also brings the joy of the Lord to us. But she is also a woman who serves, and she serves simply because that is what she does, if you understand what I am telling you. And that is beautiful, isn’t it?

Dwelling among the people, dwelling in the midst of the people. Always be mindful, because we Christians are mindful of the vertical but not of the horizontal, and that is one of the great problems among the people of God.

Sometimes we are tremendous when it comes to praise, tongues, gifts... all the things that have to do with God; but as for our brother... let lightning strike him—we do not care; that is his problem. I serve my God. And we need to be very mindful of that dimension.

I always emphasize the horizontal dimension of the Christian life. Remember that the cross points upward, but it also extends to the sides. Amen.

And so this is very important: that we have that proper horizontal dimension.

And this woman said, "No, I dwell among my own people," and that is so important.

So, brothers and sisters, it is important. I paused there because I felt that the Lord—and in fact, there was a great blessing when that word came; several brothers and sisters told me, "Pastor, that word marked our life as a church." I feel that the Lord wanted that word to take root.

But of course, there are so many things we can say about this passage and about this precious woman. And you know what? Right now I am undecided about whether to continue with the sermon I preached this morning about this woman... but look... let me go back a little, and we are going to read verse 18, and then I will continue from there. All right, let us leave it that way. God will allow me to tie this sermon together however He wishes.

Elisha blesses this woman with the gift of a son. She had never had children in her entire life; her husband was already advanced in years, and they had never been able to have children. As a result of her attentiveness toward the prophet, Elisha insists. After she says, "You know what? I do not need anything," Elisha says, "No, but we have to bless this woman," and he prophesies that by the following year, at that same time, she will be holding a son in her arms.

And it is when you serve, when you give to the Lord, that God will be attentive to you. Blessing will come into your life.

Now let us pick up the account here in chapter 4, verse 18, and it says, "And the child grew." That baby whom Elisha had prophesied grew; he was now a child of perhaps six or seven years old. It says, "But one day he went out to his father, who was with the reapers..." His father was apparently a farmer; they had an agricultural business. He had employees and was working in the fields. It was perhaps noon, probably, or something like that, and the child came to where his father was and said to his father, "Oh, my head, my head!" And the father said to a servant, "Carry him to his mother."

Listen, stop there for a moment.

I paused there this morning. I had never noticed that before, but look: to whom does he send the child when he is sick? To his mother. And I was saying to the fathers, to the men, "Brothers, take care of your children too. Do not let the mother be the only one who attends to the children’s problems." "Oh! Take him to his mother so she can care for him. I am at work."

Every father, every dad, has a calling to care about his children, to love his children, and to give his children fatherly warmth. Whether it is a little girl or a boy: "Dad, show them warmth and attend to your children." Do not put everything on the mother. The care, the education, the affection—no! You give your children affection; you concern yourself with your child.

This man, in contrast to the Shunammite woman, who represents the very vitality of spiritual life—a woman attentive to the things of God, a woman mindful of and concerned about the things of the Lord—is immortalized in the Bible as a man who is, to a certain extent, indifferent.

He is what they call a "non-entity." While this woman represents passion, this man highlights something like carelessness and spiritual mediocrity. When his son comes to him dying, he says to the servants, "Take him to his mother so his mother can care for him."

I am sure that he loved his son.

But how many of us men often neglect our children and think, "Well, since their mother takes care of them, I do not have to be so..." No, brothers! I believe that children need to see a father committed to the Lord, one who leads his household as a priest of God, as a servant of God, and who is as spiritually alive as his wife.

Unfortunately, in the church of Jesus Christ throughout the centuries and in every culture, women have often taken the spiritual lead while we men have lagged behind. How sad that is! What a loss! Especially when the Lord has asked men to be like priests in their homes.

I ask the young people who will have children in the future, or the young fathers, "Make a vow to God that your children will see a dad who is attentive to the things of the Lord." A dad who, when Sunday comes, will be the first one gently hurrying his family along so that they arrive at church on time.

He will be attentive, so that when the Wednesday prayer meeting comes, he goes there to pray; so that when there is a special event, he will be the first one eager to impart the glory of God to his household. Let us not be indifferent in that regard. Let us not relegate the care of our children to the mother. That is an unpaid message; it is a secondary part of the sermon, but it occurred to me at this moment, right?

