Servant Ministries, Inc.
Issue No. 111 Ira & Judy Milligan Aug
1, 2007
Next Month, Joshua!
I’m
excited about our upcoming United Ministers’
Fellowship conference in Joshua, Texas. For those who
aren’t familiar with our conferences, we strive to
accomplish two, simple but all-important things. Our first
goal is to provide a forum to facilitate mutual fellowship
among the brethren with the important relational
accountability that true, lasting fellowship provides. Our
second goal is to orchestrate a wonderful, personal
encounter with God for each person who attends. We seek for
and expect to experience “the manifest presence of
God” in every service.
Although this may be accomplished in different ways, we
strive to keep it simple. Instead of “preaching the
people to death” we provide time for prayer and
fellowship in each service, including a
dinner-on-the-grounds on Friday. Then, we spend several
hours in prophetic work shops in addition of providing
healing and deliverance rooms for those in need. The
results are marvelous. Miracles are the norm, rather than
the exception, including ears opened and eyes healed, but
more importantly we’ve seen peace and harmony
restored to troubled families and discouraged Christians
inspired to rise up and, “fight another round!”
This year, as an added bonus, healing evangelist Jack Coe
Jr. will be ministering Thursday and Friday night. Bring a
friend and come to Joshua expecting a wonderful, life
changing experience. You won’t be disappointed! See
you in Joshua!
The
Prophet’s
Perspective
Contending
for the Faith
Most prayer is
progressive, composed of three distinct steps. First, there
is petition prayer, where we ask God to provide or do
something for us, usually followed by the prayer of
authority, where we decree the answer or command it into
being. Then, of course, this should be followed by a prayer
of gratitude, specifically thanking God for the abundant
blessings that He has provided in response to our prayer.
The problem I’ve encountered in my own prayer life is
getting stuck in the first, “petition” mode and
not moving forward in faith into the next two! It’s
easy to just keep asking God for something that He has
already promised instead of reaching out in faith to
acquire whatever we need. Healing is a prime example. Most
of us have learned that to continue day-after-day asking
God for healing is an exercise in futility. Because healing
is in the atonement, it is part of our inheritance.
Therefore, once we’ve asked for healing we should
move into the second mode of prayer and began taking it
from our adversary. John said, “Now this is the
confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything
according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He
hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the
petitions that we have asked of Him” (1 John 5:14
15). A clear precedent for this three step process can be
found in the story of Israel’s deliverance from
Egypt. God’s attention was drawn toward Israel when
they groaned under the heavy burden of slavery (a type of
petition prayer, see Rom. 8:26). In response, God gave
Moses the authority to set them free. But, Moses did as we
often do. When at first he didn’t succeed, he went
back and asked God all over again. Instead of doing it for
him, God rebuked him and sent him back to complete the job
Notice that Moses didn’t get what he wanted by
contending with God, rather he obtained it by contending
with Pharaoh! Afterward, once Israel was free, they
worshiped and gave God thanks for their marvelous
deliverance (see Exod. 2:24;3:7-9;5:22-23;6:13;15:1-13).
Then, we see this pattern broken in Israel’s
subsequent failure to obtain the houses and lands that God
promised them. Because they stubbornly refused to move from
the position of petition to one of authority, they failed
to obtain the promised blessings. When their children
willingly followed Joshua’s example and took God at
His word, they succeeded. Throughout Scripture we find this
simple pattern repeated by those who succeeded, and broken
by those who failed. Ask, seek and knock. Petition, command
and act in faith and don’t take Pharaoh’s
“no” for an answer. “Beloved, when I gave
all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it
was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that
you should earnestly contend for the faith which was once
delivered unto the saints” (Jude 1:3). Amen!
“Helping Hands”
If you attended
our Spring, United Ministers’ Fellowship conference
in Branson, Missouri this year you may remember that we
encouraged every-one present to pray about helping Sandi
Nevin raise enough money to buy an automobile. God has her
stationed in Aberdeen, Scotland and her ministry has been
hampered by a lack of transportation. Well, with your help,
we’ve been able to raise enough money to buy her a
nice car. Thank You, and may God richly reward you for your
sacrifice!
Prayer Partners’ Update
I’ll
probably be in Mexico as you read this, so please pray for
God to prosper our way there as we minister to His precious
people! My desire is to see them healed, saved, sanctified
and prepared for His service. While on this trip we will be
ministering both in the USA (in the Hollywood area) and in
Mexico. It will be a short, whirlwind trip, but I trust and
pray that it will be highly effective and bring glory to
God! Thanks for you prayers and may God bless you!
Servant
Ministries Inc.
For we preach not ourselves, but
Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for
Jesus' sake (2 Cor.
4:5).
When
God visited Israel in Egypt, The Scriptures state that He
did so in response to two, specific things: Israel’s
groaning and His personal covenant with them: (“So
God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant
with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob” –
Exod. 2:24).
A covenant is the same as a contract, and before entering
into one it pays to “read the fine print”. The
New Covenant is no exception. Reading the Bible is the best
way to know the benefits and the cost and other obligations
that are afforded and demanded by the Gospel.
The Gospel is a covenant, and fortunately for us,
Christ’s sacrifice paid for the benefits–as
extensive as they are–so now we only need to meet the
basic requirements of faith and patience to obtain the
promised blessings: (“...be not slothful, but
followers of
them who through faith and patience
inherit the promises” – Heb. 6:12). Although
the list of benefits afforded us by the New Covenant is far
too lengthy to enumerate here, healing is definitely one of
them. Even under the Old Covenant the people were healed:
Psalm 105:37 states that God, “brought them forth
also with silver and gold: and there was not one feeble
person among their tribes”. Although most Christians
know that when Jesus was here in the flesh He healed
everyone that asked, many don’t realize that the same
thing happened in the early Church: “There came also
a multitude out of the cities round about unto Jerusalem,
bringing sick folks, and them which were vexed with unclean
spirits: and they were healed every one” (Acts 5:16).
The promise is ours. Lets contend for
it.
