Regaining Lost Ground

Guest (Male): Fasting and praying, he believed God. He would coal miners, hard men were brought to their knees and repentance because of one man filled with the spirit of God. What about Amy Carmichael? Did nothing for God, was a good Christian, nobody even knew about her until she was filled with the spirit of God. And then her missions outreach, everything exploded.

You, the same thing. That's why the enemy is keeping us away from this mighty, many people away from this mighty work of God's spirit. So you have to find the place and you have to have the power of the Holy Spirit. If you don't have either, find them. Say, God, I need both of them. I have to have that.

Guest (Male): Thank you for joining us here at Westside Christian Fellowship, located in Leona Valley, California, one hour north of Los Angeles. Today on Regaining Lost Ground, we hear the first part of the message titled, "You Plus God Equals a Majority."

The late pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer once said, "If we start with such ideas as God's omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence, we will never arrive at a true knowledge of God. However, if we participate by faith in Jesus Christ as the one who is there for others, we are liberated from self and experience the transcendence that is truly the God of the Bible."

Today, Pastor Shane proclaims the truth of God's living word, asserting that in Christ, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For nothing can separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. You can hear the whole message at Pastor Shane's YouTube and Rumble channels.

Make sure to subscribe today. For more information, visit us online at westsidechristianfellowship.org. We also encourage you to hear more truth from Pastor Shane with the Idleman Unplugged weekly podcast. And now from Westside Christian Fellowship in Leona Valley, California, here's Pastor Shane Idleman.

Shane Idleman: One of the greatest truths that you ever will know as a Christian is the title of this message. This has helped me more than anything else looking back on my life, getting through challenges, and it's this: You plus God equals a majority. You plus God equals a majority.

And this is a time where the enemy's beating us up. We look in the news, we look at politics, we look at the culture, we look at Hollywood. And maybe it's just me, but it's pretty depressing when you start to become in the minority and silenced. Pulpits are silenced, churches are silenced. Laws are being passed that are so ungodly I can't even speak much about them from here. And you become discouraged.

And a truth that we have to remember is you plus God is always a majority. However, we have to position ourselves correctly. We can't just say that and hope it all fits in place. There's a positioning that involves is involved, just like setting your GPS to get somewhere. You have to position yourself. So God, how can I put myself into the majority by aligning with your word?

I'm going to read something from David Wilkerson. The title is "From the Prayer Closet to the Lions' Den." Do not be deterred by adverse and confusing circumstances in your life. One does not go down from the prayer closet directly to some mountaintop victory. Amen. Have I learned that the hard way. You may go down to the lions' den or the fiery furnace or the valley of confusion.

But do not despair. God is sovereign and he is the shepherd still leading. Your suffering and confusion will give way to faith that will never fail, a faith that has been tried as gold in the fire of adversity. In a nutshell, persevere. So I'm going to talk about the four places where we can align, I'm sorry, the four items here, four bullet points where we can align with God and be in that majority.

Because really what I mean by that is God plus you is a majority means God's working through you. God can take a small Gideon's army. God can take a shepherd boy named David. God can take one prophet and turn a nation around. You plus God is a majority. So the first thing we have to talk about this evening is the place. You have to find the place.

Okay, what do you mean by that? Well, I'm going to read Matthew 6:6. But you, talking to the believers, talking to Christians, when you pray, go into your closet and when you have shut the door, pray to your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you openly. So what we see from here, first and foremost, God must again become a priority.

We've hit on this many times before, but it's a good reminder. God must be the priority. There's privacy, there's intimacy. When you first started dating your spouse, was there not privacy and intimacy? You wanted to get to know them. It was the priority. How much more God? Finding that place of solitude, getting to that place.

I remember one of the old saints in one of their books I was reading, it might have been A.W. Tozer, where he talked about a mom that said, "Tozer, I can't get in a silent place." He said, "Just put your apron over your head and go sit in the closet and let the little kids run around. That can be your silent place." It has to be a place where we meet God. Jesus said, "When you pray, go into your closet." In other words, go somewhere where you shut out the world, you shut out your distractions.

Let me just give you a tidbit of information here: Leave the phone outside the closet and just make God the priority again. Because when God's the priority, he's the all-consuming fire. I've had so many things in my life compete for that relationship. Everything's competing for that relationship: friends, media, things to do, priority list. And God says, go somewhere and shut your place and shut yourself into a closet. It doesn't have to be a literal closet.

