Desire The Pure Milk Of The Word — Randy Krahn

Desiring the Pure Milk of God's Word

Let's pray, Lord Jesus. I just pray you'd speak by your spirit that wouldn't come from me. Lord, we want to hear from men. Lord, we want to hear from the Holy Spirit. I just pray for the anointing of the Spirit to rest upon your word, Lord, as the words are spoken, that it would cut us to the quick, Lord, that you would impact us in our hearts, that we would change, that we would grow spiritually.

In Jesus' name, amen. You know, I think about one of those things that is common to man, which is food. You know, you can fast 40 days, some fast 50 days, but eventually got to eat. If you don't eat, you won't grow.

You know, and everybody likes food. Everybody has their different ideas of what tastes good and what they enjoy, what they are looking forward to. In the same way, a little baby that's born craves milk.

It doesn't crave all those things that we as adults crave, because God created it to crave one thing. And it says as believers, as newborn babes, we can't lose this. We have to desire the pure milk of the word.

Some of us say, well, I'm lactose intolerant. Well, I'll then drink soy milk, I guess. But you know what? The point of the matter is, is if we lose our love for the word, you stop growing. So you might love all kinds of things.

You might love all kinds of doctrine. You might love all kinds of teachings. You might love all kinds of ministers who have a certain style in which they present the food. But you individually have to have a hunger and a thirst for the word of God.

That's how you know you're healthy spiritually. If you don't have a hunger and a thirst for God's word, if it's a burden to you, you're spiritually sick. How many of you have a small baby and that baby's not latching on?

Maybe two, three days not latching on. Hey, we're going to call the midwife. We're going to seek out the physician. We're going to want to get in touch with the health nurse and find out what's going on.

Something's not right. How many of you would wait a whole week and say, well, you know what? The baby will probably eat on Sunday. You know, we won't worry about it. We'll trust God on the matter. You know, God has the baby.

No, as obedient children, you know, we want to be obedient to what God says, desire the pure milk of the word. We have the hunger and thirst for God. And our way of hungering and thirsting for God manifests through hearing his voice.

We shared last week. We want to hear his voice to be led by the spirit, not to be under law, not to be lived by rules. It's like, well, I have no hunger. I have no thirst, but I know I'm going to die if I don't eat.

So, you know, I'm going to do my daily bread devotion because it's good for me because if I don't eat it, I'm going to die. You know, you may as well be on a life support. What is that? That's how Israel had become.

Israel had become like on life support. They were like dead man's bones. There was no hunger and thirst for God because when Christ came, there was no desire to know him. They rejected him. And he came proclaiming the pure milk of the word.

He came speaking parables. He came speaking life. Life was pouring out of the man. Jesus Christ. And you know who latched on? The sinners, the sick, the beggarly, the poor. They followed him everywhere he went.

And the Pharisees were so exceedingly jealous of that guy. They just absolutely sought ways in which they could destroy him, shut him down. We have to be careful we don't become religious because we will become an enemy of those who are born again.

Ezekiel's Dry Bones and Faith That Hears the Word

I'm thinking of a passage in Ezekiel in 37 where there's a great valley and it's speaking of Israel. And there is Ezekiel and he's looking over the valley and he's seeing a vision and all scattered throughout this valley are skeletons and bones, just bones here and there all over the place.

And the Lord speaks to him and says, prophet, he said, Ezekiel, can these bones live? You know, we cannot go by what we see. If you go by what you see, everything will become impossible. We have to walk by faith, not by sight.

If we go by what we see, we'll say, well, you know what? The man who does these things shall live by them. We'll say, give me a list of rules that I can see and I'll keep those rules and I'll be holy.

But that is not how man is made righteous. A man is made righteous by faith. And faith doesn't come by seeing. Faith comes by hearing the word of God. And so God tells Ezekiel, can these bones live? And he looked and he saw and it looked hopeless.

And so he didn't know what to say. He said, Lord, you know, because he knew it was impossible. And then he said something. He said, I want you to prophesy. Start preaching to the bones because that's when faith can come.

