Gateway Church's Podcast
The Role of the Church
A Gateway Sermon
pretty wealthy and everything was on track for us to retire when we were 40 and then do what we'd always wanted to do, and I had everything planned out. I didn't experience when I was nine years old. I started smoking when I was six, and don't ask me why. I guess I just got involved with some other little friends who did, and I started as well. And when I was about nine, I taught the little boy down the road who I had befriended. I taught him to smoke also. We became quite good buddies. What I didn't realize, though, was who his dad was, and then one day my mother and I were just, you know, sitting with him. It was a knock on the door, and we opened the door and this guy was standing there. We'd never seen him before. Anyway, he just launched off, and he said, you know, it's a sorry day. He said to my mother, it's a sorry day your son was ever born. He'd never amount to anything. He's cursed from the day he was born, and I mean, this guy just spewed curses and anger upon me, and today I can understand that he was incredibly angry that I taught his son to smoke. He was the president of one of the biggest religious denominations in our country, and it was in the front of him. Be it as it may, though. That's what became my image of the church and of God and of godly things. I didn't want anything to do with it. Whenever anybody witnessed about the church to me or wanted to witness about the gospel to me, all I would see is this angry man that was standing at the door spewing curses on me. But then when I was nearly 35 years old, suddenly my dad had a double heart attack, and he was rushed to the hospital. My mom called me, asked if I want to see my dad alive, that I would need to come up to Johannesburg very quickly, because he wasn't going to live long. I got him an aircraft, flew straight up, went straight to the hospital, and my dad was already, he was deeply unconscious, they had him on some life-sustaining machine, so I couldn't talk to him anyway. I just stood there holding his hand, which already felt really clammy and cold, and I just began to weep. I couldn't handle it. My dad and I had been such close friends. He was much more than just my dad, he was my buddy. And we'd worked together, we'd just done so much together. I went out of the hospital, I asked the doctor first, I said, "What is my dad's chances?" He said, "I don't think he has any chance. In fact, I don't think he's going to see the night out. The muscles in his heart are so severely damaged by the heart attacks he had that I don't think he's going to make it." I went and said in the car, and I just whipped my heart out. My whole life, if something had gone wrong, I just worked a little harder. Somehow managed to get the money together to solve the problems I had. Here was the problem that money couldn't solve. Here was something I didn't actually know how I could get this thing right. I just sat in the car and suddenly God flashed a picture in my mind of a meeting that I'd been to with my mother some years before that. My auntie, the ranger, was the first time oral Roberts came to our country. I went to that meeting, I didn't really listen to what he was preaching. But I saw a miracle that night of a cripple coming out of a wheelchair and I'd watched this cripple playing with these little thin paraplegic legs. Nobody could walk on those legs. As they wheeled them past an oral Roberts laid hands on this cripple, he suddenly came out of the wheelchair and began to run around the front of that place. I was amazed but it didn't change my life. Yet all those years later, as I sat in the car weeping, suddenly this picture flashed back into my memory. I went to my mother's house and I said, "Mom, we have to find someone who can pray for Dad. He's dying." It took us four hours to track someone down who'd pray for my father. Eventually we got old my cousin who I hadn't seen for 20 years, would become a pastor. He prayed with us on the phone and then unbeknown to me, went to the hospital and prayed for my Dad that night. He went through these elders. They anointed him with oil. I got to the hospital early the next morning and I dreaded ringing the bell on that intensive care because I thought they're going to tell me my father was dead. When the sister came, she was smiling. She said, "Come quickly. Your Dad is so much better. He wasn't better. He was totally healed. God, it's super, naturally healed." I tell you, I went out of that intensive care that day. I had never been so ecstatically happy in my life but I was also confused. You see, I did have some moral codes in my life. I did some pretty strong principles and one of the greatest principles in my life was that one hand washes the other, that if you wanted people to help you, you needed to help people. That if you wanted people to be kind to you, you needed to be kind to people and there was something here that confused me greatly. I had never done a thing to God, for God. I had only in fact ever used the name of Jesus in a blasphemous way and I'd never done anything for him and yet in the middle of that, God has suddenly done this incredible thing for me of healing my father. I said to my cousin, "If you ever are in our area, come and tell me how God could do this wonderful thing." He came down just a month later and my wife and I gave our lives to Jesus Christ right in our house. We didn't have a Bible. We went out the next day. We went on board Bibles for our whole family. We came home. We wrote scriptures in them. We posted them. I mean, something had happened in our lives that was just absolutely phenomenal. We didn't fully realize exactly what it was. Three weeks later, I said to Anne, "We cannot carry on like this. We have 142 laborers on this tobacco farm and they don't know the Jesus that is coming to our life." I told them this Sunday we have church on this farm and we moved the tobacco bales more on to the one side of the bond and that Sunday I went to church. I was three weeks old in the Lord and I went and listened to the message. I wrote all the scriptures down. I went straight back to the farm and I preached the very same message to about 40 or 50 of our laborers. Amen. You know what? I was so stupid. I didn't even know that the Sunday morning message in an assemblies of God church was not a gospel message. But I preached it. I don't