God's Whisper - Pastor Stan Harvey

uh we're going to take our thoughts today from first kings chapter 19 verse 11 to 12. first kings chapter 19 verse 11 to 12. and we are continuing our series on lessons and lockdown and the word of the lord tells us in first kings chapter 19 verse number 11 then he said go out and stand on the mountain before the lord and behold the lord passed by in a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks and pieces before the lord but the lord was not in the wind and after the wind and earthquake but the lord was not in the earthquake and after the earthquake of fire but the lord was not in the fire and after the fire a still small voice amen a still small voice i want to talk to you today on this topic god's whisper god's whisper and i want to invite you to keep your bibles open and we're going to just go through this text and this passage and hear what god has to say to us amen thank you everybody perhaps one of the hallmarks of fallen humanity is our our terrible inconsistency even the very best of them as gifted and powerful and anointed by god as elijah was yet he was still plagued by a glaring weakness even after calling fire down from heaven in a showdown on mount carmel with the prophets of baal and and this incredible scene that caused the the children of israel to to turn back to their god to acknowledge once again their god and yet uh with with such an incredible experience yet when the wife of ahab jezebel made a simple threat to this powerful man of god he was off for his life the bible says ran for his life and not only did he run but when he went into the wilderness and he sat under a juniper tree he asked god to die this is what is so remarkable and yet before we can uh look down upon this man we are reminded of our own uh inconsistent nature the bible tells us in james chapter 5 that elijah was a man subject like to to like passions as we are he says that elijah as powerful and anointed as he was yet there was still some some flesh in him there was still some weaknesses in him and he said that's just as we are and so we would be resident to look down upon elijah given our own inconsistent nature we can be filled with faith and encouraged in periods of when we are in the house of god when we are in in conference or revival service and have faith even for god to do something for other people yet when it comes to our own needs we are riddled with doubt and intimidation and so uh we can certainly relate to elijah uh here he is would preferring death than being able to stand up to uh ahab's wife jezebel to this wicked woman and yet he already has had the power to be calling fire from heaven and verse number five the bible tells us of first kings 19 that as he laid and slept under a juniper tree suddenly an angel touched him and said to him arise and eat and he looked and thereby his head was a cake baked on coals what he did when he was running for his life when he went and take took off and and was afraid and was fearful and even got to the point of utter despair that he wanted to die he went to sleep amen sometimes the best response to stress and problems and tension in life is to simply go to sleep we spend too much time being stressed being uh in despair and being disgruntled and upset and tossing and turning sometimes you've got to learn to just go to sleep and leave it in the hands of god there are things that are beyond our control and there are things that you've got to remember that are beyond our ability to change they are beyond our control and you might as well let god have it and take control of your circumstance amen psalms 127 and verse 2 he says it is vain for you to rise up early and to sit up late to eat the bread of sorrows for so he giveth his beloved sleep amen sometimes in life with all of the stresses and with all the tensions and all of the problems we've just got to learn to go to sleep because we have this faith and trust that god is going to work all things out amen doesn't isn't that what the bible tells us isn't that what paul wrote in romans that he said all things work together for good there's no point of you staying up and tossing and turning because there's absolutely nothing that you can do about it but you can learn to trust in the hands of god you can put it in his hands and then you can rest in his hand you can go to sleep knowing that while we are sleeping god is doing something amen remember in the bible god always spoke he always manifested himself he always revealed himself to his people so often when they're asleep in the realm of dreams because dreams is the realm of the supernatural and i want to encourage somebody instead of just keep stressing and tossing and turning and letting your gray hairs grow as you're thinking as you're pulling your hair out you can just trust and rest in god amen he is able to work things out all things work together for good to them that love god who are the called according to his purpose amen can i tell you we can work ourselves to death we can worry ourselves with fear and we can cause our life and our joy and our peace to just be totally drained from us because we are so worried we are so so fearful but hear me today if you believe that your god is still on the throne if you believe his word that he hasn't forgotten about you that he knows you that he did not allow one spout to fall to the ground without the father knowing that how much more would he know that he has numbered the hairs on our heads if you believe that then you can learn to sleep at night and rest and trust and i promise you that in the morning there'll be fresh vision though in the