Sowing Besides All Waters 1976

I'll just read one verse from Isaiah 32, but I'm going to read a little bit longer passage to give us some idea of how this all fits in. I'm just going to read from verse 15 through 20 of Isaiah 32. Until the Spirit be poured out upon us from on high, and the wilderness become a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest, then judgment shall dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness shall remain in the fruitful field.

And the work of righteousness shall be peace, and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance forever. And my people shall dwell in a peaceable habitation, and in sure dwellings, and in quiet resting places, when it shall hail coming down on the forest, and the city shall be low in a low place. Blessed are ye that sow beside all waters, that send forth thither the feet of the ox and the ass.

I just praise God. I guess our balcony's packed now. And just put the ushers to feel free.

Just squeeze them together. We've got room for two more down here, and a few more down in here. And after that we can put... Oh, there's room there.

Okay. Okay, now this passage that we are going to start out with today really is describing what happens when the Spirit of God descends upon His people, or upon a certain area, whatever this may be. Always the effect of this is to transform the wilderness into a fruitful field.

That's the first thing. In other words, people who are up to that point hard and unreceptive and closed, suddenly, for reasons that they themselves may not understand, begin to soften, and their eyes open, and they begin to see the working of God for the first time. They're open to this.

The second thing that happens in this prophecy that we just read is that people are sent forth to do something in this fruitful land now. And those who sow beside all waters are called blessed. In other words, now you have... It's no longer a desert.

You have water flowing. It's possible to grow things. But the second thing that it then said is that those who take advantage of that situation and do something about it are called blessed.

What's the good of having, you know, water flowing in the desert, transforming it into a fruitful field, if nobody's there to farm it, do something with it? Okay, now our experience has been, for many of us who've been at this any length of time, that for a long time, it seemed like we were farming a wilderness, you know, beating our heads against a wall. You go out and try to get some response. Nobody's interested.

Don't talk about Jesus. They don't want to push you away. Then the rain falls.

The Spirit of God descends. And the whole situation changes. Now suddenly, people become receptive.

And it's no longer that we're beating our heads against a wall. It's no longer, as it once was, what shall I do? You know, where can I go that I might get some response? Now the thing is totally the other way. Now our problem is how are we truly going to do a decent job handling the cries that come to us for attention? It's not what are we going to do with all this time we have, but how are we going to in any way do the needful thing in answer to these cries that are coming from all directions? And we can see this in our own lives.

If you just look out over your own experience, those among us who are believers, from the place where you work, in the neighborhood where you live, perhaps among your own relatives, you begin to see a response that we did not see some years back, or even a few months ago. And we see this in our ministry here, in the corporate body. And I'm sure you wouldn't mind my mentioning it if he's not here today, but for years we'd go into the highway bar down on Verner.

Brother Clicky, who lives here in the neighborhood and is known by many of us, and I'm not using him brother in the sense that he knows the Lord, but he's certainly a brother in the flesh, and his nature is exactly like ours, would be sitting there during almost all his off hours, and if anybody had told me six months ago that I'd ever see Clicky coming around, I would not have believed it. I would have talked to Clicky, but never expected a response from him. And so now what happens? Monday night after Monday night, rain or shine, Clicky gets up off his bar stool over there and finds his way over to the Bible study without any crying from us.

And he may not be sober, but he's coming hungering and thirsting. And I praise God for the men who are here from 71 West Willow through one chap who was found on the streets last summer, and more and more. And Bill was mentioning the Edison Hotel.

The work really of one man there in the hotel. A whole bunch of men are coming now to the catacombs on Thursday nights. And they had so many people, they almost have to lock the door because they can't handle them all.

And everywhere we turn, this is happening. There's a response that we just did not see before from the same people. And now the same spirit that creates the fruitful field and causes this response to come is also about the business, and this is where we become involved, of raising up laborers to handle this.

And so many of us, if we have our ears at all open, are hearing the Lord calling us out of our marketplace of spiritual idleness to get to work in that field. And he's making all of us to know that we are all, no matter what kind of jobs we have, full-time ministers, we are all bearing much fruit, or we're called to bear much fruit, all called to a labor that is going to be glorified and glorious. Only in the eyes of God, men aren't going to see what's happening, nor does this matter.

And all of us are called to take risks and to do things that are going to be costly to us as we go on. This involves every one of us. And as we begin to respond to the call that is coming out to us, in any way, as we begin to move, what happens is that we begin to find our function in the body of Christ.

