Tuesday Night Live 21st September 2021

well kia ora and good evening welcome online tonight wherever you are still maybe in lockdown um if you're in tamaki makoto so good to be with you online tonight is exciting um for me i am in the presence of greatness um with these two amazing men um that you see on your screen um my name is emily and i am hosting tonight we are actually across five platforms and so um tonight is a night where you can interact and ask questions and engage with alfred narrow tonight so it is an amazing opportunity that you might not always have the opportunity to do so um that is what tonight is about is for you to be able to interact with pastor brent and pastor alfred so um i'll just tell you a little bit about alfred um first of all he's really steezy and if you don't know what that word is pastor brennan it's called style with ease and so something about alfred other than the the accolades that are behind his name i just call him a steezy guy you know he's just got style with these anyway that's my two cents for tonight and that's all i'll be contributing to the conversation um but other than that he has been in the um nine years in the house of representatives in in new zealand parliament as well as being a pastor for 20 years so this dude is in the know and he is an incredible communicator so we're up for an amazing night um but pastor brent it's great to be with you and it's over to you now well thank you emily i i thought you'd said that he was sleazy dear lord what have we come to hear tonight it is just a great delight to to be with you all tonight and and in particular to have pastor alfred naru with us um our pastor alfred and his wife mocha have become very good friends and incredibly supportive and encouraging and of course they are they are members of our church past today they passed their own church for about 20 years and then um went into parliament and uh had nine years there so pastor alfred comes with an incredible wealth of experience both in the church and in the secular world and especially in the political arena and i just want to welcome you here tonight why did you just bring your greetings pastor alfred to everybody um greetings everyone it's it's awesome to be here um thanks emily um from steezy to sleazy call me sneezy because then i thought i'd be one of one of the 12 dwarves or something like that so um look it's just really great to be here and um you know what i love about encounter uh is just the opportunity to be able to engage you know to connect with people um it's um it's multicultural it's you know um a variety of different age groups that are there and it's just really cool we've got cool people who are who are hip and cool like emily who just help keep us grounded and but at the same time too you know it's got a real vision and a heart after the lord and um to see people grow in god and in their potential as well so it's an honor be to be here tonight very good well tonight i want to um talk about prayer and and really i mean on sunday we had um two messages and in the previous week weekend um a couple of messages and i mean prayer was just the undergirding issue in fact as a result i'm going to speak on some very practical points on prayer on sunday morning and sunday night but i want to actually talk to to you alfred about prayer because i know you're a man of prayer as you are with your wife and so you know you you talked about um about some aspects of your prayer life and of course prayer is always a um a journey of development of growth of finding effectiveness and prayer and i wonder if you would just share for a few moments something of your personal journey um in prayer you know what has changed for you over the years or what are some of the lessons you've learned as you've developed your prayer life just just share a little bit about about that for me please yeah um thanks for the question brent um yeah look it's a great question and i suppose when we first started out in our in my christian walk um but i suppose when i grew up as a young kid that went to a traditional church um i grew up in a pacific island churchill we went to poc newton pic is the acronym for pacific island church and uh we grew up in john street used to walk all the way up to pontabee road and k road and then on to edinburgh street and so there was you know this old church and we used to go in and we learnt as you do how to sing sunday school songs you know how to read the bible and how to pray and so there was a traditional form of learning those things and i think you know that's good it's good for kids um to be able to do that to recite to remember um the word of god is important especially when they're young and i suppose that you know as i obviously got a little bit older and when i gave my life to the lord you know it was in 1982 so i was sort of quite young was 80 it was 18 years old and it was that an evangelist was speaking um and then he said that you know if you want to give your life to jesus to come forward and say this prayer and i suppose it was the the transition of change between just saying prayers because it was traditional and and i suppose you'd use the word maybe religious to praying a prayer that was now entering into a relationship with god yeah very good oh that's the transition point for me that you know it's no longer my faith was no longer religious that i could say things uh and recite them actually now it's a personal relationship and that's what the invitation was you know if you want to come forward and have a personal relationship you know through the lord jesus christ you know with god the father then come forward and say the prayer of salvation i suppose that's that was part of the transition and you know when i look back now it's nearly been 40 years in their journey of faith that we've had in all sorts of different ways and when i first came in it was an evangelism uh and you know i was pretty hardcore was out there and we were doing outreach back in those days emily we still used to play guitars and go on the side was the hangout pamphlets and we had an outreach center where we people could come on friday nights and had coffee and tea and we'd actually literally share the gospel both in word but also in our actions we'd love people and care for them and um so you you sort of alert then that you then could learn to pray with people um but when i look back my my prayer life was a bit like a roller coaster you know there were times there were highs and the times there were lows and and and yet when i look at david when you read the psalms you know david's a bit like that you know he's he's on a roller coaster one minute he's up he's saying lord you're amazing the god of creation you know you're omnipotent you know your omni and he uses these you know amazing creative words and then he goes down then he see him go down and they're really oh lord why have you forsaken me and and you know i look back at my life and i and if i was to track it it was it's been a little bit like that there are times where there's highs why i just thought i thank you for what i've been able to achieve thank you you've answered my prayer and then you go into a low where you feel like you're silent there's no answer you're not knowing or the prayer doesn't get answered and so you you you get to their point