From John chapter 17, the title of sermon is WHEN GOD PRAYS FOR YOU.

Listen well.

If you can’t get the audio on your device, visit the main podcast page at http://revandersongraves.podomatic.com/

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---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME Church in Fairfield, Alabama;  executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO);  and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Subscribe to my personal blog  www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com .

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

Follow me on twitter @AndersonTGraves  #Awordtothewise 

You can help support this ministry with a donation to Miles Chapel CME Church.

You can help support Rev. Graves’ work by visiting his personal blog and clicking the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar.

Support by check or money order may be mailed to 

Miles Chapel CME Church

P O Box 132

Fairfield, Al 35064

STALLING CRAZY

Some people have the almost magical ability to turn their bad day into everybody’s bad day.

King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon was one of those people. 

In Daniel chapter 2, Nebuchadnezzar had a recurring nightmare.   The dreams  were so bad that he started staying awake all night.  On top of that, he either couldn’t remember what happened in the dreams or he didn’t want to tell anybody.  Either way, anxiety and sleep deprivation accumulated until the head of the Babylonian empire just sorta snapped.

He called for all of the the magicians, astrologers, sorcerers, and Chaldeans.  These were the Ivy Leaguers and think tank fellows of the day.

Nebuchadnezzar assembled them as an imperial task force an said, “I have had a dream, and my spirit is anxious to know the dream.” (Daniel 2:2, 3)

They replied, “Tell your servants the dream, and we will give the interpretation.”  (Daniel 2:4)

King Nebuchadnezzer said, “No. You tell ME the dream and what the dream means or I’m gonna chop you up into little pieces, kill your family, burn your house to the ground, and use the pile of smoldering ash as a garbage dump.”  (Daniel 2:5, paraphrased)

Well now EVERYBODY’S having a bad day.

The academics were shocked.  They explained that his request was unreasonable and impossible to comply with. (They would’ve said “with which to comply.”) 

The king accused them of stalling. “I know for certain that you would gain time.”  (verse 8)  

They were  stalling so they could stay and explain very calmly and rationally that it was highly irregular to threaten the leading minds of the nation with death under those conditions.

“There is not a man on earth who can tell the king’s matter; therefore no king, lord, or ruler has ever asked such things of any magician, astrologer, or Chaldean.” (Daniel 2: 10)

And that’s where the “wise men” messed up.  You don’t tell crazy people that they’re acting crazy.  That just makes them act crazier.

Jesus said, “Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you in pieces.” (Matthew 7:6)

They called King Nebuchadnezzar unreasonable and he responded by having them killed and ordering the deaths of all their colleagues, co-workers, and employees. 

When you’re dealing with crazy, like everybody’s-about-to-have-a-bad-day crazy, you don’t stall to stay.    You stall to leave.

A young Jewish academic named Daniel worked in the magicians, astrologers, sorcerers, and Chaldeans industry.  When Arioch, the head of the king’s hit squad, came to kill him, Daniel stalled. 

“Why is the decree from the king so urgent?” Daniel asked (verse 15)

Daniel talked his way into an audience with the king.  The king who hadn’t slept in days except to doze off into a nightmare he couldn’t remember, and these guys he pays to know stuff don’t know anything, but, yeah, they paid for that, they’re all gonna pay, bwahahaha, who are you--- that king.

Daniel did NOT tell Nebuchadnezzar to calm down.  He did NOT appeal to Nebuchadnezzar’s sense of mercy or reason.   Daniel stalled so he could leave.

Daniel went in and asked the king to give him time, that he might tell the king the interpretation. (verse 16)

Basically, Daniel said, “Sure I’ll tell you what you dreamed that you don’t even remember.  Sure, but first I need to run home real quick.”

Sometimes, you have to put some distance between you and the crazy, so you can draw closer to God.  Otherwise, you’ll get drawn into their crazy.  Why do you think Jesus kept wandering off from the disciples? (Luke 5: 16)

"Wait here while I go there and pray."