We're not lone rangers, as we constantly say, but we fit together, but, you know, this is not something imposed on us from outside, but as we function, as we minister, one of us becomes the finger, and somebody else becomes the big toe, and somebody else becomes the ear, and somebody else becomes the eye in the body, and things begin to get done corporately. Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it, and God has appointed in the Church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, then healers, helpers, administrators, speakers in various kind of tongues. Are all apostles, are all prophets, are all teachers, do all work miracles, do all possess gifts of healing, do all speak with tongues, do all interpret, but earnestly desire the higher gifts.

Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them if prophecy in proportion to our faith, if service in our serving, he who teaches in his teaching, he who exhorts in his exhortation, he who contributes in liberality, he who gives aid with zeal, he who does acts of mercy with cheerfulness. But the only way we're going to find exactly what our function is, come to the place where we know where we fit and what we're supposed to do, the only way we're going to get there is if we learn, first of all, to sow beside all waters. In other words, to grab the opportunities that are in front of our noses.

And don't wait until you get your degree from seminary or until the right opportunity comes along that seems juicy, but you grab the thing that's there. You don't wake up one morning and decide, I'm a prophet, and I'm not going to do anything else in the body of Christ but prophesy. Or, I'm an evangelist.

Don't be asking me to run errands, drive people to the store, visit the sick in the hospitals. I'm called to be an evangelist, and that's all I'm going to do. I'm a teacher.

Don't ask me to waste my time counseling, listening to people's problems. I'm going to concern myself, and I'm not going to be sidetracked from teaching the living word. And somebody says, wait a minute.

Isn't that what the apostles did? Didn't they say at one place, you know, looking up from among you seven men of honest report whom we may appoint over this business of serving tables. Men, you know, who are full of the spirit and wisdom that we may appoint to this business, but we will concentrate on the ministry of the word and prayer. True, that's what they said.

But don't ever get the idea from this that this means that Peter and the apostles never did anything else. They never helped to distribute what was needed to the widows, nor that the seven deacons who were appointed thereby did nothing else than serve tables. We know that wasn't true because one of them, Stephen, one of these deacons who was called to serve tables was the first one to be martyred for preaching the word.

He preached. Philip, another one of them, what's he doing up there in Samaria preaching and healing the sick? He's not supposed to do that. He's a deacon.

Now we find him down on the Gaza Road speaking to the Ethiopian eunuch. What's he doing that? He's not supposed to be an evangelist. He's a deacon.

See, but these men and women in the body began to find where they fit and what they were to do by faithfully sowing beside all waters, grabbing all the opportunities that came their way. And we have to learn to do the same. Blessed are ye that sow beside all waters.

Imagine what it would have been like if Philip had said to the Ethiopian eunuch, I'm sorry, I can't explain Isaiah 53 to you. I'm a deacon. Now if you need a hamburger and a Coke, I'll help you out.

But you're going to have to wait until you find an evangelist to open the scripture to you. On the contrary, Philip took the opportunity that was there. He got up into the man's chariot, opened the scriptures to him by the life that Philip had.

And by being faithful, we notice by the time we get to Acts 21 that Philip, one of the seven, is now called Philip the evangelist. Not to say that evangelist is higher than deacon. But the point is that along the line that you function, you will find the ministry that God has given you.

Now we can take the entire ministry of the body, everything that has to be done, and break it down, arbitrarily perhaps, but we'll do this, into seven areas. And what we say then is that if we are faithful so and beside all waters in all of these seven areas, all of us, we will, as we do this, begin to find exactly what it is that God wants us to do and we will find that there may be one particular area which is our specialty. Okay.

You know, but don't say I'm not going to do anything else. Be faithful so beside all waters and you will find what God wants you to do, how you fit in the body. Now the first area in which we are all called to minister, without any exceptions, even if this sounds monotonous, is prayer.

Ah, here he goes again. Prayer, every Sunday it's prayer. May it be that way until the Lord comes back.

The basic ministry to which you and I are called is to pray. And that ministry is primarily to God, not to man at all. First we minister to the Lord before we ever minister to men and we minister to Him in worship and thanksgiving and praise to Him.

This is pleasing to Him. And as we do this, we've discovered that that's not some little extra frill that we do to kill time, but this becomes our joy, it becomes our life, it becomes the source of all our strength. And as we learn to worship God alone in prayer first, we then come to the place where we start indeed to intercede effectively for others.

And we begin to lift people up before the throne of God and call down God's blessings upon them. And we plead the blood over them. And we minister healing and life to them in our prayers by interceding.

Any mother or father in this gathering who fails to do that kind of thing for their children, one by one, by name, every single day, I say, if you fail to do that, this means that you either don't believe there's anything to it or you don't care about your kids. And if you're going to pray for your children, your mate, your parents, your brothers and sisters, your family, why do you stop there? So God has set you in some manifestation of the body and now you do the same with your brothers and sisters in the body, by name, day after day, faithfully you intercede. You don't even stop there.

