In this sermon, the pastor discusses the concept of being more than conquerors. He explains that this statement is not an empty promise, but rather a reflection of the believer's victory through the redemptive work of Jesus Christ. The pastor emphasizes the power of the Spirit and the impact of revival in shaping the history of America. He also delves into Romans 7, highlighting the limitations of the law in bringing deliverance from sin and the need for a Savior. The sermon concludes with the story of Daniel in the lion's den, illustrating the liberation that comes from trusting in God's deliverance.

Romans chapter 8, read verse 37. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. There are many tags that are put on chapters in the Bible. Perhaps the best known and maybe the ablest critic of religious books in America is Dr. Wilbur Smith. And I remember he said a while ago about this chapter that in some ways it is the greatest chapter in the Word of God. The great writer Coleridge said it's the most beautiful thing that any man was ever allowed to write. This eighth chapter, as many of you know, begins a new section in this wonderful epistle to the Romans. The seventh chapter is a chapter of gloom and the eighth chapter is a chapter of glory. The seventh chapter is a chapter of condemnation and the eighth chapter is a chapter of emancipation. The seventh chapter is a funeral march and the eighth chapter is a wedding march. It's the song of a soul set free, to use the type of a lovely hymn. If you want to use the phrases of John Milton, you remember perhaps he wrote two great classics, Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. Rather strange, I can't work it out, but he wrote Paradise Lost after he got married and he wrote Paradise Regained after his wife died. There may be no connection but it's certainly interesting. And the seventh chapter is the chapter of Paradise Lost. It's a chapter of depravity. The eighth chapter is a chapter of deliverance and delight. It's a phrase that's used very often, Romans 8.1. There is therefore now no condemnation. And so the chapter begins, away in the heights there is no condemnation and it ends, there is no separation what shall separate us from the love of God. But it does not say that there is no tribulation. In fact it marks tribulation out for us very, very carefully. Now this is a magnificent chapter and if you want to make a special branding here, as I said the seventh chapter is a chapter of misery and condemnation and the eighth chapter is a liberated soul. And you can explain this by this fact that in the eighth chapter, pardon me, in the seventh chapter, the seventh chapter is the chapter on a self-centered person. And the eighth chapter is a chapter about a Christ-centered person. In the seventh chapter you read that first person over and over and over until you get weary of reading I, I, I, I. I want to do this and I can't but I find I'm in bondage and so forth and so on. And therefore if you count up you'll discover 31 times you find that I and no mention of the Holy Spirit. And in the eighth chapter there is no mention of the I except in two verses where he says, I reckon and I'm persuaded, where he's no alternative. But the difference is in the eighth chapter that there is all the mention in the world about the Holy Spirit. Eight, nineteen times the Holy Spirit is mentioned. A self-sin-bound man in the eighth, seventh chapter and no Holy Spirit. A liberated man in the eighth chapter and over and over and over and over and over again he pays, he pays tribute to the Holy Spirit of God. It was Spurgeon, if I remember right, and I do, it was Spurgeon who said on one occasion that the Bible often suffers more from its exponents than its opponents. As I said yesterday one man sarcastically said the Bible is inspired otherwise it would never have survived all the bad preaching. Of course that doesn't happen here. But there it is, it's, it's this amazing, amazing word of God. Now let me just remind you of this, that here is a man talking about emancipation. He's talking about an individual having under his feet the world, the flesh, and the devil. We'll get to it a bit later, but he says in all these things, and he doesn't leave you to fill in the blanks, he fills them in himself. I love to read the Apostle Paul, do you know why? He snubbed the devil. The devil never pushed the apostle around, he pushed the devil around. I'm going to make a guess that when, when, when Paul died they had a half day's holiday in hell, they were so glad about it. Never once did Satan get the victory over the Apostle Paul. He triumphed. No man ever had such a massive theology. No man ever saw further, deeper into the pit of human depravity. I think one of the most alert writers today, that is not on the shallow sensational stuff, but a deep writer, is that wonderful man of the Liabré Fellowship in Switzerland. And that gracious man says in his book Death in the City, Schaeffer, God has given up on the cities of America. He's written finish on them. That's why they're such hotbeds of rebellion. That's why we've got cities, whole cities that are bankrupt. The whole world has been asking, why does the greatest country in the world, with the greatest city in the world, New York, why is it bankrupt? And the other mayors of different cities say we're teaching on the edge of bankruptcy. But you see our greatest problem is we're morally bankrupt, we're spiritually bankrupt. And I remind you again that that gracious man says that for 40 years he has watched America going down the drain, and that's not not nice. He's like Jeremiah. He saw a nation alternating with fits of depression and darkness and devilry, and then coming around and trying to say they were the chosen people of God, and then slumbering down in the mire again. He reminds us that in China, that great godless anti-Christ, anti-God, anti-biblical, anti-American country, though we're trying to woo it, that in that nation eight centuries ago every town and city had a thriving New Testament Church. Eight hundred years ago, where is she tonight? Nobody, I say, saw the depths of depravity. He saw that because men had rejected the message and the Son of God, that God gave them up to uncleanness. If you want to read a very vivid, dramatic, stirring, disturbing account of that, read J. B. Phillips's translation of the first chapter of Romans. Men have given up the natural course with women and were doing the devilish things they're doing today. Isn't it amazing that the Methodists have recently said that they're not going to condemn a man if he comes into the ministry because he's a homosexual? They've dedicated a church to homosexuals in California recently and they opened it by having communion because they said it's the only way to have it. And the ministry is a homo, and all the fellows there are homosexual. I say this before God, I'd as soon give communion to a dog as give it to those people. Man, if you and I knew how near America is to judgment, I say as I said last night, you would have come to church tonight in sackcloth. God gave him up to depravity. They walked in there uncleanness. But you see this man, if he has had a picture of the depravity, if he sees the snake pit of the human heart, if he sees how twisted and distorted men can become. And I'm not talking theory, I lived two years in the subculture of New York with folk that did sex things I never dreamed existed. Sex with animals, sex with each other, live like devils, slept all day, went to hell every night. And I saw those people as twisted and distorted and dirty and doomed as damned as any man this side of eternity, and Jesus saved them. And Paul doesn't care how terrible the malady is, he's not concerned about the malady, he's concerned about the remedy. He said in Romans 8 at 725, he is able to save to the uttermost, and the gutter most, and the mutter most. And therefore at the end of this amazing chapter he says, we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. One of the favorite hymns in my church, I have a church too, I have two dozen members, and one of the favorite hymns in my church is Beneath the Cross of Jesus. I think I weep every week when we sing it. It's a beautiful hymn. One phrase in it always gets to me, I ask no other sunshine than the sunshine of thy face. Dr. Tozzi used to say to me, Len, you know Christians don't tell lies, they just sing them. Is it true you ask no other sunshine than the sunshine of his face? A phrase that rips me every time I sing it, content to let the world go by. You let it go by today. Did you ever try and jolt somebody before they slipped into hell? Has it caused you any agonizing tears? Yes sir, this man had the