Stall……. to leave. 

If you can’t  physically get away from crazy, you can create mental and spiritual distance.

In August 2013, a mentally troubled man with an AK-47 charged into an Atlanta elementary school and pointed the gun at school clerk Antoinette Tuff.  Physically, she had nowhere to go, but she still managed to stall and leave. 

In her mind, Miss Tuff went back to her pastor’s last sermon when he’d talked about showing compassion for people in grief.   She took the gunman away from his problems and plans by talking about her family and her past struggles with suicide.  In that office, Miss Tuff prayed with the crazy man who had come to kill her.  She responded to the threat in the most Divinely insane way.  She called the man with the gun, “baby,” and she loved him.

The gunman surrendered.  No children were hurt.  (Read more about Antoinette Tuff here.)

Daniel left the king’s audience, went home, and called his friends. Together they prayed until God gave Daniel the impossible answer to the king’s insane request.

Then Daniel went back to minister to crazy King Nebuchadnezzar (cause crazy needs Jesus, too).  

Daniel went to Nebuchadnezzar and said, “There is a God in heaven who reveals secrets, and He has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will be in the latter days. Your dream, and the visions of your head upon your bed, were these…” (Daniel 2: 27, 28)

In the end, the king rewarded Daniel, rescinded the execution order, and said, “Truly your God is the God of gods, the Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets, since you could reveal this secret.” (Daniel 2:47)

You can’t reason with crazy, but God can.  But it takes time, God’s time.  So stall.  Move yourself and the conversation away from crazy to what God wants to say.  Then leave the rest up to God.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME Church in Fairfield, Alabama;  executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO);  and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Subscribe to my personal blog  www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com .

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

Follow me on twitter @AndersonTGraves 

You can help support this ministry with a donation to Miles Chapel CME Church.

You can help support Rev. Graves’ work by visiting his personal blog and clicking the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar.

Support by check or money order may be mailed to 

Miles Chapel CME Church

P O Box 132

Fairfield, Al 35064

MY TWO SALVATIONS

When they crucified Jesus, the  Romans placed Him between two thieves.  Each of those thieves asked Jesus to save him.  The Lord only saved one. 

I’ve been both of those thieves.

When I was 21, I was sitting on the top back step of an upstairs-downstairs duplex trying to figure out how to get the huge metal desk my father had given me out the back door and down the steps without dropping it, falling, or being crushed to death by it.  My roommate and I couldn’t take the desk down the much wider front steps  because we were breaking our lease and sneaking out of the apartment.

My life was a mess. 

I’d dropped out of school, lost both of my full scholarships, completely screwed up all of the important relationships in my life, and now I was a fugitive from a ghetto landlord, and there was a giant grey desk jammed into the kitchen doorway behind me.

I plopped down on the steps and prayed.  I asked God to forgive me for my sins.  I asked Jesus to be my Savior.

Nothing happened.

I don’t just mean that there was no spectacularly miraculous or emotional display.  I mean nothing happened inside me.

I was not convicted of sin.  I did not feel the assurance of salvation.  It was not the beginning of a new life.  My heart was not strangely warmed.  No new birth.  No regeneration.  I…I know I was not changed.

I had prayed the sinner’s prayer, but I wasn’t  saved.

For a few minutes I sat, waiting.  Then I abandoned the desk and stuffed the rest of our stuff into my car.  The landlord caught us pulling out of the driveway. (Our downstairs neighbor had snitched.)    I lied.  We left, and I kept right on sinning the sinful sins I had sinned before.

I was still the first thief.

The first thief on the cross next to Jesus cried out, “If You are the Christ, save Yourself and us.”  (Luke 23: 39)  

He didn’t regret his actions; he regretted the consequences. He didn't believe Jesus was the Messiah, but he thought it was worth a shot.

But, the Lord does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” (1 Samuel 16:7)

God knew that what I wanted on those steps was a rescue not a relationship. God knew I wasn’t humbled.  I was hustling like a thief trying to escape execution.

