Monday, January 22, 2018
Do Our Diaries Reflect The Priorities Of Heaven
Do Our Diaries Reflect The Priorities Of Heaven
Rob Rufus returned from Australia and preached yesterday a much anticipated sermon; "Invading the Impossible - Part 12" called "The Power of Testimony". I cant WAIT to hear it and even more transcribe it to share it! But while Rob was away I have listened to a couple of sermons and there was one sermon that must be transcribed and shared. After Rob returned from Brighton last July in 2007 - he preached one called; "Do Our Diaries Reflect the Priorities of Heaven" - on Sunday 22nd July.
Here it is:"How many of you find life easy? How many of you find that life has got a few challenges? Everyone finds life easy do they?! Some of you will not put up your hands for anything because you think it is a trick question? Have I been so hard on you that you are frightened to put up your hand?
Why did God hide some of the best promises and riches and blessing in the Promised Land among some of the biggest giants? There were blessings and riches in the Promised Land that it was Gods will for His people to go in and inherit. God did it - God arranged it! Because He did not want the casual pursuer of God, the coward, the self-pitying person, the self-concious person, the self-centred person, the person of unbelief to have access to His greatest blessing.
So He hides His greatest blessings amongst His greatest challenges so that the people who are going to receive the blessings of God have to repent of all self-righteousness, all delusions of self-sufficiency, to throw themselves completely onto God and to come into the Presence of God every single day and make a choice that no matter demanding life is and no matter how many pressures come, I will make my calendar a priority that I am going to engage God on a daily basis.
If we dont engage God on a daily basis and get into His Presence then we are going to have to find our lives are being lived out of the barren or insufficient resources of grace - in other words we are living our life on an empty, emotional soul tank. Amen? God wants us to have our cups overflowing. "The Lord anoints my head with oil - my cup overflows".
How does it come? Through grace - but I have to position myself in a place of receptivity to receive grace.
I want to say to you that over the summer break we are not going to allow ourselves to go passive like many other churches do. "Just close down - so many people are away - lose momentum and let the devil take back ground he lost from us". I say no - we are not giving the devil any ground. He doesnt even deserve one millimeter and we have fought blood and nails and guts for 3 years - I dont know about you but Glenda and I have war stories that some of you wouldnt believe. You would think I was exaggerating! You would feel so sorry for me that you would pray and fast for days for Glenda and me! Unbelievable stuff!
I was on the phone for hours and hours dealing with international stuff (not with the UK - that was such a mighty time and I told you last week about the miracles that happened. It was mind-blowing stuff). But I was dealing with issues and there just came a point where I was sweating under my armpits with the adrenaline sweat - focused for hours and hours dealing with horrific issues and somewhere I had to stop and say; "As important as this is - I have to pull the phone out and go into my bedroom and spend 3 hours alone with God". Because if you do not do that devil will keep you on the run and if your outgoing of emotion, energy exceeds your income then that is how we define nervous breakdowns!
The reason Glenda and I have not had a nervous breakdown in 28 years of ministry is not because we are strong. I learnt that secret many years ago that this world is relentless in its pursuit of your time. It will eat your time and invade your world with things that seem so urgent that if you do not give into them now, then you will have big problems. But if you really go back in your thinking and ask yourself those things that seemed so urgent - were they that urgent?! I will tell you why they werent urgent but seemed urgent. It was the fear of man. It was "If I dont pander to mans demands and if I dont fit into mans requests of me then they wont like me" and it is the fear of rejection and fear of not being understood that makes us go beyond the grace of God to try and fit in with mans new role and once we are delivered from the fear of man and man-made rejection - they may reject us and misunderstand us;
But we will come to a place when the most important thing in our lives is that we have got heavens approval, heavens endorsement and heavens endorsement is the supernatural on your life. Heavens endorsement is divine authority!
The political spirit - the fear of man, the placating of man, the wanting man to like you - that is what drives people in every kind of career and workplace into overload and into nervous breakdown. You cannot hear God when you are exhausted! You can like Elijah in the wilderness hear the still quiet voice. But it wasnt the Elijah calling down fire from heaven and taking on Jezebel. No he was exhausted and running.
I am determined that I cannot afford to let the devil to catch me on a day that I am so exhausted I have no divine resources to resist him.
When you run out of resources to resist the devil then you become prone to deception and make very bad decisions. You make very bad decisions that take you off your highway of destiny and onto a road of disaster. Never take the easy way out of pressure! Get before God and let Him fill you with His Presence and His joy and get up on a mountainside! You have to shut the noise of Hong Kong down sometimes! I promise you by the integrity of Gods Word - if Jesus was here in Hong Kong, like He was in Jerusalem 2000 years ago, then I promise you that He would get out of the noisy city and get out to the mountaintops. Over and over in the Gospels it says "Jesus withdrew to a solitary place!".