morning when you arise and when you wake up there'll be a new renewed strength there'll be a trust in fact to go to sleep is a simple expression of our trust in god he gives his beloved sleep and i want you to remember that you are his beloved amen turn to somebody next to you if you're not if you're with your family tell them you are loved turn to the other person next to you and tell them that you are his beloved oh yes you are special you are the apple of his eye and he will take care of you he will make sure that you are not left wanting that you are not left by yourself oh but we can learn to rest in our father's arms oh bless the name of the lord and so that's exactly what elijah did he went to sleep and then i like the next part of that that the bible says that the angel he was in such a deep sleep again the angel touched him reminds me of our first sermon on this in this uh in this series about peter when he was in prison had to wake him up and then the angel said this time in verse number seven rise and eat because the journey is too great for you praise god instead of stressing with all that's happening today just get up and eat but just don't eat too much but i like that in verse number eight he rose and he ate and he drank and he went and the strength of that food 40 days and 40 nights the bible says there was a cake that was cooking a cake baked on coals apparently god likes cake praise god i like this passage of scripture that god made a cake for him i don't know if it was a cheesecake or a mud cake or a salted caramel cake or it was a pavlova cake i'm not quite sure but he was apparently god doesn't mind that we eat cake but listen don't eat too much praise god sometimes all you can do is when you were under stress and when you were fighting the battles of life it's just to keep doing what you know to do don't don't lose your routine in this lockdown don't lose what you normally do make sure you get up and you pray and and you go through you do your exercise you walk outside and enjoy the beautiful sunlight i am convinced that there is no more beautiful place in this world during winter time than than in the southeast part of australia where the sun is so beautiful i mean it's getting so warm already go out and do that and enjoy the things eat your food and enjoy your your family whatever it is that you do when you don't know what to do just continue to follow your routine continue to do what what you normally do he says go and eat drink he says in verse number 8 that he ate and drank and he went in the strength of that food 40 days and 40 nights as far as horeb and the mountain of god elijah was running away out of fear and timidity from this witch of a woman named jezebel and he goes to the same mountain that moses had gone to the mountain of god that moses had brought the children of israel and where he had this incredible encounter with god could it be that that elijah running for his life where else would you go to where where would you run to when you were in despair when you were in a battle but he went to where he knew god had met his people he remembered the story of moses he remembered how moses heard from god and how god gave him the ten commandments and how that that place god manifested himself and revealed himself and where where moses saw the glory of god praise god i want to encourage you not not only do you do what you normally do and you retain your routine and you maintain your devotions and you maintain what you normally do but listen to me brothers and sisters can i encourage you that when you are under pressure when you don't know what to do you've got to go back to the old landmarks and go back to the ancient paths the bible tells us in jeremiah chapter 6 and verse 16 thus saith the lord stand ye in the ways and see and ask for the old paths where is the good way and walk therein and you shall find a rest for your souls can i tell you here today that no matter what it is regardless of how modern life he's getting and all the things that we have around us that we got to go back to the old paths we've got to continue to go back to the ancient ways and to the old paths because i want to remind you that it still works that it's still the answer we've got to go back to where they went to the paths of prayer and fasting and meditation of god's word it's still the answer it's still the way through to god it's still the way that we can find power and the access to the divine it's still by pushing through into the throne room of god you need to ask for the ancient paths you need to ask for the old ways because they still work and if we're going to see a revival as the end time church of this hour we've got to learn to know that it's still the answer it's still the it's not our stuff thank god for our equipment thank god for this online platforms and thank god for the equipment all the modern facilities that we have but let me remind you if we're going to see a powerful move of god you cannot substitute for prayer and consecration and devotion and fasting and humbling ourselves oh when we get to seeking god if it was good enough for moses if it was good enough for elijah if it was good enough for our forefathers i want you to know it's good enough for us that when we begin to get on our knees and on our faces and knock on heaven's door and we determine i'm not leaving here until i get a hold of god i'm not gonna leave here until you change me god is gonna answer us praise god elijah goes to where he knows god has spoken to the children of israel goes back to the mountain of god in fact you can go to that same place it's in it's in saudi arabia today