El Bethel International Ministries
Fishers of Men Part 2 - Audio
You're the God of Wonders You're the God of Wonders You're the God of Wonders You're the God of Wonders Welcome to the God of Wonders radio program from El Befel international ministries. We're thankful to God that you've joined us to hear the second part of a message entitled "Tissures of Men" by Kerba Stephen. As you know the Lord clearly stated that in order to follow Him, we must first of all deny ourselves and then take up the cross and follow Him. For many today denying oneself is a great challenge. But as you'll see in the scriptures, when we have a heart to follow God, when we understand who God is and we love Him with all our heart, mind, soul and strength to deny ourselves for the sake of one who gave all for us is not so difficult after all. It certainly is not an easy road all the way. There will be some difficult points, but nonetheless He goes with us and He will give the grace necessary to overcome the devil, the world and the flesh so that we may inherit glory. Please join us so that you may be strengthened tonight and refreshed on your course to fulfilling all of God's will for your lives. Am I really following you? Because we don't want to be deceiving ourselves thinking that okay, I am following the Lord. You know reading, let me hear it, I am saying a little prayer, you know going to. A lot of activity doesn't mean we are following the Lord. There has got nothing to do with following the Lord. In small and in big issues in our lives, we need to consult with the Lord. And see what does the Lord say? Does He want me to do this? Will Jesus like me doing this? Or am I saying that? Oh Lord, let me go bury my father first. Or Lord, let me go and be farewell. Or are we saying that Lord, this is too much. I can't give this up and return sorrowfully like the rich young ruler. Or do we come to Jesus the Lord I want to follow you? But we are not really following the Lord. Do we follow in the category where we go after the Lord for material benefits? For bodily needs, but we really don't follow the Lord. We do not want to when it comes to denying ourselves, we actually stop at that point and we say, I can't deny myself. Oh cross, I can't take up the cross. People who are in the third category, we are going to see what does it mean to take up the cross? What kind of cross did Jesus carry? How did Jesus we saw in 1 John 2 6 that if we abide in Him we have to walk as He walks? That means we need to first know how He walks. If we have to know how He walked, we are going to look at Sinippian chapter 2 verses 5 to 9. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation and took upon Him the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, where for God also had highly exalted Him and given Him a name which is above every name. And now we see from verse 5 to 8 what Jesus did, how He denied Himself, and then verse 9 on verse we see the result, the price that He got, because of denying Himself. So denying Himself, how did Jesus deny Himself? He made Himself of no reputation. That means the moment we say, what about Me? What do people think about Me? When we have to do something for the Lord, how this is going to reflect on Me? When we have that Me, the worry about a reputation, we got to check our thoughts. We have not denied ourselves. So at that point we have to say, I have to make myself of no reputation. If I want to follow the footsteps of my Lord Jesus, I have to make myself of no reputation. And then to follow the footsteps of Jesus, the next part of denying ourself is, take the form of a servant. Jesus took the form of a servant. We have to take the form of a servant. Doing God's work is not saying that, okay, I'm a president. No, we are called to serve because that's why Jesus said, that's His footsteps and the Lord says, if you want to be the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven, then we have to become the servant of all. If Jesus took the form of a servant, how much more we need to have, that same attitude that we are called to serve, not to Lord over. We are called to serve. And am I having that servant-like attitude in my heart? Any time when the Lord wants us to serve Him, am I saying, Lord, I'm willing to serve you? Or saying, or do we think, Lord, what am I going to get? What is my title going to be, Lord, where are you going to play? And that is not denying ourself. That is like being just like a world trying to establish ourself. And that is an abomination before the Lord. And if we want to follow the Lord, follow the footsteps of Jesus as we deny ourself. That means we have to make ourselves of no reputation, take the form of a servant. And what the Lord did, and He took His cross, Jesus took His cross. That's why He's able to say, you deny yourself, you take of your cross and you follow. He took His cross. His cross is much, much more heavier than ours. He says, our yoke is easy and our burden is light because He took the heaviest burden. So He took the heaviest cross. We're just carrying the little cross on this earth that He has called us to carry. And our cross, we have to compare our cross with Jesus cross. What did Jesus carry actually? What did Jesus go through? What was His cross? Isaiah 53 verse 3. He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid as it were our faces from Him. He was despised and we esteemed Him not. Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. Yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was upon Him. And with His stripes we are healed. He was oppressed and He was afflicted. Yet He opened not His mouth. He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter. And as a sheep before her shearers is dumb. So He opened not His mouth. He was taken from prison and from judgment. And who shall declare His generation? For He was cut off out of the land of the living. For the transgression of my people was He stricken. And He made His grave with the wicked and with the rich in His death. Because He had done no violence. Neither was any deceit in His mouth. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him. He hath put Him to grief when thou shalt make His soul an offering for sin. He shall see His seed. He shall prolong His days. And the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand. He shall see the travail of His soul and shall be satisfied. By His knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many. For He shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide Him a portion with the great. And He shall divide the spoil with the strong. Because He had poured out His soul unto death. And He was numbered with the transgressors. And He bear the sin of many and made intercession for the transgressors. This is the path of the cross that Jesus walked. He is despised, rejected of men, a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. It says that He carried. He bore our griefs. He carried our sorrows. We look at Jesus. He was the person who had the most grief, the most sorrow, the most faith. We look at verse 12. The reward that the Lord gave Him. Because He carried His cross. Therefore will I divide Him a portion with the great. And He shall divide the spoil with the strong. Because He had poured out His soul unto death. This is what Jesus did. He carried His cross unto death. He was crucified, beaten, He bore the thorns. And even while He was undesired, even before His crucifixion, He was still carrying His cross. He was rejected. Even though He did so many miracles, most of the people were ungrateful. They questioned Him even if we read the book of John. A lot of times it really turns my heart to read the book of John. Because He is a lot of heaven and earth. And look at these people questioning Him. Asking all kinds of things and saying that He has a demon when they are doing things that are not pleasing to the Lord. And they know that very well. But they will go and question Him. And provoke Him, try to test Him and all those things. And He didn't have a place to stay. And Jesus was just walking from place to place. But He had a mission in His mind. He said, "I got to carry this cross and have to accomplish my mission." And then what will happen is the Lord will quench the first. The purpose of His depth on the cross will be quenched by seeing the soul state. That was His goal. And that is the same goal that the Lord has for us. If we follow Him, He will make a judgement. I'll be prepared to walk the path that Jesus walked. Which means we have to put our reputation down. Which means we have to take the form of a servant. Which means we have to take up our cross every day of whatever it is that our workplace, in our family, when we travel, if we get despised because of Jesus' sake, are we willing to take up that cross every day? Even though our cross, when we compare it to the cross of Jesus Christ, is much smaller and much lighter. Jesus never asks us to carry His cross. He asks us to carry our own cross. He knows how much we can carry. So our cross is according to the Lord knows which cross we need to bear. And are we willing to carry our cross which the Lord has given? And taking up a cross and following, we are going to look at 1 John 3.13 to see what is the Lord talking to us. How does that apply? We just saw the cross that Jesus carried. We just saw that we need to follow His footsteps. And how are we going to carry our cross day to day life? And what did Jesus say apart from what we see about Him carrying, about Him suffering? What did He say? Did He say anything about us in detail, what we have to, what does it mean to carry our cross? Did Jesus say anything about that in His word? Did the Spirit of the Lord speak to us anything from His word? And we are going to see 1 John 3.13 and John 15.18 to 25. Marvel not my brethren, if the world hates you. Why is He saying that? Why is He saying that not be surprised if the world hates you? If we are expected to follow in the footsteps, if we are going to follow Jesus, really follow Jesus, then we shouldn't be surprised. Because what did Jesus say in His word? How was Jesus treated when He was in this world? So we should not be surprised when people hate you. That has to say in our mind, when we go through something, we have to know that verse has to come to our mind immediately, what the Lord said. Don't be surprised. It's like a mother telling the child. When you walk through that path, don't be scared of the dog thing that's hanging over there because it's just the shadow of the curtain. So when we go, we expect okay to see the dog thing hanging and we know, "Oh, Mommy told. I don't have to be afraid of that because that's just the curtain, shadow." The way that Jesus has already told us, don't be surprised if the world hates you. Chapter 15 was 18 to 25. Why did Jesus say, "Don't be surprised if the world hates you"? If the world hates you, you know that it hated me before it hated you. If you were out of the world, the world would love His own. But because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hated you. Remember the word that I said unto you. The servant is not greater than his Lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also. But all these things will they do unto you for my name's sake, because they knew not him that sent me. If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin. But now they have no cloak for their sin. He that hated me hated my father also. