When It Seems There's No Way Out - Morning Prayer
Morning Prayer with Pastor Sean Pinder
When It Seems There's No Way Out
(dramatic music) Bless you, God, I bless you. My name is Pastor Kevin Windham. And the King of Texas, I'm the pastor of New Begin and Apostolic Ministry. I just wanna invite you all to three powerful nights of healing, miracle, deliverance, signs, and wonders that's hosted by my dear friend, Pastor Sean Pender. This mighty man of God has come to our church and the Lord has used them many times. And I thank God for him. And I believe if you show up at those miracle services, you will not lead the way you came. Register now, get your registration now, I promise you, you won't leave the way you can. God bless you, bye-bye. (dramatic music) ♪ Eat your face ♪ ♪ Or let me live in the glory of your grave ♪ ♪ And then we'll run ♪ ♪ And I will run to you ♪ ♪ To your words of truth ♪ ♪ It's not by my normal power ♪ ♪ But by the spirit of God ♪ ♪ And yes, I will run the race ♪ ♪ 'Til I see your face ♪ ♪ Or let me live in the glory of your grave ♪ ♪ Yes, I will run ♪ ♪ Yes, I will run to you ♪ ♪ To your words of truth ♪ ♪ It's not by my ♪ ♪ Not by power ♪ ♪ But by the spirit of God ♪ ♪ And yes, I will run the race ♪ ♪ 'Til I see your face ♪ ♪ Or let me live in the glory of your grace ♪ ♪ 'Til I will run ♪ ♪ And I will run to you ♪ ♪ To your words of truth ♪ ♪ It's not by my ♪ ♪ Not by power ♪ ♪ But by the spirit of God ♪ ♪ And yes, I will run the race ♪ ♪ 'Til I see your face ♪ ♪ Or let me live in the glory of your grace ♪ ♪ Yes, I will run the race ♪ ♪ And yes, I will run the race ♪ ♪ 'Til I see your face ♪ ♪ Or let me live in the glory of your grace ♪ ♪ And yes, I will run the race ♪ ♪ 'Til I see your face ♪ ♪ Or let me live in the glory of your grace ♪ - Good morning and welcome to another Morning Prayer broadcast. This is Jeffrey Zimmerman standing in for Pastor Sean Pinder this morning, as I have done on occasion before. And I'm always very happy and privileged to do that. I've been with Pastor Sean and Pastor Amy for a number of years. My wife, Melanie, and I serve alongside them in the ministry. And we're very excited, very honored to do that. And also to be able to sit before all of you, the wonderful people of God, and minister the Word of God to you. And we are glad to be here today. I know that God has something for us today. And so before we get started, we're going to go ahead and pray and have a word of prayer. Father God, in the name of Jesus, we lift you up. Lord, in this place, you said in your Word that if you are lifted up, you will draw all men unto you. Lord, I pray that as I minister the Word of God to your people, Lord, that you would touch the lives of the people on the broadcast, strengthen them, encourage them, strengthen their faith, Lord God. Let them feel hope rise inside them again, Lord God, in the name of Jesus, and let them know that you are with them today and every day. Lord, anoint these lips of clay today. Lord, I pray that they would not see Jeffrey Zimmerman this morning, but they would see Jesus. Let the Word of God be so simple that even a child can understand what you are saying to your church today. In Jesus' name I pray, amen and amen. All right, and so the title of the series, of course, is You Are Never Alone. I really like that title. I'm excited about this series. You are never alone. People need to know that. You know, we are never alone. There are plenty of times when we all feel like we're alone, amen? I don't care if you've been with Jesus for just a little while, or if you've been with Him for many years, there are going to be times when you feel like you're all alone. But aren't you glad that Jesus said, I will never leave you? I will never forsake you. He is the friend that sticks closer than a brother, amen? And the title of the message today is, when it seems there's no way out. Boy, haven't we all been in those situations? It just seems like there's no way out. It seems like you're in a situation and you just can't get out of it. You do not have the power to be able to get yourself out of the situation. You know, sometimes you're in certain situations and maybe there's something you can do to help yourself. But there are certain situations in everybody's life, every now and again, that come around that we do not have the ability to do anything about. But in those times, God is setting us up for a miracle, as we're going to see in the life of Peter in the book of Acts chapter 12 and starting with verse 1. The Bible says, "About that time King Herod Agrippa began to persecute some believers in the church. He had the apostle James, John's brother, killed with a sword. You remember James and John, the sons of Zebedee, disciples of Jesus." Peter, James, and John were three of Jesus' main disciples. Sometimes when other disciples, when Jesus went to certain places, he only took Peter, James, and John with him. So James was one of the, I guess you might say, the lead disciples, the main disciples, and here he was killed with the sword at the hand of this wicked King Herod. So when Herod saw how much this pleased the Jewish people, verse 3, he also arrested Peter. This took place during the Passover celebration. Then he imprisoned him, placing him under the guard of four squads of four soldiers each. So four squads of four soldiers, that's 16 soldiers around Peter. 