This child says to his father, "Oh, my head, my head!" And the father says, "Take him to his mother."

"And when he had picked him up and brought him to his mother, he sat on her lap until noon..." And what happened to the child? He died. Here is another very important lesson.

Brothers and sisters, one wonders: How is it possible that, if God gave this child to this woman... she was not asking for him; she had already reached a mature age; she had already adjusted to her barrenness and to not being a mother; and God actively activates her womb, activates her husband’s reproductive capacity, and they have this son in their advancing years? And now this son, like any other human being, becomes sick and dies.

And I ask myself, what logic is there behind this?

I could understand how perhaps a child born in the ordinary way, like any other child, might be subject to the ups and downs of life and might become sick and die. But a child actively ordained by God? Brought forth from old age and barrenness and called into life by the Spirit of God—and then that child dies and... It is important, brothers and sisters: many times we wish that the gifts of God, the provisions of God, came with a lifetime warranty and also with an extended service contract, so that nothing would happen to them and there would be no problems at all.

And what I see, brothers and sisters, is that, look, many things are going to come in life: situations, trials, difficulties, crises in our lives that are not going to make sense. There are even things God will have given you that you will later lose or that will enter into crisis.

And you will have to ask yourself whether, at that moment, you are going to say, "You know what? God does not make sense; God does not care about my life; God is false in His promises, so I am going to turn away from Him," or whether you are going to say, "I know that God has a purpose in this, and I am going to wait until the Lord makes clear what He is seeking to accomplish through this." And you will also go and seek the solution to your problem in God.

And you will wait until the Lord answers you and makes clear what He wants in your life.

Because, brothers and sisters, let me tell you: just because we are in God’s will, because we are serving the Lord, because God has blessed us, that does not mean there will be no tribulations in our lives. Difficulties will come; testing circumstances will come. And at that moment you will have to decide, "You know what? No matter what happens, I am going to remain firmly attached to the promise of my God, and I am going to seek to strengthen that promise in my life."

Because afflictions come, trials come; that is part of daily living, part of the human condition.

I was also thinking about what the apostle Paul himself says in Ephesians chapter 6, where he tells us to "put on the whole armor of God." For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

There is a struggle in life; there is an enemy who will want to snatch away the blessings God has brought into your life. We are at war; we live in a sinister world, brothers and sisters.

God is not the only player in this stadium. There is a whole evil host in this world that wants to steal, kill, destroy, and sow misery and tragedy in our lives, and it will try to steal our blessings. And we have to be alert, we have to be vibrant, we have to be filled with the energy of the Holy Spirit. We have to be prepared so that when the trial comes, instead of collapsing and being filled with panic, we know where we have to go to find the answer we need.

Because anything can happen to any one of us. Even if you are at the very center of God’s will—perhaps all the more reason for the enemy to try to make you stumble and bring affliction into your life.

So you have to do as the Apostle Paul says in that same passage of Ephesians 6. He says that “We have to put on the whole armor of God: the breastplate of faith, the shield of the Word, the sword—I don’t know whether it is the shield of the Word or the sword of the Word; I think it is one of those things—the point is, the sword, the shield, the helmet of salvation, the footwear of the Gospel.” We have to put on all these things, every part of the Christian life, brothers and sisters. We have to be filled with the anointing of the Spirit.

We have to stock up on everything God has provided. The Word of the Lord says, “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but what? Mighty in God for the destruction of strongholds.” Hallelujah.

And we have to fill ourselves with God’s anointing so that, as the Apostle Paul says there, when the evil day comes, “so that when the evil day comes, we may stand firm,” and he says, “And having gone through everything, to stand firm.” That phrase “stand firm” is a phrase that means—the Apostle Paul was using an image from Roman warfare: when the enemy came to attack a soldier, the soldier held his post, held his ground. He did not move from it, and when that avalanche of attack had passed, he was still standing firm in his place, defending his position. And that is the idea behind that phrase.

When crisis comes into your life, when the problem comes, when the enemy comes like a flood to snatch away God’s blessing, at that time you have to stand firmly on what God has promised, on what God has spoken over your life.

