Vision (Bartimaeus- Prison Message) - Part 2

Why is prayer significant? It's because as we're on our knees we hear that rhema word. We hear that word that penetrates through the darkness and says, Brother, you can do it. Christ crawls out to you in those times of prayer and says, I love you.

I want to set you free. I want to release you from that bondage. Why is the church of God significant? Why is fellowship significant? Because as you're with the brothers and sisters in the Lord, you hear the word of faith come through them.

Faith is built. The bottom line of the true everlasting gospel is faith in Jesus. If someone hands you a list of disciplines and duties to get set free of that bondage, that's not the gospel.

The bottom line is faith in Jesus. Faith in the finished work of Calvary's cross. It's all in Jesus.

This is what we need, folks. We need a revelation of what Jesus has done for us on Calvary's cross. He's poured out His life.

It's all been done there on that cross. We need to become Christ conscious, cross conscious. We need a revelation that Jesus has set you free.

He's already done it. He's just waiting for you to believe it. Believe it.

He's set you free. He wants to just embed, just engrave upon your heart victory. A vision that Jesus has set you free.

He's already done it. He's just waiting for you to believe it. Believe it.

He's set you free. He wants to just embed, just engrave upon your heart victory. Faith, courage, hope.

He's set you free. And immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus on the road. You know, some of us, we get in a tight stand when we see Christ.

We mean business. We get desperate. We make all kinds of promises.

And then after a little bit of the pressure eases, what do we do with that hope? What do we do with that little relief that we receive? Do we press into Christ more or do we go back to our old ways? Hey, brothers, I'm telling you, in this place you may be forced to be desperate to seek him. What are you going to do, though, when the pressure's off you? For some of you, perhaps, when you go back to the outside world, are you going to still seek him? Jesus is interested in those who will serve him regardless what the conditions, in good times and bad times, for better or for worse. Jesus is looking for a bride.

Hey, isn't that what we expect? Men, isn't that what's expected of us towards our wives? That we will be true to our lover, our wife, regardless if it's in sickness or in health, better or worse? I'm telling you, Jesus is looking for a bride. A bride. He longs for a bride.

He's not a harlot. Someone who won't just love him for the benefit, and then when everything's doing better, cast him aside. He wants a woman of fidelity, of virgin chaste, holy, pure.

That is faithful and loyal to his love. Do you know what the love of Jesus does to your heart when it really grips it? It says, God, I want to serve you. I want to love you.

I don't care what I have, what I don't have. I'm yours. I'm reserved for you.

I am set aside for you, you and you only. I am no longer living for common use. I am reserved wholly for your love, for your delight, for your pleasure.

That is the heart of Christ to you tonight, folks. Jesus is crying out to you. We respond.

We make the vow that I will serve him, that I will love him. If you get a taste of Calvary's love, it'll transform you. It'll make you a broken man.

You don't care what news say. Do you want that in your life? Are you willing to pay the price of pursuing him, being determined to press in on him by faith, believing in him? Folks, we need to learn how to pray like this. As I was sitting up here last night, you know, some of you men in here, you never took care of your kids when you were back at home.

And since you've come in here, you've made a decision about Christ. And what's on your heart now is what's happening to my little girl or my little boy. What's happening to my wife? And I'm not there.

I'm not there, and I'm a changed man now. Only if I could be at home now. You know, that's the truth.

There's some of you that have been thinking that, have been concerned about that. If you will become a man of prayer, God can do wonders. You must become a man of prayer.

Did you know you can still be a provider for your family in this place? If you'll be a man on your knees, if you will get on your knees and say, Oh God, have mercy. Keep my baby unspotted for the world. God, have mercy.

Keep my wife. Keep her till I get out. I'm changed, Lord.

You know I am. Give me another chance. That's the word for some of you, and you know it.

You've got to become a man of prayer. It's the only hope for Emmaus with this newfound vision, with this new revelation, with this new, for the first time he could walk down the road without another man's help. He didn't have to lean on anybody now except Christ.

And with this new vision, what did he do with it? He followed Jesus. Hallelujah. That's what I want to do with my faith.

The Lord wants to make you men of prayer, seekers after Christ, lovers of Jesus. Lovers of Jesus. He's the answer to that relationship that was never there, that father that was never there, that mother that abandoned you, people that rejected you all your life.

Jesus is the answer. He is the hope. He will free you.

Free you of pride. Free you of fear. Free you of being so concerned with that other man's thing.

He'll make you reckless. Give you abandonment. Make you have a passion for the first time in your life.

Something that means something. A sense of destiny. I praise him for that every day.

A hope and a vision. Without a vision, the scripture says, the people throw off their strength. We need vision.

God wants to give us vision like he gave Bartimaeus. You know a blind man? He stumbles around. He doesn't have any certainty.

He has no determination, no sense of purpose. You ever seen a man that's walking someplace, he knows where he's going? You can see it in the way he walks. It's the same way.

If you get a vision of Jesus, you do not throw off your strength. You have purpose. You have focus.

For the first time in your life, you can get free of some things because you've seen a vision of Jesus. Without a vision, another version says, the people perish. You will die without that vision of Jesus.

Jesus wants to reveal himself to you tonight if you'll only be willing to bend the knee, to cry out, to be persistent. Let's pray this way. Lord, you know what you're doing here.

You know who you're touching. God, I just ask now that you would accompany your word by a demonstration of power, a demonstration of conviction. God, anything frivolous, anything foolish, Lord, I just pray that you shut it up in the name of Jesus right now.

God, that you would settle our hearts and sober us and put within us a fresh determination that we must get a hold of Christ. Thank you, Lord Jesus. I pray that you would just move on men's hearts.

God, that you would bring revival in this place. You would pour out your spirit, Lord Jesus, that you would answer the prayer of these brethren tonight. God, oh God, help bring humility in this house.

Bring humility in this house with desperation, and with that desperation let it be coupled with hope and courage and faith. Faith, Lord. God, for these men that are concerned about their families, that stay up at night and worry, Lord, make them praying men and let them know it's settled in heaven, that you're able to take care of them.

Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. God, I just pray that you just touch the men, Lord.

Touch them. Change them. Change us all, God.

I don't want to be the same after tonight. Lord, draw me a little closer. Give me more vision, more clarity.

God, let our appetite for you and bring a desire and a hunger for you that's real, that transforms our life, gives us purpose. We wait on you, Lord. Hallelujah.

Hallelujah. We're not trying to manipulate anybody, Lord. We're not trying to make anything happen.

We just want you to move. We want you to work. Holy Spirit, come.

Holy Spirit, come and manifest and magnify Jesus. Jesus. Lord, just show us what to do next.

We're not pretending that we know what we're supposed to do. God, just show us what to do next. Lead us, Holy Spirit.

Lead us, Holy Spirit.