Latest / Your Daily Portion with L. David Harris / 06 19 2024 The Early and Latter Rain

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06 19 2024 The Early and Latter Rain · Your Daily Portion with L. David Harris

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  Most of us eat every day, some of us too much because yesterday's food
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  is not enough to supply energy for today's needs. Why then, do some
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  of us expect yesterday's portion of heavenly manna, the word of God to keep
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  us through today's challenges. On this program, we are going to change all
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  of that. Let's experience God's words today and receive the power we need to
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  live healthy, vibrant lives. Welcome to Your Daily Portion with your host,
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  author speaker Elle David Harris. Good morning, Good morning, Good morning.
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  It is Wednesday, June nineteenth, twenty twenty four. Hello, my name
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  is El David Harris. I am your host, and this is your Daily
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  Portion where we give you God's word every single day, and today is no
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  exception. We are continuing in our Lesson study series the Great Controversy. Our
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  caption for today is the Early and Latter Rain. The Early and Latter Rain.
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  Will get it to that in just a moment, But first I like
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  to say welcome to you and ask you to please go over to your Daily
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  Portion dot com. Please join our online community, pick up the Your Daily
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  Portion book, and let us know where you are in the world. At
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  your Daily Portion dot com. This is the way that we continue to build
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  faith and fellowship. We still have space for the Your Daily Portion coaching program,
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  so please go ahead and click that joint button, and then we will
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  continue to grow together. Let's go ahead and pray, and then we will
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  get underway. Father and Heaven, thank you for giving us this new day
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  and for the opportunity that you have entrusted to us to open your word.
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  Please give us the fullness of your Holy spirit. Teach us to love you
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  and to serve you with everything we have and everything that we are. I
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  pray God now that you will give us understanding, Give us the early rain,
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  give us the latter rain. In Jesus' name. I pray, Amen
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  and Amen again, the early and latter rain. Now, of course,
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  there is so much that we could say concerning the early and latter rain from
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  the Bible perspective and from an agricultural perspective. If that's the best way of
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  saying it, let me just say that sometimes we look at things historically and
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  don't really learn to apply them for us. Now, so we know that
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  when you're planting and harvesting, there are two rains or times of rain,
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  or as we say here in Jamaica rainy season, and one is preparatory and
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  one gets us to the point where it's time for harvest, right, okay,
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  good? And so in the Bible, the early rain was I would
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  say about the beginning of the Christian era, if you want to call it
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  Christian. And God did something very special and began to add to his new
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  body of believers in a miraculous way based on what we saw during the time
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  of the Day of Pentecost, after Jesus was resurrected, okay, and so
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  the church grew by leaps and bounds. And ever since we have been hopefully
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  depending on the perspective that each of us has. Hopefully, we've been doing
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  what God has said that we should do, and through multiple eras until now
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  we His children are awaiting the second coming of Jesus Christ, the harvest okay.
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  And so as we await the harvest, the latter reigns must come that
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  power from the Holy Spirit that prepares us to be harvested, prepares us to
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  assist others who are not yet fully connected to God and then get them to
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  the point of harvest. All of this is happening as we await the coming
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  of Christ. We need a special unctionist. Some of the old timers used
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  to say, a special burst of power from God in order to make it
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  through these last days. Okay, And I'm thankful because in the same way
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  that God gave the power of the Holy Ghost to the early believers in order
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  to communicate his message effectively, even to the point that people who did not
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  understand every language of the world but their own language alone, Peter was able
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  to preach to all of the languages and cultures represented there without the benefit of
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  a translator. You see, God stopped at nothing to lead his people to
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  him under the Early Reign. And so in the last days do we expect
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  that God is going to do less? We expect that God is going to
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  limit his power or to expand his power, and of course to expand his
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  power. Now, if you were to look at the Early reign and the
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  latter reign as part of a continuum or part of a journey that we take
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  as believers, then I would say, tomorrow, if Lord bless you,
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  you're making a commitment to God. May not have made a commitment to God,
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  and under the power of the Holy Spirit you choose to serve him we
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  can call that conversion story the early Rain, the beginning of your experience with
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  God in twenty twenty four, the early Rain experience that says, I am
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  hearing God's voice. He is opening up my heart so I can learn to
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  serve him and yes, learn to confess and repent, learn to yield my
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  will to him, so I can be of service to other people, right
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  victory over things that used to bind me right or enslave me. And so
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  we would call that an early rain experience. And then the latter rain experience,
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  of course, is as we grow. As we grow, we receive
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  more and more power from the Holy Spirit, and we get to the point
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  where our characters begin and continue to match the character of Jesus. You're like,
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  what is that possible? Absolutely, there are people who will be alive
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  before Jesus returns that aren't his children, who will live in the sight or
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  the presence of a holy God without a mediator. And so God is giving
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  us the power to live holy lives fully, fully, and I'm so thankful.
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  And so what I want to do now is, since I've given that
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  quick or brief overview, I want to go into the Bible right now,
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  into the Book of Acts, chapter one and verse fourteen, where the Bible
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  reads all these all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with women and
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  Mary and the Mother of Jesus with his brethren. And so prayer, prayer
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  ignites an experience with God, ignites for those who have begun to fall asleep
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  at the wheel spiritually, it ignites revival. Yes, it ignites an experience
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  with God that says, you know, status quo or the way that we
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  used to do it is just not enough, okay. And so during that
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  same experience we see in the Book of Acts, chapter two and verse four,
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  and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with
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  other tongues, as I mentioned earlier, as the spirit gave them utterance.
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  And so we are looking in such a way that we are open to the
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  power of the Holy Ghost. Yes, whatever it is that God wants to
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  do, if he wants to give you certain gifts in order to accomplish his
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  will to communicate the gospel better in these last days than be open to this.
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  Following God's instructions, He told those people during the early rain times that
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  he was going to do so thing special if they came together in one place
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  on one accord, putting their differences away and praying and waiting or tarrying as
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  some would say, and then he would do something very special, and they
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  did. And therefore we expect great things from God. Let's read from Zechariah,
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  chapter ten and verse one, and the Bible reads, ask ye of
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  the Lord rain in the time of the latter rain, so the Lord shall
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  make bright clouds and give them showers of rain to everyone grass in the field.
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  There are people right now that are not expecting anything from God. But
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  we, if we are His children, are saying God, the lands of
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  people's lives are dry, the bones of people are dry. People are not
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  really connecting with you, and we need special power right now in order to
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  assist them. We need special power even in our own lives to deal with
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  the trials that are right in front of us. And God is saying that
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  if you ask for this rain, that he will give it to you.
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  I remember reading a quote in the book Evangelism, pages six sixteen and sixty
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  seventeen where it says the power of God or the Holy Spirit is looked to
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  as in the future, but we are to have it now. Ask for
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  it, seek for it, we must have it, and God is willing
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  to give it. That is the rain of the Holy Spirit. And so
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  we give God thanks for that. And as that is the reality, we
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  are unified in the last days through the power of the Holy Spirit until Jesus
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  comes. Until then, follow us, guide us peacet Thanks for joining us
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  listening. Friends. Always remember we cannot live by bread alone, but by
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  every word that comes from the mouth of God. This has been your daily
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  portion with el David Harris. Make it a great day. Yeah,