the same mountain of horeb where the tops of the mountains are blackened and there is a cave in there called the cave of elijah and there he went verse number nine into a cave and spent the night in that place and behold the word of the lord came to him and he said to him what are you doing here elijah and he said i have been very zealous for the lord god of hosts for the children of israel have forsaken your covenant torn down your altars and killed your prophets with the sword i alone am left and they seek to take my life when god speaks to elijah he starts to tell them well you know and again what he just said just then is not true he said i'm the only one i've been very zealous you know god and in here it sounds like a a little sort of victim pity party story uh a self-pity uh sort of party where he says i've been very zealous for the god of the lord god of hosts and uh the children of israel have forsaken your covenant they've torn down your altars and i am left alone he wasn't alone and they seek to take my life they weren't saying they had after the showdown on carmel when he caught fire down from heaven and and consumed the sacrifices he had the children of israel he had the people slaughter the the prophets of baal they had turned back to god they had followed him and yet here he is wallowing in his self-pity can i tell you that when things are not going well in life when things don't turn out the way you want and and we we somehow internalize it and we we become a victim uh we we like the the self-pity we we like to say oh look at my everything's going wrong and we blame other people i i've been in counseling sessions with with folks with with families with couples and there's been domestic violence and i've heard i've heard the husband say well you know the reason why i act like that is because she makes me angry so it's not my fault that i act violently he said it's her fault for making me angry so he he he negates the the personal responsibility he's the one that's the victim the reason why he's he's beating on his wife he's the one that's that's been been afflicted he's the one that's been attacked she made me angry and therefore i had to do that can i tell you uh that when things are not going like we want there can be a tendency and a propensity at times that we want to uh be the victim play the victim and we're the ones we're the only ones suffering we're the only ones going through this elijah elijah you're not the only one that hasn't bowed you're not the only one that still believes in god you're not the only one that's suffering under this yoke of bondage and problems from a backslidden king you're not the only one that's suffering from the mistakes of those in authority can i tell you here today the strength that we can find brothers and sisters i know this may be frustrating for some the situation that's in our world but listen to me uh we you're not the only we are in this thing together amen that we we we don't have to be a victim we can see that we are victorious that god is on our side you got to quit with this this pity party you got to quit with this self-loathing that somehow it's you know we're the victim that somehow we're the ones that have been attacked no listen to me whatever it is that you can do remember that god is still with you that we are in this thing together i am convinced in the depth of my heart that we can take this time that we are in i know we can't be together i know we can't enjoy it but listen to them this is not gonna be forever i i'm convinced of that in my spirit that there's coming a time when we will be together we just gotta hunker down right now we just gotta just go through with this and enjoy every moment of it yes that's what i said enjoy it why well you know i can't see my friends and i can't go out here and and go to my favorite restaurant across town and i i can do some of these things and it's getting really boring i understand we know that but listen to me this too shall pass we're going to look back at this as this history making moment in our world and say that this was a period where god was doing something in us where god was visiting with us and so he's he's in this cave and god tells them verse number 11 go out and stand on the mountain before god before the lord and behold the lord passed by and i want you to see this this very critical text it says that when he passed by when the lord passed by and the great strong wind tore the mountain into the mountain and broke the rocks and pieces before the lord but the lord was not in the wind and after the wind and earthquake but the lord was not in the earthquake and verse number 12 in the year after the earthquake of fire but the lord was not in the fire so apparently god was not in the earth wind and fire amen earthquake wind and fire praise god perhaps he was expecting like it tells us in the book of exodus that the same mountain the mountain of a fire that had an earthquake and wind it was a very a very terrifying place that he was expecting the same kind of experience that the children of israel had but the bible tells us that god was not in the wind or the earthquake or in the fire but that he was in a still small voice that god began to speak praise god you see elijah had learned the secret of calling fire down from heaven he didn't have a problem with the challenges of a big crowd but when it came to a wicked jezebel speaking to him it penetrated the sense his sense of bravado to where it sunk into his heart to cause him to flee and what i believe that god is trying to reveal to us here today that that he said that god was not in the elements he was