Restoring The Roar (Part 2)

1 Thessalonians 5: 23

23 Now may the God of peace sanctify you (make you holy) in every way, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ comes again.

Proverbs 18: 14

The strong spirit of a man sustains him in bodily pain or trouble, but a weak and broken spirit who can raise up or bear?

The fact that the strong spirit of a man sustains him in bodily pain or trouble sounds to me like a good advertisement for a strong spirit.

Remember the divine order of spirit, soul, body.

 Jesus spoke and still speaks words that are spirit and life. He speaks spirit words that are designed to receive a spirit response and result in a life of care-free superabundance.

The strong spirit of a man sustains him in bodily pain or trouble.

sustain – strengthen or support physically or mentally

A strong spirit will keep your soul and body strong.

To sustain can also mean to cause to continue for an extended period or without interruption, or to bear pressure without breaking or falling.

The strong spirit of a man sustains him in bodily pain or trouble.

Many times over the years I have heard people say that persecution brings revival. Believe it or not I have even heard people pray for persecution so that they could have revival. That prayer doesn’t quite line up with Jesus’ direction on how to pray. He said to pray, “Lead us not into temptation (testing, trial), and deliver us from the evil one.”

Persecution does not bring revival, but revival (the life that is produced by a spirit response to spirit words) often leads to persecution. The life of God in us attracts persecution.  That is why we must remember that we are over and not under.

The enemy of our souls wants to steal the word from us so that he can kill that life and destroy God’s image in us.

Remember, the God of peace, of shalom, of nothing missing and nothing broken, is the one who sanctifies us spirit, soul, and body.

According to 1 Corinthians 6: 17 we are one spirit with him.

And as a result:

Romans 16: 20

20 The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet.

We are here to destroy the works of the enemy, and so it’s time to restore the roar. We will not be intimidated.

Remember, we are not under pressure – we are over pressure. We are under the mighty hand of God, we are under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, and so we are over everything else.

We are sustained by the love of God, the peace of God, and the joy of the Lord that is our strength, all of which are the fruit of receiving and guarding his word in our spirit. His word of love, his word of peace, his word of joy. His spirit words.

We are going to look at three guys from Scripture whose strong spirit sustained them in time of trouble.

You see, our soul will buckle under pressure. But our spirit is over pressure.

The first guy is Caleb.

Numbers 13: 26 – 33; 14: 1 – 10, 20 – 24

26 Now they departed and came back to Moses and Aaron and all the congregation of the children of Israel in the Wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh; they brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. 27 Then they told him, and said: “We went to the land where you sent us. It truly flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. 28 Nevertheless the people who dwell in the land are strong; the cities are fortified and very large; moreover we saw the descendants of Anak there. 29 The Amalekites dwell in the land of the South; the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the mountains; and the Canaanites dwell by the sea and along the banks of the Jordan.”
30 Then Caleb quieted the people before Moses, and said, “Let us go up at once and take possession, for we are well able to overcome it.”
31 But the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we.” 32 And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature.
33 There we saw the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.”

14:1 So all the congregation lifted up their voices and cried, and the people wept that night. 2 And all the children of Israel complained against Moses and Aaron, and the whole congregation said to them, “If only we had died in the land of Egypt! Or if only we had died in this wilderness! 3 Why has the Lord brought us to this land to fall by the sword, that our wives and children should become victims? Would it not be better for us to return to Egypt?” 4 So they said to one another, “Let us select a leader and return to Egypt.”
5 Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel.
6 But Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had spied out the land, tore their clothes; 7 and they spoke to all the congregation of the children of Israel, saying: “The land we passed through to spy out is an exceedingly good land. 8 If the Lord delights in us, then He will bring us into this land and give it to us, ‘a land which flows with milk and honey.’
9 Only do not rebel against the Lord, nor fear the people of the land, for they are our bread; their protection has departed from them, and the Lord is with us. Do not fear them.”
10 And all the congregation said to stone them with stones. Now the glory of the Lord appeared in the tabernacle of meeting before all the children of Israel….

……20 Then the Lord said: “I have pardoned, according to your word; 21 but truly, as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord— 22 because all these men who have seen My glory and the signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have put Me to the test now these ten times, and have not heeded My voice, 23 they certainly shall not see the land of which I swore to their fathers, nor shall any of those who rejected Me see it. 24 But My servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him and has followed Me fully, I will bring into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it….

