Believe the Word

Hi, this is Pastor Daniel Bracken. You're listening to Kings Alaska Podcast. I hope the Word encourages you and you get a touch from God that brings transformation and equips you to experience life with people, power and purpose. Thank you for joining us. Enjoy the Word.

If you would turn in Your Bibles to 2nd Chronicles 20 and stand to your feet and we're going to read the Word together. We're going to start at verse 14.

Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon Jaheziel, son of Zechariah, the son of Benaiah, the son of Jael, the son of Mattaniah, a Levite of the sons of Asaph, in the midst of the assembly. And he said, listen, all you, all of all you of Judah and you inhabitants of Jerusalem, and you, King Jehoshaphat. Thus says the Lord to you. Do not be afraid or dismayed because of this great multitude, for the battle is not yours, but God's. Tomorrow, go down against them.

They will surely come up by the ascent of Ziz. And you will find them at the end of the brook before the wilderness of Jeriel. Jeruel, you will not need to fight in this battle. Position yourselves. Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord.

Who is with you, O Judah and Jerusalem, do not fear or be dismayed. Tomorrow go out against them, for the Lord is with you. And Jehoshaphat bowed his head with his face to the ground. And all Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem bowed before the Lord, worshiping the Lord. Then the Levites of the children of the Kohathites and the children of the Korah Heights stood up to praise the Lord, the God of Israel, with voices loud and high.

And so they rose early in the morning, went out into the wilderness of Tekoa. And as they went out, Jehoshaphat students said, hear me, O Judah, and. And you inhabitants of Jerusalem. Believe in the Lord your God, and you shall be established. Believe his prophets and you shall prosper.

And when he had consulted with his people, he appointed those who should sing to the Lord and who should praise the beauty of holiness as they went out before the army of the Lord, saying, praise the Lord for his mercy endures forever. Amen. Let's pray. Father. Thank you so much.

Oh God, thank you. Thank you for your word. A lamp into our feet. It's a light upon our path. Lord, I pray today, Holy Spirit, that you'd come upon me with power and an unction to be able to preach.

That's what. What you put in my heart to. To Share with your beautiful people this morning. Come on, lay hands on your heart this morning. God, we pray.

I pray, Holy Spirit, that you'd come and you would let the truth of your word permeate our hearts, oh God, that it would change us, it would rearrange us, oh God, that you would bring revelation, open up our eyes today, that we would see marvel from your word. In Jesus name, Amen. You may be seated. This morning, I'm going to be bringing you on a story summarizing briefly the events of things that take place in 2nd Chronicles 17:18, 19. And then we'll hit our main text at 20, because the things that take place, the.

The principles of. Of the life of King Jehoshaphat, who we're going to be talking about, are very important to look at when we come to our main text, which is in second chronicles 2020. Jehoshaphat becomes king at the age of 35 years old. The in the year approximately 872 B.C. he's fourth in the lineup of kings after the tribes.

The nation had been split into two. Into two. The northern tribes in Israel under King Ahab's rule at the same exact time, and the southern tribes, which, of course, he's reigning over. And Jehoshaphat pleased the Lord. Right there in your notes.

He pleased the Lord and he followed the Lord. Why did he please the Lord? What. What about him please the Lord? Well, the first thing is that he followed the Lord.

The text says that the Lord was with him. I'm talking about chapter 17 right now. And I encourage you to go and read these chapters. Just read them. Because you cannot come to what happens in Second Chronicles 2020 without going back and understanding the life of Jehoshaphat, like I said.

And so the Lord was with him. And it says there in. In chapter 17, the Lord is with them. And it says that therefore the Lord established his kingdom because of this. He made his kingdom settled firm and secure.

He established Jehoshaphat because he followed the Lord. Jehoshaphat was the great, great, great grandson of King David. So, for instance, my beautiful mother in love on the second row right here. Mama, that would be in the lineup. So I have a beautiful granddaughter named Scarlet Joy Johnson.

I don't have a picture for you today. So that would be like my. The relationship between my mama, my mother in love, and Scarlet's grandchildren. So that's the relationship. There's several generations there.

I had to think about that for a moment. And the reason they referenced David is because they're saying that just Like David loved God, was a man after God's own heart. They're inferring here that Jehoshaphat was the same exact way that he loved God with all of his heart. Asa, Jehoshaphat's father also loved God. He did some kind of interesting things, but there towards the end, but he loved God also.

