In this sermon, Eddie discusses the three ways in which every son or daughter of God is tested. He emphasizes the importance of understanding these areas, particularly for those in training for ministry. Eddie also mentions a book called "Ministry to the House or Ministry to the Lord" by Watchmen Knee, which aligns with his message of ministering to God rather than seeking the approval of others. He highlights the need for Christians to be like soldiers of Jesus Christ, standing firm in their faith and not being swayed by the opinions of people.

Let's glorify your holy name. We just glorify your holy name. You are the one Lord and we praise your name. We give thanks to God. Hallelujah. Lord you have brought us through many dangers, toils and snares. You are faithful Lord. You are faithful. Praise your name. And Lord as we're here I pray for all of our needs Lord that all have problems of one kind or another. And Lord we just ask for your help in Jesus' name that God may glorify that our joy may be full. You always have answered our prayers Lord. Always. We pray Lord as we continue that the Holy Spirit will minister where the need is tonight Lord. Where the need is. And add Jesus to each one of us Lord. We can do nothing of ourselves. We look to you alone Jesus we pray in your name. Amen. Alright we're ready for Eddie's masterpiece. Okay week 15, May 19, 1998. Take 4114. Reaching your rank. Recommended reading The Gift of an Opportunity. Short answer. Every son or daughter of God is tested in three ways. Identify these three areas. Now that's a good question. It's something that appears at different times in different ways. Good question. Andrew and Yvonne are here so I'm particularly anxious that they understand these things because he's now in training for the ministry field training this summer and Yvonne is leading songs at a church where they're interning. So I'm very anxious because I know some of these things are very familiar to all of you but other people never heard of them. So I don't think you ever heard of them at Point Loma. You'll have to bring them back there. Alright. Every son or daughter of God is tested in three ways. Identify these three areas. Okay. You have any idea Andrew what we're talking about? Oh Yvonne knows all the answers. What are they Yvonne? And yes they apply. They apply. There's many ways in which these three appear. Usually we think of them in terms of the three tests of the Son of God. And in what three ways was he tested? Okay. In the name of the Lord. Which in our three forms of sin would equate to which one? Worldliness. And that is our desire to find our security and survival in the world. Now that's a big temptation. See some people hit real hard with that one and not with the others. To some people the idea of becoming a Christian and coming out of the world and not being part of it, not finding your comfort there, your survival there is a major step. To other people it's just no problem. That is not where they live. Okay. Any questions about that? Security and survival in the world. Getting your thing from the world. Strength of the world. Being a person of the world. Okay. And how did Jesus answer? The answer is very significant. Because it reveals to you the core of the problem. What did Jesus say? Where he was quoting from. Remember to read the 8th chapter to teach us that. You see these things. Maybe we need the blackboard. These three keep coming to my mind. See I wrote a book on this and it's about the size of a telephone book. It's in three volumes. It's called Three Deaths and Three Resurrections. And in that book I take about fifteen of the illustrations in the Bible of the three levels of redemption. And you can't get too nice with them. Nothing in the Bible is that clean cut. They're always a multidimensional matrix. It's not a linear matrix. It's a multidimensional matrix. Have you ever seen these pictures of three dimensional chess where you just don't move in a linear way but you move up and down. You have three levels of the board. Have you ever seen that? It's pretty complicated chess. Well God's things are like that. They're multidimensional. And of course our desire is to make a chart and lay it out linearly. Well you can't do that because they interact in so many, probably more than three dimensions if the truth be known. So there's three things in the Ark of the Covenant that are very handy to show these three. The Ark was only a box. And what three things were in it? A jar of manna. Aaron's blood is gone. That never bred worms. It was eternal manna. And the three things have to be in the heart of every overcomer. You have to overcome in these three areas. And the first one is the manna. It's not first in order. It's the first we're talking about tonight. The words keep coming out from the mouth of God for every individual. They're always going out. And we live by them. We think if I don't have groceries on the shelf I'm going to die. But what he's saying is man does not live only by bread but by the words that are coming from God's mouth. Every word that's coming up from God's mouth does man live. And so God wants us to look to him to break the yoke of the world. You know if we could, economists are telling us one of these days the bubble's going to burst. Well for people whose sole trust for survival and security is in money, they're going to panic. Americans are going to panic if something happened and they couldn't get money. They're going to panic. But God wants us to know that man doesn't live that way alone. That's not it. That's why Jesus in the charismatic movement would have said boy if you can take your spiritual power and make bread out of stone, that would really be tremendous. And Jesus, that's what he was saying. If you're a son of God, if you're a son of God, command these stones to make bread. Now that was toward the end of this 40 day fast. They say by that time your hunger really isn't an issue like it is on the third day. Nonetheless it was a time when he was bereft of all creature comforts in an inhospitable desert without food and so Satan said you're the son of God or if you are the son of God, work some magic for us. See and the charismatic movement has fostered that. Use your faith to produce in the material realm. And Jesus said no. I will not do that. I will not use the gift of God to material ends. Now that's a big temptation in the ministry. That's why I say never mix religion and your business. Like buy Starbucks coffee and you'll be an overcomer. People do these kinds of things. Oh yeah. You alter yourself to be healthy. If you want to be a strong Christian then buy my vitamins. People do this. They mix it up with life insurance. They have all kinds of ways of getting Jesus involved and of course Christian bookstores are full of items that you can get that have Christ on them whether they're a magnifying glass or a tumbler or a picture or whatever they are and there may be a place