In this sermon, the speaker reflects on a personal struggle they faced regarding the idea of taking action versus waiting on God's guidance. They were torn between the urgency of the world's problems and the need to hear from God before acting. The speaker emphasizes the importance of seeking God's will and being led by the Holy Spirit rather than blindly rushing into action. They share their own experiences, including a moment on a bus where they realized the importance of discerning God's voice. Ultimately, the speaker highlights the significance of prayer and waiting on God's timing in fulfilling the Great Commission.

For your wonderful love to us, Lord. All our blessings, for they are numerous, Lord. Numerous. We thank you that we can be here in health, Lord. Praise you and serve you, Lord, and learn about you. We ask, Lord, for each family represented here, that your hand will be on them. You bring in those that we're concerned about into your kingdom. We pray, Lord, especially for those in Tape Land. And we pray that you will bless them and heal their diseases. Those of the church that are sick, we pray you'll heal them, Lord. And help us tonight, Lord, to say and perceive just that which you have ordained, Lord. We commit everything to you that Jesus may be exalted. And we pray in his name. And everyone said, Amen. I think, as I prayed tonight, I thought we should continue with 2 Thessalonians. And we finished up through the first chapter, Sunday night. First of all, we want to do the questions. For those in Tape Land, we're putting up the questions on the overhead. Week 2, 7 January. And the tape is number 3902. The title is Dying to Self. The recommended reading is The Pinnacle. And the first question, the third death, always takes place in a religious setting. For example, Jesus on the pinnacle in the city of Jerusalem. True or false? On the tape you said it was true, but I'm not sure I understand what you consider the third death. Well, the third death, remember Jesus had three temptations. One had to do with survival and security in the world. That's the test of bread. And the second one is the kingdoms of the world. That's the test of sin. And then the devil brought him to Jerusalem for the third test. And that third test has to do with the third death that God requires of us. This death to self-will. And I'll take the hit on that. Eddie obviously is looking for a true there. And I take the blame for this for the way I've taught it. I know what I've written and I know where you've read this. I would say the third death to self may take place because it's conceivable that God could do this in other ways. But in the case of Jacob and in the case of Abraham and in the case of Jesus, it was in a religious setting. But in Jacob, I guess we associate Jacob with religion, but it's often in a religious setting. And what it is, is death to your desire to do something. Often in a religious setting. And we see today where the idea is to go out and do big things for God. The question really is, what do you do with your gifts? What do you do with what God has given you? I mean, you don't hear that dealt with much in the church. I mean, we take it for granted that we're supposed to get out there and do something. What you might call aggressive faith. And remember that when the devil said, step out because the Bible says they'll catch you up in their hands, they won't hurt yourself. But what you're doing is putting God to the test. But in our circles in which we move, this is considered the right thing to do. This is considered the right thing to do. Take a step of faith and God will meet you. Has anyone ever heard that preached? Did anyone ever read it in the Bible? Now the faith chapter is what? Chapter 11. That's the faith chapter of the Bible. Starts off with Abel. But you won't find one single example in there of aggressive faith. What kind of faith is shown in Hebrews 11? Do you remember how it goes? By faith, Abel gave a better sacrifice than Cain. By faith, Noah built an ark. By faith, Enoch was translated. By faith, Abraham went out. What kind of faith is shown in Hebrews 11? It's the faith of obedience. You remember Hebrews starts out, God who has sundry times and divers manna spake unto the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken unto us by his Son. When you go through the heroes of faith, you don't see any testing of God. Any example of, well, let me give you an illustration. In Bible school, when I was in Bible school, there was a girl there that wore glasses and she needed to wear glasses. Her name was Bernice. And she went to a healing evangelist meeting and he had an anvil on the stage. And the idea was if you wanted to be healed from wearing glasses, then come up, we'll pray for you, and then break your glasses, there he goes, on this anvil. Break your glasses on the anvil. Okay? This is not that unusual. In fact, it was not too long ago, someone was telling me about someone that he went to a faith meeting and he was a diabetic and they told him to stop his insulin, which he did, and he died. I mean, this actually happened a few weeks ago with someone who called me. Well, see, this is what you might call aggressive faith is common in evangelical thinking, both Pentecost and Baptist thinking. The person who will get out there and dare to do something for God. And it's so common we assume that it is correct, but it's not scriptural. And that's the test of the pinnacle, is you get an idea what you want to do for God. And maybe God gave you that. Maybe God gave you that burden. You might have a burden to work with drug addicts, you might have a burden to build a big church, or a burden to go to the mission field. How many people have gone to the mission field ahead of God's time? And so you get thinking about it, you get thinking about it, and your friends tell you, well, get out there by faith, God will give you the ticket, God will supply the thing when you get there, God will take care of you. And it sounds so right and so Christian, but it's unscriptural. That's not the way the people in the Bible behaved. You stop to think about the birth of Jesus, Gabriel appeared to Mary, Gabriel appeared to Elizabeth, Gabriel appeared to the father of John the Baptist, John was called, you won't find it. And look how the apostle Paul was called. And then after that, how he was led of the Spirit. God said, go here, don't go there. And none, and any of the apostles, disciples, that followed Jesus, none, there's no word Jesus ever said to them, okay, now I've shown you what to do, now get out there and show your faith. Never. We assume it's correct, but it is not correct. Yes, Paul? This was, he had association with A. A. Allen, of our, and one of the, one of the books that I read, was that, command ye me, from that verse, to go out and do something, by commanding God. So what you do, God will back you up and do it. That's right. That's the pinnacle. Command ye me concerning the work of my hands. Another one that's often used is, ye shall say unto this mountain, be thou cast into the sea. Well, didn't Jesus say that? He cursed the fig tree, you'll do this, you'll do a lot more things. In this challenge, to faith, all my Christian life, I've heard has been, regarded as a good and proper thing. But it's not scriptural. What's wrong with it? I gave you the answer in Hebrews 1.1. God, who at sundry times and in diverse manners, spake unto the prophets. None of the prophets took it on themselves, I want to be a prophet. Well then get out there and try it. Concerning the priesthood, the Bible says, no man takes this honor unto himself, but he that is chosen of God, as was Aaron. And whenever you find, like Korah, see, his attitude was, well, we're all holy. Well, Korah was a Kohathite Levite. Now that's as high as you can go, because the Kohathites carried the seven vessels of the tabernacle. And they resented that. They saw Moses and Aaron, and they saw them doing the things that they did. And they supposed that Moses and