I've got a picture at home of John Wesley's prayer room, and it wasn't big. It just had a desk and a little sitting area there. It needs to be somewhere, I believe, where you can meet God. There should be a place of solitude and remembrance to draw strength. Do you know how a battery is recharged? Is it put out in the sun? No, it's hooked to a recharger.

And that's what the silent place does. It recharges that spiritual battery. It lifts us up and there's a remembering that takes place. And what I like about different areas or places I go or in my own home and finding that place where you meet God, that's precious. I know people don't even want to sell their house because of that place, that prayer closet.

And I was reminded of the Old Testament where when Joshua took the people of Israel across one of the rivers there and they put up these stones and the Bible says, what meaneth these stones? What does that mean? So children next generations would ask, why are these stones here? And Joshua and the old generation would say, "Let me tell you about what God did."

And that's why it should be hard sometimes to sell your parents' house if they passed away, if you remember that prayer room. That's where dad used to meet God. That's where mom used to pray for us year in and year out. There's a place of remembrance where God moved and God would dwell among his people. I love corporate prayer, don't get me wrong, but there's something special about private prayer. I cherish private prayer.

God tells us to pray corporately, to agree together. But private prayer, do you know why I like private prayer? Because it's honest prayer. We don't pray very honest in corporate prayer. We pray eloquently and we pray spiritually and we pray for important things. But in the private prayer area, you can cry out to God and say, "Oh God, take away this whatever it is, anger, pride or jealousy. God, I have no love in my heart." Try praying that in corporate prayer.

And actually, ironically, as I read more on revivals, it's often when corporate prayer turns into private prayer, people start to be honest, that revival hits a place and people cry out, "Oh God, save me." Me and Brian as I was driving here this evening, we talked about one of the revivals, the Welsh revivals. We have a passion for revivals. And it was in a little prayer chapel.

And this girl stood up in a youth meeting and she said, "Well, if nobody's going to say it, I'm going to say it. I love Jesus Christ." And the spirit of God came upon that place. Honest, soul-searching, heart-wrenching prayer. It's okay to stand up and say, "God, we need you. We need you. Our nation is crumbling. Our state is deteriorating. Our families are lost. Oh God, we need you. Would you visit your people?"

Apart from a mighty move of God's spirit, we are lost. The number one email we receive here is where can I find a good solid church in and you name the state. But the second or third or up there is they're asking, Shane, is there any hope for America? Is there any hope? Look at the news. Is there any hope?

And I tell them, I will tell you that there is no hope apart from a mighty move of God's spirit. That's why we contend. That's why we pray. And we know God hears the prayers of his people. I know that. The father sees in secret and the private time of prayer, this is when we communicate. Can you see a team succeeding, a baseball team, a football team that doesn't communicate?

Is there a business that's going to survive? Let's not talk to each other. Nothing survives without communication. That's why often I say before I answer someone, I say, "Well, I need to wait for orders from headquarters." Communication has to take place. And the enemy's robbing us of that time of prayer with busyness.

You know the average family now is on the television, media outlets over seven hours a day? A day, not a week. A day. Seven hours. You know how many books you could read in a month? You could get through the Bible in a short amount of time. And it's this thing contending because the enemy knows if you get in that prayer closet, if you get broken and humbled by God and you're sitting there and you're pulling down heaven and you're humble and you're empty and you've got a spirit of love and gentleness and you're praying according to God's word and you're praying for the souls of men and you're praying for the glory of God, those prayers must be answered.

Because God is a covenant-keeping God. And when God says, "If you seek me, you will find me. If you pray prayers according to my will, I will hear you." God desires to answer the prayers of his people. Who gave you that desire in the first place? God. And that's where the power is missing, the power of the prayer closet. Make that time somehow, somewhere, take it to God.

That's why I like that part of that movie, The War Room, where she took out majority of her clothes. You don't need 14 pairs of shoes. Remove those things, those distractions. Now, I'll give you a disclaimer up front. Me and Brian talked about this too. It's funny. Anywhere you go and you start to talk about holy, extreme Christianity, they think you're out there. And that's really normal Christianity though.

