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Stories of hopelessness that turn to hope. Here is your host, Mike Zwick.
Well, if not for God with Mike Zwick, we've got a special guest today. I've got. Robbie Dillmore, the Christian car guy. Pastor Robbie Dilmore at Kilby Church out in Ramsdorf, North Carolina, and we are going to be talking about. The power of prayer.
The power of prayer. Prayer is extremely powerful. And prayer has changed my life, Robbie. But it's also changed yours. And so one of the things that I thought of.
Is whenever I think of prayer now, it's funny. I actually went to go hear Robbie Dilmore years ago. When he was preaching over in Durham, North Carolina, it was a Presbyterian church, and he told a story about how the seagulls are flying at this by the beach at the sea. And he said, how they're being held up. Do you remember that, Robbie?
L'Oreal, absurdly. It's a beautiful story. really think about prayer. Um It it really is just relationship. Like It's real.
your faith kind of engages God. And, you know, I can't imagine having a relationship. without ever talking and so You know, clearly, prayer. a gigantic part of that.
Well, the Bible actually talks about it. It says to pray without ceasing. That means we are to constantly be in prayer. And I think sometimes people think: if I'm going to pray, I've got to go to a prayer meeting, or I've got to do a special event, or something like that. But the truth is, wherever I go, Robbie, I'm talking to God.
Wherever I go, I'm communing with God and I'm asking Him. And see, to me, Robbie, the thing about prayer is it is not a one-way street. It is not just me. Speaking to God, giving Him my commands, giving Him my demands, it is me talking to God and asking Him. And see, part of having a conversation.
Because people always talk about a relationship with Jesus Christ. The part about having a conversation or a relationship with somebody. Yes, you talk. But you also spend time listening to God as well, is that right? Oh, I absolutely love it.
You know, in Deuteronomy 6 what they produced would call the Shema. That starts out here, O Israel.
Well You know, that's just telling you that well, you know, it's a huge, gigantic thing. In fact, And one of the times that Jesus talked about the most important commandment, he started out with that because it proceeds. But love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your strength. Begins with here, O Israel, the Lord your God is one, but that idea of here. also comes with the idea I've obeyed.
You know, Like clearly God knows What's on our heart and he knows what what we say, but what we don't know is what he has to say. Yeah, and you know what when you talk about listing as well One of the things that I'm reminded of is there was a movie, I don't know if you remember it, it was called Dumb and Dumber. Oh, yeah. Did you ever see it? I don't think I've ever seen it all the way through.
I've seen bits and pieces of it.
Well, there was a part in there where. Uh there was it was Jim Carrey and his co-star, and I can't think of who the other guy's name was, but it was the other guy from Dumb and Dumber. And maybe Jeff Daniels, I'm not sure, but one of the things that he said. He says, there was this girl that I was dating for a long time. And he said she ended up breaking up with me.
She said something about how I never listened to her. He says, I don't really know what she was saying, I wasn't really listening. Yeah.
So And so, but that's not the only one. One of the biggest issues that I hear. from women who are married or looking for a guy, whatever, is that Many guys are not active listeners. Because women love to talk. Women love to talk, but women also are good at listening.
That's why they get together. And a guy, you know, guys, a lot of times, Robbie, we get on the phone. We'll be on the phone for about two or three minutes. We get to the point. We say what we're going to say, but women can be on the phone for.
hours really. And it seems like a few minutes to them because they love not only talking, but they love the interaction of that conversation. And so sometimes it's like if we just get up in the morning and we say, thank you, Lord, for the food. Thank you, you know, for another day. First of all, that's a great thing.
But if it's almost like just a prayer that we kind of just, it's a recital that we just sight off or whatever it is. And it's not a deep, intimate prayer time with God.
