Chapter 3

The Lost Key

CHAPTER THREE

Another situation that arises, in life is when a man THINKS he has the key but hasn't - maybe it's the wrong key! Many declare that the key to power with God is prayer and fasting and will of course quote the words of Jesus "This kind cometh not forth but by prayer and fasting". Whilst obviously we dare not say that they are wrong we do say that many of them are not right! The greater includes the lesser and this may well be on the way to finding the key that will break the vicious circle that so many are in - the seeming impenetrable wall that many are running their heads up against - their only consolation being like the man in the asylum, who when asked why he kept running his head at the wall said, "IT'S SO LOVELY WHEN YOU STOP DOING IT!"

May I put this question to any who are fasting and praying - WHY are you doing it? What is the motive that impels you to fast or pray? WHAT I do in God's sight is not so important as WHY I am doing it! To do the right thing without faith is like owning a car and having no petrol - IT WON'T GO!! Without faith it is IMPOSSIBLE to please God! Better to have a scooter with petrol in the tank than a Rolls Royce revelation without faith! Of what use is the Rolls Royce - untaxed - no license - rusting in the garage? But make no mistake about this - MUCH better to have a Rolls Royce AND petrol! A man can fast and then write a book on it - "How I fasted for forty days" and his motive COULD be, to let people see how wonderful he is!

He would do well to fast from living to people - Jesus said, "How can ye believe who receive honor one of another and SEEK NOT the honor that comes from God alone! Again, "Wash your face and TELL NO MAN" (see also Is. 58) Only prayer that is born of the Spirit and led of the Spirit is acceptable to God! James says, "Ye ask amiss that ye might consume it upon your lusts!" (James 4:3) As the Savior slept the disciples prayed, "Master save us we Perish", in the midst of the storm on Galilee! If they had had real faith they would not have prayed - they would have rested. As the hymn writer says: NO WATERS SWALLOW THE SHIP WHERE LIES THE MASTER OF OCEAN AND EARTH AND SKIES! This is not a criticism it is a statement of fact; maybe if we had been there we would have shouted along with the loudest!

So then WHY I pray and WHY I fast will make or break this issue and send me on my way pursuing my course of searching for the LOST KEY! Why? Where? What? There must be finality somewhere. Most of us are familiar with the type of situation, and maybe have done such things as the young man who is trusting the Lord for healing - takes his spectacles off - jumps on them in the Name of Jesus and then three months later secretly and almost ashamedly sidles into the opticians for a new pair! Again with great gusto and loud Hallelujahs how many have thrown their pipes, tobaccos and cigarettes on the back of the fire and then gone back to the soothing weed afterwards! WHY? Well, answer it, why? Are you prepared to water down the standard and make God a liar because of YOUR experience? Somewhere in the past I have read a story of a young Irish policeman who found a dead horse in, I think it was, Mac Conachie Street and because he couldn't spell it in his notebook he pulled it around the corner into King Street!

How many of us have pulled our dead horses around the corner because we would not have TRUTH. Well, do we want reality or not? Most of us have heard of the ostriches supposed habit of sticking its head in the sand and thinking because it can't see that it can't be seen - I don't know whether this is so, but I do know that MAN does this! Nelson declared "I see no ships" as he put the telescope to his blind eye. WHAT he said was TRUE but not the TRUTH! HE COULD HAVE SEEN IF HE HAD WANTED TO! So can you! Will you have truth in the inward parts? (Ps. 51) Are you willing for God's Holy Spirit to x-ray you? To be stripped to be clothed! To be emptied to be filled! He taketh away the first that He might establish the second! Maybe, as I have had to do, you will have to say - Lord I am not willing - but I am WILLING to be made willing. Lord work in me to will and to do of your good pleasure (Philippians 2:13). God declares: "Sin shall NOT have dominion over you" (Roms. 6:14). If God be for us who can be against us? (Roms. 8:31) IN all these things we are MORE THAN CONQUERORS.

This is the divine plan for YOUR life! For MY life! How few Christians ever seem to see the fulfillment of the plan of God for their lives!

"When Jesus was come near, He beheld the city, and WEPT OVER IT saving, If thou hadst known, even THOU, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace. . . because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation!" (Luke 19: 42) How many in eternity will look into the book of WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN! with bitter regret. It will be too late then!

At this point I would direct your attention to faith. Faith is A key - is it the key? Well, you say, Jesus said "Only believe!" Again like prayer and fasting faith can be well on the way, and of necessity must be because without it I cannot please God - BUT IS THIS FINALITY? If it is we have now found the key! Go on - do it! Only Believe! And make no mistake about it, this is the word of God: ONLY believe! Just when it would appear that I have attained the goal I am faced with this - there are obstacles to faith! Jesus said: "How can ye believe who receive honor one of another?" The principle that causes me to live to man will hinder the growth of faith like a canker worm will blight a plant! I may be in a position of wanting to believe and yet cannot! Why? Whilst God will not have the works of the flesh - Faith without works is dead! God expects the works of faith. Your faith is in His word - His Word is a fact and therefore YOU ACT on a FACT! AND IF YOU DON'T ACT YOU DON'T BELIEVE! The Angel of the Lord said to Abraham (Gen. 22:11) when he "took the knife to slay his son" Now I Know!!! So then, whilst Abraham was NOT justified by works (of the flesh, Roms. 4:3) Abraham was justified by works (of faith)! Again faith works by love - you will find it very difficult to believe God after a row with your wife! How can you love and believe God whom you don't see if you don't love your brother who you do see?

Well, was this not your trouble? You did not SEE God in that situation that made you fall out with your God VIA your wife - Joseph said to his brethren - "It was not you it was God!" You only saw your wife!

Remember those words - "When were you sick Lord and we visited you not?" Verily INASMUCH as you did it not . . . you did it not to ME! So faith can be hindered and made not to work by a hidden principle operating in man that makes him fall out with his God and fall out with his brother! What is it? Again we push on through the jungle searching for one thing and only one - the Master Key! Many keys but only one Master Key! How easy to believe because I have keys that I have THE KEY!! The good is the enemy of the best - a key will unlock a door but THE KEY will unlock every door! The Greater includes the lesser, but the lesser does NOT include the Greater!

Psychology is a key - but not THE key. The Bible (the greatest book on psychology does not so much stress the educating of the mind as the RENEWING of the mind - Be ye transformed (changed) by the re-NEW-ing of your mind (Roms. 12:2).

Let this mind be in you - you have let the Savior in? Have you let His Mind in? Read Philippians chapter two!