In this sermon, the speaker shares a personal story about a young boy who expressed his desire to attend Bible school and become a preacher. Years later, the speaker encounters a man named Roy who has become a hardened and angry individual, causing fear and distress to those around him. Despite his initial resistance, the speaker refuses to be intimidated by Roy and continues to engage with him. The sermon ends with the speaker affirming that the young boy from the beginning of the story has grown into a man of God, highlighting the transformative power of faith.

I'm going to ask us to bow for a moment of prayer, and then we'll go into the message. Can we just all bow our heads, please, for a moment in God's presence? Father, thank Thee that we, as Thy children, washed in the blood of God. Thank Thee, Father, we can gather and bow before Thee, and worship Thee, and adore Thee. Thou art worthy of all our praise. We worship Thee for the long-suffering of God with every one of us, the patience, the grace. Thou art good, Thou art perfect in all Thy dealings with us. We bless Thee that, as our God, we can look to Thee in faith to come now, and to take the scales of our eyes, that we may see that which is in Thy Word, and from Thy Word that which is in Thy heart toward all of us. So, in mercy, come now, shelter us under the blood of Christ, protect us from all the powers of darkness, cleanse the atmosphere of this building with the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son. Wash me in the blood of Jesus Christ. Fill me with the Holy Spirit, and move by Thy risen, resurrected power across from heart to heart, as the Holy Spirit takes His Word, and makes it living, and applies it to our consciences, and hearts, and lives. Come now, God, and speak. We're so tired of men's voices, and we hear so much, and we go to so many meetings, we walk out the same. Nothing happened. For good, to change us one iota, O our God, please have mercy. We look carefully away from ourselves. We know in ourselves we can do nothing. In ourselves, there's just the inability to be all our consciences know God requires of us. So, we look away from ourselves. We look away from any preacher. For any preacher is just a base, and at his best, unprofitable servant. But for the grace of God, and we look to Thee, and Thee only. Our expectation tonight is in Thee, and Thee only. And for that reason, looking at our hearts, and our motives, and our faith, come and honor this prayer. For we all unitedly agree, and ask these things of Thee, our Father, in Jesus, the Christ's name. In Jesus, Christ's name. Amen. Now, I'm going to read from a few passages in the Old Testament, and they all relate to each other. The wonder of comparing Scripture with Scripture, which is why you need a good margin in your Bible. So that you can look, and look, and compare Scriptures through the whole Bible, that have the same thought, the same doctrine, that God is laying before us. But I'd like to just look at each of these verses, though there are many, many, many multitudes of verses that say these words. But the strangest thing, each one changes to a degree. And that little change gives more light. That's the wonder of comparing Scripture with Scripture. So, to those of you that have your Bibles, you're welcome to go from page to page with me. On the other hand, if you want to just sit and listen, most of you can quote these words. So it's not going to be anything really necessary for you to page back and forth to verses you know. Most of you, I'd be surprised, don't know these verses enough to quote them. So listen, rather than just reading. And listen to that innermost being where only God's voice can reach, if you allow it, to what God has to say to you, not your children, not the unsaved person you dragged here tonight, to you. The first of these verses that I'm going to be reading from is in Exodus chapter 20, from verse 5. I, the Lord, thy God, am a jealous God, a jealous God, visiting the iniquity, the sins, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and the fourth generation of them that hate me, and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. Exodus 34, verse 6. The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and upon the children's children, unto the third and the fourth generation. Staggering words, but what does God mean? What does God mean? Deuteronomy 5, verse 29. Deuteronomy 5, verse 29. Oh, that there were such a heart in them that they would fear me and keep all my commandments always. Oh, that there was such a heart in them that they would fear me and keep my commandments always, that it might be well with them and with their children and with their children forever. Chapter 6, verse 2 of Deuteronomy. That thou mightest fear the Lord thy God to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command thee, thou and thy son and thy son's son, all the days of thy life, that thou mightest fear the Lord thy God to keep all his statutes, which I command thee, all his statutes and commandments, which I command thee, thou and thy son and thy son's son, all the days of thy life. What does God mean? Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, on and on to the next generation. Does God say here that He judges your children because of your sin? They face judgment because you defied Him. You denied consciously what God requires of you. Does God say such an unjust thing that He would judge the children for the sins of the fathers? No. No. He makes it clear in at least four verses in the Old Testament that the son shall not be judged for the father's sin. Every man shall be judged for his own sin, God says again and again, so he doesn't contradict himself, which is why you've got to look at any verse you read in the light of all scriptures, or otherwise you come out with heresy, error, misinterpretation. If God does not judge the children for the father's sin in one verse, but each man shall stand before God and be judged for his own iniquity, what does God mean? That He forgives, forgiving long-suffering, clearing sin, but by no means will clear the guilty visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children under the third and fourth generation. What does God say? Beloved, I believe with all my heart, soul, and might, I believe that God growls, grieves as He utters such words. It's not a condemnation that He just decides to place on children because fathers sin. No, His grief as He cries out to us is this, the influence, the consequences of your defiance of God, fathers and fathers, upon your children will go on and on. You openly defy God. Your children are influenced and their lives will be tragically affected, and their children's lives tragically affected by what you of your own choice, circumstance by circumstance, as they were watching in that home, watching your life, defying God, what He says of marriage, what He demands of a wife, of a mother, of a father. It's not just the mother that God cries out to be in submission to the father, to the husband, to keep the testimony of the home, to subject yourself that there isn't war because of class of wills, wills that have neither been yielded to God and truth, though they tell their children to seek God, so they war. There's no subjection. And by the by, don't ever think God just tells women to be in subjection, leaves the man, read