Aaron were doing these things, and God was backing their hand. But that isn't the way it was. God was telling Moses what to do. And you'll see it repeated over and over in Numbers, Exodus and Numbers in Leviticus. And as the Lord commanded Moses, so he did. As the Lord commanded Moses, so he did. As the Lord commanded Moses, so he did. Now, when the two sons of Aaron went into the Holy of Holies, and there's some evidence that they were drinking, they were drunk, and the fire came out and burned them to cinders, and God says, you don't come in at any time. In other words, any time the mood hits you, you have to obey God. Now, all of us in here would agree with that. That we should be obeying God, and we should do it. But it very seldom is practiced. In fact, the big issue in this church two years ago was never over evangelism. That was never the issue. That was a red herring. We believe in evangelism as much as anybody that ever lived. And we have success in evangelism, but it's indirect. For example, Brent Smith, the cowboy evangelist, was just written up in the Billy Graham magazine. Peggy gave me the copy to show me. It was written up. He lives in Falmouth. I don't know. I don't know how many people that he has touched. But he told me himself, he was at the end of his trail. He was finished. And someone, probably Gene Openshaw, gave him one of my tapes, and he listened to it, and he listened to it, and it brought him back to life. And now he's an evangelist. So you see, we're, and I could show you a fellow over in Wisconsin that does jail work. He's been doing it for years. I guess he's head chaplain over there. Do you remember him? He follows the tapes religiously. Dr. Tinney, up in Sacramento, is doing the work of an evangelist. Ed Barksdale, the kids are getting saved in his church because of Kerry. They follow the tapes. See, because God has, there's more than one way to stuff a goose. If you follow God, you're going to be fruitful. See? But the issue never was evangelism. It was presented as evangelism and caused a lot of words said that never should have been said. You know, Brother Thompson doesn't believe in evangelism, but that was never the issue. The issue was the pinnacle. The issue was, do you wait on God before you do something, or do you just go out and do it? That was vocalized. We do not have to wait on God because the Great Commission is there. Not that they were fulfilling it, because we're fulfilling the Great Commission, which is to make disciples and teach them to keep God's commandments. So the whole thing was a potpourri of confusion. But boiled down, the essence was, do you wait on God, or do you just say it's in the book so we're supposed to do it? In fact, that was vocalized by someone that the jail ministry was started because we saw a need and we went and met it. God wasn't in the thing. The truth was, the jail ministry was born in about three years of prayer. And so this is no academic issue. This issue, in fact, a friend of mine is pastor of the Fourth Square Church in Oceanside. The same thing, someone came into the church, and he's a small congregation, very little money, and the guy says, if you give me a thousand dollars or something like this, we're going to put on a thing, we're going to get anywhere. And of course, every diligent pastor wants to do the best he can, and so he did, and it went on for a couple of years, and nothing came of it. And the guy said, well, you just didn't give it enough time, you just didn't give enough money. And so the pastor up there said, forget it. I'm going to deal with the people that God sends me, I'm going to love me, and build them up in the faith, and they can keep all this jazz. And so, that was the issue. The issue was the issue of the pinnacle. It never was an issue of evangelism because every true man of God believes in evangelism because the Bible tells us about evangelism. Just like we believe in teaching, just like we believe in the gifts of healing, just like we believe in pastoring, just like we believe in everything else. We believe what's in the Bible. But the issue is, do you do it, or does it come forth out of prayer? See, that's the issue of the pinnacle. Do you jump off and challenge God to meet you? Do you do big things for God? Do you push the envelope? Or, do you wait on God in prayer until you know what you're doing? And there are times to push the envelope. There are times to work day and night. There are times, but it's always the Lord is initiating it. And whenever you begin to feel that you're going a little too fast, you just slow down and say, Lord, are you in this that I'm doing? I mean, have I run ahead of you? Have you taken a right turn and I'm still going straight down the freeway? See, you're always conscious. And if you're in the Lord's will, you don't burn out. Because the Lord is always renewing you. Because you're doing, because it isn't you, and yet it is you. It's that union of God as a person. I mean, God doesn't talk to you like you've got a beeper and say, now do this and do that like a puppeteer. It isn't that. It's the fact that it's kind of what I call 49-51. You give God that 2% edge. But it's always God who's in the lead. And then you do what you're doing. But you don't take command like they say, God is my co-pilot. That's a huge error. God should be your pilot. You are the co-pilot. And there's always, and you'll see in the 11th chapter of Hebrews that look at the way God dealt with Abraham. Abraham wasn't charging around trying to see what he could do for God. He was busy trying to obey God. So, I've watched the people that have really been movers and shakers for God and they're people that wait and they've learned. I heard one man preach. He preached on no sweat. He was talking about the linen garments of the priesthood. It's no sweat. You wait and God. It isn't that you lay back and God does the thing. It's that God is in control and you're not saying, now should I jump off? Which, jumping off the pinnacle, he would have just been showing off. That's all he'd have been doing is showing off. What's accomplished by jumping off the pinnacle? But a test to show, you know, why would you want to move a mountain? Why would you want to do any of these things? And these kind of things are in the Bible to test our hearts. Now there's a place to move mountains. When the Lord leads you up to that like he did with Moses. He led Moses up to the Red Sea. And then Moses is praying and God says, why are you praying? Go forward. Now see, you can get out of that the wrong lesson. That you don't pray, you just go forward. But the man who knows God, or the woman who knows God, knows better than that. That isn't what God is saying. God is saying, as you follow me, you may come up against a mountain and you begin to pray and God will say, why are you praying? Let me speak to the mountain. Well, the word is there. God told you the mountain will move. It's not an invitation to presumption. It's to move mountains and to walk on the water is the ordinary inheritance of every child of God. And that's why Jesus marveled at their unbelief. But over and above stopping the sun and walking on the water and commanding the fish. Over and above that, God wants people who are walking in obedience to his will. And when they're walking in obedience to his will, then these other things are effortless. They're not a showing off. They're not the challenge of adventurous faith. And between those two is the difference between the false prophet and Christ. Seems like a minor thing. It's a major thing. For two thousand years, the Christian church has been trying to show off, so to speak. Now, that's a blanket statement and there's been a lot of marvelous exceptions to this. But on the whole, the building of great cathedrals and all this stuff for the glory of God is not for the glory of God. It's for the glory of man. And getting huge numbers of people and doing all these things and working the moves and beating people and torturing heretics and all this