Now you pray for that person on the job or that neighbor across the street or that person who's forever giving you a hard time and as you begin to exercise a ministry faithfully in prayer, so in beside that water, you will begin to experience life coming into you that you never knew before. The second area in which all of us are called to minister and it's a second in importance, I'm quite sure, to prayer is simple serving of other people. We get the idea sometimes, you know, that there are certain Christian peons, the little one-town people who are supposed to run the errands, go to the grocery store for people, drive them hither and yon, carry things, while others of us are committed to more weighty responsibilities.

We don't do those things. We don't have time. We're too busy with the important matters of the kingdom and that's nothing but a lie from Satan.

Every single one of us is called to run errands, to serve in simple, you know, ordinary, down to earth ways all the time. This is the second thing in importance and it comes down upon every one of our lives to do the simple thing and not to make a production out of it. If the president and vice president of the company, you know, come in on a Saturday morning and paint that crummy little lunchroom where the men in the shop have to eat their lunch, praise God for that if they do it without making a production out of it.

But if their picture is plastered all over the bulletin board on Monday, you know, and then they're in the company paper, you know, and they get as much mileage out of it as they can, then you know they're doing it for other reasons. You know, and you and I are the same, you know, we're to do it unobtrusively, simply, naturally, you know, if you're too busy to drive people to the doctor, to visit the sick, to help the weak, to put yourself at the disposal of the elderly, if you're too busy doing more important things, then you're too important to even get through the door of the kingdom of God. The third area where every single one of us, without any exceptions, is called to sow beside all waters to minister is in evangelizing.

You know, as soon as the word evangelizing is mentioned, people think of an evangelist standing at a microphone before 20,000 people. But that's not evangelism at its best. Evangelism at its best is one person dealing directly, faithfully, wooing a soul to the cross of Jesus.

And you know, the 20,000th bit, mass evangelism, may have its place, but I'm convinced of this with all my heart that it's not nearly as important to God as it seems to be to so many Christians. The important thing is the evangelism that you and I are called to do one to one. You know, and this can be done anywhere, that you promise this person on the street corner while you're waiting for the bus, or when they're talking to you, they're crying on your shoulder on the telephone, promise them that the Lord has something good for them.

You call them to turn around, which is to repent, and let the Lord direct their lives. And we're to be doing this faithfully, sowing the seeds of all waters all the time. The fourth area where every single one of us, without exception, is called to minister is in the area of healing.

God didn't give the ministry of healing to Oral Roberts and Catherine Kuhlman alone. He's given it to every believer. These signs shall follow them that believe.

And then there comes a whole list in Mark 16, finally, they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover. You believe in healing? Oh, that's, praise God, I want to take you to the healer. No.

You're called to minister healing. Just as surely as you are called to proclaim the good news concerning Jesus to people that you meet along the way, you are also called to believe that the word that you will speak will be confirmed with signs following as God pleases in the lives of those who in any way respond to the truth of what you say. So none of us is to be afraid to lay our hands on somebody who's sick and pray or to point them to the great physician who is Jesus.

A healing ministry is imparted to every follower of the Lord. Granted, certain ones are gifted. Certain ones are called to a ministry of healing in the body that becomes special, but I dare say most of them will do it the way Jesus does.

They will heal and they will stay be quiet about it. And if any of us find ourselves led in that direction, may God give us the wisdom not to make a production out of it, but to do it the way Jesus does it. The fifth area where I believe every single one of us is called to minister now, I don't care what your equipment is, is in the area of preaching and teaching.

Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. Go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things, whatever I've commanded you. Does that only apply to the twelve? Obviously.

The body of Christ has to do teaching all the time and that includes all of us. I want to read a few verses from Acts 18. Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, which was in Egypt, came to Ephesus.

He was an eloquent man, well-versed in scriptures. He had been instructed in the way of the Lord and being fervent in spirit. He spoke and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John.

He began to speak boldly in the synagogue, but when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him and expounded to him the way of God more accurately. Now here's a beautiful illustration of some people sowing beside all waters. Apollos is doing the very best he can by the light he has.

He doesn't say, I'm not going to do any preaching and teaching until I graduate from Union Seminary. You know, he does it, he sows beside all waters with the light that he has. Priscilla and Aquila get a hold of him and they say, What are you doing preaching? Who called you to preach? Why, you don't even know the gospel right.

No, they took him aside, encouraged him. What wonderful encouragement they gave him because he was faithfully doing what he could do by the light he had. And so, you know, in no way did they pour cold water on what Apollos was doing, but they expounded to him the way of God more perfectly.