Faith comes by hearing the word of God. And so the spirit of the Lord came on Ezekiel and he started to preach to the bones. And that is how change comes. It does not come by keeping rules and regulations, dotting I's and crossing T's.

It does not come from packing our head full of logos. You can pack your head full of good things just like you can go and eat all of the wonderful dainties that are out there. But Daniel refused to eat all of the king's dainties.

And so he began to preach to the bones. Preach the life into the bones. And as he began to preach, the spirit of God went forth and the bones started to hear. The bones were hearing the preaching. Because the bones began coming together bone to bone.

And all of a sudden there was a full, the sinew was coming on and the body was coming together. And then there were all these corpses lying in the valley all put together. A wonderful work of the Holy Spirit was happening.

Bone came to bone and then sinews and flesh. God was doing a miracle. But that's not where it ends. Now he says, preach to the breath, to the wind of the spirit. Preach about the life, the life of the spirit.

And as he began to preach to the life of the spirit, all of a sudden these corpses come to life. It didn't happen while he was looking at the dry bones. It happened that he began to see with his eyes what was impossible for Ezekiel, became possible by the Holy Ghost.

Salvation by Faith Rather Than Works

And we shared last week from Romans 10, 9 and 10 about our salvation. That if we confess with our mouth the Lord Jesus, that if we believe in our heart that God raised Christ from the dead, ye shall be saved.

For with the mouth confession is made and with the heart one believes unto righteousness. So you want to become holy? You want to become righteous? Then you need to begin to live by faith. The just shall live by their faith.

But if any man shrinks back and starts to observe days and months and seasons and years, brothers, we're missing the gospel. We're missing the good news. I had a call from my brother this week and he said, Jesus began to preach the good news after John Baptist was arrested.

Jesus began preaching and he said to me, how is it possible that Jesus wasn't even resurrected from the dead? What kind of good news, what gospel was he preaching, saying the kingdom of heaven is at hand?

He told that to the disciples. Go and preach the kingdom of heaven is at hand, the kingdom of God is at hand. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons, freely receive, freely give.

He gave them the Holy Spirit to do these things. But Christ wasn't resurrected. They hadn't received the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The fire hadn't fallen. And I thought about this for a second and I said, brother, Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

And even before the foundation of the world, God knew that man would fall into sin. And he made a provision and a plan that in 1st Peter in chapter 1, he sent Jesus Christ. He had a plan to send a Redeemer to deal with the sin issue.

Because he knew that man could not do it. Even before grace came, he sent faith to Abraham. The promises, brothers and sisters, are not to you and to me. We claim all kinds of promises. They're not to you and to me.

They're to Abraham and to his seed, which is one. Capital S-E-E-D. Christ. And if you're in Christ, then all the promises are for you and me and they're yes and amen. But while we stand here and quote all the promises, while we go by what we see and we walk by rules and regulations, you can claim them all.

I was at a meeting a number of years ago and it was a bunch of men who were addicted to sexual sin. And they were there to get liberated. And the men were not preaching a gospel of faith in Christ. They were preaching a works gospel.

And so what they were saying is you need to quote all these promises because they're true for you. And just claim them. Just claim the promises. That's a works gospel. Just to claim something like you can do it.

You can claim it. And so they began to say, I am the righteousness of God in Christ. You can claim them all you want if you're not claiming them by faith. Well, he said, okay, we went through all the promises.

He says, let's now we're going to do it again. But we have to say it a little bit differently. We have to say it in a way that like we're in Vancouver area. So like it's game seven and the Canucks are playing in the Stanley Cup finals and they're going to win and they shoot in the game winning shot and they win and we win.

Let's now say the promises like the Vancouver just won the Stanley Cup with more enthusiasm and more zeal. You know what? The Jewish people had way more zeal than people who won the Stanley Cup. They had an absolute unbelievable zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.

They sought to attain righteousness, but it wasn't by faith. It was by works. And then all of a sudden Jesus Christ was found. The father was found by those who did not look for him. He was found by those who didn't ask for him.