Ephesians 5, don't just read 1 Peter 3, read the other passages, all five of them, you'll find that God tells the man how godly he must be to love that woman as Christ loved the church, gave Himself. You must want to die for her, for her needs, for her happiness, for her dignity, through you being her husband, that she would delight and not find it a cross to bear, to be in subjection to such a man, but a joy. You have no verse in this Bible to law that over the woman, sir. You have to love her in such a way that she and your children see. You demand from her heart and soul out of love to be in submission to such a man, otherwise God will judge you tragically through your sin of not being such a man. Don't blame the wife if there's unhappiness, sir, in the house. I found most times it was the man's fault who demanded submission, but was ungodly, unChristlike with a testimony, with scriptures to defend his self-will and his unbroken spirit. Oh no, God is speaking in grief of the consequences, not only in marriage, but in everything in your life, the tragic, tragic consequences that isn't his will, isn't his choice to judge the children, but will happen in such grief that you and I could never know the grief God cries out to us all. Oh, that I didn't have to be so, that such a heart was in them to obey my commandments always, that it might be well with your children, with you and your children, the tragic influences and consequences and repercussions. God doesn't say words that won't happen. They will happen. They will happen, mothers and fathers. You tell your child to fear God, to love Jesus, to give himself to Christ. Tell me, are you the reason, you're the one that tell them the way to Jesus, are you the reason they won't want Jesus, won't want what you've got, so they won't seek with all their heart, it'll all just be an outward thing to please you? They don't want it because of you. Are you the reason your child's going to hell, sir? You hold a Bible to make them bow their head at the dinner table and all kneel and pray. Are you the reason they won't love God, will harden themselves against him? Answer God. If you're not here for God, what on earth did you come here for? But if you're here for God with one, one iota of integrity towards God, I dare you, answer God right now in your heart. Sir? Lady, answer God. No one else matters right now, God. The influences upon the children of the sins, the defiances against God's known will, the deliberate calculated defiances, knowing, knowing what God says of the repercussions, but you care more about having your way, your will, your sin and your children's souls in truth, or you wouldn't do it. You wouldn't do it. I have three boys, you know two of them, Roy, my middle boy, 23, and Samuel, my baby, don't worry Samuel, I'm 60, and my mother still says this is my baby, a 60-year-old baby. You never stop being the baby, Samuel, I'm sorry for you. And then we have another son that most of you haven't met, but he's been to America on occasions when he was very small, Noel, our firstborn, a shout of joy to God from Luke, Noel, his great grandfather's name, who loved God. Noel was a little boy when this incident happened. He was small right now, all of them, including my 16-year-old baby, looked down at me, but those days, Noel, my eldest, was this size, you know. He wasn't doing homeschooling because homeschooling in Africa didn't take off until the Americans proved it worked and there's true fruit, and there was true education higher than what the schools give you in the government schools. People like Bill Gothard, etc., made the world convinced, so now the world, they're always 10, 15, 20 years behind America on everything, sin or godliness. The godly anyway, of the godly. Oh now, Noel went to school, he comes home, and he didn't know it when he walked in that door, but his uncle Dudley, my brother, who's three years older than me, he was visiting. Now Dudley and I, when we were saved, shortly after that we separated because of God's work and calling to be in the center of God's will. My brother went to another continent, preached in many countries of the world, and won probably a few hundred thousand people to Christ. Many say more than that, but I want to please not grieve God. Now Dudley was in San Francisco, in Australia, in places, and I found that years would go by and I didn't see my brother. We would meet up at an airport crossing continents in minutes to make real sacrifices, to just have moments together, otherwise it was a telephone, but he didn't see his nephews, these three boys of mine. He hadn't seen Noel since Noel was a little boy, small like that. Now Noel was bigger, and he was sitting there speaking to me in our sitting room, in our lounge, and my son comes back from school and hears that his uncle Dudley, who he hasn't seen for years from overseas in America and San Francisco at that time, he's in the lounge with his daddy. Noel ran through excitedly, and as he walked through the door, my brother Dudley, instead of getting up and shaking his hand, got forward and just groaned and burst into tears, but I mean with grief. He just, oh, he started sobbing. Now my brother's not like that. I was shocked. Noel of course thought he did something terrible, so he turned and ran out rather than shake his hand. Here's Dudley now sits down, bent and weeping. I went over to him and touched him, and I looked, Dudley, what are you weeping like this for? What's happened? Why when Noel walks through the door do you sob like this? What's wrong? Eventually he says to me, oh, I'm so ashamed. Sorry, Keith. I don't understand myself. I don't weep like this. He said, but nobody warned me, Keith. I had no warning. Keith, when Noel walked through the door, I was thrown back 30 years to when you were a boy, when I was a boy, to our childhood. It was like you walked through the door. He is exactly like you, Keith. It was like you walked through the door the way he walked. He walks like you walked, and when he spoke, Keith, it was your voice, the exact voice. Just as he was speaking, it was like your mannerisms when you were a child. I just suddenly saw my little brother again, and no one warned me, and it affected me in a way. I'm so sorry to embarrass Noel and you. I didn't know it would affect me like this. Now, it is astonishing how much of us is seen in our children, comes out in our children. They talk about genetics. I think they're a bit crazy, to the degree they're going. They blame everything on genetics, you know, but I suppose there is a lot of truth in some of the things they... 90% no. I disagree with all that, but it's astonishing how much of us, without our children realizing it, is seen in them, without them trying to emulate us, to look like us, to have our mannerisms, our voice. They're like us. It's astonishing, to what degree. When I asked Jennifer's father if I could have his daughter for my wife, one day, I'll tell you it was a fearful moment for me. I sat there trembling, because he's not the sort of man that anyone would feel comfortable with asking such a question as that, trust me. It took a long time for him to even adjust to the thought that I was there for his daughter, but now here I am walking in there asking him if I could, if Jenny and I could, when they marry, and I'll never forget what he did. He stopped smiling. You would