greatest concept of human depravity, and he has the greatest concept of the redemptive work of Jesus Christ. We used to say when we were kids, what happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable mass? I never found the answer to that, but I'll tell you what. Calvary and the power of the Spirit is an irresistible force, and sin is not an immovable mass. The only reason there's an America tonight is not because we signed the Declaration of Independence, it's because 34 years before that signing there was a revival swept this country. Paul, oh he says so many things in this chapter I don't know where to start really. And I guess I won't know where to end either, but anyhow let's try. Romans 7 is a chapter on the tomb. Romans 8 again is a chapter on triumph. Think of, think of just, I'm just going to read this. I'm not going to preach tonight, I promise you that. I'm going to preach tomorrow night. I got a word from the Lord tomorrow night that just about tore me up. I don't care if I don't sleep a wink tonight, that doesn't bother me. But I tell you tomorrow night, if you love me, I think there are three of you that do, somewhere I can't see you, but if you love me you really pray for me for tomorrow night because I'm gonna really preach tomorrow night. It'll tear me up as well as you. If you can find any reason not to come tomorrow night, stay away. See your mother-in-law. Go get blessed in a bowling alley, that's where most of you get it anyhow. But anyhow, so tonight I'm going to share some thoughts with you here. I caught Dr. Tozer off and he was such a blessing to me brother Peter, that's right. And he said to me, you know, as soon as man got alienated from God, he got interested in things. Now I was reading through this epistle, pardon me, this chapter this afternoon, and I noticed how many times Paul says that. In verse 5 he says, they that are after the flesh do mind the things, the things of the flesh. That they that are after the spirit mind the things of the spirit. Get that? And then that very famous popular verse, Romans 8 28, all things work together for good. Not something, all things. Losses as well as gain, invisible things as well as visible, things that are bitter that as well as those of the sweet, all things work together. Mr. Chadwick used to tell us the only way to read that verse is backwards way. To them that love God, to them that are called according to his purpose, all things work together for good. If you read it the right way, the forward way, it doesn't make so much impression. But if you read it from the end first, to them that love God, all things work together for good. To them that love God, to them that are called according to his purpose. Now notice what he says in verse 31. What shall we say then to these things if God be for us? Come on lift your head up. If God be for us, who can be against us? Notice really what he says in verse 37. Nay, in all these things. Here, you can almost make a contempt there can't you? Things, so what? And then he finishes verse 38. I think he kind of put his shoulders back and laughed in the face of the devil and said, you haven't got an invention in hell that can separate me. That's what he says doesn't he? Because he says here at the end of verse 38, I am persuaded. Are you persuaded tonight? Paul was a persuaded man. He was persuaded that God was able to keep that which he had committed unto him. I am persuaded that neither height, nor depth, nor any other creature can separate me from the love of God. For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principality, nor things present, nor things to come. If that isn't defiance, will you tell me what is? You see one day, this man was going down the Damascus road. You know what? A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument. Never listen to a bachelor that talks to you about marriage. A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument. And as I said last night, Paul, he has such a panoramic view of the world. He was going down the Damascus road, breathing out threatening. He carried in his toga there, he carried a document that said he could put any Christians he liked to death. And he did exactly what this blundering, blind, bankrupt age that you and I are living did. He reckoned on everybody but Jesus Christ himself. And Jesus slipped off his throne and let him in the road. And Paul said, who art thou, Lord? And on that road he said, he revealed himself to me, and then he said, in the wilderness the school of silence that's still open if you want to go, and it costs you nothing. On the Damascus road God revealed himself to me, and there in the wilderness he revealed himself in me. And then he sought up into heaven. I don't know all he saw except it was just so marvelous. The Lord said, don't ever say a word about it as long as you're dead. Never put a strain like that on a woman you know this. But the Lord said, as long as you live you can't share anything that you saw. And he never did. And I sometimes wonder if God rolled out a plan of the ages from the incarnation to the consummation. I wonder if he saw the day in which you and I live. I wonder if he saw the depravity that was going to try and strangle the world finally before Jesus comes. But I'll tell you whatever happened there on that Damascus road, and then there when he and God were alone, and God stripped him. The greatest brain the world ever had. Roll Socrates, play to anybody you like in a bundle, they don't come near him. He went there in the silence. What happened? He became spiritually pregnant. He birthed these churches to whom he's writing here. He birthed these epistles in the Holy Ghost. And God put something in him that when you put him in the water 36 hours in the Mediterranean, the waves couldn't wash it out. And they lashed him 195 times, they couldn't whip it out. And the devil chased him and he couldn't scare it out of him. And they wouldn't give him any food and they couldn't starve it out of him. And me thinks brother, sister, you and I had better get an experience like that before long because the roof's gonna come in before we've got much further. God hasn't raised you up to be a bottle-fed baby from here to eternity. He's coming to get his dues out of your life. He's invested a lot in you. He didn't save you to escape eternal fire, that's a fringe benefit. He saved you that you might be conformed to the image of his Son. And however costly that may be, if you'll obey God, oh you may escape now, but brother he'll get you before long anyhow. I'm making comments on this chapter, they're very beautiful I think. Look what he says in verse 9. Come on now, don't think I'm standing here waving the traffic out to get to heaven and out to go the other way. I'm not. I'm you to participate right here. Is this your experience? Look at verse 9. Well let me go back a minute. You see lots of people say today when you talk about a victorious life, well you know what Paul said. Yeah I know what Paul said. I heard, he's dead now, Dr. Campbell Morgan, I heard him preach many times. I heard him preach one day and again to quote Dr. Wilbur Smith. He said that man had a mystique, that he could come into an audience and stand there and open the Bible and immediately something radiated from him. I heard him give a message on holiness, it was marvelous. I couldn't believe it was true. He talked about the sanctified life, the life of holiness, the indwelling Spirit, and then at the end, in case he encouraged us too much, but he said, remember this dear friend, even the great apostle said. What did he say? Well he quoted what's in the end of Romans chapter 7. Oh wretched man that I am. Well I didn't need the Lord to tell me that, I knew a lot a long while before the Lord told me that. I don't need the Lord to tell me with a lot of wretched Christians, I know that well enough. But you see we tag on to that another statement and we say, and now listen, listen what the scripture says. The scripture says that they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But read the next verse, you're not in the flesh. Now what do you do with it? This flesh, yes. But a fleshy nature, a lusting, sinful, greedy, lustful nature, no. You see Paul here uses one of the most amazing terms in all his career. He says, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Now what do you do? Is that the end of the story? In the original there are no chapters, there's no seventh chapter, an eighth chapter. The seventh goes right on into the eighth. Now what do you do? You stay at the end of Romans 7 and say, Paul is saying all through his life, oh wretched man that I am. I have another war warring in my members. What does he say? He says, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Well tell me tonight, can Buddha do it? Can Confucius do it? Can transcendental meditation do it? No sir, a thousand times over. There is one who is able to do it. You see, all around here we've got a few crosses, there isn't one here at the moment, but at a cross, the usual type of a cross. Do you know there were a hundred and twenty different types of crosses? There was a traditional cross, there was a cross like a letter T, like that, in which a man's head was allowed to drop back. There was a cross like a letter X, where a man's body was stretched up, his arms went up each section of the X, and there he was crucified. There was another cross, it was a straight tree like this, with a spike, and they pushed the man's body on it, and turned his body any old way they like, like a propeller, and left him to hang on the birds to eat him. But there's another crucifixion worse than any of them. That was it, if you murdered a man, or another person, they will take the dead body of the person you murdered, and they will crucify you to the body, to the dead body. There's the corpse, you made you lay down on it. They strapped your arm to the other arm, your leg to the other leg, the trunk to the other trunk, the neck to the other, to that neck, and then they stood you up and said get going, and you staggered everywhere with a body of death. And gradually of course it became rigid with death. The mortification, the stench, the maggots would work inside, inside in the bowels, the whole body would degenerate, and you could try to go to sleep with that rotten thing. And if you were struggling down the road after two or three days, and the stench had made you vomit, and you're just about as sick and weak, and feeling as horrid as you could, and you saw a friend and said, hey Jack, cut this body off from me. Okay, there's nobody around. He gets his knife out, and he cuts the ropes off, and he's just gonna cut the last, and you look up and there's a Roman center. What are you doing? I'm liberating my friend. The law doesn't allow you to do that. Oh yes it does, yes it does, yes it does. Go ahead. On one condition, the one condition is if you free that man from that corpse, that corpse will be tied to your body. Do you love him enough now to have the body? Oh no sir, no I won't cut it. I don't want that stinking rotten corpse attached to my body. All right, we'll tie him up again. Now Paul has been talking about the law, and we say so much about the law, but read the seventh chapter. He says the law is holy. He says the law is spiritual. You see the law could bring condemnation. It could point out sin, but it couldn't cast out sin. Can the law do it? No. Who can deliver me, he says, wretched man, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? And he says there's no answer to it, but then he says yes there is. Thanks be unto God, through Jesus Christ my Lord. You see in the sixth chapter he says when when Jesus died we were crucified with him. Were we? Romans 6 6 says that, knowing this that our old man is, not was, is crucified with him. The trouble in the Church of God today is we preach half a salvation. We tell people how to get rid of a lot of lousy sins. We don't tell them how to get rid of a principle inside that has dominion over them. And this is exactly what Paul is talking about in this epistle. This is why I say it's the Son of a soul set free. All right come over to verse 9 please quickly, time's going. You're not in the flesh but in the Spirit. Come on tonight, are you in the Spirit or in the flesh? Have you got secret lusts? What's biting you on the inside? An unforgiving spirit? A grudge? Laziness? Jealousy? Anger? Secret lusts? What is it? He says you're not in the flesh but in the Spirit. If so be, now listen, the Spirit of God dwelleth in you. Look at the next verse, verse 10. If Christ be in you. Look at the 11th verse. The Spirit of him that raised up Jesus dwells in you. Man alive, how in God's name can you be indwelled? By God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost to be defeated. Don't argue with me about it. Scratch it out of your Bible if you don't believe it. If you're a Christian you're an indwelled person. God dwells in you, the Father dwells in you. That's what it says. I didn't write that did I? I write good books, but they're not as good as this. The Holy Ghost wrote it. And he says I want you to know that if you're really born of God, God dwells in you. And the Son dwells in you. He that hath the Son hath life. He that hath not the Son, doesn't matter how many, if they baptize you three times a day, won't make you a Christian. He that hath the Son hath life. He that is born of God. And he that hath the Spirit of God dwelling in him. All right just come down a little bit further in the chapter. Look at verse 22. We know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together. Do you think it's doing that tonight? Men have dreamed of a utopia from Augustine's city of God down to Goliath's travels, if you want it for your children. And Moore had his utopia, and Francis Bacon had his utopia, and I'm not going to tell you how many more. Hitler said you could dominate the world by a pure race. The Marxists say the only way to clean the world up is get rid of the flappy bourgeois folk we have around here and rule by revolution. The creation groaneth. I think, and you may disagree, but I think we've started to see the domino theory break up one of the greatest countries in the world, and that's Africa. I noticed a little Tom Thumb politician, Hervon Kissinger, is there right now. And in the mail I read today, in the Herald, the Miami Herald, he says he's going to see that America does not buy any chrome. The highest chrome in the world is made in Rhodesia. Ian Smith is a born-again, believing, preaching Christian. He's the president of the country. He's a friend of a friend of mine. The highest standard of living for colored people in Africa is in Rhodesia. Kissinger isn't even going to go in. He's begging opinions from other people. That's not fair judgment. But he says I'll see America doesn't buy chrome. I hope he'll also see that they don't put it on Russian boats and double the price that they've been doing and send it here. He says we can't let the weak people down. All right, since he got $90,000 at a Nobel Prize, which came out of dynamite, why doesn't he spend his $90,000 and blast the Berlin Wall? If it's after the oppressed people, well what about Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia and Estonia and all those border countries that were swallowed up and signed away so graciously by Mr. Ford in the Helsinki agreement? Come on now. He says I'm going to help the oppressed people. Then when he comes home he'll be campaigning for the Indians all over this country, huh? How hypocritical can you get? The whole creation growneth. Was it Bacon that said the only way to liberate the nation is to, no I forget the one who said that, but he said the only way to to liberate a nation is to have a philosopher king and and upgrade education. We've upgraded education and downgraded morality. Ten years ago you couldn't get into Harvard, a girl couldn't get into Harvard, at Yale they were not co-ed. They're not co-ed tonight, they're co-bed. The big shops down there say it's not our business to interfere with what the kids do upstairs. I bet it would be if they set fire to the place. The whole creation growneth. I've asked you more than once, did it cost you a tear when you heard that 50 million people were signed off in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia? 50 million people went into captivity, did it cost you a tear? 110 million people behind the Iron Curtain, has it cost you a tear? Or are you still rehearsing your choir number for Sunday? Yes, I believe every earthquake we have, whether it's Guatemala or anywhere, I believe it's a sign of a whole groaning creation. Creation grown! Will you notice what he says a little further down? In the next verse 23 that we, not only creation, but we ourselves also have the first fruits of the Spirit. If you're the first fruits of the Spirit, here's a proof, here's a proof, here's a proof you have it. You know what it says? That you're grown within yourself. Do you? After the Holy Ghost came in and he knows the mind of God and nobody does but the Spirit, and the Spirit whispers the secret of God to you, and some nights you can't sleep, and you're like a woman who wants to get delivered of something and it isn't time, and you're grown within yourself. I'll tell you the secret of getting revival in the church, find half a dozen people that know how to groan, you won't have the