not in the environment like elijah was expecting but instead it was a whisper and i know we we can't experience the environment of church right now and i believe that god speaks to us when we gather together when we are worshiping together when we are lifting up the name of the lord together and god is moving and but but hear me we don't have the luxury right now and the freedom to have this environment where the presence of god but what god wants to teach us is that we don't have to have the environment god is not always speaking through the environment and the circumstance but but we've got to learn to tune in because he will speak in a still small voice and the word for whisper or the word for still can be interpreted from the hebrew as whisper the word for small interpreted as fine or gentle voice so what god is speaking to elijah he said he's speaking in a gentle whisper the whisper of god god wants to speak to us at this time but i want you to know that he wants to speak to us in a gentle whisper that it's so quiet that somehow the whisper is something that you've got to tune your focus and your attention into more than half a century ago a man by the name of doctor out doctor alfred tomatis not tomato tomatoes was confronted with the most curious case of his 50-year career as an otola ra autullarian i can't even say it it's so long somebody who uh finds out the problems with with your uh larynx with your vocal cords a renowned opera singer had mysteriously lost his ability to hit certain notes even though those notes were well within his vocal range he had been to other ear nose and throat specialists all of whom thought it was a a vocal problem but dr tomatis thought otherwise and using a sonometer he discovered that even an average opera singer produces 140 decibels sound waves at a meters distance that's slightly louder than the military jet taking off from an aircraft carrier and the sound is even louder inside one's skull that discovery led to a diagnosis that the opera singer had been deafened by the sound of his own voice selective muteness was caused by selective deafness so like with most singers would understand this that if you can't hear a note you can't sing that note so in the doctor's own words he said the voice can only reproduce what the ear can hear and and so this this opera singer lost his ability to sing or lost his ability to be able to to to sing lift his voice because he had lost the ability to hear his own voice and i am convinced brothers and sisters today that somehow we often lose our way we find our lives in problems and circumstances and situations because we have failed to hear the voice of god it's because we have failed to be able to discern the still small voice and let me remind you that god doesn't speak in a loud way in in the earthquake in the fire where where it's booming the booming voice of god and i i know he certainly can do that but oftentimes what god wants to do is speak to us in a gentle whisper amen that's why at times you've got to learn to turn some things off you've got to turn to to learn to turn the the the distractions and the volume and the things of the world you've got to turn it right down and turn it off so that you can discern the voice of god to find direction for your life to find his will and his purpose and i am convinced that god wants to speak to us and he wants to speak to this church not just every sunday but every day when you wake up god's whisper is speaking into your heart and you've got to learn to tune in oh praise the name of the lord i i know some folks they just can't handle a silence you know silence can be so deafening there are some folks and i've been there i could be like that sometimes where i feel like i've got to have some sound on i've got to put put some music on put some youtube on i've got to be listening got something in my ear my airpods on and some feet some people can't handle this kind of deafening silence or or awkward silences but listen to me sometimes in hearing from god if you want to hear from god you got to turn off uh the social media you got to turn off all that that rubbish that you hear on youtube there's so much a conspiracy theory today because of the of youtube and all this online stuff that's just it's you know the the money that they're raising and some of those channels is unbelievable but sometimes you just got to turn that off and here's the deal why god's whisper is so profound because whenever somebody whispers to you you you kind of you have to tune in what you're saying you've got to focus your attention when somebody whispers when you're just sitting around a table and just talking you're just kind of relaxing and you're letting the the speaker do the work to speaking to you but when it's a whisper when somebody comes to you to whisper something you all of a sudden tune in you begin to block out all of the background noise and you tune in intently so that you can begin to hear what this this profound message would be and that's why god speaks in a whisper i believe because it then becomes incumbent upon the listener to make sure that they are paying attention to what is being said god doesn't speak in a loud booming voice he doesn't come into people's lives and and kicks their door down and says here i am but he is gentle he he comes and again uh he he speaks and and talks to elijah in the form of a question while he can certainly provide and and give his strong commands here thus say of the lord elijah but what a whisper does is that not only does it cause us to lean in and focus our attention on the speaker what god what what do you want to say to me