Joseph Prince — Don't Fight - Feed!
When God hears that you want him, but you are afraid your sins have disqualified you from all his blessings, but God tells the angels, "Go get her, go get him. My heart is so full of love, my hand is so able. I am under-utilized, I want to bless somebody.
Somebody put your head under my hand of blessing. I got so much blessing, but so few to bless them with, so few people rather to bless them with so much that I have," oh man. That's the heart of our God today. God is for you. God is looking out for you. When the prodigal son came home, the father ran towards him.
Praise the name of Jesus, aren't you glad to be a believer? Amen, once upon a time, the law, man lived under the law. And the law demanded righteousness from man. But today, we are under the grace of God because of what Christ has done, and the grace of God dispenses righteousness to man.
One is demanding, so you must perform. The other he gives you, so you must receive. Which do you think is better, to be under law or under grace? Under grace, amen? Praise the name of Jesus.
Today, we receive everything because of another obedience, Jesus Christ's. Or you'd rather be under law, where every good thing you receive is because of your obedience? Well, you know what? No one can obey God to qualify for all the blessings, so thank God we are no longer under the old system of the law. We are under the system of grace.
Let me illustrate. You know the story of David and Jonathan, a friendship between these two men that we find is so heartwarming in the Bible? When David killed Goliath, the Bible tells us that Jonathan when he met David, he found in David a kindredness because he was a champion himself. Remember the story of how Jonathan scaled the walls, the steep walls of Michmash, and defeated the Philistines, of them fell before him.
All right, and here he find that giant Goliath falling before this young man, 17-year-old boy, David. And he liked David. And they exchanged--excuse me, they made a covenant with one another, and they are now blood brothers. And one of the rituals they go through is that they make blood is shed, and they'll join their wrists together, so now they are blood brothers. That means, "All that you have belongs to me, all that I have belongs to you. Amen, if someone attacks you, it's attacking me."
David was 17 years old and Jonathan probably slightly older, but they became blood brothers from then on. Now, Jonathan comes from a family that hated David. His father, King Saul, who was the king of Israel at that time, did not like David, he hated David, and was jealous of David And the Holy Spirit has left him and come on David, so he was always jealous, always careful, always had evil thoughts about David.
But his son Jonathan and David were very close, amen. And Jonathan many a times would warn David about what his father would do. Well, many years came and gone, and David is still running from King Saul, and King Saul even nearly killed his son because of David, because his son would defend David.
Of all the good things that Jonathan has done, before Jonathan died with his father on the battle of the Mount Gilboa, Jonathan did something, In the midst of all the great things he did, one thing he did not do, he never went to be with David. David was with his mighty men, and he never identified himself with David.
There are people who are believers, but they never identify themselves with a church. You know, people say, "You're a Christian?" "Once in a while, you know, on Sunday, I just follow my wife, you know, it's a good thing to do, family time, bonding and all that, blah blah blah." You know?
They don't want to identify themselves with our heavenly David, the true son of David, Jesus Christ, amen? So, but those who are with David, they all didn't die, they were alive. But those who were with King Saul, they all died on Mount Gilboa, including Jonathan, David's covenant brother. So, when Jonathan died, the news came back to King Saul's house. The news was that Jonathan and his father King Saul is dead.
Now, imagine the whole household heard the news that the house of Saul--when they heard the news, what do you--what would you think of when you hear that your father and the king has died, and your grandfather is the king, and your father has died? Of course it's bad news, isn't it? By this point in time, Jonathan has a son, his name is Mephibosheth, Mephibosheth.
His name means to breathe out shame, what a name, to breathe out shame. And Mephibosheth was 5 years old when he heard--the news came to the house that his father Jonathan died with the grandfather, the king, King Saul. And what happened is that the whole house was in turmoil, they were afraid that David might come because they had always been hearing bad news about David.
King Saul always peddled fear in the family, all right, telling them that one of these days, David's going to come and kill all of you so that he can get the throne, you're all in line for the throne. And David's eye is on the throne, he's going to-- but nothing could be further from the truth. David's heart was for the house of King Saul. David loved Saul. In fact, more than one time, God delivered King Saul into David's hands, David refused to kill King Saul, amen?
There are many, many people, including your friends, your colleagues who think of God in a bad way, in a hard way. They have wrong thoughts of God, they have a bad opinion of God. They think that God is out to get them, God is out to punish them, God wants to give them sickness, God wants to give them diseases.
Even professionals who are university graduates, even people who are in professional line will quote this in black and white, and make it legal, all right, "Not responsible for acts of God." Tsunami, earthquake, accidents, they call these acts of God.
No one calls it acts of the devil. And then they attribute to the devil everything that is good and pleasurable. For example, they say that, It's sinfully sweet." Have you heard of devil's cake? Or they'll say of a guy, "That handsome devil, he is a handsome devil."
You heard of that, Kailing, handsome devil? You won't hear handsome angel. You heard that about your father, is it? People say he's a handsome devil. You know, it's sad because you know what? The devil is not handsome. he is altogether lovely, but the world is calling white black, black white, evil good, good evil. Amen? So, we have to know what is right and what is wrong.
So David, when King Saul died with his son Jonathan, the whole house, the whole palace was afraid of David. They had a wrong thought of David that was peddled by the king himself. The king says, "One of these days, David's going to come and kill all of you."
So, in the panic, a maid took the 5-year-old boy, Mephibosheth the son of Jonathan. Don't forget David and Jonathan actually are blood brothers, and David would have defended Mephibosheth with his own life.
But instead, because of the fear, the lie that has come upon the human race that God is after them, so people are shunning God, running away from God, amen?
They are so afraid that God will--God will punish them, God will judge them, God will give them a disease, or God will give them an accident. They are so afraid, and it's a lie, it's based on a lie. While the real--the real culprit, the devil, goes free. Amen?