That was me. Maybe that was you. How then did the gospel and the promises become real? Because faith was always before the law 400 and some years earlier. It was always by faith. The law was added because of sins so that we might see what sin is.

So we might turn away from sin and look to God realizing that we can never be good enough for God. Your best attempt at looking good before men and looking good before the church people and looking good in the eyes of God will never measure you up.

That all might become guilty. That is the purpose of the law. Not to make you holy, but to show you that you're unholy. That you might call upon the name of the Lord. Now how shall they call upon him and whom they've not heard?

So then faith doesn't come by seeing brothers and sisters. It comes by hearing. Hearing what? The rhema word of God. Now all this gospel, all this good news is given by inspiration of the Holy Spirit and it's true.

But we need a living word. We need a now word. We need a word that's going to speak to my situation right now. And the Holy Spirit is ready, willing, and able to speak to you right into your situation to give you that faith so you can grab that promise and claim it as mine.

New Creation and the Promises of God in Christ

If any man be in Christ, he's a new creation. Old things have passed away. Everything's becoming new. And now because of the shed blood of Christ and because he has been ascended above all heavens, seated at the right hand of the power, he has received a name which is above every name.

That at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow in heaven, every knee on earth, and under the earth. And every tongue confess Jesus is Lord. And now we have to call upon him for help. But many of us don't call upon him.

Many of us trust in our righteousness. Many of us quote scripture. Many of us quote promises. But the promises are to Abraham and to his seed which is Christ. And so we need to be co-heirs with him, joint heirs with him in faith.

And when we are in faith and we are in Christ, then all the promises of God are yes and amen for you, brother, sister. They're yes and amen for you. And so we need to be found in him. What does it mean to be in him?

If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. You are thirsty for the word of God. Ask you, are you thirsty for the word of God? Do you wake up in the morning longing to hear a word from heaven to sustain you on the journey?

It is a journey. We are sojourners. You know how we are going to come to that place where we grow spiritually? It says in 1 Peter, I think it's in chapter 20 or verse 22. It says, since you have purified your souls through obeying the truth, through the living word of God, the rhema word of God, we have an opportunity and a responsibility to obey this word that we have received by faith.

It has to be obeyed by faith. We have to purify our souls. How is our soul purified? Through obeying the truth, through the living word of God. And when we're obedient to what the spirit says, to be in tune with the spirit, you say, well, how do I know if I'm in tune with the spirit?

My sheep hear my voice. They follow me. So when you open up the scripture, when you're thirsty for the pure milk of the word, then something will speak to you. And there'll be some manna, some living bread that comes from those pages.

Perhaps a word will come when you're walking down the road or when you're at work, a scripture will come and you'll grab it and it will sustain you. The living word of God. So faith come by hearing and hearing by the rhema word of God.

The rhema word is different than logos. Logos is the written word. We need to know the written word, but in every situation we need to be led by the spirit. So we need to understand what the spirit is saying in every situation.

My sheep hear my voice. Now the lambs follow the sheep. So if you're young in the Lord, then you get good counsel and godly people who fear God, who have a desire to walk in the spirit, who are liberating you from rules and regulations, and they are pointing you to Christ and they're teaching you how to walk worthy of the calling and how to purify your soul in obedience to the truth and how to go and make restitution to make amends and to prepare yourself to receive an impartation of the spirit of life.

The Holy Spirit's Power for Freedom from Sin

We all need salvation, but we also need the baptism of the Holy Ghost. The power of God is what we need to live according to this book. You can never fulfill the purpose and call of God on your life without the power of the Holy Spirit.

With man it's impossible, but not with God. We were at a meeting last day and I said to the man, I said, do you believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ? Every hand, oh yes, they're believers. Do you believe that God can set you free from drugs?

Well, I'm saved. Would you believe God can set you free from alcohol? Well, you're regardless. I'm a Christian. I know I'm going to heaven. Nobody's going to challenge me on that. It says the scripture also says those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.