for that. I don't say there isn't but you've got to be careful when you mix God, when you try to use your talents, especially spiritual talents to make money. You've got to be careful of that and that's what Satan was saying in the larger arena of thought. Use your God-given abilities to feed yourself and that's a temptation that every son of God faces. And you know if in the last days God gives people to multiply bread just as Jesus did, that would solve the problem of the hunger in the world. And if God gave someone, and I expect he will because Jesus said, and I think he was talking about the last days, the works that I do shall you do also and greater works, John 14.12. Okay, so we can look for that. But I'll tell you something, if that ever happens, there will be pressure on that person that will be unbearable. Because whoever the person is, man or woman, they're only human. And at first they may say, oh no, I'll only do this as God directs me. Their determination will be beaten down and then they'll begin to doubt. Then they'll begin to doubt. Maybe like they say, I am just proud and wanting to show off. Maybe I have no heart for the hungry. They'll bring you pictures of little African children with their stomachs swollen from protein deficiency. And if you're a Christian, you're going to stand here and tell me you have a solution to this. You're going to let these babies die and you're going to waver. Then the question arises, would God ever give you a gift and tell you not to use it? The answer is yes. In the end time, I look for the charismatic people by and large, the fervent evangelicals to split into two camps, a small one and a large one. The small one will comprise a militant people who refuse to march to the drumbeat of the world. They'll bear the reproach of being different. There will be people who accept, the key to this whole thing is that 54 chapter of Isaiah we talked about Sunday, the baroness will accept the idea, okay God, you've intervened, I don't have my normal stuff going here, but I do significant work. He moves in dramatic ways by withholding the lot of a person like Sarah or Hannah or Elizabeth. When he's going to do something, he wants when that thing comes forth to be significant and dramatic. The edge of this, the dirty end of this thing, is going through life thinking God doesn't love me, and everybody's saying, well you're a loser if there ever was one. There's always a reproach with the cross. See, as long as everything is bright and shining and populous and happy and going, you're okay. I've been reading a book today, Eddie, I'll give it to you when I'm through with it, it just came in today, we ordered it, it's The Three R's by Dave Hunt, he's this newspaper reporter that is so mad because his father was a preacher and they persecuted him because he didn't believe in the rapture. So his dad's dead now, so Dave Hunt's out for blood. So he's researching this thing, I mean researching it, and this is his third book. The first one is The Great Rapture Hoax, and then I forget the third one is The Three R's, which is Revisionism, Robbery, and something else, and who he's after is Hal Lindsey, he's after Hal Lindsey. And he's shown the plagiarism that went on there, which he isn't the only one, it's even been in the paper how in this book, The Late Great Planet Earth, he plagiarized from several sources, including his own professor at Dallas, the alum, and it's an appeal to the Zodiac, but this book has been a fantastic moneymaker. It was something like the New York Times called it, I think it was the bestseller of the decade, the New York Times, The Late Great Planet Earth. This has brought in millions, millions. President Carter read it and taught it in a Sunday school. President Reagan read it. What I'm pointing out to you is this, as long as you keep things away from the cross, away from suffering, see Satan's bottom line, and it appears in just about every heresy, whether it's the super love, or the rapture, or grace, or whatever, the bottom line always is, thou shalt not surely die. See in eternal security, in all of these things, the bottom line is thou shalt not surely die. In other words, there's no suffering, but when they say the ejection seat of Christ, nobody will suffer there, thou shalt not surely die. It keeps coming out and coming out. Well, yes. Follow up on that, it's okay with God if you sin? Yes. What's accented, Mark, yes, of course that's true, what's accented is the penalty, the idea of suffering that involves humanism, and humanistic thinking, and the rights of people, this whole thing, man must not be accountable, he must not suffer, no matter what. You see it in the court, you see it in our criminal justice, it's infiltrated American society, we're assaulting the criminal, this kind of thing. This is what I see, that a minority of the charismatic move will go back to cross-carrying obedience. Coward and reproach, that suffering is a large part of the Christian redemption, that God works through barrenness, and what he produced in Isaiah 54 was the new Jerusalem, meaning that the only benefit we're going to be to mankind, to finally be the tabernacle of God among men where they can have justice and peace, is if we're willing to be made barren, because that's, it comes through Sarah, it comes through him, and of course the greatest example of all is the Lord Jesus Christ. The world wasn't changed by his teaching, it was changed by his death, and so was the Apostle Paul. If it hadn't been for that, if it hadn't been for Paul's suffering, the life of Jesus, there would have been no atonement, and so all of his teaching would have been without the necessary power to make it work. But he had to go to the cross, and Paul had to be denied all of his rights. Joseph had to be put in prison. I mean, this is the way God works, and the charismatic teaching is against that, the rapture is against that, and since the business of the government is to promote an image that prevents the citizens from seeing it, so all the time you get this bridge to the future, we've got a generation of young people, give them all computers, they're going to solve every problem in the world, it's going to be super bright. Actually, the result is Springfield, Oregon. But that image, the politicians that are in power, the ones that are out of power, don't be by the party that was out of power. They were embarrassing the politicians in power, saying everything's okay, look, isn't it wonderful? Chaos is going on. So people are used to the image, yes, sure, you're talking about the one that teamed up on, yeah, no, this is a different, from the beginning, his first book was The Great Rapture Hoax, see, a play on the late great planet Earth. I'm surprised he hadn't written one called The Late Great Rapture, I suppose that would be nice. But anyway, because the dispensationalism is going out of vogue, see, not in America, but in other, dispensationalism, that's