16, that's a lot, amen, against around one man. Herod intended to bring Peter out for public trial after the Passover. Isn't that something? Herod's trying to look like he's a religious man by observing the Passover first. Isn't that what they did with Jesus? They wanted to get him off the cross before the sun went down because it was about to be passed over then as well, I believe. At the very least, it was about to be the Sabbath day, you know? They didn't want to be murdering someone on the Sabbath day, you see. As if that makes any difference to God. Anyway, but it says here, while Peter was in prison, he prayed very earnestly for him. Now this is very important. The church prayed very earnestly for him. Now Peter probably felt like he was alone. It certainly looked like he was alone. I mean, he's got 16 guards around him guarding him, stopping him from going anywhere or doing anything. But the people of God, the church are praying very earnestly for him. People were praying for Peter. If you got people praying for you, then you're not alone. Amen? And that's what we have to understand is that sometimes when it looks like you're all by yourself, you're not really all by yourself. God is watching out for you, you see? And the night before Peter was to be placed on trial, remember Jesus was placed on trial, we saw what happened there, so this was going to be a similar situation. It was the intent, you see? But he was asleep, fastened with two chains between two soldiers. Others stood guard at the prison gate. So Peter is sleeping. Isn't that something? I have to admit, I don't think I'd be able to sleep here. I think I'd be up crying out to God, playing in tongues. Just crying out to God with everything I got. Amen? There's no way I'd be sleeping at a time like this. But you see, Peter reached a point in his life at this time where Jesus was a few years ago when Peter was with Jesus on a boat. Remember, Mark 4, verse 35, as evening came Jesus said to his disciples, "Let's cross to the other side of the lake." So they took Jesus in the boat and started out leaving the crowds behind, although other boats followed, but soon a fierce storm came up. Highways were breaking into the boat and it began to fill with water. Now Peter at this time was with the rest of the disciples trying to bail the water out of the boat, trying to write the ship, trying to get the sails fixed and whatever they needed to do to get out of this storm. Okay? He's frantically trying to get things under control. Amen? And Jesus is over in the boat. What's he doing? Verse 38 it says, "Jesus was sleeping at the back of the boat with his head on a cushion." Now why was Jesus sleeping? Because Jesus understood that he was not alone. Jesus understood that the Father was in control. The situation was in God's control. Jesus was on assignment from God. And so Jesus realized that nothing could happen to him until he was finished with the assignment that God had given him. Now isn't that encouraging? No, you can know that whatever the situation is that you're facing in your life. Even if it looks like there's no way out, amen? The truth is nothing can happen to you until God is finished with the thing that he has assigned you to do. And until you finish that assignment you're going to be okay. Somebody say amen. I think that's an encouraging word, don't you? Amen. So we go back to Acts chapter 12 verse 7. Suddenly there was a bright light in the cell. And an angel of the Lord stood before Peter. Now how in the world the other guards did not see this bright light? I do not know. Apparently they weren't meant to see it, okay? So they didn't see it. The angels struck Peter on the side to awaken him. And he said quick, get up! And the Bible says the chains fell off his wrists. Now notice something here. The angel didn't have a key as far as we can see. The angel didn't take a key and open these chains. The chains fell off. See we say, well God you don't have what you need to get me out of my situation. I need money or I need somebody to go in and do something. Or I need this or I need that. You don't need nothing. All you need is God to come through on your behalf. Amen. Peter was absolutely powerless to do anything about his situation. But God came through for him. The angel told him get dressed and put on your sandals. So he did. Now put on your coat and follow me the angel ordered. So Peter left the cell following the angel. But all the time he thought it was a vision. Peter had had visions before so he thought he was in a vision. He thought he was seeing something that wasn't actually happening in real life. He didn't realize it was actually happening. Verse 10 says, they him and the angel passed the first and second guard posts and came to the iron gate leading to the city. And this opened for them all by itself. Walmart was not the first one to come up with doors that opened by themselves. God did this hundreds of thousands of years before Walmart even came around. But notice they passed. The angel was with Peter. See, it only looked like Peter was alone but he wasn't alone. The gate opened by itself and they passed through and started walking down the street and the angel suddenly left him. Peter didn't need him anymore. The angel left. And then Peter finally came to his senses and said, "It's really