so often we are so distracted and we we go through the the routines of life and go through uh you know just the same old and we just rush from here to there here's the beauty about this lockdown is that we can slow right down at a snail's pace and learn to to quiet our soul to steal our souls and we can lean in to say god what are you trying to say to me i'm going to turn off these voices on on on social media i'm going to turn off these voices that are blaring and that are glaring so loudly in my ears and i want to tune in to the the gentle whisper of god and as elijah hears listens to the stillness have you ever done that have you ever just in your time of prayer just kind of just shut everything down sometimes you got to disconnect disconnect from all the stuff that you're hearing you're seeing use some common sense disconnect from netflix and and from amazon prime whatever it is that they're using and just sit in the quietness and i promise you god will begin to speak to you we are so bombarded by sound and noise to the extent where some people even just talking to a person you know you just want to avoid that uh that awkward silence you got to fill up that that space of silence with something to say until until you know that somebody really well until you've become intimate with that person and in that intimacy no words have to be said but you can simply be in each other's presence i remember brother slack would often talk to us about that how him and sister slag would go for long drives and they wouldn't have to say anything there would need to be no words said he would go by and as they see a landmark of somebody he would simply just point and that's it but they don't have to speak they don't have to fill up that awkward silence as it were because they they are intimate and and here's the implications of a whisper of god's whisper is that it not only draws our attention but it means we get real close to the speaker when somebody whispers to us they have to get real close to our ear and and begin and so close that they would even touch our body and then we would feel their breath speaking on on our skin and that shows intimacy and that's why i believe god wants to whisper to us he doesn't come with a booming loud voice and the crash bang wallop of of the noise of everyday world but he comes in a stillness so that we can draw closer so not only we can we do focus our attention but that we draw nearer to him he wants to whisper because he wants to draw us closer into an intimacy with god god forbid that we should get out of this lockdown and we are no closer to god that we should get out of these restrictions and we have not made any any inroads to an intimacy with god but i want you to know that every day your god wants to whisper because he wants to draw you in closer to himself and when you find that intimacy with god when you find that closeness with god you can sit still and you can be at peace he doesn't have to give you stuff he doesn't have to bless you with everything but you can sit still content satisfied knowing that your god is right there with you the lover of your soul the one that sticks closer the one who was as near as your very breath you can walk with him in an intimate relationship and i want you to know that that's the strength of your life it's not how much money you got in the bank account it's not how well your body is oh but even when i'm by myself i've got this god close to me i'm intimate with my savior oh i walk with him hand in hand like that old song oh that we used to listen to all the time i walk with him just a closer walk with god praise god a whisper sound and and if you remove every sound you remove every distraction you'll find that even in the silence it can be loud for some people they have this ringing in their in their ears mark batterson in his book whisper talks about how on the morning of august 27 1883 ranchers in alice springs australia and this is 1883 heard what sounded like gunshots the same mysterious you know if you know alice springs is right in the heart of australia the same mysterious sound was reported in 50 geographical locations spanning 1 13th of the globe what those aussies heard was the eruption of a volcano on the remote indonesian island of krakatoa 2233 miles or over four and a half thousand kilometers away they heard it in alice springs from indonesia that volcanic eruption possibly the the loudest sound ever measured was so loud that the 310 decibel sound wave circumnavigated the globe at least four times it generated three thousand foot tidal waves through rocks a distance of of of 34 miles and cracked one foot thick concrete 300 miles away if you were to drill a hole directly through the center of the earth opposite of krakatoa you would find colombia south america and although the sound of the eruption was was an audible in colombia there was measurable spike and atmospheric pressure because of what's called the infrasonic sound waves that caused the air to tense the sound may not have been heard all the way to the other side but it was felt you see there's what's called infrasonic sound infrasonic sound is is between uh 20 20 hertz or a frequency of 20 hertz to 20 000 hertz or 85 rather to 85 hertz to 2 500 hertz but the human ear watch this can go from 20 hertz to 20 000 hertz anything below 20 hertz is infrasonic it says according to research you can hear a sound with your ear but it's still sound with a lower frequency and i'm coming no close there's ultrasonic sound ultrasonic sound is is is so powerful is beyond uh with with ultrasound uh you can you can destroy or crush kidney stones with ultrasound