Sometimes that can be a problem. Yeah, well, you're missing out on, you know, Jesus. promise life and life abundant. But uh abundant life is Uh it's I have certainly discovered whether I'm fishing or I'm preaching. Um it's that interaction and you know those moments that you know That God is actually you know being manifest somehow through either what you're saying or what you're experiencing.
and you sense his presence and in his presence is formless of joy. And so You know, a lot of my prayers I know fall. flat or whatever. But if if you stay in there the the opportunity to have a full life Uh w when you know that oh my goodness Um God was was in this conversation, then it changes everything and it really gives you a sense of what is the truth. And something.
firm foundation to stand on. Christ is our firm foundation, the rock on which we stand there. You know, it's funny when we're talking about this, I'm looking at Hebrews chapter 1, where it says, God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in past times unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son. Whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds. And when I think about that, it says, you know, before, and there is prophetic words out there, and there are people who prophesy, and I'm not saying that that doesn't happen.
But one of the primary ways that we can speak to God, or the way that I see it, Robbie, is number one, we have to read His Word. And I know you spend plenty of time in his word, and I'm trying to as well. But then number two, if he's speaking to us by his son... that we can have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. But in that, we have to speak.
We have to be able to commune with God. We have to be able to talk to Jesus. Ask Him, Lord, what do you say about this?
Now, here's the problem that some people may say. Is they may say, Well, you know, if I want to call my friend Robbie Dilmore, I can call him on the phone and he speaks back to me, and it's just a conversation. It's open, it's honest, it's easy, whatever.
Well, Now, this hasn't happened to me. I'm sure it's happened to a few people. where God will actually speak audibly to them. And I don't know if you remember Pistol Pete Maravich, but he said that when he got saved. And he became on fire for Jesus before he died, but when he got saved, He said that he God actually spoke to him in an audible voice.
But let's be honest, that doesn't happen that much.
So most times when we're talking about God speaking to us, people are waiting for this audible voice. But Robbie, how does God typically speak to you? Yeah, you but You brought up some amazingly beautiful points. And that's the very reason that you spend time in the scripture. Because You know you know that he's speaking through that.
And so while you're studying the scripture, Or memorizing scripture is another great way. If you memorize scripture, and you're trying to remember a line and all of a sudden that line comes to you.
Well told you it was the Holy Spirit. discern how that feels when that you know, you say, okay, What's John 3.16? And so who's telling me John 3.16 is for God to love the world? And then when I start to forget, all of a sudden it'll come to me. And when it comes to me, I go, oh, that's you, Holy Spirit.
Thank you. And I begin to acknowledge that's what that feels like. That's what that sounds like.
So later. when when I'm you know kind of away from the scripture And trying to discern an issue. And all of a sudden a piece of scripture comes in, then I know for sure, okay. The Holy Spirit sent that one in. Right.
I know that, oh, I I'm trying to figure out what to pray in this situation. And all of a sudden I realize, oh, open my mind to behold wondrous things out of thy law. That comes out of the 119th Psalm. But the Holy Spirit gave that to me. And so I can discern what that feels like.
what that voice sounds like and the piece of it. In other words, when God speaks, Yeah Now there's times where it'll invoke those. There's no doubt it does, and sometimes it invokes Um conviction but Most times It's a peaceful still small like oh Oh, oh that's what that feels like. And so it's a matter like anything of any relationship. The more you do that, the more you talk to it, and the more you discern, oh, that had to be from him.
Then you begin to train your ear. to hear his voice. Yet, my sheep hear my voice. My sheep hear my voice, and another they will not. follow and and here we are Hebrews chapter 4 Verse 4, it says, For he spake in a certain place of the seventh day on this wise, and God did rest.
the seventh day from all his works. And in this place again, if they shall enter into if they shall enter into my rest, seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, And they to whom it was first preached. entered not in because of unbelief. There's a friend of mine from our church. And he was talking to the pastor and he said, You know, the pastor said, I think you need to have some quiet time.
I think you need to spend some time alone with the Lord. And really just slow down. And the old man said, he said, well, I can't slow down. I'm always on the go, go, go, go, go. But if God took a day of rest, if he took the seventh day as a day of rest, How much more do we really need to spend some time with God where we can rest in Him?
