Passage

[John 6: 68]
Simon Peter answered Him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life."

Introduction

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
This is the 2009 Devotional Service for the Paul and Mary Mission. Let us give all thanks and glory to God the Father who has blessed us to have this devotional service. I also give thanks to all the devotees who have prepared for this service with all your hearts, minds, and souls.
Dear devotees, today's reading passage John 6:68 says, "Simon Peter answered Him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life."
This means only Jesus had the word of eternal life, and Peter couldn't leave Jesus.
Simon Peter realized early that Jesus alone is the way to eternal life. So, he stayed with Jesus throughout His entire public ministry.
Peter denied Jesus three times out of fear when Jesus was captured, but it was before he had received the Holy Spirit. Once he repented and turned back, he followed the way of the Lord to the point of death, taking his cross.
Finally, he entered New Jerusalem in the kingdom of Heaven, and is now able to stay with the Lord forever. Now devotees, where have you set your hearts and what are you following?
The word of life is in this church, and since you believe this fact, you have been dedicated in your faithfulness, your voluntary works, and making your offerings.
All those sowing in body and spirit will be borne as precious fruit and give glory to God.
Therefore, in the name of the Lord I pray for you to have increased fervor and fullness of Spirit in your hearts and have greater faithfulness starting with this devotional service.

Main

Dear devotees, and other members, the title of today's message is 'Precious Gift'. God the Father has given you devotees of Paul's and Mary's Mission truly precious gifts.
They are things that cannot be bought and that are more precious than anything in this world.
I will talk to you about three precious gifts that God the Father has given to you. Through this message, I hope you will be filled with faith, hope, joy, and happiness.
The first precious gift that Father God gave to us is the grace of salvation.
Romans 3:23-24 says, "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, [24] being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus."
We were all once sinners, but we received salvation solely by the grace of God when we accepted Jesus Christ.
We were to fall into the fire of Hell and suffer forever, but now we can go to the heavenly kingdom that has eternal happiness and peace.
We just accepted Jesus Christ, and God the Father has given us this amazing grace of salvation!
Even when we reflect on our lives, we will realize everything is just the grace of God.
We didn't know about God at all, but we came to know Him and believe in Him. This is totally by the grace of God.
It is the Father God who let you hear the gospel through somebody.
Even when you refused to accept the gospel once, twice, even three times or more, God did not give up on you. He kept on knocking on the door of your heart until you opened it.
God the Creator of all things gave this love to us when we were no more than lowly creatures.
But when we finally opened our heart and accepted Jesus Christ, God gave us the Holy Spirit and the right to become His children.
He cleansed all our sins at once through the precious blood of the Lord. Now, we are sinners no more for God has justified us.
He also wrote our names in the Book of Life as people who can live in the eternal kingdom of Heaven.
We have received this grace of salvation for free, without paying anything.
But God the Father has paid a huge price to give us this grace of salvation.
Namely, God paid the price with the blood and life of Jesus. Jesus was scourged and wore the crown of thorns on His head.
He was nailed through His hands and feet and His side was pierced by a spear. He was completely innocent, yet He shed His chaste and uncorrupted blood.
By shedding of the blood of Jesus all our sins were forgiven. Also, Jesus was hung on a wooden cross in our place. We were the ones cursed and the ones who should have hung there.
Through this, we were set free from the curse of the law that states that the wages of sin is death.
Therefore, how precious a gift from God this grace of salvation is!
God has endured with us for such a long time and He paid such a great price to save us.
Thus, we who have been saved are very precious beings.
You members of the Paul's and Mary's Mission are so very precious.
We were bound to live our lives in sin and then fall into Hell. Our lives were meaningless. But God made our lives so valuable.
Namely, God has made us His precious children who can live in the kingdom of Heaven forever.
And if you have the qualifications to enter into New Jerusalem, God will consider you even more precious!
Dear devotees, and other members, if you are thankful for the grace of salvation, I urge you to take hold of New Jerusalem by force.
Compared to the endurance, effort, and sacrifice of God in saving you, your effort to go into New Jerusalem is nothing difficult or hard.