ultrasonic sound you can you can see a baby inside the womb of a mother but infrasonic sound that it's sound but it is not hearable to the human ear you can't hear it and sometimes the whisper of god is so gentle it is so quiet that you can't always hear it with a human ear but you can hear it with the human spirit that's why the bible tells us that they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth that there is a way of worship or communication between us and it's in our spirit and that's why you've got to make sure like last week's message you're walking you're leading by the being led by the spirit and not by the raven being led by the dove because god wants to speak to us in the depth of our spirit god speaks in a whisper he speaks in a gentle voice that causes us to to focus our attention that causes us to draw closer to god much like the the writer of revelations john the apostle john the revelator was known as the beloved of the lord because he was one who laid his head upon the bosom of our lord so that he could hear the very heartbeat of our messiah someone whispers not only do we hear their voice but we feel their touch and god's whisper is speaking to us today praise god so you got to learn to practice listening give god space and time in your prayer time don't just talk to him you got to spend time letting him talk to you you get frustrated don't you when when people are talking to you and they don't want to let you talk but they just want to talk and tell you about what's on their minds i wonder maybe god gets a little frustrated sometimes that we talk to him all the time but we don't listen to his whisper you can hear the whisper of god by learning to listen with your eyes by reading the word of god reading your bible when you read your bible every day god begins to whisper something into your spirit as you read you got to make up your minds continue to read his word until he speaks to you become sensitive to the touch and the voice of god and he will lead you and he will guide you and i want to close with a simple story a young man by the name of samuel spent his early years tending to the priest eli he would have learned to listen to to eli the priest as he was his servant as it were he was his understudy he had to do everything that the priest told him do he was his personal servant he was the priest eli was his master and he learned to hear the voice of his master he learned to learn to hear the voice of the priest whatever he told him to do and one night when samuel was in bed he heard the voice calling him samuel samuel waking up out of that bed perhaps and and you know wondering what what the the high priest is wanting now he says yes did you call me and eli said no no i didn't call you go back to bed after he went back to bed once again he heard the words calling his name samuel samuel it sounded so much like the voice of the priest that again he said well he's calling me again he goes back to eli's chamber and say yes did you call me eli said no no i didn't call you go back to bed it happened again a third time and then the third time eli said realizes that the penny dropped with the priest and says listen that's not me calling you the next time you hear that voice you say speak lord for your servant is listening next time he calls you and so sure enough after that third time once again the voice of god spoke samuel samuel and the young man said speak for your servant is listening i pray today that that would be our prayer perhaps the voice of god sounds awfully like the voice of our elder the voice of our leader the voice of somebody that you might be familiar with it might be a voice that sounds so familiar [Music] but can i tell you god can speak through the leadership he spoke through my elder he spoke through my pastor every single sunday to me and if you can learn to discern the whisper of god and say lord speak for i am listening would you pray with me right now as the musicians are going to lead us in a time of an altar service where even if you are at home at the office at work wherever you are listening joining with us this could be the altar of god and i promise you god sent me here to tell you today that he wants to speak to you every day in a gentle whisper father in the name of jesus we lift up our voices to you today we thank you lord for your word we thank you god that you speak to us that you speak into the depth of our spirit lord out of the belly you said shall flow rivers of living water and we speak of of having his gut reaction that we a gut tells us that's the depth of our spirit that's in our spirit our spirit can discern so lord help us to not be fleshly not to be carnal but spiritual people to learn to hear your voice to learn to devote this discern the whisper of god to telling us directing us leading us giving us comfort giving us strength and encouragement giving us peace giving us reassurance giving us your direction giving us conviction helping us look god to be in the right place with you and so right now we open our spirits to hear your voice to hear the gentle the still and fine whisper from god in jesus name wherever you are why don't you pray and let god fill your heart once again let it be a time of surrender that'd be a time of simply listening to his voice in jesus name [Music] i know [Music] of your presence [Music] is [Music] [Music] jesus [Music] bring [Music]

Channel: POSydney

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Keywords: sermon, Sydney, pentecostal, POS, Australia, worship

Id: CcCkguH6nB0

Length: 45min 23sec (2723 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 15 2021