About a year later I was engaged and a few months out from the wedding. I had tried “getting myself together” but I felt myself falling apart.  Around 2 A.M., alone on the 3^rd shift at a convenience store off I-85, I locked the doors, fell on my knees between the snack food aisles in front of the beer cooler and gave my life to Christ. I confessed everything.  I surrendered everything.  I submitted to whatever God wanted me to do, go through, or become. 

I’ve never cried so hard in my life. 

I was absolutely broken.  I was whole for the first time. And I have never been the same.   That night Jesus saved my soul like He’d saved the other thief crucified next to Him.

The thief on the other cross rebuked his friend and said, “Do you not even fear God, seeing you are under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said to Jesus, “Lord, remember me when You come into Your kingdom.” (Luke 23:40-42)

His prayer wasn’t very well constructed.  It missed several  crucial theological benchmarks. Dude didn’t even say, “Amen.” 

But the Lord looked at his heart, and Jesus said to him, “Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.” (Luke 23:43)

On the floor of that gas station, God looked at my heart and assured me that I would be with Him in Paradise.

A personal relationship with Jesus is a relationship between your spirit and the Holy Spirit, a heart-to-heart connection between you and God.  If you give the sound of your words to Jesus but not your heart, you’re stuck on the steps, hanging on the first thief’s cross, still doomed. 

You can fool me, your mama, and the entire church, but you can’t hide your heart from God.

The flip-side is that you don’t have to get yourself together.  You don’t have to memorize an eloquent liturgy of repentance.  You don’t have to speak in tongues or first give a sacrificial seed-offering.  You don’t have to be in the right place nor do you have to wait for the right time.

All you have to be is sincere. You just have to be honest with God and yourself.  You just have to let go, and let Him.

Jesus knows your heart, and He still wants you for Himself.

He received a condemned thief.  He received me.  He’ll receive you. 

Give your heart to Him.

For real.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME Church in Fairfield, Alabama;  executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO);  and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Subscribe to my personal blog  www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com .

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

Follow me on twitter @AndersonTGraves 

You can help support this ministry with a donation to Miles Chapel CME Church.

You can help support Rev. Graves’ work by visiting his personal blog and clicking the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar.

Support by check or money order may be mailed to 

Miles Chapel CME Church

P O Box 132

Fairfield, Al 35064

If... Then...

This is what He said:  "If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land." (2 Chronicles 7: 14)

This is what we hear:  "if people who call on My name will pray then I will hear from heaven, and will forget their sin and heal their land."

Notice the difference?   Read them again.

We expect----heck, some people stand up and DECLARE--- that God will fix what’s wrong for us.   Why? 

Why would He?

Are we called by His name? 

To bear His name is to be a member of His household.  To be a member of His household is to obedient to His authority.  Are we obedient to His authority?  Really?  Even when He authoritatively tells us to do what we don’t wanna and to quit doing what we enjoy?

Are we the people called by His name, or are we just the people who call His name when we want something?  Cause those people are houseguests, not member of the household. 

Do we humble ourselves?  Or do we exalt ourselves as blessed, highly favored, anointed, royal, etc., etc.?

I’m not saying that the saints aren’t all of those wonderful, Biblically rooted things.  I’m simply pointing out that when we focus on the exalted aspects of our Divine identity, we’re not in the place where God said He’d hear, forgive, and heal.

We pray.  Oh, we do pray.  But when we pray, do we seek His face, or do we seek His fortune?  Do we want a deeper experience and understanding of God for God’s sake?  Or, do we want deeper blessings from God for our sake?

Last questions.  Be honest, now. 

Are we turning from our wicked ways? 

Are we, or are we turning around looking for ways to justify our wickedness?  Do we come to Him weeping and confessing, “Lord, we have done wrong.  Lord, I have done wrong”?  Or, do we come to him with 3-ring binders full of reasons why what we’ve done shouldn't be called wrong and shouldn’t be held against us?