expect to smile, at least to encourage the poor boy. He put his cup of tea down and he looked at me with a straight back, so I waited, hardly breathing. After about a full minute of just looking at me with great gravity, he said, Keith, listen to me very carefully. I want you to look at Jenny's mother. I want you to carefully look at Jennifer's mother. I want you to look at the way she speaks to me, Keith, the way she speaks to her children, her standard, the way she runs her house. I want you to look at Jennifer's mother carefully, Keith, everything about her, because, Keith, in 20 years' time, that's Jenny. Don't doubt this. Is that what you want, Keith? Is that what you want, Keith? Don't answer me. Pray, and then answer me, and he sat back, watching. I did pray, and then I said, Sir, I think your wife is wonderful, and you look very, very happy being married to her. That was the right thing to say, because he suddenly smiled, and I knew I was a little bit gaining ground here. Well, he gave consent for Jenny and I to basically what you people would say court, but there were different interpretations in different continents amongst the conservatives, trust me, but we were deeply protected in our relationship as few on earth, and I believe it was holy, and I thank God for that. We shame of nothing, nothing, but he gave us permission, and I was so blessed and so thrilled. Well, 20 years went by like one moment. Those of you that don't know that yet, you're in for a fright. Suddenly, you wake up, and life's gone. This moment called life. That's all you've got. Don't waste it, but 20 years went by swiftly. Was he right? Oh, yes, to such a degree that there have been times I've had to walk away from Jenny out of the room, shut the door in another room, and get on my knees. There's times that I am so stunned to what degree she is exactly like her mother in her conduct, in the way she speaks to me, to her children, in her standards, her values. It is beyond comprehension to what degree she is like her mother. He was right. Don't doubt that now. I was preaching in a town where God seemed to just rend the heavens, and visit that town and community, so that multitudes of people were just seeking God. They were just streaming. There was no room in the building, probably the largest building in the town. The people just kept on streaming, seeking God. The whole town was turned upside down. That was the only way to get God. That was the prayers of the saints. They got to fasting in earnest, and when that happens, God comes. Well, how do many's wife of the largest church in the whole community, which most people in all the farming areas around, all the town go to. It's the church that most of our country attend, because of the great Andrew Murray, and the influence of his revival. That denomination dominates basically Christianity, a great percentage of it in our country and continent, well, Southern Africa. But the Dumene's wife, when I say Dumene, that's what we call them in South Africa, the pastor's wife of the Dutch Reformed Churches. She requested that I and her get along, and she was broken. She said she needs privacy, and she would prefer it not to be seen, with the whole town being counseled by me. So I said, Lady, I'm so sorry. I would never, ever do that. I would never sit alone with you in any circumstance. There's too many men greater than I will ever be, who were destroyed when they did just once, thinking it was God they were serving, and it was the end of them. If you're willing to sit with people somewhere, I'm willing to speak to you, but not alone, sorry, in the circumstances you're speaking. So the Dumene of the church I was preaching, you know, that arranged the meetings originally, he said to me, listen, tell her to come to our home, to the pastorate, and my wife and I will sit the other side of this division between the lounge and the dining room. We'll know you're in there, and we'll be there. We won't close it, but we won't hear what you're saying. Is that safe enough for you? I said, yes, if you're willing. I said to the Dumene's wife, she said, yes. So she came the following day. We were sitting in the lounge, the Dumene and his wife of another denomination, said the pastor and his wife, the house I was staying, they were sitting in the dining room. So she said to me, as she sat down there, my daughter married a man who said he loved Jesus, who had all the right terminology, everything you want to hear he had, religious testimony, but he desperately wanted my daughter. It was unnerving to what degree he would go to get my daughter. He so wanted her. Eventually, we consented. Eventually, he married her. Now, sir, now he's got her. He doesn't want her anymore. He wants to divorce my daughter. Now he's got her. He doesn't want her anymore. He doesn't love her. He treats her so wrong, sir. Shamefully, he doesn't want to, he doesn't love her. He said, sir, I am the wife of preacher of most of this community. They all look to us, look up, not just to our messages, our lives. I cannot face a divorce in my home. I cannot face life, sir. I don't know if you could even begin to comprehend what this is going to do to me. I know that I cannot survive this. I can't survive what's happening. The divorce is coming into my home, my, the darling of our home, my eldest daughter. And then as the tears were pouring down her face, she said, what am I going to do, brother Daniel? What am I going to do? Help me to know what to do. I prayed, God, help me to know what to say to this lady. And then I said, lady, could I ask you a question that might offend you badly? Yes, go ahead. Is there a possibility? Is there just a possibility that your daughter is the one to blame? Is there a possibility your daughter has given him real reason to stop loving her, to not be able to bear living with her anymore? Is there a possibility that it's not him to blame, that your daughter really has got problems and has made it that he can't face life with her anymore, let alone love her? You know, that woman's whole body reverberated in shock. She didn't just gasp, her whole body shook like someone had hit her. And she just burst out sobbing, bowed her head, just sobbed uncontrollably, so that the dooman he and his wife came running through trying to console her. She was just broken. Eventually they left, she composed herself. And then she said these words to me, Brother, God, God is in this meeting of you and I. I am so hardened that I was not willing to admit what is true to myself, because it's my daughter, it's my family. But what you say is true. It's her fault entirely. The way she speaks to him shocks me, grieves me, fills me with fear, the way she treats him in front of others. It's no wonder. But, sir, worse than that, it's my fault. It's my fault utterly. You see, she speaks to her husband like I spoke to mine. She treats her husband like I treat him. She's doing what I sold her marriages, and I can't challenge her, not once, because I am to blame. What right have I got to say, stop, you're wrong. I only now realize what grace my husband had in not leaving me, because I marvel that my daughter's husband hasn't left yet, just watching how she treats him. I'm to blame. I want to ask you mothers who defy God totally, knowingly, knowing, consciously, carefully, calculatedly, knowing, but no matter what the cost or