In this sermon, the speaker discusses the importance of redeeming the time and understanding the will of God. He shares personal anecdotes about being on the phone while doing various activities, such as walking the dog or playing golf, and how it can lead to distractions and forgetfulness. The speaker emphasizes the need to be filled with the Holy Spirit and to rely on God's power to overcome struggles and failures. He also highlights the significance of scripture memory in renewing the mind and living a life of purity. Overall, the sermon encourages listeners to make a deeper commitment to Jesus Christ and to turn away from doubt, fear, and the lies of the devil.

I want you to turn to Ephesians chapter 5. Tonight we want to speak about the Holy Spirit. The fullness and the reality and the power of the Holy Spirit. You cannot talk about missionary work without talking about the Holy Spirit. We believe the real directorship of a work such as O.M. must come from the Spirit of God. Do not think of me as the great leader or director of this work, because that is wrong. O.M. has many leaders. Some of these fields that we are working, the Holy Spirit is doing things, I don't even know what is happening. But how can I lead when I don't even know what's happening? I don't even know who is there. The work has been growing very rapidly. Every year or two there seems to be a new country where now O.M. is working. We as area leaders, five, six of us, meet together four times a year. And we try to figure out what the Holy Spirit is doing. We try to figure out what the O.M. leaders are doing. And then we try to discern what the Holy Spirit is doing and what these leaders are doing. And it is difficult. And we are making mistakes, I can assure you. The great work of the Holy Spirit goes forward not in the absence of mistakes. It goes forward despite our mistakes, because God is God. And if you haven't made any mistakes yet, it's because you haven't done anything. Once you start doing things, once you start moving, mistakes will come. Ephesians chapter 5 is just one of many passages that's on my heart. One of the chapters we would like you to memorize. How many of you memorize scripture, even one verse a month? Raise your hand. Great, that's a real discouraging encouragement. But I would really encourage you to memorize scripture. Now we don't want any of you to be falsely motivated. But if you memorize 50 scriptures by January 1st, 1988, and you get a friend to test you on those verses, and you score 80% or higher on the test, you can write to me and tell me about that, and I will rejoice and send you 20 wonderful, challenging, motivating free books. Of my choice. So that's just to encourage you along in your memorization. Most of you don't need any of that kind of secondary motivation. You can just continue memorizing. Praise the Lord. When I was a young Christian, I had so many struggles. Problem is, I still have too many struggles. But one of the things that's really helped me is memorizing the Word of God. If I had heard that message last night when I was a young Christian, it just would have blown me away. I would have just gotten a car and driven home to England. But it's impossible. Who can live this kind of purity, this kind of reality? I thought at times, God can never use a character like me, with my dirty mind and my lust and my perpetual falling on my face in various and sundry ways that I don't like to talk about. You know, God uses ordinary people. God uses struggles. God uses failure. Holy Spirit works. Holy Spirit can and will change us. Let's read this passage that you're going to memorize. I was going to say just how much Scripture memory helped to clean up my mind and renew my mind. Verse 16 talks about redeeming the time. Oh, how I would love to speak about that. That is so exciting. To learn how to do two, three, four things at the same time. That's a whole message. I won't share it with you. It upsets people. It makes my wife nervous. Especially the telephone. My attempt to do various and sundry things while I'm talking on the telephone. Of course, I have a kind of phone you can just walk around. You take it in the toilet. You take it in just everywhere you go. You just take it. You take the dog out to the nearby field. I'm on a phone in the field while the dog is doing his duty. Some of you saw me on the phone here. I was in the middle of the woods talking to David Hicks in Atlanta. I was walking around and I almost ran into a tree. So I'd love to talk about redeeming the time, but that's got to be another time. Verse 17, That's a good verse. Isn't that exciting? Finding out the will of God. That is the mega adventure of a lifetime. Finding out the will of God. I'll tell you one of the most exciting things about it. When you miss it, and you get into a cul-de-sac, a dead end street, Très bien, très bien. I remember when I first went to England, I didn't know what a cul-de-sac was. I kept seeing that name in different towns in England, in the streets. Cul-de-sac. I thought every town in England has a street with the same name. And then I discovered it means a dead end. That's American lingo. A dead end street. A dead