7 Tips for Your Walk With God From a 67-Year-Old Saint

“When we gave our lives to Jesus Christ, it wasn't a 50-50 proposition, I'll run my life 50% of the time and You help me 50% of the time. No, it's 100%. God's running the show. He's dictating it."

Below is a snippet of a conversation with Bruce Jacobs, a 67-year-old man of God who has come to develop a deeply intimate relationship with the Lord. Bruce offers an abundance of wisdom and life lessons, emphasizing the need for humility in discipleship, the significance of studying the Bible, the power of prayer in daily life, the necessity of surrendering control, the importance of using our authority in Christ, and more. If you prefer listening, you can listen to the full conversation on Apple, Spotify or YouTube.

1. Not only do you need to read your Bible, you need to study it

Ask questions. Everything that's in scripture is there for a reason and a purpose. So ask the questions why, Lord, why did you put that in here? There's something here that I'm missing. What's going on? Take the time out and say, okay, why did He put that here?

If you study the Hebrew culture, you'll learn so much more, especially in the Old Testament. You'll learn so much more about what was being said in the Old Testament when you know the Hebrew culture and why they did certain things.

So read your scripture and study it. Turn the TV off. There's nothing but garbage on TV. There really is. I don't watch TV anymore. I really don't. All my time I spend just studying. And I pray every day, ‘Lord, give me an insatiable desire for your word. Just run it on me. I just want more. I say, I need more of Jesus. I need more of you. I just want more. Just give me more. Keep dumping it on me'.’ And so it's important. It's so important to study the word. Don't just read it.

I mean, ask the questions, you know, when God chose Gideon and they go down to the river to lap the water, you know, why? Why did God choose the ones that brought the water up to their mouths versus the people that went down and put their mouths to the ground? Why? Right?

Because the people that brought the water up to their mouths were also looking around. They were ready. They were ready for battle. You know, they were looking for the enemy. The people that had their heads in the water weren't looking around. They weren't prepared. God's looking for people who have their heads up, who are always looking, always listening, always seeing. That's what He wants. So that's why He chose the 300.

2. If you study the Old Testament, the New Testament comes alive

When you understand the Old Testament, you will understand the New Testament because everything in the entire Bible is the gospel message of Jesus Christ. Everything. From front to back, it's about Jesus and nothing else. Salvation is by grace through faith, but the growing of your faith from milk to solid food is something every Christian has to pursue.

I know 60 year old people that are still on spiritual milk yet. They've never grown. They've never gone any further. Doesn't mean they're not saved. But they haven't grown and they've lost so much in their relationship to Christ.

3. Pray about everything

Pray about everything. There is nothing too small to pray about. Pray for a parking place. Before you leave your house, say, ‘Lord, I'm going to the store and I need a parking place. Can you help me to find a parking place?’ We look at certain things and say we can take control. When we gave our lives to Jesus Christ, it wasn't a 50-50 proposition, I'll run my life 50% of the time and you help me 50% of the time. No, it's 100%. God's running the show. He's dictating, He’s running it.

I can't tell you how many times I used to drive for a soil testing company in New York, in New Jersey, and I used to have to go to New York and parking was atrocious. I never had trouble finding parking because before I left the building, I would ask the Lord to find me parking places when I got there. He always found me one, always.

I had a man in church who had to go near the George Washington Bridge and he got there and there was no parking places. So he said, well, I'm going to see if what Bruce said works. So he says he prayed for a parking place and he came back and he says, ‘I never found a parking place.’ And I said, ‘Well, did you ask Jesus to sit in your front seat of your car before you left or did you put Him in the trunk of your car and you waited till you get there to get Him out?’ I said that's why you didn't find a parking place because you had Him in the trunk and not in the front seat.

Giving up control is very, very hard. It's very hard. Jesus said when he punished Adam, remember, He never cursed Adam. He cursed Eve twice, but He never cursed Adam. He cursed the ground, but He didn't curse Adam himself. But He said, ‘By the sweat of your brow, you will till the soil. You're not gonna use the sweat of my brow anymore. It'll be on yours. You will have to work. Your desire will be to do it your way, not my way anymore. You will do it under your power and under your control.’ And that's so typical of us as we are today. We want to do it our way.