where it came from, the brethren, and brethren teachers like Trigellus, you've heard of Trigellus, he's a brethren teacher, great scholar, and they began to see this thing isn't right, it's producing immorality, this state of grace thing. So, my point is this, the minority that accepts the suffering, accepts the reproach of the cross, will be the ones where God is working. The majority will become the false prophet. And if you'll read in Revelation 13, I guess, chapter 2, 13 it is, 13, you'll see that the power behind the Antichrist is the false prophet. He's the one that makes an image, image, image, image, image. And as I see it, the Antichrist is libertarian democracy, it's the beast that comes out of the sea of mankind. But it has no life in it, it will take a miracle working church to give it life enough to control the world, that will satisfy both the political and the religious needs of people. That's how I see the scenario shaping up. And key to this thing is the bread question. Because Antichrist and the church will get together to supply the needs of mankind. And if God were to give someone the power, whatever God gives them that will benefit mankind, like healing, multiplying food, the power to change weather patterns, ocean currents, that could make heretofore barren lands fruitful. See, this kind of power is coming to the church. And you remember in the two witnesses, they have power to change water to blood, to do things destructive. Well here you'll have the majority of the church working with the government to do what the church is crying out to do. Let's get out there in this poor, dying, bleeding world, we need to get out there and do something about it. That's not the cry of the Bible, the cry of the pie. I got an email today from a lady, she said, do you know what you're saying is the same thing that Watchman Nee said in a book, and I've never read it, but it's called ministering to the Lord. Isn't that a beautiful way to put it? Are you going to minister to the house? Or are you going to minister to the Lord? And so he saw that thing. So it's all say in the world, see if Carter and Reagan would read that book, if Carter, the president, would teach it in a Sunday school class in Georgia, then this is something that a Christian politician could get a hold of, and then anybody who was not talking about improving the lot of men, but was talking about some weird thing like worshiping God and pageantry, which is a, I mean we can march with bands in Poway, and it's a, you people are losers. That's where the persecution will come from. I mean it's writ large, you don't have to look hard to see it, you can already see it today. In fact I remember reading about the last Christian that ran for president, Pat Roberts, was down in like Venezuela or one of the, either South American or Central American country, a guest of the president, teaching them about capitalism. Because Pat Roberts is very much into capitalism, and making money, very much into it. He's all the time advising people about stocks and bonds and how to get rich. You can already see where the alliance would come, between an upbeat, forward looking, dynamic, world interested, outgoing, community oriented, church that is going somewhere, and teaching the people about computers, and teaching them about marketing techniques. And then you've got this lone group of losers, that are doing their peeping and their muttering in the church, and don't seem to care about anybody. That's how it will seem to them. To us, the fact that we'll be building a church page, I believe, I think we can get a church page on the internet free through something that's happening, we've already got an education page out, our books are out, but it looks like we're going to get one that will just be for the church. And I'm very tempted to put down the statement of our church, to put down that we believe that the church should be people standing on a sea of glass, meaning glass mixed with fire. See when you see that in Revelation, on that scene, the song of Moses and the Lamb, when you see that sea of glass in Revelation chapter 4, it's pure, but when you see it up to the end, it's mixed with fire. You have people standing with their hearts, praising God, singing the song of Moses and the Lamb, see that brings together both covenants, and made transparent through being baptized with fire. And that's what a church should be, a great marvelous church should be, it should be a worship of God by people who have been made to get the sin out of them by the fire. When you see a politician can't make anything out of that, that doesn't seem like it's doing anyone any good. See, we know it, but we can't explain it to the outside. And in America, these two things have been confused, partly because our country was settled in a large part by Christian people, which gave it the name of being a Christian country. But at the same time, there came another group at the same time, like Tom Paine and others, and Thomas Jefferson and others, who were deists or agnostics, and so they gave us another America, America based on the pursuit of happiness. See, which was not the original Pilgrim intention, they left England to worship God, they didn't come over here for happiness, half of them died in the first year. See, the idea was people would come from everywhere, and they would come to this wonderful place that somehow was Christian. But now, as it spins out, and as it distills out, we see that democracy and the kingdom of God are totally antithetical, they're totally antithetical. One is the rule of man, and the other one is the rule of God. One comes from the bottom up, one comes from the top, then to a parent, up until maybe World War I, well after World War I, we got into the roaring twenties, then the phobology and everything, getting away from the farm, you know, how are you going to keep down on the farm after they've seen Pariah, that came out of World War I. That's when Camel cigarettes started, Hollywood, and now television and the internet, and now, little by little, the Christian element in America is being put into a very small minority. But that's why it happens, because it's inherent in what is happening. It's entrusting in America, not in other countries, but in America, the kingdom message. He's putting it here. The gifts of the Spirit are in America. They're not in other countries. Other countries are way behind us in these things. So it's so ironic the way that God works, and that he can get people in America who, in the midst of luxury and warmth and food and everything else, can come out of the world and say, no, we're not going to make bread. No, we're not going to take our God-given gifts to help the world. We love God first. And you see, that runs against the humanist, you know, if you love God, you show it, and you love to your brother. That's not Bible. It's not Bible. We have to understand we were made to worship God, and the world