And so we can see a generational blessing taking place there of people, of. Of a family that loves God. Well, the second thing that he did, besides following God, is that he removed false worship. He didn't seek the bales like his, the. The ancestors.

Before that, he didn't seek the bales which were common idols of the day. And he removed all the high places of worship, false worship, and remove the ashrams out of Judah. Thirdly, he commissioned leaders to teach God's laws. To teach the word of God to the people. He commissioned teachers, the priests, the Levites and the priests.

Specifically in Deuteronomy, excuse me, Leviticus 10:10. They were actually the ones that were given the responsibility. They were entrusted with the spiritual growth of the people of the land. They were entrusted with, of teaching people how to live for God and sharing the Word with them and helping them understand so that they would walk in the fear of the Lord. Let me just say that the people right there in Jehoshaphat's kingdom, in the kingdom of Judah, they had drifted away from God's word.

And Jehoshaphat sent them out so that they would be brought to God, brought back to God. They needed to know how to walk in the fear of the Lord. Well, that same thing is happening here, here in our nation and all over the earth. People have drifted away from God. It's not like the bedrock of foundation of their lives.

And we gotta teach people, we gotta share the Word with them. And that's exactly what Jehoshaphat did.

You cannot know God without studying his Word. You cannot walk in his ways and walk in the fear of the Lord. You cannot walk and know the will of God for your life if you don't know the word. Can I get an amen around here? You cannot.

You might be saying, today, I want to grow in my walk with God. I want to grow as a Christian. Well, you know what? The first step, you got to be filled with the Holy Ghost, which is great, awesome power. We need it.

But we've got to know God, believe in God through the intentional study of the Word. You must do it. We must do it. And I want to encourage you Today, on the 25th of January, we launch all of our new life groups and our new teams. Get discipled, take a class, do whatever it is, be intentional, Make a commitment to learning the word of God so that you can believe God's word, so you can walk.

In the blessing in 1995, my husband told the story, but I got saved. That was 30 years ago, which to me is very shocking. I still feel like I'm that young 26 year old and a woman, a life group leader, came alongside me. I am so grateful. I'm forever gonna be grateful.

She will receive many rewards in heaven for what she did. She got me rooted and established in the Bible. She taught me how to fight along with a great bunch of other people like my mama did too. She taught me how to line the words of my mouth up with the word what the Bible said. One of the things that she did which affected me, which I still do even today, is back then there was absolutely, there was no Internet.

It wasn't even a thing. I would do these word studies. The first one I did was on speech. She said, write down when you're studying, when you're reading the Bible, write down every single thing that you, every scripture that you come across that has to do with your speech, your talking, the word, anything that comes out of your mouth. And oh my goodness, we had no Internet and I had to, I hand written, wrote them.

I didn't ask chat, give me all the, the, the scriptures that talk about my mouth and my speech and the effect of it. I didn't do that. No. By the grace of Almighty God, I hand wrote them. I had a big fat notebook.

It was the first of many word studies that I did. And I'll tell you, I had a. Used to curse because I was, I was a sinner. Then I got saved and I had. God was doing a work on the inside of me.

But when I did that word study, something changed. The word of God, which is living, it's. It's active. And as I read that word, it was like this fire, literally. I could feel it in my bones.

That started to change me and rearrange me. And it changed. I'd never. I didn't curse after that, except for a couple times when I got really mad. But thank God for his mercy and compassion back then.

Amen. Amen. I'm so grateful. I'll forever be grateful for her pouring into my life. And I want to just say, who are you discipling?

Are you discipling people? I want to challenge you today about. With that I was able to learn what pleased God. I was able to put away my idols. I had a big fat bonfire and burned everything because I figured out that that was wrong.

I learned my identity, who I was. I learned. I learned how to please him and walk in the fear of the Lord. Well, fourthly, as a. As a result, back in your notes.

As a result of Jehoshaphat's following God, getting rid of false worship, commissioning leaders to go out and teach the Word. The fourth thing is, is that God's blessing and protection came upon the land. Imagine that. You know why? Because they weren't sitting, because they were walking in the way of the Lord.

They were walking and following in obedience to God's word. And the protection and the blessing of God came upon Judah. God caused the surrounding nations to have the fear of the Lord about them.

The surrounding nations saw the blessing of God on Jehoshaphat and said, oh, my gosh. The fear of God came on them. We're not going to attack them. We're not going to go to war with them. And not so much that they were.