consequences, you will not change. I want to ask you mothers, answer God right now. Do you honestly think there's going to be no repercussions, no consequences, though God warns? With grief, as he warns those who will defy him. Do you think there's no consequences, father, the way you've treated your wife? Do you think the failures of your lives will not come upon those children in some incredibly staggering, grievous way, no matter how religious you are? Have you answered God, sir, or tell me, does God not matter anymore? Even in a meeting, answer God that. If you're not having dealings with God, why doesn't he matter? Even if you come to religious meetings, answer God that. When I was a young preacher, I was allowed to go to a reformatory, what you would call a correctional school, where many of these boys were murderers, young teenage boys. Some of them were just old enough to put into prison, but they were giving them a chance to somehow get a trade or some form of a education outside of the influences of a prison, the total evil influences that you can hardly reform a person that you make them worse in the prisons. So they give them more of a chance in allowing them to stay in these correctional schools. So many had murdered. I don't remember how many told me they'd killed their fathers. These were boys that really had hit rock bottom in life before life had actually begun. It was destroyed. Six of them, the first time I preached in this one section, where the very bad boys were, came to Christ in one meeting on their faces, sobbing, under conviction, after 10 minutes of preaching, God grew up. They were the worst boys in the whole reformatory, even the warders, the teachers, the police feared these boys. They were so evil. And as a result of the way they changed, 200 boys came to Christ within a matter of a few weeks. Not one has backslidden after 30 something years. Now that isn't me going around, checking up. That's the statements of the principal and others of that whole faculty and that whole correctional school. The principal said he never before and never since ever witnessed anything that boys changed like that. He never saw anything in his life like that before or since. It was one unique occasion where God came. And God came. I don't know to this day what the reason ultimately is, because I was young in the faith, but God came. God came. I've seen many, many of those boys married with children, forgiven eventually and let out through their lives, their conduct, who walk with God to this day. Many have contacted me. Many have sent messages via others. I'm stunned how many let me know they still walk with God. And I bless God for that. One of the boys called me one day and he wanted to be alone. So I sat with him in this dark section of this horrible building that looks like a vault. How you can keep humans there, I don't know, but that's how they kept them there, I suppose. Nonetheless, this boy says to me, weeping, Sir, my father told the police to tell me that he no longer loves me, that his love has died to me. He hates me. He told the police to tell me, and they told me, your father said we must tell you till the day he dies, don't ever, ever, ever attempt to contact him. He does not want to ever see you again till he dies. He will never forgive me for the shame I brought upon him, the hurts on that family. He told the police, I have died. I am as good as dead. He will never, ever, ever accept to recognize me again as his son. Sir, I haven't lost one night's sleep. Though my father said that didn't make me lose one night's sleep. That's how wicked I was. But now that I'm safe, I can't sleep. I weep, wanting his forgiveness. I agonize. I groan at the thought that he can't forgive me. I want his love again. I suddenly want his respect. I want to be his son. I don't blame him for what he said. I've been wicked, but Sir, I'm safe. I've changed every value in my life. Every priority has changed in one moment. I want you to find my father, please. I want you to go and find my father and tell him what's happened to his son and beg him, ask him to forgive me. Ask him to forgive me. Tell him I want his love, please. Won't he forgive me? I want you to go to him, Sir. I don't want anybody in the world but you to go and to tell my father. It took a while. I couldn't go in days. It's a matter of a few months. One day I found myself suddenly in a circumstance where I realized if I was disciplined with everything, I could get there. So I, with the help of others, we managed to find where this man worked. He was the owner of a company, a very wealthy man, a man of wealth that most of us will never know such wealth. It was a large, prosperous, amazing company. And this man was the owner. And they took me up to different sections till I got to where his office was. And I sat in this reception. They explained, this lady woman, the secretary, explained through the glass paneling I saw she was speaking to him about what I said that his son has asked me to please make contact. I saw his face looking through the glass with such grief, with a big cigar, just walking in circles and looking at me. Before he said to tell him to wait. Well, they made me wait for two hours, but I waited. As one person came after the other, this man with his cigar would scream in that office of blasphemy and profanity like you can't believe could come from one human's mouth in one day. He was ugly. He was evil. He was dark. Darkness in his life. Or the way he spoke to those people, even woman, the filthiness of his language, the vileness. How did a man ever become that? I thought. How could a man ever become this? It was his thick, black, greased hair and his big cigar and his anger and hatred of everybody that comes near him and no respect for anybody, not even a woman. He's so defiled. Eventually, as I saw people running out of that office with fear, they had to go near him. They just run out with fear. The lady is hurting the way he speaks, but just running. I realized this man made this world a very, very unhappy place for everybody that comes near him in life. And eventually, when he saw I wasn't going to go, and he was angry at that, he said, tell him to come in with a bit of filthy language attached so that I could hear. The lady looked embarrassed and shamed and she said, you can come in. I walked in there and as I began to speak to him about his son, he just started screaming, swearing, cursing, shouting at me, lost control. I hate him. He's not my son. He shamed me. I will never forgive him. Go on, tell him. I told the police to tell him. I will not forgive him. I don't want him. He's not my son. I said, sir, did your son have any choice of becoming what he is with a father like you? Did you give him any choice with you as his father? He was so shocked. He sat down. He put his cigar down and he trembled. He quaked. No one had ever spoken to him like that in his life. Not once. I said, sir, I've watched you for about two hours and I thought to myself, what hope did that boy ever have but to be everything he is and where he is with a father like you. If this is how he grew up with such a father, he has been saved. God has forgiven him and so you might not accept this now, but you will no matter what you say to me now. If he's saved, then he's never going back to save. He's finished with it. He's turned and God has