Praying and Waiting for God's Timing - Tony Evans Sermon on Elijah

what depression discouragement despair often brings is distorted information Elijah is by himself depression gets worse if there's nobody in your life to change your thinking see if you feeling sorry for yourself and you're talking to yourself that's a bad conversation for yourself you already feeling sorry and there's nobody to talk to but you about you regarding you to tell you what you are to do and you aren't in a place to even hear you correctly then your discussion with yourself is helping yourself to become worse off about you so God then it is the picture and tells him Elijah tell me how you feel stop talking self believe you talk to yourself you were getting depressed or suicidal start talking to me okay now I'm gonna show you the wind in the rain and all that stuff that y'all talk to me cuz you talking to you it's giving you kill you stop talking you to you and y'all talk to me God has an angel for you he's got a person for you he has himself for you he gave realize you all three of those to give him a supernatural experience to lift him out of his depression and one of the reasons that the church exists is to have people available in your life when you are down who can embrace you minister to you lift you up and he can use you to do the same thing for somebody else because when we are depressed we need another perspective that doesn't deny the reality of how we feel but what it does is double that you live [Music] prayer is the one thing God has established to make contact with what he has already decreed where there is no prayer there is no contact and where there is no contact you do not get what God has already declared for you to have known as his will prayer is the mechanism God has decreed that is absolutely necessary for him to release what he intends prayer does not make God do what he hadn't planted you but what it does is release God to do what he has decreed to do God has decreed the end from the beginning he has decreed the totality of your life and all that he plans to do and it's already been decreed before you call on it but the assumption is you will call on it and when you call on it that's what he has decreed he then dispenses if it is within his will so let's get this straight prayer activates the decree and the will of God it doesn't make it happen it just grabs it because it has already been decreed to happen prayer is the mechanism that grab something out of the invisible realm so you can see it at work in the visible physical realm so God is decreed for every Christian the sum total of your life what he will do and what he won't do and when he plans to do it but it's with a condition and the condition is prayer let me start off by reading two verses chapter 17 verse 1 of first kings now Elijah the Tishbite who was up the Settlers of Gilead said they have as the Lord the God of Israel lives before whom I stand surely there shall be neither do nor rain these years except by my word so Elijah tells Ahab it snuggle ring chapter 18 verse 1 and now it happened after many days that the word of the Lord came to Elijah in the third year saying go show yourself to Ahab and I will send rain on the face of the earth so in chapter 17 verse 1 he says it's not gonna rain in chapter 18 verse 1 he says it's getting ready to rain in chapter 17 verse 1 God says I'm a closed heaven in chapter 18 verse 1 God says I'm open heaven and both of those statements were made by the same person so before we go any further let me explain why this rain thing is there in the first place a hab didn't make this up you see in Deuteronomy chapter 11 verses 13 to 17 this is what God said God says if you go worship idols I'm a closed-down heaven so won't rain if you choose other gods I'm gonna no longer bless your crops I'm no longer gonna bless your planting I'm no longer gonna bless your fruit bearing and the sky is going to dry up if you go after other gods but he says if you turn away from other gods then I will open up heaven and I will let rain again fall on the earth so the whole reason Elijah is praying is based on something God had said years early to Moses so Elijah reaches back to what God had already said and by the leading of God that many years later to the situation we find him in in what we've gone over so far in first Kings 17 and 18 in other words his prayer was tied to God's Word in James chapter 5 that's after Hebrews let me read beginning with verse 16 therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another so that you may be healed the effectual prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much now watch this Elijah was a man with the nature like ours and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain so we think it was back the kings and it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months then he prayed again and the sky poured rain and the earth produced its fruit stay with me and God said it's not gonna rain God said it's now glory there's a gap of three and a half years between when he said no rain because of their idolatry and when it was gonna rain so watch this the change with the rain only came when the idolatry was addressed and as long as there was idolatry God would not shift from no rain to rain then he says and he gives you the secret of prayer that produces the supernatural James said the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much so that means if you and I understand effectual fervent prayer as illustrated by James in the life of Elijah you and I can effect heaven opening heaven closing no rain rain we can affect it just like elide you affected it and let me tell you why and then I'll tell you how you know why because James says that Elijah was of light nature as us so if you're here today looking for a miracle that will open up heaven shut heaven that is bring the supernatural in the history based on the will of God tied to his word you must be a effectual fervent righteous prayer verse 41 it says I had the sound of the roar of a heavy storm that's what he says Elijah says I hear thunder storm but wait a minute in the verses to follow