The Prepper Broadcasting Network - Reliance - Don't Be Absent 2025.05.02

Episode Date: May 11, 2025

God bless the Menking family! 

Again the word of the Lord came to me. Son of man, say to the land, you are a land that has not been cleansed or rained on in the day of wrath. There is a conspiracy of her princes within her like a roaring lion tearing its prey. They devour people, take treasures and precious things and make many widows within her.

Her priests do violence to my law and profane my holy things. They do not distinguish between the holy and the common. They teach that there is no difference between the unclean and the clean, and they shut their eyes to the keeping of my Sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them. Her officials within her like wolves tearing their prey. They shed blood and kill people to make unjust gain. Her prophets whitewash these deeds for them by false visions and lying divinations. They say, This is what the Sovereign Lord says, when the Lord has not spoken. The people of the land practice extortion and commit robbery.

They oppress the poor and needy and mistreat the foreigner, denying them justice. I looked for someone among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found no one. So I will pour out my wrath on them and consume them with my fiery anger, bringing down on their own heads all they have done, declares the Sovereign Lord.

Jesus, we pray that you would help us. You are high priest and our intercessor. You are speaking to this generation through your word. Holy Spirit be with us now. Pour forth your wisdom, your your comfort your guidance Help us to understand what you want us to receive from your word Lord you are good and your mercies endure forever Weeping may last for a night, but joy comes in the morning God you have promised great things to us. Encourage our hearts. Help us to look and to see with clear eyes what is going on and what is our duty and what is necessary in this time, in our land, in this generation, in our households, and in our own hearts. God, you are righteous and faithful. You are just and merciful.

And you are holy, Lord, high and lifted up, set apart. You are for us and not against us. We declare these things and magnify your name, Jesus. Thank you for the victory that you have won for us. Thank you for the righteousness that you have provided. Thank you for your wisdom. Thank you for your word. Thank you for the opportunities that we have. Lord, I pray in your name Jesus that you would not find no one in this generation, that you would find us standing in the gap, that you would find us going forth in your strength and in your might, that your kingdom would expand, that you would win a mighty victory. God, you deserve it.

You are worthy of all of it. Help us, Lord, to understand the times in which we live. Help us to be your people. Help us to represent you properly. Lord, we cannot accomplish these things or anything in our own strength. We need you, Lord. We need your help, your guidance. We want your will to be done. So let it be done now and in everything on earth as it is in heaven. Redeem this time, Lord. Nourish us from your word. And lift us up through this time of fellowship. In Jesus' name, amen. Almost seven years ago, I recorded a broadcast for Reliance called,

Don't Let God Find No One. And it was about these verses. When the Lord is speaking with Ezekiel, I think it is perfectly appropriate to take him at his word when he says in verse 30 of chapter 22, I looked for someone among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found no one. I think that means that the Lord found no one. I think that means that things may have been different if the Lord had found someone.

Now, I don't want to quibble about whether this is a literary device or how metaphorically we should interpret this. I want to focus on the discipleship aspect. How many of us have been called? How many of us have been led? How many of us have been ushered into an opportunity of responsibility, not necessarily even in the form of human institutions, but by God himself. How many of us have been given the gift of a family, a wife, children, a place of prominence, a voice where other people can be influenced by it, a responsibility for us

to stand in the gap, to build up the wall, to create a place of safety and a sanctuary in a land where there is violence and extortion and robbery and the neglect of the things of God. There are many different ways that you can take this in terms of, well, what is the solution? What should we do? All of these other things. But I don't have a specific plan for that. Seek the Lord on it for word from him so that you would follow the will of the Holy Spirit and not be strung along or guided into places where you shouldn't be by other voices. Hear from the Lord on it. He

knows exactly what you're supposed to do. But regardless of the specifics, let it be purposed in our heart today, tomorrow, and for the rest of our lives that as it stands for us, we will not let the Lord find no one. We will not let our hearts be hardened and our ears be stopped and our eyes be closed to the things of God, to what is going on around us.

Let us be firm, steadfast, fixed in our attitude, in our mindset, and in our spirits to say, not on our watch, by the power of God. Lord, even if you can't find anyone else, I pray that you would find me standing ready to build up the wall, to stand before the Lord in the gap. Lord, there is mercy abundant in you and at your right hand. That is what is needed, grace and mercy and love abundant in you and at your right hand.

