In this sermon, the speaker shares a personal story about carrying a cross and meeting a general in a presidential palace. He emphasizes the importance of sharing the gospel and asking people if they are saved. The speaker also encourages the audience to come together in love and unity. The sermon concludes with a call to sing a song about getting together in love, with the repetition of the name of Jesus.

It's just beautiful to be here tonight. I ran in there a while ago and laid down for ten minutes to kind of, you know, rest to see what was, oh, a pen sticking in my pocket there, to find out, you know, just to rest and say, God, I just, you know, clear my mind, refresh me, wake me up, and get us ready to go for again. So I find a lot of times I have to lay down and I say, Lord, give me eight and ten, and that means eight hours and ten minutes, you know, eight hours of sleep and ten minutes, and he does it. And since y'all aren't going to do any singing, I guess maybe he thinks I'll do one of my songs. Have you ever heard any of my songs on record that I've written? You haven't. I didn't expect you had. Why don't you stand up? I'll teach you a good song. I wrote it. And you notice over here this big cross. Wasn't that a terrific article they did in today's newspaper? I mean, that was really great. Praise God. I think it'd be good if you call the editor or write him a letter and just express, because that, that newspaper story was written better than I could have written it, or even the preacher said better than he could have written it. I mean, it was the gospel and then just the pictures of you praying there in the middle of the city on your knees in the mud and the rain and the wet and praying with that wonderful lady, you know, just the cross and prayer. What a wonderful picture right here at this Christmas time to share. Well, I've been walking around the world with this cross and a lot of music is written for church, and it just doesn't have the right beat for walking. So my music is for walking. You might find another purpose, maybe a horseback riding on a slow horse. I don't know, but, and it's also, my songs are written for those who can't sing. And on most music, are you ready for it, choir? Most music is written for singers, but not mine. You didn't expect it anyway. So mine's made for walking. So all you got to do is speak. If you can say anything, you can, you can, you can sing this music. Now what we'll do is we will clap and on the third clap, the third beat, you say Jesus. And on the third beat, you say Jesus. And on the third beat again, you say Jesus three times. And then brothers and sisters. And we do that three times. And then let's all get together in love. And you say that three times and you'll pick the rhythm with it. And then you sing it. Let's all get together. Let's all get together. Let's all get together in love. Got it? Everybody's ready to do it. Okay. It's real simple. You can do it. Okay, here we go. Now, I'll count it off. I'll go one, two, and then we'll hit it, but we'll get our clap down first. Okay, here we go. Whoa, whoa, whoa. You can't walk that fast. We're not talking about praising the Lord. We're talking about getting down and bap, bap, bap. I mean, I wouldn't last a day that way. So you got to get in kind of like I'm, so just slow it down a little bit. It goes like this. Now, there you go. We can keep that up all day. Okay, count it off. One, two, Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. Let's all get together in love. Let's all get together in love. Let's all get together in love. Now sing it. Let's all get together. Let's all get together. Let's all get together in love. Let's all get together. Let's all get together. Let's all Let's all get together in love. Now you did real good. Now this time you got to do it louder and you got to try to smile. If you don't mean it, fake it. Okay, everybody, here we go again. One, two, Jesus. Louder. Jesus. Jesus. Now sing it. Let's all get together. Let's all get together. Let's all get together in love. Let's all get together. Let's all get together. Let's all get together in love. Now sing it again, but put your arms around somebody standing by you, everybody. Let's all get together. Let's all get together. Let's all get together in love. Let's all get together. Let's all get together. Let's all get together in love. Stretch it out across the aisle. Sing it one more time all the way. Let's all get together. Let's all get together. It's beautiful out there. Let's all get together in love. Let's all get together. Let's all get together. Let's all get together in love. Just stand there with your arms around the person by you and let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, we thank you for the love of Jesus Christ. We thank you, Father, for your love that sent Jesus to this earth. And we thank you, Lord Jesus, for your love to send the Holy Spirit to abide within us. We thank you, Jehovah God, our Lord, the Divine and Holy Trinity. We ask you this evening, in the name of Jesus, to visit us with your presence and with your glory. We invite you into this place, into this building that has been dedicated for the glory of God, with these men and women who have assembled here to worship you, who have joined together in love one for another. We pray that every evil and demonic spirit would be cast out of these grounds. And we pray for liberty in the spirit. I pray, dear God, that every person in this building that's not saved shall be convicted of their sins and brought to a desire to know Jesus. I pray, Lord, that they will have the walk to acknowledge and confess Christ. I pray for Christians that are bound, those who are defeated, those who are backslidden, who have been living in defeat, that they shall have victory this night. We invite your presence and your Spirit, in the name of Jesus, in whose name we pray, amen. Praise God. God bless you. I want to share with you this evening just a little bit different from the way we have in the previous three meetings together in this auditorium. Because this evening I want to share with you more from the Scripture than I have out of my personal experiences that have been illustrating the Scripture. But I also want to begin by sharing an experience that will well illustrate what we're going to share about tonight. Tonight I want to share with you about the presence of God. I want you this evening, as we share, to make yourself available where God can reveal His presence to you. But we're not wanting this to be a time when you say, He touched me. We want it to be a time where you begin to realize that He is with you always. So we're not here tonight for a highlight. We're not here for a mountaintop experience. We want to gather and to share together this evening about how you can live on top of the mountain all the rest of your life. When you come to understand the presence of God, your life will be absolutely revolutionized. Many people say, but Arthur, don't you get lonely when you're traveling around the world? I said, how can you get lonely when you know that God is with you? When you can discuss earthly things with the heavenlies, you're never lonely. How can you ever get lonely when you know the Father loves you and that His eye is in every place beholding you? How can you ever be lonely when you know the presence of Jesus is with you always? How can you ever be lonely when you know that the Holy Spirit of God abides and lives within? How can you ever get lonely when you know, in the very presence of God, the angel assigned to you stands in God's company always? How can you ever despair that God will never hear you when you know that Jesus ever liveth to make intercession for you? How can you ever be alone when you know that you're surrounded by a host of heavenly ministering angels that are always at the disposal of God's Spirit to meet your every need? How can you ever be lonely nor despair when you realize that Philippians 4.19 is for you, where the Bible declares, My God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory through Christ Jesus. Now I want you this evening to become aware, in a way you never have, of the always