where you get disappointed and so um yeah so that's been when i look back that's what the journey has been i suppose the the point is is that over time you wanna i've learned how to um you know lower the highs and lift up the the lows so that there's a consistency that's building and you're building into that so that you realize you can learn things along the way and you start to mature because then you realize that sometimes my prayer was a selfish prayer and said lord i'm going to come to you father you know i want this job i want this i want that it was like a shopping list that i had that i wanted from god and what i realized is that actually that was the wrong way around you know yes we bring my petitions my prayer to god but and i suppose i go back to matthew chapter six and as i shared on sunday and i know they call it the lord's prayer but it was a prayer that when people the disciples were saying well how should we pray and as you know it says our father who art in heaven holy is her name you know thy kingdom come they will be done on earth as it is in heaven and it's that point where it says thy will not my will your will god and i suppose that's some of the maturing in the learning is where my will becomes a line actually it's the will of god because if he's the loving father that i i know him to be and he only wants to give good things for me then you know it's for me to trust in the will of god you know for these things um so yeah i suppose that's been um some of the learnings along the way uh in the journey um that i've had so yeah in trying to bring it to a point of the reality of what prayer actually is that's being in relationship with god it's actually seeking his will not mine first and foremost and then as i'm doing that then i grow in my my love and my trust um with god my father you know i mean what you're saying is just so important because i know that many people listening here if they were to be absolutely honest they would say i'm struggling in prayer and to actually hear someone of your maturity say well i've actually been on a journey and you know i've had lows and i've had highs and i've had the same thing that becomes an incredible encouragement because people realize actually i thought that pastor alfred must have had a phenomenal prayer relationship but the reality is it's it's just not like that it's it's like any relationship you start you learn about each other and you grow in your sensitivity to each other to hearing what each other's saying and and and all of that sort of stuff i mean i mean one of the classic um cases in in marriage when um a husband suddenly realizes that the wife is saying one thing but it's meaning something else and it's learning how to actually interpret that and it's very much like that with god and that it takes time to have that sort of sense of confidence ah god speaking i'm hearing god i'm sensing him i mean that's true isn't it yeah i mean that's a great example and especially about you know listening i remember one time you know i um when i came home from work and um mock and i were catching up with having a coffee before we're having dinner and i asked her how was her day and she said that he's just quite upset because you know what someone had said and um and um straight away i went onto the phone and i said she said what are you doing and i said i'm going to fix this i'm going to ring up that person i'm going to tell them mistake number one no no i heard what you said you said no he said i didn't ask you to fix me all i ask is for you just to listen and so and i think that that's it's a great example about how that you know when we treat our relationships that way that we treat god their way too you know we sort of think that what god's and then we immediately act when actually god was just wanting us to sit and be still and to hear what was on his heart and our job is not to try and fix everything our job is to be in relationship with him and out of that relationship just knowing that you're being heard and that's what i learned you know out of that is that actually all i wanted was for you just to listen to hear me and um yeah it's a great example yeah well you know i i shared a story in our church about three um you know before lockdown about a a great man of god a man of the spirit called walter butler and and he told the story how because what he used to do is he used to go into his uh prayer room and he'd put a in the middle of the night he'd put a a um a blanket over himself and he would just sit there waiting on the lord he wouldn't say anything or do anything just sit there and and he said one night he was doing this and all of a sudden he heard this crippling behind him and he thought what the heck is it he turned around and there was jesus and jesus he'd appeared to him and he had tears that were coming out of his eyes and and dripping down on the floor and and the lord said to him he said walter don't even stop this i love these times when we get together and yet there was nothing being said and and and one of the one of the things that i have found so encouraging is to understand that that prayer is not even so much about the words i speak but it's about having a a heart orientated toward jesus and and sometimes i can just sit there say nothing pray nothing but just be there and and let his presence envelop me and just see what happens guys but we've got a question from um pastor murray you want to go with that yeah go it's the question for you operators i would like to know some keys key scriptures when praying for government well what i'd like to do and that's a really good question but we're going to come on to that a bit later actually so emily if if we could if you'd remind us to come back to chris because i want to talk about his his job and his prayer life while in parliament because that's very important um uh well i want to just sort of move to um the next thing and i want to just talk about speaking in tongues which as you know as a church alfred as you know we value very very highly and and we work hard at making sure that every person in our church speaks in tongues can you just talk about what the role of speaking in tongues has become for you in your prayer life you know i'd say that um for me speaking in tongues it's um it's it's like it supercharged my my prayer life and i suppose i take that from you know first corinthians chapter 14 and especially verse 2 where it clearly says that you know when we're speaking in tongues we're not speaking to man or to other people we're speaking directly to god and so there's this language that you know we have that only the spirit of god can understand yeah that's communicating and so you know what i find is that um as i'm doing that and i suppose what i've learned and matured along is actually um continuing to be open to continue to praying in tongues for longer periods of time and and at the same time too you know further on in that chapter of first corinthians it talks about interpretation and so there are times where i do pray i said lord you know speak to me by your spirit that as i'm speaking in tongues the things that you desire to to speak to me about then i pray that you would reveal them uh to me as well and so that's why i think that you know speaking in tongues is just such an important part and i suppose it's the