tells you Jesus is not in the faith. But then he would move on individuals and they would obey him. But see, it's always a little flock. Fear not, little flock. It is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. So there's times when God moves in multitudes, but that's never to be our objective. What should be our objective? Huh? Obedience. Obedience. Obedience and faith are very closely tied together. Very closely tied together. The true faith is a faith that obeys what God has said. It is not a magic by which you try to get something done that's in your mind. Now, that's where that's where we are today. So you can sense that Pentecost has peaked and God has something fresh. I mean, you can sense that in the spirit realm. And of course, when that happens, the high hills begin to jump. But that's the time to listen. That's the time when this feast, you do no servile work. That's the time to say, Father, what direction are we going? Not to say, now we've got this gift and we've got the gift of healing and we all do that and our work is God's work and there's this window and all these people aren't saved and now let's put on a campaign and all that. See, that puts man in the saddle. But every once in a while you'll find someone who's willing to go the way that Joseph went and Abraham and others that have waited on God. And that's what God is looking for today is people who will wait on God and not go to sleep, do what's in front of them, practical people, but they're not sure the Bible says there's this need and there's that need. But that's not a command to action. You've got, the Holy Spirit must interpret the Bible because the Bible tells you one minute to go and another minute to come. One place it tells you to follow me and the next says go back to your city and bear witness. Which one do you do? It says if anybody wants to take your coat, give them your car. You know, give, give, give. Are you supposed to do that? You do it blindly without the Spirit. You just make a mess of things. You've got to hear from God. You've got to hear from God. Well, here he said to the rich young ruler, give everything you have and give to the poor and follow me. Will you read that? That's what I'm supposed to do. I'm supposed to give everything to the poor and follow Jesus. Well, that's not the Christian life. The Christian life is to present your body a living sacrifice that you may prove the good and acceptable and perfect will of God. And it's easier for the flesh to go out and do something than a lot of it is just self-will and a lot of it is showing off. See, but I'm not here to criticize or run down people. I'm telling you that this issue was presented to me by the Lord in the late 40's. In the late 40's. That's almost 50 years. And I come head on with this issue. And I saw in the Bible and God was talking to me about His rest. I said, do I dare to believe God? Boy, if you don't think this was a test. It was a test of my sanity because I'd only been saved a few years and the people that I respected were saying, you know, the idea, it wasn't that, it was that, you know, you have to just get out there and do it. You just do it. And I was, but God, you know, because God had given me a gift and I knew He'd given me a gift and I, what do you do? Do you just use it? Can you turn it on like a faucet? How do you do this? Oh, what a wrestling match I went through. And this is what was laid on me. But the world is going to hell. While you're here, the world is going to hell. Get out there and do something. The world is going to hell and what are you doing? Well, maybe I was sitting down for a minute. I was very busy in Bible school. I was so busy I didn't even have time to take my clothes off the line. I used to, I'd wash them and hang them out in the line and then when I was running up from the chapel to get ready to go to work I'd grab something off the line. That's how busy I was. You know, but the whole world's going to hell. The whole world, that was laid on me. The whole world's going to hell. And I, and I went, I went through, to bring to you tonight what I'm telling you is the distillation of a number of experiences that I had. And I told you about the one where I was trying to, they kept saying you've got to testify to everybody you meet and you've got to testify to everybody you meet. And I got on the bus and I forced myself to turn to the lady next to me and testify to her and then she says no hablo inglés. And I, I knew that wasn't God. And right then I said, I, this is, I am, you know, if the whole world goes to hell, this is not me. You know? And there were, and there were other things that happened along the way. But I was trying to grapple with this idea. And I told you that I went to a, down at Sixth Inferno and the First Assembly of God was there at Sixth Inferno. They had a missionary thing. I wasn't married. I went up, I laid on the floor and I said, God, I'll, I'll go any place. Just tell me, just, just, tell me where to go. I'm ready to go. You know? I'll go to Tibet with a sweater. Just, just, tell me where to go. What to do? And God spoke to me. All he said was, I love you. That's all he said. And I knew this conversation was over. But I mean, that was a missionary thing. And the idea was, young people go. God needs you. Get out there. Stagger across the rice paddies till you fall in and drown. Burn out for God. I'm trying to cope with this kind of thing. And I told you the story about Brother Branham. That was really a climax. How many have ever heard when I told you the story of Brother Branham? Yeah, well, most of you haven't heard it. But it's, it's very apropos. But it was, it taught me something. Because Brother Branham had a tremendous gift of healing. Probably the greatest of this century. And we, we went up there and we had a meeting in Riverside in the early 50s. 1952, 53, something like that. And there was an old brother in the church whose boast was he had never been sick a day in his life. His name was Brother Wright. But he had a son who was retarded. And his name was Jesse. They lived in Chula Vista. Brother Wright and Jesse. So Brother Wright came to Audrey and me and said, I'll give you a ride up to the Branham meeting. I want Jesse to get prayed for. So we went up there. The big tent was up there in Riverside. And Branham, William Branham, you know, I mean, he had a gift of healing that was, I mean, it was just the kind of thing you want to see in your life sometimes. I mean, this guy was a miracle worker. And you could feel it when you went in. Oh boy, it was a wonderful sensation. And we were sitting there with Brother Wright and Jesse. So this is what happened now. Brother Branham got up and he said, you know, my way of ministering is to, I just ministered to maybe five or six people in a meeting. But then after that he was so drained that they pretty near had to carry him off the platform because virtue went out of him. But what'd he do? You know, he would just point at people and begin to tell them things. Not that time, but I've heard that at other times he would tell people, he would say, this is where you live, I see the street, this is the number of your house and all like that. And then their faith would come up and when he felt it was up for healing he'd just touch them and say, you're healed. His hand would swell up and all turn red, you know. And so this is what he said. He said, now, the brethren that are with me, he had a number of people traveling with him. And he said, they have told me that I need to pray like Jack Cole and the others. I need to have a healing line because I'm only ministering just a handful of people. But he said, that's what God has given me to do. But he said, I want to be, he's a very humble man. And he said, I want to be obedient to God. And so he said, tonight what I've decided to do is to do both. And he said, the first half of the service I will pray as God has always taught me to pray for people. And the second half of the service I will have a healing line. And