So Amalek then is a demonic power that comes to steal away your spiritual life, to steal away the blessing, to steal away your life with God, and he comes at times when you are going through struggles, difficulties, misunderstandings, pressures; and you're feeling weary and toiling and straining a bit. Does that sound familiar? See, sounds familiar, okay then so that's what it means, to lose your spirit life, the life of God, the vital relationship with God, the dynamic expression of life that God's called you to, through a season of toil and difficulty and pressure. That's what it means - so what is the nature of it? They were nomads. They never settled anywhere, so they were like Cain. Cain was cursed, so he never settled anywhere. Many Christians never settle anywhere. You can't ever be productive if you don't settle; and so they were nomads, they had no commitment, no roots. They had no place they were planted. They built no lasting relationships, they just wandered.
You can't be fruitful, productive, or have great spiritual inheritance unless we're planted, form relationships, become committed somewhere. Wherever it is may not be perfect - it certainly won't be, because we're there [laughs] but however, we need to be planted somewhere. We need to build relationships. The church is not just about a big body of people gathering like this. It's about actually the connecting and forming of relationships. If we don't form relationships then we'll never really come into our full inheritance. We can't because Christianity's never about walking alone. It's about a body, and most of the promises God made are to His body. Because we're western in thinking, we're very individual in thinking, so we just take it all for ourselves and don't worry about you mate; but actually it doesn't work like that, because there are so many scriptures that talk about our need to consider one another, forgive one another, encourage one another, love one another, so Christianity is about a community of people experiencing God together. Relationships are vital. People feel lonely, and then they become nomadic. They become like Amalek, wandering around from this place to that place.
But the real problem is actually your difficulty in forming relationships, open relationships, where we can talk and enter in and engage one another, and share our struggles, and have people pray for us. You know that's the kind of Christian community that God is building. That's the church He's building, where we can be in a small group, we can share our heart, and people will stand with us through our troubles and difficulties. So Amalek comes to steal away all of that, so this spirit would come to try and stop you forming any relationships, and to end up hating people you should be loving. So God calls us to love one another, and to love the community, love the people who are unsaved. Why? Because He does; not to judge or find fault, but to love and engage, and bring the life of Christ to them.
I had an interesting experience last week, quite interesting really. I had a guy who was a Buddhist and he was - I won't describe him in a way that could be known by anyone, but he had been in politics. He was in a very high position in politics, and now he was going through some very, very difficult season of litigation, and all kinds of accusations were against him. So I was asked if I could counsel him, and I sat down and he got talking a little bit about the problems he was having and whatever. Suddenly the Lord just opened up to me to understand, one, exactly what the nature of the problems were; and two, that I didn't need to lead him to Christ for God to bless him, so I just shared with him. I said: the Lord's showing me this is what your problems are, da-da-da-da and he began to weep and weep and weep, and I shared with him. I said now I want to pray and we just prayed and rebuked the things, prayed for the peace of God to come in his life, and the guy, I mean he looked transformed afterwards, totally transformed.