is against God. And ways, and his will, and his eternal purpose is in Christ. It means death to us, and it will someday. We will not surely die. And big time. Big time. Like Lindley said, it's large and in-charge. Yes? I've heard from several areas, huge. I'll surprise you. I'll believe in that. And if I were president, I'd enlist every church. The problem is with the churches in the local community. And I don't want to get into that, but I want you to perceive what I'm saying as being against. Titus says, be zealous always of good works. It has to do with the way you go about it. If you go about it to ameliorate, to remove the penalty of sin, then you're fighting against God. But if you, if you, see, every church has some kind of the heart to work with the poor, because God is always interested. Be zealous always of good works. But it is moving unto God, and not trying to save the world. But the churches that do it should be banner-waving churches who are standing on a sea of glass and worshiping God. What happens is, the church doesn't come out. The churches don't come out, and they're coming out from a rational perspective. Instead of, instead of the gospel becoming a way of meeting God's needs, it becomes a way of meeting man's needs. The first commandment is to love God. When we do that, then the other works will follow. If we put love your neighbor first, then you have antichrist and the false prophet. You've got to be careful of this, because the greatest persecution of God's true remnant will come from humanistic Christians. It will, because they'll say, oh, you're hard and unloving. You're hard and unloving. No, we're not hard and unloving. We're on God's side. We're on God's side. We don't fool around. If God directs us to help someone, and He does, believe me, I gave up my whole career. I was on my way to district administration, and I've got a life, general administration credential in the state of California, a life that never has to be renewed, that goes through grade 14. I could be president of a junior college. I've got the credential to be president. God said no. But I didn't do it to save the church. I did it of obedience. Obedience. Get a feel for that, because you may be tested on it in the future. People say, you have no heart. Why aren't you out saving people? Because the Bible doesn't teach us that. It teaches us that the gifts and ministries of the church are for what? Healing the body, because when the body is built, then the needs of the world will be met. So people don't see that, because it's not apparent. But believe me, what God wants in a church are people standing on a sea of glass, and I'm speaking figuratively, transparent, mixed with fire. They've had judgment go through their nature. They've got the heart, the song of God that is in them. They are standing before God's throne, because that's where the sea of glass is located. They are singing the song of both the old covenant and the new. They haven't gone off into this dispensationalism that's cut off the old. It's all one package, and they're are being poured out on people. And so the church that has people first will end up working with a government already, let's say about a year ago, that Mr. Clinton invited something like 20 outstanding church leaders to meet in a room set aside in the State Department to help him. And that's just the way it'll be, and the church will be, oh this is great, this is tremendous, our government will be, but what is the government going to want? Great and grave security. Everything will be turned, the stones, into bread. How many know that they came and tried by force to make Jesus a king? Think what he could have done with his power? Allegiance? Flatten Rome? Feed the hungry? Clothe the naked? He could have done it all. That's why I fear for any Christian that runs for president, because he will be forced to build a power base out of people who have no heart for God. It's all Christian talk. Do good, do good, do good. That's why I have to build this power base, because there aren't enough of the true cross-carrying limit to make a power base to elect a president of the United States of America. So he's going to have to bring in everyone that even believes Christianity, and the result will be antichrist and a false prophet. That's the way I see it shaping up now. You can get back the money you put in the collection tonight, it doesn't go that way, but I started on that track 20 years ago, and I can just see it going that way. The rapture was just part of the thing. Yes? William Branham had one of the greatest gifts of power in this century. Walter and I heard him preach twice. And in his book, Footprints in the Sand of Time, he tells how he was traveling with a party, which included Gordon Lindsay, Minor Argon Brighton, some rich people, some famous people, and they composed a party. And they went with William Branham around on all his tours. William Branham was a very humble man. He had been a gamekeeper in Tennessee or something like that, and an eight-foot angel appeared to him and gave him a tremendous gift of healing. I mean, it was spectacular, just like you think a gift of healing should be. I mean, people would come up on the platform, and he would tell them like that. They'd come from all over, tell them what their street looked like and their street number and everything, and then their faith would be built up, and then he'd lay hands on his hand, he'd swell, and then he'd be healed. I mean, it was dramatic, and it was powerful, just like the New Testament. Much more dramatic than Captain Kuhlman. Captain Kuhlman had the real... He was slated to speak to 100,000 people in Nigeria, as I remember. It's in the book Footprints in the Sand of Time. And the Spirit spoke to him and said, Don't go. Don't go. And they had already made the arrangements. And so all of the people that were with him, the movers, said, You have to go. We have already slated it to a huge meeting. The Spirit said to him, Don't go. That's the issue, Bill. Right there. Branham was so humble. He was so gentle. You can imagine the pressure on him, because you begin to think, Well, who am I? You know, I don't have a walkie-talkie. Maybe I'm not hearing from God, which is what you're talking about. And he went. He went in disobedience to God, because it seemed like the, quote, right thing to do. All these people. He went and ministered. I don't know what happened, but he got sick. Branham got sick and was out of commission for about six months from disobeying God. Now, that was a small thing compared to whether somebody received a gift to multiply food. Now, during the revival in Indonesia, on a couple of occasions, I understand, they filled up jugs with water, and it was turned to wine for the communion. So, you know, that's not too far. I've never heard of anyone being able to create food, but turning water into wine. And that's pretty well documented. It's not that far away. So you