that boy and God has forgiven that boy and you need to forgive him because you were the cause of his life. And you know it. You know that man bowed his head across the table and started sobbing so violently that the woman next door, who probably hated him, started crying. He says, it's my fault. It's my fault altogether. He had no chance with a father like me. He had to be. The tragedy is, I never knew it until now. What's wrong with me? I never knew it until now. How is that possible? You tell my son I forgive him, but tell him more. Tell him I want his forgiveness. Tell him I said it to me. Tell my son as soon as I can get down there, I'm coming to be with him, to ask for his forgiveness. You could tell my boy that, please. By the way, I'd like to end with this concerning that boy. He is a man of God now, not just a Christian. He is a man of God. He so went through with God. Quite a lot of years ago, I was preaching in a town, staying with the doormen, he was a pastor, his family, there was a little boy, about 10 years old. Who's 10 years old sitting there? Who's close to 10? Stand up, please. Good. I'm training you to be a preacher. This is the first step, publicly to stand up. Yes, he was your age. Sit. Good. This little boy, the pastor's son, walks up to me one night after the service, and he holds an envelope out to me and says, Brother Daniel, this 10-year-old boy, God has laid it on my heart to give this to you. So I looked at this little fellow and I took the envelope and I opened, it was full of notes. A lot of money in there for a little boy to hold out. So I said, wait, this is a lot of money. I can't take this from him. But God has it impressed upon my heart to give it to you. How can you say no? Out of the mouth of babe. So I said, does your mommy and daddy know how much money you want to give to this man? Before I could get any answer, I looked up and there was his mother saying to me, thank you, thank you. She said later to me, he never ever gave his tithing once. He just kept, and he says he's not giving it until God shows him he can give it to you. He wants God's guidance. He must have heard some sermon, he took it really seriously. The one point anyway, as a child, how he got that much, I don't know, because he was only 10. It was a lot of money for a boy. I was very grateful to God. But he says these words to me now after I took it. Brother Daniel, when I grow up, I'm going to come to your Bible school and I'm going to go out and preach to bring the world to Jesus like you are. He says it like that, that boldly, that's wonderful. God bless you for wanting it. Well, the years went by. I didn't see the boy years and years. And then one day, there's Roy, he arrives at Bible school. And this whole lot of young students arrive, the first term students, here they are in the lecture rooms, they let me lecture by the way. I don't lecture, I preach. And they know it's, how does a preacher lecture? So I just preach and make appeals, basically in the lecture room, but they haven't fired me yet. Anyway, I walk in now, I know it's Roy's arrived at last. That place is hot, it's burning to go to this Bible school so you can go and get equipped to go out. Not everybody's Mennonite, that you grow up and you know you don't need Bible school, you just go and preach. So many come from backgrounds, you've got to train them to be sure they don't go out with heresies or overbalances and give them the foundations. So there was Roy with all these other new students and the student body. And as I went shaking hands, there's one fine-looking young fellow, blonde hair. He says, do you remember me, Uncle Keith? Now, uncle, you call someone older than you in our country, that's respect, okay? I'm not related to him, but you don't say uncle, you're in trouble, or auntie, if you're still younger and you're talking to someone older. It's not like your country. So he says, do you remember me, Uncle Keith? I said, you know, I don't, I'm sorry. You don't remember me? And he gave me his name. And I said, no, I really don't. I meet a lot of people. Please forgive me. I don't remember you. Now he looked a little bit hurt. And he said, I was a little boy when you were in my home. My father was a preacher, a minister in the town, and you preached in a church. And I gave you my tithing. You were the first person I ever gave my tithing to. And I told you, one day I'm coming to your Bible school, and I'm going to go and preach the gospel and win the world to Christ like you are. Well, here I am, sir. I said, I do remember you now, but, oh, but you've changed. They do change, you know. Watch, in a little while, you'll be so changed, you won't be it. People will be amazed if they haven't seen you grow up slowly. Well, anyway, there he was, big, Roy and him took to each other, tragically. They really caused something, the two of them. They had a lot of fire, but very little wisdom. So on fire that they left all the students scared, full of fear. Even the principal was concerned. I mean, these two wanted to win the world, but they met it. And somehow they find each other in their immaturity and fire and lack of wisdom. Whoa, they turned the world upside down, and even the Christians. But I loved them for it. I said to Jenny, when she says, you've got to do something to slow Roy down, to calm him down. I said, no. If you've got fire, praise the Lord, God can balance him. But if he's not ablaze, how does God balance you out then? Just pray the fire doesn't go, if the balance comes. Well, God did that, hallelujah, to such a degree that right now, others feel a bit unstable in their presence, but now this dear boy did preach and has become such a godly instrument. I do bless God for him. Roy was his best man at his wedding the other day, and I preached. I had to, they demanded. I don't like to preach at weddings, but how could you say no to that boy? Anyway. Now, tragically, his father, after all the years, telling his children to follow Christ, preaching to all these souls, pulpit after pulpit, his father lost out to God. To such a degree, it's beyond comprehension. His father just went into sin. Shame, drinking, drunkenness, smoking. And his mother, her mind crumbled. I said, boy, don't judge your mother, what she's doing, what's happened to her life. Her mind just crumbled. Just couldn't face all this. How do you explain all this? I don't know. I'm ashamed to say it happened. I'm so grieved, you could never know my grief, don't think I'm using the illustration of brazenness. I have wept, wept through this much. But this boy was shaken, deeply shaken, because his father was his hero. Not me, his father. From childhood, his father preached the soul and the gospel, integrity. And now a drunk. His father lies dying from some accident. A motorbike that shouldn't have been there, the money should have gone to his children and wife. Under the influence of those lying in this condition. And they thought he was going to die, but for the grace of God, he didn't. The only one in that family that wanted to see him was this boy. We made sure he got down the other side of the nation, to see his father and speak and pray with him. This boy said something to me, that shook me. He said, Uncle Keith, I have one fear in life. I have one fear in life, that I'm going to be like my father. He used to be my hero. He used to be everything I wanted