And you have to remain there, hold that position. Many times, all a man or woman of God needs to do is stand on what God has said. You do not have to go around looking for the devil, attacking him and goading him. I believe what you need to do most is simply stand firm.

The Word says, “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.”

There are moments in life—look, a spell of suffering may come into your life, and it is important to recognize when those moments come into our lives. It may be a time of illness. The doctor tells you, ‘You know what? You have an illness, and we are going to have to give you chemotherapy, or you will have to begin a strict regimen involving a drastic diet, or you will have to change your lifestyle, and your life will no longer be the same, and you have to do this and you have to do that.’ And at that moment you have to say, ‘You know what? The evil day is coming into my life, but I am going to remain firmly attached to the Word of God.

It is time to put on the whole armor of God, time to take those truths I learned at other times in my life and apply them now.’ We have to recognize when those times come into our lives. It may be a time of family difficulty; it may be a time when the enemy covers you with a shadow of depression; it may be a time when a child becomes rebellious, and the little boy who was so lovely and so obedient suddenly enters adolescence, and it is as though there were a monster in the house and you do not know where it came from.

What must we do in those times? Recognize that moment and say, ‘This is the evil day the Word speaks about, and instead of starting to scream and panic, what I am going to do is use the whole armor of God.’ And you gird up your loins through prayer, fasting, searching the Word of God, and confessing what God has spoken over your life. Claim what God has promised in your life, and you know what? That time passes like—right now it comes like when… you open an oven in which heat has been building up, and sometimes you have seen that… on a couple of occasions I have seen it almost explode, with smoke coming out and a wave of heat bursting forth.

That is often what happens in our lives: there is a sort of wave of heat that passes, and you have to be prepared for the moment when it comes. You have two choices—I believe that for many believers, when those evil days come, what God has given us dies, and the devil comes to snatch away what God has proclaimed over our lives. The question is, what are we going to do in those moments? And how are we going to confront the devil who wants to destroy our marriages, destroy our children, destroy our finances, destroy our health, destroy our emotions, and remind us of every mistake we have made?

He wants to thrust us into a life of depression or anxiety or guilt or resentment or whatever it may be, and you have to say, ‘You are not going to get through here. I am going to stand on what God has promised, and I am going to bolt my feet to the Word of God. You can roar and throw all the stones you want. I am going to stand firm on what God has declared.’

And you begin to press the enemy with your prayer, with your confession, with your declaration that God is faithful and that God makes sense even if your own senses deny it. You say, ‘No! I know that my Redeemer lives. I know that He is good. I know that He is not slumbering.’

“He who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep,” says the Word of the Lord. And when you hold on while the devil roars and the storm tears the roof off the house, perhaps when it is all over, all that may remain of your old house will be two or three little sticks.

Once the storm has passed, what do you do then? When calm returns, build your house again. Go back and put boards on those pillars once more.

And you know what? “Your second house will be better than the first,” says the Lord.

Brothers and sisters, trials will come, difficulties will come, struggles will come into our lives. You will have at least three, four, or five episodes of severe trials and difficulties in your life. I do not believe there is a believer worth his salt who does not have five or six scars he can show from where the devil struck him with a stone or slashed him with a sword. Just as with a warrior, there is no general worthy of his stars who cannot say that he has been in battle several times and perhaps was wounded, or was afraid, or that the enemy came seeking to destroy him. That is part of life, and it will come, and you should not be surprised by it.

Do not be surprised when trials come into your life, as though God were being inconsistent with you. The fact is that if you are in God, if you are in this world, you will have affliction, and the devil will come like a bear or a lion and try to snatch away what God has given you; and you have to fill yourself with the power of the Holy Spirit. You have to use times of prosperity and tranquility to fill yourself with God’s provision. Your oil has to be overflowing, and when that fierce spell comes, you need to have enough oil so that a great deal can be consumed and there will still be enough left when the next blessing comes.

Fill the vessel again. We are people of war; we live in a sinister world, and we always need to be in that position. When the devil comes to snatch away what God has given you, make sure you have what you need to confront the enemy and that your faith does not falter. Many of us collapse when the time of drought comes because we were weak, and we need that.