We all know the story. Ten of the top men in the nation of Israel who had experienced supernatural deliverance from the bondage of Egypt heard the word of the Lord and processed that word in their souls rather than their spirits and so they saw themselves as being under what the word placed them over.

Leaders have a massive responsibility because the people they lead are influenced by their message. Tragically, the vast majority of the people fall down under the soulish report brought by their respected leaders.

It has been said that of the twelve leaders sent to spy out the land only Joshua and Caleb brought back a good report. But they actually all agreed that what the word of the Lord said was true, that it really was a land flowing with milk and honey and that it was a fruitful land.

The problem was that they saw themselves as inferior to the giants who occupied the land. And so they failed to enter in to their destiny, which the Lord calls disobedience, and which leads to death.

I have seen this scene played out many times as respected leaders of God’s people acknowledge the truth of God’s word but there is active discouragement in respect of expecting it to be attainable for anyone. This causes people to fall down in passive acceptance under their circumstances.

The most basic and fundamental mistake we can make is forgetting that we were created for worship, and worship is service, or acting on the word of the one whose greatness we acknowledge.

PauI said, “I beseech you brethren by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service, your acceptable act of spiritual worship.”

The people who had been delivered out of the bondage of Egypt had experienced the power and the glory of God first-hand, and so there is no point at which it becomes acceptable to stop believing and acting on what God says.

Joshua and Caleb heard the word of the Lord in their spirit and so they only saw the good stuff and saw themselves as more than able to possess the land because God said so and because God was with them and for them. But sadly they were in the minority, and the other leaders were responsible for feeding a soulish frenzy of persecution against the move of God.

In the scriptural narrative the LORD himself identifies what  separates Caleb from the majority of his contemporaries.

My servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him and has followed Me fully, I will bring into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it.

The strong spirit of a man sustains him in bodily pain or trouble.  Remember, to sustain means to strengthen or support physically or mentally.  A strong spirit will keep your soul and body strong. To sustain can also mean to cause to continue for an extended period or without interruption, or to bear pressure without breaking or falling.

And so, for the next forty years Joshua and Caleb continued to walk by faith while the others of their generation fell all around them.

Through faith and patience Joshua and Caleb stayed over while every one of their peers went under, and so they inherited the promise. They maintained their roar.

Joshua 14: 6 – 14

6 Then the children of Judah came to Joshua in Gilgal. And Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite said to him: “You know the word which the Lord said to Moses the man of God concerning you and me in Kadesh Barnea. 7 I was forty years old when Moses the servant of the Lord sent me from Kadesh Barnea to spy out the land, and I brought back word to him as it was in my heart. 8 Nevertheless my brethren who went up with me made the heart of the people melt, but I wholly followed the Lord my God. 9 So Moses swore on that day, saying, ‘Surely the land where your foot has trodden shall be your inheritance and your children’s forever, because you have wholly followed the Lord my God.’ 10 And now, behold, the Lord has kept me alive, as He said, these forty-five years, ever since the Lord spoke this word to Moses while Israel wandered in the wilderness; and now, here I am this day, eighty-five years old. 11 As yet I am as strong this day as on the day that Moses sent me; just as my strength was then, so now is my strength for war, both for going out and for coming in. 12 Now therefore, give me this mountain of which the Lord spoke in that day; for you heard in that day how the Anakim were there, and that the cities were great and fortified. It may be that the Lord will be with me, and I shall be able to drive them out as the Lord said.” 13 And Joshua blessed him, and gave Hebron to Caleb the son of Jephunneh as an inheritance. 14 Hebron therefore became the inheritance of Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite to this day, because he wholly followed the Lord God of Israel.

The strong spirit of a man sustains him in bodily pain or trouble.  Caleb’s physical strength was maintained by his strong spirit.

When a lion roars it is announcing to all of its enemies, “I am here, this is my territory, get out of here.”

Caleb had a righteous roar.  He knew what had been promised to him and nothing or nobody was going to stop him possessing his inheritance.

Joshua and Caleb were worshippers in spirit and truth. They received God’s word in their spirit and guarded that word with worship, acknowledging that what God says is what God will do because every promise God makes is a promise that God will fulfil.

Release your roar!

To be continued…..