(It’s the White man’s fault. 

I was born this way. 

My parents gave me PTSD. 

My student loan is too big. 

My income is too small. 

Other people are worse than me.

Obama.)

How can you or I turn from our wicked ways when we don’t see what’s so wicked about the way we are? 

If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

Now here’s the hard part.

God will hear our prayers.

God will forgive our sin.

God will heal the brokenness and injustice in our land.

But first…

But first, we have to:

1)      Submit to His authority

2)      Genuinely humble rather than exalt ourselves

3)      Love Him and seek Him alone

4)      Be real about how wicked and stupid WE have been

---then He  will hear from heaven, and will forgive our sin and heal our land.

And if not, then He won’t; and 50 years after this movement we’ll be talking about how sad it is that nothing has really changed.    

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME Church in Fairfield, Alabama;  executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO);  and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Subscribe to my personal blog  www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com .

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

You can help support this ministry with a donation to Miles Chapel CME Church.

You can help support Rev. Graves’ work by visiting his personal blog and clicking the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar.

Support by check or money order may be mailed to 

Miles Chapel CME Church

P O Box 132

Fairfield, Al 35064

WAIT. WHAT'D YOU JUST SAY?

Maybe it's because I'm an old English teacher.  Maybe it's because I'm a little bit obsessive about this whole Word of God thing.  Whatever the reason, here is my contribution to the canon of "Things Christians Need to Stop Saying."

#1 “Declare and decree”

I’ll come back to the rationale, but the language comes from Psalm 2: 7.   What the Psalm actually says is, “I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee.” (King James Version)

No translation says “declare AND decree.”

Grammatically, the structure of the actual Biblical quote is verb followed by object-noun.  The popular version people repeat is verb followed by synonymous verb.  The verb declare and the verb decree basically mean the same thing.

The Bible says “I command what will be.”  We (and by “we” I mean “ya’ll”) have been saying, “I command and command.”

But hey, so what?  

Well, the difference between what the Bible actually says and what the trending church cliché says is deeper than grammar.

King David is the human author of Psalm 2, but the speaker in verse 7 is a prophetic Old Testament depiction of Christ.  Jesus is the begotten Son God.  It's Jesus who says, “I declare the decree,” and the decree is the Father's declaration of the Sonship of Jesus.  This is internal Trinity business.  When a Christian presumes to have this exact same level of authority to declare and decree, that Christian is claiming to be equal to God.

In Jesus’ name and in His will, we are authorized to bind, to lose, to heal, and to cast out evil spirits.  But, the power to make something from nothing by just saying that it is so---- that power is reserved for God.

And that other verse about “speaking things into existence” is also a verse about what only God can do.

As it is written, I have made thee [Abraham] a father of many nations, before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were.  (Romans  4: 17)

In this verse, Abraham doesn't speak anything into existence.  God does not pass on the power to call forth something out of nothing.

God’s exclusive Divine ability to call things that don’t exist into existence was the foundation of Abraham’s faith.    We are ---- less than God. (Psalm 8: 5)

The misquote has deceived thousands of Christians into thinking that they can just make up reality as they go along.  That's some ole New Age stuff.  That's not Biblical.  

It’s not just that you’re saying it wrong.  It’s that what you’re saying is wrong.

#2 Touch and agree

“Take somebody’s hand,” intones the preacher, “cause Jesus promised that if we just touch and agree….”

That ain’t what Jesus said.

What Jesus actually said in Matthew 18:19, is “That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.” (KJV)

Not “touch and agree” but “agree …as touching.”    Touching in this case means “about” or “on the subject of.”

There’s nothing wrong with touching when we pray.  It’s a beautiful act.  Human touch can evoke a sense of unity that just being in same room cannot achieve.  Jesus touched the people He prayed with and for.   