This morning the Lord brought to my mind the image of David when he was going to fight Goliath, and David had to convince Saul—an experienced warrior—that he, a young man who had never been to war, had what it took to confront Goliath. And look at what David says to Saul in 1 Samuel chapter 17. It says here in verse 33: ‘Saul said to David, “You cannot go against that Philistine to fight him, because you are only a boy, while he has been a man of war from his youth.”’

Physically, David could never have faced an experienced warrior who stood more than eight feet tall. Impossible! And Saul was only looking at this boy who, although he was a strong young man, could never face a man who had been fighting all his life and had every conceivable advantage: size, experience, weight, cunning; Goliath had it all. And here was this inexperienced young man.

Look at how David answers Saul in verse 34 of 1 Samuel 17: ‘David answered Saul: “Your servant used to tend his father’s sheep, and whenever a lion or a bear came and took a lamb from the flock, I went out after it and struck it and rescued the lamb from its mouth; and if it rose against me, I seized it by the jaw, struck it, and killed it.

Whether it was a lion or a bear, your servant killed it, and this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, because he has defied the army of the living God.” David added, “Jehovah, who delivered me from the claws of the lion and the claws of the bear, will also deliver me from the hand of this Philistine.”’

Glory to the Lord.

Brothers and sisters, can we speak that way in our lives when the devil wants to snatch a child away from you—as he came to snatch one away from David in the form of a sheep or a lion? When the devil comes to snatch away the peace in your home, when the devil comes to snatch away your health or emotional stability, or to wreak havoc in your life, embitter your heart, fill you with resentment, or impoverish your life in some way, do you have what it takes to break the lion’s or the bear’s jaw and carry your little sheep—your inheritance, your blessing—home intact?

That is what we have to ask Him. I ask Him, ‘Lord, help us so that when crisis comes into our lives, instead of lying down to die, we may confront the bear and the lion and snatch away from them what they want to take from our lives.’ And that requires having the necessary vitality.

One of the things I see in this woman is that during times of normalcy she stored up reserves for the time of crisis. When her son died, she was spiritually and emotionally prepared. She knew what she had to do; she received revelation from God about where the solution to her problem lay. Instead of saying, “Oh, my son!” and hurling protests at God and losing her faith, she immediately set out to find the solution. And how do we know that was the case? Because we have already seen her. Because when everything was fine in her home, her business was running smoothly, her marriage was going well, she had already reached a calm maturity and was content with not being a mother.

It is clear that she was a spiritually vibrant woman. When that man of God passed by her house, she immediately urged him to stay there because she knew that wherever God’s blessing was, prosperity and stability were there as well. “She persistently invited the prophet to stay in her house,” the Bible says. She knew that she had to seek that presence of God in her life and in her home, and that if this prophet, who was a servant of God and carried the vitality of the Spirit, lodged in her house, it would be a blessing.

She invested, and it says that the prophet came and stayed in her house, and “then, not content with that, she said, ‘You know what? Evidently, he passes through here several times a year. Let us prepare a room for him; let us prepare an office for him so that when he arrives and passes through here, he will not simply have to stay in another bedroom, perhaps feeling uncomfortable among the family. Let us make life comfortable for him and build an addition onto the house for him. Let us prepare a room where he can be comfortable, and let us make sure he has what he needs.’” Let us install an Internet connection there so that he will not have to keep asking for one; let us provide everything for him: a good telephone, a computer, so that he can be at ease there in his own space.

She thought about the specific things, was attentive, and wanted to invest in the Lord.

She was a woman who clearly loved God, and that is important, brothers and sisters. When your life is going well and everything is normal, when there are no clouds in the sky, the bills are paid, and your health is stable, that is the best time for you to cultivate a life of spiritual vitality: to pray regularly, read the Word of God regularly, and attend your discipleship classes. There is another unpaid advertisement for the discipleship class.

Grow in the knowledge of the Word of God, fill yourself with the anointing, do a little fast every now and then, and fill yourself with the anointing.

How many of us… what happens? We become spiritual… when? When we are in the trench and the bullets are whistling past our heads. Then we are spiritual giants; then we seek divine intervention, cry out, begin fasting, and become spiritual titans.

Brothers and sisters, let me tell you: the best time to cry out, grow, and seek God’s blessing is during times of normalcy.