there is no storm yet in fact you gonna see in a moment the sky is clear in fact that's not even a cloud in the sky in fact nobody hears this but Elijah cuz we likely have to tell a hab that there is a sound of a Thor cuz they have came here so let's get something straight your proximity to God will determine what you hear this must be relational prayer because I have made God my only God no more idols I have drawn close to him so his Holy Spirit is able to speak to my human spirit about the application of the scripture which is written in the Word of God so the scripture said it's gonna rain but how does he know when it's gonna rain he heard the sound he heard something other folk couldn't hear because he was in a proximity that Ahab didn't have and so he could pick up things that other folk couldn't pick up because of his proximity to the Lord cuz verse 42 says and Ahab went up to eat and drink but he lied you went up to the top of Carmel and crouched down on the earth and put his face between his knees stay with me Elijah goes up to Mount Carmel he doesn't go where they have he goes up to Mount Carmel he separates himself and he finds a place to get alone with God but look what he did when he separated himself it says he bent down put his hair between his knees in Old Testament days they didn't have stirrups for pregnant women they didn't have a place where a woman would lay up and put the legs on the SteriPEN for examinations but I give birth Oh what the women did was crouched down but they hand down and then somebody would say push push in other words it was the position of Labor why it was the position of labor because he's about to give birth to a miracle it was the position of labor because he's getting ready to get better to something supernatural see when you need God to do something not regular but super unleaded when you need God to do something not ordinary but extraordinary you got to get in a position of birth but no woman gives it a position of birth unless you pregnant the whole point of birth is that you are pregnant see some of us want God to give birth when we haven't even let God get us pregnant we don't have the pregnancy of his presence the pregnancy of his life but we want him to give birth to a miracle he knew that he needed the miracle heaven opened so he got in a position and he labored this is the biblical word travail travail means to be in labor you go before the face of God you say why do I have to go through all that cuz you're giving birth to a miracle you're giving birth to something supernatural this is not regular ordinary you're asking God to do something out of the ordinary but it needs a point of contact okay he said to his servant in verse 43 go up now and look toward to see in other words look for the answer because there's a storm so look for the answer so the servant went up verse 43 says and looked and said there is nothing okay let's stop there he prayed and nothing happened anybody know what I feel you pray and nothing happened he went up and he said I looked for an answer but there's no answer to the prayer first of all did you pray in labor because we all know that's false labor we all know that's false labor you you think something coming ain't nothing come but he prays he says I don't see anything but then he goes on and he says and he went up and looked again there's nothing he said go back seven times go back seven times seven is the biblical number of completion seven is the biblical number of completion when something is completed in the Bible it gives you the number seven it's a biblical number of completion another word servant I know what the word said Deuteronomy 11 I know what God told me because I heard of Sam and we're closed so when the written word lines up with what God is telling me in my spirit and then I go in the labor and nothing happening yet you keep going until you suck nothing down cuz the bigger the miracle you need the more labor you gonna be in cuz that baby's head is so big so you go you labor tell God answers it once you can tie it to his word tie it to your spirit and you've labored and prayer about it you don't quit cuz you heard nothing you'll pray tell you get an answer because an answer it's coming in due season you keep going you don't quit cuz you see nothing you hear nothing you know nothing no you keep going and so notice this down he's persistent he keeps going and so look at this now the man comes back after the seventh time verse 44 and says behold a cloud as small of the man's hand is coming up from the sea okay we've gone from seeing nothing to see in a cloud this big the cloud the size of the man's hand a little tiny cloud he said well I've been going seven times and the only thing now is showing up is a cloud besides of a man's hand you see he prayed expectantly he expected to see something now what he saw what much because all I saw was the cloud with man's hands the tiny cloud but that's all they needed to see because sometimes God doesn't give it to you all at once he let you see a little something something that's a little cue to let you know keep on going keep on praying keep on trusting because I hear you then the hand of the Lord was on Elijah and he girded up his loins and outran the Jezreel oh no you didn't okay wait a minute watches now in the previous verse a hab has got a chariot which means he has horses horses are pulling his chariots and these are multiple horses because he's the king so he's got a group of horses pulling his chariot from Carmel to Jezreel which is 15 miles so this is a 50 mile ride Kings had runners the job of the runner was to run in front of the king to make sure there was nothing in the road so there would be nothing to jeopardize the king so the king had runners now I don't know what happened to a have runners maybe they got scared when they lied you killed all in profits and quit I don't know but his Runner was nowhere to be found and Elijah becomes his runner but wait a minute Elijah says he had to girdle up his loins that means he had to pull up his robe tuck it under his belt and run there's an old boy here oh boy is running 15 miles and he's outrunning