Were afraid of Jehoshaphat, but they knew that God was real. I pray that my life. Maybe you have the same prayer. I pray that there would be something in my life where, when I go out into the community, when I'm around people, that they say, oh, my gosh, there's something different about that person. There's something different about you.

What is it? And that they would have the fear of the Lord because we walk in authority, because we walk in power, because we walk in his ways, and we walk in the fear of the Lord. Right? That believers, unbelievers, unbelievers would notice. There's something different.

It's a good thing to reflect on. And the surrounding nations came with gifts for Jehoshaphat. There in the text, in chapter 17, the Philistines, Arabia, other nations, they came and brought tribute to him, gave him lots of gifts and lots of money, silver and all kinds of stuff. And Jehoshaphat built up the surround all of the areas of Judah, fortified the cities, and raised a great army with over a million people. If you do the math on all those numbers, we're talking about having a year of power and breakthrough.

Keys to having a year of power and breakthrough. And. And Jehoshaphat was one who loved the Word of God. And he. He believed God's word.

He knew that the blessing of God would be over their land if people would know it, believe it, and live it. Amen. He believed it. He trusted God, he knew the blessings would be poured out on the land, and he sent out teachers and Levites and priests. What a great king.

Do we have that kind of a burden? I'm not just talking to you. I'm. I'm. This.

This message, this studying, this just made me look at myself going, God, I mean, do I have the fervor to constantly be going out and sharing and teaching the Word to other people, knowing that God's blessing, if they will live for God, that the blessing of God would pour out of. Be poured out upon them? Oh, God, help me. I want to be zealous like that. And he did it because he shared it with others, because he himself did it.

He knew.

Interestingly, as we move into chapter 18, there's a very interesting story that's sandwiched in here, and I believe that it's a fascinating story. Jehoshaphat makes a horrible mistake. That's right there in your notes for all you note takers. Take some notes. It's a good message.

You can go and study it later. He makes a terrible mistake, and he makes an alliance by marriage with King Ahab. You know, Ahab, the husband of the infamous Jezebel. He makes a marriage alignment. But when you read the beginning of chapter 18, where it starts to talk about that, it says is that the Jehoshaphat was prosperous and very wealthy and had great favor.

And that's my. My version of that. And it says, and in the same sentence, he made an alliance with Ahab. He didn't need to make an alliance with Ahab. Why in the world would he yoke himself and bring Ahab into his family?

You know what he did? He caused. He. He sent his son Jehoram to marry Ahab. And Jezebel's daughter, Athaliah.

She was a very wicked person. She needed Jesus. She needed God. She didn't walk in his ways at all. In fact, she did some of the most horrific things.

Great consequence for this terrible mistake. You know what happened, Athaliah? Jehoram and Jezebel's. Excuse me. She's her mother's daughter.

Athaliah and Jehoram had a son, King Ahaziah. Well, he died. And after that, she usurped the throne, became the only female to sit on the throne of David in Judah. And she tried to destroy the Davidic bloodline. And they escaped with Joash, who was just a little boy back then.

And she caused Israel, excuse me, Judah to fall back into worse idolatry than they. Than. Than they had. In fact, she Even set up her own idols in the very temple of the Lord and caused all the. All her idols.

Terrible. What a horrible consequence of being unequally yoked. Hello. Why did he do it? We think that possibly he needed a wife and he couldn't marry.

Jehoram couldn't marry from his own people there, you know, so who knows? But. But obviously, Jehoshaphat did not seek God. But, you know, God is kind and merciful. Well, as a result, Jehoram goes down and.

And visits Ahab. You know, he had made that alliance a few years later. And he goes down and he goes. So it means going down. He's actually going north.

But from the high elevation of Jerusalem, he goes to Samaria to see Ahab. And Ahab throws this giant feast for him, probably to entice him to go to war. And so he says, hey, would you come with me to fight the Arameans in Ramoth? Gilead, I need some help. And of course, Jehoshaphat, being a man of integrity, a man of the word, a man who lived, walked in the fear of the Lord, of course, kept his.

His alliance. He had to. He had to do it. So he goes out to battle, and God has mercy. Ahab, I mean, you just look at the.

I think the reason that. One of the reasons that's in there is because you see the stark difference between Ahab and Jehoshaphat. I mean, it's fascinating, you see how much Jehoshaphat loved God's word, of the fear of God. And then you see Ahab over here, who doesn't want anything to do with it and totally wasn't loving God, didn't serve God at all. In fact, the prophet says that he hates God.