We have to be like Joseph, who in the years of the fat cows—what did he do? He stored up wheat, food, because he knew that the times of the lean cows, famine, and drought were also coming. And when those times came, he needed to have his granaries full so he could give food to the people when there was none. And that is how we have to be.

Look, if God is giving you a time of rest, refreshment, blessing, joy, and prosperity, that is the best time, when everything is calm, for you to fill your satchel with God’s blessing. Serve the Lord, give to the Lord, pray to the Lord, study the Word, prepare yourself, because the evil day may be on its way.

I am not trying to frighten you; I am not saying that it has to happen, but if you are a human being and live in this world, a time of difficulty will come into your life, and it is good for you to prepare. You are a soldier; you are a warrior, whether a man or a woman, and you need to stay alert so that when difficulty comes, you will know what to do in your life.

It is a warning. Use this time in your life to fill your satchel with God’s blessing.

Now, look at this: what does she do? When the boy dies, verse 21 says, “Then she went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, and she shut the door and went out.”

Where—look at this, brothers and sisters—where did she put the boy? If you were this boy’s mother, wouldn’t you put him in your bed, in your own bed? Or wouldn’t you put him in his bed?

You know, the boy dies, and you are going to put him in the family bed. What did she do? She took the boy and put him where? On the prophet Elisha’s bed. She went to the room she had built in times of peace and laid the boy on the prophet’s bed. I believe the Holy Spirit enlightened her to make that prophetic gesture and place her child in the territory of God’s prophet. Symbolically, she was saying, “This is God’s problem; it is not my problem. God gave me this son; He is going to have to take care of him now.”

Brothers and sisters, where do we put our problems when they come into our lives? Do we put them in our bed and become filled with insomnia? Night comes, and at two in the morning—I am the first one who sometimes has to raise my hand—I am lying there with my eyes like two light bulbs, thinking about this, thinking about that, thinking about the other thing that needs to be done, this and that, and sleep slips away from us because we take our problems to bed.

And what does the Word of God say? “Do not put the problems in God’s bed. Put the problems in God’s room.” The Lord says, “Cast your burden upon Me.”

God is telling you, “When you find yourself in difficult situations, throw the problem onto God.” The problem is His. God is eager for His people to throw their problems onto Him.

Put your problems in divine territory; do not put them in human territory. There is no one there who can help you. You cannot even help yourself, but when a difficult situation comes into your life, cry out to the Lord; seek God’s anointing.

The Apostle Paul says again in Philippians, chapter 4, “Be anxious for nothing.” And that nothing means… “nothing”; it means the death of a child, illness, financial crisis. It says, “Do not worry; do not cultivate anxiety, uneasiness, insomnia, or excessive worry.” I know that is difficult, but that is what the Word of the Lord tells me.

When you feel anxiety, sadness, and fear because of something that is happening, acknowledge it; understand that you are going through it, but do not give it lodging in your emotions. When anxiety comes to visit my life, I immediately confront it and say, “You are a person who has not been invited. You have not been invited into this house; you have to leave.” And I begin to wage spiritual warfare against anxiety, and I begin to declare God’s peace in my spirit, and I begin to declare God’s blessing, provision, and solution over my life.

Do not settle into anxiety; do not settle into worry; do not think, “I am destined to be this way my entire life, to take pills all the time, and to live…”

Look, the Word says, “Do not be anxious, but…” That word “but” is extremely important. In other words, that nervous energy that enters your life—you know what? Instead of allowing it to circulate through your emotions, bounce around, and grow stronger with every cycle it makes within you, direct it to the Lord.

It says, “But let your requests be made known.” What does that mean? Instead of worrying, pray; instead of becoming filled with anxiety, cry out; instead of keeping the problem in your bed, transfer it to the Lord’s bed. “Let your requests be made known.” God knows them, but He loves for you to verbalize them, for you to take time to express what you need in your life. Cry out, pray to the Lord, present your need to God.

Brothers and sisters, let me tell you something: every day I learn more and more that prayer is not something reserved for when you have a crisis in your life. Prayer should be something that permeates and fills your life every day. You have to pray as naturally as one breathes; you have to pray as your heart beats; you have to pray as your blood flows through your veins—continually. The Bible says, “Pray without ceasing.” That means we have to cultivate that habit of prayer and that delight in prayer. It is not merely for solving a problem; rather, your entire life must be fed, nourished, and integrated by a spirit of prayer.