transition between just praying and then interceding you know and we're heading into that whole aspect of a deeper form of prayer that um there sometimes we seem to say prayers quite quickly because it's in the moment and then there are moments where we actually need to take time to pray and to travail i mean you know first jew talks about you know to contend for the faith um to to words that we use about travailing praying and to see and to persevere in korea ephesians 6 talks about that where you know pray you know and never cease to pray so um praying in tongues uh is important because sometimes we get caught up in our own words and then we sort of premeditate what we want to pray to god where in tongues it allows the spirit of god to then determine the focus and the direction often in what we're praying and so for me that's why praying in tongues is is really important so would you say that um praying in tongues speaking in tongues has been something that has developed over your christian life and become more focused more central more effective yeah it's um and it's grown even more so and i i think that the more um are so intense that you become uh in your prayer life um and in when you're you know you're travailing and you're you're really earning and you're and you're pouring yourself out you know before the lord and i find that now um i'm spending a lot more time both in myself and then when i'm praying with others who are who are the same mind we will just pray in tongues for you know over an hour and just continue to pray and ask the and that's the spirit of god to lead us so um so definitely it's something that i you know i'd encourage people to continue to grow in their prayer life yeah you you use the word which i think in christian circles is often very very wrongly interpreted or thought of which is the word travailing so and you've used that word a couple of times travailing in prayer what is that about for you well most prevailing in prayer is that um it's it's contending it's struggling i mean when the word to content to travail is to pour out is the yearn is the long it's their yearning and longing you know it's like for instance when you're you're longing when you're praying for a loved one and praying for a family member and um you know you just you pour yourself out you say lord i just want to um i yearn i long for you know your will along with your desire i long for this person you know to come to know you you know family members that i've prayed for and i suppose yeah it's an old it's a bit of an old school word um [Music] not quite like you know steezy but it's sort of prevailing you know and that we use but it's it's it's struggling and it's not being afraid of the struggle i think that's sometimes we can think that you know our christian faith is meant to be just an easy life when actual fact it's a life that some sometimes the greatest things come out of the perseverance and the struggle that we have uh with issues that are before us that uh give us built character and i think that's what i would add on to it that when we struggle through that when we persevere and we have resilience um that's where the character and prayer comes from well you know i mean um and you know i've talked about this issue of romans eight i'm praying with groanings that cannot be uttered and i know for me and i know for many people who have been open and you know that where i've had a an open transparent relationship with and we talk about prayer um you know it just comes a point when english words cannot express what you're feeling and you don't even know how to pray for a situation because it's so complex and you just and then sometimes what i will do is i'll just say holy spirit pray through me pray into this situation but through me and i will speak in tongues and and often the groaning will actually be an actual manifestation where you will groan like like as if you'd like in childbirth which i would know about of course but but there is there's the the inner burden of this thing coming out of you and you can't explain it it doesn't have words in english and even speaking in tongues doesn't seem to do it and it's just like the holy spirit i mean do you know anything of that have you seen that have you experienced anything of that yeah i've experienced that and um you know i felt a bit awkward and a bit weird and i'm glad that it was just me on my own because you know with others there but what i what i got to a point brent is that i got to a point where i was totally exhausted i i had no words to say and sometimes we need to get to the end of ourselves when we get to a point where we just cry out and like you said then there's this groaning that comes out there's this longing in this yearning that comes out when you're um i suppose it's like an athlete when you're getting to a point where you've just given you're totally exhausted and then you just push yourself right you just and that's the same thing too you keep pushing that out of you and um yeah i've had that i know when the holy spirit is really uh anointing it upon me is that um you know i just start to cry you know and um you know i'd like to think that i was an alpha male you know that i could be staunch and strong all the time but the truth is that sometimes that strength comes in the willing to be vulnerable before the lord our god and that's the thing is that we um you know god does that spirit of god will do that to us yeah yeah yeah i think um you know i i think we often get to places where we just don't know what next how do we you know i prayed and prayed and prayed over the situation or this thing just seems to be too overbearing and i think it's important that people are listening actually understand that's part of the journey of prayer that is part of our prayer life coming to that point and then we become the vessel of travail and the vessel of birth that birth is something in the spirit through the travail through if you like the pain of childbirth in other words we are birthing something in the spirit and frequently we don't even know what is being birthed but what you'll often find is times after that you know it might be a week it might be a month it might even be six months you suddenly find something's changed and actually what's what and the cause of that without you someone's even realizing was the travail and the release of the burden and the birthing process of the holy spirit using you as a vessel to achieve his purposes in the spirit hey very powerful stuff anyway let's let's sort of move on for have you got any other questions at this point emily yeah yeah we've got komato billy asking you a question um the bible says when you pray you don't get answers because you ask amiss can you please explain well that's actually go and i just want to come in on that point because it's a question i was going to actually talk about because it's one of the things was an apostle norma cloud on sunday spoke about the importance of praying the will of god and uh and so why don't you share something of your journey alfred in um in learning not to pray and miss learning what is the will of god in in the issues that you pray about yeah i mean i um i suppose the first time that i actually uh experienced you know the provision of god was when um in 1980 was in 1986 um and um the i've been