same church in a year. But you can't learn groaning except by the Holy Ghost, it's the school of the Holy Spirit. And if you think that's unusual, look at verse 26 in which he says, Likewise the Spirit helpeth our infirmities, we know not what we should pray for us we ought, but the Spirit itself, really a bad translation, the Spirit himself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Huh? And verse 27, the Spirit because he maketh intercession for the will of God. Hey, that's pretty advanced Christianity isn't it? Huh? We know not what to pray, oh we know how to give God a shopping list. We know how to tell God do this, that, oh the pastor said remember to pray for the building fund. The devil doesn't care if you build a church from here to Miami, that won't worry him. But somehow if we can get people so desiring the anointing of God, that they'd rather pray with groanings and tears and sing like Galli Coetzee, or have a better voice than Richard Tucker had in the, in the, in the opera in New York. Now I've heard people say when it says that we pray with groanings, it's like praying in tongues, it's nothing of the kind, because if it was, God would say so. It's beyond that. The greatest language of prayer has no vocabulary. The greatest prayers in the Bible have no words. Friday night I think I'm going to talk on Hannah. Do you remember Hannah, how she prayed? And even the man of God thought the priest thought she was drunk, and she groaned, and she trammeled, she was barren. I suggest to you with all the little pretty little conferences we have going on now about the Holy Spirit and all the rest, we're a barren people before God. We have no revival in the land. But I'll tell you this, when the Holy Ghost comes and begins to burden people, it's a pretty pretty rough thing to learn the true language of intercession. But the Spirit helpeth our infirmities. Let's come to this verse right here for a minute or two. In all these things, he's mentioned them, sort them out when you go home, will you? Tribulation, distress, famine, peril, nakedness, sword, perils of the deep, so forth, so on. Sort them out, put them in little sections like that, and you'll find that some of them are things that attack the body, some attack the mind, some attack the spirit. And he says in all these things, there is no area in your life where as a Christian you're expected to be defeated. You say I can't be perfect, can't you? Are you sure? Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, be ye therefore perfect. He said of Job, to the devil hast thou considered my servant Job. He's perfect and upright. He set a task for Abraham before the Holy Ghost was given, as we know, and he said, walk before me and be thou perfect. You can't have Adamic perfection in your body, you can't have mental perfection. There are many areas you can't have perfection, but you can have perfect obedience. And we sing the song, perfect submission, all is at rest. And the only way you can have rest is by perfect submission, to know there's no rebellion in your spirit in any area at all. In all these things we're more than conquerors. You know what gets us very often? We get so discouraged, we get so earthbound, we lose sight of the majesty of God, we forget this, that God has branded you as a child of God, and he lives in you, and the Spirit lives you, and the Christ lives in you, and we let little trivial rubbish round about us upset us. And notice what he says in verse 33, who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died. Now here is your strength. Notice in this verse again, verse 34, who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died. Can Christ's death be contested? Satan knows better than that. And then he says, he is risen again at the right hand. Can the sovereignty of Jesus Christ be contested? And then he says at the end of the verse, he maketh intercession for us. Is there any way that the prayers of Jesus Christ can be sabotaged? I was in a place a few years ago, and a man came to see me, a lawyer. And he said, we've read something you've written, and a bunch of us got together, and I want to tell you this, we've got thirty million dollars behind us, and we'll buy you the largest tent in America, we give you a bigger wage than Billy Graham. He went on his wonderful story, and so forth and so on. And oh, he made such a dangling prize of it. And I said to him, I'm not a bit interested. The only thing I'm interested is in getting right into the dead center of the will of God, and knowing this, that I'm just where God wants me to be. There is no other prize as far as I'm concerned. You see, if I'm a believer, I have the protection, this is what this verse says, I have the protection of the death of Jesus. If he is risen, I not only have protection, I have propitiation. He's justified. Not only that, if he justifies me, I've not only protection and propitiation, I have prayer that's offered by him. I told you that the editor of Decision came and talked with me a while ago, we had a very interesting time, and how that he said that two million people a day pray for Billy Graham. And I said, that's great, I'm not interested, I want them to pray for me. He said, what do you mean? I said, because God says if two of you shall agree, that's all. That's why the greatest soul winner that America ever had, Charles G. Finney. Oh, you may disagree with his theology, he did not believe in original sin. He believed in acquired depravity. He believed a child was pure, until it voluntarily transgressed. The argument is, you have sin in you. Did you want it? No. And God's gonna send you to hell for having what you didn't want, and you didn't get. God puts sin in you, and he sends you to hell for having it. No sir, he says that's not true. A child is born pure and innocent, and somewhere it acquires depravity. Well, whether you like his theology or not. I'll tell you one thing I like about him, amongst others. He said, nobody told me about the Holy Ghost or any baptism. But I was going over Boston Common, and he suddenly said, waves of glory came over me. And he said, I felt as though I'd burst. And you know what he did? A little while after he said, other waves of glory. He said he had repeated baptisms of the Holy Spirit. You know, one of the great weaknesses of the day in which we live is this. You've only to come to here, and asked to be full of the Spirit, and you've got it made from here to eternity. Now that's not true. I think the most splendid example of a Spirit-filled life wasn't even the Apostle Paul, with all his achievements. I think the greatest was that young man, maybe not 20 years of age, when they martyred him. That young man by the name of Stephen. And he was full of the Holy Ghost, and he was full of wisdom, and he was full of love. If I had a glass here, I don't have one. If I had a glass, and I filled it with water to the top, could I fill it with something else without emptying it? You say logically no, and I say sure I could. Let's change it. Here we've got a beautiful, beautiful church. A couple of hours ago, if you come in, there was nobody in. You look in and say it's empty. It wasn't empty, it had air in it, otherwise you couldn't have breathed. It was already full, full of air. A few minutes ago, the building that was full, was filled with praise. Oh how you sang so beautifully. It's nearly filled with people. It was full when we started. But on that fullness, you fill fullness again. You didn't empty it, it's full. It's full of air, it's full of people, it was full of praise, it's full of light. You could turn something on and make it cold, and we say bye, it's filled with cold air. Or you could heat it up and make it, you see it was full to start, you keep filling. Now the Apostle Paul pray that people may be continually filled, and he prays that they may be filled with the knowledge of his will, as well as being filled with the Holy Ghost. There are many of you tonight, claim to be filled with the Holy Ghost, and you're wandering around in circles, you're not filled with the knowledge of his will. Possibly not even filled with love, maybe not filled with peace. He says I pray that you may be filled with joy. That's why I like this chapter, it's such a marvelous chapter. Man alive, he's more than conqueror, he says, over all these things. And then the old accusing devil comes and says, now just look at this, and look at that. You know what Toze used to say, he used to say to me, Len, I talk back to the devil. Do you ever talk back to him? Tell him where to go now to get there? Hmm? Or do you constantly get whipped from him? We suffer for the accusation, listen, as long as you live, till you get to the pearly gates, Satan