Prayer is talking with your Father; prayer is having coffee with the Lord at four in the afternoon and being renewed by His strength. Prayer is delighting in taking those quiet minutes in your home in the morning, before the children wake up and the noise of life begins to roar, setting aside those minutes to be with your Daddy while you drink your first coffee of the day, and talking with Him and saying, “Father, I present my day to You; saturate my mind with Your presence. I acknowledge that I am a son or daughter of eternity.”

“I know that my work will be blessed today because You are going to bless me. I know that You will take me along Route 93 or Route 128, crowded with cars, and You will keep me blessed. I know that You will give me what I need so that this day will be a blessing. You will use me; Your presence will be with me. I will return home calm, and You will give me victory. And when I go to bed, I will lay my head on my pillow and have a peaceful sleep.”

To pray is to remind yourself that your life is in God’s hands, to inject vitamins into everything you do, and to nourish all your problems, dreams, and aspirations with the nourishment of God’s presence. And you will see that your plants grow much more beautifully than those of the neighbor who does not pray or the Christian who does not pray.

And he will wonder, “Why does this person do the same thing I do, and look how beautiful the tomatoes and peppers she plants are! And look at those enormous flowers!” It is because you are giving them spiritual Miracle-Gro. Miracle-Gro is a substance that you put on plants; Meche uses it at home.

Listen, I think that you… a few days ago there were some tomatoes that were not like basil—well, she is very sophisticated: basil, imagine that. She has a very lovely garden and has a knack for plants. And that basil was drying up and dying, and she took a substance—they are like little pellets—and applied it; she opened up the soil a little and put them in, and within a few days that basil was lush and full of life.

Why? Because it had nutrients underneath. It had to be watered; the insects had to be kept away from it; but there was something additional nourishing that plant, and it was feeding on those secret nutrients. And I believe that prayer is like that. Prayer is the “Miracle-Gro” of the plant of our life, and when we pray, a vitamin enters into the anxieties, struggles, interventions, and natural efforts of life. Then there is something additional, something secret, that makes your life flourish and makes people wonder, “But why does this person work as much as I do, yet their money goes further?”

And, “Why is this person just like me, yet has so much vitality, gets up in the morning, and has a song in their mouth while I am depressed?” The Miracle-Gro of prayer.

What does the Word say? It says, “But let your requests be made known through every kind of prayer and supplication.” That phrase “through every kind of prayer and supplication” means that the Apostle Paul’s expression “every kind” means continually, through any kind of prayer and supplication, one might say.

Sometimes prayer can be, “Lord, I praise and glorify You”; sometimes prayer can be a direct, specific cry; sometimes prayer can be praise that you give to the Lord, a song that comes from your mouth; sometimes prayer can be a pregnant silence, when you remain very quiet and enjoy that warmth your Daddy gives you, that arm around you, and you say, “Thank You, Lord. I feel it, and I remain nestled close to You.”

If I could write merengue songs, I would write one like that and call it “Nestled Close to You.” Because, brothers and sisters, sometimes all God needs is for us to curl up in His lap, and we do not have to tell Him anything; we do not have to ask Him for anything, but simply remain close to Him, feeling His warmth and allowing His vitality to be transmitted to us, while we listen to the sure, steady beating of His heart. It is not shaken by anything; nothing troubles it, nothing disturbs it, nothing makes it afraid.

His heartbeat is steady; He knows that the world is under His direction. Nothing escapes His watchful care; nothing can withstand His intervention. And when you feel the heartbeat of your Father’s heart because you are close to Him, that is all you need.

You can take that to the bank; God’s blessing is already upon your life.

Yes, prayer takes many different forms; it is not merely talking, talking, talking. Sometimes God wants you to be quiet and allow Him to answer you, and for you to listen to what He is telling you, so that you are simply filled with the choice He has given you: “Child, you do not have to tell Me anything else. I already have what is yours, and I am going to give it to you.” And you remain very still and receive.

There are many ways to pray to the Holy Spirit. It may be while you are in bed and feeling restless: close your little eyes and dedicate some thoughts to the Lord, and before you know it, you will be snoring peacefully, because God’s blessing came, you forgot your problems, and now it is time to get up. There are many ways; it is through every kind of prayer and supplication.