That is what is needed, grace and mercy and love and forgiveness and redemption and salvation and healing and restoration and deliverance and freedom. There are so many things, so many powers, so many avenues, so much arrayed against the kingdom of God. But there is God. There is the ultimate balance of power, tilted infinitely in his favor. He is the creator.

Nothing else is. Nothing else compares. Nothing else can truly oppose his will, nothing can thwart his ultimate design, nothing can change his course from delivering righteousness and holiness and faithfulness. There will be and are challenging times, there will be times when the wall is being broken down. Depending on where you look you could say the wall is broken down now. But as it pertains to us, let it never be said that the Lord found no

one. We don't have to do it in our own strength. We don't have our own strength to do it in. It would be completely diluted to suggest otherwise. How often do we fall into the traps of worrying about this or that when we can indeed stand still and see the salvation and the deliverance and the power of our Lord. But standing still and seeing God's power is not a call to being passive, it's a call

to stand in the gap. It's not a call to take things into our own hands. That is a recipe for disaster and infighting and undermining and ineffectiveness. Even at first, or in the middle or somewhere along the way, there can be some positive progress. It is a call to simply state our declaration that we will build up the wall. We will be called the repairs of the breach. We will stand in the gap.

This is something that is pivotal in my life as I seek to grow further in my faith and to protect my family and to do the things that I am called to do. I must have a stronger intercessory prayer life. I must dedicate more time to being with the Lord. I must be in prayer to seek his guidance and his direction. We will be overwhelmed by the world if we are not regularly in the presence of God, constantly in communication with him, receiving our guidance from him, receiving our strength from him, receiving our nourishment from him. If we are not overwhelmed by his power and his goodness and his love and his justice and his holiness and his righteousness and his faithfulness, then we will be overwhelmed

by what surrounds us, what attacks us, what is within us, what is part of us in terms of our carnal nature. But let it be said that the Lord will not find no one because the Lord has given us hearts and desires to stand in the gap and to build up the wall. So how do we do it? What do we do? Who do we seek?

What kind of tactics and strategies do we deploy? We are living in a world where there is a universal battle going on, not just spiritually, but every aspect of the systems and the societies that we are engaged in, the political, the economic, the technological, the psychological, the relational, everything is fair play now. Everything is at access.

It is no longer the time when the fights were people standing in lines and pointing muskets at one another. It is now a complex type of battlefield where everything is fair game. Every mode of influence and coercion and power dynamic, everything is fair play. Everything is live. It feels as if, to many of us, that the foundations have crumbled. And this is not ultimately a pessimistic thing

because some of the foundations that we have been building on as a land, as a society for a long time, are not the right foundations. They just simply aren't. Even some of the religious foundations that we can point to are not the right foundations. There is a true foundation, a true cornerstone, solid as a rock, unmoving,

eternal, and it rests in Jesus Christ, our high priest, our savior, our Lord, our intercessor, our healer, our friend. Brothers and sisters, Jesus can do it all. There is nothing that is too big for God to handle. There is nothing outside of his grasp. There is nothing beyond his reach. There is no depth he cannot go to, no height he cannot climb. There is nothing outside of his purview.

And so, when in Ezekiel, he says he found no one, I don't think he just wasn't looking in the right places. I think he found no one. Will you join me in saying, God forbid that that happen? Will you join me in saying that we understand not all the nuances of the battle that we're in, but the ubiquity of that battle? The fact that it is everywhere and all the time and never relenting, there will be an endless string of temptations, seemingly endless I

should say, because one day, thank God, that too will end. There's going to be pressure and challenge and difficulty even from those we love Sometimes especially from those we love Will we rise to the occasion? Will we perform our duty for the Lord of the universe? Will we follow him? Will we take our place and rightfully submit our lives and our will to his own?