And you see this stark contrast between the two men, and they go out to war. And Ahab is a great. So fascinating story. He's like, I'm gonna hide in my. In the commoner's clothes, and I'm just gonna go over here because.

And then you just. You know, just be yourself. So he knew that they were all gonna go after Jehoshaphat. What a jerk. He set him up, you know, like, you can't find me, but you cannot hide from God.

It had from Prof. The prophet said to him that he was gonna be killed in that battle. And a random arrow hit him in the breastplate near the heart, and he died. But before that took place, all of them came towards Jehoshaphat. And he cried out to God, and God spared him.

He had mercy. It's right There in your notes. He had mercy. He had mercy on Ahab, and his life is spared. That's number three.

And coming into chapter 19, that's the summary of 17 and 18 and 19. The prophet comes and rebukes him and says, oh, there's. You're. You know, you're. Why would you partner with somebody that hates God?

And yet there's some good things in you. You love God. You tried to turn people back to the word of God. You love God with all your heart and you believe his word. And so because of that, you know, God had mercy on you.

And so J. Jehoshaphat suddenly gets filled with this fresh zeal, fresh zeal. And he makes even more reforms in Judah. He brought further spiritual order by appointing judges. I'm going a little fast in the notes, but you can keep up. Judges not only made legal decisions, but they instructed the people in God's ways.

And in doing this, Jehoshaphat was following Moses plan of delegated authority, which you can read about in Exodus 18. That's a model that we follow in our church that you know, all we. So if you're a life group leader or a leader in this place, you know that you're a delegated authority underneath us. And we're a delegated authority underneath Dr. Morocco, our worldwide senior pastor. It's Moses plan of leadership for to govern Israel.

So it's fascinating. And so there were local judges in the Supreme Court of Appeals in Jehoshaphat State like there had been before. And the king put priests and Levi's in charge of the judges, which was wise because they were really the best ones equipped to evaluate cases because they knew the Mosaic Law. And it seems that some of the Israelites had failed to continue those policies that Moses had put in place. And so that's why he put them in there.

And he gave them principles to lead. He commanded them. You can read there in the text in chapter 19. He said, Be wise, be good stewards, be. Be integrous, be honest, be courageous, and have the fear of the Lord when judging and doing all these things with the people.

Because you are judging in God's place. You are the delegated authority for the Lord, and let her be there. He took personal responsibility. Do you know, it says there in that chapter, I love. I absolutely did love this.

He did home visitation. He went to house to house to house all over Judah and Jerusalem, telling the people to follow the Lord, teaching them, seeing how they were doing. He was like a. He was a pastor to that nation. He Cared about the condition of the heart of those people.

I did a little chat search on. On what the size of Judah was back then. In compared comparison to Alaska here and the Matsu burrow here is about seven to eight times the size of Judah. Back then it was about 33,400, a little over 3,400 square miles. But you know, Juno, Juno, the city and all the surrounding areas with the waterways is about the same size.

Can you imagine, let's just say Nick Begich or our governor would go house to house. Can you imagine them walking 3,400 square miles around trying to teach people about God? I said, that's just so beautiful. To me, they cared. He cared so much about his people and his land.

What a kind king.

I mean, that. That is really moving to me.

Well, something happens as we come in into, into chapter 20. There's an imminent attack. There's a crisis.

Word came to Jehoshaphat that a great multitude of soldiers was approaching Judah from beyond the sea. This would have been the Dead Sea. Back then, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Mayunites, which were probably allies or neighbors of the Edomites, and also probably Edomites came. There was a coalition of armies that formed. And they saw all the stuff that was taking place, all the blessings, all the wealth, because he was very wealthy and very prospered, very firm and settled in his kingdom.

And they decided to come back, come against Judah and attack. And they tell the king, and the Bible says, oh, what is. Joseph has his response. He's afraid. But the very, very, very first thing he does is he seeks the Lord.

He goes to seek the Lord. What do you do when you're afraid?

I'm going to take a water pause. Okay.

He seeks the Lord. He trusted in God. He trusted in his word. He knew the promises of God, of protection over the land. He knew.

And if you look at everything that I just shared with you from chapter 17, you know, he made a mistake in chapter 18. But and then going into chapter and then chapter 19, you can see that Jeffat believed God. And so the very first thing he does is he seeks the Lord. He runs to God. He knew he was outnumbered.

He was up against a great multitude, a horde of people and armies for. Armed for war, armed for battle, to oust his, the people of Judah from the land, the promised possession. And when you're in the face of a hopeless situation, there should in Christ be no hopelessness. We should not. We should not experience hopelessness.