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin. But now have they both seen and hated both me and my father. But this comes with the past that the word might be fulfilled that is written in their law. They hated me without a cause. We see the answer right here. The continuation that we saw from 1 John 3, 13, when he says marvel not, when the world hates you. The world hates you because it hated Jesus first. And the last words it says, they hated Jesus without a cause. If they hated Jesus who raised the dead, who cleansed the lepers, who healed the sick, who gave sight to the blind, who did all these miracles. All of these things are good things. He actually gave life to people. And he actually gave food to people. He did all of these good things for all of these good things. They hated him. If they can do that to Jesus, how much more to us? So we need to know if we are called to follow him, if we respond saying, "Lord, I want to follow you." We have to know if they hated him, they will hate us. Jesus didn't say they can, they could. No, he used the word they will hate you because they hated him. And so we need to expect, just like the example I gave with the child going looking for, "Okay, mommy said there's going to be something black over there that I need to watch out for and not be afraid of." So our thing is when the Lord says, "They're going to hate you." We're going to have that in mind. We're not going to panic everything. Is she going to hate me? It's not about that. But when somebody hates us, it should not come as a surprise. We need to know, "Oh, they hated Jesus. That's what they're doing to me." And we have to, that is part of us caring across. That is our cross. Walking the path the Lord has for us. When people hate us, when they persecute us, when we don't do anything wrong, that's the last line we see over here, verse 25, they hated me without a cause. If they hated Jesus without a cause, and we are walking as he walked, then people will hate us without a cause. So it is at that time, we should stop ourselves and not think, "I didn't do anything wrong to this person. I didn't speak anything wrong. What did I do? All I did, I helped. I gave the money. You know, I did this. You know, I gave them a car ride. You know, I took care of the children. But look at what they're doing. They're stabbing me now. We should not make a big deal out of it. Because if we are saying, "I'm carrying my cross because I'm following Jesus," we should not make a big deal out of it. Because that is the part of our cross that we carry. And because we are following Jesus, we should gladly carry a cross. And we have to rejoice. That's what God's word says. When we suffer for righteousness' sake, we have to rejoice. And we are exceedingly glad because our reward is great in heaven. So we have to keep that in mind and to say, "Lord, how am I carrying my cross? If I'm saying I'm carrying my cross, how am I carrying? Am I carrying my cross happily because I'm carrying it? Because my Lord carried it, and this is much smaller." If we look at Apostle Paul, when he went through persecution and suffering, he's rejoicing. And the apostles, when they got beaten, they were rejoicing, saying that they counted as a privilege to suffer for Jesus' sake. But now, like we see a lot of people like, "Oh, sitting and complaining and crying because somebody is not talking to them, or somebody threw stones at them, or somebody spat on their car, or they took some bonus from their job because they were believers, these are all part of our cross." We know that. We say, "This is my cross that I have to carry it." And it's not all cross. We always see cross. That's why the Lord gave us in our logo. We have cross on our left-hand side, and we have crown on our right-hand side. Without cross, there is no crown. And if we have crossed, we definitely have crown. We're going to see the blessing of following Jesus. Now, we saw the three types of people who got calls, and who said they will follow the Lord, and only the third type of people follow the Lord. And now, what are they going to get? What is the blessing of following Jesus? If you and I are following Jesus, what is the blessing that we're going to get of following Jesus? If we read one John chapter two, verse six, the same verse that we saw. If we walk as he walked, and we show that we are abiding in him, then the blessing is the promise for those who are abiding in him. See, first John two-six says that if we abide in him, we're going to walk as he walked. And thereby we are showing that we are abiding in him. And if we are abiding in him, that is, if we are walking