Oh, that's beautiful, Michael. And and that passage in the Hebrews The more you think about it, the more you realize Jesus is that rest. And so sim simply put, apart from him, You know, we can do nothing. And so you know It's sweet up. realize that the reason why it's burden is light And as yoke is is easy is is that because When we slow down And we be still and know that He's God.
Then all of a sudden You know, we can begin to see what's important, what's of value from God's perspective. and make decisions that are in line with God rather than on our agenda or you know for selfish purposes. Yeah, and speaking of the power of prayer, you know, I believe that I'm where I'm at right now. Because of a praying mother. My mother told me when I was growing up.
She said that the one thing that she would always pray for is she would pray for my salvation. She would pray for my salvation. She would pray for my salvation. And I'm praying for the salvation of my children as well. And two of them, you know, they're already following the Lord, but they're young.
And, you know, we all know that things happen. But there was a time later on in my life Where I was in college, and I ended up not really following the Lord or turning away, but I do believe that it was my mother's. You know, we can look at the natural.
Well, I met a girl and. she was talking to me about Jesus, but well, was that just because that happened? Or was it because my mother prayed for that for all of those years? And we've been talking about revival a whole lot lately, but at the beginning of every revival, just about every revival that I've seen, it all started out with prayer. Before Jonathan Edwards spoke, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God up in Massachusetts, They bathed that place in prayer.
Prayer, prayer, prayer, prayer, prayer. And the funny thing was, when he preached that sermon, they said he wasn't jumping up and down. He wasn't screaming. He spoke in a monotone voice. But I do believe it was the prayer who moved in the hearts of people.
When you look at what happened over in Wales in 1904 and 1905, there was a guy by the name of Evan Roberts. He had prayed for about 10 years, and he was praying to God for 10 years that God would bring 100,000 people. And he showed them. God showed him that there were going to be 100,000 souls who would come into the kingdom of God, that God would give him because of his prayers. When you look at Smith Wigglesworth, I just saw a quote by Smith Wigglesworth.
He said, and this is what he said. He said, I never pray for more than 20 minutes. He says, but I never go 20 minutes without praying. Uh there was a there was another uh Revival, the revival of the Hebrides or the Hebrides or Hebrides over in Europe as well. And it started off with these three women who were in their 80s, and they literally, Robbie, could do nothing else, but they just sat in their house and they prayed.
And after they prayed, God brought a big revival. You know, it's good to have preaching. It's good to have teaching. It's good to have get-togethers and all of that stuff. It's good to hold revivals.
It's good to hold tent revivals, all of that stuff. But I do believe that sometimes The power of prayer can be underemphasized in the church. And I've also heard that if you want to see which meeting in the church is the least attended, it's the prayer meetings. What do you think?
Well, there's a whole lot you just.
Okay. That's amazing. But I think that, you know, Uh James the Banks teaches um who does an encouraging prayer with us on the Truth Network that And I love this. that like when your mother prayed for you, You're making a deposit in those bowls of incense that are up there in heaven. It never goes away.
And so we have the honor, absolute honor, of not only praying for our children, for praying for their children and their children's children. And those prayers. that you've made for your great, great, great, great, great, great grandson. as the case may be, or store it up there. And it's an amazing thing that we have The absolute honor.
To pray things like that in the same way, you know, what an amazing time of fellowship with. God the same. Hey, you know, show me Like how can I pray for Yeah. How can I pray for it? Church to come back alive.
How can I pray? That Um that's it. They dry bones you know, we'll put flesh back on them and and it's so amazing when you look at that passage. In Ezekiel 37, That what God told Ezekiel, prophesy over these dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.
Well Again, there's here. Right? Not only here, but here the word.
Well, who is that? That is Jesus. He is the word, right? And clearly it is the Bible. But again, if you just One of the neat things you can do is you can pray that people will be more convicted to pray.
Because if they hear the word of the Lord, however, they get it. then they get life because that's how you put life on the dry bones is the Word of God. Yes. Yes. And and John 10.10.