So if we're practicing sin, brothers, sisters, what does that show about our spiritual state? That we're unregenerate or we've fallen from grace. Because you can't be walking in grace being filled with the spirit and practicing habitual sins, whether it be sexual, drunkenness, immorality, overcome by bitterness, anger, unforgiveness, that's a big one.

We have to release and let everything go and give it to God. Call on the name of the Lord until you get the victory. You will call on his name if you believe. If you don't believe, you'll find another way to work it out.

But we need the power of God and it comes through the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. Ask to be filled with the spirit for the full immersion of the spirit. Ask him to give you whatever giftings that he has for you that it might build up the body and be an encouragement to others.

So that you can fulfill the purpose and call of God for your life. Liberate people from legalism, brothers and sisters. Liberate them from bondage. Don't look down on anybody. But for the grace of God, you'd be that chain smoker, that drug addict, that toque smoking person, that alcoholic.

But for the grace of God. I remember this time when we were going to go on a vacation and the Holy Spirit spoke to me and said, I don't want you to go. I said, why? I'm going with my big fat Bible in my hand.

I'm going with the Holy Ghost. I'm going to go on that boat and they're going to serve me like a king. It was all paid by the family. I was really excited to go and the Holy Spirit said, I don't want you to go.

And I argued with the Holy Spirit. The next day he came again. And I said, out literally, out loud, why? And the Holy Spirit, the tone changed. And all of a sudden I began to have a trembling in my bones.

And I began to realize the words that were said, faith comes by hearing, right? The words that were said was, do you think you stand? I said, I'm not going to go back. I'm not going to go back because the words were, you're going to go back to your old life.

If you go on this vacation at this point in your life. And I said, no, I won't. I won't go back. I've come too far. And then the tone changed. And I heard, do you stand because you say you stand or do you stand by grace?

And all of a sudden a fear of God came in my bones. And I remember going to my wife and saying, honey, I can't go. I can't go on this thing because God spoke to me. And I need to obey God. You know, the end of that was my wife had a miscarrying womb at that time.

And the end of that matter was, was that she opened up the womb again as the act of obedience by faith. And God blessed us with seven more children. At that time we had two. Now we have nine. I'm not saying it always goes that way, but that was, we didn't do it for a blessing.

We didn't do it for the favor of God, but we did it because we fear God and we want to be found in him. We want to follow him. If we go somewhere and it's not in his will, we're going to be in a bad way.

Hearing Christ's Voice and the Resurrection of the Spiritually Dead

So we want to be walking as we're led by the spirit of God. These are the sons of God. They put to death the deeds of the flesh and live. You know, brother, it says the hour is coming and now it is in John chapter five.

Jesus said this, when the dead shall hear the voice of the son of man and live. Well, you would ask yourself, how can a dead man hear? I heard this preached years ago. How can a dead man hear? In the same way, when Ezekiel was looking at those bones and then he saw those corpses, he could have said, you know, I saw, I saw a miracle.

The corpses came together, but you know what? I don't think they're going to stand up, you know, but yet he just said, preach to the breath by faith. Just speak to the bones, speak to the corpses, preach to the dead.

Some will hear. The hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the son of man. They'll hear the voice of the living spirit. They'll hear a rhema word. They'll stand to their feet and be gloriously born again.

You know, there's Lazarus. He was in that tomb and he was there stinking for four days. And he was, Jesus came and he was weeping because all the people were weeping. And they said, Jesus, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.

And Jesus was weeping because the people seemed as though they had no hope. A lot of times we weep because we don't believe we weep because we don't have hope. And that's why fellowship is important. Encouraging one another and strengthening one another.

Because there's times when we're weak in faith and we're discouraged and we need someone to come alongside us and say, hey brother, hey sister, put your hope in God. Why are you downcast? Don't look at your circumstances.

Don't look at how hopeless it is. Maybe you've messed it up and you think what's the way out? Humble yourself in the sight of God and he will lift you up. He'll liberate you, brother. The life is in the blood.

We have Jesus' blood running through our veins if we're born of incorruptible seed. Let the Holy Ghost work. Allow him to liberate us and fill us full of faith and hope. At that time we went on that cruise, my wife and I, we were not seeing eye to eye on that situation.