But, Jesus’ point was not about physical touch.  Jesus was stating the power and necessity of spiritual and intellectual agreement, what Luke called being “on one accord” (Acts 2: 1, 46), what Paul called being of “the same mind” (Romans 12:16; 1 Corinthians 1: 10; Philippians 4: 2).

There is no inherent spiritual power in making physical contact with another person when you pray.  You can’t double-team God and make Him give you what you want.  We’re not the Wonder Twins. 

(The Wonder Twins….. lame superhero team from the 1970’s cartoon “Superfriends”?    Just google it.)

Misquoting Jesus from this verse makes us look in the wrong place for the key to effective corporate prayer.  We look down at our hands when we should be looking within at our hearts.   The Lord wants His disciples to ensure that everyone on the prayer team is of the same mind about what they’re praying.   That level of agreement requires dialogue before prayer begins.

Jesus wanted His disciples then and now to talk to each other before we all decide to talk to God at the same time.  

I know that this may sound pointlessly nitpicky.  I’m also aware that this post may contain my own grammatical errors, but the point here is deeply important. 

Some Biblical misquotes are harmless.  I paraphrase all the time. 

But…

When thousands of “Christians” misquote God because they either didn’t examine the scriptures for themselves or because they gave more credit to the trending version than to the Biblical version; then something sad and dangerous happens.

We create a new doctrinal tradition, and “thus you have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition,” as Jesus said in Matthew 15:6. (New King James Version)

If you think I’m wrong, fine.  Open YOUR Bible and read the passages for yourself.  Cross-reference with other Scriptures.  I don’t much care which translation you pick.  Pick ‘em all if you want.  Just really read what the Holy Spirit really said, and compare that to what you’ve been saying.

And then, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you more than to God, you judge.”  (Acts 4: 19)

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME Church in Fairfield, Alabama;  executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO);  and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Subscribe to my personal blog  www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com .

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

You can help support this ministry with a donation to Miles Chapel CME Church.

You can help support Rev. Graves’ work by visiting his personal blog and clicking the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar.

Support by check or money order may be mailed to 

Miles Chapel CME Church

P O Box 132

 Fairfield, Al 35064

LISTENING FOR THE LIGHT

This morning I tried to listen.

Around 4:30 A.M.,  while the rest of my family was sleeping, I shut my laptop, closed the door of my study, turned off the lights and sat, trying to listen.

Which is harder than it sounds, at least for me.  You see, inside my head there is this constant conversation, an unceasing dialogue with myself: planning, worrying, praying, reviewing class notes, outlining sermons, anticipating questions from students, board members, church members, and random dudes I talk to on the street, cross-referencing Bible verses, revisiting conversations, praying, running hypothetical scenarios, re-analyzing research, scolding myself over missed opportunities, imagining, praying for a deeper prayer life.  I’m constantly producing all of this noise within myself.

This morning I tried to shut up and just listen.

And that’s when I began to see.

What started off as pitch blackness in my study began to dissolve into shapes, objects, even patterns on the dark comforter I’d wrapped around myself.  Out of the darkness came light.

In our narrative of the Genesis of creation we usually begin with God’s Words, “Let there be light.”  After all that was the beginning of the first day.  Only it wasn’t.  A Jewish day, a Biblical day, doesn’t begin with morning.  It begins with night.

So the evening and the morning were the first day. (Genesis 1: 5)

Before the Voice and the light, there was the long, long evening of silence in the dark.

The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. (Genesis 1: 2)

Before God spoke, He listened.

And to whom could He have been listening except Himself, the unceasing dialogue within the Trinity.  Before the light emerged from the darkness and dissolved into lesser and greater lights, before the darkness was broken into patterns of alternating night, God was there, hovering above the liquid darkness.  Not flying, just hovering.  Just sitting in the dark, listening.

For how long, did that first, long evening last?

For how many of our centuries, millennia, and epochs, did God sit there planning, thinking, imagining, anticipating, outlining prophecies, rehearsing answers to prayers, running scenarios, sketching out creation in His head, worrying through the necessary plan of redemption?  