Because the very first thing that we should do is go to God, trust His word, believe in him, seek him, and get the word of the Lord from him. Amen. That's the very first thing we should do as Christians. And what does he do? He encourages the nation to seek the Lord.

He proclaim, proclaims a time of fasting.

He assembles them to prayer. Men, women and children. They were all in the temple, there in chapter 20, seeking the Lord together. They were all there together, petitioning of the Lord, prayer in prayer. Children, men, women, everybody, the nation.

And what does he do? He prays. And I love his prayer. It's so similar to Solomon's Prayer when he dedicated the temple. Talking about how, you know, if you, if we pray and distress comes and we, we, we pray, you're going to hear and you're going to answer.

How does he pray? Well, first, he exalts the Lord and he reminds God of his great sovereignty. He can do what he wants when he wants to. He's God. He reminds him of his covenant, the covenant that he made between himself and his people.

He reminds God of his. Of his presence and his goodness. God, you are so good. He reminds God of his people and his possession, that the possession that God himself had given to the people is about to be taken. He declares complete dependence upon God, knowing that there is no way, there's no way that they can do anything.

Is totally in the natural looks, hopeless. But he does not have hopelessness because he's seeking God. He places his. His trust in God. He bases his petitions on this, which would have been the Torah back then, on the promises of God.

All of his prayers are based on the promises of God, the Word. Knowing what the Word. You cannot pray the promises of God. If you don't know this, you don't know what God has said. You don't know what you can have.

You don't know who you can be. You. It's all right in here. The answer is in here. God's promises.

You know, I found that God loves to be reminded of His Word because it shows that we're like actually turning to him. It shows that, that we understand and, and we're in covenant with him. And we know Him. We know His Word. He loves to be reminded of His Word because when you, you remind him of His Word, I don't know, I find that he breaks in and moves in power.

I found that. And I love God's immediate response to this prayer immediately. They're praying. They're done praying and all, and right comes along. Jaheziel.

The Levite. And he starts out with, don't fear. Don't fear. People of Jerusalem and Judah, don't fear. In fact, I love it.

That phrase, do not fear is written 365 times in the Bible. One time for every day of your life. 365 times. Do not fear. In the face of this crisis, in the face of this, this terrible threat, Jehoshaphat goes and seeks the Lord and, and the word of the Lord is, don't fear.

Don't.

The word of the Lord comes and there's given a divine strategy from heaven. The prophetic word comes forth and the prophet speaks and he says, you know, something crazy like a Jericho march. Like, he tells, like Jerry, like Joshua had to do. That was a pretty crazy prophetic strategy, wasn't it, if you don't know it. He, they, he told them to march around the walls of Jericho and don't say anything.

Just worship. And he had the worshipers out there. Don't, don't say one word until the last day. And then you lift up your voices and shout and the walls will come. I mean, that.

Can you imagine if we did that today? Well, guess what? We're doing that on Friday. And we're believing the walls are gonna come down. We're gonna do that strategy.

But he gives him a crazy strategy. He says, listen, this is that famous verse.

Well, he didn't say that yet. So he says, he gives him a strategy. The battle belongs to the Lord. That's the strategy. Don't do anything.

Just, just don't do anything. You can't do anything. The battle is going to belong, but the battle belongs to the Lord. You know, it's hard to trust God if you don't know his word. It's hard to place all of your trust.

That is what God was saying to those people. He's saying, put your trust in me. I'm going to take care of you. And if you, if they hadn't had a great king, a great wise king that had been teaching them the word of the Lord, can you imagine them just sitting there going, I mean, you cannot. It's hard to put your trust in something that you don't believe and know you don't know and believe.

It's very hard, hard to obey. Well, the following day, the word of the Lord, like I said, comes and the people obey. That's a beautiful thing. They obey. They follow the word of the Lord, the divine strategy that was given through the prophet.

They show up, getting ready for battle. And Jehoshaphat says that that verse, he says, believe in the Lord, believe in His Word and be established. Believe in his prophets, and you will prosper, you will succeed. And they follow that. They go down there, they wake up in the morning, and Jehoshaphat does something very strategic.

He puts all the worshipers out at the front, and the battle starts with the worship.

He instructs those leading the people to lift their voices in joyous praise and worship. And they did it. They sang praise to God and began to thank him because they knew that they were going to trust. They had to trust Him. They trusted him, and so they just lifted their voices and they began to thank God.

