(South West Baptist Church 2008) Have You Let Go — Gerhard Du Toit

I just would like to say this morning it's been a tremendous encouragement and a privilege and a blessing to be able to be with you in these few days that we have been able to spend together. Those of you who have not been with us what we have done because I have the privilege of being involved in seminaries and Bible colleges and conferences for missionaries and pastors and then of course churches in about 30 to 40 different countries of the world.

And there is a love in my heart for Australia just a great encouragement because it reminds me so much of my own country. I was born and brought up in South Africa. If you maybe recognize the accent it's quite possible that you have a South African doctor.

You know we live in the West in Canada and I've been told that there could be as many as a million Southern Africans in Canada and the United States which of course is North America. And just in Canada itself I've been told that we could have between five and six thousand South Africans that are in the medical field.

I sometimes find myself in towns or cities where we could have 27 South African families in the service and most of the time those people would be in the medical profession. In fact I often in some of those churches out there in Western Canada would say to the people how many of you recognize this accent and then a whole bunch of hands would go up and I said it's because you have a South African doctor.

And then I would say to them well if you don't treat me well these days you could end up with seven flu injections for the winter. And then you know it's just a blessing to be amongst these people when we are there.

And often they say to me well you speak with an accent and then we would say well we don't have an accent you've got an accent you know. But it's been tremendous to be able to be and if you've not been with us what we have done we explore this whole understanding from Thursday night, Friday morning, Friday night and twice yesterday and again this evening.

This whole concept of how do I learn the language of prayer and what I've tried to do in these few days is to take 120 hours of material that we sometimes share in these countries and seminaries, Bible colleges and try to just bring the cream of that material into what we were about.

Old Testament Prayer Begins With God's Revelation

11 tremendous words in the Hebrew language that is speaking to us about prayer. Some of the great understandings of Old Testament prayer when you study the prayers and the Old Testament that you can't just study those prayers because they really only give you 25 insight in what the Old Testament understanding of prayer is about.

Because it's initiated by God he answers prayer not necessarily because we are asking but he answers prayer because he is a covenant keeping God. And when you want to study those Old Testament prayers you need to come to the understanding of the revelation of God to those saints that we are going to pray.

And as a result of the revelation of God it brought them to an encounter with God and the combination between the revelation of God and an encounter with God brought them to exploits. Something that they would do for God and then you will discover the prayer that they prayed.

And when you study that prayer it takes you right back to that first 75 of what it means to come to grips with that prayer. I wish we would have had a Sunday to a Sunday because of course we can't do that because of the conference and because of our own schedule that takes us 5 -7 years sometimes in the future.

But you know it would have been tremendous to explore the 16 moral imperatives of God as it relates to prayer. The different kinds of prayer within the Old Testament. The understanding that three times in the Old Testament that when the prophets in the Old Testament prophesied about the coming of the Messiah that they were so affected by the fact that he was going to be the fulfillment of Old Testament prayer.

That God was going to become flesh and dwelt among us and we would have beheld this glory, the glory as the only begotten of the Father. That three times in the Old Testament that when they prophesied about the coming of the Messiah that they were so affected by this concept that they used one of those Hebrew words and they referred to Christ as a prayer.

New Testament Prayer and the Spirit-Filled Life

Yesterday in our times together we were going through the New Testament. You know we just scratched the surface because our minds are so feeble and some of us in Canada we don't even have enough brains to give us a headache and sometimes we can't comprehend all of this.

But I sit yesterday because I have the privilege of teaching New Testament theology and have a great interest in the New Testament. 7957 glorious verses and when you plow into the Greek New Testament as it relates to prayer there is the possibility that you can look at almost 24 words in the Greek language that is relating to the understanding of what prayer is about.

261 passages related to the work and the ministry of the Holy Spirit and we explore the New Testament tabernacle of prayer. 6 possible words that became the pillars as they relate to prayer, the roof of this New Testament tabernacle which takes us to maybe 12 possible words, the ropes that is holding that roof down which will take us to another 6 words in the New Testament.