God the Father has allowed us many things in His love so that anybody can advance all the way up to New Jerusalem.
The second gift that I am going to talk about is also a precious gift of God who encourages us take hold of New Jerusalem by force.
The second gift that God the Father has given us is the Word of Life.
All the words in the Bible, which are the heart and will of God, are words of life.
This Bible is read by countless people around the world.
But as said in 2 Timothy 3:16, all of the Bible is written by those who were inspired by God.
Therefore, we should not interpret it literally or with worldly knowledge and theory.
We have to understand the will of God correctly only through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
Soon after I met the Lord, I earnestly wanted to live by the will of God by understanding the Bible correctly.
But there were many passages that were difficult to understand in the Bible.
So I attended many revival meetings. I asked pastors questions and read commentaries, too.
But I couldn't get clear answers anywhere.
Some commentaries regarded the contents in the Bible as myths or interpreted them in a wrong way, which could take away rather than instill faith in people.
But in 1976, I heard some good news. A believer who had been to a revival meeting gave to me an eye-opening news.
That is, a certain pastor fasted for 40 days two times, and an angel interpreted the Bible for him for 3 years.
The moment I heard it, my heart was set aflame. I felt like fire coming down. I thought I would do the same.
From that time I went up to mountains to pray and fasted countless times whenever I had time.
Meanwhile I was called as a servant of God, attended the seminary college and opened the church.
Before I opened the church, I spoke at many revival meetings in my senior year of seminary college.
But one day in 1983, the Lord told me in prayer to stop speaking at revival meetings and pray on the mountain. He promised He would explain the difficult passages of the Bible to me.
It was the answer to my prayer that I offered for 7 years- since 1976.
In May 1983, I stopped speaking in revival meetings and just concentrated on the Word and prayers.
After the Sunday evening service, I went to the Gwanju Prayer Mountain and came back to church on Friday.
Even in scorching summer days, I just placed a piece of blanket on a rock, knelt down, and cried out towards Heaven.
Even in freezing winter, I went up to the mountain early in the morning and prayed until evening in the cold.
When it was below minus 10 degrees Celsius, I couldn't really sweat even though I cried out with all my strength.
Because I didn't have enough money at that time, I couldn't sleep in a warm and comfortable place.
I had only one coal briquette for the whole day, so the air in the room was always chilly. Cold winds would come into the room through the chink of the door.
I didn't have a warm blanket. I slept curling myself up and covering myself with a thin blanket.
Sometimes when I woke up in the morning, the ink I was using was frozen. The temperature in the room was also below freezing.
Sometimes I had to wash with cold icy water.
After waking up in the morning, I offered dawn prayer in the sanctuary. Then I had breakfast and went up to the mountain to pray all day.
As such prayers were accumulated, the Lord began to explain the difficult Bible passages one by one.
In the evening the Lord gave me the interpretation on the parts that I prayed about during the day. And these words were literally sweeter than the honey from the comb.
There is a lot of will of God contained in the Bible, especially in those passages that are difficult to understand. The joy of receiving such interpretations couldn't be expressed with words.
The holiness gospel including the 'Message of the Cross', 'Measure of Faith', 'Fruits of the Holy Spirit', 'Beatitudes', 'Spiritual Love', and 'Spirit, Soul, and Body' were received this way.
When I stayed at the same place for a certain period of time, many people came to visit me. So I always had to move to a solitary place where I could communicate with God.
I was moving here and there, in Gangwon do, Jochiwon, and Miryang, and finally in 2002, I had my own prayer house for the first time.
Dear devotees and other members, the words of life given by God are such precious gift.
They are more precious than anything of this world. They are treasure to me.
How much of this value do you feel and how valuable do you consider them?
You can hear and read these messages on cassette tapes, on the Internet, GCN TV, or through books.
If you want, you have access to these messages that are readily at hand.
And is there anybody who does not feel the value and preciousness of the holiness gospel?
If you just hear the holiness gospel and not practice it, you cannot feel the value of it very well.
Although it is so full of life, it can become life only for those who spiritually absorb the word.
To become life means there is a spiritual change.