he said, Jesse was going to be in the healing line. So, during the first half of the service he only prayed for about five people. And I don't think they even came up to the front. Do you remember? They didn't even come up to the front. He would just point to them and he'd say, you have a cancer there, sister, you're healed. And she'd let out a roar and this kind of thing. I mean, it was powerful. And then he said, okay. And they sang all hail the power of Jesus' name and they formed a healing line. Okay. Well, now he was just like a duck out of water. He, this was not the way God had shown him to do. But he was trying to, but see, they had persuaded him with logic. And, so, he just, they went by in the healing line and Brother Wright brought Jesse through the healing line. And you know what, what Branham did? He laid his hands on Brother Wright and prayed for him. The man that has testimony was that he'd never been sick a day in his life. And I said to myself, they put his eyes out. He couldn't see. This was a seer. Branham was a seer. But, by doing what people told him to do, trying to use logic, trying to use his gift to get more people, they put out his eyes. And he didn't even realize that Brother Wright wasn't there to be prayed for. Jesse wasn't healed, of course, because his gift wasn't operating. So, and this is the only things that, by the way, another time he went to Africa and they set up a meeting for 100,000 people in, I think it was in Nigeria and the Spirit said to him, don't go, don't go there because you're not supposed to pray there. And then all these people, what do we do? We set up this meeting with all these people and everything and the Spirit said to him, don't go, don't go, you're not supposed to go there. You see the conflict? So he went because of the pressure they put on him and he got sick and was out of commission for months. Now, suppose God gave you a gift of multiplying food and then he told you not to do it. Is everything okay, Belinda? Okay. Okay, Lord bless you. Lord, take care of Belinda and Bruce. Whatever it is, just work it out. We praise you. Jesus. Suppose that people knew you had this gift and there was a portion of Africa that was dying of starvation and the President called you to the White House and there may be 20 major ministers, leaders. They begin to put pressure on you and say, now we know doesn't the Bible tell you that this is the fast of the Lord that you feed the hungry? You know what will eventually happen? You'll begin to waver in your mind because none of us see God where we know and we begin to think, how can I be right in the world wrong? What do you think Jesus would do? He wouldn't budge. He'd be up in the mountains praying. He wouldn't even go to the White House. It happened in his life. When did it happen? Huh? You go to Jerusalem and I'll be there. You remember that? He said, you go ahead to the feast, I'm not going. He said, your time is always ready. But there was something that people did like they did to Branham. What was it? He fled. He fled. But you see, the reasoning, if you were a king, look what you could do. You're a miracle worker. You could deliver your nation from the Romans. You could restore the kingdom of David. Don't you think that temptation wasn't there? And finally, when he was hanging on the cross, which is the biggest pinnacle of all, if you are the Son of God, come down from there. And Jesus said, I have power to call allegiance. I'm not budging. The church has never been there. There have been individuals who were there. A.B. Simpson was on to that, the head of the Christian Missionary Alliance. You can tell from his writings and his hymns. Once it was the gift, now it's the giver. And this decision that took me about ten years to really make, see then it was tested again two years because there were people who were putting pressure on me. And saying, you're supposed to do this, and you're supposed to do that. And I was saying, hey, but that isn't what God is telling me. And then I got down to the place where I would either have to do what people were telling me to do or do what I felt God wanted me to do. And every time I go to the Lord, I say, Lord, is this you? What about it? And the Lord would say, it's foolishness. That's all I could get out of God was it's foolishness. So I said, well, I don't care whether school keeps or not. I'm going to do what God set me here to do. After all this that I've learned over all the years to just discard the not the practical, that isn't it. But it's to move as God moves you. And if God puts you in prison, you stay in that prison. You don't bust out. You don't jump off the pinnacle because the Bible says it will bear you up. You don't get out and do big things for God. You just do what God tells you to do. And that was the issue. The issue never was evangelism. Never. It was how you do evangelism. How you do the Great Commission, which we're doing, my goodness. We get mail every day from different parts of the world where people are learning to be disciples and to keep God's commandments from this church. And now the internet will be the first essay on the internet is called Keeping God's Commandments. That's the Great Commission. It doesn't get people to make a decision for Christ. It's to keep people to make a decision for Christ and then they don't serve Him. God wants people to keep His commandments. So it takes faith because you think, well, what if God that's what I went through in Bible school, but you know, the world's going to hell. What if there is no God? And the world would go to hell and I'm not doing anything. What if God doesn't do something and here I'm waiting and everybody's right and I felt my mind going. Am I right or am I wrong? Because I hadn't been saved that long and everybody else is spouting the party line. The world's going to hell. You're supposed to get out there and do great things for God. You're supposed to burn out for Jesus. You're supposed to do... Examples were held up. I'd go for two miles on my knees on broken glass if I could get a soul saved and this kind of stuff. But you see, the expression, saving souls, isn't even in the Bible. Well, he that winneth souls is wise. That's in Proverbs. God knows what it means in this context. Winning souls is not in the book of Proverbs. I do not know. But the king's business requires haste. That was quoted to me. Do you know where that's taken from? When David was going to get the show ready. Give me this stuff, I'm out of here. The king's business requires haste. Another one is to go out in the highways and byways and tell them to come in. That was never issued to the apostles. That, for all that I can tell from the context is talking about angels. It's certainly not a commandment. The commandment... So I decided, well, I'm going to go by the Bible and if the Bible's wrong, I'm dead. And when you go through the whole New Testament, there is no emphasis on this kind of stuff. None. Yes, Paul? As far as I have paid attention to, they take the New Testament word by word, letter by letter. And that's dangerous. And they pick that up and they expand on it, making things that are not the same. Like, he that lives all those lives. So they think you're saving them from hell. And no matter what they do, it doesn't apply. In fact, that whole verse goes, he that wins souls is wise, and the fruit of the righteous is the tree of life. In other words, you win souls by your righteous behavior. And see, that's what Jesus said, that men may see your good works and glorify God. That's how you save souls, because it's a fruit that comes from the righteous. They just naturally influence people. So, I don't intend to harp on this. People can do whatever they want, and I hope a lot of good comes from their efforts. But, if you want to talk about what God talks about in the New Testament, what he talks about is righteous and holy behavior. That's what God is concerned. And then when God has something for you to do, you don't have to dash off and be