The thief cometh, but to steal, kill, and destroy. Jesus says, That I have come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. And I think it was a few weeks ago, maybe a month or two ago. I'm not good with time, but at that time I realized, I said, I just don't seem, I'm not, I'm doing all the right stuff. I'm, you know, I'm sharing the gospel, shit, but I said, I didn't feel that fire.
And I felt the Lord tell me, you need to spend time with me in prayer. And there's also fasting as well. That now, prayer, if you're not praying at all and you start praying, you're praying for hours a day, that is awesome. But Robbie, I think you told me one time you actually fasted for 10 days straight. Yeah, here recently I've I've fast and for Almost four days.
So I I don't I I've I've discovered that you know, at at almost seventy I can't fast as long as I once could, or I don't Unless God gives me something special. Oh. It can li but I will say this, 'cause I Like And and my friend Nikita Koloff is very disciplined and taught me this practice. I I really do try to fast once a week. And there is nothing, there is no explaining to anybody How amazing your prayer will be after a day of fasting or two days of fasting or three days of fasting.
Not from a standpoint of I'm looking for outcomes other than than knowing that I'm actually with God as I'm praying. Right? Like that's the outcome I'm hoping for is that man, if I get to hang out with God and I know that He's with me and I can sense that in my prayers, I can assure you that I would be shocked. If you really practice fasting for any length of time and you didn't tell me that it didn't affect your prayer life, Because it just simply does. And It it you know, therein lies You know, yes, God may grant whatever it is that you think is important, but it's not.
if he thinks it's important, but the real outcome is like, oh my goodness, you get to have some amazing fellowship with God. And that's what it's all about. That's what it's all about. And so. You know, I've heard people say, they say, you know, you have to believe God and you have to trust God even when you can't feel Him.
And I believe that. You know, there's been times where I've just felt God and I've felt the presence of God and it's been amazing and this and that. And then there's been other times where I Maybe I felt like I was distant, or God was a little distant, and whatever. And there are times where you have to persevere, and there's times you have to break through as well. But I also believe Rolly Robbie That when we pray and that when we fast, that closeness with God becomes much easier.
Yeah, and it's a spectacular thing that again James Banks told me through encouraging prayer that if you're struggling in prayer. If you're struggling in fasting, What a great thing to pray for, Lord. Help me to pray. Help me to understand how I can connect with you. Help me to.
Fear you in this prayer. Help me to fast in a way that honors you. Help me to fast in a way that I get to spend. better, more quality time with you. The the beauty of those things When you think about it, the word disciple has a couple different neat aspects.
So one of the aspects of disciple is discipline. Come on. And a lot of people robb you, how did you get to be that disciplined? I didn't. Yeah.
You know, God? God gives those gifts to people that really push into Him. in my opinion. Like the more you push into him, He he disciples you By allowing you to enjoy those disciplines. whatever.
It's part of the disci discipleship process, but Disciple actually means, from my perspective, an enthusiastic learner.
Well, if you're so excited to learn. You. You will spend the time in prayer. You'll spend the time in fasting. because you know you're going to learn amazing things about God.
And it comes from Again, that idea of what you talked about. I want to feel that fire. feel that sense of closeness, intimacy, regard. to where You know, again, in his presence, it's fullness of joy, and I know he's there. My sheep hear my voice.
And so. If you're going to hear his voice, you have to talk to him, you have to listen. And if sometimes I think we're looking for a microwave answer. We're looking for a a quick response. A quick fix with God, but Man, I tell you what, there's been times where I've wanted God to do A, B, and C.
And God did not not D, E and F, but God did X, Y and Z. And it was so far from what I wanted. But then, at the same time, when I look back and when I had a chance to look back over the years at what God has done. I can see the pattern. Where something that I prayed for ten years ago and something that I really wanted 10 years later.
It turned out to be not good at all. And it turned out to be just It was awful. And it wasn't any good. And it wasn't what God wanted. And even though I wanted it all the time.
all the time and so badly God knew better than I did. I heard a story years ago. They said a kid was going into a socket and the kid was going to put something silver in the socket. And the parents said, no, no, no, no, no, no, stop. Don't do that.