the horses okay he started kicking it because when God comes through for you even though you've had to wait for it you'll be like Caleb who said I started when I was 40 now I'm 85 but God has given me strength at 85 that I had at 40 and it was worth waiting on him for my change to come God can take you and give you strength for whatever he's going to bring you away when you suck it down from up there down here through the effectual fervent prayer now let me close with something I was doing a evangelistic crusade in Columbia South Carolina it was Sunday night the first night of the crusade when somewhere between 15 or 20,000 people had gathered in the stadium for us to preach the gospel to before the service all the ministers and the planning committee got went downstairs underneath the stadium to pray a gentleman came in and said we've just been warned that a major storm is coming and it will be here by 7 o'clock it's now 6 o'clock and the meeting is supposed to begin at 7:00 so based on the meteorological report we were going to be drenched with a heavy thunderstorm at 7 o'clock so we went into prayer and we pray that God would hold the rain and we pray that God would allow the service to go on and we pray The ministers prayed but every minister including me prayed a safe prayer let me tell you a safe prayer I'll say prayer is Lord don't let it rain if it's not your will see you throw his will in there in case it still rains you can get him off the hook so we pray that safe prayer at the end of the prayer a five-foot-one lady named Linda said may I pray we said well yes yes go ahead and pray no we need all the prayer we can get here is the summary of Linda's prayer Linda said Lord we are here doing what you asked us to do you asked us to win people of Christ you asked us to proclaim your word we have spent money time energy to put this crusade together doing what you told us to do so you would embarrass yourself if you let it ring because you control the weather so therefore Lord here got crazy I command you to stop the rain all the preachers did was if look at each other and wait for lightning the strength because we got this little five-foot-one lady commanding god with the rain we walk up it's now seven o'clock it's time for the service to begin the emcee comes out and he says ladies and gentlemen we know that rain is supposed to come the sky is dark behind us it's coming this way we know it's supposed to come we're just going to go as long as we can go so if you'll just remain here as long as you can we'll do as much as we can cuz it wasn't looking good you can hear the thunder in the background it's coming this way as we begin the service we're 10 15 minutes into the service and now it's it's black it's thundering behind us and you can begin to hear the rain it begins to drizzle so a few people were starting to open up their umbrellas but you could see people were getting ready to leave cuz you got thunder and lightning coming this way I'm looking down Lynda is sitting next to a gentleman the gentleman opens up his umbrella cuz it's getting ready to rain it's drizzling and he puts the umbrella over Linda Linda takes her hand and pushes his hand back and refuses the umbrella and then it happened as we sat there at Bryce Stadium as the rain came up to the stadium with our own eyes the rain split half of it went around this way half of it went around that way and then the rain came back together at the other end of the stage the preachers were being spiritually polite but Linda gave an effectual fervent prayer of a righteous person she got down and put her head down and pushed and pushed and pushed and like Jacob said I'm not gonna let you go until you do something I'm gonna give birth to a miracle somebody here today needs a miracle and life needs a miracle in your emotion need your miracle in your home needs a miracle on your job if you commit to righteousness if you commit to prayer if you commit to Mount Carmel and if you get pregnant with God's life and are willing to go in the labor what happened to Elijah James says is available to you we are inviting heaven into history reviving eternity into time prayer is the mechanism that God has given mankind to communicate with him in order for his divine intervention into our circumstances prayer does not control God but it does welcome him and invite him now God has a will he has a unconditional will and a conditional one the unconditional will is what he's going to do whether we pray or not because he sovereignly determined to do it which is his prerogative but the conditional will are things he's decided to do only when we meet that condition and one of the primary conditions of his conditional will is prayer that's why the scripture says you have not because you asked and since we don't always know which one is unconditional and which one is conditional we pray about all things and then we look for God's timing to clarify when he wants to intervene the answering of our prayers sometimes he answers it quickly sometimes he answers it at stages and sometimes he answers it a long way off but either way don't let it be said I didn't get what God had for me because I was unwilling to talk to him about it one of the questions that we ask in prayer is how long do you pray about a matter until you get an answer there's either yes/no awake okay if you haven't heard no and you haven't seen yes keep praying while you wait on the Lord that clarify his answer he will not leave a prayer unanswered one way or another but there is patience and seeing is will worked out as we pray [Music] [Applause] [Music] the Bible certainly is the most life-changing book of all time but it's not always the easiest book to understand the Tony Evans Study Bible changes that Tony is added extensive study notes features maps doctrinal charts links to 150 videos and more to this experiential Study Bible the historic Tony Evans Study Bible and also the one volume commentary is available now let Tony guide you on the path to greater understanding you

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Length: 27min 41sec (1661 seconds)

Published: Wed May 20 2020