The chronicler, the. The author of this was very careful to note that the victory began when the people started to worship. I found that at times in my life, a lot of the battles that I've gone through, I mean, I've been through plenty of. Of battles in the natural, but a lot of them were on the inside, a lot of internal battles. And I know there's people here that know exactly what I'm talking about.

The battle starts here in your mind. And I found that. That there were times when I just didn't feel like worshiping God. But you develop a habit of lifting your voice, if you will develop a habit, a spiritual discipline in the face of opposition, in the face of difficulty, in the face of the. The things that you're haunted by, and in the.

In the face of that inner turmoil on the inside of you. If you lift your hands and you will worship God, you will have a breakthrough right on the spot. God will break in with power. His power and his presence will come. But a lot of times we just don't feel like it.

Can we just take 60 seconds all over this place? Can you just lift your hands up all over this place? I'm gonna just show you. Some of you, this is all news for you. You know how to do this.

But I'm going to show you. Lift your hands. Worship God. You just talk to Jesus. You talk to him like you talk to him.

I'm going to talk to him. I want to hear your voices. Worship God. Lord, we worship you this morning. We thank you for your mercy.

Thank you for who you are. Thank you that you're so good. Lord, it doesn't matter what I feel. It doesn't matter what I'm going through. No matter what that is, God, you are worthy.

It doesn't matter if I don't feel like it. You are worthy of all of My adoration. You're God. You're God of the universe. You're the one that knows.

You're the one that hung the stars. You know the beginning from the end. And I worship you and thank you, Lord, for your word. Your word says that you. You care about me, or you're performing and perfecting every single thing that concerns me today.

I thank you that you're fighting even on my behalf today. I don't know what to do, but I seek you and I look to you. Oh, oh, God today. Mighty God.

That's what that looks like when you don't feel like it, when you're faced against insurmountable odds, even the ones that are on the inside worship him. Lift your hands and let God break in and give you victory.

And God does. He gives them victory. There's a very divine deliverance. There's a divine deliverance that takes place. He sent an ambush.

He sent confusion into the enemy's camp. I love that it's so powerful.

The Ammonites and the Moabites turned against the Edomites and the other Ems, the other Ites, and then that those ites turned against the other Ites and each other. And so they showed up at the battlefield. All the Ites took each other out. Confusion was sent into the camp of the enemy because of the worship. That's when it took place.

And. And they showed up in the battlefield worshiping God. And they show up there and they're like, oh, just like God said. Imagine that. Corpses everywhere.

Tons of bounty. Tons of. Not bounty, spoil.

Tons of spoil loaded with riches and jewels and all their stuff, because they. They were probably going to just try to oust Judah from their inheritance. And the people were so blessed, they didn't have to lift a sword. If you'll lift your hands, you'll worship God. He'll undertake for you.

It might take time. You might have to do that a hundred times. You might have to do that one time. I don't know. And there's things I don't understand.

There's mysteries. I don't understand why sometimes God asks us, we worship him, and then he asks us to actually go through that and fight those the is. The people of Israel had to fight battles, like physical battles sometimes. And then you have a situation where God just says, just worship me. Lift your hands up.

Just, I, you know, because you love me, because you've listened to my word, because you've. You trust me, I'm just gonna fight the battle for you. And he takes care. I Don't understand. But you know what our job is?

Our job is to obey the word of the Lord, whatever that is, and trust in God. That's our job. And so there was great spoils, so great that people gathered it up and it took three days. Three days. And on the fourth day, they went to Baraka and they worshiped God and had great joy.

They had great joy because God had subdued their enemies beneath them.

They rejoiced over their enemies and they worshiped and they blessed the Lord God. And they returned home with great joy because of the triumph. And in verse 30, I love it. But it says. It says the realm of Jehoshaphat was quiet all around because God gave him rest.

That's powerful. But let me tell you that none. I firmly believe that. I mean, there's the grace of God, the sovereignty of God, but I believe none of it would have happened had Jehoshaphat not had the lifestyle of believing in God, of. Of the people of Judah, encouraging them to grow in the Word and walk in his ways.

I firmly believe that. And God gave him rest all the way around. God is speaking to us today.

How to have a year of power and breakthrough. Anybody want to have a year of power and breakthrough? Yes. Through fasting and prayer. Powerful tools, powerful weapons to get close to God and.

And pray and see heaven move. But the second thing is that we've got to believe the Word. We gotta get in the Word. How? You cannot believe it if without getting in it.