asked to go to this um evangelist conference to put a grammar evangelist conference and i and i um um one of the elders said to me oh you should go and i said yeah but who am i and then he goes i know but you should go because it'd be great and i said well i just i don't know if i can go because i mean you know um i'm i'm nobody you know i'm just uh and in that days i was an apprentice electrician and i didn't really think much of myself and so first of all i was doubting me and then he said to me um well here's the application form and you know something like three and a half thousand dollars now back in those days that's like a lot it was a lot of money and then i said well i just can't do it and he said well i can provide and i said yeah i sort of said yep okay whatever um and that was my attitude and i suppose the thing is is that um when i prayed i didn't really pray that i believed and so god answered anyway and and i suppose you know and billy's question is that you know when we pray you know what norm was saying is that um prayer often starts off with faith in god first and foremost and i think that's the first thing is that but then uh often that we doubt ourselves and if we doubt ourselves i mean that's why god continues to reveal himself to us um and i love psalm 139 and that's when you know when i got counsel when one of the elders said to me well you need to read simon 39 because god actually has a plan and a purpose for your life and he sees you in a different way than you see yourself and so you begin to shift your perspective because we pray and miss because i think our perspectives aren't quite right both of ourselves and of god and to me that's quite i think that's quite important if we don't get that right then we we don't come before god uh with the right heart we don't come with the right perspective of how god sees us and then um then we almost like keep a bit like gideon we keep putting fleeces out all the time when really we only need to put out you know a fleece at a certain time but we have to keep trusting that god will answer our prayers and so anyway long story short is that um i got the money given to me and i also had worked and so i got the three and a half thousand dollars went across to amsterdam and had this amazing time wow what i realized is that god kept on showing to me that actually this is my purpose and my plan for you and um as i began to continue to ask god then reveal his plans and show me what his will um you know i actually got to sit up on the stage with these guys like billy graham yonggi cho and and all of a sudden i had this opportunity and i began to see the perspective differently and god speaking to me and saying now this is the plans i have for you you know to use you and so forth and so my prayers began to change they began to say lord what is it that you hear what's your will for me what's your desire what's your purpose and what's your plan for me and um and then as i began to pray and then it's like for instance when uh if i think about going into them fast forward going into politics and people started having these words and saying oh we believe that you should consider politics and i would pray the prayer and i'd say lord if this is your will then you would you know then you would open this door what i'd like this is rather than sitting and waiting for the door to open i would say okay lord then i'm going to work my way towards that door and if it opens then i know it's your will if it's not because what i'd realized that before i just prayed the prayer lord you open the door and sit and wait when actually factor said we have to walk our prayers and that's a way i think i've been saying you've got to learn to walk you pee you pray your prayer and you walk your prayer and i believe these have feet in other words they're our feet and sometimes we say lord we pray that you know someone will come and they'll help out in the car park they'll help out in the children's church they'll help out doing their missions and evangelism and then we say amen or maybe god's calling us or maybe we know of someone you know and so we pray the prayer we're not preempting god but i believe the fact is that god gives us also the ability to walk that prayer through to get to that point i mean i mean you're touching a very fundamental issue as christian believers in that a person can sense that they should be doing something maybe have a dream towards some aspect of ministry or calling and they and and the danger is that they sit back just praying about it and not moving toward it when in reality the two work in partnership you know it's faith and works show me your faith without works and i'll show you my faith with works booker james and and so one of the things that i have tried to embody is the fact that often i'm not sure what the will of god is but i sincere this feels okay i'll start moving toward it and very soon you'll get that witness of the holy spirit yes or no and i think that's the mistake a lot of people make they don't actually start moving toward it i mean a very good example as a person who might be feeling called into the mission field well start moving toward it go on a short term missions trip open up a missions account go and talk to missionaries go and do some study about cross-cultural evangelism go and learn to work with children because you know you get on the mission field the first thing you're going to be asked to do is to speak to children you know all of those sort of very very practical things don't be sitting there saying i'm gonna go onto missions you actually go on missions and you will find if it's the will of god for your life it will unfold but if it's not you'll soon know that the holy ghost will show you and and that's just part of i think the faith venture that we have as as christian believers eh amazing um let me let me talk to you just for a few moments about fast prayer and fasting because you know i know for my life alfred fasting certainly not so much in recent years because of my health but fasting was just a fundamental um discipline that i think laid a foundation for my life and my ministry just talked to us a little bit about fasting yeah well um it's it's like with uh you know we're praying in tongues they're just they're key elements of actually it's almost like supercharging uh our our relationship with god and also walking in the will of god because uh in the end the the essence of fasting as i understand it you know through the word um it's about bringing uh our flesh our bodies um our thoughts our minds under submission to the spirit of god and it's not just about losing weight though trust me when when when you've done it you definitely um lose a bit but there you go emily we could make a um you know a plan around that fasting but um but you know that's the whole intent you know when you read through daniel what i love about daniel he's been the classic example of someone who in a position of responsibility not only prayed but also fasted and you know in daniel chapter 10 it talks about the fact is that when he had this burden he committed himself to 21 days you know they call it the daniel fast of praying but when he was doing that he it it says in the word there that he went without you know um you know pleasant food you know food that was good and so it's around you