You'll electrocute yourself. And they said, we know so much better than our kids do. our little kids with that socket issue. They said, how much more? Does God know long-term compared to us?
And I tell you what, then sometimes when certain prayers don't get answered, You don't get as frustrated because you trust God. Part of a relationship is trust. You know, you and I are are married, uh, Robbie. We're not with our spouse 24 hours a day. We're not watching their every move, stuff like that.
At some point, we have to trust them. That we can trust that we know what they're doing. We trust them to be doing the right thing. At the same time, how much more can we trust God, who's given up everything for us? He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life.
He put his son, he allowed his son to be tortured and crucified on a cross, but he rose from the grave. And so I just think it's absolutely amazing. Um that God loves us so much. And that if we just spent time with him, people talk about: I need to spend more time with my spouse, I need to spend more time with my kids. And yes, that's important.
But it is much more important to familiar. Yeah, and the neat thing is you could actually spend more time with kids. and family and all that and God all at the same time. You gotta tell me. You you got me hooked.
What do you mean? What I mean is that you know, if you're communing with God and and you know speaking with him while you're speaking with your kids and While you're speaking with your family, Yes, you got the time with just you and him, but you've got to believe that Jesus when he was in the midst of talking to his disciples or whatever he was doing. He was clearly at the same time communing with the father. And that was part of what face in the cross is so Unbelievable for him. Was he actually you know, would have this time for the first time in his life, whereas he wasn't reading with God.
And so You know, that's the The beauty of When he begins to set your priorities, he'll tell you, believe me, he'll tell you. You need to contact this you know, you need to talk to your child about this. You need to do You know, he he instructs me on all those things. Much, much, much of the conversation I have with my adult kids. comes as a result of them.
of things that he I felt input on my heart I needed to talk. my kids about. God is listening. God is listening. He's waiting for your call.
You know, I heard one time they said, there was a girl when I would go over, she said, There are so many girls out there who are just waiting for a guy to ask them out. You know, but it it is the guy's job to ask out the girl.
Now, that may be changing these days. I don't know, Robbie. But at the same time, she said, we're just waiting for a guy to call us up and to ask us out. I wonder sometimes if God is just waiting for us to call on Him, if He's waiting for us to cry out for Him, if He's looking forward. To us to cry out to him.
And then we talk about revival if we all start crying, not even if we all do, if a small percentage of Christians who are not crying out for revival right now, who are We're not praying for big things, start to do it. I wonder how much God will do. Not only in Winston-Salem, not only in Mebben or Alamance County. but all over the country and all over the world. Oh, that's beautiful.
Um You know, you know. Book of Jonah. God tried calling Jonah, telling him he needed to go to Neva. And Jonah slammed the phone there. Right?
And then when you get to Jonah chapter 2, you're going to find he picks. And he's desperately trying to call God. But if you look closely at Jonah's prayer in Jonah chapter 2, what you will not see in that prayer. There's Out of here. You know, most of us, you know, if you think about it, if you've been in the belly of the fish for three days, Your prayer would be, get me out of here.
Like, look closely at that. this week sometime and see what Jonah actually said. Once he picked up the Yeah. and and began to commune again with God. It's a phenomenal study.
Well, there's also repentance sometimes.
Sometimes we say, Lord, forgive me. And I think we live in a world right now where people say, well, don't feel bad, don't feel guilty. You need to be your best self, you need to have a better self-esteem and stuff like that. But. My Bible says that humility comes before honor.
My Bible says that humility, those who humble themselves will be exalted, and those who exalt themselves will be humbled. I want you guys as you're listening today, I want you to take some time this week. and to commune with God. I want you to listen to God. But I would even go as far as saying this, Robbie, in our last minute, or our last 30 seconds, that when you pray, I would set a time limit.
I would say, hey, I can pray for Three hours if I want to. But I'm going to pray for at least 15 minutes or whatever it is, whatever you can commit to. And I do believe that God will answer your prayer. Robbie, I want to thank you for coming on. You can catch the Christian Car Guy every Saturday on the Truth Network from 10 to 11 and Kingdom Pursuits from 11 to 12.
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