adventurous. Just listen and do a step at a time. A real good verse on that is, let every man think soberly according to the faith that God has given him. If you say, how much faith do I have? If I have faith to prophesy, I will prophesy. If I have faith to give, I will give. You think soberly and do what's in front of you. But this other is a ballyhoo. There's a ballyhoo to it. There's a kind of a showmanship to it. And it does nothing, but the fruit is not good. It tends to make proselytes. And then you can't preach discipleship to them, because they weren't brought in by the Spirit of God. They were brought in with ballyhoo. And so then you have to follow it up with weightlifters and football stars to keep the people interested. They weren't brought in. They weren't faced with the cross. They've never repented. You've got a bunch of people. But anyway, that's not what we're talking about. What we're talking about is the pinnacle. The first great issue you have to resolve in your life is are you going to live in the world and find your security and survival there, or are you going to be a Christian? It's as simple as that. And when that's settled, then God begins to deal with the sin issue. To deal with the sin in your life through the Holy Spirit. And you come up against the various issues of sin in your life. And then the third thing that God gets at, and this is where the church is coming to now, this is the issue now, is are you willing to lay aside your self-will and your plans and just obey the Lord? Whether people understand it or they don't. And you see why it's so important now. It's because the powers of hell are so great that just being saved and speaking in tongues, you will not stand. You'll go down. Morally you'll be tempted beyond your ability to stand and you'll go down. But if you get into this third level where you're crucified with Christ, but it's not you who are living, but it's Christ who is living in you, which is the Feast of Tabernacles, then you will be able to stand in the moral horrors that are coming. You know, we preach a lot of things about the Feast of the Lord and all this, but do you know all that it is? All that it is is coming to know the Lord. That's all it is. And the feast and the trumpets and all this other stuff and the pinnacle and all this is just the mechanics of the thing. But all we're saying is to come to know the Lord. When you're saved, you don't really come to know the Lord. You do and you don't. You know your sins are forgiven, but you don't really know God. How many know that's true? You don't really know God. And when you speak in tongues, you don't really know God. These things are tools to start you on the real thing, which is to come to know the Lord. And that's all, that's all it is. That's all we're talking about is coming to know the Lord. And the church people today don't know the Lord. They're silly because of the way grace has been taught, the way the wrath has been taught, and so the people are silly. And when things get tough enough in this country, they will not stand. And God wants people who can stand. And in order to stand, we've got to come to know the Lord. And He's not like He's presented. He doesn't come with a bunch of grace and everything else. You have to be worthy of the kingdom. The day of wrath is at hand. When Jesus comes, that's the day of wrath. It's not a rapture, it's the day of wrath. And in order to stand, you'll have to be found worthy of the kingdom. And people have been taught that the only one that's worthy is Christ. Why, at least five times in the New Testament, it tells you you've got to be worthy. You have to be worthy. If the Lord tells you, I'm a Christian, it's a big deal. Have you been found worthy of the kingdom? Have you laid down your life? Have you taken up your cross? Have you been real? If not, the army will go by you and God will deal with you later. You have not been found worthy to enter the kingdom. It's much stricter than is preached. Satan has been very successful in the United States in telling people that grace will apply when the day of wrath comes. Grace will not apply at the judgment seat of Christ. There will be no grace and mercy at the judgment seat of Christ. That isn't where grace and mercy are shown. Where are grace and mercy shown? Huh? When you are a sinner and you come to God, then what God says is if you will accept Christ, now listen, you won't hear this every day, you don't have to keep the law of Moses. The whole New Testament exercise in grace has to do with the law of Moses. Paul was always talking about the law of Moses. See, before that time, they were hung heavy on mankind the law of Moses, particularly the Ten Commandments, but also the feast days, the dietary laws, and all the rest of it. That was the only law that mankind had, and it was given to the Jews. The rest of it was nature. They had nature, the Jews had the law of Moses, and that was it, and the conscience of people. And now, God comes with grace and mercy, and he says, someone fulfilled the Ten Commandments, and fulfilled the law of Moses, and died in your place. Yes, you've been an adulterer, yes, you've been violent, yes, you've been a liar, yes, you've been a thief, but I'm coming with grace and mercy to give you a brand new start. That's where grace and mercy operate. It's so that you don't have to come to God guilty, saying, oh Lord, I'll never meet your conditions, I've done this, I've done that, I've done the next thing. God says, forget it, come as you are, receive the forgiveness, I love you, you're a child, I put my spirit within you, and bring you into my kingdom. That's where grace and mercy come in. Okay? You don't have to worry about the requirements of the law, the mikvah bath, circumcision, or anything else, or the Sabbath day, unless you're a Jew, and you want to. If you want to, fine, cool, there's no problem. If you want to keep the mikvah bath, if you want to keep circumcision, if you want to keep the Sabbath, if you want to keep the Passover, and then do it unto God. But just realize that these things were all fulfilled in Christ, and they're not required. Christ did it all, and so you don't have to. But if you want to, and it's a blessing to you, do it, because it bothers some Jewish people, they say, what? My son's got to be circumcised. He doesn't have to. But if you want to, and it's a blessing, do it. And that's what Paul says, if you want to esteem a day, esteem the day, but don't judge your brother, because it's all been accomplished. That's grace and mercy. Okay? But you know what the purpose of all of that is? So that you will turn away from your wicked ways, turn over a new leaf, and do what you're supposed to. That's the purpose of it. And when you take away that second part, you have the contemporary teaching of grace, that you don't ever worry about straightening up. You were saved by grace, and this will operate at the day of judgment. But you see, that's not what the Bible teaches. It tells you you have to be worthy of the kingdom. Okay, I've given you a new start. It will just be like a judge, you know, someone comes before him, and maybe he's a kid, and he did some terrible thing, and everything, and he comes to the judge, and the judge looks at him, and he has compassion on him, and they used to have in New Haven, Connecticut, the Sheriff Slavin started a first offender program. You're a first offender. And so, it's not like now where there are gangs and everything. I mean, this was 50 years ago. And so, first offender program. Okay, so the judge has compassion on you. Son, what you did was wrong. You stole money. You stole a car. What you did was wrong. You can't do that. But I see merit in you. I see promise in you. Now, I'm going to let you off. But what does the judge have in mind? That you're not going to do it again. And when you take that away, you have a travesty of the gospel. And that's what God wants turned around in the United States. He wants people to understand He didn't forgive you and bless