know fasting is about going without things that in one sense that you would normally that are pleasing to the eye that are that are good for you because you're wanting to say lord i'm going to sacrifice and i suppose that's the key word right yeah it is it is you have to learn how to sacrifice when you do that and you sacrifice means surrender surrender means that you you commit yourself before the will of god and that's when you get into the presence of god and so fasting praying in tongues and as you surrender that you know i can say brent you know from firsthand experience that's when the greatest times that i find of being in the presence you know of god has been when i've you know when i've committed myself to that to that period of time amazing amazing yeah i mean um one of the things for me is isaiah 58 which is of course it's not this fast that i've chosen and if you actually go through isaiah 58 it goes to about 10 or 12 things and they're all spiritually applied about the effect of fast and break bread for you know um and that sort of stuff i'm incredibly powerful but a lot of people read it from a very natural perspective and actually it's it's talking about the spiritual dynamics that get unlocked uh when when we fast and pray and so i feel it's a very important thing i think it it really does unlock stuff and i think like you say the whole pattern is you come to the lord with a sacrifice i present my body a living sacrifice holy and acceptable to the lord and this is my reasonable service romans 12 1 to 2 and so on so so fasting is absolutely crucial i think in the christian life well i want to come to the the big the big issue nine years in parliament and uh and i know that uh you prayed around the parliament buildings i i can't remember what time in the morning you'd get up to do it but something like either five o'clock in the morning or six o'clock or something like that and i can just imagine in that terrible city of of wind and cold and so on that must have been a sacrifice in itself but i want i i i think people would really like to hear about your journey what what made you do that what were some of the things you saw what were some of the things you learned during those times and and did it have an impact on your role as a parliamentarian and ultimately we want to get to murray's question which is about the sort of scriptures and the things that you use in order to pray for our parliament and our government and our nation thank you so you know one of the things is that i've said to people that when people have if anyone has said to me oh i'm praying and i'm just asking but i'm not hearing from god and i i often say to them when was the last time you read your bible [Laughter] the thing is is that you know there's 66 books right 44 and 22 you know 44 in the old 22 in the new and all of them uh is a letter right if you could think about it they're all letters they've been written to communicate to speak to us and then as jesus said then but i'm gonna i'm gonna supercharge it by giving you the holy spirit so it's the word of god empowered by the holy spirit that gives us direction and so i'm saying that because when i um went into parliament one of the things i was saying to the lord and said lord why am i here you know what is it that you you know what what's my purpose for being here and it wasn't until there came a time when when actually was when the um the name of jesus was taken out of the prayer by the speaker and um i was asked to come outside and speak to there was only 200 christians outside and i went outside and when i uttered the words what the speaker did was wrong the holy spirit immediately just came upon me and the holy spirit spoke to me and said i've chosen you for such a time as this wow in the name of jesus to the banner for the nations and to be my watchman on the tower ezekiel 33 7. you see and this is the authority of the word of god when we're praying we need to pray that lord you give us the authority through your word and it's empowered by the spirit of god so when i read through ezekiel 33 7 you know and through ezekiel there's a lot about the watchman the role and the responsibility of the watchman and so i said lord i want to be the best watchman that you've called me for wow and you know brent i want to say that each one of us has been called to be a watchman and a watch woman um a watched person uh on on the walls um of our res of responsibility that we have you know in our areas it could be in business it could be in school it could be a culture you know um whatever it is i believe for a watchman type role and so when i committed myself to that then i said well my wall at the moment is parliament and so physically what i i committed myself to is that every morning when i was down there in parliament at 5 30 a.m i would walk for an hour and a half on the outside and the inside of parliament and i would just pray and then moka used to be praying with me but she'd be up in auckland and i had my headphones on and so she'd be praying for my nice warm bed and i'd be out there and the wind and the rain there's nothing like that that sort of challenges you right because sometimes you need a physical movement right you need to step out physically otherwise like you said it's words without actions you know and um so as i began to pray and intercede i said lord what is it that you had for this place teach me show me i did my homework i learned the history and heritage about parliament buildings and so forth and we just had some incredible time sprint and i'll give you an example for instance one of the the moments that we were praying on the inside of parliament and um i uh you know i was just lying there and then mocker was just praying and she said you know i just got this word i could see she said i can see like like um like covering like muzzles on the on the mouths of people and a woman and i just said okay lord we're just going to pray what does that mean what are you what are you praying about and anyway so i prayed we prayed that prayer lord if there if there's a muslin that's going on on the mouths of people we pray that you would just remove that and you would expose it for what it is and that was on a thursday on the friday the news report comes out government or prime minister muzzles ministers and it was just like the lord the holy spirit was just speaking in an amazing way to be able to give a revelation about what to pray for and to see that that would shift and i believe god does use us at strategic times when we've committed ourselves to this um that he can bring revelation for us to pray look brent it's the place that i found that um on the books of parliament on the um so on the outsides of the parliament house uh there's the we call it the chamber the house and on the outside there we call them the lobbies and there's these bookshelves and it's got for over 165 years of parliament there's two sets of books one's the handsets every single speech in parliament that's written is recorded and then it's got the statutes which is every law of the land those that have been amended or changed or made right so you've got words and you've got laws and when i was there the holy spirit just immediately directed me to put up the um the latter on the bookcase because it's a big bookcase and go to the very first book