to be in life, sir. But I'm so scared as I look at my father now, that this is what's going to happen to me. What's to stop me? Sir, everybody has always said, you're your father's son. You're the identity, the image of your father. Your personality is just exactly as a tip of the old blocker. Always telling me this is my father. I'm just like my father in every way. I'm going to be just like my father. Sir, I'm so scared that that's true now. I'm so scared this is going to happen to me. And I looked at this boy and my heart just broke and I said, never. Never. Not you. Don't ever think of it again till you die. It will never happen to you. You know why? Because you know what can happen. No matter what people say, you know what can happen to people who've preached for years. You know what can happen. And you know why it happened. He neglected God, my boy. The devil can't touch you if you never neglect God and the time with God you need to give. If you devour yourself in the scriptures and you abide in Christ, you're communing with God through as he speaks to you, you speak to him. The depth of communion. Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not. Sinneth not. This relationship, this tender relationship with Christ is maintained easily. But if you neglect it, if you neglect it and you know what can happen now and you're the person of the earth that will not allow it to happen, trust me, you will never neglect God. Not for God's work. Not for anything or anyone. And I guarantee you, it will never ever happen to you. My heart knows that of you. He saw your utterly surrendered on the altar and soaked in the word of God daily. And you cannot ever end like that. There's no possibility. So don't think about it again. Don't think about it again. My father, when he came to Christ, he shook the world, his world. Can that be said of you? There wasn't a soul that knew my father that wasn't shaken, shocked, stunned, staggered beyond any comprehension that you could imagine in the whole of my country that knew him. Beginning in his home. The transformation was something that only God and grace could do. And I have never ever met a human in my entire life whose life so transformed as my father to the degree it did in one moment. One moment. My father stood up so mightily saved that the next step he took, the next word he uttered staggered everybody and didn't stop. And now years after he's dead, his life still speaketh. He being dead yet speaketh. Oh, the multitudes that came to God through him in the business world. When they saw this man, the change, they sought God. The multitudes who came to God as they saw a man they knew and feared turned to Christ and become godly and holy in one moment, not in yours. But. My father one day heard the message of Andrew Murray. Andrew Murray said, in essence, this. If a child of God, if a Christian does not come to a place of absolute surrender, if a child of God, a Christian does not come to a place of absolute surrender. Where he has a personal Calvary, dies to self, where he trusts God to fill him with the Holy Spirit. Which all it means is to be controlled of the Holy Spirit. That's all to be filled with the Holy Spirit. He's in you at salvation, but he's not in control. And you become aware of that swiftly as you look at the standard and you come to a crisis if you're saved, no matter who you are. And Murray said, I defy any man in this earth to tell me that doesn't happen after salvation. And the light God gives you and you know he's taken you from the moral things and the things you couldn't name the name of Jesus. But there's so much of the standard you suddenly aware of that you become despairing. Murray says, unless a child of God comes to a place of absolute surrender, where he lays everything on the altar of God, where he dedicates his life and what you dedicate, God consecrates. God cannot dedicate. You cannot consecrate. But if you dedicate, if you give in the fight, if you yield everything over, I will not let God go unless he has his full way. Jacob, you will be so changed from that moment. God will have to change your name to a prince with God, Jacob, a prince spiritually. Oh, my father heard this message and he was the one who ran weeping. He's so desperate not to lose anything God could do in his life while he left. He sought God with his whole being, mightily saved, transparent before God, staggered everybody beginning in his home to a degree few would ever, but in desperation needing this absolutely surrendered life. I came home a while later to our home. My nanny, our black domestic lady who literally raised me, I so love the memory of her. Oh, I loved her. My nanny says to me with tears, mommy's crying. She's crying again. Go, she's in the gardens. Go speak to her. I went out, I find my mother in the gardens weeping, weeping. I said, oh, mother, I thought all the crying was over when daddy got sick. What has he done now? She looked at me quite stunned and she tried to stop herself crying. She said, okay, these are different tears, my boy. There's no tears of shame and sorrow anymore. Please, when your father came to Jesus Christ, I was staggered. I was staggered more than anything that has ever staggered me in life, at the change in one moment in your father's life. I was staggered so much I've hardly been able to speak since then. I just keep quiet, stunned, looking at him in wonder, but since he came out in that meeting where that man talked about Andrew Murray saying children of God need to come to absolute surrender and be filled with the Holy Spirit, since he came out there, Keith, I haven't stopped weeping. I'm not just staggered. Keith is so changed now that he's a total stranger to me. I don't know the man I'm living with. Keith, he was my childhood sweetheart. I never, ever had another sweetheart, another boyfriend. I never, he was the only man I'd ever know. I know this man. I know everything about him, but Keith, he's so changed that I know nothing about this man anymore. I look at him. I can't speak to him. There's nothing I can say to him. I know nothing about him. He's so changed. Keith, I looked at him just now and that's why I just walked out in the garden crying, left him, and I thought to myself, who is this man? Who is this? I was so blessed, but I found myself saying these words, mommy, do you know, want to know who this man is? Jesus. This man you're looking at. I said, what? How can you say that to me? I said, mommy, listen carefully to the degree a Christian goes through with God. To that degree, Jesus Christ lives his life out through him. The fruit of the spirit, the evidence the Holy Spirit has control of you is in you. The evidence, the proof, that's all the fruit. The evidence, the proof that you are controlled by God, the Holy Spirit, because to the degree you yield your life in subjection to God, to that degree, God's fruit is seen in your life. Listen, the fruit of the spirit, the fruit of the spirit is not love, joy, peace, faith, long suffering. No, no, sir. You missed the whole message of the Bible. The fruit of the spirit is Christ. Full stop. His whole work is to conform us into the image of Christ, that which God predestined before the foundations of the earth. What? One of you go to heaven and one of you go to hell. That's what he decided. No, don't preach that, brother, to be conformed into