There's times in your life where you might not see eye to eye with your wife but go through with God because there's a blessing in the valley. Those dry bones came together and corpses stood up. I remember something changed at the time when my wife and I, we went to Tim Hortons and she was, I showed this on Thursdays, she was like a little squirrel sitting on the edge of her seat with her eyes wide open.

I was reading her the Psalms and we kind of found a new unity there between us spiritually speaking. It was wonderful. May the Lord help us to understand that we need the Holy Ghost. I don't care how good you are.

I don't care how much scripture you got memorized. You need the Holy Ghost and you need Jesus now more than when we first believed. This word is living. This word is powerful. This word is active and it's sharp.

It need to be sharp as a two-edged sword. I got a text from a brother yesterday. He said, brother, he said, you need to be sharpening your axe. And you know what? I texted him back and I said, you know what?

Yesterday I was in prayer and I said, Lord, I don't want a dull axe. He says, if the axe is dull, one must use more force when you're chopping a tree. I said, Lord, I do not want a dull axe. I pray that you would give me a sharp axe, that the word of God would be sharp, that it would pierce men's hearts, that conviction would come, that men would repent and turn back to God.

I said, man, that brother heard from the Holy Spirit. He must have been speaking to the Lord and the Lord told him, ask the brother to get a sharp axe. How do we sharpen our axe? Well, we need to purify our souls.

When we purify our souls in obedience to the truth and we get the fear of God, then the anointing of God can flow strong. We need the anointing of God to flow strong because it's the anointing of God that breaks the yokes.

You can have a strong axe and you can slam it against someone who's in shackles, but if the axe is dull, it won't pierce through and break free. It's not that the word of God is ineffective, but many times we're carnal.

Preaching Life to Those Dead in Sin

It says they're not all Israel who are of Israel. Neither are all children because they're descendants of Abraham. It's in faith, it's in Isaac that your seed shall be blessed. And so we want to be in faith when we're preaching the word of God.

Faith come by hearing the word. And when people who are dead in trespasses and sins hear the living word, he makes them alive. That is how dead men can hear. And Jesus standing before the tomb, he tells his brothers, roll away the stone.

They said, Jesus, four days he's been in there and he's stinking by now. Four days. Jesus didn't go by what he heard from other guys. He didn't go by what he saw with his natural eyes. He went by what his father said.

And then he cried out with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. Brothers, sisters, the hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of Man and live. Lazarus, who was dead, heard Jesus cry out with a loud voice.

And there's a lot of people today who are dead, spiritually speaking. We need to be a voice of life to speak life into those people. We can be frustrated by their actions. We can be frustrated by where they're at and they didn't make good decisions.

We can be frustrated how they're affecting us, how they take advantage of us and steal from us and lie to us and disturb us. But we need a burden for their souls. Jesus had a burden for souls. And when you have the heart of Jesus, then you will have a burden for the lost.

It doesn't matter what gifting you have, you need to have a burden for the lost. If it's just a prayer, your gift is praying of intercession, it'd be for the lost, it'll be for the backslidden, it'll be for the people who are hurting, people who are suffering, for the believers who are suffering in other countries.

You'll be burdened with them as though chained with them. You will share in the sufferings of Christ. These are rich things to partake of the sufferings of Christ and the glories that follow. But if you don't believe in the glories that follow, then you'll never be partakers of the sufferings.

The scripture says after you have suffered for a while. You know brothers, I used to go to the gym and they used to say no pain no gain. You got to push through the pain to get to the next level. There has to be a tearing of the muscle and then a rebuilding.

In a spiritual sense bodily exercise profits a little, but exercising yourself toward godliness is profitable for all things. So when we're suffering and we're going through something and it seems as though there's no hope, call on the name of your God and something good will happen.

If we look to the Lord, we brothers sisters will be radiant. Our faces won't be full of shame. We'll be able to hear when the spirit speaks and rightly divide the word of truth. We'll be able to say it is written, it is written, it is written and it will be a rhema word.