can see, God wants to give power to the church, because Jesus said, in John 14, 12, The work that I do shall you do, and greater works than these shall you do, because I go to my Father. The work that I do, the same work, raising the dead, multiplying food, walking on the water, the works that I do, and by the way, people have walked on the water. The work that I do shall you do also, and greater than these. The key there is the word greater. The Greek word means zona, because people play with this. And I saw Presbyterian magazine in which they had built a huge new hospital, and underneath they had written greater works. And then others interpret it as greater in number. It's because now there's all the Christians, so it's greater in number. But the Greek will not admit to that. It merely means greater works. Greater works, just as you would think it would mean in English. That's what the Greek means. So, it was a prophecy of Christ. It has never happened to my knowledge. And so I see it reserved for the end time, because the end time is the time of the double portion, the Elisha portion. Do we see that in the things of the two witnesses? We see the 42, which match the 42 children that were killed by the two she bears in the Elisha ministry. We see them overcome and then raised, just as Elisha died and then a man was raised from his bones. We see Elisha as the strongest type of the two witnesses, but Elisha was Elijah multiplied by two. And Elijah was John the Baptist. So we can look for Elijah to come again, but this time it will be Elijah multiplied by two, as demonstrated by the symbolism surrounding the ministry of Elisha. And so I expect that John 14 and 12 in the greater works will come forth in our day. But, ever since the healing ministry started in the 40s, there have been abuses in the realm of money and in the realm of evangelists bragging about how great they were, each one trying to be greater than the other. And pretty soon the whole gospel message was removed in favor of healing. And so the sign became the destination. They couldn't discriminate and say, well this is a sign, because people's needs for healing are so great. I mean, if your child is dying of leukemia, you don't care anything about a sign. You want him healed, period. And this is the way people are. And they were healed. I mean, people with pacemakers would go, and they go back to the doctor, and the pacemaker was gone. These things have happened in our time. Now, God wants to give miracles. He wants to give the greater works. But can you see that he loses his servants in so doing? Brannan himself was finally taught by people into believing that he was Elijah, and he fell big time. And so today there is a cult, a Brannan cult. When I was in Iceland, the Brannan cult was doing Cole Porter work, selling his books. They believed he was the seventh angel, and Elijah. And this poor guy was only a farmer, and he began to believe it, and he fell. Katherine Kuhlman didn't fall, but if you'll read some of the real biographies of her, the last days were very questionable. Not that she herself had done anything, but did things that were bordered on the criminal, and we still don't know what they were. There were clandestine meetings. Her body was kept in a funeral home. It was red-tagged, which means that her body was not available for inspection. Katherine Kuhlman. I read that in a book by Jamie Buckingham, who was close to her, and was a well-known charismatic writer. And he told about how in her last days she would wave her arm. Before that, everybody flopped their spirits up. Because when people... Amy Semple McPherson had difficulties. She went off there at the very end and married the organist or something in an Angelus Temple, and that didn't come to anything. When God entrusts you with the kind of power that Mrs. McPherson had, or William Brannan, or Katherine Kuhlman, the pressures on you are almost more than a human being can stand. Pressures from people that are advising, because you see, we're all human. And they wear us down, and we begin to... We may think, I'd never do that. But you see, when everybody is saying to you, look at people... Don't you love people? Don't you see the need? God has given you this to bless people. Why do you think he gave it to you? Well, at first, you begin to doubt. You go to pray, say, God would have bought it? There's no answer. And you think... And then you go out, like I saw Brannan before he fell. Audrey and I were there, and we saw what happened to that man. People pressured him, and they said, you're praying for Harvey. He would only pray for about five people in a meeting. He would wait until he heard from God. Then he'd say, oh, over here, or over here. And he had healing lines. All the events were on healing lines. They'd run two or three hundred people through. So the people with Brannan said, you could be praying for hundreds. But he said, but God, God has given me a gift. Well, you know, God is so wise, because he knew where I was going, that I would become a kind of a philosopher and interpreter, and I needed the data. So when Audrey and I were there in Long Beach, the second time we were in his meeting, he said, now the brethren that are with me have told me I should have a healing line. And he said, so what I'm going to do, I'm going to do the first half of the meeting, like God gave me in the beginning, and the second half of the meeting... Audrey was there. Second half of the meeting, I'm going to run a healing line. So in the first half of the meeting, he said, you know, it's something to see. He looks like if he points to a lady, you know, sister, that cancer is healed. And she, oh, like this, you know, because you didn't know who she was, but she had cancer. And of course, that would bring people's faith so high, they would get healed. And then he did a couple of numbers like that, and then he said, okay, I'm going to do as I said, and they had a healing line. And he sang, all hail the power of Jesus' name. I remember that. And then they made a break, and then they brought a hundred people in a line, including a young man and his father that we knew personally. The young man was severely mentally retarded. His father's testimony was, I've never been sick a day in my life. And so they came by in the healing line like this, Brother Wright and his son Jesse. And Brother Wright came by, and Brother Bram didn't lay his hands on him and pray for him. And I knew, I said, they put out his eyes. He's grinding at the mill. See, the world just put out his eyes. And he's grinding at the mill. He couldn't even see that there was nothing wrong with Brother Wright. He was bringing Jesse. Jesse wasn't healed. But in man's wisdom, why should you pray for five people when you've got hundreds there? When we were in Captain Kuhlman's meeting in the Oakland Auditorium, they closed the doors around four o'clock. The people were outside hammering on the door, trying to