GOD'S PRESENCE

(Exo 3:2-6 NIV) "There the angel of the LORD appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. {3} So Moses thought, "I will go over and see this strange sight--why the bush does not burn up." {4} When the LORD saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, "Moses! Moses!" And Moses said, "Here I am." {5} "Do not come any closer," God said. "Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground." {6} Then he said, "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob." At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God."

QUESTION? Does God ever do that today? The answer is yes. I almost never talk about it but I was 11 years old, in the bed by myself, totally uninterested in "Church" or "Christianity" when God's presence overwhelmed me. I secretly cried, struggled, and tried for three long weeks to resist what I knew God was asking me to do. God's presence was overpowering and finally I surrendered. God wanted me to be a "minister" and not a Military pilot. I struggled for years to keep my commitment to God.

In my lifetime I've had numbers of experiences of God's presence. It's a powerful and awesome experience when it happens. I always knew... and so did everyone else that God was asking me to do something that seemed to be impossible. This usually happens when I'm totally unprepared for the encounter. I learned to listen carefully and do exactly what God was telling me to do. The results were so spectacular that many people called them "miracles." (With God there is no such thing as a miracle. It's just business as usual for God)

Looking back it hasn't been easy. It's not easy today. Sixty years of preaching, traveling all over the world, struggling, praying, and doing things others would not do is still a part of my lifetime commitment. At 76 years old I know I'm close to the end of my life but still I'm determined to keep listening for God's voice and the power of his presence.

There is a nagging problem for me. There is no way I can tell anyone how to have that kind of "Divine encounter with God." I passionately wish I could. It's God's choice - not mine. I see the urgent need for many of God's people to have that experience as our world goes spinning out of control. Churches desperately try to somehow "lead people to worship and experience God's presence". Most of the time it's a failure and a sad exercise in futility. Only God can draw near to us and make it happen.

When God sent Moses back to Egypt to tell Pharaoh to let the Hebrew slaves go free, Moses asked: "(Exo 4:1 NIV) "Moses answered, "What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, 'The LORD did not appear to you'?" Good question!!!

(2} Then the LORD said to him, "What is that in your hand?" "A staff," he replied. {3} The LORD said, "Throw it on the ground." Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from it. {4} Then the LORD said to him, "Reach out your hand and take it by the tail." So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and it turned back into a staff in his hand. {5} "This," said the LORD, "is so that they may believe that the LORD, the God of their fathers--the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob--has appeared to you."

Unfortunately when Moses showed Pharaoh the stick/snake miracle the Magicians of Pharaoh's court came out and did the same thing. Yes, Moses snake ate up their snake... but they kept matching the miracles of Moses. God raised the bar and eventually they couldn't match the miracles of Moses. Was God having fun when he sent the next plague of Gnats, flies, and lice into the Egyptians homes "but not in the houses of the Hebrew slaves"?

Pharaoh begin to compromise. "Take you people out into the desert and worship your God". But almost immediately Pharaoh harden his heart. (Don't go too far" (we want you back at work as soon as possible). Sound familiar? People often pray and the minute they get out of trouble they forget God and their promises.

The next plague was on the animals. ((Exo 9:3 KJV) "Behold, the hand of the LORD is upon thy cattle which is in the field, upon the horses, upon the asses, upon the camels, upon the oxen, and upon the sheep: there shall be a very grievous murrain." This word "murrain" means a plague. The Egyptians held in idolatrous reverence almost every animal, but some they held in particular veneration; as the ox, cow, and ram.

Among these, {Apis} and {Mnevis} are well known; the former being a sacred bull, worshipped at Memphis, as the latter was at Heliopolis. A cow or heifer had the like honours at Momemphis; and the same practice seems to have been adopted in most of the Egyptian Nomes. Each Nome, or province, of ancient Egypt had its own god or totem, its own capital, frontiers and coat-of-arms. By the infliction of this judgment, the Egyptian deities sank before the God of the Hebrews.

Next came festering boils, that broke out on men and animals. Then a hail storm, the worst that has ever happened in Egypt since the beginning of time. (Not a hail stone fell in Goshen where the Hebrew lived). Next came a plague of Locusts, everything in Egypt was destroyed... but Pharaoh hardened his heart. Then came three days of darkness - so horrible it could be felt...

Pharaoh still refused to bend, and told Moses "I will kill you if I ever see your face again." So be it... Hard hearted sinners seldom repent. Then God said to Moses: " (Exo 11:5-7 NIV) "Every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn son of the slave girl, who is at her hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle as well. {6} There will be loud wailing throughout Egypt--worse than there has ever been or ever will be again. {7} But among the Israelites not a dog will bark at any man or animal.' Then you will know that the LORD makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel."

There is no question that America was founded by Godly Christian men and in spite of a corrupt supreme court - Christian monuments are everywhere in Washington D.C.

This is Moses holding the ten commandments in the rotunda of the Library of congress. Monuments of our Christian Faith are everywhere. Here is one on the door of the U.S. Supreme Court. I wonder if the Chief Justices ever feel like hypocrites when they make ruling that defy the laws of God? This carving of the Ten Commandments is on the door that opens to the U.S. Supreme Court.

There are many of these scattered all over Washington but here's another one in the chambers of the Chief Justices of the United Supreme Court. This is where they make rulings that defy the laws of God and refuse to allow children to pray in Schools.