will accuse you. That's his job, he's the accuser of the brethren. Even if you've done nothing wrong, he'll try to make you feel bad, he's a liar from the beginning. You know, if you sat down and contemplated every day how precious you really are, and I'm not facetious, all sarcastic, how precious you really are in the sight of God. In Washington, up there, Smithsonian Museum, I guess, there's a bit of an apron with a dirty brown mark on it. I haven't seen it, but I read this. And the Rockefellers have a bit of money, they own America, and yet the Rockefellers can't buy that apron. It looks like a chocolate stain, and the apron isn't worth much. But when they were carrying the great emancipator, Lincoln, out of that theater, and as they passed the little girl, his blood fell on her apron. And immediately somebody said, that's sacred for America, get hold of it. And there's nothing in the world can buy that thing which is stained with blood. And I want to tell you tonight, in face of the world, the flesh, and the devil, and all hell and communism, that if the blood of Jesus Christ is on you tonight, you're worth more than all the wealth in Fort Knox or anywhere else in the world. You're precious to him, why? Because his blood is upon you, that's why. Oh sure, they'll accuse you, that's what Paul says here, isn't it? Are you going to get upset, he says, because you have tribulation, or distress, or famine, or peril, or nakedness? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? And listen, I'll tell you what God Almighty says he'll do if they do that. Listen to this, will you. Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you. To you who are troubled, rest with us, he says. Now he's saying this and I won't tell you where, but he says it in his writing. To you who are troubled, rest with us. The Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and to the glory of his power, when he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe. The point is, it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to those that trouble you. You say, if you say something bitter about another Christian, before ever it hits them, it hits the Son of God. If you stand on my toe, if I had an injection and you put me out of commission, you could stand on my toes, cut me up, I wouldn't feel it. But if I'm normal, and I am, and you stood on my toe, my head would react the first. When you criticize somebody bitterly, the pastor, the deacons, the elders, when you say some nasty, horrible thing, before ever it hurt that people, it hurt the Son of God. Because in as much as you do it to the least of these, you do it to these. My brethren, you do it unto me. Now what are you going to do with this text? Quickly, I'll try to get to it in ten minutes. What are you going to do with this text? What is this text? In all these things we are, verse 37, we are more than conquerors. That's beyond the bound of logic. How can you be more than a conqueror? Somebody asked an old preacher how he could be more than conquerors. He said, well you shoot three birds and kill four. Now that's not good. You can do three things with this text. You can say it's a statement by an ignorant, irresponsible person. They're trying to overload you with confidence. You can be more than conqueror. That's one thing you can do with it. The second thing is, you can say it's an unbalanced statement by a super optimist. The third thing is, you can say there here's a man talking about out of experience. In all these things, he said, we are more than conquerors. Now I can't prove this, but I'm usually right. I think the Apostle Paul got repeated baptism. You know the pastor said tonight while the offerings been taken, pray. And I prayed. I said Lord give them all a baptism of generosity. Well I think there were situations in which the Apostle Paul prayed for special benefits, special blessings. Do you know there isn't a man on God's earth knows how the next phase of revival will come. It's coming, don't make any mistake about it, but God's gonna do it his way. Don't mention this, but they don't even have the blueprint in Dallas Theological Seminary. But anyhow. You know God has wonderful ways of working. Before my sweetheart and I left Baton Rouge about a little over a year ago now. They had the state conference, the Baptist state conference in the First Baptist Church in Baton Rouge, big beautiful place. And they had said that a colored preacher would be there. He's a fantastic preacher. Billy Graham has him all the time in his meeting. After they burned, they had the riots in Watts, you remember? Burned up 13 million dollars worth of property. And everybody ran away. And this great big fine godly spirit filled colored man went in there and worked a revolution. He put Acts 2 & 3 together. And he built homes for the people. And he got furniture. And it's a totally transformed community. I'd love to hear him preach. And I went to hear him preach. He didn't turn up, he was fog-bound in Alabama. Billy Graham says he inspires me every time he preaches. Somebody asked him, was he on the left wing or the right wing? He said, brother I don't care about the wings, give me the bird. Hmm well I like that. And so somebody substituted. Well I'm sure God didn't make any mistake. This man said I've been up in the Carolinas. And he mentioned a certain church. And he mentioned how God works in revival. One pastor got desperate. He said my people come to church, pray their tithes, routine. They've no passion, no vision. They're worldly. They enjoy bowling a lot more than groaning. They like fishing for tiddlers in the water much more than fishing for men. The more of them are traveling than travailing. And he said to his wife, another man and woman in the church, can we agree together that God will send us revival? And they did. They prayed all night. Sometimes it's very painful when, in fact, I don't know when God ever does any blessing without painfulness. If he could have done it without painfulness he'd have done it for his son. But his son had to go through the horrors of Gethsemane and the cross. So this preacher and his wife, and the other man and his wife, she prayed the organ I think, prayed. And God began to move. Moved them nearly all out of the church. From about 450 people they went down to about 45. And he thought well now Lord, Lord put the brake on here. It's going to stop here isn't it? The Lord said no not yet. And they went down until they were a very select company. The preacher and his wife, the oldest deacon and the organist, four of them. And instead of shutting the shop up he said keep on praying. Great, God's moving. Well he sure was. They never asked him to move that way, but after all you tell God to move, he does it. And he said for weeks I preached to four people. Didn't take long to take the offering. And he didn't need any committee meetings. For once the church was united. And then he said God began to turn the tide. And they started coming back, people got saved, and now he said he had hundreds of people. In another community they heard about this, and thought my that's great. Let's ask God to work. You see the Holy Spirit is so wonderful. As I said last night, he's the Spirit of truth, and he convicts of error. He's the Spirit of life, he convicts of death. He's the Spirit of power, he convicts of weakness. He's a Spirit of joy, and he convicts of sorrow. And he's the Spirit of love. I'm going to tell you this, that I believe tonight if the true Church of Jesus Christ, every true believer in America had a baptism of love. I thought there was somebody behind me. If every believer in America had a baptism of love, the church will be back in business. So a preacher says that's the answer. God hath not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, and of power, and of a sound mind. He preached on it, and the chaplain called him from the local jail. I hear you, you've got to love church. I hear people go up to each other, and hug each other, and sometimes kiss each other. I hear the church is doing better than it did, and it's all true. What about it? Oh well he said I have a man coming out of jail on Monday. He's just finishing a life sentence. He murdered one or two people so forth, and his wife died while he's in jail. He doesn't know any relatives. He needs a home. Does your church have that kind of love that gets out of the door, and comes down the street? Well I hope so. Well would you ask the church on Sunday morning if anybody would take this man in? He hasn't a home, he hasn't a suit, he hasn't anything. Would anybody take him in? So after the Sunday morning he preached another stirring message on love, and he said take a seat. And when he said that after