end street is no big deal. When you get to the end, you turn around and you go back. Das ist natürlich kein Problem. Wenn man in einer Sackgasse stecken bleibt, dann geht man bis zum Ende, dann merkt man es und dreht sich herum und geht zum Ende. Wenn wir zum Ende kommen, einen Fehler gemacht haben, dann hat Gott immer noch etwas Besseres bereit. Er ist auch in der Lage, das alles zu überschatten und uns zu helfen. Vers 18, und saufert euch nicht voll Wein, daraus ein unordentliches Wesen folgt, sondern werdet voll geistes. Das ist eine der klarsten Aussagen über den Heiligen Geist im Leib, in der Gemeinde auch. Und dann haben wir, in Vers 19 bis 21, eine teilweise Beschreibung des Heiligen Geistes im Leben des Gläubigen. Les das selbst. Wie wunderbar. In Kolosser 3, Vers 16 finden wir eine ähnliche Beschreibung. Hier haben wir eine fast ähnliche Beschreibung des geisterfüllten Lebens. Aber hier haben wir einen interessanten Punkt. Der Heilige Geist wird gar nicht erwähnt im Kolosserbrief. Wie kann das sein? Wie heißt es, lasst das Wort Christi reichlich in euch wohnen. In all wisdom. Teaching and admonishing one another, there it is. Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. Vers 17, whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him. Mit Worten oder mit Werken, das tut alles in dem Namen des Herrn Jesus und danket Gott dem Vater durch ihn. Und dann kommt wie im Epheserbrief die praktischen Anweisungen über die Ehe. Ich bin sehr stark von dem überzeugt, was ich jetzt in aller Schwäche weitergeben möchte. Ich glaube, es ist das Vorrecht jedes Gläubigen, in der Fülle des Heiligen Geistes zu sein. Und ich glaube, dass Satan alles daran setzt, die gemeine Jesu, die Gläubigen über das Wesen, wirkende Personen des Heiligen Geistes zu verwirren. And there are all kinds of extremes that people get into. And then there are things that people say are extreme, but are not really extreme, they're biblical. Like some people, if they see you worshipping with your hands in the air in a meeting, they think, well, that's extremist. Weil einige Leute zum Beispiel sagen, wenn du deine Hände in einer Versammlung hochhältst, dann ist das extrem. Was für ein trauriger Kommentar. In vielen der Psalmen finden wir, dass die Gläubigen ihre Hände im Vorgehoben haben. I know some of you may come from a place where lifting your hands in the air is a badge that you belong to a particular group. That is not true, I can assure you, in Operation Mobilization. So avoid giving people labels, because half the time you'll give them the wrong label. You won't know what you're talking about. Because, you know, when the Holy Spirit sometimes works in power, people change. People who have been lifting their hands for years, suddenly feel they don't want to put them in the air anymore. They want to just weep and pray in repentance and brokenness. Leute, die vielleicht jahrelang ihre Hände im Vorgehoben haben, wollen gar nicht mehr die Hände hochheben, sondern sich beugen, Buse tun und vielleicht zu Gott schreien. Und vielleicht andere, die jahrelang lange Gesichter gemacht haben und ihr Gesicht vergraben haben, die haben schließlich den Sieg und können einmal die Hände im Vorheben. Wenn wir natürlich diesen Sommer hinausgehen, dann versuchen wir die verschiedenen Traditionen und Verhaltensweisen der Gemeinden, wo wir arbeiten, zu respektieren. Du fragst nach etwas Schlamm oder Schmutz im Gesicht, wenn du als kleiner OMA in deine Gemeinde reingehst, wo man das vielleicht nicht tut, die haben das nicht. This is where we can be very naive. What we think is very small, no problem, other people feel is very big, big problem. And you know, you wouldn't want to race the derby on an elephant. You wouldn't want to go in a great horse race on an elephant. Man würde natürlich nicht mit einem riesigen Elefanten ein Pferderem angehen. Man braucht Weisheit. Ich reise den Herrn, wenn wir in unseren eigenen Versammlungen sind. Dann kann da mehr Freiheit praktiziert werden. Paulus wollte nicht ein Stein des Anstoßes werden. Er hat Weisheit und Unterscheidungsvermögen praktiziert. Paulus hat gesagt, ich werde allen alles, damit ich einige gewinne. Die Fülle des Heiligen Geistes ist einfach wesentlich, wenn wir wirkungsvoll in diesem Sommer arbeiten wollen. Das ist nicht eine Wahlmöglichkeit. Es ist die Zeit, sich mit dem Heiligen Geist zu füllen. Billy Graham hat über die Realität des Geistesgewandels gesprochen. Ich liebe, was er gesagt hat. Become one of OM's little mottoes. He said, I don't care how you get it, just get it. Another very important passage linked with this is in Galatians. It speaks about the struggle sometimes we have. Galatians 17, chapter 5. The flesh lusteth against the spirit, the spirit against the flesh. These are contrary one to another, so that you cannot do the thing that you would. Very, very significant scripture. But if you be led by the spirit, you are not under the law. The Holy Spirit sets us free from the law, from legalism, from a religion of rules and regulations, do's and don'ts. Hallelujah for that freedom in Jesus. And it goes on to talk about walking in the spirit, after that beautiful description of the fruit of the spirit