unceasing, never-ending, constant presence of God. The reason most Christians have problems is because they don't realize how real the presence of God is. You go somewhere, you move to another town, you go off on a business meeting, nobody knows you, you didn't pray this morning, you feel like you can do anything and maybe get by with it. But when you know you're taking God with you everywhere you go, it makes a difference in your living. It makes a difference in everything when you know He is with you. When you start to speak to someone about the Lord and fear starts to rush in, you say, But God is with me. And there is all the difference in the world in every circumstance. Now I want to share an experience, and then I want us to look in the Word of God. You can, after I've shared this experience, maybe even write down some of these Scripture verses. I mean, even listen. You may get a tape recording of this message, and I advise you, you may want to, after it's over, and listen to it. It may take days before it all sinks in, but I want you to know from this night on, if you've never known it before, Jesus will be with you always. Never forget it. I was carrying the cross through Central America, this very cross right here. And as I was going down, walking from Mexico down to Colombia, and for those who may be new, we've carried the cross around the world since 1969 through 60 countries of the world, more than 20,000 miles now. Sometimes people say, who is we? Well, it's obvious who we is. I mean, it's the Lord. I'm not doing it alone, right? It's the Lord. So I always like to share the we, the Lord, His presence, His strength, because they could have never taken a step without Him. But I was walking through Nicaragua during the war, and it was when the Sandinistas were trying to overthrow the government of Somoza and succeeded in it. And it was right during the height of that war that I was passing through that area of Central America. I'll never forget that day as long as I live, and night, because I'd gone through the city of Lyon, and they had been fighting all day in the city, and we walked right up to where they were fighting a big police barracks, army barracks in the middle of town, and preached right there. And then I went on. And there were two guys who were with me at that time. We had a truck and a trailer loaded down with Bibles and gospel tracts and a small trailer to sleep in. And one guy was driving Mike Ooten, and another doctor had come to spend two weeks vacation with me, and he spoke Spanish, and he was teaching me Spanish. And it was the day that my parrot died. Now, I had a parrot, and I'd named him El Salvador del Mundo, and I was trying to learn Spanish, and I'd named him after a plaza in San Salvador, El Salvador. And I... You know, when you get on the road and you're away from your family so long, sometimes you get a little eccentric, and I had this parrot, and I'd bought him for three dollars from a little kid, and he was the friendliest thing, and he'd sit there munching on my ear, and just, oh, he'd just love you to death and ruin your clothes. But I loved him, and I mean, I only spoke to the parrot in Spanish because I didn't want him to learn English because I had a missionary plan. I think you all have a mission plan here from the church, but I had my own. And my mission plan was since it's so hard to get human people out witnessing in the world and in the jungles, I decided I was going to train that parrot how to preach. And the parrot did a good job, as a matter of fact, better than some preachers I know. And the booger was really getting his preaching down, and I was going to get him praising the Lord, and then I was going to turn him loose and let his feathers go out where I kept his wings clipped and let him fly out in the jungle, and he'd be teaching me of the parrots how to preach. And before long, the jungles would be full of the glory of God. Hallelujah. Glory adios. Deus et Te Ama, you know. I mean, wouldn't that be wild? But that day, the mosquitoes had been biting Mike and Don Price, this doctor from Key Largo, Florida. And so they were spraying hairspray, I mean, not hairspray, mosquito spray to kill the mosquitoes, and my parrot OB'd on mosquito spray. And I got up there, and the guy was kicking, you know, and I pray over him, lay hands on him to be healed, and he just jerks on and dies. And I felt so bad I cried, and I cried because my mission plan died. My parrot, and I said, I guess God has to use humans, you know. So we buried that old parrot, and I cried. I don't know why, I just boohooed. And dug a hole, put him in it, put a little cross up over it, started on down the road, got dark, and started to stop, preached in this village, and they said, don't stay here, they'll kill you. On this highway, at night, it's just murder. They rob and murder everybody. People were saying it was the government, and the government says it was the gorillas. All I know is that it was people, everybody said, they'll kill anybody, you can't stay on the road. Go up to the town, park by the church, and you'll be okay, but not on the road. I said, I've been walking around the world. I spend the night where I finish. If there's any way I can sleep where I finish with a cross, I never have run, and I'm not going to start now. We're going to sleep here on the roadside. And we pulled the trailer over in the truck, went to bed after we'd finished preaching, and we went to sleep. At 2 o'clock in the morning, and I'll make this brief because I've got a sermon to share, there was a bam on the wall. I looked out the curtain, and there were guns pointed at me, and they said, open the door, and I just slipped on my pants, opened the door, and looked, and the guys charged in. Who is Arthur Blessed? Well, I started to say, there he is right there. Old Mike Eaton was laying there, and Don, he's on vacation, that's him, but I said, I am, and they grabbed me and started to take me out of the trailer. And as they started to lead me out the door, I just somehow grabbed the truck keys. I don't know, I just grabbed the truck keys, and they led me out, and I'm preaching to them in the best Spanish I know, and they lead me over. The cross was over there near the village, and I got over beside, they led me over near the truck, kind of the truck is here, and I'm standing over like this away from the truck, and they line up here, seven gunmen with rifles and pistols and two on a truck with machine guns, and they tell me they're going to kill me. And I'm preaching away, and finally they raise their guns up like this, and I suddenly realized like that, they really are. And I don't even have a shirt on, and I thought, I'm not going to die without a Bible. I don't know, that, you may, I mean, that's what went through my mind. I'm not going to die without a Bible. And I was right there by the truck, and they got there like this, and the guy says, uno. I mean, it's starting to go one, two, uno, dos. I have the truck keys, I just turn right to the door like this, stick it in, and the guy said, don't move. I figure, what does it matter whether you get in the front or back? And I turn the truck key, open the door, and lean in. Only God knows why they didn't shoot me then. I mean, I could have come out with a hand grenade or a gun or anything. I'm in the truck. I pick up a case of Bibles, American Bible Society Bibles. I set them down. The guys come all around me. They said, get up. They're pulling on my shoulder, and I'm trying to tear the top off this box, and it's got wire in those threads. Have you ever seen that tape with a little wire running through it? I mean, I hope they don't do them that way again. I'm trying to tear it off. My fingers are about to cut, and I have to tear it around, and I need them quick. And I think, I'll give them all a Bible. And they'll have a gun in their hand and a Bible. Now, I mean, I don't know. It's strange, you see. When they had me stand up there, they were on the offense. But when I turned to that door, they didn't know what... God confounded them. They didn't know what to do. I'm getting down there, finally get the Bibles, get them up in my arm, and I