the last hymn, they knew the trouble coming some kind. And so he said what I've told you, is there a couple in the church that would give this man a bedroom, and feed him, and we'll get a suit for him somewhere. Did this love really get down there? Is it a philosophy or a part of your faith? Is it faith that worketh by love? Faith without works is dead. Would you like to give him a bedroom? Would you like to feed him? And people looked around, and he said if any couple would do this, would you kindly stand? And the whole church stood. They bowed the preacher over, he couldn't see them. She had more tears in that five minutes than he'd ever. They got the man in a home, and he made real good. A while after the chaplain called, he said preacher, do you have anybody else would take some? Yeah, yeah, oh a hundred or more couples stood. And they kept taking them, and taking them, and taking them. And you'd say, you see that man over there, boy he was in that, you remember that big murder in New York? He was a ringleader. The whole town began to talk about it. One day the chaplain called and said they had a very bad character, would somebody give him a home? I don't need to ask, he said I just got a signal, they're going to take him. And a dear old retired couple who had a magnificent home, took this man in, fed him, clothed him, did everything for him like a son, and he lived on it, he thrived on it. And one morning the cops came to the door of the pastor and said, sir we want to see you. What happened? You know Mr. so-and-so, the retired businessman that took him that year? Neighbors reported they hadn't seen them yesterday, and we went in the house, and they found a body bloody and battered out of all shape, lying on the rug, and he was battered to death in the other room. So everybody came up, you know how wise they are, told him it wasn't like that. They didn't say it had worked in 20 other cases, they always plunge on the one that doesn't work, you see. And they had a funeral in that church, it was some funeral. The church was jammed, the caskets were there, the preacher couldn't get through. All he could say, greater love hath no man than this, that he laid down his life for his friend. They gave all that they could give, and in return what did they get? Got battered to death. A couple of weeks after the prison, the phone rang for the preacher. Hello? This is the prison chaplain. I know what happened. But remember this, you've got about 19 good cases to the one that went rotten. I've got a man coming out of prison Monday morning. Do you think anybody in your church has, isn't there something in about the Bible that says about a love that beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth, endureth? Preacher, would you happen to have a couple that could really endure it after all that's happened? Well he said, I'll tell you this, it's been a traumatic experience for my church. There's been a lot of discussion, a lot of arguments, and there's been a lot of unhappiness. But I'll ask them on Sunday, and so Sunday morning he said, would you kindly take your seat? And he told them about the man coming out of jail, and he said, I know what's in your mind. But the man coming out of jail didn't do it, you know, he needs his chance. I hardly dare look at my congregation, he said, but I will. He said, is there anybody here would give this man his chance? Would you kindly stand? The whole church stood. Love works many, many miracles that theories and philosophies and theology doesn't work. And if the Holy Ghost is anyone at all, the Word of God says that he, the first thing he does in your life when he comes in, he hangs his shingle up. That's what he does. You know what it says on the shingle? The fruit of the Spirit is power. No, no, tongues. No, no. What is it? Oh you know what it is. The first thing. You know that I felt in a real mischievous mood today. I wish I knew all your names and addresses and had a bit of time. I'd come around when you're not looking and I'd slip in your backyard and see youngsters praying. I'd say, hey, I want to ask you something. What church does your dad go to and your mom? Are they really filled with the love of God? Do they ever argue? Do they ever say nasty things? Do they cuddle you every day and put you to bed with a kiss and a prayer? Do they ever tell you you're the most precious thing in the world? Do they ever tell you about the love of Jesus? You see, we've got the idea you've got the Holy Ghost to be anointed with the Holy Ghost to be a missionary, to be a preacher. Well that's great, you must have that. Let me say about three things here. Look, this man says we're more than conquerors through him that loved us. More than conquerors. You know when those three Hebrew children went into a burning fiery furnace, they were conquerors. But when the form of the fourth, like unto the Son of God, came and they walked out, they were more than conquerors. Do you know what the fire did for them? Well those, they were preachers, my kind, they didn't have much money and they had no penknife and they tied them up. And all the fire did was burn off them what the devil put on them. Did you say you want to go in the fire? Oh excuse me. Hmm? The fire didn't touch them, the hair wasn't singed, the clothes didn't smell. All that happened was that those boys who were tied up, when they got in the fire they were liberated. And they didn't murmur when they went in, they said God can deliver us and if not. And Jesus says I like that. I'm coming down to talk with you. And the old king says, hey what, how many boys do you put in? Three. There's another one, he looks like the Son of God. They lowered Daniel down, down, down. You know into that, into that cave, took the stone off. And the king says that's the end of him. Those lions have been hungry for a day or two. And the men up there said they, they had their teeth in there. And Daniel got down, he said man you smile bigger than anybody I've ever seen I think. Lay down and they all laid down and he felt to see which had the softest belly. You got it son, he said goodnight. And the king was upstairs on his soft bed and they spread the room so the boogs wouldn't get to him. And, they did everything nice for him. And he put his head down, he thought somebody filled the pillow with broken glass, he couldn't sleep. Daniel, Daniel went down into the lion's den. The lions wouldn't eat him, he was all grit. But when he got down there, he just fell asleep. And the king walked around and he said boy I can't sleep. He said come on let's go down. Daniel, he said why the call at two o'clock in the morning? You're just getting to sleep. Yeah, is your God able to live? He said yeah it's fine. Great down here. You want to come? He wouldn't have lasted long down there. Even though the hell if God is with you. There are some precious Christians that love Jesus about 10 million times more than you and I. That are sleeping in rat's conditions in Zoological Archipelago. Kissinger's a liar, he won't read about that. But I'll take Sultan Ensign. You know what Sultan Ensign said the other day on the British BBC and shocked the nation? That it is totally impossible to stop detente. And America has become mesmerized with it. Two years ago you could have stopped Russia, there is nothing in the world can stop Russia now, he said. There's nobody on the post of that nation like that man. That's why I say the whole creation is groaning. And we need to groan for a groaning creation and we need to ask God to stay his anger. When Daniel went into the lion's den, he wouldn't compromise, he was a conqueror. But when they pulled him out and made him and changed the laws of the means and persons he was more than conqueror. Peter once kept his mouth shut, boy that was a miracle. They asked to borrow his boat and he said take it. And that was being a conqueror. But when they brought the boat back, filled with fishes right to the brim, that was more than conqueror. When Jesus went to the cross, he could have gone like that and destroyed every man that was listening. He could have cursed those people like he cursed the fig tree and he kept his mouth shut. And when he went to the grave with a sin of the world, he was a conqueror. When he rose from the dead he was more than conqueror. That's why this marvelous eight chapter is so majestic. The spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead. Has he raised you from the death of trespasses and sins? Has he raised you from the death of formality and self-righteousness? Come on, if he has, you're indwelt by God the Father, you're indwelt by God the Son, you're indwelt by the Holy Ghost. Do not America needs more than it needs some revivalists, it needs