know if I got it right, but I preach it with much more enthusiasm and do you know that within three weeks, 42 people had been born again on a second-end message that they didn't even call a gospel message. My friends, I want to tell you something tonight. Never ever think that the power of God cannot work. In a new believer or any believer, God's power transcends every boundary and every situation. It's the devil who lies to us and says we're not good enough. We're not experienced enough. We don't know enough. From the day you receive Jesus Christ into your life, from that day, you are supernatural being. That God loves and that God has purpose as it feels in Ephesians chapter 2 and verse 10 that you are now the creation, the workmanship of God created in Christ Jesus no less. For the purpose of good works, amen. We were six weeks old in the Lord and I came to Mark chapter 16. I'd never read the Bible when I got saved. The man who led us to the Lord said read the New Testament first, so I started. You know when I started in Matthew, I thought what kind of a book is this, a family history book? Nothing more. Everybody begat everybody. But as I got a bit further, I want to tell you I couldn't put the book down. By the sixth week, I was at the 16th chapter of Mark and I read something. It says those who believe in my name, they'll cost their demons. I know what a demon was, but I went on to say, and they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover. I read it again. I read the whole chapter. I read chapter 15. I read chapter 14. I was looking for something. I wanted to know what qualified you. How long did you have to be a Christian? How much did you have to know? Did you have to go to Bible school? How was the deal here? You know what I found? It said only one thing. These signs shall follow them that believe. Hey man, the moment you believe. I thought, my God, if this is true, I'm going to do it. And I told those same people in my tobacco church. I said today we're going to pray for the sick. And I want you to realize something. I was still smoking 70 cigarettes a day. Man stopped it. I don't blow away your religious thinking. I slept two on my way to the farm and then I told him today I'm going to pray for the sick because the Word of God says you shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover. And I called them up. It came about five of them. I went on to the first man. He was an old man. I went to lay my hands on him because it says, and you shall lay hands on the sick. I didn't know where to lay them. They didn't pray in our church like that. I didn't know where that didn't say you shall lay hands on their head. Suffered the shoulders are a good place. So put my hands on either shoulder. And I said, in the name of Jesus, and I tell you, I'd rehearse my prayer. I knew exactly what I was going to pray. I only got two in the name of Jesus. And this guy was struck down like the lightning had hit him. I thought, my God, he's died. So we picked him up. We ran outside with him. I mean, my wife and two or three of the others. We put him on that tree. I took my jacket off. I began to fan him all the time I was praying. Please, Jesus, don't let him die. I prayed for him to get healed. After about two or three minutes, he suddenly sat up revived. Why was I happy? I tell you, I wouldn't let lying back inside. I said, no, you're an old man. You must have fainted from heat exhaustion for three weeks. I never let him back inside the barn. I didn't pray for anybody more either. Because I went to the church that Monday and spoke with one of the elders. And you know what he said to me? He said, you've got to be careful in the devil. I thought, my God, I didn't even know the devil was part of that equation. Do you know what I got beaten against for you tonight? He's not. Amen? He's not. Another three weeks went by. But this thing wouldn't leave me alone. And after nine weeks of being born again, we prayed for the sick on that phone. We started to see God do supernatural miracles. And I was still smoking seventy cigarettes a day. God didn't leave me there. It was only two weeks later. And God spoke to me audibly. And he said, stop smoking and get baptized. I had a cigarette hanging in my mouth. Let me tell you something. You want to smoke seven year day? You got to work at it. There's only so many hours in one day. I had one hanging in my mouth. When he spoke, you know, a lot of people wish God would speak with him. I tell you, they speaks to you audibly. You get such a fright, my friend. I took that cigarette out of my mouth, fast as lightning. I screwed it up in my hand and I dropped it beyond my back. I don't know if I thought God couldn't see me, but I just got the fright of my life. I never ever took another puff of a cigarette and I got baptized that same Sunday. Amen. God will never hallelujah. God will never leave you where you are. But God will use you like you are. Amen. I want to read you a couple of scriptures tonight that have been just such an incredible part of a revelation to me of how much Jesus loves me. In John chapter 18 and verse 22, Jesus prays and John chapter 17, rather verse 22, "This is the glory which you gave me. I have given them that they might be one just as we are one. I am them and you in me, that they may be made perfect in one, that the world may know that you have sent me and that you have loved them as you loved me." Amen. He looked at John chapter 14 and verse 23. It says, "Jesus answered and said to him, 'If anyone loves me, he will keep my word and my father will love him and we will come to him and we will make a home with him.'" Amen. So a home and a presence is actually two different things. The day I got born again, the day I come fresh Jesus is the Son of God. It says in John chapter 4, it says that when you confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God comes to draw within you. He was there from the very day that I received Christ into my life. But I want to tell you something tonight. As you obedient to him and as you keep his word, that presence becomes a home. It becomes a relationship. It becomes so much closer. See, God wants to do miracles in your life and feel your life. We call to a miraculous life. We are called to a mundane life. We are not called to live as the world lives. God has lifted us above that. Jesus is in John chapter 10 and verse 10. He says, "I