He understood that He was operating - though He was fully God - His divinity was restrained within His humanity so He had to operate from His humanity 100% of the time - never out of His divinity. As a man He would have burnt out and had a nervous breakdown unless ...
Some of you walked into this place so exhausted and I want to tell you exhaustion comes to all of us but when it comes over a prolonged period we need a loving correction to say we are making wrong choices. We either left the TV on too long or went to a party (and by the way I am not against parties - Jesus went to parties!) or we had one more late night that we couldnt afford to have but we are afraid of offending people. So we chose man and mans programmes rest in being with God.
So we give Sunday morning our leftovers and I am not prepared as the host of the service with you to host Him who is all-glorious and to allow the potential God had for this meeting to be robbed or diluted because of human exhaustion. God has an agenda for every week and every Sunday He opens prophetic windos for us to get through and if we dont go through these windows we may have to wait for 10 or 7 years or even 40 years for those same windows to open again.
God is unfolding eternal agendas sequentially by supernatural purpose. God is not a human that He should lie and is not a man that He should live in haphazard purpose. God is moving by sovereign intention to the climax of the ages and He is moving history to a purpose. People are either moving in partnership with Him or they are moving as survivors trying to look for a way out of pressure.
There is no way out of pressure at all.
Pressure is going to be here and intensify till the end of the age. The way to handle pressure is to get into the Presence of God and then God capacitates you to handle peace in the midst of pressure.
Some of you are underestimating your value - you are underestimating how important you are to God. You are underestimating your preciousness, you are underestimating the call of God on your life. Some people say; "Rob is a superstar". No Rob is a pathetic little man! If I went one week without spending time alone with God, the very next week I got into the pulpit you would be embarrassed for me! Because I would stand here full of self-pity and weariness and confusion and demonised but you see me week after week standing in this pulpit because week after week I have made decisions sometimes to stop working 12 hours a day, turn the phone off and get alone with God and it is a deliberate decision that could be misunderstood! Not only by people in this community but by people in the international community.
I make a decision sometimes that I am going to spend romantic time with my wife. And I am going to take my daughter out for a meal and I am going to shut work out and focus on you! In a way I am speaking seriously but dont be so sober! I am not a superstar but under the anointing of God we are called to be superstars! I am so tired of people saying; "We dont want superstars in the Church!". Are you crazy?! I want superstars! I want superstars leading our children! I dont want just anyone leading our children! I want superstars leading the worship and greeting at the door! I dont want someone; "Im so unworthy ... I am doing this because no one else will!". Do it as a superstar! Do it under the anointing! Do it under authority!
You know in the past people have said; "Oh well you know Rob - you are a superstar and so everyone depends on you". And I am left thinking; "Well what must I do? Must I glow less?! Must I stand looking depressed in the worship like others? Must I come down to the level of unbelief and conservatism and formalism? If I glow less - will others glow more?!". Because I would glow less that others would glow more then I would GLADLY glow less! But I find if I glow less the people glow less! But if I glow more and get on fire then people come to watch me BURN!
I cant handle passivity! I cant handle in the pulpit people who have got no passion - no volcano - what is that?! Its blasphemy! When you meet with the living God and He fills your being with the glory of His Presence, the God who created the heavens and earth and He expands your being with His living conciousness and when you speaks, you must speak from that authority. I cant handle mealy-mouthed little words and little apologies! Oh I am so sorry - I am breathing the air in the place! Jesus is called the Lion of the Tribe of Judah and knows when to use the rod and when to use the staff! He is not always using the staff as a Mr Nice-Guy. Sometimes He will use the rod in discipline and correction because He disciplines those that He loves and then He uses the staff.
Some people always use the rod always correcting and rebuking everyone. Some people just use the staff - always Mr Nice-Guy - dont want to upset. If we volunteer lets do it as superstars shining for Jesus and we are doing it for eternal purposes.
When we greet people at the door, we are impact nations by just being faithful!
If it takes being a superstar and shining and getting more bold to lift the church then I am going to go up another level! You put me leading the junior church and after 3 weeks look in and there will be no superstars.
Because we are only superstars when we are operating in our place, in our gifting and in our calling.