It is one of the overriding themes of this broadcast for many many years that it is Absolutely perfectly rational for us to outsource our decision-making to a God who is omnipotent who is omniscient, and who loves us so much that he would send his only begotten son to redeem us by paying the price of his divine life on the cross so that we, while we were still sinners,

could have a pathway and a way for us to be restored into right relationship with our Creator that is the God we serve unique categorically unique Beyond compare beyond measure and he loves us and He sees us Will we really draw away from a God like that? and he loves us and he sees us. Will we really draw away from a God like that? Will we be willing to put aside and to allow the Holy Spirit to examine our hearts

for any misconceptions about who God is? Will we draw nearer to God? Will we pursue him more fervently? Will we rely on him even more? Will we find the peace that passes understanding in the midst of a violent and many times vile generation? There is evil abounding, but there is good in greater measure, because the resources of God, His holiness, His mercy, His love, His justice, they never end, and they never will. He is more powerful, more mighty, more ready, more loving to pour out of these things for our benefit?

Will we really, brothers and sisters, have the absolute audacity to refuse to put ourselves into a posture of service? Will we really find ourselves saying, I would rather go my own way, even as we claim his name? Will we refuse to receive directives from a commander like that, the Lord of hosts? Will we really, in our boldness, in our pride,

fail to come to the cross, to admit our own helplessness, and to pray that the Lord would secure us. He is not looking for a superhero to solve all of the problems, to fight all of the battles, to clean up things that he can't do himself. He is looking for a contrite heart, a broken spirit, a penitent people. He is looking for those who weep, who weep at the sins of the nation and who are willing to stand in the gap, not because we deserve it, but because God deserves righteousness.

He deserves a people, he deserves a testimony in this earth. He gave up his own life. He sent his son to die for us. And now Jesus, our Lord and Savior, is at the right hand of God the Father, interceding for us. He is standing in the gap. He is building up the wall.

And he wants us to join him in this endeavor, in this service. It may be a silly thing that the Lord has given me from time to time, but just how cool would it be if you remember announcers and people who introduce fighters and other things like that with all the grandiosity and the trumpets blaring and the loud voices in this corner standing six foot two, et cetera, et cetera. What if you got the chance to do that for Jesus in the assembly of the saints,

all of the saints of all time, and here is our Lord and Savior entering and you get to announce his presence. There's going to be a lot of crowns being thrown to the feet of our God very shortly but you get to showcase him. What will you say about this one? What will you say about Jesus Christ? The one who is worthy of it all. The King of Kings, the Lord of Lords. Can you imagine yourself in that moment?

I don't know what it looks like exactly. I don't even know if that's actually something that is going to happen in the new heavens or in the new earth or at the marriage feast of the lamb. But it was a cool thing, a thought that popped into my head spontaneously or led by the Holy Spirit, to just consider that dynamic,

to understand how he deserves the glory, he deserves that entrance. Is that what people sense when they come into our homes? A sense of reverence, a sense of love, a sense of holiness, a sense of there being something of God in this place, a joy, a peace, the fruits of the spirit, true supernatural power being there.

Is that what people sense when they encounter us? Is that what people feel when they enter our homes? Is that the sense that people receive when they do business with us? When they communicate with us? Can they feel that somehow, some way, dealing with such people gives us confidence that at least someone is standing in the gap, at least someone is trying, at least someone is attempting to build up the wall. That kind of example is so valuable for others because we just don't see it enough in our generation.

That is not the standard. That is not the moral benchmark. It is not the habit of society to which people conform. There's a different standard these days, one that has been eroded, but not, not in our houses. By the power of God, by His grace, let that never be said of us.

Let it be said that God did not find no one, but that He found us, praying, seeking His will, serving Him, loving others, extending a hand, showing hospitality, supporting the right things, building up the walls, standing before God in the gap on behalf of the land. For let it be known, brothers and sisters, we serve a God of justice. His love deserves a proper response. He is altogether worthy of it. Would you join me? Would you join me in praying and

seeking the Lord and allowing the Holy Spirit to speak to you and to all of us? Can we make sure that by the grace of God, when he looks upon this generation, that he finds us and that it is not the case that it is no longer said that he has found no one? God find us ready. Find us standing. Find us standing. Find us seeking you. Find us willing to serve.

Find us willing to work for your kingdom. Find us ready. Find us eager. Find us joyful. Find us at peace. Find us content. Find us reflecting on your glory and your majesty. Find us learning more about you.

Find us fellowshipping. Find us serving one another. Find us ministering to you. Lord, we glorify your great name. Do a mighty thing in this generation. Work your will in our lives, in the lives of our families, in the lives of our communities, and in our land. Don't find no one, Lord. I pray that you would find us. In Jesus' name, Amen.