Psalm 104 says that when God holds court, He wears light like a robe of honor and majesty.  But when He needs to just be with Himself, Psalm 18 says that He covers Himself in darkness and thinks His secret thoughts.

He made darkness His secret place;

His canopy around Him was dark waters

And thick clouds of the skies. (Psalm 18: 11)

It’s a scary thing really to sit in darkness and listen.  Without the noise and screens that distract us, we face some things about ourselves that we’d rather not face alone at 4 something in the morning.   But we need to.  If you and I are going to build and become what God so carefully planned and created us to build and become then we have to face the silence and the darkness because that has always been the way that God brings forth Light.

Now in the morning, having risen a long while before daylight, Jesus went out and departed to a solitary place; and there He prayed.  (Mark 1: 35)

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME Church in Fairfield, Alabama;  executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO);  and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Subscribe to my personal blog  www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com .

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

You can help support this ministry with a donation to Miles Chapel CME Church.

You can help support Rev. Graves’ work by visiting his personal blog and clicking the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar.

Support by check or money order may be mailed to 

Miles Chapel CME Church

P O Box 132

 Fairfield, Al 35064

THE REPENTANCE CLAUSE

Saul and David were the kings of united Israel.  They were alike in many ways.  Yet, one of them died a tragic failure at the end of his royal dynasty while the other concluded his life in triumph and peace.  What made the difference?

The answer isn’t what you might think.  Discover how to recover from an epic fail.  

Learn the lesson of THE REPENTANCE CLAUSE.

Listen well.

If you are unable to get the audio on this page, click here.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME Church in Fairfield, Alabama;  executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO);  and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Subscribe to my personal blog  www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com .

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

You can help support this ministry with a donation to Miles Chapel CME Church.

You can help support Rev. Graves’ work by visiting his personal blog and clicking the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar.

Support by check or money order may be mailed to 

Miles Chapel CME Church

P O Box 132

Fairfield, Al 35064

SILENCE IS NOT CONSENT

“So do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or prayer for them; for I will not hear them in the time that they cry out to Me because of their trouble.” (Jeremiah 11: 14)

Often, people take arguments personally.  When you actively dispute their position, they take it to mean that you don’t like them--- personally don’t like them.  But that’s not necessarily so, especially if your argument is the honest exposition of God’s Word.

God told Ezekiel, “Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel; therefore hear a word from My mouth, and give them warning from Me.  (Ezekiel 3: 17)

God sent Ezekiel to argue with Israel because God wanted Israel to change, because if Israel changed then God could help them.

When the prophets are loud, it means that God is offering mercy instead of destruction.

On the other hand, people tend to think that when you stop audibly disagreeing with them that it means they won the argument

Not necessarily so.  Sometimes it means that you’re just through arguing with this fool and you’re just gone leave them to continue in their foolishness and bear the consequences of it.

Like when God told Moses, “Now therefore, let Me alone, that My wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them.” (Exodus 32: 10)  

Silence doesn’t mean consent.  And prophetic silence, means exactly the opposite.    Prophetic silence means that God has turned against you so thoroughly that He doesn’t even want to talk about it.

There are men and women of God who truly live for the Lord and who speak His Truth with accuracy and integrity.  They speak the same things, confirming that they are led by the same Spirit.

When all or a bunch of them suddenly go quiet----- that’s when you need to be afraid, very afraid.

When they’ve been warning you and warning you about the path you’re on and they just suddenly shut up----- it doesn’t mean that you’ve won them over to your side.  It means that God has told them to let it go and move out of the way.

But we don’t see it that way.  We think we’ve won the “cultural argument,” “shifted cultural discourse in our favor,” or “isolated the opposition.” 

But consider the people who are quiet now.   Do they say what’s popular, or do they say what God tells them to say?

And if they speak God’s Word, don’t you think they’ll also keep God’s silence?

When the prophets are loud, it means that God is offering mercy instead of destruction. When the prophets go silent, it means that God is pissed off.