I'll say it again, like 70 times. I'm passionate about this. I'm so passionate because it's changed my life. The Word of God. This has changed my life.

The first thing right there is believe the Word, have faith in God, and our faith gets built and strengthened. Our faith is built by hearing God's Word. I'm so grateful for the Bible app. I'm so grateful because when I. My kids were growing up and my life, I was working full time and I had little kids and I just.

It was hard or I had to drive somewhere. I could always put that thing on and my kids could listen to it too. And I could hear the Word. Could hear the Word and have my faith built. If you don't do that, man, download it.

Download the Bible app and just listen on your way to work on your commute. Five minutes. Join the Bible plan that we're doing. They might all be full, but it doesn't matter. Just have your own Bible plan.

Just go on there and pick one. My husband and I's Brains are very different. Pastor Daniels is very different. He loves the McShaney. I love that.

It's great. But in my brain, I like the other one. I like it very chronological. He likes it like that. And that's great.

Pick one that you like. Amen. It's only by reading, learning, growing in the Word, growing in the wisdom and knowledge of God, his ways, that we'll know how to live, how to follow God, how to live for Him. We'll know his will and his plan for our lives, and we'll be able to fulfill it. The Bible, like I said, contains all the promises of God, the means, that's the basis for which we pray.

This is what we pray.

Make God's Word the authority in your life. There's a lot of voices and opinions out there. And you know what? I don't care. I mean, I value people's opinions in certain areas.

Like, yay, does that outfit look good on me? Yes or no?

But you can't. There is no right opinion about certain things, things that contradict God's law. I'm not going to stand on somebody's opinion. And God doesn't stand over your opinion to make to see it happen. He stands over His Word.

Make this your opinion.

Secondly, obey the Word. So first, believe it, know it, get it all down in your spirit. But secondly, obey the Word. Do the Word. Like the book of James said, don't just be a hearer of the Word, but.

But do it. Do. Do the Word. And if you don't know how to do the Word, ask for help. If you don't know what to do in a circumstance, look in the Word.

And then you. There's so many people that in this great family that you can ask for help, ask for wisdom, but the answer is here. Do the Word. Choose. Choose this day who you're going to serve.

Choose to stay who you're going to believe. Choose whose opinion. No, don't choose opinion. Choose the word of the Lord, the report of the Lord. Choose.

Choose to obey him, his instructions, his commandments, and live in the fear of the Lord. Obey his word he gives. He will give us divine strategies if we ask if we seek Him.

Thirdly, speak the Word. I love what Jehoshaphat did. I'm so moved by him and his. His what? He did.

Four chapters written about him in Second Chronicles and also some in Kings.

He went out and taught the people. He sent people out to teach. They spoke the Word, they taught, they shared.

And then the prophet obeyed God also by speaking the Word. Let your mouth line up with what the word says. Another thing, let your mouth line up with this over your family, your household, over yourself. Agree with this. Don't agree with what you might think or feel.

If it doesn't line up with this, it's not. It's not a thing. Right? Speak his word over your circumstances. Speak and declare God's word over your marriage.

If you're having trouble, your children declare it. Write a decree. That's one of the things that I love to do. I love. I'm just old fashioned.

I love writing stuff down. I love writing the scriptures, I guess I don't know if that's old fashioned. I like hard copies. I like my Bible. I don't like it so much on there.

I love to write it down. But write it down. Write a decree. Write a prayer and pray it every single day over your family, over whatever situation that is. It's a powerful tool.

Make a decree and a declaration and finally share. Share the word. Like Jehoshaphat. We're to be a people of influence. Don't be like Athaliah who encouraged people to go back and to their false idols and their false worship.

Teach the people around us. Let's God help us to teach the people around us how to walk in the fear of the Lord, how to walk in this way, how to please God.

It starts with us personally taking responsibility ourselves. We've got to learn the word ourselves. That's the only way that we're going to be able to share it in our homes. You can't share something that you don't know. You don't know what the word of God says.

It's hard to share. Hard to share. But may we be a people that are so burdened for our families, so burdened for our friends, burdened for our. Our schools, our community, our state. That we, we take this, that we are intentional about knowing this.

So that people can live in the blessing and not live the curse. Not get the crud kicked out of them by the enemy because they're not doing this. May we be a people burdened for that. Come on. Anybody in here want to be a.

Be a person who shares the word, Zealous for sharing the word. I do. Lord, help us. Come on, just lay hands on your own heart right now if that's you. If you want that this morning.