I am so glad my wife Janice is not with me this morning because she always says to me, Danny don't become too analytical, I love figures and numbers you know. 180 ,552 words in the New Testament. 4 ,366 ,405 letters in the Scripture.

Don't you tell my wife I told you that. But you know brother and sister it is tremendous because when you bring the New Testament together. In fact let me tell you something you know, I sit in planes for 80 to 90 days of the year and I can't stand flying.

For God gave me a promise one day and said, Lo I am with you, I can't stand flying. But you know I have learned to utilize the time and if you spend 3 hours every day on the New Testament you will be able to listen through the New Testament 40 times every single year.

Maybe you think this is absolutely ridiculous, but I have been doing this for about 35 years. You say what have you been doing? If you write out 17 verses of the Old Testament every day by hand, every 4 years you write out the whole of the Old Testament.

Because I have an interest in languages and the beauty of pictures that is coming unto us from the Hebrew and the Greek texts of the New Testament. I just love to do that. In fact you say how do you do that?

15 verses of the Old Testament I should say every day takes you through the Old Testament every 4 years. And about 17 to 18 verses of the New Testament takes you through the New Testament every 15 to 18 months.

So you say how do you do that? I have got other writers in my right hand, so I write the Old Testament out of my right hand and I write the New Testament out of my left hand. Thank God He is the only one that is able to understand my writing when it comes to that.

My dear precious wife often say to me, Daddy, I think what is happening with your left hand is that you are developing this side of your brain. You know she is a typical calm, cool, calculated Canadian.

Anyway, brethren and sisters, it is God's work you know. And that is why Paul said to Timothy, study to show yourself a proof unto God. A workman not needed to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

That is why Paul said to Timothy, Timothy was the young man in whom he invested his life and mentored him. And he said to Timothy, all Scripture is given by inspiration of God. It is profitable for reproof and for correction and for instruction in righteousness.

That is why the Apostle Paul said when he spoke about the spirit filled life. And he said in Ephesians chapter 5, be not drunk with wine wherein there is an excess. And he used the present imperative mood and he said, be being filled to the spirit.

And then he gave us this incredible consequences of being filled to the spirit. You say, what did he say? He said, singing to yourselves in Psalms and Hymns and spiritual songs. You say, what is that?

That is spiritual worship. Then he would go further and he spoke about spiritual submissiveness. He said, wise, submit yourselves to your husbands as unto the Lord. That is spiritual submissiveness. And then the Apostle Paul speaks of spiritual sacrifice.

What did he say? He said, husbands, love your wives as Christ loved a church. And he gave himself for it. Why? So that he might sanctify it by the washing of the Word. That is why he said to the church at Colossae, He said, let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly.

That is why Jesus said, heaven and earth shall pass away, but my Word shall abide forever. That is why Christ said in John chapter 15, If you abide in Me and My Word shall abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will.

And I sometimes find seminary students and they would say, isn't that amazing? I can ask what I will because Jesus said, If you abide in Me and My Word abides in you, you shall ask whatever you will and you shall receive it.

And I staggered, you know, at the arrogance of the ignorance of the simplicity of the foolishness in understanding Scripture. And I said, you have no idea what you are speaking about. Because the condition is, Jesus said, if you abide in Me.

Brethren and sisters, that means that God has come and put the sentence of death upon the self-life. And that means that His Word abides in me. And if we come to the place where we have abandoned ourselves to Christ, and come to the place in the life of the Apostle Paul, when he said, I am crucified with Christ and nevertheless I live, and yet not I Christ liveth in me.

And he said, the life which I now live in the flesh, how do I live it? I live it by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me. That's the crucified life. You say, what does it cost?

It costs absolutely everything. If you are a young person in this service this morning, or a student that is studying theology, you only have one life to live. You can't mess around with it, because it's going to cost you more to miss the will of God than it's going to cost you to find it and your relationship with God.

And so you say, what is it? Brethren and sisters, it's the will of God. Why are you saying that, you say to me this morning? Do you know why I'm saying that to you? Because you can't take people forever spiritually than you are yourself.

We can only impart to people that which I possess. 75 of my growth is determined by what I read. God do not bypass the mind. I've been born with a personality, but it's in the process of building up Christian character.