and when i took the first book out and that's when when i read it and i knew why that the holy spirit directed me there because parliament began in 1865 right and went in 1854 when parliament was constituted the very first debate was not about sheep was not about education or economy it was about prayer and so it's like these revelations come when we commit ourselves and when i committed myself to that to their journey of being the watchmen in their place revelation of the word power of the holy spirit and then stepping out in faith the combination of those things meant that god was able to i believe shift and move things and hence the reasons why when i made that speech in parliament outside parliament the footprint of faith is deep and wide in this land i can speak about those things because i gave the impressions of god in the history and heritage of our nation and the foundation stunts that could say and i could say we can say that we are a christian nation amazing absolutely amazing and of course because you you you begin to to to realize some things i remember you telling me the story which might be good to talk about how um maori was not represented at all well on the actual parliament grounds so what i what as i was going around there's different statues there's two main statues there's a statue of john balance who was a premiere back in uh 1830 through 1831 18 1883 to 1881 to 1883 and then there was what's it said um there's a more there's a a commemoration plaque uh for whichever captain cook but there's nothing on the outside parliament that acknowledges the bicultural relationship between maori and pakia or of any significance to maori and it's not until you go on the outside and when i was on the outside and i was praying one morning i saw these two po two poe's po means post and there were these two concrete posts carved as the edges of a canoe the shape of a canoe with maori carvings on it and what i did when i did my research on it it showed that these actually belong to tiatiawa tribe which is in taranaki and so the land of parliament is the land that actually belongs to which is out in the taranaki area and then further along there and then i just as i was praying i said to lord what's the significance of this these two pope and what i believed is that they're a gateway and then that very um that year 2018 i was invited to go and speak in parihaka now parihaka significant um uh it's a great place to go for the history and heritage and in 1881 that's when the land confiscation of parihaka had happened and when i was there and i learned the history and heritage was that the two um maori kombats were at that time who was in charge of parihaka that one loved the old testament one loved the new testament and so therefore when the land confiscation happened right they turned around and rather than acting uh against they actually went out in peace and what came to me was isaiah chapter nine verse six for unto us the son is given the child is born and the government shall be upon his shoulders and he shall be called wonderful counter almighty god everlasting father prince of peace and so they acted with peace because they believed in the prince of peace wow but internationally it was the first recorded incidence of passive resistance but you see that's why i believe that what i what the holy spirit was showing to me that actually this was a a situation where the history of our country the group had invited the prince of peace in a time of conflict and i believe what we witnessed at that time was actually a coming of peace even though it was traumatic and it was tragic um for the people that were there but i believe there's something significant for the future of our country and understanding uh all of that but all of that came brent uh like i said when we commit ourselves to be a watchman and uh in service of the lord in our spheres of influence on the walls of our places of responsibility then that's where we begin to see shifts and change happen in revelation well of course you know this is just so important because i know that what you're talking about tonight and parliament is the tip of the iceberg of things that the lord showed you and things that you experienced as you prayed in parliament and through the grounds and around the grounds it's absolutely incredible now but i didn't realize that when you did that you had mocker um listening in often yeah so michael wood would look and sometimes actually i had different um people coming in onto their prayer morning so people who had found out said can i join you so actually norma mcleod joined me uh mike devetta who's a pastor up north in whangarei joined me as well and um steve green a couple of others uh but mocha was the mainstay but yeah um so yeah we just we just committed ourselves to pray together um as we went around parliament now i we've got to move this pretty quick because i want to get onto a very important topic but you know murray's question was scriptures around prayer but see what i'm learning from you tonight is the scriptures about prayer over parliament and over the government really is uh scriptures that came as you prayed in other words you didn't come with pre-defined um you know passages but the lord spoke to you and developed conviction over the the scriptures to base your period i mean is that a right is that right or wrong yeah no absolutely that's that's right and uh just so that you know we do want to answer murray's question um i mean first timothy chapter two murray uh verses one and four talks about first of all then i urge that supplications and prayers and intercessions and thanksgiving be made for all people for kings and for all who are in high positions romans chapter 13 1 also in philippians chapter 4 verse 6. really what they say murray is that they're about putting our attention to pray for those people who are on those roles of responsibility you know because we pray that they would act you know with justice and mercy they would show kindness they would be discerning they would be wise you know those things i think are so important for us to pray for so you know the word of god shows to us is the first thing we should do is pray for them and then at the same time too you know like i said we our prayers can have feet so i encourage people that you know if you want to pray in the in this case for emps but for anybody could be a local body uh counselor then form a relationship with them because you know it's one thing to pray for them but then um send them an email give them a phone call say hey look my name's emily i just want to pray for you because i didn't just you know anything i can do to help you because then what you're doing is that you're actually you're praying out of relationship not just he's a person who's in a status position and what you do is that you now bring your prayer and your presence and the presence of god into this relationship with a person you know and i think that's the thing that becomes important i want to encourage people that it's one thing to pray for these people in authority and you'd be amazed how easy it is that how accessible people are inside um both parliament and around the place i remember meeting these um these guys who who love rugby from the uk and they said to me you know what's amazing about new zealand we can