4. God loves being involved in your life and He wants you to be with Him no matter how small it is

Release your control and have God work through you. And that requires a humbleness. You cannot be discipled unless you are humble. It's not gonna work unless you're humble. Discipleship is very difficult because you need people who are humble. You need people who are saying, ‘I don't know a lot about the scriptures. I know the stories, but I really don't know scripture. Can you teach me how to not only know scripture, but to have a closer walk with God?’ And you need a humble heart to do that.

If you ask God to work through you, be ready. Be very, very careful if you pray that prayer. He took my career away. He may send you to Somalia. Right? He may. So be very careful if you pray that, be very serious about it and be ready for what He’s going to bring. But if He works through you, it's amazing what's on the other side. I'll tell you that right now. It's just absolutely amazing what happens on the other side and the things that you're going to see and do. And it's really amazing.

5. Pray scripture

It's God's word. If you pray scripture, God will answer immediately. Your prayers will always get answered if you pray scripture. And I'll give you some scriptures to pray.:

• Psalm 91. Pray it in the first person: ‘I dwell in the secret place of the most high, so I will abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, He is my rock and my fortress, my God in whom I trust.’ So pray it in the first person. And pray it every day because that's a prayer of safety that He will take care of you and watch over you. Pray it over yourself and over your household as well.

• Ephesians 1:16-20. ‘And I pray that the God of my Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory may give to me a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him.’ Pray that, memorize it and pray it. Also Ephesians 3:14-19.

• James 1:5-8. ‘If you pray for wisdom, I will give it abundantly.’ Every day I say, ‘Lord, you promised me in your word that if I pray for wisdom, you will give it to me abundantly. So I'm praying for wisdom. I don't want a thimble full. I want an ocean full. I want you to dump wisdom all over me.’ And it also says that ‘the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.’ So I say, ‘Instill in me the knowledge of the Holy One that I may also gain understanding’. So I have wisdom and understanding at the same time.

• Colossians 4:12. That's a prayer from Paul where Paul had asked for a discerning spirit, that's also very good. And the other one was Colossians 1:9-11, which is also asking for God's will. And that's another one that's really good to pray for. And He will always answer, if you pray scripture, as long as it's synced up to His will, He will always answer.

6. The closer your relationship, the more you will recognize His voice and the more opportunities He will provide

The key to all of this is His scripture and your pursuit of Him. Be prepared to be patient and use the time He gives you to increase your knowledge of Him. He's got something in store for me yet. He's not done with me yet. I know that. But whenever I ask him, ‘What do you have in store? What am I supposed to do?’, He just says, ‘Be patient, be patient.’ And He just gives me time now. Now He’s giving me time. So I'm spending as much time as I can.

I believe there's going to be a huge revival coming. I really believe that there's going to be huge, huge revival coming and many people are going to need to be discipled. I think that's one of the key things that's going to happen. I don't know that for sure, but He’s giving me time and He tells me to be patient.

7. Know your enemy

Know your enemy, the devil. He deceives, he lies, and he murders, and he can't create. But you have access to Jesus' authority. Use it against him, and Satan can't touch you or his demons. Learn to use Jesus' authority to cure the sick, war against the evil one, et cetera.

A good example is: I'm cutting my grass and my lawnmower breaks. So I go over to my father's house and I grab his lawnmower from his shed and I put it in my car and I yell through the door, ‘Dad, I'm borrowing your lawnmower.’ He says, ‘No problem.’ I can borrow his lawnmower because he owns it. He has the authority over that lawnmower and I am his child. Because I am his child, I have access to the lawnmower.

If the man down the street comes walking on the property and goes into a shed and takes his lawnmower, my father will call up the police because he stole them because he's not his child. He doesn't have authority because only God, my father has the authority for the lawnmower. Jesus has all authority in heaven and on earth and because we are his children, we have access to that authority. So He wants us to use it. You know, bind Satan in Jesus’ name. Cure the sick, in Jesus’ name.

Listen to the full conversation on Apple, Spotify or YouTube.

Thank you for being here,

Katharine

P.s. Eternal Echoes is free today. But if you’d like to partner with me in passing on faith and wisdom to future generations, I’d be so grateful if you consider supporting my work. I thank you truly, kindly and sincerely.

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