What they call extreme is normal Bible-believing Christianity. There's extreme snowboarding, extreme mountain bike racing, extreme rock climbing where that guy just climbed El Capitan with no ropes, nothing, just climbed the 3,000 foot rock. I think that's a little extreme. But when it comes to extreme Christianity and saying I've given up everything for God, yes, I'm going to remove idolatry from my life so I can seek God.

Yes, I'm going to remove the things that distract me, the things that are pulling down my family. Yes, I'm getting extreme because there's extreme warfare. We live in extremely critical times. And as the old saying goes, if not now, when? If not you, who? If not here, where? That's always God's call is to his people. So find that place. Find that place.

I even took an area of my garage and had it converted into a room where I can pray and read and seek God. And I love when my kids find me there just broken by the power of God. I wish they'd find me there more, but I'm usually done by the time they're up. But it's that place and they know that's where Dad's at. That's where Mom's at. We have our areas where we meet God.

And I believe what Jesus said. When you pray, go into your closet. And when you have shut the door, there's intimacy, there's privacy. "God, you're the priority. I'm shutting the door." This we make an appointment with everyone else. How many people have doctor's appointments? Dentists appointments. All kinds of appointments. There's nothing wrong. God is on my calendar.

He is on my calendar every single morning that I take breath out of these lungs. I'm meeting with God, Lord willing, barring an emergency. He's on the calendar. That's my priority. That means I go to bed a little earlier than some. That means I'm not going to watch garbage at night that gives me garbage thoughts and then no passion for God in the morning.

We're selected because God is the priority. So find that place to be in the majority with God. Find that place to seek him. How much more, if not now, when do we need this direction from God, the discernment from God in these dire times? And then Brian touched on this so I won't touch on it too much, but you have to have the power.

The power. See, you have the place when the place you meet with God meets the power of the Holy Spirit. Watch out. That's where lives are changed. There's a lot of dead praying. There's a lot of dead praying. But when you ignite that prayer with the power of the Holy Spirit, we read this earlier in Acts, you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you.

Prayer flows from a spirit-filled believer. It flows from a spirit-filled believer. So if you have a difficult time praying, willpower's not going to cut it. It could be a spiritual problem. Because a person filled with God's spirit wants to pray. They love prayer. Prayer is your heartbeat, prayer is your food, prayer is your power. You tap into the power source.

See, praying meets the power of the Holy Spirit. Without the power of the spirit, you might as well schedule root canal for me. It's just dead. I'll fall asleep. There's nothing there because you have to have that power. It connects the power, just like what happens when you plug a light switch in or plug a light and turn on the switch. You have to connect to that power.

I remember I've shared this before, but a little differently, when I was operating heavy equipment. I love digging trenches and just tearing up the road and tearing up the dirt and just big trenches and excavators and backhoes. And we'd bring in long conduit for Edison, Southern California Edison, big four-inch ductile and run big, large electrical lines through those. I wouldn't do it, but Edison would.

But every time I got close to the vault, it's okay by the house where there's no connection. But when you get to where they're making the connection and you hit one of those 12,000 volts of electricity with a steel tooth on a you unless you're grounded in the rubber in your tires, you will be electrocuted. It's common knowledge. So but there was nothing to it until they connected to the power source.

A dead conduit, empty. A trench, empty. But once it was connected to the power source, that's where that life came, that's where the electricity came. There's no difference with the Christian. We have to be connected to that. And this is why prayer is not a priority in the hearts of many people. It's hard and it's boring. Have you been there?

Or maybe it's you're here tonight. Prayer actually shouldn't be boring. It's exciting. We look forward to it. But it's like telling somebody not filled with the spirit of God is like telling an adult to watch Baby Einstein. I'm being revisited by those videos now with the baby. Or having your young child watch the news. How long does that last? Dad, Mom, I'm bored.

Why? Because they're not engaged. It's not relevant. So spirit-filled believer, Shane, what does that mean to me? Well, you cry out to God and you say, God, I want what we've been talking about all weekend. I want that infilling of the spirit. I want more of you. And to shoot you straight, you all know this but I love repeating it, the only reason I'm here today is because of this point.

This point. This is the only reason. A man broken by God, filled with his spirit wanting to share his truth and his love and a passion for what God has done in my life and the lives of many, many more people. And it's ironic. There's many books out there I can point you to. One is They Found the Secret. I've referenced that before. It's not an Oprah spirituality book. It's a powerful book.