Jesus was able to rightly divide the word of truth. My grandmother taught me a scripture and I'll end here. She said Randy, study to show yourself approved unto God. Get into the word. I was 12 years old.

You need to become a workman, a laborer for the Lord who needeth not be ashamed. If you go and walk in the flesh and make all kinds of bad choices, you're going to experience shame. But if you learn the word of God and you hide the word of God in your heart, then you won't sin against the Lord.

So you need to be a workman who needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. That means dividing truth from truth. Because sometimes the scripture says two things. And the devil tested Jesus in this thing.

Throw yourself down from the temple for he will give his angels charge of you. And Jesus said, uh-uh, my father didn't say that. It is also written, thou shouldn't put the Lord thy God to the test. We're not a temp God.

Do something dumb because we want to prove God's got us. We need to hear from the Holy Spirit. If God speaks it, come out on the water and walk, then you go. If he doesn't speak it, you don't just go running out there expecting God to got you.

We have to hear from the Holy Spirit. In every situation you heard me share last week, I want you to go with that man and share your testimony with that man. There's a time when he says if you don't hate father, mother, wife, children, yes, your own life also, you cannot be a disciple.

What does that look like? If you don't hate your own life, if you love your life, you're going to lose it. In every situation, we have to say, you know what? No, I'm going through with God. God told me to do this.

God's asked me to do this. I've heard from God. I'm sacrificing Isaac on the altar. Don't try to stop me. I'm going through with God. Imagine if Abram's wife found out about it and was pulling on his legs and grabbing him by the pants and saying all kinds of things to dissuade him.

You didn't hear from God. No, he said, like Job, you speak as one of the foolish women speaks. Job's wife said, curse God and I. Look at what God has done for you. Why do you put your hope in God? Look at your situation.

He said, you speak as one of the foolish women speaks. I'm going through with God. Naked I came, naked I go. Blessed be the name of the Lord. I'm going through with God. I'm going to go to that mountain and I believe that God cannot lie.

He promised that he would raise up Isaac to be an Isaac. My seed would be blessed and I believe that God is able to raise him even from the dead, but I'm not going to hold back my son, my only son, Isaac from the altar.

If God calls you to put something on the altar, you don't have to reason with 30 people. If you know it's God, put it down. Sell it off. Get it out of your life. Ask the Lord to give you the grace and the faith to go all the way with God.

Going All In with Christ

I shared with a man on Thursday. I said, you know, I've seen people at the Las Vegas and they get hooked on gambling and they go and they make foolish bets and eventually they end up all bankrupt. They put their faith in something that has a perishing end to it.

Many people lose their homes, their cars, but I said, when you come to Jesus Christ, you have to come with what little you have. You maybe have one chip and you go all in. It matters not how much you have.

You go all in with Christ. If you don't go all in, you're not going to experience the power of God. If you hold back some of your heart, you say, well, I'm going to love the Lord with 90 of my heart.

I'm going to keep a little lunch money here for myself. I'm going to keep a little something for myself. No, we have to go all in with Christ. We have to put our full faith in God, our full trust in the Lord, not lean on our own understanding.

In all our ways, acknowledge him and he'll bring it to pass. I've seen a scripture that says, I've never seen the righteous forsaken nor his seed begging bread. You don't have to go and beg bread, brothers.

You don't have to worry how God's going to provide. He says he's going to provide abundantly for us. It may not always go according to our plan. His ways are not our ways, but he is able to do exceedingly and abundantly more than we ask.

Let us love God with all of our hearts. Let us love him with all of our minds. Let us purify our souls through obedience to the truth, through the word of God. Desire a hunger and thirst for righteousness.

That's when you'll be filled. Ask the Lord for the pure milk of the word, thirst again, that you would have a desire to grow spiritually and put your hope in God. Why should you be downcast? Why should you be discouraged?

Why should you be sitting on the side of the road like blind Bartimaeus? Ask the Lord to revive us again by the power of his love, through his grace. In Jesus name, amen.