in verse 22. And it's linked with being crucified with Jesus Christ. Verse 25, if we live in the spirit, let us also walk in the spirit. Walking under the power and the control of the Holy Spirit. Sometimes I'm asked to speak on the Lordship of Jesus Christ. I don't believe you can separate the Lordship of Jesus Christ and that emphasis of scripture with the message of the fullness and the control of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit makes the Lordship of Christ possible in our lives. Holiness is tied into that. Sometimes we get the idea that the Holy Spirit is just to bring us blessings. Of course he brings blessings. But he brings responsibility. And he is tugging at our heart that we may repent and make Christ Lord over every area. And he is tugging at our heart that we may repent and make Christ Lord over every area of our lives. The scripture says that one of the main purposes of the Holy Spirit is to increase and magnify Jesus Christ. There is no competition between the Holy Spirit and Jesus. There is no competition between the Holy Spirit and Jesus. And then Jesus says, look at this group, they are all talking about me. And then the Holy Spirit says, no, look at this group, they are all talking about me. But down here we do that. And if you don't mention the Holy Spirit in a message, then someone gets upset. And in a message, if you don't mention the name of Jesus a certain number of times, I've had people even listing them as they were listening to me, people get upset. And now someone has written something that we're neglecting mentioning God the Father enough. We need to mention God the Father enough. He's getting upset because we're talking about Jesus and the Holy Spirit. This is foolishness. There is one God. And we are talking about the Blessed Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. They are one. There is no competition. So if you meet a brother, and in his life he's been crucified with Christ, he's made Christ Lord of his life, and his life shows this. You don't need to judge him because, well, but brother, maybe you don't have the fullness of the Holy Spirit. You only have the Lordship. You weren't crucified with Christ. You don't have the fullness of the Spirit. There are characters even written in a book. You know what the title is? Let's stop fighting about the Holy Spirit. There is even a book that someone has written, which says, stop fighting about the Holy Spirit. Satan wants to confuse the issue. One of the problems that we have, I think, is that we believe that the Holy Spirit somehow comes down and is poured out. We're told that we're cups, and the liquid's being poured in, and then we're going to bubble over. I don't mind different ways people describing spiritual experiences. If we understand the basic issue. The basic issue is that the Holy Spirit is a person. Not a force, not a liquid, not a bubble, person. And, of course, this is a mystery. How the Holy Spirit lives in us. But I believe the Word of God is clear. Though in OM we come from different backgrounds, in different churches, I think we have a hundred percent agreement that if a person is a true believer, the Holy Spirit is living in him. The Word of God says, if you have not the Spirit of Christ, you have not Christ. There are not two spirits. The Word of God says, if you have not the Spirit of Christ, you have not Christ. We read in many verses of our body as the temple of the Holy Spirit. God's plan is the filling of the Holy Spirit for us. Acts chapter 13, you want to see how this ties in to the missionary thrust. Such very important missionary passage. Speaks about the church in Antioch. Five men in that church. It's amazing how that church started, by the way. That's spoken of in chapter 11, verse 19. Some people were scattered abroad because of persecution. They ended up being used of God to start the church in Antioch. Five men had a vision. What does it say, verse 2? They ministered to the Lord, or as they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work unto which I have come. Wow, this is extremism, isn't it? Look at this. The Holy Spirit is speaking. These people are clairvoyant. Pardon? They must be, you know. And yet, that's what it says. I don't think that's necessarily an audible voice. The Holy Spirit speaks through the system, the mind that God has given us. And what does it say? When they had fasted and prayed, they laid hands on them and sent them away. Some people get very upset about any kind of laying on of hands. A great apostolic movement in India under the leadership of Bakht Singh believed in laying on of hands. Whole denominations broke and refused to fellowship with them because they laid hands on people. I know some people overdo this. I've had a lot of people lay hands on me. I go to a lot of meetings, a lot of interesting meetings. And before I preach, they like to lay hands on me. Many years. Many years this has been happening. Some of you are wondering why. Why my head is, you know, so flat. We see a very beautiful balance in this passage of Scripture. First of all, we see they ministered unto the Lord. We see a God-centered group of people. They ministered unto