as he walked, then if we turn to John chapter 15, verse seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven is ours. It belongs to us. Those are the promises, it's guaranteed. Guaranteed, given by Jesus Christ, to his followers, to his true disciples, who deny themselves, take up his cross and follow him. And these are the people who will be used by the Lord to do signs and wonders, who will be used by the Lord to raise the dead. You know why? Because they carry the cross like Jesus did. So they will perform the same miracles Jesus did, and much more. And everything that Jesus has belongs to them, because they walk the path of Jesus. That's what following him is. We exactly imitate, copy, follow his footsteps. That's what following Jesus is. So, if we can please read John chapter 15, verse seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, if we abide in Jesus, what is he going to get? We talked about the people, if we walk with the Lord, if we walk as he walked, exactly as how Jesus walked, then we are abiding in him. Look at the promise that the Lord is giving. If we abide in him, if he abide in me and my words abide in you, whatever we ask, God is saying that he will do it first. That's the first blessing. He's saying that he will answer all our prayers. If we abide in Jesus, that means if we walk as Jesus walks, he will answer all our prayers. Then we will be able to do, like Jesus did, stand in front of Lazarus' grave, and Jesus said, Father, I know that you always hear me. If we follow him, if we take up a cross and follow him, then he will definitely answer our prayers. And then, if you go to the next verse, it says, "Herein is my father glorified, that you bear much fruit, so shall he be my disciples." So, when we are his disciples, what's going to happen? God, not only hears all our prayers, what happens? We start bearing much fruit, not little fruit, much fruit. And then he says, "As the Father had loved me, so have I loved you, continue in my love. If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love." These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that you joy might be full. So, we see three blessings here, the Lord gives, the following. When we follow Jesus, when we abide in him, that is, to walk as he walked. The first blessing is, he will answer all our prayers. That means, if we pray for a sick person, God will heal the sick person. If we pray for a person in financial need, God will hear that prayer. If we pray for a broken marriage, God will bring that together. God will hear our prayers, and God will do them. Second blessing is, we will bear much fruit. That's why, being versions of men is. God, he gives souls, God, he gives souls, just like how Jesus saw souls being saved after he died on the cross. And then he was glorified, just like that, when we follow Jesus, just like how the Lord used to the disciples, God used us also. We will bear much fruit. And the third blessing the Lord will give us, the joy of the Lord will remain in us. That means the joy of Jesus Christ itself will remain in us. And he's saying that, because of that, our joy will be full. So, no matter what we go through, the joy is something, the joy of the Lord is something that cannot be brought with money. That cannot be brought with friendship, that cannot be brought with. So, these three blessings, to me, that actually contains everything. That the Lord answers our prayers. And if we bear much fruit, and if the joy of the Lord will remain in us, resulting in our joy being full, we have everything. So, you're going to examine ourselves and say, "Lord, which group am I in?" Have I really thought about following you? What is the purpose? Am I saying I'm following you, or I want to follow you? And do I really know what it means? And if I'm in the third group, Lord, have I given up whatever you ask me? And we have to ask ourselves, "Lord, am I walking as you walked on this earth? Am I following me as a little child will follow the mother? Am I paying attention to everything that you are saying? Am I doing everything that you would have done in my situation? Am I taking up my cross, gladly, and following you? We have to ask ourselves, "Lord, am I a grumbling Christian, or am I a joyful Christian?" That will say it all. God doesn't want murmuring believers saying, "Oh, I have to carry my cross, and cry, and cry, no." We have to gladly, because the joy, you know why the disciples were able to be so joyful when they were persecuted? Because they followed the Lord, they were carrying the cross, and the joy of the Lord was in them, and that joy was full. So even though they got beaten up, they were happy, they counted the joy, they get beaten up for the Lord. So we have to look at that, we have to say, "Lord, I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back." And we say that, we say, "Father, if I'm going to follow you every day, I know you will hear me." We don't have to be worried about whether the Lord is going to hear my prayer, am I going to get answered? I'm asking for this, is He going to give me this? You know why? Because when we follow Jesus, we can never go wrong. Because the will of Jesus was to do the will of the Father. And how He heard what the Father said, and that's what He spoke. How He did what the Father did, that's what He did. Can we do that? Yes. Can we hear the Lord