But we have got some superstars in that junior church! You put me in a mechanics shop, drive your car in and see - in fact in some areas I am actually retarded. I am not joking. I dont even rate on the scale of capability. But in my place I can shine. But I want to tell you that I would not shine if I dont know my place and get alone with God and recharge my batteries. If you find your place in this church (and everyone has a place in this church - God has placed you where your best gifts and anointings can operate) and when you find your place and realise that you are breaking out of religious tradition that has sat in pews and listened to "superstars" speak -
Church is a place where every believer - every member - has a contribution, a function and a purpose to make that church shine like a superstar church.
I dont know how people can come to church and not know their purpose! "Oh yere Ive got to go and sit in that chair in church". But if you know - I am coming to be a greeter at the door, Im coming to be an usher or to work in junior church or to work on the computers or in music. Im coming to make sure during tea that no one is left out and everyone has had some contact with someone - some love! I am coming to prophesy - I am going to get up early Sunday morning and wait on God and come full of God and I am going to go beyond Rob and be a greeter superstar and dance and praise the glory of our great King! I am going to show off my love for God in front of everyone else! I am not going to just stand there in the worship!
"Rob you dont know what kind of week I had!". You dont know what kind of week I had. I want to talk about the glory of God - the Presence of God. I am so desperate for Gods glory!
I want to be among a people that love God and His glory more than they love anything else! They want God - they want to know His voice and hear His voice! We live in a generation of people who dont know God and if He walked in they wouldnt know what His Presence is. They never heard His voice once audibly on the inside of them! They dont know the character of God - the nature of God - they are not even friends with God! God is just a concept to them.
"The Big Man upstairs - some being up there runs the universe by remote control like a robotic kind of technocrat".
Every believer under the New Covenant is meant to hear the voice of God - know God - walk with God - have His Presence in their lives.
I want to give you a 10 minute showing of when I was in Brighton in the last main session and I want to show you what it takes if you walk with God - how foolish you can look sometimes and I know some of you do not enter into the Presence of God because of a false sense of dignity or a fear of man and a conservative culture that contradicts the liberty of the kingdom of heaven.
I want you to know that when you walk in the Presence of God there is a price! When you know His Presence, His Presence may come on you and manifest on you in ways that may make you look stupid in the eyes of man. So you can shut that down because God is a gentleman and if you say; "Oh Lord I dont want Your Presence on me to make me do things that make you look stupid". Then you grieve the Holy Spirit and He will leave you alone.
But years ago I said; "Lord You come upon me and You do anything You want - if its You, I will take it!". I am not afraid of the devil or false miracles and counterfeit signs and wonders because I am a Christian! I am anointed! I have God in me and I can discern the moment a devil does something that is a miracle! I KNOW it is not the Presence of God! I know it and can feel it. I dont live in fear and neither should any of you if you are born again. You should discern and detect the presence of false miracles INSTANTLY when they happen.
Let me say this: All genuine miracles from God come out of His Presence - then His power manifests from His Presence. If there is no Presence of God there and a miracle happens - then be careful. It is a devil miracle. You have got to know the Presence of God and when you know it then you will know whether a miracle is from God because the Presence will first manifest and then the power will come out of the Presence and do the miracle. If a miracle happens and no Presence is there - watch out! Counterfeit! It is EASY to detect!
So in these days you need to know two things:
1. You and I need to get to know the New Testament at least - slowly and gradually - fairly well.
2. But more important than that we need to get to know the Presence of God. THAT is how you will know the false!
Hong Kong get ready! The most bizarre miracles and signs and wonders are about to hit this planet!
The most awesome angelic visitations the planet has ever had - the Bible predicts this! If falling and shaking confuses people and they think; "Can God do this?!" - what are they going to do when awesome things start happening?! That we walk on water and raise the dead!? When angels suddenly appear and we all see them with our own eyes and the angel speaks with the voice of the Ancient of Days! He says; "I am Gabriel - sent from the Third Heaven!". Those who have been walking in the Presence for for years will hear and simply lift their heands and worship the God of glory. Those who dont know the Presence and God and are just being religious will run out the room and not be ready for what is going to hit this planet!
I was speaking in front of 4, 500 people and there were another couple of hundred in the overflow room (at Brighton) and the minister of Westminster Chapel - one of the most prestigious known-to-be-conservative churches where R T Kendall and Martyn Lloyd-Jones came out of - the man that took over from R T Kendall, was in the overflow room! And the power of God hit him and others so they fell off their chairs. The minister of Westminster Chapel fell over and hit his head on the concrete and he has got a bald patch at the back of his head. He grazed it and he came up afterwards and gave me a big hug and said; "I needed that!".Stop thinking because you have got a professional career that you work for a company that you work for a company and I work for God. Someone in this church told me this week - "Rob I am so glad you told me that youve had problems with your children when they were younger teenagers in the past - it makes me feel like there is hope for me because you work for God and I dont!". I wanted to scream with despair and say; "Have I been here so long - 3 years - to tell you that everyone of us are full time priests of God!".