the Lord. Much of our ministry today seems to me so easily becomes man-centered. Even I've caught myself after the ministry. Oh, I wonder what Peter Mead, my number one exhorter, I wonder what he thinks of that message. Or Dale Roton, who's been my Nathan and a few other things for 28 years. Very gifted in calling me to repentance. He comes and says, Brother George, praise the Lord, His hand is mightily upon you. God really used your message tonight. Many were spoken to by it. But, Brother George, just one thing. If you could be just a little more truthful in a number of these areas, one, two, three, four areas, God could use you so much more. Well, I'm sure some of you will have that ministry. It's not given to everyone. So we see they ministered unto the Lord. What does God think of what I'm doing? That's the important thing. Did my testimony, did my message, did my witness, did it please God? Not even first was it successful. Did it please God? Because sometimes I think today we get carried away. We get carried away with being successful. They ministered to the Lord. And they fasted. The Holy Spirit said, and then verse three, we see the church in action. Wasn't just sort of the Holy Spirit moving in just some way outside of the church? But the Holy Spirit worked through the church, and the church commended these people out. But then it goes right back in verse four to the Holy Spirit again. So they being sent forth by the Holy Spirit, deported unto Seleucia, and from there they sailed to Cyprus. I hope you will just study the book of Acts. Look at Acts chapter four. This is what we need in our prayer meeting tonight. Verse 31. These people had been at Pentecost, the historic coming of the Holy Spirit. They were there at the feast of Pentecost, they were now gathered in prayer. What happened? It's beautiful. When they had prayed, the place where they were shaken, was shaken where they were assembled. They fell to the Holy Spirit. Looks like I'm getting shaken. They spoke the word of God with boldness. How many of you ever marked your Bibles? Do you believe in marking your Bibles? When I started marking my Bibles, a little baby Christian, it revolutionized my Bible study. And I have all kinds of marks and codes, and I don't understand them all anymore, but it's been a very exciting pilgrimage. Whenever the Holy Spirit is mentioned in my Bible, I put a little dove. That's my little code. That's what I remember. A little dove. And there are doves all over the book of Acts. You underline that. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit. They were all filled. That one or two who maybe came forward, they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. We don't just read from one or two who maybe came forward, but all were filled with the Holy Spirit. We know, of course, that you come from different churches that emphasize different things. And we in OM try to take a position with which many of your communities also agree. Any vocabulary that God will use. As leaders in this work, we don't agree completely with one another on all the jots and tittles of this great subject. Some of you have read about this in my little book with extremism that needs a little bit of revising, like most of the things I've ever written. Praise God, this book doesn't need any revising. But it does need sometimes language adjustments and new translations are very helpful. We know a great segment of the church emphasizes the baptism of the Holy Spirit as a second work of grace in the believer's life. This did not start with the Pentecostal movement around 1904. It goes back to the Salvation Army, it goes back to the Methodists, John Wesley, and probably further back than this. But there's been tremendous division between different groups as to exactly what this means. And as you know, if you've read Bilheimer's book, Love Covers, great tension came between the old holiness people and their baptism of the Spirit for holiness and the charismatic people who emphasize more the baptism of the Holy Spirit for gifts. And I'm sure some of you have studied these things and you'll probably continue to study as I have for 30 some years, this interesting subject. Another large sector of people that are fellowshipping and working with us in O.M. is the Catholic Church, come from quite strong churches that don't believe this way. They believe in conversion and they believe in ongoing sanctification. It's interesting that many of those churches do believe in crisis experiences with the Holy Spirit. But they don't believe it should be called the baptism of the Holy Spirit. And this is still today as it was 30 years ago, one of the greatest controversies in the church of Jesus Christ with many related issues. And you know, we need a lot of wisdom. Because so much disunity, so much confusion easily comes. And 25 years ago people came to me and they said, you will never unite together these two separate views on the Holy Spirit. And for 25 years we've seen, guess who, the Holy Spirit unite those different kinds of people together. This is why we do not in any way want to put down what your church is teaching. Of course there may be someone here from some