have come that you might have life and that you might have it more abundantly, a different dimension of life, supernatural life, spiritual life, miraculous life." Amen. And there are so many reasons that I could preach to you tonight about why God wants you to live a miraculous life. But I'm going to give you just one tonight. And that is that God wants you to live miraculously so that God can demonstrate his love through you in the name of Jesus. Amen. So that he can reach others through you and demonstrate his love. If you have a look in John chapter 14 and verse 12, it says, "Most assuredly, I say unto you, he who believes in me, the works I do, he will do also, and greater works than these will he do, because I go unto my Father and whatever you ask in my name, I will do that, that the Father might be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in my name, I will do it. If you love me, keep my commandments." Amen. What are his commandments? Go into all the world, preach the gospel to every living creature, lay hands on the sick, they will recover, feed the hungry. He says, "When you feed those who are hungry and you plow the naked and you visit those in prison, he says, "When you do that, you've done it unto me." Amen. Why? Because he wants to demonstrate his love. Amen. Some years ago, I'm going to finish in just a moment. Some years ago, I was in Portugal, you know? The ministry has been just such a wonderful experience. There have been times of heartache too. I was away in Mozambique. I didn't even have any contact when my Father died. It was only when I arrived back at the airport once returning that they met me at the airport to tell me my dad had died two days before that. I was in Portugal some years later. I got back from I was busy with a convention there. I got back into my room late that night about two o'clock in the morning, in fact. I noticed in the garden my room and my wife phoned and said, "My mom would die." You know, I spoke with my wife and encouraged her, and when I put the phoned out, I just called out to the Lord. I said, "Lord, I really need you tonight. I need you to encourage me down on that. I really need your help." And Jesus just began to speak with me. And he said to me, "Son, I said you the apple of my eye. I love you." Do you know? It just meant so much to me. In the empty sea, much else to me. I want to tell you something tonight. Jesus loves you more than you'll ever understand. He needs to give you a revelation of his love. He needs you to understand that his love's unconditional. It doesn't depend on your behavior. You seem to lie understood that. I never really understood the love of God. I never really understood the love of Christ. Because whenever I used to think of how Jesus loves me, I would think of the things that were not yet fully right in my life. I would think of the things that I need to do straighten out. I want to tell you something tonight. Christ's love for you is not conditional on your behavior. He loves you regardless of your behavior. And if you understand his love, you'll understand the purpose he has in your life. In 1984, I was exposed to the poor for the first time. I thought I knew the poor. But I ended up in a camp in Pumbara and Mozambique where more than 30 people were dying a day. I was supposed to go out there for one day. The aircraft that took me up, said to go refueling, never came back for ten days. I didn't have a change of clothes. I didn't even have toiletries. I didn't have any food. I worked in that camp in the same clothes without being able to bar for anything else for ten days. I never had such an experience in my entire life. There were 36,000 people in this camp and they were all starving. More than 30 of them dying every day. The emotions that were going on inside of me. I would have told you that I'm not an emotional person, but I realized in that week, just the emotional ones. And on the first day of that week, I cried out to God and I said to him, "You know, I need to know what your heart is here. My heart's broken. I can't take this anymore. I cannot take this anymore. I need to know what your heart is. Do you care that these people die like this? Is it your will that they die like this? And God spoke so clearly to me and he said, "My heart is like your heart. I need ten times more." He says, "No more will these people die." He said, "That's why I've sent you to help them. I want you to help them." I said, "Lord, how am I going to help them? I don't have any money." He said, "Just do what you can do and I'll be with you." You know, I learned something so important that day, and that is this. We are called to express God's love through us. That's why we're blessed to be a blessing. That's why God wants us to live a miraculous life. That's why God wants us to heal people, deliver people, help people, feed people, because that is the calling of a Christian to express the love of God. This bow heads tonight. Lord, I just thank you for this time together. I know that our people here tonight, Lord, who have such a desire in their hearts to serve you, to see your miracles, O God, to see your miracles flow through them. And in fact, if there are people here tonight who have such a desire in their heart to see the miracles of God manifest through their lives, to live what we read then, the gospel of John, that those who believe the works I do, he shall do also. If that's a desire in your heart and you cannot say, "I want to believe God today." I want you to stand up right there where you are. I want to pray with you right now. I want to pray with you right now. I believe God wants to anoint people in our time to bring the miraculous power of God throughout the earth. I want you just to raise your hands to him right now. And just open your hearts. Just open your hearts. And just empty your mind right now. Don't think about uncertainties or anything now. Just open your heart and empty your mind. Lord Jesus, I ask you tonight to stretch forth your hand of anointing in this place, O God. God, teach in every person who is standing before you tonight Lord. Touch them with your anointing Lord. Reveal yourself to them. And most of all Lord, reveal your love to them and your true purpose in their lives in the name of Jesus. Let your power just fall upon them Lord. In Jesus I thank you Lord. I thank you for that right now in the name of Jesus. Amen.