the image of his son. That's the, that's the purpose of God. That's the plan. That's the work of God into the image that was lost at the fall through Satan, inherited by fathers down to children, to children and children. That sinful nature to the degree the father sins even, it's like a vicious circle coming upon his children and their children. You see, holiness is Christ. Otherwise, it's heresy. Holiness is not dress. It's not modesty and no makeup and humility and modest clothes. Lady, that's beautiful, but that's not holiness. You can dress like a nun and be a devil. You can dress so separately and be so separated from worldliness and worldly things and televisions and places and anything, and yet be the reason your child goes to hell. Without Christ likeness, you've got nothing of any value to God or man in the light of eternity. Without Christ likeness, the more religious you are, the more disciplined and stronger you are in your religious convictions, the more you send people to hell because they won't want what you've got that you're not Christ like. If Jesus Christ is not seen formed in you, you're transformed by the glory of God from image into image, just being more and more conformed into Christ likeness. If that isn't what in essence is taking place in your life, God has had nothing of his way in your life. God doesn't call you to religion. God doesn't call you to fanaticism. God doesn't call you to sacrifice. God doesn't call you to separation, sir. These things have their places only once. Don't put the cart before the horse and be everything outwardly, and yet the inward work has never happened. Christ likeness, sir, not religion, not strictness, not separations, not humility even, and just God. Without Christ likeness, lady, sir, you have got nothing, nothing but that which will grieve God and man beginning in your heart to the degree that you are Christ-like in your every reaction, because the fruit of the Spirit is not your efforts. It is the spontaneous reactions without any effort of your own. You see in our religion, sir, called Christianity, it's not what you can do. It's what God is allowed to do through you. You can't work yourself up to be anything. You can't discipline yourself to be anything. To the degree you yield your life totally, to that degree the spontaneous reaction is seen in your life in every circumstance, no matter how trying the circumstances. To the degree you're soaked in the Word of God once, once, once, you are totally surrendered. And let me shock you now. From the day you're saved, God cancels out the sinful nature of the inherited, the influences, and suddenly you're no longer like your father or mother. I don't care whether they were devils. God cancels it out so totally to the degree you go on yielding until you're so totally yielded and soaked in the Word of Christ and communing with God and letting him change you from image from glory to glory into the image of Christ until there's so much of Christ like this that every step you take staggers the powers of hell. You will not stagger the powers of hell by being religious. You will not stagger the powers of hell by being a preacher. You will only stagger the powers of hell, beginning in your home to the last step you take in life, to the degree you live Christ and Christ lives out his life in you. And you are changed into the image of another father, sir, ultimately. Not your father. When you're saved, that image gets taken away until the image lost, the image of God lost at the fall is the one thing God is having his way to bring back in your life. God talks about how we trample Satan underfoot, how we don't see him. Let me tell you, the only time your life has ever proved that once to the smallest degree is when Christ is seen in you. Christ-likeness, love that suffers long and is kind, love that can love your enemies without effort. It just has to. We'll bless them that curse you. We'll do good to them that hate you. Do you think that is just some standard? That's Jesus Christ, sir. That's him, the standard of the New Testament totally. If we embrace it is for one reason, to make you like Jesus. It's Christ. Holiness is Christ or it's heresy. The other things, yes, they have their place, they're precious, not to be despised. I love modesty. I love separation from worldliness. I love sacrifice. The whole life is a living sacrifice, which is your reasonable service to God. But if you tempt these things, anything to any degree, before God has taken hold of you and revealed the fruit and is having his way to form Christ in you, all these things will be used by the devil, not God, beginning in your heart. Until there's nothing left of your earthly father in you, your heavenly father's got such control. Until even your wife weeps because there's nothing left. Of the man she's lived with. All those years. Until your children, years after you're dead, cry out to the whole world, I never saw a man in my life like my father. Who trained so much, so swiftly, that in nine years, he brought more people to Jesus Christ through his life than most preachers in my nation's history who stood in pulpits for 40, 50 years, ever did. And he never preached once. His life was his message. There's nothing more fearful in the hands of God than the holy life. Beginning in the home, the devil and the powers of hell will sweep in terror what they see is accomplished through your every reaction and word, sir. The impressions made in your children, that will go on to their children and their children. God guarantees the influences are reversed from the effects of sin to the effects in fruit and reward of obedience and righteousness. When did you absolutely surrender unto God? When did you have a personal Calvary? Is what Andrew Murray says true with all your religion? Unless a child of God comes to a place of absolute surrender, where he has a personal Calvary, and by God's grace, he's still controlled, totally consecrated, because he dedicated. Unless that happens, he will become a grief to God, that we saved, and man. Beginning in the home. Is that you? I'm going to ask you something. It's going to hurt. If it is you, if you've got one eye out of integrity left between you and God, of letting him truly have his way, you listen carefully now. I'm going to ask those of you that know God desperately requires of you, right now, to absolutely surrender. Not to work yourself for fast or pray for years and say, now, maybe as I'm in such a state, I could say it can happen. No, but by faith, to do the will of God, to yield everything, a living sacrifice. I beseech you, I beg you, Christians, brethren, by the mercies of God, that he present you, dedicate one moment. Your body's a living sacrifice, not a dead sacrifice lying on the altar, but totally, just as that dead sacrifice, you die to self, you die to sin, you die to everything that God doesn't want. A living sacrifice that he may prove. He may prove what is that good and perfect and acceptable will of God for you. I want those of you that right now have that much left in you, that there's no pride at this point, just one thing, a desire that what's left of life, that little moment left of life, will be proving what God wants to do with you, beginning in your home, on the next step you take, and not to waste it through pride, protecting all I am, though I know everything is