totally extremist church. There may even be someone here from a Pope. I hope not. In that case of course we're going to be speaking very clearly. But that's not generally the problem. How many of you have been sent by your own church to some degree? And you know, they may not have written out the check for 6,000, but they sent you, they prayed for you and commended you to this work. I wonder if you would put your hand up. I'm in that category. About 80% of you. And I believe many others will find that experience in the years to come. But you know what we have been able to unite on? That we all need to be filled with the Holy Spirit. That should be an ongoing, an ongoing work. There may be a crisis somewhere along the line, but the bigger and more important issue is the ongoing, continuous walk in the control of the Holy Spirit. And perhaps one of our strong points when we speak about this, we believe God works in different people in different ways. We do not despise some special work of the Holy Spirit that you may have experienced in your life. It is not our position to judge that just by talking to you. As leaders and coworkers, we will have to evaluate your life. And if we don't see the fruit of the Holy Spirit in your life, we're going to have some doubts about your vocabulary and the reality of your theology. Be filled with the Holy Spirit. Many of you feel inadequate for this work. You may feel afraid or shy. One of the main things we see the Holy Spirit doing in the Book of Acts is bringing boldness, bringing anointing and boldness in our witnessing. That's very important. But I don't believe that's worked out the same in every life. I don't believe the Holy Spirit is out to destroy your personality. And sometimes you get people who are pretending. They get the vocabulary. They get the Holy Spirit smile. They look so happy. And sometimes even when they pray, their voice changes. You get a sort of a rough kind of guy when you normally talk to him. But when he starts praying, people look around and say, the Spirit controlled man. I feel so, so strongly we need humility in the things of the Spirit. No matter how filled I feel I am and I've known this reality almost all of my Christian life, I feel I can be filled more. Because the Holy Spirit is a person and that person wants more and more loving and dynamic control of every area of my life. And praise the Lord. He doesn't reveal all of our self-life to us all at once. Aren't you happy about that? How many of you would like everything connected with your self-life that you're going to face in the next 20 years revealed tonight instantly in one blow? Would you like to stand up? Because I tell you, if you stand up and God answers the prayer, you won't be standing long. And as I have read the biographies of so many men of God, they have had great experiences of a wide range and yet most of them have always sensed that they still have so much more where they needed to grow in their life. This seems like a contradiction but it is a divine paradox. The spirit-filled man is fulfilled but he wants to be more fulfilled. He knows God's power in his life but he wants greater power. He knows fruit. The fruit is coming but he wants more fruit. He's not satisfied because some of the pears and some of the apples seem to have worms. And so he's a learner. He doesn't boast. He doesn't send out an advertisement for his meetings. As the most spirit-filled man in the world I'm looking forward to coming to your church. By the way I would like to know in advance what your honorarium and travel expense will be. Many, many people are becoming very skeptical about any talk of the Holy Spirit. Many people because they're tired of seeing people who talk about the Holy Spirit but who live like the devil. And I tell you when we are dealing with these holy things especially out in the world and even often with our own parents and our own friends we need tremendous wisdom even how we explain what God is doing in our lives because people are becoming more skeptical and more cynical than ever before. And all kinds of people are making every claim you can imagine of what the Holy Spirit is doing through them or through their ministry or through this or that. I was jogging the other morning some weeks ago in England there was an L plate on the road. I have to explain in England when you first learn to drive before you get your license you have to put one of these plates on the car that big L people know you're a learner they get out of the way. I'm a bit of a scavenger I tend to pick things up so I pick up that broken L plate. God so spoke to me and I've been carrying that around for weeks. Now I go on 32 or 33 years in the Lord and the ministry I have so much more to learn. That's why I'm always grabbing a new book. I'm grabbing two or three or four and I started that one in history I didn't get past three pages but I started. I want to ask you are you filled with the Holy Spirit? Me? The Holy Spirit? I love that. The Illudian that's filigrams makes the women are very shy about the Holy Spirit. Oh the great preacher my husband the great preacher needs to be filled with the Spirit. Let's lay hands on him