But many pastors you would read about where they would be preaching and just kind of dead. The sermon's dying. And then they were mightily filled with the spirit and the sermon comes alive. Isn't that interesting? The same words. The same exact words. The same sermon. The same thing. What's the difference? I'm saying the same words, the audience is dead as dead.

I'm filled with the spirit of God and the audience is being convicted and lives are being changed. We come in with the spirit of expectation. We expect God to move. I don't know about you, but I expect God to move. Samuel Chadwick was bold enough to throw all of his sermons into the fire. He said, "These are the works of my own hands, my own thoughts." He threw all his sermons into the fire one night and the book he wrote said, "And then the fire of God fell upon him."

Because he emptied himself of himself. And you might say, well that's great, but I'm a mom, I'm a dad, I'm single. What does this have to do with me? Well, you're in ministry. You are in ministry. When I quoted here the scripture from Acts, you shall receive power, not everyone filled on Pentecost became pastors. Did you know that?

I would even argue that most of the people filled with the spirit of God on Pentecost did not necessarily become pastors. They became ministers. They all ministered. They brought the word of God. And people think, well that's what pastors need. No, I actually need, I'm going to make a bold statement here: I need the filling of the spirit as much as pastoring as I do parenting.

Let that sink in. And I'm honest with you. I'm completely honest. We need the spirit of God in our marriages. That's how you unite marriages. That's how you come against the enemy. That's how you stay in the workforce and hold on to your integrity. We need God's spirit. And I was going to ask security, I've given you this analogy before, but it's so timely and God put on my heart again for some reason.

But I wanted to bring a shotgun in here this evening. And security never lets me do this. I don't know why. No, Paul, I can't do that? Okay. I was speaking one time in an event in Hume Lake, actually, and they had a nice new shotgun they were giving away. So I had a wonderful illustration right here on the stage. 12 gauge, 3-inch mag.

I was ready to win that thing. I don't know how they gave it away. So I picked up this shotgun, you could do it up there, and I explained that I'm holding this gun but it's nothing. You wouldn't, okay big deal, look it's empty. But if I were to pull out a slug, 3-inch Magnum slug, put it in there, close the chamber, and just move it a little, you'd hit the exit doors.

What's the difference? Because it's an empty gun but you bring power to it. And that's the difference. Straight as a gun barrel theologically, but you can be just as empty. But you put that round in the chamber, you put the Holy Spirit of God into a broken, empty vessel, and God will plow through the works of darkness.

I've seen God plow through the work of darkness by one spirit-filled believer who's contending for their family, who's contending for our state. We just talked about How Rees, Ryan and myself, who prayed, was an intercessor. Great book. The book is so convicting you'll weep as you read it. He would fast, he would pray, and he changed the course they record of World War II by his prayers.

Fasting and praying, he believed God. He would coal miners, hard men were brought to their knees and repentance because of one man filled with the spirit of God. What about Amy Carmichael? Did nothing for God, was a good Christian, nobody even knew about her until she was filled with the spirit of God. And then her missions outreach, everything exploded.

You, the same thing. That's why the enemy is keeping us away from this mighty, many people away from this mighty work of God's spirit. So you have to find the place and you have to have the power of the Holy Spirit. If you don't have either, find them. Say, God, I need both of them. I have to have that. And then of course, Brian touched on this as well, the purity. The purity.

Hello Regaining Lost Ground listeners, this is Pastor Shane Idleman. Hey, I want to let you know that my new booklet titled "A Calculated Assault Against Cancer" is now available. You can download it for free right now at shaneidleman.com. Again, my new booklet, "A Calculated Assault Against Cancer" is now available at shaneidleman.com.

And the reason I did this is because there's so much negativity and fear that encompasses that word and especially in the medical industry. There's not a lot of hope. And so I want to release this booklet to give people hope and perspective and let them know, hey, with God all things are possible and his sovereignty can be your sanity.

So again, get this to anybody struggling with their health, especially and primarily cancer. The title of the booklet is called "A Calculated Assault Against Cancer" and it's available right now at shaneidleman.com.

Guest (Male): Westside Christian Fellowship is located 60 miles north of Los Angeles in Leona Valley, California. Thank you again for listening to today's message of Regaining Lost Ground, where we are reminded daily: times change, truth does not.