said, Uncario, Uncario, Un Biblio. Not too good of Spanish, but do you want a Bible? And nobody's standing there. I look up, and the nearest one, I promise you, is as far away as from here to that man, laying on the ground. One guy's laying back in the door of our trailer with his feet hanging out. And I look around there. I say, Uncario, Un Biblio, Señor. No molesto, por favor. We're not going to bother you, sir. And they get up. Guy gets out of the trailer, and he looks around, and he runs toward the truck. They jump on the truck. Guy cranks up. They wheel around and take off. Tires spinning down the highway. And I'm standing there. I thought, Wow. Boy. They just left like that. I walk in the trailer, and I said, Praise God. Don and Mike said, Arthur, we thought you were dead. I said, Well, those guys were going to shoot me. And I said, I decided I was going to get a Bible. I believed I could maybe get that door open before I died. I was just going to get a Bible. And I told them what happened. Don said, Man. He said, Arthur, I've only been saved two years. He said, And I tell you. He said, I know meat when it hits meat. He said, I've been in a lot of barroom brawls. He said, We heard them beat you. We heard the meat flesh against flesh. We heard them beat you. Then we heard a holler. And he said, We saw them falling down. And one guy fell in the door. We thought you'd kicked him before you died. I said, No. I didn't do anything. I didn't hear anything. I didn't see anything. I said, When I got up, they're laying on the ground. And one guy's in the door. And, I mean, the story goes on and on. Now, just listen. I said, We sat there, and we said, Man. God must have sent his, I mean, the angels must have come down here and knocked him down, I think. Yes. I mean, you know, I said, Are you sure? I mean, I'm sure. I mean, they heard the blows. Guys fell back. Mike was right by the door, and he just saw them going down. And, so then, we stayed up the rest of the night. It was two o'clock at night when this happened. Early in the morning, at dawn, I'm up ready to start carrying the cross. The village of people are standing there. They've been up all night standing out there watching after this had happened. And when we came, Don speaks perfect Spanish, and I was understanding a lot. Those people were saying, We saw God here last night. There was a bright light. And they'd been standing there watching the trailer all night. They said, God was here. We saw a bright light. That very night, in Phoenix, Arizona, many of you have heard of Trinity Broadcasting Network, TBN. They're now the largest Christian network in the country. Seven Christian stations, full time, from coast to coast, as well as hundreds of cable networks. And their president and founder, Paul and Jan Crouch, were in Phoenix, Arizona. And we have the videotape of all this. That night, I mean, of what they say the next day, that very night, at one o'clock in the morning, Phoenix time, Paul and Jan were reading the Bible and sharing and talking and praying, and suddenly Jan has a vision. And Jan saw me, and she saw me standing by that truck under a tree, and I was looking up. And it was like I was saying, I'm about to die. And Jan grabbed Paul. She said, Paul, pray! Arthur's about to die! And Paul rolled out of bed and she starts to pray. And she had been reading that day Billy Graham's book on angels. And as she had read that, as how the angels are at the ministering beckoned Word of God, Jan said, Lord Jesus, in the name of Jesus, send twelve big angels down there right now and deliver him. And it was exactly the same time as I was down there in Nicaragua. The next night on their television program, Jan gets on and Paul, and they tell what has happened. And the tape, we've seen the tapes. Nobody's in touch with us in Nicaragua, but that morning at my office, people start calling the office all across America and began to share, saying, what has happened? Last night we felt Arthur was about to die. And Sherry went down to the post office and the postmaster said, didn't he just die? I mean, it was a shadow of death hanging over. Finally, later that week, at the end of the week, we arrive in Managua, Nicaragua. And there in Managua, telephone back, and I talked to Sherry. She said, call the TV station, Arthur. They're on the air. Here's their line on the set they gave to me, if you call. And Jan was sharing and was shared on the air what had happened down there. All I want to say out of that is what I'm going to preach on tonight. My presence shall be with you. God that night had sent His angels obviously and struck down those gunmen for the next weeks through Nicaragua. Incredible awakening. Those people, I never said anything about it, those people said, the word spread what God had did and tens of thousands day after day flooded to me along the highways through Nicaragua. Tonight, I want to read a Scripture verse from the Bible. In Exodus the 33rd chapter and the 14th verse, it says these words. And God is speaking to Moses. And Moses has made a request of God. And Moses has said, Lord, if I have found grace in Thy sight, show me Thy way that I may know Thee, that I may find grace in Thy sight and consider that this nation is Thy people. And God said, My presence shall go with Thee and I will give you rest. Moses was on the mountain with God. And that mountain, you remember, is Mount Sinai. And the glory of God had come. I mean, the Bible says that God spoke with Moses as a friend speaketh to his friend in verse 11. And the Lord spoke to Moses face to face as a man speaketh to his friend. Moses on that mountain in the very presence of God. God speaking to him as a friend speaks to a friend. And Moses said, Lord, show me Thy way. I want to know You. I don't want to just meet You. I want to know You. I want to understand You. I want to find grace in Your sight. And God said, Yes, Moses, My presence will go with You. Now, Moses was there in the middle of that Sinai desert. I had been there myself. I walked with this cross from Jerusalem to Cairo, hundreds of miles through that desert with four canteens of water, getting army. The armies along the way would give me water. And I mean, Moses was there with hundreds of thousands of people. There is no food. There is almost no water. It is a hard desert. And there he is. And God is saying, Go. And God has led him. But on this mountain, God is talking with Moses. And God is giving him the Ten Commandments. And God is giving him orders of how to set up all that is before him. And Moses, in his condition, says, Lord, I want to know You. And God said, My presence will be with You. I tell you, if God's presence is with you, everything is okay. Right? I mean, no matter what you've got or what you hadn't got, but if you have God with you, it's okay. Right? I mean, there isn't one problem you've got that if you know that God Almighty is with you, it's alright. You can live through it. Whatever it is, however tough, however easy, whatever the circumstance, God said, Moses, My presence will be with you. The root meaning of that word in Hebrew is what God was saying, My face shall be with you. My face, my eyes, you will be in my ever-constant watch. And I will be with you. He will be before you, behind you, around you, in you, above you. My presence, I was walking through Central America and a truck came by one day. It had been, it's a death road, I mean, around the world, walking on the roadside, wrecks in front, beside, you're walking within inches, sometimes even less, I think than an inch there. Brush your clothes. It is dangerous on the roads. And yet this truck came by and it was loaded with tire rims, steel wheels. And it was all way up, more than you could get by with in America. But as the truck went by, the ropes broke. And all these steel rims started falling all around me. And as that steel started dropping around me, I started laughing. I said, You thought you had me from the top, didn't you, devil? I mean, God's been all around me and He thought He'd drop a steel wheel on my head. But no, I said, God's up there too. His presence shall be with you. His face shall be with you. And I will