and pray for a great anointing. He goes out to the meeting. You stay home. You got two kids. You got his dirty socks. You got all the dirty plates. I will tell you you need the filling in the Spirit for your work at home as much as your preacher husband needs the filling of the Holy Ghost for preaching out in the church. I believe we made the whole thing too spectacular. We came in the realm of mysticism and up in cloud nine. So nobody feels they could be filled with the Holy Spirit. Something really spectacular is happening. And then we love to hear the testimonies of the spectacular fillings and the spectacular blessings. And the spectacular gifts that sometimes come. And we try to copy everything. I'm going to say something very carefully but I'm going to say it. We are working together with beautiful Christians from the different Pentecostal denominations. Those people have actually been persecuted at times for their faith and for their way of expression and ways of talking. And for some of you it's the first time you have worked with people of that background or of a strong charismatic background. Many of you come from that background. And you are as welcome here as anybody else. But one area you may find difficult is that in OM we don't have a big emphasis on speaking in tongues. Which has been a point of heavy criticism and contention in the body of Christ for over 85 years. Nobody is saying you can't speak in tongues. But we feel it's best if that's done in a church where the pastor and the leader of that church have discernment and experience and wisdom in handling that issue. There is a high percentage of the body of Christ, a large percentage of the body of Christ, that don't agree probably with most of us about this particular gift. It's a very, very tough issue. Every year we always have a few of the longing that OM would really start to move in the depths and everybody would start to speak in tongues. And we'd really know OM had come of age. Leaders, we have wrestled with this sometimes in prayer and fasting. And we believe that this starts to come just produced by ourselves. We won't come of age, we will come apart. Many, many strong great churches send and commit their young people to us because they know our parents stand on this particular issue. So it would be unethical and it would be wrong to suddenly move into this kind of thing without communicating to the churches that OM is going to change. This is what we're going to do in the future. Then they can decide whether they're going to send any more young people. We realize because these churches trust us and believe in us that thousands of young people over the years have come to these meetings and have been filled with the Holy Spirit in these meetings and have gone out to reach millions of people with the Word of God across the world. We cannot accept that speaking in tongues is the main evidence of the filling or the baptism of the Holy Spirit. That's something we just cannot accept even if your church teaches that. We respect them but we cannot accept that as a movement. I'll tell you one reason why I say that. Because surveys have proven that 30 percent of the people in Pentecostal churches, statistics, 30 percent have never spoken in tongues even though that is their denomination and their belief. I minister in these churches, I love these people but I discover those who don't speak in tongues feel they can't be filled with the Spirit, they've never been filled and that God can't use them and they live, many of them, for 20, 30 years as absolute defeated second class citizens in the United States. This is why many of the main leaders of the modern charismatic movement do not say this is the exclusive sign or the main sign of the filling or the baptism of the Holy Spirit. They have changed many of them on that issue and I think it is good. As you see, we don't really have any excuse to go around saying I can't be filled with the Spirit. You mean you have to wait 20 years to be filled with the Holy Spirit? As far as I know I was filled with the Holy Spirit the night of my conversion. I'm not saying that happens to everybody. I've seen some people's conversions were very, very, you know, very, very small events, humanly speaking, not divinely speaking. And I know in my life I had to be filled again and again. And I know in my life I had to be filled again and again. And a couple of years later I picked up R.A. Torrey's book about the baptism of the Holy Spirit and read that book. I didn't understand it. I was just a baby kid. I said, well, whatever it is, I want it. I'm ready for anything. And I think that something happened to me then I know that when I went down to the jail to witness that week about half the people, well, several people came to Christ, ultimately over half of them came to Christ through my feeble utterances. Well, I've had so many similar experiences then, since then. I'd be very hesitant to say that was the second blessing in my life. I'm going to ask God and explain what's been happening to me. Meanwhile here I would prefer to get on with world evangelism. Some emphasize the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Surely