And I need to saturate myself with the reality of what Scripture is about. And you know, in those 248 passages in the New Testament, there are 12 aspects of New Testament prayer that we will be able to contemplate.

And we've begun to do that. And this evening, we're going to try and bring this thing somehow into the harbor. I mean, it's impossible to be able to share the depth of you when it comes to the understanding of prayer.

Prayer as Walking With God

And can I share with you a secret this morning? Brethren and sisters, I learned to pray on a mountain on our farm in Africa with six black African pastors. Men that would say to me that you can't walk with God on the basis of what you're trying to accomplish for God.

But they would say to me, ministry is the consequences of walking with God. And they would spend days and nights of prayer and fasting on that mountain. Fasting to them was praying without words. And when I learned to pray with these men, you know what I learned about prayer?

I'm collecting books on prayer. I have about 800 old classics and books in my library as it relates to prayer. But you know what I learned about these men? You never get to the place where you know how to pray.

It's not the times that you spend with God. It's the times that God is spending with you. You see, we know so much about the Word of God, and yet the Scriptures know so little about us. And I would ask these men and say, how many hours do you spend in prayer?

And they would look at me as astonishment. I mean, they would go for 40 days of prayer and fasting. They would come to grips with the Hebrew word, which is the word masah, that speaks about the burden of God, and how this burden of God, theologically speaking, brings brokenness and cleansing, and brings into our lives a realm of the Spirit of God.

And how it leads us to a spirit of prayer. And how the spirit of prayer leads us to the will of God in prayer. And how the will of God in prayer is surrounded by the promises. And these men would say to me, we don't know how many hours we spent in prayer, but we very seldom go through an hour without praying.

So what was about them? They were intoxicated with the consciousness of the centrality and the supremacy, and the purity and the passion and the unction of God that brought them to a place where they live a Christian life that demanded a supernatural explanation.

You say, what did it cost him? It cost him absolutely everything. Absolutely everything. And it's been great to be here in this tonight. I really trust, you know, there are some of us here, and you only come to church on a Sunday morning.

Listen, Reverend Sister, it's not what you've come to receive this morning, it's what you've brought into the service. And you see, when we speak about the concept of a Christian life, there's a staggering statement that breaks my heart.

And I find myself many times weeping in the presence of God, because Jesus turned to those early disciples and he said to them, as my Father has sent me, he said, so sent are you. Do you know what that means?

It means I only have one life to live. And only that which is done for Christ is going to last. We're not taking anything with us, you know. Nothing. I mean, you can have a million dollars in the bank, and you're not going to take one cent with you.

You can bury it with yourself, but you're not going to take one cent. Just one life. We have some material there. I was a bit frightened last night. We've been giving out a lot of material, and last night all my notes and stuff were there, and I was speaking to Dr. Polis.

We were standing there, and I watched people, and they were jumping into my own personal notes, and I got frightened, you know, because we often are in a Chinese church in the lower mainland of Vancouver in British Columbia.

You need to come to this church. They have eight Sunday services. They preach the same message eight times on a Sunday, 6 .30 in the morning till almost 9 o 'clock at night. And I gave them a lot of material, and I don't know how this happened, but one of the sheets in my own quiet times where I wrote down a lot of things that God was speaking to me personally about.

Things that I was struggling with, and God was dealing with me about those issues in my life, and that sheet of notes got into those notes, and these Chinese people grabbed it, and they made copies, brother and sister.

And when I got the copies afterwards, here's one of his copies, I thought, oh no! And I said to them, I said, listen, that one copy is personal. Oh, they said, we read it, and we liked it, and we apply it.

And I thought, I'm never going back to that church again. I want to speak to you this morning, and you know, our time is limited. This country of Australia, you know, time runs twice as fast because you're down under, and people keep calling me mate, and I'm not sure if it's cellmate, or what kind of a mate is it, but I need just three other brothers to come.

Christian Growth and 2 Peter 3

I want to speak to you about Christian growth this morning, and I would like us to give out this material. And so, if you could just run it through us. I think we have enough copies. Can you give our brother some of this, and then we just go quick, just so that we don't waste our time.

