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ACTS 29 TODAY

COMING TO THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE TRUTH

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WHAT JESUS TAUGHT ABOUT FASTING

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In Matthew 17, we find an account that reveals what

Jesus taught His disciples about fasting.

Jesus climbed up what we call the Mount of

Transfiguration with James, Peter, and John.There Jesus

had a visitation of God. Afterwards, He charged the

three disciples who were with Him to tell no man what

they had seen; then they came back down the

mountain.

Meanwhile, the other disciples were trying to cast a

devil out of a man’s son at the foot of the mountain. The

disciples had cast devils out before this with no

problem, but now they had run into one that just

wouldn’t come out of the person. While they were

making their unsuccessful attempts, a crowd had

collected around them.

The disciples were probably feeling frustrated,

flustered, and embarrassed. This is the situation that

Jesus, James, Peter, and John walked into when they

came down off the mountain.

And when they were come to the multitude, there came to him [Jesus]a certain man, kneeling down to him, and saying,

Lord, have mercy on my son: for he is lunatic, and sore vexed: for ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the water.

And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him.

Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him hither to me.

And Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour.

Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out?

And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for

verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of

mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove

hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing

shall be impossible unto you.

HOWBEIT THIS KIND GOETH NOT OUT BUT BY PRAYER

AND FASTING.—

Matthew 17:14-21

So this man came to Jesus and said, “Lord Jesus, please

have mercy on my son. He’s crazy— out of his mind —

and often a spirit throws him into the fire. I brought

him to disciples, but they couldn’t cast this devil out.”

Notice how Jesus answered the disciples: “You faithless

and perverse generation, how long shall I suffer you?”

In other words, “How long am I going to have to do this

for you?” Jesus wouldn’t have said that if He hadn’t

expected His disciples to cast that devil out.

Jesus rebuked the devil, and it departed out of the boy.

Then the disciples did the same thing I would have

done. They came to Jesus privately and said, “Why

couldn’t we cast that devil out?” (I definitely wouldn’t

have yelled that question over the heads of the crowd,

because Jesus would have probably yelled the answer

back to me: “Because of your unbelief!”)

Notice again Jesus’ answer to them in verse 20:

And Jesus said unto them, BECAUSE OF YOUR

UNBELIEF: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a

grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this

mountain,Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall

remove; and NOTHING SHALL BE IMPOSSIBLE UNTO

YOU.

Jesus said the reason that devil wouldn’t come out of

the boy was the disciples’ unbelief.He went on to say

that if they ever learned to deal with that

unbelief,

they

would be able to say to a mountain, “Be removed!” and

it would obey them. Finally, Jesus said something

absolutely incredible: “Nothing shall be impossible to

you.”

So Jesus was saying that if I ever learn to deal with that

particular kind of unbelief, I have a promise from Him

that absolutely nothing will be impossible to me. When

I realized that truth, I wanted to know what kind of

unbelief Jesus was talking about here so I could isolate

it and deal with it!

UNTIL NEXT TIME

LARRY

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ACTS 29 TODAY

coming to the knowledge of the truth

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PRAYER AND FASTING…THE POWER TWINS

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Let’s say you’ve just committed yourself to a season of

praying in the Holy Ghost. You’re hungry to know God

more intimately and to walk in His plan for your life, so

you’re ready and willing to yield to the Holy Spirit’s

purging process and to push through any impasses you

might encounter.

But what about those areas in your life in which you

have been defeated time and time again? What about

those deeds of the flesh that have wedged themselves so

tightly into the nooks and crannies of your life — the

ones that taunt you into believing that you will never be

any better than you are now and that you will never

accomplish anything more than what you’ve already

accomplished? Is there anything that can help set you

free in these areas once and for all?

I have good news for you — Jesus has given us an

important key for just such a purpose!It isn’t a very

popular key; yet when a person employs it, that key will

shut down the flesh nature with the same vengeance

that God used to slam the door on Noah’s ark against an

entire world that had gone the way of the flesh. That

key is fasting.

You see, if you ever learn to shut your flesh down, you

will shut Satan down, because the only power he has is

through the seduction and manipulation of the flesh

nature, which includes the mental and emotional realm

as well as the physical body.

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My First Experience With Fasting

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God introduced me to fasting during a time when I had

reached an impasse in my prayer life. I had gotten so

hungry for God from just praying in tongues that I was

looking around for ways to get closer to Him. During

this time, my heart cry was “Help me produce

something for the Kingdom in the next month or two,

Father. I have to see something tangible!”

I found out right away that an impasse was overcome

more quickly when I fasted. Not only that, but the

workings of my flesh surfaced much more quickly as

well! I learned that fasting accompanied with prayer

multiplied what was already in me.

The first time I went on a fast, I had amazing results. As

soon as I came off the fast, every-thing in my world

went wrong!

I came off this long fast, which I refer to as a “seeking

time,” and almost had to stagger into meetings. I had

weak knees, and it wasn’t from a lack of food! I could

hardly stand up to preach. It seemed as if God’s

anointing had lifted from me. When I laid hands on

people to pray for them, they wouldn’t have fallen

under the power of God even if lightning had hit them!