meet anybody and i said well like who we met these all blacks and we had a beer with them in the pub you know because in different parts of the world right people who are in positions of status aren't always as accessible and i think we live in a country where actually good old kiwi new zealand lots of people are accessible and so while we we can pray for these people in authority um i encourage you to take their prayer one step further and form a relationship very good well listen i i i we're getting close to the end of the of our time together but we have got to go to where angels fear to tread and that is to ask the the question um i know that you've developed a quite an effective prayer life with your wife mocha and i know that a lot of people will be listening to this broad broadcast and that will be like their their their world of nightmare stuff and so i want you just to talk a little bit about your your relationship and prayer with mocker how did that develop for you has it been effective you made a statement um to me um today though or yesterday you had to learn to minister out of your marriage not not just out of um our ministry and you know i mean that's an incredibly potent statement so your prayer life with your wife let's talk about that you know um you know when we first came and got to know each other was actually an outreach and um walker's brother you know is my best friend so we got to know each other and family and at the same time we would pray and we would seek lord and so um when you're praying when you're friends it's different when you're praying when you're a husband and wife right because um the relationships are slightly different you're you're living with each other you're growing you know and um and i suppose it's had to grow in there there are some times where it's been good and sometimes where it's been painful you know if i'm honest with you i'm thinking like oh lord maybe she's not listening to me you know no that's not true it's just you know it's about um and so i you know and sometimes she'd pray in one direction and i pray in the other and i suppose one one thing that i i learned in in a very painful way in one sense is that um you know i had to learn how to surrender you know myself into this relationship because it's a covenant relationship you know um our wedding cake i had the you know the passage in ecclesiastes three about you know a three chord strain is not easily broken um relationship is a covenant and i suppose this is what god was teaching me because i realized that actually when i kept on focusing on me and my gifting and then i said well here's mocha's gifting here's my gift thing let's just bring them together actually what god had to unpack uh to me was that no that's not how i see it and so i just say lord okay how do you say he said and he reminded me that in actual fact that um that marriage uh of a husband and a wife is a creation principle you know of all the things that were created there was only one that was created in the image of god you know that we were created in the image of god and that coming together is a creation principle and that's incredibly powerful because what god creates out of that are good things when we um when we when we allow that relationship to be what it should be in him and so where what god was teaching me is that alfred i'm going to teach you to minister out of your marriage not just out of your gifted and so um what does that mean well it means that first of all i surrender you know all my ambition right and all my desire before you and before mokka i mean for my wife and i said lord then i pray that you would help us bring those two together so that lord's got that with there's a complimentary aspect in the way that we minister and then sometimes she leads and i follow and sometimes i lead and she follows or sometimes we lead together and so um you know that's not perfect uh brent but you know it's a journey that has has most definitely shifted our prayer life together you know and um and i've come to to greatly appreciate you know mocker's discernment many times more now when i've learnt the principle of ministering out of our marriage not just out of our individual giftings um and that's really made a difference you know to us oh amazing amazing well i want to come to the the final thing um which i think is really important is uh i know that many chris many christians struggle with prayer alfred um you know and they go through the journey but how would you work with a person who's struggling with their prayer life to help them have a more authentic realistic relevant prayer life what would you do with them i think the first question i'd ask is that you know what is it that they um what is prayer to them you know and to whom do they feel that they're praying to um i can remember that i was talking to someone who was um who was a um quite a successful um rugby coach and he was telling me that all the team knew um that he was a christian and then one day um the team sort of got together and i said okay okay tell us about uh we know that you're you know you're quite religious tell us about your religion and he said uh i can't and they said no yes you are because you're you're we know you're the religious guy and he said well i can't tell you about my religion they said why because i don't have a religion and i said well what do you have and he said i have got a relationship and my relationship was with the lord jesus christ and you know i found that those comments so powerful because it just helps us to first of all see ourselves and what i would encourage that person with is that you know is to help them to understand their prayer is not a religion we've been saying that first and foremost it's a relationship and if you don't have a relationship it's like relationship with people around us people that whom we love you know the relationship only gets better when we commit ourselves to journey with one another to hear each other to spend time with each other and so i'd be saying to them that you know look you know when you reframe it and understand that you're entering into a relationship it begins to shift things yeah what would you commit yourself to what would that look like how much time would you spend well the more time we spend with someone that we love the deeper the relationship you know can be um and i think you know that becomes important the last thing i'd say is this is that you know jesus was um [Music] knew that the disciples needed to journey together and not alone and so in the middle part of his ministry he sent them out two by two and i think that one of the things that's can be incredibly helpful for people and i found just recently you know and i have to give credit to you because you preached it in one of your sermons and you know i thought oh no the pastor's preaching and i'm feeling convicted by the lord about praying uh and partnership and so you know when i committed myself to pray with someone you know every day on a regular basis my prayer life has just grown wow and so you know the the second thing i would say is then commit yourself i think you said it before emily that you know when we journey together there's a level of accountability that happens in the livability of growth that's important as well so um pray as if it was a relationship as