speak and do the same thing? Yes. But we can only do those things only by abiding in Him. And abiding in Him means to walk as He wants. So if we are keen in going through the Scriptures, we can never, we can buy a car. But until we look at the manual of the car, and until we really know how to operate the car, we can have the key and we can sit down, not doing anything, or we can mess up the vehicle even. The same way with the Lord is, if we want to know how Jesus really wants, we want to know the heart of the Lord. We want to know what the Father thinks, so I can think the same thoughts. If we want to know what the Father is speaking, that means we have to read His Word and spend time with the Lord. That's the only way where we're going to know His will, and we're going to walk in His footsteps. It's not going to come like, "Oh, I know already how Jesus walks. It's never going to be like that." The spirit of the Lord will exactly show us. And then what happens is when we pray for a person, God will say, "I'm going to heal this person." Then we pray according to God's will, and God hears that person. And God will say, the Father will say, "Go raise this person from the dead." And that's what Jesus said. He heard what the Father said, and He spoke. He did what He saw what the Father did, and He did. That's the same thing we can do. We can do. God will never call us to do something that we cannot do. God will never tell us, walk in my footsteps, or walk as Jesus walked us, we cannot walk. So this is something that we can do. It is a glorious privilege that the Lord has given for His joy to remain in us. And for us to have that joy of Jesus. It's not a joy, you know, earthly joy. It's not like, God is not saying, "Okay, I'm going to give you a good joy. Good amount of joy." No, it's the joy of Jesus. He's saying that He's going to give us His joy. So that is something that we cannot purchase, anything. And if we know that this is what Lord, I have decided to do. Keep our eyes on the Lord Jesus Christ and walk as He walked. And we have, you know, basically seen that the suffering of Jesus and the path that God has called His disciples, true disciples. And we need to make a choice where we want to fall within those three categories, whether it's going to be one, two or three, or whether we're already in one of those and whether we want to move to the third one. And the Lord continues to speak to us as we're going to worship the Lord, examine ourselves one more time and commit our lives to the Lord. So the Lord can use us so that God may hear our prayers, so that the Lord may bless us with abundance of food, and so that He may bless us with His joy Himself, which is Jesus Himself, with the Master Lord, for grace, to follow Jesus. God's call comes to each one of us. That's what we saw in us, where it goes to a rich man, it goes to a poor man, it goes to a fisherman. God wants to make each one of His visions of men. That's God's calling. It's not just to randomly follow, it's not to follow endlessly, endlessly, but the goal is to become fishes of men. The goal is, for Jesus, to answer all our prayers, to make us to bear much fruit for His joy to remain in us, for His joy to be full in us. And the path is a glorious path of denying ourselves, taking up a cross and following Him. The moment we let go of our stuff, Jesus will fill us with Himself. As long as we keep holding on to our stuff, Jesus cannot fill us. We have to empty ourselves and say, Lord, I don't want anything of my stuff, Lord. I don't want my stuff to be seen. I don't want my name to be heard. Lord, I want to give my stuff, Lord, to become of no reputation. Lord, I want to take the form of a servant. Lord, I want to carry my crosswalk, no matter what people say. Even if they spit at me, even if they reduce my income, even if they cut their relationship with me. Lord, I will take my cross gladly and follow you, Lord Jesus. Friend, if you pray that prayer, in your own words, simply saying, God, I want to follow you. God, I need you in my life. Lord, I'm tired of living for myself, tired of living to please this world, tired of serving Satan. God, deliver me that I may live for you with a brand new home. I ask you to come into my heart tonight and begin to correct everything that's gone wrong in my life. I ask you, Lord, with all the faith and belief in your Son, Jesus Christ. Amen. Friends, do read your Bible and pray to God every day and find a place where you can worship, where people value holiness, they value a life of the cross, but also a life of glory, where the power of God gives them victory over sin. Victory to go through the trials of this world and be victorious and receive that crown of life at the hands of God himself. If you'd like to contact us, please reach us by email at e-b-i-m-i-n at gmail.com. That's e-b-i-m as a Mary i-n at gmail.com. Or you can write us at El Bethel International Ministries, P.O. Box 966, Gosh in New York, 1094. We'd love to hear from you, and by the way, you are entitled to receive a free magazine called Delight in Jesus just for writing it. God bless you, and may you pursue him to find out the real meaning of life. Life that's full and abundant with everlasting inheritance. God once said, "Oh, my God, you are, you'll be out there for me." God said, "I'd like you, no one like you, you're the only God." [BLANK_AUDIO]