You are full time servants of God as much as I am - whatever your career is! I want to PUKE on this distinction between clergy and laity! I hate that - it is unbiblical - it flies in the face and blasphemes the Cross! On the Cross, Jesus said; "It is finished" and He destroyed the Levitical priesthood and brought Gods eternal plan into being that He tried to bring into Israel and Israel rejected being a nation of priests so God had to raise up a professional priesthood! But He wanted all of Israel to be priests. When He died on the Cross He destroyed the Levitical priests and the apostle Peter says; "We are a nation of priests!". The Christian church are ALL priests under God!
I believe when you come into a Sunday morning service, I believe you should come into this place with as much concern for the welfare and success of this meeting as I do - oh fellow priest! Did you do that this morning? Did you come into this meeting thinking;
"Oh God as a priest, I have the privilidge of standing before You to pull Your Presence and bring You into the meeting!".
Or did you think; "Rob will do that. Hes the superstar!". No - you are all superstars! Your job may be not to preach. Thats my job. But your job is to do a whole lot of other things as superstars. This Church is an incredible powerful Church for how young it is. This Church is one of the best churches I have been personally a part of and I mean that from my heart with integrity. This Church is operating through - at about 10% of its potential. But we will see 90% release of talents and gifts and power in this church when every priest stands up and says; "I hate the distinction between clergy and laity! It came in about 400 A.D and was part of the demonic Dark Ages and was never there in the New Testament! I reject it - I am a priest!
Even though I work in education, the medical world, in mechanical world - you are a priest of God and you can hear God and walk with God and know His voice! And you carry His Presence!
And somewhere you have to repent and say; "Father I repent of a cynical skeptical mind - I repent of fear and I say, Father would You come on me with Your Presence and would You come on me with Your glory? Would You manifest Your glory to me in such a mighty way and whatever it means - if I get drunk in the Spirit, if I shake or if I fall - I dont care God! I want that more than anything else in my life!".
Here I was standing in front of 4, 500+ people and I am wanting to make a good impression and I go up to the room before I went into the meeting and I am praying to myself and the Lords Presence comes into that room in such a glorious way and I started laughing and crying. Eventually I tried to pray and got up to walk but could hardly walk because the Presence of God was on me and I was walking all funny and bowed over. Glenda came in and said; "Have you been crying?" and I said; "Yes but because I am so happy". I said; "I am coming to the meeting - 4, 500 waiting!". And you know what? I didnt care about the 4, 500! I dont mean that in an unkind way. I didnt want to leave the room because His Presence was so beautiful and so attractive that I just wanted to stay with Him. He eventually had to tell me - "Go down Rob and speak to them". When I went down there, I spoke for about 10 minutes and suddenly the Presence of God came over me in such a way that I just lost it and started laughing in front of 4, 500 British people and other nations! I made a complete fool of myself but if I have to make a fool of myself to release foolishness in you then I am happy to do so!
I would normally hide this but I am going to let you see it. Dont think you are insulting if you laugh. 4, 500 were laughing - I wish the camera had panned over the congregation because dignified people were laughing. Leaders of high influence internationally were falling off their chairs under the power of God - some unconcious! God hit that place and all I did was stand there and get drunk in the Holy Spirit! I promise you I had touched no alcohol. Thanks Ryan - can we try and get that on there?
(DVD recording begins):
"If you have your Bibles please turn to Acts chapter 9 but please dont try and take notes again. Most of you will have worked that out by now. Well I have so enjoyed my time here and I feel a bit sad that this is my last one because I think I have been enjoying myself more than most people. So we are with the Mobilise wild ones tomorrow morning and we really are looking forward to that! Just in the room out there preparing for this meeting, I was just sitting on the couch relaxing and the Presence of God so came into the little room I was in relaxing - the manifest Presence of God came - and I just began to weep. Glenda came in a bit later and said; "Are you okay? You look like you have been crying". I said; "Yes I have but because I am so happy!". The Presence of God came in and began to remind me of things in the past. He began to remind me that I grew up in a home where my dad was an atheist - a total atheist - and got saved many years later. My mum was an agnostic - she didnt know if God existed or not. Our house had no faith in God at all.