Your hearts become good, your words become nice, and your deeds become decent and gentle.
The word of God is living and active and it causes these works of change.
As we change into spirit this way, we will receive blessings in all things. The rule that says, "we will be prosperous in all things and be in good health as our soul prospers" applies to all people at all times and locations.
Do you have a difficult situation in life? Why don't you hold on to the word of life and pray to practice it as it is?
You shouldn't just try to do it for a specific period of time and give up, but you have to hold on to this Word of Life until the end, believing your hope is in the Lord alone.
Then, the faithful God the Father will resolve your difficult situations and fill your shortages.
The world is becoming more and more evil, and people say it's more and more difficult to live due to the difficult economic situations.
They try their best with all wisdom of men, but in many cases the results are regrettable.
But if you hold on to the word of life and practice it, you will not face a lamentable result, although it may seem foolish in the sight of other people.
You will receive substantial and abundant fruit, which is much more than what you expected.
I pray in the name of the Lord that you will take in the word of life and give glory to God with a good fruit.
Dear devotees and other members, the third gift of God is power.
Psalm 62:11 says, "Once God has spoken; Twice I have heard this: That power belongs to God."
How precious a gift it is that God shows His power that belongs to Him alone! The fact that God's power is manifested also testifies that the holiness gospel that is preached here is also true.
Mark 16:20 also says, "And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them, and confirmed the word by the signs that followed."
When the disciples spread the gospel, the Lord worked with them in spirit to manifest signs, which confirmed the word preached.
And the powerful works that God is showing to us in this church are not merely some healing of sicknesses.
It is not only the healing of diseases, but also there is regeneration of paralyzed and degenerated parts of the body.
Also, we can rule over and drive away the power of evil spirits.
Even when they don't receive my prayer in person, the powerful works still take place transcending space-time.
You can experience the power of God with faith any time through Muan sweet water and handkerchief prayer.
Had there been no such works of power, could your faith grow up to what it is today?
Would you have been able to bear with all kinds of sicknesses and problems in life just with the hope for heavenly kingdom?
Jesus said in John 4:48, "Unless you people see signs and wonders, you simply will not believe."
Your faith could grow up and you could have true hope for the kingdom of heaven because there are works of God's power in this church.
Therefore, I hope you will be even more glad and happier whenever you witness the works of power.
Although God cannot be seen with the eye, I hope you will give all honor and praise to God who always shows us the evidences that He is the Living God.
Is there anybody who is trying but does not receive the answer to a certain problem?
Is there anybody who is in despair and agony because of personal problems?
I want you to remember that God has given this church the precious gift of His power that can make impossible things possible, and possible things even better.
We have the works of power that many prophets and the righteous wanted see but could not see, and wanted to hear but could not hear.
I hope all of you will experience the power of God and become the witnesses, and become spiritual warriors who have faith as God desires of you.

Conclusion

Dear devotees and other members, suppose you gave somebody a gift, and that gift was very useful for that person. Then, you must be very happy about it.
But on the other hand, you gave somebody something very precious, but that person doesn't know the value of it and just disregards it. Then, how would you feel?
God the Father has given us three very precious gifts.

They are the grace of salvation, the word of life, and the works of His power.
These three gifts are more valuable than anything in the world. Their value is incalculable.
Through this message, I believe you realized their value even more.
Then, you should now make these gifts completely yours.
You should live by the word of life with thanksgiving for the grace of salvation.
Then, your heart can change into a clean, good, and true heart.
Also, I urge you not to rely on the world in any situation but only believe in the power of God, experience His power, and become a witness of His power.
Then, you will also become spiritual warriors who have perfect faith.
Eventually, you can become true children of God who have true hearts and perfect faith.
I pray in the name of the Lord that you will all become these true children of God and become a great joy to God the Father who has given us such precious gifts without sparing anything.

[Amen]