some Holy Ghost filled mothers and Holy Ghost filled fathers. Let me tell you one thing that'll let you go. Reluctantly, but I'll let you go. I came to America first in 1950 and I went to the Chicago Evangelistic Institute to speak. And they gave me a bedroom that had been occupied by Joseph Smith, not the Mormon, Joseph Smith the old holiness preacher. He's a wonderful man. Somebody said to him one day, wherever you open the Bible it opens at holiness. He said, I don't have to open it, it's on the cover. Holy Bible. He was going to a big conference to speak and a little country preacher heard about it. And he said, sir you don't preach till 11 o'clock Sunday morning. Would you be good enough to stop off at my country church? We never get the big preachers, we can't afford them. But you, you could get a, you could get a train later that night or the next morning and you'd be in the next town and you'll be there in time to preach. Would you do that? And he said, my brother I'd be delighted. And the very thing happened that they thought when he got there the church was jammed way, way back to the doors and they brought extra seats and everything. And dear old Joseph Smith had one great star sermon amongst others, Acts 1.8, ye shall receive power of the Holy Ghost is coming upon, the Holy Ghost coming upon you. And he stood up and introduced himself and said, I'm so glad to be here. And my text tonight is Acts 1.8, ye shall receive power, the Holy Ghost coming upon you. Usually witnesses unto me in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria to the uttermost parts of the earth. And his mind went blank. He waited a bit but it wouldn't take, it wouldn't come back. And he said just this, you think you need the Holy Ghost to be a missionary. You need the Holy Ghost to be a parent. And these were the old days, no wall carpeting, bare floors or sometimes you know some of that cholineolium. You need to be a Holy Ghost filled parent to get out of bed at two o'clock with a bawling baby and walk around till your feet are like blocks of ice. You won't remember that some of you, some of you older ones will. And put the baby back in bed without getting sour or bitter or complaint, just get back into bed in victory. And he said to the preacher, would you get the people to sing a song? And he thought yeah he's gonna rest and get his mind back. Instead of that he slipped off the platform and away he went. About three years after he was going to the same conference, the same pastor called and said, would you be good enough to stop off at this church? We had a fantastic meeting last time you're here. He said sure you sure did. You sure had a marvelous meeting. The only time in my life my message where my mind went blank, I lost out everything. I sure had a wonderful meeting. And the Lord said well why don't you go back, you're too proud. No I'll go back. When he got to the depot there was a preacher and he had a buggy, an old country truck. He said I'm gonna drive you myself. I want to tell you something. Do you remember when you were with us last time? Oh brother he said. I've heard the way, the wheels of the train all the way coming saying, fail it, fail it, fail it. Worst meeting of my, worst meeting, the best meeting we ever had in our life. Do you remember that you said you need the Holy Ghost to keep calm, with poise, even if you have to look after a baby at two o'clock in the morning. Yeah I said that. Well he said I said to the congregation, you know my wife and I have been married five years, we've no children but I don't think I could do that. So I'm gonna ask God the Holy Ghost to come in my life and make me that kind of parent. He said I knelt at the front and my wife came and the deacons came, the whole congregation came. And he said we're in such a time of weeping and wailing and seeking God but it changed our church. And then he said preacher, a few months after that my wife came and said darling, and I knew by the light in her eyes, we're gonna have a baby. We're gonna have a baby after six years. Oh he said, a little fellow came. Somebody ran to the house and said your wife went to hospital while you were out, you know, and she's had a baby and it's a boy, another preacher. And he dashed down to the country hospital as he went in and said pastor, pastor, I can't wait, I waited six years for this. Pastor, the doctor wants to see you. Went into a side room, there was the doctor. I've known you for a number of years, I've heard you preach. You preach about Christian faith and fortitude and something that says you can be conqueror in every circumstances, tribulation, distress, famine, peril, naked. I've heard you, I know it, I know Roman things. Yeah but why preach it now, my wife had a baby. And he told him, he said now I've delivered hundreds of babies but never a baby like this. He said listen pastor, I'm gonna tell you it's grim, it's terrible. You've got a baby, it's the most distorted baby I've ever seen in my life. It's face is slanting, it's mouth is slanting, it doesn't have arms, it has two little strings like carrots. It doesn't have any legs, it has two little red things that should have been legs but they aren't. And obviously the child is more than retarded. And he broke down and he said what did my wife say? She doesn't know. You didn't tell her? No we thought the only person that could tell you would be yourself. Oh well if you can't tell her, how could we tell her? Well the nurses put some screens round the bed, you go in and he went in and she said darling did you hear the news? You've got a boy. Well aren't you happy about it? What's wrong with you? He said sweetheart. Is there something wrong? And he told her. And as soon as he said, after he said the little child's face was twisted and it's eyes were slanting and it's face and it was messed up and it had these strings for legs and arms. As soon as he said that, as though he pulled the switch, she went insane. And here's a young godly preacher in the country with a crippled child and a wife that was insane. And for six weeks she alternated between insanity, insanity and she'd smile and say about the baby. My baby isn't here. Where is the baby? Please bring the baby. And then she'd shriek. I didn't have a baby, I had a freak. The church went to prayer and miraculously the woman's mind recovered. He said to his wife darling, I've no explanation for this. No explanation at all. I'm gonna make a deal with you. I'll have to prepare my sermons, I'll have to do my duties in the church. But he said when I come home at ten o'clock at night, I take over. I take over. You go to bed, I'll do the other thing. You go to bed at ten, I take over. And every night I take charge of that baby till eight in the morning. By this time of course poor old Joseph Smith was sobbing away there. And he said you know what? It seemed as though every morning at two o'clock that poor little helpless child would ball out. And he said I kept a coat there and I put it on and I picked up its little deformed body and I wrapped it up and he said I walked round that floor till my feet were like blocks of ice. I walked round and I walked round and I walked round. And sometimes it would go quiet in half an hour and sometimes it would go on for two or three hours and not go quiet. But he said I want to tell you something. That night when I knelt there I didn't say God make me another Apostle Paul. I didn't say Lord will you make me one of the most hell-fired flaming evangelists in history. I said will you take the irritability out of me? Will you take the anger out of me? Will you take the other things? And will you give me your peace? And will you love and reign in my heart in love? And will you please do this that if I had stood up to walk around the bedroom at night until I'm frozen with a baby in my arms I'll get back to bed in victory. And I want to tell you that for six months I had to get out of bed every night and I never got back into bed in defeat. And at the end of six months he said God mercifully took the little fellow to heaven. He said I think the only reason he sent him was to prove that I'd really been filled with the Spirit and that you can face circumstances like that. What knocked you out of kilter today? Wife burned the toast? There's some other tragedy? Come on. Why are you so hard to live with? You're not starving. You're all well-dressed. You got a little bit laid on one side and you get so irritable and upset and greedy. And people say sometimes you know I often ask the Lord to make me humble. I'll tell you how to make you humble. To get humble go home and sit down before your little kids right there and and just sit down and say do you think I'm like Jesus? And they'll