It was a happy home - a great mother and dad but no faith in God at all. No legacy in our generations. No legacy in any of our ancestral lineage. We only had legacy of spiritists and witchcraft, alcoholics - no one! As I said last year we go back to William Rufus of southern England who was King and we do trace ourselves directly back to him which is the truth! I know people laugh but we have traced our lineage back to him! So like I said last year, not many noble, not many wise but a few are of noble descent. William Rufus assassinated in the forest by William Torrell. Anyway! There was no legacy of Christianity in our home at all.
I remember as a 5 year old boy walking around in my parents garden without any expectation. I hadnt read the Bible and hadnt been to Sunday school at that point and had not heard anything about Christianity at all. The Presence of God came on me and instantly I knew as a little boy that this was God! I could feel His Presence and I have to tell you - the way I describe it was the way I felt when I was up in the room. I suddenly as a little 5 year old felt so special and so precious!
Because when Gods glory comes over you He brings His favour and all His manifest goodness shines on you and the divine attention is appreciating you and loving you not for what you have done or can but just as your intrinsic value as part of His creation and I remember just being amazed in the Presence of God!
I never felt the Presence of God again for 18 years! I lived a life of total "Thou shalt not deny thyself" - that was my command. The body is a push button pleasure machine and I became a total hedonist but I always in my heart while doing wilder and wilder things and was nearly killed a number of times in initiatives I was doing.
Something in me wanted to experience that Presence again. I went to churches and never experienced it. I went to places of religion and never felt it.
Then finally I joined the Hare Krishna movement and became a strict Hindui keeping laws and rules and became an asethic sleeping on the concrete - keeping the law. Celibate within marriage. Vegetarian. During that time I started to experience the Presence of God again and knew it was Gods Presence. He had come into the temple but it wasnt that Presence I had felt as a little boy. It was a Presence that terrified my heart and it was so frightening. It wasnt like He was mean or harsh or horrible - I felt so different to God and felt something of the awe and nature and character of God. It wasnt like I was afraid of going to hell because I didnt really know about hell.
I just felt deeply convicted for 3 months every day that Presence would come upon me and I felt nauseous at times and got hysterical with fear of the Presence coming upon me. And after 3 months in a Hindu temple on my own wearing a monks clothing and with my head shaved with clay from the Ganges River and standing in the temple - I knew Who was chasing me down and I just said;
"Jesus I give up running from You and I surrender my life to You" and as I did that (in 1977) the whole room in this temple that I was alone in filled up with the Presence and glory of God! But this time it wasnt terrifying - it was a Presence I remembered as a little boy and I felt so precious and special and favoured again.
From that moment I was born again and left the movement immediately and began to seek God and found a church where they loved the Presence. From then on the pursuit of my life became - I want the Presence of God. Because you see if you seek the power of God - and I have just done a seminar on the "Workings of His Mighty Power" and I advertise it not to promote the ministry but because it complements the teaching on faith I have been giving. And just a degree of that power that is at work within us and how to be strengthened in your innermost being so you can operate in that power.
You see I will never promote seeking the power of God because that will lead to utter unfulfillment. You need to seek the Presence of God and the glory of God because God hides His power in His glory. He hides His power in His Presence. But His power is what He DOES. His glory is Who He IS. You will never be satisfied with His power but you will find Your hearts satisfaction in Who He is. His Presence and in His glory.
So when you come into the glory of God - the Presence of God - not seeking His power ... many of the healing evangelists in the 1950s Healing Revival burned out and I do not judge them but they died in immorality and collapse. They would go on 40 day fasts seeking the power of God and have six week crusades with mighty miracles but then not know how to live a normal life because;
They didnt realise that you dont have fast 40 days under the New Covenant to get the power flowing. There is revelation of the New Covenant that will bring the dimensions of power that are awesome! I know Jesus fasted 40 days but you are not Jesus and I am not Jesus and there was a whole reason why He had to do that!
I dont mind fasting and I do fast but when we pursue the power instead of the Person of God, we do not experience much power and often we wreck our marriages because if you regularly have to fast and do strict aesthetic things to get the power then you dont have time for a good marriage or children or to live a normal sane life! Eventually you become irrelevant, weird and insane!
God wants us to live in the supernatural with a texture of sanity in our lives that attracts people. I always had this problem that the key guys who seem to move in the highest level of power were the guys I least wanted to be with because they were so legalistic and religious!
Yet Jesus was fun to be with and people wanted to be with Him and when He went to a wedding, He didnt stand in a corner teaching the latest en-vogue teaching about the Kingdom and sipping orange juice! He was in the centre of the party turning water into wine and having fellowship with everyone and being part of the festivities! In the middle of having fun with everyone, suddenly He