I think we should have enough copies this morning, and if we do not have enough, maybe you can share with your husband or your wife. If you can't do that, you need to come to us for counseling. But I think you should be able to do that.

So, turn with me in your Bible. You should have a sheet in front of you. Really want to encourage you to be with us this evening, and our last session together. But turn with me in your Bible to 2 Peter 3.

2 Peter 3. And just for the sake of our time, let's break into that chapter. We've been sitting for quite some time, and I'm going to ask you that we stand for the reading of the Word of God, and we just be able to change our positions.

2 Peter 3. 2 Peter 3. Verse number 12. Looking for and hastening unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with a fervent heat.

Now, nevertheless, we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. Wherefore, beloved, seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent that ye may be found of Him in peace, without spot and blameless.

And on account of the long suffering of our Lord Jesus, His salvation, even as our beloved brother Paul, also according to the wisdom given unto Him, I have written unto you. As also in all His epistles, speaking in them are these things in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are in learnt and unstable rest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.

But ye, therefore, beloved, seeing that ye know these things before, beware, lest ye also be led away where the error of the wicked. Fall from your own steadfastness, but grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

To Him be glory both now and forever. Amen. You may be seated. Let's just pray together. Our Heavenly Father, it's been a tremendous encouragement to be able to be in this beautiful little congregation over this weekend.

We want to humble ourselves again this morning before you because there has been moments in these sessions when there were many of us at the altar of our church and many of us on our knees and our hearts became broken in the presence of God because we came to the realization that as it relates to prayer, that we will never really be able to know how to pray.

Father, that being in the school of Christ as it relates to prayer, that one of the things that would happen to us is that we would feel that we are running into the ocean and we've gone so deep as it relates to prayer, and then we feel we can't go any further and when we stop, we look and it seems to us the water has just come to the ankles.

And God, I'm so grateful that You've never allowed me to be involved in a conference like this weekend without meeting with God in my own personal relationship with Him. Father, I've been so thankful that there has been moments in that room where I have stayed that my own heart has become so humiliated and smashed up and I found myself, spiritually speaking, disintegrated under the awesome understanding that the God that we are serving is the One that initiates prayer.

And Father, my heart has been burdened. And I want to ask You again that as we understand the burden of God, that You will help us to learn how to dissect the burden of God and that You will help us to systematically persevere and prevail and pray this thing through to You.

And Father, my heart has been burdened for these men and women that I have been in these services. And we want to say to You this morning, Father God, we are not interested in a church that will be full of people, but the longing of our hearts has been that we will be in a church that will be full of people, that will be full of God.

And we do not want experiences, Father, that is a mile wide and an inch deep. But it's the burden of our hearts that when You come to us, that You will reach into the depth of our relationships with You and that we will be able to surrender ourselves to You and that we will never be the same.

And Father, You know this Sunday morning that there is probably a very small possibility of being able to have the privilege of being back in this fellowship for possibly many, many years. And yet, it's been a marvelous blessing to be able to spend time with men and women who know what it means to be hungry and thirsty after God.

We want to pray this morning for our pastor and for his wife. And Father, I felt so awful these days not having the privilege of meeting them and the struggle of coming to the church without the senior pastor being here.

And yet, God, it's been a blessing upon my heart to trust You every single day that in this time of refreshing for them physically and emotionally and spiritually there in the beautiful land of Israel, that all that God the Holy Spirit who is omnipresent, and God is omniscient, and that God is omnipotent, that somehow, Father, the same consciousness of the presence of God that we experienced here, that You would reach down into their hearts and in their lives.

And we know that they have been praying for us. Father, I pray this morning as they will probably listen to this material in the days and the weeks to come. Oh God, we pray that You will bless our pastor in an abundant way.

We thank You this morning for his life and his ministry. We thank You that in his heart is there a longing to see this church becoming a praying church. This church becoming a church where people would live a Christian life that will demand a supernatural explanation.

This will become a place where men and women will not sit here on a Sunday morning and be half-born, but men and women will sit here with a desire and a passion to become intoxicated with a centrality and a hunger and a thirst after the life of the Lord Jesus.