say oh I remember a situation in which my boy was having some trouble and I got him on one side one day. He'd been to a college or a lot of a Bible school a lot of double standards and it was really troubling him. I took him on one side I mentioned his name and I said now don't you forget I'm your daddy right now. You forget you have a lovely mother there. Tell me this, have you seen anything in your mother's life or your daddy's life that will cause your feet to turn out of the way? Hmm? Have we ever let you down in any way? Don't think of my feelings. You know he gave me the greatest honor. I've had a few in my life. He gave me the greatest honor. He said if it weren't for mommy and daddy I'd have lost faith in most Christians I've met. But you live like Jesus in the home. I've never heard you quarrel. I've never seen anything wrong in this home that Jesus couldn't honor. That's my sweetheart if it's true. That doesn't give me any credit. It gives credit to him. You see when I asked God to come and fill my life with the Spirit I was, I was 15 years of age and already leading a youth team of almost evangelists, revivalists and we saw people get saved. I said to the kids let the other folk do what they want. You're going to come and meet me for prayer at 8 o'clock in the church on a Friday night. We prayed till about 10 and you're going to meet me in the church 6 o'clock Sunday morning and they came. I'm a debtor to America. Do you know why? Because outside of the New Testament the greatest thing I ever read was the life of David Brainerd. And I read that when he was about 18 years of age he met God. And I read that he died at the age of 28, the ripe old age of 28. And I read that he used to kneel in the snow when it was up to his chin, when he had to make a hole in it and pray until he said I prayed from sunrise till sunset and I couldn't touch the snow with the tips of my fingers. The heat of my body melted the snow and he had tuberculosis. And when he spit you'd have thought you've broken flowers up. And if you pick one of those things up about an inch long and got a little bit like that, it would have stretched like that, it was a piece of his lungs. And if you turn sideways you say who sprayed that? It was when he sneezed he sprayed it with snow, he sprayed the snow with his blood. And when other boys went to play ball I climbed over a fence over the golf links and I went and prayed behind the trees like David Brainerd did. And if the kids weren't coming to pray Sunday morning I went over the golf links again in the rain or the snow and I got under those wild branches and I prayed and I prayed and I found a hill and I stood on the hill with my hands up like Jesus did over Jerusalem and I prayed and I wept over it. Why? Because one day Jesus Christ showed me that just being a soul winner and being apparently a success in the church wasn't everything. I knew in my heart I got jealousy because another guy in the church could lead meetings better than I could. And there are other things in my heart that nobody knew a thing about. I remember going to that altar that day and in our church if you went to the altar somebody always came with an open Bible and quoted the scripture and this fellow said what do you want the Lord to do? And I said I wanted to make Romans 6-7 really in my life. Len you mean Romans 6-6 I mean Romans 6-7. You mean Romans 6-6 I mean Romans 6-7. He could have quoted Romans 6-7 from middle to the front to the back upside down inside out he knew it he could say it in his sleep. Knowing this that our old man was crucified. Romans 6-7 he that is dead is freed from sin. And I said when I came to the altar a while ago I got born again now I want to die. Did you die? Die to self-seeking? Die to public opinion? Die to ambition? Friend listen you have only one life it will soon be fast and only what's done for God will last and when we're dying how glad we shall be if the lamp of our life has been burned out for thee. God doesn't use men that are alive he uses men that are dead. He doesn't use sober men he uses drunk men. He doesn't use somebody's he uses nobody's. And the hardest thing I have to do is take my reputation and nail it to the cross and see it die. I was now about 19 years of age and I just got all my material ready to go in business and all the samples of suitings and and all the other things and boy I was going to make a stack. And I was cutting a suit in the factory and the Lord said this is it. Took the tape measure off my neck took my big shears and laid them down there were 8,000 people in the factory. And I said Lord I heard your call as clearly as those men heard it by the Galilean Lake. And here I am my altar isn't in the church my altar is my bench in the factory. Here you take this my spirit, my soul, my body, my mind, my will, all my faculties, all I have, all I'm going to have there they are take them. And I'll make you a promise I will never go back I won't even look back. I put my hand to the plow I had no money I wrote to colleagues that night I hope they'd turn me down and for some strange reason they accepted me. I had no money I managed to get a few gifts folk in the church gave me a little I had enough to get through one semester. I was going down the corridor one day I met a man who was a millionaire and he said Len I've known you since a little boy. Did God call you to preach? I said he did. What are you going to do if you don't get any money? I said go back to work and preach at weekends. He said all right I'll pay your bills as long as you're in college. Did you have any problems? I say that lest you're discouraged and think it can't happen to you. I owe my spiritual life after God to a saintly mother who influenced my life more than my preaching daddy. I never heard my mother gossip. I never heard her criticize anybody. I never saw her get angry. All I got when I came home from school was mother in one chair and grandmother in the other singing take time to be holy usually off key anyhow but they were singing take time to be holy and if it wasn't that it was trust and obey. Man I was born in a far better home than the Rockefellers. I was born in a home where a man the father was godly and the mother was a saint and I've been dealing with a man recently who's very wealthy and he said you know I've got nothing I've lost my family. I've lost my family. I've lived for money, success, fame. I've got them all. I've lost my family. In all these things where's your point of defeat tonight? Is it prayerlessness? Is it lack of love? Is it self-pity, self-seeking, self-glory, self-promotion? What is it? And I want to tell you God can put an end to it and you can leave this house and from tonight if you obey God. You can be more than conquered by the indwelling God, by the indwelling Holy Spirit of God. But you'll have to confess it. I can't confess it for you. If I could repent for you I'd be down there right now repenting for it. I can't do it. You have to do it. God can't do it for you. You have to do it. But your repentance, your humility, your sincere seeking God for that cancer within the breast, whatever it is, will bring the compassion and love of God and the cleansing of the blood and then the indwelling Holy Spirit. Let's sing 265. We'll start at verse 2. Remember this hymn is written by H. G. Spafford, a man that lost his millions and right after that he lost four daughters in a ship that sank. And when he got nearly to the coast of England he looked over the side of the boat because the officer had told him the day before, I'll tell you where your daughters were lost. And he looked over the side of the boat. He was hanging on to the rail as the boat went up and down. And the thought came to him sorrows are like sea below. I've got four darling well-educated daughters down there. My bank went down I've lost all my money. And he said I said thank you and I ran down to my my bedroom and got my pencil and I wrote this hymn right out without any pause. When peace like a river attendeth my way. When sorrows like sea billows rock. You may not be there maybe you're in the second verse eh? Though Satan should buffet. And boy has he buffeted you. And have people criticized you? And have you gone sour under it or have you got victory tonight? I said last night and say again you can't be a Christian and bear a grudge. You can be a backslider and bear a grudge. You can't be a Christian and bear a grudge. Hmm? Have you a choked up prayer life? Hmm? Does it really mean anything to you that millions are slaves? Does it mean anything to you that last year in 75 40% of the free world went down the drain? Hmm? Come on you may be the one key holding up revival. Maybe just you nobody else I don't know.