give you rest. Amen. Rest. Peace. Relax. I am with you. You can go to sleep in the middle of chaos. This summer as Joshua and I were in Lebanon and in West Beirut and through the night bombing and shelling and it seemed like unending shaking and all little old Joshua, he'd reach over and get his Bible and he'd say, Daddy, the Lord's with us. And he'd close his little eyes and go to sleep. And the Lord's presence, I will be with you and give you rest. Rest. You can go to sleep. Hey, whatever it is you're facing, I mean, I'll be with you. Now then the Lord said, I'll be with you. And Moses said something. Moses said in verse 18, I beg you, Lord, show me your glory. I'd like to see your glory. His heart was right. His desire was right. And God said, I'll be with you. And he made an awesome request. Show me your glory. And you know what God said? I will make all my goodness pass before you. Do you know why that's what God wants for you? I want all my goodness to pass before you. God is just delighted to show you all His glory, all His power, all His greatness, all His might, all His goodness He wants to give you. And we're going to get into that a little more later. And I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee. And then he goes on in verse 20, Thou canst not see my face, for there shall no man see me and live. The Lord said, Behold, there is a place by me. You stand upon a rock, and it will come to pass that my glory passeth by. I'll put you in a little cleft of the rock and cover you with My hand while I pass by. And I will take away My hand, and you shall see My back parts, but My face shall not be seen. Moses, you asked for it. And I want you to see all My goodness. And I'll bring My glory by. And I will come by, and I'll let you stand in this little corner of the rock. And I'll pass by, and I'll move My hand, and you can see Me. Oh, my dear friend, I want every day to live in the presence of this almighty, glorious God. And you can live in His presence. Look over in the end of Exodus, the last chapter, verse 37. And God, and when a cloud covered the tent of the congregation, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. And Moses was not able to enter the tent of the congregation because the cloud abode upon it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Let's just stop there. Wouldn't it be awesome if tomorrow we came up here to church, and as you started into the church, you felt such glory, and the glory of God was so in this place. You just stood at the door, and others drove up, and others stood out there, and others stood, and there was an awesome manifestation of God, and you couldn't even get in the building. You felt such glory. Now, that's what happened. And the Bible said, And when the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the children of Israel went onward in all their journeys. And if the cloud was not taken up, then they journeyed not until the day when it was taken up. For the cloud of the Lord was upon the tabernacle by day, and the fire was upon it by night. In the sight of all the house of Israel through all their journeys. Now, we're slowly building this message. Just hang on. Right about now, we're going to start taking off. You thought it was good already, right? Now, it's going to get better. What did God say? He said, My presence will go before you. What did He tell them to do? He told them to make a tabernacle. And the glory of God came down and abode there upon that tabernacle. And there was a cloud that covered the tabernacle. And there was a cloud upon it by day, and there was a fire that burned over it by night. And every time the cloud moved, they moved the tabernacle. And every time the cloud stopped, they stopped. And they moved the tabernacle under the cloud by day and in the fire by night they abode. Now, hold on. Over in the New Testament, in the New Testament, the Bible tells us something about the believer. The Bible says, Know you not that your body is the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit? That you're not your own, but you're bought by a price. The Bible tells us all throughout the epistles that we are the tabernacle of God. That our body is the temple of the Holy Ghost. It is the temple of God. Now, it is also represented that when they built the temple in Jerusalem, there in the Holy of Holies, represented the ever-constant presence of God. But that temple and the Holy of Holies that represented the all-ever-presence of God has been torn down. And on that place stands a Muslim mosque. Now, hear me. The Bible declares that our body is the temple of the Lord. Right? Do you believe it? The Bible says that we are the tabernacle of God. We are indwelled by the Spirit of God when we've received Jesus as our Savior. Now, listen. That tabernacle represented the presence of God. And the cloud represented the cloud of the glory of God. The cloud has always represented the presence of God. From down below, when they looked on the mountain, they saw the cloud, the cloud, the cloud of glory, and fire. It's what the people saw. Now, over in the New Testament, John said, And Jesus shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire. On the day of Pentecost, they were baptized with what? Cloven tongues of fire when Jesus was on the Mount of Transfiguration. What did the disciples see? Peter, James, and John saw a cloud of glory surrounding where they could not see. When Jesus ascended unto the Father, what did He ascend into? He ascended up into a cloud when Jesus comes again. This is good. What is He coming? The Bible said, in the same manner that you've seen Him go, He is coming again. He cometh with the clouds, the Bible said, representing the presence of God. Your body being the indwelling place of the Holy Spirit. Your body being the temple of God. Your body being the tabernacle of God. God wants you living under the cloud and in the fire. Under the cloud, when the cloud of God's Spirit moves, you move. When the cloud stops, you stop. Walk in the Spirit, the Bible says. And the Holy Spirit, He shall guide you to all truth. Move with the Spirit of God. And when you abide, abide in the fire of the Holy Spirit of God. God is saying, as He was with that tabernacle with Moses, My presence shall be with you. Today, God Almighty is with you. You're to live in the cloud of His presence. You're to live in the fire of His presence. God says, I will be with you. My presence shall be with you. Look at another passage of Scripture. So exciting. In 2 Chronicles 7. And when Solomon had made it in to praying, the fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offerings and the sacrifices. And the glory of the Lord filled the house. Now again, this is talking about the temple. It's the temple. Earlier we talked about the tabernacle, which was the portable thing that they carried as a place of worship. But now we're speaking of the temple they built in Jerusalem. The same thing is happening. You understand? As they dedicate the temple to God, it says the fire came down from heaven, consumed their sacrifices and offerings. That's what happens whenever we're saved. That's what happens whenever the Holy Spirit of God takes control of our life. You come to God. Sign 2 It ends up that old sin washes you clean through the blood of Jesus. And the glory of God wants to fill the temple of God, which is you. And He wants to abide within you. And the priest could not enter into the house of the Lord, for the glory of the Lord had filled the Lord's house. And when all the children of Israel saw how the fire came down and the glory of the Lord, there's the fire and the cloud. They bowed themselves with their faces to the ground upon the pavement and worshipped and praised the Lord, saying, He is good for His mercy. Endure it forever. Praise God. They saw the fire come down. God, I tell you, friend, is saying, My presence will be upon your tabernacle. My presence. I want to fill that temple with my glory, with my fire, with all my fullness. I will be with you. That is the message of God always through the Old Testament. Never fear. The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not walk. Why? Because He is with me. His rod and His staff, they comfort me because He is with me. Not standing above you, observing you. Not standing nearby, watching you. But He is within you and around you and His glory upon you. I will be with you. My presence. There is no such thing as a little bit of God, right? Is that theological, pastor? Can you have a piece of God? He is not cut up. There is no little pieces of God. Some people say, Well, I've got just a little of the Lord. Well, you haven't got a little of Him. You don't cut Him up. You don't slice Him up and say, I'm 80% with Him. You're either with Him or not. My presence. He's either with you or He's not. There isn't any little bit of God. There isn't a little slice of Him. I will be with you. Let's look over there. Again at that 23rd Psalm. I love it. Aye, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. Why? Because God is with me. If I live, I live for Him. Paul said, If I live, I live for Christ. Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. For me to live is Christ. To die is gain. There have been a number of times I've been close to death. Many of you the same. I don't know about you, but almost every time I've been disappointed because I almost made it. If you ever hear about me getting run over by some big Mack truck somewhere in the world, don't cry. Say, Glory to God, He made it. Been close so many times, I said, Well, looks like I'll have to work up. I've got to keep on walking. I could have gone on to heaven and made a cruise around the pearly gates and those golden streets, but I've got to walk through Alabama now, or Kansas, or got to go on across the Sinai Desert. Hey, He will be with you. And then He says, Oh, He says, Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life. Psalm 23, 6. I love that. Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life. I don't know. I love to study this Bible. It's God's written Word to me. When I just came into Israel again, walking down from Beirut, and I arrived in Jerusalem, I spent almost a week with one of the greatest men of God, greatest theologians I know, and that is Dr. Bob Lindsay at Jerusalem Baptist Church there. And he's studied Hebrew for over 40 years. One of the leading scholars in the world in Hebrew. And I stayed at his house, and we just dug in. Day and night I'm picking his brain all the time because I'm laughing up every truth I can get from God. And we weren't talking about this at all, but he was sharing about something else. And I remember that this just moved me. It really bore witness with me, as he was saying in Psalm 23, verse 6, where it says, Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life. You know what that says in Hebrew according to one of the greatest Hebrew scholars in the world? That word in Hebrew, follow me. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me. You know what that word follow me in essence means in Hebrew? It means God's face, God's presence, God's goodness and mercy shall chase after. It doesn't mean just following along. It says, My goodness and my mercy shall chase after you. I'm going to bless you. I want to give you everything I get, even if you're moving on. God's got everything. You don't have to come to, Oh God, give me something. Oh God, do something. He's chasing you to bless you. He's hunted you down all over this world trying to do good things for you. It's you that's been running from Him. He's saying, My blessings, my goodness and my mercy will chase after you. I love to walk down the road. And when I'm going down the road, I never thought of that chasing after. But I've been going down the road and I love to walk down the road. And as I go down the road, I say, Hello goodness! And I go on along. I say, Hello mercy! Glory to God! I've got Him behind me. And the Bible said, His presence will go before us. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord. Lord, every step is Your step. Every thought is Yours. I mean, He said, The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night. And I know it's hot when you're walking through the Jordan Valley by the Dead Sea. And it's 120 or 30 degrees. And the only thing out in the open are donkeys and me. And the sheep and goats are even in the shade. Just an old donkey. But I say, The sun shall not smite thee by day. I'm not afraid of the sun. God's with me. Nor the moon by night. Wherever you lay down your head, the eyes of God are in that place. And God, I rest with You. And I go to sleep. I mean, You just sack out and die off. I never have a problem going to sleep. I just hit down and bong. I'm gone. I love to sleep. I remember Jesus went to sleep on that sea. Remember? In the boat with the disciples in the middle of a storm. I don't care what storm there is raging around you. You can have peace because He is with you. He said, Thou preparest a table before Me in the presence of Mine enemies. That verse amuses me and makes me laugh. One of the great thrills of seeing that in reality. I was walking from Jerusalem to Cairo two years ago carrying the cross in 1980. And as I was going across there, it was really a wild time. Just four canteens of water and a sleeping bag and a few rolls of Jesus stickers and there I went. And it was really wonderful. The night before I crossed into Egypt. Now people had said I'd already went through Israel before but some said, You can't walk through Israel while preaching and carrying a 12-foot cross. The last night I stayed in Israel, I slept in Prime Minister Begin's house just outside El Arish at the old line in a mashav. And I mean it, haul the cross in there and put it in the bedroom where I spent the night. A dog nearly killed me. A dog attacked me. I walked up on that base and a German police dog grabbed me by the arm. But anyway, praise the Lord, you know, laid in there that night in His house. Spent the night. Now I'm in the Sinai Desert. Next morning, I'd been in South America in red where they were opening the border between Israel and Egypt exchanging ambassadors. And I felt like the Lord wanted me to be the first one over there to walk across that border with a cross on the day they opened the border. And that morning, I was over there and met Captain David the night before and he agreed to let me up there on the front line first. And they opened the border and I'm the first one over with a cross into Egypt. Now it's against the law to evangelize in Egypt. You know, the leaders of the Muslims are in prison and the leaders of the Christian Coptics over there are in prison. Such religious strife. And it's illegal to convert a Muslim to be a Christian or anything like it. And yet, I walk into Egypt and thinking what in the world is before me. Cross the border and there's a big limousine waiting to take me to meet the military governor of the Sinai. Well, I say, I'm walking. They said, we'll give you a ride. I said, no, I walk with a cross. I'm heading toward Cairo. And they said, no, the military governor, General Mohammed Hakan Saket, praise the Lord, wants to see you. And I said, well, I only walk. He can come out here or he can wait. I'll be there in a few hours, but I'm not riding. I walk. And finally, the limo drives off. They can't believe it and I go down the road. There's a sandstorm. I'm in little old short pants and a t-shirt. It is, oh, I'm dirty. Get up there and they're waiting for me. Direct me over to the palace. They call it the palace, presidential palace. And I go up there to this palace, lean the cross up against the building and all these men in sharp uniforms and everything, they're taking me and there I am kind of, you know, easing in. And I go upstairs and there's red carpet up and I walk in this big swank room and there's the general with all his badges and everything on and I walk up and he's got tears in his eyes and he's been down, he's been looking out the window as I walked up with a cross and he said, why are you carrying that cross? And I sit down and I share with him about Jesus Christ and I ask him if he's saved and then I share the gospel. Now, you may never know when you read about or hear about or see me with some leader in this world. You say, what in the world is Arthur