And what does the Apostle say afterward? He says, “And the peace of God, and the peace of God, and the peace of God.”

I declare that peace over your life right now in the name of Jesus. Receive the peace of God.

Take a very deep breath and say, “The peace of God in my life.” Receive that peace from God in the name of Jesus.

I declare that peace of God over you. Whatever problem may be harassing your life right now, whatever need, whatever difficulty, whatever giant, whatever enemy, whatever challenge—look, whatever construction you may have to undertake in your life right now—say, “The peace of God, the shalom of God, in my life.”

God is with me like a mighty warrior; though the fire comes, it will not burn me; though the river comes to overwhelm me, it will not drown me.

The Lord is with me; the peace of God floods me. And the peace of God, it says, “Surpasses ALL understanding,” because when there are problems in life, logically, we cannot expect to have peace.

But when God installs peace within you, it comes from outside; it does not come from you. It comes from eternity into time and space, from the place where there are no problems; it travels through that air filled with demons and problems and lands in your spirit. It is an email sent directly from God to your heart, a FedEx delivery that arrives, and God installs it within you.

The peace of God surpasses all understanding. When you pray, cry out, and seek the solution in divine territory, when you put your problem on the prophet’s bed rather than your own bed, the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, says that it “will guard your minds and hearts in Christ Jesus, our Lord.”

When you claim what God promises for your life and move in the energy of the Spirit, the peace of God fills your spirit and your heart and guards your mind in Christ Jesus.

And when you fix your eyes on Christ Jesus and set your mind on Christ Jesus, the power of Christ Jesus is transmitted to your life and then rushes toward the problem, dissolves and destroys it, and provides the solution you need.

Because all we have to do is look toward Christ, look toward Him. If we can look at Him with a gaze of faith, as the little chorus says, a pregnant gaze, that gaze transmits the power of God to your life and gives you peace and the solution you need.

Many of the problems in our lives arise because we do not look at Him; we do not keep our gaze fixed on Him. We fix it on many other things around us, including the very problem afflicting us, and God says, “Take your eyes off the problem; fix them on Me, child.”

The Word of God says—there is a passage that says—“Let us fix our eyes on Him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that our spirits will not grow weary to the point of fainting.” It is in Hebrews, I believe, isn’t it?

And the idea in the original Greek is: focus your gaze on Christ Jesus with such a degree of concentration that your spirit does not grow weary, does not faint, does not fall.

Many times, all God asks is, “Set your eyes on Me. Focus on what I have said; do not look at the giant coming with those enormous biceps and that roar and that threat and that—all that boasting—do not listen to him, do not look at him.”

Set your eyes on Christ—on what He has promised, what He has said, what He has been to you—and hold on to Him. When the fiery serpents were poisoning and killing the Jews in the wilderness, what did God say to Moses?: “Look, make yourself a bronze serpent exactly like the one that is killing them, raise it up on a pole, and tell them to look at that serpent. And when they look at the serpent, they will be blessed and healed.”

Because when God gives you a solution and you focus your eyes on the solution, sometimes, brothers and sisters, look, God mocks the enemy and shows you that his worst attacks are for your blessing, and many times God turns the serpent the enemy intended to use—He turns it into a source of blessing for your life.

God turns the problem that came into your life into something that is a blessing. But you have to look at Christ, you have to focus on Him, you have to be filled with His Word; you have to develop a reflex so that when the problem comes, your instinct immediately leads you to Him, not to the problem. “Set your eyes on Him. Focus your eyes on Him, and God will lead you to the solution.”

I am going to leave it there.

But the Word of God is very clear this afternoon for all of us, brothers and sisters. God wants a people who know what to do when trouble comes; I believe that is the heart of the message this afternoon. When the enemy comes into your life, do not become hypnotized by his serpentine gaze, like the little animals upon which the serpent fixes its eyes, hypnotizing and paralyzing them so that it can then come, coil itself around them, and destroy them.

No! Take your eyes off the serpent; forget about the serpent—it has already been defeated. Set your eyes on Christ Jesus and make that gaze a radioactive gaze that draws the movement of God, channels it back, and destroys the serpent. You are not going to destroy the serpent; God destroys the serpent, God dissolves it.

