Joseph Prince - A Challenge to Prioritize Hearing Again
This is an excerpt from: Hear Your Way Out Of Every Weakness
And the people that came to Jesus during His time, notice the way it happens. And I'll close with this all right? Luke chapter 5, "The report went around concerning Jesus all the more; and great multitudes came together to hear, and to be healed by Him of their infirmities". They came what first? And then to be healed. There are people who bring their relative or bring their friend, they come to a pastor, and they say, "Pastor, can you please pray for..."
Of course the pastor will pray. Why? He's a pastor and he won't want to disappoint you, all right? And he loves you. So you are his church member, right? You bring someone else who never hear the Word, who not even willing to come to church, or given a chance to even listen to one of Pastor Prince's sermons, let's say, someone from this church, and what happens? They want you to pray for healing. But those people, notice how they receive healing. They came to hear first and then to be healed of their infirmities, all right?
Another verse, next chapter. This is Luke 5. The very next chapter, see the trend. "And He came down with them and stood on a level place with a crowd of Jesus' disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea and Jerusalem, from the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear Him and be healed of their diseases". Again, the same order. They came to hear and to be healed. "As well as those who were tormented with unclean spirits. And they were healed. And the whole multitude", I love this, "The whole multitude sought to touch Him". Marvel heroes don't hold a candle to Jesus. It's all fake, fake, and more fakes. And the world is running after it because the heart of our young people are all crying out for Jesus.
This is, look at this. "Whole multitude sought to touch Him, for power went out from Him and healed them all". Whoa! Walking by the... I was just there a few days ago, the area of Galilee. And power went out of Jesus and healed them all. hallelujah, beautiful. So what did Jesus do? This is Jesus' ministry, and I'll close with this verse. "Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching," preaching, say, "Preaching," "the gospel of the kingdom, and healing," say, "Healing," "all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people".
So the people came to hear, so Jesus preached. They came to hear and to be healed. Remember this. Always remember this. Just now, there's a special anointing. Of course God heals, sometimes God heals when there's a special anointing, all right, and I ask you all to pray with me that this happens more and more in a service, and that's more the gifts of the Spirit. It operates as the Spirit wills, but the norm for the believer is to hear first, and then faith comes, and then you receive. If you're not receiving, ask yourself, are you hearing the Word of Christ? Make sure it's the Word about Christ. That woman with the issue of blood, when she heard about Jesus, she came in the press behind, amen? I'm gonna read to you a real quick testimony and then I will dismiss you, okay? All right?
All right, a sister from Singapore. This just came a few days ago. "I was born with a defective left eye, with scars across my retina. Hence for 55 years, I could only rely on my right eye to see. My only good eye, however, is highly myopic and I had also suffered from acute glaucoma in that same eye once". My eye is seeing something else, okay. "Same eye once. My eye doctor fears that over time, due to severe myopia, my retina which has become stretched and thin will develop scars too, turn myopic degeneration, which could lead to blindness. I work in an international construction company and my job requires me to do close-up work on the computer and read construction drawings.
Recently, I suddenly could not see clearly with my right eye. There was a diagonal patch across my visual field and my vision became so bad that I could not read text on my phone and laptop, and I could not walk down the stairs because I could not see well. I had to inform two of my colleagues of my situation so they could help me, as I was seeing very little and my eye was in pain. During this very tough season, I was listening". I was listening. I was listening. Are you listening? "During this very tough season, I was listening to Pastor Prince's various sermons on Gospel Partner. In one of his sermons in 2002, he mentioned the higher way is to believe", the higher way to healing, "is to believe what God said in His Word, just like the centurion who approached Jesus for the healing of his servant. God also led me to meditate on His promises. Faith arose in my heart as I kept hearing and hearing the Word of Christ".
You see, I saw this testimony only last night. I prepared my sermon already, but you see how it comes together? Even the Word of Christ. "Faith arose in my heart as I kept hearing and hearing the Word of Christ. A couple of weeks later during one of the Sunday services, Pastor Prince prayed for people with eye conditions and I received the healing for myself. The next day, I realized the diagonal patch across my visual field was gone. I could", listen, hold your claps, this is the last one already, "I could read the text on my devices and even type out this testimony to testify of the amazing miracle of God in my life. May all praise and glory be to our Heavenly Father". Praise the Lord, amen. Give Jesus the praise, hallelujah. Thank You, Lord.
Whatever troubles you are faced with, I told you just now, it's the key. It's the key to receiving all that God has done, but there are voices telling you hearing alone is not enough. Don't worry about doing, listen. If you hear long enough, if you feed long enough, you will do. It's like you have all this pent-up strength on the inside, you know? You must do something, all right? You understand that in analogy of an athlete. He has all the strength. He keeps running. He has all the strength. He wants to do something. But the strength comes first, amen.
And many of us, we are trying to do things we don't have the strength for. Feed, hear. Hear your way out of sickness. Hear your way out of depression. Hear you way out of that guilt and condemnation. Hear your way out from all that the devil is trying to restrict you and hold you back. Hear your way out. The way out is to hear the Word of Christ. Get hold of teachings that's about Christ, and about Christ that's revealed in the Gospels, and Christ in His finished work, which has brought grace under which we are all under, this wonderful dispensation of grace.