On top of that, we were in debt for an entire month’s

budget. I tucked myself away to fast and pray — and I

came out of that time only to be more in debt than

before! I told God, “The least You could do is to

supernaturally arrange for the bills to be paid while I’m

locked away with You!”

I was getting a little short-tempered about the situation.

Anger was building up on the inside because I wanted

to know why.

I began to see clearly. I came to realize that during the

fast, certain areas of my flesh nature that hadn’t been

put to death in the past had come to the surface. When

these fleshly works began to surface, the anointing felt

less, but in reality was greater than ever before.

This is what Paul meant when he said in essence, “For I

would rather glory in my infirmities (or weaknesses as

a man) because when I am stripped of my dependency

on my flesh, it places my dependency on the Holy

Spirit” (2 Cor. 12:9,10). When we feel weakest in our

own natural strength, we are usually the strongest,

because un-mortified areas of our flesh are in the

process of dying.

Fasting and prayer in combination help cause those

fleshly works to come to light in our lives more

quickly.Tests and trials will also bring them to light, but

I would rather not wait for the trials. Fasting and

prayer allow the Holy Spirit to reveal those things

hidden in darkness and to deal with them before the

trials come. This in turn causes our character to be

strengthened.

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Until next time

LARRY

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ACTS 29 TODAY

coming to the knowledge of the TRUTH

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STEPS TO INTERCESSION

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Intercession is born in us when the needs of others

move our spirit so strongly that we finally give the Holy

Spirit something to add His power to. That is when faith

in its purest form flows from our spirit.

Let me tell you the steps that lead to true intercession

after you begin the edification process by praying in

tongues at your own will.

The Holy Spirit will first build you up to that place of

sensitivity we’ve been talking about.You will start to

look at your husband or wife or lost family member

and say, “Oh, God, above everything else, I would that

he [or she] be saved.” At this point, the desires of your

heart begin to change in the edification process. You

are taking the first steps toward intercession.

Although you may think you are directing the Holy

Spirit’s prayer, you are not. You have your list of prayer

requests: Joe needs a car; Susie needs this; Jan needs

that. All of those things are almost irrelevant to God.

So you sit there with your big list and say, “Okay, I claim

all these things.” When you say,“I claim it,” God hears

it. Then you say, “Now I’m going to pray in the Spirit

about it.” At this point, the desires of your heart begin

to direct your prayers rather than your mentality.

What did God say? He said that He would grant the

desires of your heart if you delighted yourself in Him

(Ps. 37:4). That means that if you delight yourself in the

Lord in prayer, the desires you have will come from

Him, and these are the desires He can fulfill.

As you pray in the Spirit, the Holy Spirit will begin to

plant a little seed. That is the conception of a miracle. It

is the birth plan for your backslidden spouse or your

child on dope or a lost relative. He plants that seed

directed by the desires of your heart. As you pray in

tongues,God will begin to form that little “baby” by the

authority of your spirit.

Several months go by. You keep praying, and that

miracle growing on the inside of you begins to “show”

as you carry it to fruition.

Soon you don’t care if anyone around you is praying or

not. You get up early. You pray at all times of the day

and night. You walk around and crave spiritual things

that you never used to care much about.

The months go by as you continue to pray. Suddenly, by

an act of God’s will and not your own, it is time for

birth, and you begin to groan. The labor pains are

getting closer and closer.It is only a matter of time

before that “baby” is birthed in the spiritual realm.

After long hours of edifying myself through praying in

tongues, God began to slip me over into intercession to

birth things in the Spirit.

For example, I remember a time when the symptom of

partial deafness temporarily manifested in my body

while I was interceding. That night a woman who was

totally deaf came to my service, and God opened her

ears! She could hear music and the voices of her

husband and son for the first time in her life. Why?

Because God was able to bring me to a place in the

Spirit where I stood in the gap for this woman’s healing.

So is it worth the hours and days and months that it

takes to build that superstructure in your spirit by

praying in tongues so that one day the Holy Ghost can

begin to use you in mighty intercession? Oh, yes, my

friend, it’s worth every minute.

It is a high honor to stand between Satan and the

people he is trying to kill, steal from, and destroy. And

nothing can compare to knowing that those you’re

praying for may have known hell as their eternal

destination — except that you paid the price to be

purged so you could stand in the gap and set the

captives free!

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For in these last days, many shall scurry to and fro.

Fear will encompass the earth.Men’s hearts shall fail

for looking upon those things that are coming upon the

world.

But run not here and run not there,for your answer is

within.

Look up, saith the Spirit of Grace, your redemption

draweth nigh.

Establish your feet on the foundational rock of doing

My sayings.

Be ye strengthened with all power and might in the

inner man, for it is the inner strength that will

accomplish My purpose in My people.