We ask You this morning that this would not just become a praying church, but oh God, we pray that this church will become a soul-saving agency. Men and women who drive past here probably five or ten thousand cars easily every day, that there will be a moment when You would pour out Your Spirit upon this place.

And that the amazing, unexplainable reality of the immersion of the presence of God will draw them into this parking lot. And they will come into this place with an unquenchable hunger and a thirst to make peace with God and their relationships with You.

Father, thank You this morning. Now we've come to Your Word. Our time is so brutally limited. And yet, Father, we ask of You, as we spend these few minutes in the Scriptures, that You would come to minister to us fresh and anew in our relationships with God, because we ask it in Jesus' name.

Amen. The life and the ministry of the Apostle Peter in the New Testament is an unbelievable and an unexplainable life that determines to us an understanding of what Christian growth is all about in the Scriptures.

Peter's Life as a Picture of Christian Growth

From the moment that he was invited to become a follower of Christ and he was instructed by the Lord Jesus Christ and he was inspired by the life of Christ, will you discover that in the life and the ministry of Peter, if there is a word that dominated his relationship with God, then it's this word Christian growth.

And when you study the life of the Apostle Peter, and I've often said to my wife and daughter, you know, Peter was one of those disciples because of the impulsiveness of his personality and the fact that he was a total extrovert.

He was one of those followers of Christ that brother and sister, when someone or when there was an aspect of pressure upon them, if there was someone that wanted to say something, it was the Apostle Peter.

Quite often he said things that was totally out of place. In fact, I looked some time ago at the life and the ministry of the Apostle Peter and as I was looking at, you know, I was so struck by that moment.

You remember when Peter and James and John came out of Gethsemane with the Lord Jesus. In the Gospel of Luke, who was written by Luke the historian and the physician who gave us around 15 technical medical terms in the Greek language, that Luke gives us such an incredible description of what happened in that incident.

And you remember when Christ came out of Gethsemane and as He was coming out of Gethsemane, Peter and James and John were with the Lord Jesus. And when Judas Iscariot and that group of people who came to capture the Lord Jesus, when they came to Him and Judas kissed the Lord Jesus Christ, and when he did that, you remember Peter, the disciple, did an amazing thing.

The Bible says he took out a sword and he cut the ear of the man with the name of Malchus. And I look at that incident and I was so struck by this. And I said to my wife, I said, you know, I suspect that the only reason why he cut that man's ear off was probably because he simply missed his head.

You see, if you look at the life of Peter, brother and sister, that was what his life was all about. That's why when you would study his life, in the Gospel of Mark, that was to a degree, theologically speaking, dictated as the young Mark probably sat at his feet and he was telling them about the life of Christ.

In the first 12 chapters of the Acts of the Apostles in 1 and 2 Peter, you will discover that he often speaks about development. He often speaks about Christian growth. And so he's coming unto us in his epistle and he's saying unto us in that 105 verses in 1 and 2 Peter, he speaks about adding unto your faith.

He speaks to us about cultivating. And then, brother and sister, he's coming unto us this morning and this morning's service, and he makes a statement and he said to us, but grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Savior, the Lord Jesus.

He didn't say grow into grace, but he said grow in grace. I want to speak to you in this little time that we have available about the subject of Christian growth. You see, I do not know this Sunday morning if we will be able to see one another again in five or ten years' time if the Lord would have tarried to come, but if we would have been able to sit down and I gave you those 20 questions on accountability that we share with men in different countries and pastors, and I would ask you those questions, where are you in your relationship with God?

What have you been reading in your times, in your personal times with God? What has God been saying to you? Do you have friends in the world? Or do you have worldly friends? Friends in the world that you reach out for Christ?

And I would ask you, and we would look at one another and I would say, have you been growing in your relationship with God? I wonder what you and I would be able to say to one another. You see, life is an ongoing process.

Brother and sister, life never stands still. And you and I cannot receive Christian growth unless we have received the life of Christ. I want to speak to you this morning in the little time that we have available on three possible aspects of Christian growth.