we need that as well. G.L. Moody was a great evangelist. Let us understand those of us struggling with this issue of tongues. Thousands of the mightiest men and women in history according to research have never spoke in unknown tongues. Most of them did have trouble with their own tongues. So for you to believe that God can never use you until you have this one particular gift is to pray each of different tongues. I could give hundreds of examples. We'll just mention G.L. Moody. Just one. G.L. Moody believed in the Holy Spirit. He was a mighty evangelist. He didn't speak in tongues with the men. He didn't have any power in his ministry. Do you know what the secular encyclopedia says? G.L. Moody American evangelist who depopulated hell by two million souls. Do you think he knew anything about the Holy Spirit? The poor died and he came before some of these modern movements that have all these new movements. He tells us the Holy Spirit doesn't give us only unlimited power. The Holy Spirit gives us unlimited money. And that if you have power you have prosperity. I can't believe what these people are saying. Maybe they dream it. He's driving around in a crummy Ford Transit. You can have a Volkswagen or you can have a Jaguar. It's not only name and claim it, it's nab it, grab it. I know some people get upset when you speak about these things. Can we never speak out against anything? Then we will be fools. Because the word of God speaks that. I love people who are in these movements. I wrote a letter of confrontation to one of the founders. The letter of course did not get to him. It was handled by a secretary. I don't mind that. But she gave me a computerized answer. Well, I can handle that. I mean, I've got to be big hearted. But she fed in the wrong questions. I couldn't handle that. And my heart really, really aches for so much extremism running rampant in the body of Christ today. We need tremendous discernment. A.W. Tozer, one of the most anointed spiritual men who has ever lived, believed that discernment was the greatest gift needed in the church. D.L. Moody said we should be filled with the Holy Spirit. But he emphasized we need to be filled again and again. L.Lady once said, Mr. Moody, why do you keep talking about being filled again and again? And he said, because I leak. I leak. He is speaking. I brought this water at a very convenient time. And how beautiful that is, even though it's only a partial picture. We need to be filled again and again. When we speak about reconnectment and people respond to that message and they reconnect their lives, they turn from sin in their life, they renounce sin and confess and fall before the Lord Jesus and surely the Holy Spirit fills that person at that time. If you have made a deep, sincere reconnectment, further connectment of your life to Christ and abandonment to God, surely the Holy Spirit fills you at that time. But probably the next day there is something you may have grieved before. You have to repent and deal with that. Please read again Calvary Road. We strongly believe in personal revival. We pray for larger city-wide revival, church-wide revival, nation-wide revival. Hallelujah! Let's pray and work for it. But for ourselves, we don't have power. We appropriate. Please apply. Don't keep begging the Lord in each prayer meeting, Lord, Jesus, Lord, Lord, but appropriate what is yours indeed. Personal revival. Jesus, reigning and ruling in your heart is your privilege. It's your inheritance as a believer. It's just about in Christ in Colossians are all the treasures of wisdom. In Jesus Christ all the fullness of the Godhead, bodily, that's a powerful statement. And I believe it's just Satan who wants to defeat us. Tell us to believe or it'll never happen to me. Oh, yeah, I experienced that for a while when I was a young Christian. Oh, I experienced that during that special summer camp I went to when I went forward and they laid hands on me. Oh, I got that wonderful experience for several weeks. And now I'm spiritually dry. Why do people tell me that? Spiritually dry. You may have been spiritually dry as you walked in this tent. Maybe because you didn't understand anything. But you have no excuse to walk out of the tent. Jesus is living in you. The Holy Spirit is living in you. You must yield. You must believe. You must stand on your promise. You must ask. If you ask for bread will he give you a stone? You know those verses. The power of the reality whatever you want to call it of the Holy Spirit in our life he will give it. He will give it. Maybe not in the way that you've been dreaming about for years. But you can have this particular gift or this particular talent or that your eyes will become brighter or you become better looking or that the Lord will give you a spiritual girlfriend on the same night. No. If you are filled with the Holy Spirit you are still you. This morning after my jogging I spent ten minutes in recreation hitting golf balls out in the field. Do you believe a spiritual man when he plays golf is that special? And when a man plays golf he's nothing. Because I can play in the power of the Holy Spirit. So if I lose a golf ball maybe play it maybe get it. And