How and when did this get inside the United States Supreme Court???? It's Muhammad inside the U.S. Supreme Court. What message does that send? (Hint: He's holding a sword)


The Council on American-Islamic Relations in 1997 protested the Supreme Court's Muhammad sculpture and said it was concerned that Muhammad "was shown with the Quran, Islam's Holy Book, in one hand and a sword in the other, reinforcing long-held stereotypes of Muslims as intolerant conquerors." (Imagine that!!!) Chief Justice Renquest responding to the complaint told CAIR the image could not be changed and explained that swords also were used throughout the court's architecture as symbols of justice.

"Altering the depiction of Muhammad would impair the artistic integrity of the whole," Rehnquist wrote. "Additionally, it is unlawful (under the U. S. Code) to remove or in any way injure an architectural feature in the Supreme Court."

In response, protesters in Turkey marched outside the Danish consulate, terror groups in the West Bank threatened Danish and European interests, the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades – an offshoot of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah Party – briefly kidnapped a German and thousands of Muslim demonstrators in Beirut clashed with police Sunday, storming the city's Danish consulate and setting it ablaze. A nearby Maronite Catholic church also was attacked, prompting fears the protests could turn into a sectarian clash.

In Damascus , the evacuated Danish and Norwegian embassies were burned during protests that also damaged the Swedish embassy. Rioters reportedly tried to storm the city's French mission but were held off by police. Feel safer now?????

(Psa 9:17 KJV) "The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God."

What can save us? We need to abandon the lust for huge buildings and impersonal churches...the driving ambition for success and recognition. Ambition to build a multi-million dollar church building will absolutely guarantee that you will have to compromise your spiritual integrity to do it. The love of money is the root of all evil. Strange isn't it that Jesus - with all his spectacular power and miracle working abilities said: "I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." You can search all you like for a building and a piece of property that is "His church" and you won't find it. It is his power that builds "His" church in the heart of those who hunger and thirst after righteousness.

Anyone who listens to the news knows that the whole world is in trouble. We desperately need to have a "Divine encounter" with God to give us his spirit and power.

Unfortunately Satan can create a counterfeit religion call it "Christianity" and deceive God's people. In Second Peter 1:18 (NIV) we read: "We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with him on the sacred mountain." (Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration (Matthew 17:1-9)

Peter goes on to write: (2Peter 2:1-3 NIV) "But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them -- bringing swift destruction on themselves. {2} Many will follow their shameful ways and will bring the way of truth into disrepute. {3} In their greed these teachers will exploit....(Make merchandise of you "KJV")... with stories they have made up. Their condemnation has long been hanging over them, and their destruction has not been sleeping."

We need millions of American Christians to have the experience of the "presence of God." I can't tell you exactly how to have it - but I can tell you that your heart will have to "hunger and thirst" for the experience. If you have ever been really hungry or thirsty then you know how powerful those feelings are. They become your absolute priorities. To do that you will also have to stop reading, listening to and trying to use the lying false teachings of greedy preachers who all feel the need to be multi-millionaires.

Here are several links that will tell you what they believe...and teach. I've known many of these people personally ...and steered clear of their ministry and phony unscriptural teachings.

False Preachers Page - Forgotten Word Ministries

For you who don't feel comfortable at the church you may be attending...let me encourage you to pray and ask God to visit you. In my years as a pastor visiting church members on a regular basis was something I enjoyed. Someone once told me: "When you are talking you ain't learning nothing." I took that advise and always made it a point to get people to talk to me - while I listened carefully. It was amazing what I learned - often from the old saints who had lived a lifetime.

I was astonished how many of them opened up and finally told me of great and wonderful experiences of their encounter with God. Aunt Nanny was 98 years old when she told me how things were in the glorious and spiritual early days of the church. She said: "I was washing clothes in an old wash pot over a fire in the front yard. I had just taken the towels out of the wash pot and hung them over the bushes in front of the house.

Suddenly, God spoke to me that a dear friend in the church was sick and needed help and prayer. I dried my hands, put on my walking shoes and walked the three miles to her house. When I knocked on her door I heard her moan as I entered. She was alone, desperately sick and needed help. I prayed for her and in minutes I knew she was better. I stayed with her until she was rejoicing in the Lord and felt normal. "Pastor, I miss those days when that sort of thing was a common experience."

One night in a church we pastored I was about to preach. A minister friend that I knew well was in the audience. I heard the message loud and clear.... "Ask D.C. to pray." So I did exactly that. He stood and prayed, and prayed, and kept on praying, until people were crying, running to the altar to give their hearts to the Lord. He kept praying until his own Brother in Law was saved, and everyone in the church was touched by the presence of God. The long lasting effects of both of us being used by the Lord changed many lives that night. Nothing was out of order, nothing was contrived, we didn't take an offering, we simply had the experience described in the Old Testament.

(Ezra 3:11-13 NIV) "With praise and thanksgiving they sang to the LORD: "He is good; his love to Israel endures forever." And all the people gave a great shout of praise to the LORD, because the foundation of the house of the LORD was laid. {12} But many of the older priests and Levites and family heads, who had seen the former temple, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy. {13} No one could distinguish the sound of the shouts of joy from the sound of weeping, because the people made so much noise. And the sound was heard far away."

I'm absolutely certain that many people are tired of carefully orchestrated programs planned weeks in advance... of lifeless shows, of sermons contrived to give the appearance of "progress being made..." Maybe we should talk to each other about it, listen carefully to the "voice of the Lord" and allow God to use us to change our country and the world.

Send me an e-mail - I would like to know what you think.