you to take you to heaven. He forgave you and blessed you to give you a fresh start so that you could live righteously and thereby inherit eternal life. Now, if you take this forgiveness and this touch of God and then you don't turn your life around, you're in for it. Big time. Listen, you're in for it big time. And that's what I'm putting out on the internet. And judgment is hanging over this country. And God wants to give His people to tell them, you turn yourself around and start obeying me because I'm not accepting this. You can talk about deciding for Christ all you want to. It doesn't mean a thing. I want to see righteous behavior. That's why I saved you. And that's what Ephesians 2.10 says. Somebody read that. We all know 8 and 9, don't we? For by grace He is saved through faith and that not of yourselves it is the gift of God not of works lest any man should boast. And someone read now 2.10. You see, you should never read Ephesians 2.8 and 9 without 10. What does 10 say? For we are His workmanship prayed in Christ Jesus for good works which God had prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. That's why you're saved. Is to walk in good works. Now when you don't walk in good works it's like the judge says, I let this kid out of here and two days later he stole my car again. See, that's what's going on in America. Because people are being told but the judge did that because you're in a dispensation in which you're not responsible anymore for your actions. That's the problem with dispensational teaching. See, that we have moved into a dispensation of grace whereby God is not requiring righteousness. And then it came out in the Scofield Bible. Did you know that Paul and Scofield were both jailbirds. The apostle Paul and Scofield that wrote the Scofield Bible were both jailbirds. Paul was a jailbird because of the Roman Empire and because of the Jews that put the pressure on him. Scofield was in jail because he was an embezzler. And the Scofield Bible is still one of the most popular Bibles that's being sold. And it's full of lies. It's absolutely it's saying yes, the judge forgave you because we are not in the same dispensation that it used to be where if you stole a car you went to jail. Now, if you steal a car you're forgiven by grace. It's a whole new thing. That's what dispensationalism is. And you can see how terrible this thing is. Yes, Paul. Yes. The worst of all is that the term security thing now, this Christian research institute that I listen to once in a while to see what's going on. This man has a lot of followers and he's supposed to be well respected I'm not going to say his name right. Millions call him. Millions. Literally millions. And he emphasizes so much about eternal security. He wrote a book called Christianity in Crisis and then another one is coming out Safe and Secure. There is no way you are going to go to salvation. That's the worst of all. Everything is washed in the shower of divinity so if one not to win you save by grace and then you save in security. You just sum it up and tell them so they know it's not an isolated thing. Stan heard that kind of stuff in Bible school that repentance is just not in the game. What are you going to repent of? And you can see what a satanic thing this is because it's frustrated God's intention in forgiving us because his purpose in forgiving us was so that we would get a fresh start and not have to drag around our past. But then to use that as a new dispensation in which we don't have to serve God anymore has completely destroyed the church. See that? So we have a nation of people that do not know God. And so God is here now to get all the people that want to to come to know him. And so we go to the mechanics of it the feast of the Lord because that gives us something to hang ideas on. Okay? In the Passover we've been saved through the blood. In Pentecost we've been filled with the Spirit. Now what are we facing? Warfare as God comes to declare war on our personality. That's trumpets. If you're a Christian you can expect God to deal with you about worldliness. You can expect God to deal with you about the lust of your flesh. You can expect God to deal with you about your self-will. You know? And that's where the pinnacle comes in. Whereas the lust of the flesh is unlawful. We know that. But you see, we've never regarded personal ambition as being unlawful. But personal ambition is a worse enemy than the kingdom than lust is. It's personal ambition that murdered Jesus. Not lust. But personal ambition. The Pharisees saw what was happening because of his ministry and they said look, the people are following him. So what's wrong with that? What's wrong with this if they're not following us? So that's personal ambition. So kill him. So it's a worse enemy. Now they didn't say oh, he's a holy man and we've been committing adultery so maybe we'll get caught on this and we'll murder him for that reason. Or whatever. Or he's out there making money more money than we are. They didn't crucify him for that reason. They crucified him because he was popular. So it's a worse... So personal ambition in spiritual matters has to die. Because as long as it's alive we don't know the Lord. The knowledge of God comes as we are willing to die to the world to sin and to us having our own way. Self-will. Stubbornness. Pride. And God has to deal God wants to deal with all of these things in the church today. Is there any question about that? Yes. Did you see what you said with the beat of trumpets? The beat of trumpets in a personal sense as applies to us as individuals is God declaring war on the enemy in us. And those three enemies are worldliness and the lust of the flesh and self-will. And he deals with them separately and I mean you can cast out lust you can cast out lying you can cast out some of these things but you can't cast out the things that are involved in self-will and rebellion and pride. How are those dealt with? You can't cast them out. Cast out of me the self-will you can't cast out. They say cast out of me a lying spirit that you can do. But if somebody says cast out of me the self-will it won't go because it's not a spirit that's in you. So it can't be cast out. So how does God deal with self-will? Huh? How does he do that? Huh? He puts you in prison. He puts you in a place where you're not getting what you want. I mean you want it so bad and you're not getting what you want. And he puts you there for years. I mean it's because that self thing inside of there whoa I mean the demons you know the lying and the jealousy and the gossip and all these other things that float around in our personality are just little spirits and they can be cast out if you're determined to get rid of them. But when you come to self that's what you are. That's your whole Adamic nature. And boy when you begin to go after that guy you it's years but you can't know God and preserve your Adamic nature. You cannot do that. So okay so we get saved we're washed in blood God has forgiven us. We're filled with the Spirit now we have the ability to communicate with God and maybe we have the ability to minister you shall receive power if the Spirit has come upon you. But you can do that you can minister you can be saved you can preach and not know the Lord. And so there's a lot of sin in the ministry oh man is there sin in the ministry and fighting and backbiting and politicking oy the ministry is filled with it. Why? Because they have come to those two levels but this third level knowing God they don't know God. We say how in the world could a man be an evangelist and have hundreds of people maybe thousands thousands of people converted and not know God? Simple. It happens every day. They're evangelists I know of one prominent evangelist he'll never never stand before God. His personal life is deplorable. And he'll come before Jesus and expect you know a great commendation like he has on earth. Boy you know it's a worldwide reputation he's a shaker. But when he comes before the Lord the Lord is