And it is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of a silent God.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church in Montgomery, Alabama, executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO) and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To listen to sermons and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme.blogspot.com .

You can help support this ministry by clicking the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar.

Support by check or money order may be mailed to

Hall Memorial CME Church

541 Seibles Road

Montgomery, AL 36116

BLOGGING THE LORD’S PRAYER: STRAIGHT TO THE TOP

Matthew 6: 13      …For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.

My father taught me to go straight to the top when I need something done.  Buford Graves said, “There’s always somebody who can say ‘No’ when everyone else has said, ‘Yes’ and ‘Yes’ when everyone else has said ‘No.’  That’s the person you talk to.”

Jesus gave the same advice when He taught the disciples how to pray.

Jesus taught the disciples to praise God for His holiness, to seek God’s coming kingdom, to desire God’s will in every plane of existence,  to ask God to provide what they need, to ask God to forgive and to make them forgiving, to seek God’s preventive and redemptive protection, and His rescue from the evil one. 
Jesus taught His disciples to do all of that For (meaning Because)  Yours  is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

We acknowledge that angelic authorities, powers, principalities exist and affect us; but

when we really need to get something done we go past angels and straight to the top.

Let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility and worship of angels (Colossians 2: 18)

We recognize and respect the status of human authorities.  We deal with bosses, managers, gatekeepers, and colleagues, rendering to Caesar what Caesar is due; but when we really need something, we go past people and straight to the top.

Do not put your trust in princes,

Nor in a son of man, in whom there is no help.

His spirit departs, he returns to his earth;

In that very day his plans perish.  (Psalm 146: 3-4)

Why? 

[Because] Yours  is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

David was the greatest king in the Old Testament, and David said: “Blessed are You, Lord God of Israel, our Father, forever and ever.

11     Yours, O Lord, is the greatness,

The power and the glory,

The victory and the majesty;

For all that is in heaven and in earth is Yours;

Yours is the kingdom, O Lord,

And You are exalted as head over all.” (1 Chronicles 29: 10, 11)

David was at the top of the political game, but he understood that he wasn’t at the very top. 

And when we need something, we go straight to the very top.

God loves us.  This we know because the Bible tells us so.  But we don’t pray to God just because He loves us. 

Mama loves you.  Your pet dog, cat, parrot, iguana, or rock loves you.  But you don’t pray to those. 

(You don’t, do you?)

Despite the love, you don’t (I hope you don’t) pray to those because their power to answer your prayers is limited.

If God loved us as much as He does, but He was limited as other entities are, then it wouldn’t be feasible to pray to God.   It would be like praying to mama, or your pet rock, or to an angel. 

But God is far beyond your pets, your guardian angel, and even your mom.

Those have some power.  Those possess some glory.  Those, like King David, operate in authority over certain territories or kingdoms.

But God----- God has THE power, THE glory, and THE kingdom.

That is to say:  God has ALL power, ALL glory, and ALL kingdoms.

And God the Father has manifest His Son Jesus Christ far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come.

 And He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church (Ephesians 1: 21- 22)

That’s Jesus---for through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father. (Ephesians 2: 18)

Why would we give our worship to peons when we know Who’s at the top?

Why would we bow our hearts to the people of this world who say “No” when we know Who has the ultimate “Yes”?

Why would we submit our lives to the cultural influence that tempt us with “Yes” when we have heard God’s ultimate “No”?

Why would we yield the fate of our souls to those who like us are mortal and created, when we can appeal directly to the infinite and eternal Creator?

Why wouldn’t you bow to the One to Whom every other power, glory, and kingdom ultimately submits?

So Jesus said to them, “When you pray, say… For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church in Montgomery, Alabama, executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO) and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To listen to sermons and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme.blogspot.com .

You can help support my ministry. 

Support by check or money order may be mailed to

Hall Memorial CME Church

541 Seibles Road

Montgomery, AL 36116