one of my shots this morning the ball went astray and it landed by a rabbit hole and went down into the rabbit hole. You better pray for that rabbit. And I went over there and I looked down at this rabbit hole. What am I going to do? In the name of Jesus we pray. No! I lost the golf ball. And if you're skinnier than me and you think you can go down the rabbit hole I'll meet you in the morning. What am I trying to say? When we are filled with the Spirit we are still very, very, very human. And we will make mistakes. Sometimes we will still say stupid things. And sometimes we will forget little things in life. I was speaking in the power of the Holy Spirit of the student meeting I'll never forget the occasion. At the end of the meeting I had this awesome feeling come over me. I discovered I preached for an hour with my flies around. Excuse me. I haven't told that in five or six years. Forgive me, I'm an extremist. I want to be more balanced. But I have this desire, believe me I'm sincere. I just want you to get the point of this message. We are filled with the Spirit but we are still human. We will still fail and there will still be lots of struggles between now and heaven. The same is true when we talk of the Lordship of Christ. We talk of total commitment to Christ. We talk of the crucified life. All of that is wonderful when it's kept in balance and you realize you are a clay pot. Word of God says this treasure is in an earthen vessel. He fills with the Holy Spirit. When you are you will no longer be intimidated by this thing or by that thing. You will get to know the reality of walking in his power and in his grace. When you sin you'll repent you'll be cleansed you'll be refilled or whatever you want to call it and get ready to strive in the work of God. It will mean self-being crucified and Christ being my God. Let us pray together. I want to give this invitation for you to make a deeper commitment of your life to the Lord Jesus Christ. For you to turn from doubt and from unbelief from intimidation from fear of failure from the lies of the devil I want you to turn from all of that diabolical intimidation and cast yourself upon the Lord in a fresh way trusting him in a fresh way God said, trust the Lord with all your heart lean, lean not to your own understanding and be refilled with the Holy Spirit. You have heard the message you have read this in the Word but have you believed have you trusted God Jesus Christ and from that day on move forward on the promises of the Lord. I want you to pray your own prayer prayer of confession prayer of brokenness before God and ask him to fill you afresh with his Holy Spirit I want you to renounce sin, Satan, and commit yourself rummage 12-1 and your whole body as a living sacrifice to God be able to say not I you pray your own prayer ask him to fill you before the Lord believe believe stand on his promise stand against the lies of others no, it's going to be a seven day a week ongoing commitment I sense that some of you need a new start some of you need a fresh start I want you to pray a prayer of confession and commitment as you do that if you mean it with all your heart and I want you to just quietly stand where you are in that place and I want a prayer a prayer of commitment plead for the filling of many many lives by the Holy Spirit to you and the Lord that standing up is an outward expression of an inward transaction make that inward transaction stand up as an expression of faith I believe even if you have to pray as I often do oh God help now my unbelief you just pray and then stand up God bless you let's all be in prayer it's not a simple thing for some people that holding back on the Lord maybe because of some false ideas God I believe has opened your eyes from this world now it's your turn to make that commitment this day on you're going to live in personal awakening you're inheriting from Jesus God and you're going to claim it because you know now that great doubt will struggle but as we go through day by day with our eyes upon it oh Lord and you see each one standing before you you've been working out things in our lives for months maybe for years to bring some of us to this crossroads Father we believe this is Bethel we believe you are meeting us in this place we don't have to ask you to come down because we know you are already within us and by faith we yield our members unto righteousness by faith we turn over every area of our life every room every tavern every basement of our life to you it's yours we are yours fill us up put a mighty anointing free cleansing Lord to hidden sins and hidden problems set us free across this tent tonight for we pray in the name and the authority of our Lord Jesus and we rejoice in this great forgiveness Lord I repent I've sinned against you even as a Christian leader the sins of the tongue the lust of my eyes I thank you for cleansing me and Lord we believe that we are to go out and to evangelize the world we thank you for this call this promise and we know now it will not be in our own strength hallelujah it will not be in our own strength but the power of your Holy Spirit working through us we thank you that is all there is of this recording