true. The Lord has sent his angel and saved me from Herod and from what the Jewish leaders had planned to do to me." Let me tell you something today folks. Satan has come to do three things. He comes to steal. He comes to kill and he comes to destroy. But Jesus said, "I have come that you might have life and have it more abundantly." Isaiah 54, 17 says, "No weapon that is formed against you shall prosper. And every tongue that shall rise against you in judgment, you shall condemn." The devil means harm against you. But it ain't going to happen because God is looking out for you. Somebody lift your hands to heaven and just give God a praise. Hallelujah. Thank you Jesus. Thank you for fighting for me Lord. Thank you for looking out for me. Thank you Jesus for your deliverance. Glory to God. I got to give you the rest of this. Listen to this. Acts 12, 12, when Peter realized that he was actually out, he went to the home of Mary, the mother of John Mark, where many were gathered to prayer. This is where the church was praying for him. He knocked at the door in the gate and a servant girl named Rhoda came to open it. When she recognized Peter's voice, she was so overjoyed that instead of opening the door, she ran back inside and told everyone, "Peter is standing at the door." They said, "You're out of your mind." When she insisted they decided, "Well, it must be as angel." Now doesn't this sound familiar? Isn't this what the disciples told Mary when she came from the garden and told them that Jesus had risen from the dead? They told her, "You're crazy woman. Jesus didn't rise from the dead. We saw him die, amen?" But she was telling the truth and so was this lady here. Meanwhile Peter continued knocking because they hadn't opened the door yet. When they finally did open the door and saw him, they were amazed. Here they were praying for him. Praying for God to give them a miracle and then when the miracle came, they didn't believe it. Isn't that how we do? A lot of times, amen. We do that sometimes, don't we? He motioned for them to quiet down and told them how the Lord had led him out of prison. He told them the whole story. He told them how it happened. He said, "Tell James and the other brothers what happened." And then he went to another place. Now this is very important right here. What did he tell them to do? He said, "Tell James and the other brothers what happened." Now this seems natural enough, but don't you know Revelation 12, 11 says? And they have defeated him by the blood of the Lamb and by their testimony. You see, Peter knew that it wasn't enough that the angel had rescued him. He needed to share the testimony of what God did for him with others. Amen? He needed to spread the word because people in the body of Christ were discouraged after James had been put to death. They needed encouragement. And so Peter came and showed them, "Hey, God brought me out. I'm alive." And once they heard that word, the devil was defeated, amen? The thing that Herod tried to start was defeated by God. Hallelujah. The devil may be coming after you, trying to start something in your life. But if God be for us, who can be against us? It seems like there's no way out, but how many of you know Jesus is the way out? Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." He is the way out. Father, God, in the name of Jesus, I join my faith with the people of God today. Lord, I pray that you would deliver them, set them free, cause their chains to break, to follow the ground in the name of Jesus. Lord, give them the victory today over their situation. And let them testify of the great things that you do for them. Amen. Amen. And amen. Glory to God. To support the work of God, the preaching of the gospel, visit us online right now at shawnpinda.net/give. You can also give through the ministry pay pile account that addresses paypile.me/shawnpinda ministries. You can also give through the ministry app. Many of you have downloaded the shawnpinda ministry's app. Amen. You can give through that app as well. You can also give through the ministry's account. The ministry's email address is info@shawnpinda.net. You can also give through the ministry cash up account. That address is the dollar sign, shawnpinda ministries. You can also give through the ministry Venmo account that address is @shawnpinda ministries. You can also text to give all you have to do is text the letters SPM to the number 45888 and a link will automatically be sent to you. You can also give by mailing your donations into the ministry. Just remember to make your checks and money orders out to shawn. Pin the ministry's PO Box 2726 McKinney, Texas 75070. Join Pastor Sean Pinner in Plano, Texas with three nights of miracles at the Plano Event Center, Tuesday through Thursday, August 13-15 at 7 p.m. Nightly. Come and experience a life-changing time of anointed worship and powerful preaching and witness the power of God live as souls are saved, the sick are healed and lives are transformed. Register today. Visit miraclenights.net to register. This is your time for a miracle. See you there. Never forget me and my beautiful white pastor Amy, we love you. We appreciate you and thank you our wonderful partners and viewing audience for your support and your prayers. God bless you. See you again on tomorrow morning on another morning prayer broadcast. [music]