God help us, Holy Spirit. That we would be ones who just devour this. That we would know you, that we'd be able to share it with other people. That you'd burden Us, we would understand the great responsibility, even like King Jehoshaphat had for his, his kingdom, for his nation. Lord, our responsibility as Christians is to share your word, to preach the gospel.

God help us.

We want people to turn to you, oh God. And so in conclusion, this morning I challenge you. You want to have a year of power and breakthrough.

Eat the scroll as it says, devour the word, believe the word, grow in the wisdom and knowledge of God through this, through the Bible, speak his word, share it, do it. And I double dog dare you take a class if you don't know. Don't be embarrassed. So many people, so many Christians and I'm not like the paragon of knowing the word, okay, I'm growing. But so many people, just Christians, they don't take time with this.

They don't take time to learn what it's really saying and they don't live up to what everything that God has for them. They don't apprehend everything that God has for them. They don't walk in everything that God has for them. The freedom, the fire. Amen.

Let's just stand to our feet all over this place. I double dog dare you. Take a class, get discipled, go the next step. Every single one of us can go the next step. And growing in the things of God and growing in the Word.

Can I get an amen all over this place? You know the Lord told me that this year it's going to be a year of the open. He spoke this to me, you know we're about to have a prophetic conference. I'm going to hear probably prophet Jane Hammond. She's going to bring what she feels like the word of the Lord is for the year.

Well you know what, he spoke to me, he said this is the year of the open door. It's the year not only of having doors open for us personally, but it's going to be a year of God opening an effectual door for you to preach the word, for you to teach the word, for you to share your faith. Those hard hearted people, people that you've been praying for. God's going to give you a moment and you're going to speak and share the word and their hearts are going to turn and they are going to be saved. The Lord spoke that to me as I was preparing the sermon.

Look for it, be prepared, be ready. Jade Hammond in 2024, she said I am. One of the things she said is she prophesied the divine the word of the Lord. One of the divine strategies. She said, I'M going to visit you you with not just revival, but with his what with what history will call the Great Alaska Awakening.

Nations will come to drink. We will win a nation. And the state will be filled with reformers and miracle workers. And I believe not only through fasting and prayer, but by being a people that believe the word, but by being a people that share the word, that believe the words, that, that, that know the word, that do the Word. And the other one that I can't remember at the top of my head, if we will be a people, God is going to bring great revival and reformation to our state.

If you believe that, give a big amen this morning.

Amen. Well, I want to invite you this morning. Maybe you're just like going, what in the world are you talking about in this place? I don't even know this God. Maybe you're here and you've never received Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior.

In just a moment, I'm going to give an opportunity and we're going to pray together. But maybe you're also here and you're not feeling this unction and this fire and this zeal for God anymore. In fact, you feel like you might have drifted and this morning you might want to reaffirm your faith. Maybe you're here and you prayed that prayer, but you just want to make sure because one day we're all going to face death and we're all going to cross over to the other side and we want to all just make sure that we're with Jesus in the end, which is really the beginning. Amen.

So I want people praying. It's just between you and the Lord all over this place. I'm going to pray. I want you to just agree with me in prayer and repeat after me, say, dear Heavenly Father, thank you for sending Jesus to die for my sin. I believe, Jesus, that you died on a cross for me and you rose again so I could have a brand new life come into my heart.

Come into my life. Be my Lord and Savior and help me to live for you.

Give me a hunger for your word and fill me with your spirit. Come on, just all over this place, raise your hands up to the Lord, oh Lord, would you just come Even upon each and every person that prayed that prayer this morning, Lord, upon all of your people, would you just fill us afresh with the Holy Ghost? Come upon us in power and let me bless you this morning. Lord, I thank you that you're for your word. I, I pray, oh God, that your people were encouraged.

I pray, oh God today that we would be a people, oh God, that believe your word, that we would be established, firm and secure. God in all of your promises and everything that you said in your word, who we are, who you are, God, your will for our lives, your plan, your purpose, purpose for our lives. And I pray today, God, would you bless your people, cause your face to shine upon us, lift up your countenance towards us, be gracious to us, keep us, and give us peace. In the mighty, matchless name of Jesus. And everybody said amen and amen.

Well, I hope you were encouraged by God's word. Thank you again for listening to Kings Alaska Podcast. God bless. Bless you. For more great content, go to kcalaska.

Com and may God's face shine upon you and give you peace.