Blessed doing with Yasser Arafat or what's he doing with this person or that one? I tell you, everybody I meet when I get a hold of their hand, you can know I'm preaching the gospel. I'm not dealing with politics. I'm asking people if they're saved and telling them how to get saved. I shared with that general, he began to cry. I cried. We got on our knees, prayed, and you know, Muslims don't believe Jesus died on the cross. But when we got up from praying, he said, would you give me a piece of your cross? I said, well, if I gave everybody a piece, there'd be no wood left. He said, well, I'd just like a piece of that cross. And I think, here's a Muslim. And I just prayed with him. And we prayed to Jesus. And he's now wanting a piece of cross. I said, okay, come down with me. He said, alright. I said, only gave a piece of the cross to one man, and that was the Pope, Pope John Paul. There's a chip out down there where I cut out a piece and gave it to the Pope when I met with him in Rome. And I said, but I'll give you a piece. Took the pocket knife, whacked him off a piece right down there. He stood with it, took his billfold out, put the cross, cut two pieces in his billfold in front of all his staff. And he had tears running down his cheeks. He looked at me and he said, Arthur, he said, would you, would you eat my dinner? He said, I've been waiting for you. I've got to be in Cairo. He said, and I've waited and waited. My dinner is ready, but all the staff's got to go. Would you have our dinner? I said, well, if you insist, I'd be glad to. He said, all right. And he said something in Arabic and then he hugged me and he got off in the car to go get in the helicopter to fly back to Cairo. And these guys take me and I go into a room about the size of the ground floor of this church and there are rows of tables. And at the front, there's a table from one side almost to another. A setting across there for maybe 15, or 20 people. There is food piled up, not on all, but across this front table. Place settings, everything you can imagine to eat. And they set me down and there are these guys in their white coats all around and I sit down at that table by myself in Muslim Egypt in the middle of the Sinai Desert, El Arish. And I'm sitting there and I think, my God, my poor wife's praying, Lord, don't let him starve to death out in that desert. Lord, don't let him thirst. Give him something to drink. And I'm sitting there looking at all that food and tears start pouring down my face and I remembered those words, Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies. Thou anointest my head with oil They gave me the Sinai Peace Medal in Egypt for the Minister of State in his office in Cairo for carrying the cross through the Sinai Desert. Oh, my presence shall go with you. And then, my dear friend, we thought about the presence of God the Father. Now, I want you. You think, isn't that good? If we stop right now, it's worth the trip to the church tonight, isn't it? But that's only one third. Two thirds to go. I mean, it's good and better and better. That's what it means. Moving on, growing from glory unto glory. God's presence will be with you. But now, I want you to think of the last words written in the Gospel of Matthew. The words of Jesus which say, And lo, I am with you always. Say that. I am with you always. Who said it? Jesus. Did He mean it? Yes. How long will He be with you? Always. Always He will be with you. And notice what He said before that in verse 18. He said, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth and I will be with you always. Why are you defeated? Why are you worried? Why are you troubled? Let's get on shouting ground. God says, In the presence of Jesus, I will be with you always. I tell you, I grew up in Louisiana and in Mississippi and you just can't do this Scripture justice the way most white folks read it. You got to get in a good black church to get the meaning of this verse. I just was with Dr. E.V. Hill on television. Interviewed him two weeks ago. Mount Zion Baptist Church in Los Angeles. We spent two hours together on television. That man preached made me feel like a little shrimp compared to an elephant. I tell you, if you want it, I'll try it. But when I was a kid, we used to go down and we'd go down to those black churches and that's where I learned the Gospel. That's where I really heard it. Now if you really want to get the meaning of this, even an old white guy can try to say it the right way so you can get the point. But it says, Oh, here's the way we read it. All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Don't get too blessed out of that. But if you really want to get what God said, you've got to say, All power. I didn't say a little. I said, All power. Right? All power. All power is given unto me. You've got to understand it isn't a little bit. It's all power is given to me in heaven and in earth. And he says, And I am. I am with you always. Right? I said, Not a little time. Always. And I tell you, we white folks preach around on that about three minutes. A good black preacher can preach all day on always. Always. And I tell you, we white folks have got to get convinced that it is always. Right? Not a little time. Not a short time. We've been living the way we've been preaching it. We brush over that always and we need to hang on to that always. All time. Right? I mean, you've got to sing song it. You've got to stretch it out. You've got to cut it up in pieces. You've got to stay with it. You've got to get the point. He didn't mean a little time. He said, All power is His. All power. And he said, It's given to Him in heaven and in earth and in that authority, in that power, in His presence, He will be with you always. Are you beginning to get the point? Now, he didn't say, I'll be with you if you read your Bible every morning. I remember when I was in college, nearly died off, going to BSU devotions. I'm not putting down the BSU, but they sang all these little songs. They tried to get you spiritual. You've got to wake up in the morning and spend at least 30 minutes praying and reading the Bible, or the Lord won't be with you like He should through the day. I tried to wake up and get spiritual. And I'd set my alarm clock. All I ever got was the guilt. I mean, I felt bad if I didn't get up. If I did, I'd read it, try to pray, and I'd sleep through class. I'd be seduced. I just, I am a night person. I mean, I like to read the Bible at night. Maybe others like to read it in the day. But I was trying to, I felt if I don't do this in the morning, the Lord won't be with me through the day. Oh, I tell you, God will be with you even if you forget to read the Bible in the morning. He'll be with you even if you forget to pray. You shouldn't. And you should read the Word. And you should pray when you get up. And you should pray without ceasing. But even if you forget, doesn't mean He's going to cop out and say, you're on your own. It's a bad day. You weren't with me this morning. He'll be with you always. All the time. A lot of Baptists, we've got the theology of saved forever. Once saved, always saved. But we hadn't got a hold of the always presence of God. We've got some theology that keeps us saved. But we've got to get our theology in line with the Spirit that keeps us alive and gives life and gives blessing. I am with you. Who is? Jesus is. Now what kind of power did Jesus have? All power, didn't He? And we look at Him, we see He healed the sick, raised the dead, walked on the water, calmed the winds, cast out demons, raised the dead, fasted for 40 days, overcame the works of Satan. He showed His power over all the creation. Now do we have a watered down version of Jesus today? I don't think so. What does the Bible say? Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever. So what Jesus do we have today? The same One who was here then. I remember preaching and sharing with a guy from Bali, which is in Indonesia in the Southeast Asia area. And there, just in Hindu animist worship and a real conglomerate of religion, knew nothing at all about Jesus. And I was sharing with him about Christ. And as I explained the life of Jesus to him, he was listening and listening and listening. Finally I told him how Christ had died for His sins. And then I told him about Jesus being resurrected. And as I was giving the facts of the resurrection of Christ, he smiled and he said, Oh, I understand. I said, What do you understand? He said, Oh, Jesus came back, reincarnation. I understand. I said, Now just a minute. I said, Now Jesus came back after He had died and on the third day He rose again. Not reincarnation. Listen. And I showed him in John. He came back in the same body. He said, See the nail prints. See my thigh. Not reincarnation. The same Jesus. In the same body. And the same Jesus is coming again. And the Bible said in Acts, the first chapter, when Jesus had ascended into heaven, the angel said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up from you shall return in like manner as you have seen Him go. Which Jesus? This same Jesus. On the day of Pentecost when Peter preached, he said, Ye men of Israel, I want you to know that this same Jesus whom you crucified is both Lord and Christ. Amen? The one you crucified, the one who died here on the cross, the same one is Lord and Christ. And who is with you now? And how long will He be with you? And what does He have? How much power? What Jesus? Is it a new one or what? The same Jesus. And what did He say? Greater works than these shall you do. He will be with you. When? When you're right here tonight. You know what His promise is? He promised any time two or three are gathered together, He'll be in their midst. I'm gathered here in the name of Jesus. Are you, pastor? It doesn't matter whether any of you else want to be in on it or not. He's here because we are here in the name of Jesus. Every one of you that are here in the name of Jesus, say amen. I mean He's here in our midst. He made a promise. I will be with you. He made a promise He'd be with you any time two or three are gathered in His name. He also made a promise that He'd be with you as one person, right? Always. I will be with you. You're never alone. Always with Him. The Bible says the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. Illustrating the power of prayer in the book of James, God speaking through James said, Remember Elijah who was a man of like passions like you? He prayed and it rained not for seven years and he prayed and it rained. You see, one man. I will be with one. But also I will be with two or three. I will be in their midst. Jesus is with you. Now we get on over to the third point. I mean these are powerful points. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost. That's the best sermon outline ever preached, isn't it? You can't outline them better than that. God saying I'll be with you. But you know what Jesus said? Notice what Jesus said in John, the 14th chapter. Reading there in verse 16. And I pray the Father. Now when you've got Jesus praying to the Father, I mean that's going to be done, right? I don't have any doubt of that. Jesus speaking to His Father and what did He say? I pray the Father and He will give you another Comforter. That's the Holy Spirit that He may abide with you forever. You know what that abide means? You don't say He's not a tourist. He isn't passing through. He's not visiting. He didn't say I will pray the Father and He will give you the Holy Spirit and He will visit you. But what He said, I'll give you the Holy Spirit and He will abide, He will dwell, He will make His permanent residence with you forever. You see many times when you fill out papers and things when you come in the country or whatever and immigration, they ask you what your address is or something, but there's always something that says permanent address. Where do you really abide? You may be here, but where do you dwell? Where's home? And you know what Jesus said? He said I'm going to ask the Father and I'm asking Him, His Son, and He's going to send you the Holy Spirit and He will make His residence in you forever. So who is with you? The Holy Spirit is with you. Now I hear a lot of people say, Oh, I've got the Holy Ghost. I always drop my head and kind of scratch a little bit on that. What we need is not people to have the Holy Spirit. We need some people whom the Holy Spirit has got. You need the Holy Spirit to have you. See the Bible said on the day of Pentecost they spake as the Spirit gave utterance. They weren't speaking and then the Spirit, the Holy Spirit. I don't care if you're so full of the Holy Spirit you say until you've got white doves perched on both shoulders. If you aren't winning the loss to Jesus, you're not filled with the Holy Ghost, those are just sick birds. That's not the Holy Ghost. The Holy Spirit of God transforms us. I find a lot of people easy to get our hands up, but we don't get them out. It's easy to say glory to God when we're in the church. We walk out. We climb up like a turtle. The Holy Spirit gives liberty to live. To live in this world triumphantly. He will abide with you forever. Verse 17, Even the Spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive because it seeth Him not neither knoweth Him, but you know Him for He dwelleth with you and shall be in you. Ok, now it's not the Holy Spirit just kind of hanging around looking at you, watching you, trying to make contact, but where does this Holy Spirit abide in you? The Bible said in Romans if you don't have the Holy Spirit you're none of His. So the Holy Spirit comes to abide, to dwell, and to reside in you forever. And when you have the Holy Spirit, what do you have? See, it's all ditto, ditto, ditto. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. What the one does, the other does. No distinction. What do you mean? Ok, Jesus said, All powers given unto Me in heaven and in earth go, and I am with you always. What did He say about the Holy Spirit? Jesus said of the Holy Spirit before He ascended into heaven, and you shall receive power. After that the Holy Ghost has come upon you. Same thing. Power. Jesus gives power. Father gives power. God said to Moses, My presence will be with you. Now meet all your needs. God provided His power, led them through that wilderness. The power of Jesus is with you through the empowering of the Holy Spirit. You say, oh, I have the power. I am filled with the Holy Spirit, but you don't have the power of victory in your life? No, no, my friend. We can have the power of God, His presence. God is saying, My presence will be with you. Jesus is saying, My presence will be with you always. The Holy Spirit is saying, My presence shall be in you always. I know this is going on and on. You probably can't hang on to it, but let's try it again. There is a little bit more in Corinthians that just enlightens us to what it is that God is doing in our life. And I want you to notice it over there in 2 Corinthians 3, 17. Do you like this? Isn't this getting in the Word? I mean, it's just the Word. Listen to it now. Hang on. Verse 17, chapter 3, Now the Lord is that Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. Now let's hold on now. Who? We're speaking of the Holy Spirit. How many of you are saved? Raise your hand. Okay, put them down. How many of you that are saved believe the Holy Spirit abides, dwells within you? Raise your hand. Okay, now I'm not going to ask you to raise your hand on this one. Just follow me. Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. How many of you are living in the liberty of the Spirit? Where the Spirit of the Lord is, is He in you? There's liberty. Do you have liberty? I ask you that. Let's look at how you have all that liberty. Verse 18, But we all, with open face, beholding as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory unto glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. Now listen. Have you ever stood in the mirror? Have you ever looked in the mirror and you saw somebody else come up in the mirror? You know, they walked up at another angle. You're not looking at yourself. You look in the mirror and you're seeing them. Now this is what he's saying. He said as we stand in the very presence of God with the abiding presence of Jesus and the infilling of the Holy Spirit, it's like standing in front of a mirror. And as you look into the mirror, instead of seeing yourself, you see the glory of God. As you look in that mirror at the glory of God, suddenly you are changed into the same image that you're looking at. Suddenly your life becomes a life of the glory of God. And we're changed, not by our power, but by the power of the Lord, by the Holy Spirit. We don't change ourself. We're changed by Him. How? From glory unto glory. In other words, instead of going from mountaintop to valley, you just climb from one top to another rather than down in the valley. Do you get that now? Do I need to run it by again? You see, we are not... Some of you are so frustrated as Christians. You sit here and you start feeling good tonight and you say, I am not going to feel that good again. Every time I feel good, I'll be depressed by Wednesday. I know it. I can't make it and I refuse to get all excited because I'll just wipe out again. And then it'll crank me up to the top and you're just on a spiritual roller coaster and you're sick of it. It's not the Word of God that says you're supposed to live on roller coasters. He said you're to grow from glory unto glory. See, He said you look at that mirror and as we behold the glass, the glory of the Lord, we are changed into the same image. Have you ever been around people that you just know they know the Lord and they are living in the glory of the Lord and don't you just love to be around them? I mean, you just want to know them. You just want to hang around them. My old grandfather, bless it, was that way. We called him Papa. He lived to be 93 years old. I mean, he was a saint of the Lord. I remember saying to Papa, I came to see him when he was 92 and I said, Papa, when were you saved? He said, I was seven. I said, you're 92 now. How is it? After all these years, you know, 85 years with God, how is it? Papa looked at me and he said, it's getting better all the time. Getting better all the time. I wrote another song called It's Getting Better All the Time, but I won't do it. Maybe tomorrow. No. But it's getting better all the time. That's the way it is with God. You can live with Him. You can live in His glory. Now let me show you a little more about that. Look down in 2 Corinthians 4, verse 6. Write down the page in your Bible and just hold on to this one. For God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness hath shined, where? In our hearts. For what? To give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Where does God want His glory? Remember over in Deuteronomy, the Bible made a promise. God made a promise. God said, For as surely as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord. Did you know that's coming to pass today? Because all over the world, all over the world, the glory of God is beginning to shine in the lives, in the hearts of people, on every continent, in every land. Where does God want His glory? He wants His glory. And where His glory is, His presence is, right? Where does He want it? In your heart. And how do you have it in your heart? You have it in the face of Jesus Christ. When you see Jesus, when you trust Jesus, when you believe in Him, and you ask Him to save you and live within you, His presence comes to dwell in your heart through the face of Jesus Christ. His light shines in the heart. Isn't this good? I tell you, my friend, there's no reason you ought to walk out of here tonight taking it from the devil any longer. You can walk out of here and say, Get your hands off me, Satan! I'm the property of God. I'm not yours. I'm bought with a price. The blood of Jesus paid the price for me. You start out of here and you start to be depressed, you say, Get out of here, Satan! The Lord is with me. Thy presence is with me. You walk out of here and you say, God is with me. And you don't have to take it any longer. That's what sent those empowered people who were disciples, weak, timid, falling around. And then they, on the day of Pentecost, they came to understand Jesus hadn't just died on the cross and hadn't just risen again and hadn't just taken off, but they came to realize He was still with them. And they turned the world upside down. My friend, you've got the promise of God, Jehovah God, that He will be with you. You have the promise of Jesus Christ that all power is His and that He will be with you always. You have the promise of the Holy Spirit that He will abide with you and He will transform you into the image and likeness of the glory of God, which is Jesus, and it will shine in your heart as you see the face of Jesus. Reminds you right back there in Exodus, doesn't it? Where God said, My face shall go before thee. My presence shall go before thee. Just what I read in Corinthians where He says, All this glory comes into your heart in the face and the presence of Jesus Christ. Many of us tonight, in a moment, we're going to give an invitation. And I just somehow feel that maybe even some who have been saying, Arthur, as best as I know how, I'm right with God. I seek to serve Him. But as you've been listening tonight, you've just somehow said, Oh, I want God to cleanse my mind. I want Him to purify my heart. I want Him to help me to realize from now on that He is with me. Always. See, the one thing I know is one day everybody in this building is going to someday die. You will one day. These hands aren't going to move. I look at them. I see they're alive. But you know, one day they're going to be dead. One day the color of my skin is going to be gone to white. My heart's going to stop beating. I'll be dead. You'll be dead. But you know the one thing I know? The Bible says what Jesus said. When Lazarus died, he was carried into the bosom of the Father by the holy angels. My presence will be with you. My granddad Campbell, when he died, he had called for me to come back from Mississippi College to see him. And he said he's about to die. When I got there, they said, you can't come in the room. He'll get excited. He wants to see you, but he'll get excited and die. And they told him he's out there, but granddad said, I've got to see him. I've got to see him. And they said, you're going to be excited. He said, I'm going to die soon anyway. I want to see him. Brought me in there and laid hands on me and prayed all over me. And he was so excited. And they said, you've got to get out of here. Arthur, you've got to get out of here. He's about to die. We thought he was dying several days ago. Oh, my granddad prayed all over me. All over me he prayed. And finally they led me out and I walked out the door. And they said, he began to sing, Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. Once was lost, but now I'm found. Was blind, but now I see. Sang it twice. And he said the Lord's Prayer. And he sat up and lifted up his hands. And he died. My presence will go with you. Hey, it's okay. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. I flew back from Africa and I got back just before my father was dying. And I spent a week with him. And he said, son, I'm ready to go. It's time. I'd led him to the Lord when he was an alcoholic and he'd been set free. We led the doctor to the Lord over there who was tending to him. And I said, Daddy, want me to pray for you? He said, son, I'm ready to go now. You don't have to pray. And ask for the Lord to heal me. The time's up. And I sat there day after day and night after night and I read the Bible to him. The night he was going to die, I was sitting there beside him and I'd read the Bible. They said he was in a coma. But you know what? Every time I'd quit reading the Bible, he'd start to tremble. And when I'd read the Bible, he was okay. I don't care. They said he couldn't hear. I believe he heard right on down to the end. You don't know what was there. All I know was he trembles when I quit reading the Word. And finally the last heartbeat came. And the doctor looked at me and he said, do I say praise the Lord? I said, praise the Lord. My daddy's breathing the fresh air of heaven. No life had left the body, but my dad is with Jesus. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. For Thou art with me. Thy presence, I tell you, the presence of God. To live in His presence to me.