This woman laid her problem on the prophet’s bed, went to the prophet, and said to him, “Look, I did not ask you for a son, and I told you not to give me a son because I did not want you to mock me. Now you gave him to me, my son has died, so that is your responsibility.” And you know the story: the prophet went to where the son was, stretched himself out over him and blessed him; he spoke words of life, and that woman left carrying her son in her arms—alive, healthy, raised from the dead. Because she knew where to place the problem; she knew where to go with her need.

The Lord clearly tells you today, “Place the problem in My territory; cultivate the gaze that focuses on Me.”

In days of peace, cultivate the ability to look toward Me instinctively. Soldiers train in times of peace and perform the same exercise over and over and over again so that when the roar of battle comes, they do not have to think, ‘What do I do? How do I assemble the rifle? How do I reload it?’ No, they do it instinctively because they trained during peacetime and repeated the same exercises over and over and over again. So when they do things, they do them automatically, because there is no time to think; there is no time to say, ‘Okay, what do I do now? And how do I solve this?’ No, no!

Looking at Christ has to be an instinct, a reflex injected into you, and by dint of repeating it every day of your life, it becomes a natural habit. And when the problem comes, you immediately lay the problem on the bed in that room you built for the glory of God.

In your times of peace and quiet, there is a room, there is a refuge; that is the room where the prophet comes, that is the room where the presence of God comes, that is the room where the Holy Spirit is.

That room has to be in every home, it has to be in every soul, it has to be within every person; there has to be a room where the prophet’s presence abides, where there is a bed on which you can lay your problem and the death the devil wants to bring into your life. Build that place for yourself. Give yourself to the Lord; invest your life in the Lord. When the trial comes, you will know what you have to do. The Holy Spirit will enlighten you, and you will see the glory of God.

Let us bow our heads for a moment and ask the Lord to change our instincts. God wants a warrior people, God wants a prepared people, God wants a people who will not be frightened when the lion’s roar comes.

God wants a people who will not run away when the bullets begin to whistle because they do not know what to do, but rather a steady people, a warrior people, a tested people, a battle-hardened people. And when the lion comes, that people digs in, takes its stand upon the Word, stares it down, and says to it, ‘You will not pass this way. I have the armor of God. I know how to wage war against you, and you are not going to get your way. I am going to stand upon what God has declared.’

People of God, the days of diapers are over. People of God, God wants you to enter spiritual adulthood. Cast aside everything that distracts you, everything that impoverishes your walk. The Lord is already saying, ‘It is time to put away childish games; it is time to stop coming to church as though putting on a hat and then taking it off.

It is time to stop playing at the gospel and to let the Spirit of God take possession of every corner of your life, for you to live for God alone, for everything that claims rights over your life to be dethroned, and for the Lord to be King over every compartment of your life.

So that when the day of trial comes, you will emerge better than before. When it is all over, you will be like this woman with her son whole and unharmed; you will be able to go home and sit once again in that rocking chair, thanking God and remembering the battle from which God delivered you.

Celebrating the blessing, celebrating the deliverance, celebrating God’s faithfulness in your life.

There is a price, brother, sister; a price must be paid. Vitality does not come, authority does not come, discernment does not come just because; they are earned by those who have invested.

Salvation is for everyone; the anointing is for the few. The anointing is for those who pay the price; the anointing is for those who know this is serious. There is a price for living a robust and vital life in the Lord. Do not enter heaven limping and hobbling, barely making it in as the gates are closing. Enter heaven with your head held high, full of strength, because you lived a life of storing up vitality. You paid the price, practiced the disciplines of a warrior, exerted yourself in the Lord, gave yourself to the Lord, and God brought you through all your trials.

Hallelujah, thank You, Lord!

Father, raise up a mighty people this afternoon. Lord, do something with us. We do not want to be mediocre; we do not want to dishonor the great God whom we serve. Lord, help us to be soldiers of whom You can be proud; may we honor the great God whom we serve.

Remove from us everything that competes with that total surrender of our lives. We praise and glorify You, Lord. Blessed and praised be Your name.

Sermon by Dr. Roberto Miranda recorded September 6, 2009, at Congregación León de Judá

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