get in. People in wheelchairs. There was no room for them. When healing, when God is working in healing, really working in healing, you'll never get a building big enough for the people. Any simple person could not get a building big enough. People come on the outside and touch the outside of the building so they could get healed. And that's why they came to Jesus, by the fountain. Healing will do that. But Jesse was not healed. Now, you see, according to, now why do you think when there was two or three hundred people waiting to be healed, God would deal with five and close the meeting? Why do you think so? Doesn't he care about people? What would you do? Would you pray for them all? Or would you listen to God? Oh, I'd listen to God. Well, you're there. And you see the people crying in their pain. Dwarf, misshapen, limbs missing, blind, deaf. And God is giving you a gift of healing? Do you know why? Because it's a sign. God's intention is not to heal the world. The world is what it is because of sin. It's a sign. So these signs you'll follow them to believe. To the person being healed, it's the destination. But in the overall plan of God, it's a sign. God, and you'll hear the charismatic prophets saying, God's going to give such a gift. It's going to end. Waiting for the moving of the water. And Jesus went through and healed one person. They were all sick. Didn't he care? He had the power. Now this that I'm teaching you tonight, well, if you've got one drop of humanism in you, because Christianity is mixed with humanism today, I have brought you to a place of decision. Oh, yeah. You can't go on forever on the fence. You've got to go one way or the other. Either it's God or it's people. You've got to make up your mind. See, when I said choose ye this day, you know, you choose. Remember when Moses came down off the mountain? Who's on the Lord's side? Just Levi. He said, put on your sword and go through and kill your brothers. And for this reason, the Levites got charged with the tabernacle. Sinihas, while Israel was standing around in indecision, Sinihas went through and killed Cosby and I forget his name. God said, he staged the plague and he'll never lack a man in the priesthood from his descendants. Now people, that's the song of Moses. And you say, but the song of the Lamb is different. No, the song of the Lamb is not different. Read Revelation 19. Read how Jesus is coming and calling to the birds of the air to feed on the wicked. Oh, no. The wrath that was exercised in the Old Testament fell on Jesus Christ on the cross of Calvary. There was no change of God's nature. He just took it out on his son. Because God is God. He's a spirit. He's satisfied with blood, not with words or good intentions or how nice people are. God is God and he's a spirit. And the blood flowed by the thousands of pounds on the Day of Atonement. And other high feast days in Israel, the blood running down the broken throne to a spirit. And that spirit is your father. And all the philosophy of Jesus would have not changed anything. He had to shed his blood to appease his father's sense of justice. Get a sense of God. He's not a human being. He's a spirit. Jesus loves people. Go and sin no more. He wrote on the ground twice. One writing was for the song of Moses and one was for the song of the Lamb. He's the gentle Jesus and the good shepherd and he mediates between God and men or we'd be nowhere. But never think for one moment that when he puts on that helmet of war and goes to war against the wicked that he's half shepherd and half commander in chief. He will make Genghis Khan look like a little old brownie. Get a sense of the Lord Jesus Christ, the King. He's not joking when he says he comes down and sees some poor dude that was so scared and self-conscious he buried his talents. He didn't say, it's okay Charles. He said, you wicked, lazy servant. You know I'm a hard man. Put him in the out-of-dark. How many times in the Gospels did Jesus talk about when he returned what he'd do to people? Cut him in pieces and appoint him as a portion of the unbeliever. That's got to be done in another world because we can't cut people in pieces and then appoint them as a portion of the unbeliever. So there has to be a convergence of the physical and spiritual realm. That's Jesus. He's a fearsome King. Worse than that, when the bowls of wrath are poured out, it will be done by God's saints. You read the 149th Psalm. His honor have all his saints. Have you ever read the scripture in 1 Corinthians 6 that says we shall judge the saints? How come they have never read that? 1 Corinthians 6, that's there. He says, why do you go to law against one another? Don't you know we're going to judge men, we're going to judge angels? Now I want you to think about something. This judgment is a white throne judgment. God the Father is not on that throne. It's Christ and his saints. God judges no one. He's committed all judgment to Christ and Christ commits it to his body. 1 Corinthians 6. So on the great white throne, it's not God the Father, it's Jesus Christ and his saints. Now what it says in Revelation 20, the first resurrection, and I saw thrones and they sat on them. Those are the thrones of judgment. Now picture it. Before you comes an angel. An angel isn't even a human being. He may be very large, so may you be, because you're representing Jesus Christ, you're representing God Almighty, and here's a creature that God formed before man was thought of. An intelligent creature that can speak and reason and act and make decisions. And you look at him and the spirit of judgment within you says he rebelled against God. And then all of a sudden your spirit is praying before God. Where does he go? He goes into the third level of the lake of fire. And you speak, if I hear I judge him, my judgment is just. This might be an angel that has the power to appear very beautiful. To appear as a female. Very beautiful. Maybe he's a little girl. They do appear in different forms, you know. And you're looking at this, surely Lord, you don't mean for this to go into the lake of fire. The judgment is the third level of the lake of fire. You see how you have to get used to that beforehand? The judgment of this court is the third level of the lake of fire. Bailiff, take the defendant away. That is the bottom line of what Satan is saying to the church with this love and grace and all the rest of it. Thou shalt not surely die. He's afraid. And you are the judges. He didn't get to the judge. He's doing okay. He'd like for the judges to rebel against God and the church is going to rebel against God is what I'm trying to tell you. Where are you? You're in a culture that is saturated with humanistic and democratic ideals. We're soft. And that's why people say what I preach is too hard. It's not too hard. They don't say is it in the Bible. That's the issue, but they don't ask that. They say it's too hard. I say they're too soft. The Bible says endure hardness