wrong. I want those of you that are desperate, whether you're a child, knowing you need this, whether you're a father or a mother, whether you're a teenager, I want you to look at your hearts, the hardness of your heart, I want you to look at just how real you are with God, and how much he's having, and I want you to ask yourselves, does God cry out desperately? You desperately need this, and I desperately require this of you, child. For all that's remembered of you, beginning in your home, is grief, though you said you're saved. I want to ask you from my heart, those of you who desperately, desperately, desperately need to seek God for forgiveness and cleansing, and to ask by faith that he would give you the grace that right now you absolutely surrender, and of trusting to fill you, to take complete control, that no longer efforts of your own, but spontaneously, he lives out his life, no matter how trying the circumstances, the fruit of the spirit, the evidence is there, as you maintain the tender relationship by never neglecting the tender presence of God, morning and night, from now on, which I want those of you that know God requires of you, and you desperately need this, not a little shallow thing of desperation. It'll cost you to admit that, but it's going to cost you a billion zillion times more hurt to not admit it tonight, if you know you are to. Trust me, I want those of you that know God requires of you, and you love God enough to say, there it is, God, everything, or nothing more, everything, no matter what it costs me, and it's going to cost you, but it's going to cost you so much more if you don't. Those of you that God's speaking to, and it's a yes from your heart, soul, and might, everything, I want you to stand and say, it's me, God, and those that stand, I'm going to pray for. Costs, doesn't it? Oh, doesn't it cost? Funny, your children especially, you think they'll judge you? No, sir, they'll judge you if you don't, because they know. So, don't think you're losing ground, you're gaining their respect, perhaps for the first time in life, true respect for what you are in religion. Come, those standing, will you come? Let's make something sacred here. Those sitting, they'll pray with you, no one's going to judge you, even your children, they won't judge you, they'll love you for what you're doing now. God won't judge you, he'll love you now, in a way, oh, beyond comprehension, for God is love, and he can undo the damages in moments if you seek him, the damages you have done to an unyielded life. Everyone else, will you bow your heads, please, and in your heart say amen, when I say amen, so that all of us are agreeing, for where two or three of you agree, touching anything, that is the father's will in my name, it shall be done. God has a holy obligation now, he won't deny himself, he can't, he's holy, and don't anyone kneeling dare believe God would turn his face away and say, no, thank you, I'm not interested in your bowing and wanting my will, don't believe that, that's the devil, it'll say that. Don't have the slightest doubt, for I haven't the slightest doubt that if you pray this prayer with all your heart, soul, and might, as best as you can, for that's all God can expect of you, God will answer this above that you and I are asking and believing, I know that, I know that through the multitudes across this world that have told me already, and I don't know about the most, but those that have told me, show me enough that this prayer and this bowing is what God honors, even if it's preachers bowing, they said that was the turning point of my life and ministry, when I prayed that prayer, so I have no doubt, God's proved it enough to me that he's holy and his holiness makes it incapable of turning his face away from his children, seeking to let God have his full way, so have faith and in humility, let's ask God together now, God does not look at the words that proceed out of the mouth, God does not look at the words that proceed out of the mouth, he looks at the heart, he looks at the heart from whence they come, God's looking at your heart, and though it's my words leading you to pray, God won't judge you for that, if you say in your heart as you pray these words and God sees your heart that this is as best as you can God, what I say from my heart, even though it's another man leading us in prayer, God will answer this prayer, because it's the heart that matters, so from your heart as best as you can let God see this is your prayer from your heart now, from your soul, that's all he's waiting to see, so pray aloud every one of you on your knees or here in the front, and if it's uncomfortable for you on your knees, then stand for a while, it is not the outward, it's the inward bowing that matters to God in essence, so pray aloud every one of you after me, everyone kneeling, everyone in the front, oh my God forgive me for the grief I have caused thee and others beginning in my home, because of an unsurrendered life and will, though I've been saved, forgive me for every sin, every defiance of the known will of God, and every repercussion and influence, wash me in the blood of Jesus Christ, that cleanses not only at salvation, but from all sin, for if we who are saved sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the propitiation for our sins, if we confess our sin, for whoso confesseth and forsaketh his sins shall have mercy, oh we confess and we ask thee by grace to turn us to no longer fail, in all the aspects we have failed, beginning in our home, wipe away every sin, things I've forgotten in my baseness, to even confess, let there be a clean start here tonight, a clean plate, because of my faith in the blood of Jesus Christ, let the blood go deeper, wash me through and through, and through and through, and through and through, and through and through, create in me a clean heart, oh God, and renew a right spirit within me, a consistent, steadfast walk in the light I've been given, with no compromise, I absolutely surrender, I dedicate my life, my body, every faculty of my being on the altar of God, take my life and let it be consecrated, Lord to thee, fill me now with the Holy Spirit, take control of me, live out thy life within me, that I might have not words as a testimony, but a life, that I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth his life through me, let the fruit of the Spirit be seen in my every reaction, no matter how trying the circumstances, I know that's not possible, apart from thee living it through me, undo the damage I have done to my children, and others, through my failures, and my unchristlikeness, and by the grace of God, help them to forgive me and to respect me, as they see Jesus Christ now in me, Lord, give me the grace to never neglect thee, morning and night, so that daily I am renewed, equipped, spiritual, for that day, from the next step I take, to the day I die, I pray, that less and less, of any worldly father or mother, will be seen in me, and more and more, of my heavenly father, and of Jesus Christ his Son, and the Holy Spirit, will be seen, every step I take, by thy grace, I ask for this, please answer my prayer, above that I'm asking, or believing, for thy name's sake, and thy glory, in Jesus Christ's name, in Jesus the Christ's name, I ask this of thee, my heavenly father, with my whole heart, no matter what the cost. Amen.