The Dynamics, Direction, and Demands of Christian Growth

I want us to look at the dynamics of Christian growth. Secondly, if we would have the time, I want us to consider not just the dynamics, but the direction of Christian growth. And thirdly, if we would have had time today, I want us to consider the demands of Christian growth.

You know, when I was a student at seminary, my professors always used to say to me, you always will have enough too much material. And you know, my dear and precious wife Janice, she would often say to me, because what happens in countries where we get to the first point of the first point of the first point of the first point.

And we were in a city of New York in a Korean church of about 6 ,000 people. They prayed together every morning from 5 to 7 o 'clock. And every morning from 5 to 6, I had to speak to them, not in Korean through a translator, for an hour in the theology of prayer.

And then they would pray. And one night I was speaking on Christian growth and my wife turned to me and she said, Daddy, I want to challenge you. And I said, what is it? She said, I want to challenge you tonight to finish your whole message.

You know what I did, brother and sister? I took the last point first and I worked my way back up and I did it. And she lost it. She had to pay for lunch the next day, you know. Alison, we're not going to have time here this morning.

I wish we would have had time to look at the demands of Christian growth. How do you and I promote Christian growth? How do you and I protect Christian growth? You say, what is the direction of Christian growth?

Brother and sister, it is incredible. Because you see, when the Apostle Peter came and he said to us, grow in grace, you know what he said? This understanding of growing in grace, you will discover that the grace of God is not only God's unmerited favor towards us, but it's also God's unmeasured fullness in us.

And when you and I would speak about the direction of what growing in grace is all about, you will discover three things. It is a downward growth in my capacity to receive the fullness of God. It is an upward growth in my capacity to perceive the fullness of God.

And you know what happens? The combination between a downward growth when God comes to my Christian life and He puts the sentence of death upon the Christian life, and He brings me to the place where He cleansed me from the sin that I am conscious of, and He put me into a life where I began to live a life in the fullness of the Spirit of God, and the understanding of complete surrender, and the crucified life.

When that happens, my friend says, it's wonderful. He is not just leading me in the understanding of cleansing, but the second aspect of the direction is simply this. He brings me to the place where it becomes an upward growth in my understanding to perceive the fullness of God.

And I discover the fullness of the life of Christ. And you say, what's the consequences of that? Ah, it's tremendous. The combination between this downward growth as it relates to the grace of God and this upward growth bring me to the place in my relationship with God, brother and sister, where it becomes an outward growth in my relationship with God.

That's why the Lord Jesus said in John 7, the last day, the great day of the feast, when He stood up and He said, if any man thirsts, let him come unto Me. He said, he that believeth into Me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water shall flow from the innermost of His being.

Why did He say that? He spoke about the Spirit because Christ was not yet glorified, and the Spirit was not yet come. And He spoke about the force of this river. And He spoke about the source of this river.

He said, if any man come to Me, and He spoke about the cause of the greatness of the river of God. So you say, well, what is it? I want to touch down on the dynamics. Our time is limited, but you're not allowed to look upon your watch otherwise we take up an offering and you lose it this morning.

Give me a few minutes to explore this with you. You say, what are the dynamics of Christian growth? How do I know that my life is changing? Brother and sister, three things. There is the communication of the truth of the Word of God.

There is the fertilization of the seed of the Word of God. And there is the manifestation of the life of the Word. You say, Gerard, what do you mean by the communication of the Word of God? My friends, would you allow me to suggest to you this morning, there is no possibility for you and for me to be able to grow as a Christian unless we expose ourselves to the communication of the truth of the Word.

You see, if I do not expose myself to this, and I don't want you to misunderstand me, but this is the weakness of some of these so-called evangelical movements today in the church that are focusing upon manifestations and experiences and everything that you can think of in the Christian church today.

You say, what is the deficiency? They move from experience to the exposition of Scripture. And you say, Gerard, what do they do? They interpret God's Word in the light of experience. And they isolate the Scriptures.

And if the Scriptures does not fit into the realm of their experience, you know what they do? They simply bypass it. And they would not accept it for one single moment because of the weakness of the theological understanding of what the Scriptures is all about.