I know this is going to happen unless he repents. The Lord is going to say I never knew you. See the one the issue is knowing God. Knowing God that's the issue. You can be a spiritualist all get out gifted do all kinds of stuff and the Holy Spirit will use it. That's what confuses people. They say but people got saved they got healed. Yeah well this is not proof of the pudding that's in the eating. Oh no. Knowing God is a different matter. And it's something that you have to work at every day. You have to every day you have to lay yourself on the line. Lord this day is yours. You have to take up your cross and follow Jesus. It takes time. You have to cultivate the presence of God. You have to bring him into everything. And God will use and once God sees that you want to know him oh he will love you but he will begin to cause people to do things and circumstances to happen that bring out the evil in your nature. And then you then you have a big fat choice. So you can either rail at the people and kick and everything and act like a wild donkey and then because you're not having your religious way. And it happens all the time. Boy politics in the ministry I tell you it makes you sick. You wouldn't think that a minister a pastor of the church would cut you down behind your back. They do. It's common. Politics. They're saved. They're filled with the spirit. They prophesy. And they don't know God. It's common. Very few of God's people know God. They know the church. They know how to work the moves. They know what they're supposed to believe and think. They say a lot of things they don't do for sure but then they're just people. But they don't know the Lord. No one has ever told them. Being a church attendant doesn't mean you know the Lord. You've got to start praying reading your Bible and when you do things are going to start popping in your life. Things are going to irritate you. They're going to get at those Amorites that are there. God's going to send the Hornet after them. And they're going to come out. People are going to irritate you. You may be real savvy concerning the churches and think you've got the whole thing by the tail on a downhill pole. You don't even know the Lord. Who is this Lord? Who is the King of Glory? It's in the Feast of Trumpets that you begin to know him. As long as you want to charge around the countryside and do your religious number God will let you do it. And he'll use it but you won't get anything out of it. Now that isn't fair. Why not? God never asked you to do it. That's your doing. Don't blame God because you're not listening to the Lord. So when you make up your mind and say Father I'm through with my religious shenanigans and I would like to know you please sir. I've heard about you with the hearing of my ears and now I would like to meet the consuming fire of Israel. And I mean you have to put that in words. You have to tell the Lord that that's what you want. All these people out here are saved. They don't know God. They know the church. They know they're saved. They believe they're saved. They are saved. They worship and sing hymns. Cool. But they don't know God. Some of them come along and teach prosperity faith. They don't know what's what. They're told don't lay your hands on God's anointed. So they're being fleeced all the time. You know. Send for your miracle necktie for a contribution of 99.99. You have a miracle necktie and it'll work. It'll keep fleas off your dog. It will cause your car to start in freezing weather and if your friend calls you and your kids are living on the street, just hold up the miracle necktie and the next thing you know they'll be preparing for college. Any problem that you have and you can get three of them at a special rate of 299.99 and you can three of special rate of 299.99 three of them at a special rate of and you can at a special rate of 299.99 three of them at a special rate of 3. Once your friends have you on the i but sin that dwells in me. That's a separation between sin and the I. But it's the I that we're talking about now. And the I is not illegal like sin is. So you say, if my will wants to do something wrong, it has nothing to do with doing something wrong, it's your will whether it wants to do something wrong or right. Now, a good example is Jacob wrestling with the angel. Jacob came to the brook Jabbok and he sent on his family and then he was wrestling with the angel because he was afraid that Esau was going to kill them all. And he wanted blessing from God. He wanted God to bless him. He knew if God would bless him, he'd be alright. And so he wrestled with God. And as he did, his nature changed. And he began to question. You see then, he was only concerned about Esau and his family. But then he ended up saying, what is your name? He became interested in God. All of a sudden, it dawned on him, who's this person I'm wrestling with? And he forgot all about his troubles. He wanted to know about God. And so when he came out of that, he was a changed man. He was wounded in his hip for one thing, in his thigh rather, and he went. But God changed his name from the supplanter. He was called the supplanter or the heel snatcher because when his brother tried to come out of the womb, he reached out and grabbed his brother by the heel. And so he was born a couple of seconds before Esau. No, no, I'm sorry. He was born a couple of seconds after Esau because Esau had the birthright. And then he got it by trickery. And his mother was a supplanter in her own right because she put him up to it. Now see, both of them were after something good. See, they were after the birthright. Esau despised the birthright, which was a hard thing in the sight of God. God did not appreciate Esau's attitude. But you see, it was the will to do a religious thing to get that birthright. And his mother was saying, you see, Jacob was his mother's pet and Esau was his father's pet. And they evidently played favors. Well, the mother wanted Jacob to have that birthright. And so she, a good Jewish mother, right? So she says, my boy is going to have that birthright. And so we would think, well, she was just ambitious for her boy. But in God's sight, see, that's supplanting. Then he went up there, he had an uncle Abel who was also devious and a supplanter. So you've got two devious people working against each other. But he finally had to come down and face the music. And eventually, if God is dealing with you, you have to come down and face the music. But your will, you say, but it was a good thing I wanted. I wanted my son to have the birthright. But it wasn't wrought in God. God knew it would happen because he said the elder shall serve the younger. Jacob have I loved and Esau have I hated. But the thing is that Rebecca got ahead of the game and Jacob got ahead of the game. And when he came down, he had to face this man he saw. You'll always, whatever you accomplish by supplanting and guile, you're going to face someday if you're going to know the Lord. Let me tell you how God works with you. If you're doing something wrong, God won't do a thing about it. Do you know what he does? Now listen, this is absolutely biblical. God lets you do it and do it and do it and do it. He doesn't do anything about it until you decide it's wrong and turn. And when you do, that's when you get what? He just wants to see how far you're in. All the while, what you're doing is putting nails in your coffin. And God says, go ahead. And you feel, well, God isn't stopping me. But what you're doing is wrong. What you're doing is wrong. And it goes on and on and on until you say, hey, wait a minute. I better go back to my wife and kids. What I'm doing is wrong. And that moment is when God begins to come down on your case. I mean, it seems so crazy, but it actually makes a lot of sense because God is just letting you just do what you want to get it all out there. And then when you decide to turn, then God comes down and you really catch it. That's the way he operates. So the time came when Jake was facing all he saw, but