On his side, notice also, Apollos doesn't say, Okay, I'll listen to Aquila, but I ain't going to listen to Priscilla, she's a woman. Doesn't she know that it says in scriptures women aren't supposed to teach men? What about that? Priscilla and Aquila together, what does that? Oh, but Priscilla was just praying while Aquila was doing the talking. There are occasions when you and I, I don't care who you are, if you're following Jesus, are called to teach, to expound, and usually, for most of us, in ordinary situations, and if we're faithful and God has something more for us in that area, he'll open doors.

It can take place on a jet plane, or on a street corner, on your living room, in the lunchroom at work, in a hospital ward, any number of places. If we'll sow beside all waters, God will open more doors for us. The sixth area, where I believe every single one of us is called now to be faithful, to sow beside all waters, is in the area of counseling.

Now, the term counseling, as we think of it, is not used in Scripture that way, but wherever you read in Scripture about exhorting or encouraging or rebuking, people listening to one another's problems, you have counseling going on. And it went on then just as it goes on today. And the equipment that we need to be effective in counseling is not the mouth but not so much as the ear.

God will give us the strength to let this ear stretch way out and truly listen for the cry of the heart that's underneath the words that are being spoken to us and let the other ear go up toward the throne for whatever guidance the Lord would have for us but that we learn to listen. Now, we could, no doubt, put some money in our budget next year and open up seven booths over there in the Sunday School Hall someplace and have five nights a week professional Christian counselors counseling people and we can fill them all the time, no doubt, with us to say nothing of the people out there. But, I'm convinced that we will be far more effective and far more healing and wisdom will go forth if you and I will sow beside all waters in the area of counseling.

Truly learn to listen to each other and take time with each other and pay attention and certain ones will come your way that you have to listen. Some will be believers and some will be outside the kingdom entirely but they want to cry on your shoulder. They've got a problem.

Maybe it's a marriage problem, maybe a financial problem, maybe it's a physical problem, maybe it's a mental hassle but that God will give us the wisdom to truly listen to people and if the opportunity comes your way, don't say, well, you know, go to the brother so-and-so or reverend so-and-so or doctor so-and-so too quick. First of all, you listen and see if it isn't true that perhaps God has you the one to do the listening and you may be in a far more effective position to do the listening and counseling than anybody else. Finally, all of us are called into the area number seven of binding and loosing.

Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Again, I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven for where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them. From this, it would seem, it would be pretty clear that this binding and loosing business is to be done normally in company with another brother or sister or two or three.

That we don't normally do this by ourselves. But the idea is that there are spirits that are just harassing and afflicting and condemning and tearing to shreds the minds and hearts of so many people and these spirits are to be bound in the same way that our Lord bound them. And we are at the same time in His name to loose and set free these souls who are so imprisoned and so inhibited and so paralyzed by their fears and their resentments and their anxieties and their self-consciousness.

We all know what that's like from inside. And we are called by the Lord to loose them. There can be, I'm convinced, no other reason why so many troubled and afflicted and hassled spirits have found their way among us.

People with problems and that probably includes all of us. But there's no other reason why so many are coming this way other than that God would have His people here in the name of His Son and by the power of His Spirit set the captives free. Find the spirits of evil and loose the children who have been in bondage.

And we are called to do that. I'm not talking about a seminar going for 6 months and all the ins and outs of exorcism. I'm talking about simply coming before the Lord in the name of Jesus and getting on with this in twos and threes.

Setting people free. And when we see people who are hassled to do this in mercy and love but to know that God will undertake. Surely He's calling us all today.

Blessed are ye that sow beside all water says the Spirit to us. Now the bankers and the insurance underwriters and the politicians may consider Detroit a mess. But one thing Detroit is not.

It is not a spiritual wilderness. It is a fruitful field. And the same God who makes it a fruitful field and we'll not just talk about the city of Detroit let's take the whole metro area because all the problems are everywhere.

The same God who makes it a fruitful field is also now calling us to go in there and harvest. Cultivate. Plant the seed.

Water. Work. And He's sending us forth again today from this gathering to do these things.

And as He does may He give us the wisdom to understand in our own experience what this means when He says to each of us blessed are you who sow beside all water and make the most of the opportunities that are coming your way now. Let's pray. Lord God you know how long so many of us have been waiting for that magic word that's going to bring us joy and happiness and something to wake us up something to get us going.

Grant that we may hear right now that word that has been spoken so many times already and we've not taken it in come. And that word which has so often been spoken to us by the same Lord go. And grant that as we come to you Lord Jesus today today to feed on your body and blood and to drink in the life of your spirit we may also be equipped and unafraid and truly faithful diligent as you send us forth and say go.

And grant that the days that follow this day in fact the hours Lord Jesus that follow this hour may be hours in which we sow beside all waters and we begin to get the things done that you call us to do and as we do so that we may come to a life that we've never known. We ask it for your mercy's sake. Amen.