Through that inner strength will I empower you in

these last days to stand. (word given thru Dave Roberson)

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UNTIL NEXT TIME

LARRY

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ACTS 29 TODAY

coming to the knowledge of the TRUTH

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The Holy Spirit Helps Our Infirmities

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My experience was right in line with Romans 8:26,

which says the Spirit also helps our infirmities. That

means He helps in conjunction with someone who is

already helping.

This throws us back to verse 23, where Paul says that

we are groaning out of our righteous human spirit. So

when Paul says in verse 26, “Likewise the Spirit also

helps us…,” he is saying, “In the same manner that you

are groaning out of your human spirit, He will also help

you.”

This is how it works. A mountain comprised of fleshly

works stands between you and God’s plan for your life.

The Holy Spirit will focus in on that mountain “with

groaning s that cannot be uttered” (Rom. 8:26). You

have entered a mild form of intercession, but it is for

yourself that you stand in the gap.

These groaning s are not just referring to speech so

profound that you can’t utter it. It’s also talking about

reaching a place in the Spirit where you begin to hate

whatever stands between you and God’s plan so badly

that you enter into a state of groaning or grieving.

Your heart cries out, I wish this was out of my life!

Lord, I hate this!At this point, you have given the Holy

Spirit the faith He needs to come alongside and move

the mountain out of the way.

If you persevere in prayer and refuse to let the

mountain defeat you, at some point you will experience

a “meltdown,” where the Holy Ghost removes the

mountain and you come out on the other side

victorious. Why? Because you cannot continue to report

to prayer and still retain your problem. You will either

have to quit edifying yourself and yield to those works

of the flesh or allow the Holy Spirit to purge them out

of your life.

The Holy Spirit will pull out the problem at the right

time, when you’re ready and can survive the purging.

Your part is to just keep praying.

Don’t stop. Push through the impasse. The Holy Spirit

will illuminate this purging process for you, and when

it’s all over, you’ll be able to see and understand that

massive mountain that was removed from your life.

You will thank God that you are one step closer to

mighty intercession.

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Praying in Tongues vs.Deep Intercessional Groaning

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The combination of the two passages we’ve been

looking at in Second Corinthians 5 and Romans 8 settled

for me the age-old issue of the difference between

praying in tongues for personal edification and the

deep intercessional groans of the Spirit — that diversity

of tongues that is operated by God as He wills.

The truth is, even if you start out praying in tongues

with a cold, indifferent, stony heart,only two

ingredients are necessary to bring you to the place

where the Holy Spirit can move through you in deep

intercessional groaning s: your knowledge that your

indifference is wrong,and your decision to pray in the

Holy Ghost by your own will as often as possible.

As you continue to pray in tongues, the Holy Spirit will

edify you and charge you up into the love of God until

compassion gets hold of you — until at times, as you

walk away from yet another person still bound to his

wheelchair, you feel as if you can’t even live unless you

see results. This is the kind of groaning that says, “I

can’t stand this anymore. It hurts too badly.I will put

aside all of my selfishness and strife and all of our

differences. I’ll do whatever I need to do to serve the

purposes of the Holy Spirit.”

Putting our differences aside is a major part of what

delivers us into true intercession.Dead religion consists

of “I have my rights! Vindicate me!” That’s where most

of the church world lives, and that’s why most

Christians seldom visit the realm of miracles.

Therefore, the Gospel of glad tidings doesn’t reach that

little deformed child bound to a wheelchair. He doesn’t

get a chance at his reward because the Church failed

him.

But when we get to that place where we groan out of

our righteous spirits over this world’s pain, sin, and

misery, we don’t want to fight with anyone anymore.

We just want to pray. So why don’t we put all of our

differences aside and start praying!

It is the groaning of our righteous spirits that the Holy

Spirit picks up on. If He examines me and sees that my

new nature is crying for help in groaning s — hurting

but not knowing how to pray as I ought — He says,

“Excuse Me, but I have been sent to help your

infirmities.I want to add My groaning s to your cries for

help, for that will translate to pure power for you to

rise above the inabilities of the flesh.

“You have come to a standstill. In your own strength,

you can’t pull this off. You don’t have the power. You

don’t know how to do it, but I do!”

So the Holy Spirit adds His anointing of power — His

intercession, His groaning s — to blend together in

unison as one with the groaning s of your spirit. At that

point, He empowers you to rise above the problem and

do something about it.

In Galatians 4:19, Paul made a revealing statement that

provides insight into the distinct difference between

tongues for personal edification and deep

intercessional groaning s:

My little children, of whom I TRAVAIL IN BIRTH again

until Christ be formed in you.

How many women pick the day to give birth to their

child? How many choose the day their baby will be born

without man-made intervention? How many stop the

process and say, “I think I’ll wait two days”? Not too

many, I would imagine. Women can start the child

bearing process as they will, but they cannot end it

according to their own will.

In the same manner, at your own will you can start the

process that will lead to intercession and travail by

praying in the Spirit and edifying yourself. But even

after you have reached that place of sensitivity in

which you groan out of your righteous spirit because of

the imperfections of this world, the deep intercessional

groaning s of the Holy Spirit only come upon you as He

wills.

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UNTIL NEXT TIME

LARRY

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