he had enough of integrity and God in him to instead of trying to ambush Esau or something, he went to God. And he stayed with it. And God said, let me go. What does that tell us? Yeah, God will try to shove you off. Leave me alone. Leave me alone. I mean, you've really got to mean what you're doing. And Jacob had something in him that Esau would never have if he lived a million years. And God knew that. And Jacob said, I'm not letting go of you until you bless me. And then when he came out, God changed his name from the supplanter. See, the supplanter is the I. I'll supplant my brother. I'll supplant my uncle. See, I'll get the stuff. See, that's the I working. And it was justified because his uncle was cheating him. But God will not accept that. And when his name was changed, which Israel means literally, he struggles with God. That's what it means. That's the contemporary translation. I've checked that in my in my Stuttgartentia, which is the Leningrad text that's supposed to be the best. Because I've heard all different things. It means a prince of God, a soldier, and all this other stuff. But the Leningrad text is supposed to be the best Hebrew text in Leningrad, Russia. It says that Israel means he struggles with God. And you know, I've got that on a card because of all the keys to the Christian life, that's one of the big ones. As your life, you change from a person who is getting what you want by manipulating, by politicking, by just having to have your way. How many here have to have their way? Watchman Nee says, the soulish man will always have to have his way. It's a characteristic of the person walking in the soul. That they have to have their own way. They have to have their own way. When you see someone that has to have their own way, that's the person walking in the soul. And that kind of a person will supplant, he'll do anything to get their way. And eventually you'll face the music. And you have to make a decision. And when you do, and you decide for God, instead of trying, he could have tried some number on, smart enough, I think, to try some number on Esau. But Esau was coming with 400 men. And all Jacob had going for him was a couple of wives and a whole bunch of kids. And he was in a pretty weak situation and all this flock in there because Esau had 400 men. Desert marauders, you know. He didn't want to tangle with that. Oh God, where will I go? So God drove him to himself. And Jacob had enough integrity. He wouldn't be put off. When he came out of there, he was not the supplanter anymore. He got his way after that by struggling with God. And now if there's any way you're ever going to learn to be a real Christian, it is to pass from the manipulator to getting what you want by struggling with God. And God struggles with you, and you struggle with God, and you have to keep that up. And as you do, you are changed. You are changed inside. And you come to know God. God is a consuming fire. God is the consuming fire of Israel. He is not Santa Claus in the sky. He's not a kindly old gentleman that wishes boys would be boys. He's none of these things. He's a fire. He's a consuming fire. And we are fire of that fire. There's that spark in us. And as we begin to wrestle with God, we begin to know Him. The flesh begins to die. And that's why we were washed in the blood. It's to come to know God. And that's why we were filled with the Spirit. It was to enable us to better know God and to communicate God to other people. But the end of it is to know this fiery God. Praise the Lord. If you do, you'll be able to stand and help others in the days to come. But if you stay at the level of just being saved and being filled with the Spirit, the weight of moral horror that is coming, you'll go down. You'll go down. You have to be a living dead person. You have to be crucified with Christ and living with Christ. And then in the darkest time of deception and things, what will happen is the Lord will say, just step aside. Let me do it. And He'll come forth and He'll answer for you to anti-Christ and the powers of hell. And they cannot stand before Jesus. They can stand before you. You can talk in tongues. Look, I'll come home. And they'll just stand back and laugh at you. In fact, they like the attention. But when Christ comes up in there and begins to talk to them, they're finished. And they know it. And they fear God. They fear Christ. Are you up for it? That's that pinnacle thing. Are you going to sit there and wait for God? Or are you going to jump off and try to do it yourself? Oh, hallelujah. Well, let's stand. Lord, we come unto you tonight. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Father, You are well worth the knowing. And we know that Jesus came to forgive our sins that we might begin to know God. We know, Father, it's not easy to come to know God. You are a God that hides yourself, O God of Israel. And you will put us off like you did Jacob. Leave me alone. We know that. You want to see, do we really want to know you? Or are we willing to be occupied with your gifts? Are we really after God? Have we enough brains to see that it is God we want and not His gifts? If you don't go up with us, Lord, we don't want to go up. We're not content with angels and gifts or anything else. Father, if you don't go with us, we don't want to go. We want to know you, Lord. We want to know you. We want to know you. And, Lord, we're willing to go to the ends of the earth if that's what you want, to be spectacular or to be nothing. It doesn't matter, Father, as long as we know that you are the one who is commanding the operation. We don't want any blindness of the flesh. We don't want any adventurism. We want to know God. And so we pray, Father, in this dark hour in America when we're in a moral cesspool here and perversity and lies are abounding on every hand and the nation is settling for second best and third best in their leaders. Oh, God. What a time. Even James Michener says that America's in a bad shape. Bad shape. We know that, Lord, because people are not seeking you and they're not seeking you because they're not being taught to seek you in many cases. God, we've been lied to and deceived and hidden and everything else. And now we pray, Lord, that you will turn this thing around. Oh, God, turn it around. We pray you'll give peace and truth. Hallelujah. Jesus. Pray, people. Pray and call on God. Hallelujah. God will do a wonderful thing in our nation if he can find a handful of people that will mean business with God. Father, we present ourselves. We repent on behalf of this country and the stuff that's going on. And, Lord, we want you to turn it around. We want multitudes to come to know the Lord. Help us, Jesus. Help us, Jesus. Help us. Help us. Help us to present ourselves before God as living sacrifices, Lord, that we might prove your acceptable and perfect will. Oh, God, we're sick and tired of being Jacob, Lord. We want to be Israel. We want to know God. We want to know you. We want to know you, Lord. We want to go past the church activities and meet the living God. And we mean business, Lord. So, wail away at us, Lord, whatever's left to be done. Do it, Lord. Have at it. Help us like Jacob did. Hold on until you bless us. Until you change us. Until we know God. Oh, to know you, Father. We know someday we'll see your face. God, we want to know you, Lord. We want to know God. Hallelujah. And we esteem the knowledge of God above everything on this earth, Lord. Oh, hallelujah. You saved us. You filled us with your Spirit. And now we want to know you, Lord. Oh, God. Praise your name. Praise your name. Oh, God. Peace, peace, wonderful peace Coming down from the Father above Sweep over my spirit Forever, I pray In fathomless billows of love Peace, peace, wonderful peace Coming down from the Father above Sweep over my spirit Forever, I pray In fathomless billows of love We give thanks unto you Thou art worthy, O Lord We praise your holy name We praise your holy name O Lord, you are worthy You are wonderful, Lord Glorious Lord