if it is a relationship with the living god and pray together i think are two things that could help start people that have the world yeah well you know and i'm excited you've said some of those things because um you know i felt the lord speak to me you know to actually this sunday speak on prayer morning and night and actually some of the things you're talking about are exactly the issues that i'm going to address in the morning two absolute key factors for an effective prayer life and then sunday night i'm just going to deal with a string of keys that i believe can empower our prayer life so you know i think god's speaking at the moment about prayer both um to ourselves to our to our churches um i think this is a season with what is going on uh in our nation that we've got to be more vigilant and prayer and i think it's a it's just a mission critical issue at the moment emily any more questions that you feel would be good for tonight before we close now you're microsoft emily sorry um no not no no real questions okay okay well look what as we come to a close um alfred um i really would like you just to pray for people right now just to pray over their prayer life just just to encourage them in prayer for just a grace to come around them um so that especially in this time for aucklanders and lockdown but through our nation that people would somehow receive a grace from god you carry something without any doubt in prayer and i believe that gives you the authority and the positioning in the spirit to be able to impart something of that grace into people's lives so why don't you just lead us in prayer all right thank you brenton thank you let us pray how did we come before you um father god i just pray lord then by the the second chronicles 7 14 is what comes to mind and i feel you speaking through that lord and there was a way in which the wider context was king solomon building the temple your temple a place of worship father david had secured the city and the country and the land and so um now it was time to build the temple and as he built the temple you came into that place lord god and then you said i i will now make this my dwelling place and so father god i love that story because lord our first prayers lord we pray that we as our in our bodies would be the temple of god i asked lord god that you would help us we would allow our bodies our our minds our hearts and our spirit could be a temple that is pleasing for you and then you would say to us that i will make this a dwelling place that your holy spirit will dwell within us lord god and then father god i thank you that you then went on to say to solomon now this is what i want you to tell the people that if my people who are called by my name and father god i pray right now that those that are listening i thank you for those that have been asking questions i thank you for billy i thank you for murray and thank you for others that are on the that are on the line right now lord god and that are listening but father god you know them by name 139 tells us this lord god for you are fearfully and wonderful made lord god you know our thoughts you know our coming and our going lord god and so lord god we pray that those of us that are called by your name and you go on to say or humble themselves father god i pray now that we just pour ourselves before you lord god we just humble ourselves and say father rest we surrender we receive we surrender father god um our thoughts our desires our ambitions lord god we surrender before you lord god we humble ourselves and say father god you are the lord of our lives and father god says that you will pray and then we will seek your face father god i thank you lord god that as we come before you that you come to us lord god but lord god you ask us to come to you and open the door father god so father we want to seek your faith lord and i pray that you would help us to seek you father god the presence of you not just father god of things that we've read things that we've known but father god i thank you that by your holy spirit and by your son the lord jesus christ and you've given us example of what it means to enter into a relationship father god i thank you that you spoke uh to miriam and aaron in fact you told them off and you said to them this you told them to come out of the tent and in the cloud you said this you said to prophets by the god of apostles you have visitations by dreams and by visions but to my servant moses i meet with him face to face and so father god we want to pray that as we seek your face that we father god would have the favor of moses as moses had that lord god you would desire to see us face to face and we will desire to see you lord god and father god as we see you in a relationship with you lord god right now father god what is in our hearts and you know that father god is the uncertainty of the times that we're living in father god there's pandemic there's covert knighting there's all these names laws god there's delta and then there's the issues around contract tracing and people father getting vaccinated father god it just creates father god fear into the hearts of people with all this uncertainty and what all this chaos lord god and so father god we pray for healing because lord that's what you asked us to pray for when we seek you father god then father god you will hear our prayers hear our prayers lord god father that needs to be a healing in the land but before healing from the pandemic lord god there needs to be a healing in the landfill of the god of the brokenness of god at times that exists in the hearts of moving woman father god father god where people have turned away from you lord god jesus needs to be a reconciliation father god we're father god even in good families by the god relationships have become strained and so there needs to be a restoring lord god father god we just want to pray now that we you would hear our prayers and you heal this landlord god you would heal the lamb and father god i thank you that it goes on to say that it now i will i will see and i will hear father god father god i pray that you will see father god what is in our hearts you will see what's happening in this nation father we pray that you will bring river fresh revelation to us now lord god hallelujah lord jesus thank you father god thank you jesus for this time in jesus precious name amen amen wow wow what uh what just an amazing night this has been alfred and just so grateful for you just sharing openly your heart on this issue and uh you know we we're going to continue to pursue this theme at the in this season on sunday um don't forget that thursday night we have our zoom holy spirit night and um where there are connections on how to get i'm a part of that um on our website and on my in brent douglas ministries um site uh but you know god is doing stuff over the internet people are getting healed people are getting faith built up and restored and so i just want to invite you to be with us on thursday night and then be with us on sunday thank you for joining us and thank you emily for what you've done here tonight hey god bless you and uh good night good night

Channel: Encounter Church

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Id: 3aiQ_BEcQQk

Length: 66min 7sec (3967 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 21 2021