as a good soldier in Jesus Christ. You'll never judge men and angels until God can trust you in the earth. And then there comes before you a human being. Maybe it's someone you knew. I've been in this place, and you have too, where I prayed to God to know his mind about someone hoping that I was going to hear something good and not hearing it. I've been in that place. And I don't plead with God or anything else. And if that's what you're saying, Lord, then that's the truth. Because I've learned you never go against what God says. He sees things you don't. We may feel compassion. God may see that their heart is as deceitful as a nest of snakes. You can go around and do your Pollyanna thing, but you'll never sit on the throne of judgment. You'll have perfect recall. That's one of the blessings of overcoming is that except for the things that you ask God to remove from your memory bank, you'll have perfect recall. That's a marvelous thing to remember only that which you want to remember. And you remember about this person. What are you saying, God? Maybe God said, the decision of the court is that they be beaten with lashes and then brought into the kingdom without inheritance. They have not served me. But I have, they've got a godly mother and a godly brother praying for them. And to ensure the total happiness of their loved ones. But they must receive lashes. There must be enough fire on them that I can be sure they won't bring sin into my new kingdom. And so they'll be saved by fire to the prayers of loved ones as was Lot. And then there may be others that you look at and you think, I know that person. They're pretty decent. And then where it comes, they would wreck my creation. They are assigned to the lake. And they're looking at you knowing that you have the power to shut or open the doors of the kingdom. Whosoever sins you retain, they are retained. Whosoever sins you remit, they are remitted. That's the 22nd chapter of the gospel of John. Now, how are you going to do? They're looking at you waiting. Remember me? We used to walk, we had sweet fellowship. We walked into the house of God together. Where does it say that? In Psalms about whom? Jesus and one of the twelve named Judas. We had sweet fellowship. We walked into the house of God. Remember how we used to pray? Remember how I prayed for you to get the baptism? The sentence of this court is the lake of fire. To go against that is to rebel against God. But shouldn't I plead with the Lord? I don't think that would work with a judge in that position. The pleading should be done now. The pleading should be done now. Let me tell you why. If you go against God's will, if God says they'll wreck the kingdom, let me tell you something. They will wreck the kingdom. Sarah got her husband to marry Hagar and it was a grief to Sarah after that, wasn't it? God knew best. And it was a grief to Abraham. He had to send Hagar and his boy out into the wilderness to die and they nearly did. When you go against God's will, you bring chaos. Now, have we learned that or not? At the age of 72, I have learned a couple of things and one is that God knows what He is doing. And when you hear from God about people, you don't interject your own judgment. It's fine to pray. If God shows you someone, it's fine to pray. It's always good to pray for people. It's always the right thing to do. Until He says, take your hands off. They're under judgment. Just take your hands off. Try to be in a place where you can hear from God. Now Bill is saying, suppose God doesn't speak to everybody in words that they can hear. What about this guy? I want to help the poor. If someone came to me and said they wanted to help the poor, I wouldn't do that. You know, stand on the lake of fire till you hear from God. I'd say, look, if you have that burden, brother, let's pray. We'll pray with you about that. There's a great need for that. There will be more if the Republicans win. We'll pray, you pray and then watch the fruit. If you feel that God is endorsing this and going ahead, then maybe God is showing you, in all thy ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy paths. And that's what I would tell that person. He may not speak to you. I wouldn't lay on him. You've got to be some super spiritual person. If that's on your heart, I know I'm doing what's on my heart. If you do what's on your heart, the body will function. Pure religion and undefiled just to visit the fatherless. But you see, that's an altogether different thing than saying, I'm going to go out and use the things of God viewpoint. You may not see it, but pray about it. To use God to help people. When you don't even know what God is saying. You may be standing between that individual and his judgment and doing them infinite harm in your desire to help, which is carnal. I don't know whether you can see that or not. I mean that is very clear. So no, we don't turn stones into bread. If we fall flat and everyone around us dies of hunger, and in the past we have turned stones into bread, we don't do anything. We obey God. The need, you probably heard this Andrew, the need does not constitute the call. You don't go to the mission field because of the poor heathen. You go because God tells you to go. Because when you get there, you may find that these poor heathens are going to kill you. Or like Amy Semple McPherson, who went and was six months in China and her husband died and she had to come home. Well if you go out there and you don't know what you are doing. I know a young fellow, he said oh I had such a call, he wanted to go to Indonesia. Oh I just know I am called to Indonesia. And I thought buddy all you are going to get over there is diarrhea. There is nothing else going to happen. You are going to go into a busy place, not know anybody, not know what you are doing, and you haven't heard from God. And all you are going to do is find yourself in a strange and hospitable place with diarrhea. That is what you are going to get. Unless God has spoken to you. So the need does not, but we hear it all the time, there are so many people, this window is open, that window is open, this is closed, oh this is, oh that is going to happen. That is all mental. That is all mental. No door closes when Jesus is ready to open it. You don't have to worry about closed doors. Worry and just say am I doing what God said. That is all that matters. Am I, and if I don't hear any words from God, am I watching constantly to see the fruit of what I am doing. Because if you are not, what will happen? Never mind. If you are not doing what God said, and you go off and do something on your own, it will work for a while. And just as sure as God made apples. Why aren't you solving this problem for me? Why aren't you doing this? I shouldn't be doing this anyway, you should be doing this. That is how people do. Well sure, because God, they thought they were in God, their intentions were wonderful, and then it goes belly up. Because when it was put to the fire, God wasn't there. And so they don't know what to do, and they are hurting, so they are looking for somebody to blame. They wouldn't blame themselves and say, well I guess I didn't hear from the Lord. It's your fault. It's the pastor's fault. It's all these people's fault. If they only do what they are supposed to do, I wouldn't be in this mess. Human beings, God loves them, he made enough of them. Yes? How is it that the Lord wants to do it for you, but he wants to bestow it in the end time? In order to make it available to us, he has to make it available to everyone, and then they will use it for their own purpose. And isn't this who mourns on the track? Not, well that may be, but I think the scenario will run something like this. I think today, God is training people who have seen what happened with the healing evangelists. And have seen the folly of trying to get great crowds of people, because the Bible doesn't operate in great crowds of people. God is dead to the opinions of people. They are just through with this thing. And will not move unless God tells them, if the whole world goes belly up, they are God's servants. They are not here to kill. They are soldiers of Jesus Christ. And if God can find some people like that, I believe he will invest them with the power of the two witnesses. Now for the larger group, they will work, you can work the things, it seems that the healings will happen, you can put a Christian veneer on it. And you can kind of force things in the spirit. And all the rest that goes with it. But the other group will be just intent. They are the barren, and out from the many more of the children of the barren, out from the barren will come the new Jerusalem. Because that is why you see the walls all adorned. And they will be the ones who end up really helping people. They will be the ones who really will bring the lasting solution. That is the irony of the whole thing. Those that went out to help people will end up making a mess of things. Those that stayed rigidly before God will end up being the benefactors of mankind. But it will be in service to God. And that is the order that has to be. God is first. And then people. God. Adoring God. Adoring God. Are you up for it? Are you up for it? God has to get somebody somewhere that will be on the Lord's side. You will end up doing more good. Jesus lived the most reclusive life of any man that ever lived. Prayed all night. And did the most good for the world. That is the way it works. Boy, the looks I am getting, I tell you. They are not angry. They are not angry. They are just like, what did he hit us with tonight? Yeah. I didn't remember that. Remember Jesus in his own home synagogue said there were many widows in Israel, but Elijah was sent only to one. And she wasn't even an Israeli. Do you remember that? And that there were many lepers in Israel, but Elijah was just sent to one. And that guy that was healed there was the captain of Israel's greatest enemy. Yeah. He was the commander of battle of the Aram. Aram or something like that. Anyway. And what did the people of his home synagogue do when they heard that? Because he had said why there were many people in Israel needed help, but Elijah was just sent to this one woman. And there were many lepers in Israel that needed help, but Elijah was just sent to this one person. And what basis was there for rage? They believed that Elijah and Elisha were true prophets. That Elijah was coming before Messiah. What basis of rage? When all Jesus did was point out to them how God worked. Now that is going to take some thought. What motive? When they heard, would you react like that? If someone came and said, you know, somebody in America was, all Americans had need, and they were sent to one person in Yugoslavia or something. Would that anger you? I don't see the basis for all this rage. Yes? So when Christ heard that he was going to his death, or then he brought in the name of Sarah, and he didn't look like it. Yeah. And he didn't look like it. And he knew what he was looking to. He never tried to sell. He never worked moves. He knew what they would do. And he had them going. Listen to the gracious words. Oh, what he's going to do to those in Zion? They're mourning, and he's going to make them laugh. Oh, this man, oh, he's got to be our pastor. There's no question about this. This is the rabbi. And he thought, enough of this slop. Let me lay one on you people. Then we'll find out whether you love God or where you're coming from. Oh, yeah. Which of the prophets have your fathers not stoned? Yes? According to Scripture, that's the nature of people today. Yeah. They need to be enraged. It depends. If you use the verses out of the promise box, you're fine. That is negative. Never. Imagine picking up the promise, you know, and it says, woe unto you, you know, hypocrites. Well, it would rain on the parade, I tell you. But the Bible is as much negative as it is positive. Audrey's going to handle it. The sisters of Mary prophesied. It's really remarkable what they come out with. I'm not into this. Okay, so they do have a good promise box. You may have to choose in the days to come. Be with the Lord's despised few. I'll take the way with the Lord's despised few. With the Lord's despised few. How's it go after that? Oh, you're just young folk. I'm going through Jesus. They used to have real God-oriented courses. And now, boy, you've got to watch it. It can get like one of the modern courses says something about he's as beautiful as a painting by Monet. Can you believe it? Oh, hallelujah. Father, we know, Father, that your love extends far beyond anything we could ever comprehend or grasp, Lord. We know that is in us humans to defy God, and we know that it comes from Satan, who, under the guise of being a friend. So, Lord, we know that friend is always counseling us to become more oriented. But kingdom people will be the one that, and Lord, how long will it take us to learn? So, Lord, we're persuaded that some day, Lord, some of us should be in a position to commentate as Jesus did to the mountain of prayer. Should the day come when we're on the great and issue the judgment of God knowing that his judgment always has the greater love. So, Lord, let us not be befuddled by Satan and his, because it is fleshly and like all fleshly love, it is fundamentally self-centered. And we know that, Lord. We see it in Satan, but we don't see that in God. But we see enduring love, enduring love that bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things. Oh, Father, we have tasked our lot with you, hallelujah, that we might please you, Father, for no other reason than that we might be among those who stand on the sea of glass, purified by judgment, singing the song of Moses in the land, telling of the great deeds of God, not what we've done or any man has done, but what God has done. Oh, Father, grant that for us we may live in the devouring fire. Hallelujah.